Page 35 of Dead Beside the Thames
Mrs. Hughes’s soft features were worn and rather faded, with lines that declared her a kindly soul, yet her brown gaze was shrewd. She curtsied to Claudia and Charlie, then clasped her hands before her. “How can we help you, my lady?”
Rather than refer to a murder, of a family member no less, Claudia serenely stated, “My parents will soon be visiting town, and they’ve asked me to learn what I can about how Bryan is faring.” She smiled with just a touch of fond exasperation. “Living in the country as they do, they are prone to worry. Not over anything specific—more in general, if you take my meaning.”
Mrs. Hughes nodded readily. “The parents of our other lads have occasionally inquired as well. Parents do fret sometimes.”
Straightening, Hughes stated, “In the case of the four we have here now, all such concerns have proved unfounded, I’m pleased to say.”
Relieved, too,Claudia thought, but she nodded encouragingly. “Just so. From that, I take it that you know of no problems—quarrels, arguments, anything like that—involving Bryan?”
Mrs. Hughes shook her head, and Hughes replied, “Nothing of any significance. Indeed, the four here get along very well. Lord Bryan has been no trouble at all. Well,” he amended, “no more trouble than other lads of similar age and station.”
Claudia stared back, momentarily flummoxed as to how to progress to the question she needed answered.
Beside her, Charlie stirred, and when she glanced his way, he suggested, “In order to allay your parents’ concerns, why not simply ask about Bryan’s doings on a particular evening? Say last Saturday evening. You can then relay that to your parents as evidence there’s no reason for them to worry.”
“An excellent idea!” Claudia turned to the Hugheses and smiled. “So, what were Bryan’s movements last Saturday?”
The Hugheses exchanged a meaningful look, but what meaning the look carried, Claudia couldn’t tell. Then Hughes cleared his throat and returned his attention to Claudia and Charlie. “As is often the case, all four went out at about eight o’clock on Saturday night.”
Mrs. Hughes nodded. “Together, the four of them.”
“They tend to stick together,” Hughes put in, “which, to my way of thinking, is reassuring.”
Claudia nodded, and Mrs. Hughes went on, “They mentioned they were going to some ball in Mount Street, and after that, theyplanned to go on to some other entertainment, but they didn’t say what that was.”
“No, they didn’t,” Hughes corroborated, “but they came home together at around three in the morning.”
Mrs. Hughes huffed fondly. “Heard them come staggering up the stairs just after three o’clock.”
“All four?” Charlie asked.
Hughes nodded. “Aye. We can hear them each go into their rooms, and I take special note, as once they’re all in, I go down and lock the front door, which I did.”
“So,” Claudia summarized, “the four spent their evening together, and they were here, in their beds, from three o’clock onward.”
Charlie caught Claudia’s gaze. “If your parents want to know more, we can always ask the other three if they were with Bryan the entire night.” He smiled at the Hugheses. “It sounds as if the four look out for one another.”
Hughes was starting to eye them with suspicion, but he nodded. “Aye, they do that, the four of them.” He looked at Claudia. “However, if you’re wanting to know definitely where any one of the four was between whenever they left the ball and three last Sunday morning, I don’t think asking them will help.”
Frowning in puzzlement, Claudia asked, “Why? If they were all together…?”
Mrs. Hughes sighed. “Drunk as only lords can be, they were. You should’ve heard them stumbling around getting up the stairs. Legless, they were. So no matter what they say happened or didn’t happen, you wouldn’t want to be putting any faith in anything any of them say.”
Claudia’s expression blanked. “Ah. I see.”
Charlie rose and thanked the Hugheses for their time and their help, then grasped her hand and drew her to her feet. Shewas still digesting what they’d learned—and what they hadn’t—when they reached the pavement.
She heard the door close behind them and, still frowning, halted. “That’s really not all that helpful.”
“Sadly,” Charlie said, “I have to agree.” He studied her face. “We’ll just have to hope that, inebriated or not, Bryan can remember where he went and that it’s the sort of place we can prove he was at.”
Claudia sighed and started for the hackney. “Hopefully, we’ll get more useful information from Jonathon’s man. Jonathon’s rooms are in Jermyn Street.”
Jermyn Street was just half a block away, but the time was now long past noon, and when Charlie inquired, she admitted that she was, indeed, famished.
At her suggestion, Charlie paid off the jarvey and, arm in arm, she and Charlie strolled the short distance to Piccadilly and a nice little eatery she knew of there.
By mutual if unvoiced agreement, while they enjoyed a light luncheon, they once again spoke of other things.
