‘Rose,’ he interrupted. ‘I must insist that you avail yourself of Grace’s carriage, or if you wish to explore, then you take Mrs Brook with you.
‘Mrs Brook—’
‘Yes, my dear. You see, it isn’t quite right for a young girl who is a stranger to Edinburgh to wander round unescorted.’
‘How am I to cease being a stranger if I can’t search out places for myself? I like my own company. Besides, I am used to going about Kirkwall alone.’
‘Kirkwall is not Edinburgh. There are dangers in a city that you would not encounter in Orkney.’
‘I’m not a child any longer, Papa,’ Rose said in wounded tones.
‘I am quite aware of that,’ he said coldly.
Then, her heightened colour warning him that she was upset by his remark, he put his arm around her, hugged her to him.
‘I want you to be happy here, my precious. And safe. I realise your papa is a great fusspot, but do bear with me. Will you -please?’
Resting her head against his shoulder, her sunny smile restored, she said: ‘Of course I will, dear Papa. I just love Edinburgh so much. I can hardly believe that I am to stay here soon - for always - with you. And I want to know everything about it.’
‘And so you shall, love. Now - another piece of toast?’
Fondly he watched her pour out his second cup of tea. She was so lovely, this daughter of his. It was a dream come true, having her sit there across the table. They would soon get used to each other’s ways.
As he was leaving for the Central Office, she helped him into his cape and, handing him his hat, smiled.
‘Aren’t you fortunate to have Sergeant McQuinn with you. Such a nice man, isn’t he? He’ll look well after you, I’m sure.’
Faro bit back an angry response at thus being entrusted to his sergeant’s care, kissed her goodbye, and with the domestic harmony only slightly dinted by her innocent remarks walked more sharply than usual in the direction of the High Street and the Central Office.
There McQuinn awaited him, busily writing notes at his desk.
‘Well, sir, I’ve been to Priorsfield. Mention of burglars in the district works wonders,’ he added with a chuckle. ‘I sternly demanded what security measures they had on hand and as one thing led to another I expressed an admiration for all those lovely exotic potted plants and was told they came from Mr Theodore’s greenhouses.’
‘ “How do you keep them so well?” I asked. “I hope if any of you are using poisonous chemicals you sign for them.”
‘And what did I discover? That the only poison used in that house was rat poison.’
‘Rat poison?’
‘Rat poison, the very same, Inspector. Arsenic, ordered and signed for by who but Mr Cedric himself.’
‘Don’t you mean Mr Theodore?’
‘No, definitely Cedric. Like you I thought they had said the wrong name. But it seems that most of the Langweil business is conducted from Priorsfield. According to Mrs Gimmond, there were rats in all their malthouses. Everyone knew about that, but Mr Theodore also left domestic matters like vermin extermination to his brother.’
‘As you know there’s been a plague of rats in the sewers for as long as folk can remember. In spite of all attempts to get rid of them, no sooner is one old rat-infested building pulled down than they spread like wildfire into the foundations of the other houses.’
Faro nodded. ‘Including Priorsfield, McQuinn,’ as he remembered Piers Strong’s argument for hygiene, for an all-clean, rat-free Edinburgh. ‘They’re an infernal nuisance.’
‘Right, sir. And I gather Mr Theodore wasn’t aware of their presence until he found they had gnawed their way into his new library. Carried in with boxes of old books stored in the cellars they were nesting behind the shelving.’
‘The maids all shuddered and squealed, going on about how they went to light fires in the morning they could hear the rats scuttling about.’
‘So there was arsenic in the house.’
‘A plentiful supply, to all accounts. And in regular use,’ was the reply.
‘Did you get the impression that Cedric had any enemies on the staff?’
‘No. From what Mrs Gimmond said, he was well liked. Seemed she was acquainted with the servants in Charlotte Square too. Said they were all shocked, that he had been a good master and would be sadly missed.’ McQuinn frowned and shook his head. ‘But you know, I got an odd impression that she didn’t care for him personally.’
‘Indeed? How so?’
McQuinn frowned. ‘Nothing in what she said, but her face gave it away somehow.’
‘What is she like, this Mrs Gimmond?’
‘Handsome woman. Well spoken. Not quite the wife you’d expect Gimmond the butler to have. Odd that she’d marry a low-class chap like him.’
Faro looked at McQuinn. Gimmond’s impeccable accent hadn’t fooled his sergeant. ‘What makes you think he’s low class?’ he asked.
McQuinn shrugged. ‘You can always tell. Something in his manner gives him away. He’s not quite the ticket, not confident enough. I’ve met a lot of butlers in my time and Gimmond is not quite easy in the part.’ He shook his head. ‘You know, sir, I wouldn’t be at all surprised if he’s had trouble with the police at some time. He has that nervousness, the sidelong shifty look that old lags display when a uniform shows up on the doorstep and their old sins begin to bother them.’
Faro remained silent. He was not at that moment prepared to take McQuinn into his confidence about Gimmond’s past. But his sergeant’s observations were worth noting.
‘Did you get any useful information about upstairs?’
‘Scandal, you mean?’ grinned McQuinn. ‘Not a whiff. As I said, all seemed to be blessed harmony, a devoted family. Not only working together but holidays too. Never seemed to tire of each other’s company. As you know, I expect, the brothers were also keen golfers and their wives often accompanied them. That seemed to surprise Mrs Gimmond. Quite unusual for keen golfers to want their wives along, she said.’
Faro smiled. ‘You’ve done very well, McQuinn.’
McQuinn laughed. ‘And I’ve been invited to look in again. So I’ll keep at it. Mrs Gimmond is a good cook too.’
‘I would have expected that.’
‘But then, Inspector, you’re not a poor bachelor like me. You have good connections.’
Faro refused to rise to the bait even when McQuinn added with a grin: ‘How’s that pretty daughter of yours, sir? Staying long?’
‘She is here to finish her education. Going to school.’
McQuinn whistled. ‘School, is it? Well, well, you astonish me. I’d have thought she was more ready to be here to find a husband,’ he added with a grin.
Faro seized the papers on his desk without further comment. He was determined to stick to his resolution to stay on cordial terms with McQuinn and not allow his sergeant’s abrasive personality to threaten the efficient performance of their working relationship.
‘Where next, Inspector?’
‘Somehow, somewhere, we need to track down whoever attended Cedric Langweil and told him that he had a diseased brain which was going to kill him in six months.’
‘Sounds like Dr Laurie’s domain.’
It was, but all enquiries regarding the missing consultant seemed doomed to failure.
And then they had a piece of luck.
Faro found a note awaiting him from Maud Langweil. With it a letter of condolence from a Dr Henry Longfield who had just heard on his return from New York that Cedric had died.
‘Perhaps he will be able to help you,’ Maud wrote. ‘He has been in America for the past six months. It is possible that Cedric saw him just before he left.’
When Vince read the letter, he looked almost happy for the first time in weeks. An enquiry at Surgeons’ Hall confirmed that Longfield dealt with cancer patients at the Infirmary. He was also a consultant physician.
Considerably heartened by this information, Faro went to visit the doctor
in his house in Moray Place.
Dr Longfield was not dismayed by the presence of a detective inspector. The police often called when sudden death required discreet enquiries.
‘Cedric was a friend of mine, yes. We had known each other since student days and I was sorry to hear of his death.’
‘Sorry but not surprised?’
The doctor frowned. ‘Both, as it happened. Why do you ask?’
‘Did he ever consult you professionally?’
‘Only once, curiously enough, just before I left for America. He wanted me to give him a thorough examination. I did so and gave him a clean bill of health.’
‘You mean there was no sign of illness?’
‘None at all. He was strong and healthy, in excellent condition - a man in the prime of his life. It would not have surprised me had he lived to be ninety. And yet such things do happen. Massive heart attack, was it?’
‘Not exactly. I will be frank with you, Doctor. Cedric Langweil’s death is baffling. He told his family that he had a brain disease and was unlikely to live until the end of the year. Which prediction was in fact correct. But that was not how he died...’
And Faro proceeded to relate the facts as he knew them.
At the end, Longfield was silent for a moment. ‘So that is the reason for this visit, Inspector. It does sound as if someone gave him a helping hand. Curious, because on several occasions he showed considerable interest in the workings of the human brain. Why we did certain things and so forth; a true Darwinian, he regarded man as just a little higher than the apes. Often he said it was only our superior thought processes that kept us above the laws of the jungle. Some of us, that is,’ he added with a wry smile.
‘In fact, now that I give it particular thought in the light of what you have told me, Cedric frequently asked me what were the first indications of disease of the brain. Most unfortunate,’ he sighed, ‘this morbid preoccupation must have preyed on his mind until he believed that he was suffering from some abnormal condition.’
He shrugged sadly. ‘The result was that he took his own life, in a state of mental aberration and disturbance. And yet that does amaze me. You see, he did not strike me as a man who would entertain such notions. He loved and lived life to the full even as a student. He would never accept the second best and he worshipped beauty.’
The picture of Cedric greedy for life did not fit the picture of the desperate man who believing he was dying, panicked, thought Faro as he thanked the doctor for his help.
Returning to the Central Office Faro realised that the interview he most dreaded could no longer be delayed or avoided.
He must talk to Barbara Langweil, who had also been present in Priorsfield when her brother-in-law died.
Faro was more than usually nervous about the procedure, anxious not to upset that beautiful sensitive woman by any hint that she was responsible for Cedric’s unfortunate demise under her roof. Or since the evidence pointed to his having been murdered that her hand might have been capable of administering the fatal dose of arsenic.
Gathering together the notes that he had written on the case so far, Faro leaned back in his chair, his back rigid as he closed his eyes and his mind tightly against such a thought.
That his goddess might also be capable of murder.
Chapter Eight
Walking rapidly in the direction of Duddingston, Faro was again aware of the historical drama of Scotland’s past surrounding him.
To his left the sun glanced off the rolling fields outlining the parallel lines of the old runrig system of agriculture. Begun with the monks and discontinued long ago, its evidence was still visible also on the upper reaches of Arthur’s Seat, whose towering mass overhung the road on which he walked.
Samson’s Ribs, they called it. Out of sight lay Hunter’s Bog, where once the Young Pretender had camped with his troops, certain of victory. Looming darkly on the horizon above Duddingston Loch, Craigmillar Castle. Within those now ruined and roofless walls the Prince’s thrice-great-grandmother Mary Queen of Scots had, according to legend, let the besotted Earl of Bothwell whisper in her ear a plan to rid a wife of a loathsomely diseased and unwanted husband.
As Faro entered the iron gates of Priorsfield he was again aware that an air of mysteries unsolved, lost in time, clung to the great house before him. He would not have admitted to his colleagues in the Central Office, or to a great many other people, his belief that as well as bricks and mortar houses were built of the lives of the generations who have lived there, their memories of good and evil, their scenes of sadness and joy absorbed into the stones.
What then was the strand linking Prince Charles Edward Stuart’s fortune with the humble alehouse that had been Priorsfield? And the mystery never to be solved of French gold that might have changed the destiny of the Stuart monarchy? And what of the skeleton dug up a century later with a knife in its ribs?
Sometime he must talk to Grace about her ghost. Children were sensitive to such things and for his money, Priorsfield, secret in its nest of trees, seemed haunted by more than raucous crows.
Out of sight, the peacocks screeched a warning.
He shuddered. He didn’t like peacocks, they offended his sense of justice that an unfeeling Creator had crippled such beauty by a terrible voice.
Gimmond opened the door to him. As usual they exchanged a minimum of words.
‘I will see if the mistress can see you.’
Waiting in the hall, Faro rehearsed his opening speech to Barbara with such elaborate anxiety he decided it would be a relief if she were unable to see him.
He was almost surprised when Gimmond returned. ‘Will you come this way, sir. Mrs Langweil will receive you in the library.’
Barbara was seated by the window, overlooking the drive. She must have seen his approach and as always, at that first glance, her beauty took him by the throat, rendered him speechless.
Unlike her sister-in-law, deep mourning became her, the veils and jet adding vulnerability, enhancing the luminosity of her skin, the brightness of her eyes. Where grief blotched other faces, eyes reddened, here was a woman who cried and became even more beautiful.
More desirable. His eyes avoided the slightly heaving bosom, the tiny hand-spanned waist. He tried to glance at her sternly, painfully aware of the honey-coloured hair, of amber eyes that changed colour. Her hands were very white, with long tapered fingers. Her handshake was lingering, cool.
She dismissed his apologetic, stammering reasons for ‘this unexpected visit’ with a smile.
‘It is necessary, I quite understand. In the distressing circumstances of my brother-in-law’s death I realise you must interview all members of the family who were present in the house. You must do your duty, Inspector Faro, however unpleasant.’
Another smile, brilliant this time, revealed small exquisitely white teeth, lips very red against the ivory skin. ‘Please go ahead, I am quite ready. I thought it was quite vital that you should see these, for instance.’
With the important air of a conjuror producing rabbits from a hat, she took from the side table cards on which were written the menus for that fatal evening’s dinner party.
Faro was more interested in the list of the wines.
‘Will they help in your enquiries?’
‘A little.’
‘How else can I assist you then? Please do not hesitate to ask - anything. And I will try to answer.’
She was very anxious to please, but the answers to his routine questions were valueless.
Did she know of any reason why someone should poison Cedric Langweil? No. Did he have any enemies? No.
And the more searching: ‘Were the relations between your husband and his brother amicable?’ And softening the blow, ‘Any business troubles, perhaps?’
He thought that question brought a fleeting shadow, the merest hint of a frown. The instant later it was gone.
‘I know of none. My husband told me you had asked him if Cedric had any enemies, if there was a
family feud.’
She looked at him boldly. ‘I can only confirm what he said to you, Mr Faro, add my assurance to his. You must believe us when we tell you that in this family we are all devoted to one another. And loyal too.’
Aye, and there’s the rub, thought Faro. Loyal. That’s the insurmountable barrier all policemen stumble over, again and again, hampering any enquiries. Whatever the stratum of society, rich or poor. Family loyalty so fierce and protective that getting at the whole truth and nothing but the truth was an impossibility.
‘Do you consider the absence of a suicide note significant?’
She looked thoughtful, a fleeting expression as if something had occurred to her. A moment later it was gone.
‘Surely it would have saved the family a great deal of anxiety and such enquiries as this would have been quite unnecessary if such a note had been written,’ Faro prompted her.
She looked away, shook her head. ‘I suppose so.’
It wasn’t the answer he had hoped for. And, again feeling she had not been completely honest with him, he handed back the menu, which was impeccable, its ingredients innocent of venom. They had all eaten the meal, shared the same dishes. As for the wines served at the meal, they were innocuous, otherwise more than her brother-in-law would be now lying in Greyfriars Kirk. The fatal dose had been administered during that last hour Cedric and Theodore spent together.
And in this room.
All the time he was thinking: She could have done it easily. Slipped into this shadowy room unobserved. The serving table conveniently placed just inside the door, in order that an unobtrusive butler could attend to decanters and glasses without disturbing the two men sitting on either side of the fire. The armchairs Faro noticed had high backs, too, concealing the occupants from draughts and intrusions.
He reconstructed the scene. A noise, a door opening quietly, and neither man would have made the effort to sit up and look round, dismissing the newcomer as a soft-footed servant—
No, that would not do. What if Theodore had picked up the wrong glass?
If indeed Cedric had been poisoned by the claret, then his murderer had to have an accomplice. And if this lovely woman before him was the guilty one, then she had to have someone who would make sure that Cedric got the right glass. Someone she could trust.
The Evil That Men Do.(Inspector Faro Mystery No.11) Page 7