God Save the Queen! Page 20

  “We’re almost at the shop.”

  “At least will you promise to let me help you find the tea strainer?”

  “Of course. The legend is every bit as much part of your heritage as it is mine. More so, in fact.”

  “Because Grandpa loved the Gossinger silver collection?” Flora felt her love for the man walking beside her open up like a flower and it was difficult to keep her voice level. “It’s really nice you think that way, Vivian, but we both know it isn’t so. What’s wrong? You’ve got a funny look on your face.”

  “There’s a woman standing outside the shop.”

  “What about it?” Flora had trouble seeing so far: The rain was coming down harder, so that the brim of her hat couldn’t keep it off her face. “It’s probably someone taking cover until this eases off a bit.”

  “Or waiting for us to get back.” Vivian quickened his pace. “Yes, I was right! It is Cousin Sophie, with a suitcase at her feet.”

  “Miss Doffit? Whatever would she be doing here?”

  “Another intriguing question,” Vivian replied.

  “Thank goodness you’re back, both of you, although I was only expecting Flora,” Miss Doffit exclaimed. “Luckily I’ve only been waiting here five minutes. But there’s a dog inside that’s been barking at me. And as you can see, the feathers on my lovely powder blue hat are sopping wet, which wouldn’t matter so much, I suppose, if they came from the kind of birds that swim.”

  “Speaking of which,” Vivian produced the key and stuck it in the lock, “I have a nasty suspicion I know what brings you here, Cousin Sophie. It has to do at least in part with a tea strainer in the shape of a swan. Although why my aunt didn’t come herself, I can’t begin to guess.” He held the door open for the two women to get in out of the rain.

  “Are you saying you have it? That Mabel has been worrying herself into a frenzy for no reason?” Miss Doffit had to shout to make herself heard over Nolly’s frantic joy at being released from prison and reunited with Flora. Her old face crumpled in bewilderment, and if Vivian hadn’t picked up her suitcase at just that moment she might have sat down on it.

  “No, we don’t have it,” he reached inside to snap on the light, “but let’s continue this conversation in the dry, shall we?”

  “Vivian, you really shouldn’t be so cross. You’re making assumptions ...” Flora brought up the rear with Nolly in her arms.

  “Oh, it’s all right, dear,” Miss Doffit spoke softly now as they all stood in the middle of the shop, “there’s no way to put the cat back in the bag once it’s out, and I’m sure it’s better this way. I haven’t lived to be my age without accepting the fact that sometimes you’re in the wrong because of trying to do right. The main thing here, Vivian, is for you to understand that poor Mabel is making herself ill over this business. She’s terrified Henry will never forgive her if he finds out what she did, although why he would I don’t know. Not if we all promise never to breathe a word.”

  “There’s her sister,” said Vivian grimly.

  “But she doesn’t know—”

  “As of this afternoon she does.”

  “That was my fault.” Flora’s mouth quivered. “I let it out about the tea strainer being a long-lost treasure. But I really don’t believe, even if her relationship with Lady Gossinger is rather cool, that Edna Smith would spill the beans to Sir Henry. Her life’s complicated enough already. Anyway, if we can get the tea strainer back, surely that should be the end of it?”

  “It would then be only the sister’s word against Mabel’s that she ever had the tea strainer and was so ungrateful as to give it to the church bazaar.” Miss Doffit pulled off her hat and squeezed it out. “I remember my mother once giving a tiara to the Women’s Institute for its summer fete. Which explains in part why we ended up with no money and I’ve spent my life, like a woman without a country, living in other people’s houses.”

  “You’re trying to break my heart,” said Vivian.

  “I suppose,” Cousin Sophie smiled at him, increasing her wrinkles a hundredfold, “Mabel could say, if push came to shove, that she did give her sister a tea strainer, but it wasn’t the Queen Charlotte one.”

  Flora put down Nolly the better to concentrate on Edna’s defense. “I really think that this is unfair. Mrs. Smith strikes me as a decent person who is probably feeling every bit as bad as Lady Gossinger about all this. Even more so, perhaps, because she is very pro the Queen and understands that she—meaning Mrs. Smith—gave away something that belongs to Her Majesty. Poor woman, I don’t suppose she’ll get any sleep tonight.”

  “That’s one of Flora’s greatest charms,” commended Vivian. “She has this boundless faith in human nature.”

  “I think she has lots of charming ways,” retorted Cousin Sophie, “which doesn’t mean to say I think Henry was right to—” Stopping just in time, she deftly changed course, “—to spoil her the way he did when she was little. But I was almost as bad, I imagine. We did have fun, didn’t we, Flora, dressing up in the trunk room? One of the reasons I never married was because a duke never asked me, so it was great sport to pretend I was the Duchess of Devon, I think that was who I was. I seem to remember you aspired to being nothing more than a lady, in the titled sense of the word. And it’s remembering those pleasant times that has me hoping, my dear, that you’ll let me stay here with you for the next few days, even though I’ll be glad to leave the treasure-hunting to you. That’s something I really wasn’t looking forward to, even though Mabel did give me money for taxis.”

  “I’ll arrange for you to stay at an excellent hotel, Cousin Sophie,” said Vivian.

  “I’m not sure that would be a good idea.” The old lady’s face turned mulish. “What if I should fall in the night, with no one to hear me? And I do like a cup of tea when I want one. That’s not unreasonable at my age, is it?”

  “Of course you can stay here,” Flora hastened to say. “The flat upstairs has two bedrooms, both of them furnished because Vivian was kind enough to ask Sir Henry to send all the pieces from the rooms my grandfather and I used at Gossinger.”

  “The bed in the smaller room is extremely hard,” Vivian said. “Flora, I need to talk to you.”

  “We are talking.”

  “I mean alone. No offense, Cousin Sophie, but this is important as well as private.”

  “Of course, dear.”

  “Then why don’t you let me take you upstairs so you can use the bathroom to dry off and change your clothes before going into the sitting room to warm up by the fire. It’s one of those with the electric logs. I’ll turn it on for you,” Vivian told his cousin.

  “And in the meantime, I’ll take Nolly out,” Flora said. “I won’t go far, and I’ll feed him when I get back.”

  When Vivian and Miss Doffit had gone upstairs, Flora found the dog’s lead and attached it to his collar. She had a queer, unsettled feeling, but she told herself that one crumpet did not do much to fill the gap between lunch and dinner. And if that wasn’t the reason, she decided as she and Nolly stepped out into the rain and headed for the closest lamppost, it had to be because it had been an unsettling day—meeting Reggie, to say nothing of the rest of the afternoon. But she hadn’t imagined the strained look on Vivian’s face when he said he needed to talk to her. And she didn’t think he was worried about something as simple as her being let in for extra expense if Miss Doffit stayed with her. No, there was something more, and while her head told her it couldn’t be anything ominous, her heart had different ideas.

  She was back in the shop and had only just filled Nolly’s food and water bowls when Vivian came downstairs.

  “I wish we could go up to the flat,” he told her, “but Cousin Sophie might overhear. And it’s important that she doesn’t. Why don’t we sit on the floor as we did the night of the picnic? Flora, that night seems an eternity ago. So much has happened. You ... happened.”

  “Do you want me to sit down because you don’t think I can handle what you have to say stand
ing up? Yes, that’s it. You’re scaring me, Vivian.”

  “Won’t you?” He made a sweeping gesture toward the floor.

  “No, I won’t.” Flora clenched her hands. “Please don’t keep me in suspense.”

  “I should have told you that first night; I meant to—it was why I came, but I talked myself out of doing what I knew was right.”

  “Vivian, please don’t look so sad.” Her hand moved of its own accord and touched his cheek. “You’re a friend, I never thought I could say even that much, but I have to.” Somewhere outside herself she saw him take her hand in his and kiss its palm. “I trust you,” she said, “and know that you did what you thought was best for me. Now tell me.”

  “It has to do with the day your grandfather died....”

  “Yes?” Her heart gave a couple of thumps and then went quiet.

  “We were there in the tower sitting room—Uncle Henry, Aunt Mabel, Cousin Sophie, and I—waiting for tea.”

  “And I was late bringing it up.”

  “So you were.” Vivian gave her hand a final squeeze. “It was after you left that Uncle Henry broke the news that he’d decided to change his will.”

  “But what could that have to do with ... ?”

  “Your grandfather’s death? Everything, I believe, because what he had decided was to leave Gossinger Hall to Hutchins.”

  “I can’t take this in!” Flora reached behind her as if gripping the back of an invisible chair. “Why would he do something like that?”

  “The house is not entailed, so there were no legal constraints. His reasoning was quite sound, to my way of thinking, and hinges on the Gossinger silver collection.” Vivian felt as though he were reciting from a rehearsed text. “The collection was brought to the house late one night in the latter part of the eighteenth century by the daughter of a local silversmith, who had grown up on the stories of the Swineherd of Stowe, the man who’d left his life savings to Lincoln Cathedral. This man, the girl’s father, wished to make a similar bequest. So he asked her to take all the pieces that remained unsold in his workrooms, on the day of his death, to Gossinger. She was to request that young Sir Rowland take them with him when he next took his carriage into Lincoln and present them to the cathedral.”

  “So that’s how it got there.” Flora spoke through stiff lips.

  “But things didn’t work out the way the silversmith intended. When the girl arrived, Sir Rowland was at the card table with a group of his drinking and wenching pals. He had been losing heavily all evening and in a last desperate bid to save himself from financial ruin, he staked Gossinger on the turn of a card. He lost. He must have thought he was saved by divine intervention when that girl showed up with baskets full of silver. He used the silver to stake another hand. And his luck turned. He not only got back Gossinger, but gained a small fortune as well. According to family records he gave that money, which may well have been more than the value of the silver at that time, to Lincoln Cathedral. But he refused to part with the pieces themselves, because he had all the superstitions of the gamester and believed that while the silver remained, Gossinger would be immune to all ill fortune. As for the girl, one legend says she and Sir Rowland became lovers. Another claims that, consumed with rage, she cursed him, and that her ghost walks Gossinger to this day.”

  “But why,” Flora wanted to stay trapped in the web of the story but found herself inexorably tugged back into the present, “why did Sir Henry decide to leave Gossinger to my grandfather?”

  “Because he knows Hutchins was a descendant of that silversmith’s family.”

  Vivian rubbed his forehead. “Uncle Henry believes that Sir Rowland committed a great sin by going against a dying man’s wishes and that in reparation, however belated, he should return the silver collection, along with Gossinger, which would have gone out of the family without it, to the rightful owner.”

  “My grandfather being the closest living descendant?”

  “Yes. It’s exactly the same thing as the tea strainer. Wherever it has been hiding all these years it must, if family honor is to be preserved, go back where it belongs. You do see what this all means, don’t you, Flora?”

  “Of course I do! I’m not completely stupid!” She picked up Nolly who had been sitting patiently, trying not to look as though he minded being left out of this momentous conversation. “You’ve just provided me with the motive for my grandfather’s murder. Now are you going to tell me who murdered him?”

  “You don’t think ... ?” Vivian blanched.

  “That you—?” Flora’s eyes stung. “How can you suggest I would think such a thing?”

  “Because Gossinger would have come to me.”

  “But you don’t like it!”

  “That’s true, but I might have equally disliked the idea of someone outside the family inheriting it. Let’s be realistic: I could have sold it and lived rather nicely on the proceeds.”

  “We’re wasting time,” Flora said impatiently. “Do you think the killer was Miss Doffit?” The thought of the old lady now sitting placid as a cat by the fire being a cold-blooded murderess sent a chill through Flora. “Is that why you didn’t want her to stay here?”

  “No, I don’t think she killed your grandfather. Although I don’t like what I am thinking about her, because I’ve always been awfully fond of Cousin Sophie ...”

  “Then if it isn’t her, and it obviously wasn’t Sir Henry, then there’s only one person left. And that’s Lady Gossinger!”

  “Aunt Mabel was beside herself when Uncle Henry broke the news about his will. He knew she would be, which is why he did it in front of Cousin Sophie and me. I suppose some might say that was cowardly of him, but his determination to follow his conscience makes him a hero in my eyes. And there’s more, Flora. Now that your grandfather is gone, Uncle Henry is talking about leaving Gossinger to you instead. He may in fact already have done so.”

  Flora pressed her fingers to her lips in an attempt to steady her breathing before she could speak. “Please, don’t you dare ask me if I realize what that means! All right, I’ll say it for you. You’re afraid that Lady Gossinger may make away with me next. That’s why you’ve been staying here. I never did believe you ran your car out of petrol the other night. Everything’s becoming clear, even to dim-witted me. I see now why you were so sure Boris Smith had seen or heard something that frightened him so much that he hasn’t been himself since.”

  “I’m hoping to find out what that is,” Vivian doubled his hands into fists, “because the problem is that I don’t see how we can prove any of this without some evidence. It’s all pure speculation, and to tell you the truth much of the time I believe I’m mad as a hatter. That I’m the one turning your grandfather’s death into a murder story.”

  “You could have told the police about the will and let them reach their own conclusions. Didn’t my grandfather deserve that much?” Flora spoke stiffly.

  “And what if they couldn’t come up with anything concrete? Aunt Mabel could have sat back and bided her time until, lo and behold, you met with an accident. I’ll admit that there’s a part of me that still can’t believe she’s a murderer. I always found her rather endearing, despite her faults. But no consideration of that sort would have stopped me from speaking out if I had thought it would settle matters up front.”

  “Do you think Sir Henry suspects her?” Flora put Nolly down. He was becoming unbearably heavy.

  “No, I’m sure he doesn’t. The man’s completely guileless.”

  “So that takes us back to Miss Doffit.”

  “I think Cousin Sophie may have decided to throw in her hand with Aunt Mabel as a means of ensuring she can never be tossed out from Gossinger on her ear. And that at the least she is here to find out if you have any suspicions. At worst ... I’d really rather not think about that. But as I must, it seems to me that if Aunt Mabel is visibly at Gossinger, she might not be suspected if something untoward happened to you.”

  “Somehow I can’t see Miss
Doffit pushing me under a train.”

  “No, but she could be here to make arrangements with someone willing to do the job for the right price.”

  “Oh, this is beginning to sound ridiculous.”

  “I know,” said Vivian.

  “At least I now understand why you took me somewhat seriously when I told you Nolly sensed someone was following us. You aren’t ... you aren’t thinking that Snuffy—and Reggie, too—could be mixed up in this?”

  “The idea naturally occurred to me, but there reaches a point where it’s impossible to know where paranoia starts or leaves off. I thought that if we could take it one step at a time—"

  “But that’s just what you didn’t do! There was no ‘we’ about it. It was my grandfather that was murdered, not yours! And it’s my life that you are now saying may be at risk!” Flora’s eyes blazed with tears. “You had no business treating me like a child. If I act like one sometimes, that’s up to me. No,” she held up her hand, “don’t touch me. The girl who said she trusted you isn’t here anymore. Actually it’s even worse than I let on! I allowed myself to fall in love with you! Can you believe that? Because I can’t!”

  “Flora, you must know—

  “I want you to leave, Vivian. I want you to pack up your Cousin Sophie and her suitcase and be out of here in three minutes, or I’ll set Nolly on you both! And I’m not going to hate myself for this in the morning.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  When Flora woke up the next morning, her head throbbed and her eyes felt as though they had been rubbed in sand. For a moment she feared she had a hangover. She’d had one once when she was seventeen and went out dancing with some of her friends from school and returned home at what the current housekeeper had called a godforsaken hour. All Grandpa had said when he’d seen her was that he was glad she had taken a taxi home.

  This was the same sick, muzzy feeling. The memories of last night floated mercifully out of reach. Until she sat up, upsetting the equilibrium so that they came back with such force that now her head really did feel as though it were about to explode. She had to stagger into the bathroom to get a glass of water, which she drank sitting on the edge of the bath.