‘Mrs John said she slept right through and when she woke up this morning she wasn’t so dribbly,’ the cook said. It was to the point, if rather indelicate as bulletins go. ‘Mrs John had stayed all night, madam. She only come home when Mrs Jack went in after breakfast to relieve her.’
‘A good sister-in-law indeed,’ I said.
‘This last day or two,’ said the cook, and a kitchenmaid engaged with pastry at the work-table murmured her agreement. ‘I never knew how fond Mrs John was of Mrs Ninian before now.’
‘Never knew how fond we all were,’ said the kitchenmaid. ‘Not that- I mean to say-’
‘Wheesht your cheeky tongue, Elizabeth Rose!’ said the cook.
‘Oh my,’ the maid said, quite unaffected. ‘I get Lizzie usually, you know. It’s only the full whack o’ Elizabeth Rose when somebody’s angry.’
The cook tutted good-naturedly and smiled.
‘It’ll come in handy if you ever start a little teashop,’ I said. ‘Like Margaret-Ann for Hats. We’ve just been talking about her.’
The kitchenmaid snorted and the cook tittered with one hand over her mouth.
‘Well, you know why that is, don’t you?’ she said. ‘Her right name’s Mrs Smellie and nobody would buy a fancy new hat from that.’
‘Smellie as in Inspector Smellie?’ said Alec. He was staring at me and I was staring back at him.
‘That’s her husband,’ said the kitchenmaid. ‘He’s a big man at the tolbooth but it’s Maggie that’s in charge when he gets home. Or so they say.’
‘And he tells her everything,’ said the cook. ‘Confidential police business or no. I know that for a fact because she – well, she let my friend Nannie off with a big bill when Nannie’s man was up to his neck in bad debts and in a load of bother with pawning stuff he shouldn’t have, and the only way she knew was the inspector telling her. But she’s a good woman. Knows it all and says nothing.’
Alec and I had risen, he shrugging himself back into his overcoat and I pulling on my gloves.
‘If you really don’t mind the dog trespassing on your hospitality a little longer then,’ I said, making for the door with as much casual ease as I could muster. Alec was on my heels.
‘Not a bit of it,’ said the cook. ‘I like a dog about the place, me.’
She was still saying goodbye when the servants’ door banged shut behind us.
‘At last!’ Alec said. ‘Whatever Margaret-Ann knows is what the inspector knows. The thing that made the inspector believe in murder, in the teeth of all the evidence. I told you Dulcie was laughing at us.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘You threatened her with the police and she said, “Oh, come now, Mrs Gilver, you can’t go to the police, can you?” She knows about Hugh. Inspector Smellie told his wife and she told Dulcie. He tells her everything. He certainly told her something that made her go off like a rocket at the thought of Dugald and Mirren marrying, didn’t he?’
‘And it’s not something we’ve heard already, is it?’ I said, with a sickly feeling spreading through me.
‘As dreadful as the things we’ve heard already are,’ said Alec. ‘I’m very much afraid not, no.’
12
‘I think we’re out of luck,’ said Alec. Our sprinted exit from the Abbey Park kitchen the previous day had of course led to the scuffing of feet and clearing of throats, because Sunday is not a day for shopping and we could hardly beard her at home, where the fierce inspector would be ensconced in his carpet slippers, so here we were at ten o’clock on the following morning, Alec cupping his hands around his eyes and peering in through the window of Margaret-Ann for Hats, his breath fogging a growing ring on the glass, and both of us losing heart since the blind was drawn down on the door and the shop was in darkness. I squinted at a card propped up on a miniature gilt easel which set out the opening hours in copperplate script so decorative as to be almost illegible.
‘We are,’ I said. ‘She’s not open on a Monday. Not open until tomorrow afternoon.’ I put my hands on my hips and puffed out a sigh of annoyance. Just then the bell of the newsagent’s shop next door pealed as a man in a brown apron stuck his head out.
‘If ye’re after Maggie Smellie,’ he said, effortlessly sweeping away all the sophistication of the copperplate script, the smart bottle-green and tawny paintwork and the artful swathes of chiffon hiding the interior from view, ‘she does her stint at Hepburn’s on a Monday. Ye’ll catch her there.’
I was glad in a way, although a quiet word would have been easier managed in a quiet shop than in the bustle of a department store, but it was Monday morning after all and Monday-morning bustle tends more towards the butcher and greengrocer surely than towards purveyors of elegant hats. The truth was that I had been longing for an excuse to enter the House of Hepburn and see for myself the results of Old Bob’s great spiteful retort to Mary Aitken, see for myself what Fiona and Hilda Haddo, who had filled their home with spindly gilded furniture and had tassel combs for their cushions, might have made of three floors of glass cases and mannequins, see for myself what other wonders there might be in a place where one could perhaps find mauve mousquetaires.
I was not disappointed: where Aitkens’ was all dark oak and flannel sheets, Hepburns’ was like an enormous boudoir, like the inside of a jewellery box, and it made me half-want to twirl with delight like the clockwork ballerina. The floors were pale – they must take a lot of washing, I thought, before I caught myself and banished such dreary practicality – and as for the counters, there were not many to be had. The perfumery, where we found ourselves upon entering, was set up instead with numerous little tables dotted around, white or dove-grey wrought-iron affairs such as one would find on a hotel balcony on the Mediterranean, and there were bottles of scent and tins of powder arranged on these tables and the assistants, dressed in pale lilac and more of the dove grey, simply drifted around amongst the customers, like hostesses at a cocktail party.
I scanned the far edges of the room and saw fountains of silk scarves and the glitter of costume jewels but not a single hat stand anywhere, so I beckoned to a nearby drifting sales assistant and asked her for directions.
‘I’m not sure whether it’s ready-to-wear or bespoke millinery we’re after,’ I began.
‘We don’t make a difference, madam,’ said the girl. ‘Millinery is on the first floor because we here at House of Hepburn value every lady just the same and we give our every lady the same devoted attention whether she is shopping for a bridal gown or a handkerchief-case. It’s the House of Hepburn way, madam.’
And designed, I thought, to lure every woman of taste and fashion away from Aitkens’ for ever.
‘Right, well then,’ said Alec. ‘I’m certainly not going to penetrate the upper regions with you, Dandy. I’ll go and skulk about in the Gents’ Department and meet you afterwards.’
‘Oh no, sir, sorry, sir,’ said the assistant, who seemed well schooled, not to say indoctrinated. ‘We don’t have a Gents’ Department, I’m afraid. We have Toys and Gifts in the basement if you have any, um…’ – she gave him a swift once-over – ‘nephews or godchildren with birthdays coming.’
‘I’m allowed to wait in the cellars?’ said Alec. ‘Very well.’ His mouth was rather tight as he smiled. I have often noticed how gentlemen who sense no danger of their own sex being overindulged by the existence of the many exclusive spike bars, pavilions and clubhouses in the sporting world, supper and pudding clubs at our universities and billiards rooms, libraries, gun rooms, estate offices and smoking rooms in our very houses, for goodness’ sake, can suddenly get that lemon-sucking look if they ever encounter a ladies’ carriage on a train or, as here, a few square yards of scarves and bracelets undiluted by cufflinks for a change.