The Truth-Seeker's Wife

by Ann Granger

  ‘You could not have built the bonfire or put the body on top of it.’

  ‘No, Davy did that. It wasn’t any part of my plan. But when they left the body in the icehouse, it was asking for trouble. The Beresfords should not have been surprised when trouble came.’ She gave a little nod of satisfaction.

  ‘It was unspeakable! He will answer for it and for everything else, poor Robert Harcourt’s death and everything. You planned that, too, I suppose? Who tied the wire across the path? Davy? I dare say it was he who did it, under your direction. And did he also remove it? Or were you waiting in the bushes to dart out and remove it before others came?’

  ‘I wanted to leave matters tidy,’ she said complacently.

  ‘Have you no understanding of what you’ve done?’ I asked. ‘You brought up your son to hate both his father and the man who was probably his brother. To hate them to the extent that he conspired to kill them: to commit both patricide and fratricide. These are horrible crimes; all right-minded people would be appalled by them. Even those who are rogues and criminals in other ways would not commit such awful deeds.’

  ‘What do I care what others think? If vengeance cannot be done through the law, then it must be done in other ways. A father who does not recognise his child is no father.’ A mocking look entered her eyes. ‘I have shocked you.’

  ‘The law is not about vengeance,’ I argued. ‘It is about justice.’

  ‘What I did was justice. The law would not have given me that. I had to make my own.’

  ‘Then let us talk of Robert Harcourt.’

  Tibby scowled at me and then looked down at her hands clasped in her lap. ‘What of him?’

  ‘He did not deserve to die!’

  Tibby looked up at me and I was astonished and appalled at the expression in her eyes. ‘He had to die. He was too dangerous to leave alive.’

  ‘But for brother to kill or conspire to kill brother…’

  ‘When did Robert Harcourt ever treat Davy as a brother? He hated the very idea! Harcourt had already told me, more than once, that when Sir Henry was gone he – Harcourt – would make sure that Beresford turned me, my sister and Davy out of this cottage and chased us away. Where should we have gone? Harcourt said he would inform the authorities about Davy’s business with the French smugglers. Another magistrate wouldn’t have turned a blind eye. Oh, he was a fine-looking fellow, Harcourt, and thought a great deal of himself, too. I dare say he impressed you, Mrs Ross. But once Sir Henry was out of the way, there was nothing to stop the Frenchwoman’s son from carrying out his threats.’

  I was moved to argue. ‘You really believe he would have informed on Davy? After all, if he realised Davy was probably his half-brother…’

  She leaned forward in the rocking chair, bringing its motion to a halt and herself, its occupant, crouched, almost as if she would spring out at me. ‘Oh, Harcourt had long ago guessed the truth about Davy’s real parentage. He knew we lived rent-free. He saw how Meager gave Davy odd jobs of work and chose to ignore what he did when out in his boat, and anything else Davy did that might be breaking the law. And Harcourt resented it, you see?

  ‘Besides, if ever Meager had acknowledged Robert Harcourt as his child, I would have spoken up about my son. Told the world! Sir Henry might brush aside my threat to speak out, as he did when I stopped him up on the heath. But Harcourt really feared I might do it, and he didn’t fancy that one bit.’

  It was cruel reality, but I understood. Harcourt’s pride had been his downfall. It was one thing for him to boast that his true father was the squire. It wouldn’t have been the same thing to be spoken of as only the half-brother of Davy Evans, the local ne’er-do-well. Oh, Davy’s silence could be bought, no doubt. But Harcourt would pay all his life for it. He could not afford to leave Tibby and her son in the village. He had to chase them away.

  Tibby was speaking again. ‘Harcourt earned a good living from Sir Henry. He was a conscientious estate manager, I’ll give him that, so he was confident Mr Beresford, the heir, would keep him on. That should have been enough! But no, he had taken it into his head that Sir Henry should acknowledge him publicly.’ She snorted.

  ‘Tibby,’ I asked cautiously, ‘did Harcourt guess you and Davy plotted Sir Henry’s death?’

  ‘Well, he wasn’t a complete fool, was he?’ she snapped. ‘Other than in sticking to his demand that Meager admit he was his father. Even before your husband ever arrived here, and that fellow from Southampton was still poking about at the Hall making his inquiries, Harcourt spoke to Davy. He said, “I know you and your mother are responsible for this! If the police don’t get to the truth of it, I shall tell them so.”’ She relaxed and leaned back, setting the rocking of the chair in motion again. ‘Harcourt was a threat to Davy. He had to be removed.’

  It was how she saw it; and I knew I couldn’t shake her belief that what she’d done was in some terrible, twisted way, right. But I might break through that wall of self-justification in another way.

  ‘Tibby,’ I said, staring at her in dismay. ‘Don’t you realise Davy will hang for his part in all this?’

  She shook her head. ‘Davy is safe away. You won’t catch him. He will be in France by now.’

  I was so exasperated at my inability to pierce the armour of complacency she had clothed herself in that I seethed with frustration. Somehow, in some way, I would pierce that shield.

  ‘What of that ghastly bonfire? Whoever planned that awful act of desecration, it was designed to drive the Beresfords from Oakwood House. You thought that, when the inheritance was settled, they would move to the Hall; and you did not want any of that family living in the Hall. The body being stored in the icehouse made it easy. Davy is responsible for the bonfire and taking the corpse from the coffin. It was you who left the roses and fan on the piano, to frighten Mrs Beresford, not to do something nice for her. But Mr Beresford has told my husband that he and his wife have no intention of living at the Hall. They will rent out the house to a tenant. So you see, what you did in the matter of the roses and the fan was not only cruel, it was unnecessary.’

  Tibby looked sulky and sat in silence. It was broken, not by her, but by her sister who spoke from her place at the window.

  ‘He has come here.’

  ‘Mr Beresford?’ I asked, surprised.

  Cora turned from the window. ‘No, your husband.’

  I had been so intent on listening to Tibby’s tale that I had paid no attention to the noise of wheels and hooves outside. But now I heard the heavy thump of men’s feet approaching, and there was a thunderous knock on the door.

  Cora went to open it. I saw Ben standing at the threshold and, behind him, Hughes from Southampton.

  ‘What are you doing here, Lizzie?’ Ben asked in surprise.

  I looked at Tibby. She nodded and ordered sourly, ‘Tell him!’

  ‘Miss Tabitha Dawlish,’ I said to Ben, ‘is, in reality, Mrs Evans, née Dawlish. The marriage to Isaac Evans is recorded in the register of the church here. I found it earlier today. Davy is her son and his father was Sir Henry Meager. Meager paid Evans to marry her.’

  Ben looked towards Tibby. ‘Is this so?’

  ‘You may read it for yourself in the register, as she told you,’ said Tibby. ‘She is a good detective, your wife. And if you want to know who killed Meager, then I did. I have told your wife so, and now I tell you.’

  Ben looked at me again. ‘So she says,’ I told him. ‘I am not certain myself that she’s telling the truth. I think she wants to save her son from the gallows.’

  Tibby spoke again and this time there was a note of triumph in her voice. ‘You will not find Davy. You can do as you wish with me. I have little time left and will not live long enough to hang.’

  Hughes spoke unexpectedly, his soft Welsh tones striking a new note in the room. ‘We have found your son.’

  Tibby’s face drained of colour. ‘No! You’re lying! Davy is safe away in his boat.’

  ‘We are not lying, Miss Da
wlish, or Mrs Evans, as you please.’ There was a note of resignation in Ben’s voice as he confirmed what Hughes had said. My heart sank.

  ‘The fog thickened at night out at sea and early today a packet ship out from St Malo ran down a sailing boat they hadn’t seen in time and couldn’t avoid. They realised what had happened and made out the figure of a man clinging to the hull. They managed to get him out of the water and aboard their vessel but, despite their efforts to revive him, by the time they reached Southampton he had died. The body is in the morgue at Southampton. I have seen it there and I recognised your son. We have come here today to ask you to come with us to Southampton to confirm the identification…’

  ‘No!’ Tibby leaped up from the chair with a dreadful screech. The chair began to rock violently behind her as if it, too, rejected Ben’s news. ‘You lie, truth-seeker! Davy knows the waters hereabouts! He has crossed the Channel before! He has reached France!’

  ‘No, Mrs Evans, he did not. Please, come with us now. I do not know exactly what you have told Mrs Ross, but you have not made any confession to me. Please do not repeat it now, as in the light of what you will find at the morgue, you may wish to withdraw—’

  He broke off as Tibby drew a strange ragged breath, making a sound that was not quite human nor animal. It resembled the desolate cry of the wind moaning through a gap in the eaves on a stormy night. She leaned forward and seemed to somehow shrink into herself, but then pushed herself upright in a desperate effort. It would be her last. She staggered forward and collapsed at the same time.

  Cora cried, ‘Tibby!’ and ran forward to catch her sister. With Tibby clasped in her hands, Cora gasped, ‘It is her heart! Dr Wilson told her it would be her heart…’

  Chapter Nineteen

  Elizabeth Martin Ross

  ‘Sometimes,’ I said to Ben, ‘when people talk about right and wrong, they make it sound so simple. In reality it’s a complicated thing. Take Isaac Evans. He took money to marry Tibby Dawlish. That meant Tibby and her child were saved from the stigma of illegitimacy. But then he deserted her. He could have argued that he’d abided by the deal he had made with Sir Henry Meager. On the other hand he had not abided by the deal he’d made in the church with Tibby before God. Yet he sent Tibby a purse of a few shillings from time to time. She remembered him kindly.’

  We were back in London and seated in our cosy little house, after supper. It was so good to be home.

  ‘You are a romantic,’ said Ben bluntly. ‘I’m a police officer and I’m not swayed by Tibby’s kindly thoughts of the absent Evans. I could put to you a different version. In sending his wife a few shillings from time to time, Evans avoided a charge of deserting and failing to support his family.’

  ‘You are telling me the law would have gone searching high and low to find an itinerant labourer?’ I argued.

  ‘I don’t know, because the matter didn’t arise. A police officer deals in facts.’

  Ben was sounding obstinate and I’d get nowhere with my argument, or worse, I’d end up defending Tibby’s taking of what she thought of as Justice into her own hands. ‘Did anyone ever find the wire that was tied across the path to bring down Harcourt’s horse?’

  ‘Now that’s a curious thing,’ said Ben. ‘There is a pond upon the heath behind the village.’

  ‘I know it,’ I said. ‘I met Cora Dawlish nearby.’

  ‘Well, Hughes has informed me that recent hot weather caused the water to sink to a very low level and various items were recovered from the mud. They included a tangle of wire. It was known the police wanted to find any abandoned wire, so it was reported. That doesn’t mean it was the wire tied across the path. But it’s a possibility. It might suggest that Tibby Dawlish or Evans, as you please, was hiding in the bushes by the path waiting for Harcourt to ride through, and scurried out to remove the wire after Harcourt was thrown from his horse. Or that Davy removed the wire, and passed it to his mother to take away before he ran out to announce he’d found the body.’

  ‘It is very annoying,’ I said after thinking about this, ‘not to be able to prove everything.’

  ‘Often we are lucky to prove anything!’ Ben smiled. ‘I do enjoy a lively discussion with you concerning police work, Lizzie.’

  ‘Superintendent Dunn wouldn’t approve,’ I said. ‘You need women in the police force. I’ve told Mr Dunn so.’

  ‘He hasn’t forgotten. Ever since you told him that, Dunn has feared that female influence will find its way into the workings of Scotland Yard. However, I do know he has much respect for you, my dear.’

  ‘Don’t butter your words,’ I told him. ‘I know you fear it as much as he does.’

  ‘I wouldn’t dare to argue. Am I going to walk into my office one day and find you sitting at my desk?’

  ‘No, not me. But one day, some other woman will sit at that desk!’

  There was a pause. ‘Meager must have been an odd fellow,’ said Ben, wisely changing the subject. ‘He doesn’t appear to have had much to recommend his character in so many ways, yet he took steps to support his illegitimate children, Harcourt and Davy Evans. Possibly even the girl, Susan Bate, for whom he did the best he could. It is unfortunate that he did not treat the two sons he fathered out of wedlock more evenly. In that, I fancy, he was influenced by Robert’s mother being an “old flame”, shall we say?’

  I added, ‘But Davy was only a servant’s child, not that of an old love. Besides, she reminded Meager of the wife he’d treated so unkindly. Little wonder Davy grew up to resent the difference deeply. His resentment was fanned by what his mother told him. Mother and son both longed for vengeance.’

  Ben nodded. ‘That was where Harcourt made his big mistake. He should not have threatened them with expulsion from their cottage and informing on Davy’s illegal activities.’

  Struck by a thought, I asked, ‘What will happen to Susan Bate now? If the Beresfords don’t move into the Hall, a new tenant might not want to employ Susan.’

  ‘I can give you news of Susan,’ Ben told me. ‘Hughes wrote to tell me she is now working for Mrs Garvey at the Acorn Inn. Mrs Garvey is a kind woman and will look after her.’

  Ben looked thoughtful. ‘With the best will in the world, one makes mistakes. When I first met the assembled staff in the kitchen of the Hall, they were all clearly very distressed. But Warton, the butler, seemed out of his mind, ranting about the end of the world and the scarlet woman… quoting other bits of the Book of Revelations as well. The cook told him to be quiet. I thought, at the time, she was embarrassed at his performance and the loss of dignity. But I fancy now Warton saw what had happened as a judgment on Sir Henry’s life. Sir Henry had sinned in the ways of the flesh and now he’d been punished. The cook was worried Warton might start spilling out all the family’s murkier secrets. She wanted to defend the reputation of her late employer; and told him pretty sharply to stop. My error was in not taking Warton’s claims seriously. Then, of course, the wretched Lynn fainted, and Warton was forgotten.’

  He sighed. ‘A little later Warton stopped his ranting and followed me. He waited in the entrance hall to see if he could speak to me. But I was anxious to hear what Harcourt had to say, and I ignored the poor old fellow.’

  ‘The family portraits told a story, too,’ I mused. ‘Did you really not see a likeness to Harcourt in the portraits of Captain Sir Hector Meager?’

  Ben smiled. ‘And did you, Lizzie, not see a likeness to Davy Evans, especially in the early portrait of Hector Meager, with the sea in the background?’

  ‘I didn’t give Davy a thought in that respect,’ I had to confess. ‘Perhaps Davy also inherited his skill as a sailor from his grandfather?’

  ‘Perhaps. However skilful he was, trying to reach France was a desperate throw of the dice. The Channel crossing at that point is probably the widest. Given fair weather and daylight conditions, it would still have taken him hours. He set sail at night, with the fog gathering. That was foolhardy in the extreme, but he had left himself no other
option.’ Ben gestured widely with his arm and fell silent.

  I wasn’t yet ready to give up my pity for Evans. ‘I can’t think kindly of Davy,’ I said. ‘But I don’t like to think of the moment he saw the larger shape of the packet boat loom up out of the mist and tower above his little sailing boat.’

  ‘He probably heard it before he saw it,’ Ben replied. ‘The packet boat is steam-driven and the sound of its engines would have travelled through the murk. But Evans couldn’t be certain exactly where it was, or manoeuvre fast enough to avoid the danger, when it did appear, like a phantom ship in legend.’ Perhaps Ben did not want to be thought fanciful, because he added briskly, ‘If you want to feel sorry for someone, why not pity Robert Harcourt, one of those Davy and his dreadful mother conspired to murder? Rightly or wrongly, Harcourt believed himself Meager’s son. For myself, I’m inclined to believe he was. If you think of Davy, you now think of him facing death on the sea. If I think of Harcourt, I remember my first sight of him, standing on the steps of the Hall, looking for all the world like its owner, not the estate manager. Also, I remember him laid out dead in that small back bedroom. And all, really, because he wanted to be acknowledged as a gentleman’s son. I can’t say I’ve ever felt any such ambition. I’m a collier’s son and proud of it.’

  ‘And Cora Dawlish? What will happen to her?’ I asked.

  ‘She has not been charged with anything. She may have known what her sister intended, but she has withdrawn any sort of admission she made to you. She now says she was only teasing you when she prophesied you would bring death.

  ‘The sisters’ cottage was searched by Hughes’s men in the vain hope of finding some evidence of what Tibby planned. But Cora Dawlish had made sure there was nothing to find, before Hughes got there. There were scraps of burned paper in the grate. Little could be made of them. They might have formed a diary. Even so, if Tibby had made any mention of her plans in it, well, it had gone up in smoke.’