Murder At Wittenham Park (16 page)

“Let's hope you're right,” she said, before they rejoined the others, “and at least I now know why I'm the only person who heard nothing during the night. Whatever that woman put in the cocoa was powerful stuff.”

As they re-entered the library Dodgson, who had been waiting for them, announced dinner and they all trooped through to the servants' hall. No matter what anyone might do to improve the room—and Dodgson had done his best with linen and silver—the servants' hall remained a gloomy, high-ceilinged cavern. Its cream paint was peeling, and below the dado-rail the walls were an ugly tone of chocolate. The ceiling lights had white plastic shades, like an old-fashioned railway waiting-room. The builder of Wittenham Park had seen no reason for the staff either to be or feel comfortable. Gilroy's grandfather had not been a mine owner for nothing, and Gilroy had not bothered to redecorate a room that was very seldom used. Few of his acquaintances travelled with a valet or a lady's-maid these days.

It was a relief when the meal was over and Dodgson told them coffee and liqueurs were available in the library.

Jim Savage, however, told Jemma he wanted to talk to the maid and went through to the kitchen. As he had expected, Tracy was clearing dishes into a catering-sized washing-up machine.

“Hullo, sir,” she said brightly, turning around with a plate in her hand. “Isn't that dreadful about poor Ted?”

For a moment Jim couldn't think who Ted was, but was reminded when she went on with morbid enthusiasm.

“Imagine being torn to pieces by a lion! He was such a nice man, too.”

“He what? You mean the lion keeper? What happened?”

To his horror Tracy related what she knew, adding, “Can't have been drugged can it? Not properly. No way.”

“The experts will find out soon enough.” Jim re-assured her, thinking that two deaths in twenty-four hours seemed to be extraordinary. “Have they had trouble with the lions before?”

“Ooh yes. One of Ted's men got mauled last year. I don't go anywhere near the place myself. They had to shoot the lion.” She resumed stacking plates and asked over her shoulder, “You looking for Mr. Dodgson?”

“No.” He put the lion park tragedy out of his mind. “In fact, I wanted to ask you something. This morning were all the early morning teacups washed up?”

“I put them in the machine myself.”

“Including Mr. Welch's? Did you go into his room to fetch the tray?”

“No way! Not after what he'd tried to do yesterday.”

“So where was it?”

“Outside his door.”

“And the cup had been used? I mean, he'd drunk his tea?”

She had to think about this. “He must have done because I gave him the nasty old blue teapot set and the cup was dirty.”

“What time d'you think you collected the trays?”

“I waited till they'd all gone down to breakfast.”

“So it was after nine o'clock?”

“Oh yes.” She remembered something. “Except that tall, thin lady, the one who thinks she's God Almighty. She brought her own tray down at about twenty to nine.”

“Tall and thin?” He realized she must be talking about Loredana. “The lady in the Chinese Room whose husband didn't come?”

“That's her. She made a big thing about how she wanted to save us work! What difference does one tray make, I ask you? And you should see her room. Enough bottles for a perfume shop.” Tracy suddenly stopped her brief tirade and looked at him curiously. Inspector Morton had been asking her very similar questions and policemen had been going through everything, even the dustbins. “You're not a detective, are you?”

He laughed gently. “No. Just interested. I was supposed to play the detective this weekend, but that was before Mr. Welch died. My daughter writes for a crime magazine.”

“Are you serious?” Tracy was enthralled. “Can I talk to her?”

“I'm sure she'd like that. I'll tell her.”

When Jim rejoined the others his mind was still concentrated on what Tracy had said and he felt a definite sense of progress. He told Jemma about the lion quietly, then outlined his theory. Unless he had got the sequence of events completely wrong George Welch had placed his early-morning tea-tray outside his room shortly before he died. If whatever poisoned him had been fast-acting, that was exceptionally unlikely. Nor was it in Welch's character to put a tea-tray, or anything else, out for collection by the maid. He was too bad-mannered and selfish. So if he hadn't put it out, who had?

“Could have been his wife,” Jemma suggested. “Who else would have wanted to go into his room?”

“Whoever wanted him dead?”

“You mean we're back to square one? Come on, Daddy. Who had the motive, who had the means and who had the opportunity? That's what we need to know. That's what our heavy-handed inspector will be asking himself.”

“Then it's what I'd better ask myself again,” Savage said, “which means rewriting my notes.”

While he did so, Jemma picked up a magazine to flip through.

“How beastly of someone!” she said after a few minutes, disturbing her father to show him the magazine. “The horoscope page has been torn out. Just when we needed it.”

Having learned to react immediately to things his daughter said, Jim put aside his notebook and looked obediently at the page. Only a section of it had been removed. It was still headed, “Your stars this June.” The missing parts covered from Pisces to Leo.

“Amazing how obsessed some people are by the stars,” he commented and tried to resume his note-taking.

“Daddy! Haven't you got any imagination? Someone wanted to know if this was a propitious time.”

“That could apply to just about everyone here, from Lord Gilroy wondering about contracts, or the actress worrying about her next job.” He examined the page more carefully. The missing paper had not been roughly torn, but quite neatly removed, perhaps with a slightly blunt knife. “Well,” he said, “that's one more thing to keep an eye open for.”

They were interrupted by Hamish, who joined them apparently casually, but soon asked if they had any idea where the missing contract was. “My wife's very concerned about it,” he explained.

“Does it affect you?” Jim asked.

“Only through her.”

Why did Hamish sound evasive, when it was he who had raised the subject? Jim's thoughts went back to the row they had overheard before dinner last night. Welch had bellowed out, “You bloody well will, or else.” And another voice, which might have been Dulcie's, had added, “You haven't any option.” So was it Hamish who'd had no option? And then, during dinner, he had forced the subject of Lloyds losses into the conversation. Was that what he had been told to do? And it had a bearing on the contract, because Gilroy's losses might make him feel compelled to raise money through the sale of land. Jim decided to cast a metaphorical fly over these deep waters.

“I imagine quite a few people will be glad to know George Welch is dead,” he suggested.

Hamish smiled his thin, inward smile. “No one would disagree with that.”

“A bit of a bastard in business?”

“As tough as they come.”

“But your wife knew how to handle him?”

“My wife is quite a strong character,” Hamish admitted. It sounded to both Jim and Jemma that there were times when he wished she weren't. “But not always. He could be incredibly rude.”

At that moment Gilroy walked in, looking harassed and slightly dishevelled. Everybody looked up. He hesitated, then addressed them.

“I'm sorry to tell you that Ted, our Lion Park keeper, has been killed by one of the lions.”

“Oh no!” Loredana burst out emotionally. “How horrible. He was such a nice man. What happened?”

“A lion he thought was sedated attacked him. The lion has had to be shot.” Gilroy almost mentioned the thousands of pounds that an adult male lion was worth, and that he had now lost, but thought better of it. “There will be a full investigation.”

That was all he felt it necessary to say. During the flurry of talk that followed he went across to his wife and they went through to the servants' hall to find him some food.

Next Adrienne excused herself, saying that she hoped never to have another day like this in her life, and was escorted upstairs by Priscilla Worthington. Dee Dee had suggested, virtually ordered, Priscilla to look after the newly widowed woman.

Across the room Loredana was telling Hamish and an unreceptive Dulcie that she couldn't believe such a tragedy had happened, though she knew, from having been on safari herself, that lions could never be trusted.

“Hamish, I'm exhausted,” Dulcie said eventually, cutting brutally into the flow of Loredana's safari knowledge. “For heaven's sake, let's go to bed.”

After they had gone, Jim found himself yawning and earning an instant reprimand.

“Daddy! Please! I can't bear your falling asleep after dinner.”

“Sorry, darling.” Jim made an effort to sit upright, but knew it was a lost cause. “I think I'll go up too.”

“Well, that is sociable! Who gets to entertain me?”

“Loredana?” Jim suggested wickedly, getting up. “See you in the morning, darling.”

When he reached his small room and opened the door, he had a sixth-sense feeling that there had been an intruder. Seconds later he realized that there had. A thick white envelope was lying on his bedcover. He picked it up, saw there was nothing written on the outside and that it was unsealed, then extracted the contents and gave a low whistle, of which his daughter would have deeply disapproved. He was holding the missing contract of sale for five hundred acres of Whittenham Park. He flipped through the typed pages, some with changes written in by hand. Two signatories were named. Above the words, “Baron Gilroy of Wittenham,” there was no signature. Above the name, “George Ernest Welch,” there was another blank space. Neither had signed.

10

I
NSPECTOR
Morton had the contract document inside a transparent plastic exhibit bag, labelled with the details of where and when it had been found. Jim Savage had brought it down before breakfast, after showing it to Dulcie McMountdown, who had at first objected to its being given to the police, then seen the wisdom of it. Morton was grateful. Contrary to his expectations, Savage was being sensible and co-operative. He felt certain that the contract was central to his investigation, although why it should have been dumped in Savage's room was a mystery.

“I had a feeling it might be,” Savage had said non-committally.

“Why?”

“Because the others see me as neutral.”

“There's no neutrality between the law and a murderer,” Morton growled.

“But I am not the law. And not everyone thinks as correctly as that.”

Morton had been forced to agree with this. Now he was seated at the table in his interview-room looking across at one person who unquestionably did think logically and correctly: Dulcie McMountdown. The time was 10
A.M
. on Sunday, of which he made a note. The document in its plastic bag lay between them, inanimate, yet able to speak volumes, if it only had a voice.

“Was there anything significant about the contract, Mrs. McMountdown?”

“Yes. George Welch had not signed it.”

“And why do you think he hadn't?”

“On the last occasion I spoke to him he was uncertain about all the amendments. They gave certain advantages to Lord Gilroy.” Dulcie spoke calmly and circumspectly. She could not reason out how this document figured in Welch's death, but she was as convinced as Morton that it did. Not that he had said so, she merely sensed it. “I advised Mr. Welch that there were limits beyond which we could not push Lord Gilroy over the land sale.”

“So he died before he was ready to sign?”

“Presumably.” Actually this was jumping to conclusions. Depending on how George was poisoned, he might have been killed before he could sign. She decided to speculate gently. “When I last saw him on Friday night, he'd drunk quite a lot of whisky. He might have fallen asleep. He might have decided to go over the amendments again in the morning. After all, Lord Gilroy had agreed to sign if this draft was accepted.”

“Gilroy's word is his bond?”

“In today's world, nobody's is.” Remembering the stormy meetings they'd had, Dulcie's plan had been to get them both round the table in the morning and have both sign then and there.

“Did anyone visit Mr. Welch after you that night?” Morton wondered if she knew that Mrs. Worthington had brought him yet more whisky at 11:30
P.M
.

“Not that I know of. Did they?”

“When Mrs. Worthington brought him the cocoa he told her to ask the butler for more whisky.” He carefully did not specify who took up the liquor.

“That damn cocoa!” Dulcie said with feeling. “You know I ended up drinking it, and it was doped?”

Morton nodded. “In other words, you know very little about what went on during the night?” Was there a flash of anger in her blue eyes? He thought so. But her answer was as guarded as it could be.

“That is quite right. I had to force myself awake when the maid began screaming.”

“As part of the ‘murder' plot?”

Dulcie heard the disdain in his voice and decided to be frank. “The only people who cared about the plot in the least were the Savages and Priscilla Worthington. The contract was the real issue for most of us.”

“Including Mrs. Chancemain?”

“She and her husband were invited purely to make up the numbers.” Again that flash of annoyance. “Loredana was a hanger-on.”

Morton was now quite aware of Loredana's activities, but in his estimation they were indeed peripheral. He returned to the subject of the contract.

“Was Lord Gilroy unhappy with the land deal?”