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of furrowing her forehead to show how intently she was listening—but yielded little helpful information. What was most interesting to Lenox was that she seemed genuinely sad to have lost her friend. It made Frederick Clarke more real, made his death seem graver, when she talked with a smile on her face about him.
    She had been working at the Starlinghouse for a year. “I’ll never forget,” she said, “at the end of my first week he took a piece of the cake they was having upstairs—Mr. Starling’s cake,” she added, remembering he was there, “and put a candle in it for me. ‘Happy first week,’ he said.”
    As far as she could recall, she had never seen him wear a gray suit or a gold ring, or indeed anything other than his footman’s livery. He always had his nose in a book.
    She had oberved occasionally in the past that he had scrapes on his hands.
    “Occasionally,” murmured Lenox after she had been dismissed down the opposite hallway (the staff were segregated in their sleeping quarters, men down one hall and women down another). “If it was an ongoing condition it means there’s no significance in their directly preceding his death.”
    “They still might be related.”
    “Perhaps.”
    Betsy Mints was even less helpful than Jenny Rogers. A small, thick woman, she had a deeply stupid face that was red from the constant heat of cooking over fire. In conversation, however, she was witty enough, in a voluble northern way. Her experiences with Frederick Clarke were extremely limited. She thought he was quite handsome, very efficient, and rather rum—quiet, inward, that is to say—but that was the extent of her analysis of his character.
    Lenox had higher hopes for Jack Collingwood, the young butler. For one thing he directly supervised Clarke. Lenox and Dallington sat at a table with him while Ludo hovered anxiously behind.
    “I apologize for the lateness of our meeting,” said Lenox.
    “Not at all, sir.”
    “It’s nearly ten o’clock. You must be off soon.”
    “Yes, sir.”
    “From what I understand, Frederick Clarke was a good footman?”
    “Entirely blameless in the conduct of his professional duties, sir.”
    “Did you like him?”
    “Like him, sir?”
    “Were you friends?”
    “No, sir.”
    “What was your impression of his character?”
    “Mr. Clarke was quiet and studious. He preferred to be in his room, reading, if he had spare time. He spoke to me once or twice about going back to school. I dissuaded him from it, of course. He was excellent in his work and could have risen to be a butler in due time.” This said as if there could be no higher conceivable ambition.
    “Who do you think killed him?”
    “I have no idea whatsoever, sir. A vagrant, I might venture.”
    “But to what end? Did he carry money?”
    “No, sir. He and I both have our wages deposited in Mr. Starling’s bank, and I never saw Mr. Clarke spend his on anything. As for household money, that is my province exclusively.”
    “What was his day off?”
    “Thursday, sir.”
    “That’s all?”
    “The family eats a cold collation after church services, following which the servants have Sunday afternoon to themselves.”
    “Did he leave the house or stay in?”
    “Left, sir, invariably. That’s quite usual, however.”
    “Did you ever see him wear a gray suit?”
    “No, sir.”
    “Or wearing a gold ring?”
    “No, sir.”
    “Did you ever celebrate his birthday?”
    “No, sir.”
    “And you saw cuts or scabs on his hands?”
    “Yes, sir. I reprimanded him once—his only reprimand—for having unsuitable hands. Of course under his white gloves it didn’t matter, but then it’s the principle of the thing, I believe.”
    “Did you ask him where he got them?”
    “No, sir.”
    Lenox sighed. “I take it you’ve spoken to Inspector Fowler?”
    “He has,” interjected Ludo.
    “I can find out more from him, but what were you doing at the time of his murder?”
    “I was here, sir, with Jenny and