Hy dropped off Miss Martello’s body and left a message for Kirby, who’d just stepped out of the hospital on an errand. Rather than wait around for the doctor he’d gone to meet Lightner.
He made good time from Bellevue, getting to Anita Fowler’s place before the inspector.
He’d just opened the windows in the airless, scorching room when the Englishman opened the door. “You beat m-m-me here,” he said, removing his hat and tossing it onto the small settee. “Wasn’t Kirby there?”
“He’d just stepped out.”
“Ah.” He went to stand in front of window that Hy wasn’t blocking and pulled off his gloves. Hy didn’t know how he could stand wearing them in this weather.
“Well, I spoke to tw-twelve of the sixteen occupants,” Lightner said. “At l-l-least five of them were pr-pretty girls—bl-blonde and brunette, and even one ginger.” He smiled at Hy. “Nine of the residents I talked to said they sp-spoke to Flynn either on their way in or out.”
Hy grimaced. “So Flynn’s information isn’t exactly reliable.”
“No, nor is it comprehensive. N-Nobody had a visitor who was an old woman with a cane. However, two of the residents were quite old and utilized c-canes. One went out yesterday and saw Fl-Flynn but didn’t speak to him.” He sighed. “One of the women is g-gone for the month. We m-m-might as well go back to talk to the others, not that I hold out m-much hope that—”
“I want to talk to the English detective!” The loud, angry voice came from the landing outside Anita Fowler’s second floor room.
Lightner gave Hy a questioning look.
“I don’t recognize the voice,” Hy said.
“Should I open the door?” Hy asked as the voices in the hall grew louder.
Before Lightner could answer there was a light tap on the door and then it swung open.
“Excuse me, my lord.” Mrs. Stampler gave a slight shiver at the word lord, as if the mere act of saying the Englishman’s title gave her some sort of thrill.
“Good afternoon, M-M-Mrs. Stampler.”
A head shoved in beside the old lady. “She won’t let me speak to you—I’m Kitty Brannen, the cook over at Mr. Beauchamp’s and I need to tell you somethin’ and she’s—”
“What you need to do is know your place,” Mrs. Stampler snapped.
Hy couldn’t help gaping. Gone was the sweet, grandmotherly matriarch. In her place was a narrow-eyed, tight-lipped virago. She even sounded different—her soft Southern accent more pronounced.
Miss—or Mrs.—Brannen turned on the bone-thin, towering old woman, her expression just as vicious. “My place is wherever I want it to be. I ain’t no slave, no matter how much you might like me to be.”
Mrs. Stampler inhaled so hard that the slitted nostrils of her long, pointy nose turned into black circles. “Why of all the—”
“Mrs. Stampler,” Lightner said.
Hy had no idea how the other man did it, but the Englishman’s soft voice was better than a bullhorn for shutting people up.
The old lady’s head swiveled toward Lightner like a dog obeying a whistle. “Um, yes, Lord Jasper?” Mrs. Stampler asked, all sweetness and light again.
“D-Do you happen to have any of those lemon cookies that Detective Law m-mentioned?”
“Why, yes, my lord. They are rather a specialty of mine.” Her pale, papery cheeks flushed with pleasure. “Would you care for some tea, as well?”
“That would be l-lovely. C-Could you g-give us perhaps thirty minutes?”
“Of course, my lord.” Mrs. Stampler cut the cook a triumphant look and turned with a dismissive sniff.
Kitty Brannen glared at Mrs. Stampler’s departing form.
Lightner extended a hand. “How do you d-d-do Miss Brannen? Or is it missus?”
“That would be Miss, my lord.”
Lightner bowed low over her hand, something Hy could never get away with doing in a million years without looking like a regular horse’s arse.
The courtly action had the predictable effect on Miss Brannen, who made a soft cooing sound, just like every other female the Englishman had come into contact with.
Was Hy jealous? Well, maybe a little. Still, he had to admit that Lightner’s adage about catching more flies with honey was a good one. If there was one habit Hy was determined to develop, it was the Englishman’s courtesy. Even if Hy couldn’t quite swing the bowing.
“Come in, M-M-Miss Brannen, have a seat,” Lightner gestured to one of the two chairs around Miss Fowler’s small kitchen table.
“Oh, why thank you.”
Lightner took the chair across from her. “Thank you so m-much for coming forward.”
Miss Brannen smiled, the expression taking ten years off her age. “After I spoke to Detective Law,” she smiled at Hy, “somethin’ else came to me, and it’s been botherin’ me.” She shifted in her chair to get comfortable, clearly wanting to make the most of her opportunity on center stage. “You see, it’s about the blood stain.”
Both Hy and Lightner gave the woman their complete attention.
“Er, and what st-st-st-stain would that be?” Lightner asked.
“Well, I first noticed it just before last Christmas.”
“Oh?”
“Uh-huh. I probably wouldn’t have remembered nothin’—er, anything,” she corrected, “if not for the whatnot drawer.”
“Whatnot drawer?” Lightner repeated, looking perplexed.
“Oh, just a place where you put things you don’t wanna throw away.” She grimaced. “But I’m gettin’ ahead of myself. Back around Christmas I noticed the pastry marble was darker—like maybe somebody had been cuttin’ meat on it.” Her face tightened. “I accused two of the kitchen girls of doin’ it. I ain’t proud of what I done,” she added, her careful accent slipping as she got excited.
Hy knew the feeling.
“I asked Eliza and Hannah—they help out twice a week. But they both swore up and down they never did it. You see, it’s special stone—just for makin’ pastry and such. It’s real easy to stain. I figured they were just lyin’, but what can you do?” She shrugged. “Anyhow, I have a special poultice I make for stains like coffee and tea, but I don’t like to use it too much ’cause it can leach out the color—even outta stone. The one thing it don’t work so good for is blood.”
“So, it is a c-counter. But you mentioned the whatnot drawer?” Lightner prodded.
“Yes—it’s a drawer that never worked right, even though the house was almost new. I soaped it over and over, but it still wouldn’t slide good. So we just keep things in it we don’t need too often—broken tools that maybe can be fixed so you don’t wanna throw ’em out, you know?”
The Englishman nodded his encouragement, although Hy suspected that a duke’s son had never seen a whatnot drawer in his life. Pretty much every drawer in the small lodgings Hy shared with his cousin was a whatnot drawer since Ian never put anything back where it belonged.
“So back in February—I know it was February ’cause we had that awful, awful freeze—I was lookin’ for the broken snow scraper I’d put in there ’cause I couldn’t find the good one.” She frowned. “It’s amazin’ how many things in that kitchen grow legs. Anyhow, the drawer was even stickier than usual, and when I got it open I saw all this browny-red all over.” She hesitated, her dark eyes creasing with a combination of disgust and excitement. “Um, I didn’t know it was blood ’til I started to clean it up. There was a lot of dried blood. And you know where the joint on a drawer meets the front part?” Jasper and Hy both nodded, enrapt. “Well, there was some hair caught in there; red hair. At the time, I thought, why that hair looks just like Mr. Beauchamp’s hair, but I couldn’t think what his hair and all that blood would be doin’ all the way down in my kitchen.”