Fifth Member

by Claire Rayner

  ‘Oh, hell,’ she said in a whisper. ‘He was a Klinefelter’s.’ ‘I don’t know what you call ’em,’ Gus said. ‘But according to the guy’s medical records which Roop got hold of – don’t ask how – this bloke had been a borderline case, registered as a male but …’ He shrugged. ‘I gather it’s not uncommon for there to be such doubts about gender. And because Scroop never told Edward about himself, and just dumped him, Edward hated him. Always did. And according to Powell, it was the deception about his gender he had hated him for the most. He’s a bit of an amateur psychologist, this Powell, and he spouted a lot of stuff about Edward having doubts about his own sexuality, and that, married to his rage about his birth experience and the way his mother failed to give him his birthright by not going through with a normal birth, made him hate women. And Scroop had been womanish. Anyway, Powell was clear, Edward hated Scroop. And then, it turns out, Scroop tried to get money out of Edward for old time’s sake, he said, and Edward got mad. He arranged to meet Scroop at the shed on the waste ground, where they used to meet, years ago. It was a favourite haunt, apparently. That was why no one saw anyone arriving there in a van or whatever. They got in quietly as they always had. And Edward strangled him. He left the body there.’

  ‘But why the Ripper? Was it just to bewilder us?’

  ‘Sort of,’ he said. ‘That was part of it, we reckon. But not till after he’d done in Scroop. Edward realized after he’d strangled him that he’d left him in one of the Ripper’s old stamping grounds. We think he must have gone back long after the strangling and done the chopping up and added the genital mutilation to assuage some personal need. It wasn’t hard for him to do that. Cut throats and chop off organs, I mean. He was as keen a huntsman as aristocrats like him are supposed to be. Used to shoot deer, so knew how to gut them. He was good with a knife. And then he set to work to get rid of the rest of the people in the same way. His brothers, so that he could get the inheritance, especially the title, because he’s always been a hell of a snob, we’ve been told, and to which he believed himself fully entitled. The doctor who was to blame for what happened when he and his twin were born – it was you who worked that out, of course. Sam Diamond, partly because, like his brother CWG, he was on the Committee trying to do away with inherited power in Parliament and partly to please his latest lover Jasper, who’s a right bastard and who’d screw anyone for threepence and then sell the bits for candlewax. And of course, killing someone who was in Powell’s way as Sam was, on account of he’d had a fight with Alice when he’d found out what was going on and he’d threatened to stop Powell as a way of getting her out of trouble – again, he should have been so lucky! – added to his hold on Powell. Or so Edward figured. The fashion espionage thing was all Powell’s. He made a bomb out of it. So, there you have it. It’s all explained, even the sending of the fax to direct us to the storeroom where Richard’s body was. Once he’d started the Ripper thing he had to keep it up. It was the only way to keep us convinced a set of murders, including two which directly benefited him, were nothing to do with him.’

  ‘He lured his brother to the Market by telling him Marietta was there and asking for him? I was right about that?’

  ‘Oh, yes. You were right. Cigaretta, ye Gods! Anyway, it worked.’

  ‘How did he get in?’ she asked, coughing painfully once more.

  ‘In his usual way: conning and bribing. Told a storeman at the Market he wanted to play a trick on a mate: gave him five hundred quid and got the back-door key copied, and the details of the alarm system. Roop managed to get hold of him.’ He shook hi; head almost in admiration. ‘I have to hand it to the bastard – Edward, that is. He did his job thoroughly: vetted all his sites; used ’em cleverly; got his victims where he wanted them. Scroop, of course, knew the hidden shed; he’d met Edward there before. As for the Bishop – well, we don’t know yet how he lured him. But I imagine some tale of a person in trouble would work well enough. Dammit, the man was both a doctor and a committed Churchman. It wouldn’t be difficult, I imagine, to play on his compassion. Getting his own brothers, David and Richard, to meet him almost anywhere wouldn’t be difficult. Even though we now know they weren’t on the good terms people thought they were, they were still brothers. Edward just had to invent some sort of crisis and they’d turn out. They wouldn’t want to but they would. Edward used a sick Marietta as his bait, as you said. He only had one weak spot – Marietta herself.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘Yes, and it all got very dicey then. He suddenly realized Marietta knew the twin-birth facts – her husband had told her, or she found out through some casual comment – so she had to go. He used Powell to help with that. And was, I’m sure, all set to kill off his old nanny too, eventually, because she knew too much. It all fits, doesn’t it? And while you did a hell of a good job of the case, you have to face the facts, my darling. Old Roop did all the dirty work. You had the fun.’

  She touched her throat and glared at him, and then, after a moment, let her lips curve. ‘You’re right,’ she whispered. ‘I owe him an apology. Dammit.’

  ‘That,’ said Gus with a huge appreciation, ‘is something I will have to see.’

  ‘Is Marietta OK?’

  ‘Fine,’ he said. ‘She’s in another of these side wards here. This bleedin’ hospital’s packed with people from this case.’ He chuckled appreciatively. ‘There’s some admin. type going around tearing his hair out over it. Wants to know who’s going to pay for all these beds. I should worry!’

  ‘I’ll help him sort it out. It’s not his fault. Listen, Gus.’ George struggled with the words. ‘It’s all over? You’ve got Edward locked up? Does he get any privilege for being a lord? Which he is now, isn’t he? Will he have to be tried in the House of Lords or something like that?’

  ‘I’ve no idea,’ Gus said. ‘Right now, he’s in a common or garden nick, lord or not. I imagine, by the way, that the event that prodded him into the whole set of murders, was his brother’s marriage. It meant he might produce an heir, and cut Edward out for good and all – but what the hell! Let his lawyers sort out the rest of it. We’ve got bloody Lord Durleigh with enough evidence to swamp the House of Lords – What’s the matter! For heaven’s sake, what on earth’s the matter?’

  She was grimacing, her eyes shut against the pain and tears squeezing out beneath the lids as she tried to control the laughter that had suddenly filled her and realized that it looked very much as though she were weeping. She reached for his hand and managed to control herself.

  ‘Oh, Gus,’ she whispered. ‘I just thought of something. He did all this mostly to end up as Lord Durleigh? Of Durleigh Abbey?’

  ‘So I gather,’ Gus said, mystified.

  ‘Well, he’s failed,’ she said. ‘He isn’t Lord Durleigh at all. Just the Honourable Mr Edward CWG. Richard’s widow is pregnant with a boy. Doesn’t that mean that he’ll be the new earl?’

  ‘Do you know,’ Gus said, as a smile began to spread across his face, ‘do you know, I rather think you could be right.’

  In the small hours of the next morning, when George had slept off the effects of Dr Kelley’s injection, she turned and woke. Gus was still sitting at the side of the bed, his head drooping over his hands, which were holding one of hers, and she used her free hand to touch his hair gently, wriggling her fingers clear of the bandage. It sprang back under her touch and she felt a lift of pure delight at the look of it. He seemed to feel it, because he woke and lifted bleary eyes to hers.

  She smiled at him. ‘Hello, there.’ Her voice was still thick but had lost the painful hoarseness. He grinned widely at the sound of it.

  ‘Hello, ducks,’ he said. He lifted one hand and flicked the brim of an invisible hat with his thumb and forefinger. ‘How’re you doin’, then?’

  ‘Fine and dandy,’ she said. ‘Fine and dandy.’

  ‘Anything you want, sweetheart?’ He sounded soft and warm and solicitous and she looked at him consideringly.

  ‘Do you remem
ber, right at the start of this case, you bet me I was wrong about it being deliberate motive-based murder? You said you’d give me whatever I opted for when it was time to collect?’

  ‘I remember.’ He looked cautious. ‘Oh, Gawd, what do you want then? Something so bloody expensive I’ll have to sell a restaurant to pay for it?’

  Her smile widened even more. ‘Probably, very probably.

  ‘I thought, you know,’ she added, ‘that a baby might be rather nice. While we’re both still in one piece, you understand. Is that something you think you could manage?’

  ‘Manage?’ he said. ‘Oh, I think I could manage it. In fact, if you were a private patient instead of NHS, I’d manage it right now. But just let me get you home, my duck. Just let me get you home!’