I felt suddenly queasy. “If you mean to be sick, do it elsewhere,” Aunt Dorcas said sternly. I took a deep breath and blew it out slowly.
“I will not be sick. But I am forced to believe you. Ludlow said there was a lady involved, but he never spoke her name. I assumed it was Lucy.”
Aunt Dorcas gave a little snort. “Lucy would not say boo to a goose. Emma would fatten the goose, invite it to tea and slice out its liver for pâté.”
The image was not a pretty one. “What did you mean about your sister?”
Her lips worked furiously for a moment, and I realised she was fighting back tears. When she spoke, the words came fast and harsh. “India. Gertrude took Emma out to find a husband.” Her thin lips curled into a sneer. “She found something else. A native man she wanted to marry, far above her station in India. His family were connected to the nazim. Gertie tried to tell her the man would never marry her, but she would not hear anything against him. Finally, it came out that Emma was pregnant by him. He offered her money, but nothing more. Can you imagine that? Offering her money like a common whore? And that’s all she was, giving herself away like that.”
I maintained a tactful silence. Emma might have chosen her lover unwisely, but taking a solitary lover hardly made her a whore.
“Gertie told her they were leaving India. Emma cried and screamed and threw such a fit she miscarried, thank God. Gertie tried to explain the child was malformed, she had seen it herself, but Emma never believed her. She thought Gertie had caused it somehow. She blamed her for the loss of her lover and her child. Gertie hushed it all up the best she could, but there were still many who knew. It was impossible to hide it, the tantrums, the dead baby. Your Mr. Snow was one of them. He served in India. And Emma recognised him, I saw it in her face the first night she met him here in the Abbey. I watched him watching her. It took him the better part of the evening to place her, but he finally did. There was an air of triumph about him, and Emma looked sick as a cat. She knew he remembered her from India and that he knew about the baby. Poor Gertie. She tried so hard to keep it all quiet, to protect Emma. In the end, she did the only thing she could. She packed Emma up and boarded the next ship home.”
Aunt Dorcas looked away then, her lips working even faster now. “Gertie never saw England again. She died on board that ship and they buried her at sea. Word got back to her friends in India, and there was talk. Not openly, no one would dare. But there was speculation. It was whispered Emma had exacted her revenge.”
I nodded slowly. “I remember now. Not about Emma, but about Aunt Gertie dying during a sea voyage. I had just come out into society and someone asked me at a ball if the lady buried at sea was a relation of mine. The newspapers mentioned it.”
“Emma told the captain and the ship’s doctor it was her heart,” Aunt Dorcas said bitterly, “but Gertie was never sick a day in her life. She was the strongest of us all. No, that girl poisoned her, I know it, though it can never be proved. She saw to that. A body buried at sea cannot be examined. She got right away with murder. And when there was murder done in this house, I knew her handiwork for what it was. And I knew I should be next.”
For the first time I saw her for the frightened old woman she was. “And you left that night? With Brisbane?”
She nodded. “The maid who brought my hot milk that night told me what had happened. I knew it was Emma, and that I had to get right away. We had never spoken of what happened to Gertie, but once or twice in the years since I have seen her eyes on me, thinking, as if she wondered what I knew. If she thought I believed her guilty of Gertie’s death, she would not have hesitated to put me out of the way, I know it.”
I thought of Emma, so solicitous of Aunt Dorcas, wanting to know if there was any news of her whereabouts. My stomach ached to think of it.
“What did you tell Brisbane?”
She shrugged. “Nothing of substance. I told him I would not stay in a house where murder had been done, and that I must speak with the Gypsies, for the spirits would reveal all to them. I told him I knew of a passageway that would lead to the churchyard.”
I shook my head. “I cannot believe he would take you there on so flimsy a pretext.”
“It was not flimsy,” she said stoutly. “It was the truth, at least part of it. I could not tell him more. He is not family. I have spent the better part of a dozen years crushing that scandal. Do you think I was going to resurrect it with my own hands? I had no proof, only my suspicions, and you know as well as I, my dear, the ramblings of an old lady carry little weight. What would have happened if I had pointed the finger at her? Eh? The lot of you would have dismissed me—mad old Aunt Dorcas is at her tricks again.”
I remembered Emma then, slyly insinuating about Aunt Dorcas and her “odd turns”, all the while watering her villainy with crocodile tears. It was diabolical.
“I prefer to think we would have listened,” I told Aunt Dorcas.
“And you might have. But I was not about to gamble my life on it.”
We fell silent then, both of us stubbornly certain we were right. But as I thought on it, I realised how brave she was. She had taken matters into her own hands when she felt threatened, and had gone to live among the Gypsies, an intrepid thing indeed at her age.
I smiled at her. “How did you like the Gypsy camp?”
She pulled a face. “No proper sanitation, and do not even ask me about the food,” she complained. But even as she spoke I saw the corners of her mouth turn up a little. It had been the adventure of a lifetime, I would wager, and the memories would warm her for a long time to come.
I rose then and dropped a kiss to her cap. She scrubbed at her cheek and scowled at me. “I do not like displays of emotion, Julia. It comes from having all these Italians in the house. I feel a headache coming on. Go and fetch me my lavender salts.”
She gestured toward her travelling case, a kidskin affair, fitted with a dozen bottles, all stoppered tightly and labelled with her spindly script. I reached for the lavender, surprised to find it empty. I turned it over and read the label. And as soon as I saw the word lettered there, I knew what she had done. I slipped the bottle into my pocket, then reached for the one slotted in the next compartment.
“Here are your salts,” I told her evenly. She took them and began to sniff, waving a handkerchief in front of her face to waft the fumes to her nose.
I drew the other bottle out of my pocket. “And you will want to restore your supply of laudanum. The bottle is quite empty. You ought to be careful with such things, you know. That much laudanum could kill a person.”
I held the bottle out to her and she averted her face, her mouth working furiously. “You were in too much of a hurry after you poisoned the bottle of brandy. You put the lavender and the laudanum in each other’s place. It was careless of you, and worse still to ask me to go to your dispensary. I would never have thought it of you otherwise.”
She raised her chin, staring me down with her great toad’s eyes. “Emma had already done murder twice, once by her own hand and once by another’s. If she died, God himself would call it justice.”
“And Lucy?”
She clutched her handkerchief to her lips. “I have already told you, they are of a kind. Lucy would not harm another, but to save Emma, she would commit every sin and smile as she did it.”
I shook my head, wonderingly. “I cannot quite believe it. How did you lure the footman from his post?”
She waved a hand at me. “I took the sheet from my bed. I burnt two holes for my eyes, and I was a phantom. A childish trick, but effective. I have forgotten more about this Abbey than you will ever know. How simple it was to show myself and let him follow me. It was the work of a moment to leave the brandy at his chair and remove the sheet. I was wearing a black gown. Even if he saw me leaving, I would have been but a shadow to him. I left the sheet in the linen cupboard when I sent Brisbane to the lumber rooms to fetch me a fur.” Her eyes were gleaming now, and it occurred to me that she was rath
er proud of what she had done.
“It was not your decision,” I told her. “You had no right to mete justice. You realise I must tell Father.”
She scrabbled up against the cushions, her eyes wide with fear. “You dare not! He is grieved enough that a stranger has committed murder in this place. What would it do to him to learn of this? Think of the scandal. It is a different world now than the world of his youth, Julia. The story would make its way round the world, and everyone would know the shame of it. He would never recover from that.”
I itched to slap her, elderly aunt or not. She was still staring fearfully over the edge of her handkerchief, but there was a touch of triumph in her. She had given me the one argument I could not fight.
I slid the bottle back into my pocket. “Very well. For Father, I will keep silent. But mind this—I am keeping this bottle. And if I ever hear that you have harmed anyone, in any fashion, I will produce it.”
I spoke sharply, my voice ringing with conviction, but we both knew the threat was a hollow one. It would be my word against hers if ever I decided to tell my tale.
She gave a dry laugh. “I am old and I am tired, girl. My fangs are well and truly drawn. When I go back to Norfolk, it will be to die, and with me, so dies this story.”
“That it will,” I said. “Go tomorrow. I will not say farewell.”
I left her then and went to my own room. In a very few minutes I was tucked into bed, warm and safe and so tired I thought I could sleep a month. But it was a long time before I slept, and every time I closed my eyes I saw Emma’s face, watching from the shadows.
THE TWENTY-NINTH CHAPTER
Some say that ever ’gainst the season comes Wherein our Saviour’s birth is celebrated This bird of dawning singeth all night long, And then, they say, no spirit dare stir abroad.
—Hamlet
The days running up to Christmas were busy ones, and I kept myself too occupied to think much. Whenever I found my thoughts lingering on Brisbane or Emma or Henry Ludlow, I ruthlessly wrenched them away, turning instead to hanging mistletoe or poking cloves into oranges to make pomanders. I went for long walks in the gardens and attempted to train Florence to sit nicely. And I said goodbyes; some of them rose more easily to my lips than others. Aunt Dorcas left us the day after her return from the Gypsy camp, and in spite of my parting words to her the previous night, I did my duty and stood with my family to bid her farewell. She passed down the line of assorted relations, pausing when she reached me. She flicked me a cool glance, which I returned. Then she nodded, almost imperceptibly, proffering me a crumb of respect. I did not move, and she passed on. I was not sorry to see her go.
The following day, Plum and Alessandro, both of them nursing bruised hearts—and pride—took their leave as well. I regretted their leaving, but I was relieved, I realised with a guilty little pang. Alessandro had been a charming companion in Italy, but I had been mad to think even for a moment we might have been more than friends. And Plum was no companion at all at present. He was still sulking over his affairs, and Father had not been kind to him on the subject of Mrs. King, scolding him for taking up with such a creature. They were barely speaking by the time Plum and Alessandro departed, but I knew they would make it up eventually. Marches always did.
Still another parting made me quite nostalgic. My husband Edward’s distant cousin, the nearest neighbour to the Abbey, had been forced to quit the manor house at Greymoor. The snowfall that had locked us in with a murderer had caused the weakened roof of the house to finally collapse. Thankfully none of his family or staff were injured, but the damage was too extensive. It was the perfect excuse for him to tear it down, and when he came to the Abbey to bid his farewells, he was full of building schemes for a property he had in Kent, near his wife’s relations. So the last of the Greys moved out of Sussex, and the house was left to fall to ruin. It would not be long before the village children began to dare each other to run up and touch its sagging doors and peer into its broken windows, I fancied. Ghosts walked abroad at Greymoor, and I shuddered when I wondered if Edward might be one of them.
But the weeks before Christmas were happy ones, too. Aunt Hermia and Portia’s beloved Jane came down from London, as well as a plentiful assortment of my brothers, sisters, spouses, nieces, and nephews. We were a full and merry party, and as the season ripened, I felt myself growing more relaxed. There had been no word from Brisbane, but I had not really expected one. I wore the pendant, as a charm for his safety, I suppose, and went about the business of Christmas. I wrapped presents and strung holly and ivy on the mantelpieces and played endless games of hunt-the-slipper with my nieces and nephews.
Christmas itself was Bedlam. The children were up at cockcrow, tearing into stockings and making a sweet nuisance of themselves. But in spite of the noise and frantic activity, the day was surprisingly pleasant. After breakfast we all bundled up and walked into the village for church. I had dreaded this, fearing that we would be met with stares and hostility. The shadow of murder still hung over our house, however normal we had tried to make things for the children. But I had underestimated either the power of the March name, or the affection with which the villagers regarded us. They were a trifle distant when we arrived, but after Uncle Fly’s eloquent sermon on the subject of brotherly love, we were greeted much more kindly. We chatted politely, and Aunt Hermia even extended invitations to several families to come and take mince pies and wine with us. No one stammered or fled in fright, which I took as rather a heartening sign.
Once back at the Abbey, we feasted on a delectable Christmas lunch and then the children opened presents, a noisy and lengthy affair. Father, who could never bear to see anyone left out, gave each of his grown children a present as well. I presented Puggy with his finished cushion cover, which he received with an indelicate noise deep in his throat. I took that as an expression of gratitude. Florence looked exceedingly pretty in a collar fashioned of Venetian lace, and Grim bobbed his head in thanks for a tin of glacéed fruits from Paris. Then the children sang carols, and when they concluded—to tumultuous applause from their indulgent family—the tea things were brought in and we all gathered around as Father, preening in his garishly striped waistcoat from Violante, read out the Christmas letters from my absent brothers and sisters. There were few dry eyes when he was done, for we were all quite fond of each other and missed one another more than we would admit.
When he was finished, Father wiped his eyes and shooed us all to our rooms to prepare for the party that evening. Naturally it was to be a quieter affair than in years past. He had decided that dancing would be inappropriate, but Lysander had promised to play suitable music for our enjoyment. Everyone hurried to their rooms, the adults to change, the children to an early supper. Only Father remained behind, standing at the darkened window, and as I made to leave, he called me back.
I quirked a brow at him, and he waved toward the door.
“Close that, if you would. I do not mean to keep you long, but I should like to speak to you. Privately.”
I obeyed, and then joined him at the window. It had long since fallen dark, but the landscape was dotted with lights—lanterns and bonfires and torches as folks moved from house to house in merry parties. Father nodded toward a light not far away, just at the edge of a small wood on the other side of the moat.
“There is the Rookery. Can you see it?”
“Of course.” The Rookery was a tiny, quite mad-looking house. The Rookery had passed through several inhabitants since it was built in the eighteenth century. Each had left their mark, adding odd little staircases or pulling down façades and putting up new ones. What remained was a bizarrely charming confection with a pair of reception rooms and a few bedrooms, nothing more.
Father nodded again. “It is a sound little house. It was overgrown with ivy, and a few roof tiles were loose. Nothing that could not be mended. I had Benedick oversee the repairs before the snow fell. It is quite snug now, and perfectly in order, freshly painted, and not
a bit of damp.”
I was a bit mystified as to why he was telling me this, but I nodded encouragingly. “Oh, excellent. I have always thought it a darling house.”
“I am glad to hear you say it,” he said mildly. “It is yours now.”
I blinked at him. “I did not hear you correctly, I am afraid.”
“It is yours, Julia. I know I gave you a present with your brothers and sisters, but this is something else. Just for you.”
I stammered a little in my confusion. “B-but, Father, surely there are others in the family who need a house.”
“It is not a house,” he corrected. “It is a home. Of your own, for so long as you shall live. I cannot give it to you outright. It is entailed with the estate, and when I am gone, it will belong to your brother, Bellmont. But I have arranged with the solicitor that it shall be yours to live in for the duration of your life, so long as you wish it. You may go and come back, as you like, but it will always be here for you to return to.”
I shook my head. I could not quite take it in. “But why me, Father? Portia is a widow as well,” I reminded him.
“Portia has a home, and Portia has Jane.” He put out a hand and touched my shoulder. “I will not always be here, child. I do not know what the future holds for you, but I would have you cared for. You are my favourite.”
I put a hand over his. “You have ten children, and five of them are under your roof right now. How many times have you said that today?”
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