02 - Mrs. Jeffries Dusts for Clues (19 page)

“But just a moment ago, you remembered every little detail about that evening,” Betsy protested. Then she realized what the girl wanted. Obviously remembering that Malcolm Farnsworth had given her a shilling to deliver that note had reminded the girl that sometimes you could make a bit of money.

Sighing, Betsy reached into her cloak and pulled out some coins. Making sure she had enough for her fare home, she handed the rest over to Essie. She didn’t begrudge the girl the money, for in truth Betsy could well remember what it was like to be poor and desperate.

Essie greedily snatched the coins. “Course I listened in. Nothing else to do around ’ere, is there?”

“Did Miss Everdene mention anything about Mary Sparks to Mr. Farnsworth?”

“Nah, she just talked sweet to ’im, pretended everything was fine. She didn’t say a word about what ’appened in the kitchen. Stupid cow, ’e’s only marryin’ ’er fer ’er money.” Essie’s lip curled up in a sneer. “You’d think she’d figure that much out every time she looked in ’er mirror. Why would a ’andsome man like ’im want someone like ’er if’n she hadn’t inherited a packet from her old grandmother?”

“So Miss Everdene inherited a rather large sum of money?” Betsy frowned thoughtfully.

Essie shook her head. “Believe me, Mr. Farnsworth couldn’t see the woman for dust until ’e found out ’ow much she had. It’s got the reverend’s nose out of joint too. ’E’d been hopin’ to keep Antonia at ’ome. But she put her foot down and said she was marryin’ Malcolm Farnsworth whether ’e liked it or not. Two of ’em ’ad a right good row about it. But as she’s the one that gets the money, she’s the one that makes the rules now.
She’s of age. The old man can’t keep ’er from marryin’, and ’e knows it.”

“I don’t care where that woman’s body was found,” Everdene’s voice boomed, “it’s nothing to do with us.”

Essie eased the door open again, and both women put their ears near the crack. Betsy heard the inspector say, “But, sir, we’re not insinuating it does have anything to do with either you or your daughter. I’m only asking if either of you knew the houses were sitting empty. After all, both of you are shareholders in Wildwoods. It’s not inconceivable that the fact the houses were empty might have been mentioned here, and that Miss Sparks overheard the remark and decided to take refuge there for the night.”

“She didn’t leave here until the next morning,” Antonia Everdene insisted.

“Now she’s lyin’ again,” Essie said in disgust. “Cor, acts so holy and then lies ’er bleedin’ ’ead off to the coppers. Probably thinkin’ by lyin’ she’s protectin’ Malcolm Farnsworth.”

“Why would she need to do that? I thought you said he was still here after Mary left.” Betsy reluctantly pulled away from the door.

“’E was, but ’e didn’t stay long. ’E didn’t even stay to eat, and he certainly didn’t take Miss Everdene for a walk by the river like ’e did most times ’e come.” Essie smiled maliciously. “’E only stayed long enough to talk a bit, and then ’e claimed ’e had to get back to Knightsbridge. Said ’is friend’s mother was feelin’ poorly and ’e ’ad to get back to sit with her a spell.” She broke off and laughed. “The only woman he were goin’ to sit with was Mary Sparks. You could tell ’e couldn’t wait to git out of ’ere and go to her.”

“So what time did he leave?”

Essie shrugged. “Couldna been more than ’alf an ’our after e arrived. Miss Everdene was madder than a wet ’en. ’Ated to see all that fancy food she’d bought for the occasion wasted on her drunk of a father and ’erself. Right tightfisted, she is. I wonder if she’ll be so mean once she’s married. Probably so, stingy is stingy if’n you ask me.”

Betsy gazed at the thin, plain girl and felt both pity and revulsion. Essie couldn’t read or write, probably didn’t have any parents and certainly didn’t know the meaning of loyalty. But Betsy refused to judge her. There but for the grace of God go I, she thought humbly. If not for Inspector Witherspoon taking her in when she was sick, desperate and at her wit’s end, she could well have ended up like this girl: illiterate, ignorant, ill-treated and ignored. Essie had been so hungry for someone to talk to that Betsy hadn’t even had to come up with a reasonable story to get into the house and start asking questions.

“I expect you’re leavin’ now,” Essie said sadly.

“Yes, I’d better be goin’. They’ll be getting worried if I don’t get back soon.” She broke off and hesitated, wondering if she had the right to say what she couldn’t suppress any longer.

“All right, then.” Essie squared her thin shoulders beneath the cheap fabric of her dress. “I’ll make sure there’s no one ’angin’ about, and you can slip out the back way.”

“Wait a minute.” Betsy couldn’t help herself. There was something about this girl. “Look, if you ever decide to leave here…”

“Leave ’ere? Where could I go? I’m not really trained. The only reason the Everdenes keep me on is because no one else will put up with ’em. They’re ’orrible to work for, but at least it’s a roof over me ’ead.” Essie gazed at her suspiciously. “What are you on about?”

“Nothing,” Betsy said quickly. “But if you ever do decide to leave here, come see me.” She started to offer to write Inspector Witherspoon’s address down, but then she remembered that Essie couldn’t read. “You’ve a good memory, well, you must ’ave.” She quickly rattled off the address and then left before she could say anything more.

* * *

Witherspoon’s ears ached by the time he and Constable Barnes were out of the Everdene house and safely into a hansom.

From out his window the inspector spotted the figure of
a heavily cloaked woman hurrying toward the High Street. Though he couldn’t see the face, there was something very familiar about the way the woman moved.

“I’ll wager that no one ever slept through one of his sermons,” Constable Barnes said with a groan. He rubbed his ears and winced.

“Only if they were deaf, Constable, only if they were deaf.” Witherspoon sighed and wished he could go home for a nice soothing cup of tea, but he couldn’t. He still had to sort out this wretched murder case. And as if that weren’t bad enough, his Chief Inspector was dropping hints that things weren’t progressing fast enough to suit him. Well, really, the inspector thought, what do they expect me to do? It’s not as though this were a simple case. Even identifying the victim had taken a dreadfully long time.

“We know that Mr. Farnsworth is lying now,” Constable Barnes said in satisfaction. “Wonder why he told us he didn’t discover the ring were missing until he reached into his pocket to give it to Miss Everdene?”

“Perhaps, Constable, because it’s true.”

“You mean you think the reverend’s lyin’?” Barnes sounded scandalized.

“Well, we know that someone is, Constable,” Witherspoon said morosely. He didn’t have a clue as to which of the prinicipals in this case wasn’t telling the truth. But he was hardly going to admit that.

“Perhaps the Lutterbanks won’t be as bad as this lot,” Barnes said hopefully as the hansom clip-clopped across the bridge.

“Hopefully,” the inspector muttered. “But I highly doubt it. You know, Barnes, I never realized…”

“Realized what, sir?”

“That the rich were just as prone to lying as the poor.”

Mrs. Jeffries paid the hansom driver and then paused to look around the busy corner. She glanced at the crumpled note in her hand and double-checked the address. Yes, this was the place where Wiggins had told her to meet him. Shepherd’s Bush. Craning her neck, she stared across the heavy traffic on Goldhawk Road, to the Green, looking for the familiar face of their errant footman.

From behind, someone grabbed her elbow and spun her around, and she found herself face-to-face with a disheveled Wiggins. “Good gracious, Wiggins. You startled me. Now, where on earth have you been and what in heaven’s name have you been up to?”

A smear of dirt was on his chin, his clothes were wrinkled, and there were dark circles under his eyes. “Thank goodness you’ve come in time,” he gasped, ignoring her question. “’Urry. We’ve no time to lose. She’ll be ’ere soon.” He tugged her round the corner onto Shepherd’s Bush Road. “I was scared she’d slip back into the ’ouse before you got a gander at ’er.”

“Just a moment,” Mrs. Jeffries panted as the footman pulled her around handcarts and dodged in and out of clusters of pedestrians. “What are you talking about? Who are we looking for?”

“’Urry,” he urged, ignoring her questions. “She’ll be ’ere any second.”

“Who?”

“There she is!” Wiggins said triumphantly as he pointed to a young woman crossing the road.

The girl was dressed in a pale lavender housedress covered by an apron. She was slender, blond and very pretty. She wore a short cloak of brown wool over her dress and carried a large shopping basket.

They watched as she went into the grocer’s shop.

“Is that who I think it is?” Mrs. Jeffries asked.

“It’s her, all right.”

She was so relieved. They weren’t dealing with a madman! Cassie Yates had done precisely as she’d said she’d do. She’d gotten married. Wiggins pushed a lock of hair off his rather dirty forehead and nodded. But before he could explain further, Cassie came out of the shop and headed purposefully back the way she’d just come. The footman grabbed Mrs. Jeffries’s elbow again.

“Blimey,” he yelped. “She’s given the grocer her list. That means she’ll be comin’ back this afternoon to collect the basket. But we can’t risk losin’ her now. I think she knows she’s bein’ followed. She might ’ave spotted me yesterday.”

They dodged through the busy streets, keeping the brown cloak in sight. Mrs. Jeffries was too winded to ask where they were going or how Wiggins had managed to find Cassie Yates so quickly. She was only glad that he had.

The chase ended at a tall brick house at the bottom of Dunsay Road. They had to duck behind a bush as the girl paused at the end of the small front garden and turned to have a quick, suspicious look around before she slipped into the house.

As soon as the door closed, Mrs. Jeffries turned to the footman. “Excellent, Wiggins, you’ve done a remarkable job. But the next time, do please let us know what you’re up to. Despite that rather mysterious message from Mr. Beaks, we’ve all been rather worried.”

Wiggins picked a blade of grass off his rumpled shirt. “Sorry, Mrs. Jeffries. But I were ’ot on the trail, and I ’ad
to make sure she was the right one.” He brushed more dirt off his sleeve. “Sorry about this too,” he mumbled, as the housekeeper glanced anxiously at his soiled clothes, “but I’ve been sleepin’ rough.”

“Oh dear, I do hope you won’t take a chill.”

“Not to worry, I’m right as rain. Anyways, like I were sayin’, it couldn’t be helped.”

“However did you manage to find her?” Mrs. Jeffries asked. “Did she come back to Knightsbridge?”

“I found ’er by keepin’ a sharp eye out on the McGraw ’ouse. Sure enough, once I’d figured out that Garrett’s little nip of a brother come out to play the instant Garrett got ’ome every day, it were as plain as the nose on yer face,” Wiggins explained proudly. “’E were sending the lad to keep an eye on ’er. So instead of keepin’ my eye on Garrett, I followed the little ’un, and he lead me straight to ’er.”

Mrs. Jeffries stared at the footman incredulously. “Garrett McGraw’s little brother? But what does that have to do with Cassie Yates?”

Now it was Wiggins’s turn to look surprised. “Cassie Yates? Who said anythin’ about ’er? That girl that just went into that ’ouse inn’t Cassie Yates. She’s Mary Sparks.”

* * *

Edgar Lutterbank glared at the inspector for a moment before shifting his hard gaze to Constable Barnes. “I presume you’ve a good reason for this inconvenience?”

Inspector Witherspoon stifled a sigh. The Lutterbank family was being every bit as uncooperative as he’d feared. He and Constable Barnes had been kept waiting for half an hour before Mr. Lutterbank would even condescend to see them.

“We’re not trying to inconvenience you or your family.” Witherspoon smiled tightly at the four people staring at him with enmity. No, he corrected silently, only three of them were hostile. Mrs. Lutterbank was pretending they weren’t there. The pale, mousy woman had been gazing blankly at the wall since he and Constable Barnes had been shown into the drawing room.

“However,” he continued, trying to infuse some authority into his tone, “this is a murder investigation. Mary Sparks was in your employ directly prior to her death. She spent less than twenty-four hours at the Everdene household. So if you don’t mind, it would be most helpful if you can answer a few questions.”

“Of course we mind,” Edgar Lutterbank charged. “But I don’t see that we’ve any choice in the matter.” He pulled a watch out of his exquisitely tailored coat and frowned. “But do get on with it, man, I’ve a meeting in the city in an hour.”

Witherspoon turned to Mrs. Lutterbank. He might as well start with the least aggressive member of this household. “As the mistress of the house,” he asked, “could you explain your reasons for asking Mary Sparks to leave?”

Mrs. Lutterbank ignored him. She continued to study the wallpaper.

“She didn’t ask Mary to leave,” Mr. Lutterbank cut in quickly. “The girl left of her own accord and, I might add, without giving notice.”