A Gentlewoman's Guide to Murder

by Victoria Hamilton

  Looking straight ahead, Lady Clara murmured, “I support an orphanage—actually I helped organize and run it—and visited two days ago. It is St. Pancras Children’s House in Camden Town. The wardress—Mrs. Miller, widow of a soldier—told me an exceedingly odd story about a man who came looking for orphans of a suitable age to put in trade. He did not want boys, only healthy girls to become scullery maids to what he said were good London families. Pretty girls. Pretty blonde girls.”

  Emmeline felt a jolt under her rib cage; this confirmed her suspicions of an orphanage being involved. She knew that Sally had lived in one before entering service. Was this an organized system of abuse? “What did she tell him?”

  “She had an uneasy feeling about him in the pit of her stomach and told him that he was unwelcome there.”

  “Did she describe him?”

  “He was tall and thin, of middle years, stooped, with a dirty cap and stained hands, broken nails. He smelled, she said, like soiled undergarments and gin.”

  “What is his name?”

  “He didn’t introduce himself, and she didn’t let him get to the point of telling her before she sent him and his scruffy dog away from the orphanage.”

  “Dog?” The word echoed in a pause in the liturgy, and others twisted in their seats but Emmeline didn’t care. “What breed?” she muttered to Lady Clara once the vicar had resumed speaking. It was a group prayer, the congregation responding to the vicar’s voice.

  “No breed. Small. Scruffy. Devoted to the fellow and following him at his heel.” Open prayer book on her lap, Lady Clara glanced over at Emmeline. “Is that important?”

  “If I am correct, that was Ratter, the man who brought little Molly to Sir Henry’s home. And now I know what I must do.”

  “What is that?”

  Trembling, Emmeline grasped the wooden seat with her gloved hands to steady herself. “Visit every orphanage I can to find out who this man is and where to find him; he may be able to tell us about a larger conspiracy to buy girls from orphanages for men to abuse. He’s one of the men who visited Sir Henry the night he was killed, and he may even be the murderer.”

  The vicar intoned, “The night has passed, and the day lies open before us; let us pray with one heart and mind.”

  She was eager to begin her search, but she had obligations. She spent the rest of that day finalizing plans for the literary salon she and Fidelity were to hold on the upcoming Tuesday, a memorial to honor the work of Miss Anna Seward, the Swan of Lichfield, for whom many had so much admiration. Fidelity enjoyed Miss Seward’s poetry, while Emmeline was interested in her botanical accomplishments and political leanings in an age that was increasingly critical of learned and ambitious women.

  Emmeline wished she could hasten the arrival of a more modern era, in which women were respected for artistic pursuits but also allowed active participation in the politics of their nation. Who was it who commanded that she be nothing more than an adjunct, an addition, condemned to perpetually be helpmeet and not originator? Whenever she asked such a question, the answer oft came back “the Creator,” for which there was no adequate retort, since she could not claim divine guidance to the contrary. Perhaps no other woman found it so, but it seemed to her that a woman’s life work was to suppress her natural urges, rein in her natural desires, and conceal her natural abilities. Surely a Creator, if there was one, should not wish to stifle half of His—or Her—creation’s abilities?

  October 29th, 1810, Evening Edition of The Prattler

  By: The Rogue

  Death and the Knight?

  Death Prowls, leaving equal parts of Sadness and Joy as it steals the Souls of the Wicked and Righteous alike. And who can say which is which?

  Your eager Correspondent has learned that the lady-who-would-be-widow of Sir John H___ is awaiting news of his Imminent Demise as one might await the joyous report of an Imminent Birth. Who can blame the blameless Lady H. when it is said she has a Carnal Longing for the Lusty Loins of a younger Beau? Your Rogue wonders … is the dying Husk of a Man to be hastened, then, when the urges of youth will not be restrained? Time, that hoary old man who totters toward year’s end, will tell.

  In another Household, your Faithful Correspondent has learned, one more Life and Death drama—or rather Death and Life drama—has taken place; a gentleman newly widowed must make haste to place a ring on the Nursemaid’s finger or risk a Miraculous Six Month Birth of a Babe. But who is this mystery Master and Nursemaid couple? Your Rogue knows it not, but would welcome any information his faithful readers might send his way, via the good offices of The Prattler!

  Sixteen

  Monday dawned. Emmeline spent an hour with Mrs. Bramage and Birk, arranging how the sitting room would accommodate the seventeen people they would be hosting the next day at the literary salon. After luncheon, she dressed carefully in a sober, dark blue Spencer over a dark green day gown and awaited the arrival of Dr. Woodforde. He arrived exactly on time to escort her to Sir Henry Claybourne’s brewery.

  “No walking stick?” Emmeline said, noticing him limping without his aid.

  He smiled as he handed her up into his vehicle, a curricle which his family wealth enabled him to keep in the city. It was a necessity, as he was a physician much in demand among wealthy dowagers and thriving families. “It was an annoyance, and my foot has recovered enough that I don’t need it,” he told her. As he jumped up into the seat, he winced slightly. “Hard to remember not to put too much weight on it, though.”

  Picking up the reins, Woodforde set the team in motion along Cheyne Walk, past the royal hospital. “I looked into the brewery you named as a potential investment,” he continued. “It is—or was—the property of Sir Henry Claybourne, so recently murdered in such a disagreeable way.” He glanced over at her with a knowing smile. “The very man whose demise so fascinated you that you had me recite details of his corpse and manner of death.”

  He clicked to his horses to raise them to a trot. She suspected he would discover her motives, so she confessed some aspects of her purpose. “You know me too well, Woodforde. My curiosity is getting the better of me. I’m wondering if, beyond the logical people to have murdered him—”

  “There are logical people to have murdered him?” He directed his team into traffic as they entered the city.

  “Well, of course,” she said, raising her voice over the sound of carriage wheels and barrow carts. The street narrowed. As Woodforde slowed, a sweeper leaped out to remove some horse dung from the cobbles, then dashed back to the curb again. “Don’t we all have people whose lives would be improved by our demise? Birk would be delirious with happiness if I were struck by a carriage in the street and expired. Leopold would no longer have to pay to keep the London townhome open year-round, so his pocketbook would be substantially improved. And my eldest niece would be the benefactor of my inheritance.”

  The doctor shot her a disbelieving look. “You don’t mean to say your closest family wish you dead?”

  “Of course not, Woodforde. But then, I am a gem of rare quality: pleasant mistress, dutiful sister, and helpful aunt. Who knows with Sir Henry? The people closest to him have the most motive. Wife, servants, sons … or whomever inherits his business. Did he have sons, I wonder?”

  “My investigation turned up no legal issue.”

  She gave him an appreciative look and smiled. “Delicate way of saying he may have had bastards aplenty but his wife bore him no living child.”

  “I should be shocked by your language,” Woodforde said.

  “And yet you are not.”

  “I think you deliberately use language to try to shock me.”

  Perhaps that was true, perhaps not. Emmeline was silent while he negotiated a tricky turn onto a wider street, then said, “The people most likely to have killed the man would be those close to him, unless the murderer was, as some of the more sober papers surmise, a viol
ent stranger who attacked him as he stepped out to the convenience. In addition to family and servants, there may be debtors, employees, or competitors who would have enjoyed seeing Sir Henry dead.”

  Woodforde glanced over at her, eyebrows raised. “Is not the simplest explanation the most likely? The female who invaded his house and made off with the young scullery maid supposedly threatened him. I’m surprised you do not add her to the list of those who are, in your view, suspect. Why not?”

  He was deliberately baiting her now. He had already said he didn’t think a female capable of such a murder. Emmeline clasped her hands together and squeezed. “Simplest explanation? Thought it went without saying, Woodforde,” she said lightly. “Seems silly to me, though, to think that she would go away, then come back some time later to kill him. She was there and could have done it then, if that was her intent.”

  “You have a point. I suppose your curiosity will not allow you to rest until you have done the job of the magistrate and courts.”

  “You mock me,” she said, and took in a shaky breath, controlling with great difficulty her desire to move about in agitation. “But of course it is the most idle of curiosities. I am a sensationalist and nothing more; you have caught me out, Woodforde.”

  He was silent for a time, his strong hands handling the reins with great efficiency. Finally he said, “Emmeline, you are never idle, so perforce your curiosity has a purpose. I wish you trusted me enough to tell me what it is.”

  They came, at last, to the outskirts of Clerkenwell beyond the Green, even beyond Rofoman’s Row, and approached a large complex of buildings both commercial and industrial, with coal stacks belching smoke into the gray sky from atop the largest of the buildings. In front of the structures was a cobbled yard enclosed by an ironwork fence and gate, across which burlap bag-laden carts were wheeled by men and boys. There was a brick building along the road, and over it in arched letters was writ Clerkenwell Brewery. The air had a yeasty scent, oddly sweet and almost like tomato bisque; that was the smell of beer brewing.

  “Failing that,” Woodforde continued as he pulled up to the brewery office door, “I’m surprised you don’t go to your uncle. I’m sure he could discover what the magistrate has learned, though the criminal court is not in his purview. He indulges your every whim and would most likely sate your curiosity.”

  She most certainly could not do that. She couldn’t risk the chance that her uncle, who knew her better than most, would protest her investigation. As indulgent as he was toward her, and as much as he loved her, familial pride was one of Sir Jacob’s abiding traits. If he feared she would expose the family to public humiliation, he might reveal her actions to Leopold. That could mean an end to her freedom.

  Emmeline was already walking the fine edge of independence under Birk’s watchful eye, maintaining her reputation while making sure Leopold wouldn’t wish to discombobulate his own serene country life by having an inconvenient and defiant sister in his home. She had to make sure her eldest brother’s life was better without her in his household than with her there, and that it remained worthwhile to him to finance her life in Chelsea—not an inconsiderable investment, especially with as many children as he had to provide for.

  Woodforde only knew Leopold as his friend Samuel’s pompous but genial older brother. But to Emmeline, Leopold was the person who held every comfort in her life in his grip; one wrong move or unsavory slice of gossip and he could command her to return to live at Malincourt, and she would have to obey. Her only other choice would be to retire with Fidelity to a country cottage, which would be all she could afford from her own income.

  So she could not simply trust her uncle to help her, nor did she feel easy now that Woodforde had figured out so much. She could ask him to keep her investigation a secret, but to even say so much would imply she was doing something of which Leopold would disapprove.

  “How do you wish to handle this?” Woodforde asked, helping her down from the carriage as a boy emerged to hold the horses. “I wrote them a note this morning requesting an interview with the managing partner, a Mr. Wright.”

  Taken aback, Emmeline said, “On what grounds did you request an interview?” She hadn’t even thought of such a step, merely assumed that they would walk in and ask for an interview with the owner.

  “I know you spoke of investing. I don’t for a moment believe that is your motive in visiting the murdered man’s brewery.”

  She held her tongue and simply waited.

  “So I thought it safest to say that I am a doctor representing an asylum. We are seeking a better deal on ale for our inmates.”

  “Clever,” Emmeline said, surprised at his talent for deception. Perhaps this would be better. Mr. Wright could just send an investor on his or her way, but a customer would require time, and would be expected to ask questions. “I suppose I am a patroness of the asylum, then.” He was about to take her arm to escort her into the office when she stopped him, hand on his arm, searching his face. “Woodforde, why are you doing this?”

  “I’m curious as to what your true motives are.” His well-shaped lips twisted in amusement. “And I fear that without me you will land in trouble, and how would I ever look Samuel in the face if that happened and I had had the opportunity to help, but didn’t?”

  “Ah yes, poor little lady that I am, without wits to keep myself safe, nothing but hair, big eyes, and dainty feet.”

  “I didn’t say that,” he muttered curtly. “Stop assuming you understand me and my meaning when you so clearly don’t. If you remember, I have always looked out for you, Emmeline, and I always will, whether you are jumping off the eaves of a barn or storming a brewery to uncover a murderer.”

  He had referred back to a long-ago incident, in which her younger brother Thomas asked if he could fly and Emmeline determined to show him it was not possible by, of course, trying it herself. Woodforde had been there to catch her. “For dear Samuel’s sake, then?” she said.

  “No, for your sake, and for my peace of mind. I hope someday you will trust me, Emmie.”

  “Let’s not stand on the pavement brangling,” she said coolly.

  They entered the brick building, Woodforde limping slightly still, through the large oaken door into a spacious office. There was a low wooden railing, behind which was a desk. A clerk sat scanning a bound ledger with columns of numbers, making notations. At other desks, lesser clerks were copying letters and recording orders by the weak light that came from a row of high windows. Woodforde ushered Emmeline through a gate in the wood railing, planted himself in front of the clerk’s desk, and loudly announced, “Dr. Giles Woodforde for Mr. Wright.”

  The stooped elderly man started up and signaled to a boy of about twelve who was wheeling a cart with more ledgers toward him, an apprentice no doubt. “Here, Billy, show this gentleman and lady back to Mr. Wright.”

  Wright’s office was spacious and reasonably bright, given the gloom of the late October day. Windows lining the room overlooked the large yard where workers carried on with business, wheeling carts filled with barrels and bags of hops. The men shook hands and Woodforde introduced Emmeline, then stated his business.

  “I have interest in an asylum—” Woodforde began.

  “Actually, an orphanage,” Emmeline said, with sudden decision, sitting forward on her seat.

  Woodforde cast her a surprised look.

  “The good doctor is on the Board of Guardians,” she continued. “We are concerned by the … the healthfulness of what the children are drinking. The water is abominably wretched where they are situated. Stinking, in fact.”

  “We use only the best water in our brewing process,” Wright said genially, sitting back and threading his fingers over a canary waistcoat that covered his small, rounded paunch. “Located near New River Head for that very reason, y’see. They’re putting in iron mains, y’see; longer-lasting than the elm pipes they were using
. Best water in London or area.”

  “We wish to learn of your small beer and establish its healthfulness to improve the children’s constitution to make them fit for work. We also require a stronger brew for the warders and matrons.” Emmeline felt Woodforde’s questioning gaze on her but did not turn to meet it.

  “Seems a precious waste of beer. Who would throw money away on orphans? Do your benefactors know you intend to feed them beer?” Wright eyed her with distaste and turned to the doctor, glaring at him from under shaggy brows. “Whose idea is it? Does the young lady have too tender a regard for the baseborn?”

  “It is an experiment. I wish to see if their health improves, making them fit for work at a younger age,” Woodforde said, adapting his story. “It is the most healthful of beverages, of course—small beer, I mean—fortifying and vitalizing, and so we intend to tell donors.”

  The man nodded at that bit of specious nonsense, while Emmeline fumed in silence at his deference to Woodforde and ridicule of her.

  “Who’s your supplier now?” he asked, still speaking exclusively to Woodforde.

  “I’d rather not say. We only purchase a small amount for the warders and matrons. We do need beer, both for the orphanage and an asylum, as I said. I spoke of this once with your partner, Sir Henry Claybourne, at a dinner of charitable supporters. I understand he is since deceased.”

  The man sat back, his gaze becoming cautious. “Aye, that he is.”

  “We offer our condolences,” Emmeline said. “You must miss your partner terribly.”

  “He weren’t here most days.”

  “Why is that?”

  He ignored her question and focused solely on the doctor. “Why the questions about Claybourne?”

  “I remember Sir Henry stating in conversation that he had no children,” Woodforde said. “I am concerned for your company’s stability. Who will take over his duties here now?”

  “No one,” the man said, sitting up and shuffling some papers together on the green baize surface of his desk. “He didn’t do much of anything. I’ll buy the widow out … give ’er a fair price.”