Queen of Hearts (Royal Spyness Mysteries) (22 page)

The sheriff looked pleased. “The accomplice, mark my words,” he said. “She was probably waiting with the getaway car.”

The tension in the room was palpable as we waited. It seemed to take forever but at last we heard the sound of a motor and the crunch of tires. Then there was a raised woman’s voice, some male grunting and a couple of curses as Ronnie went to open the front door.

“Get yer bleeding ’ands off me,” said a strong Cockney accent. “This ain’t no way to treat someone what’s connected to your guests and royal people at that.”

And a red-faced and very disheveled Queenie was shoved, struggling, into the foyer.

I stood up as Queenie looked around, blinking like an owl in the electric light. “A fine welcome you give people in America, that’s all I can say,” she said.

“We caught her trying to force her way through the gate,” the groundsman said. “We couldn’t quite understand what she was saying but she was clearly up to no good.”

“I was trying to get in and the blooming gate wouldn’t open,” Queenie said angrily. “And then suddenly these men start shouting and grabbing me. I told them I’m with Lady Georgiana Rannoch what’s staying here as a guest of Mr. Goldman.” Her gaze fastened on me. “Oh, there you are, miss. Thank God. I’m so glad to see you. Tell these people who I am. They’ve been treating me like I’m some kind of criminal or something. Manhandling me something shocking.”

“What are you doing here, Queenie?” I asked. “A social call at almost midnight? No wonder the gatekeeper was suspicious of you.”

“It’s taken me this long to hitch a ride out from Beverly Hills,” Queenie said. “There ain’t no buses. I had no idea it was so far and hardly any motorcars come this way. And it’s bleeding cold too. Then the sodding gate wouldn’t open and I thought it was stuck and I was trying to push it when these two great gorillas came out and grabbed me. I told them who I was but they seemed not to understand me.”

“That’s because they are Mexican and you speak with a Cockney accent,” I said. I wanted to smile but I was determined not to. For once I was going to play the indignant employer. “So what exactly are you doing here?”

“Well, I should think that was ruddy obvious,” Queenie said. “I’ve come back to you. I decided I’d rather work for you for no money than the old cow who was paying me well.”

“You got the sack, you mean? You set fire to her dress or broke her perfume bottle?”

“I bloody well didn’t,” she said. “If you want to know I was doing quite well, apart from melting her undies when I ironed them. How was I to know about a stuff called rayon and what happens when you iron it? But the old cow had no idea how to treat servants. She wanted me to clean her toilets. ‘I can’t do that,’ I said. ‘I’m a lady’s maid.’ And do you know what she said then? She said, ‘I’m not paying servants to have them sit around doing nothing. I don’t need someone to dress me but I do need clean toilets. In America we work for our living.’ So I told her that I was used to working for quality and no amount of money was worth being treated like dirt and I walked out. I went back to our bungalow at the hotel and they said you’d come up here. So here I am.”

“You want to come back to work for me?” I said. “Isn’t that rather presumptuous? Didn’t it occur to you that I might have found a new maid?”

“Gorn,” she said with a grin. “Where would you find a proper maid here? If they thought I was worth snapping up and paying in Beverly Hills there can’t be too many maids around.”

I thought this was an insightful comment. “Well, I suppose you’ll have to stay now, Queenie,” I said, “because you would not be allowed to leave. There has been a murder and this policeman has just started his investigation.”

“Blimey,” she said. “You don’t half get yourself involved in a lot of murders.”

The sheriff was looking at me with interest.

“What does she mean?” he asked.

“I’ve just had the bad luck to have been staying in places where someone died. Nothing to do with me, I assure you. Just an innocent bystander.”

“And this young woman is your maid?”

I sighed. “Yes, I suppose she is.”

“Well, keep an eye on her. I’m still not happy about someone trying to break in.”

“Don’t worry. She’s quite harmless apart from damaging everything within reach,” I said.

Craig had also risen from his seat and went over to the men who were lingering near the front door, looking uncomfortable at being inside the house. “You’re the groundsmen, right? So did you find any evidence of a break-in along the fence?”

“No, senor,” one of them said. “The fence looks fine. We drove all the way around and didn’t see nothing unusual.”

“And the man at the gate? Nobody has tried to get in or out apart from this young woman?”

“No, sir. Jimmy says the only people he’s let in all day have been Mr. Goldman’s guests. People he knows.”

Craig looked around at the rest of us. “Then we have to presume that the killer is among us here, don’t we? It simply can’t be an outsider.”

“Unless the outsider is still hiding among the trees and rocks,” Mummy said in her usual bored way, stretching languidly on the sofa as if this were any cocktail party and not a murder inquiry. “It seems to me it would be quite easy to hit poor Cy over the head and then melt into that fog until an opportune moment came for someone to open the gate.”

“So maybe you guys could start patrolling the grounds now,” the sheriff said.

“In the dark? What could we see in the dark?” one of the groundsmen demanded. “Someone hears us coming and slips behind a tree or a rock. It’s impossible.”

“Then we’ll get dogs brought in in the morning, wild animals or not,” the sheriff said. “My men will be arriving soon with the medical examiner, and then we’ll do a complete search of the house for clues. And in the meantime I’ll be questioning each of you in turn in the library.”

“In the library?” Mrs. Goldman demanded. “But my husband’s body is still there. Surely that’s not appropriate and most insensitive.”

“They can move the curtains around the body if you do not wish to look at him,” Juan said. “But I think you will not wish to interview me. I was not there. I left after dinner.”

“I told you. Nobody is touching anything,” the sheriff boomed. “And I want to speak to everybody.”

“Then why do you want us in the library, if we’re not supposed to touch anything?” Barbara said in a testy voice. “Won’t that risk contaminating the crime scene?”

It was clear we were all getting tired and feeling the strain.

“I have my reasons,” the sheriff said. “And since you all were in that room this evening at some point, then it would be natural to find your prints there anyway, wouldn’t it?”

I realized then what his reasons were. He wanted to see how we reacted to trying to speak normally in the presence of Mr. Goldman’s body. Perhaps he hoped that the killer would show signs of uneasiness under the strain. But from my experience killers can remain completely cool in such circumstances, can lie without batting an eyelid. That’s why they kill in the first place—that have the sort of personality that spurs them to take risks the rest of us couldn’t imagine.

“Let’s start with the widow,” Sheriff Billings said. “And the rest of you stay put. Nobody is to move from this room.”

“You want us to stay here?” one of the groundsmen asked, looking at his colleague.

“I’ll want to speak with the employees separately. Go and round up your pals and the household servants and I’ll be speaking to you shortly.”

“In here? In the house?” He looked at us uneasily.

“Better make it the kitchen. And perhaps someone could put on a pot of coffee. I’ve been on the job since seven this morning,” the sheriff said. After they had gone out of the front door, muttering to each other in Spanish, the sheriff turned to Mrs. Goldman. “Come along, Mrs. Goldman. Follow me.”

We watched them walk away, Mrs. Goldman walking as if she were a zombie. Barbara Kindell stood up as if to follow and assist her friend, but then sat down again. “It’s not right to put her through this after she’s just lost her husband,” she said. “That man is a bully and a brute. His wife may be a big fan of mine, but that won’t stop me from telling it like it is in my column this Sunday. And on my radio show too.”

“I suppose he’s just trying to do his job,” Darcy said. “He wants to catch us with our guard down to see if anyone cracks under the pressure of being in a room with the body.”

“I shall find it horrible,” Stella said. “It’s a sadistic thing to do, that brute grilling us with questions when he knows that poor Cy is lying there.”

“It will not bother me,” Juan said. “I have nothing to hide and I have seen bodies before. In Spain we are used to death in the bullring.”

“That’s also horrible,” Stella said. “I went to a bullfight once with Cy and swore I’d never go again. Spain is such a cruel country.”

“Oh and America is not?” Juan demanded. “Here you shoot each other with guns, no? Al Capone and the gangsters? At least in Spain we fight with honor.”

“Easy, old man.” Craig put a hand on Juan’s shoulder.

“What should I do, miss?” Queenie shifted awkwardly from one foot to the other. “Should I go up to your room and wait for you?” She had been standing away from the group, half in the foyer as if she didn’t know where she belonged.

“The sheriff said that nobody should leave and I presume that includes you,” I replied. “You’d better find a chair and come and join us.” I was still feeling ambivalent about her arrival. In a way I suppose that I had grown fond of her and was glad to have her back, but I wasn’t ready to forgive her deserting the ship at the first opportunity.

Belinda moved closer to me on the sofa. “I’m freezing,” she said. “I didn’t get a chance to dry off properly. And I really wish I hadn’t come here.”

“Your own fault,” I said.

“I know. Stupid, really. I do these impulsive things, hoping that something good will come out of them, but it never does. I went down to Kingsdowne Place when you were staying with the Eynsfords and look what happened there. The problem is that you are a disaster magnet, Georgie. I should learn to stay well away from you.”

By now I was also tired and grouchy and I’d had enough for one evening. “Face it, Belinda, you don’t come to see me. You come because you hope to take advantage of people I know.”

One of the good things about Belinda is that she is frightfully easygoing. She nodded. “You’re right. I’m a horrid, shallow person and I only think about myself. But I have to add that my actions are born partly out of desperation. It’s not easy trying to survive with little money in this world.”

“I’m certainly aware of that,” I said, “but I would never land myself on people claiming to be something I’m not, in the hope of snagging myself a rich man.”

“No, of course you wouldn’t. You have Queen Victoria’s blood running through your veins. You are eminently respectable and moral. You’ll marry and have oodles of children and live in a drafty old country house and be supremely happy. I like the good things in life, unfortunately.”

I glanced across at Darcy. He caught my gaze and winked, making me feel so much better. This might be a horrible situation but I was in the same room as a man who loved me and whom I hoped to marry someday. Poor Belinda looked for love in all the wrong places and while she lived a glamorous life from time to time, she had no security. I patted her hand. “Your turn will come, I’m sure.”

“I’m not so sure anymore. Craig Hart invites me for a skinny dip and then rejects me? There must be something wrong with me. I’m getting old and haggard and unattractive.”

“Belinda, you’re twenty-three and devastatingly beautiful. In fact if you wanted to stay on here and make a career in films, I’m sure you could.”

The flicker of a smile crossed her face. “Do you really think so? You’re very kind, Georgie. A sweet person. You deserve happiness.”

I leaned closer. “And when we’re alone I’ll tell you something else that will make you feel better,” I whispered.

“Oh God. I wish he’d hurry up,” Mummy said in her stage voice that echoed around the cavernous rooms. “All I want right now is my bed. And to be back in Germany with Max or at my villa in Lugano. Or my dear little place in Nice. Or at Brown’s Hotel in London. Anywhere but here. This was such a stupid idea in the first place. And a ridiculous movie. Bloody Mary and the Virgin Queen fighting over King Philip of Spain—I ask you.”

Silence fell again.

“I don’t know about anyone else but I’m going to have another drink,” Charlie said. He went over to the drinks table and sloshed cognac into a glass. We looked up as Mrs. Goldman returned and sank onto the sofa next to Barbara. She pushed an imaginary strand of hair back from her face, even though her hairstyle and makeup were still immaculate.

“So many stupid questions,” she said. “So unnecessary. Somehow he latched on to the fact that we didn’t live together. As if that gave me a motive for murder. Trying to put words in my mouth. I told him that life suited us perfectly the way things were but he wouldn’t give up.”

“Here, you need this more than me, Helen.” Charlie handed her his drink. “Get that by you.”

“I don’t normally, but right now I really do need one,” she said and took a big gulp. “He wants Stella next,” she said and there was a glint of malicious glee in her eyes. I suspected she’d taken delight in giving Stella an excellent motive for his murder. Stella looked pale but regal and resolute as she walked from the room. I watched her go, still wondering. Darcy obviously still had reason to suspect her or he’d never have come here. And she had left the room to order another pot of coffee. How long had she been gone? Long enough to sneak into the library and bludgeon her lover to death? And then make off with one candlestick? I shook my head. This made no sense to me. If she wanted to steal the candlesticks she had ample opportunity. Presumably she knew the combination to Mr. Goldman’s safe. She could drive up alone whenever she wanted. And as for killing him in such a brutal manner—there was no reason that I could see. They had been very chummy on the ship. She was still the star of his pictures. They had driven to the castle in the same car. And she didn’t seem the volatile type. But then who else in this room would have wanted Cy Goldman dead—apart from his wife?