The Evil That Men Do.(Inspector Faro Mystery No.11)

by Knight, Alanna

  ‘September isn’t too far off,’ Vince was telling Rose. ‘So much to do—’

  Unfortunately for the couple’s revised wedding plans, on the eve of Barbara’s thirtieth birthday party at Priorsfield her husband Theodore and brother-in-law Adrian were poisoned.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Adrian was still alive.

  By a miracle, he had taken the merest sip of the Langweil Alba liqueur when a commotion in the hall erupted to reveal Gimmond.

  ‘Sorry to disturb you. But could Dr Adrian come quickly. One of the housemaids - upset a pan of boiling water—’

  Before Adrian had finished attending to the crying maid and had dressed her scalded arm, he became aware of feeling distinctly ill. Leaving the kitchen hastily he vomited, retching with stomach pains.

  Returning shakily to the scene he had just left, the door was flung open and Barbara rushed in screaming: ‘For God’s sake, Adrian, come quickly. Theo’s lying on the floor. I think he’s dying.’

  ‘Get the carriage,’ Adrian ordered Gimmond, and followed her upstairs where he took one look at his brother and decided that he had been poisoned. With Gimmond and Jock’s assistance, while Barbara surveyed the terrible scene weeping and refusing to be parted from her husband, Theodore was bundled into the carriage.

  Ten minutes later they delivered their now deeply unconscious burden to the Royal Infirmary. Jock, given instructions to alert Faro and Vince at Sheridan Place, found Faro alone.

  The carriage hurtled towards Charlotte Square where Faro expected to find Vince with Grace. As he rushed past the startled maid unannounced, Maud appeared on the upstairs landing.

  ‘Vince? He left about ten minutes ago.’

  Faro cursed under his breath.

  ‘Is something wrong?’ Maud asked.

  Faro considered and then shook his head. No point in alarming Maud at this juncture.

  But at his urgent manner and distraught appearance, she said gently: ‘Grace has not yet retired. She’s in the library. She’ll tell you if he was going straight home.’

  Conscious that Maud was watching him very curiously, he ran lightly downstairs, and flinging open the library door he found Grace and Stephen Aynsley sitting on a sofa in the lamplight reading what looked like a book of poems.

  Their heads were close together. Grace was smiling and Stephen’s face, watching her, wore a look of complete and utter adoration.

  They were unaware of his intrusion, like two people captured for ever in a romantic painting by the embers of a dying fire.

  Faro felt a moment’s anguish on Vince’s behalf. Did he not realise that Stephen Aynsley, Grace’s second, or was it third, cousin, was also madly in love with her?

  Then the spell was broken, and they stood up to greet him.

  ‘Vince? He went home, I think,’ said Grace. ‘What on earth is wrong?’

  ‘Your Uncle Theodore has been poisoned.’

  Grace gave a small scream of horror. Her hand flew to her mouth. ‘No ... Oh, no!’

  ‘Adrian got him to the hospital. He wanted Vince to know.’

  Maud had followed him downstairs. ‘What is wrong?’ she demanded. And leaving Grace to tell her, he fled leaving a scene of consternation behind him.

  By the time he reached the hospital, Vince was already leaving the ward. ‘Thank heaven you got here—’

  ‘Mrs Brook gave me your message—’

  ‘How is he?’

  Vince shook his head. ‘I think this proves your theories, fantastic as they seemed. It really does look as if the missing Justin must be somewhere around. There is no other logical explanation.’

  But there was one, thought Faro grimly. Though, like me, you cannot face up to its grim reality. And at the light step behind them, he turned and looked into the tragic eyes of Barbara Langweil.

  His mind was full of deadly accusations, but now, even now, he turned away from them, determined with every doubt fading that he was going to see Barbara as innocent until the evidence proved her undeniably guilty.

  There was nothing he could do here and he returned to Sheridan Place for what remained of that night of anguish and uncertainty, of dreams turned hollow, and goddesses who were but human after all.

  At eight next morning he made his way to the hospital, but as he was entering the gates the Langweil carriage swept past him. Bearing a trio of weeping women, it told him even before he reached Theodore’s bedside that he was already too late.

  Theodore’s death suggested his innocence in the murder of his brother Cedric and the questionable fatal accident to the lawyer Moulton who knew too much about the Langweil family.

  He found Adrian, pale, dazed and sick-looking, staring down at the sheeted figure on the bed. Faro put his hand on his shoulder. At least he would survive.

  Following him into the corridor, Adrian said: ‘We did all we could. Dear God, who would do such a thing? When I think if we’d waited and opened it for the party - it might have been Freda. She has a passion for liqueurs.’

  Faro looked at him. Had the amateur murderer got the wrong victim once again? Had Adrian’s pregnant wife been the intended victim?

  ‘Who would do this? Have you any ideas? For God’s sake, Mr Faro, help us.’

  Faro shook his head. All his theories - but one - had come to naught. ‘Can you tell us exactly what happened before the maid came in and you had the glass in your hand?’

  ‘Maud had left at ten when Barbara retired. We’d finished off the wine, and as it was well past midnight the servants had gone to bed. We were in rather high spirits, however, and Theo went to the cupboard and triumphantly produced Barbara’s bottle.

  ‘ “She won’t mind. Hates the stuff,” he said as he broke the seal. “Shall we see if it’s at the right temperature for tomorrow’s party? Before Freda spots it. Then none of us will get a look-in.” ’

  Adrian groaned. ‘It’s a family joke, just now; part of Freda’s condition is a passion for sweet drinks.’

  ‘Had the bottle come from the cellars in the usual way?’ Faro asked.

  Adrian looked embarrassed. ‘No. According to Theo, it had been a present to Barbara, but liqueurs were far too sweet for her.’

  Barbara again.

  Faro groaned. ‘I’m going to Priorsfield.’

  ‘Do you think he might still be on the premises?’

  ‘I think he might.’

  ‘Then get him, for all our sakes. Get him, Mr Faro. Show no mercy. It must be one of the servants. It cannot be anyone else.’

  Calling a carriage, Faro paused at the Central Office to collect McQuinn. Rapidly filling in the details, he waited for his sergeant’s reactions.

  McQuinn, now with the gift of hindsight, nodded eagerly. ‘Always suspected something of the sort, sir. Amazed that you weren’t on to it sooner. Are we to make an arrest?’

  ‘The usual procedure, McQuinn.’

  As the two men waited in the hall at Priorsfield, Faro gave the final instructions.

  ‘Perhaps we’re too late and the bird has flown,’ whispered McQuinn anxiously. ‘Shouldn’t we—’

  ‘No.’ And as Gimmond appeared, Faro said: ‘See no one leaves the house.’

  He doubted he would be received by Mrs Langweil and was almost surprised when Gimmond led him into the library.

  ‘If you will wait a moment, Inspector.’

  ‘Before you go, Gimmond. You have heard about the master?’

  Gimmond bowed, his face shadowed. ‘Yes, Inspector. The staff are all devastated. He will be a great loss to us. A fine master—’

  ‘You are, I take it, in charge of the cellar?’

  ‘I am. That is solely my responsibility.’ Faro’s expression warned him of danger and he added hastily: ‘There are, however, occasions when the master or the late Mr Cedric might take out bottles without my knowledge. They have their own keys.’

  Faro looked thoughtful. ‘And on the night of Mr Cedric’s death?’

  Gimmond frowned. ‘I took out the wines
required for the meal that evening from the menu prepared by Mrs Langweil and given to my wife.’

  ‘And none of the bottles had been tampered with?’

  ‘If you are implying that the seals had been broken, Inspector, I can tell you it would be more than my job’s worth to put such a bottle out for the master’s guests.’

  ‘Then have you any idea—’

  A faint smile touched Gimmond’s lips as he interrupted: ‘Is this in the nature of an official questioning, Inspector?’

  ‘No. I thought merely that being in the house at the time, you might have seen something unusual—’

  ‘Or that I might have had a hand in it,’ Gimmond concluded the sentence for him.

  Faro regarded him with new interest. This was the first time Gimmond had ever referred, even obliquely, to their old association. And Gimmond had without doubt the best opportunity of all to put arsenic in Cedric’s glass. Was it possible that the butler and his wife might be implicated in both murders? Could they have been the assassin’s accomplices? Had he been too hasty in dismissing Gimmond from his list of suspects?

  Watching him closely, Gimmond said softly: ‘If you will cast your mind back, Inspector, you will recall that the verdict in my case was “Not proven”. Otherwise I would not be in this position of trust, serving the family.’ Looking at Faro, he said: ‘I am not ungrateful for your silence, Inspector, especially where Sergeant McQuinn’s enquiries are concerned. So if there is any way I can help you - you have only to ask.’

  ‘Had Mr Langweil any enemies among the servants?’

  ‘So you think it might be one of us? Now that would save a very nasty scandal, wouldn’t it? Find a scapegoat below stairs.’ Gimmond laughed mirthlessly. ‘Typical police procedure, ain’t it. Spare the rich master and blame the poor servant, if you can find one to fit the part.’

  He sighed. ‘You’ll have your work cut out in this house, if that’s your game, Inspector Faro. Ask Mrs Gimmond, if you won’t take my word for it—’

  ‘About this bottle of liqueur—’

  Again Gimmond shook his head. ‘None of us ever laid eyes on it. I’m told that Mrs Langweil had been given it as a present. So she said,’ he added in mocking tones of disbelief.

  Both men jumped when the bell by the fireplace jangled through the room.

  ‘That’ll be the mistress. If you will come this way, Inspector.’

  In the upstairs parlour, Maud and Freda were consoling their sister-in-law.

  Seeing him enter, they looked resentfully in his direction.

  ‘Please, I wish to see Inspector Faro alone,’ Barbara whispered. ‘Please go, my dears. Of course I shall be all right.’

  ‘Are you sure?’ asked Maud. ‘Shall I stay? I really would like to stay.’

  ‘No, please go. And take Freda with you.’

  Bowing the ladies out, Faro closed the door.

  ‘Sit down, Mr Faro.’ She smiled sadly. ‘We have rather a lot to say to each other, have we not?’

  She had been weeping, and weeping copiously. And Faro marvelled how grief enhanced her loveliness, if that was possible, making her vulnerable and ethereal. More desirable.

  An angel in tears. And yet this particular angel might he knew with dawning realisation, be a devil in disguise.

  Suddenly his mind was cold and clear. He knew, and had known for a long time, but refused to admit it to himself, why the murders had been committed.

  He could no longer cling to the hope, the faint possibility of a missing brother. Or a servant with a grievance.

  All that remained was a beautiful woman with the most tawdry secret of all. A lover who was her brother-in-law.

  Faro drew in a deep breath. ‘Barbara Langweil, it is my duty to inform you that I am here to take you into custody for the murder of your husband Theodore Langweil—’

  As he cautioned her he expected her to protest, to soften his heart with womanly tears; he was not kept long in suspense.

  Instead she looked at him, dazed, shocked. Then she nodded.

  ‘Yes, Mr Faro, I am guilty. I did it. I poisoned my husband.’

  Faro said nothing. There wasn’t anything he could say, hoping for a miracle, a denial of guilt with some totally unexpected revelation of damning evidence pointing to the real murderer.

  But Barbara shook her head and sighed. ‘It is not quite as you are imagining. It so happens that I loved Theodore, I shall always love him.’

  And again she began to sob, while Faro stood by helplessly wondering, what then, if she loved him, was the motive.

  ‘Cedric was my lover.’

  That his suspicions aroused by Peter Lamont were true after all, gave him no sense of triumph. He felt faintly sick.

  ‘It’s a long story, Inspector. You must bear with me a little. I will try not to give way like this, but I will be honest with you.’

  And so saying she straightened her slim shoulders and regarded him sadly. ‘This whole sorry business began for me when Theodore married me, brought me to live at Priorsfield. Cedric and Maud were living here at that time and I soon realised, for he made no secret of the fact, that Cedric wanted me. He claimed that he was wildly in love and I, fool that I was, even flirted with him a little at the beginning. Naturally I was flattered that both brothers should love me.

  ‘Theodore tolerated it with good humour at first. Then it began to irritate him and he suggested that Cedric and Maud make the move to Charlotte Square. There he thought Cedric’s feelings would soon disappear when we met more rarely. But over the years what he regarded as a passing infatuation grew stronger. It became an obsession.’

  Her face darkened as she continued slowly as if reliving the scene before her. ‘While Theo and I mourned that we had no child as the years passed, Cedric was delighted. He said to me once, “If you had a child by Theo I would want to kill him. Yes, I would, my own brother. I could not bear the thought that he had given you something that I could not. That you could be possessed by him in a way that I could never possess you. Completely, utterly.” ’

  Pausing, she glanced at Faro apologetically. ‘I really believed until then that Cedric did not think that Theo and I - well, lived as man and wife. Once he said to me, “I would go mad if I let my mind dwell on Theo kissing you, holding you in his arms at night.” ’

  ‘What about Maud? What were her feelings?’

  ‘Oh, Maud knew. Cedric actually confided in her.’ Barbara shuddered. ‘But bless her good kind heart, she never took it seriously. She knew that I was utterly faithful to Theo and that I would never betray her. She had nothing to fear from me.

  ‘And then late last year Cedric seemed unwell. He looked strange, odd. Then one day Theo told me that Cedric had seen a consultant. He was incurably ill. He was under sentence of death, as Theo put it, and had been given only a few months to live.

  ‘As you might imagine, we were all shattered by this news. While Theo was the solemn, dependable head of the family, Cedric was so vibrant, the wit and humorist. They had always been close until I came along.’

  She paused, frowning, and then added with a wan smile, ‘I did love Cedric, you know. As I loved Adrian, for they were like the brothers I had never had. Then for a while, Theo seemed very preoccupied. I thought it was anxiety about Cedric which we all shared. I asked him about it and he said Cedric had asked him to grant a dying man’s request.’

  She was silent, staring into the fire so long that Faro whispered: ‘Go on.’

  She started as if she had forgotten his presence. ‘It was - that Cedric had asked that he might share my bed for one night before - before the end. I was horrified. I thought Theo was joking. Then I knew he wasn’t. He was almost in tears, my strong unemotional husband. “Do this for me, my darling.” ‘

  ‘I need not trouble you with my reactions to this monstrous suggestion or my tearful reproaches. How could Theo, my husband, even bear to mention such an idea to me. Did he not love me? And what of Maud? But Maud, it appeared, had been consulted and had
given her consent.

  ‘Reluctantly, after many sleepless nights, I gave mine. For Theo assured me that it would never change his love for me. He would love me more than ever for making this sacrifice for our beloved brother.

  ‘Arrangements were made. We would stay at a small hotel in Perth where no one knew us. Theo had booked two double rooms under an assumed name. Cedric and I shared one, while in the other Maud had the bed and Theo slept on the sofa.

  ‘On the journey there Cedric was so bright and excited, all trace of illness had vanished, he was literally like a young bridegroom. I could hardly bear to look at him. I felt physically sick at what lay ahead.’

  Again she paused. ‘I do not know that I can find words—’

  Faro reached out, touched her hand. ‘My dear Mrs Langweil, there is no need to tell me anything that does not relate to your husband’s death - please do not distress yourself unnecessarily—’

  ‘Distress myself!’ she repeated, her face bewildered, dazed. ‘That night with Cedric was like being with a madman. I did all he wished of me and yet it was not enough. It seemed that he could never be satisfied with what I gave him. He was like a raging animal. I was terrified of him, so different from my gentle, considerate Theo.

  ‘At last dawn came. It was over. And we returned to Edinburgh. Theo never spoke to me about it and soon our normal life with all its social occasions and visits took over so that I would look across the table at Cedric and wonder if it had happened at all or if it was merely a very nasty embarrassing nightmare.

  ‘And then Cedric became ill again. This time he was vomiting, terribly sick. He began complaining about bouts of indigestion but assured Theo that the consultant had said he would have these - towards the end. That this was part of the pattern, that his body was breaking up, its final decay.

  ‘We were prepared for the worst. But even I was not quite prepared for what happened next. Theo came to me and said Cedric wanted one more night with me. This would be the very last, we all knew this. We could see that time was running out for him. But again I rebelled. I could not go through all that again. Never, never. But Theo took me in his arms and said: ‘This time, my darling, do it for me.’