Death by Silver by Melissa Scott Page A

ask if it had been installed after the murder.
    As he’d expected, there were iron chairs and a bench toward the middle of the garden. He shifted one to a respectable distance, and looked up as Larkin appeared in the doorway.
    “This is Sarah, Mr Lynes.”
    It was the girl who had opened the door, her face carefully blank, her hands folded in front of her.
    “You’re to answer his questions, Sarah, just as if he were the police,” Larkin went on.
    “Yes, Mr Larkin,” she said.
    Larkin gave Julian a last look, not quite disapproving, and withdrew into the shadows of the kitchen. Sarah came forward reluctantly and bobbed a curtsey.
    “Mr Lynes,” she said.
    She was older than he’d thought at first sight, sixteen or so, a thin pale rabbit of a girl with dishwater blonde hair drawn ruthlessly back under a prim plain cap. “Sarah,” he said, his tone scrupulously neutral. “What’s your surname?”
    “Doyle, sir.”
    Julian jotted it down in his memorandum book. He’d learned that taking notes made people feel perversely more comfortable, as if he wouldn’t remember the things they said that he didn’t write down. “Thank you,” he said. “I know I’m going to be asking questions you’ve already answered, but I hope you’ll take your time with them. Anything you remember, no matter how small, may prove to be helpful.”
    “Yes, sir.” Her voice was as colorless as her hair.
    Julian took her through the events of the day of the murder, as much for what she thought was normal as to find anything that seemed odd to him. It had been entirely uneventful, just the usual round of visits and shopping, livened only by a dinner party of friends so familiar as to be almost part of the family. From everything she said, Ned’s visit had been the most excitement the household had seen in months.
    “And did you notice anything peculiar about the silver?” Julian asked.
    Sarah hesitated. “I can’t say I did,” she admitted. “Not that I have much to do with it. But Mogs – Margaret – she did twist her ankle coming in the kitchen door the first time she’d been set to help clean it. Swelled up like a melon, and Mrs Victor had the doctor come for fear she’d broken it. And Mr Larkin always says he comes over queer when he polishes it.”
    Possibly because it was new and in poor taste, Julian thought, or because the polish overwhelmed him. He hadn’t yet seen the size of the butler’s pantry, but it couldn’t be too large. Or, more likely, because Edgar Nevett had spread the story among his staff, and Larkin was astute enough to agree with his employer. Still, it would be interesting to see who first bruited the notion of a curse.
    Julian took her through the day’s routine again, but there seemed to be nothing out of the ordinary. The gentlemen had gone to their work, except for Mr Frederick, and the ladies had occupied themselves with visits and charity work. Sarah had waited at table during the dinner party, but she had noticed nothing unusual.
    “It was like a family party, really,” she said. “Mrs Nevett and Mrs Boies are old, dear friends, so Miller says, and they both sponsor Mr Ellis’s work.”
    “So it was Mr and Mrs Boies, and Mr Ellis,” Julian said.
    “And Mr and Mrs Victor,” Sarah said. “And Mr Frederick.”
    “Not Mr Nevett?” Julian refrained from looking up, though that was the first unusual thing he’d heard so far.
    She hesitated again. “I believe he had to go back to the City.”
    There was definitely more there, but Julian merely nodded. “And Mr Reginald?”
    “He left for his club before dinner.”
    Julian nodded again. “What did they quarrel about?”
    “I never said they quarreled,” she said sharply.
    “But they did.”
    Sarah looked at her feet. “Yes, sir. But I couldn’t hear what they said, not even with them shouting –” She stopped again, flinching. “They argued a lot, sir. It didn’t mean nothing.”
    “Mr Nevett was a quarrelsome man,”