Mrs. Jeffries Rocks the Boat (4 page)

“There’s only seven houses on the square.” Barnes could have sworn there were more than that.

“Oh yes.” Tavistock beamed proudly. “The houses are all quite large, sir. Not like some other places I could mention. There’s only the seven of us.”

“What’s the gardener’s name and where can I locate him?” Witherspoon asked. He was confident that Barnes had written down all the necessary particulars about the square’s residents, and he wanted to make sure he took care of this bit of information before it completely slipped his mind.

“Jonathan Siler,” Tavistock said. “I don’t know where he lives. You can get that information from Mr. Heckston. But I’m sure that Jonathan hasn’t anything to do with this poor woman’s death. He’s been taking care of the garden for years and he’s a decent fellow, certainly wouldn’t go about stabbing his betters. Not, of course, that we don’t have to keep after him to keep the place up to our standards. You know how that class of person is. They’ll do a fine job as long as you keep a close eye on them.”

Witherspoon said nothing. He could easily have argued the point. He’d seen more than one case of murder where someone’s “betters” got a bullet in the brain or a knife in their
back. “I’m sure your gardener is most trustworthy. But you do understand, we have to talk with him.”

“He’s due here this morning,” Tavistock said. “As a matter of fact, he ought to be turning up any moment now.”

“When did you arrive back from your trip abroad?” Witherspoon asked.

“Yesterday evening. I stopped and had a bite to eat in a restaurant near Victoria, fetched Hector and came on home.”

“And how long have you been gone, sir?” Barnes asked.

“Two weeks. I’d planned to stay longer.” Tavistock smiled sheepishly, “but I found myself missing home.” Again he leaned down and patted his dog. “You know how it is, sir. One goes off expecting to have a marvelous time and one finds that one misses the comforts of home. I know everyone says Italy has such superb weather, but frankly, this time of year it’s simply too hot. I’d fully planned on staying a month. I sent the staff a telegram telling them I was coming home early.”

“I see,” Witherspoon said slowly. He didn’t think there was much more this witness could tell him. Nodding at Barnes, he rose to his feet. “You’ve been most helpful, sir. Pity you weren’t in the garden last night…”

“Who says I wasn’t?” Tavistock exclaimed. “Of course I went into the garden. I had to take Hector walkies before we retired. Mind you, it was quite late when we went in, around midnight I should say.”

“Why were you there so late?” Barnes asked.

Tavistock shot him a disgruntled look. “You obviously don’t have a dog, Constable. Especially a dog that’s quite excited to see you.”

“Oh.” The constable nodded in understanding. “Took him out to do his business, I see.”

“Precisely, sir. We went all the way into the garden too.”

“And there was nobody there,” Witherspoon said.

“Precisely,” Tavistock replied. “If there had been, Hector would have found them. He’s quite good at finding things.”

CHAPTER 2

Betsy broke into a welcoming smile as she opened the front door. “Constable Griffiths, how nice to see you. What brings you here? Inspector Witherspoon was up and out hours ago.” She could tell by the pleased expression on his face that he hadn’t come bearing bad news about their inspector.

“I’ve brought a message for the household, miss.” He smiled bashfully. “Inspector Witherspoon’s been called out on a murder case. He won’t be home till quite late.”

“A murder. Really?” Betsy threw the door open wide. “Come in, then.”

“I’d love to, Miss Betsy,” he explained, “but I’ve got to get over to Constable Barnes’s house and tell his missus he won’t be home in time for supper.”

Betsy wasn’t about to let the details of a murder slip through her fingers so easily. “Oh, but you must have a cup of tea,” she implored him with a pouting smile. She hated using such tactics to get her own way, but she simply couldn’t risk his going without telling them the details. “You simply must. It’s so warm out today, I’m sure you’re tired from coming all the way over here. Come down to the kitchen with me.”

Constable Griffiths hesitated. He was quite sweet on Miss Betsy. She was ever such a pretty girl. But he didn’t wish to be derelict in his duty. “I really shouldn’t, miss.”

“Nonsense, if you’re worried about getting the message to Mrs. Barnes, don’t be.” She reached out, snagged his arm and tugged him into the house. Surprised by her aggressiveness, he found himself inside before he could stop her.

“It’s still quite early, you’ll have plenty of time to get to the Barnes house.” Betsy slammed the door shut on her victim and gave him another dazzling smile. “Inspector Witherspoon would be most upset if he knew we’d let you leave without giving you refreshment.” Still holding his arm, she tugged him towards her, whirled about and ran smack into Smythe.

He glared at the dainty hand on the constable’s sleeve.

Betsy glared right back at him. “Constable Griffiths’s come to give us a message,” she blurted before Smythe could run the poor lad off. “There’s been a murder, and the inspector won’t be home till late. We’re just on our way to the kitchen to have tea.”

With the men in tow, Betsy led the way downstairs.

When the three of them trooped into the kitchen, Mrs. Jeffries and Mrs. Goodge, who were sitting at the table, making up menus for the week, looked up in surprise.

“There’s been a murder,” Betsy blurted, “and Constable Griffiths’s come all this way just to let us know the inspector’ll be home late. I insisted he have a cup of tea before he goes on to the Barnes house.”

“But of course he’ll have tea.” Mrs. Goodge snatched up the menus and stuffed them in her apron. “And something to eat as well.”

Within moments, Wiggins had appeared and the entire household gathered around the table to have tea with the constable.
They looked expectantly at the housekeeper. No one wanted to be the first to speak. They’d leave that up to Mrs. Jeffries. The wrong question, the wrong attitude could have terrible consequences. Constable Griffiths wasn’t stupid. If they didn’t handle this just right, he could easily guess it was the household helping to investigate the inspector’s cases that gave the man such success. None of them were prepared to do anything that would injure their employer. He’d been far too good to all of them.

With a barely perceptible nod of her head, Mrs. Jeffries acknowledged that she understood. Then she smiled at the constable, leaned back and fired her first salvo. “I must say, Constable, I do so admire you policemen. I don’t think I could start my day by doing something as dreadful as investigating a murder. I think it’s terribly, terribly brave of you.” Flattery always worked.

“Oh, there’s nothing to it, really. It’s all part of the job,” Griffiths replied modestly. “Mind you, a murder like this one doesn’t come along every day.”

“Who got killed?” Wiggins asked eagerly. Now that Mrs. Jeffries had taken the lead, the rest of them instinctively understood how to play their own parts. Wiggins, because he was young, could get away with asking blunt, straightforward questions.

“Now that’s a right interestin’ question,” Griffiths replied. “We don’t know. The woman didn’t have anything on her to make an identification.”

“It’s a woman, then,” Mrs. Goodge commented brusquely.

“Oh, how sad,” Betsy cried. Like the footman, she too stepped into her part with ease. “Some poor woman get’s murdered and they don’t even know who she is. How awful…I’ll bet she’s some poor street woman down on her luck.”

“This woman weren’t poor,” Griffiths said. “She were well dressed, well fed and laying on a bench in a private garden in a posh part of town.”

“What private garden?” Smythe asked. “Someplace near here?”

“Sheridan Square.”

“That’s too close for my liking.” Mrs. Goodge shook her head in disgust. “We’ll all be murdered in our beds, we will. What’s the world coming to when a decent woman can’t even walk the streets of London without being murdered for her money?”

“We don’t think she were murdered for her money,” Griffiths said quickly. Then he blushed. “I mean, the inspector doesn’t. I overheard him talking to Constable Barnes. The garden where she were found is private. You had to have a key to get in and out. She didn’t have one on her and she weren’t no young woman, so we don’t think she nipped over the fence. Besides, it’s six foot tall and it’d be hard for even a man, let alone a middle-aged woman to get past them spikes running along the top.”

“What’s that got to do with ’er bein’ killed fer ’er money?” Wiggins asked. He wasn’t playing a part now; he really wanted to know.

“It means whoever killed her probably had the key and let her into the garden with it,” the constable explained. “The inspector and the others reckon she must have known her killer.”

Mrs. Jeffries nodded in encouragement. “I see. Well, I expect you gentlemen will have it all cleared up in no time.”

Stealthily, they questioned the constable until they’d wrung every little detail about the murder out of him, and then Betsy escorted him to the door.

As soon as the two of them had disappeared up the front steps, Smythe leapt to his feet. “I think I know how we can identify the victim.”

“How?” Mrs. Jeffries asked.

“She didn’t fly into that garden and if she weren’t layin’ there last night when that Tavistock fellow took his dog out, that means she musta gone there early this mornin’. There’s a hansom stand not more than a quarter of a mile from Sheridan Square. I’ll nip over there and see what I can find out.”

“You think she went there by hansom cab?” Mrs. Goodge asked.

“She ’ad to get there someway,” Smythe reasoned, “and a respectable well-dressed woman walkin’ the streets in the dead of night or early of a mornin’ woulda been noticed by the constable on patrol. But accordin’ to what Griffiths said, no one saw hide nor hair of her.”

“You’re right, Smythe.” Mrs. Jeffries nodded. “There’s a good chance the victim did use a cab. Go on and see what you can find out. We’ll meet back here this evening.”

Smythe nodded and took off towards the back door.

“Where’s he goin’?” Betsy asked as she came back to the kitchen.

“To see if the victim got to Sheridan Square by a hansom cab,” Mrs. Goodge said. “And I don’t think it’s fair. Smythe gets to do something, and the rest of us have to sit here twiddling our thumbs because the silly woman managed to get herself murdered without anyone knowing who she was.”

“We’ve plenty to do,” Mrs. Jeffries said calmly. “For starters, you’ve got to get that provision list ready and off to the grocer’s so you can prepare to feed your sources. The larders are empty.”

“I suppose so,” Mrs. Goodge agreed grudgingly. But she was still annoyed that Smythe had got the jump on them. There was just the teeniest bit of natural competition between the males and the females in the household.

“The larders really are empty,” Mrs. Jeffries said again. “If we manage to identify that woman quickly, you’re going to be in a bit of a pickle if you haven’t anything on hand to feed people.”

The cook decided to give in gracefully. “You’re right. I’d best be ready. Let me see, where did I put that list? Ah yes, here it is, in my pocket with the menus.”

Mrs. Goodge did her investigating in her own way. She baked enough to feed an army and then opened her kitchen to dozens of London’s working people. Costermongers, servants, delivery boys, rag-and-bones men, flower girls, and
shoeblacks; one and all traversed through Mrs. Goodge’s kitchen. While they were there, she pumped them for every morsel of gossip about the suspects in a particular case. But she didn’t stop there. She also had her own network of servants from other households feeding her information. She’d cooked for a number of England’s finest families, and she still had connections all over the country. She was quite ruthless about using them as well.

Betsy frowned. “It’s all well and good that Mrs. Goodge has something to do, but what about Wiggins and me? Are we just supposed to sit about twiddling our thumbs?”

“Of course not,” Mrs. Jeffries replied. She quite understood Betsy’s complaint. “There’s plenty we must do. I’d like you to nip over to Luty and Hatchet’s and tell them what’s happened. They’ll need to be here this afternoon for our meeting.”

Luty Belle Crookshank and her butler, Hatchet, were friends of the household. They frequently helped on the inspector’s cases. Luty Belle, in particular, threw a fit if she was left out.

Mollified, Betsy nodded. “Right. Do you want me to get on over to Sheridan Square afterward and see what I can suss out?”

“Absolutely,” Mrs. Jeffries agreed, “but do be careful. You mustn’t let the inspector or anyone who might recognize you catch even so much as a glimpse of you.”

“I’ll be careful,” Betsy promised.

“What am I goin’ to do, men?” Wiggins asked eagerly.

“You’re going to get over to Sheridan Square as well,” she replied. “But unlike Betsy, you’re to make yourself known as a member of the inspector’s household.”

“What?” Wiggins jaw dropped. “Are you ’aving me on, Mrs. Jeffries?”