Malice in Miniature (15 page)

“Anyway, she assumes that Lathrop took about ten minutes to boil the kettle and steep the tea, and the doctor said the symptoms would make themselves known almost immediately after she drank the stuff. So that means she probably opened the caddy sometime between six-thirty and quarter to seven.”

“So that looks like Claude, doesn't it?”

“Perhaps. Sir Mordred, as you remember, was in London. But of course the cook was there, though we have no reason to suppose she wanted Lathrop dead. And both Meg Cunningham and Richard Adam have keys to the house.”

“John Thoreston? Bob Finch?”

“No. Neither of them. But either could have hidden in the house until after it was shut up, done what needed to be done, and left. Several of the doors are self-locking.” He waited politely for any further questions. I shook my head, and he went on.

“From the symptoms the poison is almost certainly an alkaloid, which means some sort of plant. Neither the autopsy nor the lab analysis of the herbal mixture left in the caddy has been completed yet, but the doctor's guess is monkshood, which seems a likely bet. Its active principle is aconite, which would cause the symptoms described. It's often grown as an ornamental in our part of the world; why not in Brocklesby's garden? So you see, Thoreston could have had both means and opportunity. And as for motive—”

“I know, I know. But the psychology is all wrong, it seems to me. Thoreston is the cornered-rat sort. He might bite in an extremity, but poisoning is not his cup of tea. So to speak.”

Alan quite properly ignored that. “So you favor Claude?”

“Your guess is as good as mine—probably better. He's more vicious than Thoreston, certainly, but not anything like as intelligent, and certainly not a rural type. Would he even think of a plant as poisonous? Wouldn't an overdose of cocaine be more his style?”

“My dear, I don't know. He is vicious, as you say, and if he isn't precisely intelligent, he's quite clever enough to pick a few sprigs of a plant. But what motive would he have? I'm reasonably certain his mum was his chief means of support. Our information on him is a trifle sketchy, but nothing has turned up so far to indicate that he's gainfully employed. Why would he want to kill his meal ticket?”

“Well, I wish I could ask him, but he's vanished, too, probably run off to London in a panic. He's not the kind to stick around where there's trouble.”

“Indeed. And as for Bob—”

“I flatly refuse to believe Bob guilty of anything worse that a weakness for his pint. Somebody planted that bag with the miniatures in it so Bob would be suspected. I wish it hadn't had his fingerprints on it, though.”

Alan sighed heavily. “That's one of the reasons they turned him loose, actually. Morrison is no fool, Dorothy. That bag struck him wrong from the first. A trifle too convenient And it was a bag that had held grass seed.”

“Oh, of course. So Bob had handled it at one time.”

“Exactly. No one likes the man as a suspect any more than you do, but when he's thrown at us, we must at least consider him.”

“What a tangled mess.” Privately I decided that I would spend Monday trying to do some untangling, but I thought better of telling Alan.

I left Bramshill on Sunday night, just in time to catch the last train back to Sherebury. After a couple of days in the manor house I had begun to feel somewhat more at home, but still not quite ready to commit myself to being chatelaine of such a dwelling. Alan and I left it at that. “We'll talk when I come home on Saturday,” he said comfortably. “Don't fret about it, darling—or about anything else. We'll work it out.”

Monday morning dawned brilliantly sunny, but very cold. A light rain the night before had left moisture in the air that condensed, toward morning, into hoarfrost. Every dry twig, every blade of grass glittered diamond bright. I put aside my worries; it was a morning to shout aloud for the pure joy of being alive. The cats caught my mood and raced around the house, rumpling the rugs and destroying various small objects in their wake. I couldn't scold them; I felt much the same way.

I rushed through my job at the Cathedral Bookshop. The gossip centered around Bob Finch, who was said not to be working at all, though so far staying sober. That strengthened my sense of purpose. I fixed a hasty lunch, ate it absentmindedly, and tried to think up an excuse for going back out to Brocklesby Hall.

Not that I needed to excuse my actions to myself. Alan had not forbidden me to continue, and I was stubbornly convinced I was in the right. However, I had to get past the Cerberus at the door, and that would require some fancy talking. I decided I might get by with offering again to help Meg in the library. Not only did I still have some questions for her, but she probably needed help. Thoreston's decampment had left her with some of his duties to perform, and she had more than enough to do already. Surely I could offer to take some of the more mundane library chores off her hands. Anyone with a working knowledge of libraries could read the shelves, for example, or file things. With that vague idea, and a bright red, morale-boosting hat, I set out.

The constable on guard duty this time was older than the poor boy I had conned on Friday, and made of sterner stuff. I explained my errand plausibly, I thought, and gave him my most winning smile. He steadfastly ignored the small red felt roosters bobbing on top of my head and repeated, “I'm sorry, madam. I have orders to admit no one except members of the staff.”

“I see.” Here was a brick wall; I would have to find a creative way around the problem. “Then perhaps I should call and ask Mrs. Cunningham to request my appointment as temporary staff.
Thank
you so much.”

He looked at me suspiciously, but made no attempt to follow me to the parking lot which, fortunately, was around the corner, out of his sight.

It was also close to Sir Mordred's barn/workshop, and there was more than one way to skin a cat. I paused by my car and surveyed the area. No one was in sight; the atmosphere positively reeked of peace and harmony. Somewhere in the distance I could hear the rattly hum of a lawn tractor. Richard was apparently taking advantage of the fine weather for one last mowing before winter set in. That really left only Sir M. likely to be outside, unless some police expert happened to be combing the herb garden. Well, Sir M. I could cope with. The police—I'd cross that bridge if I came to it.

There was a good, sturdy dead bolt on the barn door, so I was actually lucky that it was open and the lord of the manor was working inside. I've done a spot of breaking and entering now and again, in a good cause, but I'd never have been able to credit-card my way past that lock. Sir M. was fussing over some finicky job on the workbench when I came in, and jumped when I spoke his name.

“My dear Mrs. Nesbitt, I—”

“Martin. I kept my former name.”

“Yes.” There was no mistaking the disapproval in the monosyllable. “If you had only told me who you were when we first met, I should never have allowed you to take tea in the kitchen, as I understand you and your distinguished husband did.”

“I guess I'm still not used to my married state. And it was a very good tea, so don't worry about it. You have a fine workshop here, Sir Mordred. I hope you don't mind my stopping in, but you did offer to show it to me once.”

“Ah—yes. Yes, of course I did. And, in any case, I owe you a debt of gratitude for looking after me the other day. I must apologize for my behavior, but when you pointed out that Mr. Thoreston must be at the root of all my troubles, the shock, on top of all the other shocks . . .” He wiped his forehead delicately with a silk handkerchief. “You are most welcome to look at my humble work, dear lady. What would you particularly like to see?”

I didn't have a clue, of course. I was there to see what I could see, talk to him, and draw whatever conclusions presented themselves. “Whatever you'd like to show me. I love to see how fine craftsmen do their work.”

A little of the best butter never hurts, but as my eyes wandered I could see that I spoke nothing but the truth. The room was untidy, but only in the way that an artist's milieu always is when work is being done. Tools that were not in use were clean and hanging neatly in their appointed places. The workbench, a fine smooth surface, had vises clamped to its edge, ranging in size from small to very small. There was a table saw, a drill press, a lathe, all somewhat smaller than the usual versions. Everything shone with care; some of the tools looked new. It was, in short, a fully equipped and very professional carpenter's shop on a reduced scale, and the bits and pieces that I could see lying around in various states of completion were extremely impressive.

Sir Mordred melted completely under my beams of appreciation. “Perhaps, then, you would like to see the steps in the manufacture of fine miniature furniture. As it happens, I have just begun a new Louis XIV desk . . .”

He showed me the processes and explained them in exhaustive detail. As usual with Sir Mordred, I soon felt I was learning a great deal more than I wanted to know about the subject, but there is no stopping a true enthusiast once he gets started. “And what is this in the corner?” I asked finally. “It looks like a small kiln. Do you make your own pottery?”

He smiled patronizingly. “I do, of course, but not in that kiln. That is for drying wood, when it is necessary to produce an aged effect in a short time. The pottery kiln is in the next room, where I store several kinds of clay, as well as the molds for various kinds of tableware, ceiling decorations, vases . . .”

I suppose it was interesting in its way, but it was also useless. I was trying to invent an excuse to make my escape when Richard Adam walked in the door, in the middle of a lecture on the various glaze effects produced by various techniques. “Salt-glazing, of course, is a very old—yes, Adam, what is it?”

“I've finished with the lawns, as you wished. Was there anything else? I should get to digging the bulbs while there's still some daylight.”

His tone was almost rude, and little Sir M. looked distinctly annoyed. I seized the opportunity.

“I've kept you far too long, Sir Mordred. You obviously have responsibilities to tend to. Thank you so much for showing me what you do; I must be going.”

I shot out into the daylight. The long shadows of evening were beginning to stretch out against the lawn, and birds were circling the small lake that dominated the back garden. One bird, coming in for a landing, took my breath away. From where I stood, about fifty yards away, it looked like an airplane, with a wingspan of at least six feet. I moved slowly across the grass, trying to be perfectly quiet, and I was nearly at the edge of the water when the great blue heron saw me, rose magnificently, and flew away. I followed it with my eyes, tilting my neck back and nearly losing my balance on the muddy shore of the lake.

As I looked down for surer footing, I saw it. I moved back then, slowly and carefully, like a cat backing up, until I stood safely on the grass where I could leave no more footprints, and studied what I had seen.

Something had been dragged across that little patch of mud at the edge of the lake, something heavy. The shoes that had slipped had been deep in the mud. And faintly, close to one of the footprints, was the slight but unmistakable print of a tire. Not a car tire, narrower.

A motorcycle tire?

I
f Inspector Morrison had been in sight I would have gone straight to him, but he wasn't. I didn't even know if he was here, or back at the police station, or out working on some other case, and I would be stopped if I tried to wander around the Hall looking for him. So I climbed in my car, drove home in reckless haste, and put in an urgent call to Alan.

He returned the call promptly.

“Alan, I've been out to the Hall, and there's something the police need to look into right away.”

I detailed the marks I had seen at the edge of the lake. “If Claude is still missing . . .”

I didn't have to spell it out for him, of course. “I'll get on to Morrison myself, and then ring you back.”

To my relief, he said nothing to curtail my activities. But why did he need to call me back? I'd told him everything I knew. Had he had second thoughts, or third or fourth? Would he call me off?

I sat by the phone with mounting apprehension and impatience, and snatched it up on the first ring.

“The tracks are new,” Alan said without preamble. “Morrison said they checked the lake carefully on Saturday, on the principle of being thorough. It's a convenient place to get rid of anything one doesn't want found. There were no signs then of anyone having been near it. He's sending men out to the Hall immediately.”

He cleared his throat. “You've been very helpful, love. It was clever of you to notice those tracks, and I'm glad you reported back immediately. There are—a few things Morrison told me that you might want to know.”

I drew in a long breath. “Yes?”

“I'm meant to be in a meeting at the moment, so this will have to be quick. Three things: First, Thoreston was arrested yesterday in York, and has been brought back to Sherebury for questioning. Second, one of the gardens at the Hall does, in fact, have a fine stand of monkshood, and some of it appears to have been recently cut. Third, the head gardener is not being particularly cooperative. Morrison is sure he's lying about something, but can't tell what.”

I didn't like Alan's last piece of news, and I was very, very glad he couldn't see my face. “Well, that's all very interesting,” I said cautiously. “By the way, what exactly did Thoreston do to cook the books? I'm not an expert on embezzlement.”

He chuckled. “That's comforting to know. I shall rest easier, knowing my retirement account is safe. He did it the easiest way, ghost payroll. Brocklesby made it simple for him, not knowing the names of the casual employees.”