The Ghosts of Ardenthwaite (The Northminster Mysteries Book 5)

by Harriet Smart

“Now, I know this is difficult for you, ma’am,” Giles said, “and you have already given your account to Captain Lazenby, but could you bear to tell me again what happened? When was the last time you saw him?”

  “Just after luncheon yesterday. I went up to the schoolroom to speak to him.”

  “About what?”

  “Just to remind him to keep his journal up to date. He keeps it while his father is away, travelling about the diocese – it is so that he can see all has been well when he returns.”

  “So, just a simple reminder?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You didn’t scold him over it?” Giles said.

  “No, no, of course not.”

  “Forgive me, ma’am, it sounds like the sort of thing my mother might have scolded me over when I was that age.”

  “No, I went to remind him because I had forgotten to mention it to him at luncheon. The fault was mine, not Edmund’s.”

  “And after you had spoken to him you left him to his books?”

  “Yes.”

  “And his tutor was not supervising him at that point?”

  “No, Mr Cooper was with the younger children at that point, giving them their lessons downstairs.”

  “And after that you went for your walk in the gardens?”

  “Yes. For about an hour or so. There is a little summer house where I stopped for a while and read, and then I walked back.”

  “And went where?”

  “To see the children downstairs. To hear them say their lessons. And at four we generally take tea. That was when Edmund did not come down. So I sent Fred to fetch for him – that is my second-eldest boy.”

  “And Fred came back without Edmund?”

  “Yes. He said he could not find him in his room or the schoolroom. And that was when I began to worry a little.”

  “Because that was quite uncharacteristic of him?”

  “Yes,” said Mrs Hughes. “He is a good boy, very diligent, and it was odd that he was not there.”

  “And you would expect he was hungry and would want some tea, I suppose?” Giles said.

  “Yes, yes, there is that,” she said. “But mostly it is because we are very orderly here, Major Vernon. Things happen at their appointed hour, and we all like it that way.” She gave a sigh. “And half an hour passed and he still did not appear. And so I asked one of the servants to see if he had seen him about – but there was nothing. I cannot tell you any more, Major Vernon. He had simply gone. It is as if he were stolen away.”

  “I doubt that very much, ma’am. When people vanish, it is most often through their own volition.”

  “But Edmund would not do such a thing. He had no need to run away or any such nonsense. He was taken, sir, I am sure of it!”

  -o-

  “Are you doubting Mrs Hughes’ word, Major Vernon?” said Lazenby when they left the drawing room.

  “No, of course not,” Major Vernon. “Just her reading of events. It’s hard for her to imagine her son might have been rebellious enough to abscond. And what is more likely, do you think, sir, that the boy has run off somewhere or that he has been abducted by some nefarious individuals for reasons unknown?”

  “But there was that case in London – Mrs Hughes actually reminded me of it – where two boys were taken from their beds and sold into degradation.”

  “Yes, I remember that case,” said Major Vernon. “And you will forgive me, sir, but that was wrongly reported. I think it was put about in an evangelical pamphlet to promote the suppression of vice. A worthy cause, of course, but the facts were mistakenly presented. Those boys ran away to escape a violent stepfather and were reduced to selling themselves for bread. There was no abduction, and I doubt it very much in this case.”

  “That pamphlet was written by the Dean of Hornchurch,” said Lazenby.

  “Yes, sir, and he was, no doubt, wrongly informed. I shall not say he elaborated the story for effect, though I think the story was bad enough in the first place.”

  “So you do not find the idea of an abduction plausible at all?”

  “Not at this stage. All we know is that the boy has gone. Why and where and how, that is all to be determined. Captain Lazenby, if you wish me to work on this case, you must allow me to do it in my way.”

  “Yes, of course,” said Lazenby. “I only hope you will consider Mrs Hughes’ feelings, Major Vernon. She is such a good woman.”

  This was too much for Felix. Lazenby’s tone had been needling him.

  “I think you may be sure that the Major will show proper consideration for any woman, whatever her rank,” he said.

  Major Vernon smiled briefly at that, and said, “I want to look over his room. Mr Carswell, shall we go up?”

  A footman took them to Edmund’s room, which was located in a remote corner of the palace. It was a north facing attic adjoining his schoolroom and overlooking what seemed to be the kitchen wing.

  “I should like to speak to Mr Cooper, the tutor,” said Major Vernon. “Could you find him for me and send him up here?”

  “Certainly, sir.”

  “So,” said Major Vernon, when they were alone. “Edmund apparently vanishes into thin air from here. No one saw him leave, no one heard anything. It is very odd.”

  “If you assume they are telling the truth.”

  “Quite; we shall have to talk to the servants,” Major Vernon said looking around him. “I would imagine, all things considered, he has run off.”

  “From this house, yes, I would,” said Felix. “No plum pudding and no novels.”

  “And being kept at home with a tutor, with no friends of his own age. Tom might know where he has gone,” said Major Vernon examining the bookshelves. “A dry diet.” He turned to the writing table.

  “I met him,” said Felix. “He was with Tom and Celia, and they were playing with the rats, and then his tutor came and carried him off. He seems to have had very little leisure time.”

  “Perhaps Tom has stoked the fires of rebellion in him,” said Major Vernon. “That isn’t going to help matters, is it? Let us hope for everyone’s sake that Edmund gets hungry and comes home soon. We have got better things to be doing at this moment than chasing after fifteen-year-old boys. This must be the journal,” he said picking up the notebook on the table. He flicked through it and grimaced.

  “Nothing of interest?”

  “Just a record of his lessons.”

  At this moment, Mr Cooper the tutor came in. A pale, underfed young man in clerical dress, he stood nervously in the doorway.

  “You wanted to see me, sir?”

  “Yes, Mr Cooper. Please tell us what you think has happened here.”

  “Well, as Mrs Hughes says, I think he must have been abducted. Otherwise I cannot account for it.”

  “You don’t think he could have run off, as boys of that age sometimes do?”

  “Edmund would not have run away, I am sure of that.”

  “Why?”

  “He is a good, obedient boy, and he would not do anything to hurt his mother and father. Running off would not have occurred to him. Why would he?”

  “He did not seem unhappy in any way?” Felix asked. “Sometimes young men conceal a burden of distress from those closest to them.”

  “No,” said Mr Cooper.

  “And he is never difficult or disobedient?” said Major Vernon.

  “No. He is a model pupil. Very diligent and intelligent. There is no reason for his disappearance other than some evil hand at work.”

  “But you heard or saw nothing that would support that theory, Mr Cooper?”

  “No. I was in the other schoolroom downstairs with the other children. I saw nothing.”

  “But you agree with your employer?”

  “Of course, sir – who would know a son better than a mother?”

  “They are close?”

  “As I said, he is devoted to his parents. This is a loving, harmonious household. It is full of the spirit of God’s love.”


  “I believe you had to come and fetch Edmund from Canon Fforde’s house the other day,” Major Vernon went on. “Presumably he had absented himself from his lessons without your permission?”

  “No. He was simply late coming back so I went and fetched him. I suppose he lost track of the time. That is rare with him.”

  “Tempted away by fancy rats,” said Major Vernon.

  “I’m sorry, sir?”

  “My niece was showing him her fancy rats,” said Major Vernon.

  “Then he was being polite in not leaving when he should. That’s all.”

  “Goodness. So you have no complaints at all about your charge, Mr Cooper?”

  “Why would I, Major Vernon? As I have said, Edmund was –”

  “Yes, thank you Mr Cooper,” said Major Vernon. “That will be all.”

  The tutor left.

  Felix glanced at Major Vernon. It was not like him to be so peremptory. Major Vernon went to the window and looked out.

  “You think he is lying,” said Felix after a moment.

  “Can a fifteen-year-old boy really be such a saint?” said Major Vernon. “It was as if Edmund’s reputation as a good boy was all that mattered to him. Not that he might be in danger or distress, or plain miserable. The mother was the same. It’s interesting, don’t you think?”

  “What is it that you think has happened?”

  “I’ve no idea, but I find it uncommonly odd how Mr Cooper is parroting his employer’s theory of an abduction.”

  “I suppose he has too much to lose by offending her.”

  “Quite – given how many fat livings her husband has in his pocket. He must dream of preferment.”

  “And a decent dinner,” said Felix. “He looked half-starved.”

  “Let’s hope that the servants are more honest,” said Major Vernon, pushing up the sash. “What build is Edmund?”

  “Skinny and smaller than Tom,” said Felix. “Why?”

  “Might he have managed to climb out of here?”

  Felix joined him at the window. “And out into the gardens?”

  “Would you have risked it?” Felix said, looking out.

  “At that age, yes, but if he is a paragon, then it is a moot point. But it is a possible means of exit, which would not have been noticed by anyone.”

  “It does look as if some of the moss has been knocked off. Look there, at those patches on the sill, where the stone is a different colour. It’s not conclusive, but it does suggest someone might have gone out that way.”

  “We’ll have a look at this from outside,” said Major Vernon.

  -o-

  They found their way out into the gardens, and managed to identify the section of the building containing the window to the boy’s room.

  “Small and slight, you said?” Giles, said looking up. “He could easily have managed that. The downpipe is very well placed.”

  “Not to be undertaken lightly, though,” said Carswell. “Hardly a soft landing,” he added, pointing to the cobbled paving that edged the building. “He could easily have sprained his ankle, or worse.” He crouched down. “There is some disarrangement of moss here too, as a matter of fact.”

  “Just right if he went down that downpipe,” said Giles.

  “If he came down in a hurry, he might have kicked it to one side on landing,” said Carswell. “But then we may be seeing what we want to see.”

  “Yes. After all, I would certainly prefer that he was a normal boy in search of amusement and adventure,” said Giles, “than the victim of a frankly implausible abduction plot. Humour me a little longer, Mr Carswell. Let’s suppose he did escape down here. Where would he go next? What is his objective?”

  “He wouldn’t go back towards the house, because he might be seen,” Carswell said. “If I were him I would head off into the parkland, and into town the back way, over the wooden bridge by the racecourse.”

  “That is what I would have done too,” said Giles. “Shall we?”

  So they headed into the gardens, through a dense area of shrubbery which seemed to have been planted to conceal the back of the house from open view, and then turned onto a broad path which gave a fine prospect of all the park.

  “That must be the little summer house where Mrs Hughes stopped to read,” Giles said, pointing out the temple-like structure in the distance. “Perhaps he went to see her.”

  “Then why climb out the window?” said Carswell.

  “Because he was locked in his room?” said Giles. “There was a good lock on that door. Perhaps Mr Cooper and he quarrelled. Mr Cooper locked him in as a punishment and he wanted to appeal to his mother against the injustice of it. That might send him out here, don’t you think?”

  “In theory, sir, yes,” said Carswell. “But this is all theory.”

  “It is less than theory, it is more like fancy,” said Giles, looking around him, scanning the landscape. “For nothing here explains his vanishing into thin air. A little kicked moss explains nothing. And who am I, after all, to doubt the word of a Bishop’s wife?”

  -o-

  “Did he say anything to you in confidence?” Giles asked.

  “What’s happened to him?” said Tom.

  “We don’t know. I’m clutching at straws here, Tom, but he might have said something to you that can help us find him. Was there anything he said to you that made you think he was going to run away?”

  “No, but we did talk about climbing out of windows. He said he did that – climbed out of his window to come over here and see our rats. That time you were here, Mr Carswell, when he was here and his tutor came and got him? The next time I saw him he said he had done it by climbing out the window. I laughed at him because it seemed ridiculous and dangerous. I mean, it’s a couple of storeys up! He could have broken his neck. But I know fellows do that sometimes. There was a boy at school – years ago – climbed out of a window and fell and died. They are always telling us that to discourage us. You don’t think that could have happened to Hughes, do you?”

  “No,” said Carswell. “An accident like that would be – well, we would know about it, surely, sir?” he added, turning to Giles.

  “Yes, we would,” Giles said. “Let us say instead, he is adept at escaping – that is very useful, Tom. Now, was there anything else? What about family quarrels? Any scrap of gossip will do.”

  Tom considered for a moment and said, “I don’t think he was very happy. He was worried because he wasn’t saved yet, and that was all his mother and father seemed to care about, and he wanted to talk to Papa about it, whether you had to be saved, if there wasn’t another way. He didn’t want to go to Hell because he didn’t have it happen to him, the saving I mean. I don’t understand it, really, Uncle Giles, that’s why I’m glad he wanted to talk to Papa about it.”

  “Did he talk to him?”

  “I don’t think so. It was just before we went to Holbroke. He was jealous about the rook shooting too,” Tom said with a sigh. “He is going to turn up somewhere, isn’t he Uncle Giles? Can I help look for him?”

  “You are helping. Do you know where he might have gone?”

  “I wish I did. But I can’t think of anything except the window thing and the saving. Oh, and Bickley.”

  “You talked about him?”

  “He wanted to know if he was really saved. He found it hard to understand that he could be saved, because he doesn’t trust him.”

  “He has good instincts,” said Carswell.

  “When did you have this conversation?” Giles asked.

  “Just before we went to Holbroke. As I said, he wanted to go with me. Asked me if I could smuggle him in somehow – he could be my servant and I could give him three and six for waiting on me.”

  “And where did you talk?”

  “In the gardens at the Palace. It was that time we took the toast and butter – you were there, yes?” Giles nodded. “We’d arranged to meet, and after Cissie went back and we were alone he asked me if I knew what it looked it
like when a man was making love to a woman? He’d seen his mother with Bickley and he thought he was being disrespectful in some way. I said I didn’t know.” Tom went on, “I suppose if I’d seen someone like that going after Mama, I would feel pretty –”

  “Insulted?” said Carswell. “Yes, so would I.”

  “He is only a horse-dealer, after all,” said Tom. “Not a gentleman.”

  “Even if he were a gentleman, it would still be aggravating,” said Carswell.

  “Do you think that this might have something to do with his going off?” Tom asked. “Is it something to do with Bickley?”

  “I sincerely hope not,” said Giles.

  “May I help look for him?” said Tom. “There are a few places hereabout I think he might have gone, places you wouldn’t think of, perhaps. Shall I go and look?”

  “Yes, do that,” said Giles. “And if you do find him, bring him back here, in the first instance. I want to talk to him.”

  Chapter Thirty-two

  The exercise yard for the condemned prisoners at Northminster Castle was a small square, only half-illuminated by the afternoon sun. Hopkins, alias Baxter, was standing alone in the sunlit portion, his face turned up the sky, his eyes closed.

  Given the man had only ten days left of sunshine, Giles hesitated to disturb him. On returning to Constabulary headquarters he had learnt that he had been returned to Northminster to be hanged.

  “Shall I bring him in, sir?” said the guard.

  “No,” said Giles. “We will talk out here.”

  There was a bench against the wall, still in the sun. Giles sat down and after a long moment Baxter came and sat down beside him.

  “I’ve nothing to say to you,” he said. “I’ve said my piece and I will take what I deserve.”

  “I understand that, but I have news for you.”

  “What can you have to say to me that will make a difference?”

  “It’s true that I have nothing for you that can change your fate. But if you help me now, those who forced you into this place can face justice as they should.”

  Now he glanced at Giles.

  “Who do you mean?”

  “George Bickley. It was on his orders you killed that man, the man who has gone to his grave without his name, yes?”