The Case of the Threatened King Page 2

  “I’ve no idea.”

  “She never discussed it with you, told you that she was unhappy and why?”

  “No.”

  “How did she feel about going to India?”

  The general’s face became even more bleak. “I don’t know. I always believed that she loved Francis, that they had a good marriage and that she was anxious to go out and join him, but … You think that’s why she disappeared, because she didn’t want to go?”

  “I’m not sure. I’d like to see her room, see if there’s anything there that tells me anything.”

  “My carriage is outside.”

  Matson opened the front door for them. Wyatt asked him to tell Miss Tillett that he was leaving and convey his regrets to her, then he joined the general in the double victoria. They sat there, side by side, in silence as the carriage went down the driveway and over toward Regent’s Park. But though they said nothing, Wyatt thought about many things, most of them dealing with the past rather than the present; of the times when his father had seemed like the most wonderful man in the world to him and the times when he had seemed like a stubborn, bigoted monster. And from the expression on the general’s face, it’s probable that his thoughts paralleled those of his son.

  Wyatt knew that the general had rented two floors of a small house near Robert Street on the east side of Regent’s Park, but he had done so after their breach, and Wyatt had never been there. He looked at the house with some interest now as they drew up in front of it. The steps that led up to the door were scrubbed and the brass bellpull gleamed like a sergeant-major’s buttons. The general opened the door with a latch key, led the way down a hall past a sitting room and opened another door.

  “This is her room,” he said.

  Wyatt went in and looked around. The room, large and high-ceilinged, overlooked a small garden and was light and pleasant. There was a bed and chest of drawers against one wall. Facing it was a fireplace with an ornate marble mantel. There was a desk between the two windows that looked out onto the garden, and nearby was a large, open steamer trunk.

  “Where did you find the note?” asked Wyatt.

  “Here,” said the general, indicating the mantel. “It was leaning against the clock.”

  Wyatt nodded, walked over to the desk. Besides a pen, ink and several sheets of the same paper on which the note had been written, there was a book with a bookmark in it. He picked it up. It was a well-worn copy of William Blake’s poems and the bookmark was inserted between two pages in the Songs of Innocence.

  “Did she like Blake?” he asked.

  “You mean the poet? I’ve no idea. I know she read a good deal, but I don’t know what.”

  Wyatt now went over to the trunk. “Do you know what clothes she took with her.”

  “No. I believe she took only one bag with her, a not very large portmanteau.”

  “She probably took that because she could carry it herself.” He was still studying the trunk. “She seems to have left all her tropical, Indian things here.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “I’m not sure yet.” He turned to face the general. “How long have she and Francis been married?”

  “A little over three years.”

  “As I recall, they met at a house party in Gloucestershire.”

  “Yes.”

  “What was her maiden name?”

  “Darrell. Harriet Darrell.”

  “What family does she have?”

  “None anymore. When she met Francis, she was an orphan, living with an aunt in Bath. The aunt died about a year ago.”

  “She and Francis were married here in London, weren’t they?”

  “Yes. At St. George’s.”

  “Where did she stay before the wedding? At a hotel?”

  “No. I believe she stayed at some club or other.” The general had been exhibiting more and more impatience with Wyatt’s questions. “Does any of this have anything to do with her disappearance?”

  “I’m not sure. The fact is, sir, that we’re faced with a bit of a problem here.”

  “What sort of problem?”

  “Well, from the note she left and the look of the room, it’s clear that she’s gone away of her own accord. That means there’s no legal reason for the police to come in on the case. After all, one should be able to go where one wants.”

  “Even though it means the end of a marriage and perhaps the end of a career? Because you know what it will do to Francis if she’s not on that boat when it arrives in India, don’t you?

  “I think so.”

  “And you still say you’re not going to do anything about it?”

  Wyatt looked at him thoughtfully, at the new signs of age that had appeared on the general’s face, and knew what it had cost the man to come to him of all people for help.

  “I never said I wasn’t going to do anything about it, Father. I was merely explaining the official, police position to you. Let me look into it, and I’ll get in touch with you as soon as I’ve something to tell you.”

  3

  The Second Disappearance

  When Matson came back and told them that Wyatt had left with the general, it was the direct and natural Sara who put what they were all thinking into words.

  “None of our beeswax of course, but I wonder what that was all about.”

  “It must have been something pretty important,” said Andrew.

  “Important? I wouldn’t have thought there was anything in the world that would have made him come here looking for Wyatt after the way he acted at Lord’s!”

  “What happened at Lord’s?” asked Verna.

  Sara and Andrew exchanged glances and then told her.

  “I see,” said Verna. “Of course I knew that there were problems there and why.”

  “Do you think Wyatt will tell us what it was about?” asked Sara.

  “I doubt it,” said Verna. “And, I don’t think I’d ask him. It’s probably a family or a personal matter.”

  Sara sighed. “All right. I won’t ask.”

  It was two days before any of them saw Wyatt again, and when they did, they then had something much more important on their minds than the general’s unexpected visit. These were the circumstances:

  It was late afternoon, and Verna and Andrew were in the sitting room, reading. Verna, reading a play script that had been sent her, finished it and dropped it on the table next to her.

  “No good?” asked Andrew.

  “Oh, it’s a perfectly good play—well-written and well put together—but the part they want me to play is exactly like Rowena in The Squire’s Daughter.”

  “That’s probably why Harrison sent it to you.”

  “It is. But I’ve told him a dozen times I won’t play an ingenue again. I’m not only too old for it, the idea of doing the same thing again makes me ill.”

  “I can understand that, but I don’t think you’re too old to play ingenues—not at all.”

  “You’re as bad as Harrison. What are you reading?”

  “One of Layard’s books.”

  “Layard?”

  “Austin Henry Layard, the antiquarian. Or archeologist as they’re starting to call them.”

  “Weren’t you reading one of his books the last time you were down?”

  “Yes. That was rather general. This is about his discoveries in the ruins of Nineveh and Babylon.”

  “Sounds interesting. And also like something your friend Lord Somerville might be involved in. Didn’t he have a dig somewhere near there?”

  “Yes. It was he who suggested that I read Layard. He said he was not just one of the first, he was one of the best Assyriologists. But …”

  There was a light tap on the door, and Annie, the parlormaid, came in, trim in her white cap and apron, wanting to know if they would like their tea now. Verna, who hadn’t realized it was five o’clock, asked if Sara was home from dancing school yet and, learning she wasn’t, said they’d wait until she did get home—which should be so
on since she was a bit late already.

  As Annie left, Andrew stood up and stretched.

  “I’ve been indoors most of the afternoon. I think I’ll walk over there.”

  “To the school?”

  “Yes. Though I’m sure I’ll run into Sara long before I get there.”

  “Right, darling. Go ahead. I want to write Harrison a note about the play.”

  Fred, the coachman, was in the stable yard polishing the side lights of the landau when Andrew came out of the house. He whistled shrilly, jerking his head at the carriage, which was his way of asking if he was wanted. Andrew shook his head, walked down the driveway and right on Rysdale Road toward Wellington Road.

  London is, of course, many small villages that have grown together but have still managed, in most cases, to preserve their own identity. And at this particular hour St. John’s Wood was most like itself: quiet, respectable and suburban. Since it was late in the day, the sun cast long shadows, gilding the spire of the Church of St. John and the roof of the Hospital of St. John and St. Elizabeth. Two cabbies sat on a bench in front of The Red Dragon, pints in their hands, while their horses munched their evening oats. A dark green City Atlas bus rattled by down Wellington Road on its way to London Bridge, and as Andrew crossed the street behind it, the Marchioness of Medford’s carriage turned into Rysdale Road and the coachman, a friend of Fred’s, touched his cockaded hat with his whip in greeting.

  Entering the narrower, shaded streets west of Wellington Road, Andrew found himself thinking about the conversation he had just had with his mother. What he had not told her was what Wyatt had said about his new interest in archeology. He had smiled when he had first heard about it and, when pressed, he asked Andrew if it had not occurred to him that it was another form of detective work.

  “They hunt for potsherds and artifacts,” he said, “and use their intelligence, their reasoning powers, to make sense out of them, understand a civilization, just as a detective puts clues and evidence together to understand a crime.”

  When Andrew had looked a little startled, Wyatt had laughed and said he was joking. And, while he may have been, Andrew had realized that there was a good deal of truth in what he said. That one of the reasons he had been so attracted to archeology was that it did bear such a resemblance to the work the man he liked and admired so much was doing.

  He was still musing about careers, wondering whether he’d rather be a famous archeologist or a famous detective when he reached the dancing school, which was in a stucco villa set back behind a somewhat neglected garden.

  It had taken him a little over ten minutes to walk to the school, and he was a little surprised that he had not run into Sara on the way for, though he knew she occasionally stayed there until four-thirty, he did not recall her ever having been this late before.

  He tugged at the bellpull, heard it jangle inside, and a few moments later the door was opened by a maid whose cap was not quite straight and who didn’t seem to be much older than he was.

  “Yes, sir?” she said. It was fairly obvious from the smear of jam at the corner of her mouth that he had taken her away from her tea. She seemed surprised when he asked for Sara.

  “Why, she’s not here, sir.”

  “She’s not?”

  “Who is it, Katie?” called a voice from somewhere inside the cavernous reaches of the house.

  “A young gentleman asking for Miss Sara Wiggins.”

  Footsteps approached, the door opened wider, and Miss Fizdale, a thin woman in her late forties, appeared behind the maid.

  “You’re Andrew Tillett, are you not?”

  “Yes, Miss Fizdale.”

  “I remember you from the spring dance recital. That must have been the last time you were home on holiday.” Then, as he nodded, “But Sara’s not here. She left some time ago.”

  “Oh. Well, I must have missed her walking over here.”

  “Yes, you must have. But even then …” She turned. “Do you know what time Sara left, Miss Caroline?”

  Miss Caroline, shorter and plumper than Miss Fizdale, appeared beside her. Andrew didn’t know her last name. All he knew about her was that she wore pince-nez and a high-necked dark dress like Miss Fizdale and that she played the piano for the school. She was clutching a napkin, so apparently the two ladies had been at tea also.

  “She left at the usual time—four o’clock. You mean she’s not home yet?”

  “She wasn’t when I left. She probably went somewhere with one of the other girls.”

  “Probably,” said Miss Fizdale. “Though I must say I don’t approve of that—going off without letting anyone at home know. Tell her mother—or yours—to speak very severely to her about it!”

  “Yes, Miss Fizdale. I will.”

  He left. It was interesting that Miss Fizdale had mentioned his mother as well as Sara’s; interesting but not surprising. Because it was Verna who had made the arrangements for Sara to attend the dancing school, and of course it was she who was paying for it. But where was Sara? Had she gone off with one of the other girls? Or had she gone home by a different route from the one she usually took, so that he had missed her? In any case, she’d undoubtedly be home by the time he got there.

  But she wasn’t. Verna looked up from the note she was writing when he came in.

  “Well, that was quick,” she said.

  “I hurried a bit. Is Sara here?”

  “Why, no. Wasn’t she at the school?”

  “No. Miss Fizdale said she left at the usual time, about four o’clock. Perhaps she went off with another girl, one of her friends.”

  “She wouldn’t have done that without letting her mother know.”

  “Maybe she did.”

  Verna shook her head. “If she had, Mrs. Wiggins would have said something about it when we told Annie we were going to wait for our tea.” She looked thoughtfully at Andrew and stood up. “I’ll ask her to make sure but, in the meantime, call Fred. I’ll go over to the school with you.”

  He nodded, went out and had Fred bring the carriage around. They both looked at Verna when she came out of the house, wearing a hat and pulling on her gloves.

  “She didn’t say anything to her mother. Take us to Miss Fizdale’s, Fred.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” He shook the reins, started the horses down the driveway.

  “Is she worried?” asked Andrew. “Mrs. Wiggins, I mean?”

  “Not really. I told her not to be.”

  “But you are.”

  “A little. This isn’t like Sara.”

  “No, it’s not.”

  They didn’t tell Fred to hurry, but they didn’t have to. He put the horses into a fast trot, and a few minutes later Andrew was tugging at the bellpull for the second time. Miss Fizdale must have looked out the window when she heard the carriage stop for when the little maid opened the door again her mistress was with her.

  “Good afternoon, Miss Tillett,” she said. “Are you here about Sara too?”

  “Yes. She’s still not home and she didn’t say anything to her mother about going anywhere. Are you sure she left at the time she usually does?”

  “Well, I didn’t actually see her leave myself …”

  “I did,” said Miss Caroline who had joined Miss Fizdale again. “And she left when all the other pupils did, just a few minutes after four.”

  “Alone?”

  “Yes. I came out to get one of the girls who was staying on for some special work with Miss Fizdale—Maria Milanovitch—and Sara was talking to her. When I said Miss Fizdale was waiting for her—Miss Maria, I mean—Sara left.” She was crumpling a handkerchief, dabbing at her mouth with it. “You don’t think anything’s happened to her, do you?”

  “Well, we are a little concerned.”

  “I’m sure there’s no reason to be,” said Miss Fizdale without much conviction. “I’m sure she’ll turn up very soon.”

  “I’m not as sure of that as you are,” said Verna. “But thank you.”

  She
and Andrew went back down the steps.

  “I don’t like this,” said Andrew.

  “I don’t either. If I were a proper citizen of our time, believing that this is the best of all possible worlds, I’d say, ‘This is London, center of the empire and a place of law and order. I’m sure nothing has happened to her and I’m not even going to think about it, much less worry about it until … let’s say dinnertime.’ But, as you know, I’m not a proper, average citizen, and I don’t mind creating a disturbance when I think there’s a good reason for it. So—” She stepped into the landau. “Fred, take us to Scotland Yard.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” said Fred, and closing the door, he got back into the box, shook the reins and started the horses south toward the Yard.

  “Are we going to talk to Inspector Wyatt?”

  “Yes. I suppose we could go to the local police, but I believe in going to the top if I can. And besides, he knows Sara.”

  “Yes. But it’s getting late. He may not be at the Yard.”

  “If he’s not, I’m sure they’ll know where to reach him.”

  But apparently Wyatt had not left yet. The desk sergeant wrote Verna’s name on a slip of paper, gave it to a constable and suggested that she and Andrew sit down on the benches on the far side of the reception room. A few moments later Wyatt came down, followed by Sergeant Tucker.

  “Hello,” he said. Then after a quick glance at her face, “I gather this isn’t a social call.”

  “No. We’re worried about Sara.”

  “Oh? What happened?”

  Verna told him, and Wyatt listened intently.

  “What’s the name of the woman who runs the dancing school?”

  “Miss Fizdale.”

  “Address?”

  She told him, and Sergent Tucker wrote it down in his omnipresent notebook.

  “All right. Go home and tell Mrs. Wiggins there’s no reason to be concerned—at least, not yet. The sergeant or I will stop by sometime this evening and let you know if we’ve anything to report.”

  “Thank you.”

  Mrs. Wiggins was in the sitting room with Verna and Andrew at about ten o’clock that night when Matson opened the door and announced Wyatt. The inspector studied their faces, they studied his, and all of them knew the answer at once. Nevertheless, the questions were asked.