These people all had intricate bonds: by business ties, prospective marriages, friendships, common interests. And they weren’t prepared to endanger those bonds. He was facing them like he’d face a herd of elephants who would close ranks and scare him off if they could. He’d need to scatter them.
‘We are here in the same room,’ he began, ‘as we were a week ago when Sir Peter Treemore died. I’m fully aware of the painfulness of the situation, to all of you to some extent, as you were his friends, his family, partners, acquaintances. To some it is most painful as they are confronted with a deep loss, a wound that will probably never fully heal. I express my condolences and my regret for the situation to Miss Violet Treemore, the victim’s only daughter.’
‘If you are sorry,’ Erneste Demain said, ‘then why do this at all? Why put her through it?’
Although he stood a few paces away from Violet’s chair and didn’t reach out to touch her, he sounded oddly protective. Jasper glanced at Anton Müller, who looked grim.
‘Because her father’s death was no accident.’
Violet flinched under the word accident.
‘It wasn’t a burglary gone wrong either, a thief lashing out when he felt threatened and exposed. No. It was murder, cold and premeditated, and the killer needs to be brought to justice.’
Demain eyed him. ‘Are you saying the murderer is among us?’
‘Yes.’ Jasper let his gaze pass over their faces. The door into the corridor was closed.
‘And what do you expect now?’ Demain asked, his voice just a little too high. ‘That the killer will confess?’
‘That would be very convenient, but unlikely, don’t you think? No.’ Jasper waited a moment. ‘I’m certain this killer would never confess of their own accord. This killer is certain of the brilliance of the murder. Committed in a public place where everyone had access to the murder scene. Committed when dozens of people were around. Committed with a weapon that anyone can use. So we have means; we have opportunity extending to a wide circle; then there is motive.’
It was very silent. The only sounds came from the outside, through the window Jasper had opened before the first people arrived. A carriage rattled. A dog barked. Children cried out.
‘Ah, motive.’ Jasper folded his hands on his back and began to pace the space before the display cabinet that held the mask of death. ‘Wasn’t it obvious? The valuable mask, the discovery of the decade placed over his face… Making him the Lykean king, the ruler over lands and people, the father figure…’
Violet gasped and Demain moved a step to stand beside her. But Iris Phelps shot him a sharp look and he stayed in place.
Jasper said, ‘The mask’s placement across the features of the murdered man immediately struck me as highly significant. It exonerated the thief in any case, for, if he had killed to be able to get away, would he not have taken the loot along? It was easy enough. The murder had been committed in silence; there were no guards around. The window was still open and the way down easy enough for the shadowy Lynx. Even with a heavy mask strapped to his back. I doubt he would have placed it over his victim’s face. Why would he?’
‘People do odd things in a panic,’ Kurt Baum said. He stood close to the window, holding a book under his arm.
Jasper nodded at him. ‘I agree that not every action is logical when emotion is strong. But our Lynx is a cold-blooded individual. He has stolen many times and he never panicked. I grant you he might never have murdered before, but especially if he had on this particular occasion, would he have left the valuable he came for behind? His prize? No. The mask being left on the body was a clue. A clue to the identity of the killer.’
He looked around the room again. ‘The difficulty was that many people who were present at the opening and who were close to Sir Peter also had to do with the mask. His partner Erneste Demain, Herziger the museum director. His daughter Beate, Sir Peter’s bride to be.’
‘I never cared for the mask,’ Beate said. ‘I always thought it was hideous.’
Jasper ignored her. ‘I had also read in the newspapers about the curse attached to the mask. About the accident it had already caused at the excavation site. The man who had died there, Karl Müller… I wondered if Sir Peter’s murder had anything to do with this earlier death.’
‘The murderous mask,’ Rohmann said in a loud ridiculing tone.
Jasper eyed him. ‘Something that would play right into your hand. You wrote about the curse. How convenient for you that it struck again, here in Vienna.’
Rohmann blanched. ‘What are you suggesting?’
‘For the moment nothing. To keep this matter as simple as can be, I want to stick to a chronological order. I want to take us all back to the opening, where we stood downstairs listening to Herr Herziger’s speech on the discovery of the mask. Up here, however, it wasn’t empty. Sir Peter was here. And he was not alone.’
A sound came from the window and Nadja Bruckner shrieked. A pigeon landed on the windowsill and looked in, cooing. Jasper went over and with an arm gesture scared it away. He turned back to the crowd. Nadja held her hand to her face. Beate gave her a wry look and Anna seemed about to burst out laughing.
Jasper said, ‘The empress of Austria with her three ladies in waiting. That was the nickname someone had given me for my host’s daughter, Beate Herziger, and her three friends. The respectable Countess Lavinia LaRue, the jeweller’s wife, Anna Liebknecht, and the diplomat’s wife, Russian-born Nadja Bruckner. I cannot decide whether I find the nickname apt or not. At court, so I’ve heard, ladies in waiting have a lot of power as they are often privy to their mistress’s secrets. If they are talkative, indiscreet, it can cause a lot of harm. And the situation here was much the same. These ladies in waiting, or these friends, whatever I should call them, knew things. Things that could be very harmful to others.’
Nadja still held her hand to her face. Anna tilted her chin up.
Jasper continued, ‘While Sir Peter was alone here, he met with a female from his acquaintance. He pressed his attentions on to her. Or she offered herself to him willingly. Accounts as to the exact events vary. But in any case, they could have been seen in an intimate embrace. Something which would have been no doubt extremely painful to Sir Peter’s fiancée. Can we imagine the feelings raging through Beate Herziger’s heart when she came up to wish her husband-to-be well upon the opening of the exhibition and she found him in another’s arms? Can we not imagine she hid herself away to wait until the lady in question had left him and then emerged to confront him with what she had seen? Can we not imagine she was so angry she argued with him and even became physically violent?’
‘This is outrageous,’ Herziger said. His face was red and his veins bulged. ‘I didn’t give you permission to do this at my museum so you could accuse my daughter.’
‘Can we not imagine,’ Jasper continued, ignoring him, ‘how she may have stabbed the man she had once loved and who had wounded her so deeply? How she didn’t feel guilty after the fact, but placed the mask across his features to brand him for what he was: a man wearing a mask, someone deceitful and untrue?’
Everyone looked at Beate. She didn’t speak.
Lavinia LaRue cleared her throat and in a shaky voice said, ‘When I warned you not to marry him, when I told you about him and the French singer, you said you would sooner kill him than let him betray you. I didn’t believe you at the time. I didn’t think you capable of it, but now…’
Beate turned to her. ‘So you are not my friend anymore either, telling out loud what I shared in confidence.’
‘Is it not true? Didn’t you say you’d kill him?’
‘Yes, I said so, and I meant it.’
‘Beate, no.’ Herziger rushed to his daughter and put an arm around her shoulders. ‘She’s under shock. She doesn’t know what she is saying. Stop this, Jasper, stop it, please.’
Jasper shook his head slowly. ‘I cannot stop it. She admits she said it, meant it. That can’t be changed.’
Jasper shook his head again. ‘I’m sorry, my friend. It is true that if she had just come upon him with his arms around another woman, someone she knew and even trusted, she might have flown into a rage but would not have had a weapon on her to attack him with. But we must now come to another point. An important point. Your daughter knew Sir Peter was betraying her with this woman, before she came here for the opening.’
‘You mean it was Isobel Maurin and I told her?’ Lavinia LaRue breathed. She looked horrified. ‘I’m so sorry that—’
‘No. It was not Isobel Maurin and you didn’t tell her. Someone else told her. Someone who had been asked to tell her in exchange for money. That person had no scruples about taking the money and passing on the news. Beate believed her.’
Lavinia looked at Anna. ‘You did it. You never had any feeling for other people. You are a vain self-centred little monster.’
Anna’s jaw dropped. ‘How can you say such a thing?’
Beate raised a hand. Her expression was lifeless, cut from marble. ‘It was not Anna who told me. It was Nadja.’
‘Nadja?’ Lavinia gasped, staring at her Russian friend who let her shoulders hang.
‘Nadja told me that Sir Peter was having an affair with Anna.’ Beate spoke in a dull tone. ‘And I knew it was true. Anna was much younger than me, more beautiful and so accomplished. He had to love her, not me. Never me.’ She hid her face in her hands and her father wrapped his arm around her tightly. His eyes blazed at Jasper.
Jasper said, ‘Beate knew before she came here what Sir Peter was really like. She was angry, hurt and humiliated by his betrayal, with one of her best friends too. She had already said once she would kill him if he wasn’t faithful. Did she bring a knife that afternoon to make good her threat?’
‘Stop it.’ Herziger breathed heavily. ‘It wasn’t her. I did it. I stabbed him. He told me he would take the mask away from here, to another museum who had offered him more money and more publicity. I got so angry I lost all reason and stabbed him. I then placed the mask on his face to suggest the murder had something to do with the excavation and the accident there.’
* * *
Beate raised her head and looked at her father. He was confessing to murder? Surely that couldn’t be right. He was a righteous man. She had sometimes hated him for being so stern with her. She had sometimes wished she could be free. But her father wasn’t a killer.
Was he?
Jasper said, ‘You are very chivalrous, my friend, sacrificing yourself for your daughter. But you did not kill Sir Peter. I know that for a fact. You were downstairs giving your lecture. Everyone could see you.’
‘I did it before that.’
Jasper shook his head. ‘It wasn’t you.’
Beate held her breath. Could this be true? Could her father be lying to protect her?
Could it be that he truly loved her, valued her?
Tears burned behind her eyes.
Jasper said, ‘It wasn’t you, and it wasn’t Beate either. Yes, she knew about the affair between her fiancé and her best friend. Yes, she had vowed to kill him if he betrayed her. But it was not her hand that pressed the dagger into his chest, or her hands that placed the mask across his features. She is not guilty. And you need not worry about her anymore.’
Beate saw her father closing his eyes and tears running down his cheeks. She wrapped her arms around him and hugged him. ‘Papa.’
* * *
The sight of father and daughter clinging to each other, so suddenly relieved of their fears that the other had done it, touched Jasper but his focus shouldn’t shift. He had work to do here and the risk increased as he eliminated people and closed the circle on the true killer.
He let his gaze pass on to the others present. ‘Sir Peter was fond of female attention and it was all too obvious he wasn’t attending Isobel Maurin’s concerts just because he loved her singing. There were whispers about them.’
Isobel gestured. ‘There are always whispers in Vienna. You must not take all of this so seriously, Jasper. No one ever killed about a rumour.’
‘No?’ He hitched a brow. ‘You may underestimate the power of passion, dear madame.’
‘I’m a free woman. Who would care what I do?’
‘Ah.’ Jasper smiled. ‘I had no idea of it until someone told me in passing. You are a free woman now, yes, but you have been married. To whom exactly?’
Isobel stirred uncomfortably. ‘Do we need to bring that up here? It is over and done with.’
‘Then I’ll tell everyone. You’ve been married to Rupert Rohmann. The very man writing about the curse on the death mask. The very man interested in possible violent death coming for Sir Peter. Your secret lover?’
‘I object to this.’ Her eyes blazed. ‘You know nothing.’
‘Do you object to Sir Peter being your secret lover, or Rohmann? I have asked around and it seems you are still seeing each other. In seedy hotels, away from the public eye.’
Rohmann turned red. ‘You make it sound sordid, Jasper. It is not. We love each other and we’re getting back together.’
‘Is that a fact?’ Jasper didn’t look at Rohmann but at Isobel Maurin. She looked exasperated, with him or with her ex-husband he couldn’t quite tell.
‘Your former wife isn’t eager to confirm, Mr Rohmann. Perhaps you weren’t so sure of her affections after all? And you removed the competition? Such a convenient way to do it too, suggesting the mask had something to do with it. Kill two flies with a single stone: reclaim your ex-wife and write the article of your life. The one that could bring you back in business after your… lapse.’
‘I need not listen to this.’ Rohmann hissed. He wanted to go to the door but Jasper’s voice halted him. ‘Did you not attack a diplomat? Did you not pull a pistol on him? Don’t you still own that pistol?’
‘And what of it? Sir Peter wasn’t shot but stabbed. It wasn’t me.’
‘You were here for the opening. You were seen skulking about this floor. What were you doing here?’
‘I kept an eye on Sir Peter to see if he met up with Isobel. But I didn’t kill him.’
‘So you say.’ Jasper focused on Isobel. ‘Did you meet up with him, Madame Maurin?’
‘I wished him good luck. Just between friends.’ She smiled coyly.
Rohmann scoffed but didn’t speak. Jasper wondered how far he would go to protect the woman he still cared for, no matter how much she trod on his heart with her callous behaviour.
‘Did you kill him?’ he asked Isobel.
‘You asked me before and I say what I said then. Should I now confess that I have? I had no reason. He was very good to me.’
Rohmann made a hissing sound, shaking his head, but still didn’t speak or give anything away.
Jasper looked him in the eye. ‘Mr Rohmann, you just said you kept an eye on your ex-wife. Did you see what passed between them?’
‘Not exactly. It happened in an alcove.’
‘You…’ Isobel glared at him.
Rohmann said, ‘But when Sir Peter left, he was still very much alive. I followed Isobel downstairs. Neither of us has anything to do with his death.’
‘Why would you believe them?’ Demain asked. He pointed at Rohmann. ‘Writing about the curse was very profitable to him. He had every reason to kill Sir Peter.’
Jasper smiled at him. ‘And who put the idea to write about this curse into his head? Who was his source of information? Someone close to the fire?’
* * *
Demain didn’t dare look at Rohmann now to see a sign of guilt in that ferret’s face. Had he betrayed their conversation to Jasper? What for? That could only harm them both. But Rohmann wasn’t reliable. He should have known. A lousy drunkard.
But
then again, what choice had he had?
Jasper said, ‘Do you deny, Mr Demain, that it was you who shared with Rohmann what happened on the excavation site and encouraged him to write about this supposed curse?’
‘Only to gain more attention for the exhibition.’ Demain laughed nervously. ‘People gobble up that sort of thing. I wanted it to become a success. For Sir Peter and his daughter.’
Violet looked at him. ‘You used the accident we were all so upset about to create a story?’
‘It attracts people. Better to use the death for something good.’
Her expression contorted. ‘Perhaps you even caused the accident. To attract attention. You are now a very popular man with your lectures at every club in the city.’
Demain felt like she had dug a dagger into his back, and was twisting it with her cruel words. But he didn’t show it. He only said, ‘Don’t be silly, child. Accidents like that happen on sites.’
Jasper said, ‘Demain fed information to Rohmann, who wrote his sensationalist pieces about the curse. Of course, to keep the excitement going something had to happen at the opening. Something major. Like another death.’
Demain said, ‘If you think I would kill someone for attention, you are mad. A man I worked with for many years.’
‘But whom you never befriended. You told me as much. You worked with him but you never truly liked him. How hard would it have been to use him to your own ends?’
Before Demain could protest, Jasper already continued, ‘You were about to use his daughter to your own ends. You wanted to marry her. You pressed your attentions on her.’
‘No, I never…’ Demain felt like his face was on fire. Everyone looked at him that way: as if he was a creature that had crawled from the dirt. Not worth stepping on. ‘I never—’
‘He approached me.’ Iris Phelps spoke calmly. ‘He asked me to support him in his attempts to win over Violet. I told him that Violet wasn’t eager to get attached to anyone and she would probably not welcome any attempt to persuade her otherwise. But he was persistent. He even offered me money to assist him. He suggested that as Violet had an impressionable nature, I could somehow convince her that she needed to marry him.’
An Exhibition of Murder Page 20