Cut to the Quick (15 page)

“What's to be done with the body?” MacGregor asked.

“The mortician will have to come from Alderton and collect it. If no family or friends of the girl can be found, I shall take responsibility for her funeral myself. But first, I’m afraid I shall have to ask everyone in the house to look at her. I wish I could spare them that ordeal. But since no one appears to recognize her by a spoken description, we have no choice but to ask the household to view her in the flesh.”

“We might ask if anyone recognizes this.” Julian picked up the silver scallop shell. “If it was a keepsake, something the girl especially prized, it might help to identify her.”

“It wouldn’t do any harm to take it with us and show it around,” said MacGregor.

“Very well.” Sir Robert put it in his waistcoat pocket.

As they were leaving, MacGregor said, “Stop a moment. If you don't mind, Sir Robert, I'll answer one of Kestrel’s swarm of questions before we go."

He went to the bed and reached under the covers. After feeling about for a moment, he drew out a tiny hand, the flesh blanched almost white. He examined the hand briefly, then laid it under the sheet again. “No sign she ever wore a wedding ring.** He closed the bedcurtains, and the four men silently left the room.

Out in the corridor, Julian looked at the floor and frowned. “What is it now?’* said MacGregor.

“There’s hardly any dirt tracked out here. But I suppose the carpet in my room would pick up dirt more readily than the bare floor. So much for finding anything in the nature of a trail.**

“It could also be that your servant was mistaken when he said he*d left the windows bolted,** said Sir Robert. “If the girl and the murderer contrived to come in through the window, that would explain why they tracked dirt in your room rather than out here.*’ But the murderer would still have had to get out through the house, thought Julian, in order to leave the windows bolted behind him and the door locked from the outside. A fact that Sir Robert is clearly reluctant to face.

They went downstairs. From the dining room, they caught the scent of food and heard the clatter of plate. Julian thought he recognized Lady Fontclairs musical voice, but no one else seemed to be talking very much. Apparently the Fontclairs and Craddocks had little to say—at any rate, in front of the servants.

“I*m glad they’ve finally been able to dine,** said Sir Robert. Julian flicked open his watch. It was just before nine o'clock— three hours, almost to the minute, since he found the girl’s body. He was not sure if time had seemed to pass quickly or slowly since then. This night was like a dream, impossible to measure in hours and minutes. Events moved along inexorably, to some strange, solemn rhythm of their own.

“I need hardly tell you gentlemen how much I appreciate your help," Sir Robert was saying. “Your part in this unpleasant episode should come to an end very shortly, except to the extent you may be called upon to testify at the inquest, or at a trial."

Julian felt a pang of regret. Of course he had no business taking part in a murder investigation. And, God knew, it was no sort of work for a gentleman to go poking about for clues like a Bow Street Runner. Yet he found the hunt intriguing, and would be sorry to give it up. Something deeper was troubling him, too. It was he who had found the girl, in his room, in his bed. He felt responsible, somehow. He kept seeing again that little childish hand being drawn out from under the bedclothes—the hand that had not worn a wedding ring, and never would now.

Sir Robert and his companions were crossing the screens passage into the servants* wing, they met Travis coming in through the front door with a lantern in his hand. His coat and cap were lightly spattered with rain.

“What news?” asked Sir Robert. “Have you searched the house and grounds?**

“Yes, sir. But nary a thing did I find.**

“No sign that any stranger broke into the house?**

“No, sir. I looked all over the house, and I made a circuit round the outside, but there was no sign that any body *d come in on the sly. Some of the windows were closed, and those hadn’t been forced. Some were open, but I don’t think anybody got in that way. The rain was only just starting, and the ground was soft. There would have been footprints, and the flowers would have been trampled, if anybody d tried to climb in through the windows.**

“And that was true of Mr. Kestrel’s window, as well as the others?’* “Yes, sir.**

“Youve done very well,** said Sir Robert. But he did not look pleased.

“How many doors give access to the house from outside?** asked Julian.

“Not many, for a house this size,** said Sir Robert. “There’s the

front door.” He gestured toward it, down the hallway. “There's the back door in the servants’ wing, which leads into a small waiting room for tradesmen and others who come on business. And there are the French winSows in the conservatory. They open on the terrace, from which one can descend to the garden and the park.”

“If nobody climbed in or out of the windows,” said MacGregor, “that means anyone escaping from the house from— let's say, half past four up to this moment now— had to have used one of those three doors.”

“No one escaped through the conservatory windows before six o'clock,” Sir Robert said. “Lady Fontclair and I were in the conservatory from about four o’clock until six, when I left with Mr. Kestrel. I don’t know how long Lady Fontclair remained.”

“You bolted the French windows just before we left,” said Julian. “Do you remember? The wind had blown them open.” He asked Travis, “Did you notice whether they were still bolted?”

“They were, sir.”

“Then it’s not likely anyone escaped from the house that way after six o'clock, because he would have had to leave the windows unbolted behind him.”

“I think that's so, sir.”

Julian asked Sir Robert, “Did Lady Fontclair and you leave the conservatory, even for a short time, at any point between four and six o'clock?”

Sir Robert opened his mouth to answer—then paused. “I was gone for perhaps ten minutes,” he said slowly. “A quarter of an hour, at most. I’d been reading aloud, and Lady Fontclair had a fancy to hear Pope. I went to the library to get a book of his verses.” “Was Lady Fontclair in the conservatory all the time you were gone?”

“I have no idea, Mr. Kestrel,” Sir Robert said coldly. “Naturally it didn't occur to me to ask her.”

“So now we’re left with the front door and the back door,” said MacGregor.

“With respect, sir,” Travis said, “I don't think anybody could have got in or out through the front door, either.”

“Why is that?” asked Julian.

“Because it was barred, sir, from half past four on. It’s kept barred while the servants are at dinner, just as it is at night.”

“Do we know for certain that the door was barred on this particular afternoon?” Sir Robert asked.

“I asked Michael, sir.” Michael was one of the footmen. “He said he barred the door at half past four, as he always does.”

“But he would have unbarred it, surely, when the servants finished dinner,” Sir Robert said.

“Yes, sir, he did, about a quarter to six. But he says he sat here by the door after that, so he could open it for people as they came home to dinner. I found him here with Peter”—Peter was another footman—“when I was calling all the staff into the servants’ hall on your orders, at about half past six. I think they’d been having a game of dice, though they were too quick for me, and I didn’t catch them at it. I sent them into the servants’ hall, and then I barred the front door myself. I thought it best, seeing that something was amiss in the house. It’s been barred ever since, except just now when I was out in front of the house, and then I had it under my eye the whole time.”

“Which means,” said Julian, “that from half past four on, the front door was either barred or attended by a footman.”

“Yes, sir.”

“So that no one can have got out that way, either, without our knowing about it.”

“That’s right, sir. Because he’d have had to leave the door unbarred after him.” Travis glanced uneasily at Sir Robert. It seemed that Mr. Kestrel’s questions were anything but welcome to him. Travis set his jaw tightly and compressed his lips. Julian knew he would get nothing more out of him without a struggle.

No matter, he thought—what he’s already told us is disturbing enough. If the murderer was a robber who broke in with the girl, he must have got out again after he killed her. It seems he can't have used the front door, the conservatory doors, or any of the windows. That leaves only the back door, and to get from my room to the back door, he would have had to pass through the servants* hall. Could he possibly have done that without being seen? Because if he couldn’t, there won’t be any other means he could have used

to escape from the house. And at that point, we shall have to conclude that there was no mysterious stranger—that the murderer is one of the servants, or one of us.

Sir Robert sent Travis to fetch Senderby from the servants' hall. When the constable arrived, Sir Robert asked him what he had learned of the servants* whereabouts and activities between half past four and six. Senderby*s notes took some time to sort out—writing and spelling were not his strong suit—but the gist of them was that each of the staff could give a reliable account of where he had been and what he had been doing during the crucial time. Rawlinson, Mrs. Cox, and Travis had been dining in their private room. The rest of the servants had been at dinner in the servants* hall, except a couple of stablelads who had been looking after the horses. Everyone had at least one person who could vouch for his or her whereabouts between half past four and six.

Sir Robert was looking more grim every moment, and Julian thought he knew why. With the servants cleared of complicity In the murder, and the chances of an unknown intruder becoming more and more remote, it was as though a web of accusation were being woven round Sir Robert's own family. Every new piece of information he gathered was one more silken thread.

But there was a complication. Julian felt a most unpleasant jolt on hearing Senderby say, “So the only one of the servants who was off alone for more than a minute or two is Mr. Kestrel’s man, who went for a walk outdoors just before half past four.**

“Yes, I remember,** said Sir Robert. “When does he say he returned?**

Senderby floundered through his notes. “He didn’t recall, sir, but the maid, Molly Dale, she knew. Said he gave her a start by popping into the servants* hall, suddenlike, and she gave him a bit of a scold for being late to dinner. She looked at the clock, to see just how late he was, and it was ten minutes to five.**

“So he was out walking alone for twenty minutes,** said Sir Robert thoughtfully.

Julian felt a prickle of warning up and down his spine. Confound Dipper! he thought. A Cockney born and bred, a child of the London streets, and this one afternoon he must needs have a craving for fresh air and flowers! But what can they make of that? They have no grounds to suspect him. It’s true he was the last person in my room before the body was found, but he had every right and reason to be there at that hour.

They went into the servants' hall. Most of them were still gathered around the long table. Sir Robert began by showing them the silver scallop shell and asking if they had seen it before. They passed it from hand to hand, looking at it curiously, but no one knew anything about it.

Sir Robert next asked if any stranger could have passed from the main house through the servants’ hall to the back door at any time after half past four. The servants were positive on this point. The servants’ hall had been full of people all that time. No stranger could have come through there without being seen.

“I wish to pose some questions to Michael,” Sir Robert said.

AH eyes turned to a tall blond footman, with a round face and fair, freckled skin. He stood up nervously. “Yes, sir.”

Michael confirmed that he had kept the front door barred from half past four until a quarter to six. “I unbarred it about twenty minutes past five,” he recalled, “just long enough to let in Mr. Craddock. He’d been out riding, and he rang while we was at dinner. Then I looked at the hall clock and, seeing as it was early yet, I barred the door again.”

At a quarter to six, Miss Pritchard, Miss Craddock, and the Misses Fontclair came home from their outing. Michael unbarred the front door to let them in. “Then Peter and me, we sat by the door together—talking,” he finished hastily.

“Playing at dice, more likely,” muttered Travis.

Michael coloured. “Well, anyway, sir, about six o'clock I let in Master Hugh and Mr.. Kestrel, and after that Colonel Fontclair. And then Mr. Travis came and told us we was wanted in the servants’ hall, and he barred the door again.”

MacGregor was shaking his head. He can see it, too, thought Julian—the web that's tightening round the Fontclairs. Round Craddock, too: he returned to Bellegarde early enough to have killed the girl, though Miss Craddock didn’t—not that I could have suspected her in any case. But it’s devilish hard to imagine any of the others

committing this crime, either. Why should they have done it? And why in my room? And why— oh, a thousand other questions. But I don’t think Sir Robert has any choice now but to find out what his family and Mark Craddock were doing between half past four and twenty minutes to six this afternoon.

“When did Colonel Fontclair come home?” Sir Robert asked Michael.

“I don’t rightly remember, sir. I s’pose he was gone about an hour, all told.”

“How do you know when he left?”

“He come in here, sir, while we was at dinner, wanting to know if there was anybody in the stable who could saddle his horse. And somebody said there was, and he went out all in'a taking.”

“What makes you say that he was in a taking?” asked Sir Robert sharply.

“Well, he— he looked flustered, sir,” Michael faltered. “He was in a hurry and didn’t stop to say good evening or ask after people’s health, like he usually does. And when we told him there was a couple of lads out in the stable who could saddle his horse, he went out like the devil was after— I mean, like he was in a hurry to be gone.”