“Are you going to be all right?” asked Andrew, looking at Sean, who was sitting up in bed and groaning softly. “Will you be able to stay up until morning?”
“I think so,” said Sean. “I’ve had a couple of bad nights, but I’ll be fine. The thing is, do you think I might have a cup of good, strong tea to keep me awake?”
“I’ll make it,” said Andrew.
“I’ll come down with you,” said Sara. “The stove’s probably out, and I can get it going again more quickly than you.”
Sean went into Beasley’s room, and Sara and Andrew went downstairs, through the dining room and pantry into the kitchen. Sara was right. The stove was almost out, but she put in some more coal and opened the damper before she put the kettle on. Andrew, meanwhile, went scouting in the pantry and found the remains of the Banbury cake they had had for tea. He cut a slice for Sara, a slice for himself, and a good-sized wedge for Sean. He took it into the kitchen, and he and Sara ate their portions while they waited for the kettle to boil. When the tea had steeped, they took the steaming cup and the thick wedge of cake upstairs to Sean. His face lit up when he saw the cake as well as the tea. He thanked them, said he was sure he’d be able to stay awake after such provender, and promised to wake them early the next morning.
But it wasn’t Sean who woke Andrew. It was Sara.
“What is it?” he asked, sitting up in bed. “What’s wrong?”
“Put on your robe, and I’ll show you,” she said, her face grave.
Putting on his robe and slippers, he glanced at his watch. It was almost eight o’clock. Why hadn’t Sean awakened him? He followed Sara into Beasley’s room. She opened the door and stood back. He started to go in, then paused, staring. Sean was sprawled in the armchair near the window still fast asleep—in fact snoring—and the bed was empty. Beasley was gone.
“Where’s Beasley?” asked Andrew.
“I don’t know. He was gone when I came in here. And Sean was asleep, just as he is now.”
“Maybe he knows.” He went over and shook him. “Sean, wake up! Do you hear me? Wake up!”
He had to shake him several times before Sean even started to wake up, opened his eyes, and looked dully at Andrew.
“What’s it?” he mumbled.
“Beasley’s gone. Do you know where?”
Sean shook his head, closed his eyes, and started to go back to sleep.
“No, don’t do that!” said Sara. “We’ve got to talk to you!”
Bending down, Andrew looked into Sean’s eyes.
“He’s not just sleepy,” he said. “He’s been drugged!”
“Drugged! But how? And by whom?”
“I don’t know by whom, but this is how.” He held up the bottle containing the sleeping draught that Dr. Reeves had left for Beasley and showed her that it was more than half empty. “It was probably put in his tea.”
Sara picked up the teacup, smelled it, and nodded.
“I think it was. But who could have done it? Could it have been Beasley himself?”
The door opened, and Mrs. Wiggins bustled in carrying a tray.
“Good morning,” she said cheerfully. “I wanted to see how you were, so I—” She looked at the empty bed and blinked. “Where’s Mr. Beasley?”
“We don’t know,” said Sara. “We were worried about him, so we took turns sitting up with him. Sean had the last watch, and when we came in here a few minutes ago, he was asleep and Mr. Beasley was gone.”
“He couldn’t have left by himself!” said Mrs. Wiggins. “At least, he shouldn’t have.”
“No, he certainly shouldn’t,” said Andrew. “The whole thing’s very strange because we think Sean’s been drugged.”
“Mr. O’Farrell?”
“Yes,” said Sara. “With Mr. Beasley’s sleeping medicine.”
“But who could have given it to him?”
“We don’t know,” said Andrew. “But maybe Sean does. So do you want to give him Mr. Beasley’s breakfast—particularly his tea—and see if that will help wake him up?”
“Yes, of course,” said Mrs. Wiggins, setting down the tray. “What are you going to do?”
“We’re going downstairs to see if we can find anything that will tell us how or why Beasley left.”
They went downstairs and found both the front and back doors still locked from the inside. The windows were all locked too, except the French doors that looked out on the garden.
“Matson always locks them when he locks up at night,” said Sara.
“That means Beasley must have gone out that way,” said Andrew.
“Which brings us back to the question we asked before, why?”
“Not just why, but how? He wasn’t well enough to go off by himself at four in the morning.”
“No.”
“Of course,” said Andrew slowly, “there’s one thing we haven’t discussed.”
“What’s that?”
“That note he got before when Dr. Reeves was here. The one Matson brought up.”
Sara frowned, looking at him thoughtfully. “You think there may have been something in it that made him decide to leave?”
“Not only that, but whoever wrote it may have helped him.”
“You’re right.”
They went out into the garden to see if there was anything there that could tell them a little more about what had happened, but there was nothing. When they got back upstairs, Sean was drinking the hot, strong tea that Mrs. Wiggins had given him and seemed almost himself again.
“We did talk a little,” he said in answer to their questions. “He woke up and said he was hot and asked me to open one of the windows,” he nodded to it, “and to tie back the curtain.”
“That’s probably when he put the sleeping medicine in your tea,” said Sara. “When you were busy with the window.”
“He could have,” said Sean. “But why did he do it?”
“That’s what we’ve been asking ourselves,” said Andrew. “That and where he is now. I think we should go look in his house and the shop, see if he’s at either one. And if he’s not … well, I’ve one other idea.”
“All right,” said Sean. “Get dressed and have your breakfasts, and I’ll meet you downstairs.”
“We’ll be quick,” said Sara. “And since we have a lot of ground to cover, do you think we could ask Fred to drive us, Mother?”
“Of course,” said Mrs. Wiggins. “I’ll see that he’s ready.”
Since there was nothing Fred liked better than to be involved in something that promised excitement, of course he was ready. They went first to Beasley’s house, then to the shop. There was no sign of him at either place.
“Well, that’s that,” said Sean. “Now what?”
“What was your idea?” Sara asked Andrew.
“That we go to Scotland Yard and talk to Sergeant Tucker.”
“That’s what I hoped you’d say,” said Sean. “I don’t like going to the police and neither does old Beasley, but I think that under the circumstances it’s certainly called for.”
“It’s about time you got around to deciding that,” said Fred. “Get in, and I’ll take you there.”
He took them there by way of Kensington Road and Victoria Street, dropping them off at the Embankment entrance. They went through the gate and across the courtyard to the Yard’s main entrance. The desk sergeant remembered Sara and Andrew, sent a note upstairs, and a few minutes later the three of them were knocking on the door of Wyatt’s office. They were invited to come in, and Sergeant Tucker, sitting at his own small desk in a corner of the crowded room, looked up at them from the folder of notes he was reading.
“I knew that things were too quiet this morning,” he said. “Nothing to do except nobble Jack the Ripper until his nibs gets here tomorrow. Then in you walk like the three weird sisters out of Macbeth. So tell me the worst. Is it the Crown Jewels that have been snatched from the Tower or the Elgin Marbles from the British Museum?”
“Neither,�
� said Sara. “You’re not even close.”
“Then I’m puzzled. If it was just you and Andrew, nothing you could come here about would surprise me. But when Mr. O’Farrell, an associate of that royal scamp, Beasley, comes here with you.… How is the old buzzard?”
“We don’t know,” said Andrew. “That’s why we’re here.”
“Oh?” Tucker put down his folder and prepared to listen. “All right. Tell me.”
They did—Sean telling the earlier parts of the story and Sara and Andrew the later ones. Tucker listened quietly, looking at each one in turn as he or she talked. He took no notes, but they all knew that he was not only listening but would remember everything that was said in all its details. He was silent for a moment when they had finished.
“It was just this morning that he left your place?” he said to Andrew. “A few hours ago?”
“That’s right.”
“How do you know he didn’t go by himself—go because he wanted to go?”
“We think he probably did,” said Andrew. “But why did he do it? Why did he go when he wasn’t really well; and why didn’t he say anything to us about it?”
“Why didn’t he say anything to me at least?” said Sean. “Why did he knock me out with that sleeping draught of his?”
“What would you have said if he told you he was leaving?”
“I would have tried to talk him out of it. After all, he was still sick.”
“Well, there you are. That’s why he didn’t say anything to you about it.”
“But why did he want to leave?” asked Sara. “And where is he now?”
“Come on! You’ve been around the inspector and me enough to answer that. He left because he was worried, scared. And if he wanted you to know where he was going, he’d have told you.”
“What do you think we should do about it?” asked Sean.
“Nothing.”
“Nothing?”
“That’s right. If I went to Missing Persons about it, they’d laugh at me. After all, he’s only been gone for a few hours. And besides, it looks very much as if he’s gone off on his own because he wanted to.”
“You know very well that the whole thing’s very rum,” said Andrew.
“Yes, it is. There’s a lot about it that I don’t like. Your new stepfather gets back tomorrow. I don’t know when he’ll come in here, but whenever he does, I’ll go over everything you’ve told me with him, and—Yes?” he said in response to a knock. “Come in.”
A constable carrying a sheaf of papers came in, sketched an ironic salute to Tucker, handed him a note, and left.
“Good deal of slackness around here,” muttered Tucker. “Some of these constables act as if this were a station house and not the Yard. The inspector’s no spit and polisher, but just the same if he was here.…” He had been unfolding the note as he talked and now, glancing at it, “Thunderation!” he said. “Blast!” Putting down the note, he looked at his visitors. “The coves that were in Beasley’s backyard were Indians?”
“Yes, they were,” said Sara.
“All right. Then listen to me. This isn’t jiggery-pokery. It’s serious! And what I’m saying is not just friendly chitchat. It’s official! You keep away from anything that has anything to do with old Beasley! Is that clear?”
“What you’re saying is clear,” said Andrew. “But I’m afraid I don’t know why you’re saying it.”
“The why is none of your business. You just do it! And if you’ve got any complaints, you can take them up with the inspector when he gets back. And now, clear out. I’ve got a lot to do.”
“But, sergeant—” Sara began.
“Out!” he bellowed.
“Well, well,” said Andrew when they were outside in the corridor. “I’ve never seen old Tucker like that.”
“It was the note that did it,” said Sara. “He was worried.”
“I wonder what was in the note?” said Sean. “It must have had something to do with what we were talking about.”
“There’s no way we can find that out,” said Andrew. “What was in the note, I mean. But … I didn’t look at a paper this morning. Did either of you?” They shook their heads. “Let’s get one.”
They went down the stairs, across the courtyard, and out onto the Embankment. There was a newspaper seller on the corner of Bridge Street. Andrew bought an Express, and they stood there, near the Bridge Street bus stop, going through it. There was nothing that seemed at all relevant on the first two pages, and Andrew had skimmed page three and was about to turn to the next one when Sara said, “What about this?” and pointed to a small item on the bottom of the page. It was headed, Murder in Westbourne Grove.
They read it, standing huddled together. It concerned the body of a man that had been found in an alley off Chepstow Road. He had been strangled and robbed. At first glance there was nothing too unusual about it, but there were two things in the last sentence that Andrew found very interesting.
“This is the second murder of this sort that has taken place in the last few days,” said the paper. “Does this signal the beginning of a new wave of garrotings, similar to the stranglings by the Indian Thugs, that took place here in London during the 1860’s?”
“That could be it,” said Andrew.
“Because it talks about Indian Thugs?” said Sean.
“Yes.”
“But this last murder took place the day before yesterday. The note that Tucker got—the one that upset him so—must have been about something that happened since then.”
“Suppose the note was about a third murder,” said Sara, “one that the papers haven’t written about yet. Wouldn’t that get him upset?”
Sean whistled softly.
“Yes, it would,” he said. “And it would get me pretty upset too. In fact, it has.”
8
More Questions about Beasley
Dr. Reeves frowned.
“You’ve no idea of either why he left or where he is now?”
“No, none,” said Andrew.
“It’s very strange. And very disturbing. In a way, I blame myself for it.”
“Why should you do that?” asked Sara.
“I said I would come back, and I didn’t. I had an emergency at hospital that kept me until almost midnight, and I thought that was too late. But perhaps if I’d come back earlier.…”
“I don’t think it would have made any difference,” said Sean. “If he’d made up his mind to leave, he would have left whether you’d been to see him or not.”
“And you’re convinced that he did go of his own free will? That he wasn’t coerced or abducted?”
“We haven’t ruled it out,” said Andrew. “But it seems more logical that he left on his own than that someone kidnapped him. There’s that note he got during the afternoon, which may have told him something that alarmed him. And there’s not much doubt that it was he who put that sleeping draught in Sean’s tea.”
“No, there isn’t. You’ve no idea where he can be now?”
“No,” said Sara. “We’ll do some more looking for him this afternoon, but … Are you worried about him physically? I mean, is he in any danger because of whatever was wrong with him?”
“No. As I told you, I think he was given a drug. I’m still not sure what kind or how it was administered. But whatever, it gave him hallucinations, made him feel and act the way he did. And I assume that when he left here, he stopped taking the drug. But I still find the whole thing very upsetting. Inspector Wyatt is coming back tomorrow?” he said to Andrew.
“Yes. He and my mother get into Victoria Station a little before eleven in the morning.”
“I assume you intend to tell him everything that has happened.”
“We certainly do. I’m not sure we’ll do it as soon as we meet him, but we’ll try to do it sometime during the day.”
“Very good. Tell him that I’m at his disposal, that I’ll be glad to talk to him any time he’d like. And in the meantime, I’ll continue wi
th my own research, try to discover what kind of drug he was given and how.”
Nodding to the two young people and Sean, Dr. Reeves left. He had arrived at the house just a few minutes after they returned from their visit to Sergeant Tucker at Scotland Yard and was as disturbed as they had been to discover that his patient was gone. And he was not the only one who was upset about it. The three had just gone into the parlor to discuss their next move when Matson knocked on the door and told them that Mr. Bannerji was there and would like to see them.
“Show him in,” said Andrew, and a moment later Bannerji hurried in, looking even more agitated than Dr. Reeves.
“I met the good doctor as he was leaving,” said Bannerji. “And when I asked him how our friend Beasley was, he told me he didn’t know. That he was gone.”
“It’s true,” said Andrew. “He has gone.”
“Gone where? When did he go? And why?”
And so for the third time they went over the strange and puzzling events of the night and the morning—the events that led up to Beasley’s disappearance.
Bannerji’s first question was similar to the one that Dr. Reeves had asked.
“You’ve no idea where he’s gone?”
“No, none.”
“This is a bad—a very bad business. I am very afraid for him.”
Andrew exchanged glances with Sara and Sean.
“Why afraid? Do you think he’s in danger?”
“In very great danger.”
“What kind of danger?”
“I would rather not say.”
“We were just down to Scotland Yard,” said Sara, “talking to a friend of ours who knows Beasley. He was upset, too, and we got the impression that he thought Beasley might be in danger from the garrotings that have been taking place here in London lately.”
“That was very astute of your friend. Is he someone who works with Inspector Peter Wyatt?”
“Yes, he is,” said Andrew. “How do you know of Inspector Wyatt?”
“In making inquiries into our friend Beasley’s background, I discovered that he’s an old friend of Inspector Wyatt. I also learned that you have some sort of connection with him, too.”
The Case of the Indian Curse (Andrew Tillet, Sara Wiggins & Inspector Wyatt Book 8) Page 6