Don Gutteridge - Desperate Acts

Making sure he was alone, Cobb eased open thebedroom door and peered inside. The room was empty. He stepped inand surveyed the scene. On the far side, beyond the bed, stood apair of highboys and between them a large, double-doored wardrobe -their gleaming walnut veneers reflecting the glow of half a dozencandles. To his right a squat woodstove radiated the last of itsheat. Obviously, some servant – the imported Chivers most likely -kept a watch on his lordship’s creature comforts. Cobb left thedoor ajar so as to be able to hear anyone approaching from eitherend of the hall.

Avoiding the three-sided, floor-lengthlooking-glass, Cobb hopped across the braided rug towards a smalldoor cut into the wainscoting and almost invisible to the untrainedeye. He fumbled about for the latch, found it, and eased the dooropen. Behind it lay the pink bower of Lady Madeleine. As he hadthought, man and wife had separate sleeping chambers: among thegentry, cohabitation was a relative term. He now turned hisattention to the first of the highboys. One by one he slid open thesmooth-gliding drawers. To his disappointment he found only itemsthat any gentleman would wear: shirts, stockings, maleunderclothing, waistcoats, scarves and ties. As he felt about withhis fingers, he was careful to turn each neatly folded item overwithout unduly disturbing it (either Chivers or the baronet wasfastidious).

He went next to the second chest of drawerson the other side of the wardrobe. And struck the mother-lode.Every drawer was jammed with frilly, silky, lacy undergarments wornonly by women, none of which was neatly folded. Cobb’s fingersrecoiled at the touch of them, as if he had shoved his hand into apail of eels. But manfully he pursued his quarry – unearthing avariety of stays, girdles and corsets – sufficient to outfit achorus-line in Paris. And none of them compact enough to adorn atrim figure like that of Lady Mad. If further proof were needed, hesoon found it when he opened the huge wardrobe – one side of whichhoused the usual array of gentleman’s frock-coats, silk jackets,and trousers – while the other side sported a rack of matron-sizedgowns and evening-dresses: garish and, to Cobb’s mind,grotesque.

So, Sir Peregrine Shuttleworth was across-dresser, and possibly more. Fodder enough here to feedseveral blackmailers! Well, it had taken him a week, and not alittle humiliation, here in Oakwood, but Cobb had finally produceda suspect with a powerful motive for murder. It was true, heassumed, that back in England such outrageous behaviour among thelordly set would scarcely rate a raised eyebrow, provided it waskept discreet. But here in the colonies where the ruling FamilyCompact was spearheaded by the upright and pompous Bishop Strachanand where Sir P. as an outsider was trying to make his mark – heresuch a perverted obsession, if publicized, would be anathema.

So absorbed was Cobb in suchself-congratulatory reflection that he almost failed to hear thetap-tap of footfalls in the hall – followed immediately by thestifled giggle of an excited female! Without waiting to see whethershe was heading his way, Cobb stumbled into the wardrobe, pulledseveral yards of silk around him, and eased the door towards himwith one finger, leaving it perforce about an inch ajar. For a fewseconds the rasping of his own breath deadened all competing sound.Then, to his horror, he heard the clump and clatter of footsteps atSir P.’s bedroom door.

“In here, lover, in here!”

It was the voice of Lady Mad, hoarse withpassion.

The response to her plea was male, butmurmured too low for Cobb to distinguish either the words or theidentity of the speaker. But he would lay odds on HoraceFullarton.

The next sound was that of a couple lurchingor staggering into the room, followed by another lusty giggle andthe wheeze of Sir P.’s mattress as the lovers collapsed upon it. Ohmy God, Cobb thought with a rising sense of both excitement andpanic, they are going to satisfy their adulterous cravings on thebaronet’s bed, not six feet away! Just then something lacy waftedagainst his face and clung to it with the tenacity of a spider’sweb. Fearing he would sneeze, he tried to blow it off with a seriesof ferocious puffs, but failed.

Meanwhile, with a minimal rustle ofreconfigured clothing, Lady Mad and her lover had achieved physicalengagement – if the gasp of the lady and the muted grunt of thegentleman were any indication. This assumption on Cobb’s part wasquickly validated.

“Ah, yes, yes – you adorable darling!”

While the frantic coupling continued apace,Cobb succeeded in extricating his nose from its lacy overlay, andfound himself with a few moments to reflect upon the significanceof what he was hearing. If Fullarton and Lady Mad were lovers, thenthe good banker – Anglican usher and faithful husband to an invalidwife – was surely a prime target for extortion. Figuring that thelovers, who were now nearing the high point of their mutualefforts, would quickly regroup and return to the ballroom beforethey were missed, Cobb decided that he had to risk opening thewardrobe door an inch or two wider in order to confirm that themale participant was indeed Fullarton. Very gingerly he pushed atit with the tips of two fingers. It emitted a loud creak.

“Whaa was ‘at?” The male voice wasunderstandably slurred, but nonetheless panicky.

“A mouse! A rat! Who the fuck cares? Youcan’t stop now !”

Lady Mad’s piercing and piteous shriek struckCobb’s ears like a spray of darning needles, and he rockedbackwards, dislodging several gowns and striking his skull onsomething wooden and sharp. But he could have rung a cowbell in theroom and have gone unnoticed. Love is not only blind, it is oftendeaf as well. For Cobb, despite the throb beginning to hum behindhis right ear, the opportunity to see for himself just who wastrapped in the throes of lust had just presented itself. He slidthe door open a full handspan.

And found that he was staring straight intothe face of the male as he rose and fell upon the spraddled andwrithing form of Lady Mad. His eyes were open, but glazed andunseeing as his features began to contort towards the finalgrimace. Still, there was no mistaking who it was: AndrewDutton.

Cobb sagged back into Sir P.’s gowns andfrocks. What a disappointment. He was sure it would be Fullarton,adulterous and open to blackmail. Dutton was a widower. Publicexposure of an affair with Lady Madeleine Shuttleworth would bemore like a feather in his cap than an embarrassment. Besides, thiscoupling – now winding down in a sequence of wheezes and sighs -seemed more like an impromptu tryst than an affair. It was possiblethat Lady Mad, after her spat with Sir P., had decided to take onthe handsome, elderly lawyer as mate-of-the-evening. Still, if they had been having a more prolonged liaison, perhaps Duggan wasblackmailing Dutton by threatening to tell Sir. P., who, cuckolded,might very well blackball and otherwise socially cripple his wife’slover.

This hypothesis had barely finished workingits way through Cobb’s throbbing noggin when the sound of thebedroom door being flung open and striking the wall beside itstunned both Cobb and the sagging performers on the bed.

“For Christ’s sake, Maddy, what in hell areyou doing in here!”

“I should think that obvious,” Lady Mad saidsleepily, once her eyes had focussed in on Sir P. standing in thedoorway with his hands on his hips. She made no effort to close herlegs or pull down her rucked-up skirt. Meanwhile Dutton had rolledoff her as if she were afire, and was wrestling unsuccessfully withhis undershorts and trousers.

“I’m so sorry – ” he began.

“Shut up, Andy. It’s all right,” Lady Madsaid, sitting up and stretching languidly. “Isn’t it, darling?”

Sir Peregrine reddened. “I don’t give a damnwho you screw or how often, but I deeply resent your doing it in my room and on my bed!”