I was married to a lady who had briefly been a companion to an elderly woman, but Temple didn’t know that. I wondered if it would have made any difference if he had known. I was by now thoroughly disgusted with him, but I took care not to show it. Instead, I took the photograph of the dead girl from a drawer and handed it to him.
He looked surprised and raised his eyebrows. But he took the photograph and glanced at it casually. Then he looked again and an expression of alarm crossed his face. He thrust it back at me.
‘Where have you that— that horrible thing from?’
‘It is the photograph of an as yet unidentified body,’ I told him. ‘It was taken by a photographer employed by us at the Yard.’
‘Where… when…’ he stammered. Drops of sweat had broken out on his brow. He pulled out a handkerchief and mopped his face. By the time he had done this, and tucked away the handkerchief, he had regained some control.
‘I wish you hadn’t just— just produced it like that, like a damn conjuror with a rabbit out of a hat! It gave me the devil of a turn!’
‘Do you recognise the subject?’
‘I— well, I suppose you’d like me to say it is Emily Devray?’
‘Is it?’ I asked.
He had sagged momentarily but he gathered himself together and sat up straight. ‘I cannot say for sure. It is— it is a corpse, is it not? I can’t be expected to identify a photograph of a corpse!’ His voice rose almost on a note of panic.
‘But you think there is a similarity to the missing girl?’
‘Well, I… There might be! Look here, Inspector Ross, this must surely be an irregular way for you to go about your investigations. I came here to report a missing nurse-companion. Where did you… where was the girl in that ghastly photograph found? When?’
‘The body was found on Monday in the early afternoon. You will recall the fog was very thick on Monday and that probably delayed the discovery. We believe the body was abandoned where it was found earlier in the day, or possibly during the previous night. We were informed here at the Yard at four of the afternoon on Monday. As to where it was found…’ Now I hesitated. ‘Not so very far from Lady Temple’s house,’ I told him.
It might be as well not to say too much, and give him any more information than necessary, should he want later to concoct some explanation. He had his hands folded over the ivory knob of his cane and now began a rapid beat with the fingers of the upper hand on the back of the lower one.
‘I cannot possibly say,’ he announced at last. ‘I cannot identify the photograph with any certainty. There is… some resemblance, but then, Devray was… is very plain. If that is her in the photograph, all I can say is, she never looked very animated. Not, I must stress, that I did spend much time looking at her.’
Oh dear, I really didn’t care for George Temple. It was not just his manner that put me off. He was altogether too keen to make me understand he’d had no interest in the missing girl. But he was a young man and a worldly one. We had been discussing a young woman living under the same roof. A girl of just eighteen, who had no protection other than that offered by an elderly lady who was more or less bed-ridden.
‘I need to speak to Lady Temple herself,’ I said.
He looked alarmed. ‘Must you? See here, she’s not strong—’
‘Nevertheless, she is the missing girl’s employer and so I need to speak to her.’
‘You’re not going to show her that— that thing!’ He indicated the photograph. ‘For pity’s sake, Ross, my godmother would faint away on the spot!’
‘Oh, no, be reassured, Mr Temple, I should not do that. As you say, an identification from a photograph alone would hardly be satisfactory.’
He relaxed. ‘No, well, I’m glad you agree with me, then.’
‘Therefore, after I have spoken with Lady Temple, and if it seems possible that the body we have is that of Miss Devray, someone must identify it at the morgue, or say for certain it’s not her, as the case may be.’
He leaped to his feet, wild-eyed. ‘Are you saying I may have to go to a morgue and look at that corpse of yours?’
‘If you would be so good, and if it still seems necessary. After all, from what you tell me, I can hardly ask Lady Temple to do it.’
‘No, no, she can’t, couldn’t…’ He swayed on his feet and steadied himself with his ebony cane.
I took pity on him. ‘But take heart, Mr Temple. When we go to your aunt’s house, we may find Miss Devray has returned, or sent an explanation for her absence.’
‘I suppose so,’ he mumbled. He didn’t sound convinced. He hunched his shoulders briefly in a way that was dismissive.
I was even more sure he knew perfectly well she wouldn’t have returned. Emily Devray was on a slab at the morgue. Whether he was in any way responsible for her lying there remained to be seen.
* * *
I asked Sergeant Morris to come with us. George Temple was obviously not very happy about being driven through the streets of London in a cab with two police officers, as we clearly were. Morris, in particular, who is of burly build and singularly bland expression, could hardly be anything else.
When we arrived at the house, and the butler opened the door to see the three of us, George in the middle, the situation had a moment of grim comedy. Butlers are well trained not to show any emotion. But this fellow was sorely tested. He managed to control his shock, however, and gravely stood aside to let us in.
‘Let me go and tell Lady Temple the officers are here, Wilson,’ Temple ordered. ‘They wish to speak to her. It’s better I let her know.’
‘Lady Temple has been awaiting your return, sir. She is expecting you to bring the police. She asks that you will all wait in the drawing room and she will join you.’
The man spoke civilly but clearly meant to follow any instructions he had received from his employer. He did not accept any change to those orders from the young gentleman.
‘All right, then,’ Temple muttered sulkily, foiled. ‘Let her know we’re here, Wilson.’
This interested me. Was the lady able-bodied enough, despite what her godson claimed, to walk about the house unaided?
The answer was soon known: she was not. After we had waited some minutes we heard the sound of people approaching on the other side of the double doors, voices and the creak of wheels. George stood up. Morris and I did likewise. The pair of doors was opened wide by the butler and we beheld a startling sight.
A cane invalid chair was pushed in. In the chair, well supported with cushions, sat a small, frail-looking elderly lady with white hair under a widow’s cap, wearing a magenta gown with a lace collar and cuffs. At her throat was a mourning brooch, a woven pattern of hair preserved in a frame. A sad memento of her husband? Her features were good, her eyes particularly striking, and her skin, though lined, was excellent. She had once been a beauty, I decided. She was also, despite her frailty, clearly of determined character.
But, in truth, my attention was not first attracted so much to the lady as to the servant pushing the wheeled chair. I have already mentioned that Sergeant Morris is of sturdy build and tall, but this fellow was almost a giant. He had the height and physique of a prizefighter, and surely outweighed Morris. His features were blunt, as if roughly chiselled ready for some monumental sculpture, and he had a shock of tow-coloured hair. He looked as if he had emerged from some Germanic folk tale.
Perhaps Lady Temple was accustomed to visitors gawping at her manservant because, although she couldn’t have failed to observe our surprise, she chose to ignore it. Instead she gestured to some chairs and asked both Morris and me to be seated. Her voice was firm.
We did as bid. George Temple took a seat nearby. He appeared ill at ease.
‘My godson has explained to you the circumstances which have caused my concern?’ she asked.
I assured her that, yes, he had. ‘But,’ I added, ‘I would like very much to hear from you, Lady Temple, anything that you can tell me about last Sunday, from th
e morning until the time in evening when you realised that Miss Devray was not in the house. What time was that?’
‘We realised she was not in the house at all at about eight that evening. I intended to retire. I sent my personal maid to find Emily to help. She, Dorcas the maid, came back about ten minutes later to say she couldn’t find her. Then I summoned Wilson, the butler, and asked him to find out what had become of her. If necessary, he was to institute a search. Around half past nine, Wilson came to say Miss Devray was not in the house, nor could she be located anywhere nearby, despite exhaustive inquiries among the neighbours.’
‘If we could go back to Sunday morning,’ I requested.
‘Emily was certainly here then. I do not always leave the house to attend a church service, Inspector Ross, but I always read my Bible, or the order of service, every day. On Sunday, after breakfast, I asked Emily if she would read aloud to me from the Book of Common Prayer. She did so.’ Lady Temple paused. ‘She read it very well. She was a young woman of some education. When she had done that, I told her that, after luncheon, she might have the rest of the day free until the evening.’
‘May I ask, did she sit at the same table as yourself? I understand that was the usual routine.’
‘Oh, yes,’ said Lady Temple immediately. ‘She was not a servant, Inspector Ross!’
From the corner of my eye, I saw George Temple shift impatiently on his chair.
‘Was it usual, may I ask, for you to allow Miss Devray the Sunday afternoon free?’
‘Yes. She did not lack free time, Inspector! I needed her in the morning, mostly, and in the evening. But during the day, unless I wanted her to read to me, or to keep me company, Dorcas was able to manage for me.’ The lady paused, and looked briefly sad. ‘I shall miss Emily if she does not return, because I liked her company. She chattered to me about her life in Salisbury. She was a thoroughly nice girl.’
More wriggling from George.
‘But I sound selfish,’ Lady Temple added suddenly. ‘My chief concern is for Emily’s safety and well-being, not that I lack her companionship. I have found her a very reliable young woman. To simply disappear is quite out of character. Besides, when Dorcas looked in her room, everything was – still is – there, including her outer garments. The weather is bitterly cold. She would not go out without some warm mantle or shawl.’
I had already made that point to Master George; and he looked sulky now at hearing it from his godmother. He very much wanted me to believe in an elopement of some sort. John Colby in Salisbury had also speculated about one.
‘I should like to take a look in Miss Devray’s room before I leave, if I may,’ I told Lady Temple.
She inclined her head. ‘Of course. Dorcas will show you.’
‘Did Miss Devray mention any friends in London? Did she know anyone here?’
‘No one at all,’ said Lady Temple firmly. ‘I have been a little worried that she might be lonely. I think she did miss Salisbury, having lived there all her life.’
George Temple’s fidgeting was getting more obvious. His godmother had noticed.
‘What is the matter, George?’ she asked with a steely kindness.
‘I am sorry, Aunt Charlotte, it is just that, well, I know you are worried about Miss Devray, we all are!’ he added hastily. ‘But perhaps she decided, on the spur of the moment, to go back to Salisbury?’
‘Without her belongings? Don’t talk nonsense, George!’
George turned scarlet with embarrassment and rage. ‘Well, just, you know… She could have decided to avoid having to explain to you that she was leaving.’
‘Emily had better manners!’ snapped Lady Temple.
George would do well to keep quiet, I thought. He realised it and did not speak again.
‘Thank you, Lady Temple,’ I said. ‘Now I should like to speak to Dorcas, if I may.’
‘Do you need my presence?’
‘No, ma’am. But I should like to see Miss Devray’s room, as I said.’
‘Then, if you wait here, I will send Dorcas to you. Michael!’
The giant by the door, who had stood perfectly motionless throughout, stepped forward. The butler, Wilson, who must have been hovering outside in the corridor, appeared without summons and opened the doors. Michael gripped the back of the cane chair in his massive hands and wheeled his employer out of the room and away.
When the doors had closed, and we remained with George Temple, he said, ‘You didn’t mention finding a body to my godmother.’
‘It has not yet been identified,’ I reminded him. ‘Perhaps you would go now with Sergeant Morris to take a look? The task is unpleasant, I recognise that, but it is urgent.’
‘Very well!’ he said with poor grace. ‘What will you do?’
‘Stay here and await Dorcas,’ I replied mildly.
I had not to wait very long. Dorcas appeared within five minutes of George’s departure with Morris. She was an elderly woman of country appearance, plump and sensible.
‘Something’s happened to that poor child,’ she said immediately to me. ‘Her ladyship is very worried. We all are.’
‘All?’ I inquired.
‘All the servants!’ she retorted. ‘Everyone liked Miss Devray.’
‘How about Mr George Temple? Is he worried?’
She blinked and gave me a sharp look. ‘Anything that upsets Lady Temple is of concern to Mr George.’
‘Dorcas,’ I said, ‘did Miss Devray tell you, or did anything she said or did lead you to suspect, she had an admirer, a young man? She might not tell Lady Temple, but I think you would suspect it, if it were so.’
‘I don’t know why you should think that!’ snapped Dorcas. ‘But the answer is no. She never said a thing.’
‘Where did she go, when she had free time?’
‘I don’t know,’ said Dorcas. ‘It wasn’t my business to know. She did once say she had been to look at some paintings in a gallery. A museum, too, she went to a museum once, she said. The British Museum, it was. She was very impressed by that.’
I nodded. She could have met someone at a museum or gallery, I was thinking. Emily was a young woman of good education. If some young fellow had struck up a conversation about a piece of art, she might have been drawn into discussing it.
‘Lady Temple says you want to look at her room, sir,’ said Dorcas.
‘Oh, yes, I do.’
‘If you would follow me, sir?’ She turned and led the way out.
They had given Emily a small but pleasant room at the side of the house, overlooking a small walled garden. The area on which I gazed down was laid mainly to grass with some shrubs. A small wooden building in one corner suggested a gardener’s shed.
I turned back from the window and looked around the room. It was very tidy. I asked Dorcas if anyone had been in to make it so, but she said it was as Miss Devray had left it. There were some books on a shelf: her Bible, a Book of Common Prayer, three novels by Mr Dickens and two by Sir Walter Scott, plus an account of someone’s travels in the Orient: all solid fare, no penny romances. Yes, a serious young woman! Her outer clothes were in a wardrobe and her underthings in a chest of drawers, again all folded neatly. Only one thing surprised me. In the bottom drawer there was a copy of a local newspaper from Salisbury, five weeks old. It had been read, but carefully refolded, and put away to be consulted again. Now, how had she come by that? I wondered. Had someone sent it to her? Had she chanced upon it? Had some other visitor left it in a public place she’d visited? Why had she kept it?
‘I will take this with me, Dorcas,’ I told her, holding up the newspaper.
She showed no surprise.
‘Do you happen to know where she got it?’
‘No, sir.’
Wherever Emily had got it, she had kept it. Even prized it? News from home? From the evidence of Lady Temple and from this hoarded newspaper, Emily had been homesick.
When I left the house, I stood outside taking a moment to study the building. There was
a basement and a flight of steps leading down into it from the pavement, to the left of the main front door. That would be the way the servants went in and out. I walked past the frontage, along the pavement, until I reached the end of the building and came to a high red-brick wall adjoining it. There was a door in it but it was locked. I looked up. The bare winter branches of trees showed above it. On the other side of this wall was the garden Emily could have seen from her window. Had that any significance, I wondered?
I went back to the Yard and awaited the return of Sergeant Morris, who had accompanied George Temple to view the body.
He came back with an expression of grim satisfaction on his face. ‘He passed out!’ he said bluntly. ‘Keeled over and went down like a skittle. We picked him up and someone found some smelling salts. Then I got him to take another look, standing by to catch him if he went again. But he was all right the second time. Can’t blame the young fellow, I suppose, it isn’t a pleasant task. And she’s been dead a few days now and although she’s been kept good and cold, she’s beginning to look a bit waxen and there’s an odour. Body was identified as that of Miss Emily Devray by Mr George Temple, member of her employer’s family,’ concluded Morris formally.
‘Then we’ll ask the coroner to rule quickly on allowing her to be buried. Has he been informed?’
‘Inquest will be held first thing in the morning, sir.’
‘You and I will have to attend. That boy, Horace Worth, too. He found the body. Does Lady Temple know?’
‘I accompanied the young gent back to the house but he insisted he should be the one to tell his godmother. It seemed reasonable to me, sir.’
‘Yes, I suppose so. We shall have to go back to the house tomorrow, straight after the inquest. I can talk to the old lady again and you can have a chat with the servants, especially that butler. Ask him about the garden. Get him to show it to you.’
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