by Rhys Bowen
“I’m sure they won’t necessarily expect a fish course, Mrs. McPherson,” I said.
“They’d be getting one at Balmoral, wouldn’t they?”
“It’s only my mother and Herr Von Strohheim who are currently staying at Balmoral. The rest of them are in a house on Lord Angus’s estate. I don’t suppose they’ve a decent cook there, which is why they all jumped at the chance to come here and sample your cooking.”
Mrs. McPherson was softening. “Maybe I’ll see if we’ve enough smoked trout to go around,” she said. “I was keeping it for a luncheon salad, but no doubt we can obtain more. And the boys have brought in a bushel basket of berries to make a crumble, so we’ll get by, I suppose. We usually do.”
“You’re very kind, Mrs. McPherson,” I said. “Her Grace will be so impressed.”
She sniffed. “That one is only impressed when I cut corners and save her a penny or two,” she muttered. “In the old duke’s time there would have been none of this penny-pinching.”
“He did go bankrupt,” I pointed out.
“Her Grace also requested a haggis when she came to see me today,” Cook said. “Is that another of her economy ideas?”
I laughed. “No, she’s hoping to scare away the Americans. She says they’re eating her out of house and home.”
“Och, so that’s it?” She started to laugh, her ample bosoms shaking up and down like a jelly. “Well, you can tell her that I make the best haggis in this part of Scotland so they’re liable to like it and ask for more. I’ve the sheep’s stomach already boiling away ready to stuff tomorrow.”
I left her and returned upstairs quite cheered. It was good to be home again. The whole party assembled in the great hall for tea, the cousins and the princes having returned from their various outdoor pursuits. The wind that had picked up at lunchtime had heralded the arrival of bad weather and was now howling down the chimneys while rain peppered the windows. Our guests were clearly feeling the cold and gazed hopefully at the empty fireplace. Fig was pretending that she was comfortably warm and didn’t need to light the fire, proving that she was as good an actress as my mother. It really was awfully dismal in the great hall. I was longing to go upstairs for a second cardigan but I couldn’t let the side down. In truth I was glad one of the dogs was leaning against my leg.
I was quite enjoying studying Fig. I could see that she was considerably put out watching Earl spreading heaps of her special Fortnum & Mason jam with gay abandon on his scone. Suddenly there were raised voices in the entrance hall and Mrs. Simpson swept in, looking less amused than my austere great-grandmother had done. Her usually immaculate coiffure was windswept and her silk outfit was streaked with rain.
“Wallis honey, you look terrible.” The countess rose to greet her.
Obviously Wallis didn’t appreciate the remark. She already knew she looked terrible and didn’t need anybody to point this out.
“Come and have a cup of tea to warm you up before you go change.” The countess took her arm and led her over to us.
“We’ve had an absolutely beastly day,” Wallis said. “And the storm was the least of it. My dears, something terrible happened. We were lucky to escape with our lives.”
“What on earth do you mean?” Babe asked.
“We were on our way back here, driving down the pass, when a damned great boulder came flying out of nowhere and struck us. Luckily it landed on the bonnet. A couple of feet in the wrong direction and David and I should both have been crushed. I tell you, my heart has only just started beating again. David was wonderfully calm. He said these things happen in the Highlands. ‘Then I can’t think why you choose to spend any time up here,’ I said. ‘I’ve never seen a more godforsaken place to begin with.’ He wasn’t thrilled with that remark and we had words. So all in all a most trying day.”
She took the teacup that was offered her and sipped gratefully. The other Americans made a terrific fuss of her. Even her husband was nice to her. But my thoughts were racing again. Another accident that could have killed the Prince of Wales. Then a new thought struck me. Maybe we had got it wrong: maybe it wasn’t the prince who was the target. Maybe someone was trying to eliminate Mrs. Simpson. I had seen enough American gangster films to know that people paid other people to take out an enemy. What if someone in the royal circle wanted to remove her permanently from the prince’s life? Or on the other hand, what if her husband was angry enough with the way he was being cheated to want to get rid of her without paying alimony?
I decided I should make discreet inquiries to find out if Mrs. Simpson had been present when the other accidents happened to the prince. I noticed Lachan and Murdoch exchange an amused glance as she swept from the room. Then they too got up and excused themselves. One by one the party dispersed to go and rest before dinner or, in the case of Babe, to have yet another bath before dinner. I resolved to go and see exactly where this boulder fell onto the car and if it was possible that someone could have given it a convenient push. It was not unheard of for rocks to fall down mountain-sides, but the chances of timing a rock to fall on a car would be slim, I should have thought. But I couldn’t deny that it was yet another accident.
I went up to change for dinner. I was in the upstairs bathroom when I heard voices. I should probably clarify that I am not in the habit of hearing voices. The plumbing system at Castle Rannoch is eccentric, to say the least. It was added a few hundred years after the castle was built, of course. One of the features of the plumbing is that voices are carried by the pipes from one part of the castle to another. Two men were talking in low tones, in what sounded like Scottish accents.
“So are you going to tell her?” I heard one voice whisper.
“Are you mad? We’d be chucked out on our ear. She’d see to that. And I can’t afford anything to come between me and my goals right now. This place is ideal for it. You must see that.”
“What if somebody saw?”
“Then we plead ignorance. We didn’t mean it, did we?”
And the sound of chuckling reverberated in the pipes.
Chapter 16
Castle Rannoch
August 18
Evening.
I stood there, not noticing the rain and wind blowing in on me. (Oh, didn’t I mention that it’s a Castle Rannoch tradition to keep bathroom windows open at all times? Guests find this somewhat startling and hard to endure—especially when coupled with the tartan wallpaper and the groans and creaks emitted by the pipes.) A conspiracy then. It had never occurred to me before that maybe there could be Scottish nationalists at work in the castle—men who wanted home rule, like Ireland, or maybe wanted to replace the primarily German strain of monarchy with the old Stuart dynasty. Rannoch seemed an odd place to be harboring such feelings, as our family traced its ancestry back to the Stuarts on the old duke’s side as well as to the currently reigning monarch through my grandmother.
I went back to my bedroom deep in thought. When my maid, Maggie, came to dress me for dinner and was anxious to chatter about castle gossip, I was happy to oblige her.
“So is anyone new on the staff since I went away?” I asked.
“Why, you’ve only been gone a few months, your ladyship,” she said, chuckling. “Nothing’s changed here, you know.”
“So how many men actually work in the house these days?” I asked. “Hamilton and His Grace’s valet and Frederick and the under footman. Is that it?”
She looked at me strangely. “Yes, that would be it, apart from the gardener’s boy who comes in to help with the boots and bringing up the heavy stuff from the cellar.”
“And what about on the whole estate, how many men would you say there were?”
She laughed. “Are you thinking of taking yourself a local husband, my lady?”
“No, just trying to work something out,” I said. “There would be the grooms, and the gardeners and the gillies, wouldn’t there?”
“And don’t forget the gamekeeper and field hands and the shepherd, and old T
om.”
Quite a few then, but only four who would be allowed in the castle. Except that some of them did come into the castle from time to time. Fergus came in to play the pipes on special occasions. The gardeners brought in firewood; the gamekeeper and the gillies delivered fish and birds. But would any of them dare to meet in a castle bathroom? Hardly likely.
“So do you think that anybody here would have home rule feelings?”
“What do you mean, my lady?”
“Wanting to do away with the king and queen and turn Scotland into a separate state.”
“Why would anyone want to do that?” She looked perplexed.
“Some people feel that way.”
“Not anybody around here. We think the world of the king and queen. In fact, everyone in these parts knows someone or has a relative who works on the Balmoral estate and they can’t speak highly enough of Their Majesties.”
When I came down to dinner, I found Binky had been carried down and was now reclining in an ancient bath chair that looked as if it once transported our venerable great-grandmother the queen. He was holding court, chatting to our visitors who had already arrived. I was uneasy to see that Darcy was among them, as was the dark and sultry Conchita, dressed in a slinky scarlet gown with a black fringed Spanish shawl over it. So was Ronny Padgett, looking remarkably civilized and feminine in a long bottle-green dinner dress with a white silk wrap and white elbow-length gloves. I went over to talk to her immediately so that I didn’t find myself in a group with Darcy. I told myself it shouldn’t matter that Señorita Conchita was making cow eyes at him, but it did. I suppose it’s not that easy to fall out of love so quickly.
“I saw you land on the loch this afternoon,” I said. “I didn’t realize your plane could land on water.”
“I had fins made for the Moth so that I can fly up here,” she said. “The lochs are the only places nearby flat enough to put down a plane.”
“It must be a wonderful feeling to fly,” I said.
“I’ll take you up some time if you like,” she said. “Just let me know when. I’m here for a while. At least until they put that boat through its paces.” She leaned closer to me. “Between ourselves I’m hoping to be given a chance to break the record myself. I’m sure I’d do a damned sight better than that foreign idiot Paolo. But then, he’s got the money and we Padgetts are as poor as church mice.”
“Really?” I looked surprised.
“Yes, Father has a grace-and-favor position at Balmoral these days. There were times when he was in the thick of things. He had been promised a knighthood at least for services to Queen Victoria and King Edward, but he suffered some kind of ill health and was sent up here to recuperate. And here he’s stayed. It’s rather lonely for my mother. We really are in a godforsaken spot in the middle of nowhere.”
“Don’t they come down to London?”
“Not often. We no longer have a London house and my little matchbox is too small to accommodate them properly.”
A memory stirred in my head at the mention of her London flat. “By the way, I was awfully sorry to hear about your maid.”
She nodded. “Yes, it was a rum do, wasn’t it? Poor little thing. She was still a country girl at heart. Hadn’t a clue about traffic. Always wandering across the road without looking, even in London. Although what she was doing at Croydon Aerodrome on that particular evening I simply can’t fathom. I’d told her to wait at the flat in London for my instructions and I wasn’t planning to return for several days.” She broke off and looked at me with interest. “So how did you come to hear about her accident?”
“The police mentioned it to me,” I said. “It seems that there was a half-finished letter to me in her purse when she was killed.”
“A letter to you? How extraordinary—what did she want?”
“I’ve no idea,” I said. “It had fallen into a ditch and most of the ink had washed away, but it was clearly addressed to Lady Georgiana and I suspect I’m the only person with that name in London. The police thought that maybe she was asking me for a job.”
“A job—with you? Why would she be doing that?”
“I thought perhaps because you were threatening to dismiss her.”
“Dismiss her?”
“You told her to watch her step when I saw you together.”
She looked at me and laughed. “That’s the way I always spoke to her. She knew that. It’s just the way I am. And I was actually quite fond of her, clueless though she was. I tell you, I’d like to catch the blighter that mowed her down. I’d strangle him with my bare hands.”
“If she’d wandered out into the road, as you say, he probably couldn’t have avoided hitting her.”
“But then why bugger off and leave her there to die? Why not summon the police and admit to it like a man?”
“Frightened to, maybe? Maybe he had black marks against him for reckless driving before and feared his license would be taken from him.”
She nodded. “Poor old Mavis.” She sighed. “And dashed inconvenient for me. Now I’m up here with no maid, only an idiot local girl who tried to iron my leather jacket.”
Hugo moved in on us. “I watched you land that plane this afternoon, Ronny. I must say you are magnificent. So when are you going to take me up?”
“If you’re not careful, Hugo, I might just tip you out,” she said, laughing. “I do love barrel rolls, you know. They are a great way to get rid of unwanted suitors.”
So the attraction was not mutual.
“How can you afford to run a plane?” I blurted out before I remembered that a lady never mentions money.
She shrugged. “I have sponsors. And one of the reasons that I enter all these damned air races is that they come with very nice cash prizes. I’m going to try solo to Australia this autumn. It’s never been done by a woman and the Daily Mail is coming up with a fat check if I succeed.”
“Do you have a good chance of succeeding?”
“Fair to middling, I’d say. There’s a lot of desert to be flown over. You come down in the middle of the Arabian Desert and that’s pretty much it. Nobody’s likely to find you before you run out of water.” She looked around the room. “Speaking of which, I’m dying of thirst. Isn’t there anything stronger than sherry around here?”
And she wandered off, leaving me alone. I wondered if I actually envied her or pitied her. It would be wonderful to be so daring and independent, of course, but then I pictured the loneliness and the likelihood of dying in the desert and was glad that I didn’t have her nerve.
Hugo was still lingering nearby. He sidled up to me. “I say,” he said, “this old place is rather fascinating, isn’t it? Awfully rich in history. So tell me, does it have a laird’s lug? I’ve heard about them but I’ve never actually seen one.”
“Yes, it does, actually.”
“And what exactly is it? A place where the laird could spy on his guests, isn’t it?”
“Exactly. A little secret room built into the walls, where the laird could listen through slots to hear if anyone was plotting against him.”
“Dashed interesting. You wouldn’t like to take me to see it, would you?”
I gave him an exasperated look. “I thought you were supposed to be keen on Ronny, Hugo. And now you’re trying to lure me off somewhere secret? I’d stick to one girl if I were you.”
“No, I really am interested in Scottish history,” he said.
I laughed. “I’ll have one of the servants show you the laird’s lug tomorrow if you’re keen on Scottish history.” Then I moved to join Belinda and Paolo, who were talking with Max and Digby Flute, the young American.
Belinda intercepted me halfway across the floor. “Darling, talk to me about something normal,” she said. “I shall scream if I hear the words ‘torque’ and ‘thrust’ again. Strangely enough I found the use of the word ‘thrust’ quite titillating until now, but not when it so clearly applies to a boat engine.”
“They’re still at it, are they?”
“Nonstop.” She sighed. “And speaking of that—what is up between you and Darcy? You’re not exactly acting like dearest chums, are you?”
“Absolutely not,” I said. “He did something—well, for which I can’t forgive him.”
“The lovely señorita, you mean? My dear, he hasn’t been near her, and it’s not for want of trying on her part.”
“No, it was something in London. He—” I stopped, unable to talk about it. “Let’s just say that he is not my favorite person at the moment.”
“Such a pity when you’re both in the same place for once and the atmosphere is so romantic up here. Oh, and talking of romance, take a look at the dreaded Mrs. Simpson. I think she was expecting another dinner guest and he hasn’t turned up.”
I followed her gaze to the group around Binky. Mrs. Simpson was standing close to him, only half paying attention to a story he was telling. She kept glancing up nervously, or was it impatiently? Lachan and Murdoch had now joined us, looking resplendent in full Highland dress. They stood a little apart, deep in conversation, and suddenly it dawned on me that they were two men with slight Scottish accents. Could they have been the ones I overheard in the bathroom? Surely they weren’t Scottish nationalists out to kill the heir to the throne? But then they did have Stuart blood in them. I went over to join them.
“We didn’t see you all day,” I said brightly. “Where did you disappear to?”
“We were after a damned fine stag that your brother told us about,” Lachan said, smiling down at me. “We didn’t mention it to the others because they’d have ruined everything, tramping through the bracken like a herd of elephants and alerting every creature within miles.”
“So did you find the stag?”
“We did,” Murdoch replied. “Up on the flanks of Ben Alder. But it’s a canny beast. It never let us get close enough for a good shot.”
The flanks of Ben Alder, I thought. A perfect location to spy on the road down the pass and give a signal to someone that a car was approaching. . . . I looked up at Lachan’s jolly, weathered face and twinkling blue eyes and tried to picture him calmly eliminating the heirs to the British throne. It seemed impossible, but then I’d been taken in before. I knew enough to realize that criminals do not look guilty.