Page 6 of Dead Beside the Thames
“Well, I know the marquess and his current marchioness have five children. The eldest is a daughter, Claudia, who must be about twenty-eight by now.” Penelope frowned slightly. “She’s of similar age to me. It’s odd that she hasn’t married, yet I’m sure she hasn’t. Next in line is a son, Jonathon, who must be twenty-six or so, followed by another son, Bryan, who I think is about twenty-two, and a daughter, Margot, who is eighteenand due to make her come-out next year, and last, another son, Conrad, who must be just fifteen.”
Still frowning, Penelope shook her head. “I must admit that with the marquess and marchioness rarely being in town, I’m not as up to date with the latest regarding their family as I would like to be.”
Charlie gently scoffed, “You still know more than the rest of us combined.”
“Regardless,” Barnaby said, addressing Stokes, who was busy scribbling, “you won’t have Rattenby breathing down your neck just yet.”
Stokes grunted. “A small mercy, but I’ll take it.”
“Actually…” Penelope caught Stokes’s eye and lightly grimaced. “There’s a paternal aunt, Lady Selborough, who lives in town, and her husband is quite influential politically, and I believe Sedbury’s older three half siblings—Claudia, Jonathon, and Bryan—are also currently in town. I’m not sure how close any of them were to Sedbury, much less how they’ll react to the news of his death.”
Stokes softly groaned and wrote some more.
Penelope frowned more definitely. “It’s annoying that I know so little about the Hales—that’s the marquess’s family name—but I will rectify that situation as soon as possible. Meanwhile, to confirm, Lord Jonathon Hale, being Sedbury’s oldest half brother, is the next in line to the marquessate and, therefore, is now Rattenby’s heir.”
Stokes looked up from his notes. “Well, that’s something—someone I’ll need to check on.” He closed his notebook and tucked it away. “And while it’s a minor relief to know that I won’t immediately be hauled before the marquess to face demands for definitive and conclusive answers, given those involved, the commissioner himself will be demanding answers all too soon.Members of the nobility being murdered tends to make everyone in the force extra nervous.”
His expression sympathetic, Barnaby suggested, “We should plan what next we need to do.” He glanced at the others. “We know what facts we have thus far. Working from those, what do we most urgently need to learn?”
They cogitated for a moment, then Charlie offered, “Stokes said that Sedbury walking out of White’s was the last time he was seen alive, but someone must have seen him after that.” Charlie looked around the circle. “Sedbury walked out onto St. James Street at a quarter to midnight or thereabouts on a Saturday night. Quite aside from members of the ton, there would have been jarveys and street lads about, and one thing you have to say of Sedbury, he cut a figure that was hard to miss. Someone had to have seen him.”
Stokes slowly nodded. “You’re right. And yes, we should follow that up and see what we can find.”
“By the same token,” Penelope said, “we should seek witnesses who saw Charlie leave White’s and walk home to Jermyn Street.”
Barnaby nodded. “And check with Garvey for the time Charlie arrived home.”
Charlie looked happier.
“And top of my list,” Stokes said, “is finding anyone who witnessed a meeting between Sedbury and someone else on one of the bridges later that night. Jarvey, boatman, passerby—someone must have seen him or heard an argument or fight.”
Barnaby said, “Given the victim was Sedbury, who loved to brawl, then any fight that resulted in him being overcome and tipped off a bridge had to have been noticeable.” He paused, then added, “Sedbury wasn’t the sort of man who would have been taken unawares.”
Stokes humphed. “We’ll see what the postmortem tells us. Perhaps someone slipped a knife between his ribs, but from what you and the coroner have already said, that seems unlikely.”
“In essence,” Penelope said, “we need to gather all the information we can on Sedbury’s last hours. He left White’s at a little before midnight—where did he go next?”
Stokes nodded. “That’s our most obvious avenue to pursue.”
“And while you and Barnaby and Charlie are looking into that,” Penelope said, “I’ll see what I can learn about the Hale family members currently in town.”
The sound of the doorbell reached them, and they paused expectantly.
Moments later, Mostyn appeared and announced, “Sergeant O’Donnell has arrived, Inspector. He says you’ve been summoned to the morgue of the River Police. Apparently, the medical examiner has completed his task and says there’s information you need to hear.”
“Well!” Stokes uncrossed his legs and rose. “That sounds promising.” He glanced at the others. “I’ll return here with whatever insights the examiner has to share?—”
“And while you’re gone,” Barnaby said, “we’ll put our heads together and work out how to learn all we need to know.”
Stokes grinned, saluted the company, and strode for the door.
CHAPTER 2
Stokes had been to the Thames River Police’s morgue multiple times before, and it was never a pleasant duty. The River Police’s headquarters was a gloomy gray-stone building that squatted in the shadows of the Tower. Stokes made his presence known to the sergeant at the front desk and was promptly waved toward the narrow corridor that led to the even narrower stairs that gave access to the building’s basement, in which the morgue was housed.
Stokes glanced at O’Donnell.
Immediately, the experienced sergeant said, “I’ll wait here.”
