The elder gentleman had evidently been expecting more of a fight from Mr Fairweather, for he seemed momentarily thrown by the acceptance of his demand.
"You have until Monday," he replied, after a pause, "And I'll only take your word once, do you hear?"
"I hear you," Fairweather replied, though he was not looking at his companion, rather his eyes kept flicking nervously toward Henry.
Having only just mounted his horse, it was rather a pain to have to dismount again so soon, but Henry, keen to have a word with the farmer, did just that. He hopped from the saddle to the ground quickly, calling out for Mr Fairweather to wait.
"Your Grace," the farmer acknowledged him as he turned at Henry's call.
"I wish to have a word with you, Mr Fairweather," Henry replied. He glanced around and saw that the half-dozen or so people who had been watching the earlier fight between the two farmers were still lingering conspicuously. Mrs Canards--the woman who had been so quick to point the finger of blame at Miss Mifford--had actually taken a seat on some crates outside the haberdasher's and was munching on a bag of sweets as though at a play in Drury Lane.
Henry cast a withering glance Mrs Canards' way, "Perhaps it might be best if you take a walk with me."
"Yes, Your Grace," Fairweather agreed, his top lip slick with sweat.
The man was a nervous wreck, Henry noted, though he knew that his title often induced fear in even the most brawny of men--and Fairweather was just that. He stood almost as tall as Henry himself, though his shoulders were wider, and his forearms were thick and wiry with muscle. Henry's physique was toned from exercise--riding, fencing, sparring matches in Gentleman Jackson's club in town--while Fairweather's was a testament to a life spent manual labouring. No matter that Henry was fit, he still would not like to chance upon Fairweather down a dark alleyway.
"I wish to know where you went after you left the assembly last night," Henry said, as he and Fairweather walked down High Street. It was best, Henry thought, to get to the point immediately rather than faff about with small-talk.
"Why is that, Your Grace?" the farmer questioned in response; his tone was light, but his sweaty brow belied any attempt at nonchalance.
"Why?" Henry gave a bark of impatient laughter, "A man was murdered, Fairweather; a man who is reported to have vexed you by flirting with your wife. That is why I wish to know where you went last night after you left the assembly in a temper."
"Oh," Fairweather emitted a shaky laugh, which to Henry's ear could almost be mistaken for relief, "That. No, Your Grace, I did not kill Mr Parsims, I went straight home after the dance with my wife. She will confirm it if needs must."
"Needs must," Henry was serious, "Your name was also included on a list of people who appear to have owed Mr Parsims money, do you mind if I ask why?"
"No idea," Fairweather appeared genuinely perplexed, "I paid what tithes I owed annually, like everyone else. There was no need for Parsims to come scrounging after me for more, not when he had calculated his dues down to the last half-penny."
Henry liked to think that he was a good judge of character--the error in appointing Mr Parsims notwithstanding--and he believed Fairweather when he said that he did not know why he was on Parsims' list. However, his earlier twitchy behaviour warranted suspicion. Mr Fairweather was hiding something, of that Henry was certain--though the reason as to why was less obvious.
"Tell me," Henry continued, wishing to return to the matters of the previous night, "Did you notice anyone at all on your way home? Monsieur Canet, perhaps?"
The farmer's cheeks had lost their earlier pallor, but it returned once again at the mention of Canet.
"No, Your Grace," Fairweather removed a handkerchief from his breast pocket to mop his brow, "I did not see him at all."
"You're certain?"
"Most certain."
"Right," Henry gave a shrug, as he realised that he would get nothing more out of Fairweather. "That is all. My thanks for your time."
Henry spun on his heel and returned to his horse, which he had tethered outside The Ring'O'Bells, then set off for Northcott Manor. His mind, which just a few minutes earlier had been certain of Canet's guilt, was now filled with confusion. Fairweather was just as untrustworthy as the Frenchman, but which one of them had killed Parsims? Or had neither of them killed the rector? Or both?
Thoroughly befuddled, Henry took off at a brisk canter, hoping that a spot of brandy by a roaring fire might inspire the cogs of his brain into motion.
Alas, as soon as he returned, he was set upon by his mama.
"I find I am in agreement with you about the guest list," Cecilia began, the second Henry walked into the entrance hall, "A few more gentlemen would balance the dinner table nicely. Though Mr Feathers tells me that the game is not as plentiful as it ought to be for this time of year, so the hunting will not be as enjoyable as they might expect."
"I beg your pardon?" Henry stuttered, as his brain tried to work out what it was his mother was blathering about. Cecilia had a terrible habit of continuing conversations that had taken place days ago and expecting Henry to keep up.
"The party," the dowager duchess replied, with an impatient sigh, "I have decided that you were right to wish to include more gentlemen on the guest-list; the manor might resemble a harem if we do not."
"I was not aware that we had made a decision to host a party," Henry harrumphed, equally as capable as his mother at displays of impatience. It was good to remind her that the apple did not fall far from the tree.
"I have no time to be dancing attendance on the daughters of your friends," Henry continued, brusquely, "As I am sure you are aware, our rector Mr Parsims was bludgeoned to death last night, and I intend to find out who did it."
"Is that not the job of the local constable?"
"The local constable is a sodden drunk," Henry answered, "I would not trust him to hold a quill, never mind carry the weight of justice in his trembling hands."
"I hear that justice has already been served," Cecilia gave a shrug, "By all accounts, that Parsims fellow was a horrible leech, bleeding your tenants dry at every turn. And he was terribly long-winded; two hours I spent last Sunday, listening to him pontificate from the pulpit. If you're thinking of appointing anyone else, Henry, do make sure they're economical with their words."
Henry rolled his eyes; his mother could be very Old Testament when it came to matters of justice. An eye for an eye and all that. Though a dead body for a sore posterior was rather extreme, even in her book.
"Justice has not been served," Henry replied, hotly, "An innocent lady has been cast into the role of the villain of this sad affair, and I intend to clear her name."
"Is that so?" Cecilia stilled, though Henry was too het up to notice.
"Yes," he bristled with indignation, "Poor Miss Mifford, through no fault of her own--excepting, perhaps, a badly worded outburst--has been labelled as a murderess. I've never heard a more preposterous idea in my life."
"Oh, yes," Cecilia gave a coy smile, "She's far too pretty to be a murderess. Quite well connected too. Her current circumstances are not what one might hope for, but her lineage cannot be faulted."
Henry blinked in confusion; he had a suspicious feeling that he and his mother were now having two entirely different conversations.
"My advice, dear," Cecilia continued, "Is to start at the very beginning, if you wish to find out who murdered Mr Parsims. It's a very good place to start, you know."
"Thank you for your elucidating contribution, Mother," Henry replied, barely able to keep the dryness from his tone, "I shall be sure to keep that in mind. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have work to do."
"As do I, dear boy," his mother replied, mysteriously, "You have given me a lot to think upon."
Chapter Seven
After her chance encounter with the duke in Mr Parsims', Mary had returned home for a spot of luncheon. She had intended to get straight to work after eating, but once back, her mother had forbidden her to l
eave the house again.
"People will talk," Mrs Mifford had said, as she sipped upon her third glass of medicinal wine.
"People are already talking," Mary had pointed out. Indeed, on her walk home, several people had stopped to gawk quite openly at her.
"Well, if they don't see you, they won't think to talk of you," Mrs Mifford's argument had been far from sound, "I forbid you to leave the house until this whole murder matter is forgotten about."
As the villagers were still wont to discuss the time that Mr Gowan, the village taxidermist, had attended church with the buttons of his breeches undone some ten years previously, Mary did not hold out much hope that anyone would forget that she was a maybe-murderess anytime soon. Still, her mother was not one to listen to reason at the best of times, but especially not when she was medicating with wine, so Mary had taken herself off to her room to ponder on what her next move should be.
Jane, who was equally as voracious a reader of Gothic novels as Mary, had been keen to assist in the investigation.
"Oh, I do love a good mystery," Jane had sighed after Mary had explained the recent developments.
"Excepting, of course, ones that place my neck on the line," Mary had prompted.
"Er, yes," had come the reassuring reply, though it was a second too late to be believable.
Not that Mary could blame Jane. Plumpton was home, but it was terrifically boring at times. Before Mr Parsims had been murdered, the only criminally exciting thing to have happened was when someone sabotaged Mrs Canards' rose-bush before the annual gardening competition.
For the rest of the afternoon and into the evening, Jane and Mary had spoken at length about who might have murdered Mr Parsims and why. They had taken a break only for dinner--for one could not think on an empty stomach--before they had returned once more to their room. There they had again gone through the list that Mr Parsims had kept and wondered aloud what might have motivated any of those listed to kill the rector, though, by the time the sun had gone down, they had been no closer to the answer.
"We shall investigate tomorrow," Jane had assured Mary, before drifting off to sleep.
"If I am allowed out of my cell," Mary had muttered in reply, but she need not have worried.
The next morning, at around ten, Miss Hughes called upon Mary.
"I should like to take a walk with Mary," Sarah said to Mrs Mifford, "Around the village square."
"People will talk," Mrs Mifford had protested, though with less vigour in her voice than yesterday. She was suffering from a dreadful headache, which she insisted had been caused by a low-wicked candle and not the empty bottle of port-wine which stood empty in the kitchen.
"Oh, they will," Sarah nodded in agreement with the matriarch of the family, "If people think that Mary is hiding away in the house, they will assume it's because she's guilty. How clever you are, Mrs Mifford."
Miss Sarah Hughes was quite something, Mary thought with admiration, as she watched her mama fall headfirst into her friend's trap. Mrs Mifford could be relied on for two things; an unhealthy obsession with appearances and her own vanity and Sarah had tempted both.
"I did say that yesterday," Mrs Mifford agreed, as she repainted the past to her own taste, "But she would not listen. Really, Mary, enough of this silliness; go fetch your pelisse and accompany Miss Hughes to town. The fresh air will do you good."
Mary was far too thrilled to argue, and she promptly fetched her pelisse--and Jane--before escaping out the door.
"Freedom," she sighed happily, as she linked her arm through Sarah's.
"A sort-of freedom," Sarah cautioned gently, "You mustn't look too gay when we reach the village, or people will note it."
"Bah," Mary grumbled, though she affixed a suitably sombre expression to her face just in case. Her path was still that of an admirable spinster, she reminded herself. Well, it would be, once she had proved she was not a murderess.
As the three girls walked--with Sarah flanked on either side by a Mifford sister--Mary quickly explained all that had happened since they had last spoken.
"And His Grace wishes to help you?" Sarah questioned, as Mary finished, her focus not on thoughts of potential murderers but on single dukes instead.
"Well, he does have a duty to Plumpton," Mary flushed.
"Not really, when your great-uncle is the magistrate."
"Lord Crabb is not a particularly able magistrate," Mary protested, though she had no real cause to argue for if he was, she would be in a prison cell in Stroud by now.
"But he is the magistrate, nonetheless," Sarah replied, with a glint in her eye, "Northcott need not have bothered to intervene if he had no wish to, so let's not pretend he's merely motivated by a burning sense of justice. I witnessed the way that His Grace was watching you at the assembly--and he was burning with something alright, but it was not justice."
"Sarah!" Mary did her best to look scandalised as Jane snorted with laughter.
"You must not look too jolly," Mary reminded her sister, "It's not becoming when a man has just been killed--and it reflects badly on me."
Jane muted her smile, though her dark eyes danced with mirth. The idea that Northcott might be romantically interested in Mary had not struck Jane the night before, as Jane was not one to be struck by romantic notions. She was something of a dreamer, preferring reading and wandering to talk of men and marriage.
She was, Mary realised with a start, well on her way to becoming a bluestocking, if Mary did not act quickly.
"I met Mrs Wickling on my way to your house," Sarah said, as they reached the village green, "She said that Mr Parsims' funeral is to be held tomorrow, in St Mary's, and that he is to be buried in the graveyard beside the church. I would have thought that His Grace might have arranged for his body to be returned to Abingdon?"
"He's not from Abingdon," Mary replied, in an absent echo of Northcott's words the day before. Something stirred in her memory, but before she had a chance to prod further, Jane spoke, interrupting her thoughts.
"I thought it strange too," Jane agreed, "Though I overheard Papa telling Mother that it was because Mr Parsims had no family to speak of and that there was no one to claim the body. He and Northcott decided last night to have him buried in St Mary's."
Northcott had been speaking with her father? Mary's mind forgot for a moment that she was trying to remember something--something important!--as she pictured the duke and her Papa in the library at Primrose Cottage. Had Mary been asleep upstairs when he called? She had no idea why, but it felt rather thrilling to think that Northcott had been in the same house as her while she was wearing a night-rail. This scandalous thought made her blush, and as Jane peered at her queerly, Mary gave thanks that her sister could not read minds.
"Should I fetch some smelling salts?" Jane queried, as Mary returned to earth.
"No," Mary tried to disguise her giddiness with impatience, "I was trying to recall something important before you interrupted me."
"Oh, I beg your pardon," Jane huffed, her voice anything but apologetic, "If my presence is getting in the way of your thinking, I shall gladly take myself off."
"Oh, don't leave, Jane," Sarah interrupted, partly to prevent Jane leaving, and partly--Mary suspected--to remind the pair that she was present. It would not do to descend into one of their sisterly squabbles in front of Sarah. No, those were best kept behind doors.
"Just there's something about Abingdon which rings a bell in my memory," Mary said, as the three girls continued on their walk.
Jane and Sarah continued on with the conversation, as Mary once again lapsed into thought. They were walking the periphery of the square and had turned back toward High Street, when the sun glinting against the mullioned windows of The King's Head Inn caught Mary's eye, stirring something in her memory.
"The Hargreaves," Mary cried out, as she recalled the couple from the assembly.
Her two companions looked back at her with confusion, though Mary did not blame them; The King's Head was a pop
ular inn, and one couldn't expect to know the names of all their guests.
"At the assembly," Mary explained with excitement, "There was a couple called the Hargreaves. The husband mentioned that they were from Abingdon--where Mr Parsims held his living before Plumpton--and on the night of the dance, Mr Hargreaves was telling his wife that he had bumped into a familiar face. Or, that 'mangy cur', as he so eloquently put it. I bet you five-pence that it was Mr Parsims; that they knew him from his time in Abingdon."
"You don't have five-pence," Jane reminded her, "In fact, you still owe me for the ribbon you purchased last week."
"Is now really the time?" Mary huffed, though she did not act too outraged, lest Jane recalled that she had also not yet paid back the groat she owed her from the week before.
"The Hargreaves might shed some light on Mr Parsims' past, or have an idea of who might have murdered him--"
"--Or, perhaps they murdered him themselves?" Jane interrupted, even macabre.
"I don't think so," Mary bit her lip, "They did seem ever so sweet."
"Eudora also acts sweet," Jane replied with a grin, "But especially when she's stealing something from you; smiling villain, and all that. Come, let us check The King's Head and see if we can speak with these Hargreaves."
Jane led the way, near marching, across the green at a diagonal, instead of following the path. Mary followed her, though the grass was still wet with morning dew and her kid-skin boots--another London purchase--would be none the better for the shortcut.
At the inn, they found that Mary had sacrificed her footwear for nought, as the Hargreaves were away shopping in Evesham.
"Please tell them to call to the vicarage when they return," Mary instructed Edward, who gave an agreeable nod.
"Yes, Miss Mifford," he parroted politely, before flushing a little, "And please pass my regards on to Miss Emily."
"I shall," Mary promised, thinking that she would do no such thing. Emily was the softest of the three sisters, and young men were forever placing their hearts in her hands, aware that she would not damage them--or, more importantly--their pride. Poor Emily was so kind that she would say yes to marrying the first man who asked her if they were not kept away from her.
A Death, A Duke, And Miss Mifford (Regency Murder and Marriage Book 1) Page 8