Death by Silver (13 page)

Over the course of the afternoon, Julian worked his way through the rest of the staff without hearing much new. Miller, Mrs Nevett’s maid, sniffed at the idea of a curse – you’d expect something more dramatic than a kitchenmaid with a twisted ankle – but gave the details of Mrs Nevett’s social round without much prompting. She denied having heard Mr Nevett and Mr Reginald arguing, but admitted that such wasn’t uncommon, and certainly neither man had stayed to dinner. Though that wasn’t uncommon, either, as Mr Reginald spent most of his time at his club. It was hard on a young man to have to live at home, particularly when he was of an age to be setting up his household.

On the other hand, Jane Pugh, the senior housemaid who also served as Mrs Victor’s maid, believed whole-heartedly in the curse, and was sure it must have had something to do with Nevett’s death.

“Not that I don’t think Mr Mathey did his job,” she added hastily, “for I could feel the whole house lighter once he was done, but it’s hard to think it hadn’t drawn a burglar already.”

“It’s possible,” Julian said – and it would have been, had there in fact been a curse – and took her through the events of the day.

She, too, had seen nothing out of the ordinary. Even the break in her routine was familiar: Mrs Victor had spent part of the afternoon at Ellis’s mission, and he had brought them back again in his carriage.

“Which I know Mrs Victor was grateful for,” Jane said, “and so was I, to be honest. It’s a fine place, as such things go, and the girls that come from there are honest and willing, but – I’m nervous every time we have to go there, and that’s a fact.”

Mrs Rule, dragged reluctantly from her range, stood scowling, but recognized quickly enough that the best way to get back to work was to answer his questions. She’d been skeptical about the curse, but it was true that Mogs – Margaret – had hurt herself the very first time she’d been allowed to clean the forks, and in general she was a neat-footed girl, very handy. And Mr Nevett had looked thoughtful rather than angry, which to her mind meant he knew something they didn’t.

Other than that, the day had been much like any other. She hadn’t had to make tea for the family, bar Mr Frederick, who took his tea in his room because he had the headache, but there had been guests to dinner, and even if they were almost family, she had her pride to consider.

“Did Mr Nevett plan to stop to dinner?” Julian asked.

Mrs Rule pursed her lips. “I’d thought so,” she said, carefully. “Mrs Nevett ordered lamb chops with peas the way he likes – liked – them, so I assumed he was. But then she told me he wouldn’t stay, nor Mr Reggie neither.”

“Do you know what they quarreled about?” Julian asked again, and watched her bridle.

“I do not.”

“But you heard them at it,” he said.

She nodded reluctantly. “They did raise their voices, yes. Though it’s nothing new, fathers and sons don’t always get along, the more so when the sons are grown.”

“And it’s not easy having two mistresses in a house,” Julian said.

“Easier than you’d think,” Mrs Rule retorted. “Mrs Victor’s a lady, and she knows her place. And Mrs Nevett is as gracious as may be.”

And that summed up the household neatly enough, Julian thought. He was beginning to feel rather sorry for Victor’s wife.

Margaret Jones the kitchenmaid – she looked more like a Mogs than a Margaret, a skinny active girl with a frizz of red-brown hair and freckles scattered across her nose and cheeks – admitted to having twisted her ankle the very day she’d been told off to help Larkin and Sarah clean the silver after another dinner party.

“Mind you, I didn’t notice anything when I was polishing it,” she said scrupulously. “I rather liked it, actually. It’s pretty, all curlicues, and it’s not hard work to get it shining. Mr Larkin said I did a good job. But then I was running out the areaway, and I missed the step there where it’s cracked, and down I went. Mrs Victor sent for the doctor and there was a fuss, and I had to spend half a day in bed. And Mr Larkin said Mr Nevett said it was because of the silver.”

So Nevett had suggested the curse. Julian nodded, and led her through the events of the day of the murder. She’d seen nothing out of the ordinary, either, and less than the others, being stuck in the kitchen for most of her work. But her room was in the attic, where she shared with Sarah and Jane Pugh, so she’d known nothing about the burglary until Sarah came downstairs screaming.

“And well she might,” Mogs said. “I saw him myself when the police came. Cor, it was ugly, his head bashed in and blood everywhere. I saw a man get run over by a brewer’s dray, and he didn’t look no worse.”

“Nasty for you,” Julian said, though she seemed to have coped well enough. “Tell me about the day before. Was there anything out of the ordinary?”

Nothing, she said, and proved it by a quick rundown of her day’s work. She’d been in the kitchen most of the day, except when she was sent to the shops just before noon because the butter was off, and then there’d been nothing but washing and scraping and chopping things until Mr Reggie came storming down the stairs and out the garden gate.

“He’d been fighting with Mr Nevett,” she said, and stopped abruptly. “Which, please, sir, you shouldn’t take notice of. They argued all the time, him and Mr Nevett. It didn’t mean nothing.”

“But they neither one stayed to dinner?” Julian asked.

Mogs shook her head. “No, sir.”

“The police said that back gate was found open,” Julian said, without much hope, and she gave him a sharp glance.

“It was. They said the burglar must have got out that way.”

“Do you know if it was locked after Mr Reginald left?” he asked, and Mogs shrugged.

“Mrs Rule locks it every evening, and she’s not one to forget.”

That wasn’t exactly an answer, and he thought Mogs knew it, but before he could question her more closely, he saw a figure in the doorway. She took his glance as an invitation and came to join them, a neat and handsome figure in precisely calculated blacks.

“That’ll be all for now, Margaret,” Julian said, and came to his feet. “Mrs Nevett?”

“Mrs Victor Nevett,” she said, and held out her hand. “And you are Mr Lynes. Pugh said you’d been entirely reasonable, but I wanted be sure the staff didn’t feel bullied. You’ll forgive my being blunt, I’m sure.”

“Of course,” Julian said. She was pretty enough, with pleasant features and an ivory complexion, but her looks were marred by a pair of gold-rimmed spectacles. From the look of them, she was only moderately near-sighted, could probably manage quite well without them, and it said something about her character that she preferred clear sight to fashion. He wondered why in the world she’d ever married Victor. “After having the police in the house, I’m sure everything is upset.”

“A death is bad enough,” she said. “But this –” She stopped as though she couldn’t bring herself to call it murder. “My mother-in-law and I are particularly concerned about some of the younger members of the staff. They have been hired through Mr Ellis’s mission, and they already suffer a certain stigma on that account. I want to assure you that they are all honest girls, and very reliable. Mr Ellis would not have placed them with us had they been otherwise.”

“And they’ve given good service?” Julian asked.

She met his eyes squarely. “They most certainly have. It would do them no kindness to keep them on if they weren’t capable of doing the work.”

“And yet Mr Nevett complained.” That was something of a shot in the dark, but Julian was certain he was right.

“Mr Nevett was very exacting in his standards,” she answered. “Sometimes to a fault. But Mrs Nevett and I were satisfied.”

There was nothing to say to that. Julian bowed slightly, and escorted her back inside. Larkin was waiting, and they stepped into the tiny pantry as Mrs Victor drifted up the stairs.

“She’s very protective of her people,” Julian said.

Larkin bowed. “She and Mrs Nevett are ladies.”

There was no good answer to that, either. They retreated to the butler’s pantry, far too narrow for its purpose, and Larkin confirmed that, indeed, Nevett had been the first one to mention the curse.

“And in front of the younger females,” he said, “which is never well. They were overexcited about the mere idea, and I believe Mr Nevett was wise to have the silver looked at.”

He, too, proclaimed the day entirely ordinary, and was adamant that the quarrel between Nevett and his middle son was also nothing unusual. Young men who were trying to make their way in the world could be oversensitive, and Mr Nevett was perhaps not always tactful. But it was nothing more than that. He’d not noticed the silver missing first thing, but the burglar had closed the door of the pantry, and that had hidden it at first glance. It was only after Sarah had found Mr Nevett’s body that they’d thought to look for a robbery.

Julian thanked him, feeling the familiar overstretched, overstuffed exhaustion that came at the end of a day of interviews. There wasn’t anything more to be asked, at least not until he’d had a chance to talk to Ned. He folded his memorandum book into his pocket, and allowed that he was ready to rejoin his compatriot.

Ned followed Victor into the smaller back parlor, a more masculine room, with leather chairs and a number of bookcases; maps lined the walls rather than elaborate still lifes, although a large portrait of a younger Edgar Nevett and his wife hung over the fireplace. Both looked stiffly posed, and neither was smiling, but he supposed that was fashion.

The two younger Nevetts were sitting in armchairs with a decanter between them, both cradling glasses; Ned expected that if he were in their place, he’d want a stiff drink as well. Reggie had changed more than Victor, ruddier and even more plump than he’d been in school, with a curling mustache.

“Mathey, old man,” Reggie said, actually looking a bit pleased to see him. “Victor said he was bringing you in, but I thought you might not want to take on such a mess.”

“I’ll do what I can to sort it out, old boy,” Ned said.

In the other armchair, Freddie shook his head and drained his glass before putting it down. His black frock coat looked stiff and new in a way that made Ned suspect he hadn’t possessed one before going into mourning. His hair curled too long over his collar in a way that would have been unremarkable at Oxford but was probably now meant to signify artistic temperament.

“I won’t keep you long.” Ned settled into a chair himself. “And I think we’re all right here,” he said, glancing up at Victor. “I’m sure you’ll want to attend on your mother.”

“I’ll do that,” Victor said rather sourly, and went out.

“All right, then,” Ned said. He tried to shake the feeling that he ought to be in a Sts Thomas’s uniform with his books piled on the table rather than sitting here in a frock coat with his metaphysician’s case against his knee. “Just so that I can have it entirely straight, if you could tell me where you were the day Mr Nevett was killed?”

“I went to work as usual,” Reggie said. “I’m at Seale’s. My bank, that is. I’ve a position there.”

“You breakfasted here?”

“No, I spent the night at my club. I came here from the office.”

“Around what time would that have been?”

“I couldn’t tell you exactly. Around six o’clock.” He frowned at Freddie. “I didn’t see you when I came in.”

“I was upstairs,” Freddie said.

“Doing what?” Ned asked.

“I had to dress for dinner, didn’t I?”

“That doesn’t take an hour,” Reggie said.

“I didn’t particularly care to encounter the pater,” Freddie said. “I’d been sick with a headache that morning – a late night, you know – and he was never very patient with anyone being ill.”

“And after you came in?”

“I went up to dress for dinner myself.” Reggie shifted uncomfortably in his chair, turning his glass around in his hands. “And then I had a talk with my father. He wanted to discuss some business matters. He called me into his study, and I couldn’t very well – I mean, of course I went in to hear him out.”

Ned made a note, and then frowned. “In his study? He was sitting at his desk?”

“He was.”

“And was the candlestick at that point in its accustomed place on the bookcase?”

“I suppose it was. Oh, I don’t know.” Reggie looked visibly flustered. “I think it was. It must have been, mustn’t it?”

Ned tended to agree, but only made a noncommittal noise. “What did you quarrel about?”

“We didn’t quarrel,” Reggie said. Freddie raised his eyebrows, but said nothing. “We were just talking.”

“What were you talking about?”

“Business matters.”

“What kind of business matters?”

“Banking, if you must know,” Reggie said, with a red-faced defiant expression that Ned would have been more inclined to believe if he hadn’t seen it too many times at Toms’ accompanied by a squeaked
I was paying attention, sir, really I was!
“Father felt I should have tried to get a position at Hoare’s with Victor rather than going to Seale’s. The family has always used Hoare’s. He felt strongly on the matter.”

“And that was the source of your quarrel?”