by Anna Dean
‘And it is such a compliment to the girls,’ continued Mrs Harris. ‘Such a compliment that the colonel should have seemed to quite make up his mind to have one of them as soon as he met with them here two weeks ago. For you must understand, my dear, that the colonel does not generally fall in love. He is well known for not doing so. Indeed, I once overheard the gentlemen talking about him – you know how gentlemen talk in those unreserved moments when they think that there are no ladies present – well, from what I overheard they were all quite sure that Colonel Walborough would never marry. That he had no wish to do so at all and was quite set against the idea. And bless me! I remember clearly how Mr H struck the table – as he does when he is very sure of something – and he cried, “No, no, Walborough is not interested in the ladies. His interests take quite a different direction.” And all the gentlemen laughed and laughed! Which I thought was strange, for I do not see why it should amuse them so much that the man should be too devoted to his career and like his own company too well to marry. But there is no accounting for gentlemen’s jokes, is there, Miss Kent?’
‘No, indeed, there is not,’ agreed Dido, who was more concerned with the colonel’s recent change of heart than impenetrable masculine humour. ‘It is quite remarkable, is it not,’ she said, ‘that he should now have decided to marry after all?’
‘Oh yes, my dear, it is,’ exclaimed Mrs Harris, her pink cheeks glowing in triumph. ‘And so romantic, don’t you think? Why, I heard him telling Melia that he had waited because he had not yet seen the woman he could be happy with – which I thought was very charming. Though, now I think of it, it was Sophie he said that to, because it was before he had settled on Melia, you see. “Well,” he said, “I should have married years ago if I had been so fortunate as to make the acquaintance of the right lady.” Which was very pretty.’
‘Very pretty indeed! I congratulate you; he must be very much in love.’
‘And a very comfortable establishment it will be for Melia. For I don’t mind telling you, Miss Kent, though I wouldn’t mention it in general, that the colonel is rather richer than most people suppose. That is to say that he has prospects. For besides his four thousand a year, there is his uncle’s estate in Suffolk which he is almost sure to get for there is no one else the old man can leave it to.’
‘Indeed? I am very glad to hear it for Miss Harris’s sake.’
‘Oh yes.’ Mrs Harris lowered her voice to a suitably respectful whisper. ‘Five thousand a year,’ she mouthed. ‘Mr H reckons that the Hunston estate clears five thousand a year after land tax, and a very pretty house it is too…’
Mrs Harris talked on happily, but Dido gave her as little attention as she safely could. Her mind was full of suspicions. For, lacking the mother’s partiality, she could not help but wonder why the colonel should have decided so suddenly to break through his resolution of not marrying. And why should he have fixed upon the Harris girls, whose charms were, it had to be admitted, nothing out of the ordinary?
Dido did not accompany Mrs Harris to the milliner’s, she went instead in search of the village’s apothecary. She had need of some aromatic vinegar and was also anxious to get a new cough mixture made for Jack, the footman.
She found the place about halfway along the muddy street. It was a small dark shop sunk five steps below the level of the street, with the name of Bartley just visible in faded black letters above the door. The many shelves and drawers of dark old wood that were ranged behind the counter, together with the bottles and jars and boxes of pills displayed in the small window, made it seem very gloomy indeed. There was a smell of herbs and aniseed and horse liniment. Dido did not like the place. It was her experience that dark apothecary shops dealt too much in patent medicines of dubious character and too little in good old-fashioned stuff.
Nor was she pleased to see that the apothecary himself was absent. Behind the counter there was only his assistant – an extremely thin youth with a bad complexion and an apron which had perhaps, long ago, been white. He was talking to a gentleman – in fact he was talking to Mr Tom Lomax. As soon as she recognised him, Dido stepped back into the shadows, though she hardly knew why.
Tom was impatiently tapping a silver-headed cane against the counter and demanding a supply of horse pills. But there seemed to be a difficulty.
The shop-boy was red in the face and rubbing his hands together with discomfort. ‘I’m sorry,’ he kept saying. ‘I’m sorry, Mr Lomax. You know I would if I could. Truly I would. But Mr Bartley was very definite. He said I wasn’t to let you have anything at all. Not till your account was settled. It seems he has spoken to your father…’
‘My father,’ began Tom hotly, ‘is an interfering old…’ He recollected himself and said, with an effort at calmness, ‘It is all nothing but a misunderstanding. A temporary lack of funds. It will all soon be put straight.’
‘I’m very glad to hear it, Mr Lomax.’
‘In fact, Robert…’ Tom clasped his hands over the head of his cane and leant across the counter familiarly. ‘In fact, I don’t mind telling an old friend like you that I shall soon be coming into a fortune of twenty thousand pounds. It is all quite settled.’
Robert grinned proudly and rubbed his hands harder than ever, looking as if he did not quite know what to do about being so honoured with a gentleman’s confidence – and being called a friend into the bargain.
‘So if you could see your way to just letting me have a dozen of the pills…’ said Tom.
And then it was all, Well, Mr Bartley did say… But then, sir, with you coming into money… And it’s always a pleasure to do a favour for a friend…
And the upshot of it all was that a few minutes later Tom walked out of the shop with a package of horse pills whistling cheerfully to himself. Dido quickly turned her face away as he passed and he saw only an insignificant female in pattens and a shabby pelisse. A creature not worth a second glance.
And, much to her mortification, it seemed as if the shop assistant received a similarly unfavourable impression, for no sooner was she alone with him than he began with, ‘Are you the maid from the hall? Mr Bartley has my lady’s stuff ready,’ and produced a package wrapped in brown paper.
Chagrined at having Catherine’s unkind remark confirmed, and still occupied with what she had overheard, Dido spared herself the pain of an explanation and, for the next ten minutes – as she gave detailed instructions for the making of her cough medicine – the boy fumed inwardly against the arrogance and self-important airs of great ladies’ maids.
However, as she stepped out into the sunny street carrying her two parcels, Dido found that she was not sorry the mistake had been made; indeed she was very much tempted to take advantage of it.
She hesitated and looked up and down the street; Mrs Harris was not to be seen. There was a small boy eyeing gingerbread in the little bow window of the baker’s shop and a stray dog lapping rainwater from a dirty puddle. Two housewives with laden shopping baskets hurried by deep in conversation. She caught the words ‘murder’ and ‘inquest’ and ‘Sir Edgar’ as they passed. Then she was alone again with the dog and the child. No one was watching her.
Should she look at the package she had been given? She was almost certain that her ladyship’s languor was aided by laudanum. One quick look in this parcel might confirm that suspicion. Of course she should not do it. But it was for Catherine’s peace of mind that she was acting. She had to find out all that she could. It was all done in a very good cause.
As usual, her curiosity triumphed over her manners.
Very quickly – before her conscience could argue against her – Dido unpicked the knots in the string and pulled the paper away to reveal the bottle inside. She read the label.
And then, thinking that she must have been mistaken, she read it again.
‘My dear Miss Kent! Are you unwell?’ Mrs Harris was at her side now, looking concerned. ‘You are very pale.’
‘Oh no, no, I am quite well, thank you. Just a l
ittle tired perhaps.’ Dido hastily pulled the paper back about the package and did her very best to smile; but the shock she had received had been so great that the rutted street and the little black and white shopfronts, and even Mrs Harris’s plump pink cheeks, were all swimming together in a kind of mist.
‘I think we had better go home.’ Mrs Harris linked arms very kindly and set off on the road to Belsfield. Dido was glad of her support – and glad, too, to find that she had heard enough gossip in the milliner’s shop to keep her occupied all the way in retailing it, without expecting many answers from her companion.
‘For it seems the inquest is over and still no one knows who that poor woman was. And there’s no one missing from the village that it might be. Though Judith Jenkinson, the milliner, was almost certain it was Clara from the Crown because no one had seen her for almost a week, and everyone in Belston has been quite sure that she’ll come to a bad end these last two years; but then she came home safe and well this morning and it seems there’s a young sailor at the bottom of that little mystery.
‘So you see, my dear, the verdict the jury gave was that the poor woman was killed wrongly…or unlawfully…or something of that sort because Judith Jenkinson says it can’t be murder on account of them not knowing whether it was planned beforehand or whether someone just took it into his head to shoot her all at once – because then it would be only homicide – so Judith says. Which seems very strange to me for the poor soul is just as dead whether the fellow was thinking about it before or not…’
Dido let her run on unchecked while she struggled for comprehension of what she had seen inside the parcel. Never had she expected to see such stuff sent to a respectable woman. What use could a prosperous married woman have for it? Indeed, a gentlewoman ought not even to know what it was…
She paused there, recollecting that she herself had recognised it.
In fact, she remembered seeing such medicine twice before – on charitable visits to the homes of the poor and despairing, but…
‘So, there you are, my dear, what do you say to that?’
Mrs Harris was looking at her, her little dark eyes sparkling. Dido was obliged to ask her to repeat herself.
‘What do you say to Sir Edgar’s generosity?’
‘His generosity?’
‘Why yes, my dear. Did you not hear me saying? You see, there being no kin to come forward and prosecute the case, Sir Edgar has taken all the trouble upon himself – and he has offered a reward. Two hundred guineas,’ she mouthed with a significant nod.
‘Oh! Indeed, yes, that is very generous.’
‘It is, and I am glad to say that everyone in the village seems to agree that it is. Everyone is full of praise for Sir Edgar. Which is just as it should be and, just between ourselves, my dear, it does not happen often enough. People are too much inclined to speak against the poor man, in my opinion. For they say he is proud and his tenants call him hard, which I do not believe is true…’
Dido could not attend any longer. Her own thoughts made her deaf. She was certain…yes, she was quite certain that this was the same stuff she had seen in those wretched, overcrowded cottages. And she knew how it had been used. She was not deceived by the benign-sounding message on the label: Guaranteed to speedily relieve all female irregularities. She knew that the irregularities it cured were the sort which would, in the natural course of events, result in the birth of a child.
And why would her ladyship use such stuff – in defiance of the laws of God and man – unless the gossip about her was true?
Dido remembered now that that gossip had seemed to have its origin among the tradesmen of the village. Perhaps the supplying of medicine like this had begun it.
She thought again of that pale face lolling against the green brocade: its beauty and, above all, its discontent. Yes, she thought, my lady might be capable of an indiscretion.
But could Mr Lomax be her fellow sinner? Dido found that notion much harder to countenance.
Chapter Eight
The party presently collected at Belsfield was much inclined to play at cards; it was perhaps her ladyship’s influence. Every evening ended with the tables being set and, while Lady Montague was careful to gather about her whist table the most serious-minded and the best players – her husband, Mr Harris and Margaret – the cheerful Mrs Harris was left to preside over a round game where the slight demands of play allowed for a great deal of flirtation and gossip.
There was only one exception to this general passion for cards and that was Mr William Lomax. When the tables were brought forward, he would excuse himself and retire to the fireside with a book.
Having observed this, on the evening after her walk to Belston, Dido pleaded a slight headache and moved away from Mrs Harris’s table as the first cards were being dealt. She had no particular aim in view, other than to try what a little conversation with the gentleman might produce. She could hardly make direct enquires; she could not ask whether he was my lady’s lover. But, she thought, she would see where their talk might lead.
‘You do not play at Speculation this evening?’ Mr Lomax enquired, politely laying his book aside as she took a seat near the fire.
‘No,’ she said with a smile, ‘the speculation is a little too wild for me today.’
‘Ah yes!’ he replied with instant comprehension.
At the table behind them Mrs Harris, who, it seemed, was a great advocate of divination, was strenuously maintaining her conviction that a fashionable practitioner of that science from Bath should be employed to discover the name of the dead woman. Meanwhile, her youngest daughter was expounding her own ideas of how that poor, unfortunate creature had come to be in Sir Edgar’s shrubbery. Dido did not quite comprehend the details of Miss Sophia’s theory, but the general idea seemed to be of a highwayman choosing – for some unspecified reason – to hide the body of his victim in the baronet’s pleasure grounds, and the story made up for what it lacked in sober reasoning with a great deal of riding about in the dark and shooting with pistols.
‘And yet,’ said Mr Lomax after listening for a moment or two, ‘it is a subject which must arouse speculation in us all. The discovery cannot be easily explained.’
‘No, it cannot,’ Dido agreed. ‘But that does not authorise us to invent brigands and strangers blundering about, miraculously unobserved by the household.’
‘Maybe,’ he said with a smile. ‘But,’ he continued, looking at her very earnestly indeed, ‘my dear Miss Kent, if we do not include strangers – and strangers with evil intentions – in our explanations, does that not lead us to a very distressing, and I might say, even more unlikely conclusion?’
Dido coloured and did not quite know how to reply. The steady regard of his grey eyes was disquieting and she found it necessary to lower her own gaze. They were both silent for a while. At Mrs Harris’s table gossip had given way to play and Miss Sophia was now in eager negotiation for a queen with Tom Lomax – who was allowing himself to be cheated shamelessly. At the other table a sedate silence prevailed, broken only by a little satisfied snap as her ladyship laid down a trump card.
‘Miss Kent,’ pursued Mr Lomax at last, ‘if we do not include strangers in our accounts, does not that lead us to conclude that an inmate of this house committed the terrible deed?’
Dido was discomfited; it was extremely unpleasant to admit to such suspicions – and yet she was determined not to lose the opportunity for the conversation at which she had aimed when she left the card table.
She spread her hands and gave a self-deprecating smile. ‘You must forgive me, Mr Lomax. I am only a woman and I know little of how to reason – or how to draw conclusions from facts. Yet I must confess that, terrible though such a prospect may be, it seems to me to be the least unlikely.’
‘Does it indeed!’ He left his seat and moved to one closer to her. ‘And, may I ask,’ he continued in a lowered voice, ‘why you should think such a thing?’
‘Well…’ It was, she found, rather
difficult to think clearly when he was so close and watching her so very intently. ‘Well, if the guilt does not lie within the house, then we must suppose that someone – some stranger – entered these grounds carrying either a dead woman, or else a shotgun. And this, Mr Lomax, could not have occurred under cover of darkness, for the body was not in the shrubbery at nine o’clock and yet it was there at dusk. So it must have arrived there in broad daylight.’
‘I see.’ He thought for a moment, resting his chin on his interwoven fingers. ‘Well, I grant you that the carrying of a body unobserved seems extremely unlikely. But is a gun so very improbable?’
‘What?’ cried Dido raising her brows. ‘On the property of such a sportsman as Sir Edgar? A stranger walk across the park and into the very gardens with a gun upon his arm? Mr Lomax, I doubt whether the most adventurous poacher in Belston has ever achieved such a thing undetected on a moonless night in the most distant copse upon the estate!’
He smiled. ‘Well, well, you argue very convincingly.’ He was silent for some moments, tapping his foot upon the carpet and watching her with a kindly expression. ‘But I think that this conviction gives you no pleasure.’
‘Naturally it does not.’
‘Then perhaps you will allow me to put your mind at rest, by showing to you that, though the intrusion of a stranger might seem improbable, the deplorable alternative is even less likely; that it is, in fact, impossible. Miss Kent, I assure you that the woman could not have been murdered by any one of us.’