Page 35 of Death at the Dower House
“I don’t know much about it,” I told her. “But it looked like she was strangled with her scarf, and I imagine you’d find that easier than using your hands.”
Laetitia turned pale, and so did Constance.
“Pippa…” Francis protested.
I nodded. “Sorry. I’m upset.”
“We’re all upset,” Gilbert said, and sounded petulant. “Who are you to take charge and tell us these things?”
I turned to him. “I’m nobody. I’m one of the two people who found her, but apart from that I’m nobody. I wish she wasn’t dead, and I wish I hadn’t seen her, and I wish we didn’t have to talk about it anymore. But I assumed you’d want to know. If you didn’t, then I apologize.”
There was a moment of silence while no one said anything. Then Crispin opened his mouth. “Sit down, Darling.” He glanced around the dining room. “Maybe we can find something—”
“Dawson’s fetching the bar cart,” Christopher said, dropping onto the chair next to me, “as soon as he’s called in the local police.”
Crispin nodded. “I think we can all do with a drink.”
There was a murmur of agreement around the table. I’m normally not one to imbibe before three, especially not on a morning following a party, but we’d done it at Sutherland Hall two weeks ago, so there was no reason we couldn’t do it here. It was definitely needed.
“What was she doing in your mother’s room?” Marsden asked.
The question was directed to Gilbert, I think, or perhaps to Constance, but again the words fell out of my mouth without thought. “Isn’t it obvious? She didn’t want to share a room with Lady Laetitia. Lady Peckham’s room was empty. Why not go there?”
“So who of us knew where she was?” Marsden asked, looking around at everyone.
It was another blatantly obvious question, and not one he was likely to get an honest answer to. If no one would admit to having seen Johanna after she went out into the garden last night, no one would admit to knowing where she’d gone to spend the night.
“I knew she wasn’t in her own room,” Laetitia said, “although I didn’t stop to think where she might be instead.”
The way she very carefully avoided looking at Crispin gave the lie to that assertion. She had thought Johanna was with him, and had been determined not to dwell on it.
“I went up to bed long before the rest of you,” I said. “I have no idea what anyone else did after that.”
Except for those moments in the water closet, of course, and the embrace I had spied through the window.
Although if Crispin had gone to Lady Peckham’s room with Johanna after the scene I’d witnessed in the garden, things must have turned sour very quickly. Christopher had told me that Crispin had come into their shared bedroom twenty minutes or so after him and Francis. Take off the time they had been in there while he’d been outside the garden, and you were left with… what? Fifteen minutes? Ten?
That might have been enough time to kill someone if he had wanted to. He would have had to be very quick about it, though. And the scene I had witnessed hadn’t looked like it would turn to violence that fast.
I eyed him across the table. He didn’t look any guiltier than he normally did, which is to say not at all. Then again, I’ve never had the impression that he has much of a conscience. That was why I had been able to convince myself so thoroughly, on so little evidence, that he had killed his grandfather and his grandfather’s valet two weeks ago.
Which, of course, he hadn’t. And he probably hadn’t done this, either. Why would he? He had two beautiful young women fighting over him. Why ruin the fun by killing one of them?
He looked up and caught me staring, and met my eyes for a moment. After a second, he smirked. “Penny for your thoughts, Darling?”
“Just wondering whether you retired to Lady Peckham’s room with Johanna last night,” I said.
Next to him, Laetitia stiffened, and both her brother and Gilbert Peckham turned to eye him suspiciously.
If he noticed, it didn’t bother him. One eyebrow arched, but his voice was perfectly calm when he told me, “I didn’t.”
I nodded. I didn’t think he’d admit to it even if he had, so this was nothing I hadn’t expected.
A rattle outside the door heralded Dawson with the bar cart. “Gentlemen,” he intoned as he pushed it through the door. “Ladies.”
Peckham sprang to his feet. “Dawson. Astley says you have the key to Mother’s room—”
“I’m sorry, Mr. Gilbert.” Dawson didn’t even look up at him, just kept pushing the cart across the floor.
