A Fatal Freedom (25 page)

Suddenly Sam’s expression lightened. ‘We’re to have a proper meal today. I heard Cook tell Mrs Trenchard yesterday it were a disgrace there weren’t no money for food. Credit’s all used up, she said. We’ve been living on the store-cupboard for weeks and now its empty. But this morning she told us we could look forward to dinnertime.’ He looked expectantly at Thomas.

‘So you think Mrs Trenchard has given her some money and that Cook will need to do some shopping before she can produce a proper meal for you all?’

Sam nodded vigorously. ‘Last few days we’ve been starving. Never thought I’d be serving in a gentleman’s house what couldn’t afford to feed its staff.’

‘When do you think Cook will be going out?’

‘Dunno. But she went upstairs ’bout five minutes ago.’

‘Thanks, Sam.’ Thomas thought of something else. ‘Millie around?’ he asked in an offhand manner.

‘Nah! Went off early this morning, dressed in one of Mrs Peters’ best gowns and with her hair done all la-di-dah. She thinks now she doesn’t have to look after her mistress, she can come and go as she pleases. If you ask me, she’s a disgrace.’

‘And you don’t know where?’

‘Found a fancy man, must ’ave.’

Thomas wished fervently that that would turn out to be true. ‘Better go back in, Sam,’ he said. ‘I’ll wait around the corner and see if Cook comes out. Now not a word about this to anyone.’ He slipped Sam another sixpenny piece.

With amazing speed it vanished into an invisible pocket.

Thomas had already reconnoitred the local shops. Unless the Peters’ cook was adventurous, there was everything she needed by way of fresh produce within a ten-minute walk. He took himself off to hang around the butcher’s that seemed to offer good quality at a reasonable price. It wasn’t long before a lanky female in a serviceable jacket and remarkably plain hat and carrying a basket came along. He folded the newspaper he had pretended to peruse and shoved it behind a crate conveniently sitting on the pavement.

‘Mrs Firestone, isn’t it?’ he asked courteously, falling in beside her. ‘What a piece of luck meeting you.’

‘Well, Mr Jackman as I live and breathe. And what, pray, do you do here?’

He looked at her. The dour features were unsurprised, the eyes disillusioned. ‘Why, waiting for you, Mrs Firestone. I hoped you would welcome a strong arm to carry your basket.’

‘And in return?’ She stood with feet seemingly anchored to the pavement proclaiming her unwillingness to co-operate with him.

‘Mrs Firestone, Cook, you were there when Mrs Trenchard announced to all the staff that I was investigating the death of Mr Peters …’

‘I know that she has forbidden you the house.’

‘Has she told you all never to speak to me?’

‘Forbidding you the house cannot mean anything else.’

‘Did Mrs Trenchard tell you why I was forbidden the house?’

‘Not my place to ask.’

‘I think Mrs Trenchard believes I might uncover something unpleasant about one or more of the inhabitants. She thinks I should concentrate on contacts Mr Peters had outside his household.’

‘So why aren’t you doing that?’ But a little of her belligerence had leaked away.

‘Why don’t we proceed with your shopping.’ Thomas took her basket and she made no move to object. ‘Might you, perhaps, be visiting the butcher?’ He indicated the shop a few doors away.

She looked down at the ground. ‘Not there.’

Thomas looked around but there wasn’t another. ‘Then where?’

The cook squared her shoulders and set off down a side street, Thomas following with the basket.

A number of streets later, they entered another butcher’s.

A large joint of topside was requested and shown for inspection.

‘Too fresh! I’ll not be your customer if that’s the sort of meat you try to pass off on them.’

The butcher seemed unmoved by this remark. He went into the rear of his shop and returned with what seemed to Thomas an almost identical piece of meat, except it looked darker than the first. It was held up for scrutiny.

‘That’s better. I’ll take it and start an account.’

The butcher was a man of mature years with a sour expression. He shook his head. ‘You may know your meat, missis, but I knows customers. It’s cash or nothing until I knows where I am. I’ll take the address details, then we’ll be able to deliver should it be needed.’

An address was spelled out; not the correct one. Mrs Firestone’s back seemed to dare him to comment. Thomas said nothing but took the wrapped packet of beef together with one of suet that had also been requested. He placed both in the basket, watched cash handed over, a gracious farewell given the butcher, and followed the cook outside.

She said nothing but went in the direction of a greengrocer’s, where vegetables were purchased, then a grocer’s for eggs, a small packet of sugar and an equally small one of currants. In each case cash was handed over.

Outside the grocer’s the cook gave a sigh that sounded one of relief. ‘Beef is a little extravagant but we deserves it and it will last the week being as it will be served with Yorkshire pudding. Milkman is still delivering milk; well, he’s my sister’s husband’s nephew so he needs to keep in. Then roast tatties and carrots, and they’re new season’s, followed by dead baby’s leg.’ She gave him a challenging look.

‘Steamed currant roll is one of my favourites, Mrs Firestone; and I suspect it will be served with custard?’

She nodded. ‘Bird’s, none of that fancy cream unglaze.’

Thomas felt his tummy rumble. ‘Wonderful! I am only sorry I cannot be invited to join you all. Tell me, what was your performance with the butcher all about?’

She checked the items in the basket and seemed reluctant to speak. Thomas waited. Finally she gave him a straightforward look. ‘Look, if I’d gorn to my usual butcher, the one you was waiting outside, and he’d had a sniff of cash, which he would as he wouldn’t have served me without, our account being so adrift, and I don’t mind telling you that me housekeeping money’s been short a long time. When the master asked me to do special buffets for his friends during the time the mistress was away, I told him I had to have extra cash, which he give me. Made it help with feeding the staff as well. Now, if our regular butcher had got a sniff of cash, I’d’ve been forced to hand over all the money Mrs Trenchard give me to put against the Peters’ account. Which would have left nothing for nothing else.’

‘I understand. But a false address?’

Now her look was distinctly shifty. ‘You never knows how pally these tradespeople are. I may have to go back there next week. Who knows how long this state of affairs is to last.’

Thomas had been given the opening he’d been waiting for. ‘It’s to sort things out that I’ve been hired. Mrs Firestone, do you believe that Mrs Peters murdered her husband?’

Her face flushed and she clasped her hands in their brown cotton gloves tightly together. ‘Think that little angel would do any such thing? What do you take me for?’

There was no doubting her sincerity.

‘Do you suspect anyone else in the house?’

‘Indeed not! We’re a respectable household.’

‘I’m sure you are. My visits to Mr Peters suggested nothing else. But I wanted to hear it from you. I am sure as cook you must have your finger on the pulse of everything that goes on there.’

Mrs Firestone looked gratified but started to walk back the way they’d come. ‘That’s as maybe but as cook, as you say, I declare it’s time dinner was started.’

The basket was heavy but Thomas was happy to bear it. ‘How about Albert? Would he have had reason to want Mr Peters out of the way?’

A loud snort. ‘Albert? Far as ’e was concerned, the sun shone out of Mr P’s trousers, if you’ll forgive the phrase. Not that he isn’t a sneaky sort. None of us trusts Albert.’

‘He seems to have been involved in Mr Peter’s business life. If, for instance, he had decided to, as you might say, freelance, and Mr Peters suspected as much, and challenged him, maybe even warned him that he was thinking of calling in the police, might Albert not then want to remove him from this life?’

Mrs Firestone stopped dead and turned to look at Thomas. ‘My, what a mind you’ve got, Mr Jackman.’ She appeared to give the matter some thought. ‘Do you think that accounts for why he has upped and left?’

Thomas stared at her. ‘Left? Albert has left Montagu Place?’

‘Took ’is case and one that looked mighty like the one Mr Peters used to carry ’is papers in. Sarah remarked on it.’

‘Sarah?’

‘Albert came in this morning as we was finishing breakfast. Dumped the two bags on the floor, drank his tea and ate his toast. Then said he knew he wasn’t favourite with any of us and that we wouldn’t be sorry to see the back of ’im but not as pleased as he was to see the back of us. Then he picked up his bags and left. We was all gobsmacked. All right, there wasn’t no job for him with Mr Peters gone but Mrs Trenchard has promised us all our wages – whatever ’appens, she said.’ Mrs Firestone’s voice trailed away as though she did not put full faith in those words.

‘And Sarah commented on the briefcase Albert was carrying?’

‘It was after ’e’d gone up the basement stairs, whistling like there was no tomorrow. “Why, that looked like the one Mr Peters always carried,” she said.’

Thomas thought about the empty drawers in the study desk. ‘Did it look as though it had a lot of papers in it?’

‘Don’t know about that. I wouldn’t know if it had anything in it. But as I said, that Albert’s a shifty sort. None of us trusts him far as we can see him – and that’s too far.’

‘Where has he gone?’

‘Now there’s a thing!’E wouldn’t say. I reckons ’e didn’t know. Said if anything came for him, to forward it to the master’s company, he’d be in touch with them. And that, he said, included the wages he was owed.’

Thomas wondered how closely the valet was, or had been, involved with the import/export company.

‘What about Millie, Mrs Peters’ maid?’ Thomas shifted the basket from one hand to the other as they made their way back to Montagu Place.

‘That too heavy for you?’

He shook his head. ‘Not at all, but I’ll say you must be strong, Mrs Firestone.’

‘All cooks is. We ’ave to be, ’eaving heavy pots around, wielding choppers and such.’

‘Do you trust Millie?’

The cook sighed. ‘There’s another you never knows where you are with. Sweet as anything when she first comes. On her dignity, of course. Well, a lady’s maid always thinks she’s above the rest of us staff.’

‘Why should that be, Mrs Firestone?’

‘’Cause she’s in such close contact with the mistress. Knows everything that goes on, she does.’

Fleetingly Thomas wondered whether Betty knew anything about the position a lady’s maid held in the household.

‘And did she tell you about Mrs Peters’ friendship with Daniel Rourke?’

Mrs Firestone shook her head. ‘Nor she did! And I wouldn’t have believed it if she had. Another sneaky one, Millie is. Though when she went for the master after Mrs Peters left, well, you could have knocked me over with a basting spoon.’

‘She did, did she?’

Mrs Firestone made a face as they crossed Marylebone High Street. ‘Sweet as sugar, she was; couldn’t do enough for him. Those evenings what I told you about when the master had his friends round, well, it was Millie what acted as hostess. Course I didn’t see what went on above stairs but Emily reported to me.’ Mrs Firestone stopped. She hesitated for a moment then said in almost a whisper, ‘She saw Millie slip into his bedroom! And she was dressed in a gown belonging to the mistress. Well, I didn’t know what to think.’ Though it was obvious that she did. ‘Of course, when the mistress returned, all that stopped. After Mr Peters died and the mistress had been arrested, Sarah wanted to know if we should tell Mrs Trenchard what had been going on.’

‘And you said?’

The cook sniffed. ‘Spreading gossip like that isn’t any part of our jobs. Ten to one, she wouldn’t believe us, and if she did, what could she do? The master’s dead. Nothing can harm him now. Millie’s a silly girl what will get her comeuppance sooner or later. If she’s fired now, what will Mrs Peters do when she comes ’ome? Better she should find out about her in her own good time.’

‘I don’t suppose Albert was too happy with Millie making up to Mr Peters?’

Mrs Firestone sniffed derisively. ‘I’ll say not. Thought the master and all his affairs was his, if you ask me. Look, is there anything else you want of me or can I get back to my kitchen? They’ll all be wanting their lunch.’

Thomas saw that they had reached Montagu Street. He handed over the basket and doffed his hat. ‘Thank you for your courtesy, Mrs Firestone.’

She gave him a sharp look. ‘If anything I’ve said is of help to Mrs Peters, I’m right glad. The idea she could have anything to do with the master’s death is …’ She huffed and puffed, trying to find words for her outrage. ‘Well, any who thinks that should be in a lunatic asylum. We shall ’ave to rely on you, Mr Jackman, ’cause that policeman ain’t no good, and you can tell him I said so. Mrs Peters in prison!’ She carried her basket down the basement stairs, her straight back expressing how ridiculous it was.

Thomas watched her go for a moment, then walked rapidly away, anxious not to be found in the vicinity should Mrs Trenchard suddenly appear. He thought that he now had a very clear idea of matters in the Peters household. It was time to move the focus of his investigation.

Rachel welcomed Ursula’s arrival with a sigh of relief.

‘Thank heavens you’re here! Let’s set off.’ She crammed a hat on her head, put on a jacket then hustled them both out of the door. The sun had come out and there was no hint now of rain.

‘Where is the prison?’ Ursula asked as they started hurrying in the direction of Victoria station.

‘Holloway is north of Islington,’ Rachel said, leaving Ursula no wiser. Her present knowledge of London was minimal. She regarded its vast sprawl as an ongoing project for which considerable time was needed. For the moment she was only concerned with how long it would take to reach Alice and the impossibility of the task she was expected to perform.