The Mammoth Book of Historical Whodunnits Volume 3 (The Mammoth Book Series)

by Mike Ashley

  “What,” the good doctor asked slyly, “does Lord Elmstead ever think of? Do you see him, my young friend, enjoying what the continent has to offer? Good wine, good food, the glories of music and the arts? Is he, in short, capable of appreciating the Birthplace of Civilisation? I think not. If he did not go voluntarily, might he have been sent?”

  “You imply that Lady Elmstead might have sent him there to escape punishment?”

  “If he has indeed embarked on such a journey, that might well be the implication. But consider, my friend: a tour like that is never undertaken lightly. There must be preparations made, items purchased. I am not aware of any concomitant upheaval at Elmstead House. Leave me to make further inquiries. We are not alone in this, you know. Justices such as I have colleagues upon whom we may make demands.”

  My head reeled, whether with the news or with the heady perfume of his bulbs I could not say. I staggered into the open, filling my lungs as deeply as I could. Before I took my leave, however, I must raise young Matthew’s request.

  “What has filled your nose, your eyes, your mind since your sad discovery?” Hansard asked, holding my gaze. “Can you, with such knowledge, imagine courting a fresh young maid? Let the young man be a pall-bearer. Let him – if he can – read a lesson at her obsequies. But, unless we have the strongest of grounds to suspect him to be such a villain, let us not sully his innocence.”

  My path took me next to the Woodmans’ cottage. Mrs Woodman must have heard the news by now, and needed divine comfort.

  I read to her the most inspiring words I could, and we bowed our heads for many moments in prayer. At last, I took it upon myself to refer to the harsh words she spoke about Lizzie when she first disappeared.

  “You said she was no daughter of yours, Mrs Woodman. Can you not find it in your heart to recant now you know her cruel fate?”

  She raised tear-filled eyes to mine. “But Rector, they were the honest truth! True, I should not have uttered them, since I vowed by all I held sacred that I would never reveal the secret. I was Lizzie’s wet nurse. No more. I never knew her true parents, but I suspected. I suspected. But a woman like me can’t make accusations, especially when my mouth is stopped with a golden guinea every quarter, regular as the moon. I was to bring her up like my own, they said –”

  “Who said?” My pulses were racing.

  “The legal men who brought her to me. I made my mark on their paper, Rector, and as God is my witness I’ve spoken of it to no one till now.”

  “He will surely forgive you.” I got to my feet, uttering my kindest platitudes. Dr Hansard must hear this news, and immediately. As I bent my head to quit the cottage, I asked, “I suppose the men of law left you no papers?”

  “Nothing,” came the sad reply. “But,” she added with the incurable optimism of her sort, “my guinea still comes each quarter, so belike they don’t know she’s gone.”

  If I had committed murder, the last person I should wish to suspect the crime would be a man with a legal bent. So I gave one final blessing and went on my way. Over our supper at his house, the good doctor and I exchanged news of our activities. I grew more and more drowsy, the scent of his hyacinths almost overwhelming me.

  “Blue again,” he sighed, as I touched the tight, crisp head.

  “Again?”

  “Indeed. I have it in mind to breed a pink flower, but whenever I get close, the blue returns to dominate. Good God, man, what ails you?”

  I had leapt to my feet, knocking over the port glass.

  “The hyacinths keep returning to blue,” I said slowly. “The blue dominates. Does not the same happen in human beings, Edmund? Does not a trait run from father to son, or even from grandfather to son – blue eyes or large hands?”

  He comprehended in a flash. “You are saying that our dear Lizzie – a by-blow of the Elmstead family – by heavens, Tobias, I believe you may be right!”

  “That Lely portrait; Lord Elmstead’s paler orange; Lizzie’s Titian glory – they must be connected!”

  “Not to mention Lady Elmstead’s nose,” he added dryly. “You were ever too much in love to notice your Lizzie’s only defect.” Then he clamped his hand over his mouth. “But why should Lizzie resemble her ladyship? Though one cannot condone it, one must expect a man of means to have an occasional by-blow. But a lady – every feeling is revolted!”

  “Did you not say that his late lordship travelled some years ago? Soon after the birth of the present lord?”

  Edmund nodded. “Indeed. And I wondered at it at the time. The Tour is usually made between university and marriage, to introduce a young man to . . . to the pleasures of the flesh, Tobias.”

  “One would imagine that in his case he had already experienced them,” I objected.

  “So why should he go abroad? Don’t worry, my young guest. Lead us in our prayers, I beg you, and in time the truth will emerge.”

  I had spent many hours in prayer since that evening, and was even now before the altar on my knees. Recognising Dr Hansard’s nimble footfall, I breathed “Amen” out loud and turned to face him. It was clear even in the dim light that he had news. We stepped into the churchyard together, the early evening calm hardly broken by the sounds of lads practising on the green for the summer’s cricket.

  “What would you say if I were to tell you that a closed conveyance was seen leaving Elmstead House late one night at the very time his lordship was supposed to be speeding for the Continent? That it made its way to the self-same asylum where his father spent a year after the birth of his son, grief at seeing such a puny specimen having apparently turned his brain? In vain did his doctors tell him that all babes are red-faced and bald at birth! He had expected the sort of infant depicted by our Great Masters! My suspicion is this, Tobias, that her ladyship, believing as many women foolishly do, that having given birth will prevent another conception, took a lover – Elmstead’s brother. The result would be Lizzie, immediately farmed out and provided for.”

  “Suspicion! Your mind races apace, Edmund. Can people behave like this?”

  His glance was cynical. “Your innocence does you credit. But believe me, some aristocratic households comprise not just legitimate children but the by-blows of both man and wife. Once an heir is provided, preferably two, then eyes are permitted to stray. These are not love matches, remember, but alliances between great houses, the young participants consenting, merely. There are rumours of such a deed in the Duke of Devonshire’s household even now!”

  My mind reeled, but I managed to say, with a fair assumption of calm, “Even if it were so, how could we persuade her ladyship to confess? And how would we persuade a jury of her peers to convict her?”

  Perhaps the same problems had already occurred to him. He paced between the graves, pausing to tweak a weed here and there. “I suppose,” he said at length, “that we could demand that whoever delivers Mrs Woodman her bounty reveal its source?”

  “And deprive the old lady of valuable income? In any case, they are almost certainly ignorant of the principal in this case. God grant inspiration will visit us as we sup together.”

  My servant was wide-eyed as she brought in the cold meat and cheese that were to be our repast. “They do say, sirs, that there’s great doings at the big house. It seems her ladyship’s taken it into her head to join his lordship on his travels. Such a hurrying and scurrying you never did see!”

  “Thank God for the nosiness of villagers!” cried Edmund, as she left us. “My good friend, there’s no time for that now! We must be on our way! Up to Elmstead House, of course. Have your horse saddled this instant!”

  We rode too hard to speak, grateful for the brightness of the spring evening.

  “Her ladyship is not At Home,” the butler declared.

  “She will see us,” Dr Hansard announced grimly, veritably pushing his way into the marble entrance hall. “Where is she? Her boudoir? Don’t worry: I know my way well enough.”

  Even Hansard tapped on the door before pushing it
open. Although shocked by our entrance, her ladyship tutted with irritation at something left lying on the carpet. To my surprise, instead of ringing for a servant, she picked it up herself.

  “Some refreshment, gentlemen? No? Forgive me if I take some of my drops, Dr Hansard – I feel my palpitations coming on.” Her back to us, she measured a quantity of laudanum into a glass, and turned to us, raising it as if in a toast. She swallowed convulsively, gasping a little. “And why are you here? You can see it is not convenient.”

  “I am here not as your physician, but as a Justice of the Peace,” Hansard said portentously. “And I believe you know all too well why I am here, My Lady. Lizzie’s death. Murder, I would say. And worse than murder, evisceration.”

  It seemed to me that she paled. Certainly her breath came in ugly gasps.

  “She was with child, My Lady. And it seems to me someone wanted to ensure that she bore no more babes.”

  “Do not repine over the unborn child’s death,” she whispered. “It would have been a halfwit. Inbreeding, Doctor Hansard – surely a man of your calibre knows the problems it brings! Every great family has members confined to attics or elsewhere. What hope could there be for any child of my son’s, especially one begotten of his sister?” Her eyes focussed on me, with some difficulty, I thought.

  Urging her to a seat, I took her hand and knelt beside her. “There is still time to make your peace with the Almighty,” I urged.

  “No time. No time at all.”

  Hansard did all he could as a man of medicine, but it was clear I was superfluous. I busied myself looking round the room. What could it have been that she wished so much to pick up. Where had she put it? There was nothing untoward on the little silver tray that held her drops and the jug of water. I followed the line of the wainscoting.

  “If only we knew what poison she has taken,” Hansard groaned. “Then I might try an antidote.”

  I proffered a pellet I had just picked up.

  “Rat poison?”

  “She must have told her staff that there were mice here, thus ensuring a ready means of escape. Good God, Hansard, how long will she be like this?” I looked on her ghastly features and prayed for a rapid end to her suffering. Then I remembered poor Lizzie’s death, and changed my prayer, that the Almighty might in His infinite wisdom suit the punishment to the appalling crime.

  It took her ladyship till noon the next day to die.

  Matthew’s first child, a lusty and handsome baby, arrived in the world seven months to the day after his wedding. Lucy has since presented him with two more tokens of her affection. Hansard was so delighted by the pink strain of hyacinth he managed to produce he swept away in matrimony the housekeeper up at Elmstead Hall, now administered by a board of trustees, Lord Elmstead being deemed of unsound mind, having torn apart his physician’s cat. As for myself, I did think of leaving this parish, but I am about to publish a monograph on the nesting habits of the genus Sylviidae. It may be that I shall be invited to present it at the Royal Society. As it is, I have ample reason to visit the spot where I discovered poor Lizzie, and I can visit her grave every day.

  Footprints

  Jeffery Farnol

  When I compiled the first Mammoth Book of Historical Whodunnits in 1993 I included an Appendix which listed the major historical mystery novels up to that time. It was only after I had completed that, that I became aware of another pioneer of the historical whodunnit, Jeffery Farnol. Farnol (1878–1952) was Birmingham born and bred and might have spent his life in a brass foundry had he not been fired for hitting the foreman. He then trained as an artist and for a while worked as a painter of stage scenery in America before having success with his first novel The Broad Highway (1910), a Regency swashbuckler. He soon found that this was a profitable vein to mine and the Regency period provided a setting for many of his later works. He was an influence on the young Georgette Heyer. His second novel, An Amateur Gentleman (1913), in the same setting as Broad Highway, included a Bow Street detective Jasper Shrig, who became a regular feature in many later novels. Over time he took centre stage and Farnol wrote several atmospheric Regency whodunnits including The Loring Mystery (1925), The Way Beyond (1933), The Happy Harvest (1939), Murder by Nail (1942), Valley of Night (1942) and The Ninth Earl (1950). Fortunately Farnol also wrote the following short story featuring Mr Shrig, which admirably portrays his idiosyncratic style.

  Mr Jasper Shrig of Bow Street, leaning back on the great, cushioned settle, stretched sturdy legs to the cheery fire and, having lighted his pipe, sipped his glass of the famous “One and Only” with a relish that brought a smile to his companion’s comely visage.

  “Pretty cosy, Jarsper, I think?”

  “There ain’t,” sighed Mr Shrig, glancing round about the trim, comfortable kitchen, “a cosier place in London, say England, say the universe, than this here old ‘Gun’ – thanks to you, Corporal Dick. You’ve only got an ’ook for an ’and but you’re so ’andy wi’ that ’ook, so oncommon ’andy that there ain’t no word fur it, so, Dick – your werry good ’ealth, pal!”

  Corporal Richard Roe, late of the Grenadiers, flushed and, being a man somewhat slow of speech, muttered:

  “Thankee, comrade,” and thereafter sat gazing at the bright fire and caressing his neatly-trimmed right whisker with the gleaming steel hook that did duty for the hand lost at Waterloo.

  “On such con-wiwial occasions as this here,” murmured Mr Shrig, also gazing at the fire, “when I’m as you might say luxooriating in a pipe, a glass, and the best o’ pals and comrades, my mind nat’rally runs to corpses, Dick.”

  “Lord!” exclaimed the corporal, somewhat surprised. “Why so, Jarsper?”

  “Because, Dick, in spite o’ windictiveness in the shape o’ bludgeons, knives, bullets, flat-irons, and an occasional chimbley-pot, I’m werry far from being a corpse – yet. Fur vitch I’m dooly thankful. Now talkin’ o’ corpses, Dick.”

  “But, Jarsper – I ain’t.”

  “No, but you will, for I am, d’ye see. Now folks as have been ‘took off’ by wiolence or as you might say The Act, wictims o’ Murder, Dick – with a capital M – said parties don’t generally make pretty corpses, not as a rule – no.”

  “Which,” said the corporal, shaking his comely head, “can’t ’ardly be expected, Jarsper.”

  “But,” continued Mr Shrig, sucking at his pipe with very evident enjoyment, “contrairywise I ’ave never seen an ’andsomer, cleaner, nater ca-darver than Sir W. Glendale made – so smiling, so peaceful – and mind ye, Dick, with a knife, an ordinary butcher’s knife, druv clean into ’is buzzum, up to the werry grip, or as you might say ’andle. Smiling he was, Dick, as if ’e ’ad been ‘took off’ in the werry middle of a bee-ootiful dream . . .

  “ ’Twas the face of a man . . . as died . . . in his sleep . . . fast asleep!” mused Mr Shrig. “Now why should a man sleep . . . so werry sound . . . ? You’ll mind the case, I think – eh, Dick?”

  “For sure, Jarsper, the misfortunate gentleman was murdered about a year ago –”

  “A year?” mused Mr Shrig, pausing with toddy glass at his grim, clean-shaven lips. “Say nine months, say ten – stop a bit till I take a peep at my little reader.”

  Setting down his glass he drew from the bosom of his neat, brass-buttoned coat a small, much-worn notebook whose close-written pages he thumbed slowly over, murmuring hoarsely:

  “D. E. F. G. . . . Griggs . . . Goreham, Grant – and ’ere we are – Glendale . . . Sir William . . . Baronet . . . Murdered . . . June 1 . . . sitting at desk . . . Murderer – wanting!”

  “Ay,” nodded the corporal, leaning forward to touch the cheery fire with a caressing poker, “ ’tis one ’o them crimes as was never found out.”

  “And, Dick, your memory sarved you true – for the Act was commit – eggsackly a year ago this here werry night!”

  “And I suppose it never will be found out now – eh, Jarsper?”

  “Why, since you axes me so p’inted, Dick, I
answers you, ready and prompt – oo knows? Hows’ever I’m a-vaiting werry patient.”

  “Ay, but wot for?”

  “Another chance p’raps . . . dewelopments!”

  “Jarsper, I don’t quite twig you.”

  “Dick, I didn’t expect as you would. Lookee now – there’s murderers vich, if not took and ‘topped’ or, as you might say, scragged – as gets that owdacious, well, murder grows quite an ’abit wi’ ’em and – wot’s that?”

  “Eh?” said the corporal, starting. “I didn’t hear anything.”

  “Sounded like a dog whining somewheres,” murmured Mr Shrig, glancing vaguely about. “There ’tis again!”

  “That’s no dog, Jarsper!” muttered the corporal. “Somebody’s ill or hurt – that’s a child’s voice or a woman’s.”

  “No, Dick, that’s the voice o’ fear . . . terror, Dick – lad. Now, stand by, pal.”

  Then soundlessly the corporal unbarred the door, drew it suddenly wide, and with a slithering rustle, a vague shape swayed in and lay motionless at his feet.

  “A woman, Jarsper!” said he in a hushed voice, stooping above this vague shape.

  “Oh, dead, Dick?”

  “Looks that way, Jarsper.”

  “Then in wi’ her – so! Now shut the door – quick! Lock it, pal, and likewise bar it and shoot the bolts!”

  “Lord love us, Jarsper!” whispered the corporal, ruffling his short curly hair with a glittering hook, and staring at the lovely form outstretched upon the wide settle. “Anyway, she ain’t dead, thank God!”

  “No, Dick, she’s only swounding.”

  “But what’s to do now, Jarsper? What’s the correct evolution? How to bring the lady round, comrade?”

  “Cold vater applied outwardly is reckoned pretty good, Dick, but sperrits took innardly is better, I fancy. So get the rum, pal, or brandy – vich ever comes ’andiest – stop a bit, this’ll do!”