I slipped quietly out of the library and back downstairs, where, by the ancient and reliable trick of appearing to be fearfully busy, I managed to pass through the servants’ hall and out the side door without being waylaid. Patience was in the kitchen garden harvesting herbs for Mrs Ruddle, and we exchanged cheery greetings as I passed, but the old ‘striding purposefully’ trick worked its magic and she didn’t detain me.
A few minutes later, I arrived in the yard, where I saw Morgan and his helpers wheeling the dented green motor car into the former coach house. He dismissed the two lads, and they ambled past me, as slowly as they thought they could get away with, on their way back to the servants’ hall.
‘It doesn’t look too badly damaged,’ I said by way of alerting him to my presence.
He turned sharply at the sound of my voice, but relaxed when he saw it was me.
‘No,’ he said, ‘not too bad at all. She’m a bit banged up, but we can knock out them dents. Probably could have driven her back down here, to be honest.’
‘Do you need any help?’ I asked.
‘I never say no to an offer of help,’ he said, unclipping the bonnet latches. ‘And even just some company would make a change. People mostly doesn’t have time to loiter round the workshops. I don’t mind bein’ on me own, but a chat’s always welcome. Can you hold this a minute?’
I reached across the bonnet of the car from the other side and held the half that he had just raised while he fiddled with the supporting brace.
‘You can let go now,’ he said. The bonnet stayed up on its own.
‘Do you have any idea what you might be looking for?’ I asked, rounding the front of the motor to peer into the mysterious mechanicals.
‘Sommat as might have caused the accident, you mean?’
‘Yes,’ I said, continuing my journey round the motor.
‘Could be anythin’,’ he said. ‘Throttle cable might have jammed, brakes might have failed . . .’
‘Does that sort of thing happen often?’
‘More often than you might hope. Wonderful things, motor cars, but they ain’t ’alf complicated. Hundreds of moving parts all workin’ in harmony – it only takes one little blighter to start singin’ out of tune and it all goes to pot.’
‘I really ought to learn more about how these machines work if we’re to properly enjoy our little Rover,’ I said.
‘’Tain’t all that difficult to understand, really,’ he said, looking up from under the bonnet. ‘Take the brakes, for instance. You press down on the pedal here.’ He indicated the foot brake.
‘That part I knew,’ I said. ‘And then the motor just sort of stops. By magic, presumably.’
He laughed. ‘Not magic so much as mechanics. You push the pedal and it pulls this lever, and then that pulls these cables, and they pull these levers, and then they squeeze two metal shoes lined with grippy stuff against the inside of these drums . . .’ His voice trailed away to nothing.
‘What’s the matter?’ I asked, trying to follow his gaze.
‘See this cable here?’ He indicated the end of the wire where it emerged from its housing by the brake drum on the right-hand side of the vehicle. ‘He’s supposed to be connected to this lever here.’ He reached over and tapped the connector for the threaded rod, from which a short length of wire protruded. ‘Dawkins only had one brake goin’ into that bend; no wonder he couldn’t stop. Wouldn’t have noticed at low speed, but if he was drivin’ it ’ard like, he’d not have got anythin’ like the brakin’ he was expectin’. Would have been lopsided, too. Ain’t no wonder he crashed, poor beggar.’
‘It broke?’ I suggested.
‘No,’ he said. ‘See the way the ends of the wire are crushed? Someone cut it.’
I stayed with Morgan while he checked the rest of the motor car. He found no other faults, and we returned to the house through the now-empty kitchen garden. After washing his hands in the gardeners’ sink by the door, he gestured me to follow him, and we set off upstairs to the library.
He knocked on the door and entered. As he made his way briskly across to where Lord Riddlethorpe was sitting, I went to the window seat, where Lady Hardcastle had made herself comfortable with a book.
She put the book down as I approached, and I noticed that she was re-reading The Woman in White.
‘What ho, Flo,’ she said. ‘What news from the workshop?’
‘Not good, my lady,’ I said, sitting down next to her. ‘It looks awfully like sabotage.’
‘Gracious,’ she said. ‘How certain are you?’
‘Morgan gave the motor car a thorough going-over and everything was in full working order, except that one of the brake cables had been snipped through.’
‘Well I never. “One of . . .”, you say?’
‘Yes, my lady, just one side. Left the other one intact.’
‘Hmm,’ she said. ‘I suppose he’s telling Fishy?’
‘He is, my lady.’
‘It won’t make him feel any better, I don’t suppose. He’s been busy blaming himself, but blaming someone else won’t necessarily help.’
As she spoke, Lord Riddlethorpe and Mr Waterford rose from their armchairs and followed Morgan out, presumably to inspect the damage for themselves. Harry took note of the comings and goings and excused himself from his losing conversational battle. He came over to join his sister and me.
‘News?’ he said.
‘Someone sabotaged the brakes,’ said Lady Hardcastle.
‘Good lord,’ he said. ‘So someone killed poor old Dawkins. Why?’
‘Why, indeed?’ said Lady Hardcastle. ‘Quite cunningly done, too.’
He looked at me quizzically.
‘Whoever it was only disabled the brake on one side,’ I said. ‘The way Morgan explained it to me, it wouldn’t have made much difference to anyone driving at normal speeds – bringing the motor car up to the track, for instance. But once a driver like Ellis Dawkins was at the wheel, taking the motor to its limits as he tried to see what it could do, only having half the brakes he thought he did could lead to disaster.’
‘As it did,’ said Harry thoughtfully. ‘As it so very did.’
‘Does he know when it happened?’ said Lady Hardcastle.
‘It could have been any time from yesterday afternoon, when he checked all three motor cars for the party, and this morning, when he took them all up to the starting line. They were in the coach house, but they weren’t locked up, and the house was full of guests until one this morning.’
‘So it could have been anyone,’ she said.
‘Anyone who knew enough about motor cars to know how to cut the brakes,’ said Harry.
‘Well, quite,’ said Lady Hardcastle. ‘That must narrow the field quite a bit.’
‘You’d think so, my lady,’ I said. ‘But once you’ve taken a good look at the working parts of a motor car, it’s not terribly difficult to work out how to cause them mischief.’