Philanderers Gone

by Beth Byers

  All she knew at this point was that, on paper, she was the most likely suspect in Leonard’s death. Detective Truman was going to have a field day with this information. The only way to avoid his further suspicion, if possible, was to face this information about the will head on.

  She straightened her shoulders with resolve. “Gerald, please take me to Scotland Yard.”

  Chapter 11

  Hettie flicked her finger against her palm as she considered what she should do. She wanted to know why Scotland Yard was so focused on thinking the yacht going down was a murder. In her opinion, she could imagine any individual on the yacht being murdered, but it took a special kind of cruelty and disregard of a human life to kill everyone on a yacht to rid oneself of just one fellow.

  If she were to try to list all of the people who might do such a thing, she was unable to come up with one name. Surely…surely…this was all a mistake. Surely no one had murdered Harvey and his death was—if she were being vicious, she’d finish that thought with the ‘natural consequences of his choices.’

  After leaving Ro, who’d looked ready to sick up at the sight of her own house, Hettie had Peterson return her to the hospital. She couldn’t imagine Scotland Yard telling her why they thought there was a murder. Not with her as a suspect. They’d soon come to realize that despite her hysterics, she didn’t gain all that much with Harvey dead.

  Yes, a philandering husband was out of her life but that wasn’t worth murdering over. It wasn’t like she was left with a new fortune. She wasn’t. She might save money without Harvey and the way he tried to slide bills for his mistresses into Hettie’s payments, but she’d come to realize his game and was able to counter it.

  Peterson handed her out of the auto when they arrived at the hospital.

  “You know,” she told him, “I should learn to operate one of these.”

  Peterson’s gaze widened as he registered what she said. Who knew he was one of those gents who didn’t agree with lady drivers? She wasn’t surprised, but she winked, remembered where she was, and then sighed. It was as if what had happened wasn’t real. Like the murder of Harvey and the others was some sort of party game where people played at why a person would be killed. It didn’t make sense if it wasn’t a game.

  If it were a game, however, Hettie considered—she’d blame the widow. Perhaps in the party they would act out the scenes, or perhaps the clues would all be laid out like a puzzle. Perhaps the game would be a sort of themed scavenger hunt where you discovered more along the way of the hunt. That made more sense to Hettie.

  She’d thought it before, and she’d think it again, but the only person anyone could be sure would be on that yacht was either Ro or Leonard. Lately, given what Ro had said, it would have been Leonard. So if this was truly a murder and not a random, horrible accident, the intended target must be Leonard.

  Harvey couldn’t have been the true target. Not unless the murderer was also on the yacht and had a way off without becoming his own victim. Hettie didn’t think that even Leonard’s lover would be a guaranteed target. Ro made it seem, as she talked about her husband, that his lovers were ever-changing and he was nearly as cruel with them as he was with Ro and his servants.

  Hettie stared up at the hospital, knew she didn’t want to go inside, and then went in anyway. She hurried through the floors, trying to avoid seeing anything. She paused in sheer shock when she caught sight of the handsome but cheeky servant from the party. The man was in one of the wards, in one of the long lines of beds, and he was saying something to a nurse to leave her blushing.

  Hettie had no doubt that the servant had been on the yacht. Perhaps he’d left the party just after they had. Or maybe the yacht had been in the dock for a while as everyone arrived. Of all the people on the yacht, given the eavesdropping nature of the fellow, she expected that he might have learned and heard far more than the others. Perhaps if she…yes! Hettie hurried back out to Peterson and sent him for a few things while she went to see if she could learn anything from the doctor.

  Hettie bypassed the ward where the Lothario-styled servant lay and hurried down to the morgue, crossing her fingers that no bodies were out when she approached the doctor. Hettie paused at the door, remembered those kind eyes with the crinkles at the edges, and dared to knock.

  A moment later a much younger man with thinning blonde hair and watery blue eyes met her at the door.

  “Yes?” he asked, glancing her over rather as though she were a side of beef.

  She eyed him back, determined to not let another man push her around or manipulate her as Harvey had done. “I’m looking for Dr…” It was only then that Hettie realized she had never gotten his name. She stumbled over her words. “The doctor who helped me this morning.”

  “You here for those drunk yacht folks?”

  Hettie blinked in the face of his derision and then nodded.

  “Dr. Neville Hale then.”

  Hettie looked at him helplessly and the man scoffed as though she should just know that yes, of course, Neville Hale was the name of the kind doctor. “Very nice? Dark eyes? Laugh lines?”

  “He’s not that serious if that’s what you mean. Too many jokes, not enough focus.”

  Hettie blinked again as she realized that this much younger doctor with the sneer and scowl was deriding his…probable…superior to her. She ignored the sneer and asked, “May I speak with him?”

  The fellow considered her. “There’s a body out. Wait here.”

  The door was shut in her face with a bit too much force for her comfort, but only a few minutes later, the kind doctor opened the door.

  “Hello?” His warm gaze was concerned and he clearly remembered her.

  “I wondered if I could speak with you for a few moments.”

  He nodded, so very gently, and held out his arm, which she accepted. While she gathered her thoughts, he quietly led her towards that little green space. She found herself seated and then he took a seat next to her after offering her a cup of tea and being declined.

  “What can I do for you?”

  “I’m afraid I’m in rather a little trouble and wondered if you could help me.”

  “Why ever would you be in trouble?” Dr. Hale asked. “Trouble beyond losing your husband?”

  “The trouble of losing him,” Hettie told him in a hushed voice. “He was quite a philanderer and I laughed when I heard he died. It wasn’t that I thought it was funny,” she told Dr. Hale, hoping he would see.

  He did immediately. His eyes crinkled with a kind smile. “You must have wished him out of your life time and again. It must have felt like a terrible cosmic prank.”

  To Hettie’s horror, the doctor’s immediate understanding had tears welling in her eyes. She nodded and he reached out and took her hand, squeezing it tightly as if providing her an anchor to fight through her emotions.

  “I quite understand,” Dr. Hale said, but he didn’t expand upon why he did. “How are you in trouble?”

  Hettie took the reins of her emotions and glanced to the side, blinking rapidly until the sheen was gone. Then she dared to return her gaze back to Dr. Hale. “It’s Scotland Yard. They have reason to believe that the yacht accident wasn’t an accident, and because I…lost control of myself, they think that I might have been willing to kill Harvey to get rid of him.”

  Dr. Hale didn’t react immediately. His gaze moved over her face, lingering on her eyes for a long time, before taking in the rest of her. She didn’t feel like she was being leered at. If anything, she felt as though he were examining her to see if she was lying. Rather like Hettie’s mother had done when she’d told a whopper about not eating the tarts.

  Whatever he saw in her must have been enough for him to answer. “I don’t see you as the killer.”

  “So you also believe that there was a murder?”

  Dr. Hale paused and admitted, “I’ve heard the reasoning behind why there might have been nefarious actions and find them compelling.”

  “You bel
ieve it was a murder?” she repeated. “All of those people?”

  “I think it could have been.” Dr. Hale frowned.

  Hettie wanted to reach out and smooth his wrinkles back into laugh lines, but she also couldn’t abide the idea of a man touching her, let alone touching one herself. She shuddered and then shuddered again as she realized what he’d said. Someone had likely murdered all of those people on the yacht.

  “But why?”

  “I suppose if we knew that, we’d understand who.”

  “Why me?” she asked then. Her selfish follow-up question had a bit of a wail to it. “I wouldn’t have hurt Harvey let alone a yacht-load of people who were innocent of his crimes.”

  Dr. Hale nodded. “I believe your reaction—though understandable—was concerning to those who hadn’t been in a similar position.”

  Again, Hettie wanted to ask him what his experience was, but she knew better than to poke another’s wounds in such a way. She took another deep breath in. “I suppose I wasn’t thinking. Perhaps if I were English and I had the same stiff upper lip that you all do so well, I’d have been able to contain myself.”

  “Did you know he might have died?”

  Hettie nodded and then sighed. “My friend, Ro, and I spent the night at a party and I took her home. Ro was going to get clothes and come back to the hotel with me, but instead, we discovered Scotland Yard at her house. We found out then about the yacht accident and that people had died, and they weren’t sure if our spouses were included. The whole journey over to the hospital, I thought how nice it would be to have Harvey out of my life while also not wanting him to be dead, and hating myself for realizing how peaceful it would be to not have that constant battle with him. He was difficult.”

  Dr. Hale nodded. That gentle glint in his gaze hadn’t faded at all despite her rather blunt confession. Her hands were shaking, and surely he could feel it under his own anchoring hand.

  “Will you tell me why the detectives think that those poor people were murdered?” Hettie asked him.

  “Witnesses on a nearby vessel saw enough to be certain that things were not right with the yacht. Most of the survivors were fished out by the men on that vessel.”

  Hettie nodded, her lip quivering. “Why would anyone put that many people at risk?”

  Dr. Hale gave her a slight, but warm, smile. “I believe the reason why we find it so baffling is the exact reason why you can’t be a real suspect. I imagine it’s quite disturbing to be a suspect in your husband’s murder. Scotland Yard detectives are very good at what they do. They’ll discover that there isn’t a strong reason to suspect you as they delve further into the case.”

  “One can only hope,” Hettie told him weakly. He wasn’t a detective, and he wasn’t involved in the investigation, so he had no reason to know what Scotland Yard believed.

  Chapter 12

  Hettie left Dr. Hale, glancing back as she went. There was something about a man who gave her the credit of not immediately thinking her a monster because she’d lost complete control of herself.

  It struck her suddenly that she’d have to arrange Harvey’s funeral. Should she take him back to Canada?

  She didn’t want to deal with any of this. Nothing at all. She took a deep breath in and then let it out slowly. A funeral for Harvey in England or taking him home to be buried in Canada? Would she be able to stand going back to where everyone would know that he’d played her for a fool and even had her paying his mistress’s bills?

  No, Hettie thought, no. She considered sending a telegram to his family. For goodness sake, she should have done so already. She mentally started composing a note but wasn’t sure how to truly handle it. Perhaps, I regret to inform you that Harvey Hughes has died after a terrible accident. More details to come.

  That might work. She closed her eyes at the look that would appear on his mother’s face. Of all people, no one adored Harvey Hughes more than Barbara Hughes. Hettie shook off the image of his mother’s reaction and focused on finding her way back to the main floor and to the men’s ward.

  Peterson stood outside the pretty, eavesdropping servant’s ward. She approached him.

  “I’ve got to send notice back to Harvey’s family.”

  They got a pencil and paper from the nearby nurses’ station, and before Hettie could agonize over how to tell the news, she sketched it out quickly and sent her man to send the news to both Harvey’s family and her own. When he had gone, she eyed the box full of goods he’d gotten her for the next interview.

  She lifted it, pausing for a moment at its weight. She took a moment to gather herself, then crossed to the servant and dramatically set down the box on the table next to him. “Fancy meeting you here.”

  He stared at her. He was pale, she noted, with dark circles under his eyes and a prominent bruise on his cheek. “Ah—”

  Hettie opened the box and pulled out a bottle. She saw that Peterson had gotten several bottles of dark beer along with the rest of her requests. “Look at this. Doesn’t that look delightful?” She grinned at him. “Hettie Hughes. What’s your name?”

  His eyes glanced to the bottle and then to her. Begrudgingly, he answered, “Donovan Brooks. What do you want?”

  “What did you see?”

  His eyes narrowed on her, and she pulled out a chunk of cheese and sniffed it. “Oh that does smell good.” She followed with a loaf of bread that was still warm, and she opened the brown paper wrapping enough to let him scent it. “I imagine the hospital food is rather terrible.”

  “It wasn’t so bad.”

  “Do they not let you eat at that mansion where you work?”

  Donovan grumbled. “I work different parties. More of an occasional servant than regular staff.”

  Hettie studied him. “I’m not trying to torment you, you know. Only exchanging a few nice things for a little conversation.”

  “Did your husband live?” Donovan asked with a wicked lift of his brow and thick sneer.

  Hettie flinched and shook her head.

  “What are you wanting to know?” Donovan asked in a hard tone. “That he was stepping out on you? You already knew that, right? Do you want the name of the girl? Because I heard she died.”

  Hettie flinched again.

  “Left behind a sister who’d tried to tell her again and again that your husband was a nasty piece of work. She wasn’t wrong, was she? The sister?”

  Hettie took in a deep breath and then told the man flatly, “I knew what Harvey was.”

  “I bet you’re happy. I heard Scotland Yard thinks it was a murder.”

  “Was it?”

  The fellow reached out for the warm bread. She didn’t object when he took it from her. “The food here is bad.”

  Hettie nodded, unsurprised.

  He took a hearty bite, then asked around his wad of bread, “What else is in there?”

  Hettie pulled out a few magazines, a newspaper, chocolate bars, cigarettes. With each withdrawal from the box, his eyes lighted.

  “There were odd happenings, to be honest,” he said in a more congenial tone. “Mr. Leonard was running me ragged, like he always did. He was a cruel bloke and I only agreed to work for him on the yacht for double pay, up front.”

  Hettie lifted her brows in surprise, though she shouldn’t have been. She’d heard what Ro had to say about her husband, and the treatment of the servants had come up a few times.

  “The thing was, I’m sure I saw a fellow on the ship who didn’t belong.”

  Hettie tried not to gasp. “You mean like a…a…saboteur?”

  He stared at the bread in his hand, his look distant. “That yacht was running fine when we left. And even though Mr. Ripley took the wheel far too often as drunk as he was, it was running smoothly. Then all the sudden there was a bang, followed by a quick round of fireworks, so no one thought anything of it. Only fireworks hadn’t been planned for the evening, and the first explosion didn’t sound like the rest.”

  “Bloody hell,” Hettie brea
thed, eyes wide. “You think that the saboteur used some sort of explosive with fireworks to hide what he’d done?”

  “Yes,” Donovan said flatly. He glanced aside and shivered. “We’d have all died if there weren’t a random boat nearby who was willing to fish us out. They did their best to save us all.”

  “What about Mrs. Stone?” Hettie asked.

  “I heard she lived, but I didn’t see her on our rescue boat.”

  “Do you think you missed her?”

  “I dunno. But she’s in the ladies’ ward.”

  “Who was she sleeping with?”

  “Who can tell with her? Leonard maybe? That French man with the narrow mustache. Your husband certainly. I heard him brag that you’d paid her bills a time or two.”

  Hettie kept her face passive though it was a bit of a fight to do so. It was hardly the first time Harvey had pulled that trick on her. “If your boat didn’t save her, who did?”

  Donovan shook his head. “I dunno. I dunno anything about it. Not really. I told you what I saw. For the most part, I was delivering champagne and cleaning up the sick. You’d think folks on a boat would attempt to vomit over the rail and save me the trouble.”

  The disgust on Donovan’s face was echoed on Hettie’s. “If you think of anything else, I’ll reward you.” She shifted the box closer to his bed so he could get to it easily.

  “I could use a ride home.”

  Hettie turned back to him and saw a flash of something deeper on his face. Was that shame? Or only hope? Surely he had people who would take care of him.

  “When are they letting you out?”

  “Later today.”

  Hettie nodded. “I’ll send my man. He’ll be here and take you home. Look for a Mr. Peterson.”

  Donovan nodded and then said the first purely unadulterated thing she’d heard from him. “Thank you.”

  Hettie paused. A part of her wanted to help him. Another part of her remembered the way he’d jumped at the chance to blackmail her after eavesdropping and knew she shouldn’t. Instead, she said, “You’ll be all right. Have you heard of Mr. Hercules Jones?”