by Issy Brooke
That was untrue, Theodore thought. Everyone knew that professional matters, business deals and important political information was dealt with at social occasions just like this one. So he said, “I could come tomorrow. But I should prefer to strike this very instant, as this may be our best chance of apprehending the guilty party or parties and to that particular end, it is helpful that Sir Michael is here. If he might be summoned?”
Within five minutes, all three men were at the window watching the rain sheet down against the glass. Sir Michael was a grey and pale sort of man, with a receding head of thin white hair and drooping jowls. He looked unimpressed to have to listen to Theodore, but he was also polite and mindful of Theodore’s status. Sir Michael had been raised to the knighthood only recently, and was pleasantly deferential.
Theodore decided to start with the most shocking part of the whole affair, to get their attention fixed upon him.
“Lord Mondial arranged for his valet, Tobias Taylor, to shoot his wife and for himself to be injured, making it look like a chance robbery.”
Judge Anderson blurted out a laugh that he changed instantly to a cough, and Sir Michael merely twitched his cheeks.
Theodore had not expected mirth as a possible reaction but he ploughed on. “Tobias Taylor was seen coming from the stable area after the incident by a respectable man and various servants, but he lied about that and claimed to have been inside the whole time. Clothes that fit the man exactly were found burned in the gardens.”
“He sounds like a potential suspect on that bare information, yes, but how do you account for Lord Mondial’s alleged involvement?” Judge Anderson asked. “Not to mention that it was not his wife who was shot.”
“Yes, how dare you!” came the thundering and unexpected cry of Mondial himself. He burst into the room and now everyone was looking their way. He must have been in the adjoining room and had heard everything. Theodore felt this was to his own advantage. Surely he would not be able to lie in front of the judge and the county commissioner of police?
Theodore pointed at Mondial and held his nerve. “Your wife is the very best of women – I know this for she is, of course, my own daughter – but she disappoints you, does she not? She is, in your erroneous opinion, too concerned with your children and no longer young enough, pretty enough or social enough to deserve a place on your arm.”
Many of the women listening to this speech gasped and nudged one another. Someone nodded.
Theodore went on. “But in your strange and twisted logic, you knew you could not bring shame to her or to your own reputation by taking a mistress, nor could you cast her aside into an asylum which many a husband in your position has done before you.”
There were murmurings of agreement and a few names were whispered among the listeners. Everyone knew of at least one troublesome woman who had suffered the fate of receiving a diagnosis of “madness” or “hysteria” and been sent away “for her own good”, leaving the husband free to do as he pleased.
“Only one course of action seemed to lie open to you. You decided that you had to have her shot, indeed killed, and then you could elevate her memory, seem to be an object of pity, and have your pick of women to serve as the next Marquess of Mondial Castle. In fact you had already chosen Miss Lamb though she rejected you, did she not?”
“Are you suggesting that I had Miss Lamb shot for some imagined refusal?”
“No. Even you would not sink so low. She was not your target; your wife was.” Theodore tried to keep the impatience out of his voice. Had he not already said as much? “I am suggesting, however, that your plan misfired when you put it into practice. You told Taylor to find you and your wife in the gardens that afternoon, to shoot her, and to injure yourself. You came to the room where my own wife was seated with yours, and insisted that she accompany you into the garden. Little did she know she was walking into a trap!”
“But she did not come,” Mondial spat out.
“She did not. She returned to the house to see to the children and instead you encountered Miss Lamb, quite by accident. Before you could do anything, Taylor had kept to his part of the plan and shot you both – her fatally and you only lightly. No wonder you were distraught. Your distress at Miss Lamb’s death was genuine and your remorse at that moment was great.”
“This is utterly preposterous.”
“You refused police involvement, instead agreeing to allow an untried man – myself – to look into the crime, insisting on staying close to me in case I discovered anything.”
“If I had been guilty, why would I have allowed you to investigate at all?”
“Because you thought me a fool, incapable of revealing the truth.”
“You are a fool and there is not a scrap of truth in it! Except – perhaps...”
The room fell silent. Everyone seemed to be holding their breath.
Mondial had been backed into a corner. But he had one way out and he took it. “Bring Tobias Taylor here immediately!” he yelled.
THEODORE WAS EXPECTING Mondial to interrogate Taylor and use him to prove his innocence. Everyone was now trying to press their way into the reception room. He caught sight of Adelia and he was heartened to see his mother alongside her. He also saw Dido, and wished that he had not. The truth was going to destroy her and he longed to spare her. But it was not possible.
Taylor walked into the room wearing his finest official livery and came to a halt before Theodore and the judge. He smiled ever so slightly in a smug way and Theodore began to say, “We cannot trust a word this man says.”
He was cut off by Mondial. “Indeed, we cannot!”
That took the wind out of Theodore’s sails and he closed his mouth.
Mondial took a moment to let the shocked murmurs die down before continuing. As he spoke, every word made Taylor’s jaw drop a fraction further open. “This man has been my trusted valet for ten years, maybe more. In that time he has lied, cheated, stolen and gambled. He has tried my patience in every sense. I have, of course, done my Christian duty by not only forgiving him his transgressions each time, but I have sought at every opportunity to encourage him to reform. He is a dissolute womanizer – ask any female member of the household staff. He recently fled this place taking money he had stolen from my own rooms. I, fool that I am, covered for him once again by saying that I had sent him away on business but certain people were astute enough to not be fooled by that. Yes, I lied, but only to give my valet yet another chance. He returned as soon as he had gambled it all away.”
Theodore was shaking his head but every sentence was entirely plausible.
Mondial barely paused for breath. “But these allegations are the final straw. Do I believe that my own valet could have committed such a monstrous act? I do not want to believe it. I am, perhaps, too inclined to see the best in people. I am notoriously kind-hearted. You, Calaway, for example, though you are spouting forth some of the most vile accusations about me and my wife, yet I do not rise to your provocation. I am mindful of the recent stresses that you have been under. You speak out of concern and care for your daughter and surely the potential lawsuits which currently plague you must be affecting your mind; and this causes me to be more generous in my opinion of you.”
Theodore wanted to smack those weasel words right out of Mondial’s mouth. How dare he allude to the lawsuits! He began to speak but someone was at his side, jabbing a sharp elbow into him. It was his mother, the Dowager Countess.
Mondial smiled slightly. He knew that he was winning with the force of public opinion easily on his side. He said, “And of course I recognise that I owe you a particular debt of gratitude in bringing this vile miscreant to justice and for that I thank you.” He nodded at Taylor, who began to yell.
In between foul language and words that made the ladies pale and the gentleman urge restraint, Taylor shouted, “You liar! You lying...! It was you, it was all you...”
Mondial waved his right arm vaguely towards Theodore. “Are you saying I shot myself? C
alaway here will certainly vouch for the injuries that I sustained. He did a fine job in patching me up, in fact.”
Once again, Mondial looked like a magnanimous and forgiving sort of man while Theodore simply felt foolish. He tried to argue his point, saying, “You must have known it was Taylor all along. You simply could not have failed to miss your own valet standing so close in front of you!”
“He was at such a great distance, and I was injured and of course tending to the poor dead girl in my very arms...”
Ripples of sympathy rose for the heroic figure of Mondial. Theodore clenched his fists and tried again. “He was close enough to take your watch!”
Mondial dipped his hand into his pocket. “He took no such thing.”
“But ...”
“You were almost as overwrought in the terrible situation as I was. It is natural you might misremember things.”
While Mondial and Theodore had been sparring, Taylor was obviously taking the chance to work his way towards the nearest doors. A woman screamed, and suddenly all was pandemonium as the valet sprang free of the crowd and sprinted off through the rooms. A man cried, “The hunt is up!” and it triggered a great and unseemly pursuit of the errant valet though many of them skidded to a halt at the front door and looked out dolefully at the rain.
Theodore remained where he was.
He felt utterly beaten.
Twenty-seven
Adelia was one of the crowd who had run after Taylor through the great hall, though quite what she hoped to achieve with such unwomanly behaviour didn’t even cross her mind. She stopped with most of the others at the main doors as a handful of men bravely dashed out into the pouring rain. She wondered how strong and fit Taylor was. He lived his life behind closed doors and some of the pursuing men were able sportsmen.
She turned and went instead in search of Dido, her heart breaking for the terrible situation her daughter now found herself in. She would be the object of so much speculation and gossip. But they’d known that it would happen when they made their accusations to the judge; and it was better than leaving her at the hands of a man who wanted to kill her.
Except that the planned exposure of Lord Mondial had not worked and it now appeared he was going to get away with everything by simply throwing his valet to the wolves and washing his hands of the whole affair.
Adelia loved Theodore deeply but she couldn’t feeling just a tinge of frustration that he had not been as clever in expressing himself as Lord Mondial had been. He hadn’t quite managed to put his case forward convincingly. She wished she could have spoken out on his behalf but that would have undermined his position and anyway, who would have listened to her when there was Lady Montsalle around to remind everyone of Adelia’s background? But then, Theodore had so much occupying his mind at the moment – Mary’s sudden illness didn’t help matters.
Various people reached out to her as she passed and she ignored them all, even Lady Montsalle who was not used to being snubbed. She just caught the woman’s loud tut before she spotted her daughter being led towards the stairs by the reliable Dowager Countess and the indomitable Harriet Hobson. Adelia skipped forwards to catch them up but as she reached them, a hubbub at the doors behind her made her stop and turn around.
Sir Henry Locksley, with his hair plastered to his face, breathing heavily, was dragging the screaming, kicking Taylor into the hall. She only caught the briefest glimpse of him before they were swallowed from view by a surge of people around them.
It was a job for the men now. The judge and the county commissioner of police would do what they needed to do. She hoped Theodore was going to be all right but at this moment, her place was at her daughter’s side and she went on up the stairs to find her.
DIDO WAS NOT GRIPPED by paroxysms of grief. She was not wailing or crying. At first, Adelia assumed that her daughter must have received a massive dose of laudanum but it would not have worked so quickly.
No. The truth was that Dido was showing her mettle and strength in the face of adversity. Adelia looked upon her straight-backed daughter with pride.
“You are so like your father!” she burst out as she closed the door of the private upstairs day room behind her. “Life may offer you blows and you may be knocked down but you will survive – no, indeed, you will rise!”
Dido didn’t smile but she met her mother’s eyes. “I try to take after you, dear mama. Can’t you see that? Oh, what a dreadful mess we are in. But there is one glimmer of happiness in all of this; Mary’s woman, Cobbett, has just sent word that Mary has eaten a light meal and is reading, just like her old self once more. As to everything else, however ...” She dropped her gaze and sighed.
Harriet positioned herself by the door that Adelia had just entered through as if she were on guard and ready to repel all intruders. Adelia went directly to Dido’s side and sat down. The Dowager Countess had taken the most comfortable armchair which was in the bay window, not that there was any kind of view of the grounds to be had through the sheeting rain that clouded the glass.
There was just the barest hint of a wobble in Dido’s voice as she asked, “So, what happens now?”
“I don’t know,” Adelia said. “But I am sure your father will sort everything out.”
Grace snorted from her perch in the window. “As my son, I love him dearly. As a man – well, like the rest of them, he’s going to need some help. Off you go, Adelia dear, and play your part as a dutiful wife. He might be the brains of the affair when it comes to science but he’s not as rational as he likes to believe and it takes us womenfolk to help them navigate through the seas of emotions. He’s in a storm now; go and pilot him out.”
Perhaps it was the slowly-flooding garden that gave rise to Grace’s sudden passion for nautical references. Adelia looked to Dido.
“My dear child, this is not my house and I don’t want to overstep my mark...”
“Why not? Try it; it’s fun, I find,” said Grace.
Adelia ignored her, which was as overstepping as she felt she could get with the Dowager. “Dido, what do you wish me to do about the guests?”
“I don’t know. Whatever you deem to be the best. I support any decisions you make. Do apologise to everyone on my behalf.”
“Do not,” put in Grace. “This is your house and you owe no apologies to a single soul.”
Adelia wasn’t comfortable with it but she had a duty to perform. She could see that Dido was in safe hands and in no immediate danger of throwing herself from the highest battlements of the castle in grief and shame. So Adelia took a deep breath and sailed out of the room, going back downstairs to take charge of the party that had been left in such disarray.
THERE WAS NO SIGN OF Judge Anderson, the chief of police, Lord Mondial, Tobias Taylor, her husband or Sir Henry. It was immensely frustrating to Adelia to find herself sidelined from the investigation after having had such a role at the heart of the case. All the garden party guests were milling around in groups, gossiping and nudging one another when they saw Adelia. She went straight to the housekeeper and the butler who were, against all the odds, managing to keep their staff in order. This meant the guests were replete with all the food and drink that they expected to have. Without that, there were sure to have been mutterings and mutinies.
Adelia made some snap decisions. “The supper will go ahead as usual. Feed the military band in the servants’ hall and give them some beer as they expect but ask them to leave; do not let them become too drunk to go. Retain only the string quartet who must play calm and gentle music this evening. It is to be a dignified and restrained affair with no dancing. Let it be known that we expect early hours to be kept by those staying overnight. Anyone with good breeding will understand why this is to be the case.” She was speaking to the senior servants but loudly enough for anyone close by to hear. She knew her words would spread. No one would want to be painted as the disrespectful one. The servants nodded and agreed and set off on their tasks.
Thank goodness it was
such a well-ordered and experienced household, Adelia thought once again. Honestly, Lord Mondial doesn’t realise half of the efforts his wife goes to on his behalf. He thinks a wife is merely an ornament to boost one’s status in society. But woe betide the man whose wife is nothing more than a sparkling object! She remembered one old Duke, twice widowed, who had taken a fresh young thing while he was almost in his dotage. In three years flat he had ended up penniless and ruined and no one could say that she had done so deliberately or with malice; she was simply hopeless at everything except spending money and throwing parties.
Now it was Adelia’s own turn to be capable and in control. She plastered on a polite smile and entered the fray, answering questions, greeting people, dealing with problems to do with the food or accommodation or where one might powder one’s nose or make a hasty repair to a dress or sit for a moment in peace or a thousand and one other things. She had the very best of light food sent up to Mary and Cecil and received word back that they wer perfectly content. She kept one eye out for the reappearance of her husband.
But none of the men returned until supper was over.
Theodore came in, looking ready for a drink or three, as the conversation fell silent.
Taylor was not with them.
And nor was Lord Mondial.
ADELIA HERSELF WAS longing for nothing more than a bottle of wine to herself, a deep bath and a sleep that would last about twenty hours. By the time she was able to retire, it was nearly midnight. She had food sent up to Dido and Harriet in their room. Cecil also came down and joined in, saying that Mary had been well enough to sit with Dido and Harriet.
Grace came down to supper and hissed at anyone crass enough to mention either the murder or the public allegations and revelations from earlier in the evening. Adelia was grateful for her support. Her feet ached, her head thumped, and she was utterly exhausted with the worry and the management of things; and with the pressure of having to appear serene and calm, as if nothing bothered her at all.