Sick of Shadows

by Beaton, M. C.

  ‘Lady Phyllis’s nickname is Lady Sponge.’

  ‘What!’

  ‘It seems that Lady Phyllis likes to be invited into other people’s homes and once there, she costs them a lot of money. Furthermore, she usually takes with her as many servants as she can so that she is spared the expense of feeding them.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Some other servants joined our gossip. They, too, remember visits from Lady Phyllis. One said she had only been invited for tea and yet she turned up with all her baggage and servants and claimed that she had been invited to stay. It took a couple of months to get rid of her.’

  Harry ran a hand through his thick hair. ‘Oh dear. I had better visit Lady Rose.’

  But when they arrived at the town house, it was to find only a caretaker and his wife in residence. Harry was told that the whole family was now at Stacey Court. He telephoned the earl, confidently expecting to be invited down, but it was Matthew who answered his call and told him that Lady Rose had given instructions that Captain Harry Cathcart was to be told she was ‘not at home’.

  ‘Not at home’ was society’s snub. It was a way of saying, ‘I don’t want to see you’.

  He sat down and wrote a heartfelt apology to Rose. Her father read it and decided not to show it to his daughter. Sir Peter Petrey was due back from Scotland soon. If only Rose would break off her engagement to this eccentric captain, Sir Peter would be so eligible and Rose seemed to like him. The earl threw Harry’s letter on the fire and decided to invite Peter to come on a visit.

  Harry, on receiving no reply from Rose, thought she was childish and ungracious. It never dawned on him that such an independent spirit as Rose Summer would have her mail read by her father.

  As the weeks passed and there were no new leads on the murder of Dolly Tremaine, Harry, still smarting over what he saw as Rose’s rejection of him, began to take on new cases and immersed himself in his work.

  As autumn crept over the English countryside and the smoky bonfire air hung over the bare frosty fields, the earl and countess began to make preparations to remove to London for the Little Season.

  Only Daisy felt as if she had been condemned to years and years of Sundays where nothing ever happened. Sir Peter had come on an extended visit and Rose seemed to enjoy his light-hearted company very much.

  It was a damp drizzly day when the cavalcade of carriages and fourgons arrived at the town house. The sight of the earl and his family and servants moving from the country to the town was like watching the procession of some minor foreign royalty.

  Smoke swirled down from chimney-cowls and the buildings were black with soot. As they arrived, the lamplighter with his long brass pole was making his journey around the square like some magician, raising his pole and sending another golden globe of light out into the dusk, leaving behind him, as he passed from lamp-post to lamp-post, a warm constellation of minor planets.

  Rose felt heavy of heart as she stepped down from the carriage. London, again. London, where the infuriating Harry Cathcart had no doubt forgotten about her.

  The only thing to raise her spirits was the thought that at balls and parties she would no doubt see the Honourable Cyril Banks. Some detecting was just what she needed to make her feel that her life was not totally useless.

  She was to have the opportunity of seeing Cyril sooner than she expected. The next day, having accepted the invitation to afternoon tea at the Barrington-Bruces while she was still in the country, Lady Polly set out, accompanied by Rose and Daisy, her own lady’s maid, Rose’s lady’s maid, and two footmen.

  Lady Polly wished to show off her new hat. It was not really new but one that Miss Friendly had refurbished. Lady Polly had quite forgotten how much she had objected to Rose’s hiring Miss Friendly in her absence and now considered the employing of the seamstress to have been all her own idea.

  Lady Polly’s round figure was covered in a large sable coat and round her neck was a sable stole. Her felt hat was trimmed with sable fur and on her small feet were fur boots. She felt very chic and did not know that her daughter thought she looked like some exotic beast in a cage at London Zoo.

  Rose herself was wrapped in a long fox coat but with a small fur hat perched rakishly over her curls. Daisy beside her, wearing a squirrel coat, felt its warmth banishing the cold of the day and wondered if she would ever see Becket again.

  When they arrived at the large white house in Kensington, they left their coats and entered the drawing-room in their tea-gowns. A fire was blazing on the hearth, but there was a large embroidered fire-screen in front of it and the room was cold.

  Rose recognized Cyril immediately. She waited for him to settle down so that she could get a chance to talk to him about Dolly. But she had to wait quite a time. The duties of a gentleman at five-o’clock tea were onerous. He had to carry teacups about, hand sugar, cream, cakes or muffins, all the time keeping up a flow of small talk. He had to rise every time a lady entered or left the room.

  At last he found a chair beside Rose and settled himself with a sigh. ‘Thought I was never going to get anything to eat.’

  ‘There is plenty left,’ said Rose. ‘Ladies do not eat, you know.’

  ‘Except for your companion.’

  Rose looked to where Daisy was ruining her gloves by putting a muffin dripping with butter into her mouth.

  ‘You must be as distressed as I am about the death of poor Miss Tremaine,’ began Rose.

  ‘Oh, that? Beastly business. I was grilled at Scotland Yard. Can you believe it?’

  ‘How too frightful for you,’ said Rose, smiling into his eyes.

  ‘I say, that fiancé of yours was there! Aren’t you ashamed of him being in trade?’

  This was insolence, but Rose chose to ignore it. ‘His work certainly takes him away from me a lot.’

  ‘If I were your fiancé,’ said Cyril, ‘I would stick by your side the whole time.’

  Rose rapped his arm with her fan and giggled, ‘Oh, sir, you flatter me.’

  Cyril’s eyes brightened. Rose was a considerable heiress and rumour had it that her engagement was shortly about to he broken. She was hardly ever seen out in society with her fiancé, and the gossips had said that he had never even visited her when she was in the country.

  ‘I do miss Dolly,’ said Rose, looking suddenly sad. ‘I wonder why she was running away?’

  ‘I think I can tell you that,’ said Cyril. ‘I think she was one of Sappho’s sisters.’

  Rose stared at him, puzzled. What had Dolly to do with Greece, and why was Cyril leering at her in that odd way? She remembered the lines of a Lord Byron poem: ‘What men call gallantry, and gods adultery/Is much more common where the climate’s sultry.’ He was always writing about Greece and he did have some poem about Sappho. Had there been some scandal? Had Dolly been in love with a married man? Her thoughts raced round and round at the same busy rate that had once animated the dead squirrels of Daisy’s coat.

  ‘I do not understand you, sir.’

  ‘Oh, never mind,’ said Cyril hurriedly, realizing that if Rose did actually understand him, she might think he was calling her a lesbian as well. He fetched up a sigh. ‘Deuced pretty girl, what?’

  ‘Yes, indeed and so sad. Did she ever say anything to you about being threatened by anyone?’

  ‘No, on the contrary, my friend Berrow was about to make her an offer.’

  ‘Lord Berrow is quite old, is he not?’

  ‘Stout fellow. In his prime.’

  ‘I am surprised to hear you speak so well of him when it looked as if he was about to succeed where you had failed.’

  ‘Believe me, Lady Rose, our friendship will survive anything. Now, I do not like to hear about murder from those pretty lips of yours.’

  ‘I wonder, sir, if you would mind asking Mrs Barrington-Bruce to remove the fire-screen?’

  Cyril darted off. When he returned it was to find his place had been taken by Sir Peter, who had just arrived.

 
‘When I came in,’ said Peter, ‘you were flirting with that dreadful toad, Banks.’

  ‘I was trying to find out information about Dolly,’ whispered Rose.

  ‘He is an awful pill. Do you think he killed her? He’s vicious, I think. There was some scandal.’

  ‘Oh, here he comes,’ said Rose, raising her fan. ‘Do talk about something else.’

  Daisy slipped from the room. On entering the house she had seen a telephone in the hall. She had wanted to phone Becket to tell him she was back in town, but Matthew had gone on a week’s leave and the study door was locked. She looked nervously about.

  The hall boy, who had been half asleep in his chair, stirred himself. ‘You looking for the Jericho, madam?’

  ‘No, I wonder if I might use the telephone?’

  ‘Is it all right with Mrs Barrington-Bruce?’

  ‘Oh, yes.’

  ‘That’s all right, then. I’m just going down to the kitchen. If anyone needs me, ring the bell.’

  Daisy waited until the green baize door had closed behind him and then picked up the receiver and asked the operator to connect her.

  To her relief, Becket answered the phone. ‘It’s me, Daisy,’ she whispered. ‘Why hasn’t the captain called?’

  ‘He did not know you were back. He wrote a letter of apology to Lady Rose but she did not reply.’

  ‘Her father reads all her post. He probably destroyed it. The captain should call.’

  ‘I’ll tell him. We are going to Oxford tomorrow. The captain wishes to talk to Mr Jeremy Tremaine.’

  ‘I wish we could go with you. I wish –’

  Daisy heard the drawing-room door upstairs begin to open and hurriedly replaced the receiver.

  ‘I sometimes wonder if perhaps I should be focusing my attention on Lord Berrow,’ said Rose to Peter.

  ‘He’s even more foul than Cyril.’

  ‘That is interesting. A murderer surely must be a foul person. Perhaps I will flirt with him a little when I next see him.’

  ‘Isn’t your fiancé annoyed when he sees you flirting with other men?’

  ‘Oh, no, he will understand it is all part of research.’

  ‘And what does your oh-so-frequently-absent captain think of me?’

  Rose looked at him in surprise. ‘He knows you are my friend. You are famous in society for being available to escort ladies who have been left stranded by their escorts.’

  He laughed. ‘What a reputation to have! Do you not care for me a little?’

  ‘You are a flirt, sir. Of course I value your friendship. Why is Daisy grimacing and winking at me?’

  ‘Miss Levine, may I say, is a most unusual companion.’

  ‘Excuse me.’ Rose got up and made her way to the corner of the room where Daisy was standing. ‘Why are you making all those funny faces?’

  ‘I phoned Becket to say I was back in town,’ whispered Daisy. ‘The captain sent you a full letter of apology. Your father must have torn it up.’

  Rose was suddenly furiously angry. She knew that her father would bluster and deny that she had been sent any such letter.

  ‘You know, Daisy, I sometimes feel like marrying anyone just to have my own home and freedom.’ Rose looked thoughtfully across the room at Peter.

  ‘Bad idea,’ said Daisy. ‘Men you marry can turn into heavy fathers.’

  ‘How would you know that, pray?’

  ‘Observation.’

  Daisy watched anxiously as Rose went back to join Peter and saw the ease with which Rose chatted and smiled at him. But the captain would surely call that evening.

  Harry arrived home late. Becket helped him out of his coat and told him about the destroyed letter.

  ‘I will see Lady Rose tomorrow,’ said Harry.

  ‘We are leaving early for Oxford, sir,’ Becket reminded him.

  ‘I shall call on her when we return.’

  Rose was prepared for bed by her maid. She picked up a book to read before going to sleep and then crossed to the window, parted the curtains and looked down into the square.

  Two men were standing over by the gardens, black silhouettes in the night. Something made her let the curtain fall and turn off the gaslight. She returned to the window and parted the curtains an inch and looked down again. The two men had moved into a pool of lamplight. Cyril Banks and Lord Berrow. As she watched, they both looked up at the house.

  She dropped the curtain quickly and stood there, her heart beating hard, suddenly frightened. Where was Harry?

  The next morning, Harry parked his motor car at Paddington Station and he and Becket took the train to Oxford. They sat in the dining-car and ordered breakfast as the train gave a great hiss and moved out of the station into a black and rainy morning.

  When the train stopped at Slough, Harry suddenly said, ‘I really do not know what to do about this engagement of mine.’

  ‘To Lady Rose?’

  ‘Who else? Perhaps, if I had not gone along with her plan, she might have enjoyed India and met some handsome officer.’

  ‘I think Lady Rose would be made unhappy by a conventional husband,’ said Becket. ‘If I may make so bold, sir, I think you and my lady are ideally suited.’

  ‘Nonsense. We would fight the whole time.’

  Harry stared gloomily out onto the platform. Opposite was a tin advertisement: ‘They come as a boon and a blessing to men, the Pickwick, the Owl, and the Waverley pen.’

  ‘I wonder who thinks up these advertisements,’ said Harry. ‘Some failed poet?’ And Becket knew the subject was closed.

  But at a telephone-box at Oxford Station, Harry telephoned Matthew and asked which social engagement Rose had for that evening.

  ‘A fancy-dress party at the Sowerbys,’ said Matthew.

  ‘Tell Lady Rose I shall be there to escort her.’ Harry rang off. ‘I shall be going to a fancy-dress party tonight, Becket. Do I have fancy dress?’

  ‘No, but perhaps we could improvise.’

  They walked down from the station and climbed into a hansom carriage. ‘Is Phil doing well?’ asked Harry.

  ‘Yes, he is very diligent. The house has never been so clean.’

  ‘How does he pass his leisure time?’

  ‘He reads. He enjoys books.’

  ‘I am thinking of starting a charity to help the poor of the East End. Perhaps we will get Phil involved. Instead of lords and ladies playing the part of bountiful benefactors, perhaps someone like Phil would be good at finding out the truly deserving. We have more than enough money now. Do I pay you enough, Becket?’

  ‘At the moment, yes.’

  ‘What does that mean?’

  ‘Would it be possible to continue to work for you were I married?’

  ‘You, Becket?’

  ‘You must have noticed my fondness for Miss Levine.’

  ‘We will see. Lady Rose without Daisy would be completely unprotected.’

  ‘Perhaps the ideal solution would be for you to marry Lady Rose and protect her yourself,’ said Becket boldly.

  ‘That’s enough, Becket. I will consider your problem, but for the moment I wish to hear no more about it.’

  St Edwin’s was one of the lesser Oxford colleges, haying been built on Gothic lines in the last century. They asked for Mr Jeremy Tremaine at the porter’s lodge and were escorted across to a stair off the main quadrangle.

  ‘First-floor landing, sirs,’ said the porter and left them.

  They mounted the shallow stone stairs and knocked at the door on the first landing.

  Harry had somehow hoped that the Tremaine family, driven by thwarted ambition, had murdered their own daughter. He had decided against the rector and his wife, however, which left the son.

  But the man who answered the door to them looked as if he could not hurt a fly. All the looks had gone to Dolly. Despite his youth, Jeremy was tall, thin and slightly stooped. He had a yellowish skin, like tallow, and wore spectacles on the end of his nose. He was dressed in a severe black suit and a white s
hirt with a high starched collar. His dusty fair hair was already thinning. Over his suit, he was huddled into a dog-hair rug.

  Harry introduced himself. ‘Come in,’ said Jeremy. ‘Excuse my dress, but the lazy scout has only just made up the fire. May I offer you something? Sherry?’

  They both refused. Becket took a chair by the door and Harry sat down in an armchair facing the one into which Jeremy had just lowered his long thin form.

  ‘Is it about my sister’s murder?’ asked Jeremy.

  ‘Yes, we still have no new clues. Have you any idea who could have done this?’

  ‘I have thought and thought.’

  ‘It must have been someone she knew,’ said Harry. ‘She must have put on that fancy dress to show someone.’

  ‘Perhaps she wanted to show it to Lady Rose and was attacked by some madman in the park.’

  ‘An intellectual madman,’ said Harry dryly, ‘to take the trouble to arrange her like the Lady of Shalott.’

  ‘I’ve thought about that,’ said Jeremy eagerly. ‘What if the whole effect was an accident? What if the murderer, horrified at what he had done, simply, well, laid her out, as it were?’

  ‘Perhaps,’ said Harry. ‘There was talk that Miss Tremaine was fond of a local blacksmith’s son, Roger Dallow.’

  Jeremy gave a scornful laugh. ‘Village gossip. I know where that came from. That old maid, Miss Friendly, always mooning about the place and dreaming of romance. Every boy and man for miles around was fascinated by Dolly, but she did not encourage any of them.’

  ‘Have you any idea what became of Roger?’

  ‘He ran away. I know that. His father is a brutal man, so nobody was surprised.’

  ‘And he never wrote to your sister or tried to communicate with her in any way? Becket, pray come nearer the fire. You must be frozen over there.’

  Jeremy gave a sour laugh. ‘As far as I know, Dallow was illiterate. He was keen to attend school, I’ll say that for him, but his father kept him working at the smithy.’

  Harry repressed a sigh. This whole journey had turned out to be a waste of time. He had learned that Jeremy had spent the summer in Greece and had waited eagerly for the Michaelmas term at Oxford to begin in the autumn. He could think of nothing more to ask him and he and Becket took their leave.