by Carola Dunn
“Mr. Gooch drove off the road, Sir Nigel.” Best not to confuse matters with the rocket for the present, Daisy decided. It would come out soon enough. “He’s . . . he’s quite badly hurt, I’m afraid. But Dr. Prentice turned up and is taking care of him, and there are two ambulance men who were driving the van. You can ask the doctor, but I’d say the best way to help would be to remove Mr—Hello, Mr. Dryden-Jones.”
“What’s going on, Mrs. Fletcher?” The orangutan pointedly ignored Wookleigh.
“I was just telling Sir Nigel—there’s been an accident but the doctor has everything well in hand. It would be best if you’d just keep out of the way and let him get on with it.”
But the Chief Constable had gone ahead to speak to Dr. Prentice. Dryden-Jones followed with an irritable “Hi! This is my county!”
Dr. Prentice looked up and said angrily, quite loud enough for Daisy to hear, “What is this circus? Get those cars out of the way! We have to turn the van around.”
Wookleigh seized Dryden-Jones’s arm and steered him back towards the gates. “Yes, yes, my dear fellow,” he was saying as they came level with Daisy, “no one’s disputing that it’s your county, but even chief constables and lords lieutenant don’t interfere with the medicos. Let’s get our motors out of the way. By Jove, now here’s a lawyer. Doctor chappie’s right, just like Piccadilly Circus. They say you’ll meet the whole world if you hang about long enough in Piccadilly Circus. Morning, Lewin.”
“Good morning, Sir Nigel, Mr. Dryden-Jones.” A small, nondescript man in a black frock coat, striped trousers, bowler hat, and gold-rimmed spectacles joined them. “I tried and tried to ring up last night,” he said plaintively. “After due consideration, I thought it my duty. But the number was constantly engaged.”
“I was obliged to spend quite some time on the telephone last evening,” said Dryden-Jones. “Assisting the police, you know.”
“Then it is still . . . er . . . a police matter? I am shocked! I was calling upon a client in the neighbourhood, and after due consideration I thought it my duty to come to Edge Manor in case the police required my evidence. We guests were informed of an accident, but the circumstances were odd, very odd. I am Sir Harold’s solicitor, you know.”
“Was, my dear chap,” said Sir Nigel. “Or perhaps I should say ‘were.’ You were Tyndall’s solicitor. He is no longer among us.”
“As I feared! There is mischief afoot. But you err, sir, in saying I am no longer Sir Harold’s solicitor. My duty to him as his executor continues. And if a . . . er . . . crime has been committed, I must see the police at once. What is holding us up? If I cannot reach the house instantly, perhaps I should report to you, sir, as Chief Constable.”
“Not of this county!” Dryden-Jones howled.
Though dying to find out what the lawyer knew, Daisy decided it was time to intervene. “Dr. Prentice asked you to move your vehicles, gentlemen” she said with a touch of her mother’s grande dame manner. “There is a seriously injured man to be considered. Mr. Lewin, we didn’t meet last night. My name is Fletcher. I’m a guest at Edge Manor and my husband is the police officer in charge here. I believe your motor-car must be blocking Sir Nigel’s. If you would be so kind as to back down the hill, then the others can do likewise.”
Lewin and Dryden-Jones looked ready to take offence at being directed by a mere female, but Wookleigh said firmly, “Quite right, dear lady; come on, chaps,” and herded them away.
The lawyer started to object. Sir Nigel, his voice lowered but quite audible to Daisy, told him, “The Dowager Lady Dalrymple’s daughter, my dear chap.”
There were no further protests. But they left Daisy to the humiliating realization that she was sitting in one of the cars blocking the drive, and she didn’t know how to move it.
For heaven’s sake, she admonished herself, you’ve seen it done often enough. That was the hand brake, and that stick was the gear lever, between her seat and the driver’s seat. Those three pedals were the clutch, the foot brake, and the accelerator. Surely one could discover by trial and error which was which? The big dial on the dashboard showed how fast one was going. Did it work in reverse? Still, she had no intention of going faster than a snail’s pace. Oil pressure she could safely ignore for the few yards she needed to drive. At least she hoped so.
There remained the question of starting the machine. Peering at the floor by the pedals, she saw no self-starter button. Blast, she’d have to crank it.
The baby within, whose antics she had been ignoring, turned a somersault. Reprieve! No one could expect a six-months-pregnant mother-to-be to crank an engine. Which, now she came to think of it, was just as well, as she wasn’t at all sure how to find reverse gear, and wasn’t there something called double declutching? She hadn’t the foggiest what that involved.
As if reading her mind, Dr. Prentice stood up and called, “Mrs. Fletcher, can you drive?”
“No!”
“All right, come here then. Please.”
The “please” was definitely a perfunctory afterthought. Daisy reminded herself that he was a doctor dealing with an emergency. As she went to him, one of the van’s crew came to move the little car.
Daisy tried not to look at Gooch, but she noted from the corner of her eye that his head was bandaged and one arm splinted. “What luck that you came along!” she said warmly.
“I want a word with the police, and I thought I’d better look in on Lady Tyndall. Have you any nursing experience?”
“I’m afraid not.” Daisy felt more useless by the minute. She was definitely going to learn to drive, if not to become a nurse. “Is he going to be all right?”
“It’s touch-and-go. I’ll have to go with him in the van, and you’ll have to stay with the corpses. We can’t leave them unattended. The van will return to pick them up as soon as the men have carried this poor fellow into the house. How many months along are you?”
“Six.”
“You can walk up and down, then, so as not to get chilled. But I’ll give you a rug from my car anyway.”
“Thank you,” Daisy said meekly.
As they spoke, Prentice’s car had backed after the Lanchester into the lane, and the van followed, going forward. Then the van backed up the lane and returned, facing towards the house now. It stopped and the driver jumped out. The doctor’s car reappeared and the second man came to help lift Gooch into the rear of the van.
With considerable annoyance, Daisy saw the Lanchester’s long bonnet nosing after the runabout. She debated asking Dryden-Jones to watch over the remains of Sir Harold and Mrs. Gooch.
The van departed. The van man came to get the doctor’s car. Handing Daisy a tartan rug from behind the seat, he said, “Sure you’ll be all right, ma’am?”
“Hurry back,” she begged.
He drove off. The Lanchester pulled up beside her.
“What’s this, what’s this?” demanded the orangutan, alias Struwwelpeter, alias Dryden-Jones. “What were those fellows thinking, to leave you behind, Mrs. Fletcher! Allow me to offer you a lift.”
“The men are needed at the house, and someone has to watch over the bodies.” Daisy indicated the two sheet-covered stretchers at the side of the drive. “They couldn’t fit everyone into the van.”
Dryden-Jones paled. “Oh . . . er . . . yes . . . well.” Obviously he was not going to offer to take her place. Instead, he addressed his chauffeur, who, like a well-trained servant, had been pretending not to listen to their exchange: “Hotchkiss, take Mrs. Fletcher’s place. I shall drive her to the house.”
Hochkiss’s training was not proof against this. He turned an alarmed face to his employer. “Sir, do you think that’s a good idea?”
“I know how to drive!” He started to get out. “Nothing to it. Hop in, Mrs. Fletcher. I’ll take you to the Manor.”
As Daisy’s path crossed Hotchkiss’s, the chauffeur muttered to her, “Better hang on tight, madam.”
She hung on. She needed to. With Dryden-Jones
behind the steering wheel, the Lanchester started off like a startled rabbit and proceeded by leaps and bounds that would have done credit to a kangaroo. The big car shuddered and moaned.
Daisy was very glad she had not tried to drive, and more determined than ever to learn how. Properly.
Glancing back, she saw Wookleigh following at a cautious distance, his Bentley rolling smoothly along under his own control. She closed her eyes and tried to concentrate on what Gooch’s being injured might mean to the investigation.
They reached the forecourt at last and came to a halt with a final convulsion. Daisy opened her eyes. They were stopped right across the bows of the van, which had been backed up to the front door.
“You can’t stay there, old chap!” Wookleigh parked neatly beside the doctor’s car. As the lawyer’s small car pulled up beyond him, he strode over to the Lanchester and opened the rear door for Daisy. “My dear lady, are you all right?”
“I think so.”
“Take my arm, do. Dryden-Jones, you’ll have to move. The van can’t get out.”
Dryden-Jones still hung on to the wheel with a rigid grip. Turning his head cautiously, as if afraid it might fall off, he said with the merest trace of his usual asperity, “I shall go in only for a minute, just to make sure my county is providing the Chief Inspector with every facility.”
Wookleigh opened his mouth, but Daisy squeezed his arm and whispered, “If it means he’ll go quickly, leave it. The van driver can always move it if necessary.”
He looked down at her with approval and patted her hand. “Quite right, my dear. He may have to in any case.”
Daisy was too well brought up to omit thanking Dryden-Jones for the lift. She just hoped he didn’t think she was being sarcastic. He avoided meeting her eyes but climbed out of the car on wobbly legs. They all went into the house together.
They found Dr. Prentice and his patient in the entrance hall. The doctor was once again kneeling beside the stretcher, looking very worried. Before Daisy could ask him if Gooch’s condition had deteriorated, Babs came through from the passage. Behind her, a goggle-eyed maid peeked around the door.
Babs was breathing faster than normal, so she could only have arrived a few minutes earlier. After a glance of dismay at the gentlemen with Daisy, she disregarded them. “Dr. Prentice, I was ringing you up when I was told you’d just arrived, with Mr. Gooch.”
“I was on my way here when I came across the accident. I need to get him to bed immediately so that I can make a proper examination.”
“Gwen’s making up the cot in Father’s dressing room for him. I hope that will do. Dilys, show them the way.”
The maid scurried to obey. As the stretcher men picked up their burden once again, Prentice said, “I’ll need hot water bottles, plenty of hot water, bandages, and something suitable for splints.” Without waiting for a response, he followed his patient up the stairs.
“Daisy . . .”
“You go along, Babs,” said Daisy. “I’ll deal with things here. Sir Nigel, Mr. Dryden-Jones, Mr. . . . er-hm won’t you sit down?”
“Lewin,” said the lawyer. “Lewin, Lewin, Pent and Lewin. I really must insist—”
“All in good time, my dear fellow,” said Sir Nigel. “Can’t you see the household is all at sixes and sevens? Mrs. Fletcher, you come and take a seat. You must be in need of rest after your . . . adventures.” He gave the Lord Lieutenant a scathing look.
“Just want a quick word with the Chief Inspector,” said Dryden-Jones feebly.
Daisy would have liked nothing better than to sit down, preferably with her legs up, but she said, “I ought to see if I can find Jack Tyndall.”
“I’ll do that,” the Chief Constable offered, “if you’ll point me in the right direction.”
“The last I saw of him, he was on the lowest terrace, dismantling the fireworks apparatus.”
“Not to worry, if he’s there, I’ll fetch him in a trice. I’ll go out through the French doors, that will be quickest.”
As Sir Nigel’s tall, narrow figure disappeared into the drawing room, Alec emerged from the passage, followed by Tom and Piper.
Dryden-Jones darted towards him with a cry, “Chief Inspector, just the man I wanted to see.”
Not to be pipped at the post, the lawyer scurried after him. “Chief Inspector? You are in charge of the case? I am as yet unaware of . . . er . . . precisely what has occurred, but—”
Dryden-Jones raised his voice. “Since Gloucestershire is my county, I—”
“I consider it my duty, much as it goes against the grain—”
“I want to assure you—”
“I feel obliged to inform you,” Lewin persisted, rivalry provoking him into abandoning the discretion demanded of a lawyer, “that Sir Harold disclosed to me last night that he intended to change his Last Will and Testament to disinherit his son.”
15
Dryden-Jones broke the silence that followed the solicitor’s revelation. Scarlet with embarrassment, he gabbled, “Needn’t tell you, shan’t breathe a word, none of my business. Mum as the grave. Oh dear, not the best way to put it!” He pulled his gold hunter watch from his fob. “Dash it, is that the time? Bit of a rush, don’t you know. Anything my people can do for you, Chief Inspector . . . Know you’ll excuse me, Mrs. Fletcher!”
Routed again, he bowed and fled, to Daisy’s vast relief. “ ‘Stand not upon the order of your going,’ ” she muttered to herself, “ ‘but go at once.’ And don’t come back.” She doubted he’d know how to start his car, but the van driver could move it when he came down.
Alec looked after him grimly. “Let us hope he really can keep a still tongue in his head. Sir,” he said to Mr. Lewin, “while I appreciate the information, I can’t but feel it would have been preferable to convey it privately. I take it you are Sir Harold’s lawyer?”
Lewin was almost as red in the face as Struwwelpeter had been. “I don’t know what came over me,” he stuttered. “I assure you, Chief Inspector, it is not my practice to . . . er . . . broadcast my clients’ confidential affairs. Lewin’s the name, of Lewin, Lewin, Pent and Lewin. I trust . . . er . . . dare I hope—that you will overlook my disgraceful error of judgement and not mention it to anyone? I feel it very deeply, indeed I do.” He took out a handkerchief, blotted his forehead and polished his glasses.
“You can count on my discretion, Mr. Lewin, and that of my men. And my wife’s.” Alec cast a minatory glance at Daisy, who had installed herself on the sofa by the fire. “The Lord Lieutenant’s I cannot speak for. We shall need to take a statement from you.”
“Oh no!”
“I’m afraid so. Detective Sergeant Tring will accompany you to the billiard room and you can tell him exactly what Sir Harold said to you. Thank you for coming forward, sir. Lawyers are rarely so accommodating to the needs of the police.”
With witnesses to his outburst, Lewin hadn’t a leg to stand on. Looking very hangdog, he followed Tom through the door to the passage.
“That was a nasty dig, darling,” said Daisy as Alec sat down beside her, and Piper opposite. “I suppose he deserved it, but I must say Mr. Dryden-Jones is enough to make anyone forget himself. Thank heaven he’s gone.”
“Yes, but Daisy, what’s this about Gooch? All I know is a maid brought a message from Miss Tyndall saying he’d crashed his car. He was upset when he left us, but I didn’t suppose him incapable of driving or I’d not have let him go!”
“He looked fearfully upset when he passed us—Babs and I were walking along the drive—but he’d have managed if it hadn’t been for the rocket. It shot straight across in front of him. It would have been a miracle if he hadn’t lost control.”
“Did you see who set off the rocket?”
“No, but—”
“We’ll come back to that. Go on.”
“His car went into the ditch and hit the gatepost. He was unconscious and bleeding.” Daisy did her best not to picture the scene. “I don’t know what Babs and I would
have done if the mortuary men hadn’t turned out to be St. John’s Ambulance men as well.”
“Where did they take him?”
“Babs said to bring him here. Upstairs, in Sir Harold’s dressing room.”
“Ernie.” Alec jerked his head towards the stairs.
“First floor, third door on the left,” Daisy directed as Piper hurried off. She moved closer to Alec and took his hand. “It was the greatest of luck, darling, not only the ambulance men, but then Dr. Prentice came along and took over.”
“Ah yes, I was expecting him. Good timing.”
“Except that Babs had already left to telephone for him when he arrived. Maybe I should have tried to catch up with her.”
“Certainly not! You didn’t try to help the doctor, did you?”
“He made me sit in his car. And then the others kept turning up, Struwwelpeter, then—”
“Daisy! Struwwelpeter?”
“Don’t you know that illustration of the children’s rhyme? German, I think. The boy with hair like a bush and long, curly fingernails. Not that I’ve noticed anything wrong with the Lord Lieutenant’s fingernails, but perhaps ingrowing hair would explain—”
“Daisy!” Alec reproved her again, but with a grin.
“Sir Nigel called him a stuffed orangutan.” She defended herself. “Or at least, told him not to sit there like a stuffed orangutan. He was just sitting there in his great big car, with all the drama going on, and when Sir Nigel pulled up behind him, he hopped out to see if he could help.”
“Wookleigh’s here, too?”
“Yes. He’s gone to look for Jack. And then that little lawyer arrived and started fussing about how he had to get through because it was his duty to tell you—But I never guessed he was going to make quite such a shattering announcement.”
“One of the maids told Tom she overheard Sir Harold threatening to cut young Tyndall out of the will, yesterday afternoon. She assumed it was just another row. But if Sir Harold actually went so far as to speak to the lawyer, it doesn’t look good for the boy.”