David Dickinson - Death in a Scarlet Coat

‘I don’t think so.’

‘You don’t suppose that the Powerscourt person might have got to him in the meantime, my lord?’

‘I don’t think it’s likely. Anyway, the doctor died yesterday morning. He was very old. He can’t cause any more trouble where he’s gone.’

‘No, indeed, my lord. Thank goodness for that!’

Sowerby took a brief inspection of his tattered surroundings once more. He wondered if his client had killed the doctor as he believed he had killed his father.

‘There’s just one thing I should mention, my lord. It shouldn’t happen, but it’s as well to be prepared.’

‘What’s that?’

‘If Hayward spills the beans, or if Dr Miller did speak to somebody before he died, there’ll be calls for an inquest and probably an exhumation; that’s when they dig up the body and get a pathologist to examine it.’ He noted the horror on Richard’s face and couldn’t work out whether it was caused by the unpleasantness of the exhumation or what it might reveal.

‘I don’t think we want to dig up the body, my lord, do we?’ Richard shook his head. ‘We’ve got people back in the office in Bedford Square who have stopped more exhumations and post-mortems than I’ve had fish suppers. All members of the family are supposed to agree for a start. That should stop proceedings once and for all. But if you hear anything about a pending exhumation, let us know at once. At once, I say. It could be crucial.’

‘One question, Mr Sowerby, if I may. Do I have to speak to the police when they come, or can I simply refuse to talk to them?’

‘For the present, my lord, I think you should see them.’ Sowerby thought his client was worried about incriminating himself. ‘If they really come at you time after time, trying to find inconsistencies in your story, then you can accuse them of harassment. And, of course, don’t forget that you can call on me or one of my colleagues to come and sit in on the interviews. Won’t do the police any harm to have to wait until we get here.’

As Sowerby was driven away he was observed from the stables by Charles, who had overheard the introductions up at the Hall. ‘B-b-bloody lawyer,’ he said softly to the nearest horse. ‘I’ll have to tell Lord P-p-powerscourt all about him.’

‘So how is the Palace of Westminster these days?’ Lady Lucy was entertaining her cousin’s daughter Selina and her young man Sandy, who worked for The Times , to tea in Markham Square.

‘I think it manages to rub along all right, Lady Powerscourt,’ said the young man, sipping politely at his Earl Grey. ‘It’s never completely quiet, mind you, or else there would be nothing for me and my colleagues to write about.’

‘I took Sandy shopping this morning, Aunt Lucy,’ said Selina. ‘I advised him on a couple of shirts.’

Lady Lucy was not at all sure of the propriety in polite society about young ladies advising young gentlemen on the purchase of clothes. At least it had been shirts. It could have been worse, much worse. Indeed, Lady Lucy, so relaxed with her own children, found the whole business of being an aunt rather difficult. She felt that she asked far too many questions about where the girl had been and with whom she had been consorting, but some of the young men hanging around the great London art galleries thought that rules were there to be broken and that manners only existed to be flouted.

Sandy looked rather embarrassed about the shirt-buying expedition. Not for the first time Lady Lucy wondered if Selina wasn’t too forward, too pushy. She thought Sandy seemed to be quite a shy young man and might prefer a quieter sort of girl. She had mentioned this thought to her husband, who told her not to be ridiculous, that Sandy was perfectly capable of looking after his own interests and wouldn’t continue his liaison with Selina if he didn’t want to.

‘I tell you something that will interest your husband as well as yourself, Lady Powerscourt.’ She rather approved the addition of ‘as well as yourself’ to the sentence. It showed Sandy thought pretty fast.

‘And what might that be?’ she said, smiling.

‘You remember the Earl who died up there in Lincolnshire the other day? The one whose death is being investigated by your husband?’

‘The Earl of Candlesby,’ said Lady Lucy, ‘and what a strange way to go. Do you have any special information you’d like to pass on to my husband?’

‘I think it’s more interesting to me than it will be to him,’ said Sandy, ‘but let me tell you about it anyway. The old Earl, the dead one, he never set foot in the House of Lords in his life. There are backwoodsmen and backwoodsmen in that place if you follow me. Sometimes the Whips can drag some of them kicking and screaming down to the Palace of Westminster to vote in an important division. But the real backwoodsmen won’t even do that. It’s a mark of shame to them ever to go to London to vote at all. So they sit in their remote castles and their leaking houses until they die. My information concerns the new Earl, whose name is Richard.’

‘And what does this Richard propose to do?’ asked Selina, feeling that she had been left out of the conversation for too long.

‘He’s going to take his seat in the House of Lords as soon as he is allowed. And then he’s going to join the fight against Lloyd George and his Budget. I’ve bored everybody rigid with my stories about the battle between the government and the House of Lords about this Budget, but the Conservatives in the Lords are delighted to have a new recruit and one who isn’t too old. Youth is always at a premium in the House of Lords. You know, people who can stand up unaided, walk without sticks, eat with their own teeth, that sort of thing.’

‘How do you know this, Sandy?’ asked Lady Lucy.

‘It’s quite simple really. People sometimes think reporters are far smarter than they really are. I wrote to him, and he wrote back. That’s all. He sounded very excited about joining the House of Lords.’

‘You make it sound as if he was joining the Garrick Club or the Carlton or one of those places,’ said Selina.

‘I’m not sure there’s that much difference, really – institutional smell of cooking and carbolic and floor polish, awful school food all round,’ said Sandy. ‘The House of Lords is very similar to the Garrick or the Carlton. Lots of old boys asleep in the library after lunch. Terrible hunting prints all over the walls.’

Lady Lucy was about to reply when the conversation was interrupted by a slight coughing noise at the door. It was Rhys, the Powerscourt butler, recently promoted to chauffeur in the Silver Ghost. Rhys always coughed before entering a room.

‘Telegram, my lady,’ he said, in a voice that might have been announcing the death of the sovereign.

‘Need your help,’ she read. ‘Not often I ask this. Maybe first time. Could be record.’ Do get on with it, Francis, she said to herself with a smile. ‘Do you have any relations in south Lincolnshire? Preferably grand ones who know Earls etc. When found, please come to Candlesby Arms. New cook. Better food. Bring Ghost. Bring JF. Bring Rhys. Love, Francis.’

Translating this, Lucy realized the main thing her husband wanted, apart from herself and the car and Johnny Fitzgerald, was a way into county society in the area round Candlesby. Her relations, and distant bells were already ringing in her mind about a second cousin married to a baronet who lived in a manor house near Great Steeping, would not have to provide entertainment or any of the delights of society. Wittingly or unwittingly, their job would be to provide Lucy and her husband with murder suspects.

Inspector Blunden reported to Powerscourt the following morning that there was still no decision from the Chief Constable about applying for an exhumation. ‘This is so typical of the man, my lord,’ the Inspector reported. ‘He’ll have been sidetracked by some other crime somewhere else. I’ve heard there was a great robbery at the Bishop’s Palace up in Lincoln in the past few days. He’s probably showing himself off up there, getting in the way of the investigating officers, poking his way around in the private rooms and throwing his weight around with the Dean and Chapter. What I don’t understand, my lord, is how he ever managed to win a battle. He couldn’t have kept his concentration for long enough. He’d have wanted to bring the cavalry back before they’d even reached the front.’