Don Gutteridge - Unholy Alliance

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“Sounds like he hung onto one of them billy-douches from some silly maid of his,” Cobb opined.

Marc smiled, but found himself oddly touchedby the letter and its sentiments. “One of his many conquests backhome, I suppose. Macaulay was told that Chilton had a weakness forthe weaker sex.”

“Well,” Cobb summed up their effort, “we gotourselves a bone-a-fido English butler, but no medicinebottle an’ no fancy booze.”

“Perhaps the poor devil carried that flask ofwhiskey around with him in order to face the temptation of thedrink every day. Alcohol can be a devastating addiction.”

“I guess we gotta figure the poison wasbrought inta his office by the killer, an’ probably the sherry,too.”

“It’s not much, but with Garnet’s clearaccount of the late-evening events and whereabouts of the guestsand staff, and from what we’ve deduced about the possible sequenceof actions in the butler’s office, we now have a solid base fromwhich to ask questions of our suspects.”

Cobb grinned. “You like to take yer timeabout interrogatin’, don’t ya?”

“Never begin until you know all you can — ”

“In advance of yer questionin’,” Cobbfinished up with a chuckle.

“So, let’s get to it,” his mentor said.

As they stepped out into the rotunda and turnedtowards the front of the house, they heard the door to theservants’ wing open. Priscilla Finch came trotting past thembalancing a tray of buns and tarts.

“Miss Finch,” Marc said to her, “could wehave a word, please?”

Priscilla looked as if a word with thepolicemen or any other male was the last thing she wished, but shestopped at the entrance to the dining-room, drew her tray up to herchest, and waited, dutifully. Her eyes were red and swollen fromcrying, and made a vivid contrast with the washed-out white of herface. All her prettiness had vanished. Obviously the shock offinding the butler dead and cold in his office had deeply affectedher.

“I know you’ve had a terrible shock, miss,”Marc said as Cobb gallantly took the tray off her hands (and palmeda tart as he did so). “But I really do need to know something thatyou may be able to help me with.”

“I–I’ll try my best, sir,” she stammered,unable to control the trembling of her lower lip.

“Mr. Macaulay asked you and Bragg to preparethe bathroom for possible use later last evening, did he not?”

“Yessir,” she said warily. “We try to bea-bed or in our quarters before nine-thirty if possible, as we’reoften up a five-thirty or six in the mornin’.”

“Bragg would have made sure the boiler wasfull of hot water and you, I presume, would bring up a fresh supplyof towels and soaps?”

“Yessir. I did that about seven o’clock. Mr.Bragg was to come up a bit later an’ stoke up the stove.”

“Did you place any soaps or salts on thelittle shelf above the tub?” Marc asked, recalling, as he did so,the layout of the room he had been shown on Wednesday.

“Matter of fact, I did, sir. Several bars ofperfumed soap and a big jar of bath salts.”

“Please, think carefully before answering: did you notice whether or not Mrs. Macaulay’s spare bottle oflaudanum was on that shelf?”

“I don’t haveta think, sir. It was there atseven o’clock. I recall ‘cause I reached over the tub an’ had toshunt it aside a bit in order to get the pot of salts to sit thereproperly.”

“Thank you, Miss Finch,” Marc said, andnodded at Cobb to return the tray. Priscilla took it eagerly anddisappeared into the dining-room.

“That was serendipitous, Cobb,” Marc said.“We now know the laudanum was there at seven. I believe we can takeMiss Finch at her word — for now. So, sometime between seven and,say, twelve-thirty in the morning, someone in this house slippedinto the bathroom and removed it. All our guests knew where it wasbecause Macaulay announced its whereabouts at supper, and certainlythe servants would know.”

“You want me to head downstairs an’ start inon them?” Cobb asked around a mouthful of mince tart.

“Yes. I’m setting up in the library. Meet mefor luncheon at one o’clock. That should give us time to completethe interviews and jot down some preliminary remarks andconclusions. Then we’ll go into the library and compare notes. Withany luck, we’ll develop one or two leads that will dictate ourafternoon activities.”

“I reckon we’re gonna need a littleluck, Major.”

Marc could not bring himself to treat Robert Baldwinand Francis Hincks as murder suspects, so he asked Macaulay tobring them into the library together. In addition to the matter ofthe murder itself, the three friends and political colleagues wereacutely aware of the complications it would bring to theirdeliberations here. However, as tempting as it was to plungedirectly into a discussion of these complications, they resistedthe urge admirably. Robert and Hincks sat down at one side of theconference table and quietly faced Marc in his role asinvestigator.

“Graves Chilton was found in his office earlythis morning,” Marc began, “poisoned by some sherry he had drunkthat had been laced with laudanum. We have reason to believe thelaudanum came from the bathroom off the rotunda, and was removedfrom there after seven o’clock last night. Although it is possiblethat Chilton committed suicide, all the circumstances point todeliberate murder, carried out by some person who shared a drinkwith him some time after midnight.”

From their expression it was clear to Marcthat his colleagues had already gleaned most of thisinformation.

“You’ll need to know whether we saw or heardanything pertinent to the matter,” Hincks said.

“Yes. We all had supper together atseven-thirty, and then drifted to the parlour and billiard-roomshortly before nine, except for Tremblay and Bergeron, who wentinto the northwest wing. A few minutes later I was called away home- Beth is fine and the baby still due, by the way — and Macaulayhas assured me that everyone except the butler had cleared thissection of the house by ten o’clock. We presume Chilton tidied up,then went to his office and opened up the estate’s ledger, thoughit appears he decided to take whiskey from his flask rather thanwork on the accounts. However, he may have been using a pencil tomake notes of some kind in the ledger, for we found evidence thatthree pages had been removed from it, presumably taken away by thekiller.”

The sinister implications of these latteractions were not lost upon Robert and Hincks, but Hincks saidsimply, “I was exhausted and went straight to my room. I was asleepby eleven and did not wake up until roused by the commotion thismorning. That isn’t a lot of help, I’m afraid.”

“I also went straight to my room, but I didnot sleep right away,” Robert said. “Louis and I had a frank talkin the parlour — his English, thank Heaven, being better than myFrench. When we learned that your Beth was likely in labour andthat you might not be able to rejoin us for at least a day andperhaps not at all, Louis and I decided on a strategy to formulatea written agreement to seal our alliance. We would each go to ourroom and write out, as best we could, the main points ofconvergence from our two days of talks — me in English, he inFrench. If you did return, we two would meet with you for an hour,have you go over the two drafts with us, and make a fair copy ofeach. I would date and sign the French document, Louis the Englishone. If you did not return, Clement Peachey from my chamberswould be conscripted to play your role.”

Marc wanted to talk about this intriguingdevelopment, but said instead, “So, you were at your desk for sometime after ten o’clock?”