Harriett (9 page)

David
frowned at that. “I don’t have Madame Humphries or Miss
Hepplethwaite on my list, I think I would remember them,” he added
wryly. “I can check the records of the rest of the group though and
get the list to you by this afternoon.”

“
What about Harriett or Babette? Are they on any medication as
far as you know?” Mark’s question was just a little too sharp, a
little too pointed, and he inwardly groaned at the look of interest
on his friend’s face.

David
sighed. He had never seen that intent look on Mark’s face before
and wasn’t sure what to make of it. Was it because he suspected
that either Harriett or Babette might be involved? Or was it
because he had rather too much of an interest in proving their
innocence? He rather suspected the latter might be the case but
wisely kept quiet.

“
Harriett is always in excellent health. My family have known
hers for many years. My father delivered her you know. I haven’t
seen Harriett at my surgery since she was a young child with
chicken pox. Babette has only had cause to visit me oh, about once
or twice in the last ten years. As far as I can recall, there isn’t
anything strange or startling about any of the family, apart from
the usual aches and pains, that sort of thing. None of them are on
any mediation as far as I know.”

Mark
heaved a mental sigh of relief and leaned back in his chair. “I
don’t think it is likely that the muslin cloth was left in the
glass the last time it was cleaned.”

“
It’s too small for a cleaning cloth, don’t you think?” David
frowned dubiously.

“
I know.” Mark shook his head. “I really cannot see that
something of this size has any particular purpose.”

“
I know. It had to be cut for its intended
purpose.”

He
nodded slowly and pushed to his feet. “Thank you for your haste in
getting this to me.” He watched David slowly fold up the cloth and
shuddered with revulsion. He had no idea how David did the job he
did and was very grateful that his own work was more cut and dried
– no pun intended. “I had better go and ask some questions of
Tipton Hollow’s Psychic Circle, hadn’t I?”

David
sighed and made his way toward the door. “If you can get me the
decanters, I will study them for any trace of anything
unusual.”

“
I will do that. In the meantime, send me the reports when you
have them. Just leave them on my desk and I will get to them when I
have conducted the first round of interviews. Thank you,
David.”

Mark
parted company with his friend at the front door to the
constabulary and stopped Detective Brown as he entered the
building.

“
You had better come with me. We have some investigating to
do.” He nodded down the road toward a black carriage that waited by
the kerb.

“
What have you found out?” Isaac asked as he cast a glance at
the rapidly retreating back of Doctor Woods.

“
Tipton Hollow, please,” Mark called to the driver and settled
back into the seat to relay his conversation with David.

“
Good Lord,” Isaac grumbled with a sigh.

“
Although we cannot rule anyone out, I think it is highly
unlikely that Harriett or Babette Marchington would kill anyone in
their own parlour. Not only would it be foolish to draw attention
to themselves by committing murder in their own house, but it would
have to be a very arrogant murderer indeed to take someone’s life
with so many people around.”

“
They would have to be either very clever or incredibly
stupid,” Isaac agreed. He couldn’t see either Harriett, or Babette,
being a cold blooded killer. He hadn’t spent much time in Tipton
Hollow himself, but he had learned enough about the place to know
that the tea shop Harriett ran with her family had an excellent
reputation for miles around. The family were held in high regard,
and had excellent community relationships with businesses and
locals alike. They were the least likely people to be involved in
such a sordid event as murder.

“
Which house first?”

“
I need to go to Harriett’s and see if they have cleaned out
the room yet. Hopefully, the decanters will have been left
untouched. David wants them so he can run a few tests for poisons
and the like.”

“
Or more pieces of cloth?” Isaac added ruefully.

“
Or more pieces of cloth,” Mark sighed. Now that the cause of
death had been identified, he felt driven to get to Harriett’s
house as quickly as possible and stop her from drinking any more of
that sherry.

It
seemed to take an age before the carriage rumbled to a stop outside
29 Daventry Street in Tipton Hollow. Mark left Isaac to pay the
driver and stalked toward the front door in hurried strides. He
tried to keep his impatience at bay, however knocked on the door
with more force than was necessary.

Harriett
hurried through the house and wiped her hands on her apron. Her
stomach dipped as soon as she saw the outline of the person
outside. She knew who it was before she opened the door, and poked
at the random curls that had escaped the bun at her nape
self-consciously as she took a deep, fortifying breath. With a hand
that trembled, she turned the latch and pasted a cautious smile on
her face that was at odds with the thrill of excitement that
coursed through her.

“
Good morning,” Harriett called and stood back to allow the
men into the hallway.

“
Good morning, Harriet,” Mark replied gently as he studied
her.

There
were dark smudges beneath her eyes that told him she had slept as
little as he had. Her complexion had lost the healthy glow she had
had last night, and she now stood before him pale and guarded. He
hated to see her thus and searched for something to say to reassure
her.

“
Do you remember Detective Brown?”

It was just over twelve hours since they had left the house,
of course she remembers him
, Mark thought
and mentally winced at the stupidity of his question.

“
Yes, I do, good morning, Detective. Can I get you both some
tea?”

“
Yes, please. That would be wonderful.”

Harriett
hesitated at the parlour door. She couldn’t bring herself to go
into the room today any more than she could last night and wondered
how she was going to get around her sudden reluctance to even think
about tidying the room.

“
Why don’t we go into the sitting room where it is more
comfortable?” Mark suggested softly. He had seen the brief flash of
fear on her face and read her reluctance for what it was. “Has
nobody been in there yet?”

“
Not yet. Babette has been baking and I, well -” Harriett
hesitated. She was at a loss to explain her aversion to being in
the room because she wasn’t normally a squeamish person but for the
life of her she couldn’t even open the parlour door, let alone go
into the room.

“
It’s alright, Harriett, we do understand, and it is quite
fortuitous really,” Mark murmured softly. “I will explain why in a
moment.” He motioned toward the rear of the house and followed her
down the hallway.

What was
it about this man that seemed to rob her of her common sense? This
was the second time she had met him, and the second time her world
felt slightly off kilter, as though nothing was quite the same and
wasn’t ever going to be right again. Not in a negative way, but in
a way that she knew that something major had happened in her life
and it would always colour the way she viewed events and
circumstances around her.

The men
took a seat in the room next to the kitchen and waited while
Harriett fetched a tray of tea things. She poured the fragrant brew
while Babette placed a plate of assorted cakes on the table, the
scent of which made Mark want to groan. Once everyone was furnished
with tea and cake, the ladies took their seats and waited with an
air of trepidation for Mark’s news.

“
I don’t see any way to soften the news ladies, but I am
afraid I have to inform you that it looks like Minerva Bobbington
died of unnatural causes last night.”

Harriett
stared at Mark as the words rolled around in her head. They tried
to seek a place in which to fall into some semblance of order and
make sense, but failed miserably.

“
Murder?” She whispered as she stared in horror at Mark, then
Isaac. She wanted to deny it was possible, but couldn’t because the
truth was written in their eyes. She jumped when the warmth of
Mark’s hand landed gently on hers as it rested on the table. The
calm reassurance in his steady green eyes immediately settled her
and she took a breath to quell the shock. In that moment he was her
anchor in a storm tossed sea; her steady ray of hope in the storm
that had descended upon her and unleashed its fury. Murder? In her
house? How? Who? Why? Questions tumbled around in her mind but her
mouth was too dry to speak. Tears pooled in her eyes at the thought
of poor Minerva Bobbington. Who would want to kill such a poor,
defenceless soul as Minerva?

Mark
knew that it was highly unprofessional of him to offer even such a
minor attempt at comfort, but the distress on her face made him
angry. Someone had upset her; made her cry in fact, and that made
him all the more determined to get to the bottom of what had really
gone on in her parlour.

“
How?” Harriett asked in a quivering voice. Her eyes silently
pleaded with him to tell her and he simply couldn’t
refuse.

“
She choked on something in her drink?”

“
Something in her drink? What?” Her eyes stared in horror at
him. The regret on his face was plain, as was the reassurance in
her eyes. She could see no accusation or suspicion, merely calm
authority that steadied her.

“
There was something in her drink that got lodged in her
throat. It looks unlikely that it was an accident but, until we can
find out how it got into her drink, we need to treat this as an
unexplained death.”

“
Murder,” she whispered.

Mark
nodded solemnly.

“
How awful,” her hands trembled and she felt tears well again.
She blinked rapidly to keep them at bay and took comfort from his
presence. “I will help in any way I can.”

“
Excellent. Now I want you to slowly recount exactly what
happened last night, Harriett. Don’t leave anything out.” He
glanced at Isaac, pleased to note that he already had his pencil
poised to take notes.

Harriett
slowly went through everything. She seemed to talk for a long time.
Babette only interjected occasionally with additional bits of
information here and there. Tea was replenished several times, and
nothing but crumbs were left of the Victoria sponge cake that
Babette had baked only that morning, but nobody seemed to notice as
the evening’s activities were recounted in minute
detail.

“
Go through the messages again,” Mark asked with a frown and
drew out his own notebook. He wrote all of the messages down,
before focusing on the ‘H is in danger’.

“
Did it give any indication as to who the ‘H’ was?”

“
I am afraid not. Several people got a bit annoyed with the
vagueness of it. I don’t know if any of the messages have any
relevance to what happened because Minerva Bobbington doesn’t have
an H in her name and couldn’t take the message about the
cat.”

Mark
sighed deeply. His instincts warned him that there was something he
had overlooked, if only he could figure out what. A strong,
protective urge to keep the woman in the chair opposite safe shook
him to the core and he briefly wondered if he really was the right
person to lead this particular investigation. He was fairly certain
that his impartiality, a valuable asset in his line of work, was
skewed by his keen interest in Harriett. Unfortunately though, he
really needed to have a valid reason to continue to see her, if
only to make sure that she was safe.

“
So, let’s go through this. Who at the meeting last night has
an H in their name?”

“
Madame Humphries, Gertrude Hepplethwaite, Harriet,” Isaac
hesitated and looked at the woman seated next to Mark. “Sorry,
Harriett. Hugo Montague and Miss Betty Haversham.”

“
But if someone was trying to give a warning message to
someone whom they knew was in danger, would they use their surname,
or first name?” Harriett questioned with a frown.

“
I have no idea but, until we can uncover a bit more
information, I think it is important that you take extreme caution
in everything you do, Harriett.” Mark stared hard across the table
and watched her squirm uncomfortably in her seat as though she
wanted to protest at his dictatorial manner. He knew that he was
being rather heavy handed with her, and ignored Isaac’s discrete
cough beside him. He felt compelled to do everything within his
power to ensure that Harriett didn’t become the killer’s next
victim and if it made him unprofessional so be it. “Don’t go out at
night alone, in the dark. When you are at home, make sure that the
door is locked and don’t answer it at night, especially if you are
alone in the house.” He lifted a hand when Harriett and Babette
both took a breath to speak and silenced them with a stern look.
“Right now, we have a death that looks suspicious. Someone at that
circle may have been the murderer, we just don’t know yet. Until we
do, you cannot take any chances. Not even with people that you have
known for some time. If there is one thing I have learned in my
job, anybody is capable of murder, just not everybody does
it.”