Snobbery With Violence: An Edwardian Murder Mystery Read online

  “I saw a figure in the gardens and decided to investigate. Are you distressed because of His Majesty’s proposed visit?”

  “Of course. Please go away. I hate you.”

  “But why? Would you rather Blandon had seduced you?”

  “If you had left things alone, he would have propositioned me, I would have refused, and that would have been that.”

  “But he did, I gather, and you refused, and yet you made a scene and brought the whole matter to the attention of society!”

  She gave a pathetic little shrug. “What do I care? The season is a farce. I am better off without a husband. Now, please leave me in peace.”

  Harry bowed and walked off. He felt angry. Ungrateful little minx!

  A telegram was sent off the next morning informing the king of the servant’s illness. Daisy was confined to a servant’s room in the west wing.

  Despite her distaste for the whole business, Rose found herself becoming curious about the girl. In the first place, to be a Gibson girl at the Gaiety Theatre meant beauty and elegance. Rose had seen postcards of the Gibson girls on sale in the village shop.

  Her curiosity got the better of her and one morning she called on Daisy. The chorus girl was lying listlessly in bed, staring at the ceiling.

  “I brought you some books and magazines,” said Rose. “You must get very bored.”

  Daisy yawned and stretched. Without her make-up, she seemed little more than a child. She made an effort to get out of bed, but Rose held up one hand. “As we are all in this deception, there is no need to rise for me. Have a look at these books. I do not read much fiction, but there are a few novels there.”

  Daisy sat up in bed and took up one of the novels. “Looks all right,” she said, after apparently scanning a page.

  “You are holding the book upside down,” said Rose quietly. “You cannot read or write, can you?”

  “No, my lady,” said Daisy, hanging her head.

  “And you are not a Gibson girl either, are you?”

  Daisy mournfully shook her head from side to side. “I asked the captain to let me say I was, this place being so grand. He got me from Butler’s.” Rose looked puzzled. “It’s a vaudeville place down the East End. Ever so rough, it is.”

  Rose drew up a chair to the side of the bed, the light of a crusader in her eyes. “If you wish, I can teach you to read and write. You could better yourself. Come along. Think of it. It would pass the days. There is no need for you to lie here. We could use my old schoolroom.”

  “Anythink’s better than this, my lady.”

  “I will wait outside the door until you are dressed,” said Rose firmly.

  King Edward was unusual in that he enjoyed being king. He was not given to either introspection or abstract ideas. Perhaps for that reason, he became easily bored. He was seated at the Duchess of Freemount’s dinner table and the duchess recognized with alarm the danger signals coming from the king. His heavy eyelids were falling, his voice was deepening and slowing up and his podgy fingers were drumming on the arm of his chair.

  “I believe you are not going to the Hadshires’ after all,” said the duchess.

  “Some servant girl’s got typhoid. Whole place in quarantine.”

  “Indeed! Poor Lady Rose must be feeling very bored. Banished from society and then quarantined. Your visit would have restored her. Such a beauty. I am surprised they did not rush the wretched servant to some hospital, fumigate the place, and then go ahead and entertain you.”

  A spark of interest lit the king’s eyes. He studied the duchess for a long moment and then said, “Think Hadshire’s faking it?”

  “I never said that, sire.” The duchess twinkled at him and gave him a knowing little smile.

  The lessons in the schoolroom were interrupted two days later when a footman burst into the room and shouted, “Sir Andrew Fairchild, for the king. He’s here!”

  Rose and Daisy rushed back to the west wing. Rose helped Daisy out of her clothes and into a nightgown. Daisy quickly applied a white lead cosmetic to her face. “I don’t think we need to worry,” whispered Rose. “He will not dare risk infection. But if he comes, play your part well.”

  She shot out of the room, and hearing footsteps ascending the staircase, dived into another servant’s room and stood with her ear against the door.

  She heard her father protesting, “I’ll never forgive myself if you catch this awful infection.”

  They went on past where she was hiding. “In here,” she heard her father say. “If you don’t mind, Sir Andrew, I’ll wait downstairs. The footman will bring you back when you’re ready.”

  Rose waited until her father had left and eased out into the corridor. John, the footman, saw her and Rose held a finger to her lips for silence. They both stood listening.

  They heard Daisy say in a weak voice, “The angels are coming for me. I hears the beating of their wings. Is that a light in the sky? Is that you, Mother?”

  Oh, Lord, thought Rose bitterly. She’s overdoing it. She put a handkerchief over her face and walked past the footman and into the room. “There, now, dear girl,” she said firmly. “You must not tire yourself by talking. Sleep now.” She flashed a warning look at Daisy, who subsided into silence.

  “Come away, Sir Andrew,” ordered Rose. “It is dangerous to be so close to the infection.”

  “Doesn’t seem to bother you, hey?”

  “It is my Christian duty to do what I can,” said Rose firmly. “Your arm, sir.”

  He reluctantly held out his arm and Rose took it and urged him back along the corridor.

  A week later, the earl was informed by telegram that the king would be visiting him in a month’s time. “I’ll send that wretched girl packing. It’s her fault the trick didn’t work,” raged the earl, erupting into the schoolroom.

  “A word with you outside, Pa, if you please.”

  Father and daughter walked outside and down the corridor a little way. “Pa,” said Rose firmly, “I do not wish Daisy to leave until I have taught her how to read and write.”

  “Stuff and nonsense. Didn’t do you much good, did it?”

  “I beg you to let her stay. I have nothing else to occupy my time. Unless, of course, I do some work for the suffragette movement.”

  “Don’t you dare!” yelled the earl. “Oh, keep your latest toy. I’m wiring Cathcart.”

  Four

  As a rule, the men-servants in large houses expect gold. These gratuities are really a great tax on people’s purses; and the question whether to accept an invitation is often decided in the negative by the thought of the expenses entailed, not by railway tickets and cabs, but by the men and the maids.

  —LADY COLIN CAMPBELL, ETIQUETTE OF GOOD SOCIETY (1911)

  “I wonder why our king got suspicious,” said Harry to his man-servant after reading the earl’s telegram.

  “Perhaps one of his servants talked.”

  “He assured me they were all very loyal.”

  “A royal visit would mean a great deal of money in tips for the servants, not to mention the prestige of having served His Majesty. They may have felt balked and bitter that such a visit was cancelled.”

  “We’d better deal with it, anyway. Know anything about dynamite, Becket?”

  “Nothing, sir.”

  “Where would I find out?”

  “I read somewhere, sir, that they were blasting a new railway tunnel on the underground railway at Liverpool Street Station. Perhaps one of the workers there might be able to supply you with some dynamite and instructions as to how to use it, if discreetly bribed.”

  “Good man, Becket.”

  Harry, disguised in clothes purchased at a second-hand clothes store, made his way late in the afternoon to Liverpool Street Station. He located the site of the new tunnel, located the gate where the workers would come out and waited patiently. At seven o’clock, dirty, weary men began to file out. Leaning against a hoarding, Harry studied their faces. He at last picked out a man olde
r than the rest. His face was crisscrossed with broken veins and his nose was bulbous, all the signs of a heavy drinker. He followed him as he walked from the station, keeping a steady pace behind him. He was feeling decidedly weary as he trudged along, his bad leg aching, wondering if the man lived at the ends of the earth, but his quarry finally opened the doors of a pub in Limehouse and walked in. Harry gave it a few minutes and then walked in as well.

  The air was full of the smell of pipe smoke and cheap cigarette smoke. The smoke lay in wreaths across the dingy pub, which was lit by flickering gas lamps.

  The smell of unwashed bodies struck him like a blow in the face. He went to the bar and ordered a pint of porter and looked around. The man he was chasing was carrying a full pint to a corner table. Harry picked up his drink, walked over and sat down.

  “I want to talk to you,” he said.

  “What about?” The man took a pull at his beer. “Who are you?” he growled. An evil-looking prostitute with sagging breasts and black teeth leaned against Harry’s shoulder. “Fancy a good time, guv?”

  “Shove off,” said Harry.

  He waited until she had gone.

  “My name’s Bill Sykes,” said Harry.

  “Bin reading Dickens, ’ave you?” sneered his companion.

  Harry cursed himself. He should have guessed that a dipsomaniac, like many of his kind, would turn out to have come down in the world.

  “My mother did,” said Harry. “Your name?”

  “Pat Brian.”

  “Mr. Brian, I have an offer for you. How would you like to earn two hundred guineas?”

  “Garn.”

  “The truth.”

  “What d’ye want for it?”

  “A quantity of dynamite, enough to blow up, say, a bridge and a building, and instructions on how to do it.”

  “How did you know I was a blaster? Come on. Who’s bin talking?”

  “No one. Lucky guess.” I am a rank amateur, thought Harry. He could have turned out just to be one of the labourers.

  “Two hundred guineas. What’s it for?”

  “The two hundred guineas are for you to supply the material and instructions, keep your mouth shut and not ask questions.”

  “Two hundred guineas!” Pat stared into his beer and then took a long pull. “I could quit. I could get back to Ireland. Buy a bit o’ land, I could.”

  “When could you get the stuff?”

  Pat finished his drink. “Come along o’ me. Going back to Liverpool Street.”

  “Have you a key to the site?”

  “Don’t need one, guv. Know a way in. How do I know you’ll pay?”

  Harry slid a wash-leather bag out of his pocket and passed it over. “Look in there. Under the table.”

  Pat fumbled with the bag under the table. His eyes widened. He stuffed the bag in his jacket pocket. “Thanks,” he jeered. “You’d best walk out of here. One shout from me that you’re the perlice, and they’ll murder you.”

  Harry sighed. He fished in his other pocket and then said levelly, “I now have a pistol pointed at your private parts under the table. Give me back the gold or I’ll blow your manhood off.”

  Pat ducked his head under the table and then straightened up. He shrugged. “Worth a try. Can’t blame me, now can you, guv?”

  “Get to your feet and walk to the door. I will follow. You now know too much, so if you attempt to run away, I will shoot you.”

  “You’re going to force me to get the stuff for nothink,” wailed Pat, his accent an odd mixture of Irish and Cockney. “Jesus, Mary and Joseph. I have no luck at all, at all.”

  “You’ll get your money. Now, walk!”

  “That person is here again,” complained Rose.

  “If you mean Captain Cathcart, yes,” growled her father. “And speaking of persons, why hasn’t that Daisy creature been sent packing?”

  “I am teaching her to read and write, Pa. When she has mastered both, she will find a good position, possibly as a clerk, in London. I would like a typewriter.”

  There were two reasons why the earl finally capitulated and gave in to his daughter’s demands. Rose kept busy with her protégée was less likely to get into trouble, and a typewriter was considered to be a woman’s machine and was designed with scrolls of gold on black to give the machine the feminine touch.

  Rose went immediately to find the earl’s secretary, Matthew Jarvis, to instruct him to order a typewriter and have it delivered as soon as possible. Matthew nodded and said he would attend to the matter immediately. Matthew was a chubby man whose clothes always seemed too tight for him. He had a round red face, a heavy moustache, and little brown eyes.

  Daisy had been regaling Rose with stories of her sometimes quite horrific childhood in the East End of London. Rose had begun to wonder about people in the household, realizing they had lives and thoughts of which she had hitherto known nothing.

  “Are you happy here, Mr. Jarvis?” Rose asked.

  “Yes, my lady.”

  “You have worked for my father for five years now. Do you sometimes find the job a little tedious?”

  Matthew looked shocked. “Not in the slightest, my lady.”

  “Your family, do you visit them?”

  “Yes, my lady. If you will excuse me, I will continue with my work. I will now be able to telephone to order the typewriter, my lord having recently had that very useful instrument installed.”

  “Very good. Oh, Mr. Jarvis?”

  “My lady?”

  “I believe Captain Cathcart is with us, but so far I have not seen him. Where is he?”

  “To my knowledge, he is working in a downstairs room in the east wing.”

  “At what?”

  “I am afraid I could not say.”

  Curiosity sent Rose on a search of the east wing. It had been added on to the main Tudor building in the days of Queen Anne. It was usually where the guests were housed when the earl and countess held a party.

  She found the captain in a little-used room at the end of a corridor on the ground floor.

  “Don’t you ever knock?” he asked angrily, when she walked in on him.

  “You forget. This is my home. I have no need to knock. I see you have a quantity of sticks of dynamite. Are you going to blow up the king?”

  “No, I am going to create a couple of explosions. I have already written several anonymous letters to the newspapers warning them of a Bolshevik plot against the king.”

  “The Bolsheviks do not advocate terrorism. It was in their manifesto.”

  “Didn’t stop them killing Tsar Alexander the Second.”

  “That was the last century. That was the Nihilists. The Bolsheviks have eschewed terrorism in their new manifesto.”

  “Well, according to me, they haven’t. Now, if there is nothing else…”

  “Just one thing. You should wear gloves.”

  “I did not know there was a drawing-room etiquette to deal with dynamite.”

  “You must be careful of sweating.”

  “My dear goose, I am as cool as cucumber sandwiches.”

  “I didn’t mean you. I mean the dynamite. Sweating is a problem with nitro-glycerine material. If it gets absorbed through your skin, you will get a nitro-glycerine headache.”

  Harry, who had been kneeling on the floor, beside the cases of dynamite and percussion caps, rose to his feet. “Has it never occurred to you, Lady Rose, that your knowledge is unwomanly?”

  “Not in the least. I see you are as stupid and old-fashioned as the other men in society. You would feel more comfortable were my conversation limited to discussion of the latest Nell Gwyn hat, the Camille Clifford coiffure, the Billie Burke shoes and the Trilby overcoat. Good day to you.”

  I hope she never marries, thought Harry savagely, or her husband will wring her neck. But he put on a pair of gloves.

  He decided to go for a walk in the afternoon. The sound of voices came from the paddock at the back of the stables. He walked over and leaned on the fen
ce. Rose was giving Daisy riding lessons. At first he did not recognize the chorus girl. Her face was free of paint and she was wearing a chic riding outfit which Rose had ordered for her from John Barker of Kensington for the princely sum of one hundred and five shillings. It had a tightly cut bodice, lightly boned to the waist, and the skirt was cut to accommodate the right knee when mounting side-saddle. Over the bodice went a very tight waistcoat.

  “That’s right,” Rose was saying. “Stand on the mounting block. Oh, I nearly forgot. You must unbutton your waistcoat first. Never mount when buttoned up or the buttons will pop and fly all over the place.”

  Daisy put a foot in the stirrup, grasped the pommel, heaved herself up and went straight over the other side. Rose gave an exclamation of dismay.

  She rushed to help Daisy up and then both girls burst out laughing. Harry moved away, puzzled. What on earth was that little chorus girl doing with Lady Rose?

  Up until that day, he had dined separately in the quarters he had set up in the east wing. He decided it was time he joined the family, and when he returned to the house he sent a note by a footman to say he would be pleased to join the earl and his family for dinner that evening.

  Because of Rose’s disgrace, he expected there to be only himself as a guest. But the little earl was popular and had lately found courage to send out a few invitations. There were three guests other than Harry: the Marquess and Marchioness of Hedley, the rector, Mr. Busy, and a faded cousin of Lady Polly’s.

  The marquess was a jovial man who liked to model himself on King Edward. He was heavy-set and heavy-bearded. His marchioness was a timid, crushed lady, as if her spirit had been borne down by her husband’s relentless joviality.

  Rose, reflected Harry, was looking exceptionally beautiful in a white chiffon gown and with white silk roses in her hair. He wondered how Daisy fared in the rigid snobbish hierarchy of the servants’ hall.

  He tried to engage Lady Hedley, who was seated on his right, in conversation. “The weather has been very fine this summer,” volunteered the captain.