A Death for a Cause (20 page)

‘Martins,' I said again. ‘Euphemia Martins.'

‘Martins?' asked Bertram. ‘Martins? Why on earth would you bother to conceal a name as common as that? Unless there are some Lord and Lady Martins I have never heard of?' His voice dripped sarcasm.

‘I cannot understand it,' I said, taking off my gloves and collapsing into a chair in a most unladylike fashion. ‘My mother has known how important my pseudonym is. In fact she approved of my using it. She did not wish our name to be associated with service.'

‘Why? It's a decent living,' said Bertram.

I looked over at Bertram. He was standing legs wide, arms crossed, a fierce expression on his face. On a taller man it might have looked imposing. Dear Bertram. He had been my champion and occasionally my protector for so long. How much should I say? I felt my mother had opened this can of worms and she deserved whatever happened next.

‘As I told you, Bertram, my father was a Vicar. My mother came from a superior social class. She eloped with him when she was very young and her family cast her off. When my father died so unexpectedly we discovered he had no savings and were on the brink of destitution. My mother once again appealed to her family, but they ignored her. This is why I went into service. I saw little else that could be done, and I have a younger brother who must shortly be sent off to school.' I vaguely registered that Bertram had sat down opposite me, but my mind was racing as I decided what details to give him. I had kept the truth from them all for so long I was desperate to divulge all, but instinct warned me not to do so. ‘My mother raised me as a lady, far above what is usual for a vicar's daughter, and because my father observed I have a sharp mind, and he was a most intelligent man himself, he gave me access to his library. He taught me far more than my mother liked.' I smiled slightly. ‘She would always say that intelligence in a lady is as useful as having hooves.'

‘It would mean you didn't need shoes,' said Bertram lightly.

I laughed at this. ‘That is exactly what I told her. I had to go to bed without supper for a week for my impertinence.'

‘She sounds a bit of a Tartar.'

‘Life has disappointed her,' I said sadly. ‘I believe she has always tried to do her best by both Joe and I –'

‘Your brother?'

I nodded, ‘– but she also feels that she has failed. I am very sorry to say that the love between my parents did not survive their disparity in station. My mother was ill-fitted for such a lowly life.'

‘Are you going to tell me you are descended from royalty?' asked Bertram, and I could see he was only half-joking.

‘Not at all,' I said quickly and then for the first time I lied. My paternal grandfather had been a professor at Oxford University. His wife had died young and he had kept himself very much to himself after that. He and my father corresponded at length and when I was old enough I wrote to him up until his death, some two years before my father's demise. He was a hugely intelligent man with a dry wit and huge sense of compassion. I prayed he would forgive me for what I must say next, but I needed to redirect Bertram's interest, if I was to keep my grandfather, the Earl, secret. ‘My father's family were in trade. They were drapers. My father had excellent manners, but he could not ever offer my mother the life she had been brought up to expect.'

‘So what has changed?'

‘If I understood the conversation correctly she is on the verge of marrying a Bishop. I keep thinking that I must have misheard, but her comments were concise.'

‘A prince of the church,' said Bertram, smiling. ‘Much more suitable. Which is your mother's family?

‘But that is not the extraordinary thing,' I said, diverting him away from a dangerous area. ‘She was having tea with an old friend, Lady Celia Blake. The woman I knew as Martha Lake.'

Chapter Twenty-nine

One last hope

‘Good Gad!' said Bertram.

‘I could not have put it better myself.'

‘We know that Harrington Blake was a friend of Wilks. How does your mother know her?'

‘You are not suggesting that my mother has anything to do with this sorry affair?'

‘It seems most unlikely,' said Bertram, ‘but then you running into her while shopping for gloves is simply extraordinary.'

I bristled. ‘I am not lying,' I said coldly.

Bertram held up his hand. ‘I never said you were, but it is damnably odd. If I've understood you correctly, your mother would have had superior connections in her youth. Do you have any idea how she knows Lady Blake?'

‘The Bishop is her cousin.'

‘So your mother had to take tea with her? I know these cleric types can be a law unto themselves …'

‘She did say something about them being Primroses together? Some horticultural society when they were young?'

Bertram stopped lounging and sat up straight like a dog that has sniffed a postal delivery man. ‘She said they were Primroses? Are you sure?'

‘I think so,' I answered. ‘It was such an odd thing to say I could not forget it.'

‘How did Lady Blake react to your mother saying this?'

‘I don't know. My attention was on my mother.'

‘Well this changes things a lot,' said Bertram. ‘And I can tell you I don't like it at all.'

‘Can you explain why a yellow flower is causing you such distress?'

‘The Primrose League includes a group of women who came together to speak for politicians when paying someone to lobby for votes was outlawed. They were a highly conservative lot. Definitely the “behind every great man is a great woman” type. Being a suffragette and being in the Primrose League? Not possible.'

‘People change,' I said. ‘She may have revised her views.'

‘Has your mother?'

‘Well … no.'

‘You see, that's the thing. In my experience people don't change,' said Bertram. ‘Once they pick a political side they stick with it. It's in the blood.'

‘So you are saying that Lady Blake would not support the Sisterhood?'

‘It seems unlikely. I mean all things are possible, but those Primrose women were made of stern stuff.'

‘Hmm, it must have been when they were very young,' I said, ‘but if Lady Blake is anything like my mother then I do doubt that she will have changed her worldview so dramatically.' A thought occurred to me. ‘Unless her marriage …'

‘From what I could discover they are a very happy couple. No rumours. No children, but no scandal either.'

‘Drat,' I said. ‘That means she was at the march for an entirely different reason.'

‘To kill Wilks?' asked Bertram.

‘It is a bit of a stretch,' I said, ‘but we do seem to have run out of other suspects.'

Bertram slapped himself on the forehead. ‘The letter. We have forgotten all about the letter. We must visit the boarding house.'

‘Surely Aggie would have burnt it,' I said.

Bertram looked down his nose at me. ‘Most people,' he said, ‘do not have our experience with espionage, conspiracy and secrecy. I doubt it would have occurred to her.'

‘Then we shall visit Mrs Breem after breakfast tomorrow,' I said. ‘Now we know who Martha really is, it's not as if she can run away.'

‘I am going to order a brandy,' said Bertram suddenly. ‘This is all getting rather too much for me. Is there anything you would like?'

I shook my head. ‘No, I think it is time for me to go to bed,' I said. ‘It has been a very long day and talking to my mother always takes it out of me.'

As I left the room I heard Bertram muttering. It sounded like, ‘I do wish you wouldn't use words like that.' But that made no sense, so I readied myself for bed and within moments of slipping between the covers I was deeply asleep.

The next morning dawned overcast, promising showers later in the day. Bertram and I sat downstairs in the Hotel dining room, picking at our breakfasts and casting glances out of the window. I suspect neither of us was keen to venture abroad in such weather. The gloom without was affecting even Bertram's appetite. I had never before known him not take a second kipper. Finally, when neither of us could postpone the meal any longer, we rose and agreed to meet again in the lobby. Bertram had the task of finding us a cab and I went up to put on my hat and coat, and fetch his umbrella.

We were almost at the boarding house when the clouds gave and a light rain began to fall. The air felt chill and I huddled down further into my coat. Eying me Bertram said, ‘I don't suppose we could …'

‘No,' I interrupted. ‘We do have to go through with this. Two people have died. I know little about Wilks, but Maisie was an innocent with all her life before her.'

‘Sometimes I hate having a sense of justice,' moaned Bertram as he paid off the cabman.

The boarding house, a narrow, many-storied terrace, must once have been handsome. Now it teetered on the edge of respectability, with sparkling windows but peeling window frames. A drop of rain slid down between my coat collar and my neck. I shivered and marched smartly up to the front door. I rang the bell before Bertram could stop me.

It took a further two rings and a goodly time before we heard steps approaching the door. By this time the brim of my hat had begun to sag, and as it was one I particularly liked I was not in the best of moods when the door finally opened.

Mrs Breem stood before us in all her glory, a fox fur round her neck, paste jewels at her throat, and dressed in a tight tweed suit that she must have bought when she was younger and thinner. ‘Ye-es,' she drawled.

‘I am Aggie Phelps' cousin,' I said, suddenly inspired, ‘and this is my brother, Edwin. We have come to collect our poor Aggie's effects.'

‘How do I know you are who you say you are?' asked Mrs Breem, her eyes narrowing.

‘Good heavens,' I replied sounded as shocked as I could. ‘Who would be as despicable as to pretend such a thing? I assure you I am indeed Aggie's cousin and not some vulgarly curious sightseer!' I regretted the words as soon as I had spoken them. I had given her good cause to doubt me.

‘You could be from the newspapers,' said Mrs Breem. ‘I have already had a journalist here asking questions. I sent him away with a flea in his ear, I can tell you.' I fancied a martial light flickered in her eyes. This was not going well.

‘We do appreciate that you will have had to re-let the room,' said Bertram from behind me. ‘In fact I imagine that you may well be out of pocket.' He smiled charmingly. ‘I know that Aggie would have hated such a thing to happen. She was always very precise about such things, wasn't she?'

‘Well, yes.' I could see her suspicions were faltering. I deviated from character and kept my mouth shut.

‘Perhaps if you could work out her account,' continued Bertram, ‘and we might have the effects? I imagine that there is not much. Aggie would have wanted her clothes given to charity, of course,' he added with a masterstroke.

Mrs Breem fairly leapt at this suggestion. ‘Indeed, and that is exactly what I have done –the clothes and a few other things.'

‘Is there nothing left?' I cried, undoing all Bertram's good work in a moment.

‘She did not have much, as you would know if you were her cousin,' snapped the landlady.

The edge of my hat dipped and a shower of raindrops fell on my shoe. Mrs Breem stepped back and seemed about to shut the door.

‘We most want to collect her correspondence,' said Bertram. ‘Unless the police have already taken it.' He coughed in an embarrassed manner. ‘I believe we must confide in you. Poor Aggie had got herself involved in a few escapades that weren't quite the thing. The family don't want it getting out and casting a shadow – as it were, either over us,' he paused, ‘or even, potentially, over where she was staying.'

A guinea later and we seated in a stuffy little parlour with a small box on the table in front of us. Using extreme politeness, Bertram managed to persuade Mrs Breem to leave us alone for a few minutes while we examined the contents.

‘What a deplorable woman,' I said. ‘She must have sold all of Aggie's effects as soon as she heard she was dead!'

‘Hush,' whispered Bertram. ‘I think it unlikely she has gone further away than the other side of the door. I imagine she believed Aggie to be without relatives and was attempting to recoup her losses on rent until she could re-let the room.'

‘You approve?'

‘Of course not. I meant only that no other meaning should be ascribed to her actions. I do not believe she was attempting to hide anything.'

‘Oh,' I said. ‘It never occurred to me the landlady might be involved.'

Bertram made an exasperated noise. ‘That is the exact opposite of what I am suggesting! I am attempting to prevent you from mistaking greed for intelligence and coming up with yet another outlandish theory.'

I barely heard him. I had opened the box and was shifting through the contents. ‘Laundry lists! Shopping lists! A recipe for meatloaf!'

Bertram looked over my shoulder, ‘With capers. Interesting idea. I might suggest it to my cook.'

‘There's nothing here!' I cried. ‘No letter. Unless …'

‘Stop thinking like Fitzroy!' snapped Bertram, pre-empting me. ‘It will not be in code. Besides, even if that laundry list were a code,' he picked one up, glanced at it and blushed furiously, ‘we would not know how to decipher it.'

‘There is no letter from Lady Blake.'

‘Perhaps she had it with her when she died?' suggested Bertram.

‘Fitzroy would have said.'

‘So the fabulous Fitzroy can now read ashes?' said Bertram vulgarly.

‘Oh, I had forgotten. Do you think the firebomb was that extensive?'

‘According to the papers,' answered Bertram, ‘the train carriage burnt right down to the undercarriage.'