“She was very chatty and wanted to review every moment of the night, which is not unusual,” Annette explained. “She is always talkative when things go well. After she changed into her nightclothes, she sat down at the table in her dressing room to record a few thoughts in her notebook, reminders to herself about little things that can be improved next time. Then she drank a glass of warm milk and said she would read for a while in bed. She was far too tired, though, the poor lamb, and fell asleep almost immediately. I blew out her candles, dampened the fire and turned in myself. That was around midnight.”
Bea nodded, as this information conformed with what Mrs. Mayhew had said. “And your bedchamber is where?”
“Just there,” she said, pointing to a door partially hidden by the wardrobe. “It’s a cozy space. I also perform many of my chores in there. It’s close enough that I can hear Mrs. Mayhew call out for me, but there is also a bell. She rarely uses it because I usually hear her.”
“Did she use it this morning?” Bea asked with deliberate vagueness.
Emphatically, Annette shook her head. “You mean when she woke up from her nightmare? Oh, no, not at all. She did not have the ability to think that clearly. She was just terrified, shaking and heaving, and her eyes were blind for a moment. I lit the candle and looked straight at her and I swear she couldn’t see me. It was so awful. I’ve never seen her like that.”
“Does she have nightmares often?” Bea asked.
“I wouldn’t say often, but every now and then, yes,” the maid replied cautiously. “But it’s more like a little upset and she rings for me and I read to her in bed for a short while. Usually, she falls back to sleep within a half hour. But this one was so unsettling she couldn’t stay in her bed and requested I read to her in the dressing room with all the candles lit. I think she was afraid if she stayed in bed, she might fall asleep and have the same awful dream. So we remained in the dressing room and I read to her for a couple of hours.”
Again, this aligned closely with what the other woman said and allowed Bea to remove both women from her list of possible suspects. “Do you recall the time Mrs. Mayhew woke up and when she was ready to go back to sleep?”
“I do, yes, it was a little after one-thirty when she woke and coming up on four when she felt calm enough to try sleeping again. She was so upset by it all. She hated the fact that we would both lose sleep and kept looking at the clock, as if deeply distressed that it was growing so late. I told her not to worry because she had no reason to get up early in the morning. Of course, we could never have imagined.…” She sighed deeply and let the thought trail off. “Then to awaken to the terrible news. It was devastating.”
“And what time was that?” Bea asked.
“Eight-thirty. I dressed myself, then pressed Mrs. Mayhew’s pistache morning dress. At nine fifteen, I went downstairs to collect her tray and that is when I learned what had happened. I rushed upstairs to tell the mistress. She was so distressed, she fainted at once. I think it was the lack of sleep. She was already so tired. I ran to the dressing room to fetch her smelling salts, but I couldn’t find them. I looked everywhere and made such a mess of everything in my frantic search. My wits were a bit scattered by everything, and I flew downstairs in a panic, which upset Mr. Mayhew, who feared his wife might be seriously injured. I told him she had fainted onto the bed, but he was so anxious and I was anxious and it was a relief when Mr. Parsons volunteered to borrow smelling salts from the neighbors. He was a godsend and returned quickly, but the poor lamb…. I am not sure waking her was an act of kindness because she was so deeply disturbed by it all. She cannot believe something so dreadful could happen in her very own home,” she said, looking down at her hands, which were clenched now in her lap. Then she added softly, “None of us can. Everyone is so upset, even Mr. Stebbings.”
Tilting her head curiously, Bea asked who Mr. Stebbings was and why his distress was noteworthy.
“He’s Mr. Mayhew’s valet, your grace,” Annette replied, “and resented the cheroots.”
“The cheroots?” Bea said.
“Every so often, when he was in a particularly generous mood, Mr. Mayhew would give Monsieur Alphonse a cheroot from his personal stock,” the maid explained. “It is a token of his appreciation that he has never extended to Mr. Stebbings, which he considers to be a great personal slight. Or so his numerous complaints in recent months have led me to believe.”
Bea was not familiar enough with relations with one’s valet to know if this was a legitimate grievance or not. In a more traditional arrangement, he would be ranked higher than the cook, but Mr. Réjane could not be described in such pedestrian terms. He was a master of the culinary arts, an innovator of la grande cuisine and a vital aspect in Mr. Mayhew’s business endeavor. Giving him the odd cheroot did not strike her as outlandish.
Could Stebbings’s sense of hierarchy be that severe?
Ah, but to chop off your colleague’s head simply because your employer appeared to favor him?
It was a decidedly disproportionate response.
Perhaps seeing doubt on Beatrice’s face, the
