‘Oh come, Mr Seddon, let’s stop playing games. I know you were stealing from the firm. Why was that? To try to keep up with your wife’s vulgar taste in clothes? I know Frank Pickering knew, too. I know he confronted you. I know you lured him to a meeting late last Tuesday night. I know you strangled him with your scarf. I know you carried his body to Combe Woods on a handcart you found near the cricket pavilion. I know...’
I missed what else she knew because I was somewhat distracted by the distinctive click of a revolver being cocked and the all-too-familiar feel of its barrel being thrust into my ribs. Even through the sensation-deadening embrace of my corset, I’d never forget that feeling.
‘I think you’d better join your mistress,’ hissed Mrs Seddon, ‘don’t you?’ She jabbed the revolver into my ribs again, propelling me through the door and into the dining room.
‘Look what I found in the hall,’ she said to her husband, all traces of the upper class veneer disappearing from her voice. ‘Lady Muck’s lackey doing a bit of snooping.’
She waved the gun to indicate that I should join Lady Hardcastle by the dining table.
‘Oh, Ida, what have you done now?’ said Mr Seddon, despairingly.
‘Just another bit of tidying up after your mess. It seems I has to do everything round here.’
‘Everything?’ said Lady Hardcastle. ‘You mean you–’
‘You think that wet rag could do anything practical?’ she sneered.
‘He manages to run a successful shipping agency.’
‘He managed to run it all right. But he didn’t have the sense to take what was his from it. “Investing in the future,” he says. “Rewarding loyal service,” he says. “That’s where the profits go,” he says. Well what about my future? What about my loyal service? You think I married into this carnival freak show of a family for love? Sharing a marriage bed with that feeble oaf? You think I did that out of passion. I wanted my just rewards. I earn everything I get.’
‘So you bullied him into stealing from his own firm?’
‘Bullied, dearie? He’d do anything for what I can offer him.’ She crudely hoisted her impressive bosom.
‘And when Mr Pickering threatened to cut off your funds by reporting the theft to the police...?’
‘Yes, your lady-hoity-toity-ship, I got rid of him. Choked the interfering life out of him with a very expensive silk scarf from Paris and then strung him up in an oak tree. All carefully planned it was. Nothing could go wrong. Not until you started poking your beak in.’
‘Excellent work,’ said Lady Hardcastle. ‘Apart from tying him too high so his feet couldn’t reach the log. Oh, and not leaving an impression in the ground from the log. Other than that, an exemplary effort.’
‘Details. The police would never have noticed anything like that. You’re an interfering snooper too, i’n’t you. And I reckon you know now what happens to them.’
‘I believe so, yes. But satisfy my curiosity. Even when I realized who had killed poor Mr Pickering – and I confess I wasn’t quite sure which of you it was until I got here – I couldn’t for the life of me fathom how you’d managed to get the body into the tree. Even from the handcart it was quite a feat.’
Mrs Seddon looked up at the memorabilia on the wall and Lady Hardcastle followed her gaze. ‘Of course,’ she said at last. ‘The block and tackle. That display isn’t asymmetrical by design, it’s because there’s a piece missing. We should have noticed that, Armstrong.’
‘I noticed, my lady,’ I said, shifting my weight slightly and balancing on the balls of my feet. ‘I thought that’s why you wanted your meeting to be in here.’
‘Did you, indeed? Well done. Well done. And so it was. And what happened to the block, Mrs Seddon? And the scarf? Why couldn’t we find those?’
‘In the coal hole till things had quietened down. But I’ll have two bodies to dispose of after tonight, so I’ll probably get rid of them then.’
‘You’re a very clever and meticulous woman, Mrs Seddon. I congratulate you on the thoroughness of your planning. Isn’t she good, Armstrong?’
‘Very accomplished, my lady,’ I said.
‘And you, Mr Seddon? You had no part in this?’ said Lady Hardcastle.
He sighed. ‘No. He came to me and told me he knew, but I thought I’d dealt with it. I thought he was going to be a gentleman about it and that we could sort things out without anyone being any the wiser.’
‘You pathetic worm,’ spat Mrs Seddon. ‘I swear if I didn’t need to keep up appearances I’d be finding a hole big enough for three. You’re a usel–’
Her rant was interrupted by the creaking of a floorboard outside the door.
The next few things happened in something of a blur. The listeners at the door realized that they’d been tumbled and began to make their hasty way inside. Mrs Seddon turned towards them, levelling her pistol. She fired at Sergeant Dobson but at the instant she pulled the trigger, my right foot connected with her wrist with a satisfyingly loud crack of breaking bone that could be heard even over the report of the gun. Dobson fell to the ground, unhurt but wisely getting out of the way of more shots, while I grabbed Mrs Seddon’s broken wrist, wrenching her towards me and smashing my open palm into her nose. Blood gushed. She collapsed. And Constable Hancock said, ‘Ida Seddon I am arresting you for the murder of Mr Frank Pickering. Oh. Well, I’ll be sure to tell you again when you wakes up.’
It was all over in an instant.
‘I say,’ said Mr Seddon, rather gormlessly. ‘That was most incredible. Where on earth did a little thing like you learn to do that?’
‘China,’ I said. ‘It’s none too easy in this dress, either. Thank you for noticing.’ I curtseyed.
‘I say,’ he said, blushing.
Sergeant Dobson was back on his feet. ‘James Seddon I am arresting you for theft and embezzlement and for aiding and abetting Ida Seddon in the murder of Mr Frank Pickering.’
Mr Seddon was handcuffed and our policeman friends made ready to take him and his groggy, blood-soaked wife outside.
‘Wait a moment, Sergeant,’ said Lady Hardcastle. ‘I believe there’s a telephone on a table by the front door. Do you think you should place a call to Inspector Sunderland and get Bill Lovell released?’
‘Yes, m’lady,’ said the sergeant. ‘Hancock, you get these two into Sir Hector’s motor car and I’ll place that call.’
By now the household servants were all very much aware of what was going on, but I went into the kitchen to explain more fully. There was consternation, of course – they were all probably about to become unemployed – but I very much felt a sense of relief, as though much that had been wrong in their lives was at last being put right.
‘I said she was a wrong ’un,’ said Mrs Birch. ‘And him not much better. Good riddance to them both, I say.’
Lady Hardcastle had joined us and gladly offered her assurance that she would do everything she could to find them employment elsewhere, offering to write references and make whatever introductions she could. They were clearly pleased and began talking about what plans they might make for the future.