Death of a Milliner: Riley Rochester Investigates Book 9 (Riley ~Rochester Investigates) Read online

  ‘It’s Mrs Faulkner, not Madame Boise,’ Salter said, his cheeks chalk white as he leaned over the body and scratched his head. ‘What the devil was she doing here?’ He straightened up and sent Riley a supplicating look. ‘This is bad,’ he said, almost to himself.

  ‘Stay here,’ Riley said to his three detective constables. ‘Take a look around, see if there’s any sign of forced entry. There are four apprentices here, I think you said, Jack. Jack?’ Riley repeated, more sharply when his sergeant didn’t appear to hear him. ‘Maureen and three other girls live upstairs?’

  ‘Yes, that’s right.’

  ‘The other three are still up there,’ the constable told them. ‘It’s just Miss Salter and the other lass, the one as flagged us down, in there.’

  ‘Where’s the murder weapon?’

  The constable sent Salter a wary look. ‘I took it from the young lady. It’s over there.’ He pointed to a table, upon which a bloodstained pair of cutting shears rested.

  ‘Find something to put them in, Peterson,’ Riley ordered. ‘Then all of you, take statements from the three girls upstairs.’ He turned to his sergeant. ‘Ready? Needless to say, you keep quiet and let me ask the questions.’

  ‘But I can’t…’

  ‘You can and you will, Jack, if you want to help me discover who did this. If Madame Boise had been the victim, then Maureen would be in the clear. But since Maureen appears to have been the subject of a dispute between the two ladies and she desperately didn’t want to return to Mrs Faulkner’s establishment, I can guess what you would be thinking if she was anyone other than your daughter.’ Riley held up his hand to cut off Salter’s protest. ‘I know it’s hard for you, but you must let me help you.’

  The desire for action appeared to drain out of Salter and he looked momentarily defeated; a sight Riley had never imagined he would observe. ‘Let’s get in there,’ he said, almost in a whisper.

  The moment they opened the door, a bloodstained Maureen launched herself into her father’s arms. He all but swept her from the floor and sat down with her still cradled in his arms.

  ‘There, there love. It’ll be all right.’

  Riley sighed, sincerely hoping that he was right.

  The other woman in the room looked a little older, but scarcely more composed than Maureen. A trail of tears decorated her cheeks, her hair had fallen down and her hands shook.

  ‘You have had a terrible shock, ladies,’ Riley said calmly. ‘Perhaps one of you would like to tell me what happened so that we can get to the bottom of this tragedy.’

  ‘That’ll be easy enough,’ the older woman said, glowering at Maureen. ‘I came to open up and found her…’ she pointed an accusatory finger at Maureen, ‘standing over Mrs Faulkner’s corpse, bold as you like. You should arrest her.’

  Maureen buried her face in her father’s shoulder and whimpered.

  ‘No one’s arresting anyone yet,’ Riley replied, sending Salter a warning look. ‘First things first. What is your name, miss?’

  Riley ordinarily depended upon Salter to take notes, but his sergeant was occupied with comforting his daughter. Sighing, he extracted a small notebook and pencil from his own pocket and waited.

  ‘Miss Doreen Cornish.’ The young woman, whose long face and pinched features made her look permanently disapproving, tossed her head. The edge of a birthmark peeped over the high collar of her blouse. She wouldn’t be unattractive if she smiled, Riley thought. He also knew that he was being unfair. She’d had a terrible shock and was bearing up well, given the circumstances. ‘I am madame’s chief assistant,’ she said with an exaggerated air of importance. ‘It was my duty to open the premises this morning, and this is what I found.’

  ‘You do not live here?’

  ‘Only the apprentices live in.’ She made it sound like an accusation. ‘I have rooms a few streets away.’

  ‘Madame Boise doesn’t live on the premises?’

  ‘Sometimes. She has a suite of rooms on the first floor, but she doesn’t always stay here.’

  ‘Where does she go?’

  ‘She has her own house in Finsbury Park.’

  ‘Is that where she spent last night?’

  ‘I wouldn’t presume to ask.’ Miss Cornish put up her chin. ‘Madame relies upon me to keep things running smoothly and not to put my nose in where it’s not wanted.’

  ‘Do you always open the premises?’

  ‘I have keys, of course, as does madame. If she doesn’t intend to be here to open, then she makes sure that I am.’

  ‘What time were you expecting her to arrive this morning?’

  Miss Cornish adopted a haughty expression. ‘It is not my place to ask.’

  Riley silently cursed the pretentious female and adjured himself to have patience. ‘Apart from yourself, Madame Boise and four apprentices, who else is employed in this establishment?’ he asked.

  ‘Just Mr Girton. He’s madame’s driver. He does deliveries too and anything else that’s required of him.’

  ‘I see. Very well. I shall need to speak with you again.’ Riley nodded towards a door. ‘Where does that lead to?’

  ‘The back of the workroom. There’s another room which is a store, and an office with stairs beyond it to the upper floors.’

  ‘Please go up that way.’ Riley wanted to spare her from passing the body. ‘I will come up when I can.’

  Miss Cornish looked as though she wanted to say something else, but thought the better of it and walked through the door that Riley opened for her, sparing a contemptuous look for Maureen.

  ‘She doesn’t like me. She never has.’ They were the first words that Maureen had uttered and she immediately burst into tears after speaking them. ‘This is so horrible,’ she sobbed.

  Salter handed his daughter his handkerchief and smoothed her back with his large hands as both detectives patiently waited for Maureen to compose herself.

  ‘Sorry,’ she said sheepishly. ‘It’s been such a shock.’

  ‘Sit down over here, Maureen,’ Riley said, gently but firmly. ‘I understand your anguish but it’s important that we establish a few facts as soon as we can so that we catch whoever did this terrible thing.’

  Maureen sniffed. ‘Of course, Lord Riley. I understand.’

  She obediently left her father’s knee and moved to the chair that Riley held out for her. The restraining hand he lifted prevented Salter from moving to join her. Riley himself sat opposite the girl and smiled reassuringly.

  ‘Start from the beginning and tell me what happened.’

  Maureen mopped her eyes, sat a little straighter and began to talk. ‘We usually have our breakfast at seven and start work at eight. The shop doesn’t open until ten. But last night we had a rush order and we worked until one o’clock in the morning. Madame said she and Mr Girton would deliver the finished items to the client this morning and that we could sleep in. We didn’t need to start work until we opened at ten, which was very generous of her. Mrs Faulkner wouldn’t have made any allowances of that sort.’

  Fresh tears swamped her eyes when she realised that Mrs Faulkner would no longer be making allowances of any sort ever again.

  ‘Do you and the other girls all sleep in the same room?’ Riley asked, anxious to establish a few facts and avoid another bout of tears.

  ‘No, sir. I share with Beryl and Susan shares with Rose. Beryl was still dead to the…oh, I mean she was fast asleep when I woke up. I couldn’t get back to sleep so thought I’d come down while it was quiet and work on a few ideas I have for a new hat. And that…well, that’s when I found Mrs Faulkner, lying there, with all that blood spouting…’

  ‘Was it spouting?’ Riley ignored Salter’s frown. If he was less involved, he would appreciate the importance of the question. ‘Think carefully.’

  ‘Yes, it was spilling everywhere. And I’m sure…’ She gulped, tears streaming down her face once more. ‘I’m sure her lips moved and I think she asked for my help.’

  ‘What did y
ou do?’

  ‘I knelt down beside her. She needed help and I tried…’ She paused to blow her nose. ‘I must have knelt in the blood and…well, I just pulled the shears out from her chest. She asked me to help and it’s the only thing I could think of doing. It made a horrible squelching sound.’ Maureen shuddered. ‘Then Doreen came in, screamed the place down and that’s all I know.’

  Riley glanced at Salter, who was holding himself rigid, scarcely breathing. He probably hadn’t realised that his daughter had interrupted the murder. A second or two earlier and she might have been a victim too. Riley didn’t doubt for a moment that Maureen had told the truth, but she wasn’t in any state to answer more questions. And Riley had dozens more that needed answers. He made do with asking just one.

  ‘Are you aware of Mrs Faulkner’s home address, Maureen, and if she has any relatives?’

  ‘She lived above the shop in Clapham. That’s all she had. Don’t know about relatives.’ She paused. ‘There was a man, younger than her, who came to the shop sometimes. She got all giggly when he was there, but I don’t know his name. We weren’t even supposed to look at her when we were working.’

  ‘Very well. Thank you, Maureen.’

  What to do now, Riley wondered? He couldn’t send Maureen home, but he had no intention of arresting her.

  Peterson appeared. ‘The back door has been forced open, sir,’ he said. ‘That’s how Mrs Faulkner must have got in, but none of the girls upstairs heard a thing.’

  ‘Right.’ Riley stood and took Peterson aside. ‘I have a job for you,’ he said. ‘Take yourself off to this address.’ He scribbled it down on a page in his notebook, tore it out and handed it to Peterson. ‘It’s the home of my sister, Lady Gaston. Tell her that I have urgent need of her services and ask her to come here as quickly as she can in her carriage.’

  Peterson looked a little bewildered but went off to do as Riley asked.

  ‘A word, Jack,’ he said, repeating his sergeant’s name twice before engaging his attention. Salter stood and joined Riley on the opposite side of the room.

  ‘Maureen didn’t do this,’ Salter said.

  ‘Of course she didn’t. You and I both know that, but I have to play this by the book, otherwise the real culprit might well get away with it.’

  Salter gave a reluctant nod. ‘Can I take her home?’

  ‘You could, but—’

  ‘But what? Surely you ain’t gonna make me work all day. The child’s in a terrible state and needs her mum.’

  ‘If I send her home with you then you can’t work on the case or have anything to do with it.’

  Salter scowled. ‘Have a heart, guv’nor. My place is helping find out who done this.’

  ‘I would feel just the same in your situation, Jack, but it won’t serve. I’ll help Maureen all I can, but you have two choices. You can either take her home and stay there with her until the case is solved, or you can let me put her somewhere safe so that you can’t be accused by a clever defence attorney of priming her.’

  Salter rubbed his chin, reluctant to see the truth in Riley’s words. ‘Where do you have in mind?’

  ‘Doctor Maynard’s here, sir,’ Carter said, poking his head around the door.

  ‘Ah, Lord Riley.’ Maynard offered Riley his hand when he joined him. ‘Always a pleasure, even if we do tend to meet in such unpalatable circumstances.’

  ‘Goes with the territory, unfortunately.’

  Maynard knelt by the corpse. ‘A fresh one,’ he said, with less subtlety than usual. ‘Stabbed through the heart and very recently. Not much else I can tell you, and I suspect you already deduced that much for yourself.’

  He stepped aside to let the photographer do his work.

  ‘No sign of the lady putting up a fight,’ he added, resuming his examination when the photographs had been taken. ‘She must have been caught unawares.’

  ‘She was stabbed in the chest, so it stands to reason that she saw her attacker,’ Riley remarked. ‘Surely she would have tried to defend herself.’

  ‘You’d think so, wouldn’t you? But there’s no sign she did that’s immediately apparent to me. Perhaps she knew the person and didn’t feel threatened.’

  ‘Could a woman have done it?’ Salter asked.

  ‘Oh yes, Sergeant, if she’d been angry enough.’

  Salter’s face turned a chalkier shade of white and he turned his head away.

  ‘Very well. Thank you. You’ll let me know once you’ve done your post mortem,’ Riley said.

  ‘Naturally, but I doubt if there will be much to find.’

  Riley and Salter watched as the mortuary attendants lifted the body onto a stretcher, covered it with a sheet and carried it out to their wagon.

  ‘You were saying,’ Salter prompted gloomily, once the doctor had departed.

  ‘Right. If you want to continue working, then Maureen can’t go home to Clapham.’

  ‘Yeah, I get that.’ Salter kicked moodily at a loose floorboard. ‘What do you have in mind?’

  ‘I’ve sent for my sister and I’m going to ask her to take Maureen in for a day or two, just until we have found out what’s what.’

  ‘That’s…well, that’s very generous of you, sir.’ There were tears in the tough sergeant’s eyes. Riley never thought to see the day.

  ‘Cabbage is staying with Martha at present, so she will be good company for Maureen.’ Riley was referring to his niece Sophia, who had modelled Maureen’s hat at Alexandra Palace and was indirectly responsible for Maureen procuring her sought-after position as Madame’s newest apprentice. The two had become friends, after a fashion, and Riley knew that Cabbage could be depended upon to keep Maureen’s spirits up. ‘I’m going out on a limb for you here, Jack. If anyone finds out what I’ve done, that I’ve given a murder suspect preferential treatment, it could cost us both our jobs.’

  ‘I’m well aware of that, sir, and grateful.’

  ‘Then repay me by not telling anyone where Maureen is.’

  ‘Except Mrs Salter.’

  ‘You will have to tell her what’s happened. She will read about it in the newspapers so it’s best coming from you. As to Maureen’s whereabouts, simply tell her that I am keeping her safe.’

  ‘She will want to know more than that.’

  ‘And you cannot tell her.’

  Salter sniffed. ‘Right. Thank you, sir. I guess I have no choice.’

  ‘You don’t. For now, I don’t want you here at all while we talk to the other girls. Doreen obviously doesn’t like Maureen and won’t hesitate to cause trouble.’ Riley slapped his shoulder. ‘Go home and tell Mrs Salter what’s happened.’

  ‘Best not to have us both worrying. Maureen’s not harmed…well, not physically, so she doesn’t need to know anything yet. I’ll tell her later.’

  ‘In that case, get yourself off and deal with that attempted abduction.’

  Salter’s mouth fell open. ‘You must be joking.’

  ‘Am I laughing, Sergeant?’ Riley sighed. ‘I’m trying to help you here, man! Go off and do your duty and we’ll meet back at the Yard later.’

  ‘Let me talk to Maureen first.’

  ‘Just go.’ He gave Salter a little push. ‘I’ll take good care of Maureen and so will my sister. That’s the best I can do for you in the circumstances.’

  Salter went off, mumbling incredulously about bloody abductions. Riley sighed and went to look at the forced back door.

  ‘What do you notice about this, Carter?’ he asked.

  Carter shrugged. ‘A glass panel smashed so someone could put their hand in to turn the key that was in the lock.’

  Riley shook his head. ‘Look again.’

  All three of his detective constables examined the door. He was unsurprised when Peterson was the one to come up with the answer. ‘It was broken from the inside,’ he said. ‘The glass has fallen outside.’

  ‘Right.’ Riley glowered at Carter and Soames, who were supposedly more experienced men and tutted. ‘Which
means?’

  ‘That whoever killed the lady was already inside the premises,’ Soames said warily, ‘or had a key, and broke the glass to make it look like someone broke in.’

  ‘Precisely.’

  ‘Don’t look so good for the sergeant’s daughter, does it, sir?’ Peterson asked.

  ‘Not as things stand, but it’s early days.’

  ‘Lady Gaston’s here to see you, sir,’ a uniformed constable informed Riley.

  ‘Martha,’ Riley said, holding out his hands to his sister. ‘Sorry for the inconvenience.’

  ‘Riley, what on earth…’

  Riley took her aside and succinctly explained what had happened, as well as what he required from her. Martha agreed immediately to take Maureen in, just as Riley had known that she would.

  ‘The poor child. She’s incapable of killing anyone. I’ll do what I can for her whilst you find out who actually did this terrible thing.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘How’s Sergeant Salter?’

  ‘Beside himself.’ Riley felt uncompromisingly grim. ‘I’ll have my hands full preventing him from doing something reckless to prove Maureen’s innocence.’

  ‘Fathers turn into warriors in the protection of their daughters. Best not get in the way.’

  Riley smiled. ‘You’re not the first person to tell me that today.’ He felt the strain as he abstractedly ran a hand through his hair. ‘Anyway, you wanted to talk to me about something. Now’s as good a time as any.’

  Martha hesitated. ‘You’re busy. I don’t want to hold you up.’

  ‘Give me a clue.’

  ‘Henry.’

  ‘Ah.’ Riley’s shoulders slumped. His brother, the Marquess of Chichester, was renowned for getting himself into scrapes, usually involving money or women, but Riley had recently hoped that he’d finally grown up. ‘Just when I thought my day couldn’t get any worse.’ He let out a long sigh. ‘What has he done now?’

  One of Riley’s detectives called his name.

  ‘Tell me later,’ Riley said to Martha. ‘I’ll call in to talk to Maureen this afternoon when things have calmed down a bit and we can talk then. See if you can get her to sleep. It will help her. Call a doctor to give her a sedative if necessary.’