Murder in Belgravia Read online

  MURDER IN BELGRAVIA

  A MAYFAIR 100 MYSTERY

  Lynn Brittney

  To Nellie and Arthur Skinner, my grandparents, who met and married during the First World War. Their daily experiences in London, during that period, have formed the core of the Mayfair 100 books.

  CHAPTER 1

  London. May 1915

  Lady Harriet sat before him—composed and pale. Chief Inspector Beech detected a slight trembling in her hands. She was so young, in her early twenties, and yet possessed of an impressive gravity. He spoke softly and tried to be reassuring.

  “Lady Harriet, you must know that this is a very serious situation. I only want to help you.”

  She pressed her lips together, whether in obstinacy or pain he could not tell, but she did finally speak.

  “I have told you, Mr Beech, I can only speak to a woman—preferably one of my own class and married. I will not … cannot … discuss my husband’s death with a man, no matter how courteous and refined he may be.”

  Beech sighed. “Lady Harriet, you have confessed to your husband’s murder and you refuse to enlighten us as to the circumstances. I do not want to have to place you in custody …”

  “No! You can’t!” Beech’s words were interrupted by the maid, who had been hovering nearby, anxiously. “My lady is ill! She cannot be put in prison!”

  Lady Harriet stirred and raised a hand to silence her maid. Beech thought he caught a small flicker of pain pass across her face.

  “Esme, that will do!” she admonished her maid.

  Beech noted the maid’s eyes fill with tears—not, he thought, from the admonition but from genuine concern about her mistress.

  He changed tack. “Lady Harriet, do you have a physician that might attend upon you?”

  Lady Harriet shook her pale face.

  “There is only my husband’s doctor and I should not care to be examined by him.”

  There was a small trace of venom in her voice, which Beech mentally added to the sparse information he had so far gathered.

  “Perhaps a female physician might be sought?” he tentatively suggested.

  Lady Harriet’s eyes widened in surprise.

  “Is there such a thing?”

  Beech looked at her in astonishment.

  “There is an entire hospital full of female doctors in Euston Road … and there is also a London Medical School for Women.”

  “What sort of women become doctors?” she replied. “Are they of good reputation?”

  Beech realized that he was dealing with an aristocratic young woman whose view of the world was severely limited.

  “Lady Harriet, for a woman to become a doctor requires a great deal of skill and intellect, not to mention the money to allow them to train for such a long time. So, yes, I would hazard a guess that most female doctors come from wealthy families and would be, what you would call, of ‘good reputation.’ ”

  Lady Harriet dropped her head and a small flush came into her pale cheeks as she understood Beech’s gentle criticism of her attitude.

  “You must forgive me,” she said softly, “I have little understanding of the world and … this … has all been such a shock.” She raised her eyes to look at him again. Her iron discipline was beginning to fail her and a tear rolled slowly down one cheek. “Esme,” she whispered hoarsely, “I think I need some medicine …”

  Esme ran swiftly to her side with a bottle and a spoon. Beech watched for Lady Harriet’s response to the medication and, judging by her shallow breathing and relaxation of her tensed hands, he deduced that it was some form of opioid and that he needed to take immediate action to have her examined.

  “Lady Harriet, I shall arrange for a female doctor to attend upon you as soon as possible. Perhaps Esme could show me out?”

  Lady Harriet nodded briefly and motioned Esme away. Beech stood and bowed to the dazed young woman and followed the maid into the hallway.

  “Esme, may I look at that bottle, please?”

  Esme looked concerned but handed the bottle over.

  “It was the master’s medication,” she hastily explained, “but I’ve been giving it to my lady ever since this morning when … it … happened. I had to give my lady something! I think she’s in terrible pain, sir.” She looked miserable.

  “You probably did the right thing, Esme.” Beech tried to be reassuring. “The name on this bottle … this is the doctor who was looking after your master?”

  Esme nodded. “Doctor McKinley. He has his practice in Harley Street, number forty two … may he rot in hell!” she added with feeling.

  “Why do you say that, Esme?”

  The maid bit her lip.

  Beech could see that she was reluctant to talk, so he reassured her.

  “Your mistress is in grave danger. Murder is a serious business. You must tell me what you know.”

  “I don’t know anything, sir,” she said sullenly. “I only know that when the master came back from the war and started being treated by Doctor McKinley, he turned into a monster. If he had been a dog, someone would have shot him and that’s all I’m going to say on the matter.”

  “Very well. I’m going to organize a lady doctor to come and see your mistress. It might be better if you put her to bed, ready for the doctor’s arrival.”

  Esme looked at him piteously. “She won’t move, sir. I don’t know what’s wrong with her but she has been sitting in that chair in the library since the master died, and she refuses to move. I think she’s in terrible pain.” She lowered her voice. “You saw the spots of blood that go from the bedroom to the library. That blood is hers. God help her.” She began to cry softly.

  Beech felt a sense of alarm.

  “Then I must hurry. Go back to your mistress, and help will be sent as soon as possible.”

  Out on the street, after a cursory word to the constable guarding the front entrance, Beech hailed a motor taxi and instructed the driver to take him straight to the Women’s Hospital. As the taxi pulled away, Beech saw the mortuary wagon arriving to remove the husband’s corpse. His mind kept going back to the face of the young aristocratic woman he had just left. He knew so many young women like her. Brought up in the cloistered world of the rural aristocracy, home tutored in “ladylike” subjects, brought to the cattle market of the London Season to be found a husband, and then married off to a suitably noble and moneyed young man. At the age of eighteen they were thrust into a physical adult relationship with a virtual stranger, which often made them miserable for the rest of their lives. In Lady Harriet’s case it had ended in tragedy. The husband, turned by his war injuries and opioid drugs into a savage, which, whatever he had done to his young wife, had resulted in him lying dead in their bedroom with a pair of scissors through his heart. And the young wife, trained from birth to be self-contained and never discuss private matters with anyone, was now in God-knows what state, physically and mentally, but refusing to ask for help or explain her act of probable self-defense.

  His anger and frustration mounted. The Metropolitan Police was simply not capable of dealing with such cases. Beech knew that, in the last year, since the outbreak of war, the young male population being largely absent, many of the crimes now involved women, and the Criminal Investigation Department was not trained to deal with them adequately.

  The Commissioner and the Home Office flatly refused to set up a women’s police force—the best they would do was allow the militant suffragette groups, and other women, to organize volunteer women’s police forces to supervise and control the influx of women seeking war work into the large cities. But these volunteer groups had no powers to investigate or arrest. They merely dealt with security and reported any problems. Perhaps, he reflected, the Lady Harriet case could a
lter matters. This was the first aristocratic criminal case he had encountered and it could tip the balance in favor of a plan he had been contemplating for the last few months.

  The taxi arrived at the Women’s Hospital and Beech instructed the driver to wait, then ran into the lobby.

  “Where is Doctor Allardyce?” he shouted at the woman on the reception desk, while waving his warrant card.

  The startled woman called back, “Ward Four, but you can’t go up there!”

  Beech halted in his tracks.

  “No men allowed!” the woman said firmly, pointing to a sign which said “NO MEN ALLOWED BEYOND THIS POINT.”

  “Of course, I understand,” Beech spluttered, momentarily flustered. “It is a matter of grave urgency. Is it possible you could fetch her for me? I’d be awfully grateful.”

  Struck by his politeness, the woman smiled and called across to a passing female orderly.

  “Annie, can you fetch Doctor Allardyce, please? This gentleman needs to speak with her urgently.”

  “Who shall I say wants her?” said the orderly, who looked to Beech as though she had been bred to haul heavy weights and would stand no nonsense, even from the most aggressive of men.

  “Chief Inspector Beech, if you would be so kind.” He flashed the orderly a respectful smile and she grunted her appreciation.

  Beech looked around and found an empty seat among the other men who were, presumably, waiting for permission to visit female patients, and watched the orderly plod up the stairs. He fidgeted as he waited for what seemed like an eternity but was rewarded by the sight of a familiar face coming down the stairs, flanked by the orderly and an equally formidable Matron. He was instantly struck by how different she looked to the last time he saw her.

  “Peter! What a pleasant surprise!” Caroline Allardyce beamed at Beech, who stood expectantly. “Just bear with me a moment while I give Matron some instructions.” She turned to her companion to write something in a book. The business done, she advanced upon Beech and planted a kiss on his cheek. The other waiting men grinned and Beech felt himself flushing.

  “Good Lord, what have you done to your hair!” he asked without thinking, and Caroline smiled.

  “I’ve cropped it, you goose! All the professional women are doing it now! Saves ages in the morning not having to fiddle around and put it up in a ladylike bun.” She seemed amused at Beech’s apparent dismay. “To what do I owe the pleasure of this visit?”

  “I need you to come with me, at once. Can you do that?”

  Beech’s sense of urgency startled her.

  “Er … yes. Just let me get rid of this white coat …” She gave him a quizzical look and started to unbutton her coat and hand it to the woman at the reception desk. “Could you please dispose of this for me, Mary? Thank you. Now—” she turned back to Beech “—I’m intrigued. What is so urgent that you have come all the way from Scotland Yard to get me?”

  Beech grabbed her arm and propelled her toward the door. “I have an urgent case for you to examine and there is no time to waste.”

  Caroline pulled away. “Wait a minute, if I am to examine a patient … it is a live patient we are talking about, isn’t it?” Beech nodded. “Then I need to get my bag.”

  “Of course … sorry … what was I thinking? Can you run and get it and I’ll meet you in the taxi? It’s just outside.”

  “I’ll be two shakes of a lamb’s tail.” Caroline disappeared and Beech made his way to the taxi, and saluted a thank you to the driver for waiting. As he climbed inside, he felt himself relax a little. Caroline always had that effect on him. Solid and reliable. Good old Caro. He’d known her since they were children in Berkshire and she had always been a positive, friendly influence. Always someone he could talk to.

  There was a waft of perfume as Caroline climbed into the taxi with her bulky black bag. “Now, Peter Beech, tell me all about this emergency case of yours.”

  Beech moved forward in his seat, pulled down the partition that separated the driver from the passengers, and instructed the driver to return to the address in Belgravia, then he made sure the partition was closed firmly.

  Speaking in a hushed voice he told Caroline of the events of the day. His department had received a message from the local beat bobby that Lord Murcheson had been murdered during the night. Beech had arrived at the address to find that Lady Murcheson had confessed to the murder but would say nothing further.

  “I think her husband attacked her and she killed him in self-defense and I also think that he damaged her internally. She left a trail of blood from the bedroom to the library and she will not or cannot move from the chair in which she is sitting. She is in a great deal of pain and her maid is giving her opiates. I fear she may die before we learn the whole truth but she will not allow a male physician to examine her and she will not elaborate on the events to a male police officer.”

  Caroline drew a deep breath. “Poor woman. But she won’t be the first upper-class victim of sexual violence I have tended to.”

  Beech was astonished. “Good God! Surely not!”

  Caroline gave him a rueful smile. “Sadly, it is true. Only doctors know what goes on behind closed doors—at all levels of society. If you knew how many top-drawer ladies I have repaired after botched abortions, you would never sleep at night.”

  Beech shook his head sadly. “I fear I’m somewhat naïve when it comes to women. And that is not a good attribute for a policeman.”

  Caroline laughed and squeezed his hand gently. “Dear Peter, I don’t think anyone in your social circle understood why you chose to become a policeman, any more than they understood why I chose to become a doctor. I can still hear my mother saying, ‘Why, in God’s name, do you want to delve into the unsavory side of life, Caroline? No one will want to marry you now!’ ”

  Beech laughed. “Sounds like my mother! She actually said to me, ‘Peter, your father would turn in his grave! No one of our class goes into the police force. That is a job for the lower orders who can better deal with the criminal element of society!’ I guess we are just two misfits, Caro.”

  “Nonsense!” Caroline’s briskness jerked Beech out of his momentary self-pity. “If there is one good thing that has come out of this dreadful war, it is the breaking down of the barriers between the classes. By the time this war has finished we shall be living in a meritocracy and the upper class will be finished. Besides … who will inherit their estates? There will be no men left in another couple of years. Thank God you’re out of it. How’s the leg, by the way?”

  Beech grinned. “Still gives me hell—especially at night—but thank you for asking. Ah! We’re here!”

  The taxi stopped and the passengers bundled out. The constable opened the front door of the house for them and they found Esme standing, trembling and tearful, in the hallway. She flung herself at Beech.

  “Thank God you’ve come back sir! My lady is in a stupor and I can’t rouse her! Please God, I hope the doctor can save her!”

  “Show Doctor Allardyce into the library,” Beech urged. “I’ll wait here.” He gave a grateful nod to Caroline as he sat in the nearest armchair.

  Caroline and her black bag disappeared with Esme, and he waited. After a few minutes he heard a scream and leapt to his feet, uncertain whether he should violate the privacy of the library; just then the maid came staggering out of the door in a state of shock.

  “Oh my God!” she screamed, before she dropped to the ground in a dead faint.

  Beech hammered on the closed door. “Caroline! In God’s name, what has happened?!!”

  The door was opened a fraction by a bloody hand and Caroline’s drawn face appeared behind it.

  “If they have a telephone here, call the Women’s Hospital and tell them to send an ambulance,” she said quickly. “Lady Harriet is hemorrhaging. I’m going to try and do what I can here to stem the bleeding but she needs to be hospitalized immediately.”

  Beech nodded, leapt over the prone body of the maid and ran d
own to the servants’ quarters. He found the butler, cook, and several staff huddled around the kitchen table. They looked frightened and miserable.

  “Where’s the telephone?!” he shouted urgently.

  The butler stood up.

  “It’s in my quarters through here, sir.” He motioned Beech to follow him.

  They went down a corridor and into a small room where a telephone was standing on a table by a single bed. Beech grabbed it and jabbed at the cradle several times.

  “Exchange, how may I help you?” a woman’s voice answered.

  “This is Chief Inspector Beech of the Metropolitan Police. I need to be connected to the Women’s Hospital immediately. It is an emergency.”

  “Connecting you, sir.”

  There was a click and silence. Beech felt his heart pounding, then he remembered the maid.

  “Your mistress’s maid is in a dead faint in the hallway. You’d better minister to her.”

  The butler looked grave. “At once, sir,” he said, grabbing a bottle of brandy from a shelf and departing in haste.

  “Women’s Hospital,” a voice said, as the line crackled into life.

  “This is Chief Inspector Beech calling on behalf of Doctor Allardyce. She requests that you send an ambulance as a matter of some urgency.”

  “Of course, sir. May I have the address please?”

  Beech gave them the information and, once again, stressed the urgency. The man on the end of the line assured him that the ambulance would be there as soon as possible. Beech noticed that his hands were trembling as he replaced the ear piece.

  As he made his way back through the kitchen, a tearful cook barred his way.

  “Is Lady Harriet dead, sir?” she asked fearfully.

  “Not yet,” was Beech’s grim reply. “I shall be wanting to question all of you, once Lady Harriet is on her way to hospital. Do you understand?”

  “Anything we can do to help, sir,” came a voice from over the cook’s shoulder. It was the butler, who was supporting a revived Esme and guiding her toward a chair.

  “Good. Is all the staff here? I take it that no one is missing?”