Snobbery with Violence

∨ Snobbery with Violence ∧

Ten

If this young man expresses himself in terms too deep for me, Why, what a very singularly deep young man this deep young man must he!

– W.S. GILBERT

Doors flew opened, voices shouted, guests and servants came running. Kerridge, now staying at the castle, appeared wrapped in a large Paisley dressing-gown to take charge.

Once more a servant was sent to Creinton to bring Dr. Per-riman. Kerridge bent over Bickerstaff and felt his pulse. Then, producing a large handkerchief, he covered his hand and gingerly lifted the lid of the teapot and sniffed.

“He’s drugged,” he said. “He’s not dead. I want the servant who brought this tea up to come to the study and I want to interview the kitchen staff. Some of you get Bickerstaff to a bed.” He turned to Rose. “What alerted you?”

“I heard a banging at my door,” said Rose. “I think the poor man must have realized at the last minute that he had been drugged and hit the door.”

Curzon pushed forward. “It was John, the footman, who took the tea up.”

“Whose idea was it to serve the constable with tea?”

“It was on the list,” wailed Curzon.

“What list?”

“There’s a list in the kitchen for all the late-night drinks that people may require in their rooms.”

“And who makes up this list?”

“It’s pinned up during the day in the main kitchen and various valets and lady’s maids write down what is required.”

“Bring the list to my study. Ah, there you are, Judd. Get another officer to stand guard outside Lady Rose’s door and make sure he does not drink or eat anything while on duty.”

“It was probably another of Mr. Pomfret’s pranks,” said Lady Sarah Trenton. She had flirted with both Freddy and Tristram to no avail and was feeling rejected and sour.

“I’d better see them. Back to your rooms, everyone. I’ll talk to the footman first.”

♦

Lady Polly fussed over her daughter as she helped her back into bed. “I will be so glad when we get you away from this dreadful place. I shall heave a sigh of relief when we can get you off to India with Mrs. Trumpington.”

“I’m not going.”

“Yes, you are, and you are not taking that so-called maid, Daisy, with you. You will have a proper lady’s maid.”

Rose burst into tears. Lady Polly patted her shoulder and then snapped at Daisy, “Don’t just stand there. Do something.”

“I think you should leave her to me,” said Daisy firmly. “My lady, now is not the time to upset her by telling her she’s going to India.”

Lady Polly shifted from foot to foot. She had never known Rose to cry before. It was all too embarrassing.

“Very well,” she said curtly.

Rose’s father poked his head around the door. “Dreadful business,” he said. “Place is full of murderers. I’ll send for two of the gamekeepers. They’ll do a better job of guarding Rose. Keep her in her room and get her meals sent up.”

Rose sobbed into her pillow.

“Well…harrumph…don’t cry,” said the earl. “Everything will look different in the morning.”

He and his wife left. Daisy hugged Rose, rocking her back and forth. “There, now, Daisy’s here, and as long as Daisy’s here you won’t be going to India.”

“They’ll make me,” wailed Rose.

“Not if we run away.”

She handed Rose a handkerchief. Rose scrubbed her eyes and sat up. “Run away?”

“Why not? We could go back home after this is all over and really make sure our typing is perfect. Then we wait till your parents are off visiting someone and off we go.”

“But they’ll put Captain Cathcart on the job and he’ll find us!”

“I think not, if we talk to him first. Think of it! You and me independent and free as the air, living in London.”

Rose smiled. “I am feeling better already. But I wonder who was out to get me this evening.”

♦

Kerridge had taken a statement from John when a constable entered the study and said that Miss Frederica Sutherland was anxious to speak to him on a matter of importance.

“Show her in,” said Kerridge wearily.

Frederica entered the room swathed in a pink satin robe. “I thought you ought to know,” she began.

“Know what? Pray take a seat, Miss Sutherland.”

“I saw him.”

“Who?”

“Sir Gerald Burke.”

“When, and what was he doing?”

“It was like this. I wanted a cup of cocoa, but it was late and the servants can get very uppity if you haven’t ordered in advance.”

“Go on.”

“I thought I would go down to the kitchens and make myself some. I opened my bedroom door a crack to make sure there was no one about. John the footman passed me carrying a tray. I waited to make sure he had really gone but I heard footsteps. I saw Sir Gerald go up the stairs after John, and then I heard a voice call, ‘John’, I thought that there were really too many people about, so I went back to bed.”

“The voice that called out – man or woman?”

“I couldn’t say. Could have been either. It sounded muffled somehow.”

“Thank you, Miss Sutherland. We may have to speak to you again in the morning.”

After she had left, Kerridge drew forward a plan of the guests’ rooms. “That’s odd,” he said. “Burke had no reason to be in that tower. He’s in the other one, the east tower.”

“Maybe he was visiting one of the ladies,” said Judd. “Although he looked a bit of a daisy to me.”

“We’d better see him and find out what he was doing. Where’s Curzon and that list?”

At that moment the door opened and the butler walked in. “I cannot find it,” he said. “The list has gone.”

Kerridge sighed. “Go and take another look. Send Sir Gerald Burke.”

“He may be asleep.”

“Then wake him!” snapped Kerridge.

After ten minutes, Gerald appeared. He held out his wrists. “Put the handcuffs on,” he said. “It’s a fair cop. Isn’t that what they say?”

“Only in penny dreadfuls,” said Kerridge. “Do sit down and tell us what you were doing in the west tower. You followed the footman, John, up the stairs. And yet your room is in the east tower.”

Gerald wrapped himself more closely in an elaborately embroidered dressing-gown. He extracted a long cigarette-lighter, a gold cigarette-case and a box of matches from his pocket and proceeded to light a cigarette with maddening slowness.

“Sir Gerald. I am waiting!”

“I lost the way,” said Gerald. “Simple. I was half-way up when I saw the Trumpington female’s card. So easy to get lost in this pseudo-medieval horror.”

Kerridge consulted his notes. Harry had told him about Lady Hedley’s conversation with Rose and how Mary Gore-Desmond had been a guest of the Hedleys during the season.

He stared at Gerald, who smiled back through a wreath of cigarette smoke. Kerridge decided to take one of his leaps in the dark. “You were very friendly with Miss Gore-Desmond when she was staying with the Hedleys, were you not? In fact, her parents thought you might make a match of it.”

“Ridiculous. I admit I did squire her about a bit. It was Hedley’s idea. He said he’d promised her parents to try to get her engaged but he said that maybe she would look more attractive to the fellows if I could be seen paying her a bit of attention. But she began to take me seriously and I knew I’d better get out or that desperate little thing would be suing me for breach of promise or something. Too, too fatiguing. Not as if she had much of a dowry, either.”

“And when you found that out, that was when she became boring?”

“Don’t inflict your middle-class morals on me, my dear, dear chap. One has to look after oneself in this wicked world. My tailor’s bills alone would keep someone like you in luxury.”

“Were you intimate with her?”

“I do not go around seducing virgins.”

“So you say the reason you were in the west tower was because you lost your way? I find that hard to believe.”

“Think, dear Super, just think what this wretched place is like at night. Hedley’s father went to great expense to get gas piped to the castle and now everyone who is anyone has electricity. The gaslight all over the house and in the corridors is turned off at night and we are all expected to collect our bed candles from the table in the hall.

“I turned left at the first landing instead of right, that is all. A simple mistake. I must inform you, I am known to the crowned heads of Europe and am not in the way of having my word doubted by a common policeman.”

Kerridge comforted himself with a sudden vision of himself, three stone lighter, and twenty years younger, manning the barricades while the limp body of Sir Gerald hung from a lamppost.

“Sir Gerald, I would advise you to co-operate with the police. We are now looking on the death of Miss Gore-Desmond as murder.”

Gerald got languidly to his feet. “Oh, do let me know how you get on. Will that be all?”

“For the moment.”

Gerald swarmed out. “Insufferable little tick,” raged Kerridge. “I’ll bet he did it.”

“Doesn’t look to me as if he could do anything with any woman,” said Judd.

“Oh, that kind would lay the cat if there were money in it. Get the cook up here and then the rest of the kitchen staff. It’s going to be a long night.”

♦

Fortunately for Rose, her mother had instructed the doctor to see her after he had examined the policeman. The sympathetic doctor reported back to Lady Polly that it would be unhealthy to keep her daughter confined to her room and might bring about a crise de nerfs.

She went down for a late breakfast. There were only a few guests present. Rose knew that her mother, like some of the others, preferred to take breakfast in her room.

She helped herself to kidneys, bacon and toast and found a seat next to Harry. He had barricaded himself behind a copy of the Times but lowered it and said, “I see last night’s ordeal hasn’t taken away your appetite.”

“Do you think someone was really trying to get to me?” asked Rose.

“I’m afraid so.”

“Perhaps it was just another trick by that precious pair, Freddy and Tristram.” As if on cue, the door opened and Cur-zon announced portentously, “Mr Pomfret and Mr. Baker-Willis. Mr. Kerridge wishes to see you.”

Grumbling and throwing nasty looks at Rose, the pair left the room.

“I wish that might turn out to be the case,” said Harry. “But no. They wouldn’t risk anything at all with a murder investigation underway. Kerridge is getting the full pathology report today. I hope he’ll let me know if there was anything interesting in it.”

“Have you seen Kerridge this morning?”

“No, but I saw him last night. He’s probably catching up on some sleep. He wants it to be Gerald Burke.”

“Why?”

“It seems Gerald was seen on the stairs of your tower instead of his own and around the right time. Someone called to John. The footman put down the tray with the tea and went back to see who was calling. That must have been the time when the tea was drugged. Mrs. Trumpington takes laudanum to help her sleep, so does Margaret Bryce-Cuddlestone. There’s a bottle kept in the still-room downstairs. Poor Kerridge. There have been so many phone calls from this castle complaining to people in high places, and that includes Kensington Palace, that he is under tremendous pressure.”

Curzon entered again and approached Rose. “Lady Hadshire wishes your presence, my lady.”

“Can’t it wait until I have finished my breakfast?” demanded Rose.

“Her ladyship said it was extremely urgent.”

Rose sighed and whispered to Harry, “Meet me in the library after luncheon.”

Harry nodded. Rose went up to her mother’s room to find her father there as well.

“Sit down, Rose,” ordered her father. “This is a bad business.”

“I do not think anyone will try anything again, Pa, and we will soon be out of here.”

“That is not why we summoned you. We learned that you have been seen talking to Captain Cathcart at breakfast.”

“Yes. So?”

“Rose, he is not a suitable man for you to consort with.”

Rose felt herself becoming very angry indeed. “Is that all you can think of? It looks as if there might have been another attempt on my life last night and all you can think of is suitable or unsuitable men.”

“It is for your own good. Captain Cathcart has been useful to me, yes, but as a worker, a tradesman if you like. You are not to speak to him again.”

Rose stared at them and then an idea formed in her head. A splendid idea. Blackmail.

“It would be such a pity if His Majesty were ever to learn how you engaged the services of Captain Cathcart to stop his visit. How the Kensington Palace set would throw up their hands in horror. Just think of it! My social disgrace would be as nothing compared to yours.

“My acquaintanceship with the captain is innocent. I am not in the slightest romantically interested in him. But he is the only one I can talk to about the murders. If I am reduced to confining my conversation to prattling gossip with the other men, goodness knows what I might let slip.”

“You wouldn’t dare!” gasped Lady Polly.

Rose got to her feet. “Well, let’s see how it goes, shall we? Now I must go and finish my breakfast.”

♦

Daisy was sitting in her room. Her sewing basket was on a table beside her and a basket of silk stockings to be darned was at her feet. But she had found a bound copy of six months’ issues of Young England in the library and was reading a serial about Roundheads and Cavaliers and felt she simply could not stop until she got to the end.

There was a knock at her door. She hid the volume under a cushion and went to answer the door. Becket stood there. “You shouldn’t be calling on me in my room, Mr. Becket. They’ll all be down on us like a ton of bricks.”

“Nobody saw me. The captain says he won’t be needing me this morning and told me to get some fresh air.”

“Amazing. It’s raining stair rods.”

“I don’t think he noticed.”

“Well, come in. But if my lady comes back you’ll need to disappear sharpish.”

“I’ve heard rumours that Sir Gerald Burke is the villain.”

“That pansy!”

“You never know. He might just look like a pansy. He’s got a nasty manner with the servants. Curzon says he’s always complaining about one thing or the other.”

“Curzon says! How did you get so friendly with old frosty-face?”

“He was complaining about you. He was going to complain to Lady Polly. I had to stop him somehow.”

“How did you do that?”

“I said you were Lady Polly’s illegitimate daughter.”

“What!”

“A lot of that thing goes on. You see, most of these aristocrats have arranged marriages, so they’re allowed a bit of license after the children are born. If one or the other has an illegitimate child, it’s hushed up. The only shame is in being found out. Old snobby Curzon was quite melted. ‘I see that must account for her free and easy manner,’ says the old goat. ‘Breeding will out’.”

“I don’t know that I like being called a bastard,” said Daisy doubtfully.

“An aristocratic one. Look at all the dukes and earls who got their titles on the wrong side of the blanket. Also, he’ll never breathe a word. He worships his betters, as he keeps calling them.”

Daisy began to laugh. “You are a one. I forgive you. My lady’s ever so upset. Her parents are threatening to send her to India. Now what about your master marrying my mistress?”

“Won’t do. He thinks she’s the most unfeminine woman he’s ever come across.”

“If we could get them together some way…”

“It’ll be difficult. When all this is over, she might be packed off to India and never see him again. And yet, I feel they are suited.”

“She won’t go to India. We have a plan. We’re going to find some way to get to London and become businesswomen. We can both type.”

“But that would reduce your lady to the ranks of the middle class.”

“What’s wrong with that? My lady says the middle classes have morals.”

“My master might consider her unsuitable for marriage.”

“What! A man who goes about blowing up things! He might think she’s too good for him.”

“I’d better go before I’m caught here,” said Becket. “I’ll let you get on with your sewing.”

“I hate sewing,” said Daisy. “I’d rather type any day.”

♦

After luncheon, Rose hurried to the library, followed by Daisy. She waited impatiently for Harry. The minutes ticked past. Daisy searched the shelves for another bound volume of Young England.

At last Harry entered, followed by Becket. “Any news?” asked Rose eagerly.

“Yes, very much so. Mary Gore-Desmond was not pregnant but she had secondary syphilis.”

“Then all Dr. Perriman needs to do is to produce old Dr. Jenner’s records,” said Rose, “and the police can find out if Hedley has syphilis.”

“Dr. Perriman says that Lord Hedley is not being treated by him for anything and Dr. Jenner’s old records are confidential. Sir Gerald Burke’s doctor in Wimpole Street was telephoned and said the same thing. His patients’ records are confidential.”

“Can’t he appeal to the Home Secretary to get a warrant to seize the records?” asked Rose.

“I think he’s trying. He says if he were requesting the medical records of Mr. Bloggs of The Larches, Jubiliee Road, Peckham, he’s get them Uke a shot. I’m beginning to understand why he’s so bolshie.”

“Where are Dr. Jenner’s records?”

“In Perriman’s surgery at Creinton.”

“Then we’ll just need to get them,” said Rose.

“And how do we do that?” asked Harry.

“Why, you break into his surgery and have a look.”

“My dear lady, I am not a criminal.”

“We could go over to Creinton. You could take me because I am not feeling well, and while the doctor is examining me, you can have a look around.”

“I should think your parents will have something to say if you go driving off with me,” said Harry.

“I won’t ask them. Daisy can run and get my coat and hat. Becket can bring the car round. You can support me out to it and say you are rushing me to the doctor.”

“It’ll look odd.” Harry looked at her uneasily. “Such as us always getting the doctor to come to us – we don’t go to him.”

“Oh, let’s try!” said Rose, betraying her youth by jumping eagerly to her feet. “Do put that book down, Daisy, and fetch my fur coat and the felt hat with the veil.”

♦

As a few of the men had gone off fishing and the rest of the guests were sunk in after-luncheon torpor, they were able to leave without any confrontation.

Creinton was a small market town and the arrival of a motor car caused a great deal of interest. Harry drew up before the doctor’s surgery, which was in the main square, and switched off the engine. “If I plan to burgle the good doctor,” he said, looking at the crowd which had gathered around the motor car, “I had better ride over. This thing attracts too much attention.”

They entered the waiting-room. There were three people waiting, sunk in that dismal torpor engendered by doctors’ waiting-rooms. This one was particularly dismal with its horsehair-stuffed black leather furniture, black marble clock and brown-painted walls.

A nurse built like a battleship came out. “Mr. Jenkins,” she said, and then her eyes fell on the new arrivals, just as a small tired-looking man rose to his feet. Her heavy face creased into a smile as she surveyed the glory of Rose’s sable fur coat.

“This is Lady Rose Summer,” said Harry. “She has been feeling faint and anxious while we were out for a drive and I really think Dr. Perriman should have a look at her.”

“Of course. Right away. Do sit down, Mr. Jenkins. Come along, my lady.”

Rose wanted to say she would wait, but Harry had a hand under her arm and was urging her forward.

In the surgery, while Rose explained about feeling faint, Harry’s eyes ranged over the room. Along one wall were wooden shelves containing cardboard files. As Dr. Perriman had only recently taken over Dr. Jenner’s practice, they would be all the files of Dr. Jennets patients.

He wandered over to them and then realized Dr. Perriman was addressing him. “Would you mind leaving us, sir? I need to examine the lady.”

“Of course,” said Harry.

He went into the waiting-room and then outside into the square where Becket was guarding the car. “I’m just going to see if there’s a way into the back,” he whispered to Becket. “Do you think you can hold the crowd’s attention?”

“Get Daisy, sir,” said Becket. “I’ve got my concertina in the car.”

Harry summoned Daisy while Becket located his concertina and took it out of the box.

“What’s going on?” asked Daisy.

“I think Becket needs your help to keep the crowd’s attention away from me while I see if there’s a way into the back.”

Harry found there was a narrow alley running down the side of the surgery. He paused and listened as Daisy’s voice, accompanied by Becket’s concertina, rose in song.

“Come where the booze is cheaper, Come where the pots hold more, Come where the boss is the deuce of a joss, Come to the pub next door.”

Harry grinned, remembering his tutor telling him that a Guards band had played just that song one Sunday afternoon on the terrace at Windsor castle, and Queen Victoria asked her lady-in-waiting to find out the words to the pretty air. It was with great reluctance that the bandmaster told her.

There was a tradesmen’s entrance at the side. Harry studied the door. It had four panes of glass on the upper half of the door. He could smash one and reach in and slide back the bolt, of there was one. He cautiously turned the handle. The door was unlocked. He stepped inside and examined the other side of the door. No bolts, only a large key in the lock. He extracted the key and went out and closed the door. Now for a locksmith.

A large crowd had gathered around Becket and Daisy. Daisy lad moved onto a sentimental ballad, “The Blind Organist.”

“The preacher in the village church one Sunday morning said: ‘Our organist is ill today, will someone play instead?’ An anxious look crept o’er the face of every person there. As eagerly they watched to see who’d fill the vacant chair. A man then staggered down the aisle whose clothes were old and torn, How strange a drunkard seemed to me in Church on Sunday mom; But as he touched the organ keys, without a single word, The melody that followed was the sweetest ever heard.”

By asking one of the few residents who was not listening to Daisy, Harry located the locksmith and handed over the key, saying he needed an extra one to the stables.

The locksmith chatted as he ground the key, saying he had taken over the business from his father, who had died only two months ago. “Funny, I always refused to go into the business,” said the locksmith, “although he trained me. But he left the shop to me, so here I am.”

“What was your trade before?”

“Sort of traveling carpenter. Bit of work here. Bit of work here. There you are, sir. That should do very nicely.”

Harry paid him and took the keys. As he hurried across the square, he saw to his horror that Rose and Daisy were now standing up in the car with their arms around each other, singing at the tops of their voices.

“Any old iron, any old iron, any-any-any old iron:

You look sweet, you do look a treat,

You look dapper from your napper to your feet…”

Harry hurried up the alley, opened the door and put the original key in the lock and sprinted back to the car just as Rose and Daisy were bowing before a burst of tumultuous applause.

Coins were raining into the car. Harry groaned and thrust his way through the crowd. “Show’s over,” he shouted. Daisy clambered into the back next to Becket, and Rose sat down in the front.

Harry switched on the engine. “Throw the money back,” he ordered.

“We earned it,” complained Daisy, but she and Rose and Becket scooped up handfuls of coins and threw them back into the crowd as they drove off.

“What on earth were you doing making a spectacle of yourself like that?” shouted Harry to Rose above the noise of the engine.

“It was fun,” said Rose. “Tremendous fun.”

“Dr. Perriman no doubt was called by his nurse to have a look at you performing and he will wonder if your adventures have turned your brain.”

“Did you find a way in?”

“Tell you in a minute.” Harry waited until they were clear of the town and then stopped and turned to her. “I got a copy of the key to the tradesmen’s entrance. I’ll go along tonight.”

“I’ll go with you,” said Rose, her eyes shining with excitement.

“No, you most certainly will not.”

“I’d be safer with you than in my room at the castle, policeman or no policeman.”

“We could be the look-out,” said Daisy.

“I don’t know what you were about, singing music-hall songs, Lady Rose,” said Harry.

“King Edward sings music-hall songs,” protested Rose. “His favourite is: ‘Hey, hi. Stop, waiter! Waiter! Fizz! Pop! I’m Racketty Jack, no money I lack, And I’m the boy for a spree!’”

“But just think if the doctor informs your parents of your behaviour!”

“Then it is up to us to find something dramatic in the records,” said Rose, “so that then no one will be able to think of anything else.”

♦

Dinner was a long and tedious affair, enlivened only by the effect Sir Gerald was having on the grim American, Miss Fairfax. They were seated together and he seemed to consider all her blunt utterances the highest form of wit. The more he laughed, the more Miss Fairfax glowed.

To his amusement, Harry, on the other side of Miss Fairfax, heard Gerald saying at one point, “You really must let me take you around when we are both in London. I see you in midnight taffeta with a high-boned collar, very grande dame.”

“I’ve never bothered about fripperies,” said Miss Fairfax.

“But you must, dear lady,” said Gerald. “And your hair would be magnificent if it were red.”

“Wicked boy,” she said with a great bray of laughter.

So enamoured was Miss Fairfax of Gerald’s company that she only turned once to Harry during the long meal and that was to ask him what the hunting was like in the countryside around. When Harry replied that he did not hunt, she said, “I should have known,” and turned back to Gerald.

Harry had told Rose he would leave the castle at two in the morning. He now wondered whether he should trick her and leave earlier. He had a sudden picture of her standing up in his motor car with her arm around Daisy, singing her heart out. She had looked really young and carefree for the first time since he had known her.

Lady Hedley was complaining that police had been crawling over the roof of the castle all day. “All Lady Rose’s fault,” she said loudly. “The young women of today are prone to fantasies and hysterics.”

Rose felt like shouting a denial down the table but kept quiet. She had told Daisy to use her wiles on Becket and make sure Harry did not change his mind about taking her with him.

♦

Daisy had rummaged in the hamper of costumes for charades and had managed to get two boys’ outfits. Giggling nervously, they put them on and crammed their hair up under a couple of tweed hats. Long overcoats completed their disguise. Before they changed into their costumes, Rose told the constable on duty that she would sleep in her mother’s room that night and suggested he take up his guarding duties outside Lady Had-shire’s door.

Becket had told Rose firmly that if his master planned to leave them behind there was nothing he could do about it. So it was with relief that they saw the car parked on the other side of the moat. They hurried across the drawbridge, Rose clutching Daisy’s arm and looking nervously to right and left.

When they climbed in, Harry let in the clutch and cruised down the slope away from the castle, not switching on the engine until they were well clear. Once out on the road towards Creinton, he stopped the car and got out and lit the headlights, climbed back in and set off again.

Rose found driving in the dark very exciting, fascinated by the square of light the two headlamps created before them.

When Harry reached the outskirts of Creinton, he parked the car under some trees, got out and extinguished the headlamps and said, “Now, Lady Rose, you and Daisy are to stay here with Becket to protect you. I will be as quick as I can.”

“But I wanted to be a burglar,” protested Rose.

“Stay here and don’t dare move,” hissed Harry.

“Spoilsport,” muttered Rose. “Honestly, Becket, there was really no reason for us to come. This is not an adventure.”

“It’s better this way, Lady Rose. If the captain gets caught, it won’t be nearly so bad as if you were found with him. Imagine the headlines in the newspapers. There are still two reporters staying at the pub in Telby.”

♦

Harry walked swiftly along, glad it was one of the days when his leg was not paining him. When he reached the square, he felt very exposed and kept close to the buildings, relieved there was no moon.

When he turned the key in the side door, the lock gave a loud click, which, to his ears, seemed to echo around the silent town like a pistol shot. He waited for a moment, Ustening, and then opened the door and went in. He lit a dark lantern. He found himself in a small kitchen. The door leading out of it was fortunately bolted on his side. He slid back the bolts, top and bottom, and found himself in a narrow passage. Ahead lay the front door, the panes of stained glass on the upper panels gleaming faintly. He remembered that he had entered the waiting-room on the right with Rose and then had gone through to the surgery. There was a door before he reached the waiting-room door, which probably led into the surgery. He tried the handle. It was locked. He hurried along to the waiting-room door. Locked as well. Both were stout mahogany doors. He tried a door on the other side of the corridor. Locked as well.

There was a staircase facing the front door. Perhaps some old files were kept in the upper rooms. Harry crept up the stairs. There were three doors leading off a landing. All were locked.

He retreated to the kitchen, defeated. He could possibly find some implement in the kitchen that might jemmy the door to the surgery open, but that would lead to a full police investigation. All he wanted to do was to read Lord Hedley’s file. He sat down for a moment at the kitchen table to rest. Rose was going to be so disappointed in him, he thought with a wry smile.

Perhaps there might be something he could use to pick the lock. But he had never picked a lock before and hadn’t the faintest idea of how to go about it.

There was a Welsh dresser against one wall. He set the lantern down on it and opened the first drawer. It was full of knives and forks and spoons. He picked up one of the knives. It had been cleaned so many times with Bath brick that it was thin and fragile. He put it back and opened the other drawer.

At first he could not believe his eyes. He held up the lantern and stared down. The drawer held keys with labels attached.

One label read ‘Front Door’, another ‘Waiting-Room’. There was even one marked ‘Safe’.

Harry grinned and selected the one marked ‘Surgery’. He was about to leave the kitchen when he heard footsteps in the alley outside. He extinguished the lantern and crept to the kitchen door and locked it and then crouched down. The footsteps came closer. A hand rattled the door. Then the footsteps moved on. Glancing up, Harry saw a police helmet bobbing past the window. The constable on his nightly rounds.

He waited and then cautiously relit the lantern and made his way to the surgery and unlocked the door.

He searched along the rows of files, looking for a folder marked ‘Lord Hedley’, but there was nothing there.

It might be in one of the upstairs rooms, thought Harry. I should never have let Rose come. This might take all night and she might do something silly like come looking for me.

He went back to the kitchen and collected the keys to the upstairs rooms. The first had been a bedroom, but the bed was now piled high with odds and ends and the rest of the room was full of discarded furniture.

The next room was an office with a roll-top desk. There were bookshelves all round, mil of medical books, some very old indeed. And beside the fire stood a large safe. Harry studied it. To his relief, it was an old-fashioned one without a combination lock. He went back to the kitchen and collected the safe key and went upstairs again.

He unlocked the safe and knelt down in front of it, the lantern on the floor beside him.

There were various items of jewellery in a box:a gold half hunter, dress studs, a gold Albert and a gold toothpick. Another box contained, to his surprise, an opium pipe and a small quantity of opium. Was Dr. Perriman an opium smoker? Or had that vice been one of the late Dr. Jenner’s? There were various title deeds and business papers, and a cash box containing a few hundred pounds.

There was one thick file which he took out and laid on the floor and opened. In it was Lord Hedley’s medical file and also correspondence between Dr. Jenner and a Dr. Palverston in London. Harry let out a soundless whistle. The correspondence between the two men discussed the use of arsenic to counteract the effects of syphilis. And in Lord Hedley’s file, he found Dr. Jenner had started to treat Lord Hedley for syphilis last summer.

He carefully replaced everything and locked the safe. In order to give Kerridge this information, he would need to cover up the fact that he had broken into the surgery.

He went downstairs and put the keys back in the drawer, being careful to lay them back in the order he had found them.

He breathed a sigh of relief when he locked the kitchen door behind him and hurried off towards where he had left the others in the car.

Daisy and Becket were excited at his news, but Rose seemed a trifle disappointed.

“It all seems so easy,” she complained. “I had imagined you having to behave like a real burglar.”

Harry had carried that bright image of Rose singing in his car. It popped like a balloon and disappeared. She was really a very silly little girl.

♦

Harry called on Kerridge first thing in the morning with his new information.

“Where did you get this?” demanded the superintendent.

“I can’t really tell you.”

“You must.”

“Superintendent, I know you pay informers and you do not demand where they got their information from and drag them into court.”

Kerridge drummed his fingers on the desk. “I can confront Hedley. Even if he admits he has syphilis, he will deny having anything to do with Mary Gore-Desmond. We will then need to approach her parents for further proof – was she sleeping with anyone else? – and that will shake them rigid. But it shows Hedley has arsenic at his disposal.

“Still, I’ll need to interview him. You may yet be forced to tell me how you came by this information.”

“Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that,” said Harry.