Murder at Merisham Lodge: Miss Hart and Miss Hunter Investigate: Book 1

by Grace, Celina

  Remembering this, I brightened somewhat. An extra cup of tea after breakfast helped and then Mrs Watling and I set to with a will to produce the Sunday roast. The family nearly always went to church on Sunday mornings and it gave the house a decently empty feel.

  After lunch had been served, cleared away and washed up, I set to, preparing the tray for tea. Once the sandwiches had been cut and the scones had been buttered, I covered them with a damp tea towel, put the little lids on the glass pots that contained the honey, marmalade and fish paste and gave a last polish to the empty silver teapot that stood awaiting its filling, nearer the time. Maggie would see to it in my absence. Then, feeling happiness fill me up again, I took the stairs upstairs as fast as I could, to get quickly washed and changed out of my uniform.

  Verity wasn’t there but she was waiting at the kitchen door for me when I got back downstairs. She had on a green velvet cloche hat that Dorothy had given her, which made the red-gold of her hair stand out most attractively. I could see my own happiness and excitement reflected in her face.

  We didn’t speak until we were out of the lodge grounds and climbing over the stile to the footpath that wound through the fields.

  “Oh my Lord, Joanie, it’s good to be out of there.” Verity threw her head back, squeezing her eyes closed for a second.

  “I know what you mean.” It was difficult to walk soberly, as we were expected to do. I felt like running and jumping and spinning around, so glad was I to be free.

  “When do you have to be back?”

  “Not until seven o’clock.”

  “Wonderful.” Verity slipped her hand about my arm and gave it a squeeze. “Because I have lots to tell you.”

  As we walked towards Merisham, I found myself thinking of Asharton Manor. It had never been very far from my thoughts over the past week, ever since the murder had happened. That was strange, because after the murder at Asharton Manor, and for a while after I’d left the place, it was as if it had all been a strange and terrifying dream. I had to remind myself that it had actually happened. I think it was when the case came to court that it became real to me again. Perhaps it was the flaring black headlines in the papers every day. Evil Killers. Depravity at Asharton Manor. Murderers Hanged. It made it difficult to forget or to dismiss it as a dream.

  “Penny for them, Joan?”

  I started. Without me realising, we had reached the high street of Merisham and Verity was steering me in the direction of one of the three tea shops available. This one, Peggy’s Parlour, was the most expensive but had the most delicious cakes.

  We went inside and were shown to a table at the back. I didn’t mind. We were near the entrance to the kitchens. It was rather noisier than it would have been at the window tables, but that would make it easier to talk without being overhead. It made me feel a little uneasy, the fact that I was thinking like that. It was like Asharton Manor, all over again. But along with the uneasiness was another feeling, the same one I’d felt back then. Excitement. A sense of purpose. The fact that Verity and I were facing a challenge, again.

  Verity ordered such a variety of cakes that I was quite alarmed.

  “Verity, are you sure…”

  She waved away my concerns. “Of course. Don’t worry. Dorothy gave me a couple of extra shillings the other night.”

  “Why?”

  Verity’s mouth quirked up at the corners. “I think it was because I made sure she got back to her room in time for breakfast.”

  I felt my eyes widened. “Back to her room?”

  Verity giggled. “Well, yes. Because that Simon stayed the night, didn’t he?”

  I could feel myself blushing, absurdly. It was ridiculous, it wasn’t as if I were some giggly teenager anymore, and what was Dorothy’s love life to me? I think I was just awe-struck at her nerve.

  I leant forward. “Isn’t she afraid of – well, you know. Getting into trouble?”

  Verity shook her head. “There are ways and means, Joanie,” she said, mysteriously to me. “Anyway. That’s enough about her, for now.”

  The tea and cakes came then, and the next few minutes were occupied with pouring our tea, pressing cakes upon each other and then taking the first satisfying sip.

  After the first cake, Verity daintily wiped her mouth and leant forward a little.

  “So,” she said, with a little more urgency in her voice. “I got talking to Dorothy about the police. She’s furious with them because of them arresting Peter.”

  “They did release him,” I protested.

  Verity waved a hand impatiently. “I know that. It’s just that it makes it quite easy to get Dorothy going on the subject. She gets very indignant.”

  I helped myself to another cake. The waitress came up and topped up our teapot with hot water and I gave her a grateful smile. It felt so good to be waited on for a change.

  “Well,” I said as soon as my mouth was clear of cake crumbs. “He is her brother, after all, despite the fact she obviously thinks he’s a complete no-hoper.”

  Verity was pouring tea as I said that and she suddenly frowned. “It’s funny you say that,” she said, putting down the tea pot.

  “Why is that?”

  “Something that Dorothy told me. She’d been talking to Peter about what he was going to do for money now – you know how he’s always got none. It was funny but she said something like ‘he told me he’s got some money coming to him soon so he’ll be all right.’”

  I waited but Verity didn’t say any more. “And?” I prompted.

  “Well, that’s just it. Dorothy seemed – seemed a bit nonplussed. A bit puzzled. As if she couldn’t imagine where Peter would be getting this mysterious money.”

  It seemed obvious to me. “What about the will?” I asked quietly.

  Verity looked at me startled. “The will?”

  It wasn’t like Verity to be so slow. “The will,” I repeated. “Her ladyship’s will.”

  Verity’s frown cleared. “Oh, that. Joanie, you genius, of course it must be that. How could I not have guessed?” She picked up the teapot again and topped up my cup. “I’ll tell Dorothy that tonight, take her mind off it.”

  “I suppose the will has already been read?” I asked.

  Verity shrugged. “I don’t think it has, actually. I’m sure I overheard Rosalind making an appointment with the solicitors. I think they’re coming during the week.”

  We were down to our last cake by now and of course, we each urged the other to have it. “Let’s split it,” Verity said, brandishing a knife.

  We each took a piece and munched away. I drained the dregs of my tea cup, wondering if I was going to tell Verity what was on my mind.

  “I’ve been thinking a lot about Asharton Manor,” I said after a moment. Verity looked up from her plate, quickly. “I suppose it’s inevitable, given the circumstances.”

  “Yes,” she said, slowly.

  Now it was my turn to look down. “We did – we did do the right thing, didn’t we, V?”

  Verity looked astonished. “How can you even ask that? Of course we did!”

  “I know,” I said, uncertainly. Not for the first time I wished I had Verity’s strength of character, her firm and sound knowledge of her own mind. She didn’t sway this way and that, like me. She wasn’t wishy-washy.

  At Asharton Manor, the evidence Verity and I had found had led to the hanging of two people. It was a thought that sometimes woke me up at night – that I, Joan Hart, lowly kitchen maid, could be said to be responsible for the deaths of two people.

  Of course, Verity, when I’d once confessed I sometimes felt like that, had given me a stern talking to. Of course it wasn’t down to us. If people didn’t want to be hanged for murder, then perhaps they shouldn’t commit murders. I knew she was right, but…

  That was what was making me drag my feet a little now. Fleetingly, I wondered whether in both cases if the murder victim had been – well, a bit nicer – I’d feel differently about catching their killer.
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  I thrust the thought of that horrid old manor house from my mind and turned my attention back to what Verity was saying.

  “So I had it from Benton that Duncan was listening to the wireless in the snug until after half past one that night. Probably getting stuck into the whisky as well, knowing him.”

  I forced myself to take an interest. “So, that clears him really, doesn’t it? How did you get Benton to tell you?” Benton was Duncan Cartwright’s valet and not given much to chatting with us kitchen maids. He was a good looking man of about thirty, but the sneer that always hovered around his countenance when he addressed us put me off him a bit.

  Verity looked mischievous. “I used my feminine wiles.”

  I giggled. “Meaning?”

  Verity laughed. “Actually, I hardly had to do anything. He’s a bit of a goat, that one. You want to watch yourself, if you find yourself in a dark corridor with him.”

  “I’ll bear that in mind,” I said, drily. “How did Benton know he was there all evening?”

  “Oh, he kept asking for things – drinks and for his cigarette box to be filled.”

  I sat back in my seat and used my fingers to tick people off. “So Duncan’s in the clear, Dorothy’s in the clear, but Rosalind and Lord Cartwright are providing each other’s alibi. Is that correct?”

  “Correct.”

  We sat and looked at each other across the table. “What about Peter? Why did they release him?”

  Verity shrugged. “Presumably because I told them that he was with Dorothy all that time before the gloves were found in his room.”

  “Hmm.” It was the first time I’d really considered those bloody gloves. It gave me a nasty feeling. The intent, surely, had been to cast suspicion on Peter Drew, but why? Was he just a convenient scapegoat?

  It was Verity who looked up at the clock on the wall above my head and exclaimed. “Goodness, Joan, I’m going to have to go. Dorothy’s dining out with Simon again tonight and I need to get her ready.”

  We got up, having left the money for the tea and cakes in a convenient saucer on the table. I left an extra bit of money for the waitress. I knew what it was like to have to toil on your feet all day with no thanks.

  We quickly hurried up the street and turned off to follow the footpath that led back through the fields. The sky darkened as we walked, and as we reached the stile, the first fat drops of rain began to fall, darkening the shoulders of our coats and our hats. In the end, we had to run for the kitchen door, breathlessly arriving in the kitchen in a whirl of muddy shoes and wet clothes, and there wasn’t time to say anything more than a hurried goodbye before we both had to get back to work.

  Chapter Eleven

  Just as Verity had said, the solicitor for Lady Eveline arrived for the reading of the will on the Wednesday of the next week. Mrs Watling and I had orders to prepare a more ambitious luncheon than normal. Rosalind Makepeace had taken to coming down to discuss the menus and the orders with Mrs Watling every morning, just as Lady Eveline had done. I presumed she was doing so on Lord Cartwright’s orders, but it still seemed a little bit of a liberty to me. I wasn’t alone in this. After she left that Wednesday morning, Mrs Watling had sniffed and tossed her head. “Thinks she’s lady of the manor already, that one does,” was her only comment.

  I nodded but said nothing, concentrating on making the rabbit quenelles. I was trying to remember Lady Eveline’s attitude towards her husband’s secretary. Had she been friendly with her? Or antagonistic? For the life of me, I couldn’t remember.

  According to Verity, the solicitor, whose name was Mr Fossick, was due to arrive at midday. When the front doorbell rang, faintly through the floorboards, at about five minutes before the hour, of course I thought it was him. But after a moment, several sets of heavy footsteps sounded up above. I looked up in consternation.

  After a moment, Verity came down with Dorothy’s breakfast tray, heaped with soiled dishes. “The police are here again,” she whispered as she brushed past me on the way to the scullery.

  Startled, I was distracted from my work for a moment. The police here? For the reading of the will? Why? As I bent to push the rabbit meat through a horsehair sieve to make it as fine as it could be, I wondered. Could it be that they wanted to watch people’s faces as the will was read? Were they looking for shock, or anger, or triumph?

  I wanted to be able to be there myself, to see for myself, but I knew that would be impossible. I plucked Verity’s sleeve as she walked back past me. “Is there any way you can be in on the will reading?” I murmured.

  Her expressive face showed what she thought of that suggestion. “Not likely. Not unless Dorothy has a fit of the vapours, or something.” I saw her expression change. “Actually, that gives me an idea. Yes, that might work… Leave it with me, Joanie.”

  I had to be content with that. There was soup to be clarified, roasting potatoes to turn, cheese to remove from the refrigerator. I patted the big metal box affectionately as I took out the paper-wrapped package. I’d worked in enough kitchens to really appreciate the new-fangled appliances that were slowly being introduced to the houses that could afford them. Of course, we still got daily deliveries of meat, milk, fish and vegetables, but now we could actually keep them fresh for longer than a day. It was marvellous. Right after I’d left the orphanage, I’d worked in one awful kitchen where the cook was a right, mean old skinflint. With my own eyes, I’d seen her ‘wash out’ a smelly, slimy chicken by sticking its backside over the gas jet and letting it fill with gas like stuffing. Then she’d lit the gas to get rid of the stench of rotting meat. Awful. I lost a lot of weight in that job, I can tell you. I didn’t dare eat anything she’d cooked. Luckily, me and the housemaids used to steal food, when we could, and hide it in a special cupboard only we knew about.

  Thinking of that horrible position made me feel rather grateful to be here now, with a reasonably sympathetic woman to work under, a decent kitchen and modern appliances to work with. I went back to the quenelles with a lighter heart, forgetting about the drama that was unfolding upstairs.

  After the lunch was sent upstairs, and the servants’ lunch was finished, both Mrs Watling and I fortified ourselves with a cup of tea and a bun. I decided this was as good a time as any to get a bit more information on the family.

  I began conventionally enough. “It’s a terrible tragedy about her ladyship, isn’t it, Mrs Watling?”

  Mrs Watling sighed and rested her head against the high back of the chair. “I never thought I’d have to go through anything quite so shocking in my life, Joan, and that’s a fact. I thought I’d go to my grave without having witnessed anything quite so awful. It makes me feel quite weak.”

  I knew what she meant. I was pretty sure that she wasn’t mourning Lady Eveline herself – who amongst the servants could? It was the shocking nature of her death that was so difficult to comprehend – that was what was so difficult to get past. I hesitated over my next question; it was one that could be taken the wrong way. “So what – what do you think happened, Mrs Watling? Who could have done such a terrible thing?”

  Mrs Watling sat up a little. “Not one of the family, if that’s what you’re thinking, Joan,” she said sharply. “I’m sure none of them would do such an awful thing. The very thought doesn’t bear thinking of.” She was silent for a moment and then said reflectively, “No, it must have been an outsider. A tramp or a maniac. Some terrible person like that. There’s been an awful lot of desperate men out there since the war.”

  I knew what she meant, but I forbad to point out that the war had ended twelve years ago. “You’ve worked for the family for a long time, haven’t you?”

  Mrs Watling sighed. “Almost twenty years, Joan. That’s why I can’t think—” She pushed up the rim of her cap and sighed. “I knew Master Duncan as a tiny boy. He was such a lovely child. Such golden curls and such a winning way about him. He used to come down to the kitchen for raisins and ask for them so sweetly. Of course, his mother put a stop to
that once she found out, and quite rightly.”

  I waited. She was obviously in a reminiscing mood.

  “Lord Cartwright wasn’t so wealthy then but they still had to have the best of everything. My goodness, what armies of staff we had then, Joan. You would scarcely believe it. Of course, anyone who was anyone wouldn’t have dreamt of having less than three footmen. I was a kitchen maid then, and the cook was a Frenchwoman, Madame Bouchard. French cooks were the fashion, then.” Mrs Watling sighed again and then painfully eased herself from her chair. “What a long time ago now it seems. Another lifetime.”

  With a sudden painful twist, I saw what she meant. For a second, my imagination showed me a young and pretty Mrs Watling, slim in her maid’s uniform, dashing hither and thither under the orders of the French cook. I looked at her now, rather stouter and greyer, and worn out from the hard work. Yes, she was a cheerful sort of woman but I realised now I knew nothing about what she’d wanted to become, what her dreams and hopes and aspirations had been. I saw myself, twenty years from now, doing the same thing. I would be ‘Mrs Hart’ but I would not be married. I would not have any children. I would have spent my entire youth slaving over a baking hot stove, making sure the fat, lazy people up above wanted for nothing, while down below my life went up in smoke and down the drain.

  Shaken, I forgot about asking more about the family. Silently the two of us got up and moved towards the kitchen table, our hands reaching automatically for the pots on the stove, the utensils on the chopping board. My throat closed up. All of a sudden, the kitchen felt stifling, its walls closing about me.

  “Just got to get a bit of air,” I mumbled and staggered towards the door to the courtyard outside. I saw Mrs Watling look at me in surprise but by then, I had reached the steps and run up them, to stand out in the courtyard, tipping my face up to the sky and taking deep breaths of clean, cold air.