The Serpent on the Crown - Elizabeth Peters [83]
Ramses’s mother was gone less than ten minutes. “What?” demanded Emerson. “Don’t tell me Nefret wouldn’t let you help carve the poor woman?”
“Don’t be disgusting, Emerson. I only wanted to have a look at her clothes before they were removed.”
“Hadn’t they removed them?” Ramses asked.
“I asked Ayyid not to do so. Anyhow, given the delicate circumstances, he preferred to have a woman take care of that.”
“Quite proper,” muttered Rayburn.
“Quite,” Emerson agreed. “Well, Peabody?”
His wife gave him a tolerant smile. “I will spare you the details, my dear, since fashion means nothing to you. Suffice it to say that she was wearing evening dress—quite an expensive model, to judge by the designer’s label—of crimson satin, pleated across the bosom and caught on the shoulders with diamond clips—fake diamonds—”
“I thought you were going to spare us the details,” Emerson objected.
“Though costly, the dress was last year’s model,” his wife continued, unperturbed. “As I suspected, the beads we found in the garden were identical with others trimming her sleeves and bodice. Her jewelry had been taken.”
“How do you know she was wearing jewelry if there wasn’t any?” Emerson demanded.
“No woman would have assumed an elaborate evening costume without the appropriate jewels.”
“So the motive was robbery!” Rayburn exclaimed in unconcealed relief. “Confound it, Ayyid, you ought to have searched the hotel servants and their quarters.”
“I did,” Ayyid said tightly.
“They—he—had ample time to conceal the jewelry elsewhere,” Rayburn insisted. “Isn’t that so, Mrs. Emerson?”
“Robbery was not the motive, Captain Rayburn.”
“But, Mrs. Emerson—”
“No thief would have taken the trouble to arrange the body so respectfully. Her eyes were closed and her hands folded on her breast. Pray allow me to continue. Underneath her gown she was wearing—”
“I don’t want to hear about it,” said Emerson in some confusion. “Get to the point.”
“I fear that you are missing the point, Emerson. According to the guests at the hotel, Mrs. Petherick wore only black, in keeping with her role as a grieving widow. Why was she attired that night in crimson? And where had she come from? She had been missing for almost a week. Was she about to stage a dramatic reappearance, but was prevented by the murderer?”
Observing the skeptical expressions of the others, she said impatiently, “Someone was with her when she died, that much is undeniable. Someone who arranged the body, someone who had enough regard for the proprieties to treat it with respect. All her garments were intact, with no tears, cuts or bloodstains.”
“Then how did she die?” Emerson demanded.
He repeated the question to Nefret when she returned, looking as calm and fresh as if she had been engaged in arranging flowers.
“Congestive heart failure” was the reply.
“Then—no murder,” said Emerson, with a telltale look at his wife.
“Oh, it was murder,” Nefret said. “Her heart was damaged, but what caused it to stop was suffocation. I believe she was unconscious when the cloth was pressed to her face, since there were no bruises on her arms and no traces of skin or blood under her nails.”
“You’re sure?” Rayburn asked.
“Yes. There were threads caught in her teeth. If you would like a second opinion—”
“That won’t be necessary.” Rayburn sighed heavily. A murder investigation, with the victim a British subject, was a complication he did not appreciate.
“So her breath was sucked out,” said Sethos, with unseemly relish. “Just wait till the newspapers hear about this.”
SIX
I felt it my duty to be the one to inform the Pethericks of the results of the postmortem. Emerson did not object; in fact, he said he would go with me. I knew why, of course. His detectival instincts were temporarily in the ascendance, and having been proved wrong (by me) on several essential points, he was hoping to win