The Pigeon Pie Mystery (6 page)

When the dispute was finally settled, and new tickets purchased, the only thing left of their train was a cheerful plume of smoke. The pair stared incredulously at the empty track, then turned and retreated to the waiting room. Easing past the portmanteaux, carpetbags, and parcels, they sat down next to the Bibles chained to the wall lest someone broke the Eighth Commandment. While the passengers and a dog glanced at the curious couple, the mistress and the maid kept their eyes on the ground, silently blaming the other for bronchial Mrs. Boots waiting in vain for them outside the palace. Never once did either suggest a pot of tea in the refreshment room. And when they had waited, they waited some more, for it was an unshakeable truth that no train took longer to arrive than when its predecessor had been missed.

Finally they pulled out of the station, the porter gazing at the generous tip the Princess had pressed into his hand with relief. As the train crossed over the viaduct, she looked down at the London streets and tried to imagine living so far away from the centre
of the universe that was Piccadilly. It wasn’t long before the Princess, unsure of her future, thought again of the life she had hoped to share with Mark Cavendish, who had offered his love so generously, then snatched it back again with the greed of a miser. Reaching for the novel she had just bought, she opened it to distract herself: she had already wasted too much regret on that man as it was.

Pooki, her face seeming even thinner in her black bonnet, finally broke the silence as they passed through fields in the early thrust of spring. “At least you will be living in a palace, as you should be, ma’am,” she said.

The Princess smiled unconvincingly, and then lowered her head back to her book.

The light was starting to fade by the time the train reached its final destination forty-five minutes later. A porter carried their luggage to the fly, a one-horse covered carriage whose sullen driver was wearing a filthy blanket over his knees against the damp. As they headed over the bridge towards the palace, which was already in view, two small boys ran after them, caps in their hands, hoping to earn a penny carrying the bags inside. Wondering why she had never been, Mink gazed at the monument that had been seducing visitors for centuries with its iconic chimney pots, stately cloisters, and romantic courtyards. Once a royal residence, at the front stood a majestic redbrick sixteenth-century Tudor building constructed for Cardinal Wolsey and Henry VIII, and extending from the back was a contrasting late-seventeenth-century elegant Baroque addition commissioned by William III and Mary II. Its gardens, enjoyed by countless sovereigns, were some of the most loved in England.

Despite the brevity of the journey, and the lameness of the horse, when the driver pulled up at Trophy Gate, the main entrance to the palace, he had the temerity to attempt to overcharge them. When Mink threatened to report the forsaken beast to the nearest
constable, the man realised what he was up against and reduced his price. He then sloped off to the Mitre Hotel over the road, where he bought a pint of stout and eyed the only women who ever returned his glances.

More prostitutes stood at Trophy Gate, their cheeks rouged and plump curls cascading down their backs, lured by the cavalrymen barracked in the palace’s driveway. The Princess glanced at the women uneasily, remembering the pair with the careful ringlets at her father’s funeral. She then spotted a plum pudding of a woman, her shawl drawn up over her bonneted head, and her arms folded across her formidable chest. From the cough that emerged from the bundle, she guessed that it was Mrs. Boots. After introducing herself, she apologised for being late. “You wouldn’t believe the effects on the lungs of having to stand outside waiting for people who have missed their train, Your Highness,” came the immediate reply. The housekeeper then peered up at the smutty sky. “There’s nothing worse than a north-east wind for someone with my condition. It’s been howling round me ever since I came outside, which was so long ago it’s a wonder Mr. Boots isn’t a widower.” She fell silent as a young gentleman with dark curls and a black frock coat strode out of the gates. His topper bulged, the telltale sign of a general practitioner who still preferred to carry his short wooden stethoscope in his hat rather than use a bag. A faint yet persistent creak came from his boots as he passed. Reaching the other side of the road, he tipped the crippled crossing sweeper, and, as he headed home, glanced back towards the Princess with eyes that quickened the pulse of a number of his patients.

“Not that Dr. Henderson there has cured me,” Mrs. Boots continued, as Mink followed her gaze. “If you ever see him on his bicycle I’d give him a wide berth if I were you. He’s one of them scorchers. Got fined for speeding in Bushy Park the other week. And if you decide to have him for your doctor, don’t tell him you drink tea. He’s an opponent. Says it creates all manner of mischief
in the body. Still, he’s better than Dr. Barnstable, the last village doctor. Ever so nervy. Trembling hands. He should have prescribed himself one of his useless tonics. Ended up dead as a duck in the Thames just over there by the bridge. One of the watermen found him. It was a right palaver getting him out of the water. His pockets were full of stones. Not that I’m a gossip-monger. Is that all you’ve got? I expect the furniture’s following. I’ll take you the long way so you can get your bearings. We’ll have to do the tour of the palace tomorrow, given your extremely late arrival. Mr. Boots will be wanting his kippers.”

With the speed of a startled pheasant, the housekeeper suddenly took off towards the palace. The Princess and the maid rushed after her, followed by Pike and Gibbs, the butcher’s and grocer’s delivery boys, weighed down by the luggage.

“Excuse those ladies,” Mrs. Boots called over her shoulder. “The gate was put up to stop them coming in, but they still manage to get past the sentry. You would have thought the smell of that thing would put them off.” She nodded to a pile of manure from the stables. “Aggravates my chest, I tell you. The residents don’t stop complaining about it. Don’t blame them, neither, it being a royal palace and all. What we need is the Queen to pay a visit. Then they’d soon clear it.”

As they continued up the drive, Mink peered at the Tudor Great Gatehouse ahead of them, but there was no trace of the charm she had seen in countless pictures. The creeping darkness had snuffed out the dusky salmon hue of the bricks, and the crenulations stood brutally against the sky streaked with night. Wondering how it would ever feel like home, she glanced to her left and saw a long, low line of barracks, where several soldiers stood watching her from the doorways, the smoke of their cigarettes twisting up into the damp air. She looked to her right and spotted beyond the railings the silent Thames, its banks now empty of postcard hawkers, umbrella merchants, and peddlers of spurious guides who lay in wait for the excursionists arriving by river.

The palace had been attracting tourists since the reign of Queen Elizabeth, a tip to the Palace Keeper almost always ensuring a guided tour as long as the court was not present or about to arrive. Order was imposed in the eighteenth century with the standard charge of a shilling, and the housekeeper herded visitors around armed with a long stick to point to the paintings and tapestries. But the numbers were nothing compared to the assault on the monument after Queen Victoria announced in 1838 her decision to open the State Apartments and gardens free to visitors. Hordes converged with unfettered glee on the landmark, with its collection of paintings and sumptuous gardens. And still the masses charged, more than two hundred thousand a year, stuffed into railway carriages, omnibuses, char-à-bancs, carriages, dog carts, brakes, vans, costermongers’ barrows, steamers, electric launches, sailing boats, and canoes.

As they approached the gatehouse, the housekeeper pointed out the recently restored mullioned windows, which had replaced the sashes installed by the Georgians. “They never did have any taste,” she muttered, wrinkling up her nose. Passing through, they came out onto Base Court, a vast empty square overlooked by countless windows where members and guests of the court were once lodged in luxury, their numerous fireplaces the reason for the palace’s plethora of chimneys. Shafts of light suddenly appeared as its current residents parted their curtains an inch, drawn by the sound of the women’s feet.

Suddenly Mrs. Boots came to a halt and turned sharply to the Princess. “You haven’t got any pets, have you?” she asked.

Mink detected a faint odour of smoked eel. “You were very explicit on that point, Mrs. Boots,” she said.

“It pleases me very much to hear that, let me tell you,” she replied, continuing her moorland scuttle. “There are some residents who completely ignore what I tell them and think they’re too grand to follow rules. After years of protests and a petition from the residents the Lord Chamberlain finally agreed to allow
lap dogs. You’d be surprised how many of those ladies pretend a Labrador can sit on their arthritic knees. Lady Montfort Bebb took it upon herself to buy a red setter. There were six months of arguments, and the Lord Chamberlain gave in and said she could keep it until it died, after which she would have to get something smaller. She’s already replaced it once, and claims that dog is the original. Thinks I was born yesterday. Then there’s Lady Beatrice and her wretched doves. Filthy creatures. How they came to be symbols of peace I’ll never know. They make General Bagshot positively murderous. Says his windows are all covered in muck. Can’t bear her as a result. Nor she him. Not that I’m one for gossip. Four of her birds are missing, presumed dead, so that’s a start. Hopefully the cats, which shouldn’t be here neither, will get the rest.”

Through Clock Court they hurried, without even a pause to admire the famous Astronomical Clock made for Henry VIII, which could tell the time of high water at London Bridge, amongst other marvels. “That’s one of the most exceptional timepieces in the country,” the housekeeper said, as Mink turned round to look at it. “It stopped as it struck four on March 2, 1619, the moment Queen Anne of Denmark died at the palace. And it’s done so every time a long-term resident has expired within the palace precincts. Something in my bones tells me it’s about to stop again, but Mr. Boots insists it’s the beginning of gout.”

Mrs. Boots kept up her pace, believing nothing should come between a husband and his kippers. There were currently forty-six grace-and-favour warrant holders, she called over her shoulder, some of whom had relatives living with them. They were lodged, along with their servants, in apartments scattered throughout the palace, as well as in several houses in the grounds. There were also more than twenty tenanted staff and their families living there, including masons, carpenters, a lamplighter, and a turncock.

The tradition of accommodation being granted by the grace
and favour of the sovereign started in the 1740s, she explained. A select group of courtiers, some of them relatively poor, were given permission to live at the palace in the summer by George II, whose court stopped using it in 1737. George III had no interest in living in the monument either, buying Buckingham House and making Windsor Castle his principal retreat outside London. The palace, apart from the State Apartments, was gradually divided into apartments, and their allocation began formally in 1767 and was organised under official warrants six years later.

At first the residents were fashionable people with good connections, she continued. The wealthy didn’t hesitate trying to get their hands on the rent-free apartments. “Dr. Johnson, who wrote that dictionary, was turned down because the waiting list was full. Good job too if you ask me. Why everyone troops to see his boring old chair at the Old Cheshire Cheese chop-house is beyond me.” Some of the residents’ behaviour left a lot to be desired. Alterations were made to ancient structures without so much as a by-your-leave, apartments were swapped, and some had the cheek to let them to complete strangers. For the last fifty years or so, the residents had almost all been widows or dependents of distinguished military or diplomatic figures whose finances were less than desirable. “Not that they’re any better behaved, believe you me.”

Suddenly from out of a passageway appeared an old sedan chair mounted on wheels and drawn by a bow-legged liveried chairman, his powdered wig askew. “That’s the push,” muttered Mrs. Boots, nodding to the contraption. The man pulling it was Wilfred Noseworthy, the resident turncock, who was responsible for turning the water on from the mains, she explained. “He hauls the ladies to their evening engagements for a fee, and charges an extra sixpence if he has to go outside the palace gates in recompense for being seen looking so ridiculous.”

As the vehicle passed, the Princess noticed someone peering at
her through the window, and she stared back with equal curiosity. Suddenly there was a tapping sound, and Wilfred Noseworthy came to an undignified halt. The window lowered, and the occupant, a woman in her mid-thirties, with a pale, heart-shaped face, her dark hair neatly pinned up, leant out.

“Forgive me for introducing myself, Princess. I’m Mrs. Bagshot,” she said in a voice so soft Mink had to step forward to hear her. “It’s terribly bad manners, I know, but I’m leaving for Egypt on Sunday morning, and I just wanted to say that I knew your father.”

The Princess remained silent, bracing herself for another unsavoury revelation.

“I met him on several occasions and was always very impressed by the charity work he undertook for his fellow Indians,” Mrs. Bagshot continued. “Unfortunately that aspect of him has been quite overlooked.”

“That’s very kind of you, Mrs. Bagshot,” said Mink. “I hope you enjoy your time in Egypt. Will you be staying at Shepheard’s Hotel? I could sit on their terrace all day watching the passing dragomans, hawkers of sham antiques, and donkey-boys who name their beasts after English celebrities.”

Mrs. Bagshot shook her head. “I won’t be in Cairo. I’m going to Hélouan-Les-Bains for a little tonic. The sulphur water is as strong as that of Harrogate and contains almost three times as many salts as the waters in Bath. And the tennis never gets rained off.”