Shadows & Lies (32 page)

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Authors: Marjorie Eccles

Tags: #Mystery, #Historical

BOOK: Shadows & Lies
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Sebastian's rooms in Albemarle Street, the usual bachelor quarters.
Half past four on this bitterly cold wintry afternoon found Crockett ringing the bell. In his mind, he had classed Sebastian as a young man-about-town, one of the leisured classes with no more thought in his head than the pursuit of his own pleasure, and was surprised to find him in shirt sleeves, working at a big drawing board set up in the centre of a large, well-furnished but unbelievably untidy room, architectural drawings pinned up all around the walls, books and papers strewn on every surface.
Sebastian saw his surprise and rather enjoyed it. He had been to see Wagstaffe and was still buoyed up with the rough sort of approval he had received on reporting to the architect about the studies he'd so far followed, along the lines suggested to him by the older man. He thought Wagstaffe was more impressed than he'd said by how willing Sebastian was showing himself, and by how much progress he had made since their last meeting, in preparation for the start of his new career.
“I'm soon to be a working man, Chief Inspector. Going in for architecture, what do you think of that?” Smiling, without waiting for answer, he asked, “What can I do for you?”
“You can give me your sister's address, for one thing, if you will. Where does she live?”
“Knightsbridge, but as a matter of fact, you're in luck, I'm expecting her any minute. I was just about to start clearing up.” He looked round vaguely, thrusting his hands through his hair as he wondered where to start. “Women set such store by these things. Especially Sylvia. Do sit down.”
In the absence of any seat devoid of books and papers and the scarcity of empty surfaces on which to remove them to, Crockett remained on his feet, contenting himself, while Sebastian shuffled papers around ineffectually, with examining the several very good pictures on the walls and the family photographs on the mantelpiece, one of which, in a silver frame, particularly caught his eye. It was of Lady Chetwynd, looking very
elegant in lace and a huge, frilly hat, leaning on a parasol, beside a very young officer in the uniform of the Blues and Royals – the Royal Horse Guards. Presumably this was Harry Chetwynd, before he resigned his commission for a career that had ended up as dilettante journalism.
Finally abandoning any attempt at tidiness, Sebastian switched off the bright electric light over his drawing board, which left but one dim lamp burning in the corner. He drew together the thick, dark red serge curtains, cutting off all sound from the noisy street outside and enclosing the room with its low-burning fire in intimacy and warmth. He was about to turn on the overhead light when there was a knock on the door. “Here she is. Sylvia, my dear.” He had to bend and dip his head under the sweeping brim of the hat skewered to his sister's piled-up hair in order to kiss her scented cheek.
Standing in the shadows, Crockett saw at once that she was very like her mother, but in a way somehow more sharply defined. Small and extremely slim, with a very upright carriage, she was wearing dark green: a beautifully cut coat and skirt relieved only by a touch of paler green in the ruffle of silk at her neck when she removed her fur. The same pale green also extravagantly trimmed her matching velour hat: an undoubtedly expensive ensemble which nevertheless drained her complexion, already naturally pale, he guessed, of all colour. There were dark, bruised-looking shadows under her eyes.
“What a mess!” she declared immediately, with sisterly candour, looking around her. “How can you live like this, Sebastian?”
 
“I don't, not all the time. I'm very busy just now and anyway, the merest thing out of place offends Knox's orderly Scottish soul and he cleans it up even before he brings me my tea in the morning. I wish he wouldn't. I quite like living in squalor. Why don't you have a seat, Sylvia, take off your hat and I'll ring for some tea?” he added, sweeping a pile of papers to the floor from a bosomy Victorian velvet chair with a tapestry seat. “You don't look up to the mark, if I may say so.”
“I – I haven't been sleeping too well. No tea, thank you.” She put down her muff, drew off her elegant suede gloves, laid them
on her lap and lifted her hands to remove the pins from her hat. Crockett cleared his throat and stepped forward from the shadows. She started.
“I'm sorry, Sylvia. Let me introduce Chief Inspector Crockett, the detective from Scotland Yard in charge of the Belmonde murder. My sister, Mrs Eustace-Bragge.”
She immediately stood up again, looking very angry, ignoring Crockett's outstretched hand, and began to draw on her gloves once more. “You have got me here by a trick, Sebastian, and I won't have it. I shall not stay.”
Sebastian forbore to remind her that it was she who had sent him a note asking to see him. The fact that she was prepared to visit him – here – meant she wished to keep their meeting secret, probably because she wanted to borrow money for reasons the often tight-fisted Algy mustn't know about – she had hinted as much when they spoke on the telephone. Which was rich. She must indeed be desperate if she was reduced to asking
him!
He said mildly, “Inspector Crockett has been here barely five minutes, and I wasn't expecting him.”
“Please stay, Mrs Eustace-Bragge,” Crockett intervened. “I should very much like a word with you, if you will spare me a few moments.”
“Sylvia, Mr Crockett knows about the child.”
There was no noticeable change in her expression. She looked Crockett up and down, taking in what he had previously thought to be one of his smartest suits, his high, stiff and spotless collar, his well groomed moustache and polished boots, then sat down again, abruptly. Resting her elbow on the chair arm, she shielded her eyes with one thin white hand, heavy with rings. A venerable old mantel clock, whose wheezy chime usually got on Sebastian's nerves, filled the awkward silence with the three-quarters.
“There doesn't seem much point,” she said at last, “I can't tell you anything”
Crockett espied a stool in front of the drawing board and seized the opportunity to draw it forward and perch on it. Sebastian mended the low fire and then sat on the club fender.
“Perhaps not. But the accident when your brother was killed seems to have started off a disastrous chain of circumstances.
Why don't we begin there?”
“What's the use of bringing all that up again? The day that was the worst of my life. Unless you are a twin, you can never know what that feels like.” Her face twisted with pain and she went on, almost as though speaking to herself, “I think sometimes we were like two sides of the same minted coin – he the bright, gleaming side, me the one which has tarnished and grown darker.”
“Sylvia —” Sebastian protested, but Sylvia didn't appear to have heard.
“I can't tell you anything” she told Crockett again. “You must already have all the facts of the accident at your disposal.”
“It's what happened afterwards that interests me. In particular, what happened to the little boy who was never claimed.”
“Why do you assume I should know anything about him?”
“Since you pay Mrs Jenkins to look after him, I'm forced to that conclusion.”
What little colour there was in her cheeks fled. Sebastian swung round to face her. “Is this true?”
Recovering herself, she shrugged. “They were talking of putting him into an institution. Since there was no one else to do it …” Her voice trailed off. “It was very little.”
“Especially since you knew he was your brother's child.”
Unaware of what she was doing, twisting her gloves together, she said reluctantly, “I – suspected he might be.”
“Suspected?” Crockett pointed to the photograph.
She sighed. “All right, yes, I suppose I knew. He's the image of Harry.”
“And the unidentified woman?” pressed Crockett. “I think you also knew she was your brother's mistress.”
“I knew nothing about her.”
“Not even her name, where she lived?”
“It wasn't a subject Harry and I were in the habit of discussing.”
“Who took care of his things, his books and papers, when he died? I assume he must have left some indication behind.”
When she still didn't reply, Sebastian said, “You were the one who cleared his rooms in Connaught Street and wouldn't let
anyone else get a look in. Come on, Sylvia, there must have been
something
!
”
Both sensed the struggle going on within her – the need to keep her own secrets against the necessity to tell the truth, since it was obvious now the truth was going to emerge sooner or later. Finally she looked up and said, with a sort of resignation, “There were some receipted bills and so on which had been sent to him at an address in St John's Wood. And documents which showed he'd arranged for money to be paid to her through the bank, until further notice, under the name of Mrs Hannah Smith.”
Crockett fixed her with a steady look. “So you went there, found her maid and sent her to the hospital to confirm the patient was her mistress.”
She looked at him strangely. After a moment she admitted, “Yes. That's how it was.”
There followed a very long silence. At last, Crockett said, “But I'm afraid that couldn't be so. Rosa Tartaryan did not start working for Mrs Smith until the day she came out of hospital. After you had engaged her.”
After one piercing glance at his sister, Sebastian sat motionless on the fender seat, his eyes turned from her as though he could not bear to look at her. The now blazing coals burned frostily, with an occasional hiss and burst of blue-green flame. The scent she was wearing, released in the warmth of the room, was sharp with a hint of citrus and undertones of musk. It reminded him of the scent he had fancied his mother had been wearing when he had seen her and Monty on the steps outside the house, and he felt as though he were being drawn into the web of lies in which his family seemed enmeshed.
“Supposing I did?” she said in a low voice at last. “It was the least I could do, to provide someone to look after her. That woman was in no position to look after herself.”
“Perhaps you'd tell me why you engaged Rosa, in particular – a foreigner? Where did you get hold of her? And how did you explain the situation to her?”
“Get hold of her? Oh, some agency or other, I suppose. And I told her the truth, that Mrs Smith had been in a coma and had
lost a large part of her memory. She understood and spoke English excellently. Enough,” she added bitterly, “to drive a very hard bargain.”
This set off another train of thought, which Crockett put to one side for the moment. “Which agency?” he asked.
“I don't remember. Oh yes, actually, it wasn't an agency, it was Monty who recommended her. Our uncle works in the Foreign Office and has connections with these refugee organisations. Those people are always glad of work, you know. He knew nothing of why I wanted Rosa, I simply asked if he knew of anyone discreet whom he could recommend as a sort of housekeeper. I assume he thought it was for myself. Monty never asks questions.”
Yet when the murdered woman had turned out to be a foreigner, an Armenian, Monty Chetwynd had not spoken up. Crockett rubbed his nose. Had this been out of a desire to protect Sylvia, because he believed her in some way implicated in the murder? “Where were you, Mrs Eustace-Bragge, when Rosa Tartaryan was murdered?”
She raised one eyebrow and told him that she had never been out of London for the whole of September. She was on the organising committee for an important charity concert and had scarcely had a moment to herself. If he would tell her precisely the times he was interested in, she would certainly be able to find people who would corroborate it.
Sebastian, evidently still thinking of what had gone before, said suddenly, “Supposing Hannah Smith had recovered her memory? Which couldn't have been discounted. What did you propose to do about the boy then?”
“Well, of course we should have put her in touch with him,” she said very quickly. “But there was a Dr Harvill looking after her, who thought it highly unlikely.”
He looked at her very intensely. “I wonder,” he said, “that it never occurred to her to wonder why there were children's clothes and toys and things at the house, if she believed she'd never had a child.”
Sylvia was fiddling with her gloves again, wringing them together. The expensive suede was well on the way to being
ruined. “Well, there weren't any. I saw that they were removed. There was no point in upsetting her further.”
The wheezy old clock struck the hour. Sebastian buried his face in his hands. After a moment, he looked up. “Why did you do that, Sylvia? It was wrong, and cruel.”
“Cruel? Had it not been for that woman, Harry would never have been riding on a public omnibus – and you dare to say I am cruel?”
Did she never have nightmares? Crockett wondered. Had she never thought that she might be causing pain and anguish to a woman she had never met – but one whom her brother had loved? He did not for a moment believe the reason she'd given for removing all traces of the child. All her actions seemed to him to have been motivated by unthinking jealousy – that her beloved twin had loved someone more than he loved her; even, perhaps, that his mistress had a child and Sylvia didn't …and perhaps by greed. He imagined her going to the St John's Wood house, rummaging through Hannah's personal possessions, perhaps even taking what she wanted. He could envisage her searching the house from top to bottom, avid for anything she might turn to her advantage, anything to add verisimilitude to the story she must concoct for Rosa to tell her supposed employer, which was where she had made her mistake. “Cruel or not, it was done for a reason,” Crockett remarked. “The same reason you put Rosa there in order to keep an eye on Mrs Smith.”

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