Death at the Abbey

by Christine Trent

  Actually, she could think of no benefit Portland derived by extending temporary positions to these unskilled boys. He must do it purely to do good. How would she ever comprehend the man?

  She parted from Gilbert and returned to the chemist’s for some cloths to take care of her face. Her bespattered gown would have to remain in that condition a while longer, as her curiosity about home children was growing with each passing second. Instead of going to Worksop Inn to change her dress, she immediately headed to Welbeck Abbey to visit Ellery Reed. Why had he concealed from her that Burton Spencer was a home child?

  She wondered if Spencer’s death had anything to do with his home child status. But why would someone want to kill a young man—a boy, really—for being an orphan?

  Violet’s breath caught. Ian Hale had worked for an orphanage. Was he somehow involved in the home children program? But even if he was, why had he tried to kill Violet? For heaven’s sake, she hadn’t even known about home children until a few moments ago.

  She remembered what the note to Hale said. Her inquiries are getting closer to my treasure. But if the home children were the treasure in question, how was it that Violet was getting “closer” to them, other than that she had prepared Spencer’s body for burial?

  In no way could she even begin to fathom what Edward Bayes had to do with it all.

  Nothing made any sense.

  Ellery Reed was just coming out of his cottage when Violet arrived. He wore a brown vest already filthy from the new day’s work, and held some odd hand tool with iron teeth. “Ah, Mrs. Harper, you are still with us,” he said, putting the tool down to one side. “It looks as though you have had the worse end of a fight with a pig.” He chuckled amiably, his words inoffensive.

  “I’m afraid I lost against a passing carriage,” Violet replied.

  “Ah yes, there is no use going up against the wheeled beasts. How may I help you?”

  “I met Gilbert Lewis in Worksop a short while ago. He mentioned something very interesting to me, that he was one of several home children on the estate.” Violet watched closely for Reed’s reaction, but it was bland.

  “Yes, we have nine of them—no, eight. I can’t seem to accept that Burton is gone now.” Reed passed a hand across his eyes.

  “You never mentioned this to me, sir. I didn’t know that Burton Spencer was a mere boy of seventeen—as large as he was—and that he was part of the home children arrangement. Why didn’t you tell me?”

  Reed looked at her quizzically. “Mrs. Harper, was his orphan status relevant to his death? I try not to point out the orphans’ status to others, lest the other workers look down upon them. The boys are only here for a short time, and there’s no point in other workers viewing them as lesser beings because they are both orphans and not here permanently. His Grace wants them treated equally. They are paid just as fairly for the work they do as the other men, and they share the same meals.”

  “According to Gilbert, they aren’t exactly paid. He says you are saving their money for them, and have promised to give it all to them upon their departure.”

  “That is true.” Reed sighed heavily. “Would you care to see my accounting ledger for the boys?”

  “Yes, sir, I would.”

  She followed him into his cottage, which was modeled much like Colonel Mortimer’s, except that it was sparsely furnished and neatly kept. Disappearing momentarily into another room, he came back with a key attached to a long chain. He pushed aside a chair positioned against a wall and inserted the key into a lock recessed in the wall. Part of the wall sprang open on a hinge.

  “His Grace likes certain things to be kept hidden from prying eyes. I must assume you are here on his business, and aren’t just a nosy hen.”

  Violet swallowed a retort as Reed got onto his knees and dug around in the opening. “Here we are.” He rose carrying a large ledger, similar to the one she used in her own undertaking business. He plopped the book down on a table, the thud reverberating through the largely barren room. Reed flipped through the pages and stopped in a certain place, pointing down for Violet to see.

  “This is the current group of boys, who arrived back in March. You can see here that at the end of each week I credit each boy with his wages. I will total it all up in this column just before they leave.”

  Violet followed along, noting that there was a long line drawn through Burton Spencer’s name. “What happened to Burton Spencer’s savings?”

  “I divided his money up among the other boys. You can see here where I added a portion to each boy’s account. It didn’t seem right for His Grace to just keep the money, and he agreed that it should be distributed among the others. A sad turn of affairs it was with Spencer, but I suppose there is solace in that the other orphan boys will have some benefit from his death.”

  “Yes,” Violet agreed, although it seemed a high price for Burton Spencer to have paid for the dividing of his seven months’ worth of spoils across eight other boys. Surely one of the other boys hadn’t killed him for this reason. How could any of them have assumed even for a moment that Spencer’s savings would be divided up this way? There would have been no benefit to such an act, anyway. They were all headed to new homes and guaranteed employment. There was no need to commit murder for just a few coins.

  Violet still needed to know what connection the boys at Welbeck had to any London orphanages.

  “Do the boys leave Welbeck at various times, or do they travel together?” she asked.

  “Usually they all leave together, then Mrs. MacPherson arranges for another round of boys through various orphanages.”

  “Including Babbage’s Home for Foundlings?”

  Reed shook his head. “I don’t know. Perhaps. Quite honestly, Mrs. Harper, I don’t keep track of where they have come from because it doesn’t matter, and I only make note of where they are going because it is important to the young men to look forward to the next place they will call home. I remind them regularly of their futures.”

  “Do any of them ever stay on here at Welbeck instead of going to Canada?”

  “No, never. There is always a farmer or factory owner who has paid good money to have a strapping young worker sent to him. They always go, except of course . . .” Reed’s words trailed off.

  Except in the case of Burton Spencer. “Did His Grace reimburse Spencer’s Canadian patron after the boy’s death?” Violet asked.

  “I believe there was some arrangement made to compensate the man, although I wasn’t privy to the details.”

  Violet was empty of questions. It was certainly a striking coincidence that she was attacked by a man who worked for an orphanage and it turned out that a group of home children were in residence at Welbeck Abbey. However, she couldn’t figure any way in which the coincidence had anything to do with Burton Spencer’s death, much less that of Edward Bayes. She needed more information, and that meant another visit to Martin Chandler. She hadn’t forgotten that it was he who had called her a raven during Spencer’s funeral, and that Hale’s telegram referred to her that same way.

  She thanked Reed and said her farewells.

  “I hope you are able to discover whatever it is you are seeking, Mrs. Harper,” Reed said as he escorted her out and picked up his tool again.

  “So do I,” Violet said, wondering what exactly it was she was even searching for anymore.

  Chandler was feeding the ravens and a couple of hawks from a pile of dead mice when Violet arrived. Some of the carcasses had been split open, exposing the rodents’ flesh—and the odor of decay—to the birds, who were all grasping perches as they waited their turns for a tasty morsel, uttering various caws and mild screeches in their impatience to eat. Chandler had obviously trained them well, for none of them jumped at the falconer or attempted to steal food out of turn.

  Violet was tired from traipsing across the estate from Reed’s cottage to the rookery, and quickly became irritated that Chandler ignored her presence as he pulled a mouse from the pile and fed
it to one of the birds, sometimes speaking lovingly and sometimes demanding a trick first, such as a whistle or a head bob.

  After several moments of this, Violet interrupted, and soon found herself embroiled in a quarrel with the falconer.

  “Mr. Chandler, may I have a moment of your time, please? I am here on important business.”

  “Still looking for what Aristotle may have choked on?” he asked, offering her his usual, lazy smile.

  Violet had completely forgotten about that in the course of events. “No, I plant myself at your doorstep concerning something more important. Have you sent any telegrams to London recently, Mr. Chandler?” she asked directly, hoping to throw him off guard. Unfortunately, the only sign of discomfort in evidence was that Chandler paused momentarily with a particularly bloody mouse in his hand, causing the peregrine to protest loudly. “Aah! Aah! Er-er-er-er-er!” the bird sputtered in frustration.

  With just a glance at Violet, Chandler tossed the entrails toward the falcon, which reached its head up and caught the mouse firmly in its beak, then placed the carcass between its talons and the perch, reaching down and ripping off small shreds with its sharp beak and swallowing them whole.

  “Telegrams? To whom?” the falconer said, avoiding a direct response.

  “Only you can answer that, sir.”

  He picked up another mouse from his pile on the table and once more tossed it up to the peregrine, which accepted it greedily.

  “What reason would I have to send a telegram, Mrs. Harper? In any case, you haven’t told me why someone else’s telegram would have you in such a dither.”

  “I am not in a dither, sir. I am attempting to discover who—” Violet took a breath. “Never mind. Do you remember that you called me a raven during Burton Spencer’s funeral?”

  He shrugged with smug nonchalance. “Yes. Were you offended?”

  “Of course not.” Violet was growing more irritated by the second by his demeanor. “I am wondering if you have ever referred to me that way to anyone else.”

  “You are terribly consumed with yourself, madam. I am sorry to have to inform you that I do not spend my time talking about you. Perhaps you are disappointed to hear that.”

  Violet couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “Of all the cheek! What arrogance to accuse me of such a thing.”

  “Me to accuse you? Madam, first you come here asking about some ridiculous telegram. It is obvious that you know specifically what telegram you are asking about, but you aren’t sharing that with me, in hopes of trapping me into a statement of guilt. Guilt about what, I cannot imagine.”

  Chandler threw another mouse haphazardly in the air so that the peregrine was barely able to catch it. However, it went straight to work at mauling its catch. The falconer picked up another couple of carcasses and tossed one to each of two ravens also waiting their turns. “Then you wish to know if I have called you a raven to others, as though it is my secret pet name for you as I worship you from afar. Why should I have any interest in you? You’re but an undertaker, barely above my own station. I have high aspirations, many of which will be realized soon, and wasting time yearning for a married rav—undertaker is not in my plans.”

  “I would blame your arrogance on your youth,” Violet said quietly, trying to control the heat of embarrassment and rage inflaming her cheeks, “except that you are nearly my own age, are you not? You simply never learned any manners. In fact, that falcon is more polite than you.”

  “If you are quite done—” Chandler said, pointing the way out.

  “Be assured, sir, that I am not done, and will never be done until I get to the bottom of this matter.”

  “What matter, Mrs. Harper? You talk in riddles and puzzles and criticisms, but all I know is that you were upset because one of the duke’s ravens managed to choke to death on a piece of debris . . . just as probably thousands of ravens have managed to do over the years. You remind me of a harpy—a hungry, filthy winged creature with the face of an ugly old woman—because you torment people and bring stormy clouds with you wherever you go. Please be gone.”

  With that, Chandler scooped the remaining mice into the ever-present leather satchel at his waist and stalked off, leaving Violet and the birds completely outraged and unsatisfied. How had she managed to anger the duke’s falconer, of all people, to the point of being dismissed from his presence? She reviewed what had happened in her mind. Was she guilty of provoking Chandler, or had he trumped up his own outrage in order to dissemble and obscure whatever it was he might be guilty of? She was so angry it was difficult to think clearly.

  However, in the heat of her fury, a memory flickered to life. When Chandler had called her a raven at Spencer’s funeral, hadn’t Colonel Mortimer made some odd excuse and left, presumably heading back to Welbeck Abbey? She hadn’t given it a second thought at the time, but was there something in Chandler’s comment that had struck a nerve with the colonel, or, worse, given him an idea so wicked that he had to walk away from them?

  24

  Violet was already exhausted from the day’s events and it was barely noon, yet she decided it was necessary to visit the colonel again, to see what he had to say about his fancy home in London. Back across the estate she went to Colonel Mortimer’s cottage, just a short distance away from Reed’s.

  As she passed through a row of boxwoods on the approach to his cottage, she noticed the colonel exit his front door, a shovel in hand. Instinctively, she stayed inside the line of boxwoods and peered over them to observe his actions. Laying the shovel on the ground, he returned inside and came back out moments later with another digging implement.

  Violet felt an unpleasant chill creeping up her spine. It turned into prickles of fear as she contemplated what to do next. Calm yourself, she thought. His actions might be completely innocent. Perhaps he is planting a shrub or something.

  In the middle of October? the suspicious side of her replied. He is up to no good, and you know it.

  He dropped the second tool and returned inside once more. When he came back out, he was muttering to himself as he picked the implements up and walked rapidly to the rear of his cottage.

  What part of the estate was back there? The Greendale Oak was in that direction. So were some of the temporary construction buildings, which were scattered across the estate. Were there any tunnels in that direction? Violet wasn’t sure.

  She patted her reticule to assure herself that her knife was still there. This time, she wouldn’t permit herself to be grabbed before she could reach into it.

  If it came to that.

  Violet emerged from the hedgerow and followed the colonel, who had already disappeared behind the cottage and out of her view. Violet picked up her skirts and walked quickly to catch up to him, all thoughts of her fatigue completely erased within the pounding of her heart. She slowed as she approached the rear corner of his cottage and finally stopped, peeping out cautiously to see if the man was still in view.

  The colonel stood about a hundred yards behind his cottage, in an open space that might have been inhabited by another cottage were it not for a dilapidated little building that still stood there instead, tenaciously clinging to life despite the vines that threatened to consume it. The colonel was examining the area surrounding the structure, a tool in each hand. Violet hated to imagine what he might be planning to do.

  From nowhere, courage welled up inside of her and she stepped out from the side of the cottage, taking large strides toward him. The colonel immediately noticed the movement and looked up. “Ah, Mrs. Harper, good afternoon,” he said. “I was just, er, just having a bit of a walk, you see.” The colonel made his way to her, except now he was weaving, as though in his cups again. Both digging implements fell to the ground as he approached.

  “Any news on LeCato?” he asked, now standing before her unsteadily. “His Grace said he sent you to London.”

  “Yes, I just returned. Mr. LeCato appears to be a trusted—”

  “Oh yes, I’m sure you f
ound more than one bootlicker willing to vouch for him. Were you able to dig deeper than just getting a few government sycophants to tell you tall tales?”

  Was the colonel trying to distract Violet from what he had been doing earlier? “I hardly think Mr. LeCato is of a position to have others fawning before him, sir. Both Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Denison themselves consider his conduct to be unimpeachable.”

  “Evelyn Denison? Is he wrapped up in this? Denison is His Grace’s brother-in-law, you know.”

  Violet bit her lip. She shouldn’t have told Colonel Mortimer that. Besides, it was the colonel who had explaining to do, not her. “What are the shovels for, sir?” she said, nodding back to where they lay haphazardly on the ground.

  “Those? Oh.” He made a vague attempt at a self-deprecating laugh. “Thought I might take down that old shed. An eyesore, you know.”

  “Did His Grace approve its destruction?” Considering how long it had been left there without falling prey to any of the estate’s building projects, perhaps it had an actual purpose.

  “His Grace?” The colonel was swaying again. “His Grace is my friend and permits me great liberties on the estate.”

  There was no smell of liquor emanating from the colonel, nor was he even wearing his bloodshot glass eye, although that wasn’t conclusive evidence. “Yes, Colonel, but I wonder if those liberties extend to taking advantage of your friend. For instance, perhaps you are not in great need of assistance, yet you pretend to be a destitute army pensioner. Perhaps, instead, you own—”

  “Well, if you’ll excuse me, I must be off to bed. A little nap, you see.” The colonel staggered off to the front of his house, leaving Violet in midsentence.