Page 3 of Murder at the Dinner Party
The hotel’s housekeeper didn’t want to speak tohim, however. “May I have a word, Miss Fox?”
Uncle Ronald bowed out and headed across the foyer to where Aunt Lilian was waiting at the lift.
Once he was out of earshot, Mrs. Short clasped her hands in front of her and regarded me with lips pinched slightly less sternly than usual. “I’m sorry to bother you at this hour, but I find it’s best to broach unpleasantness as soon as possible to get it over and done with.”
“Speaking to me is unpleasant?” I asked mildly.
“That’s not what I meant, Miss Fox, which I’m sure you are aware. What I should have said was the topic I need to discuss with you is unpleasant. I’d ask you not to infer meanings when you know them not to be true.”
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Short.”
Mrs. Short had a way of making me feel like a naughty child. She was excellent at her very demanding job, but rudely abrupt when she wanted to be, even to members of the Bainbridge family. Most of the hotel maids were afraid of her. I knew of at least six who’d been dismissed since her appointment as housekeeper in January, for offences ranging from smoking to being lazy. Even Harmony was careful not to do something that would attract negative attention.
A thought occurred to me, one that had me scrambling to think of an excuse that would explain why Harmony, a maid, and one of my closest friends, joined me for breakfast each morning.
What was said next couldn’t have surprised me more if the stout woman before me had ridden naked through the hotel foyer on horseback. “I need your help, Miss Fox.”
“Oh…uh…in what way?”
“My sister is upset.” Mrs. Short unclasped and re-clasped her hands in front of her. “I don’t like seeing her upset. She’s a good woman.”
“How can I help her?”
“I was about to get to that, if you’d only be a little patient.”
“Sorry,” I muttered.
“My sister is the housekeeper for a family here in Mayfair. Their butler died recently, just as he was overseeing a dinner party for the family and their guests.”
“How dreadful!”
Mrs. Short glared at me for interrupting. “It was. My sister likes order in her house, and I’m sure you can appreciate the chaos that ensued. Not only did he fall into a footman carrying a tureen of soup, spilling it on the carpet and creating a stain she can’t get out, but the staff are still in a flutter, days later. They say they’re too upset to work, that the house is cursed, and that he was murdered.”
I gasped, but didn’t interrupt again.
“My sister tends to agree with them. Not about the curse, about murder. She told me the police concluded he died of natural causes, but he was only aged in his mid-forties and fit as a fiddle. She also thinks he was afraid in the days leading up to his death. When she tried to speak to her employers about her concerns, she was told not to meddle and that if she took her concerns to the police, she would be dismissed.” She paused and arched her thin brows. “Well, Miss Fox? Will you take the case?”
“Me?”
“Don’t pretend innocence. I know you investigate from time to time as Mr. Armitage’s assistant.”
“We’re associates. I work alongside him, not as his assistant.”
“My sister thinks she can scrape together a little money from the other staff to pay a fee, but it won’t be much. Hence why I’m asking you and not Mr. Armitage. They can’t afford him.”
I sighed. My hope when I began as a private investigator was that I would save up enough money to one day move out of the hotel and no longer rely on the allowance my uncle paid me. Alas, although I’d received a little income so far, it was nowhere near enough to enact my plan. Harry’s business, on the other hand, was going from strength to strength. According to Mr. Hobart, Harry was very busy. He’d gained himself a reputation for solving complex crimes, some of which I’d investigated alongside him. Some of those had made it into the newspapers. The free publicity had proved a boon. So much so that he was too busy to even write a note to me after we’d kissed.
Not that I wanted to receive one, but it was the polite thing to do.I think.
“Miss Fox?” Mrs. Short prompted. “Do I need to ask someone else?”
“No. I’ll investigate.”
Her shoulders relaxed and I realized she’d been eager for me to take the case. “I’ll send Miss Cotton to your room in the morning with my sister’s details. Goodnight, Miss Fox.”
I crossed the foyer to take the stairs up to my fourth-floor suite, nodding at the night porter as I passed him. He was the only front-of-house staff member available this late. The rest had gone home or to the residence hall if they lived there. I realized I didn’t know if Mrs. Short had moved into the residence hall after her room in the hotel was demolished to make way for the restaurant, or whether she rented a place elsewhere.
I met Floyd as he trotted down the steps, whistling a tune.
