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

 

 

“I’m afraid so.” I smiled at her face. “At least it will be more cheerful for you than last night, eating your toad in the hole all alone,” I said. “And with the major also gone, I presume you had no visitors all evening?”

 

“Nobody.” She sniffed. “But I am used to being alone.”

 

“So nobody even came to the front door?” I asked. “You didn’t hear a knock, perhaps? Or see someone moving around outside?”

 

“Why should I hear this? It is not my place to answer doors. Did someone inform you that a visitor came to the front door?”

 

I nodded. “I was told that someone came to deliver a message to me,” I said, saying the first thing that came to mind. “A friend who thought she would find me here. But she could make nobody hear and thought nobody was home.”

 

Irmtraut sniffed. “I heard nothing. You should ask the servants. But they do not pay proper attention, I think. They remain shut away in their own quarters, enjoying themselves. They are very lazy, these English servants. I never got the pickled herring I sent for. This is always the way without a butler or proper housekeeper to watch over them.”

 

“Your room is above the front door,” I went on, trying desperately to think of what to ask her that might be revealing. “You didn’t hear a car pull up all evening?”

 

“Only when you and the princess returned home. Until then nothing. It is very boring.”

 

“I’m sorry. It must have been. But tonight will be better.”

 

“With English jokes I do not understand,” she said. “You will please tell me when I should laugh.”

 

I left her then and went up to my own room. She had not seemed at all rattled by my questions and one would have expected such a person to become easily flustered. But perhaps Countess Irmtraut was made of sterner stuff.

 

Queenie was sitting on my bed, tentatively brushing the hem of my burgundy velvet dress.

 

“You got this in a right mess, didn’t you?” she demanded, looking up as I came in. “Caked with bloody mud.”

 

“Sorry. I had to walk in the rain when I went to have dinner with Princess Louise,” I said, then wondered why I was apologizing to a maid. I’m sure none of my royal relatives would have done so.

 

“Well, it’s ruddy hard work trying to brush off the mud without brushing off the nap and getting a right earful from you,” she said. “And nobody even bothered to bring up me tea.”

 

“Oh dear. Hold on a minute. I’ll go down and find you some. The tea things are still out in our sitting room.” I knew I was being too soft, but I couldn’t help it.

 

As I came back into the sitting room Irmtraut was standing at the window, looking out. When she heard footsteps she let the curtain fall and spun to face me. Was I mistaken or was that a guilty look on her face?

 

I couldn’t say that I’d come to fetch my maid some cake. She’d be horrified.

 

“I decided I did want a little sustenance after all,” I said, putting a scone and a couple of pieces of shortbread on a plate. “Almost time to get dressed for the theater.” And I breezed out again.

 

Queenie was duly grateful and wolfed down the food while I laid out what I wanted to wear with the burgundy dress to the theater. But my thoughts were racing. What to do next? Obviously someone should have a little heart-to-heart with Prince George to find out why he came in late to dinner last night. I didn’t want to do that, but I could take a look at his car to see if it had really been in an accident. And maybe ask his servants what time he left St. James’s.

 

Then I should interview the servants here. The lie I had made up on the spot for Irmtraut was a good one, I decided. Nothing to do with any sort of crime. A friend had heard I was staying at the palace and came to say hello. But she couldn’t make anyone hear when she knocked on the front door. She wandered around a bit, looking for a way in, then gave up and went home. I’d ask indignantly if nobody heard or saw her.

 

My thoughts went back to Irmtraut and the damp jacket with the knife in the pocket. But the method of the murder was so different from a quick stab in the dark. If someone had fed Bobo a cocktail or two, and one of them laced with Veronal, then it had to be someone she knew. A complete stranger couldn’t force alcohol down her throat. So that probably ruled out the drug lord. Such subtle killing was not their way of operation. The quick knife or bullet in the dark or kidnapping and dumping someone in the Thames would be what I’d expect from them. And if Bobo was a habitual drug user it would make no sense to kill the goose that laid the golden egg, would it?

 

“Do you want me to run your bath?” Queenie asked, interrupting my reverie.