The Pigeon Pie Mystery (21 page)

“I was a fur-puller, sir.”

“You don’t earn much pulling fluff off rabbit skins. Did you try your hand at anything else?”

“No, sir.”

“There are much easier ways for your sort to make money …”

“Inspector!” snapped Mink. “I will not tolerate your speaking to my maid in this manner.”

He looked at the maid. “You said in your testimony that you didn’t like the General.”

“I only spoke to him once, sir. That was at the picnic.”

“As I recall, that was the occasion when you publicly humiliated him by alleging that he had killed Lady Beatrice’s doves and sold them to the butcher.”

“He asked me whether I knew any gossip. He laughed very much, sir.”

He paused. “You don’t like the British much, do you?”

The maid nodded. “I do, sir. Her Highness is half English. Before the Maharaja died she always gave me extra beer money.”

“So you like a drink?”

“No, sir. I sent the money to my mother in India.”

“Were you aware that the General fought in the Indian Mutiny?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Who told you?”

“Alice Cockle, Lady Bessington’s maid-of-all-work. She has told me lots of things about the residents.”

The Inspector studied her for a moment. “How many Indians were killed during the mutiny, do you think?” he asked. “Tens of thousands? Hundreds of thousands?”

“I do not know, sir. It was thirty years ago.”

“Do you think the General took part in the slaughter? Did he order convicted rebels to be tied over the mouths of cannons and blown into smithereens, or did he just hang them?”

The maid shook her head. “I do not know anything about that, sir.”

“Don’t you? Is there any arsenic in this house?”

“There’s none, Inspector,” Mink interrupted. “Apart from my Dr. MacKenzie’s Arsenical Complexion Soap. You see it advertised everywhere.”

He looked at her. “I know the one. My wife uses it. I presume you won’t mind if my constable and I search the premises?”

“Go right ahead, Inspector,” she said. “Oh, and if you find my collection of Sherlock Holmes stories, do let me know. I can’t find
it anywhere. I’m in the middle of the one with the police inspector who literally hasn’t got a clue.”

The Inspector walked out to fetch his constable, pulling the door loudly behind him. Mink and Pooki remained where they were, then slowly turned and looked at each other.

GRABBING HIS HAT, DR. HENDERSON
pressed inside his short wooden stethoscope and rushed out, uttering assurances to his housekeeper that he would be back shortly. “No feeding the patients, Mrs. Nettleship,” he warned as he pulled on his coat and shut the door behind him. Trotting next to him was a red-faced maid who had run all the way from the palace to tell him of the emergency that had befallen her mistress, a dowager duchess, whom he had never previously treated. Unsure of what he would encounter, for the servant was largely incoherent, he had with him his pocket case containing a clinical thermometer, a female catheter, a small pair of forceps, a hypodermic syringe, a tongue depressor, lunar caustic, a probe, and a case of needles. In his other pocket, just in case, was a bottle of strychnine to start the aristocrat’s heart. Hoping that he wouldn’t be too late, he ran down Barge Walk, turning the heads of two punters idling on the Thames.

The doctor and the maid soon reached the riverside entrance of The Banqueting House, built in the palace gardens by William III as an after-dinner retreat, which had since been converted into a grace-and-favour residence. The sweating servant showed Dr. Henderson into the drawing room, where he sat catching his breath, looking at the silk wall hangings the mistress of the house had erected on either side of the fireplace to hide the naked ladies in Verrio’s spectacular murals.

The maid soon returned and took him up to the principal bedroom, where the curtains had been drawn against the view of the
water. Once his eyes had adjusted to the gloom, he made out the patient sitting up in bed wearing a white nightcap, an untouched bowl of gruel on the floor next to her. Lying in the corner was a spaniel, its head on its paws. Before Dr. Henderson had a chance to order the pet’s ejection from the sick room, the Dowager Duchess proceeded to list her symptoms as if running through her order with the fishmonger. When she finished, he performed the five cardinal duties. But after feeling her pulse, examining her tongue, and inquiring about her appetite, sleep, and bowels, he could find neither the cause of her symptoms nor indeed any trace of them. The woman continued elaborating on her misfortunes until he was forced to use his tongue depressor in order to be able to think. He then trod around the room, emitting the faintest of creaks, staring at the floor in the hope that the answer would come to him. It was then that he noticed the dog’s discarded bone, its watery eyes, the bulge of its belly, and its tail that refused to wag.

Immediately understanding the real reason why he had been called out, he grabbed his coat with irritation and started putting it on, watched by the open-mouthed aristocrat. He then turned to her and said, “Your Grace, you are in a particularly robust state of health. However, your dog, it seems, is suffering from worms. I suggest that you consult the vet in future, even though his charges are higher than mine and he lives further away. I should like to inform you that my fee for patients with four legs is twice that for those with only two, and requires immediate settlement. I shall wait in the drawing room.”

Dr. Henderson strolled back down Barge Walk, warmed by the inner glow of victory. Not only was his fee snug in his waistcoat pocket, but while he had been waiting to be paid he had pulled back one of the wall hangings and peeked at a bare-breasted lady. Just as he felt his dignity had been restored, he sensed again that something was wrong with his hat. He took it off, looked at the label, and immediately saw that it was not his own. Hoping he was
mistaken, he returned it to his head. But there was no doubting its unsatisfactory fit. He thought back over the numerous home calls he had made, during which time he had left his topper in the hall with several others, and wondered which visitor had made off with his by mistake, or indeed taken it as a better option. As he passed Trophy Gate, he saw Pike and Gibbs smirking at him, elbowing each other in the ribs. He then thought of all the other people who had seen him that day, and to his utter mortification suddenly realised that he had walked past the Princess while she was sitting outside.

Once home, he was prevented from reaching his consulting room by Mrs. Nettleship, who was brandishing a devastating smile that revealed a ruinous row of cheese-coloured teeth. A woman whose brain had been softened by a surfeit of romantic novels, she was now of the conviction that not only was the doctor in love with the Countess, but that his affection was requited. She had reached the woefully misguided conclusion that morning following a visit from Alice Cockle, who came to return the doctor’s monogrammed handkerchief. Not knowing he had lent it to the servant, the housekeeper assumed he had given it to the girl’s mistress as a love token. All reason was lost the moment she brought it up to her nose and detected a scent.

“Doctor!” she said, blocking his way, a telltale streak of flour across her nose. “I believe you ’ave some good news to tell me.”

“Yes, indeed, Mrs. Nettleship. The Dowager Duchess paid her fee.”

“It’s not that I’m meaning. Lady Bessington’s maid ’as brought back your ’andkerchief!” The housekeeper waited for his reaction with a smile of such satisfaction that for a moment he doubted her sanity.

“Very good, Mrs. Nettleship,” he said, distracted by the number of people in the waiting room. “Now, please send in the first patient. There’s rather a backlog.”

But the housekeeper didn’t move. “There’s a sweet smell to hit,” she said, her eyebrows raised.

“To what?”

“The ’andkerchief!”

“Such as it should be, Mrs. Nettleship. That’s what laundresses are for.”

“It smells of hambrosia,” she continued. “I’m certain of hit.”

The doctor frowned. “Ambrosia? What does?”

“The ’andkerchief, doctor!”

He looked towards the waiting room. “I’m sure it’s all perfectly agreeable. Now, if you don’t mind, I must get on.”

The housekeeper remained where she was. “It will gladden your ’eart to know that hambrosia means ‘love returned’ hin the language of flowers. I looked hit hup.”

The doctor stared at her for a moment, wondering whether she had gone mad. “Thank you for informing me, Mrs. Nettleship,” he said evenly. “I very much encourage your interest in flowers. We all need something other than work to occupy the mind. With no pleasurable diversions it becomes exhausted, and we risk no longer being in charge of our facilities. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I really must attend to the patients.”

Mrs. Nettleship raised an eyebrow. “There’s a lot to be said for marrying a mature widow, doctor,” she said, leaning towards him. “They ’ave so much love to give.”

The general practitioner gazed at her, his mouth open, finally understanding her strange utterances. Mrs. Nettleship had fallen in love with him and wished to be his wife. “I really must ask you to step aside!” he cried.

She relented and headed for the kitchen, humming to herself loudly. The doctor immediately sought the sanctuary of his consulting room, closing the door firmly behind him. He sat in shock, for there was nothing more perilous than an amorous housekeeper. A knock on the door suddenly stirred him from his doom, and
a man introducing himself as Thomas Trout, the Keeper of the Great Vine, walked in, his beard clipped with the care of a privet hedge. The doctor recognised him as the man sitting next to William Sheepshanks at the inquest.

“And what can I do for you?” he asked, glancing at the primrose in the lapel of the man’s coarse suit.

Without a word, he pulled off his cap and looked up. The doctor followed his gaze and saw that his head was as naked as a full moon. As he studied the smooth pink expanse, he remembered the article he had recently read stating that a former pupil of Pasteur had put the cause of baldness down to a microbe, which was pointed at both ends. The only thing that could be done to halt its spread, the scientist claimed, was to make a clearing around the infected patch, like pulling down a house to stop the spread of a fire, in the hope that the microbe wouldn’t leap over it. But in the case of Thomas Trout, Dr. Henderson could see that there was not even an outdoor privy to demolish.

He tapped his pen on his desk as he thought. “Are you married?” he asked.

The keeper shook his head.

“About to be?”

“No, doctor.”

“Any hopes to be?”

“None.”

The doctor sat forward and rested his elbows on the desk. “Then I wouldn’t be so troubled by your lack of hair, Mr. Trout. Baldness is a common plague. And if you were at all bothered about your appearance as far as ladies are concerned, they are very understanding on that score. It’s obnoxious-smelling feet, snoring, and corpulence that trouble them.”

“Hair keeps my head warm, doctor.”

“I would have thought it quite hot enough in that glasshouse of yours.”

“Not in the winter, doctor. I turn the boiler off so the vine goes to sleep and gets some rest.”

“I see.” The general practitioner reached for his pen and wrote out a prescription for a stimulating scalp lotion made up of two drachms of tincture of cantharides, one ounce of spirit of rosemary, one ounce of acetic acid, and rose water to make eight ounces. “Apply a little at night and in the morning,” he advised, handing it to him.

Thomas Trout thanked him, handed him his fee, and headed for the door clutching his cap.

“I hope she appreciates it,” the doctor added, without looking up from his ledger. The keeper quickly pulled the handle behind him, his blush rising all the way up to his uninterrupted scalp.

ALICE COCKLE, THE LAST PATIENT
of the day, sat down on the edge of the chair in front of Dr. Henderson. It was the second time she had come, having found the doctor absent when she returned his handkerchief that morning.