Murder at the Spring Ball: A 1920s Mystery by Benedict Brown (simple ebook reader txt) 📕

gloomy in direct proportion to our proximity to London. It rather reminded me of Sherlock Holmes in ‘The Adventure of the Copper Beeches’. While Holmes fears the degeneracy of the countryside, Superintendent Edgington apparently disapproved of the sins of the city.

It was all very green and pleasant as we drove past Hampton Court and around Richmond Park but then London snuck up on me without my expecting it. As soon as we crossed Putney Bridge, the grand edifices of the capital reared up in front of the car. For a Surrey boy, born and bred in the country, I can tell you it was a real thrill.

By the time we arrived in Knightsbridge, Grandfather looked like a haunted man. Were there ghosts around us that only he could see? Perhaps his decades on the force had left a permanent stain on every street in London. I could only imagine the horrors he’d encountered there over the years and would have to ask him what he had been thinking, just as soon as he looked a tad less… murderous.

We drove past the Natural History Museum and Harrods department store and soon pulled up in front of George’s building. Wasting no time, the engine had barely come to a stop when Grandfather pushed his door open and jumped from the vehicle. He paused on the pavement to look up at the terrace of white-fronted townhouses, before striding up the steps of the property to hammer on the front door.

“What’s your business here?” the porter answered in a brusque East London accent once the door had opened a fraction.

Lord Edgington’s eyes narrowed. “I’m here to see George Trevelyan.”

The bald, beige-faced man looked unintimidated by our arrival and sniffed long and loudly through the crack in the door. “Are you expected?”

In order to communicate quite how great an inconvenience this conversation was to a man of his eminence, Grandfather did not look at the porter as he replied, but stared along the busy residential street, as if he had far more significant issues to concern himself with.

“I telephoned an hour ago, but there was no answer.”

The porter popped his head back inside the building to consult… I have no idea what, before opening the door to let us pass.

“Apartment 1B,” he called after us. “And don’t go dirtying the walls. They’ve only recently been painted.”

We huffed our way past the officious chap and along his sparkling corridor. I was tempted to leave fingerprints on the glossy dado rail, but I’m not that cruel.

“George,” Grandfather boomed, after we found the right door. We didn’t have to wait to enter as it was slightly ajar. “Are you in here? Are you decent?”

“Yes, yes!” a voice called back from the end of the dark hall. “Quite decent by most people’s standards.” He let out a laugh, which more or less confirmed that my cousin was sozzled.

We followed the sound and came to a rather modern living room. It was all Mackintosh furniture and Liberty print fabrics. Well, it was modern compared to Cranley Hall where the most up-to-date feature was a Gainsborough landscape that a long dead ancestor had commissioned and which now hung in one of the pokier guest bathrooms.

“Grandfather, what a joy to have you here!” George intoned. “And you brought your lapdog Chrissy along with you. How wonderful.”

Do you remember what I said about my affection for the pariah of the family? Well, I’d changed my mind by this point.

He was sitting on a long white sofa which, judging by the blankets and pillows strewn across it, had doubled as his bed the previous night. It was only twelve noon but the smell of spirits was thick in the air and a couple of bottles lay toppled on the carpet at his feet. I had to wonder whether he’d started drinking early or finished late.

“George,” my grandfather replied in a murmur, but, before he could say anything more, our host recommenced his sunny performance.

“To what do I owe this unexpected pleasure? Let me guess, you’re here to accuse me of matricide again. Or perhaps you’ve brought good news and Mother isn’t dead after all and it was all a hilarious trick.”

Sitting on the edge of the elongated pine coffee table, Grandfather cut straight to the point. “We know what you were doing with Maitland and young Adelaide on Saturday night before the toast. So, I’m going to ask you once more, what is your connection to Horatio Adelaide and for what reason did he send you to the ball?”

I believe the force of this opening roll of the dice must have struck George rather firmly between the eyes. His head wobbled on its perch for a moment before finding equilibrium, as though my grandfather’s words had sobered him up.

“You’ll have to excuse me,” he said. “I’m having a moment of déjà vu. Didn’t we already discuss this whole matter? I believe I already informed you that Horatio Adelaide and I play golf together, nothing more, nothing less. I’ve heard people say that he’s something of a rotter, but all I can tell you about him is that he’s got a fine handicap and puts me to shame with a one-wood.”

He let out a short, high laugh, like the first whistling note escaping from a kettle.

“You’re smarter than this, boy.” Grandfather was not amused. “You know what your golfing chum was willing to do to Maitland when he wouldn’t pay up. What do you think will happen when you’re no longer useful to him?”

It seemed as though the message was finally penetrating George’s thick skull. He licked his lips from side to side reflexively before responding.

“I appreciate your concern, I really do. But you needn’t worry. I have an understanding with Horatio and I won’t get myself into the position that Maitland was in.”

“As uttered every gambler in history,” our grandfather snapped and George peered down at the inch of gin which remained in the bottle on the floor.

Feeling that I might have something to