behavior. They had words, and it got more and more heated.
He turned his back on her, and she bashed him in the head,
drug him outside, and dumped him in the pond. Let’s face
it, she was fully dressed when the alarm was raised, she was
supposedly hysterical when she went to wake her sisters,
and she has a real motive.”
“Why is her motive any greater than her sisters?” Betsy
asked.
“Because people you owe gambling debts to aren’t very
nice. Sometimes, they can get real nasty, even to women like
Charlotte Braxton. They might ‘ave been threatening her
pretty ‘ard.”
Mrs. Jeffries nodded thoughtfully. “What you’ve described is certainly possible. But why would she drag him outside? More to the point, would she have the strength to
do it?”
“She would,” Mrs. Goodge said flatly. “All the girls were
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strong, that’s one of the few things I’ve learned today. The
Braxton daughters are all short, stocky, and strong, just like
their mother.”
“But why take him outside at all?” Ruth asked. “Why
not just leave him where she’d killed him?”
“By taking him outside, the killer widened the circle of
suspects,” Mrs. Jeffries explained. “If he’d been found dead
in a house with all the doors and windows locked, then suspicion would naturally fall on the family or possibly the servants. As it stands now, anyone could have killed him.”
“We might be dealing with a very clever killer,” Hatchet
said quietly. “If the murderer set up the situation to throw
suspicion on people outside the house, do you think he or
she could possibly be trying to implicate the gardener?”
“Why ‘im?” Wiggins asked.
“Because I think the killer thought Grantham was the
most likely person the police would see as a suspect.”
“That’s true,” Smythe agreed. “If it ‘adn’t been our inspector on this case, the local lads would ‘ave already ‘ad Grantham in to ‘elp with their inquiries, if you get my
meaning.”
Mrs. Jeffries hadn’t thought of it in this way before, but
now she began to see things in a very different light. “You
know, you could be absolutely correct. Of course, why
didn’t I see this before? The killer probably expected the police to focus on someone exactly like Grantham.”
“He’s the one that found the body,” Betsy pointed out.
“And if we found out Grantham was workin’ as a gardener to avoid prison, it’d not ‘ave been ‘ard for the police to learn that little fact as well,” Smythe added.
“And it could be something the killer knew as well,”
Hatchet continued. “What the murderer didn’t count on
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was Inspector Witherspoon getting the case and not naturally grabbing the first suspect that appears tailor-made for the crime.”
“You think the killer began to plan the crime when
Grantham came to the household?” Mrs. Jeffries asked cautiously. She was a bit leery of this kind of discussion, they’d learned on other cases that getting too closely allied to a set
of circumstances or an idea could be very detrimental to
finding out the truth. But on the other hand, they couldn’t
afford not to look at everything.
“It’s possible, he’s only been there three months,”
Hatchet replied. “It could well be that the killer needed
someone to lay the blame on, so he or she waited until they
had a likely candidate, bided their time, and then committed the murder when the house was full of people. That would muddy the waters even more.”
“That’s true, but let’s not jump to conclusions,” Mrs.
Goodge warned. “We’ve been fooled before.”
“Indeed we have,” Hatchet smiled to show he didn’t take
umbrage. “You’re right, we should wait until all the facts
are in before we speculate further.”
“Of course we should,” Mrs. Jeffries said quickly. “But I
do think your idea is worth thinking about. Now, who
would like to go next?”
“I didn’t learn anything,” Wiggins said cheerfully. “I was
all over Sheen Common, but I couldn’t find anyone who’d
stand still long enough for a bit of a chat.”
“Did you hear anything else, Hatchet?” Mrs. Jeffries
asked.
He thought for a moment. “Only what I’ve already told
you about the Burleigh family . . . wait, I tell a lie. I did
hear something, though I don’t think it’s got anything to do
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with the murder. The conservatory at the Braxton house had
been designed by Oswald Pellinger, which I think is the
reason Sir George was going to sell the structure.”
“Who’s ‘e?” Wiggins asked.
“An American architect,” Hatchet continued. “He designed a number of structures in his early days in London and Paris before he moved back to America. I believe he’s
become quite famous. Perhaps an American is buying the
structure and having it moved there.”
“Moving a greenhouse?” Mrs. Goodge snorted. “What
nonsense. Those Americans will buy anything.”
“Mrs. Goodge, did you hear anything else today?” Mrs.
Jeffries asked. She really didn’t want the cook to feel left out.
“Not really,” Mrs. Goodge sighed. “Just what we already
know. Most of the tradespeople want their money paid before they’ll do any work for the Braxton’s. But then, that’s not surprising, is it?”
Darwin Venable was quite delighted to see the inspector
and Constable Barnes. “I was so hoping you’d come along
and have another chat with me,” he said, gesturing at a
group of chairs by the window. They were in the small office
next to the Home Secretary’s. “I do hope it’s me you’ve come
to see,” Venable continued as the men took a seat. “The H.S.
has gone to Aberdeen and won’t be back till Christmas Eve.”
“We should have liked to have a word with him, Mr.
Venable, but we were already informed he was out of London. I’m hoping you’ll be able to help us. We’ve some questions on what he or you saw on the night of the murder.”
“Then I ought to be able to help you.” Venable nodded
eagerly. “I was with him. I saw everything that he did that
night.”
“Did you go into the back garden?” Barnes asked.
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165
“Yes. The H.S. woke me up to come along and take notes
when he saw the constables coming to Sir George’s house.”
“You took notes?” Barnes repeated. He couldn’t believe
this.
“Oh, yes, indeed.” Venable beamed broadly. “The Home
Secretary wants to write his memoirs one day, part of my job
is to constantly take notes on his daily activities.”
“Do you
