“You have overlooked something,” pointed out Alfred. “The letter speaks of two girls. Who is Catherine?”
“Why, she must be Adeline's sister” gasped Lydia, “and an elder one, if she was old enough to be married ten years ago.”
“A sister!” cried Adeline, “I have another sister? Oh Alfred, we must solve this mystery. I have been so fortunate in my one sister, is it possible I could have another? O, where is she, where is she?”
Lydia and Alfred both attempted to soothe Adeline's agitation.
“You had better ask 'Who is she?' - After all, we cannot be sure it is not just a coincidence. This latter may refer to a completely different Adeline. We must try and ascertain to whom the letter was addressed before we jump to conclusions.”
“Yes, yes, but how?”
The little group was silent for few moments, deep in thought, until suddenly Lydia spoke.
“If this letter was delivered through the post in the usual way, then it will have been removed from the postbag and sorted by the butler. Let us put a few discreet questions to Mr Scott, and ascertain whether he remembers any unusual letter around that time.”
“A capital idea.” put in Alfred. “Ring the bell and lets have him in directly.”
Silence once again reigned in the parlour, each mind racing with his or her own thoughts, until Mr Scott entered.
“Yes, Miss Lydia?” he enquired, “Is there anything I can do for you?”
“Oh, Mr Scott,” began Lydia, not altogether sure how to begin the topic, but then deciding to jump in feet first. “Mr Scott, we have found a letter, which due to it's sensitive nature really ought to be returned to the person to whom it is addressed. The trouble is, there is no envelope, and it is directed simply to 'E', and the contents leave us no wiser as to whom it was intended for. We were wondering if you recalled any unusual letter to Estelle, or Bessie, or Mrs Trent, about the end of May last.”
“Hmm, I couldn't rightly say, so many letters pass through my hands in this house, and that was a good ten months ago. If I could get a look at the hand, perhaps, for that seems to stick more in my mind, as they say, more than the directions themselves.”
After a moment's hesitation, Lydia showed him the top of the sheet, with the date and the great sprawling 'E'.
“Stop a moment, I do recall to have seen that style of an 'E' before. I recollect now, it did seem a little odd at the time, but I assumed it might be from some old schoolfriend or such-like, that might not know the lady's married name, like, though they put Mrs so they must have known she had married, at any rate. There was a letter come in this handwriting, addressed to 'Mrs Evelyn Wade'.”
Chapter the 11th
“It is true!” gasped Adeline, falling back in her chair. “Oh, poor Mamma!”
“Hush dear,” said Lydia. “Thank-you Mr Scott, you have been most helpful. We need not trespass on your time any longer.”
“Thank-you Miss, glad to be of service” said that worthy functionary, withdrawing, much mystified by the excitement this revelation seemed to have caused.
“Oh, Alfred, Lydia, we must find my father, we must find my sister!” cried Adeline.
Alfred, who had been silent for some time, now spoke.
“I think I may know the very person who can help you, my dear, and I will bring him to you as soon as possible.”
This person, arriving a week or two later, turned out to be a disreputable looking gentleman in late middle age, in a greasy waistcoat and dilapidated boots, which respectable personage Alfred introduced to the ladies as one Mr Richard Dodd.
“Detective Dick to you, my dears, and I hope you good ladies will pardon my appearance, being obliged to pass as a cockney type just now. At your service, ladies, at your service. Now, tell me all about it.”
“Mr Dodd is a private detective,” explained Alfred, “and a good one at that. He has very kindly agreed to help us get to the bottom of this matter. Let us answer any question he cares to put to us, I can vouch for his confidence.”
“Silent as the grave, my dears, where need be.” asserted Mr Dodd. “Now then, just start at the beginning in your own words.”
“I think this letter can tell you better than we can.” said Lydia, proferring the singed and crumpled paper.
Having mastered the contents of the letter, and made a copy of it in a greasy memorandum-book, he at once began to put questions to the young ladies.
“Adeline I assume is one of you young ladies – oh, you, is it miss – but who is 'E', I mean what is her proper name, and how was the letter addressed, if you know. I don't suppose you have the envelope, that would be very helpful, very helpful indeed.”
“The lady addressed as 'E' is, we believe, Adeline's mother and my stepmother, known now as Mrs Evelyn Trent. We do not have the envelope, but are informed the letter was addressed to Mrs Evelyn Wade.”
“Your informant didn't happen to have a good look at the postmark, did he? No, shame, shame, it may have been useful to find out what part of London it was posted in. Still, it seems to me that if the unknown gentleman is addressing her as 'Mrs Wade, then that is like to be her proper name – and his too. So, the letter brings us one step closer, we now know we are looking for a Mr M Wade.
“Stay, he writes of coming down to see her – does anyone know if he ever did? It might be worth me asking round to see what strangers were about the village last June or July.”
At this, Adeline turned white.
“Lyddy, the stranger at the gate! The man who alarmed me so! Could it be...”
“What's this?” said Mr Dodd, “This sounds promising indeed! Tell me all about him.”
And so Adeline and Lydia, between them, recounted all they could recollect of that alarming encounter.
“Hmm, you got a pretty good description of him, Miss, very useful. And you say he called you 'my Adeline', and said he was sorry – that seems a strong hint he's the man we want. And an Australian accent, you say. Hmm, clearer and clearer. How did you know it was an Australian accent?”
“Oh, I didn't. It was...” and Lydia hesitated as the realisation of what she was saying dawned on her, “It was my stepmother that suggested it might be Australian, when I told her of the incident, and that he spoke in an accent not quite English.”
“Well now, well now, you just leave it with me a short while, and we'll see what we can't find out.”
And thus saying, the queer gentleman took his leave.
“Oh Lyddy, to think, I have seen my father, that I thought died when I was a baby, and I didn't know him.” and she lapsed into quiet tears.
Lydia sat quietly thinking of the father she had known, and had loved her for most of her short life. She felt a bitter pang that this business was perhaps turning Adeline a traitor to his memory, and taking her dear sister further and further away from her. And yet, and yet... Something about the affair excited her. She had always longed for some work in which to test and challenge her mental powers. Even if it should cost her her dearest love, she felt she could not rest until she had got to the bottom of this mystery.
Chapter the 12th
It was fortunate, perhaps, that Evelyn now seemed to want as little to do with the rest of the household as possible, for Adeline knew not how she could meet her mother with equanimity, let alone sit opposite her for a long hour at breakfast or dinner. However, this necessity did not arise, as Evelyn, when not out visiting, now kept almost entirely to her own rooms, occupied with her own concerns, whatever those might be, and so Adeline was spared the sad task of keeping her countenance before a mother who she now knew to be a sinner – if not for 17 years, at least for the last ten months. How could she consent to live in a man's house, eat his bread, accept his legacy as her right, knowing herself to have no legal or moral right to these benefits, that her union was unrecognised by God or the Law?
In such a case, Adeline determined, with all the idealism of nineteen, that she would run away and beg her bread in the street before she woul
d be guilty of such an enormity.
Adeline was troubled enough, even believing her mother had committed her sin in ignorance, in the mistaken belief that she had been free to marry seventeen years ago, only to be disabused of her error by the arrival of that fatal letter. Lydia had harder doubts, for the treacherous thought had crept into her mind that perhaps her father had known, had been complicit in this greivous error. Of Evelyn's guilt she had no doubt, for even if a mistaken report, through malice or accident, of her husband's death had reached her before her marriage to Mr Trent, how that gentleman could have lived in the same country for a further seven or eight years, and she have heard no further tidings of him to correct the error, passed her understanding. And, knowing, to keep such a secret for seventeen years, to constantly keep a watch on one's tongue and one's actions, to live in daily fear of the discovery – impossible! Perhaps this was the source and secret of the coldness that had long since arisen between her father and her stepmother. It was like him, his kindness and consideration, to forbear from exposing the woman he had chosen as his wife, to spare her the pain of public shame – but still, to compound the sin by continuing to live with her as her husband! The idea that her father, the man, of all others, whom she idolised, could have been guilty of sinfulness and deception pierced her heart. The thought crept like a dark, chill shadow between her and the sacred memory of him she loved so well, and seemed to poison all her recollections.
Happily, perhaps, the hours in which Lydia was free to dwell on these direful thoughts were limited. Having asserted her claim to the house and household, Evelyn seemed content to leave the daily fatigues of management to Lydia. It was the younger lady to whom the servants brought their troubles and questions, to her they came for orders. Evelyn troubled herself very little about the house, exerting herself only so far as to order her own meals, to look over the household accounts in a desultory manner once in a while, and to assert her power by countermanding the occasional order – usually at such a time and in such a manner as to cause Lydia the most vexation and inconvenience.
This round of household cares, with leisure hours darkened by grim imaginings, would soon have destroyed both health and character, were it not for the society of Adeline and Alfred, and a new interest, which raised itself in the person of one Captain James Woods.
This gentleman was a half-pay naval officer who, having been woefully injured in action on the Indian Ocean, and then spent much of the passage home in a raging fever, had been invalided out of the service, and was now trying the restorative effects of English country air and rustic retirement.
Alfred, happening to fall in with the gentleman on one of the long lonely rambles which constituted his daily dose of physic, soon made his acquaintance, being a friendly and gregarious young man. He had a stern battle of it at first, having much to conquer in the convalescent captain's goodly fund of natural reserve, but he persevered, and few could stand out long against Alfred's genuine and frank good-nature.
The friendship, having once been established, flourished, and it seemed but natural that Alfred introduce the Captain to his other friends, having a strong suspicion that the kind attentions of two gentle young ladies could do more to restore Captain Woods to health and spirits than could be achieved by his own unaided exertions. Accordingly, then, Captain Woods was invited to accompany Alfred on one of his visits to the young ladies at the first opportunity.
The young ladies were surprised and a little perturbed at first to see Alfred bringing a stranger to the house, but when Alfred had introduced him and told part of his story in a few simple words, and after they had looked on the still-young face so clearly marked by long suffering, they opened their hearts to him.
The Captain was a slim, pale young man of around five-and-twenty, quite small in stature – indeed, he stood only an inch or two higher than Lydia, who was not markedly tall. His cheeks were clean-shaven, and somewhat hollow, attesting to his long illness. His voice was soft and pleasant. His hair was brown, touched with gold, and curling slightly from a low forehead – he affected neither beard nor moustache. His hazel eyes, though shaded with great dark circles, were mild and intelligent. He had something of the look of a sick child, seeming very little more than a boy, for all that he was older than the two girls, and had seen action and hardship, and those two gentle hearts compassionated him at once, and were highly likely to make a pet of him.
They insisted on him taking the seat nearest the fire, for the early spring days were still cold, and plied him with good things from the tea-table, and valiantly set to work to draw him out. They made polite enquiries about his health, his opinions of the village, about his life in the Navy and his ship, and made but little headway. However, it was evident that this reserve was the result of diffidence, not of ill-nature, and eventually Adeline struck upon the happy chance of playing for the gentlemen. Adeline was that rarity among young ladies – she played for the love of music, not for the love of display, and though many young women were superior musicians, there was something about the girl's sweet, untrained voice and light touch upon the keys which went straight to the heart of the listeners. She tried one or two of those fashionable exercises in the mathematics of harmony, which were politely applauded, and then lit by chance on some sweet old song of her father's time. To the surprise of all, at the second verse the Captain moved to the piano and began to sing the second part, in a fine, clear, alto voice. The voice cracked by the end of the song, but the ice was broken, and now they could all talk of music, and the Captain spoke of fine concerts he had heard in foreign ports, and was led on by degrees to forget he was amongst strangers.
How surprised they all were to hear the hall clock strike, and realise that two hours had slipped by! The captain was now issued with the same open invitation as Alfred enjoyed, and retired to his lodgings feeling in better spirits than he had for many a weary month. The girls, too, felt their troubles a little lightened from being forgot for a while, and were anxious to renew the aquaintance.
Chapter the 13th
Whilst the young ladies have been making a new friend, the patient and perspicacious 'Detective Dick' Dodds has not been idle.
On leaving his interview with the two girls, he repaired to the public bar of the Crown, having learned, by long experience in his trade, that the presence of beer and rum have a tendency to make men wax loquacious. The worthy detective had a useful talent in this line, of being able to unobtrusively nurse his own single glass of brandy-and-water an entire evening, thus keeping a clear head and a steady tongue whilst all around him heads grew fuddled and tongues grew looser.
In the bar, he found it advantageous to assume the character of a man who has just made a very good bargain, and thus inclined to be sociable and hospitable. In this guise, he struck up and acquaintance with a group of venerable elderly villagers, who were not averse to being bought a bowl of punch. These gentlemen, by name George Handy, Abel Metcalf, and Stephen Carter, I shall not go to the trouble of describing, as their like can be seen in any public bar. Look for the three aged rustics, usually sitting in the snuggest corner by the fire, nursing their pints of ale or glasses of rum-and-hot-water, eyes scanning the assembled company, on the alert for any passing acquaintance who might be persuaded to stand them a drink, ears on the alert for any scrap of gossip, which meat they strip from the bone and chew over far more exhaustively than their elderly wives do at their genteel little tea-drinkings.
It was this last propensity which made Mr Dodds heartily inclined to buy these gentlemen, in whatever public house, in whatever corner of the British Isles, a drink. For the modest outlay of half a bottle of rum, hot water, lemons and sugar in proportion, he was sure to receive a great deal of information. Much of it would be dross, to be sure, but he was prepared to listen to a goodly amount of spoil in order to get at the one golden nugget of useful information.
The other consideration of course, was that striking up and acquaintance was the simplest thing in the world – a bo
wl of punch and an expansive manner were as good to these old fellows as a letter of introduction from a duke. These ceremonies of introduction having duly been completed, Dick Dodds made himself comfortable, and after a suitable lapse, in which the strong punch began to make its effects known, began skilfully to lead the conversation toward the subject closest to his heart.
“Tell me, I saw a pleasantish kind of box out on the East road into the village. Just the sort of place I've a mind to buy myself one of these days. Who owns it? Do you think they'd be of a mind to sell?”
“You must m-mean the Grove. Grey stone house, fronts onto the r-road, biggish garden at the b-back?” (the unfortunate Abel having developed something of a stammer)
“Nay, Abel, the Grove is out North of here, not East. He's talking of the Trent place, I'll be bound.”
“It was built of a yellowish stone, I believe, and had a few fine old trees round it.”
“Aye, that's the Trent place sure enough. As to selling, well, they've had a heap of trouble there of late, the old gent died at Christmas after a long illness. The widder might be inclined, if you approach her canny, but I'd wager she'd get the best of the bargain.” and old Stephen chuckled, displaying a couple of brown and lonely teeth and a good deal of red gum.
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