The house which had been the scene of murder and mayhem with officers of the law and ambulances coming and going all night was now presenting a quiet and unruffled front. All signs of a police presence had been removed so that the normal life of the street might be resumed and the only reminders of the tragedy were the drawn curtains at all the windows and a recently sluiced area, still damp and smelling of carbolic, stretching from the doorstep out to the pavement.
The door was opened a careful inch only after Joe’s second knock. He caught sight of a fearful eye under a maid’s bonnet. ‘Police, miss,’ he said hurriedly before his intimidating features could cause further alarm. ‘Commander Sandilands and his assistant.’ He passed his card through the narrow gap. ‘We’re here to see her ladyship.’
Reassured, the girl stuck her head round the door. ‘Sorry, sir. Lady Dedham’s gone up to her room and isn’t seeing anyone.’
‘That’ll be all, Eva, thank you.’ The door was flung open by Cassandra Dedham herself. ‘Always in for you, Joe. I’m sorry about the unfriendly greeting. With the master dead, the butler laid low, and the footman helping the police with their inquiries at Vine Street, we females left behind are feeling a bit under siege. Come in, come in. There are two of you?’ She gave a welcoming nod and looked Lily up and down in surprise.
‘May I present Woman Police Patrol Officer Lilian Wentworth? Lily, this is Lady Dedham.’
He watched keenly as the two women greeted each other. Clearly, Cassandra Dedham was as surprising to the policewoman as the policewoman was to the lady. Wentworth couldn’t fail to be impressed by Lady Dedham, even in her grief-stricken state. Much younger than might have been expected, perhaps in her late thirties, Cassandra had a classical beauty that could not be extinguished by the shock and exhaustion she was suffering. Her oval face was drained of colour, its pallor accentuated by a smear of blood along her left cheekbone. Her earrings were intact, her dark auburn hair was scraped back into a chignon and very nearly immaculate. One strand had escaped to trail unnoticed on to her shoulder. Even as his eye caught it, Cassandra automatically retrieved it and tucked it out of sight under its velvet band.
‘Ah! Another of your Scottish cousins flighting south, Joe? The coverts up there must be full of them.’
Joe was just about to fall in with this convenient suggestion and make Lily an honorary relation when she decided to speak for herself. ‘I’m a colleague of the com-mander’s cousin Margery, Lady Dedham. A useful pair of hands. In attendance to save him some time. I know how to write shorthand.’
‘I say, Lil, do you really?’ Joe affected not to know. ‘She’s modest, you’ll find, Cassandra. She’s really here to put her sharp wits to our problem. Like you, she’s not comfortable with the story that’s been hacked together, though she has, as yet, only been able to form a judgement from the notes, of course. I thought you two could put your heads together and sift through the evidence again. Always assuming — and I assume a lot, I know — that you’re up to it …?’
A proviso that needed to be made, Joe thought. Under the veneer of calm and normality, he sensed that Cassandra Dedham was very near collapse. An admiral’s wife would be made of stern stuff, that was to be expected, but the woman had witnessed and played an active part in a tragedy and was still caught up in it. She was still dressed — though apparently oblivious of it — in the chiffon evening gown she had been wearing when her husband had died in her arms, only feet away from where they were standing. The dark green fabric was blotched with blood, the stains showing up as a black dappling from neck to hem. Her evening gloves were lying where she had dropped them on the hall table the previous night.
This wouldn’t do. Should he say something? How far could he presume on their acquaintance? Joe stepped forward, suddenly aware that Cassandra was becoming unsteady. Oh, what the hell! He seized her cold hands and passed an arm under her shoulders. ‘You haven’t slept. You haven’t even changed. Where’s the medico I left caring for you?’
‘No time. Statements, re-enactments for your people, Joe … Endless telephoning to be done. Peterson to arrange for… he’s doing well, they say … Hundreds of people to be informed … the press gathering. The king sent round an equerry and you can’t deal with one of those smooth young men in five minutes, you know. I sent the doctor away. He was all for giving me laudanum. If ever there was a time when I needed full possession of my faculties, this is it, I think you’d agree.’ The tension he felt in her slight form was alarming.
‘But who’s supporting you? You can’t manage without a man in the house. Surely …?’
‘Our sons are on their way. They’ve been at sea on a training ship all summer. Once John and Billy get here I can let go the reins. John’s seventeen now … man of the house … But no, you’re right, Joe,’ she said, replying to his unspoken thoughts, ‘the boys are very young still. I’ve alerted their older cousin Sebastian — Oliver’s nephew. Do you remember meeting him? Royal Flying Corps? He’ll rally round.’
Joe nodded, reassured by the mention of the friendly young airman he’d met in the admiral’s house the month before. ‘I do indeed. He fits the bill. Glad to hear he’s invited aboard. Where is he — down in Sussex?’
‘Yes. I phoned him as soon as I could. Dreadful thing to throw at the feet of a young fellow but I couldn’t think of anyone else. He’s completely au fait with Oliver’s affairs and that’s useful … I haven’t a clue. He offered at once to set off at the crack of dawn and drive down to Devon to pick up the boys and they’ll be here this afternoon. But until they all get here I shall have to manage. And I can. Truly, Joe.’
‘Nonsense!’ The commander glanced around him and squared his shoulders. He suddenly seemed to fill the hallway with his large masculine presence. A decision followed at once. ‘I shall stay and take over until the boys arrive.’
He decided he didn’t quite like the swift exchange of looks he intercepted between the two women on hearing his pronouncement. Understanding? Amusement even?
‘Joe! I knew you would. You’re an angel — a godsend.’ Cassandra grasped his hands again in her emotion. ‘And I battle to stop myself swooning at your feet, whimpering my gratitude. But you know what I’m going to say — yes, I could do with some help, but not from the one man who can bring this foul matter to a conclusion. That’s where you’re needed — out there running the investigation.’ Cassandra’s eyes flashed with spirit and she pointed to the door. ‘Go out and get them, Joe.’
‘And return with my shield or on it, you’re about to add?’ he suggested, amused by the deft way she’d deflected his attention.
‘Yes. Rout out this noxious growth or other victims will follow,’ Cassandra went on, her expression serious. ‘Others will suffer as I’m suffering if you fail. Find them and bring them in. That’s what Oliver would have wanted. “You’re a bloodhound, man, not a lapdog!” Can’t you hear him saying it?’
‘I can indeed. But I could wish you’d thought of wolfhound,’ he suggested with a teasing smile.
‘For the teeth and the killer instinct.’ Cassandra appeared pleased with the image. ‘I know you have them.’
‘Though I accept your reprimand. I’ll get about my business, then. But look, Cassandra, why don’t you let me and Miss Wentworth mount guard here for half an hour? We’re rather good at that. Give you a chance to go up and …’ he waved a hand in the direction of her skirt, ‘do what you have to do. Mustn’t frighten the horses, must we?’
Cassandra looked down at her dress. ‘I know — I look like a survivor of the massacre of Cawnpore! And I’m not going to pretend I hadn’t noticed. I could have sneaked off and changed. If I’m honest, I’ve rather been hanging on to the evening, devastating as it was. My last evening with Oliver.’ She smoothed down the chiffon folds and touched her cheek. ‘Every bit of him was precious to me, even his spilled blood. I’ve been keeping the last traces of him close about me for as long as I could. But then,’ her head went up, ‘there’s a limit. Oliver couldn’t bear slackness. I’m letting him down. I’ll disappear upstairs and do something about all this.’
The telephone on the hall table began to ring.
‘You’ll have to be butler for now, Joe,’ Cassandra said. ‘It’s probably the Prince of Wales. His aide left a message earlier saying His Royal Highness would ring back. But I really don’t feel up to a conversation. I can hardly get my words out. And he’s so sweet and always says the right thing and I know I shall just dissolve into tears and hiccups. You’ll have to think of something.’
As Joe went towards the telephone he heard her whisper to Lily, ‘The prince and Oliver were close, you know. “Matloes” both, as they like to call themselves. Oliver was his mentor at one point in his training days at Dartmouth.’
‘This could well be for me,’ said Sandilands apologetically, picking up the earpiece. ‘I asked my super to contact me here.’
‘Good. Your Mr Hopkirk. Nice man. Look, while you’re busy, may I borrow Miss Wentworth? No time to waste. It occurs to me that she can hear my account while I’m having a bath and struggling out of my cocktail dress and into my mourning clothes.’
The earpiece in his hand, Joe turned to smile his acquiescence. This was going better than he could have expected. He just hoped Wentworth could hold her nerve and make the most of the chances unexpectedly on offer. He was beginning to see the advantages of sending in a woman detective. He was an effective officer himself but there were limits — he conceded that he could never pursue his female witnesses into the bathroom and boudoir. He breathed deeply and censored the image of Cassandra shaking loose her long auburn hair and slipping out of her silken underpinnings.
To distract himself he barked into the telephone: ‘Hopkirk? That you? Where’ve you got to?’
Cassandra set off upstairs, calling over her shoulder to the maid who had lingered on in the hall, waiting for instructions. ‘Eva, see that the commander has whatever refreshment he needs, will you? And we’ll have a tray of coffee brought up to my room, in about ten minutes.’
‘Excellent idea, Lady Dedham,’ Wentworth said, picking up the gloves from the hall table and following the widow upstairs.
Lily perched uneasily on the edge of a spindle-legged French chair in Lady Dedham’s sumptuous bedroom. The curtains were drawn, a discreet lamp or two lit, and Lily was glad of the concealing gloom as Cassandra began to struggle out of her bloodstained clothes. She averted her eyes as her ladyship, swearing gently, unhooked, unbuttoned, tugged and pulled at her evening dress with hands too weary to obey her satisfactorily. She’d refused the services of her maid. ‘Don’t worry, Adèle, if I get stuck Miss Wentworth can help.’
The girl had withdrawn, casting an astonished and very unfriendly glare at Lily.
Lady Dedham hadn’t asked for help and Lily had to sense when the moment of unbearable frustration came. She moved swiftly forward to undo the hooks and eyes on the back of the French camisole and, as Cassandra stepped out with relief, Lily bent and gathered up the heap of crumpled finery, intending to hand it over to Adèle who, she guessed, would have lingered outside but just in earshot. The ghost of an exotic flower scent still lingered in the peach silk underclothes and it was this final flourish of a vanished age — an Edwardian decadence, carefree and indulgent — that made Lily swallow and blink with emotion. Slipped off in a moment were the silk and gardenias; the widow’s weeds waited in readiness. And there they were — the weeds — black garments selected from the wardrobe by the careful maid and laid out, smelling unpleasantly of mothballs, in an uninviting pool of darkness on a chest at the foot of the bed.
Cassandra saw them and looked aside with a shudder. She pulled on a white robe and headed for the adjoining bathroom. Water splashed and gurgled, pots and jars clanged and steam fragrant with lavender began to issue from the room. Lily sat on, wondering whether the ensuing silence was sinister and whether she ought to intervene. Perhaps Cassandra in her exhausted state had fallen asleep in the water? Dangerous. Lily tapped on the door and walked in.
Alarmed at what she saw — a pale face lolling just above the froth, eyes tightly shut — she called Cassandra’s name.
‘Oh, so sorry, my dear. Didn’t mean to startle you. Come in. I wasn’t asleep, just thinking. It must be the effect of the lavender, you know — it has a reputation for bracing up the mind.’ She smiled. ‘This has done me the world of good. Pass me a towel, will you? I think I heard our coffee tray arriving. And now I have something to tell you. A bit of a puzzle to put before you. It’s been lurking there at the back of my mind for hours but I haven’t had time to think about it. You must hear me and decide whether I’ve turned overnight into a silly old woman with a silly old woman’s groundless fears and fervid imaginings.’
‘The men involved have been captured. They’ll be coming up before Sir Humphrey Bodkin at the Old Bailey before you know it and they’ll be hanged. Take comfort from that, Lady Dedham,’ Lily murmured reassuringly. ‘They can represent no further danger to you and yours.’
‘You’re telling me what you think I want to hear, Lily. Come off it. I’m sure that a girl smart enough to be assisting the commander has seen further than the arrest of those two stool-pigeons. Would that be the word?’
Lily was taken aback and replied carefully: ‘It will do, but I think, in the trade, we might say “patsies”. To describe a pair who were set up — or hired — by some other agency to commit the crime. Is that what’s worrying you? I’d be intrigued to hear what gives rise to your suspicion.’
‘It concerns me, Lily, that a murderous menace is walking the streets of our capital. There may be other innocent targets going about their daily lives in London, unaware that they’re being hunted down by nationalistic madmen at loose in our midst. Who will be next to suffer?’ Unable to keep it to herself a moment longer, she sat up and fixed Lily with eager dark eyes. ‘Listen. Those two brigands didn’t kill Oliver, you know. Oh, I agree that was their intent and they would probably have finished him off, given a little longer … who knows? I keep hearing the shots replaying in my head. The first two had the same note — they were fired from the same type of gun and almost simultaneously. But it wasn’t those shots that laid him low. Oliver was still on his feet, wielding his sword and setting them to rout, when it happened. Oh, I must be mistaken … the street was clear — no one else about, I can swear to that … but it was the third bullet that did for him. A different sound. I’m no expert but I’d say it was a larger calibre gun. And fired from across the street.’