“This is bad,” I said.
“You can certainly say that again,” Aunt Roz agreed, and I came back to myself in time to see Christopher and Crispin come through the door, each with a bottle in each hand. It seemed we were to have a choice between libations in our tea this morning.
Aunt Roz gave them both a beaming smile. “There you are. Pippa just told me what has happened. I’ll have a splash of whiskey, please.”
“Our cups are over there,” I added, pointing to the sideboard. “Doctor them however you like. But not too much for me, please. I’d rather not be insensible when the constables show up.”
“Don’t want to be careless with what we admit,” Crispin nodded, without looking at me. I glanced sharply at him, but he either didn’t notice, or simply didn’t bother to acknowledge me. Instead, he busied himself with pouring liquor into one of the half-full teacups. “There you go, Darling.” He held it out. “That’ll put roses in your cheeks.”
I rolled my eyes but took the cup. “Thank you, St George. Out of curiosity, where were you between eleven and eleven-thirty last night?”
“As I told you when I let you in last night,” Crispin said, “I was having a drink to Grandfather’s memory, before I retired upstairs to where every decent person ought to be at that time of night here in the pastoral tranquility of the countryside. My bedroom. Early to bed and early to rise. Isn’t that right, Darling?”
I made a face, and he added, “You still haven’t made that apology you promised, you know. You said you came outside to offer one, but in the hullaballoo of the discovery in the maze, I assume it must have slipped your mind.”
Not quite. I’d referenced the apology, and we had been on semi-cordial speaking terms, so I had hoped that it might be enough and I could get away without actually having to make the promisedmea culpa. But I guess such was too much to expect, at least when dealing with Crispin St George, who had no finer feelings to speak of, and who would insist on his pound of flesh.
“Of course.” I fought back the grimace that threatened to overtake my countenance. “Although I did tell you I shouldn’t have misjudged you based on the stories I have heard.”
“You did,” Crispin agreed with a grin, “and it was masterful, Darling, truly. Your way with words is astonishing. But you didn’t really tell me you were wrong, did you?”
No, I hadn’t. That was what I had hoped I’d be able to avoid. But since I clearly wasn’t going to be…
I took a breath. “I’m sorry for accusing you of behaving badly with regard to the parlor maid, St George. I was wrong about you, and I’m sorry.”
I steeled myself for whatever atrocious thing might come back my way, but then Aunt Roz tut-tutted and spared me from whatever Crispin’s response was going to be. “Have you been misbehaving, Crispin, dear?”
“Not with the parlor maid,” Crispin said. “That’s just Darling’sidée fixe.” He slanted me a sideways look.
I sniffed. “I do not have anidée fixe. Don’t be ridiculous, St George. I don’t spend my time pondering what you get up to in your spare time. I have better things to worry about.”
“I’m sure you do,” Crispin said, and just like that, we were back to the dead body in the garden maze and the impending arrival of the authorities.
I turned to Christopher, who had been unusually silent throughout this whole exchange. “What’s going on with you? You’re being very quiet for someone who didn’t even see the body.”
“Crispin described it in quite enough detail,” Christopher said with a grimace, “thank you, Pippa. And there’s nothing going on with me. I’m just worried. Someone saw fit to murder someone else on the grounds last night. I guess I’m wondering who might be next.”
That was a consideration that hadn’t crossed my mind.
“Surely nobody else would be involved in this?” I said. “Grimsby—”
“There’s no way to know who’s involved until the police figure out why Grimsby was shot,” Christopher answered, with quite a pointed look in my direction, to remind me that we weren’t supposed to know anything about any blackmail attempts. Without that knowledge, Grimsby’s murder could have been affected by any number of people for any number of reasons, none of which we would know anything about.
“Of course.” It had been thirty minutes and I was already having trouble keeping things straight in my head. Better if I just didn’t offer any unnecessary information, I told myself, so I didn’t trip myself up. “At any rate, have some tea. Fortify yourself before the arrival of the constables. I’m sure we’ll have to deal with an influx of all sorts of people today.”
And such did,in point of fact, turn out to be the case. Much more so than we expected at the time, even. Representatives for the local constabulary showed up in short order, spurred by Tidwell’s telephone call, and with all evidence of being excited about the opportunity to deal with a murder. I imagine it wasn’t something they often got the chance to tackle in a small village like Little Sutherland.
That was only until someone figured out that Grimsby’s death wasn’t the only one to have taken place on the premises in the past twenty-four hours. Once the connection was made to the late duke’s demise yesterday, even under vastly different circumstances, suddenly the Chief Constable got involved, and after that, it was a short step until Scotland Yard was called in.
And thus it was that we were faced, at around two-thirty that afternoon, with the arrival of four gentlemen in city suits, who had motored down from London for the express purpose of taking over the case.
At that point, Christopher and I were in the study, watching the happenings through the window. Francis was with us, too, and although Christopher and I had stopped fortifying ourselves with spiked tea some hours ago, Francis had taken the news of Grimsby’s murder rather badly, and was clutching a glass of scotch. Not his first, either. His hands were shaking badly, and although we had both been tempted to ask him what he’d been up to last night, neither of us had quite had the courage to breach the subject.
Crispin had gone up to his rooms after lunch, perhaps in an effort to sober up in private, or perhaps just because he’d had enough of us by then. I had certainly had enough of him.
Aunt Roz, meanwhile, was in conference with Uncle Herbert, Uncle Harold, and Aunt Charlotte in the drawing room.
“Should have left while we had the chance,” Christopher told me out of the corner of his mouth, as the official car pulled to a stop at the bottom of the steps.
