Dressed To Kill (A Kate O'Donnell Mystery) (27 page)

Kate watched the lights of her taxi receding down the drive until a young woman dressed in a black-and-white maid’s uniform opened the front door to her and, when she explained who she was, led her past the main staircase and down a narrow passage to a stone-flagged kitchen. There, a number of similarly dressed staff were either busy preparing what looked like an elaborate buffet supper or were themselves sitting at a small wooden table eating from a very much less exciting spread of sandwiches and sausage rolls.

‘Help yourself,’ the woman who opened the door said, pointing to a small pile of plates. ‘There’s tea in the pot.’

Kate took a plate and helped herself to a couple of indeterminate sandwiches and a cup of tea and sat down in an empty place next to a tall young man in a waiter’s apron who eyed her up and down without much evident enthusiasm for what he saw.

‘What are you here for then?’ he asked.

‘I’m the photographer,’ Kate said.

‘Are you indeed,’ he said. ‘What happened to the other chap? Andy or something, wasn’t he called. Isn’t he his lordship’s brother-in-law?’

‘He and Lord Broughton-Clarke had a row apparently,’ Kate said. ‘I’m the replacement.’

‘He’s a bad-tempered beggar is Roddy,’ the waiter said. ‘You want to watch out for him. We’re the third lot of caterers he’s had for these do’s to my knowledge. Nothing’s ever right for him. Nothing’s ever good enough and it’s always too expensive. I heard him haggling with my boss over this little lot tonight. He must charge the people who come an arm and a leg – he claims it’s for charity but I wonder how much gets to the waifs and strays.’

‘It’s a fantastic old house,’ Kate said.

‘It may be but if you look closely you can see it’s falling down,’ the waiter said. ‘The plaster’s falling off inside, and look at the damp in the corridor out there.’ He waved vaguely towards the door. ‘And outside doesn’t look as if it’s had a coat of paint this century. But have a look at the buffet before they start turning up. That’s quite something. Take a picture of it, why don’t you? My boss might even be keen to have a snap of it.’

‘I might just do that,’ Kate said thoughtfully. He pushed his chair back and stood behind her for a second.

‘Nice meeting you, darling,’ he said. ‘My name’s Jim. But tell me, where did you get that accent?’

‘Liverpool,’ Kate snapped and he laughed.

‘Did you know the Beatles then?’

‘Only one of them,’ she said and his face straightened, mouth open in surprise.

‘You’re kidding me,’ Jim said. ‘Which one?’

‘I was at art school with John Lennon,’ she said, finishing her sandwich and getting up from the table and pulling her camera from her bag. ‘I was learning to be a photographer and he was messing around.’

‘Crikey,’ he said.

‘So show me where this buffet is being served, then,’ she said. ‘I need to know where everything is before the place fills up.’

She spent the next half hour wandering around the house taking occasional shots of the extensive array of food being laid out in the dining room and the bar in the main reception room to the left of the front door, where the band was frantically at work setting up for the evening. There was no sign of either Lord or Lady Broughton-Clarke and she imagined that they were still dressing somewhere upstairs on one of the long corridors of bedrooms she had seen on her last visit. The catering staff ignored her for the most part although when she saw the waiter she had sat next to in the kitchen once or twice he grinned at her and broke into a tuneless chant of ‘She loves you, yeah yeah yeah.’ Kate ignored him.

At a quarter to eight she was in the entrance hall when Roddy and Tatiana Broughton-Clarke came down the stairs, Roddy in evening dress, red faced and perspiring although the house was not particularly warm, Tatiana in what Kate guessed was one of her own designs, a short white dress with a single satin stripe from neckline to hemline, with a long, straight black coat over the top, reaching well below the top of her high-heeled patent boots, in some glittering, floaty fabric Kate could not identify. Roddy strode past Kate towards the back of the house without any acknowledgement leaving Tatiana to greet her.

‘Are you all right, darlink?’ she said. ‘Have you got everything you need? People will start arriving soon, although they’re not usually on time.’ She patted Kate on the arm proprietorially. ‘I must have a look at the food,’ she said. ‘Caterers are so unreliable.’

Roddy Broughton-Clarke came stomping back from the back regions of the house. ‘The bloody band have only just arrived,’ he said to Tatiana. ‘I told them seven o’clock, to give them time to set themselves up. We don’t want all that going on while people are settling in.’ he glanced into the reception room. ‘At least the bar’s in place.’

‘No one who’s anyone is ever here before nine,’ Tatiana said soothingly. ‘After all, they stay late.’

Kate wondered if she imagined the angry look Roddy flashed at Tatiana before he turned to her.

‘You came on the train,’ he said, more statement than question. ‘I’ll get the caterers to run you back to wherever you need to go to catch a late service. You don’t need to stay until midnight. Most people will be too far gone by then to want their picture taken.’ He laughed. ‘You never know, you might get an invitation yourself if you keep your mouth shut. You’re a pretty little thing.’

An invitation for what, Kate wondered as Roddy turned away again to harangue an elderly man in a slightly mildewed black suit who Kate guessed was some sort of butler, no doubt in charge of opening the front door to guests when the time came. She smiled to herself. Tatiana had hinted clearly enough at Roddy’s struggle to keep this old place going but the reality was obvious. And unless he was making a fat profit on these parties, which seemed unlikely, he was losing the battle. Broughton Hall looked well on the way to falling down.

She wandered back towards the kitchen, passing Jim, the waiter she had sat next to at supper on her way.

‘Have you brought your nightie?’ he whispered as he passed.

She grabbed his arm, nearly causing him to drop the dish of trifle he was carrying. ‘What?’ she said. ‘I’m not thinking of staying the night.’

‘Lots do, I hear, if the price is right.’ And the waiter went on his way whistling to himself.

Slightly bemused by that remark Kate took refuge in the main reception room and sat down near the door, idly watching the band finish setting up at the other end of the room, with much crashing and banging and whining of feedback. A couple of men came in looking harassed and began stripping the cushion covers off a couple of long sofas against the wall, revealing brown stains that could have been anything from coffee to wine, gravy to blood. They fitted clean new ones, put them back and plumped them up before retreating with the old ones into the back regions of the house again. It was all a bit hit and miss, Kate thought, like an elderly woman with poor eyesight trying to make up her face like a teenager. If the guests were as important – distinguished even – as Tatiana had said they were, Kate could not see how they would be taken in by Broughton Hall for a moment. She could not see the attraction. Maybe, as Andrei had suggested, there was more going on here than was immediately apparent.

She jumped when the front doorbell eventually rang and the butler tottered slowly across the hall to open it, admitting two men in evening dress who handed over their coats and hats brusquely and made their way past Kate, unobtrusive in her corner armchair, to the bar. She got up and checked the film in her camera for the tenth time. She did not want the Broughton-Clarkes to see her lounging about when it looked as if work was about to begin. She knew Roddy resented the fee she had asked for the evening and she wondered if maybe Andrei had done the same chore for nothing to please Tatiana for some reason. If Andrei had holed up here at Broughton Hall in one of the innumerable bedrooms upstairs, he could have kept out of sight for weeks, she thought. The row with Roddy must have been serious to make that impossible.

The doorbell pealed again and this time Kate thought she recognized the voice of the next visitor, but even when she positioned herself near the door she could not be sure, although she did hear the butler explaining quite clearly that he should take the young lady – or possibly ladies – to the kitchen door where they would be shown where to change. Perhaps there was to be some sort of entertainment later, Kate thought, wondering at yet another expense Roddy had incurred.

Within half an hour the house was buzzing, the band was playing endless quicksteps and foxtrots, which were mostly ignored, the bar was doing a brisk trade and people were beginning to filter into the dining room to attack the buffet supper. Kate began by taking some general shots of the dining room but as people settled into groups at tables she wandered round the reception room offering to take pictures of couples or groups of friends and explaining that the pictures would come back to Roddy Broughton-Clarke within days and he would make them available after that.

By nine o’clock, Kate had used up a roll of film and went into the hall looking for somewhere away from the crowds to switch to a new roll. She had just about finished when the doorbell peeled again and the butler admitted a new arrival who took her completely by surprise. Ray Robertson and another expensively dressed man she did not recognize handed their coats over and looked around them curiously as if neither of them had been to Broughton Hall before. Robertson spotted Kate almost immediately and strode over to her with a look of surprise.

‘What are you doing here, young lady?’ he asked. She explained the job she had been hired to do and he smiled knowingly.

‘Well, good for you,’ he said. ‘I’m sure you’ll do a good job for his nibs. I thought for a minute you might have that boyfriend of yours with you. Does Roddy know you go out with a copper?’

‘Why should he?’ Kate said, bemused by the question.

‘Well, I’d keep stum about it if I was you,’ Robertson said. ‘Fred and me, we’re here to talk a spot of business with his lordship and it’s not anything Flash Harry should know about.’ He tapped the side of his nose meaningfully, took Fred Bettany’s arm and moved away towards the bar. Within a minute he was joined there by Roddy Broughton-Clarke himself, and to Kate’s even greater surprise, the clarinettist Chris Swift from the Jazz Cellar. Kate turned away quickly, as she realized that it was his voice she had half recognized as he arrived at the front door and been redirected round to the back of the house. She still wondered why.

As the evening wore on she noticed that a steady stream of men were having a word with Broughton-Clarke and then making their way upstairs. Her curiosity piqued, she waited for a quiet moment and then went quickly up the stairs herself and found herself at the end of the long corridor where she knew there were bedrooms. She hesitated to open any of the doors, guessing from the procession of men who had been coming up that some of them would be occupied, but as she stood hesitantly close to the stairs she heard a muffled scream somewhere at the end of the corridor, which stopped abruptly as if someone had put a hand over a mouth to muffle the noise and she knew she had to act.

She walked slowly down the corridor, her heart pounding, listening at every door until she came to one where she could hear the sound of an angry voice and the muffled sobbing of a girl. Without thinking, she banged on the door, which provoked an instant loud curse inside and then complete silence.

‘Is everything all right in there?’ she asked quietly. The silence continued until suddenly the door opened and an angry red-faced, half-dressed man peered out.

‘What the hell do you want?’ he asked.

‘I thought I heard someone call for help,’ Kate said.

‘So what?’ the man demanded. ‘We’re having a bit of fun. That’s what I’ve paid for. So sod off, will you, you nosy little tart.’ He made to slam the door and then hesitated, looking at Kate sharply. ‘You’re the photographer aren’t you? Well keep your camera well away from me.’ At this, he slammed the door hard and Kate hurried away to the stairs, trying to blend in with the party again. But she watched for the man to come down again and when he did she unobtrusively made sure that he appeared in the background of as many of her shots as she could manage. But it was pretty soon obvious that the man was not going to let the matter lie when she saw him deep in angry conversation with Roddy Broughton-Clarke who immediately glanced in Kate’s direction, but he did not move towards where she was taking a shot of a group of fairly merry revellers making the most of a bottle of champagne. But she could tell from his expression that he knew she was a threat, and she felt suddenly cold. Maybe, she thought, it was time to go.

A few minutes later Broughton-Clarke seemed about to head in her direction when he was waylaid by the elderly butler who whispered something in his ear. The look of shock on Broughton-Clarke’s face was evident even from where Kate was standing on the other side of the room. He stood stock still for a long time, looking suddenly haggard and ill, before eventually coming to a decision and she watched as he approached the band and waved them into a ragged silence. As the music stopped the conversation also drifted to a halt as people became aware that their host was standing on the band’s platform wanting to speak.

‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ he said, his voice slightly hoarse. ‘I regret to inform you that I have just been told that the president of the United States, John Kennedy, has been shot and has died in hospital.’

Kate gasped, as did everyone else in the room, and then for a moment there was total silence. Roddy, she thought, looked bewildered but struggled on.

‘I hope this will not spoil your evening,’ he ventured although one or two groups were already getting to their feet. The collective shock was palpable, the party atmosphere dissipated in seconds. ‘There is a television in the dining room if you wish to follow developments . . .’ Roddy faltered. More of the company got to their feet and made a beeline for the dining room and Roddy began to look desperate. Behind him the band looked as if they were about to pack up for the night. ‘Please do continue to enjoy your evening if you can,’ Roddy went on before petering out.