“There was that other man you told me about, Ariel,” I said.
She gave one of her characteristic shrugs. “Betty would know about him too, if she’d ever bothered to talk to Mrs. Cake.”
“Oh, please! Just for five minutes can I not be the wicked stepmother?”
“The first marriage could have took place on the sly if her ladyship’s family was against it.” Mrs. Malloy handed me a tea towel to dry the cups and saucers. “Sounded that way, from how Mr. Tribble talked about its just being the bridal couple. There’d have been witnesses, of course, but they could have been anyone: people off the street. Yes,” Mrs. M mused, “it should have been easy to hush things up when the marriage turned out to be a mistake. Better to do nothing perhaps than bother with a divorce, as would have got in the papers.”
“There you are!” Betty drew in a breath. “When Nigel discovered he’d married a bigamist, he must have been so outraged he threatened to go to the police and press criminal charges.”
“Perhaps he said he would keep quiet only if she signed the house and all the money over to him-what was left of it.” I looked at Mrs. Malloy. Did the possibility ripen that Mr. Scrimshank and Lady Fiona had joined forces in murdering the man everyone assumed to be her husband? Had they each seen themselves facing imprisonment for different reasons if Mr. Gallagher remained on the scene? The likelihood of Lady Fiona’s being slammed up for bigamy struck me as slim, but she might have panicked or, even more, disliked the thought of being embroiled in a scandal. Mr. Scrimshank’s situation was more dire. If her ladyship had discovered he’d embezzled her money, agreeing to help her out of her difficulties by way of recompense might have struck him as a good alternative to the realistic prospect of spending a considerable portion of his declining years behind bars. What was one small murder between friends? Now, if Mrs. Malloy and I were to believe Betty, there had been a second.
“Before we convict Lady Fiona in absentia”-I dried the last of the cups-“we need to find out if indeed there was a prior marriage and, if so, whether or not it was legally terminated.”
“And how do we go about that?” Removing Ariel’s half-chewed sandwich, Betty tossed it in the trash bin.
“Well, what I’m thinking,” said Mrs. Malloy, “is that tomorrow morning me or Mrs. H should phone Milk Jugg and ask him to see what he can track down.”
“Who’s he?”
“A private investigator we know. Its being Sunday, he won’t be in his office today, but I’m sure we can talk him into lending a hand, seeing as we did him a favor recently and got no thanks in return.”
I wasn’t convinced that Milk would be ready to forgive our interference in one of his cases, but Mrs. M knows far more about the male psyche than I do.
“That sounds like a good idea,” Betty said, after a moment’s thought. “I only hope it’s what Nigel would want.”
“Can’t you stop talking about him?” Ariel pounced up from her chair. “I’ve never seen you go all silly about Dad. I wish I had run away for good.”
“Oh, Ariel, I am sorry,” Betty said surprisingly, as the doorbell rang.
“Why don’t I get that?” I hurried out into the hall, but Tom was there ahead of me to let the doctor or the undertaker, whoever he was, into the house. They disappeared into the drawing room and I stood thinking about what had transpired in the kitchen. Poor Ariel! Had motherhood taught me nothing? The focus should have been on her reaction to Mr. Tribble’s death, rather than a discussion of matters better left until she was not present. Guest in her house be blowed, I ought to have cut Betty off when she got started. How likely was it anyway that Lady Fiona was responsible for the old gentleman’s dropping so abruptly off the twig, to use Mrs. Malloy’s phrase? Betty had talked glibly about sleight of hand, but her ladyship, so far as I knew, was not a professional magician. What would she know about misdirecting the eyes of her onlookers? Or had she got lucky in that regard with the water dripping from the ceiling? Could it be Lady Fiona who had crept upstairs earlier after Ariel admitted her to the house and subsequently left her alone? Had she entered the bathroom above the conservatory, put the plug in the basin sink, turned on the taps, and left it to overflow? Someone had done this, and Ariel had been vehement in her denials. Who better than her ladyship would know how to make Cragstone a conspirator? And yet somehow, I couldn’t see it. Perhaps I didn’t want the lovely young woman in the portrait transformed into a demon.
There was something else I couldn’t see as I remained in the hall, looking down at the Chinese chest with its exquisite display of snuffboxes on top. The cobalt blue and gold one I had particularly admired on first entering the house was missing. Had it been stolen or merely moved to another location? According to Betty and Tom, their kleptomaniac friend Frances Edmonds had never helped herself to any of their possessions. But the relationship had altered. The Hopkinses were now filthy rich and hadn’t rushed to be generous. Had an already resentful Frances snapped this afternoon after discovering that Mr. Scrimshank was one of the guests for tea? Had she, however unreasonably, considered this another act of betrayal on Betty’s part and taken the snuffbox in retaliation?
“What are you thinking about?” Ben came up beside me.
“This and that.” I continued to stare at the chest.
“You look troubled.” His gaze was intent.
“A man dropped dead less than an hour ago.”
“It was sad and startling, but-”
“Betty thinks Lady Fiona poisoned his brandy.”
“Don’t tell me you believe her? Mr. Hardcastle was just saying that the poor old gentleman was well over ninety, making it unlikely he had the heart of a twenty-year-old. His doctor is amazed he’d kept on ticking this long. That cupful of brandy alone might have been enough to finish him off.”
“That’s the sensible view,” I agreed, wishing that I didn’t sound so stilted but not able to help myself. Had Ben swept me into his arms I would have felt he brought Val in tow. Perhaps sensing this, he put his hands in his trouser pockets and began talking about Betty.
“You can’t go by what she says, Ellie, she’s dealing with a lot of issues: the lottery win, her problems with Ariel, and… whatever else she’s got on her mind.”
“Such as?”
“Tom. You could see how he reacted to her behavior at that ridiculous séance.” This was the moment to tell him about the false Madam LaGrange, but I didn’t. Childishly, I decided that if he could have secrets so could I. Receiving no response, he continued. “There’s always stuff going on in any marriage that outsiders aren’t tuned in to.”
“Are you speaking about them or about us?” It was out. I told myself I felt better. Nothing was worse than the distance growing between us. I saw the hesitation in his eyes, waited for him to say something-anything-but when he did I wished I’d left things alone.
“Ellie, I’m caught up in a situation that I would have given anything to avoid. But it was flung at me, and there it is. I want to talk to you about it, but that might complicate things even more. Also I gave my word to-”
“Val? Or, as you call her, Valeria?” I almost choked on the words.
A muscle tensed in his cheek, but he kept his hands in his pockets. “She feels so guilty. Ellie, you’ve probably come to your own conclusion and think I’m behaving like a cad.”
“Heaven forbid! You’re my knight in shining armor!”
The drawing room door opened, making an end to our tete-a-tete. All at once there was activity. By the time the body was removed and its entourage, including Mr. Hardcastle, had departed, I was not the only person looking less than cheery when we gathered in the drawing room. Ben and Tom stood in silence; Mrs. Malloy said her feet were killing her and sank into a chair. Only Betty displayed an interest in chatting about the death, and even she gave up on this idea when Ariel flung herself down on a sofa and began sobbing uncontrollably. Galvanized into unexpected speed, Tom knelt at her side, patting her heaving shoulders and looking around in accusatory alarm at his wife.