I threw the bedclothes aside and pulled out my dress from that day, but then decided that it would be a far better idea to put on my darkest garb to blend into the shadows. I rifled through my clothing until I came across a navy dress—I had packed quite a bit of light-colored garments to reflect the sun away, but had some dark pieces I’d thought to wear once the sun had set.
I listened at the door to the hallway and, hearing nothing, crept outside and down the hall to the potted palm. I dug around for a few seconds, glancing furtively about while I retrieved the key and brushed it off with my fingers, making sure more dirt went back into the pot than on the floor. Luckily, the moon was bright, and I was able to make my way along the corridors with little trouble while still keeping to the shadows. I had yet to meet another guest, and I hoped that most of the staff would be gone as well—it was rumored that they only ran a skeleton crew overnight in case of emergencies.
When I came to the last turn, I stopped and pressed myself against the wall. I realized that my pulse was racing with the fear of being discovered—a master criminal, I was not. If a policeman had been posted outside Anna’s door, there was a possibility he would recognize me. After all, nearly the entire force had interviewed me that morning. And I didn’t have a good excuse for being in this part of the hotel.
The hall was quiet, so I crouched down and popped my head around the corner to see if anyone was outside Anna’s room. Not a soul. Apparently, the police had not felt the need to leave an officer at the scene, and a little breath of relief escaped me.
My hands were shaking with nerves, but there was no turning back. I had already come this far, and I was determined to get a look around her room. I stood and made my way to the door, trying to keep my footsteps as quiet as possible, attempting a tiptoe on the balls of my feet. I had never given any thought to what type of shoe would have a quiet sole, but I would have knocked someone down for a pair just then. Heels were very inconvenient for creeping around hotels with hard floors.
Of course, when I packed my bags, I hadn’t anticipated creeping around the hotel. Or breaking into anyone’s room.
My hand was on the doorknob and I was about to put the key to the lock, when I felt someone grasp my elbow. I jumped, jabbing back with the elbow that had suffered the assault, narrowly avoiding a full-out scream.
Redvers.
I put my hand to my chest where my heart was doing its best to make an escape.
“What do you think you’re doing?” His low voice was a whisper as he massaged the place on his side where I had caught him with my sharp elbow. I would have apologized if he hadn’t startled me so badly.
“What am I doing?” I whispered back fiercely. “You nearly killed me with a heart attack!” Blood was still pounding madly in my ears. “How did you manage to sneak up on me . . .” My voice trailed off as I saw he was standing there in his stocking feet.
“Aren’t you supposed to be a banker?” My eyes narrowed at him.
“And I thought you were a proper young lady.”
At that, I snorted.
“I don’t remember making that claim.” I went back to unlocking the door. My life of crime appeared to be off to a rocky start.
“You shouldn’t do this.” His whisper was close to my ear, stirring my hair. My pulse quickened again, for an entirely different reason, which irritated me nearly as much as his attempt to tell me what to do.
“Do what? Use this key?” I jabbed the key into the lock, twisted the knob, and pushed the door open just wide enough to slip inside. I didn’t care that I sounded childish—my nerves were strung too tight.
The idea of being caught in Anna’s room and having another charge leveled against me had my stomach churning, but now my nerves steadied and I simply felt determined. Being told not to do something nearly always had the opposite effect—it made me want to do it more. And besides my mulish nature, I needed to find some evidence that would clear my name. Or at least find something that would point me in the right direction.
I tried to close the door behind me, but it was pulled from my hand as Redvers slipped in silently behind me.
“Fine. You may come, too.” As if I could stop him. “But try to be quiet.” He grinned and I wrinkled my nose at him.
Redvers took a few pieces of the scattered clothing and pushed them against the bottom of the outside door. I immediately realized he was blocking the crack so that any light we used wouldn’t be seen outside. I hated to admit that it was a brilliant move. It was sad to see exquisite clothing abused in such a way, but I knew firsthand that their owner was beyond caring.
We kept our voices low, but Redvers shuffled to the bedroom and flipped on the electric lights. “What are you looking for?” he asked.
“I could ask you the same question.” I was feeling prickly, but I quickly deflated. “Something to clear my name. Or just give me an idea of where to start looking for answers. I doubt prison life in Egypt would suit me.”
“I think you would be running the place in very little time.”
I didn’t think that deserved a response.
“I’ll start over here.” Redvers indicated the left side of the bedroom.
Hands on hips, I stood near the doorway and simply looked around. I wasn’t really sure what I would come across that the police hadn’t already found, so I simply let myself take in the scene for a moment. Her bedroom setup was similar to my own, although hers was much larger, and much less tidy. I looked at the clothes strewn about and the blanket of feathers that covered the room. There was a higher concentration of them around the bed where Anna had been shot, and a mere scattering of them at the farthest reaches of the room. I flicked a glance at the bed, and just as quickly looked away. Red-brown stains where Anna’s blood had pooled and dried covered the sheets and bedcovers. I would be concentrating my search elsewhere.
As Redvers methodically searched the dressers on his side, my eyes fell on a needle and thread that had been pulled from a small sewing kit and carelessly tossed aside on the dressing table. It was unusual that Anna would have such a thing—a girl from Anna’s social set would have a maid to take care of any mending that needed doing. Or she would send things out for repair. So, what would Anna need with a sewing kit?
“Were you planning on doing any searching? Or simply supervising?” Redvers had paused in his search, and his voice was mildly amused. Without answering, I waved for him to continue what he was doing, and went back to gazing around the room.
My eyes fell on the wardrobe and the clothing that still hung there. A long frock dangled awkwardly from its hanger beside its tidy companions, and I tiptoed through the mess on the floor to reach it. Pushing the other clothing aside, I ran my hands over the dress. It was heavy and quite expensive, with many layers and an exquisite beadwork overlay. I gave a small sigh—money really could buy some extraordinarily beautiful things.
Redvers stopped and came to stand at my side, this time without any snide comments. My fingers had covered all the obvious hems. Frustrated, I paused, then turned the garment inside out. I felt along the thick bodice where the heaviest of the beadwork was centered, and I felt two hard lumps that were out of place. I smiled triumphantly and dug through the many layers of gauzy fabric until I found the right layer. A small area of the seam had been stitched down, and poorly.
“She must have sewn this not long before she died.”
“What makes you think that?”
“The needle and thread are still lying out.” I gestured to the dressing table. “I would have tidied them up if I used them to conceal something.”
“I don’t think tidying up was her strong suit.” Redvers did make an excellent point.
I gave a tug to the end of the thread and it came away easily. Poor Anna hadn’t been terribly good with a needle, but she had been clever in her choice of hiding spots. The police had obviously overlooked her clothing. It was understandable, given the vast quantities.
A pair of gold engraved cuff links
fell out into my hand. The initials read DH, and there were small sapphires encircling the rim. The initials were wrong, but the unusual size and shape were the same as ones I’d seen previously.
“‘DH’?” Redvers asked.
I looked up at him. “I think they belong to Amon Samara.” Redvers raised his eyebrows in question. “I saw him wearing them earlier—the night of the dance. The stones kept catching the light, and I remember thinking they were unusual, although I couldn’t see the initials, obviously.” I recalled something else. “The morning I found Anna, Amon joined me on the terrace and he wasn’t wearing any cuff links at all. This would explain why.”
Redvers held out his hand to me, and I passed him the cuff links. He bent his head over them. “What do you suppose Anna Stainton is doing with them?”
“That’s an excellent question, especially since Anna wasn’t anywhere near Mr. Samara the last few nights. That I could see, anyway.” I thought about Anna’s movements. “Actually, maybe she was avoiding him. Why else would she have missed the opportunity to flirt with a wealthy and handsome man?”
“You think he’s handsome?” Redvers asked.
I rolled my eyes. “I think we can objectively state that he is good-looking. But certainly not my type.” I recalled how my skin had crawled at his touch, and I shivered again. Redvers noticed my reaction.
“You didn’t care for him?”
“Something about him was just . . . off,” I said. “But more important, why would Anna go to such lengths to hide these cuff links?”
Redvers didn’t have any good answers.
We continued our search, but found nothing else of interest. I felt sorry for the maids that would be left to deal with the aftermath of both the murder and Anna’s housekeeping.
When we finally decided to call it quits, early morning light was just beginning to brighten the darkness beyond. Redvers checked the hallway to make certain it was empty before we slipped out and I relocked the door behind us.
“Good night,” Redvers mouthed silently, and I gave a sleepy nod in return. Then, shoeless, Redvers moved silently down the hall in what was the direction of his room, or so I assumed. I took a note from him and slipped off my own shoes before padding quietly in the opposite direction, cold marble chilling my feet and hurrying my steps. The lack of sleep was making me less cautious, and I was grateful that no other guests seemed to be up and about yet.
When I reached my hallway, I once again hid Anna’s room key in the potted palm, covering it over. No reason for the police to find that in my room, should they decide to search it again. I let myself into my own room and changed back into my nightclothes. Then I dropped onto the bed, exhausted.
Yet, tired as I was, I couldn’t help thinking that I knew very little about Redvers. He was still something of a mystery—by his own design. Banking was clearly not his line of work. And other than a gut feeling, I had very little indication that I could actually trust the man. I still wasn’t even sure whether “Redvers” was his first name or his last.
Past experience had taught me that members of the opposite sex were not to be trusted at all—a lesson I was ignoring at my own risk. Then I remembered something else.
Redvers had taken the cuff links.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
I can’t say I felt refreshed when I dragged myself out of bed midmorning, but I certainly felt determined. My first order of business, after coffee and sustenance, was to track down Redvers and demand the return of those cuff links. They were currently my only hope for clearing my name—surely the police would see them as evidence of a wider pool of suspects. I needed them back.
I also intended to ask Amon about his relationship with the late Miss Stainton. I doubted it would be a pleasant conversation, and I would have much preferred to avoid the man altogether, but I couldn’t see any way around it. I hoped a quiet breakfast would give me time to figure out how best to approach him.
A quiet breakfast wasn’t on the menu, however, as I spotted Redvers right away, dining peacefully in a corner of the room. I marched over to his table and caught him with a forkful of eggs halfway to his mouth.
“You stole my cuff links.” I glared at him, fists on hips. I hoped my look was fierce enough to compel him to turn them over without argument.
It wasn’t.
“They weren’t your cuff links,” he said calmly, returning his attention to his eggs.
“You know what I mean. I want them back.”
“I no longer have them.” He sounded regretful. At my outraged expression, he continued. “I passed them on to Inspector Hamadi.”
“Oh.” It was where I had intended them to go, and it did save me from talking with the man. “Did you explain who we think they belong to?”
“I did. I gave him all the reasoning. Although I refrained from including in my report that his prime suspect was the one who found them.”
I digested that for a moment as I flopped, uninvited, into a chair at his table. “You told him that you searched her room alone.” He nodded, and I realized he had probably done me a favor there. It was best if the inspector didn’t think I was breaking into rooms and snooping around his crime scene. Even if I had been. “And he had no problem with that.”
Redvers sighed. “If you must know, I sometimes work in conjunction with the police.”
“As a banker?” I couldn’t help but prod this sore spot. I knew this story of his was just that. A story.
He gave me a baleful look.
“You and I both know perfectly well that I’m not a banker. But I also can’t tell you what I am doing here.” His tone and his face told me he was deadly serious.
“Or you’ll feed me to a camel?”
His face relaxed and a smile teased the corners of his mouth. “I don’t think camels are carnivorous.”
“The desert is a wide and scary place. It’s hard to say exactly what goes on out there.”
He gave a rumbling chuckle, and I busied myself pouring a cup of coffee from his carafe. That laugh had caused my heart to do a little skip, and I needed a momentary distraction.
I set aside my questions about Redvers’ occupation for the time being. I would crack him eventually. “Well, what did the inspector have to say about the cuff links?”
There was a pause as the hotel staff noticed my sudden appearance at Redvers’ table, and a young man arrived to take my breakfast order. When he had gone, I looked at Redvers expectantly.
Redvers put his fork down and reached for the bread basket. “The police will take a closer look at Samara. He’s not exactly unknown to them, but they’ve never been able to pin anything on him. Just suspicions.”
“What kind of suspicions?”
“I believe he is suspected of charming well-to-do ladies out of their funds. Then he disappears for a while. I would assume until the money runs out.”
I thought that over. “He did give me a story about how he was related to the king’s first wife and something about revolution. I wasn’t really paying attention, to be honest. It sounded like he was selling me a line of goods.”
“You were right on that account, although the ladies usually buy into it. That’s all Hamadi mentioned anyway, and I’m not terribly familiar with his file.”
“Then you’re familiar with other police files?” I thought this was a brilliant guess on my part. Redvers continued as if I hadn’t spoken, and I sighed. So close.
“You’ll be interested to know the coroner believes Anna died around five a.m.” He had my full attention, all thoughts about his secrets forgotten. For now. “The hotel staff reported that the last vehicle left at around three-thirty a.m., and the last of the hotel guests finally toddled off to bed around four.”
If all the guests from town had already gone, that could only mean one thing. “Then, whoever killed Anna was most likely staying here at the hotel.”
“Or walked back, which is possible, but unlikely,” said Redvers. “It would take several hours to make it ba
ck to Cairo.”
Another detail was bothering me. “Do they know where the gun came from?”
Redvers refilled his tea, and I leaned in.
“It looks as though Dr. Williams’s gun went missing, possibly weeks ago, but he failed to report it.”
I vaguely remembered the man from the day before as he reported to Hamadi about Anna’s demise. “He’s Australian, isn’t he?”
“He is. The Mena House was used as a hospital for Australian troops during the Great War, and Dr. Williams was one of the medical personnel stationed here. The gun was his service pistol. It is rumored he developed some . . . habits . . . that made him keen to stay here in the Mideast rather than return to Australia. The hotel was accommodating and hired him.”
“I can imagine what type of habits he might have acquired.” And I could. Opium was readily available here, and I speculated that the doctor had fallen in with the pipe. “Does he have any kind of motive? Any connection with Anna?”
Redvers shook his head. “None that they know of. Doesn’t mean there isn’t one, of course. Anna knew a lot of men at the hotel.” He paused. “What about her father? Colonel Stainton.”
I was somewhat shocked at the suggestion, but then took a moment to consider. “I really don’t think it was him. He seemed genuinely devastated when I broke the news to him.” I sagged a little at the memory. The man had been absolutely heartbroken, hadn’t he? I shook my head firmly against the doubt. It couldn’t have been him. What could compel a father to shoot his own child? I felt a pang of guilt for even considering the possibility.
“Is the colonel still here? I haven’t seen him since we found her.” Of course, I wasn’t surprised—I imagined he was grieving in private.
“He’s still here. The body won’t be released for another week at least. The government moves slowly at the best of times. Then I imagine he’ll make arrangements to have her shipped back to England.”
I nodded and we sat in silence for a moment. “We need to talk to Amon,” I said.
Redvers stared at me for a moment. “We do? You realize the police will be taking care of that.”
Murder at the Mena House Page 7