Miss Amelia greeted them at the door. The usually self-contained woman was thoroughly distressed, her sandy hair escaping from under her mourning cap in wisps, her gray eyes red-rimmed with weeping. She fell on Touie with obvious relief.
“Oh, Mrs. Doyle … Touie …” she sobbed. “I came home … the shops … Mr. Lindsay-Young will read the service tomorrow … I had to see to the funeral arrangements …”
“Have you had your tea?” Touie reached for the essentials.
“I don’t think … Jenny went to fetch you …”
“Sit down,” Touie ordered, leading Amelia to the sitting room. “Where is Bedelia?”
“Upstairs, in her chamber. She was quite upset.”
“As well she should be,” Dr. Doyle said. “What happened?”
“I don’t know.” Amelia took a deep breath and tried to keep from shaking. “After luncheon, I had to go out, to shop for dinner. I left Bedelia to write some letters, responding to those who had written notes to us. I came back and found her on the floor of the conservatory. She had been struck on the head!”
“May I go up and see her?”
Amelia looked about her helplessly. “With Jenny out of the house … and Emma not here …”
“If you like, I can escort Dr. Doyle,” Mr. Dodgson offered. “Mrs. Doyle may remain with you, or you may come with us, as you wish. I can assure you, Miss Bedelia is safe with us.”
Amelia gazed helplessly up at Mr. Dodgson, caught between her own physical weakness and the bounds of propriety.
“I am going to make you some hot tea,” Touie said. “As for Arthur, I assure you, no one will think the worse of you or Bedelia for allowing him into her chamber.”
Amelia clutched at her savior. “Jenny will be back soon,” she said. “Please, stay with me!”
Touie shrugged and sat back on the sofa, while her husband and Mr. Dodgson found their way up the stairs to the second floor of Treasure House.
Bedelia’s chamber had once been a nursery, running across the back of the house. Two doors were on either side of the stairwell, one leading to the tiny room once occupied by Mrs. Cavanaugh, the other apparently for Amelia’s boudoir. The rest of the second floor was taken up with Captain Jethro Arkwright’s bedchamber, a room that filled the front of the house.
Bedelia lay on her bed, moaning, her fair curls in disarray. “Who’s there?”
“Dr. Doyle. May we come in?”
“I thought it would be the policemen,” Bedelia said, with a note of disappointment in her voice.
“The police are on the way,” Mr. Dodgson assured her. “Can you tell us what happened? Where were you when you were attacked?”
“I was watering Papa’s plants,” Bedelia said, wincing as Dr. Doyle turned her head to observe the bruise on her left temple.
“Do they need so much care?” Mr. Dodgson asked as he scanned the room. Bedelia’s school days were far from over; a spelling-book, a mathematics textbook, and a geography book were stacked on a small table set near the window, next to a sheaf of lined paper. An inkstand held two pens, and a drawing-pencil, and the condolence notes were piled atop a cheap copy of Marie Corelli’s latest heart-breaker. Bedelia’s taste in wall decor ran to the fashion-plates, taken from the Illustrated London News. Mr. Dodgson frowned as he recognized several of the so-called Professional Beauties, those ladies of impeccable taste and breeding who often accompanied His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales, and whose faces were reproduced en masse by the popular press.
Bedelia herself was more excited than hurt by her adventure. “I don’t know how he got in,” she told Dr. Doyle, as he delicately sponged the bruise and applied a sticking-plaster. “He was just there!”
“He?” Mr. Dodgson asked sharply. “Did you see him?”
“I don’t know … it all happened so fast!” Bedelia pulled away from her doctor. “Ow!”
“There doesn’t seem to be any damage, other than a bruise,” Dr. Doyle assured her.
“No scar?” Bedelia was more worried about her appearance than her wits.
“Not a bit of it.” Dr. Doyle closed his bag with a snap. “Now, you get some rest, and when you are ready, Touie and I will take you to our house. Until this business is settled, I don’t think you or your sister should remain here.”
“Oh, Amelia will do very well,” Bedelia said pettishly. “No one wants to hit her on the head.”
“You must not speak of your sister in that tone,” Mr. Dodgson chided her. “Miss Arkwright has been under a great strain.”
“Papa liked me better,” Bedelia grumbled. “My head hurts.”
“I shall make up some powders for you,” Dr. Doyle told her. “Now, Miss Bedelia, you be a good girl and rest. Mrs. Doyle will be up shortly to take care of you.”
Mr. Dodgson had moved from Bedelia’s room to the hall, where he stood, frowning. “Dr. Doyle,” he said, “I am going to do something quite reprehensible. I must examine Captain Arkwright’s private chamber.”
“Do you expect to find the Rajitpur Treasure there?”
“Consider, Dr. Doyle: A man who has worked himself up from the ranks, who has led an adventurous life, suddenly retires from the sea and takes up a scientific career, establishing himself as an authority on flora and fauna of the West Indies and Bermuda. One must ask, why?”
“Do you expect to find the answer in his bedchamber?” Dr. Doyle followed his mentor into the late Captain Arkwright’s most personal domain.
“I suspect, but I cannot say without proof.” Mr. Dodgson pushed the door to Captain Arkwright’s room open, and coughed.
The late Jethro Arkwright’s domain was permeated with a sickly sweet odor that was not quite tobacco. His bed, a massive carved affair, took up most of one wall; a matching wardrobe took up the opposite wall. The front windows were blocked by a dresser that completed the bedroom suite. The Captain’s sea chest had been placed at the foot of the bed, with a pieced quilt folded on top of it. A small table next to the bed held an oil lamp, a small carafe, and a glass.
Dr. Doyle sniffed experimentally at the glass. “Rum,” he pronounced.
“I suspect we will find the bottle somewhere in this room,” Mr. Dodgson surmised. He attacked the wardrobe, ruthlessly shoving pea jackets and dress-coats aside.
Dr. Doyle opened the dresser drawers, assessing the contents. “Shirts, not the best linen, but well cleaned, and darned. Cravats. Nightshirts, socks … Aha!” His triumphant cry drew Mr. Dodgson over to his side, to peer into the drawer.
“Handkerchiefs.” Mr. Dodgson pointed to them. “Identical to the one we found in General Drayson’s study grate.”
“I think we may safely assume that the handkerchief in question was one of these,” Dr. Doyle agreed. “But that only means that whoever poisoned Mrs. Cavanaugh had access to this room, and that means …”
Mr. Dodgson nodded sorrowfully. “Either Miss Amelia or Miss Bedelia. I think we can discount the servant.”
Dr. Doyle frowned. “It seems unlikely, but …”
“Quite unlikely,” Mr. Dodgson said curtly. “The killer would have to know the properties of nicotine, would have to have some way of preparing it, would have to have taken the trouble to dip the fatal handkerchief in the solution, would then have to have handed the handkerchief to Mrs. Cavanaugh without herself becoming poisoned. In short, the poisoner wore gloves. I have seen that domestic’s hands. She does not wear gloves, unless, perhaps, in the wintertime, to protect herself from the cold. No, Dr. Doyle, we may remove Jenny from our list of suspects.”
“Which is growing shorter by the minute!” Dr. Doyle complained. “It’s impossible!”
“Ah, yes, but one should always believe six impossible things before breakfast,” Mr. Dodgson said, kneeling down in front of the late Captain Arkwright’s sea chest.
“And just what do you think you’re doing?” Inspector O’Ferrall stood in the door, with Amelia cowering behind him.
Mr. Dodgson rose (literally) to the occasion. “In order to remove myself from Southsea before term starts, I must solve this mystery,” he said. “In order to do that, I must evoke the spirit of Captain Arkwright, which lingers here, in this room, among the objects he most loved.”
“Most of those were downstairs in his study,” Amelia said, her spirits restored by tea and the presence of Inspector O’Ferrall.
“Indeed? Then what, if anything, did he keep in his sea chest?” Dr. Doyle demanded.
Amelia shook her head. “I have no idea. Papa could be quite secretive.”
“So I have noticed,” Mr. Dodgson commented dryly. “Inspector, perhaps you would like to look into Captain Arkwright’s sea chest.”
“Think you’ll find this missing treasure there?” O’Ferrall smirked, and joined the other two men in front of the sea chest.
The lid creaked open, to display a collection of bottles.
Amelia closed her eyes in dismay. “Papa was told not to drink so heavily,” she said. “Emma and I would take pains to give him only what Dr. Pike or Dr. Doyle said he should have. He must have stored his rum in this chest.”
“What about his cigars?” Mr. Dodgson asked suddenly.
“Cigars?” Amelia echoed. “Oh, those were kept in his study after he fell asleep with a cigar in his hand and nearly burned down the house.”
“I note the scorch marks on this quilt.” Dr. Doyle pointed them out.
Miss Amelia’s emotions threatened to overcome her again. “This room has not been used since Papa’s condition grew so bad that he could not mount the stairs and we had to make up the daybed for him in the study.”
“I do not see any reading matter in this room,” Mr. Dodgson mused.
“You must not think that Papa was a vulgar sot,” Amelia said defensively. “He liked to have me read to him, in his study.”
“And he wrote, also,” Mr. Dodgson hinted. “I noted the manuscript on the small desk next to the large one.”
“Papa enjoyed telling of his adventures,” Amelia said. “I thought … that is, Emma said …” She stopped to collect her thoughts. “Papa was preparing a treatise concerning the plants he cultivated in the conservatory. Emma thought it might be worthy of publication.”
“Mrs. Cavanaugh appears to have been a most enterprising woman. In addition to running this household, she paid calls, collected for charity, and occasionally served as spirit medium. And now I find that she encouraged Captain Arkwright in his literary pursuits.”
Mr. Dodgson strolled out of the chamber and back into the hall. He examined the watercolor paintings of vividly colored flowers and birds and butterflies that hung on the walls of the hall. Then he turned to Amelia again. “Did you never paint your mother, Miss Arkwright?”
Amelia stared at him. “My …”
“These paintings are the work of your hand, are they not, Miss Arkwright?”
“Yes, but …”
“I am something of an amateur artist myself,” Mr. Dodgson said shyly. “I recognize talent when I see it. These are quite good. One feels as if one is on a tropical beach or in the jungles of South America, looking at them. However, I am well aware that one’s first attempts at watercolor are usually portraits of one’s family and friends. I ask, therefore, whether you ever painted your mother’s portrait.”
Amelia shook her head. “I’m sorry to disappoint you, Mr. Dodgson. I did not take up watercolor painting until I left Bermuda and came here. It was Emma who suggested that I be given drawing lessons.”
“And you choose as your subjects the flora and fauna of the Indies,” Mr. Dodgson said.
“I spent a happy childhood there,” Amelia said.
“Which ended with the death of your mother, at an early age.” Mr. Dodgson led the way back down to the sitting room. Amelia followed him, leaving Dr. Doyle and Inspector O’Ferrall to bring up the rear. Amelia looked about the sitting room as if she had never been in it before, then found her favorite spot on the sofa and sat down.
“Leaving Captain Arkwright a widower, with two children on his hands,” Mr. Dodgson continued.
“So, he retired from the sea, came home to England, and settled down,” Dr. Doyle finished the story, as he followed them into the sitting room.
“Is that when Mrs. Cavanaugh came to live with you?” Mr. Dodgson asked.
“Uncle Jack—that is, Captain Cavanaugh—met her in Bermuda,” Amelia said. “And she stayed with us to take care of Bedelia, because Mama was dead, and Papa was … was ill.”
“Ill?” Dr. Doyle snorted. “Wounded, more likely! Hopper found an old bullet in the man’s, um, hip. He must have taken it during his last venture.”
“Which explains why he decided to retire from the sea,” O’Ferrall agreed. “But what has any of this got to do with the Cavanaugh woman?”
“I am not sure,” Mr. Dodgson murmured.
Mr. Dodgson left Amelia in the sitting room and turned his steps toward the conservatory. “Dr. Doyle, would you assist me, if you please?”
“Of course, but …” Dr. Doyle was at the side of his mentor.
The two men were joined by Inspector O’Ferrall, and the three of them contemplated a scene of chaos.
The spiky, mottled, spiny plants had been thrown about, their earthenware pots broken, and the soil dumped on the flagstone floor of the small extension of Treasure House that jutted out into the garden. A door at the end of the conservatory swung open in the late afternoon wind.
“Be careful,” Dr. Doyle warned, as Inspector O’Ferrall stooped to pick up a shard of glass from the top of the pile of dirt and leaves. “If that is what I think it is, use gloves when you touch it.”
“Do you mean …?” Inspector O’Ferrall stared at the mess.
“As you yourself said, Captain Arkwright spoke at great length at one of our meetings on the efficacy of nicotine as an insecticide,” Dr. Doyle recalled. “I strongly suggest, Inspector, that we have found the source of the nicotine solution that killed Mrs. Cavanaugh.”
“But that would implicate Miss Arkwright!” O’Ferrall was aghast. “I cannot believe—”
“It may be that someone is trying to implicate Miss Amelia,” Mr. Dodgson said. “Are these doors ever locked? Could someone else have come in, taken Captain Arkwright’s handkerchief, and secreted it into his dresser, so that he would use it inadvertently?”
“Sounds too complicated for me,” Inspector O’Ferrall said.
Dr. Doyle squatted to finger the pile of dirt, moss, and leaves. Mr. Dodgson peered at the floor, then at the carpeted hallway beyond it.
“I wish to examine Captain Arkwright’s study once again,” he declared. Dr. Doyle and Inspector O’Ferrall followed as the scholar paced down the hall to the study.
“What the blazes …?” Inspector O’Ferrall, Dr. Doyle, and Mr. Dodgson stared at a scene that rivaled the previous night’s destruction of the sitting room.
Every drawer in the elaborate desk had been opened, the contents tossed on the floor. The wooden cases of shells and butterflies had been smashed, their fragile contents added to the pile in the middle of the room. The books on the shelves had been tossed on top of the same pile, so that the heavy bookcases could be moved away from the wall. The only objects that remained in their places were the heavy brass vases flanking the fireplace, and the hideous shrunken head and snakeskin full of poisoned arrows on the mantelpiece.
“Interesting,” Mr. Dodgson remarked.
Dr. Doyle stepped carefully around the debris. “Well, O’Ferrall,” he said, “you can’t blame poor Ram for this! He was within sight of both Mr. Dodgson and myself from the moment we saw him in Portsmouth on the Camber Docks until you arrested him.”
“Of course, Prince Jahal could have arranged for this,” Mr. Dodgson said. “In any case, the robbers once again left empty-handed.”
“How can you be so sure?” O’Ferrall asked.
“Because they have stamped on the papers in their fury.” Mr. Dodgson pointed to the scuff-marks on the pile.
Dr. Doyle squatted to check the marks. “Not the same as last night,” he decided. “Last night’s lot wore rubber boots, of the sort used by fishermen. These are quite different, much smaller.”
“Quite,” Mr. Dodgson observed. “Most interesting, don’t you agree, Dr. Doyle? And the condition of the drugget in the hallway, that, too, is suggestive. Also, the location of Miss Bedelia’s injury, and the destruction of the conservatory. Someone is searching desperately for those jewels, Inspector.”
“Our friend from Rajitpur,” Inspector O’Ferrall said grimly. “I can smell his handiwork a mile away.”
“What you smell is the scent of burning cannabis, otherwise known as hashish,” Mr. Dodgson corrected him. “If Captain Arkwright was in the sort of pain you suggest, Dr. Doyle, it is possible that he grew it and used it as an anesthetic. It is a rather penetrating scent, one which I recall from past experience.” His gaze met that of Dr. Doyle and Inspector O’Ferrall. “Oh, not personal experience,” he said hurriedly. “I have never indulged in such experimentation, although at one time some of my undergraduate students did.”
“You don’t say,” O’Ferrall remarked dryly.
“What is more, I suspect that Captain Arkwright’s interest in botany had a purely practical aspect. I am not an expert on exotic plants, but I recognize the word ‘ficus.’ Apparently Captain Arkwright was attempting to propagate the rubber plant in artificial conditions. There is a considerable sum of money laid aside as a prize for anyone who can do so. It is possible that his last expedition to Brazil was for the purpose of obtaining the seeds or cuttings of the rubber plant.”
“That would explain part of the Captain’s disposition, and his secretive habits,” Dr. Doyle commented. “If he was trying to grow rubber, and there was a prize for it, he wouldn’t want anyone else to know what he was up to!”
O’Ferrall’s bulldog jaw jutted out in bafflement. “But if that were the case, why destroy those plants? Why not take the damned things away and give them to the Royal Society, or whoever has charge of rubber trees?”
“The Royal Botanical Gardens at Kew,” Mr. Dodgson murmured. “This puts an entirely new light on things,” he said, edging around the debris in the middle of the room. “The destruction last night was purposeful, but this … this is spiteful. Miss Arkwright’s manuscript represents hours, days of careful work, and someone has destroyed it, wantonly and maliciously. That is a dreadful thing, and it must not happen again. I strongly suggest, Inspector, that you have a guard posted, and perhaps there is some respectable female who would stay with Miss Arkwright and Miss Bedelia, since Mrs. Doyle will, of course, be dining with General Drayson and the Portsmouth Literary and Scientific Society tonight.”
O’Ferrall nodded. “I’ll post a constable outside, and get Mrs. Pilkey from the jail. She’s the wardress, when we need one; widow of a Crimean veteran, followed the drum with him until he was killed. I wouldn’t like to be a burglar she finds in the house!”
With this decision made, O’Ferrall went back into the sitting room, where he informed Amelia of the steps he had taken for her safety. “And when all this is over,” he added daringly, “may I call on you? There is something I must ask you …”
“Not now,” Amelia admonished him.
“But … can I hope …?”
Amelia shook her head wordlessly. “Thank you for your kindness, Inspector. You really don’t have to send for Mrs. Pilkey, good woman though she may be. Bedelia and I can manage with Jenny and her mother. I must learn to be alone.”
“You have Bedelia,” Touie pointed out.
Amelia smiled wanly. “Oh, yes,” she said, her eyes blank gray pebbles in her pale face, “I have Bedelia.”
Touie, Dr. Doyle, Mr. Dodgson, and Inspector O’Ferrall were shown out by the stalwart Jenny.
“I’d better give you a lift back to the hotel,” O’Ferrall said. “I can’t wait to hear what Mr. Dodgson has to say at tonight’s dinner.”
“Neither can I,” Mr. Dodgson murmured to himself, as the police brougham took them back to the Bush Hotel.