Dinner Most Deadly Read online

  “Was he in this position when you found him, or has he been moved at all?”

  Lady Dunnington frowned, trying to recreate the scene in her memory. “I daresay I may have moved him some. I do recall shaking him by the shoulder. I didn’t yet realize that he was dead.”

  “Quite understandable, your ladyship.”

  Pickett pushed on Sir Reginald’s shoulder until the body fell over onto its back. The brocade waistcoat that Sir Reginald had worn was heavily stained with blood, and in the center was a small round hole that had never been put there by his tailor. A thin trail of blood had leaked from his mouth and dried on his chin. His light blue eyes were open wide and wore a startled expression, as if he could not believe such a thing could have happened to him. He had clearly been shot at close range, but glancing around, Pickett saw no sign of a firearm.

  “The coroner will have to be sent for as a matter of routine,” Pickett said over his shoulder to Lady Dunnington, “but it’s quite obvious how he died.”

  He received no reply but an unintelligible sound. Looking up from his examination of the body, he saw that Lady Dunning-ton had retired to the nearest corner, where she was engaged in depositing her dinner into a potted plant.

  “Shall I fetch someone to assist you, your ladyship?” he asked, feeling rather out of his element. “Lady Fieldhurst, perhaps, or your maid?”

  “No, no, I shall be fine,” came her muffled reply. “Still, I should be grateful if you could question Julia first, and give me a moment to compose myself.”

  Pickett needed no urging to seek out Lady Fieldhurst, so he agreed to this suggestion and would have returned to the drawing room at once, had not Lady Dunnington called him back.

  “Before you go, Mr. Pickett, there is one thing you should know,” said the countess. Her voice was stronger now, and she somehow managed to convey an air of dignity in spite of the fact that she was on her knees before a rather pungent potted plant. “Julia told me something of what happened in Scotland. I have seen her break her heart over a rich man, and I do not intend to watch her break it again over a poor one.”

  He was rather taken aback by her implication that he possessed the power to break Lady Fieldhurst’s heart, much less the desire to do so. “Lady Dunnington,” he said with some asperity, “let me remind you that there is a dead man in your house, almost certainly murdered in cold blood by one of your acquaintances. Surely you have more pressing matters to concern yourself with than who is—is—”

  “Who is warming Julia’s bed?” concluded the countess, never one to mince words. “As you point out, Mr. Pickett, Sir Reginald is beyond any help I might render him. Lady Fieldhurst, however, is quite another matter,” she added with a backward glance toward the drawing room where the viscountess waited.

  Pickett sighed. “I assure you, your ladyship, the last thing I should want to do is cause Lady Fieldhurst pain.”

  She nodded. “Just so we understand each other.”

  With this warning—or was it a threat?—ringing in his ears, he returned to the drawing room. He found his quarry standing exactly where he had left her, as if she had been turned to stone. He wanted to set her at ease, but he had no idea what to say—not after the way they had parted in Scotland, and certainly not in view of the disclosures that had yet to be made. And so they stood there like strangers, he and the woman who was and yet was not his wife.

  “My lady,” he began, “I should like to ask you a few questions, if you please.”

  She nodded. “Yes, of course.” She returned to her chair before the fire, but her eyes remained fixed on the floor.

  He took a deep breath. “I realize I have offended you, my lady, but will you not at least look at me?”

  She did so, although he recognized the effort it cost her. He thought there were shadows under her eyes, and that they held a hunted expression. “Yes, Mr. Pickett? What did you wish to ask?”

  He withdrew his occurrence book and a pencil from the inside pocket of his coat. “You can begin by telling me about the people who were in attendance tonight. I believe Lady Dunnington said she was hosting a dinner?”

  The viscountess colored rosily, apparently recalling exactly what her friend had said about the purpose of that dinner. “Besides Sir Reginald, there was Lord Rupert Latham—I daresay you will remember him—Captain Sir Charles Ormond, Lord Dernham, Lord Edwin Braunton, and Mr. Martin Kenney. And Lady Dunnington and myself, of course.”

  “My lady—” he paused, not quite certain how to frame the request he felt compelled to make. “My lady, I must ask you—I hope you will oblige me by not making a decision regarding any one of these gentlemen as a potential lover until the investigation is complete.”

  She stiffened. “I believe, Mr. Pickett, that you have forfeited any right to address me on that particular subject.”

  Pickett flushed. “I am speaking merely as a keeper of the King’s peace, my lady. In that capacity, I would caution any female against becoming intimate with a man who might be a murderer.”

  Except, of course, that it was more than that, much more. Pickett wondered wistfully if there was any way to prove a conspiracy of five, and thus hang the lot of them. Pushing aside this rather bloodthirsty train of thought, he decided he would probably never have a better opportunity to broach a very personal subject indeed.

  “However,” he began, choosing his words with care. “There is another matter, a personal one, on which I must speak with you privately. This is neither the time nor the place, but I will be in Mayfair again tomorrow for the purpose of interviewing the men who attended Lady Dunnington’s dinner party. I should like to call on you while I am in the area, and to speak to you alone, if I may.”

  She hesitated, and for a moment he feared she would refuse him.

  “Very well, Mr. Pickett,” she said at last. “If you will call at two o’clock, you may be sure of finding me at home. I shall instruct Rogers to deny me to any other visitors.”

  “Thank you, my lady. Now,” he added briskly, returning to the matter at hand, “Where were you when you heard the gunshot?”

  “Lady Dunnington and I were still in the dining room.”

  “And the men?”

  She shrugged. “They had already left.”

  His pencil stilled, and he looked up from his notebook. “What, all of them?”

  “Yes. Dinner was finished, and Lady Dunnington and I were just withdrawing to leave the gentlemen to their port. One by one, each of the gentlemen—all except Sir Reginald, that is—gave some reason he could not stay, and they all took their leave.”

  “And this was unusual? Forgive me, my lady, but I have never been to a Society dinner, and so have no idea how they work.”

  “Yes, I see. Lady Dunnington received her guests in the drawing room—this room, as it happens—and once everyone was accounted for, we engaged in idle conversation until the dinner gong sounded. Then we all went into the dining room. At the end of the meal all the ladies—in this case that would be Lady Dunnington and myself—usually retreat to the drawing room while the gentlemen remain at the table drinking port and perhaps taking snuff.”

  “Except in this case they didn’t—the gentlemen, I mean.”

  “Exactly.” She hesitated, as if wondering what—or perhaps how much—to say. “Mr. Pickett, Lady Dunnington may say it was a lovely dinner, but I can assure you it was not!”

  “I can imagine it was most awkward for you,” he said, fighting back an entirely unprofessional sense of elation that Lady Fieldhurst had found the company less than enthralling.

  “No, not that—well, yes, it was, but not only that.”

  She leaned nearer and met his gaze unashamedly now; it was almost as if the earlier awkwardness had vanished. Not quite, but almost. At any rate, it was a start.

  “Some of the conversation,” she continued, “had, I don’t know, undercurrents, I suppose you could say—as if there was a great deal being said that wasn’t being said, if you take my meaning.”<
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  “I think so,” said Pickett, recalling certain barbed comments made by Mr. Foote that very evening. Yes, it was possible to convey a great deal within the most innocuous of phrases. “And would you say Sir Reginald was the target of these remarks?”

  “They were certainly aimed at him, although for what purpose I cannot begin to guess. In any case, he appeared unfazed by them.”

  “That must have been frustrating for the gentlemen trying to provoke him.”

  “I suppose so. In fact, I had the distinct impression that the other gentlemen left immediately after dinner because they had no desire to remain any longer in Sir Reginald’s company.”

  “Interesting,” remarked Pickett, making a notation in his occurrence book. “Can you remember exactly what was said?”

  She lifted her hands in a gesture of helplessness. “I fear the gunshot and everything that followed has driven most of it from my head.”

  “I can see how it would. But anything at all that you can remember might prove useful.”

  Her forehead puckered in concentration. “As I recall, there was some discussion regarding the marriage of Sir Reginald’s daughter. There were also more than a few questions regarding my recent journey to Scotland. I did not feel your investigations there were mine to tell, so I fear I threw poor Harold and his brothers to the wolves for the sake of conversation. This led, not unnaturally, to some talk about the plight of illegitimate children, until someone—I think it may have been Rupert—pointed out that the subject was unfit for mixed company. There was a brief exchange of military reminiscences between Sir Reginald and Captain Sir Charles, who used to serve under him. And then the conversation turned to the subject of travel—Scotland, as I said, and then Brighton.”

  Seeing Pickett taking down her words, she felt compelled to add, “Of course, none of this is in its proper order. Most of it was merely idle chatter of the kind that may be heard at any dinner party—you know what I mean.”

  In fact, Pickett did not know, never having attended a dinner party before, but he was not about to draw her attention to the wide chasm between their respective stations.

  “But wait!” exclaimed Lady Fieldhurst as a new thought occurred to her. “On the subject of Brighton, I believe there was some mention of the Brighton Cup—the horse race, you know, in which Mr. Kenney had apparently won a tidy sum—and of Sir Reginald’s attempt at besting the Prince of Wales’s time in a curricle race either to or from London. I remember that particularly, because Lord Dernham’s wife and several members of her family were killed when a racing curricle collided with the carriage in which they were riding. That was three years ago, and while I never heard all the details, I had the impression that Sir Reginald may have been involved in some way. I do know Frederick used to call him a loose fish, but I daresay his opinion hardly counts as evidence.”

  “Since the late Lord Fieldhurst was fair and far off in his valuation of women, I should be cautious about setting too much store by his word where men were concerned,” muttered Pickett.

  Lady Fieldhurst nodded. “You are thinking of his mistress, who turned out to be a killer.”

  “Actually, I was thinking of his wife, who turned out to be a peach. You may be sure I would—” He broke off abruptly. You may be sure I would be a better husband to you than he was, if only you would be willing to let this absurd marriage stand. What’s that, my lady? Oh, didn’t I tell you? It seems we are married. Yes, that would set the cat amongst the pigeons.

  “You would what, Mr. Pickett?”

  He shook his head. “Nothing. But you were telling me about the conversation at dinner. Was anything said about Lady Dernham’s death?”

  “She was never called by name, but there was certainly a rather sharp exchange between Sir Reginald and Lord Dernham on the subject of private races held on public thoroughfares. The subject was dropped, though, for the maid Dulcie—that is, for Lady Dunnington was obliged to leave the table.”

  “Was she?” He looked up sharply. “For what purpose?”

  Too late, she remembered Emily’s urgent warning. “Oh, I don’t know,” she said with a shrug. “Some domestic calamity, I daresay.”

  Pickett saw something flicker briefly in her eyes, and knew she was lying, or at least equivocating. It was the first time she had been less than truthful with him, and it stung to know that she no longer considered him trustworthy.

  “How long would you say she was gone?”

  “Five minutes, perhaps as much as ten.” Seeing him writing it down, she added quickly, “But that was long before Sir Reginald was shot.”

  He looked up from his notebook. “My lady, I hope you know me well enough to understand that I am not trying to build a case against your friend. I am merely trying to gain some understanding of the movements of the major players.”

  She nodded, but her gaze slid away from his to fix once more on the expanse of carpet between them. “Of course, Mr. Pickett.”

  “So, we have Lady Dunnington returning to the table after an absence of no more than ten minutes,” Pickett reminded her. “What next?”

  She shrugged. “Nothing, really. We had dessert—over which no one seemed inclined to linger—and at last Lady Dunnington rose and suggested that she and I retire to the drawing room while the gentlemen enjoyed their port. Sir Reginald was to act as host.”

  “And this was when the rest of the gentlemen decided to take their leave?”

  “Yes, but you make it sound as if it were a collective decision, which it was not. I believe it was Lord Dernham who first declined to stay, then one by one the others concurred. Some offered excuses for their early departure—Lord Edwin said his doctor cautioned him against drinking strong spirits, and Captain Sir Charles made some mention of being on review in the morning—but others simply said their goodbyes and left.”

  “And what of Sir Reginald during all this time?”

  She frowned thoughtfully, trying to remember. “If he was offended, he didn’t show it. Of course, it could be that Captain Sir Charles really will be on review in the morning, and Lord Edwin really has been cautioned against drinking.”

  “Both excuses should be easy enough to confirm or disprove,” said Pickett, jotting down a notation. “Did Sir Reginald enjoy his port in solitary splendor, then?”

  “No, for he departed very soon afterward himself.” She grimaced. “What an unfortunate choice of words!”

  “But quite accurate, it seems, and in more ways than one. What of the butler who showed him out?” Pickett asked, having acquired some understanding of the rôles of servants during a brief stint incognito as Lady Fieldhurst’s footman.

  Lady Fieldhurst shook her head. “Lady Dunnington’s butler has gone to Shropshire to visit his sister who is ill, and the footman is not in good health himself. It was one of the housemaids who had the responsibility of opening the door to guests.”

  “It was a footman who fetched me from Bow Street,” Pickett pointed out.

  “Yes, Emily was obliged to rouse poor Jack from his sickbed, for she could hardly dispatch a lone female on such an errand, particularly at so late an hour.”

  Finding nothing to dispute in this statement, Pickett made a note of it.

  “In any case,” Lady Fieldhurst continued, “Sir Reginald declined to have the maid summoned, saying he could show himself out.”

  “And then?”

  “He left the room, and it was only moments later that we—Lady Dunnington and I, that is—heard the gunshot. We ran to the hall and found Sir Reginald lying facedown on the floor in a pool of blood. Oh, and the door was open.”

  Pickett, scribbling away in his occurrence book, paused and looked up. “Which door?”

  “Two doors, actually. The front door—the one leading outside, that is—and the door leading downstairs to the kitchen, for the servants had been disturbed by the sound as well. I remember stepping out onto the front stoop, which Emily thought a foolhardy thing for me to do. She claimed I might have been s
hot myself.”

  “Only if the shooter had a second gun, or time to reload. In all probability, you were never in danger.” It was very likely true, yet he disliked the idea of Lady Fieldhurst standing alone outside the door where a murderer had just made his escape quite as much as Lady Dunnington had.

  “My lady, will you show me, as well as you can remember, just how everything looked when you and Lady Dunnington arrived on the scene?”

  “Certainly,” she said, rising to her feet.

  “I should caution you that Sir Reginald’s body is still there,” he added apologetically.

  “It will not be the first time I have seen a dead body,” she reminded him, lifting her chin bravely. “In fact, it has become quite a common occurrence of late. I daresay I shall soon become accustomed to it.”

  He might have told her that one never became accustomed, but as he had no desire to remind her of past horrors, he said nothing. As they crossed the drawing room, the temptation to touch her became too great to resist, and he was emboldened to take her elbow. She started a little at his touch, but he was gratified to note that she made no effort to pull her arm away.

  They found the hall empty save for Sir Reginald’s body; apparently Lady Dunnington was still upstairs cleaning up from her bout of nausea.

  Lady Fieldhurst wrinkled her nose. “It reeks in here! I don’t recall any of the other bodies having such a foul odor.”

  “I’m afraid we must attribute the smell to her ladyship. When I turned the body over to examine it more closely, she, er, succumbed.”

  “I can imagine,” said Lady Fieldhurst, carefully avoiding the sight of Sir Reginald in spite of her professed indifference. She pushed open the door to the servants’ domain below stairs. “Dulcie, the maid, stood just inside the door, with the cook right behind her. And on the formal staircase leading to the upper floors, Lady Dunnington’s abigail and Jack the footman had come down from their bedrooms in the attics. Although, now that I think of it, I don’t believe I noticed the servants until after I stepped back inside. The harder I try to remember, the more confusing it all seems!” She pressed her fingertips to her forehead in agitation.