Charles thought of the belladonna—the Devil’s cherries—that both he and Beth had ingested in a hideous tea mixture, and he now wondered if Patricia had been watched by Redwing. Of course, she had, he thought to himself, wondering why he had never thought past Elizabeth’s early years to those before her arrival. “What herb?”
“Pennyroyal.”
“Pennyroyal!” the earl exclaimed. “Isn’t that one of the ingredients in the elixir Trumper added to Beth’s cocoa?”
Emerson’s eyes rounded. “Tell me Elizabeth did not drink it! In strong quantities, Pennyroyal is an abortifacient! It can bring on miscarriage.”
“She drank none of it, praise the Lord,” Charles said. “Poor Patricia. The nurse had intentionally killed the unborn child. She remained at Branham until her work was accomplished. Redwing wanted a daughter, and all sons were expendable.”
“Yes, that is my conclusion, as well,” Emerson said. “Lord Aubrey...”
“Call me Paul,” the earl said softly. “If you’re to take care of our little duchess, Emerson, then we must dispense with formality. I vaguely remember you from Oxford, but I knew your younger brother quite well. Dickie and I have a longstanding fencing match that goes back to Eton.”
“Yes, he told me about that. Richard claims he’s bested you ten times out of twelve.”
The earl leaned back against the chair. “Six of twelve, actually,” he corrected. “We left the count at a draw—for now.”
“Ah, well, I shall soon hear his side of it again. I plan to Christmas with my father and brothers in Carlisle this year,” he explained, standing. “It grows late, and I should head home. It’s been a pleasure visiting with you both. Charles, you look as though you could use a long sleep. Avail yourself of the duchess’s soporific if you wish. Alicia has the envelope. It is half a teaspoonful per eight ounces of water, though for you I’d suggest tripling that dose.”
“Thank you, Michael,” Sinclair said as he shook the man’s hand. “I hope you received our wedding invitation.”
“I did, thank you. I look forward to attending as you begin your lives together. Call if you have need of me. I shall stop in again tomorrow afternoon as soon as my other calls are complete, but if there is any change that alarms you, send for me at once. I’ve begun reassigning most of my patients to colleagues in order to make myself available to you and the duchess as needed.”
In a few moments, Emerson had gone, and Charles returned to the fireside, where his cousin poured two glasses of brandy. “This is one of our uncle’s favourites. Trust me, you’ll require no sleep aid after two glasses of this.”
Sinclair took a small sip of the amber liquid, his eyes widening as the alcohol warmed the back of his throat. “This is even stronger than Drummond whiskey,” he noted. “Have you a few minutes before we retire? I’d like to talk to you about Beth. She asks over and over if it’s going to snow. Do you know why?”
“Most likely, she’s had some dream that disturbs her. I used to discount Elizabeth’s dreams, but I’m learning they sometimes reveal a future event, or elucidate one from the past.”
“Yes, I’ve found myself dreaming of things that come true,” Sinclair said, stretching his long arms. “I’ve encountered spirit beings in Queen Anne Park twice now—and I continue to host uninvited guests; some clearly evil, others with loyalties yet unfathomable.”
Aubrey grew thoughtful, his eyes on the brandy as it swirled in the glass. “Beth used to see this Shadow Man in the park. She ran into the stables once when she was seven or so, claiming the Shadow was by the apple trees, but when I followed her there, he was nowhere to be found. She was quite upset.”
“Paul, you told me earlier that Beth’s seen this creature here, many times. When did it begin?”
The earl sipped the drink thoughtfully. “When she was four, I think. Spiritual beings have haunted Branham and Queen Anne for a century or more. When she’d had a little wine, Trish would sometimes speak of the ghosts that surrounded her, but she usually put it down to fatigue or the influence of circle members. She resented all of us, especially me towards the last.”
“I’m sorry, Paul. Beth told me that you and Patricia had an argument after she married Trent.”
“We had several, but the last was a major fracas. If Elizabeth has a temper that measures a ten, then Trish’s measured a hundred. She screamed and shouted, and I dodged a windstorm of porcelain, and in the end, Trish ordered me to leave. She actually threatened to have Trent shoot me if I did not.”
“Would she have followed through on that threat?”
“I’ve no idea. Trish’s behaviour had altered beyond all recognition. I’d merely asked to take Beth with me for a short holiday. I told Trish it would allow her to spend time with her new husband. She shouted that neither I nor the circle would ever have a part in Beth’s life again. She said she would kill Beth before letting me take her.”
Charles’s eyes widened. “Surely not! No mother would say such a thing! Trish must have been under a spell.”
“Yes, I think she was. I told you earlier that Beth had been seeing this ‘man in the park’ since her fourth year of age. I say this, because 1872 was the summer my father brought me to London to stay with Thomas Galton, my Eton friend and fellow warrior. He and I were both Oxford-bound, so I’d asked if we might spend the month of August together. My father was unwilling to say yes at first, for my mother had been ill. She was never very strong after giving birth to me, and she’d deteriorated that summer after falling down the stairs. I’d assumed the plans with Galton off, but then Father suddenly changed his mind one morning, announcing that he and I would leave that afternoon for London.”
“Had your mother improved?” Sinclair asked.
“No, but by that afternoon, a nurse had been hired to keep watch on Mother, and my father and I were on a southbound train. He said little to me during the journey, and I could tell that he was worried. I assumed it had to do with my imminent departure for Oxford, so I tried to reassure him that I could handle myself. This failed to cheer him, and I decided to read instead. We arrived in London quite late, but rather than proceed to Aubrey House, we came here. To Queen Anne.”
“Why?” Sinclair asked.
“My exact question. To my knowledge, the house wasn’t occupied, for I’d thought Patricia at Branham that month. She loved to spend summers at the seaside at Hampton. To my surprise, Baxter answered the door.”
“Miles didn’t work here at that time?”
“No, our Mr. Miles has been here only since the duchess’s death. He worked at Drummond until then. When Trish died, James sent a dozen of his most efficient and trusted servants here to keep watch on the house and on Beth, whenever she was here. That evening, it was our prosaic Mr. Baxter who answered the bell, and he did not seem the least bit surprised to see us.”
“Interesting,” the marquess noted, finishing the last of his brandy and pouring a second glass. “Is Baxter prescient?”
“He might be, but I learnt later that he’d written to my father. Wired him, and the telegram arrived with the morning post at Briarcliff.”
“Why did Baxter write?”
“He was worried,” Paul explained. “James was in Austria at the time, conducting business for the Foreign Office, else Baxter would have summoned our uncle. Charles, Elizabeth was only four years old, and she was all alone in that house. No adults other than the staff were with her. Patricia had brought her to London and abandoned her here.”
Sinclair stood and began to pace back and forth as a rising tide of anger took hold. “How could Patricia do that? Did she have no sense of motherly feeling?”
Aubrey sighed. “At the time, I was as angry as you, and my gentle father said words that one might only hear from stevedores! He was positively outraged! Trish had left orders that no one report her presence in London. She arrived with Beth and then departe
d the following morning, telling Baxter she’d be gone for a week. We had no idea where to find her.”
“How can that woman have been so callous?”
“I begin to wonder now just what influence Trent had on her back then, and when it commenced. The letter Connor penned—the one you discovered at Drummond Castle—certainly indicates a history of infidelity. Trish had probably gone to meet Trent.”
“What year was this again?” asked Charles.
“1872. It had been a relatively quiet year politically, but there’d also been a series of crimes in Westminster and Lambeth that kept the Metropolitan Police puzzled. Look in your archives for ‘The Songbird Killings’. Six music hall performers—five female, one male—found from March through September with their throats slashed, their left eyes removed.”
“I remember reading about that case when I first joined the force. They were still unsolved at the time.”
“Yes, well, one of the victims was discovered in Haimsbury Park. Did you know that?”
“No!” Charles exclaimed in shock. “She was found on my family’s grounds? Why did no one say anything about that?”
“Most people are unaware of it. Even the press never learnt that information. My father had his men hush it up. The Queen Anne gardeners discovered the body, you see. They kept up the Haimsbury gardens as well, since the estate was being overseen by Uncle James at the time, and they relocated the body to the southeast end of Hyde Park before reporting it to the police.”
Sinclair stopped pacing, staring at his cousin, dumbfounded. “You’re saying that your father arranged for the deliberate alteration of a crime scene? Paul, there may have been clues lost that the police needed to solve those hideous murders!”
“Trust me, Cousin, my father’s men combed the grounds for any and all signs, and they delivered each and every detail to Commissioner Henderson. The murderer left no trail. But you can now understand why he was doubly concerned when Trish left Beth here all alone.”
“Yes,” he said softly. “Where was Connor during all this?”
“India. Father sent a telegram, but a series of peculiar errors delayed its delivery for three days. Of course, once he received it, Connor sought permission for emergency leave, and he took the first ship back to England. Both my father and I remained here until Trish returned. It was during that week that Beth told me about seeing the man in the park. She’d been showing me the horses in the stable. Even then, Beth loved riding, and she had her own pony. I’d started conversing with Frame. He’s served here for twenty years, you know. He was introducing me to Pride of Branham. He was sire to King’s Dancer, who sired Paladin.”
“Paladin will always be a favourite,” Charles said fondly.
“He’s considered the fastest horse in England, and he has the greatest heart. Though, he cares little for carrying me! Perhaps, it’s a blessing I wasn’t the one in those tunnels last month.”
Both men laughed, and then the earl grew serious. “That day in the stable, Beth had wandered off whilst I spoke with Frame. I’d not even noticed, but my father did. He’d been inside the house talking with the police commissioner, in fact, about the murders. Commissioner Henderson was an old friend and a tangential circle member. Father had been meeting with the London membership in an effort to track down Patricia’s whereabouts.”
“Your father would have made a formidable detective.”
“In a very real way, he served as one. Father joined me inside the stable and asked after Beth. It was only then that I noticed her absence. He and I learnt from a gardener that she’d been seen talking with someone inside the apple grove.”
“The man from the park.”
“Yes. Father and I immediately headed towards the pond and the plantation nearby, but Beth was already on her way back to the stable, and we met her upon the path. She was very upset, crying in fact, and Father picked her up and asked what had happened. She was only four, Charles, but even then her language skills were remarkable. Despite that, I was shocked when she started speaking to us in Romanian.”
“Romanian? Are you certain? Beth told me that the man in the park may have spoken in a language similar to that, but she said she didn’t speak it.”
“No, she didn’t, though she knew some French by then. I recognised it as Romanian, because I’d been studying both that and Russian for two years.”
“Did you understand what she said?”
“Yes. She said she didn’t want to be queen, and that she was afraid of the wolf.”
“She said this. Wolf. In Romanian.”
“She did, but after a few minutes, her language changed to English, and when asked about the wolf, later on, she had no recall. She fell asleep in my father’s arms, but that night she began having terrible nightmares. She screamed of a wolf attack and blood. She even used the name, Charles. She said the wolf was called Redwing.”
“Did she know about them at that time?”
“No. We didn’t begin telling Beth of her heritage until after her mother died. Charles, if the shadowy figure you’re encountering is the same entity that Beth saw back then—and perhaps the one who murdered my brother—then we must keep him away from our little duchess.”
Sinclair stood quietly for a moment, deep in thought. Finally, he returned to his chair, his eyes intense and fixed upon his cousin’s face. “Look, from now on, everyone is armed inside this house. You and I keep a weapon handy at all times. And keep Bibles by every beds and scattered about all the rooms. When Trent paid his visit to Beth’s bedchamber, he revealed a great dread of that wonderful book. He could go nowhere near it.”
“Tomorrow, I’ll ask Mac to walk through the house with Martin and anoint all the doors and windows. For tonight, I pray our rest is unbroken,” Aubrey said, touching his cousin’s forearm.
“As do I. Goodnight, Paul.”
Sinclair left the library and climbed the long, winding staircase. As he entered the moonlit bedroom, his eyes fell upon Elizabeth’s face. To his relief, her breathing seemed regular, and her expression serene. He moved the long sofa once more, allowing him to recline and still see his beloved. He then locked the windows, taking time to examine the entire park from that vantage point. He could see Frame’s men patrolling along the gravel pathways.
“May the Lord protect us all,” he whispered.
The brandy’s effect had made his eyelids heavy, so the marquess set a cushion at one end of the sofa and pulled two quilts over top of himself. In a few moments, Charles Sinclair had fallen fast asleep.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Friday Morning
Thursday passed without event. Based on Aubrey’s tale of the body discovered in his gardens in 1872, Sinclair asked Edmund Reid to meet him that morning, and the two policemen now stood inside the Haimsbury spring house, beyond the north gate to Queen Anne Park.
“Thanks for coming on short notice, Ed. I’d considered speaking with you at Leman Street or even at my office at the Yard, but I prefer this remain unofficial. Besides, that office won’t be mine much longer. I offered my resignation to Monro, effective the first of December.”
The Whitechapel detective sat beside his friend, sharing tea at a small round table inside the beautiful cottage. “Abberline told me about it, and he’s already trying to convince me to apply for promotion. I’ve no ambitions for the Yard, though. How can I help, Charles?”
The spring house that had once served as the sole source of fresh water for the original estate had been converted to a guest cottage when Sinclair’s grandfather rebuilt the mansion fifty years earlier. Containing two bedrooms, a parlour, a small kitchen, and a bath, Charles felt comfortable in the simple surroundings, for it reminded him of how he’d spent the majority of his life. “Nice little house, isn’t it? I might see if Beth wants to honeymoon here,” he joked.
“I’m sure the duchess would be pleased to live a
nywhere you wish, Charles. Just be sure to hire a cook. From all accounts, Elizabeth knows far more about horses than she does spices.”
The marquess laughed. “Then, it is one of the few things my fiancée cannot do well.” After a momentary pause, Sinclair grew serious. “Ed, do you recall anything about ‘The Songbird Killings’ from ’72?”
The inspector’s face showed surprise. “I’ve not heard anyone mention those since I was a constable. Why? Do you connect those to Ripper?”
Sinclair poured a second cup of tea. “No, but perhaps I should. I read about them when I first started with the Met. Morehouse had me research it once I was assigned to CID. I’d thought it busywork to be honest, and now I wonder if it might not be related to Redwing. That is why I wanted this to be a quiet conversation. Away from official sources. And official ears.”
“I see. Well, in truth, I know very little about those murders. Weren’t there half a dozen or so?”
“Seven, according to the earl, though I remember only six. He mentioned them in conversation a few days ago. Apparently, one of the victims was discovered right here. On my estate.”
“I don’t think so. I’d remember that, Charles.”
“No, Ed, you wouldn’t, because that information never made it into any of the official reports,” the marquess explained. “The woman’s body was found by Queen Anne Park gardeners loyal to the duke and to the late Lord Aubrey. It was the latter who made certain that all references to my home were removed from any documents. The gardeners moved the body to Hyde Park before contacting the police.”
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