by T. F. Banks
“Morton! It is so good of you to come. Please”-he gestured toward a door-“Mrs. Malibrant awaits. She tells me that she is an acting Bow Street Runner and has all manner of news for you.”
“I said no such thing,” Arabella protested as they entered the small withdrawing room that looked out on the garden.
“Well, perhaps you can explain better than I,” Darley said.
Morton kissed Arabella's hand, took an offered glass of port, and sank into one of Darley's comfortable chairs.
Darley raised his glass in silent salute. “We were, to be fair to Mrs. M., discussing the bit of history we witnessed whilst delivering Lucy to her new school.”
Arabella's face, slightly flushed, lit like a candle. “You will not believe it, Henry,” she said.
“You saw Bonaparte,” Morton offered.
Arabella sat back in her chair, a bit deflated.
“It's in all the papers,” Morton apologised.
“Surely even the London papers have not begun reporting all my activities,” Arabella said. It was one of the charms of her particular humour that she could say anything without a hint of a smile. People who did not know her often couldn't decide if they were to laugh.
Morton smiled. “You really saw the scoundrel?”
“Indeed we did,” Darley said. “Large as life, or small as life in the Corsican's case. He appeared on the deck of the Bellerophon in the company of Captain Maitland, I believe. There was a great row-”
“And a woman was drowned!” Arabella interjected.
Darley nodded, the quiet satisfaction that he habitually displayed dissolving into a look of utter desolation. “Yes, very sad. With her child looking on.”
Morton found himself affected by Lord Arthur's sudden show of feeling for a woman he certainly did not know. But then Darley shook it off and smiled at his guests, his eyes glistening just noticeably.
“And what will they do with him, do you think- Bonaparte?” Morton asked softly, trying gently to steer the conversation away.
Darley shrugged. “It is the subject of intense debate, I can tell you, though little more.”
“He knows more than he is saying,” Arabella stagewhispered to Morton.
Darley's playful smile returned. “If I knew half as much as you believe, my dear, I would be the bestinformed man in England.”
“The papers say that Bonaparte wants to live quietly in England.” Morton sipped his port.
Darley laughed. “Well, you can be sure that will not be allowed. No, he will be transported-somewhere remote, I think.”
“But why not imprison him here?” Arabella asked. “Would that not be the safest course?”
Darley turned to her, shifting in his chair. “Undoubtedly, but there is a small matter of English common law. You see, according to our own laws, no man, no matter his nationality, can be imprisoned without first being convicted of a crime by a court of law. And it is very doubtful that Bonaparte could be so convicted under our present laws.”
“Even though he has made war against us for twenty years?” Arabella said.
“Oddly, war is not a crime. Bonaparte was the head of a foreign state.”
“Then we can do nothing to him?” Arabella looked a little disgusted by this foolishness.
Darley held up a finger. “Ah, but that is the very centre of the debate. Bonaparte is not on English soil. Not really in England, or so His Majesty's government claims. He is, at present, subject to the law of the Admi-ralty-which is very different from the laws that govern you and me, as Mr. Morton will no doubt tell you.”
Morton leaned forward in his chair. “But I have read that some, even prominent men of law, say that the gov-ernment's argument is fallacious. That I, for instance, could arrest a man on a ship in Plymouth harbour with every expectation that he would go to trial. Various authorities claim that the government considers Plymouth Sound part of England at their convenience, but at the moment it is not convenient, so they have excluded that bit of water from our borders.”
“But the argument is even more specific than that.” Darley was clearly fascinated by this debate. “The government claims that the ships of the Royal Navy are excluded from the laws of England, whether in an English harbour or not. And certainly Mr. Morton could not go aboard the Bellerophon and arrest a man, even a murderer. The navy have their own courts and due process. And upon this fact lies the government's case.” Darley waved a hand in the general direction of Cornwall. “Bonaparte, of course, wants to be allowed ashore. He wants-I daresay, even expects-the protection of English law. But I do not think he shall have it. No, our deposed emperor shall be sent off to some remote place to live out his days under guard.”
“But can we even do that?” Morton wondered aloud. “We return prisoners of war to their country of origin once the war is concluded. Should we not do the same with Bonaparte?”
“The French don't want him. Are afraid of having him in the country, in fact. But it is an interesting argument. I should point out, however, that the war with France was already over when Bonaparte surrendered to Captain Maitland.”
“Well, if he is not a prisoner of war,” Arabella said, “then what is he?” She was clearly less interested than their host in the finer points of law.
“Exactly, my dear. What is he indeed, legally speaking? And do the Admiralty have the right to send him off to some outpost to spend the rest of his days? The security of the nation might so be served, though justice might not. Even so, I think Bonaparte will be sent off- it is only a matter of deciding where.”
“Let his exile not be too comfortable, I say,” Arabella offered with feeling.
“For a man such as Bonaparte,” Darley said, and his smile disappeared again, “I think any place of exile would be a torture, were it as comfortable as man's ingenuity could make it.”
Morton did see Arabella home, although until they had entered the hackney-coach, the issue had been far from certain, at least in the Runner's mind. Darley, of course, said good night to them as though not a thing were amiss, as though they were two of his dearest friends in the world-an actress and a Bow Street Runner. As though sending one's mistress home with another man were not at all unusual.
“He is a mystery to me, your friend Darley,” Morton said.
Arabella had been lost in some other path of thought, but she glanced over at Morton now with her lovely green eyes, dark in the shadowy coach.
“He is not really such a mystery if you give up your expectations of a man in his position. Arthur cares nothing for the approval of others, and he is utterly dis-creet-you can tell him anything and it will go no farther-and so he is approved by everyone. Yes, his association is not what one might expect, too many writers, and even journalists and actresses, but for that he is admired for his independence of mind. Darley's genius is that he can take the measure of others-perfectly- and then reveal only what he wishes them to see.
“When first we met, he did not realise how carefully I observed human nature: a requirement of my calling. Darley thought he would confound me as he did all the others.” Arabella laughed softly. She leaned her head against Morton's shoulder, as though suddenly tired from her long day of observing mankind. “He sees you, Henry Morton, for what you are-and do not think he is the least mistaken on that score. He sees that you are a man of great integrity and uncommon dedication to the concept of justice. That you are loyal to your friends and colleagues, yet sympathetic to the less fortunate. He also sees your great desire to be considered a gentleman. What you do fascinates him-solving great puzzles- and he is oddly attracted to the danger, and the base and disreputable world in which you walk, for in his life he has known only comfort and safety. Darley is not such a mystery. He is a little bored with his coddled existence. If he could accompany you as you prowl the flash houses looking for miscreants, he would do so in a second. You see, Henry, your life looks to him very… rich.”
“Rich? I wish I could say it were so!”
“Wel
l, it is rich, though not in silver.” She sat up and met his eyes, a smile of triumph spreading over her face. “But I have not told you about the clothes! I have found the woman who made them, or at least have her name and instructions to find her. We might go see her tomorrow before I attend the theatre.”
“Give her address to me, and I will go,” Morton said.
“I will not hear of it. You will need a lady along to relieve the woman's apprehensions. And besides, she is French, and you know my French is so much better than yours.”
In fact Arabella's French was not nearly as good as she believed-certainly not as good as his. But she was clearly so pleased with herself, and Morton so wanted to please her at that moment, that he smiled in acquiescence. Arabella leaned forward and kissed him, at once passionately and tenderly.
“You must come up, Henry. It has been too many days since I have had your company. I will feed you in the morning, and we may go off together to see the dressmaker. You shall have your mystery solved by noon, and then you may see me to the theatre and thank me as I deserve.”
Morton encircled her in his arms and pulled her close. “My dear,” he murmured, “that sounds like a perfect world.”
CHAPTER 5
The dressmaker, Madame Madeleine De le C?ur, plied her trade from the back of a milliner's shop in Oxford Street. Morton wondered who her clientele might be: expatriate French noblewomen, most likely. But what would become of her now, Morton did not know. With the restoration of Louis XVIII, the French nobility were returning to France; many had already gone. Perhaps, like a camp follower, she too would soon be on her way.
They found Madame De le C?ur in a large workroom where high windows let the morning sun angle in, setting the dust motes to dancing. She was examining the work of her dozen seamstresses, holding spectacles in one hand. A handsome if severe-looking woman, she was thin, grey of hair, and surprisingly plainly dressed.
The young woman who had shown them into the workroom cleared her throat quietly and said, “Maman?”
“Oui?” Madame De le C?ur said, not raising her eyes from the stitching she examined.
“Madame Arabella Malibrant of Drury Lane to see you. And Monsieur Henry Morton…of Bow Street.”
The woman turned and stared at Morton as though he were some urchin found thieving her wares. “Bow Street,” she pronounced with little accent. “And to what do I owe this pleasure?”
Before Morton could answer, Arabella stepped forward.
“Madame Beliveau gave me your name,” Arabella said.
The severity of Madame De le C?ur's countenance was erased by a smile. “Ah, oui, and how is my old friend?”
“She is well and sends her regards.”
The woman dipped her head modestly as though receiving a compliment.
“And what is it that brings you here, Madame Malibran'? Shall I make you a gown so to meet the Prince Regent in style?”
“I should be pleased beyond measure to have one of your gowns, madame, but today we are on other business.” Arabella set the package of clothes on a work table and unwrapped it. “We are trying to discover the identity of the woman who owned these beautiful clothes. Madame Beliveau said that only you could have made them.”
Madame De le C?ur raised her spectacles but kept her other arm crossed over her bosom, as though unwilling to touch something so repugnant as another's clothing.
“And why you want to know this?” she asked, and Morton thought she looked suddenly shaken.
“A woman was found dressed in these clothes, madame,” Morton said, “and that woman was dead. We do not know her name.”
Madame De le C?ur put out her hand to a table, her eyes closing. Her daughter was at her side almost immediately, and a member of her staff quickly brought forward a chair so that she might sit.
She wept softly, not sobbing or crying out. Just a silent stream of tears and a look of complete wretchedness upon her handsome face.
Morton stood silently by.
“Perhaps, monsieur-” the daughter began.
“Non,” Madame De le C?ur said. “ 'Ow did this 'appen?” she managed, her perfect English slipping away suddenly.
“We do not know, madame,” Morton said. “Until we know the identity of the poor woman, we are at a loss to find the cause of her death.”
“C'etait Angelique Desmarches,” the woman said, mopping tears from her cheeks with a bit of linen she had been given. “It was her. She is dead? You are certain?”
“A woman was found dead wearing these clothes. Whether she is Angelique Desmarches, I cannot yet say. I need someone to view the body and tell me if this is so.”
“Oh, I could not!” the woman moaned. She waved a hand at her daughter. “Amelie. Allez. Go with the Bow Street man and see if it is Angelique. I pray that it is not. I pray this very much.”
But even in the city of London in the summer of 1815 prayers were not always answered. After accompanying Morton to view the body, young Amelie was certain beyond doubt that it was indeed the woman named Angelique Desmarches. Arabella was too affected by the sorrow of mother and daughter to be triumphant and had gone off to the rehearsal very subdued.
Morton was as patient as he could be under the circumstances, but there was the matter of a likely mur-der-and murderers very often fled the vicinities of their homicides as quickly as their ingenuity and finances would allow.
Back at the dress shop once again, Morton stood quietly by as Madame De le C?ur was given the bad news. She surprised Morton by taking it calmly, as though she had collected herself in his absence.
“I was so afraid this would be so,” she whispered.
They were in a small office now, flanked by three large oaken secretaries, all neatly organized, their papers weighted by small, ivory carvings of Oriental origin. The room was removed from the street, silent, joyless, and grave.
“Who was Madame Desmarches?” Morton asked.
Madame De le C?ur looked up at him, patting her eyes with a bit of linen. “And who are you, Mr. Morton, when all is said and done?”
“I am just what your daughter told you I am, madame. A constable in the employ of the Bow Street Magistrate. And I am here to find the person or persons who killed your friend, for I assume you knew her more than a little. Where did she live?”
“Amelie? Find Madame Desmarches's address for Monsieur Bow Street.” She gestured to a chair, and Morton sat down.
“I do not, in truth, know her well-or I did not, I should say. She was a loyal customer, always paid her bills on time-not a common thing among many of my patrons, Monsieur Morton, despite their apparent wealth. She was a very kind person, not too revealing of her mind, if you know what I mean. She dressed well, if I do say this myself. I don't know how long she was here in England, but her English was less good than mine. She was very beautiful and as young as one could ever desire to be.”
“And her husband, madame?”
She shook her head. “She was a widow. I know no more than that. She did not speak of it. Many will not.”
“What family did she have? Were many here in England?”
“I do not know, monsieur. She spoke nothing of family to me. I think she must have married well-above her station, certainly-for she did not have the manner of the French noblesse. That is really all I know.”
“Were you aware of anyone who was her friend? Anyone who knew her at all?”
The woman shook her head.
Morton sat back in his chair. A name and a dwelling place were a start, but he had hoped, after seeing Madame De le C?ur's reaction to the news, that she knew much more. Ah, well, the French were more emotional than the English, which no doubt explained it- or else losing a customer who paid on time was more traumatic than Morton had at first guessed.
“And what of you, Madame De le C?ur? Will you return to France now that your king has been restored?”
The linen was applied again, as though there were some new sorrow Morton had disturbed.
“I do not know what I shall do, monsieur. I have been here so long now, here where my talents have hardly been noticed. I once dressed the women at the court of Versailles, but what kind of world will they make in France now? Many hope that the hands of the clock will be turned back, but it will not be so. I don't know what I shall do. I don't know. So many of us have been stranded here on your shores, like la baleine upon the beach. We belong nowhere now. We have only your English air to breathe, and we are smothering.”
CHAPTER 6
Henry Morton and Jimmy Presley descended from a hackney-cab before a modest brick house in Hampstead Road, just past the turnpike. According to Madame De le C?ur, Angelique Desmarches had lived here, on the edge of town, her secluded little dwelling shadowed by oak trees and surrounded by a thick hedge. Opposite, but set back from the road, was the gleaming white expanse of Mornington Place, many of its houses so recently completed that they were still unoccupied. Behind on both sides stretched green fields, and as the two police men walked up the gravel path to her door they could hear the distant clanking of cowbells.
The housekeeper, a short, grey-haired woman with delicate features, opened the door.
“Sir?” she said, taking in Morton's appearance, making a quick assessment of how to treat these strangers- and then her eyes lit upon the gilt-topped batons that marked them as Bow Street Runners. A hand went to her mouth.
“What has happened?” she asked quickly.
“Is this the residence of Madame Angelique Desmarches?” Morton asked.
The woman nodded, a quick birdlike motion.
“Is there some member of her family here with whom I might speak?”
A shake of the head. “No one. She has no one.”
Morton looked at the poor woman standing before him, so braced for bad news. He took a deep breath, feeling sadness settle over him like a grey winter day. “I regret to inform you, madame, that Madame Desmarches has been found dead.”