The Enemy in Our Midst: A Lord Charles Stewart Mystery

by Conley, John E.

  © 2015 John E. Conley

  I. Tranquility

  Northern France

  Summer, 1916

  No place on earth was ever less appropriately named than the River Somme in the north of France. The name came from the Celtic word for ‘tranquility’ and, perhaps at the time it was discovered, the one hundred and fifty mile river flowing from the Forest of Arrouaise to the English Channel seemed tranquil enough.

  All that changed forever on July 1, 1916 when a chain of events was put in motion that would conclude in a murderous rampage twelve years later. For, in early July of 1916, Colonel Peter Humphries and the Seventh Battalion was one of many British units that joined the French in attacking the Germans entrenched along the River Somme.

  Colonel Humphries was a strict disciplinarian and singularly unlikable man. He was tall and stocky with a bushy mustache that could never be large enough to hide an oversized and unpleasant mouth. Out of that mouth spewed a constant stream of orders and vulgarities that, according to those who heard it, often drowned out the surrounding gunfire.

  His battalion of Yorkshire men was made up of willing, but mostly untested, soldiers, many of them barely out of their teens. War was new to all of them. The concept of driving back the Germans, while sounding romantic, proved to be far from it. Barbed wire fences and trenches hindered progress from the very beginning of the one hundred and forty day offensive.

  September found the battalion near Delville Wood, camped as comfortably as it could be within such close proximity to the German line. Humphries sat on his cot in a tattered tent, a small wooden box containing personal items at his side. He scratched his unshaven face, closed his eyes, and leaned his head back.

  ‘When will it end?’ he thought to himself. ‘When will I get to see Yorkshire again?’

  After a pause, he said to himself, ‘Will I EVER see Yorkshire again?’

  The Colonel reached down and lifted the lid of the box, taking out a letter that lay on top of a small stack of letters. He silently praised his home country for seeing that mail got through to the men, although he knew all mail was being read by censors.

  He had read the words in the letter many times in the last few days and he would continue to do so until the next one arrived. This time, his deep concentration was interrupted when a young private flung open the flaps of the tent and stuck his head in.

  “Colonel, you awake?”

  Humphries looked up in surprise and said gruffly, “I haven’t slept since July. What is it, Leatherby?”

  The young soldier grinned mischievously and replied, “Just a moment of your time, Colonel.”

  Leatherby stared intently at the document Humphries was holding. “Didn’t mean to interrupt your reading, sir. Another letter from home?”

  “Yes. What do you want, Leatherby?”

  “It’s Cooper again, sir,” the private explained. “I really do think you need to do something about his nasty habit of stealing food from us. I mean, it’s getting rather blatant, sir. Quite unwarranted.”

  Colonel Humphries laid the letter on top of the box, glared at the young man, and said in tones that clearly showed his lack of patience, “Leatherby, we have lost half our men since the beginning of July. The Germans are close enough to throw a rock at. Our own artillery has a tendency to bombard us. And you barge in here to tell me Cooper is taking your biscuits?”

  “It’s a morale issue,” Leatherby stated, gazing at the Colonel. “I just thought you ought to know, sir.”

  “Thank you, private. I’ll look into it.”

  The tent flap closed behind Leatherby as he left and Humphries shook his head, sliding the letter into its envelope and returning it to the box. He rose from the cot and walked outside, somewhat glad to feel the cool breeze on his face. The Colonel observed men in small clusters in front of tents, the occasional fire heating pots of coffee. Alistair Cooper, a twenty year old man nearly as large as Humphries himself, was easy to find. His booming voice and almost constant hand gesturing when he talked made him stand out prominently.

  Cooper’s wicked temper made him both a feared member of the battalion and a target for good-natured harassment by pranksters like Leatherby and Charles Stewart, a reporter for the London Daily Telegraph, who was assigned to follow the unit and submit reports back to the paper. Lord Charles Stewart, as was his proper title, was the son of a Duke and Duchess in Yorkshire. At thirty six years of age and having had his newspaper successfully appeal his conscription, Stewart eagerly accepted the assignment of following a British battalion into battle, as long as he never had to fight. He became as much of the camp as the men carrying arms and was, in fact, often sought out by them for his story telling skills.

  Stewart’s ears perked up when he heard the Colonel’s familiar voice bellow out, “Cooper!”

  The Colonel and Cooper came face to face in clear view of anyone wishing to watch, which meant, of course, the entire camp.

  “Cooper, are we not feeding you enough?”

  “Considering we haven’t had a decent meal in months…,” the private began.

  “We’re at war, Cooper. You’re not on holiday.”

  Cooper scowled and replied, “Has somebody made another groundless accusation against me, Colonel? Was it Parker? Meath? Or Leatherby again?”

  “It doesn’t matter,” the Colonel confirmed. “I don’t want details or denials or any more promises of retaliation, Cooper. If you’re taking food—stop it. I don’t want to hear any more about it. Understood?”

  “Colonel, I really do think you have better things to do with your time than pester me over a piece of cheese left unattended by somebody,” Cooper said, his cheeks turning red from annoyance in the process.

  “I said I don’t want to hear it, Cooper. I’ll have you in chains the next time, I swear to God.”

  Humphries turned and walked away. Cooper kicked a nearby rock and it sailed across the ground until smacking against a cooking pan, resulting in a booming gong that rivaled a good church bell. The men roared with laughter, with the exception of Cooper, who flung open the front of his tent and disappeared.

  A horse and its rider diverted the attention of the men as it sped into camp, raising dust in its wake. Lord Charles Stewart looked up at the familiar face of the rider and grabbed his notepad and pencil. He knew that news might have just arrived.

  “Bingham, my man, you came to tell us the war is over, for sure,” Stewart yelled out.

  The Secret Service Bureau agent effortlessly slid out of the saddle, landed on the ground and wiped himself clean, saying, “You, sir, will be the first to know. But not today. I’ve been visiting with the locals a bit, gathering intelligence, if that’s possible from a Frenchman.”

  “Give me something to write, Bingham. Just a morsel,” Stewart pleaded.

  Bingham tied up the horse and replied, “After I talk to Humphries.”

  The permanently grave-looking agent strode away briskly and Charles returned to his seat in dejection. However, past history told him that Bingham would, indeed, keep his promise and provide even the tiniest bit of news. These days of relative calm in the fighting were few and far between and Charles used them to reflect on his decision to accept his present assignment. Although he lingered well behind the lines when the fighting raged at its worst, the stories the men brought him conveyed the awful nature of the struggle.

  He sat and thought of the young men risking their lives nearly every day. Each man had his own idiosyncrasies. Stuart Meath, for instance, had a strange ‘pastime’ of collecting bayonets and knives from dead or captured soldiers. As the days and weeks progre
ssed, the box he kept them in got heavier and heavier and more difficult to transport as the battalion moved slowly forward. Charles asked Meath about them and the only answer he ever got was, “They’ll be worth money someday.”

  George Parker always interested Stewart. He was older than the rest, being close to thirty. ‘I have plans,’ Parker would tell Charles, who had no doubt that whatever the man wanted to do would get done. Parker was intelligent, maybe even shrewd, and Stewart made a mental note to try to follow the man’s career after the war.

  Alistair Cooper was…Cooper. A man of limited intelligence and imagination, yet intriguing to Stewart in his ability to constantly be in the middle of anything resembling excitement in the camp.

  Nearly half an hour later, Charles heard the sound of footsteps and he turned to see Bingham returning. As always, the agent’s face gave away nothing, so Charles asked, “What’s happening that the folks back home need to know about?”

  Bingham sat on a nearby rock and thought before answering. The reporter knew that whatever he got out of Bingham would be only half of the truth, if that. Finally, Bingham said, “I’ve been visiting a few of the local cafes—the ones not likely to be raided by the Germans, you understand—and asking the people what they’ve heard. Most of the talk is unfounded rumor, but I get the distinct impression the next big battle will be somewhere near Guillemont, or Ginchy, or both. This thing is not over by a long shot, Stewart.”

  The forty year old Bingham was a particular favorite of Stewart. He was a master of disguise and at various times had ridden into camp as an old man, a visiting British aristocrat, and a farmer. Among Bingham’s jobs prior to the war was that of butler at a manor outside London and it was this fact that led Lord Charles Stewart to keep the agent in camp a little while longer to talk about prospective employment with Stewart when the fighting was over.

  Thus began a long and eventful partnership. But, there were far less agreeable events happening every day in the camp of the Seventh Battalion; events that, by themselves, led to nothing more dangerous than harsh feelings among men. The cumulative effect, however, would prove deadly.

  II. The Invitation

  Yorkshire, England

  Summer, 1928

  The Yorkshire region of England contains nearly every idyllic form of topography known to man; from the towering cliffs along the North Sea coast, to the rivers and streams that flowed in the wooded valleys between the rolling hills of the interior countryside. It may very well have been God’s own country.

  Lord Charles Stewart was familiar with both the beauty of Yorkshire and the horror of war along the Somme. His residence in Yorkshire was Balfron Manor, one of a half dozen manors passed down from Charles’s ancestors since the sixteenth century. Balfron offered the single gentleman the seclusion he preferred, but also the hunting, fishing and occasional gathering of friends he cherished.

  Balfron was a fairly typical square, Georgian style mansion in the countryside with a slate roof, latticed windows, and vine-covered walls. Charles’ primary love of the estate always centered on the grounds. Thick patches of woods stood next to clear, shallow streams and, in all directions, fields rose to the tops of knolls, only to disappear down the other side. Of equal importance to Charles was the fact Balfron was just a short drive away from the nearest golf links, the closest thing to an addiction he had.

  In these surroundings, interrupted sporadically by travel, Charles spent the intervening twelve years after the war. He was now a forty eight year old man of short stature and few distinguishing features other than bushy eyebrows that covered large, dark eyes. He grew neither a mustache nor beard. Charles’ personality was a blend of joviality, absent-mindedness, and flippancy that was known to puzzle strangers. But he also was flirtatious and had the knack of attaining the confidence of women he met, which proved helpful in his amateur sleuthing endeavors.

  In the leisure time that followed the war, Charles honed his interest in amateur investigation by closely following any accounts of local crimes that hit the papers. Of course, his family’s status in Yorkshire made it nearly impossible for the police to refuse. Charles never got more involved than being a pest to the investigators, but his lack of further participation wasn’t from a lack of trying.

  Charles was presently sitting in the comfort of the manor’s library on a warm summer evening, a box of cigars within reach, when the sound of a familiar voice caught his attention.

  “The mail, my Lord. And your brandy.”

  Charles took the letters and let the glass rest on the table next to him.

  “Funny how letters are often the source of the need for brandy as we grow older, Bingham,” Charles said to his butler in a melancholy tone.

  He perused the entire stack of letters before inserting an opener under the fold of one that struck his fancy. A moment later, he had his reading glasses out of his dinner jacket pocket and Bingham knew something of interest was found.

  Charles took a drink and Bingham watched the expressions on his face change with each paragraph he read.

  “Well, I’ll be damned,” Charles finally murmured.

  “Curious news, sir?”

  “Most curious. Do you remember old Colonel Humphries from the Seventh Battalion during the war?” Charles asked.

  “Of course, sir. And I remember you saying once he was a real…uh, ass…I believe was your exact wording.”

  Charles grinned. “Truer words were never spoken, Bingham. Colonel Peter Humphries was the biggest ass in the British army and I still contend the Daily Telegraph knew it when they assigned me to follow his battalion wherever it went. I never knew if he’d be killed first by a German or one of his own men.”

  “He’s written you, sir?” Bingham inquired.

  “Yes.”

  Charles took another drink and stared at the letter. “He’s organizing a week-long reunion of the old Seventh and I’m invited because of the months I spent with them. How extraordinary, don’t you think?”

  It was rarely Bingham’s place, or habit, to offer personal opinions unless specifically asked and he took the high road on this occasion.

  “Surely in the past dozen years he’s heard that no gathering is complete without you, my Lord.”

  Charles replied with a grin, “And he lives here in Yorkshire. Most certainly he has heard.”

  Bingham placed Charles’ slippers next to his chair.

  “We must go, you know,” Charles said with renewed enthusiasm. “He says several of the men have already agreed to be there. Cooper, Meath, Parker, Leatherby. I declare, Bingham. Most extraordinary.”

  Bingham refilled the glass Charles had nearly emptied.

  “Do you remember Cooper?” Charles asked. “Alistair Cooper?”

  “No, sir. I don’t believe I recollect him.”

  “He was barely over twenty at the time. Mercy, did he hate the Colonel”, Charles sighed. “No man I ever met had a shorter temper than young Cooper. But you know what? If a German had made him mad and we were all in a ditch together, there’s no other man I’d want beside me than Cooper. He would have taken out every one of them with his bare hands.”

  Bingham smiled. “I knew a few of those in the war, sir. Mostly good men who died in glory. Especially at Somme.”

  After a short pause, Bingham added, “Strange relationships were forged in those couple of years, my Lord. Besides ours, I mean. Some of the men you’d least expect it from joined up after the fighting and went on to be business partners and the like.”

  The butler watched Charles gaze out at the rolling terrain of the estate, and then said, “Is there anything else, sir?”

  Charles turned quickly, as if awakened, and replied, “We’ll drive to the Colonel’s tomorrow, Bingham. This should be quite, quite fascinating.”

  The following morning was hectic for Bingham, putting together the necessities for a few days away and finding room for it all in the Daimler. Charles seemed particularly energetic and ever since the invitation arri
ved Bingham had tolerated the retelling of many a war story. He withstood even more as they travelled north over the hills and through the valleys toward Danby. Only a single stop was required to ask a well-tanned farmer where the Colonel’s residence could be found. Four more miles of sheep-dodging and Charles’ shouts of warning—to both the sheep and Bingham—resulted in the pair pulling into the long drive of a stately residence.

  Stichen Manor pre-dated Lord Stewart’s Balfron, but was a few rooms smaller and sat on fewer acres. Still, it was the classic example of a gray stone Victorian manor with pointed towers on each end, massive windows, and a general air of ancient nobility.

  “Ah, the Colonel has done quite well in the years following the war,” Charles said to Bingham as the car approached the walk up to the front door. “He should be just over sixty now, I would think. Perhaps, like my brandy, he has mellowed with age.”

  The car was hardly stopped before a middle-aged servant was at Charles’ door.

  “Welcome, sir. Lord Charles Stewart, I presume.”

  “I am he,” Charles replied, climbing out of the car and adjusting his cap. “Bingham will help with the bags. The Colonel is in, I hope.”

  “Expecting you, sir,” said the man. “Calvert will assist you at the front door, my Lord.”

  “Splendid,” Charles replied with a smile.

  The heat of the day was already building, although noon was an hour away. The sun was brilliant as it shone against the front of the manor and glistened off the brass door knocker. But as Charles reached for it, the door swung open and Calvert appeared in his stiff, black coat.

  “Welcome, sir,” the doorman uttered in his deepest tones.

  “Thank you, my man. Lord Charles Stewart to see the Colonel, if I may.”

  “Of course. This way, my Lord.”

  They passed through the foyer and turned down a hallway containing several closed doors to rooms Charles suspected were storage and gun rooms. Soon, they were beside a massive wooden door that could only lead to a much bigger space. Calvert stopped and rapped. Upon hearing the voice from within offering a short, crisp acknowledgment, the servant opened the door and nodded for Charles to enter.