Part 5 (1/2)
”Where were you when she fell?” Rex asked him as he reached the top of the steps.
”I was looking through the wine down there, checking the labels for another bottle of claret. My back was turned.”
”It's dark in the cellar. How could you see what you were doing?”
”I had the candlestick with me. The one Charley's holding. Suddenly I heard a startled scream and turned around just in time to see Miriam land at the bottom of the steps. When I got to her, her eyes were-just staring.”
”Did you touch her?”
”I turned her chin toward me so I could see her face. I wish I'd been nicer to her. She wasn't such a bad sort, really.”
Rex looked around as he closed the cellar door. ”Where's the dog?”
”Never saw him.”
”Was anyone in the kitchen?”
”No, but I pa.s.sed Mrs. Bellows in the corridor.”
Rex turned to Charley. ”Put that candlestick on the table and don't let anyone touch it, or the other one for that matter. And keep an eye on the staff when they reappear. Where is everybody?”
He crossed the kitchen to the scullery where he found the puppy curled up on a blanket on the floor, fast asleep. The rest of the room crouched in darkness. Flicking on the light switch, he found Clifford cowering by the umbrellas, a terrified look in his beady eyes.
”Ar, 'twas me,” the old man mumbled, backing into the raincoats. ”Don' tell her. She'll turn me out o' the lodge.”
”What are you hiding?” Rex asked, grabbing the man's shoulder and spinning him around.
The old man clutched an empty decanter of sherry. ”Don' tell her! An' I won' tell 'bout yer dog!”
The scent of sherry on Clifford's breath made Rex take a step back. ”How long have you been in here?”
”Eh took the wood down the cellar. Then eh seed the sherry an' thought 'ow even she couldn't grudge me some at Christmastime and me 'ands so painful from the cold.”
”Who was in the kitchen?”
”Don' rightly remember.” Clifford's eyes took on a gla.s.sy sheen.
Rex held him steady. ”Try.”
”Her was there, an' Rosie an' Cook, thas right, cos they was all complainin' about me trackin' ice in on me boots. Only Cook was around when eh come back. She was at the stove wi' her back turned so eh wus able to sneak the dog an' the sherry past her.”
”Did you hear anything afterwards?”
”I 'eard voices.”
”A man's voice, woman's voice ... ?”
”An American voice.”
”How did she sound?”
”Cross.”
”What else?”
”Eh be deaf an' the wind be rattlin' the panes and that, so eh didn't hear much else, 'cept fer a thud.” Clifford considered a moment, s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g up his eyes with the effort of concentration. ”A dull sound like a rollin' pin hittin' pastry. Be ye gwene to tell her?”
”Tell Mrs. Smithings about the sherry? No, but keep an eye on the dog.”
When Rex re-entered the kitchen, the other members of the staff were a.s.sembled around the table with Charley. Upon questioning them as to whether anybody had touched the candlesticks since Clifford polished them and receiving three answers in the negative, Rex sighed heavily, and said, ”So we have another death in the house.”
Rosie gazed at him wide-eyed. ”I was in the drawing room collecting the cups and saucers and when I got back here, the American guest had fallen down the cellar steps!”
”And, Mrs. Bellows, where were you when all this was going on?”
”Powdering my nose down the hall.”
”And I was upstairs,” Dahlia Smithings exclaimed. ”Those steps are dangerous. I warned Mr. Smart, but he fancies himself as a wine connoisseur and will go rummaging in the cellar. At least he is fit and agile. The Greenbaum woman should have had more sense. I heard she was going after a dog! Now we have another mishap on our hands.”
”I think it was more than a mishap,” Rex said, fis.h.i.+ng Ms. Greenbaum's goopy BlackBerry out of the soup tureen. ”Why on earth would she have dropped this in the Mulligatawny? No, two deaths in two days are too much of a coincidence for me.”
Two deaths in a row. What on earth was going on, Rex wondered, and why the devil did they have to coincide with his trip? Deploring his luck, he made a detour into the drawing room to see if he could find a contact in New York to whom he might convey news of Ms. Greenbaum's death. He remembered seeing an address label for the literary agency on the t.i.tle page of the ma.n.u.script she was working on. However, the box file on the sofa turned out to be empty, except for a blue pen and a key for room number eight.
Slipping upstairs, he found neither the ma.n.u.script nor a hard-copy address book in her room. Any data stored on her BlackBerry would have been destroyed when it fell in the soup. The biography of President Bush had to be somewhere. Had Miriam Greenbaum even come upstairs before dinner? Rex had been discussing swans with the other guests ... No, he was sure she had not left the drawing room before Rosie summoned them into dinner. So where was the ma.n.u.script?
By the time he returned to the dining room, the soup plates had been cleared, and a stunned silence prevailed. The ma.n.u.script was not here either, and in any case, he didn't recall Miriam bringing it in to dinner.
”What's the verdict, Counsel?” Patrick asked. ”Accident or foul play?”
”It appears Ms. Greenbaum received a blow to the neck, as you've no doubt all heard by now, and suspiciously enough, her e-mailing device was all but submerged in the soup tureen in the kitchen.”
”Whatever was it doing in there?” Yvette asked.
”Good question. Unless someone didn't want it going off and giving away her location in the cellar.”
”But we all knew she was going down there,” Wanda pointed out.
”Aye, we at table knew.”
”Getting rid of the BlackBerry might have been a wasted precaution,” Helen said. ”I lost my call and couldn't get a signal anywhere in the house.”
”Did you by any chance go into the kitchen?”
”I wandered down that way but I didn't actually go in.”
”Did you see anyone?”
”I can't recall. I was desperately trying to get Pauline back. She would only phone in an emergency, otherwise she'd leave a text message. She has an abusive stepdad. Oh, I hope nothing happened to her.” Helen twisted her napkin compulsively. ”I went to the foyer to use the hotel phone, but the line must be down with all the snow. Then I went to tell Mrs. Smithings, but she wasn't in her office or in the drawing room.”
Rex drew a quick map in his head. The only way to the kitchen was along the hall past the drawing room and dining room, unless you went outside and around the house to the scullery door, which would be almost impossible with all the fresh snow. Still, he decided to check. ”Hang on,” he said, rising from his chair. ”I'll be right back.”