Bruce reeled. ‘Jinx is dead?’ he said as the inspector stepped back into the hallway. ‘Who the hell would want to kill a dog?’
‘It wasn’t aimed at the dog,’ McGregor repeated. ‘It was in Eleanor’s chair. It was meant for her.’
‘Oh,’ Bruce said. ‘Poor Jinx. He didn’t deserve that.’
Eleanor was about to sink on to the chair in the hall, but Mirabelle grabbed her. ‘No,’ she said. ‘There’s no saying where else they might have been.’
Beyond the open door to the drawing room, Tash jumped to her feet. ‘Why would anyone be after you?’ she said.
Eleanor shrugged. She rubbed her arm where Mirabelle’s fingers had dug into her skin. Her face crumpled and she began to cry. ‘Jinxy,’ she burbled. ‘Poor boy.’
‘What are you going to do?’ Tash snapped in the direction of the inspector. ‘I mean, you can’t expect us just to sit here with a madman on the loose. Not so crazy now, is it, what Bruce did handing out the guns? We’re sitting ducks. It’s like some kind of murderous roller-coaster and you don’t have a clue.’
The inspector returned to the front door and called one of the policemen inside. ‘I’m going to take a look for myself,’ he announced.
Bruce hugged his wife, who was rocking backwards and forwards, a handkerchief pressed to her face. McGregor motioned that he was going to follow the inspector and Bruce nodded. ‘Me too,’ he said, handing Eleanor to Mirabelle, as if she was a crying child. Tash put her hand on Eleanor’s back. ‘I don’t want to sound like Uncle Niko, but poisoned pins?’ she said.
‘I know,’ replied Mirabelle. ‘It sounds like KGB. I mean, those are the stories you hear. Men killed in the street with darts. Umbrellas that fire bullets.’
‘Don’t be ridiculous!’ Eleanor snapped, heaving for breath. ‘What would you know about the KGB?’
‘Did Susan talk to you the other day, Eleanor?’ Mirabelle asked. ‘Before she died?’
Eleanor sniffed dismissively and let out a sob. ‘She wanted some time off. I said we’d talk about it after the houseguests had gone.’
Mirabelle put an arm around her friend’s shoulder. ‘It’s all right,’ she said, and then felt foolish because obviously it wasn’t.
‘Why would they want to kill Jinx? I want to see him. Don’t let them just take him away.’ Eleanor began to cry again.
‘Someone wanted to kill you, Eleanor,’ Mirabelle said gently. ‘That’s what it is.’
‘Well, damn them,’ Eleanor spat, her sorrow turning to fury. ‘Damn them all to hell.’
Chapter 15
Every man is a piece of the continent
It took a while for the women to calm down. They stood in the middle of the hall for ten minutes as if they were marooned. ‘I’d go and lie down but there’s probably a snake in my bed or an assassin in my closet,’ Eleanor said.
Eventually, one of the police officers appeared in the doorway. ‘The inspector told me to stay with you for safety.’ He stood as if to attention.
Tash laughed. ‘I think the safest place may be the kitchen. I can’t see anyone getting past Mrs Gillies and there’s no …’ she paused, ‘upholstery.’
The kitchen lights were burning bright and it was warm by the stove. Gillies stirred a pot, scenting the air with the smell of barley soup. The radio was on, the announcer reading the news; something about a clergyman calling for nuclear disarmament. ‘Sorry to disturb you, Mrs Gillies,’ Eleanor said.
‘It seems so calm in here,’ Mirabelle chimed.
‘There’s nothing else to do, is there?’ Gillies said stoically. ‘We’ve just got to get on.’
‘Well, it smells delicious.’
Gillies, unsure how to respond to praise, returned to stirring the soup.
The rest of the morning passed in a succession of pots of tea and a rush of police officers, who drove from Inverness. Eleanor fussed. ‘I can’t see how we are going to face food,’ she said. ‘I mean with all of this going on? Perhaps Mrs Gillies could just serve us in the kitchen?’
Gillies did not reply, but went to the pantry and brought in a large chicken, which she placed in a roasting tin. Elizabeth was sent to the scullery to peel a bucket of potatoes. ‘It’s easier to serve you in the dining room, Mrs Robertson,’ Mirabelle said eventually.
Mirabelle thought it must be the shock. Perhaps it was good she had something to focus on. ‘Best to lay on sandwiches for lunch and people can help themselves? Make some for the police officers,’ she directed, suddenly very much the lady of the house.
‘Yes, ma’am.’
Mirabelle wished she could help, but Mrs Gillies would entertain no offers. She sounded so resentful that her kitchen had been invaded that it seemed churlish to push the point.
Almost at lunchtime, an ambulance arrived to remove Jinx’s body, which was being sent for a post-mortem examination. Bruce stridently objected until, eventually, he was quieted by McGregor.
‘He’s more upset about the dog than anything else,’ Eleanor snapped. She was upset too. ‘You won’t cut him up much, will you?’ she entreated the ambulance men as they placed the dog’s body on a stretcher.
The man smiled apologetically. ‘They need to know what killed him,’ he said gently. ‘We’ll be as careful as we can.’
After a team of three men had searched the drawing room, the women returned to the front of the house. Tash and Mirabelle stood at the long window and watched as Gregory walked up the hill, carrying a small suitcase. He was challenged no fewer than half a dozen times as he approached the house. Tash went to meet him at the front door. ‘Sit with us,’ she said.
‘Shouldn’t I be helping with something?’
‘I’ll feel safer with you here,’ Tash insisted.
‘The village is in uproar,’ Gregory reported. ‘People can’t believe it. Journalists are offering people a fortune for information. They’re searching outbuildings for this guy – the one with the navy jacket,’ he said.
‘Was there a sighting?’ Mirabelle asked.
But Gregory just shook his head.
An uneasy silence settled on the drawing room, broken only by the sound of officers moving around the rest of the house. It was an eerie feeling. The team who had taken over Eleanor’s office stripped the chair and dusted it for fingerprints. Upstairs, they took Eleanor’s bed apart. Her bathroom and dressing room were as good as dismantled though nothing was found. By four o’clock, the rooms were cleared for use, and Eleanor announced she was going for a soak. Everyone else remained on the sofas, sipping whisky and playing cards quietly.
Outside, Mirabelle noted, the men changed shifts as darkness fell. Closer to the house two uniformed officers flanked the front door but, further away from the house, she noticed more men were setting up for the night. Before the dinner gong, a van arrived with a pack of three dogs on wide leather leashes, barking as they sniffed the air. ‘What on earth do they need dogs for?’ she asked.
McGregor, recently returned to the civilian group, watched from the window. ‘They’ll be more effective than men at night if anyone approaches the house. It means they’re taking it seriously.’
The clock on the mantelpiece struck half past six. ‘Should we dress?’ Tash asked.
Bruce nodded. ‘Why not? They dressed for dinner on the Titanic.’
Mirabelle and McGregor changed upstairs in silence. It was so quiet that, when she sprayed perfume in the air and stepped into it, she noticed the sound of the pump. At seven they came back down. Bruce dispensed malt – iced for Tash and with a dash of soda for everyone else. One of the policemen and Gregory stood guard on either side of the fire.
‘This is terrible,’ Tash said.
Everyone else murmured agreement.
‘I’ve been thinking about where to bury Jinx. We don’t have a proper pet graveyard but there are some family dogs interred near the lodge,’ Bruce announced. ‘Poor old thing hardly went that far away from the house when he was alive, but there’s a clearing and we can ord
er a stone.’
Tash’s eyes filled with tears. ‘Eleanor was right. You’re more concerned about the dog.’
‘It has to be done,’ Bruce objected.
‘I’ve been waiting for my godmother’s body for five days.’
‘Of course. I apologise,’ Bruce cut in. ‘I didn’t mean to upset you.’
‘I hope the poison tells us something.’ McGregor’s voice seemed to calm them. ‘I mean, whatever killed Jinx is potentially a clue to the other deaths. Not that any of the clues make sense.’
‘Murders. They were murders.’ Tash finished her whisky and rattled the ice cubes in her empty glass.
‘Are you sure you want more?’ Mirabelle asked. None of them had managed to eat anything much all day.
‘I’m positive,’ Tash answered. ‘Hit me.’ Bruce poured her an uncharacteristically stingy measure but she didn’t complain.
Then Bruce checked the clock on the mantelpiece. ‘It’s been such a terrible day. I can’t blame Eleanor for not facing food,’ he said vaguely.
Tash shifted in her seat. Mirabelle’s eyes met McGregor’s. The policeman made to move but Mirabelle put up her hand. ‘Perhaps I should go up and ask her,’ she offered. ‘I can have Gillies send up a tray.’
The air in the hallway felt fresh on Mirabelle’s skin and the pressure of having to say something to fill the horrible gap that had constituted the day was lifted now she was alone. She took the stairs slowly, in no rush. Turning to the front of the house, she knocked on the door of Eleanor and Bruce’s bedroom. There was no answer. Feeling only mildly perturbed, she knocked again. ‘Eleanor?’ Still no reply so she turned the handle.
Inside, bedside lamps cast golden light around the room. The walls were decorated in pale peach paper set off by a thick white carpet. A huge bed was set against the right-hand wall with a tall, buttoned headboard in glistening pink silk. The effect was glamorous. Casting around the room, Mirabelle realised that it was empty. The curtains had not been drawn on the long windows to the front of the house, which were sheer, black voids. A smaller, single window overlooked the side, and must, she thought, be framed to show off the trees that Eleanor had wanted to see in blossom. Mirabelle moved into the centre of the room and called again, ‘Eleanor?’
The door to the dressing-room suite was open and she continued. Eleanor’s clothes were heaped in piles where the police officers had searched the wardrobes. At the dressing table, the upholstery had been removed from the stool and the horsehair pulled apart.
Trembling now, Mirabelle knocked on the bathroom door. ‘Eleanor?’ Silence. She turned the handle and felt a wave of nausea. The bathroom was empty. The bath was pristine. The towels lay folded, unused, on a freestanding oak rail. The bar of soap was dry on the washstand and the air was scented with washing powder and vinegar, not with bath oil, soap or scented cream. Nobody had used this room in many hours, perhaps not at any time today.
Mirabelle’s skin felt suddenly clammy. Beginning to panic, she returned the way she had come, back into the hallway, checking the rooms as she went and calling Eleanor’s name. She scaled the steps to the roof terrace but there was no one there. Slipping down the main staircase, she checked Bruce’s study, the orangery and the kitchen, where Gillies was tipping vegetables on to silver platters, ready for service. ‘I can’t find Eleanor,’ Mirabelle said. ‘She isn’t in her room.’
‘Perhaps try the office?’ Gillies suggested.
Mirabelle continued through the back door, where another policeman stood smoking. The Alsatian beside him jumped to his feet, as if to attention. The dog’s ears pricked up as she spoke. ‘Have you seen Mrs Robertson? Is she in the office?’
The man shook his head. ‘There’s been nobody out in the last hour,’ he reported. ‘Not even our lads. Me and Sassenach here are on guard till first light.’
‘It’s time for dinner,’ Mirabelle replied, and cursed herself for sounding petty. ‘I’ll check she hasn’t come down in the meantime,’ she said and closed the door.
Back in the drawing room, Tash had started a game of solitaire. ‘Is Eleanor all right?’ Bruce asked.
‘She’s not in her rooms,’ Mirabelle said. ‘I checked the orangery and the office. When did you last see her?’
Bruce put down his glass. ‘When she went up to bathe.’
‘Wasn’t she upstairs when you got dressed?’
‘The bathroom door was closed. I thought she wanted time on her own. I got changed and came back down. I assumed she’d hear the gong.’
There was a beat – just a second as everybody took this in. Then McGregor gestured towards Gregory and the policeman. The three of them burst through the double doors into the hallway followed by Bruce. Tash put down the cards. ‘Oh God,’ she said.
‘Eleanor!’ McGregor shouted, opening every door as he made his way through the house. ‘Eleanor!’ A cacophony of men’s voices ensued. ‘Mrs Robertson! Eleanor!’
Mirabelle sank on to the sofa next to Tash. The girl’s hands were quivering. ‘I hate this,’ she said. ‘Nina would have hated it too. She was never a victim. Never till now.’
McGregor came back to the drawing room. ‘Gregory has gone to alert the officers. We’ll search the place inside and out,’ he said. ‘You stay here.’
‘Can’t we help?’ Tash asked.
‘Honestly, you won’t make much difference – the main thing in the dark will be the dogs. It would make me feel better now, knowing you were somewhere together. Safe,’ McGregor said, with a nod at Mirabelle, who leaned over and took Tash’s hand.
Outside, the men were called together, and Bruce fetched some of Eleanor’s clothes so the animals could track her scent. Tash and Mirabelle watched as the dots of light from two dozen torches fanned across the landscape. It would look picturesque, Mirabelle thought, if it wasn’t so awful. She ran through the crimes one by one. Nina Orlova, killed by strangulation in the middle of the night, Susan MacLeod with her neck broken in daylight, Eleanor narrowly missing being poisoned and now disappeared. She hoped it was kidnap because that at least meant Eleanor had a chance. She felt nauseous at the thought her body might be out there, in one of the fields, just like Susan’s.
Tash paced in front of the fire. ‘Back in Russia when people were trapped on their estates because of the Revolution, there are stories about all kinds of debauchery. Naked hunts, orgies, feasts and crazy parties. People knew the end was coming so they lashed out and grabbed life. But I don’t feel that way. I’m just terrified.’
Mirabelle felt more mystified than anything else.
‘Do you think Eleanor simply couldn’t hack it and ran off? I wouldn’t blame her for wanting to get away,’ Tash said.
Mirabelle shrugged. ‘That would be the best-case scenario,’ she said. ‘I don’t see how she could have got away. The house has been surrounded all day. There must have been a dozen men here this afternoon. More.’
‘At least we know it can’t have been Bruce,’ Tash continued. ‘I mean, not this time. He was with us.’
After a few minutes, the women decided to go up to the roof terrace so they could follow the proceedings from a vantage point. Grabbing their coats, they took the stairs. Outside, their eyes adjusted to the darkness. Neither wanted to sit on the bench so they took up a position at the farthest edge of the terrace, leaning over the rail. Tash pulled a cigarette case from her pocket and lit up. Mirabelle withdrew a pair of binoculars. ‘Where did you get those?’ Tash asked.
‘On a hook in the boot cupboard,’ Mirabelle said as she squinted.
After a few minutes the door opened, and Gregory stepped on to the terrace.
‘How did you know we’d come up here?’ Tash asked.
‘Intuition.’
‘Really?’
‘I followed your perfume.’
Tash seemed satisfied with this. Mirabelle wondered if she was flirting with Gregory, and if she was doing so because she knew she had no chance with him. Childlike, the girl sniffed in Mirabelle’
s direction. ‘You smell nice too.’
‘L’Air du Temps,’ Mirabelle said. ‘Gregory, have you given up searching?’
‘It occurred to me, ma’am, that you ladies were left unprotected.’
‘Very gallant.’
‘It also occurred to me that there is little chance of success for a man on his own. It’s dark out there. I was just walking alongside one of the guys with a dog. I’m better placed here.’
Mirabelle nodded. She was going over everything that had happened, hoping something might spring to mind. A solution. A clue. Eleanor had said she was going for a bath, but the bath remained unused. This meant she might not have gone upstairs. If she hadn’t, Mirabelle wondered, where could she have headed instead? Or if she had gone up, had she been abducted in her bedroom, before she could run the bath? There was no obvious sign of a struggle, but the place was such a mess after the police search that it was difficult to tell. Tash must have been thinking the same thing. ‘Do you think she was kidnapped?’ the girl asked.
‘That’s one of many questions,’ Gregory replied.
‘What questions?’
‘Well … what did Nina, that maid and Mrs Robertson have in common?’ Gregory spoke slowly, weighing his words. ‘That question for a start.’
‘Exactly,’ said Mirabelle. ‘While everybody is out looking for Eleanor, maybe we should do some investigating of our own. It seems likely – 50/50 I’d say – that Eleanor didn’t go upstairs after she left the drawing room, so maybe we should check her other room – the office.’
Mirabelle slipped back down the wooden stairs with the two of them behind her and together they cut through the main hallway and the kitchen. A perfect roast chicken dinner was laid on the table, almost cold on its silver service. Gravy congealed in a Victorian silver sauce boat. At the back of the house, the lights remained on in the servants’ quarters. Mirabelle put her finger to her lips, and continued into Eleanor’s office where she clicked on the light. The chair behind the desk had been removed and, Mirabelle noticed, the area where the dog had slumped in death had been cleared. The leather briefcase was gone from underneath the desk. Apart from that, it looked exactly as it had earlier – Eleanor’s silver lighter sat on the desktop where she’d left it. The newspapers and books were all in place. She began to search the desk drawers. ‘What are you looking for?’ Tash whispered.
[Mirabelle Bevan 08] - Highland Fling Page 21