A Darker God (29 page)

“Rubbish, Percy!” Letty interrupted. “You’re thinking like a Mycaenaean! And you don’t believe that nonsense yourself, either. Thetis is a practical, modern woman. We all know that. She would have killed
Maud
first, wouldn’t she? If she had a killing urge at all—which I don’t think she has. She could have pushed the old girl over the balcony or off the Acropolis at any time—or poisoned her with her own pills and potions. Maud has a cupboard full of them and chomps them up like
cachous
. Um … used to, that is. Funny, I keep expecting her to walk in and pour scorn on us for not instantly seeing the truth. But—Thetis is clever, you know. If she’d wanted to kill Maud for the inheritance she thought might be her due, or to remove the obstacle to eternal happiness, she would have done the deed so discreetly we wouldn’t be here now discussing it.”

Gunning looked from one keen, speculative face to the other and narrowed his eyes in disgust at their theorising. “The baggage! The termagant!” he huffed. “Obviously swept away by ungovernable rage. Poor Andrew tells her divorce and
remarriage are not in his plans. So—she curses him for a treacherous, lecherous knave, remembers she’s Clytemnestra, pulls out the dagger she keeps in her stocking top for just such emergencies, and plunges it into his chest. Then, with reality for a rehearsal, she goes onstage and repeats the whole performance. Pleased with your scenario, are you, Montacute?”

They stared at him for a moment.

“Not so far-fetched, Gunning,” said Montacute thoughtfully. “The lady already has a mention on her record for use of a concealed weapon. The Yard have on record her confession to a blatant act of violence committed in London. Confession! Swaggering self-congratulation might be more accurate! But it’s that confounded blade that’s the key to the whole business. Find it and it tells us the killer’s name!… She
was
searched before leaving.” He looked enquiringly at Letty, struck by an unwelcome thought.

She nodded. “Oh, yes, she was. Clean as a whistle. Nothing but a hanky and a few drachmas in her pockets. And, William, I
did
check her stocking tops.”

“So—nothing found,” Montacute went on, relieved. “Yet. They’re still looking. But the provision he made for the girl in his will strikes me as having a sort of final-arrangement whiff to it. A ’pay-off And then there’s Maud! Why kill
her?
Clear enough to any prosecuting counsel—her inheritance. Thetis wasn’t to know that the old girl had changed the terms and excluded her. And if Maud knew—guessed—or even accused her cousin of stabbing her husband, Miss Templeton might, in a rage, have thrown her over the balcony to shut her up,” he offered.

Gunning groaned. “Then, in the throes of a ravenous blood-lust, she flees into the night in search of a third victim? God! You were lucky, Letty! Her murderous rage must have evaporated by the time she turned up and tapped me coolly on the shoulder on Mrs. Rose’s doorstep with a kid-gloved hand.

To think I may have scooted off, leaving you in the company of a ruthless double killer!”

“Ah, no, Gunning, there you let imagination run away with you, I think,” said Montacute with lazy sarcasm. “Our girl could well have intended no more than to establish an alibi. Seeking shelter with a respectable and—I have to say, Miss Laetitia—
gullible
companion?”

“You’re saying she was just trying to gain for herself a friend at court?” said Letty.

“Huh! Friend
in
court might be more apt.” Montacute’s voice was suddenly heavy. “You may have to resign yourself to the fact that you have been used … manipulated by this woman, Miss Laetitia.
I
already have,” he admitted lugubriously.

Chapter 25

T
he telephone on Andrew’s desk rang and Montacute hurled himself across the room to lift the receiver with a curt “That’ll be for me, I expect.”

Gunning leaned to Letty and muttered: “With a bit of luck it’ll be the fishmonger!”

But the inspector greeted the caller chummily and fell at once into a conversation in Greek. He was talking to Superintendent Theotakis and they listened intently, not offering to leave the room. An accurate, as far as she was able to judge, account of his morning’s work ensued, followed by an arrangement to meet at headquarters for a conference after lunch, by which time some forensic evidence was expected to be to hand, as well as the preliminary findings of the postmortems. Montacute ended by saying he was just about to call a meeting of the Merriman staff for interview.

“Your cue, I think, Letty,” said Gunning.

The inspector called the staff together downstairs in the room in which they gathered to take their meals. More at ease in their usual surroundings, they would be easier to read, he’d explained to Letty. They would be more relaxed and he would be able to form some idea of relationships and hierarchies
within the group. Individual interviews would follow, when the staff would feel free to indulge in the tittle-tattle which always brought something of importance to the surface.

The permanent staff of four sat in silence around the table, and after an introduction by Letty each was asked to give an outline of his or her duties. Montacute listened and then asked: “No valet? The professor didn’t keep a valet?”

“No, Inspector,” Laetitia replied. “Like many military men, Sir Andrew preferred to look after himself. This was a simple household from day to day. Extra staff are always available and brought in at times of greater activity. There were none such on duty yesterday.”

“Then I’ll ask each to account for his or her movements at the time of Lady Merriman’s death last evening. Mrs. Stephanopoulos, will you go first? Followed by the cook, Petros, then Maria … general maid, is it? And lastly, the boot boy. Demetrios?”

Montacute spoke to them in Greek and heard their evidence with understanding nods. He seemed happy for Letty to make the running, seeing that, although her version of the language was giving rise to some smiles and questions, they accepted her and were comfortable with her presence among them. Dorothea had been in the kitchen with the cook, discussing the next day’s menus, and Maria had been in the dining room laying the table for breakfast at the crucial time. Petros, who did not live in, had, after his chat with Dorothea, gone home for the night. Nothing apparently had disturbed anyone’s routine.

Demetrios, too overcome to speak, sat close to the housekeeper and needed encouragement to explain that he’d been going about his nightly duties. The boot boy was feeling nervous, she explained protectively, because he was the one who’d found the body. He was afraid he might be held responsible for some misdemeanour … not closing the windows earlier
and suchlike silliness. It had been a shocking experience for the young lad, finding her like that, and they might like to be a bit patient with him.

No further visitors were expected at that late hour, Demetrios confided, haltingly, so, after Miss Thetis had come clattering in in her wooden sandals and whizzed straight past him in the hallway, he’d put his dusters away and gone about his usual rounds. Montacute fixed him with a keen stare and asked who else he had admitted to the house that evening. The boy replied at once and with evident puzzlement that he had let no one in besides Miss Thetis. A taxi driver had called about an hour later but had waited outside and helped Miss with her bag when she came downstairs. He’d noticed this because, drawn to his duties by the sound of someone galloping up and down the stairs, he’d waited about out of sight on the corner where the back passage joins the hall in case his help was needed.

“And what sort of help were you thinking might be called for at that hour?” the inspector asked casually.

The reply came at once with a suppressed grin: “Carrying a suitcase? All that yelling and screaming in the upper quarters, I thought someone might be going to do a runner, sir.” Getting back to his routine, Demetrios told how he had fed the cats in the rear scullery, waited for them to finish, and then cleared their dishes away. By then it was time to put the cats out into the night—the Lady wouldn’t have them inside the house after dark—and he’d started his tasks out at the back. Demetrios broke off to whisper hurriedly to Dorothea. She impatiently told him to just get on with his story.

Montacute was not a man to let anything slide by him and he gently enquired the reason for the boy’s hesitation. Dorothea shrugged and explained that the lad had got fond of the animals and was asking what would happen to them now the professor was no longer about to care for them. He wanted
Miss Laetitia to know that he’d be very willing to take them home with him rather than kick them out into the city, where they’d starve.

Letty smiled and assured him that his offer was very generous and she’d certainly make sure the cats were not forgotten.

Her intervention was rewarded with a flashing grin and a whispered “Thank you, Mistress.”

Demetrios gathered himself and told how he’d watered all the tubs of flowers, then he’d come inside again and checked that all the windows at the rear were locked, the doors bolted. The Old Mistress was very insistent on all that … she checked up on him sometimes.

Letty interrupted to remark that he was quite new in his post. She remembered that the boy back in the spring when she’d last been here was called Thomas?

Dorothea hurried to answer for him. Thomas had given notice—and returned to his own village just a little way off, on the Eleusis road. His father had had an accident at work and the lad was needed back at home. Luckily, he’d been able to recommend the services of his younger cousin. And Demetrios had given excellent service. The professor had the shiniest shoes in Athens!

Encouraged by the praise, Demetrios told how he’d gone out through the front door to check all was well and was about to come back in and lock up when he saw a dark shape on the ground under the drawing room window. He’d thought it might be a tramp bedding down for the night and the Old Mistress would never have tolerated such a thing, so he’d gone over to advise him to move away. He’d discovered Lady Merriman. And she was still alive, he’d added with round eyes. She’d recognised him and been able to speak to him. She’d told him she’d been pushed through the window and he was to fetch Dorothea and call the police.

“She said this in English?” the inspector asked quietly.

“Yes,” replied the boy, and fell silent.

Dorothea clearly felt she ought to explain. “Demetrios is a bright lad! He wants to be a butler one day in a large household. That’s his ambition. And we all know you need to speak English for a post like that. He’s learning fast! I can’t teach him much but Miss Thetis finds the time. She’s been very good to him. Go on, Demetrios! Give the gentleman a sample!”

Shy but eager to please, the boy looked at them from under his eyebrows and said clearly: “May I take your hat, sir? And now the other foot, if you please. Will you come this way, madam? Her ladyship is expecting you …”

“There! And he understands a lot, too. He’s a good listener. If that’s what he says the mistress told him, I wouldn’t doubt it. She said as much again when I got there but she was fading fast and I could hardly make out what she was saying. She was muttering in English.”

The cook interrupted to ask a question that was on all their minds. There were other more important matters than raking over the events of last night. What about tomorrow? He wanted to know if he should at once start to look for a new post? Were they all to be turned away now the master and mistress were gone for good?

They should all stay in post for the time being, Montacute told them. Their wages would be paid until such time as the inheritors of the Merriman estate decided what was to be done with the house. It would most probably be sold by the English gentlemen who had inherited, but in the meantime Miss Laetitia or perhaps Miss Thetis would preside over the household, and Mr. Gunning would be on hand also.

A burst of muttering from Demetrios directed at Dorothea greeted this. The housekeeper, in some embarrassment, waved it away, telling them it was an indiscreet question and no business of his to ask it.

Inevitably, Montacute insisted on an explanation. Dorothea told him that the boy had been asking why the professor’s daughter couldn’t just take over the house and go on living in it.

“The professor’s daughter?” asked Montacute and Letty together in surprise.

A further passage in Greek amongst the staff reduced Dorothea to giggles. “I’m sorry, sir, but the boy’s only been here since June. You’ll have to forgive him! How was he to know? He’d just about managed to work out the relationship between Miss Thetis and the professor …” Dorothea blushed and the two other servants hissed under their breath and looked aside. “I mean Miss Thetis and her ladyship … when another young girl arrived. People had told him and he assumed from the way she behaved—obviously at home here where a room was always kept for her—the one at the back—we call it Miss Laetitia’s room—that Miss Letty was the professor’s daughter!”

Demetrios was looking acutely uncomfortable, sliding further under the table as the explanation progressed and regretting the gauche question that so amused the adults.