Mrs. Jeffries and the Feast of St. Stephen (A Victorian Mystery) (18 page)

“You mean, if she thinks she got away with murder once, she thinks she could do it again?” Smythe reached for another slice of bread.

“It’s a possibility,” Luty replied.

“But what would be her motive?” Betsy asked. “Why would she want Stephen Whitfield dead?”

“Maybe she stands to inherit from his estate,” Wiggins suggested. “After all, we know he was sweet on her.”

“He might have been sweet on her, but I don’t think she was goin’ to inherit anything from the fellow,” Luty said. “I did find out a bit about Whitfield’s estate, and it’s strange.”

“What do you mean?” Mrs. Goodge demanded. “How can an estate be strange?”

Luty was a tad embarrassed. Despite her best efforts, she’d found out nothing more than a general rumor about the late Stephen Whitfield’s estate. As the others had charged her with finding out whether or not the house was entailed, she felt almost as if she’d failed. “According to my source, Whitfield doesn’t have control of any of his property except his personal property.”

“Personal property.” Wiggins frowned. “Does that mean just his clothes and hairbrushes and that sort of thing?”

“That’s pretty much what it means,” Luty said. “Everything else is tied up in some sort of annuity fund. My source wasn’t real sure, but he said he’d see if he could find out more about the estate, but it might take a day or two. Sorry I couldn’t find out other details. I know you was all counting on me . . .”

“That’s all right, Luty. You’ve done very well,” Mrs. Jeffries interrupted. “Much better than anyone could expect in such a short period of time.”

“I heard the same, madam,” Hatchet added smoothly. “There is something odd about the estate, and none of my sources knew what it was, either.” He was annoyed that he’d not been able to get in to see his friend, the Farringdons’ butler, but the fellow was still ill. But he was supposedly on the mend.

“Let’s hope I get lucky tomorrow and my source comes through with something useful,” Luty finished.

Mrs. Jeffries looked at Hatchet. “Would you care to go next?”

“I’m afraid I’ve found out very little,” he said. “Unfortunately one of my sources is still very much indisposed, but I’m hoping that is only a temporary condition.” He’d die before he’d let Luty know how depressed he was about his contribution to the case thus far.

“I’m sure you’ll do better tomorrow.” Luty reached over and patted him on the arm. She’d recovered from her feelings of failure. He glared at her.

“In that case, perhaps I ought to tell everyone what I’ve learned,” Mrs. Jeffries took a deep breath. “While I was out today, I happened to run into Mrs. Bowden . . .”

Mrs. Goodge broke in. “You mean the lady that gives us a hand with heavy spring cleanin’?”

“That’s right,” Mrs. Jeffries replied. She reached for her teacup, and as she did, she happened to glance toward the kitchen window. She could see the high wheels of a hansom pulling up in front of the house. “Oh dear, I think the inspector is home early.” She leapt and dashed across the room.

“But it’s not even half past four,” Wiggins cried.

“What’s he doin’ home this early?” Mrs. Goodge complained. “That’s goin’ to ruin everything. I don’t want to have to stop and get supper now. I want to speak to my rag-and-bone man.”

“It’s the inspector,” Mrs. Jeffries hissed over her shoulder.

Luty and Hatchet were already on their feet and heading for the back door. “We’ll be back tomorrow morning,” Hatchet promised.

“Come for breakfast,” Mrs. Goodge offered. “That way we’ll have plenty of time for our meeting.”

“Isn’t that just like a man?” Betsy looked at Smythe. “Always popping up where you least expect them.”

The next morning, Luty and Hatchet joined the household for breakfast. While they ate their bacon and eggs, Mrs. Jeffries told them about her encounter with Geraldine Bowden. She also gave them the information she’d learned from Witherspoon the previous evening while he’d eaten his dinner. The house was now quiet and empty, with everyone out about their business.

Mrs. Jeffries glanced around the kitchen. Mrs. Goodge was at the counter, taking the mince tarts she’d baked early this morning off the cooling tray and putting them onto a serving platter. “Your sources are going to be lucky today. Those look delicious. They smell wonderful as well.”

“Thank you. I’m hoping these will help loosen a few tongues. I didn’t have much luck yesterday,” she replied. The morning meeting had been so rushed that she’d not mentioned her garden conversation with Lester Parks.

“Some days are like that.” Mrs. Jeffries smiled sympathetically. “No matter how hard we try, we simply don’t hear a word about our suspects or our victim.”

“I heard something, alright.” The cook sighed. “I’m just not sure it’s true.”

“What was it?”

Mrs. Goodge laid the last tart onto the platter and then looked up. She might as well repeat what he’d told her. The poor fellow deserved at least that much. Besides, it wasn’t the sort of tidbit that would do any harm to the case. “My source mentioned that the only thing Rosalind Murray’s husband left her when he died was some shares in a tea plantation in the Far East.” She shrugged. “But I don’t think this source is particularly reliable, and what’s more, even if the information was true, I don’t see that it has any bearing on Whitfield’s murder. But not to worry—I’ve an old friend coming around this morning, and I’m hoping she’ll have something useful.”

“I do hope so,” Mrs. Jeffries said earnestly. “This case is becoming a bit of a puzzle.”

“Aren’t they all?”

“Of course they are,” Mrs. Jeffries agreed. “But usually by now we have a few more facts to work with.”

“What do you mean?” The cook picked up the clean tea towel she’d laid next to the serving platter and draped it over the tarts. “Seems to me we’ve got lots of information—we know plenty of things.”

“But we don’t,” Mrs. Jeffries argued. “And the things we don’t know are important. For instance, we’ve still no idea who will inherit Whitfield’s estate or even if there is an estate to be inherited.”

“Luty has got her sources working on that problem.” Mrs. Goodge picked up the empty cooling tray and took it over to the sink. “She seemed confident that she’d have an answer for us by this afternoon’s meeting.”

“But that’s not the only issue I’m concerned about. There’s something else equally puzzling.” Mrs. Jeffries paused and took a deep breath. She wasn’t sure she should even voice this concern aloud. “No one seems to have any reason to want Whitfield dead.”

That was what really bothered her: there didn’t seem to be a reason for Whitfield’s murder.

“What about Mrs. Graham?” Mrs. Goodge grabbed a cleaning rag from the rack above the sink and ran it lightly over the surface of the tray. “Seems to me she’d decided to jilt Whitfield and had set her sights on Hugh Langdon. Perhaps when she told Whitfield it was over, he’d threatened to make trouble for her with Langdon.”

“But what could Whitfield have done?”

“Perhaps he said he’d tell Langdon that Mrs. Graham had been his mistress and that they were engaged,” Mrs. Goodge replied. “Some men would think twice before stealing another man’s fiancée.”

“But they weren’t engaged,” Mrs. Jeffries pointed out. “Eliza Graham was very insistent on that point. She told the inspector she’d never agreed to marry Whitfield.”

“True, but we’ve only her word to go on.” The cook grinned. “She could be lying. After all, Whitfield is dead, and by her own admission, his death saved her a lot of trouble and embarrassment.”

“That’s true,” Mrs. Jeffries murmured. “And from what the inspector told us, Mrs. Graham didn’t try to hide the fact that she needed to remarry for financial reasons. I guess what I’m concerned about is why she would jilt a known quantity like Whitfield for a man who had a reputation as a bit of a cad.”

“Perhaps Mrs. Graham saw Langdon in a different light.” The cook slid the tray onto the bottom shelf of the worktable. “Maybe she fell in love. We both know that love makes people do foolish things. Just look at Betsy and Smythe.”

“They seem to be a bit easier with one another, don’t you think?”

“Yes, I noticed that as well,” Mrs. Goodge replied. “And I’m glad of it. All that tension around the table was hard on my nerves. But back to our problem. The inspector said Mrs. Graham knew that the Whitfield estate wouldn’t go to her even if she did marry Whitfield. So she’d be no better off married to him than she is now. Maybe she saw Langdon as a safer bet.”

“So you’re thinking she might have decided she could get Langdon to propose, and when she tried to break off the relationship with Whitfield, he threatened her in some way?”

“That’s one possible motive.” Mrs. Goodge shrugged. “Whitfield may not have taken kindly to being publicly jilted. Especially as he’d already made plans to go to Italy, called his solicitor to change his will, and told his mistress of many years that it was over.”

“When you put it like that, I see what you mean,” Mrs. Jeffries replied. “Perhaps Eliza Graham did have a motive. Gossip can sometimes have devastating consequences to women of her class. Who knows what Whitfield might have threatened when she told him the two of them were finished?”

“And Mrs. Murray has a motive as well,” the cook said quickly. “Remember the old saying: Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.” There was a loud knock on the back door. “That’s probably my friend.”

Mrs. Jeffries took the hint and quickly rose to her feet.

“I’ll leave you to it, then. I’ve a busy day planned, so I’ll see you this afternoon.”

Mrs. Goodge waited till Mrs. Jeffries had disappeared up the back steps before she opened the door. She smiled at the small, sparrowlike woman standing on the stoop. “Hello, Emma. It’s been a long time. Do come in.”

“It has been a long time, hasn’t it?” Emma Darnley agreed as she stepped inside. She had gray hair, deep-set brown eyes, and a sharp chin. “I was ever so surprised to get your note. But then I happened to run into Ida Leacock on Oxford Street the other day, and she said you’d been getting in touch with some of your old acquaintances.”

“That’s right.” Mrs. Goodge ushered her guest down the hall toward the kitchen. “How have you been? It was Ida who told me that you’d moved to London.”

“I came to London ages ago,” Emma replied as they came into the kitchen. She stopped and surveyed the room. “This is very nice, not at all what I expected. Ida mentioned that you worked for a policeman.”

“A police inspector,” Mrs. Goodge replied.

“Even an inspector couldn’t afford a house this size,” Emma retorted. She took off her gloves and hat.

“He’s private means as well,” Mrs. Goodge said. Emma always had said exactly what she thought, and apparently the passage of the years hadn’t changed her in the least. Good. “Give me your things and take a seat. I’ll brew us a fresh pot of tea. I’ve some lovely mince tarts. As I recall, you were always fond of mince tarts.”

Emma smiled in pleasure. “You remembered that—how very kind of you.” She slipped off her coat and handed it to the cook along with her hat and gloves.

“I remember a lot from the old days. It’s the present that I have a hard time keeping up with.” Mrs. Goodge tucked the gloves inside the hat and laid them on the sideboard, then put the coat on the rack.

“I was surprised to hear you were still working.” Emma continued her study of the kitchen as she sat down at the table. Her gaze lingered for a moment on the almost new, very expensive cooker, before moving on to the slab of marble sitting atop the worktable near the sink.

“I’ve really no choice about it,” Mrs. Goodge said. It was a lie: she had saved practically all her salary over the years she’d worked for the inspector, and she now had a tidy sum tucked safely away in a post office account. He was a most generous employer. But she had found she could get far more information out of her old colleagues if they felt just a bit sorry for her. “I’ve no family to speak of and, well, here I am, still cooking and baking.”

Emma dragged her gaze away from the pine sideboard and turned toward the cook. She smiled sympathetically. “I’m lucky. I’ve got my Neville, and he’s his railway pension. I left service some years ago, you know. Right after we had our Lilly.”

“That’s what I heard,” Mrs. Goodge replied. The kettle, which she’d left on to boil, began to whistle. She took it off and poured the water into the waiting teapot. “Was Lilly your only child?”

For the next ten minutes, they chatted about family, old friends, the weather, the season, and how crowded the shops were these days. Then the cook moved in for the kill. “Have you kept in contact with any of the others from the old days?”

“Not really, though I did get a card from Lorraine Brown last summer. Do you remember her? She worked with us at Lord Lattimer’s London house.”

“I remember her. She was a nice girl.”

“She’s moved to Dorset to live with her sister.”

Mrs. Goodge didn’t have a clue who Lorraine Brown might be, but this was the opening she wanted. “Dorset? Are you sure? I heard she ended up working as a housekeeper for that man who was murdered the other day.”

“Lorraine Brown hasn’t worked in London in years. What on earth are you talking about, Mrs. Goodge?” Emma stared at her curiously.

Mrs. Goodge put the teapot onto the table next to the plate of mince tarts. “Oh dear, I’m getting muddled. It was Helen Brown who worked at the Whitfield house. You don’t know Helen. I worked with her years after you and I worked together.”

“Murder,” Emma muttered. She frowned. “You mean that man who was poisoned at his own dinner party?”

“Yes, that’s him. Stephen Whitfield was his name.” She put two mince tarts onto a plate and placed it on the table in front of Emma. “Poor man was murdered in his own home. My inspector has got the case.” She’d decided there was no harm in mentioning this information. After all, they were two old women gossiping together, and it would be expected that she’d discuss her employer.