Murder on the Moor

by Julianna Deering

  Beaky took a hearty bite of his pie. “You know, Gray, speaking of wives, you and Mrs. Gray ought to come round to the Lodge and have dinner. It would be just me and Sabrina and the Fartherings, of course, but you two might like to get out for the evening. I’d say bring your father, but I have a feeling that might not be as well received as we’d like, eh?”

  Gray chuckled, more relaxed now. “I think we’ll just skip that bit, if you don’t mind. What the old fellow doesn’t know won’t put him out of temper.”

  “That’s settled then. We’ll expect you and the missus, say, Thursday evening. Eight o’clock. Fair enough?”

  “Done.”

  “Oh, Beaky, did you absolutely have to?” Sabrina rolled her eyes and blew cigarette smoke out through her nose as she paced before the drawing room fire. “And I thought we were all getting along so well as we were.”

  “It’s just one evening,” Beaky said. “I thought it would be nice to have guests while the Fartherings are here.”

  “Yes, but those guests? He’s all right enough, I suppose, though I don’t know how he manages to stand upright, spineless as he is. But you know she despises me.”

  “Now, darling—”

  “Now nothing. You know she does. You can tell by how very polite she is with her prickly remarks. How he’s stayed with her for the past fifteen years, I couldn’t possibly tell you.” She puffed on the cigarette once more and then ground it out in the marble ashtray on the end table beside the sofa. “You might have talked to me first.”

  Beaky looked at Drew and Madeline, wincing almost imperceptibly. “Sorry, old girl, I really didn’t think about it. Drew and I were just talking to Gray and it just seemed the right thing to do. How will we ever mend things between us and Westings if we don’t start somewhere?”

  “It would be helpful if we could spend a little time with them,” Drew added when it was clear she was not going to reply to her husband’s question. “They may say something that would shed light on the investigation.”

  Sabrina drew a startled breath, half choking on it and then quickly turning it into a laugh. “You’re not saying you suspect Morris Gray of being a murderer?”

  “I would doubt that of him,” Drew said coolly, “but it’s far too early to rule anyone out. I’d just like to find out a bit more about him. Him and his wife.”

  Sabrina’s mouth twisted up at one side. “Anything for the cause. If you can figure out what’s going on here, I suppose I can put up with Frances Gray for one evening.”

  “You’re a topper,” Beaky said, beaming at her. “And you’ll see. Farthering here will sort this whole thing out in half a jiffy.”

  “I’ll give it my best,” Drew said. “There’s a lot here to be sorted, from what I can tell.”

  “I wanted to go look at the north wing when we got back from the village,” Madeline said from her seat in the wing chair near the hearth. “But Sabrina told me it wasn’t a good idea.”

  “I’m not sure how sound those floors are anymore,” Beaky put in. “And the old gas lighting is probably unsafe. We use it now and then when we have to go in there, but to be honest I’m surprised there’s any gas left. We can all give it a look tomorrow if you like, though I’d rather neither of you went in there alone.”

  “So had I.” Drew gave Madeline a faintly stern look. “Though I expect there’ll be little enough to see.”

  “Well, come on, Madeline,” Sabrina said, standing. “We just have time to dress for dinner. Beaky, you two don’t be late.”

  “We’ll be right up, my dear,” Beaky assured her, and he and Drew stood until the ladies had left the room.

  “Now,” Drew said, taking his seat on the sofa once again, “I want to know what those men in the pub were saying. I heard enough to know they were talking about a woman, and I could tell by how they were looking towards our table, specifically at me, that it must have been about Madeline.”

  Beaky glanced toward the door Sabrina and Madeline had just gone through and sighed. “It really was nothing, old man, at least not what I heard. A lovely woman like your wife comes to a place like this, and the men from the village are bound to comment, especially the ones from off the farms, sheepmen and the like. They may not have much refinement, but I doubt that anything that was said was very bad. Most likely little more than open admiration.”

  Drew crossed his arms over his chest. “And what did you hear specifically?”

  Beaky squirmed slightly. “It was more foolish than offensive.”

  “What?”

  “One of them said he’d like to be a detective too, if he could turn up a pip like that.”

  Drew scowled. “I’ll grant you, that’s not so much. But I can’t say I care for my wife to be spoken of in such a way and in that sort of place.”

  “I expect it will be quickly forgotten, if you let it be.”

  “I suppose that’s probably true. Still, I want to know who started it. Which one of them was it?”

  “I’m not certain. But whoever it was, I don’t doubt he was one or two over the eight. Mostly they’re all just good village lads who’d mind their manners if they were sober. Let it be,” Beaky repeated. “Don’t we have much more pressing matters to see to just now?”

  “True,” Drew agreed, “but I still mean to have a word with whomever is responsible.”

  Six

  It was busy inside the Hound and Hart when Drew returned the next day, cheerfully raucous but early enough in the evening that it was still relatively quiet. The barman was a different fellow than the one he had met when he came in with Beaky and Morris Gray.

  He came over to where Drew stood. “Evening, sir. What can I get you?”

  “Cider, if you please.”

  “Coming right up.”

  The barman put the glass on the counter in front of him. “Fourpence, please, sir.”

  Drew put a half crown on the bar. “Keep the change.”

  “Very kind, sir. Very kind.”

  The barman tugged at the coin, but Drew held it where it was. “Perhaps you can give me a bit of information as well.”

  “If I can, sir.”

  Drew glanced around the bar, looking for anyone he might recognize. “I understand someone here’s been rather free with a certain lady’s name the past few evenings.”

  The barman gave a nervous little shrug. “Might be, sir, no matter how we try to keep things respectable. Which lady would that be?”

  “A Mrs. Farthering.”

  “Ah, yes . . . I have warned the fellow to keep a civil tongue in his head, but you understand, sir, when a man’s in his cups . . .” The barman again shrugged. “This lady a relation of yours?”

  Drew gave him a cool glare. “I am Mr. Farthering.”

  The barman winced. “As I said, sir, we try to keep things respectable. I can’t guarantee every man comes through my door knows his manners. Nature of the business, and none of my doing.”

  “Just tell me which one.” Drew looked around the room and saw he’d drawn the attention of a number of the barman’s customers. “He’s here, isn’t he?”

  “Not a regular, sir. My regulars are most of ’em good working men. Family men. Nothing much I can do about the strays that come round.”

  “Which one?”

  The barman pointed with the wet towel he had wadded in his hand. “That one. Just there.”

  The man just there was sitting at a corner table, bent over a glass of what was probably whisky, his cap tugged down over his brow and his collar pulled up at the back of his neck. A tattered knitted scarf that had once been red hung over his shoulders.

  Drew narrowed his eyes. “I see. He was careless enough to bump into me last time I was here.” Drew released the coin and strode over to the shabby man’s table. “I beg your pardon. My name is Drew Farthering.”

  “No need to ask my pardon,” the man growled, not looking up. “I didn’t name you.”

  A few of the onlookers snickered, and Drew clenched his
jaw. “Might I ask your name, sir?”

  The man shrugged, still not looking up. “Suppose you might. Don’t mean I’m giving it out for free.”

  Drew gave him a cold smile. “You keep it then. I haven’t anything smaller than twopence, and I doubt you have enough on you to make change.”

  The man lifted his stubbled chin. “We weren’t all born toffs, you know. Some of us have to earn what we get.”

  “One needn’t be born a gentleman to have good manners. I’m given to understand they cost nothing.”

  “Oooh, la-de-da,” the shabby man mocked. “But I don’t know what you have ruffled your feathers over. Ask anyone. Nothing I said was anything but complimentary to the lady. Fine woman, if you ask me. Wouldn’t mind having her to tea, eh?”

  There was something nastily insinuating in his grin. The eavesdroppers all around laughed, then gasped as Drew seized the man by his shirtfront and hauled him to his feet.

  “Gentlemen! Gentlemen, please!” The barman hurried over to the table. “No trouble now. No trouble.”

  The shabby man shoved Drew’s hands away and tugged his coat straight once more. “Don’t you worry about that, mate. His type don’t have nothing but talk.” Again he grinned. “Just maybe that fine woman would be interested in something more, eh?”

  Drew shook his head, his breath coming hard and heavy. “Evidently no amount of reason can make a cad into a gentleman. I will put this in terms you can understand then. If I hear of you again making even the slightest mention of my wife in a public house, or anywhere else for that matter, I promise I will deal with you in more than just words.”

  The man chortled, slapping the table with his hand. “Did you hear that, lads? He’s going to teach me a lesson. Maybe I’ll have to write lines and everything.”

  Drew took a step forward, and the barman immediately put himself in the way.

  “Please, sir.”

  “No need to worry. If our friend here would like to discuss the matter further, I’ll be glad to speak to him outside.”

  “Oh, yeah.” The man settled his cap more firmly on his head and wrapped his dingy scarf around his neck. “Lead on, mate. Lead on.”

  “You’d better ring the p’lice,” someone said to the barman.

  “No need to trouble them,” Drew said.

  “Toff’s right,” the other man muttered, glaring at Drew. “We all know who ends up taking the blame when one of us has a set-to with the gentry. And don’t he know it. That quits it for me. I’m not going to hang about in the alley waiting for his like.”

  Drew opened the door for him. “Perhaps another time.”

  “You can bank on that, mate. And soon.” The shabby man removed his cap and made an elaborate bow before stepping into the darkness of the street.

  Drew sat himself at the vacated table, drank his cider in leisurely fashion, and afterward went around to the narrow alleyway at the back of the building. The yellowish bulb above the back door lit the shadowy figure slouching against the grimy brick wall.

  “All right then,” Drew said, crossing his arms over his chest. “Your punishment is to write five hundred times ‘I will not make Drew laugh when he’s supposed to be righteously indignant.’”

  Grinning, Nick pushed back his battered cap. “I do rather enjoy playing the rogue now and again.”

  “Comes a bit too naturally, if you ask me.”

  “Manners,” Nick reproved. “And I was so pleased you took the time to telephone me right after you’d visited the murder scene.”

  “All right, all right. Tell me what you’ve found out.”

  Nick exhaled heavily. “Not as much as I’d hoped. I did have a nice chat with one fellow, who seemed more than a bit dodgy. He’s definitely got something going on, playing the big man round the pub when he’s usually stone broke, standing everyone to drinks. I let him know I’d take it as a favor if he heard of anyone wants a job done, and I wouldn’t be too particular what it was so long as it paid.”

  “And?”

  “He allowed I was a good fellow and he wouldn’t forget.”

  Drew frowned. “Not exactly a contract for employment.”

  “No. And he may well have had no recollection of it once he sobered up, but I can always try again tonight. Or tomorrow.”

  “Name?”

  “Jack Midgley. He has a cottage out on the moor somewhere. Says he’s a man-of-all-work, though he says it with a wink and a nod. The word round behind his back is that he makes his living poaching off the local estates. Been here for years and never once caught at it.”

  “Not born here?”

  Nick pulled his coat closer against the October wind and shook his head. “To hear him talk, I’d say Irish, yet he must have come to Yorkshire when he was still a boy. Most of the brogue’s worn off him.”

  “Not much in that to think he’d murder a vicar. From what I can tell, the old man liked his hearth when he wasn’t about his pastoral duties. I can’t imagine him out on the moor watching for poachers.”

  “True,” Nick said, “but he might have something to do with what’s been going on out there. There’s no reason to think the murder and the mischief are connected, is there?”

  “That mischief’s been going on for years now. No deaths, unless you count a couple of lambs.” Drew shrugged at Nick’s questioning look. “It was made to look like something wild killed them. I’m not so sure about that, however. I suppose there are the requisite legends about a demon hound out on the moor.”

  “Not that I’ve heard about so far, but give it a day or two.”

  “Beaky’s gamekeeper, Rhys Delwyn,” Drew said. “Says he’s looked into it, but he’s found nothing.”

  “Delwyn, eh?”

  Nick chuckled, and Drew raised an eyebrow.

  “What?”

  “The lads at the pub are of two minds about that one, from what I hear. On the one hand, he’s all hail-fellow-well-met, buy you a pint and drink it with you.”

  “And on the other?”

  “On the other, they don’t care for the idea of him left alone with their wives and daughters.”

  Drew thought back on when he’d seen Delwyn at the Lodge, when he and Madeline had first arrived. Just the sort of rogue who rarely, if ever, was told no. “Is he attached to anyone in particular at the moment?”

  “Not that anyone’s said.”

  Drew saw something more in Nick’s expression. “And?”

  “Just the usual pub gossip. Some of them say he needn’t come into the village if he wants company. I expect there are a number of girls employed at the Lodge who wouldn’t object.”

  Drew narrowed his eyes, not liking what came to mind. “But there wasn’t a particular name brought up?”

  “No. Are you thinking of anyone specific?”

  Drew looked up at the naked lightbulb over the backdoor. It didn’t shed much light on the alley’s dark corners. “Beaky’s wife.”

  “What? Oh, good heavens, is that what they were smirking over? Are you sure?”

  “Not in the least. What exactly did you hear, Nick?”

  “I . . . really, it’s nothing in particular. More like a secret they all knew and sniggered about whenever Delwyn was mentioned. Poor Beaky. But how do you know?”

  “I don’t know,” Drew said. “I don’t know at all. You remember how she was.”

  Nick looked mildly puzzled. “I do?”

  “Oh. You don’t know yet, do you? Beaky married Sabrina Prestwick.”

  Nick whistled under his breath. “So that’s where she landed. Well, maybe she’s grown up a bit.”

  “One can hope. Still, Sabrina Prestwick. With Beaky Bloodworth? It boggles the mind.”

  “I don’t know. She and Bunny got on all right.”

  “Until she decided to break things off without warning. I still don’t think the old boy knows why.”

  Nick chuckled. “Well, he’s better off, isn’t he? Getting on all right isn’t the same as being in love. And if she w
as just after money, why wouldn’t she have stayed with him? At least until they married and divorced and she got a nice settlement. He’s much richer than Beaky.”

  “He’s much richer than everyone,” Drew admitted. “And I suppose that is a point in her favor. Well, as I said to begin with, I don’t know anything. Maybe I’m just making assumptions I have no business making. Still, keep your ears open about Delwyn and whomever he might be calling on. Just for Beaky’s sake. What do you hear about Westings?”

  “Nothing much. There’s some who think whatever’s been happening on the moor is more of the same as when Beaky’s uncle was alive. There’s others who say it’s not the same at all. One old duffer says there’s a bluff overlooking the Lodge that’s been haunted since the pagans used it, however long ago that was. Swears blue he’s seen them up there calling down curses on the lot of us for taking up Christian ways. The others don’t pay him much mind, though they do say there have been some strange happenings up there, especially in the past few weeks.”

  Drew shrugged. “There are always strange happenings on moors, aren’t there? Half the books written in England wouldn’t exist if it weren’t for that.”

  “Not half, surely.”

  “Well, if you hear of anything tangible, let me know right away. Any local gossip could come in handy as well.” Drew glanced toward the opening of the alleyway. “Perhaps we’d better let you get back inside. No good having someone find us talking. Anything else I should know for now?”

  “I’ll get word to you should something turn up.”

  Drew looked at him thoughtfully. “Perhaps it wouldn’t hurt if it looked as if we finished our discussion after all. That is, if you’re going back inside.”

  With a sigh, Nick wadded up his cap and stuffed it temporarily into his coat pocket. Then he used both hands to muss his hair and rumple his clothes. Finally he bent down and patted his hands in a muddy puddle and used them to redden his face and soil his shirt more than it already was. That done, he replaced his battered cap and presented himself for inspection.

  “Very nice,” Drew said, looking him up and down. “But maybe you ought to roll about on the ground. Just a bit. In case someone happens to look back here, we’d want him to see that pleasantries have indeed been exchanged.”