The Haunted Season (25 page)

“I've had Constable Musteile on it,” said Cotton. Off Max's look, Cotton said, “He's all we had. We're that shorthanded. Sergeant Essex has been in Monkslip Foot working a drug deal that ended in murder. She's just back from consulting with our colleagues in Winfrith.”

Cotton punched a number into his mobile, explaining what he wanted when Musteile answered. To Max's ears, Cotton was using a talking-to-idiots voice, but on reflection it was the appropriate tone to use with Musteile, a man whose officiousness was kept in check only by his incompetence.

“Where are we with this?” asked Cotton. “I want to know about mistresses if there were any, old girlfriends, friends of friends, the lot. Get our people at Oxford onto the son. The daughter's at Cambridge.”

“I've already spoken with someone there. A Sergeant Fear.”

“Good. I'll also need to know about every cyber footprint left by the victim. And by the victim's family. Every e-mail ever sent out into the world is stored for at least six months on a server somewhere. Even deleted e-mails can be reconstructed.”

Max could hear Musteile's tinny voice through the speakerphone. “Should I alert the local horse watch members?”

“I don't see why you should,” Cotton replied. “Besides, they're probably reading about it in the
Globe and Bugle
right about now.”

“Interpol should be notified,” Musteile said. Cotton smiled over at Max to see if he'd heard that last. He had. “I'll ask to file a Red Notice with them. That's an international arrest warrant. We could have him extradited. Once we know who he is. And where he's gone.”

Ye gods and little
— “I know what a Red Notice is, Constable Musteile. I—”

But he was gone. Musteile had a habit of snapping off a phone conversation without a good-bye, something he'd seen detectives do in films.

“Goddamn it,” said Cotton, ringing him back. “Damn damn triple damn it. What a blooming idiot.”

When Musteile answered, Cotton barked, “Listen and don't hang up, or I'll have your guts pulled into guitar strings, I swear I will. I also need you to get a search warrant
if
we need one. Stand by to move on that.” Cotton explained what was wanted—it was a request he was relaying at Max's suggestion. “Got that?”

“Yes.”

There was a long, drawn-out silence.

“You can ring off now,” Cotton told him.

There was a click as Musteile ended the connection.

“Jeez,” muttered Cotton, staring at the phone. Max laughed at his expression.

“I mean,” said Cotton, “you have to wonder what recruits were rejected for the constabulary in the year Musteile was applying.”

“Oh, he's not so…” began Max. “Well, all right, he is, but it could be worse.”

“Do you really think it could?” asked Cotton.

Max looked about him at the room. “Nice of them to put you up here.”

The investigative team had set up a satellite shop in what appeared to be a drawing room. Or, as Cotton said, “a withdrawing room, a ballroom, an indoor tennis court—God knows. The butler who showed me in called it the Chinese Room. I've been puzzling over why. Something to do with that vase over there, I'd guess.” He pointed to a small porcelain vase of green and yellow, preserved under a museum-style dome. “Anyway, this place has more rooms with more specific assigned purposes than Buckingham Palace. How many rooms no one ever sets foot in is anyone's guess. And the stables! The stables can house thirty-six horses, so I'm told. I wonder if the horses have a vase, too. Anyway, as you can see, we have a sweeping view of the lawn and gardens in which to ponder how Lord Baaden-Boomethistle met his death. No doubt my team will find it all inspiring as the sunlight dances in the spray from the fountains.”

The spot where they stood overlooked a flagstone terrace leading to a green lawn shaven flat in lines of a mathematical precision. In summer, the urns on the patio would spill over with trailing flowers; the garden beds now exploded in a blaze of fall reds and oranges.

The two men watched the play of the fountains for a bit, then turned to look about them at the marble fireplaces—plural; at the flocked wallpaper—green; at the Aubusson carpet—worn thin in a manner that broadcast rarity rather than poverty; and at a painting ornately framed in gold leaf of Lord Bayer Baaden-Boomethistle dressed for the hunt, clutching a bugle and a riding crop, and managing to look simultaneously magisterial and ridiculous as he surveyed his opulent future. He looked many years younger and lighter on his feet than when last seen alive, although it was difficult to say if the hefty thighs were an illusion created by his roomy riding breeches. Max calculated the painting had to be two dozen years old. The painted dog at his feet, looking up at its master, seemed to be leaning toward the view that his master was ridiculous. It was a testament to the artist's abilities that he had managed to capture an expression something like contempt on the canine face.

Max's gaze swept the room. It was the type of house
Architectural Digest
might feature, showcasing Elton John or one of the Spice Girls splendidly draped over the furnishings at home, dressed in spangles for a night in front of the telly. No expense spared, no piece of wood or shard of porcelain left unembellished, no edge ungilded.

Cotton himself sat rather primly on a luxurious sofa, slowly sinking like the Titanic into the seductive embrace of its numerous pillows. He drew out his tablet computer and balanced it on one knee. He looked like a child of ten or so, lost in the vastness of red brocade and tasseled yellow velvet. Max stood beneath the portrait of Lord Baaden-Boomethistle, unconsciously assuming the man's commanding pose.

“I think this is what is called a morning room,” Max told him. “A sitting room used during the day, to catch the sun.” Max's understanding of the uses of such rooms was that the lady of the house would be found here of a morning, discussing plans for that evening's dinner party with the housekeeper. He could almost hear the tinkle of her spoon against bone china as she stirred sugar into her coffee, and the trill of her voice as she issued commands. “
No, no,
” she might say. “The Montesque-Netherbottoms must be seated
well
away from the Flibber-Jesnots. Bad blood there, you know, going back eons to some siege or another. Seat the daughter next to the vicar, where she'll be out of harm's way.”

“So there would be an evening room?” Cotton asked.

“Yes, but they probably wouldn't call it that.”

“The drawing room, then? I can't keep up with all of this. I really can't. It's exhausting.”

“Most people have only a parlor or living room for entertaining, if they're lucky,” agreed Max. “For occasions when they want to be grand.”

“My grandmother had a parlor straight out of the Old Curiosity Shop. Footstools went there to die, I swear—but not before they'd spent a lifetime tripping up visitors and sending then sprawling. Still, it was a great place for a young boy to pretend—oh, I don't know: to play cops and robbers, I suppose. This is just—you can't feel cozy in here, can you?”

“It's not meant to comfort, but to impress. Now, what do you say we exchange views, so to speak, and see where our thinking has led us? I know you've been interviewing the locals. Any result there?”

Cotton was himself a local man, or localish. His mother had been a performer of sorts, who would drop him off in Monkslip-super-Mare for a long stay with her sister while she herself went on tour. More often than not, she would forget to pick him up again. Fortunately, the sister seemed to have been a basically decent sort and had given Cotton what stability he'd had growing up.

“Not really. Most of them seem strangely reluctant to tip the nobs into it. They may not like them much, but I think there's a certain amount of civic pride in having such a great old family in the neighborhood.”

“Can anyone speak to their expertise with horses?”

Now Cotton swiped away a few screens on his computer until he arrived at the page he wanted. “Peregrine and his sister, Rosamund, both ride,” Cotton told him. “Although Peregrine is most often to be seen pedaling about on his bicycle. The family all ride well, according to the stable hands. Except for the dowager—she decided a few years ago she couldn't risk a fall. But she used to ride regularly. The rarity is to see them walking about on their own two legs under their own power—any of the Baaden-Boomethistles.”

“What exactly did Lord Baaden-Boomethistle do before he retired?”

“Not much, from what I gather. He had scads of family money. He had one of those aristocratically obscure occupations, like being captain of the Scottish elephant polo team. So when he drifted over the line officially into retirement, it was scarcely discernible from whatever he'd been doing before, if you follow.”

“Yes, I do see.” Max had met many such in his career. In almost no case could a job title be applied to men such as Lord Baaden-Boomethistle, or at least none that would stick. They just
were,
and they did the odd thing for charity, and they sat on this or that board, offering unwanted advice and opinion. Overall, however, they probably did more good than harm. And some men and women of the aristocracy were exceedingly generous in giving both their time and money to a cause, particularly one close to their hearts.

“The more competent members of my team have talked to a few of the lord's compatriots,” said Cotton. “Their displays of grief seem to be less along the lines of having lost a great friend, and more along the lines of having been made aware of their own mortality. Quite often the wealthy seem to think they'll live forever, and they don't care for reminders that death is the great leveler.”

“It is indeed. Beyond that, what do we have?”

As always, Cotton thrilled to Max's use of the plural. His unofficial consulting had helped close several of Cotton's cases. Max could be relied on to see the connections, the little clues, that others often missed. Cotton planned to write up some of these cases one day, when he had time.

“My people have searched everywhere, of course,” Cotton told him. “Nothing of a suspicious nature has been found.”

“Including on his computer?” Max asked. “Anything that jumps out at one from his recent correspondence?”

“Nothing so far to indicate trouble, but we've only done a quick preliminary. His e-mail account revealed subscriptions to men's clubs, a lively interest in the horse trade, and an overdue bill from his bespoke tailor.”

“No threats received or made, then. Is the bill suggestive?”

“The fact that it was overdue, you mean? No. It might depend on what you mean by ‘overdue,' however. His tailor is one of those posh outfits that think in terms of centuries rather than weeks. Anything overdue would be handed down to the next generation, all of whom would order its new shirts at the same place. But since you mention it, the overdue bill was for something the son, Peregrine, purchased and put on the family account.”

“Ah.”

“Yes, a review of Peregrine's obligations does reveal a few debts overlooked. He seems to have a weakness for playing the horses, and a talent for placing losing bets. And when did eyeglasses get to be so expensive? Anyway, I'm picking up rumors that he's involved with a rather gay crowd—gay in the modern sense—
Brideshead
-ish. You know. Not that it matters or has any connection to his lack of financial-management skills.”

“I never heard that. Where did that rumor start?”

“With his sister, for one. She says she got the gay bulletin from her stepmother, however. Who, after all, ‘is the expert in these matters,' whatever that means.”

“What's your read on the daughter?” Max asked.

“Rosamund? Disgruntled. Very bright. Puts the rest of them in the shade, really. She has no use for the brother and barely tries to hide it. I gather she'd like to see him hang for this if we could arrange it. I can see her as she might be in years to come. Competent. Complacent. In charge of something or other, probably some charity she's founded herself, and as sure of her right to rule as Queen Elizabeth I was of hers. It's tough darts for Rosamund to be second in line to the ‘throne.' She has never been happy having to share anything with her brother, or he with her. But I think I can see her point of view. She's miles smarter than her brother and doesn't see why his being firstborn and male means he grabs everything.”

“She has even less use for her stepmother, I'd say.”

“That's for certain. By the way, we've got the tests back on the strands caught in that initialed gold clip. As it turns out, Rosamund lied in vain; the roots of the hair were not intact, so we can't rely on DNA to pinpoint it as Bree's hair. It probably is, though, since she acknowledges the clip was hers.”

“And what else does she acknowledge?”

“I have, of course, spoken at length with Lady Baaden-Boomethistle,” Cotton replied. “Born Bree Anne Porter.” Again a swipe at his computer—Bree apparently rated her own separate page. “She has hazarded the opinion that her husband had no enemies. What she actually said was, ‘His many enemies are all dead now, I believe.' But she proclaims that she herself is ‘simply horizontal with grief.' Or she will be, once she gets a few social obligations out of the way.”

“Interesting choice of words,” said Max.

“Isn't it just? Given that there are rumors of the persons with whom she has been horizontal. There is an HRH on the list, I hear.”

“Surely not,” said Max. “I'd have heard of it long before now, I am sure, during elevenses at the Cavalier: Miss Pitchford and Suzanna are up on all that sort of thing. Besides, there are plenty of gallants in the near neighborhood.”

“None of them as highborn,” said Cotton. “Perhaps your parishioners were trying to spare your sensibilities. You are the vicar, after all, and perhaps they felt it was all too shocking for your pink shell-like ears. Anyway, Bree, on the occasions I spoke with her, seemed to be quite giddy with relief. And then she'd catch herself and realize it isn't the done thing to dance a jig when your husband has got himself murdered in such a remarkable way. Even if you do have an alibi. Which she does, an ironclad one—shopping in Monkslip-super-Mare, and staying the night with friends. She's all over the CCTV, and it's unmistakably her.”