“I have,” Auguste said hastily, but there was no stopping his guest.
“Are you aware, Mr. Didier, of the evil room in the house now part of Myton’s hotel? A room left locked and untouched for forty years. A disappointed bridegroom, abandoned by his prospective bride just moments before the wedding, locked up the bridal banquet room and forbade it to be opened ever again.” The distressed gentleman spoke in hushed tones. “No doubt Mr. Dickens based Miss Havisham’s chamber in Great Expectations upon the incident.”
“I know it very well,” Auguste lied firmly, in consideration of the hour, now creeping towards two a.m.
“Never to be opened again, Mr. Didier. When the hotel bought the house ten years ago, and finally penetrated the ghastly secrets of that room, what did they find?”
Auguste shuddered at the waste of such a banquet. “Rats.”
“A corpse.” There were tears in the distressed gentleman’s eyes. “A woman’s decayed body. I knew the man well in his later years at the house, little guessing what terrible secret he held in his heart.”
“You’re worried that he might wish to kill you?” Auguste was relieved. This was merely melodramatic patter. It was hardly likely that the perpetrator of a crime fifty years ago would fear the ramblings of a distressed gentleman, especially one who could barely have been born at the time the crime was committed.
“Who knows, Mr. Didier, the ways of a wicked heart? I have seen evils in this beloved street of ours that would shock, nay, horrify you.” He looked at the sole au Chablis, took a bite, and then pushed the plate away. “No. What is food, beside such human tragedy?”
Quite a help, in Auguste’s practical experience, but as he opened his mouth to speak, he lost his opportunity.
“Tragedies such as that in ‘seventy-two on the corner of the Strand and Southampton Street,” the gentleman swept grandly on. “Ah — would there be any cheese?” he asked hopefully.
Auguste sighed. “A little Brie?”
His guest looked doubtful. “I would prefer Stilton. A gentleman’s cheese, you understand. And a glass of port, if you please.”
“Certainly,” Auguste said through clenched teeth, as he turned to fetch the board.
“No doubt I have related to you the murder of Miss Gabrielle Flower?”
“You have,” Auguste replied snappily.
“Mistress to the Earl of Dover. ‘Return to me,’ quoth her former sweetheart, a clergyman, I recall.” The distressed gentleman rose to his feet to do justice to the occasion, and clasped his hand to his bosom. “‘Come live with me and be my love.’ ‘No, no,’” he squealed in a falsetto. “‘It cannot be. My plight is trothed—’” The distressed gentleman stumbled, both physically and verbally. “I do beg your pardon, Mr. Didier. I am unaccustomed to wine. ‘I have plighted my troth,’” he resumed squeakily, “‘to the Earl of Dover. I can never be yours.’ ‘Then I shall die,’” he informed himself, placing an imaginary pistol to his head. “‘But first you shall answer to God, oh most treacherous of women.’ And then he shot her.” The distressed gentleman half tumbled, half sank into his seat and took the glass of port at a gulp to revive himself.
“And he shot himself, too?” enquired Auguste.
“No. The villain ran away into the crowd that had gathered. But a few years ago I recognised him as he returned to the scene of the crime. He was a country clergyman and admitted all to me. Unfortunately that was—” he paused delicately — “while I was under a different guise, and therefore bound by the secrets of the confessional. The burden is heavy, and this week I sensed him near at hand.”
“Who is he?” Auguste was torn between genuine curiosity and amusement at the seriousness with which his unobliging guest appeared to take the responsibilities of his job.
“Alas, my lips must still be sealed, Mr. Didier. I am, you must remember, a gentleman,” he answered gravely. “Another, if you please.” He held out his glass expectantly, but Auguste pretended not to see it, busying himself with clearing the table. He was growing very tired, especially of distressed gentlemen — and of distressed clergymen.
“A cigar?” the distressed gentleman enquired hopefully.
“The restaurant is locked at two a.m.,” Auguste said meaningfully. “There are but ten minutes—” His protest was quelled by a mournful sigh.
“Did I tell you of the sad murder of Adolphus Bracket?” floated the distressed gentleman’s voice behind him as Auguste wearily set off to fetch the best Havanas.
“Yes!” he howled. He was ignored.
“At the height of his career. I came to the Albion only days before that tragic occasion. Adolphus Bracket, that darling of the gods, strode the stage like a Colossus. Never, never shall I forget his interpretation of Eugene Aram. Dead, Mr. Didier, dead, killed by a mere envious underling, not fit to walk the same stage as he graced.”
That murder, too, Auguste had heard of. Early in 1875 Bracket’s body had been found stabbed in an alleyway off the Strand beside the Albion Theatre. He had been an actor universally applauded and greatly mourned. “Was the murderer ever caught?” he enquired.
“He fled the scene and the theatre. An Italian. I knew him well for I had worked with him in the provinces. Naturally, I was First Gentleman, and he merely the villain. He resented it greatly, just as he resented the great Adolphus Bracket. I would know him anywhere.”
Auguste tried to clear his tired brain. “Have you seen him since?” He supposed he should at least pretend to take these ramblings seriously.
“The terror by night, Mr. Didier. It is always with me,” the distressed gentleman informed him gravely.
Auguste tried again. “You believe that one of these three murderers wishes to murder you? Which one?”
The distressed gentleman bowed his head. “This very week — but no, my calling forbids me to speak.” A pause followed. “A brandy, perhaps?”
“Mr. Didier?”
Auguste looked up from his careful construction of a meringue swan. The voice was familiar, but what could have brought Inspector Egbert Rose of Scotland Yard to the Galaxy restaurant?
“A cup of warm chocolate, Inspector? An almond pastry?”
“Too rich for me, thank you.” The inspector eyed the proffered plate suspiciously. “I like a nice salmagundi myself — a little bit of everything, and you can be sure what you’re eating.”
Nevertheless Auguste noticed a wistful look on his face, as he conducted him to a table where they could converse.
“Did you know a Montague Phelps?” Egbert Rose continued.
The name meant nothing to Auguste.
“Beggar outside Romanos. Top hat, frock coat, good line in patter—”
Light dawned. “The distressed gentleman,” he exclaimed.
“Very,” Egbert Rose commented drily. “He’s dead. Found stabbed in the small hours near his lodgings in Henrietta Street.”
Only the night before that, Auguste realised with shock, he had watched at the restaurant door as the distressed gentleman walked out into the darkness, his top-hatted figure and cane briefly silhouetted in a pool of light from a gas standard. Then he had stepped briskly out of it, and disappeared forever. Auguste was filled with remorse as he remembered his impatience to be rid of a guest who had merely outstayed his welcome.
“A random robbery?” he asked, appalled. Even as he did so, however, he recalled the distressed gentleman’s “I am to be murdered myself, sir.” A terrible thought struck him: Had he indeed had reason to fear for his life? Had a murderer returned, determined to silence a witness? Had he, Auguste Didier, dismissed a genuine fear as melodramatic patter?