Mistletoe and Murder Read online

  ‘And us!’ said George, winking at her. ‘What say we move on to the staircase?’

  ‘Excellent,’ said Daisy. ‘Bertie, you stay here.’

  Outside we went, strung with tinsel and baubles. I stared up through the dizzying gap in the stairs all the way to the far-off roof. It really was a tall, thin place, all angles and stone.

  Daisy lowered her voice. ‘We must have a thorough understanding of the space if we want to uncover who committed the crime,’ she told us. ‘Hazel and I have investigated the staircase before, but now we must create a full and clear map of the area.’

  ‘Exactly as I said,’ said George, grinning.

  ‘Of course you did,’ said Daisy, rolling her eyes at him. ‘But I’m saying it now, which makes it more official. Hazel, you may draw it.’

  I understood what that really meant: that Daisy would be directing me, and criticizing what I did. There was a time when I would not have seen that at once, and a time after that when I would have resented it – but these days I have made my peace with it. Daisy is Daisy, and she makes demands with the pure clarity of someone who does not consider anyone else. She knows what she wants, and she will get it, no matter the cost. And I rather admire her for that.

  ‘All right,’ I said, slipping this casebook out of my pocket under a covering of tinsel and labelling a fresh page STAIRCASE NINE, MAUDLIN COLLEGE.

  ‘Now,’ said Daisy, ‘let’s see … tinsel there, and, let’s see, a cluster of baubles there. This place really does need a woman’s touch.’

  George raised his eyebrows at her, and she winked at him. ‘Now,’ she whispered. ‘The layout. Hazel, pay attention. We know that the entrance on the ground floor has a door which gets locked, and it was locked on the night of the murder at eleven o’clock, long before the trap was set. On the left we have the loos, with Michael Butler’s rooms on the garden side. Mark that up, Hazel.’

  I drew boxes on the left to be the loos and a little box on the bottom right labelled Michael’s Rooms. Next to it I noted down the notice board, and the first flight of stairs. Then I looked about at the landing we were on.

  On the left was the door that read Freddie Savage, and on the right was the door we had come through, Bertie’s. He stuck his head out for a moment and rolled his eyes at us all before going back inside.

  I added both rooms to the map and, between them, the coinbox telephone. It was out in the open, for anyone on the staircase to use.

  ‘Convenient!’ said Daisy, wreathing it with tinsel.

  ‘Noisy!’ said George, and I knew what he meant. I saw again how difficult it would be for anyone on staircase nine to make a call without anyone else hearing them.

  ‘Most interesting,’ agreed Daisy. ‘Very interesting indeed. Do you know, I think there is a very obvious solution to the problem of Amanda’s call.’

  ‘That there was no call,’ said George.

  ‘Yes,’ said Daisy. ‘Hazel and I suggested that long ago. But if so, if no one did call Amanda, we cannot simply dismiss her story. There is one very important question to answer. How did she know that something was wrong?’

  I caught Alexander’s eye. He looked as bewildered as I felt. A chill went down my spine.

  4

  We climbed the stairs again, and came out onto the next landing. The horrid sight Daisy and I had seen last night, blood pooled on the stone, had been wiped away, but I could still see the shadow of where it had been. This was where Chummy had landed, and I saw the bit of broken stone that his head had hit against. It was most unlucky, for each flight of stairs only had twenty narrow steps – but it had happened. I shuddered, and marked my map with a cross.

  To our left was Alfred Cheng’s rooms, and on the right, the garden side, was the room marked James Monmouth. This was the room that was being refurbished while its owner was away for the hols – the room into which Chummy had been carried just a few hours ago.

  He was still there!

  I saw that Daisy had had the same thought. She looked at George, and – ‘We must get in,’ he said at once.

  ‘No!’ I said. ‘We can’t!’

  ‘Of course we can,’ said Daisy. ‘For once, we have an opportunity to observe the body itself!’

  ‘Alexander!’ I said pleadingly.

  ‘Daisy’s right,’ said Alexander uncertainly.

  I was shocked. I knew he did not really think so. How could he pretend to agree with Daisy, just because he thought her pretty? But his agreement had outweighed my opinion. The other three wanted to go in.

  ‘Decorate around me, while I pick the lock,’ ordered Daisy. She pulled a pin out of her hair and moved towards the door. Alexander stepped behind her, to tuck a strand of tinsel above the lintel, and I hung a bauble on the handle itself.

  ‘What are you doing?’ asked a voice behind us. It was Alfred, peering out of his rooms again with a look of annoyance.

  ‘Decorating,’ said George. ‘Christmas.’

  ‘Do it more quietly, can’t you? I need my sleep,’ said Alfred, before closing the door again.

  Something occurred to me then. Every time we climbed the stairs, we seemed to attract attention. Our footsteps rang on the stone steps, and our voices echoed off the walls. How had the murderer climbed quietly, without anyone hearing them in the middle of the night? No one had mentioned hearing someone moving on the staircase after the argument between Chummy and Donald at half past twelve.

  But at that moment, the door to James Monmouth’s room opened with a click, and I could not think of anything else but that. I was imagining what would be inside. I remembered the dreadful door at Fallingford, the only thing between us and Mr Curtis, the guest who had been killed. Detecting is all very well when it is about the puzzle, but when it truly becomes about a body I like it far less.

  Daisy clicked on the electric light, and all four of us slipped inside. There, on the sofa, was a shape, covered in a dust sheet.

  ‘We shouldn’t be doing this!’ I said one more time.

  ‘I don’t know why you’re so squeamish,’ said Daisy. ‘It’s all part of being a detective!’

  I glared at the other three, summoning all the bravery I have gathered over the past year. I was going to stop them.

  And then I noticed the shoes.

  They were poking out of the bottom of the sheet. They were black, and rough on the bottom, with canvas tops. Once I had seen them, I could not look away.

  ‘Look,’ I said quietly. ‘He’s wearing plimsolls.’

  ‘That’s what Harold gave us to wear last night!’ said Alexander. ‘Everyone wears them to climb, he told us so.’

  Eyes wide, Daisy took a step forward and twitched at the sheet.

  ‘And, look,’ she whispered. ‘He’s wearing bags and a coat, not pyjamas. He is dressed to go outside!’

  The legs she had revealed were certainly clad in baggy, dark-brown trousers, not night things.

  I remembered that Mr Perkins said he had heard someone clambering about on the tower as he was falling asleep. We had thought it must have been one of our suspects … but what if it was the victim? What if Chummy had been climbing last night? He could have gone out of his rooms through the window by the drainpipe, and back down the same way. He must not have had time to change out of his climbing clothes and into his pyjamas before he died. Perhaps that was why he had gone rushing at the stairs without looking where he was going – because he was tired, and not thinking straight.

  But Daisy was moving up the body again, and I thought with a flush of horror that if I had to look at Chummy’s poor broken head I really would scream. ‘Stop, Daisy!’ I said. ‘Leave him alone. Don’t look any more!’

  ‘All right, all right. Why, you look quite green!’

  ‘It isn’t nice,’ I said faintly. ‘I think I prefer it when there is no body.’

  ‘Me too,’ admitted Alexander. He did not look very well. ‘I think we should go.’

  ‘You,’ said Daisy petulantly, ‘have no imagination.
But I do admit we have made a useful discovery. We ought to move on from this room now, though, before someone notices we’ve stopped decorating the staircase!’

  5

  Out we went onto the landing, and began to go up the steps towards the top floor, where Chummy and Donald’s rooms were.

  ‘More baubles there, I think!’ cried Daisy, then dropped her voice to a whisper. ‘Look! There! That’s where the fishing line was tied!’

  It had gone, but there was the nail, still shining. PC Cross had not yet taken it away. Daisy rushed to the top step and crouched down.

  ‘Here, d’you want a magnifying glass?’ asked George, taking one out of his pocket.

  ‘Oh, no thank you. A lady always carries her own,’ said Daisy, pulling out her own tiny one.

  Together they examined the nail in the skirting board. I got out the length of fishing line we had bought, and held it up. It would have been easy to set up the trap.

  ‘The nail is knocked in deep,’ said George. ‘Interesting!’

  ‘Yes!’ Daisy agreed. ‘The noise of hammering would have bothered the whole staircase if it had been done last night. No one mentioned it any more than they did someone climbing, so—’

  ‘– it must have been done earlier, to let the killer set the trap quietly whenever they needed to!’ George finished. They beamed at each other.

  ‘While the decorators were working on the room below, perhaps?’ asked Alexander. He stared at Daisy hopefully, but she did not turn her head. After a moment, he looked at me. I blinked, and pretended I had been looking at this casebook.

  ‘Hey!’ cried a voice suddenly. ‘Hey! What are you four doing?’

  We all looked up in shock.

  Moss the bedder had come out of his little box room and was standing over us. He looked haggard and very distressed, and his livery was crumpled. It seemed as though he had still not slept at all.

  ‘Good morning, Moss,’ said Daisy cheerfully. ‘We’re decorating the staircase for Christmas.’

  ‘I’m – I’m sorry I startled you,’ Moss said. ‘It’s only that I don’t like seeing you there. It doesn’t seem safe, after what happened. Mr Charles’s fall – it was my fault.’

  ‘Your fault?’ asked Daisy sharply. The four of us bunched together. Was this a confession?

  ‘He was in my charge,’ said Moss. ‘I shall be removed from my post! It was because of me!’

  Suddenly our situation felt quite menacing. We were alone, at the top of the stairs, with a man who was one of our suspects.

  ‘What do you mean?’ Daisy pressed.

  ‘I always told Mr Charles not to play pranks on Mr Donald – that it wasn’t fair, that Mr Donald couldn’t take it. But I couldn’t stop him – I never could. He laughed it off, and his parents let him. That was why I took the job here, to look after Mr Donald when no one else would. I knew he needed it. And now – this! I tell you, it’s my fault.’

  His lips were trembling. Was he confessing? Had he tried to stop Chummy, and taken things too far?

  ‘But you told the policeman you were in your room,’ I said.

  ‘I—’ Moss began. ‘I was. Yes. And it’s my fault!’

  ‘Why do you keep saying that?’ asked Daisy. ‘How could it be, if you were in your room?’

  And that was when the door to Donald’s rooms slammed open, and Donald himself burst out of it.

  6

  ‘I say!’ Donald cried. ‘What are you all doing out here? Are you having a party without me?’

  I looked at him, and felt astonished. He was still in his pyjamas, but he had put on a paper hat, of the sort you get in Christmas crackers, and draped a length of tinsel round his neck like a scarf. He was clutching a glass in his hand, half full of some dark liquid, and on his face was a smile, a bold tilt to his features that suddenly reminded me very much of Chummy.

  ‘Come in!’ said Donald – and it sounded like an order. An order from Donald, who yesterday had bent to Chummy’s will and crept about in his shadow. I was amazed.

  We stepped into his living room, and found it even mustier than it had been last time. Bits of half-eaten toast were now strewn about, on plates and off them, and a toasting fork lay across the grate, half in the dead ashes of a fire.

  ‘Mr Donald!’ cried Moss. ‘How are you?’

  ‘Chummy’s dead,’ said Donald, and he sounded quite gleeful. ‘He’s not here any more. I’m marvellous!’

  ‘It was an accident,’ said Moss hopefully. ‘It was his own prank, wasn’t it, Mr Donald? It was my fault for not stopping it.’

  As he said that, I had a sudden feeling that Moss was not guilty. He was merely afraid that Donald was. It was only a suspicion, though I thought I was right. But how could I prove it?

  ‘I don’t care what it was!’ said Donald. ‘It means that he’s not here to bother me any more. I can do what I like! I already feel better. It’s like a weight’s been lifted off me.’

  ‘But, Mr Donald, you must agree that it was an accident!’ said Moss again. I felt Daisy tense beside me, and I knew she had understood what I had. How could we make the truth come out?

  ‘Imagine!’ said Donald. ‘The party tomorrow night will be all mine now. I’m changing the guest list! I shall hire the jazz band I want! Things are looking up. I shall most certainly be buying that mine too.’

  ‘Mr Donald!’ said Moss, rather desperately.

  ‘Why, we should all be happy! Chummy’s not about to play pranks on any of us.’

  ‘Oh yes,’ said Daisy quickly. ‘He did play some awful ones, didn’t he? That one with the jacket … and what he did to poor Moss as well! Poor Moss, you must be quite shaken up.’

  I did not know what she meant, but I saw that, for some reason, her shot had hit home.

  ‘How did you know that?’ gasped Moss.

  ‘He was a toad!’ cried Donald. ‘That jacket was my best, and he sewed up the sleeves. I found it and we rowed in the corridor. Butler came up to tell us off, and Chummy pretended to listen to him. As soon as he was gone Moss came out, but Chummy pinched his keys from his belt and locked him in his rooms. I tried to grab them off him, only he went out of the window in his rooms, up the drainpipe and onto the roofs.’

  ‘Chummy locked Moss in his rooms?’ asked George sharply.

  ‘Did it all the time,’ said Donald. ‘The keys’re easy enough to grab from the ring on his belt. He’d make Moss go back into his rooms and lock him in from the outside. I had to let him out again, after Chummy’d fallen. He still had the keys on him. I had to get them back out of his pocket when he was lying there!’

  I felt electrified. I saw why Moss had said that it was his fault: he thought that allowing himself to be locked in by Chummy meant that Donald was free to set the trap. And one other thing was clear: if Moss had been stuck in his rooms from the moment Chummy locked him in until after he had fallen, then he simply could not have got out to set the trap. We could rule him out. I had been correct: Moss was innocent.

  ‘You think I should be upset, don’t you?’ asked Donald. ‘Well, you’re idiots. You don’t know what it’s like, having a brother who’s better than you. Everything was Chummy, Chummy, Chummy. Chummy ought to be older! Chummy ought to have the money! That’s what everyone said. No one cared about me. But that’s changed now it’s just me. I can be myself at last!’

  I suddenly wanted to leave the room very much. I turned and stared at Daisy. Of course, she understood.

  ‘We’re going to go down to Bertie’s rooms,’ she said to Donald. ‘Come on, you lot.’

  We went out onto the landing again, and the door closed behind us. I shuddered. ‘Let’s go downstairs,’ I said.

  ‘One moment,’ said Daisy. ‘Something has just occurred to me. Cover for me – talk while I’m gone!’

  And quick as a flash, she darted to her right, through the door into Chummy’s rooms. Alexander glanced at me and George, and then he launched into one of the cheerful, friendly conversations he is so good at. He ta
lked about snow and about presents, and he was just getting onto the subject of Christmas dinner (apparently Americans do not really go in for Christmas dinner. Instead, they have something called Thanksgiving that happens a month before and seems to be Christmas without the presents) when Daisy came darting back out of Chummy’s rooms. Her hands were empty, but her eyes were glowing.

  ‘That was very productive!’ she breathed. ‘I looked in Chummy’s wardrobe, and the fishing line Hazel and I saw yesterday is still there, untouched since we last saw it! That’s conclusive: Chummy did not set the trap! There is a murderer at large, and we are narrowing down our suspects!’

  7

  I stood at the window of Bertie’s rooms and stared out at the dark afternoon through its little diamond panes. For a while we had to behave as though we were not detectives, but only ordinary schoolchildren, getting ready to celebrate Christmas. I twisted the catch, and pushed the two halves open so that I could peer out at the drainpipe to my left, and the winter garden below. Above me were Chummy’s rooms, and I was horrified to think about swinging out of Chummy’s window onto the drainpipe. Up here seemed high enough.

  I pulled the window closed and turned back to the room. The gramophone was on, and a man’s voice flowed out, a rich and laughing jazz song.

  Bertie knelt at the grate and prodded the fire, while George and Alexander watched. The flame leaped up, and the room was warm and bright. The tinsel on the walls shone, and it did feel like Christmas Eve.

  Daisy came to lean against me, and we watched together as Bertie pulled out a tin of mince pies from a little trunk under his desk. He laid the pies on the hearth rug, and it looked almost like a midnight feast in the middle of the day.

  My stomach rumbled. I realized that it was past lunch time, and I had not eaten anything for hours. My nerves had been singing with detective excitement and seed cake, but now I felt myself coming back to earth with a thump.

  I bit into my first mince pie and my mouth flooded with spices and candied fruit. For a while, everything was quiet. We all sat or leaned or lay across the sofa, or the carpet next to the fire, and demolished all the mince pies. I could sense the five of us drawing closer together.