Chapter 7
Ginger Investigates
When Ginger left Bertie in the morning room and headed for the main staircase he was turning over the possibilities in his mind. The grand staircase he knew, because he used it to come down from his room, led from the main hall to an airy landing from which the principal guest rooms were accessible. Cliffe's room, however, had been in the far wing and was not directly off the landing. To get there necessitated a journey through several corridors before that section of the building was reached. The servants stairs were at the back of the house. He had never used them but he knew they came out through a door that was concealed in the panelling.
As he passed the door of the drawing room he heard a muted murmur of conversation. Clearly many of the guests had not retired after the excitement of the evening. He did not stop, but carried on into the hall. The lighting was low and the shadows were deep. He paused for a moment, listening, but the huge house was still. Marble statues caught by the feeble rays of the lamp peopled the shadows with ghostly figures. Ginger drew in a deep breath and told himself to get a grip on his nerves.
He headed for the staircase and went up the shallow steps two at a time. When he reached the landing he paused and looked back. Beech crossed the hall below him carrying a tray with a decanter and tumblers. The butler's footsteps echoed on the marble floor and died away.
Ginger turned back to the landing and hesitated a moment to get the geography of the house clear in his mind. He made his way to the small corridor on the extreme right of the landing that led to the wing where Cliffe's room was located. The bulbs in the lanterns that illuminated the service corridor were dim and now he was away from the main part of the house occupied by the household and guests, the carpet beneath his feet was thin; too thin to mask his tread. He saw no one and met no one as he strode along, his feet making hollow footsteps on the wooden floorboards. It was with no small feeling of relief that he emerged into the wider corridor that linked the "bachelor quarters" where Cliffe had been housed. He turned left and made for the room where Cliffe had spent his last moments. As he rounded the corner a voice stopped him in his tracks.
"I'm sorry, sir. No one is allowed in here," a uniformed policeman, obviously posted by Constable Pearson, informed him. Ginger produced his Scotland Yard identity card and the young constable apologised, impressed.
"We don't often see people from the Yard," he observed, eyeing Ginger curiously, and clearly thinking that London policemen were a different breed if Ginger was anything to go by.
"I don't want to tread on anyone's toes," Ginger reassured him, "but as my colleague and I were here we felt duty bound to help."
"I'm sure we're delighted to have you," the constable responded dutifully if not necessarily honestly. "You Yard blokes must see this sort of thing all the time," he added wistfully. "Nothing ever happens down here in sleepy hollow."
"Well, hardly," admitted Ginger candidly. "We mainly deal with air incidents. This is a bit out of our line."
"I thought you was a rubber-necker," confided the young constable whose name, he informed Ginger, was Clark. "You'd be surprised what lengths people will go to in order to see the scene of the crime."
Ginger nodded sympathetically. He sensed that the lot of being posted to guard the door of the crime scene in this out of the way spot was not a congenial one and Constable Clark would welcome the opportunity to chat given a modicum of encouragement.
"Have there been any visitors since you took up your post here?" he wanted to know.
"You're the fifth," he informed Ginger, much to the airman's surprise.
"Good heavens!" Ginger blurted out. "Who were they?"
"The maid came up to strip the bed. I told her nothing was to be touched. Then the butler came up to try to get me to change my mind, but I wasn't having any of that. Orders is orders," he stated firmly if ungrammatically.
"Quite right," encouraged Ginger. "Who else?"
"Then a young man came up. Said his name was Fosdyke. Reeking of perfume, he was." The constable sniffed. "Bit limp-wristed if you ask me," he opined.
Ginger hadn't but prompted, "and what did he want?"
"Said he had lent the deceased a book and he wanted it back. Huh!" scoffed Constable Clark. "A likely story!"
Ginger shook his head sadly. "He'd have to do better than that to get round you," he commented.
The policeman nodded vigorously. "That's what I told him. I says 'I've heard better excuses from my nephew when he's trying to get out of doing his homework'."
Ginger smiled at the comparison. "Who was the fourth," he enquired.
The answer surprised him. "Her Ladyship - the young one, I mean," the constable clarified. "She didn't try to get in, just came to see I had everything I needed. Very nice of her, I thought," he added. "Considerate, like."
"Yes, very," agreed Ginger, wondering why on earth Celia would want to go to Cliffe's room. He thought it was totally out of character for her to go herself on an errand she would surely normally send a servant to carry out.
"Do you want to see the body?" asked Constable Clark. "It would be alright for you, seeing as you're from the Yard," he added.
Ginger declined. Cliffe had been unpleasant when he was alive. Dead he was even more unattractive. "My colleague has already viewed it," he explained. "He was the one who found the victim. I'm just investigating the routes to and from the room."
"This is like a rabbit warren," opined the constable. "There's stairs everywhere. You could hide an army in these corridors. I shouldn't like to have to tramp up and down here all day."
Ginger suddenly thought of Naomi Levy-Strauss and her claim that she had spent the day tramping up and down to her room. It reminded him of the purpose of his quest.
"Where are the stairs to the servants' quarters?" he wanted to know. "I presume you came up that way."
Clark nodded. "From the servants' hall," he confirmed. "They're just down the corridor. There's a door in the panelling. You have to look for the outline to see it. It's very cleverly done," he observed admiringly. "They went to a lot of trouble to hide the servants away when this was built," he commented. "But then, they treated the servants like dirt. They was supposed to pretend to be invisible if they met any of the upstairs lot so they wouldn't offend their eye," he continued bitterly. "My granddad was a footman here," he admitted rather surprisingly, Ginger thought. "He had some tales to tell."
"I'll bet!" agreed Ginger. "I had better get on with my investigation, though," he concluded, "and look at the stairs to the servants' quarters." Leaving the constable to his lonely watch, he walked down the corridor in the direction indicated by the policeman. About half way along, was the outline of a door in the panelling. Clark was correct; it was hard to see and could easily be missed unless one was looking for it. Ginger found the recessed handle and opened the door. The space behind it was in darkness. He groped for the light switch and pressed it down. Nothing happened. Stifling an imprecation Ginger stepped forward cautiously, feeling for the wall and testing each step for the start of the stairs.
His questing hand touched something soft but before he could react he received a push which propelled him forward. His foot encountered space and he pitched headfirst down the stairs. His last conscious thought as he hit the floor at the bottom was that the scent that had filled his nostrils was somehow familiar.
