The Blood Royal(34)
He watched as his assistant choreographed the incident as she ran, imaginary gun clutched to her side. Bending low, she sought second cover from the trampled patch they had just examined, but only briefly, just allowing time for Lady Dedham to make her way from taxi to front door, then a few more seconds for Lord Dedham to speak to the cabby. Closing in. She counted out a further thirty seconds for distraction time afforded by the appearance of Miss Harriet Hampshire. And how lucky for the assassins that lady’s appearance had been! Under cover of this, Lily ran across the road and sidled down the path to take up position in the forward cover of the bushes near the door.
Joe called her back in his precise soldier’s voice, breaking the spell. ‘That all fits in very well. And I’ll tell you something else. I think that girl – Hampshire – could have been lurking about here as well. You have to look hard to see it but there’s an indentation here in a bit of earth. It’s too narrow to have come from a man’s shoe. It’s quite distinct and very fresh. What do you make of it?’
Lily knelt and peered. ‘The heel of a high-heeled shoe, sir. Evening wear? And why would a girl dressed for a night out be skulking in the shrubbery in this area? Sort of behaviour you expect to come across in Hyde Park after dark but not hereabouts.’ She looked at the faint outline again. ‘There’s a trail.’ Lily squinted and pointed. ‘She arrived from that direction. The house with the closed shutters on the first floor. Someone giving her shelter?’
‘Number thirty-nine.’ Sandilands referred to his notes. ‘Yes. Here we are. Hopkirk took a statement from the butler, a Mr Jonas Warminster. The owner is a gentleman who goes by the even more fanciful name of Ingleby Mountfitchet. Hardly fits the description of a Sinn Fein sympathizer … Mr Mountfitchet, who is a bachelor, ex-army, had retired to bed with his cocoa when he was disturbed by the rumpus that broke out in the street below. The butler assured him that the noise was a car backfiring and his master went back to bed. Where, judging by the tightly closed shutters, he still remains … sleeping something off? Avoiding speaking to us? Yes, Wentworth. I agree. Further and better particulars required, I believe. We should run a check on Mr Mountfitchet. I’ll give instructions to that effect.’ Joe looked up from his notes and said with emphasis: ‘Don’t worry, by the way – basic slog-about police work goes on while we’re here, dancing about in the shrubbery.’
‘Glad to hear it, sir.’ Her response was automatic, her mind elsewhere. ‘Look, sir – no woman would risk ruining her evening shoes and clothes in this wilderness in normal circumstances. She’d walk around on the path.’
‘Meeting someone? Hiding from someone? Lying in wait?’ Sandilands suggested.
Lily stood up again, an object clasped carefully between finger and thumb. ‘Long enough to smoke a cigarette, anyway. There’s lipstick on this. That suggests waiting about. Ambushing? Setting up a diversion?’
Joe produced a paper evidence bag from his pocket and held it open to receive the stub. ‘Not an enthusiastic smoker, evidently. Only a few puffs taken before she threw it away. Interrupted by the arrival of the taxi?’
‘Who do you know who smokes Balkan Sobranie, Holmes?’ Lily asked, laughing at him. She seemed to have been suddenly ambushed by their ridiculous situation.
He answered the question with a grimace: ‘Ah! If only it were so simple in real life. Balkan Sobranie, eh? You’re right. That would reduce our smoker to a select club of about ten thousand émigré Russians and as many Londoners who think it the smart thing to do. Anyone from a grand duchess who screws one into a six-inch-long Fabergé holder to the girlfriend of a Soho waiter who’s decided to have a flirt with the bohemian style.’ He sighed. ‘Still – worth recording and preserving. Perhaps Miss Hampshire will be able to throw a little light? I must check the plans Hopkirk has for re-interviewing that lady.’
‘We’re thinking the same thing, sir? On the same lines as Lady Dedham herself? She was convinced it was a third gun that fired the finishing shot from across the road. And we’re looking at evidence of a third party present at the scene.’
Joe nodded. ‘Yes. Interesting that in all the noise and horror Cassandra picked out a third gun. A killer still at large? I’ll tell you – while you two were upstairs, Hopkirk read out to me over the telephone the initial report from the autopsy. Dr Spilsbury had interesting things to say …’ He took out a notebook and found his place. ‘I give you the salient bits … Hit, in the first instance, by two bullets fired one from the left and one from the right at a distance of no more than six feet. One narrowly missed the lung and crossed the body to lodge in the muscle under his left arm, the other shot penetrated a lung and would, ultimately, have caused death. The coup de grâce was delivered from farther afield and from a higher-calibre gun. Something in the order of a Browning. In the hands of a marksman, I’m inferring from the doc’s comments. Clean shot through the heart. He was dead in seconds.