‘Well, if we are going with cryptic, ARBTT could be the first letters of A Rose Between Two Thorns. Might that mean anything?’
76
Tuesday 28 November 2023
Greg Mosse, his lean frame sharply suited, and smelling like the fragrance department of Harvey Nichols, sat at one end of the long mahogany dining table, with a file folder and his Policy Book in front of him. The Detective Superintendent was giving the impression — or at least trying to give the impression, Roy Grace thought — that he was in his natural habitat, that this kind of place was normal for him.
There were imposing oil paintings on the walls, a mix of portraits of grand-looking people from past centuries and stormy seascapes, an ornate mirror above a beautiful marble fireplace and a brightly lit crystal chandelier overhead. One of the few things that looked out of period was a large free-standing monitor.
They were on the second floor of Buckingham Palace, and had a view through twin windows with gold curtains across the inner courtyard to the South Wing. Grace was again finding it hard to get his mind around that they really were here, in this iconic building, and that this wasn’t the conference room of some swanky hotel with copies of famous paintings on the wall. Despite this being his third visit now, it still felt so surreal. He drank the cup of not great coffee from the pot Mosse had waiting for him and Glenn Branson.
‘I believe your team used this room last week, Roy? For interviews?’
‘Yes, they did.’
In addition to getting his mindset around being really here, in Buckingham Palace, despite Mosse’s platitudes Grace was struggling to be friendly. This man reminded him, more than ever today, of his old adversary — and one-time jailbird — Cassian Pewe, former ACC of Sussex and the bane of his life for far too long. On top of that Mosse seemed displeased that he’d brought a colleague along, as if he’d been hoping for a cosy one-to-one bonding session. He’d almost totally ignored Branson, and Grace could tell that the DI was silently bristling, and seeing right through Mosse’s phoney charm offensive.
Mosse smiled, his entire demeanour was one of polite superiority. ‘You know, Roy and — er — I’m sorry, your name again?’
‘Branson. Glenn. Detective Inspector.’
‘Do forgive me, Glenn, of course. Branson, like the pickle, right?’
‘The T isn’t silent, Detective Superintendent,’ Branson retorted. ‘There isn’t one.’
Mosse frowned for a moment, looking puzzled. ‘Ah. Right. Yes.’
‘It’s Branson, as in the billionaire, Richard. Richard Branson.’
The Detective Superintendent laughed. ‘Of course it is!’ He turned back to Grace. ‘So, what I was saying is that essentially we have here an original locked-room mystery. Just like those Golden Age crime whodunits, don’t you think? One thousand, two hundred and fifty members of the Royal Household, including seven hundred employed by the Royal Collection Trust, and not forgetting members of the Buckingham Palace RaSPs. One of them must be Geoffrey Bailey’s killer.’
Grace shot a glance at Branson, who was making copious notes, as well as recording the meeting — because Grace didn’t trust what Mosse might report. ‘I would say it is likely that one of them is the killer, but there have been security breaches in the past — one person even getting into the late Queen Elizabeth’s bedroom. At this stage, I would keep an open mind on whether the offender is an insider or outsider.’
‘Of course, good point, Roy. All the same, it’s not often in a murder enquiry we can narrow the suspect list down to so few, is it?’
‘If you exclude the possibility of an outsider.’
‘Well yes, of course. Which I think for now we should. Exclude. Until we have eliminated all our locked-room suspects, don’t you think?’
Grace let it slide. ‘So what do you have so far, Greg?’
Mosse opened the folder with a flourish. ‘Well, take a look.’ He pushed a bunch of photographs across the polished surface of the table towards them. ‘These are from the postmortem. There was a rather interesting object found rammed down the deceased’s gullet.’
Grace looked at the first photograph, a close-up. It showed a medal, with Queen Elizabeth’s face. The wording read, For Long and Faithful Service.
‘Why would he have wanted to eat it?’ Branson said, facetiously.
Ignoring him, Mosse asked, ‘Can you shed any light on this, Roy?’
‘I think actually we can.’
‘Good, excellent.’ He shot the cuffs of his suit jacket, making sure he revealed his expensive-looking watch, intertwined his fingers and leaned forward, expectantly.
Grace sipped some more coffee to give himself thinking time. Debating how much to share with Mosse at this stage. He had valuable information from the decoded diary that he had only so far shared with key members of his team, and hoped for more intel soon from Shannon Kendall. He didn’t want Greg blundering around and alerting whoever the conspirators Sir Peregrine alluded to might be.
‘Last week, when my team was conducting interviews with all members of the Household staff who had had contact with Sir Peregrine Greaves, one of my detectives — DS Alexander — told me that a footman called Geoffrey Bailey had behaved strangely.’
‘In what way?’ Mosse made a show of producing a Mont Blanc pen from his pocket and unscrewing the silver cap, then wrote a note in his Policy Book.
‘Well, DS Alexander felt that Bailey had used the opportunity of the interview to air a personal grievance. He reported that he seemed bitter that he had been passed over for The King’s most recent award of medals to Royal Household staff, thanks to Sir Peregrine.’
‘Well, that’s highly significant, bearing in mind what was found in the man’s throat,’ Mosse said, and made another note. ‘This is why it so important that we work together and share findings, don’t you think?’ he said, looking at Roy.
‘Absolutely,’ Branson said, emphatically, even though the question had been directed at his boss.
Grace looked back at Mosse. ‘So, we have a footman aggrieved at being passed over for a medal. Then he’s found dead inside the anaerobic digester — The King’s recent energy-saving innovation — with a medal down his throat. What have you extrapolated from these facts, so far?’
Mosse looked momentarily lost. Then his face brightened. ‘I think we need time to digest them. Haha!’
Grace forced a smile. ‘In your opinion, do you think the murders of Sir Peregrine and Geoffrey Bailey might be linked?’
‘I don’t think either of us have enough information at this stage for an informed opinion. What do you think?’
‘I agree not to rush to conclusions, but so far as I can ascertain, the last murder within the Royal Household was the poisoning of the poet Sir Thomas Overbury in 1613. So on that basis, given that murders in the Royal Household happen only once in over four hundred years, with two happening within a week of each other, it would seem there’s quite a possibility that they might be connected.’
‘But you don’t know how?’ Mosse said.
‘I don’t at this stage know how,’ Grace replied to Mosse.
Grace was thinking again about the decoding of the diary in which Sir Peregrine admitted to some sort of inappropriate relationship with a colleague, and the fact that Jack Alexander had indicated Geoffrey Bailey was gay. Could Bailey have been that colleague?
But, he pondered, if Bailey had been angry because Greaves had passed him over for a medal, and had then ended up dead with a medal in his throat — over a week after the Private Secretary was killed — what could the connection be? Surely it couldn’t all be just a big coincidence?