“I can’t speak for Christopher,” I said, “although I can’t think of anyone who would be upset if he got engaged.” Apart from Flossie Schlomsky, I suppose, but she didn’t really count, since her feelings towards Christopher were mostly mercenary. “As for myself, no. No one would care if I got engaged. To Christopher or anyone else.”
“No gentleman friend waiting in the wings?” He smiled avuncularly. It sat strangely on his face.
I shook my head firmly. “No one like that.”
Pendennis nodded, and went back to being the chief inspector from Scotland Yard. “When you arrived yesterday afternoon, you went upstairs with your cousin, and then spent the time while he was talking to his grandfather doing what?”
I thought about claiming that I’d gone to my room by myself, but then I decided I might as well tell the truth, especially since there was someone who could gainsay me if he chose. Perhaps he already had. “I argued with St George. I found him eavesdropping in the passage between the Duke’s and Duchess’s Chambers, and dragged him out of there so he wouldn’t hear what the duke had to say to Christopher.”
Pendennis nodded, so Crispin must have confessed about that particular encounter. And about the eavesdropping. “And after that?”
I went through the events of the afternoon, leaving out the blackmail and suggesting simply that Grimsby had come to Christopher’s room to unpack his—Christopher’s—weekender bag. Then we arrived at tea, and the interrupted proposal.
“So you were in the drawing room when Lady Charlotte came down the stairs to announce that His Grace, the Duke, had died? Can you tell me how everyone reacted?”
“It was just the four of us,” I said, “and we reacted the way you would assume. We’ve all gotten a bit too used to death, since the war and the influenza epidemic. Everyone knows someone who died. But I didn’t notice anything out of the ordinary. Surprise. Maybe shock, but not much of that. He was old and unwell and his family knew it.”
Pendennis nodded. “Then what happened?”
“Christopher got Aunt Charlotte a glass of brandy. Aunt Roz stayed with her. Crispin, Christopher, and I went upstairs to make sure Aunt Charlotte hadn’t made a mistake.”
“Describe the Duke’s Chamber to me,” Pendennis said, which I did, in all the detail I could remember, while Finchley’s pencil scratched across the notebook behind me.
Then we went through the wait in the drawing room, what everyone said, the doctor’s visit, supper, and finally Christopher’s and my trip downstairs before bed, when we heard the gunshot. I told it to Pendennis the same way I’d told it to Tom earlier, with Christopher and me arm in arm in the east wing formal garden when we heard the shot. If Pendennis doubted me, I saw no indication of it.
Then it was time for this morning.
“You followed Lord St George into the garden maze?”
I nodded.
“How did you know he would be there?”
“I didn’t,” I said. “First, I looked for him in the courtyard, because he’d gone out through the front door. Then I went to the carriage house, in case he’d decided to take the Hispano-Suiza out for a drive. He likes to go fast, and I thought perhaps he might fancy a jaunt to get over his bad mood.”
“But he wasn’t there.”
I shook my head. “The car was, but he wasn’t. So I went to the maze. We used to play in it when we were children. And it had come up in conversation that morning.”
“Why was that?”
“I saw someone move through it last night,” I said. “After we came upstairs and I was getting ready for bed. I caught a movement out of the corner of my eye when I went to pull the curtains in my room.”
“Tell me what you saw.”
“It was just a glimpse of the top of someone’s head above the closest hedge. Moving towards the exit. I ran into the duchess’s room, but by the time I got there, they must have already left, because I didn’t see anyone come out.”
“Can you describe the person you saw?”
“Fair hair,” I said. “Combed back. All I saw was the very top of the head, so that’s literally it. Fair hair slicked back. And it could have been anyone. Every man in the Astley family has fair hair that they slick back. So does one of the footmen, and at least one of the grooms.” And Detective Finchley. Of the family, the only ones of us with brown hair was Aunt Roz and myself.
“This morning?” Pendennis prompted.
“I brought it up to Christopher over breakfast. Crispin overheard and decided to contribute something cheeky. We got into a row, and he stormed out, and Christopher told me I owed him an apology. So when he wasn’t in the courtyard and hadn’t taken out the motorcar, I went to the maze.”
“And he was there,” Pendennis said. “With the body.”
I nodded.
