In sombre mood, we got back into the carriage.
Garrard cleared his throat. “Your Royal Highness, the class and manners of those people shocked me to the quick and I apologise profoundly for putting you through such an ordeal. It’s apparent that Digby misinformed me as to his origins. I shall take it up with him as soon as he is found.”
“Save your breath,” I told him. “That’s of small account compared to the loss of the Christmas presents.”
Knollys said, “It suggests that the fellow is a blackguard.”
“Not at all,” I said. “You can’t know the wine by the barrel. I’m not judging him until we find him with the booty in his hands.”
“But how shall we trace him?”
“We must find the cabman who picked him up from the station. He’ll know where he put him down.”
“Brilliant!” Garrard said.
We drove to Lynn by the shortest route, still a cold journey of some fifteen miles. The snow scene was starting to lose its charm.
“How many cabs ply their trade at Lynn station, would you say?” I asked the others.
“Upwards of thirty. Fifty, even,” Knollys said, betraying some despondency. He has never had much faith in my investigations. “I’ve seen the line in the station yard.”
“But not all of them are four-wheelers, as this was,” Garrard said. “Most are hansoms. We’re not looking for a hansom.”
“Good thinking,” I said.
At the station, we lost no time in finding the station master. He must have seen my coat of arms on the carriage, for he’d donned his silk hat, which he now doffed with a flourish and a bow.
“You are the principal witness,” I told him. “You saw a tall man carrying a large valise and wearing a loud Norfolk jacket arrive here two days ago, on the 21st.”
“I spoke to him, Your Majesty,” he said.
“Royal Highness,” Knollys corrected him.
“You spoke? That’s interesting. What did he have to say?”
“That he was bound for Sandringham with a valuable cargo and didn’t want the inconvenience of standing in a queue for a cab, Your Royal—”
“Definitely our man,” I said. “You summoned a four-wheeler?”
“The cleanest on the stand, Your—”
“Ah! So you can identify the driver, no doubt.”
“His name is Gripper.”
“And is he here this morning?”
“No longer, Your—”
“What do you mean by that?”
“He was here twenty minutes ago. He picked up a fare, a gentleman from London. They’ll be well on their way to Sandringham by now.”
“To Sandringham?” I said. “I’m expecting no visitors today. Describe this traveller.”
“Middle-aged, brown suit and matching bowler, a rather military bearing and clipped manner of speech.”
“He spoke to you?”
“He wanted to know about the man you’re interested in, the tall man with the valise.”
“Did he, by Jove! Back to the carriage, gentlemen. I sense a kill.”
When we arrived at Sandringham, I was alarmed to see the four-wheeler on the drive in front of the main door with no sign of the driver or his mysterious passenger. I jumped out and rushed inside. A footman came to greet me.
“Where are the visitors?” I demanded.
“Sir, there’s a gentleman in the ballroom with Her Royal Highness.”
Fearful for Alix, I dashed in that direction, pursued by Knollys and Garrard. The moment I entered the ballroom I saw my darling wife standing in front of the Christmas tree with a brown-suited fellow holding a bowler hat.
“Don’t move, my man!” I shouted. “Alix, step away from him at once.”
To my amazement and confusion she simply laughed and said, “Oh, Bertie, don’t make an exhibition of yourself. This is Sergeant Cribb, the famous detective. Come and shake his hand.”
“What’s a detective doing in my house?”
“Detecting,” she said. “I invited him here. The presents for the servants haven’t arrived and I thought we should find out why. I was just explaining about the tree and our custom of giving presents on Christmas Eve.”
“Fine tree, sir,” Sergeant Cribb said.
Ignoring him, I crossed the room and addressed my wife. “You invited this man here without consulting me? I don’t want a police investigation. That’s the last thing we want after the year we’ve had.”
“He’s an ex-policeman, dear, and very discreet.”
“Retired on a modest pension, sir,” Cribb said. He didn’t look old apart from a few silver hairs, but policemen retire younger than most.
“And he comes highly recommended by the Chief Constable,” Alix said. “We have to deal with this matter expeditiously.”
“But you didn’t speak to me about this.”
“Because you were off doing other things. It’s such a busy time.”
I looked at Francis Knollys and rolled my eyes. “Well, Sergeant Cribb, what do you have to tell us apart from the fact that we have a fine tree?”
“I’d like to speak to the estate manager, sir.”
“To Hammond? He’s got nothing to do with it.”
There was a silence that would have done for a lying-in-state.
Eventually Cribb glanced towards Alix. She gestured to the footman. “Find Mr Hammond and tell him he’s wanted here.”
I said, “It’s the missing jewellery we’re exercised about, not the damned Christmas tree.”
“There may be a connection, sir,” Cribb said.
“And I’m a Dutchman.”
Presently Hammond made his entry. He was looking mightily perturbed, and I was perturbed, too, when I saw the state of his boots. Containing my displeasure, I gestured to Cribb to ask his questions.
“Fine tree,” he parroted.
“Thank you, sir,” Hammond said.
I told him he had no need to address Cribb as if he was a gentleman.
“I think it’s the biggest I’ve seen,” Cribb said.
Alix intervened to say it was a living tree still attached to its roots.
“Capital, ma’am,” Cribb said, and turned back to Hammond. “When I was being driven through the grounds I noticed a small group of evergreens not far from the carriage path. Was this tree dug from there?”
“Yes.”
“A home-grown tree. How charming.”
Alix lavished a sweet smile on Cribb. I was starting to doubt her loyalty.
“And now, Mr Hammond,” Cribb said, “I’m going to ask you to show me precisely where the tree was growing.”
“I can do that.”
“You’ll ruin your shoes,” Alix said. “The snow’s quite deep. Bertie, have you got some galoshes to protect Sergeant Cribb’s shoes?”
What next? I thought. Gritting my teeth, I clicked my fingers and sent a flunkey for enough overshoes for the four of us men. Alix elected not to come. She hates the cold.
Suitably attired, we left the house, Hammond leading. Before we’d gone a few yards Cribb left the party and trotted over to the cab still waiting near the entrance. Attached to the front below the driver’s seat was a spade.
“You might care to look at this, sir,” Cribb called out.
The insolence of the man. I know what a spade is. I’ve turned enough first sods in my time. But the other two went to look, so I joined them, not wishing to seem churlish.
Cribb said, “A necessary tool for a cabman in the depths of winter, a spade. You never know when you’ll need to dig yourself out.”
Then he held it horizontally towards me as if he was passing across a stuffed salmon for my inspection. “Take a close look at the dried mud attaching to the shoulder. I’ll pick some off for you.”
He scraped some off and I found myself constrained to look at fragments of dried mud lying in his palm.
“Do you see the pine needles?”