A Dreadful Murder Read online

  He spoke his next thoughts aloud. ‘Whoever did it wasn’t at work yesterday . . . unless the killer is one of the gardeners in Frankfield Park.’

  ‘They operate in pairs and they’ve all been vouched for.’ Warde shook his head. ‘A jobless vagrant has to be the most likely suspect. Nothing else makes sense.’

  Taylor watched through the windscreen of the car as some houses came into view. ‘What sort of crimes do you have in Kent?’ he asked.

  ‘Pickpocketing . . . house burglary . . . minor thefts from shops . . . poaching. Nothing like Caroline’s murder.’

  ‘And you always know where to look for your thieves?’

  Warde gave a grunt of amusement. ‘We have our share of ne’er-do-wells if that’s what you mean.’

  Taylor gazed out of the window as the Daimler cruised down Ightham High Street. Medieval half-timbered houses lined the road and they looked as expensive as anything he’d seen in Sevenoaks. ‘How many of your ne’er-do-wells live here?’ he asked.

  Warde’s amusement grew. ‘This isn’t a London slum, Superintendent. It’s one of the oldest and most desirable villages in Kent.’

  Taylor smiled. ‘On the surface,’ he agreed, ‘but there must be some desperate people here too.’

  ‘What makes you say that?’

  ‘Mrs Luard would have had nothing to fill her days if she hadn’t had her charity work to keep her busy.’

  Chapter Five

  Tuesday, 25 August 1908 –

  Ightham Knoll, afternoon

  Henry Warde had described the Major-General as ‘broken’ by his wife’s death and that was certainly how he seemed to Taylor. The custom of the times was that men controlled themselves. It was only women who wept for the people they loved. Yet tears were coursing freely down Charles Luard’s cheeks.

  Far from the fit old man who had walked five or six miles the day before, Taylor was faced with a frail shadow. The Major-General’s hands shook with constant tremors and his face was drawn with grief.

  They sat in the drawing-room at Ightham Knoll. There were reminders of Mrs Luard everywhere. Her portrait as a young woman on the wall. Flowers on the table. Cushions, scented with lavender. Pretty china on the sideboard. Photographs.

  Henry Warde clearly had no idea how to deal with his friend. He stood with his back to the room, staring out towards the garden. He muttered phrases like, ‘Come on, old chap, a few deep breaths should do the trick.’ Or, ‘There’s no point giving way like this. Nothing’s going to bring her back.’

  But Taylor took a different tack. Thicker-skinned than the Chief Constable – and not so convinced that the Major-General’s grief was real – he parked himself on a chair and leaned forward, staring into the old man’s face.

  It wasn’t long before Luard became uneasy and regained some control. ‘What do you want to know?’ he asked. ‘I wrote an account for Henry last night.’

  Taylor began with simple questions. How long had the Major-General and Mrs Luard been married? How long had they lived at Ightham Knoll? Did they have children? Was Mrs Luard liked in the village?

  He learnt that the couple had had two sons – both in the Army – but the younger had died on service in Africa in 1903. That Charles and Caroline had lived at Ightham Knoll for twenty years. That Caroline had a wide circle of friends and was known, and admired, for her kindness and her work with the poor.

  In sudden despair, the Major-General placed his head in his hands. ‘She never harmed anyone,’ he cried. ‘Who would want to kill her?’

  ‘That’s what we’re here to find out, sir. From what you’ve said, she had no enemies in Ightham.’

  ‘Or anywhere else. How could she? We spent our days together. There was nothing I didn’t know about her life.’

  Taylor doubted that. Most women kept secrets from their husbands, if only how much they paid for their hats. ‘What about you, sir? Do you have any enemies?’

  ‘Why do you ask?’

  ‘Someone may have thought that killing Mrs Luard was an easier revenge than killing you. A lady alone has no defence.’ Taylor watched him for a moment. ‘You’re a Justice of the Peace. Have you ever received threats from men you’ve sent to prison?’

  ‘Only in court. Most of them feel their sentences are unfair.’ Charles raised his head, his face haggard with guilt. ‘Are you saying this was my fault? Should I have warned her?’

  ‘No, sir. I’m just running through possible motives.’

  ‘Her rings and purse were stolen. Isn’t that motive enough?’

  ‘Perhaps,’ Taylor agreed. ‘But Dr Mansfield says she was stunned by a blow to the back of the head first. And a thief had no need to kill her if she was unable to fight back.’

  Charles looked blank. ‘The doctor must be wrong.’

  ‘I’m afraid not, sir. He believes your wife was knocked out for several minutes before she was shot. We’re guessing that’s when her rings were taken . . . either because theft was the aim or because that’s what the culprit wanted us to think.’

  He was watching the Major-General’s face closely. If Luard had planned his wife’s death, he was hoping to see a reaction: a flicker of alarm because the doctor and detectives were on the right track – or a flicker of relief because they weren’t.

  ‘You talk as if this man was sane,’ Charles said, raising his hands in futile protest. ‘But no sane person would have done this.’

  ‘I wish I could agree with you. Sadly, in my job, you learn very quickly that sane men can be far more brutal than lunatics.’

  The old man’s eyes welled with tears. ‘My wife wouldn’t have refused him money, you know. She was a very Christian person. All he had to do was ask.’

  ‘What if she knew he didn’t deserve her help? The world is full of husbands who take every penny their wives receive to spend on drink. If he was a local man she might have come across him through her charity work. How would Mrs Luard have reacted if someone like that had asked her for money?’

  For the first time, Taylor understood why Luard had risen to Major-General in the Army and why he was a Justice of the Peace. It was the not knowing that had left him bereft. Faced with a possible answer, his faded eyes came back to life.

  ‘She’d have told him to go home and sober up,’ he barked. ‘She had no time for drunks who left their children to starve. Is that the kind of person you’re looking for?’

  ‘It’s a possibility,’ Taylor told him. ‘Can you give us any names? Families your wife worked with?’

  Luard shook his head. ‘You’ll have to ask her friends. They’ll be able to give you a better list than I can. Caroline sits on a number of committees.’ He realised he’d used the wrong tense. ‘I can’t believe she’s dead,’ he said sadly.

  * * *

  Mary Stewart lived in one of the half-timbered houses overlooking the village green in Ightham. She seemed to think that having three policemen in her house was a cause for alarm, and gave way to near faints every time Taylor asked her a question. He found her empty-headed and silly, and had trouble keeping his patience with her.

  Most of what she told them related to her long wait in the drawing-room at Ightham Knoll before Charles arrived. Overnight, she had ‘remembered’ feelings of doom. ‘I knew something terrible had happened,’ she gasped, tapping her chest. ‘I felt it here.’

  ‘Then I’m surprised you helped the Major-General look for his wife,’ Taylor said. ‘Weren’t you frightened of what you’d find?’

  ‘Dreadfully frightened. I told him I couldn’t go any further.’

  ‘I thought you went home to meet some guests, Mrs Stewart?’

  She fanned her face with her hand. ‘I’d have gone anyway. Charles was being very strange.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘He kept slowing his pace so that I wouldn’t lag behind. I think he wanted me there when he found her.’

  ‘Meaning what? That he knew she was dead?’

  The woman wriggled her shoulders. ‘It was just very od
d, that’s all. I don’t know Charles well enough to walk any distance with him.’

  ‘Particularly if you had such strong feelings of doom,’ Taylor murmured drily.

  It wasn’t just Taylor who thought her silly. Henry Warde’s scornful clearing of his throat was so pointed that it set the woman blushing to the roots of her hair. It meant she took a dislike to him, and had fewer concerns later about joining in the gossip that the Chief Constable of Kent would do anything to protect his friend.

  * * *

  ‘Idiotic creature,’ Henry Warde, the Chief Constable, said as he led the way back to his Daimler. ‘She’ll be saying she saw a gun in Charles’s golf bag next.’

  Taylor leaned on the roof of the car. ‘Did you search it last night?’

  ‘Matter of fact, I did. First thing I thought of after Hamble said the murder looked planned. I checked his rifles as well but none of them had been fired recently.’

  ‘What about handguns?’

  ‘Three revolvers. All clean. He said he couldn’t remember if he had any bullets for them . . . or where they might be.’ Warde glared up at the Stewarts’ house. ‘It won’t stop that silly woman inventing stories if it suits her.’

  Taylor scanned the names that he’d finally prised out of Mary Stewart. They weren’t the ones he’d wanted. She’d thrown a fainting fit when he suggested that Caroline might have come across her killer through her charity work. And rather than give him a list of suspects, she’d offered some worthy ladies who were ‘bound’ to know more than she did.

  ‘Then let’s hope Mrs Luard’s other friends are more sensible,’ he said, tucking the page into his coat pocket. ‘We won’t get very far if they all stay silent for fear of being killed themselves.’

  * * *

  The Kent Messenger – late edition,

  Tuesday, 25 August 1908:

  Brutal Slaying of a Kent Lady

  The shooting of Mrs Caroline Luard has excited public concern. Law-abiding citizens are asking how a lady of Kent could have been murdered in broad daylight.

  The mystery surrounding the death continues. Mrs Luard was taking an afternoon stroll through the woodland around Frankfield Park when she was attacked. But police are puzzled as to why a thief thought she had anything worth stealing.

  While robbery still appears to be the most likely motive, a Kent detective has told our reporter that minds remain open on whether the murder was planned. Mrs Luard may have been followed or her killer may have known in advance which route she intended to take home.

  An inquest will be heard tomorrow at Major-General Luard’s house in Ightham.

  Chapter Six

  Warde checked his watch and offered the Scotland Yard detectives a pint of beer and a sandwich. They were standing outside Sevenoaks station and he pointed to the Farmer’s Inn, which was across the road. ‘It’s as good a place as any,’ he told them. ‘They have rooms if you don’t want to return to London tonight.’

  All three men were tired. They had met the gunsmith – Edwin Churchill – off the five o’clock train and had spent the last two hours watching him study the used bullets recovered from Caroline Luard’s brain. His methods were slow because he repeated every action several times. When he wasn’t staring down the lens of his microscope, he was using pincers and tiny rulers on different parts of the crushed metal casings.

  He also spent a long time looking at the wounds in Caroline Luard’s skull. He pointed out flecks of soot on her skin, which had been caused by flames in the barrel of the gun when the bullets had been fired.

  His conclusion – stated with absolute confidence – was that she had been shot by a .32 revolver at a distance of a few inches.

  ‘The man clearly knows what he’s talking about,’ said Warde as he led Taylor and Philpott into the saloon bar.

  Taylor pulled out a chair at an empty table and sat down. ‘He claims it’s only a matter of time before he’ll be able to prove which guns fire which bullets. It seems barrels are like fingerprints. No two are the same.’

  Warde lowered himself wearily onto another chair. ‘It’s a pity he can’t do it now. It would help at the inquest if he could say that none of Charles’s weapons were used.’

  ‘It depends what calibre of bullets they fire. If the barrel widths are less than .32, they can certainly be ruled out.’ Taylor broke off while a waitress took their order. ‘Which doesn’t mean there wasn’t a fourth revolver that Luard hasn’t told you about.’

  The Chief Constable sighed. ‘Do you still see him as a suspect?’

  ‘Not at the moment.’ Taylor took out a tobacco pouch and started to roll a cigarette. ‘But my mind will change very quickly if we find any evidence that his marriage wasn’t as perfect as he wants us to think.’

  * * *

  Seven miles away at the George & Dragon in Ightham, late editions of the local newspaper were being passed from hand to hand. No one was surprised that Kent police were keeping an open mind about Mrs Luard’s murder.

  Few of the regulars at the George & Dragon had any liking for Major-General Luard. One or two had been on the receiving end of his over-lengthy sentences and the rest resented his high-handed manner. They saw him as a cold and distant man who thought the working classes beneath him.

  In any case, it was well known that Mrs Luard was a deeply unhappy woman. For no reason at all, she would burst into tears in front of friends and strangers. It was well known, too, that the Major-General used golf as an excuse to leave home every Tuesday and Thursday in order to visit the house of a certain lady in the village.

  The dissenting voices of the gardeners, James Wickham and Walter Harding, were drowned out. No one believed that a controlled and rigid man like the Major-General would weep openly over his dead wife and call her ‘his darling’.

  The truth was more simple. The pub customers thought Mrs Luard had found out about her husband’s affair, and the Major-General – bored with her complaints, or scared by her threats of divorce for adultery – had shot her.

  * * *

  The inquest was held the next morning in the drawing-room at Ightham Knoll. Such was the interest of the locals that there was standing room only by the time Taylor, Philpott and the gunsmith, Edwin Churchill, entered the room.

  They had arrived an hour before so that Churchill, who’d caught an early train, could examine the Major-General’s weapons and ammunition. But they hadn’t reckoned on so many people wanting to hear the gory details of Mrs Luard’s death.

  Taylor wondered if Henry Warde had been wise to choose this room for the event. As Dr Mansfield gave his post-mortem report, all eyes were on the portrait of Caroline as a beautiful and vibrant young woman. It was hard to remember that she was fifty-eight at the time of her death and had been married for thirty-three years to the elderly man who made his statement after the doctor.

  A whispered comment floated back to Taylor. ‘What’s the betting it was her who was having the affair?’

  The Major-General did himself no favours by the clipped way he gave his evidence. To Taylor it was clear that he was trying to keep his emotions in check, but it made him seem uncaring about the fate of his wife. There was very little sympathy for him in the room.

  Indeed, one or two spectators protested loudly that the inquest was being bent in his favour. Why had the Coroner allowed it to be held in the Major-General’s own home? And why was his close friend, the Chief Constable of Kent, in charge of the inquiry?

  From the remarks being made, there seemed to be a genuine belief in the room that Charles Luard was guilty. Yet Taylor didn’t understand why, since most of the evidence pointed to someone else being the murderer.

  Henry Warde’s men had found two members of staff at Frankfield House – Daniel Kettle and Anna Wickham – who said they’d heard gunshots at 3.15 on the afternoon of Monday, 24 August. Since Thomas Durrand saw Charles Luard pass Hall Farm at 3.20 – a fifty-minute walk away – the Coroner made the point that it couldn’t have been the Major-General
who fired the shots.

  When Edwin Churchill gave his evidence, he produced a careful summary of the type of weapon and size of bullets that had been used to kill Mrs Luard. He also displayed the Major-General’s three revolvers and used a .32 bullet to show the barrels were too narrow to take it.

  Taylor’s own evidence was brief. He had taken charge of Mrs Luard’s clothes following the post-mortem, and he described how the pocket in her dress had been ripped. The Coroner asked him if he had any idea why that should be so.

  ‘I’m told she carried her purse in it. I assume the killer tore the pocket in his haste to get at the money.’

  ‘Do you have any doubt that theft was the motive?’

  But Taylor wasn’t prepared to put his cards on the table at that time. ‘We are looking at everything,’ he said.

  * * *

  ‘You should have come down on the side of armed robbery,’ Henry Warde grumbled after the inquest was halted. ‘Now we have to go through the whole thing again because that silly fool of a Coroner was too afraid to rule she was murdered by someone unknown.’

  They were standing by the Daimler, waiting for Constable Philpott to bring Churchill outside. ‘Do you blame the Coroner?’ Taylor asked. ‘If he’d given in to the hostility in that room, he’d have named the Major-General as Mrs Luard’s killer.’3

  ‘He’d have listened to a Scotland Yard detective,’ Warde said irritably.

  Taylor gave an amused laugh. ‘You think so? I got the feeling no one was being heard. Besides, I didn’t want to reveal too much to the newspapers. I saw a couple of reporters from the London rags in there.’

  ‘They’ll write what they like anyway.’

  ‘Indeed, but we’ve a better chance of finding Mrs Luard’s rings if the culprit thinks we suspect the Major-General.’

  ‘You’re hoping he’ll pawn them?’

  ‘If he’s stupid, he will. If he’s not. . . he’ll have tossed them into the nearest river.’

  * * *