Malice at the Palace (The Royal Spyness Series Book 9)

 

 

Queenie finished undressing me and I climbed into bed. The fire had burned down to embers and it was cold in the room. I couldn’t resist going over to the window and pulling back the curtain to take a peek at the courtyard below. Someone was moving around down there. I could see a torch dancing but the person holding it was invisible beneath the archway. Fortunately so was the body. And I realized that the holder of the torch must be the major, covering the body with his blanket. There was nothing else to do but go up to my room and get undressed. My hot milk was delivered. I drank it but it didn’t seem to warm me. I curled up into a ball and tried to sleep, but sleep wouldn’t come.

 

Bobo Carrington. Now that I thought about it I had heard the name before. One of the glamorous young women who was always photographed at nightclubs or at the races. But what on earth was she doing here, trying to get into Kensington Palace?

 

 

 

 

 

Chapter 11

 

 

 

MONDAY, NOVEMBER 5

 

KENSINGTON PALACE

 

I was in a deep sleep when I began to be shaken violently. I started and sat up with a gasp to see a strange young woman, dressed in servant’s garb, standing over me. It was still dark outside.

 

“What’s wrong?” I asked. “What time is it?”

 

“Five thirty, my lady, and I didn’t mean to startle you,” she whispered, “and sorry to wake you so early, but the major is downstairs and he wants to talk to you right away. I’ve no idea what it’s about but he said it was urgent and I should go and wake you.”

 

I swung my legs over the side of the bed and my feet sought my slippers. It was horribly cold. The maid took down my dressing gown from the back of the door. “Should I go and wake your maid, my lady?”

 

“No. Let her sleep,” I said, thinking that by the time Queenie could be roused and ready it would be broad daylight. “I’ll go down to the major in my robe and slippers.”

 

I tied the dressing gown firmly at my waist and then made my way down the stairs. The major was waiting in the foyer, already dressed and looking military and ready for action.

 

“Lady Georgiana,” he said. “I’m so sorry to get you up at this ungodly hour, but I wonder if you’d be good enough to come with me.”

 

“Uh—yes. Of course,” I said, conscious of the maid still standing behind me.

 

He looked at my attire. “I think you might need proper shoes and an overcoat. I’m afraid we need to go outside for a moment.”

 

“Oh, right. Very well.”

 

The major turned to the maid. “Perhaps you would make sure there is hot tea for Lady Georgiana when she returns in a few minutes.”

 

“Very good, sir.” The maid bobbed a little curtsy and fled. I went back upstairs and put on shoes and an overcoat. The major was waiting by the front door and I followed him. When we reached the archway under the clock tower I saw that the body had already been taken away and there was no sign she had ever been there.

 

“Did you get permission to move the body?” I whispered even though we were alone and my whisper hissed back at me from the vaulted roof of the arch above our heads.

 

“Yes. The Home Office had some chappies here within the hour last night. They took photographs and examined the area well before the poor young woman was carted off to the mortuary. There wasn’t actually anything to see. In fact one of the chaps suggested that the girl had been killed somewhere else and the body dumped here.”

 

“Why would anyone do that?” I asked. “If you wanted to dispose of a body surely you’d drive out to a wooded park or throw it into the Thames.”

 

“Unless you wanted it to be found,” he said, turning back to look at me. He opened a door at the far end of the courtyard and we stepped into an austere, white-painted hallway. There was no form of adornment on the walls, but the carpet underfoot was rich and thick and the place was delightfully warm.

 

“Through this way, if you don’t mind.” Major B-C opened a door and stood aside for me to enter first. I stepped into a small sitting room, definitely a man’s room with leather armchairs and the lingering smell of pipe tobacco. Two men had been sitting in the chairs facing the fire. Both rose to their feet as I came in. I hadn’t been expecting to face strangers and was horribly conscious that I was in my nightclothes under the overcoat, with my hair still tousled. This put me at an awful disadvantage.