Lestrade and the Guardian Angel Read online

  ‘What for?’ Lestrade asked him.

  ‘Disturbing the peace,’ the constable answered.

  ‘Damaging a tramline,’ said the second.

  ‘Riding a vehicle in a manner likely to cause an accident,’ said the third.

  Lestrade beckoned the constables to him. ‘Gentlemen, I am Inspector Lestrade of Scotland Yard, working under cover.’

  At that moment Watson arrived. ‘Lister, are you all right?’

  The three constables stepped back. ‘And impersonating a police officer,’ they chorused.

  ❖ Up, Up and Away ❖

  T

  he night in the cells had done nothing for Lestrade’s disposition. His backside ached, his shins were barked, his pride was dented beyond recognition. He was just glad it was the long-suffering Constable Dew who came to collect him in the morning and no one of higher rank. He ignored the fumbling apologies of the desk sergeant and made his way out to the light.

  A grey face hailed him from the parked hansom. ‘Lestrade, there you are.’

  ‘Hello, Watson.’

  ‘Can I give you a lift, old man?’ The doctor was trying his best at bonhomie, but Lestrade took it personally. When he had narrowly missed the tram last night, he had been forty-three. This morning he felt a hundred and eight. He sat gingerly on the seat opposite Watson, and Dew squeezed in beside him. A glance from his guv’nor sent him across to the other side. Dew was unmoved by a similar scowl from Watson.

  ‘I am prepared to forego the cost of the Facile, Lestrade,’ Watson said, ‘under the circumstances.’

  ‘Good of you, doctor.’ Lestrade’s look would have decimated a less impervious man.

  ‘Did you discover anything?’ Watson asked.

  ‘Scotland Yard, driver,’ called Lestrade and the cab moved off. ‘I discovered anew why I never took seriously to the cycling craze,’ he said, ‘and that Facile wheels and tramlines do not go together.’

  ‘I thought they did,’ grinned Watson, but realized the insensitivity of the remark and changed tack. ‘About Hughie Ralph, I mean.’

  ‘Well, I questioned mine host at The Short Arm in Lemsford while my clothes were drying – put that notebook away, Dew; this is not for public consumption.’

  ‘Very good, sir.’ Dew knew a raw nerve when he trod on one.

  ‘He could tell me very little about the day Ralph died that I did not know already. Perhaps mine host at the Rose, Tewin would be more helpful. Can you remember anything about that lunch?’

  ‘Good Lord.’ Watson leaned backwards. ‘Now you’re asking. I believe we had ham. Some of us partook of the pate, but I’ve been in Afghanistan, Lestrade. I’ve seen what pate did to some of our chaps on the frontier. Not a pretty sight, I assure you.’

  ‘I thought they were Pathans, doctor,’ Dew said and then retired into his corner.

  ‘I’m sure it wasn’t, doctor,’ Lestrade nodded, hoping to avoid the full blast of Watson’s war memoirs. ‘No one else in the club complained of feeling unwell?’

  ‘No, I don’t believe so.’

  ‘Did you notice your fellow guests at the Rose? Those who were not of your party?’

  ‘Scarcely at all, I’m afraid. I’m sorry, Lestrade. Not exactly being an expert witness, am I?’

  Lestrade looked at him. ‘Don’t blame yourself, doctor, you’ve had no training. Anyway, it scarcely matters. Hughie Ralph is one of two victims.’

  ‘One of two? Ah, your Willielyke chappie.’

  ‘Hellerslyke,’ Lestrade corrected him. ‘What we have to establish is a link. Two men, of an age, both well-to-do; one titled, one not. Both died by the same means – phosphorus poisoning.’

  ‘Do we know any more than that?’

  ‘Not for the moment,’ said Lestrade. ‘And you realize that I am only confiding in you, doctor, because of your medical training.’

  ‘And because of my association with Sherlock Holmes,’ Watson beamed proudly.

  Lestrade made no comment, but removed pieces from Dew’s tie knot. ‘Does a capital kedgeree, Walter, your wife?’

  ‘Very fair, sir. Very fair,’ and Dew joined in the search.

  The cab lurched to a halt on that wet Monday outside the Yard’s side entrance. Lestrade and Watson went inside, but Dew was still paying the fare when they emerged again and leapt inside the hansom.

  ‘Come on, Dew.’ Lestrade poked his head out at the bewildered constable. ‘Down in Epping Forest, something has stirred.’

  BEYOND THE VILLAGE of Theydon Bois, out across the levels of gorse and broom, near the hamlet of Bowells, a little hollow lay in those days sloping towards the south-east. It was lunchtime before the trio found it. Sergeant Dixon’s directions had been less than Ordnance Survey. By then, a stretcher covered in a blanket was being lifted on to the waiting hearse.

  Lestrade was first out of the hansom and he identified himself to the officer in the centre of the thicket.

  ‘Not just now,’ the officer called. ‘I won’t be a moment,’ and he finished what he was doing and emerged from the bushes. ‘Thanks for coming. I’m Inspector Failsworth.’ He wiped his hand before extending it. ‘Hold on a minute, sergeant.’ The officer crossed to the stretcher party and pulled back the blanket. There lay a man of thirty-five or so with a shock of dark hair, a drooping walrus moustache and a thin trickle of dark blood over his collar.

  ‘Have you had a doctor look at this?’ Lestrade asked.

  ‘Er . . . no. I thought I’d better move him before we had too many crowds.’

  ‘Doctor Watson,’ Lestrade shouted to the hansom.

  Failsworth was impressed. These Yard men carried their own medical teams with them. Watson arrived at the double with his little black bag and set to work. ‘You’d better put him down, gentlemen,’ he said to the stretcher-bearers. ‘Can’t risk elongation of the brachialis anticus, you know.’

  That went without saying and the policemen complied. The pay didn’t run to risks like that.

  ‘He’s been dead some time, Lestrade,’ Watson said. ‘Last night, probably.’

  Lestrade turned to follow Failsworth. ‘Where exactly was the body found?’

  ‘Over here,’ and he ducked into the bush. ‘No, no. The sergeant will show you. I . . . er . . .’ He closed briefly to Lestrade. ‘I’ve got a bit of a problem, you see. Shan’t be a moment,’ and he vanished again. Lestrade followed the sergeant to a depression in the grass. The mark of the body was clear in the flattened hollow, but the milling, stamping plates of many policemen had ruined all other clues.

  ‘Who found the body, sergeant?’ Lestrade asked the man.

  ‘I did, sir, on my way off duty this morning.’

  ‘What time was this?’

  ‘It would be about eight-thirty, sir.’

  ‘Do you usually walk this way?’

  The sergeant straightened, as though his deportment were in question. ‘Always, sir,’ he said.

  ‘Had you seen the deceased before?’

  ‘No, sir.’

  ‘Show him, sergeant.’ Failsworth had arrived again.

  ‘But the grass is wet, sir,’ the sergeant complained.

  ‘You’ve got your cape on, man,’ Failsworth observed. ‘Down you go.’

  The long-suffering sergeant removed his helmet and assumed the position of the corpse.

  ‘On his back, then, one leg tucked beneath him?’ Lestrade checked. ‘All right, sergeant. Thank you.’

  ‘Lestrade!’ Watson’s startled cry brought both inspectors hurrying over, except that Failsworth had to duck behind a bush on the way.

  ‘What have you found, doctor?’ Lestrade rummaged through the blanket folds to get a better view.

  ‘Cause of death, a blow to the base of the skull, done with a sharp pointed implement like a stiletto. Look.’ Watson turned the head to show Lestrade the neck, blood matted into the hair. ‘Entered between the first and second vertebrae and severed the spinal cord. The coup de grace.’

  Lestrade could see the grass
Watson was referring to. The man must have been struck from behind. He would have fallen face down if the blow had been hard enough. But if it hadn’t, he might have had time to turn, which would have accounted for the sergeant’s finding him on his back.

  ‘But that’s not all, Inspector.’ Had Watson turned a shade greyer? Probably a trick of the light. He forced open the dead man’s cold lips with his gloved hands. ‘I’ve heard of men so tough they chew iron and spit nails, but I’ve never seen anything like this.’

  There was a small, thin square of metal lodged between the dead man’s teeth. In his death agony, his lips must have closed over it.

  Lestrade gripped Watson’s sleeve. He vaguely heard Failsworth arrive, offer his apologies and disappear again.

  ‘Good God, Lestrade, what’s the matter?’ Watson whispered. ‘You look as though you’ve seen a ghost.’

  ‘As a matter of fact, I’ve seen six.’

  ‘Eh?’

  ‘Be good enough to accompany Inspector Failsworth here . . . er . . . there,’ he saw the man was waving from his bush, ‘to the station, doctor. There’ll have to be a coroner’s report, of course, but I’d find your report enlightening.’

  ‘My dear fellow.’ Watson shook him heartily by the hand. ‘I can’t tell you how touched I am.’

  ‘I know, doctor,’ Lestrade nodded, straight-faced, ‘but we must do what we can.’

  ‘It’s just like the old days,’ Watson shouted gleefully as they bundled the deceased into the glass-sided hearse, ‘with Holmes. Shall I bring my service revolver?’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ Lestrade said. ‘I’m not sure Epping is really ready for it, are you?’

  ‘Ah, but what of Romford, I hear you ask.’

  Lestrade had asked no such thing. He turned to Failsworth, who was adjusting his dress. ‘Shan’t be two shakes of a . . .’ he began, but thought better of it.

  ‘Inspector, I’d like your report on this as soon as possible. I have reason to believe it is one of a series of murders I have been too blind to connect until now. Do we know who this man was?’

  ‘No, but I’ll leave no stone unturned. I’ll send a runner to the Yard as soon as I have anything for you.’

  ‘Excellent,’ said Lestrade, convinced as he was that Failsworth was an expert when it came to running, and as he crossed to the hansom he heard Watson urging on the hearse driver by cracking his whip and shouting, ‘The game’s afoot!’

  THE WINDOWS OF NEW Scotland Yard blazed late that night. Inspector Sholto Lestrade sat on the radiator in his office trying to keep the circulation in his nether regions going. November was bitter. Christmas was coming and the goose was getting no fatter. Walter Dew arrived with Lestrade’s umpteenth cup of tea in time to see his guv’nor pinch the last Osborne.

  ‘Right, gentlemen.’ He scanned the three men in the same boat as he. ‘Let’s go through it again. Skinner, Murder Number One.’

  The constable used his pencil to point to the notes pinned on the wall to his left. ‘Captain Archibald Fellowes, late of the Second Life Guards. Coroner’s report says cause of death, drowning . . .’

  ‘What do you say?’

  ‘In the absence of my own observations, sir, I’d have to say the same.’

  ‘Would you, laddie?’ Lestrade sucked in his breath and nearly choked on the last Osborne. ‘Remind me not to recommend you for promotion. Go on.’

  ‘He had been in the water for about two days and the body was bloated and battered, probably by floating debris and embankment buttresses.’

  ‘Are you all right, Lilley?’ Lestrade asked as the constable’s eyes rolled upwards.

  ‘Fine, sir,’ the constable managed.

  ‘Go on, Skinner.’

  ‘There were two rather curious things about the corpse. One was a number of seeds found on his clothing, which on closer inspection turned out to come from Kew Gardens. And the second was the presence of an Ashanti war medal between his teeth.’

  ‘There’s more than pride being swallowed in this case,’ Lestrade said, rubbing his moustache ruefully. ‘What do we know about this Fellowes?’

  ‘Charterhouse. Sandhurst. Commissioned Second Life Guards 1889. Went to the Ashanti campaign on a rather hush-hush mission. Decorated and mentioned in despatches. But . . .’

  ‘But?’ Lestrade opened his eyes. Any chink in the armour would be welcome now.

  ‘Well, I’m still not happy with his diary, sir. May I?’

  Lestrade gestured with his hand and Skinner took the floor, pacing it as he had seen his guv’nor do.

  ‘I haven’t a shred of real evidence,’ he said, looking at them all, ‘but I think the real hero at Koomassie was Captain Hely, Fellowes’ brother officer.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘As I explained, sir, the handwriting alters at that point in the diary. Something perhaps like this. Hely got himself cut off by King Prempeh’s spearmen. Fellowes could have gone to his rescue – should have gone – but he didn’t. Not one of that twelve-man platoon came back from that mission, whatever it was, except . . .’

  ‘Fellowes,’ the others chorused.

  ‘Where does that leave us?’ Lestrade asked.

  ‘With a motive of revenge,’ said Skinner. ‘Hely and his men were dead. But those men must have had families, friends. What if one of them somehow knew the truth? That Fellowes’ heroism was a lie. He was in a private nursing home for over a month on his return to England. Er . . . “nervous exhaustion” was given as a reason to the Army Medical Board.’

  ‘And the Ashanti medal?’ Lestrade asked.

  ‘A final gesture of contempt,’ Skinner said, finding his chair again. ‘A symbol that the debt had been repaid, the wrong righted.’

  ‘And all you have is a change of handwriting?’ Lestrade asked.

  ‘Yes, sir.’ Skinner was no fool. He realized the weakness of it.

  ‘Have you followed through on Hely’s family or those of the other members of the platoon?’

  ‘I’ve started, sir, but frankly, it’s a vast job. The War Office aren’t exactly helpful. When one is a mere constable . . .’

  ‘It’s the same when one is a mere inspector, Skinner,’ Lestrade told him. ‘The same stiff upper lips and military moustaches. A fortress of scarlet tape. I know. I’ve been that way myself. Dew, Murder Number Two.’

  The constable took Skinner’s pencil and prowled as Skinner had done. ‘Sit down, Walter. You look as though it’s feeding time at the zoo.’

  ‘Sorry, guv’nor. Richard Tetley, archaeologist. Found in the second chamber at Wookey Hole cave, Somerset. Cause of death: unknown.’

  ‘Ah . . .’ Lestrade had not had time to follow that one up.

  ‘Couldn’t the Somerset Constabulary help us there, sir?’ Skinner asked.

  ‘They could, but if I know Chief Inspector Guthrie, they won’t. Harry Bandicoot said he’d put pressure on their Chief Constable to get me the coroner’s report . . . odd that. Still, I’ll hazard a guess, gentlemen, that the cause of death was phosphorus poisoning. Go on, Dew.’

  ‘The body was found by an Arthur Bulleid, also an archaeologist, at about midday on the day in question. The deceased had a carved animal in his mouth, sir. A beetle.’

  ‘Right, gentlemen, let me stop you there.’ Lestrade continued to perch himself on the radiator by the window. Across the river, the lights of Southwark twinkled beyond the silent, black barges. ‘What do we have in common so far? Who haven’t I asked? Lilley?’

  ‘Things in the mouths of the deceased, sir.’

  ‘Quite. And apart from that?’

  ‘Er . . .’

  ‘Two men, sir.’ Skinner looked earnest.

  ‘From which you deduce?’

  ‘Er . . .’

  ‘In your various enquiries,’ Lestrade said to them, ‘have you established any link at all, other than the manner of their deaths, between Fellowes and Tetley?’

  Silence.

  ‘All right, Dew. Have we a motive for Number Two?’<
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  ‘Perhaps something to do with Egypt, sir – with the Curse of the Pharaohs.’

  ‘Rubbish,’ scoffed Skinner. ‘In terms of the arcane . . .’

  ‘Let’s not go off at a tandem,’ Lestrade stopped him. ‘What are you saying, Walter?’

  ‘It may have something to do with Oscar Jones, the American archaeologist working with this Tetley in Egypt.’

  ‘Rather like Captain Hely, who worked with Fellowes in Africa.’

  ‘Sir?’ Dew was lost.

  ‘Ah, I see.’ Skinner was off and running. ‘So they are both crimes of revenge, perpetrated by the same person?’

  Lestrade nodded grimly. ‘But who? We have assorted members of the public at Wookey Hole on the morning of Tetley’s death. Unless he was in the habit of walking around and chewing marble beetles, the murderer placed the scarab in his mouth immediately after death. He would, therefore, have had to have been present at the time. For Fellowes, we know he had been in Kew Gardens shortly before his death, but when, why and with whom, we haven’t the faintest idea. And talking of fainting, Lilley, you’d better give us Murder Number Three.’

  The young constable fussed over his notes. ‘Howard Luneberg de Lacy and his wife Marigold.’

  ‘Forget Marigold,’ said Lestrade. ‘At least for the moment.’

  The trio of constables looked at him for an explanation.

  ‘First, she was battered to death, not at all consistent with our man’s methods. Second, she was a woman. All the others have been men. And third, the husband did it.’

  ‘De Lacy himself?’ Dew asked.

  ‘With the heavy-topped stick I saw in his hall stand. Oh, he’d have wiped it clean of blood, of course, but it’s a safe bet. And the lady who’s known as Liz, who frequents the Crystal Palace Park, heard Marigold refer to her companion as Looney. Howard Looneberg de Lacy.’

  ‘Why would he kill his own wife, sir?’ Dew asked.

  ‘They’re not all as pleasant as Mrs Dew, Walter,’ Lestrade smiled, lighting up a cigar. ‘Besides – Skinner, what did you discover about Mrs de Lacy?’

  ‘She was a very wealthy woman, sir, in her own right, I mean. Mr de Lacy had run up some pretty enormous gambling debts and a maidservant told me she had heard them arguing about it. Mrs de Lacy refused to give him a penny more unless . . .’