Dead bodies outdoors were not common in Mayfair, particularly not in the warmer months. Discovering two at a time was, Constance thought, unprecedented. She could see no blood, no obvious signs of attack. But the likelihood of two people dying of natural causes side by side on the same night was not high.
There was something…grotesque about these two. Standing back, she examined them.
The door that formed the background to their rest was somewhat ornate, for before the rest of the crescent had been built, this house had faced the other way. Only later had it been altered to match the newer homes on either side. The well-dressed man looked almost at home there, like some gentleman out on the tiles all night and waiting to be let in to his own home. The poor man, however, was decidedly out of place.
There was a clear space between them on the step, and at first sight, they appeared to be resting comfortably. But to Constance, they looked curiously…twisted. Their hips and legs faced straight ahead, their upper torsos leaning to the side in positions that could not have been comfortable.
Almost as if they had not died here but had been placed.
Glancing around, she found no obvious scuff marks on the paths, and the earth and plants of the garden appeared undisturbed. She would look more closely later, but for now…
She should not touch anything until the police had been, though she would have no opportunity once they had removed the bodies. With inevitable pity, she wondered who the devil these men were, the gentleman and the vagrant. Or at least that was what the second man looked—and smelled—like, his face and hands weathered and lined, his person thin to the point ofscrawny beneath his worn, ragged clothes. The fingers of one hand were curled, speckled with ingrained dirt, his matted hair receding, his cheeks thin and pale and deeply lined.
She moved nearer the bodies again and crouched down. Another smell that she could not immediately place hit her. Warily, she inserted her hand into the tramp’s coat pocket. It felt greasy, full of crumbs and fluff, until her fingers closed around something clean and distinctive. She drew it out.
A fine, soft leather notecase. Inside were a few banknotes and several visiting cards in the name of Terrence St. John, with an address in Grosvenor Square.
I don’t think so. She returned the notecase to the disgusting pocket and regarded the other man. The notecase could well be his and the vagrant had stolen it. Or the vagrant could have stolen it from someone else, at any time in the past. She felt inside the gentleman’s pockets, finding a few coins and a monogramed handkerchief—TSJ. So the wallet and the vising cardswerelikely his. Certainly, he carried no other notecase, because there was only a pair of gloves in his other pocket.
What on earth had happened here? A robbery? After which the pair had sat down together to die? And why had it all taken place in her garden, right on her doorstep?
She replaced the gloves, coins, and handkerchief where she had found them and sat back on her heels. If the gentleman was a neighbor, she did not know him. He was not a client of her establishment. Sarah, her capable lieutenant, had been under instructions to admit no new members while Constance was away, unless she was very, very sure and had written guarantees in triplicate.
He was not a young man, perhaps in his forties, but was handsome and fit, without much middle-aged thickening around his middle. From his dress, his hands, and the quality of the silk hat, he was rich.
The gate at the foot of the garden crashed open and a breathless Jeremy dashed in with a middle-aged constable panting behind him.
Constance rose to her feet. “Constable.”
“Madam. Dear me. Are you sure they’re—”
“Quite sure,” she said, making way for him. “But by all means look.”
“And you are…?”
“Mrs. Grey,” she said, before she remembered that she had intended to continue calling herself Mrs. Silver at the establishment. Oh well, a little respectability worked better with the police. “This is my house. My people found these men just a few minutes ago, just as you see them now.”
“Any idea who are they are?” the constable asked, moving closer.
“None at all,” Constance said, keeping to herself the name on the visiting cards. The police would discover those soon enough.
“He’s not a neighbor, then?” he asked, bending down to the gentleman.
“He could be, but he is not known to me.”
The constable took the dead gentleman’s shoulder in his large hand and shook him with unexpected vigor. The stiff body did not bend, but the head was bumped against the wall and the whole corpse suddenly rocked and fell to the side until it was actually leaning against the back door in an even less natural position.
It revealed the dead man’s back for the first time, and the mother-of-pearl-handled pocketknife sticking out between his shoulder blades.
The constable gasped, and Jeremy bolted around the side of the house.
“Well,” Constance said shakily, “that explainshim. What about the other one?”
“I need to send for my superiors,” the constable said, stepping hastily backward and almost falling over his own feet. He took the whistle from his pocket. “What is this address?”
When Constance told him, his jaw dropped and he blushed like a girl.
“Please go inside, ma’am. No one is to leave the house until the detectives say so.” He jammed the whistle into his mouth and blew several ear-splitting summonses. Obediently, Constance fled around the house to the area door and let herself in.
