A Fatal Freedom (39 page)

Thomas waited for Ursula at the foot of the stairs, mulling over the results of his questioning of the inhabitants of the Dorset Square house.

‘Any luck?’ she asked as she reached the last step. He could not gauge from her expression whether she had had any more success than he had.

He shook his head, put on his bowler hat, tilting it slightly, opened the front door and offered her his arm down the steps and on to the pavement. He looked up at the sky. Dark clouds had invaded the blue and rain was in the air.

‘Do you have anything to report?’

‘I’m not sure,’ Ursula said slowly.

‘Well, that’s better than a flat “no”. I don’t know about you but I’m hungry. Let’s say goodbye to Mrs Duggan and then find somewhere we can have a bite to eat and talk over what we’ve learned. After all we’ve gone through in the last few hours, I think we deserve some refreshment.’

The caretaker had not yet recovered from the shock of finding Albert and it took a little time to extract themselves from her desire to relive the awful moment, hear exactly what the doctor had said and to lament the dreadful prospect of a visit from the police.

‘What it will do to our reputation, I do not know. And such a lovely man as Mr Pond was, such an improvement on Mr Jenkins, who never wanted to avail himself of my services. Lord, how I had to scrub that place after he left!’

‘Tell me, Mrs Duggan,’ said Ursula, just as it seemed they could take their leave. ‘What do you think of Mr Barnes?’

She bridled. ‘What should I think of someone who keeps a nasty little mouse in a cage? Though what he thinks it is might be anything; seeing as how he can’t hardly see to tie his shoelaces.’

‘Thank you, Mrs Duggan,’ said Thomas hastily. ‘You have been most helpful this morning. Come, Miss Grandison, we must not take up more of Mrs Duggan’s time.’

‘No, indeed,’ said Ursula. She gave the caretaker a swift smile and started up the basement steps to the pavement.

‘I know a nice little eatery in Marylebone Lane,’ he said, guiding her in the right direction. ‘It looks as though it is going to rain. If we get a move on, we might get there before the deluge, then we can talk comfortably.’

* * *

It was a close-run thing but Thomas found the
Plate of Beef
just as the first drops of rain started. He pushed open the door and they entered.

A small, smiling man with several chins and a long white apron immediately approached. ‘Mr Jackman, long time no see!’

‘Billy, good to be here again. I’m glad business has brought me in this direction. Let me introduce Miss Grandison, she is assisting me in some enquiries.’

‘I’m honoured, Madam. May I take your coat? I’ve a nice little table at the back where you won’t be troubled.’

‘What a wonderful place,’ Ursula said, looking around the small but lively eatery. It was halfway through the afternoon but there were a number of customers attacking the hearty food the
Plate of Beef
served up. ‘I can imagine Mr Dickens using it in one of his great books.’

Billy looked delighted. ‘My dear old dad started this place and he said that the great Charles Dickens did indeed eat here.’ Billy led the way to the back and a small table for two. He held out a chair for Ursula and magicked a white tablecloth over the bare pine. ‘There’s a couple of servings of steak and kidney pudding left, if that would please you?’

‘Wonderful! Ursula, are you acquainted with one of England’s great culinary delights?’

‘No, but I would like to be.’ She smiled up at the proprietor.

‘And a couple of pints of your best ale,’ said Thomas. He watched Ursula take in her surroundings. ‘It’s very plain here, but the food is excellent and Billy and I go back a long way. I helped him and his dad over a minor difficulty with beer tax while I was a constable on the beat.’

‘I love it!’ Ursula’s eyes sparkled and Thomas realised he had forgotten how large they were and such a clear grey. They turned her from a pleasant looking but far from beautiful woman into something out of the ordinary. ‘It’s just what I imagined ye olde England would be like. Look at those leaded windows, the panes are the old type of glass. And I would imagine that the customers are all locals. Manet should paint them.’

Thomas looked at the customers, mainly men, who sat finishing their meals. ‘I don’t know who Manet is, does he specialise in capturing ordinary people instead of the rich and powerful?’

‘I saw several of his paintings in Paris, they were usually of the French bourgeoisie, the middle classes. He has a way of getting under the skin of the people he paints and presenting them without pretension. Now,’ Ursula took off her gloves and placed them at the side of the table. ‘Did you learn anything from the residents you spoke to?’

Before he could start, two tankards of ale arrived. Thomas watched Ursula try hers and he smiled as she said, ‘This is wonderful and just what I needed; it’s been an extraordinary morning.’

‘Hasn’t it!’ Thomas drank deeply and began to feel himself relaxing. He had endured harder mornings of work but few that had offered such a variety of experiences. That minx Millie and the circus; the walk across to Marylebone with Ursula relating her wild theory of the Count Meyerhoff as spy – not that it was without the bounds of possibility but, no evidence! – and then finding that blighter Albert dead – and of cyanide poisoning! For Thomas that fact both simplified and complicated the Joshua Peters case. Simplified it because if the same killer had disposed of both man and servant, then the possibility of mistakes on his part had multiplied and made identification more likely. Complicated because all the indications pointed to blackmail as the motive for the murders. But for blackmail to be effective required there to be proof behind a threat of exposure and proof in this case was missing. Again, no evidence, just theory. Yet everything pointed to blackmail. Apart, that is, from Alice Peters wishing to dispose of an inconvenient husband.

‘Not much luck with those neighbours I managed to speak to,’ he said, putting down a half-empty tankard with a sigh of satisfaction. ‘I had high hopes of numbers five and six. They are nearest to the attic apartment and therefore the most likely to have noticed anyone visiting there. However, there was no answer to number five. Number six is the home of Miss Hart, a woman of indeterminate years who seemed on the point of collapse when I told her what had happened to Pond. I had to assist her to a chair and find a glass of water.’

‘Oh dear, had she become friends with him?’

‘After apologising for being the bearer of bad news, I managed to get out of her that she had had a couple of brief conversations with Pond and thought him,’ Thomas brought out his notebook and flipped to the page he wanted. ‘Thought him, “Someone who needed the love of a good woman”.’

‘And believed that she could be that good woman?’

‘I identified her as the sort who reads sentimental stories in women’s magazines and lives in a world of her own imaginings.’

‘Daniel Rokeby writes stories for magazines,’ said Ursula, smiling. ‘Not that I think that is anything to do with the matter we’re discussing. And you think Miss Hart – was that the name? – that Miss Hart could have built a fantasy of bringing love into the life of Albert Pond on the basis of a couple of brief conversations with him? Well, I have known women like that. In fact there is at least one living at Mrs Maples’. But was Miss Hart aware of a visitor to the attic flat yesterday?’

‘She said she wasn’t there. She is employed as a clerk in an insurance company.’ Thomas referred to his notebook again. ‘Leaves every day except Sunday at half past eight and gets back at around six; half past one on Saturday. She’d only just returned when I knocked.’

Ursula looked thoughtfully at her tankard of ale. ‘All these lonely women. There are several where I am living. They work at boring jobs for little pay. When I suggested we might visit a theatre together or go out for a meal, at a place like this, for instance,’ she glanced at the other tables. ‘Well, they were shocked and said that without a male escort it just would not be possible. Not for a single woman.’

She paused for a moment. ‘Would having the vote make them more free? More able to take advantage of life? Or is it a mindset? I don’t think Rachel Fentiman, for instance, feels like that. With or without the vote, she makes the most of life. However, let’s return to Dorset Square. How about the ground floor?’

‘Not much luck there, either. At number two, I spoke to a young wife who told me, very proudly, that her husband worked in the City of London but would be home shortly, did I want to wait? Asked about possible visitors the previous day, she explained that she had spent it visiting her mother in Putney.’

‘A dutiful daughter and loving wife, I expect she is already doing charitable works of some sort or another while waiting to become a mother.’

Ursula’s arms were folded in front of her on the table, her attention concentrated on his report. Thomas found himself grateful for her interest and intelligent responses. He realised again how much he missed working with his fellow officers on the police force.

‘So, how about number two?’ she asked.

Thomas glanced again at his notebook. ‘A retired couple, Mr and Mrs Blanchard. Well dressed, pleased with life and very jolly - until they heard my news. He said it was “bally awful” and that he didn’t know what the neighbourhood was coming to. She said she hadn’t liked Mr Pond at all. Whereupon Mr Blanchard turned on her, saying she’d never spoken to the feller beyond a “good morning” and he thought Pond had been “all right”. Then she told him he’d ever had any ability to judge his fellow men.

‘When I could get a word in, I asked about visitors the previous day. Mrs Blanchard had been out for tea with a group of women friends; Mr Blanchard called them, “the harridans from hell”. At that she said I should take no notice of him, he was only upset at being left on his own. And he told me he’d spent the afternoon reading and snoozing., then added that he may have heard Mrs Duggan go upstairs at one stage but that was all. When I asked how he knew it was the caretaker, he said it sounded like her footstep. Mrs Blanchard claimed he wouldn’t know the difference between a giant and a fairy going upstairs. I couldn’t get any estimation of what time he heard those footsteps.’ Thomas closed his notebook with a little sigh. ‘What about you?’

At that moment their steak and kidney puddings arrived. ‘Better sample this first,’ Thomas said, setting to with enthusiasm.

‘It’s wonderful!’ Ursula exclaimed after a couple of mouthfuls. ‘Such a flavour, and the suet crust is so light. We get very reasonable food at Mrs Maples’ but this is in a different league.’

Thomas felt a sense of triumph, as much as if he had cooked the food himself. He let her eat half of her serving then asked again if she’d heard anything useful.

She frowned a little then told him of a deaf widow and what sounded like a very odd old man.

‘What did you say? He saw an angel?’

Ursula chuckled. ‘Oh, dear, I don’t think I’ve made much sense. I’ll try again. Mr Barnes is very old, very eccentric and almost blind. He seems to have very little idea of time and I don’t think he knows one day from another. When he opened the door to me, he looked utterly delighted and called me his angel. Then he claimed to have seen his angel going upstairs the prevous day, or it could have been the day before.’ She fiddled with her cutlery for a moment, then said, ‘He wanted me to have a cup of tea with him, I think he is very lonely.’ She glanced across at Thomas. ‘I’m afraid I told him my husband was waiting; I do apologise for taking your name in vain like that.’

To Thomas’s delight, he saw a little colour rise in her cheeks, almost a blush.

‘I am honoured,’ he said gravely.

‘I had to tell you in case we needed to go back and talk to him again.’

Thomas’s attention sharpened. ‘You think he might really have seen a female going upstairs?’

Ursula carefully finished the last scrap of steak and kidney pudding and put her knife and fork neatly together. ‘So many Americans leave their cutlery all adrift on their plates, I think it is very sloppy. And if the food isn’t quite finished, the waiting staff do not know whether to take the plate or not. That was truly delicious.’ She applied her napkin to her lips, then looked at Thomas. ‘Do I believe he saw someone going upstairs? I honestly do not know. If he did, maybe it was Mrs Duggan.’

Thomas smiled at the idea of the caretaker as angel. ‘But Mr Barnes would have seen her time after time; no possibility he could mistake her for anyone else, with or without wings.’ He thought a little. ‘Suppose, just for a moment, that Barnes did see an unknown woman climbing the stairs.’

‘Who went to the attic, called on Albert and somehow fed him cyanide?’

He nodded. ‘And suppose it was the same person, or someone in league with them, who sent Peters a box of poisoned liqueur chocolates?’

‘It couldn’t have been Alice,’ said Ursula quickly. ‘She’s in prison.’

‘But her sister isn’t. I know you don’t think either girl could be involved,’ he said quickly as he saw Ursula about to protest. ‘But let’s just think of candidates, ignoring any attachment we might have to them.’

‘You think I’m as sentimental as Miss Hart!’ Ursula said with a quick laugh but Thomas recognised that she wasn’t really amused.

‘Ursula Grandison, I would never, never call, or even think, you sentimental! But you will have to admit that you think of those sisters as friends and we never like to think of those we have given our friendship to as capable of any crime, let alone murder. But if you are an investigator, you have to look at the evidence and nothing but the evidence.’

She slowly nodded her head. ‘I understand what you are saying. OK, then,’ she suddenly sounded very American. ‘So let’s look at all the women who might, just possibly, have had cause to wish Albert Pond removed from life.’

‘Ah here comes Billy to see if we want anything else. They have excellent apple pie here.’

‘Everything all right, folks?’ said Billy.

‘I’d love a cup of coffee,’ said Ursula quickly.