Ten Lords A-Leaping: A Mystery (Father Christmas) (51 page)

“I saw him collect that last one.” Lucinda pushed to the edge of her chair. “Well, there you have it, Inspector—Gaunt had a motive, he had the opportunity, and—now—the means. Have I got the traditional three correct? Yes? Case closed, then.
May we leave this horrid place now? Sorry, Hector, darling, Eggescombe’s really quite lovely—in other circumstances.”

“I think you’ve missed something entirely, Lucy,” Jamie cut in. “There are
two
ties. As Tom’s suggested, that tie—the cut-up one, the one I found in my drawer this afternoon—is the one Gaunt kept all these years. My tie is this one.” He held it up. “This is the one Max pulled from my drawer Saturday evening and left in this room. This one is the tie that … strangled Oliver. Isn’t that right, Tom?”

Tom nodded. “I think the question is—” He paused as he might in the pulpit at St. Nicholas, to reclaim the congregation’s attention. “—I think the question is, how did the tie manage to travel from this drawing room to the Labyrinth between Saturday evening and the early hours of Sunday morning?”

No one responded. Silence descended again, this time like a pall, the atmosphere now charged with unease and foreboding energy. Tom found his eyes drawn helplessly to Lucinda as she resettled herself in the chair she’d been keen to vacate a moment earlier. She reached up to her shoulder to touch Dominic’s hand, patting it gently, almost regretfully, and released a thin sigh. He watched her lips part, sure she was to give voice to his question, hoping that if she did, the contents might spare him humiliation, but Hector, as if unwilling to have anyone supersede him, interrupted:

“Well, it wasn’t me walking about in the middle of the night with a silly bloody tie. I told you before, Inspector, that I was in bed with my wife.”

“Hector, please don’t take this amiss,” Jane responded, “but
I would swear I saw you outside on the lawn sometime in the night. You were wearing that white terry-cloth robe of yours.”

“How dare you.”

“Hector, we must get to the bottom of this, if we’re all going to carry on.” Jane shifted impatiently on her feet. “I was going to have to tell Inspector Bliss sooner or later anyway. How can I not? I know it doesn’t look good: You’ve never cared for Oliver and the two of you had been snapping at each other in the last days, I don’t know why. We had to watch the two of you hitting each other at twenty thousand feet in the air and—”

“Oh, for God’s sake.” Hector’s cup hit the saucer with a nasty crunch. “I couldn’t sleep. I went out for some air, that’s all. That’s
all
,” he repeated, turning his attention to Bliss. “I landed up on the terrace around … I don’t know the time—before dawn. I sat for a while and went back to my wife.”

“Hector,” Lucinda drawled. “Don’t put on middle-class airs. You don’t share a bedroom with Georgie, never have. You sleep with Bonzo.”

“Be quiet. I’ve had quite enough of you these last days.”

“Hector, like my wife”—Jamie glanced over his whisky glass—“I don’t want you take this amiss, but this afternoon you were late for our meeting in your office and you arrived … well, I can only describe your state as ‘shambolic.’ ”

Lord Fairhaven was silent for the beat of a heart before his face filled with blood. He sputtered: “Are you accusing me of … what? what was it?
electrocuting
that … that …”

“Roberto is his name, Hector.” Marguerite cut in with words as icy as her stare. “Was, rather. And he was a splendid artist with a promising future.”

“Mummy, for God’s sake! I’m your son. I didn’t particularly care for … Roberto.” He battled a frown. “But who you choose to—”

“That’s not the point, Hector,” Marguerite snapped. “I think it’s fairly obvious that Roberto might have seen something, witnessed something, heaven knows what, in his night wanderings and—”

“Well, he didn’t bloody see
me
!”

“Lord Fairhaven.” Bliss exercised a neutral tone. “Would you care to account for your movements this afternoon.”

Hector exploded. “I was doing exactly what I told James and Jane and Mr. Christmas I was doing. I missed my morning run, so I thought I’d take one after lunch.”

“In the heat of the day?” Bliss’s tone was sceptical.

“Have you noted Eggescombe’s many shade trees, Inspector?”

Bliss grunted as Blessing noisily turned a page in his notebook.

“You didn’t,” Tom interjected, “miss your morning run Sunday, however.”

“My lord?” Bliss frowned as Hector shot Tom a daggered gaze.

“Then let me be completely frank about Sunday morning: I couldn’t get back to sleep. I went out for some air. I returned to my bedroom. I still couldn’t sleep. I gave up. I went for a run. I came back. Had a shower. Then found Jane at my door with unexpected news. There you have it.”

“And why weren’t you frank about your movements earlier?”

“I forgot … well, it didn’t seem important. I didn’t think anyone had seen me anyway.”

“Evidently someone had, my lord.”

“Mrs. Gaunt.”

“Who kept it to herself.”

“I expect the Gaunts take the non-disclosure clause of their contract seriously,” Hector responded airily.

“Do they now.” Bliss spoke with barely suppressed fury.

“Lord Fairhaven,” Tom interjected. He had been thinking of something Hector had said earlier. “You said a moment ago that Roberto did not see you on the terrace—not surprising given the darkness. But your tone seems to suggest that
you
might have seen
him
.”

Hector flicked him a hateful glance. “I saw many things. The moon, the stars, the—”

“Roberto in the motion lights in all his nearly naked glory?” Marguerite suggested.

“Mummy, don’t be vulgar.” He placed his coffee cup on a side table. “All right, I did glimpse him. What of it?”

“And was he alone?” Bliss asked.

Hector shifted slightly in his seat. “I can’t be certain. The motion sensors only light intermittently. I heard voices. Thought I did.”

“And—again—you didn’t care to mention this earlier?” Bliss glared at him.

“I wasn’t certain. I couldn’t think it mattered. It was some good time before dawn, which is apparently when Olly met his maker.”

“Male voices?”

“They were at some distance, Inspector, but, yes, I would say so.”

“Distinguishable?”

“Well, one of them was Roberto’s. I think that should be clear by now, Inspector.”

“The other, then.”

“I have no idea. From the terrace it sounded like murmuring. There was, however, a sound like someone punching at someone else. The only word I could distinguish was one I won’t repeat in this company, and I don’t know who said it.”

“Roberto’s torso appeared bruised when Tom and I visited his studio with the kids yesterday,” Jane remarked.

Tom added: “You, too, have bruises on your chest, Dominic. They were noticeable at the pool yesterday afternoon. Lucinda claimed you had walked into an open wardrobe in the dark.”

“Did she? Well, there you go.”

“I don’t think Lord Fairhaven and the late Lord Morborne were the only two men exchanging blows this weekend,” Tom added.

“Why would I be exchanging blows—as you put it—with Roberto?”

“You were attracted to him, and he wasn’t attracted to you.” Marguerite shot him a look of disbelief.

“Nonsense,” Dominic snapped, raising his glass to his mouth.

“Did Roberto say nothing about these marks to you, Lady Fairhaven?” Bliss asked.

“He wasn’t given to that sort of thing. I noted them, but assumed they were the consequence of his work, stone flying about and the like, although …” She regarded Dominic coldly
now. “Of course, Roberto had been fine-polishing these last few days. No great chips of marble flying about, I shouldn’t think.”

“Again, nonsense. A complete fabrication.” Dominic took another sip. “I spent, as I said yesterday in this company, Saturday night and Sunday morning in Lucy’s room, or, rather, she in mine. Together, at any rate.”

Tom caught Lucinda’s eye. She had been sitting still, head bent, hair falling forwards like a curtain, concentrated on her hands in her lap, pushing rhythmically at the skin below the cuticles. Now, as she raised her head, her hair swept back and revealed once again the remarkable violet eyes, which had glazed with craving during their interlude of ill-considered passion. As they locked onto Tom’s, a soft pleading crept into their folds. But he felt no want of retaliation. He had been victim of a cruel and stupid jest, yes, but the jest had precipitated something much, much crueler. His faith demanded he turn the other cheek, and he did, in his mind’s eye, but he returned her gaze not with disdain or contempt, but with sorrow and pity and deep, deep regret. It was too late for discretion, however. Now he had to speak, though he would pay a price. He felt Hector’s eyes upon him, Hector who had witnessed Lucinda’s night movements and hazarded a guess at her destination, but he ignored Hector and looked instead at Madrun, his housekeeper and inconstant keeper of secrets. Would she keep this one? Could it be kept at all? It was her disillusionment, he thought, that would affect him most immediately and most keenly. He took in a cleansing breath, held it a moment, and he said with a rush of air:

“I have to tell you, Inspector, that it’s not true that Lady Lucinda spent the entire night in her brother’s room.”

“Yes?” Bliss flicked him a distracted glance.

“She didn’t spend it with Dominic, because—” He looked again at Lucinda who had returned to a fascination with her hands. “—because,” he said again, feeling the blood creeping up past his collar as other eyes bored into him, “she spent it with me, in my room.”

Bliss blinked. “You don’t say. And what,” he addressed Lucinda, “were you doing in Mr. Christmas’s room?”

“Don’t be obtuse, Inspector.” Lucinda looked up and cast him a gelid eye.

“That doesn’t mean I—” Dominic began, but Tom cut him off:

“There’s a little more. As I later came to realise, after a cryptic conversation by the pool yesterday, Lucinda and Dominic had a certain wager—”

“Must you? Really? Must you, Vicar?” Lucinda’s voice was weary.

“—a wager,” Tom continued with grim determination, conscious of Madrun’s eyes boring into him, “to see who might successfully bed a person of his or her choice before the night was through. I believe the notion was entertained some time Saturday evening, after Mr. Sica arrived and was introduced. Lady Lucinda soon enough won the bet.” Tom could feel his face burning. “But I don’t believe I’m incorrect in believing an attempt was made to even the score when, later, together, they observed Mr. Sica lit up by lightning from the moor crossing the lawn.”

“Tom, I am disappointed.” Lucinda tossed her hair back. “I didn’t think you were the kiss-and-tell sort.”

And now, the atmosphere grew heavy with a new anxiety. All eyes shifted to stare at Dominic and Lucinda, who received their scrutiny with the wary defiance of children caught with their fingers in the biscuit tin.

“Well, I lost the wager. What of it?” Dominic waved a dismissive hand. “There’s no proof that I strangled Oliver.”

Bliss gestured to the tie Tom was holding. “This may well provide proof once we send it for analysis.”

Dominic rested his eyes on the tie a moment. His mouth sagged. The scrape of a coffee cup set on a saucer sounded loudly. “Gaunt was to have taken care of that,” he said at last, his voice bleak. “I feel rather let down.”

“Oh, Dominic, don’t!” Lucinda cried.

“Is there any point now, Lucy? Perhaps it’s best I appeal for clemency.”

“I must caution you,” Bliss began. “You don’t have to—”

Dominic waved his hand dismissively again. “It wasn’t something I set out to do. God knows I’ve always loathed Oliver. He’s a bully and a boor and a vulgarian and a thief—and, it seems, a rapist and worse. Does anyone disagree? I thought not, though most of you don’t know he’s been plundering the Morborne estate by selling works from Great-Great-Grandfather’s impressionist collection and siphoning the money into his own corporation.

“At any rate, if I visited Baissé at Christmas or half term—after my father died—and Olly was there, he would make my life miserable. One time he locked me in a rubbish bin. You might imagine the heat in the West Indies. I nearly asphyxiated.
I never forgave him. I suppose some clever quack would say he was merely taking out his hatred of my mother on me. I don’t know.” Dominic shrugged. “I do know he was almost an adult when he was behaving this way, and I was a child.

“Anyway, as I say, I didn’t intend any confrontation—or perhaps I should say
another
confrontation—with my dear cousin. I knew he was disposing of the estate assets and I knew that if I made sufficient fuss in London, I should be able to put a stop to these outrages. There are trust laws limiting his power to dispose of the estate’s assets.”

“Although,” Hector interjected, “some might view it as quicker to simply remove the CEO—as Oliver was, in effect—from the family Trust, in a sort of hostile takeover.”

“Hector, I had no desire for the title.”

“Nonsense. You’ve been the presumptive heir to the marquessate since Fred died. Only Oliver’s having a child—a legitimate child, I should say—would set you back a spot. And Oliver was about to have one, wasn’t he?”

“I’ve always lived with the expectation, Hector, that Oliver’s rampant heterosexuality would one day channel itself into some form of conventional domesticity, so you’re very much barking up the wrong tree.”

“Hector,” Marguerite said, “do be quiet.”

“It’s called ‘motive,’ Mummy.”

“I didn’t have a motive.” Dominic glared.

“Everyone has a motive. Wouldn’t you agree, Inspector?”

“I think,” Tom interposed, “what Dominic is saying is that he was driven by opportunity and strong emotion.”

“Thank you, Vicar.” Dominic affected a little bow. “Afterwards—after my … visit with Roberto—I wandered
into the Labyrinth, I don’t know why really. I didn’t really like to return to my bedroom, having lost the wager—or at least not being able to match Lucy’s success. The night air was lovely and fresh and I remembered Marguerite’s—or was it Roberto’s?—suggestion to Oliver to have a look at the new artwork in the Labyrinth. So I did. There was a bit of lightning in the distance still, but I thought, as sunrise wouldn’t be long, to wait and see the marble in the blush of early morning. There are, as all of you know, a series of benches at the centre of the Labyrinth, and I must have nodded off on one of them for a while, as the next thing I remember seeing was someone’s back silhouetted in the glow of a torch. Oliver. I recognised that ghastly hat of his. He was shining the light on the statue. He didn’t see me or, rather, he hadn’t. I watched him a moment in a sort of—I must say—thrall of loathing. He didn’t contemplate the image of the Madonna as a connoisseur might. And it is a remarkably beautiful work. Oliver reached up with his free hand—the statue is to scale and the pedestal not tall—and began, if you will, if you can bear to hear it, my lords, ladies, and gentlemen, stroking the figure’s breasts—her cold marble breasts.”