Edwardian Murder Mystery 02; Hasty Death

to see her married before I get married again myself.” She glanced roguishly at the baker.

“As to that,” said Mr Jones, turning red, “I have a proposition to make.”

Mrs Jubbles put one thin old hand up to her bosom. “Oh, Mr Jones!”

“Yes. See, I’ve a mind to ask Dora myself.”

“Dora!” screeched Mrs Jubbles. “My Dora! Her what’s meant for the captain. Get out of here and don’t come back.”

Mr Jones stood up and laid his teacup down on a side table which had just been beyond his reach.

“I was only trying to help,” he said huffily.

Mrs Jubbles raised her trembling black-lace-mittened hands and shouted, “Out! Out! Out!”

And so Mr Jones left, bewildered, not knowing that Mrs Jubbles had believed his visits were because he was enamoured of her.

Madly, she blamed this Lady Rose. Things had been going so well before she appeared on the scene.

¦

Harry decided to call on Lord Alfred Curtis to start his investigations. Lord Alfred lived in a house in Eaton Terrace. His manservant answered the door and took Harry’s card. He studied it and then ushered Harry into one of those ante-rooms off the front hall reserved for tradesmen and other hoi polloi.

Harry reflected ruefully that even society’s servants knew he had sunk to trade.

He waited and waited. At last the door opened and Lord Alfred swanned in, wrapped in a brightly coloured oriental dressing-gown. “You woke me,” he said by way of greeting, but Harry noticed that the young man had shaved and that his thick brown hair was smarmed down with Macassar oil. Lord Alfred yawned and said, “What’s this about?”

“It’s about the death of Freddy Pomfret.”

Alfred composed his thin face and heavy-lidded eyes into what he obviously considered was the correct mask of mourning. “Poor fellow. Commit suicide, did he?”

“No, he was shot.”

“Terribly, frightfully, awfully sad. So what’s it got to do with me?”

“You paid him ten thousand pounds.”

“So? I must sit down. I’m getting a sore neck with you looming over me. Let’s go into the morning- room.”

Harry followed him up the stairs and into a room off the first landing. It was decorated in gold: gold- embossed paper on the wall, gold silk furniture, gold carpet.

There was a fire crackling in the grate. “Sit down,” ordered Alfred with a wave of one long white hand.

They both sat down opposite each other.

“I was asking you why you gave Freddy ten thousand pounds. I’m acting on behalf of his family,” lied Harry.

“Let me think.” Alfred placed the tip of one finger against his brow, rather in the manner of the Dodo in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. “Ah, yes, he was on his uppers. Begged a loan to pay off his gambling debts.”

“Do you have an IOU?”

“Of course not. Gentleman’s agreement. You wouldn’t understand.” His voice held the hint of a sneer.

“No, I don’t,” said Harry bluntly. “It’s the first time I’ve ever heard of anyone in society lending that amount of money without first securing a note.”

“Really? I have heard you don’t get about so much in the world these days.” The ‘world’ to Alfred meant the world of society. After all, for him, no other world existed.

“He wasn’t blackmailing you, was he?”

Lord Alfred rang the bell beside the fireplace and stood up. “You are leaving now. Don’t ever come here again with your nasty remarks. Ah, Gerhardt, show this person out.”

The manservant, a powerfully built man, advanced on Harry.

“I’m leaving,” said Harry, “but you will be hearing from me again.”

Alfred sank back in his chair. “Go away,” he said. “Never come near me again.”

¦

Rose lay in a scented bath and wondered what to do about Daisy. Because they had been equals when they were working, the fact that Daisy was once more her servant made Rose feel uncomfortable. She had put herself down to Daisy’s level. Perhaps there would be some way to bring Daisy up nearer her own.

After the maids had dried her, Rose dismissed them. She decided to dress herself, but realized that she would need help with her stays and rang the bell.

“Sorry, my lady,” said Daisy, looking flustered. “I should have been with you earlier.”

“Help me with my stays, Daisy. The problem is that I can no longer look on you as a servant.”

“Do you want to get rid of me?” asked Daisy in a small voice.

“After all we have been through together! Of course not. What am I to wear?”

Daisy glanced at the clock. “The tea-gown with the lace panels, I think. It’s still quite cold, so you’d better take your Paisley shawl.”

When she was dressed and her hair had been put up, Rose said, “There is no need for you to be on duty in the drawing-room. I wish to speak to my parents in private.”

¦

Harry rang the doorbell of Mrs Jerry Trumpington’s home. He hoped he would have more success with her than he had had with Lord Alfred. He handed his card, and after a few moments was ushered into Mrs Jerry’s sitting-room. She was a vast toad-like woman who carried little bits of food about her dress as a testimony to her gluttony. She had eaten quail for luncheon, Harry noticed, identifying a small bone in the black lace on Mrs Jerry’s bosom, followed by, possibly, Dover sole – there were fish bones, also – and, he guessed, in a mornay sauce, the sauce having caused a thin yellow edge on the lace.

“Why, my very dear Captain,” she said, her thick lips opening in a smile. “How goes the world?”

“Very baffling,” said Harry, sitting down opposite her.

“I was about to take tea. Will you join me?”

“Too kind.”

Mrs Jerry rang the bell and ordered tea for two.

“The reason I am here,” said Harry, “is because of the death of Freddy Pomfret.”

“Poor chap.”

“Indeed. Why did you pay Freddy ten thousand pounds?”

She sat very still, her slightly bulbous eyes fixed on his face. Then she said, “Did I?”

“Yes.”

“Oh, I remember. He was short of the ready, that’s all. I’m a generous soul.”

“Ten thousand pounds would be considered a fortune to most people in this country.”

“But I am not most people. How did you find out?”

“I heard something at Scotland Yard. No doubt the police have been in touch with his bank.” Harry could imagine Mrs Jerry’s fury if she knew the real source of the information.

Two footmen came in carrying the tea-things. Mrs Jerry waited until they had both been served and then waved the servants away. When the door had closed behind them, she said, “What’s it got to do with you, anyway?”

“I am working for his family,” said Harry, feeling that he really must contact Freddy’s family as soon as possible before he was caught out in his lies.

“I really think the – er – trade you are in is most distasteful.” Mrs Jerry ignored the thin bread and butter and the mounds of sandwiches and fruitcakes and selected a meringue filled with cream.

“Was Freddy blackmailing you?” asked Harry.

She bit down on the meringue so violently that a shower of meringue crumbs, meringue powder, and a dollop of cream joined the detritus of food on her bosom.

“Geffout!” she roared when she could.

“I beg your pardon?”