A Death in the Pavilion (3 page)

Chapter Five
Attic Adventure

‘So what did he want?’ fired Richenda the moment I returned to the dining-room.

‘Your brother sends his regards and would like you to come home,’ I said simply.

Muller raised one elegant eyebrow. ‘I suspect you are giving us the shortened version?’

Richenda got to her feet. ‘Did he threaten you?’ she demanded.

‘To be honest,’ I said taking my seat and attempting to calm the situation, ‘I do not see the purpose of Sir Richard sending his man to talk to me.’

‘He is maybe concerned Richenda would respond less civilly to him,’ said Muller.

‘Plant him a facer,’ said Richenda crudely.

‘I think we have lingered long enough over the table,’ said Mrs Muller. ‘We should all retire to the drawing-room for tea.’

Muller gave a mock groan. ‘We do not have to drink tea after every meal, Mother.’

‘It is the English thing to do,’ said his mother stubbornly in her perfect English. I looked at her sharply. Why had she been so obviously, even comically, German in front of my mother?

As if reading my thoughts, Richenda commented excitedly, ‘We had the most intriguing visitor this afternoon. The daughter of an earl, no less.’

‘Then we must invite her to the ball,’ said Muller, rising and pulling out Richenda’s chair for her.

‘I doubt she would come,’ I said quickly. ‘She is widowed with a young son.’

‘You know her?’ asked Muller.

‘I have heard of her,’ I answered quickly. ‘Staff talk.’

‘Not mine,’ said Mrs Muller, blissfully unaware that the task of keeping her four hundred staff from gossiping is not humanly possible, but I assured her it was a morsel from my Stapleford Hall days.

‘Not out of the top drawer,’ muttered Mrs Muller as she left the room. Her son followed her quickly and we heard urgent whispering. Richenda blushed and, showing unusual tact, held back for a moment.

‘Whatever have I done wrong, Euphemia?’ she asked. ‘Only this morning Mrs Muller praised my fashion sense and she wasn’t being ironic!’

‘Could she have been jealous of your conversation with your visitor?’ I could not bring myself to give my mother’s name.

‘I would have introduced her,’ said Richenda close to tears. ‘I honestly thought she was asleep and when I first met the woman I had no idea she was aristocracy. She looked so – so drab.’

Considering Richenda’s fashion sense my mother would have taken this as a compliment. However my current mistress looked close to hysteria. I cast about in my mind frantically to think of something to distract her. An hysterical Richenda is not something even the strongest man should bear witness to. ‘Barker, your brother’s man, said Muller killed his first wife.’ As soon as it was out of my mouth I knew I had said the wrong thing.

Richenda’s eyes went very wide. ‘Oh no, Euphemia,’ she said in awed tones, ‘you haven’t discovered another body, have you? That would be too much. Everyone should have a hobby, but …’

‘No, of course not,’ I snapped. ‘Richard is afraid you will marry Muller and he will get his hands on your bank shares.’ I coughed and added, ‘I mean that literally and not as a euphemism.’

‘A what?’ said Richenda blankly, ‘Come on, we should join Muller. Whether his mother likes me or not, I’m damn well going to this ball. I have this idea for a deep purple silk dress with lemon puffed sleeves …’

I followed Richenda through the drawing room, trying desperately hard not to imagine what she was describing, but her notion of sartorial elegance once envisaged tended to engrave itself on one’s mind to the extent that I often woke in the night in a cold sweat fearing she had taken it upon herself to design a dress for me. This disturbed me more than my dreams of finding a body in the corridor of Stapleford Hall. Really, I was becoming almost accustomed to corpses.

The evening ended in a long discussion about the autumn ball. I was dragooned into doing much of the donkey work. Not the actual physical moving for plants and tables, but the labour intensive copper-plate writing of invitations and discussing beforehand with Mrs Muller who should be invited to the dinner and where they should all sit. Gentlemen tend not to realise how difficult and fraught this task can be, merely trusting to their womenfolk that everyone will be happily arranged. I think it is a great pity that they therefore do not have the sense to let us run the Foreign Office.

Richenda gave loads of impractical suggestions and Muller seemed to be at pains to give in to her wishes. Though even he blanched at her prospective colour scheme for the ballroom – to compliment her as yet unmade dress. I gave him a small nod, signifying I would interfere in this matter and he gave an audible sigh of relief.

‘What is the matter, Hans? Are you tired?’ asked his mother.

‘Indeed, it has been a long trip from London and I am ready to retire,’ replied our quick-thinking host. And with that a line was drawn under the proceedings. It was understood that Mr Muller would be supplying the funds, but from now on the ball was the women’s affair. I thought he arranged this very neatly.

As I climbed into bed that night I could not help thinking that if anyone could arrange a murder neatly it would be the charming and impeccable Mr Muller. I silently cursed Barker for putting the thought in my head. Of course I then had to get out of bed and pray for Barker to become a nicer man. Murder and the Staplefords may have changed me, but you cannot stop a vicar’s daughter being a vicar’s daughter. Especially if she almost believes her dead father is looking over her shoulder watching her actions. Not that I do, of course. My father undoubtedly earned his place in heaven simply for living with my mother as long as he did, but once one has been imbued with a beloved parent’s belief system it is difficult to run contrary to it.

I was kneeling on the floor, on a rather comfortable rug, trying to find kind words for the despicable Barker, when someone scratched at my door. Now, with this large a staff, it was not impossible that one of the younger, brasher males might try his luck in the women’s quarters. My door was tightly bolted so I ignored it. I continued to search for words other than despicable, rogue, thuggish and nasty to describe Barker. The scratching continued to the point that my concentration snapped. ‘Oh, do go away,’ I cried. ‘I’m trying to be nice about someone horrible!’

‘Why would you want to do that,’ came Richenda’s voice from beyond the door. I sighed and got up and unbolted the door.

‘Why didn’t you just say it was you?’

‘I’m being discreet,’ said my mistress. ‘And why are you being nice about horrid people and to whom?’ She looked around the room puzzled.

‘I was praying.’

Richenda looked somewhat startled. ‘Isn’t that what Sundays are for?’

‘What do you want?’

‘I’ve heard something in the attic and I think it must be Muller’s wife,’ said Richenda.

I fetched over my candle from the table, so I could see her more clearly. Her cheeks did not appear flushed. ‘Did you have a lot of wine at dinner?’ I asked bluntly.

Richenda gave a little snort. ‘Don’t be rude,’ she said. ‘I was reading in bed when I quite clearly heard a crash above me.’

‘A servant falling out of bed?’

Richenda shook her head. ‘There are no servants’ quarters above where I sleep. Muller designed the main bedrooms so no servants could be within earshot at any time of day or night.’ She added, ‘There are bells, of course.’

‘So you’re saying there is nothing but storage above your bedroom?’

‘No, it wasn’t simply something falling over,’ said Richenda. ‘It was moving.’

‘Moving luggage?’

Richenda stamped her foot. ‘Damn you, take me seriously! Don’t you think it odd that a man would design a wing out of earshot of his servants?’

‘Not if he wanted privacy.’

‘Exactly! He’s hiding something.’

‘But he put you over there!’

‘Stop splitting hairs and come with me!’ demanded Richenda. ‘Remember, I pay your wages!’

I sighed and picked up a shawl to wrap around myself. ‘Bring the candlestick,’ said Richenda. ‘It will make a good weapon.’

‘Not as good as you would think,’ I muttered trailing after her. I had had experience with the fallibility of candlesticks.

It may be that many servants would have parted company at this point with their mistress, but to me a midnight stroll through a strange attic was a positive breeze compared to when I had first met Richenda and she had asked me to drag her cousin’s body, by the leg, out of a corridor and into the light so we ‘could have a really good look’.

Without pride, I can say it would have to be an atticful of bodies to discomfort me. Richenda led me to her bedroom and threw open the door. ‘Listen!’ The room looked as if it had been ransacked and smelt slightly of underwashed garments. No one could have mistaken it for anyone other than Richenda’s room.

I dutifully did as I was bid. After giving it about two minutes – she didn’t pay me that much – I was about to suggest it had been a dream when I heard distinct movement above our heads.

‘There!’ shouted Richenda. ‘You heard that!’

‘Unless you want to wake Mr Muller and ask if he does have a wife stored in the attic, I suggest you keep your voice down,’ I said with a calmness I was far from feeling.

Richenda giggled nervously. Her face went blotchy. I made a mental note to warn her not to do that in public. ‘So how do we get up there?’ I asked.

Richenda frowned. ‘I assumed being a servant you would know.’

‘I’m not that kind of a servant any more,’ I said.

‘But don’t you still know?’ persisted Richenda.

The attic rumbled above us and we both jumped.

‘You mean by some divinely inspired lower-class sense?’ I snapped.

‘How would I know,’ cried Richenda. ‘I wasn’t born in that world!’

I barely bit back the words ‘neither was I’ before a noise like rolling thunder echoed down the chimney. ‘Are you sure you want to go up there?’ I said.

‘Of course,’ said Richenda, ‘but you’re going first. You’ve got the candle.’

‘Our deadly weapon,’ I said. This time Richenda laughed. Then she sighed. ‘I don’t really think it’s Muller’s last wife, you know. Or at least I wouldn’t think that if it wasn’t half past three in the morning and we weren’t standing here in our petticoats in the near dark. It’s just that sometimes the setting …’

‘Unleashes your imagination?’ I said.

‘And this wing of the house is odd.’

‘Modern design?’ I suggested.

‘Or he ran out of money,’ said Richenda. ‘That’s the kind of thing I need to know if I’m to accept his proposal.’

‘He’s proposed?’

‘I shouldn’t think he’s even thought of it yet,’ said Richenda, ‘but he’s coming round. The autumn ball.’

‘It’s like he is putting on a show for you,’ I agreed.

There was a soft, but distinct noise above us. ‘So you see,’ said Richenda, ‘I do need to know if he has any secrets in his attic.’

The hairs stood up on the back of my neck as the faint sound continued above us. I attempted to catch Richenda’s lighter tone though I had begun to shiver. ‘And if he murdered his wife?’ I asked.

‘Even you, with your ability to attract murder, must admit that to come from one household where there was one confirmed murder and one murder disguised as a suicide, must agree that the chances of us stumbling on another murder within a month are slight.’

‘I suppose it depends on the circles you move in,’ I said gloomily.

‘But my brother isn’t involved in this!’ said Richenda, which was as close as she would probably ever come to admitting what her brother was capable of doing.

‘He and Muller have been friends for years,’ I said.

‘Richard does not go around murdering everyone he meets,’ said Richenda. ‘We’d have no friends or family left.’

I thought it prudent at this point to suggest that we hunted for the stairway. I persuaded Richenda to take her own candle by promising I would still go first if we found the attic and we set off to tiptoe through the hallways.

Now, when a house-party is in progress it is very easy to tiptoe around the bedrooms. I fear I must explain why. It is not uncommon for those of the upper classes to seek to change bedroom accommodation during the night for extra – er – entertainment. It is therefore an unwritten rule that noises in corridors are ignored. However, this was not a house party. Richenda was the only guest in residence. (I didn’t count.) And I believe both Muller and his mother would be shocked if she sneaked about in the night. I had no way of knowing if Muller would welcome such an advance or, as many men would be, be frightened by it. Richenda had her hair in rags and was at her most gorgon-like. Either way to be caught was unacceptable for either of us.

So like a pair of inept, but very, very cautious burglars, we checked up and down the hallway. Muller’s bedroom lay at the end of the hallway and I assumed must be a set of rooms, considering how the outside of the building was formed – or as much as I could recall of it in the middle of the night. His mother’s room was two doors away. We could hear her snoring and Richenda’s room had been two doors further away than that. In all there were eight bedrooms on the corridor.

The carpet lay charitably thick and plush beneath our slippered feet, but as we walked down the corridor we could see no exit but the stairs down.

‘Perhaps there is a secret passageway,’ whispered Richenda.

‘Perhaps one of the bedrooms isn’t a bedroom,’ I said.

‘How do we tell which one?’ asked Richenda.

‘Well, if I was going to hide a secret staircase to a secret attic, I would do it close to my own room if not in it.’

‘We cannot enter Muller’s bedroom,’ squeaked Richenda.

‘No,’ I agreed. ‘Let’s check the doors either side. If it’s neither of them I think we should count ourselves lucky we haven’t been caught and go back to bed. I’ll swap rooms with you tonight if you want. There are definitely no noises above mine.’

‘That will not be necessary,’ said Richenda haughtily.

Richenda took the door to the left of Muller’s room and I the one to the right. Even by the candlelight I could see her steeling herself. Then very slowly, with her fingers widely splayed, she opened the door. Her other hand trembled as she held up the candle to peer inside. Then she closed the door and turned to me. ‘Bedroom,’ she mouthed.