Murder Most Historical: A Collection of Short Mysteries

by Ashley Gardner

  I wrote a brief letter to the coachman who was John’s cousin, addressed it in care of the banker in Dorset, and took it out to post.

  Night had fallen. Streetlamps outside Sir Lionel’s had been lit, and Portman Square teemed with people. London never really slept.

  It was too late for the errand I truly wanted to run, so I began a brisk walk to a boardinghouse I’d lodged in before. Not the best, and the cook was deplorable, but needs must.

  I had reached Oxford Street when I saw him.

  Traffic blocked me from crossing, so I turned aside to buy a bun from a vendor. A little way behind me, a few well-dressed ladies and gentlemen were coming out of a large house and ascending into a coach.

  One of the gentlemen was Daniel.

  Chapter Eight

  I was so astonished, I froze, the warm bun halfway to my lips.

  Gone was the rather shabbily dressed man with heavy gloves and mud-splotched boots who argued in a good-natured way with his son. This gentleman wore a dark, well-tailored suit, which was clean and whole—in fact, it looked costly.

  Creased trousers covered shining boots, and his overcoat against the evening chill fit him perfectly, made for him. A neatly tied cravat and a gold watch chain in his waistcoat completed the gentleman’s ensemble.

  Daniel’s hair, instead of being its usual unruly mop, was slicked to flow behind his ears. He paused on the doorstep to set a tall silk hat on his head.

  This couldn’t be Daniel McAdam, could it? My Daniel?

  My first inclination was to dart forward and look this person in the face. And if it were Daniel, ask him what the devil he meant by it.

  I almost did. I hastily checked my steps, however, when I saw a woman emerge from the house and take his arm.

  She was obviously a highborn lady. Her gown spoke of elegance and refinement, silk and lace, with a glitter of diamonds at her throat. Not a courtesan, I thought. While courtesans could dress as finely as any lady, this gown was demure while also being highly fashionable.

  A sister, I reassured myself quickly. Or a cousin. Something innocent. But the way Daniel handed the woman into the coach told me differently. He held her hand longer than was polite, helped her inside with a touch on her waist that lingered.

  A sister might laugh at his care. This lady turned and gave Daniel such a warm smile that I nearly dropped my hunk of bread.

  Daniel glanced around him, scanning the street in a surreptitious manner, as I’d often seen him do—assessing the lay of the land.

  That glance clinched the matter. He was Daniel, and not simply a man who resembled him. His clothes were different, but his mannerisms, the look, the way he moved—Daniel.

  As his gaze roved the street, I ducked back from the streetlight, earning me a growl from a passerby I nearly trod on. I begged his pardon and pushed myself into the shadows of a house, where the gaslight didn’t reach.

  I could scarcely breathe. Daniel finished scrutinizing the street and climbed up into the coach with the lady. The other lady and gentleman who’d come out of the house had entered the carriage as I’d watched Daniel. A footman from the house shut the door and signaled the coachman to go.

  My heart was like stone as the carriage creaked away. I handed the uneaten bun to a beggar, drew my jacket about me, and walked on.

  ***

  The landlady at my old boardinghouse let me have a small room at the top of the house. It was cramped and cold, and I grew nostalgic for my cubbyhole behind the kitchen fireplace at Sir Lionel’s.

  It was not only the cold that kept me awake. I saw Daniel over and over in my mind, setting his fashionable hat on his head and touching the lady’s back as he handed her into the carriage.

  He’d been comfortable in those clothes, as comfortable as he was in his rough trousers and worn knee boots. He knew how to wear a gentleman’s suit without awkwardness, and the lady with him seemed to find nothing amiss

  Which was the real Daniel?

  Or had I been mistaken? Daylight had been waning, gas lamps throwing a harsh glare on the street. Perhaps I had spied a man who had greatly resembled Daniel … down to the turn of his head, the flick of his eyes, his way of looking about as though memorizing everything in sight.

  The logical way to resolve the issue was to return to the house at Oxford Street, knock on the door, and demand to know if Daniel had been there last night. I had a good excuse to go to the house—I was a cook looking for a new position. Cooks didn’t generally walk the streets knocking on doors, but it could happen. I would ask the domestics there about the household, perhaps make friends with their current cook, and discover what was what.

  Another logical course was to ask Daniel point blank. That is, if I ever saw the man again and could strike up the courage to question him. I might not like the answers.

  Or I could forget about Daniel altogether, visit my agency, find another place, and resolve to speak to him no more.

  None of the scenarios satisfied me. I rose in the morning, cross and sandy-eyed, nibbled at the breakfast of undercooked bacon, overdone eggs, half-burned toast, and ice-hard butter, and went out. I wended my way back to Portman Square and Sir Lionel’s, where all was quiet, to fetch my box.

  I made certain that the kitchen and my room had been put to rights—when Sir Lionel’s heir took possession of the house I didn’t want him blaming the previous staff for anything untoward. I’d need help shoving my trunk up the stairs outside, so I put on my hat with the feathers and black ribbon, and went out to ask the neighbor’s boot boy to assist me.

  I found James sitting on the scullery stairs. “Morning, Mrs. Holloway,” he sang out.

  I jumped. “James,” I said, hand on my heart. “Good heavens, you should not do that.”

  “Sorry, missus.”

  I felt awkward speaking to him now. Did James know? Were James and his father deceiving me together, or did Daniel keep his own son in the dark as to whoever he truly was?

  “No matter,” I said. “You’re just the lad. Can you help me with my box? I have a cart on the way …”

  A cart pulled up in the street at that moment, and Daniel climbed down from it, his feet in scuffed boots landing outside the railings above me. I gulped and hastened back into the kitchen, not ready to encounter him just yet.

  Daniel came ruthlessly inside. James darted past him to begin shoving my large, square trunk across the flagstones, but Daniel stood in the middle of the kitchen, his soft cap crumpled in his hand. His hair was its usual rumpled mess, his boots muddy, his loose neck cloth letting me glimpse a sliver of chest.

  This was Daniel McAdam. The worker, unashamed of doing manual labor for a living. I had to have been mistaken about the other.

  Daniel’s good-natured expression was in place, as though he’d spent the night doing nothing more than drinking ale with his fellow delivery men in a public house.

  “I thought you’d be agog to know what I learned from my chemist,” he was saying.

  I’d forgotten about the blasted chemist, and I was curious, drat him. “Did he discover what was in the sugar caster?”

  “He did,” Daniel said readily. “Nothing but sugar.”

  “Oh.” I blinked, my thoughts rearranging themselves. “Then what was it doing in the plant pot? And why did Mrs. Watkins swear up and down that the caster hadn’t been on the table at all?”

  Daniel’s gaze sharpened. “Mrs. Watkins, the housekeeper? When did she say this?”

  “Yesterday afternoon, when I went to call on her. She’s staying with her sister, Mrs. Herbert, who runs a boardinghouse. I believe I told you about the sister in Pimlico.”

  “And you went there to confront her alone?” Daniel’s look was narrow and so angry that I blinked. “Without a word to me?”

  “I left you a note.” I pointed to the table, where the note had lain, though I’d put it on the fire this morning, no longer needed.

  “You should not have gone alone,” Daniel said sternly, his tone unforgiving. “Y
ou should have told me and had me come with you.”

  “To a ladies’ boardinghouse?” I asked, my eyes widening. “They wouldn’t have let you in. Besides, you had business of your own last night, did you not?”

  Was it my imagination, or did he start? “I could have put any business off. This is important.”

  I had been avoiding looking straight at him, but now I lifted my chin and met his gaze.

  “What was your business last evening?” I asked. “Did it take you to Oxford Street?”

  Daniel focused hard on me as he went more still than I thought a human being could become. Everything affable about him fell away, and I was left looking at a man I did not know.

  James and the neighbor’s boot boy were pushing my box up the outside stairs—thump, bump—bantering with each other, laughing. Inside the kitchen, all was silence.

  Daniel studied me with a gaze I could not read. No more warmth and helpful friendliness in his eyes, no more clever delivery man trying to find out who’d killed Sir Lionel. He was not even the cool gentleman I’d spied last night in Oxford Street. Daniel stood upright like a blade and looked as deadly.

  “Then I did see you,” I said softly.

  His one, short nod lanced my heart. A rich gentleman did not pretend to be a poor one without ulterior reason—nor the other way around. Not very good reasons, either.

  “The lady,” I said, wanting to know the worst. “She is your wife?”

  A shake of the head, as perfunctory as the nod. “No.”

  “Affianced?”

  Daniel waited a bit before the next shake of head.

  “Lover? I must admit, Mr. McAdam, I am quite curious.”

  “I know you are.” His words were quiet, as were his eyes. “Mrs. Holloway, I have done you a great disservice.”

  He hadn’t answered my last question. The knife in my heart twisted. “How so?” I asked. “By lying about who you truly are? I have known others who have done the same thing.” The father of my daughter, for instance.

  “I know.”

  It took a moment for me to comprehend those two simple words. I know. My beloved hat felt too tight on my head.

  “What on earth do you mean by that?” I snapped. “You know what?”

  Daniel’s expression didn’t change. “I know that the man who married you already had a living wife. That he abandoned you and left you to face the world alone, with a child. That you fought hard to gain the position you have. That you’re a bloody good cook.” The corners of his lips twitched as he said this last, but I’d never warm to his smile again.

  “And yet,” I said. “I know nothing about you.”

  “That is something I cannot remedy. Not yet. I regret that, Mrs. Holloway, believe me.”

  I noted that he no longer addressed me as Kat. “Well, I don’t believe you. I was a fool ever to believe in you.” I stopped the tears in my voice and cleared my throat. “Thank you for releasing me from prison, Mr. McAdam—or whatever your name is. Now, I must get on. I have to find another place so I may earn my keep, and my daughter’s. Good day to you.”

  “I have already found another place for you.”

  I stopped in the act of pulling on a glove. “I beg your pardon?”

  Daniel took a step toward me, cool and efficient. “The Earl of Clarendon, in Berkeley Square, needs a cook, one with excellent skills. You may start there anytime you wish.”

  Anger boiled through me, stronger than I’d felt in a very long time. How dare he? Daniel had caused me to make an idiot of myself, and now he sought to repair the damage by sending me off to the home of ... who? One of his dear friends? His relations?

  “No, thank you,” I said coldly. “I will go to my agency and see what is on their books. As is proper. Good day, Mr. McAdam.”

  “Kat, you need to take the position,” Daniel said, his voice unyielding. “That and no other.”

  I thunked my small handbag onto the table. “Why? You tell me right now, Daniel. Why should I believe a word you say?”

  His eyes flickered. “Because you will be safe there.”

  “Safe? From whom?”

  “From those who wish you harm because of me.” Every word was as hard as stones. “Sir Lionel died because of me. I did not kill him, but I caused his death. That is why I knew you never killed him—stabbed, poisoned, or otherwise, no matter what he’d done. When I learned he’d made advances to you, I warned him off and ensured that James or I watched you at all times. That is another reason I know you did not kill him—James or I would have seen.”

  I struggled for breath. “What are you talking about? You warned him off? What have you to do with Sir Lionel Leigh-Blasted-Bradbury?”

  “Kat, believe me, I wish I could unburden myself to you, but I cannot. Not because I do not trust you, but because it wouldn’t be safe for you. Or your daughter. Suffice it to say Sir Lionel mixed with people he should not have. In exchange for him continuing to live a free man, he was to tell me of all interactions he had with these people and the information they imparted to him. I believe that somehow, they got wind of what he was doing, and killed him.”

  “By poisoning my dinner?”

  “By poisoning him somehow. I thought Mrs. Fuller had done so, making herself sick as a blind. But she was genuinely distressed and confused and grieving for her husband. I don’t believe now she knew what dealings her husband had. The sugar caster ... I admit I have no idea how that fits in.”

  “I see.” I said the words, but I saw nothing. I only knew that I had been made to think one way, when events had been something else entirely.

  I could blame Daniel for deceiving me, but I mostly blamed myself. I’d been flattered by his attentions and preened myself because the handsome Daniel had interest in me.

  “I thank you for explaining,” I said, finishing drawing on my gloves. “I shall be boarding at Handley House in King Street, Covent Garden, if I can help you further in the matter of Sir Lionel. Good morning.”

  Daniel stepped in front of me. “I wish you to take the post in Berkeley Square.”

  His tone was firm, but I was tired of being told what to do. “No, thank you,” I said. “I will find another position soon. I will send you word—somehow—of where if it will make you feel better.”

  I marched around him, straightening my hat as I went, and this time Daniel did not try to prevent me.

  I went up the stairs without looking back, and to the street. I told James where I needed the trunk to be sent, and made my way to catch a hansom cab to take me to my boardinghouse.

  After settling myself in there, I paid a visit to my daughter.

  Chapter Nine

  Once my so-called husband had vanished into the mists, and it became clear that I had never been legally married, I knew I’d have to work hard or my child would starve. Because I was unlikely to find a post as a disgraced woman with an illegitimate offspring in tow, I called myself by my maiden name—appending “Mrs.” to it—and found a family who would foster my daughter.

  The woman who took her in had been a friend to me since childhood. She’d been a kindly girl and was now a kindly woman. Her husband was good-natured and liked children, so my Grace lived with them and their four offspring in their tiny house and seemed to be happy.

  Grace was never formal with me and unashamedly ran to throw her arms around me when I arrived. At ten years old, she was a beauty and possessed an understanding beyond her years. Grace did not resent the fact that I could not have her living with me where I cooked. She understood that we had to make our way in the world the best we could. One day, she said, she’d do the work and look after me.

  I took her to walk with me in Hyde Park—our treat, after ices from a vendor. “Is everything all right, Mama?” she asked, slipping her hand in mine. Grace was always able to sense my moods.

  I had not told my daughter about the horror of being arrested and imprisoned. I’d told my friend who looked after Grace but she’d agreed it wise not to mention it
to the children, bless her.

  “I am sad and confused, Grace,” I said. “That is all.”

  “Because of the murder in Sir Lionel’s house?”

  So, she at least knew about that. Well, it is difficult to keep sensational news from a child, no matter how sheltered.

  I admitted as much. “I will have to find another place. I’m not sure where it will be.”

  “I know you didn’t poison anyone with your cooking, Mama,” Grace said. “It must have been someone else.”

  “Yes, indeed. The puzzling thing is how.” I pondered, forgetting to be cautious. “The arsenic was in no dish of mine. Mrs. Fuller said there was sugar; Mrs. Watkins says there was none. The sugar in the caster was tested—it was only sugar.”

  “Perhaps the caster was replaced with another,” Grace said. “Afterward.”

  “An intriguing idea.” I tapped my lower lip. “But why put the one with only sugar in the plant pot?”

  “They meant to retrieve it later?” Grace, with her pointed face and fine hair, looked nothing more than a sweet-tempered child, but I knew what a quick mind her young face hid. “They meant to switch it for the clean one, but were interrupted. They didn’t have time to fetch it out of the plant.”

  “Hm. A line I will have to investigate, I think.”

  “Will you tell me? If I’m right, will you tell me what happens?”

  I squeezed her hand. “Of course I will.”

  We walked back to the omnibus and returned to my friend’s home. My visit to Grace had lightened my heart. I never mentioned Daniel during this visit, and as I left my daughter, I realized he didn’t matter. As long as I had Grace in my life, the attentions of deceitful gentlemen were of no moment to me.

  I could not keep my thoughts entirely from Daniel, unfortunately, try as I might. As I made my way back to the boardinghouse, I wondered anew who was the lady in Oxford Street, the one he’d claimed was not his wife. Was she another person Daniel was deceiving? Or was he watching her, as he’d done with Sir Lionel?

  He’d said Sir Lionel had been meeting with certain people and reporting what they told him to Daniel, in exchange for Daniel ... doing what? Not telling the police Sir Lionel was spying, or plotting crimes, or whatever it was? Who were these bad people Daniel feared would hurt me? Or was Daniel the bad person, and whoever Sir Lionel had been in league with were on the side of good?