Murder Most Royal

‘And yet always itself,’ Lady Caroline said. ‘I’m sure St Cyrs have been thinking it wasn’t quite done from the moment they moved in, don’t you?’

Hugh grinned. ‘You’re probably right.’

As they rounded the next corner they heard a shout and saw Flora waving to them from the far end of the path, next to Rozie. Even from a distance, the Queen thought she detected a set to Rozie’s shoulders that meant her APS had something to tell her. Good. Meanwhile, her own thoughts were developing rapidly. They had a lot to talk about.

Chapter 24

Back in the saloon, the family were clustered in front of the television set, watching the inauguration of the forty-fifth president. He was seventy, as commentators felt it necessary to mention – the same age as Ned, yet obviously with much life ahead of him and much to do. Not all of it popular, if the protests taking place around the world and the lack of famous faces in the crowd were anything to go by. But the Queen was taken with Senator Blunt’s opening remarks about the ‘commonplace and miraculous’ tradition of a peaceful transfer of power.

People rather took that for granted these days, she thought. As a keen student of history, she was highly aware that transfers of power could be bloody and dangerous. Her namesake had lived in constant fear of it in the sixteenth century. Her distant cousin, Nicholas II, had lost his whole family to a revolution. The War of Independence, Partition . . . the list was brutal and long, and close to home. Philip’s family in Greece had had to run for their lives. The ‘commonplace miracle’ of peaceful transfer was much to be treasured. If her own entry in the history books could say only one thing, it would be this: for three-score years and ten, as far as she could manage it, transfers of power to countries in her beloved Commonwealth had happened peacefully. They had not always been happy, or to governments one thoroughly approved of, but you could not have everything.

* * *

The Queen wasn’t alone with Rozie for the rest of the day. Sir Simon was supposed to be bringing in the boxes the following morning, but she was relieved to see that Rozie arranged to do it herself. Rozie still had that set to her shoulders.

‘Did you learn anything useful?’ the Queen asked, without even making a pretence at opening the first box.

‘I think so,’ Rozie said. She explained how cold and evasive Flora had seemed about Chris Wallace. ‘She said his wife was close to the baroness, and that their children grew up together. But nothing about him being turfed out. She absolutely denied it. Then she seemed to get distracted by the poison garden.’

‘Is that still there?’

‘Well, no. Flora said she had to get rid of it because of the visitors. I can see why. Her brother nearly died of wolfsbane poisoning when he was little, apparently.’

‘Oh, dear.’

‘The baron wanted it all dug up in a fury, even though his wife was fond of the garden.’

The Queen was surprised. ‘How unlike Hugh.’ She thought a bit longer. ‘How very unlike Hugh. How interesting.’

‘How did you get on, ma’am?’ Rozie ventured.

The Queen pursed her lips, picked up the fountain pen on her desk and fiddled with the lid.

‘I was reminded of just how strong Ned’s childhood feelings for Ladybridge must have been. On top of that, Hugh ended up marrying Ned’s girl. If it had been Ned who had killed his cousin all those years ago, it would have made sense.’

‘Lord Mundy drove away with Ned. They could have argued in the car,’ Rozie suggested, thinking it up as she went along. ‘And then . . . Could the baron have followed him to London?’

‘Only if a tenant, Flora, the vicar and an antiquarian bookseller were lying.’

‘It’s a very solid alibi.’ Rozie grinned. ‘I’m sorry, ma’am, I’m making up wild stories about people you know.’

‘No, no. It’s useful to think through the possibilities. However, Hugh and his son are not on good terms from what I see and hear, despite what Hugh would like me to believe.’

‘He was distraught when Valentine ate the wolfsbane as a child,’ Rozie pointed out.

‘Yes,’ the Queen agreed. ‘But that was a very long time ago.’

‘But Lord Mundy’s been very supportive of his son. With the whole gay marriage thing. I mean, that’s really something.’

The Queen noticed how Rozie was gaining confidence in the job, to the point of challenging one’s assumptions, which could be very useful in this sort of situation.

‘He’s such a quiet, shy sort of man. It can’t have been easy,’ Rozie went on.

‘Perhaps,’ the Queen granted. ‘I agree that it is very unusual for an old-fashioned sort of peer, shall we say, such as Hugh, to be so open to the idea. When so much is at stake.’

‘At stake, ma’am?’ Rozie asked.

‘Ask Sir Simon,’ the Queen said, cryptically. And then, more cryptically still, ‘And then, there are the dogs.’

‘The dogs?’ Rozie echoed, feeling increasingly lost.