Shadows in Time

by Julie McElwain

  Sam scratched the side of his nose. “Aye, I reckon you’ve got a point. But what does it matter? Obviously, someone doesn’t like you sniffing around. They might not be afraid of what you know now—but they’re worried what your gonna find out.”

  Kendra frowned, still feeling like she was missing something. It didn’t make sense. But, as she’d thought last night, paranoia was an emotional response. The killer could be getting paranoid for no reason.

  Kendra realized the worker was listening. She told Sam, “We should go to the study.”

  “Miss? Are my services no longer required?” Harding asked, still holding the rod from his position on top of the chair.

  She grinned. “Yes, thank you, Harding. Your service was invaluable.”

  “Very good, miss.” He eyed the floor uncertainly, then looked across at her. “Do you wish breakfast to be sent to the study?”

  “Ah. Yes, thank you. I’m expecting Lady Rebecca, Mr. Muldoon, and Lord Sutcliffe as well.” She suppressed a smile and, because she didn’t want to cause Harding any more embarrassment, she picked up her coffee cup and moved to the door.

  “How long do you reckon he’ll be up on that chair?” Sam whispered as he followed her down the hall to the study.

  Kendra laughed. “It’s going to be another black mark against me, I’m afraid.”

  “It was clever of you ter think of that with the dowel.”

  Kendra felt the curious probe of the Bow Street Runner’s gaze, but shrugged. “It proves that the shot went high. Even if it was a warning or meant to frighten me, rather than kill me, we’re no closer to knowing who’s behind it.”

  Sam said nothing for a moment. “Did you manage ter get a good night’s sleep?” he finally asked when they walked into the study.

  “Yes,” Kendra lied, and even as she said it, she knew that Sam would recognize it as a lie. It was hard to conceal the shadows under her eyes. “Can you go to the Tip & Ship today to see about verifying Mercer’s alibi for Saturday?”

  He nodded. “I sent another man ter Spain with the note about checking theaters.”

  “Good. Maybe it won’t pan out—” Another slang term, this one not to be coined until the days of America’s Gold Rush. “I don’t know if it will turn out to be useful, but it’s a lead.”

  “I also wanted ter tell you that one of me men returned this mornin’ from Aldridge Castle and the village.”

  That perked Kendra up even more than her coffee. “What did he find out?”

  “No one remembers any strangers comin’ around and askin’ about the Duke’s family.”

  “But that only means that no one wants to admit that they might have been gossiping about the Duke and his family.”

  “Who has been gossiping about my family?”

  Kendra glanced at the Duke as he strolled into the room. Some of the awkwardness that she’d felt the night before returned. She exchanged a quick look with Sam.

  The Bow Street Runner said, “Me man returned from Aldridge Village. He says that no one’s been around quizzing folks about your daughter or family.”

  “No one has admitted to gossiping about your family,” Kendra emphasized. “They could be covering.”

  “True. However, they could mention a stranger in the village asking questions without implicating themselves as gossipmongers,” the Duke pointed out.

  “Yes, but human nature is to lie,” Kendra said.

  The Duke eyed her. “You have a very dim view of humanity, my dear.”

  She wondered if that was an observation or a criticism. “I’m rarely disappointed.”

  “I would remind you that no one from the village knew about my daughter’s ritual of tapping three times.”

  “Not that you know.”

  “Not that I know,” he agreed.

  The door opened, and two maids came in bearing trays with an array of silver domes and pots of tea and coffee, as well as a pitcher of ale. The room fell silent as they put out the dishes, curtsied, and left.

  “ ’Tis true that anyone in the household could have passed the knowledge on,” the Duke continued quietly, moving to the sideboard, where he lifted one of the silver domes to inspect the scrambled eggs beneath. “Many of the castle’s servants come from the village. I suppose at the time they may have discussed it with their families. Nanny MacTavish was concerned about the night terrors. She may have confided in someone.”

  “Where is the nanny?” Kendra asked.

  “She was a good woman—completely devoted to Charlotte,” the Duke said. He picked up a serving spoon and dished eggs onto a plate, then followed that with baked beans, stewed tomatoes, and plump sausages. “She was as heartbroken as I was when she was lost at sea. I gave her a character reference and enough money to return to her native Scotland. A village called Shandwick in the Highlands, if my memory serves.”

  A smile flickered on his face, then disappeared. “However, she said she liked the warmer temps in the South. She found a position in Sussex, as a nanny to Lord and Lady Thorpe’s three children.” He looked at Kendra and Sam, his eyes sharp. “I can assure you, Nanny MacTavish was not the sort of woman to spread tales, especially not about the idiosyncrasies of a child she once adored. Of that I am certain.”

  He sat down at the table, picked up his knife and fork, and concluded, “Nanny MacTavish died a long time ago. At least fifteen years. Consumption, I believe. Lady Thorpe told me when we met at a ball several years ago.”

  Kendra frowned as she refilled her coffee cup.

  “You are chasing shadows from the past, my dear,” said the Duke. He cut into his sausage, spearing half with his fork. “Why would anyone in the village be gossiping about Charlotte now?”

  Kendra said, “They wouldn’t. Not without prodding.”

  “Aye, but someone would have noticed an outsider was snooping around, making conversation about a child who’d been lost at sea twenty years ago,” said Sam as he filled up his plate.

  He was right, Kendra decided. Secrecy was not easy in a small village like Aldridge. The villagers were friendly enough, but outsiders were noticed. Even without telephones or the Internet, everyone in the village would have known everything by nightfall.

  “There are only four possible ways that Carlotta could have come by her knowledge,” the Duke said. “One, my household and two, the villagers. Mr. Kelly has just eliminated the possibility that it was my household or the villagers. Then there is my family. Caro has assured me that she has spoken to no one—then or now. I have written to my other two sisters. I have yet to receive a reply.”

  He fell silent as he picked up his tea, took a long sip.

  Sam frowned. “And the fourth possibility?”

  Kendra knew what was behind door number four, but let him say it.

  “That Carlotta really is Charlotte,” he returned softly.

  Kendra still felt that a few careful inquiries—so careful that the mark wouldn’t even know he was being pumped—could have elicited the necessary information. The name of Charlotte’s doll, for instance. A question, or an educated guess. It was a Queen Anne doll, for Christ’s sake. You didn’t have to be a rocket scientist to figure out that a little girl might have named her Queen Anne doll Annie. And Arabella’s scent would have been easy enough to find out, or another educated guess. Lavender was a popular perfume. If Carlotta hadn’t been correct, then she would have fallen back on the fact that she had been a young child at the time. Her memories were vague or faulty.

  As for the child’s superstitious tapping, though Kendra knew that the information could have made its way into the general public, who would be talking about it now? How had Carlotta found that out?

  She became aware that the Duke was staring at her, waiting for her to reply. She roused herself to murmur, “There might be another possibility that hasn’t occurred to us yet.”

  The Duke raised his eyebrows in inquiry. “Such as?”

  “I’ll let you know when it comes to me.”

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nbsp; * * *

  By the time Rebecca and Muldoon came in, flushed with the cold and laughing, the Duke had already finished his breakfast and left. Kendra was a little surprised at the baleful way Sam glared at the reporter. She reminded him, “I invited Mr. Muldoon.”

  Sam grunted, still glowering at the younger man. “As long as he doesn’t forget his place.”

  Overhearing, Muldoon’s jaw tightened and his eyes flashed with sudden temper. “I’m not forgetting anything.”

  Kendra decided to ignore their hostility. Friction between law enforcement and the Fourth Estate wasn’t anything new for her. She waited until they filled their plates and sat down at the table before she informed them about the previous evening’s shooting.

  “Dear heavens,” Rebecca breathed, her eyes wide. “Are you are all right?”

  “I’m fine. The shooter didn’t mean to kill me. It was meant as a warning.”

  “How can you be so certain?”

  “That’s what I would like to know,” Alec drawled from the doorway. He’d obviously been out riding. He wore his bottle-green riding jacket over dark brown vest and doeskin breeches tucked into gleaming black Hessians. As he came into the room, he tugged off his gloves, his gaze on Kendra.

  “The trajectory of the bullet was too high,” she replied. “We either have a blind shooter or someone who deliberately missed.”

  Muldoon asked, “Did Mrs. Garcia Desoto offer a description of the gunman?”

  “She says she didn’t see anything. It was too dark. She only saw the motion when he raised the gun and pushed His Grace to the floor,” Kendra said.

  “Well, thank heaven for her quick reflexes, but it still must have been frightening,” Rebecca remarked.

  Muldoon chewed his food thoughtfully. “You haven’t eliminated a woman from being the fiend who killed Mr. Pascoe, but I cannot imagine our fairer sex doing such a thing. Not because they cannot shoot,” he added hastily, even though Rebecca didn’t seem ready to argue the point with him. He hesitated, apparently not certain how to go on. He finally shrugged, finishing lamely, “It just doesn’t seem right.”

  “I understand what you mean,” Kendra admitted, since he was echoing her thoughts from the previous night. “But nothing precludes anyone from hiring someone to take the shot.”

  “In other words, no one can be eliminated from the list of suspects,” said Muldoon.

  “Yes and no. I met Fletcher after the inquest.”

  Muldoon raised an eyebrow. “And do you think God made a mistake putting feet on that creature, because it’d be more natural for him to be slithering about on his belly?”

  She had to smile. “Descriptive. I agree that he’s a snake. That doesn’t mean he’s a murderer—at least not of Pascoe,” she added when he opened his mouth to contradict her. “He says he was at Appleton Ale on both Saturday and Sunday, and if we need to confirm it, he has plenty of witnesses.”

  Muldoon snorted. “And if they don’t confirm his story, they’ll be looking for new employment or be found floating facedown in the Thames.”

  “I didn’t say his alibi was good. But it needs to be checked out.”

  He grinned. “I’ll give it a go.”

  “This man sounds dangerous,” Rebecca said, frowning. “Are you certain it’s safe?”

  Muldoon’s grin widened as he glanced at her. “Can’t be any more dangerous than sniffing around Parliament.”

  Sam mumbled something under his breath.

  “However, I have a problem with Fletcher being behind the attack last night,” Kendra said, standing to refill her coffee cup. “I don’t see him bothering with a warning. I think he would shoot to kill—or give that order.”

  Muldoon agreed reluctantly. “I can’t deny that.”

  “I’m not so certain,” Alec said. “Killing the ward of a duke—or a duke himself—is serious business. You’re not some chit selling flowers on the street corner, Miss Donovan. The crown would have every magistrate, thief-taker, and constable in London hunting for the shooter. Would Mr. Fletcher want to draw this sort of attention to himself?”

  “Probably not, but there’s another reason he drops down the list. Hester said that he tried to bribe Pascoe into stealing recipes from Barrett Brewery—”

  “Seems to me a fine motive for murder,” Muldoon interrupted, bewildered.

  “Except it looks as though he found someone else,” Kendra told him, taking a sip of her coffee. “Given that, I don’t know why he would bother with Pascoe.”

  “Who did he find?” Rebecca asked.

  “Mrs. Gavenston’s son-in-law, Mr. Mercer—possibly. They were seen together.” She looked at Alec. “Maybe you’ll be able to get more information about Mercer and his family’s financial situation at your club today.”

  His eyes narrowed. “Someone tried to kill you—”

  “No. Someone sent a warning.”

  “I’m not leaving you alone.”

  She frowned at him. The last thing she wanted was Alec to act as her shield. Her blood ran cold to think of anything happening to him.

  “I’m not going to be alone,” she said. “Mr. Kelly is going with me. Besides, my plan is to visit a dressmaker. I doubt if anything is going to happen there, except I may accidentally step on a needle.”

  Alec didn’t look convinced.

  She continued, “If Mercer’s alibi holds up, we can eliminate him. Same goes for his wife.” She glanced at the names she’d written on the slate board. If they were lucky, they could start crossing off more than Mr. Logan by nightfall. “Captain Sinclair wouldn’t tell me where he was on Saturday, but said he attended a cricket match in Windsor on Sunday with Sir William Lloyd.”

  “The Harlequins and Lewes.” Muldoon nodded. “After I’m finished with Appleton Ale, I shall see what I can find out there.” He looked at Sam. “Did you tell Miss Donovan about Mr. Shaw?”

  “Pascoe’s former employer?” Kendra asked, as Sam shook his head.

  Muldoon turned toward Kendra. “I spoke to him at the inquest. He told me that Mrs. Gavenston is one of his bank’s largest depositors.”

  “Why is Mrs. Gavenston using a bank in Maidenhead rather than Cookham?” Rebecca wondered.

  But that wasn’t the most interesting thing, Kendra thought. “Mrs. Pascoe mentioned that Mrs. Gavenston offered Pascoe his job. I assumed she’d put an ad in the newspaper, and he applied for it. Mrs. Gavenston must have known Pascoe before he came to work for her, but she never mentioned it.”

  “You make it sound like she was trying to hide something,” said Rebecca. “It might have not occurred to her. What could that have to do with Mr. Pascoe’s murder, anyway?”

  Kendra said nothing, but this was another instance of Mrs. Gavenston being less than forthcoming, and that bothered her.

  “Mrs. Doyle had the idea that Mrs. Gavenston might have an ulterior motive for hiring Mr. Pascoe,” said Sam.

  Alec looked at the Bow Street Runner. “What would that be, pray tell?”

  “She was hoping ter make a match between him and her daughter, Hester. Mr. Pascoe was a greenhorn in the beer trade, which would give her the opportunity ter groom him—according ter Mrs. Doyle.”

  “Mrs. Gavenston is not considering changing her family’s tradition of allowing the first-born female to inherit, is she?” Rebecca sounded alarmed.

  “Nay, I don’t think so,” Sam assured her. “Mrs. Doyle was of the mind that Mrs. Gavenston needed a cove on her side as a countermeasure against her uncle.”

  “I’ll bet Mrs. Gavenston is good at playing chess,” Kendra murmured. She tapped her coffee cup with her index finger, thinking. “Is it just gossip that Mrs. Gavenston wanted a match between Hester and Pascoe?”

  “As far as I can tell, it’s conjecture. Mrs. Doyle said that Mrs. Gavenston may have learned pretty manners when her ma sent her off ter a fancy finishin’ school as a young lass, but she’s got a ruthless streak in her—no disrespect,” Sam added, obviously not wanting to slander the brew
ster and annoy Rebecca. “Mrs. Doyle said that if Mrs. Gavenston thought it would be advantageous to Barrett Brewery to encourage a match between her daughter and Mr. Pascoe, she’d be doin’ it. But it ain’t as though folks don’t get leg-shackled for business reasons every day.”

  “Almack’s would close down otherwise,” Alec drawled with a lazy smile. “It’s called the Marriage Mart for a reason.”

  Rebecca said stiffly, “There’s a difference between forcing your daughter into an unwanted marriage, Sutcliffe, and encouraging a match that you believe would be beneficial. I do not see Mrs. Gavenston bullying her daughter into an undesirable arrangement.”

  Kendra recognized the defensive tilt to Rebecca’s chin. Clearly, she was having a difficult time thinking that a woman she admired might have feet of clay.

  “Well, whatever might be going on between Hester and Pascoe, I think Hester cared for him,” Kendra said finally. The desolation swimming in Hester’s eyes when they’d informed her of Pascoe’s death hadn’t seemed fake. Of course, it didn’t let her off the hook. As Kendra had told them, a great many people ended up dead at the hand of someone who professed to care for them.

  “Mrs. Gavenston might have wanted Pascoe around for another reason,” she said carefully.

  “What’s that, lass?” Sam asked.

  “She might have been the one who was interested in Pascoe.” She wasn’t surprised by the stunned silence that followed. It was controversial, but only because, as she’d thought earlier, Mrs. Gavenston was the older one in the match.

  Muldoon was the first to speak. “Romantically?”

  She eyed him with some amusement. “Mrs. Gavenston isn’t that old. I asked her, but she denied that they were having an affair.”

  Sam choked on the swallow of ale he’d just taken. “God’s teeth! You actually asked her if she and Mr. Pascoe…” He stared at her. Everyone was staring at her.

  “It needed to be asked.”

  Alec laughed. “And how did she respond?”