Murder In The Motor Stable: (Auguste Didier Mystery 9)

by Myers, Amy

  ‘There is a poetry impregnated into the Arab by the desert. No desert is barren to them, for it is their homeland whose beauties they love, whose scents are borne to them on the wind, wherever they might be. Ever since I first read Robert Wood’s The Ruins of Palmyra, I had thirsted to visit the place, and when I arrived that golden evening, I found the Arab’s true soul, poetry, passion, hospitality, conversation, all one gracious whole, inspired by the God he worships. All is Allah and Allah is all . . .’

  Yes, she would be a great writer, once those diaries were published. But today she would commence her memoirs. Should she begin like Harriette Wilson: ‘I shall not say why and how I became at the age of fifteen the mistress of the Earl of Craven’? The first sentence was important; it must attract attention. Something on those lines . . .

  ‘I shall not weary my reader (beyond the dictates of necessity) by explaining how the leaders of English society conspired to break my heart, so that scorned and rejected I was driven to tramp the desert wastes of the world alone.’

  The bitter words of her diaries had festered in her mind for twenty-five years, since she was a girl at school, written, despite her passion, in regulation copperplate. ‘I hate everybody’; the diary of ’81 – ‘How stupid and horrible they all are,’ and the worst of all because it was not bitter but exultant – ‘I, Hester Hart, am to marry the heir to . . .’

  ‘But, Your Grace,’ Thomas Bailey expostulated feebly. He seemed to be doing a lot of that recently, and here on a fragile Sheraton chair in Dewbury House, it was remarkably ineffectual.

  ‘Don’t be a namby-pamby, Thomas,’ Agatha instructed him briskly. ‘It’s settled. I shall drive the Brighton Baby in the procession. Why not? I am a member of the Ladies’ Motoring Club, I am entitled to drive whatever motorcar I choose.’

  ‘But is it advisable?’

  ‘My dear Thomas, have you anything to be ashamed of, either in your motorcar or in your actions?’

  He thought for a moment. ‘No.’

  ‘Then I shall do it.’ Agatha paused a moment to gather charm to her aid, with that flash of the eye that had so intrigued Harry (though only on first meeting it). ‘Think of the wonderful opportunity to have both the Baby and yourself discussed in the newspapers, perhaps even pictured in the Illustrated London News.’

  Thomas did think, and reluctantly surrendered. All he wanted to do was design motorcars and then drive them, but even he realised that in order to have the money to do this, other people had to be involved.

  ‘Now you’ll be able to get married, Thomas,’ Aunt Gertie had said at his father’s funeral seven years ago. ‘That’s a nice little nest egg for you.’ An immediate vision of his job on mechanical toys in Gamages department store floated before his eyes, followed by one of Ethel in haberdashery, with her permanently red nose and wistful eyes. He promptly realised they belonged together. Aunt Gertrude was right. He had taken Ethel to Brighton on an August Bank Holiday, intending to propose over a nice cup of tea after the pierrot show. Then Ethel had insisted on having her fortune told first, asking for a penny to put in the palmist’s slot machine, and also insisted he put one in himself. Out of his newfound wealth of £25, he did so, nobly forgoing an opportunity to sneak a penny into the Lady Having a Bath machine. He stared at his future life as confidently announced on the flimsy piece of paper rendered to him by the machine: Take a plunge in the ocean of life. The winds of fate are with you.

  The vision of Ethel for Evermore was immediately replaced by one of his twelve-inch motorcar model designed by himself.

  ‘Mine reads,’ Ethel commented happily by his side, ‘Hopes may be dashed, but the future is bright.’

  He had not proposed to Ethel (who had now married the owner of an electric lighting shop) but given in his notice to his surprised employers who had marked him down for promotion in ten years’ time, and he became a gentleman of leisure for seven whole days. Thomas was as fanatical as Harold Dobbs but more practical. He realised during this week that £25 would not last for ever, nor would it stretch to the costs of converting his beloved brainchild from paper to solid form. He promptly took a lowly position with a cycle manufacturer about to launch themselves into voiturettes, and this step had eventually resulted in his life’s dream being realised at the age of thirty. He was still unmarried and Aunt Gertrude had ceased sending him her usual knitted egg cosies for Christmas.

  Now he bowed to fate once more; its winds seemed to be calling him again, and, after all, something had to be done about that ghastly fellow Dobbs, so it might as well be now. He was obviously a rotter, a villain of the deepest dye, and Her Grace was quite right to have taken steps to deter him from taking part in the run on Thursday.

  Her Grace rose, to indicate the audience was at an end. She watched him as he awkwardly retrieved his cap from the butler and remarked lightly, ‘Something more must be done about the Dolly Dobbs. Don’t you agree, dear Thomas?’

  ‘Outside, lad,’ Frederick Gale ordained.

  ‘Inside.’ Leo was unusually obstinate.

  ‘You’ve got no blood in your veins, you youngsters. They didn’t win at Rorke’s Drift by holing themselves up in cosy motor houses; they manned the barricades.’

  Leo wasn’t interested in old soldiers’ tales of over twenty years ago. He was more interested in fending off Miss Dazey. Warm though these dog days were at night, he didn’t fancy being stuck here all alone at her mercy. True it was only for tonight – Mr Smythe would stay tomorrow – and it was highly unlikely that a nicely brought up young lady like her would be prowling around after midnignt, but he didn’t put anything past Miss Dazey. It wasn’t that he thought she had designs on the Dolly Dobbs; electric cars were too quiet for her, she liked roaring and spluttering along in noisy cars that scattered pigeons from their path like dust in a drought.

  ‘Scared of a female, eh?’ Fred guffawed, analysing the problem with the same acumen he exercised over a starved carburettor or one of the governor’s springs gone missing. ‘What do you think she’d do to you? Grab your John Thomas in the dead of night?’

  Leo reddened. ‘No. She’s a nice girl. But what am I to do about her? I can’t arrive on an Eaton Square doorstep and tell her parents I’ve come for their daughter’s hand in marriage. Look good, that, wouldn’t it?’

  Fred guffawed again. ‘No harm in a kiss or two, is there?’

  ‘With her there is,’ Leo replied darkly. He knew only too well. She’d surprised him in the motor pit one day, creeping through from the basement storeroom underneath the repair house and running up the circular stairs by the side of the pit platform. He’d been cleaning Lady Bullinger’s underframe and tyres – well, not hers, her Napier’s – with a bucket in one hand and a waterbrush in the other. She’d crept up on him and rattled one of the chains he’d taken off and put in the cleaning pan. There she was, dropping the chain, arms round his neck, smelling of Floris and paraffin. Lucky he had his Carless and Lees safety lamp with him or they’d have gone up in flames. As it was, he was helpless, nowhere to put the bucket down even. Unfortunately he’d enjoyed the experience.

  ‘Outside for you, lad.’ Fred lost patience. Discipline never came amiss. ‘You can have a chair and a blanket, but no falling asleep. You can take a ten-minute nap tomorrow to make up.’

  ‘What if it rains?’ Leo countered belligerently.

  ‘Take one of the rubber sheets we throw over the cars.’

  ‘Thank you, Mr Gale,’ Leo muttered savagely, cursing all engineers, designers, drivers and motorcars, particularly the Dolly Dobbs. To his mind, it was to a real motorcar what a pantomime horse was to a Derby winner. Still, he’d reserve judgement till he saw its paces.

  Leo felt a fool sitting outside, after Fred went home, waiting for ladies or their escorts to collect their motorcars. Most of them were driven by Fred himself round to the front courtyard as they were called for, but after midnight when they normally went off duty the motorcars were left here and ladies or gentlemen escorts collected
them from their respective motor houses. This evening four remained. Gloomily he waited. At twelve thirty Mrs Didier brought a cup of hot cocoa out from the ktichen, before she went home, which revived his spirits a little. Only seven and a half hours to go. He slipped into the workshop and brought out a large screw wrench, which made him feel safer.

  The Horbick disappeared first. To his surprise, since she was normally a stickler for somebody else doing the work for her, Her Grace came to drive it out herself. Trim little job, like the Duchess herself. Two cylinders, shaft-driven, good on hills, so he’d heard.

  ‘Leo, how good of you to wait up.’ She did not look over-pleased, however. Perhaps Mr Didier’s dinner had not been up to scratch.

  ‘I’m on guard,’ he said awkwardly.

  ‘How very amusing. Do you think poor Dolly will escape from her motor house?’

  He didn’t like being laughed at but he could hardly tell a duchess so. ‘I’m watching for spies,’ he muttered.

  ‘Like me? How very amusing.’ She did not sound amused, however, as without further ado she waited for him to unlatch the door and handed him the starting handle. ‘Is the battery charged?’ she snapped.

  ‘Yes, Your Grace.’

  ‘Grease cups? Lubricators? Water tanks?’

  ‘All full, Your Grace.’

  After she had departed, Leo sank back in his chair thankfully. Even Lady Bullinger was easier to deal with. Or so he thought till she marched up to collect the Napier in a no-nonsense cap, goggles and thick veil.

  ‘Start it up and take it round to the front, Leo, if you please.’ The peremptory note in her voice precluded any query as to why she could not perform this function herself since she would be driving it to her home.

  ‘I can’t do that, Your Ladyship. I’m on guard.’ The more he said it, the sillier it sounded.

  ‘Can’t?’ Her voice rose to a bellow. ‘I don’t know what you think you are being paid for, young man.’

  She did not insist, and with hardly a look at the locked Dolly Dobbs motor house she reclaimed her Napier. The six cylinders fired in correct order with military precision, number one, number four, two, six, three and five, as though anxious to display their mistress’s skill as a chauffeur-mécanicien. Leo almost saluted as the Napier slid smoothly out of view. Two to go, he thought with relief.

  Luigi was next to appear from the back staff entrance, and looked surprised to see Leo. ‘Drive Miss Hart’s motorcar round, will you?’

  Leo had no time for Luigi who saw no point on wasting charm on the likes of him. ‘I’m guarding the Dolly Dobbs – for Miss Hart.’

  Since Leo showed no sign of moving, Luigi was forced to demean his rank. In high dudgeon he climbed on to the driving seat, only to find the motorcar failed to start.

  ‘It’s a Serpollet,’ Leo said, pleased.

  ‘So what?’

  ‘It’s steam-driven. The burner takes a while to get going.’

  When it obliged and slid silently past Leo, Luigi’s lips were tightly compressed, though his thoughts, in fact, were not on the young engineer at all.

  Past two o’clock now, and Leo felt his eyelids closing. He jerked awake to find not the beautiful Miss Lockwood but a gentleman at his side peering through the keyhole of the Dolly Dobbs motor house. It was a gentleman he instantly recognised, for all he was in evening dress now.

  ‘What are you doing?’ he shouted.

  The man straightened up. ‘I’ve come for Miss Lockwood’s Rover.’

  ‘You’re one of them horse people, aren’t you? The ones who attacked Mr Gale. I saw you.’

  ‘Yes. No. I mean . . .’ John Millward was not cut out for a life of crime. ‘Perhaps I was, but tonight I’m dining with Miss Lockwood and I’ve come to drive her motorcar round.’ Both his engagement and his ability to drive motorcars were unknown to his wife.

  ‘Then why were you peering through that keyhole, Mr Millward?’ Leo grew bold.

  ‘Mere curiosity,’ he relied weakly. ‘Having seen it in its raw state, I was interested to see it, ah, cooked, so to speak.’ He laughed lightly but unconvincingly.

  Driving the new Fiat with its friction shock absorbers and multi-plate clutch, Millward looked as if he was behind a runaway horse, Leo thought. It was an odd motorcar for Miss Lockwood, much too fast. Fred said she thought the blue paint suited her fair hair.

  Shortly after he left, Leo became painfully aware that the cocoa had brought about the need to relieve himself. Secure in the knowledge that all motorcars had disappeared, he retreated to the rear of the motor stable. As he got there he registered he was wrong. A curved-dash Oldsmobile had drawn up beside it and, leaping from the driving seat was Miss Dazey, hatless and with stars in her eyes.

  ‘Leo darling.’

  He backed away. ‘Miss Dazey,’ he stuttered, ‘how—’

  ‘Everyone but you calls me Daisy. And yet we are sweethearts.’

  ‘We aren’t.’

  Even in the dark he could see her eyes fill with tears. She was too near, much too near. ‘Just because you’re an engineer and I’m a Hon?’ She laughed. ‘Don’t be foolish. I’m a New Woman. Do kiss me. And then you can drive me home.’

  Leo was appalled. ‘I can’t,’ he stuttered.

  ‘That’s not very gallant. All sorts of fates worse than death might overtake me.’

  Leo was pulled in different directions; by the dictates of heart, body – and suddenly ears. He rushed round to the front of the stable to find yet another person peering into the Dolly Dobbs motorhouse.

  ‘Excuse me, madam.’ It came out as a squeak.

  She screamed, taken by surprise. ‘I’m looking for my husband.’

  Then he recognised her. ‘He’s not in there, madam.’

  ‘Quite. A horse would be whinnying by now, or at least emitting a warm living atmosphere. A motorcar is silent metal, and you have the nerve to insult this by calling it a stable.’

  ‘He’s not here.’ Leo stuck to the salient point. A brilliant notion struck him. ‘Do you by chance have a motorcar, madam?’

  ‘How dare you, young man.’ Hortensia Millward was insulted.

  ‘In that case you can accompany Miss Dazey home in hers, and her chauffeur can drive you home from there.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘I could tell Mrs Didier you’ve been here . . .’

  Exhausted with his efforts, Leo nevertheless stayed awake for the rest of the night. Inside her stable Dolly Dobbs slumbered peacefully and safely until the morning.

  Chapter Four

  Auguste quietly whistled the aria of his native Provence from La Traviata; he was a relatively happy man. This was his favourite stage of preparation for a banquet, the morning of the previous day. Wednesday spread out before him like a luxurious canvas on which to paint his masterpieces. He knew all too well that as the day wore on, tension and perhaps passions might be roused, exacerbated by the heat of the ovens, for His Majesty would expect his banquet to include at least five hot dishes, even though it would be held en plein air in the grounds of Martyr House. Rain? It would not dare. St Swithin himself on his saint’s day last Friday had declined to send rain, thus, in accordance with the old belief, coming down firmly in favour of His Majesty’s banquet being unsullied by such a disaster. Plum pudding was disaster enough in itself. His Majesty – and His Majesty’s figure – always demanded its presence on the menu for shooting-party luncheons, and Lady Tunstall had intimated to Auguste that he would expect it to feature in a July ‘picnic’ as well.

  Auguste thought wistfully of a picnic alone with Tatiana, Egbert and Edith, but for that they must wait until the club closed for August. He wanted, he realised with dismay, to be away from Milton House; even tomorrow would bring fresh air into the stale larder of his mind. He felt stultified here, unable to give of his best, and he put it down to the bluebottle of discomfort which still buzzed around the club, especially as he remembered the unwelcome news Tatiana had sprung on him about this afternoon. Hester Hart, it seeme
d, was determined to cause trouble.

  Pierre shared his discontent. He never approved of whistling in the kitchen, Auguste had noticed, and he promptly stopped in the interests of the banquet. Too late, perhaps.

  ‘What is this?’ he asked, aghast, as he peered over Pierre’s shoulder.

  ‘Daube of beef, maître. For tonight.’ Pierre scowled, his face streaming with perspiration.

  ‘In July?’

  Pierre shrugged. ‘These English aristos will eat spotted dick in August and demand strawberries in January. Why not give them what they want? Take their shekels, my son, praising Allah, is my philosophy.’

  ‘Mr Kipling,’ Auguste retorted, ‘is not a cook. I fear you need more justification than that for daube of beef. What else is on the menu this evening?’

  Pierre looked sullen. ‘Lobster salad, roast saddle of mutton—’

  ‘Dull,’ Auguste pointed out.

  ‘But safe, maître. Tomorrow will be a long and onerous day for the ladies. Most will not dine here this evening, but quietly at home. Tonight those that dine here should have plain food, in order to appreciate the glories of tomorrow when they will eat the glories of a maître.’

  ‘You are indeed a philosopher, Pierre.’ Auguste was gratified. ‘But why do you say onerous day? Because of the run to Canterbury, or meeting His Majesty?’

  ‘Neither. Because of this motorcar, the Dolly Dobbs. Something unpleasant may happen. Why else is it being guarded by night?’

  ‘A precaution, Pierre.’ And a very necessary one, in his view. The Dolly Dobbs had aroused passions, some understandable, others less so – such as the curious reaction of its inventor when Thomas Bailey was mentioned, and the Duchess’s sudden acceptance of the situation that Hester was to drive it.

  ‘This is not a happy place to work now,’ Pierre announced sombrely. ‘This pig Luigi has something to do with it. Of that I am sure.’ He brought his knife down on a chicken with great enthusiasm. ‘He is a spy.’