Murder on the Titanic

by Evelyn Weiss

things.” It seems strange, unreal almost, in this wholesome bright sunshine and the simple beauty of Loch Lui and its surroundings, to speak of such a cynical and self-interested level of treachery as Chisholm showed. I try to explain.

  “Kitty, Chisholm deliberately betrayed his fellow conspirators, the Gophers, to the New York Police Department. You see, I think that from the very start of his deal with the Gophers he realized that, if a risk of being detected arose, he could protect himself and his German spy network by making it appear that the plot centered not on German spies, but on an Irish terrorist attack, supposedly being organized and led by Percy Spence.

  So, if the Irish terrorist attack happened, then it would weaken Britain, and that might be useful in the event of a British-German war. But it was not essential to Chisholm’s plans. He believed that, thanks to his spies, Germany could easily defeat Britain in a war, with or without the help of an Irish terror plot.”

  Kitty’s beginning to understand. “So Sir Chisholm didn’t really care about the Irish plot at all?”

  “That’s right. He worked with them, and made Black Velvet his own codename, with the intention of having a cover plan. He was perfectly happy to support their terrorist attack in London – if it could be done without risk to himself or his spy network. But, if discovery threatened, he would kill Percy Spence, and then portray the dead man as Black Velvet. If necessary, he would sacrifice the Gophers too, in order to draw attention away from himself and his principal plans.”

  The professor smiles grimly. “Like a lizard will shed its own wriggling tail, to distract a predator’s attention while it escapes.”

  I carry on. “So, Kitty, while trying to cover his own tracks regarding Percy Spence, Chisholm steered our investigation towards the Gophers and the shipment of explosives. Firstly, with the Black Velvet clues he laid out for us. Secondly, by visiting the Gophers in Hell’s Kitchen so as to get the final details of the shipment. It was easy for Chisholm to penetrate their defenses, because to them, he was indeed their co-conspirator, Black Velvet.

  But to the Inspector Trench, and even to Lord Buttermere, things looked different. Chisholm’s exposing of the Gophers’ plot, and his heroic rescue of me at Chelsea Piers, appeared to prove Chisholm’s own loyalty as a British agent, beyond any possible doubt. Even when Lord Buttermere had Chisholm arrested, it was because Buttermere thought he was an unpredictable maverick: not because he was a traitor.”

  The professor looks at Kitty. “So you see, now, don’t you, what a deceitful and ruthless man Chisholm actually was.”

  “I do indeed. I don’t really like to think about it too much, Professor.”

  “At least in respect of you, Miss Kitty, he gave orders that you should not be harmed. But Chisholm did not extend the same gallantry to you, Miss Agnes. Your life was in danger from the moment he realized that you were beginning to understand the truth of this case.”

  For the briefest moment, a scent of chloroform seems to touch the warm spring air around me.

  “Yes, professor. I didn’t understand what I had found there, in the writing-desk at Sweynsey Hall – but, I sensed in some vague way that it was significant, because it was the one thing that was oddly familiar. The real clue in the writing-desk was not the pen: it was what had been written with the pen. There was a piece of paper there, which I guess Carver never noticed when he put the pen in the drawer. The paper had a list of numbers on it. When I opened the drawer and looked at those rows of figures, I thought they were Sweynsey Hall estate accounts. It was almost a nothing in my mind – just a vague, strange feeling that I was looking at something I had seen before.”

  “Where did you see them before, Miss Agnes?”

  “Well it’s funny, but you yourself were there, Kitty. The evening that you were – taken. Before the hypnosis session, you and I waited in Chisholm’s study.”

  Kitty smiles. “I remember it well, Miss Agnes. I knocked over some papers.”

  “Indeed, Kitty. And I told you not to worry about them, and we both picked them up. One of those papers looked like a boring set of accounts figures. I guessed they were something to do with the Glenlui Castle estate. But then, when I was at Sweynsey Hall, and looked at what I thought were other sheets of estate accounts, I felt I’d seen something almost identical before. In fact both sets of papers were written by Percy Spence, using that selfsame silver pen.”

  The professor interjects. “When he and I came into his study that night, Chisholm saw that you had the paper with the figures on it in your hand, Miss Agnes. You were just putting it back down on his desk. He was, of course, sensitive about that paper, partly because it was so important, and partly because he knew how he had acquired it. He had stolen it, along with the pen, from Percy Spence’s cabin on the Titanic. So, when he saw you looking with apparent interest at a nearly identical sheet of figures at Sweynsey Hall…”

  “Exactly, Professor. The paper meant a lot to Chisholm, and virtually nothing to me. But because I was looking at it, Chisholm made a simple error – an error we all make, from time to time. He credited me with more understanding than I actually had: he credited me with his own level of understanding. He thought that I had understood the connection between the two papers: the one that was on his desk at Grafton Square, and the one that I found in the writing-desk at Sweynsey Hall. But in fact I hadn’t made any connection. All I had, at that stage, was a vague sense of familiarity.”

  The professor carries on. “At that very moment, when he saw that paper at Sweynsey Hall – and you looking at it with such interest, Miss Agnes – he decided that you had to be kidnapped too. Carver was already nearby: Chisholm had contacted him and asked him to stay near Sweynsey Hall, in case he was needed. I believe we may even have seen Carver stepping down from the same train as us, at Fen Dutton Halt, in the mist. Chisholm’s ruthlessness was total: soon after he saw you looking at the paper in the writing-desk, he telephoned Daniel Carver and asked him to abduct you as soon as the opportunity presented itself, just as he had done with you, Kitty.

  On a pretext, Chisholm sought to ensure that, that afternoon, he, I and Matthew Mordaunt would be engaged together, leaving Miss Agnes alone. He also knew that there were hardly any staff employed at the Hall since Spence’s death. Mrs Thwaite was there – but at such short notice, not every aspect of Chisholm’s plan could be made perfect. So, Daniel Carver came to the Hall that afternoon with a cotton wool wad of chloroform, and I guess that he was prowling around the grounds that afternoon, looking for a way into the Hall that would not appear like a burglary. I guess that Carver could not believe his luck at seeing you, Miss Agnes, leaving the house, going into the garden and walking towards the maze.”

  “I think you are right, Professor.” I think back to that cold, misty day. “I think it was a great chance for him – and he would have caught me, if Mrs Thwaite hadn’t come out onto the steps of the Hall to call me for coffee.

  But having failed to have me kidnapped, Chisholm then took a different approach. When we arrived in New York, he made a great play of including me in his trip to Hell’s Kitchen. As Chisholm intended, I was confused and frightened, and angry with him. Then, back at the Metropole, he could pretend to confess, to come clean about all his secrets and explain all his actions to me. So at the Metropole, I believed exactly what he wanted me to believe: that now, he was telling me the real truth about himself. He had me completely fooled.

  After I had heard his story, I was of course set up as a witness who would testify, if needed, that Chisholm was a loyal British agent who had infiltrated Spence’s Black Velvet plot. And as such a witness, Chisholm now wanted to keep me alive. So he tried to tempt me to head back home to Putnam, safe and sound. Ready to be recalled, if Chisholm ever needed a witness.”

  “But what about Daniel Carver at the Hotel Metropole, Miss Agnes? I don’t quite understand that.”

  I answer Kitty’s question. “There was one thing that still worried Chisholm: his original concern about me. He kne
w that I had seen the coded paper in his study, and the same style of handwriting and coding on a paper at Sweynsey Hall. He was still worried that I might tell the professor, or Inspector Trench, or even Lord Buttermere about the coded papers, and that one of them would put two and two together.

  So Chisholm felt that, before I went home to Putnam, he had to check out exactly what I actually knew. He told Carver to accost me in the bar at the Metropole. He thought I would be terrified, and tell Carver everything that I knew. His plan would have succeeded, except for unlucky timing.

  Because that the moment, Gwyneth saw me and came over to my table. Thankfully for me, she sent Carver on his way. But, being an FBI agent who had been investigating the Gophers, she realized immediately the nature of the business I was mixed up in. I told her what had happened to me, and she concluded, quite naturally, that Daniel Carver must be part of the Gophers’ set-up. She warned us that the Gophers were likely to be watching the hotel.

  But in fact, Carver had no connection at all to the Gophers. His only contact in New York was Chisholm. Nor were the Gophers watching the hotel: they were completely unaware that anything was wrong. They were simply carrying on with the plan for the shipment of