An Oxford Tragedy

by Norman Russell

  Monstrous! A monstrous, wicked crime! There was no reason not to believe de Neville’s story. A man who could leave a friend to drown – deliberately stand still and watch him die – would surely not scruple to send a parent out of this world if it suited his convenience.

  Mr de Neville had said that Timothy had been ‘down for what seemed like an age’ when he had dived into the water to locate Adrian Fortescue’s body. Perhaps, when he was lost to sight beneath the water, he had made doubly sure that his rival was dead? No time should be lost in confronting the Reverend Timothy Fowler. He and Maxwell would go down to Clapton Parva the next day.

  10

  Timothy Fowler’s Ordeal

  Mrs Mary Trefusis turned to her friend, Lady Corrina Davenant, and said: ‘I never go anywhere else for hats, these days. Miss Forrest has impeccable taste. Look at these straw boaters! Aren’t they just the dernier cri?’ Lady Corrina looked doubtful. ‘They’re very nice, dear, but don’t you think they’re a trifle too young for us? They’d look exactly right on your youngest girl, Julia, of course.’

  Mary Trefusis smiled. Corrina was a dear soul, but there were times when she could be vexingly obtuse.

  ‘I was thinking of Julia, not myself – or you, for that matter,’ she replied. ‘It’s her birthday next week, and one of those boaters would go well with… . Ah! Here’s Miss Forrest, now!’

  Ursula Forrest, looking elegant in an emerald green morning dress, came out of her private room, closing the door carefully behind her. She smiled at her visitors.

  ‘Lady Corrina, Mrs Trefusis, how delightful to see you both! Will you take coffee? It’s just on eleven o’clock.’

  Both ladies declined coffee, and began to admire the straw boaters, each of which was adorned with a silk ribbon. They were very smart, and clearly of the highest quality.

  ‘I’m considering one of those hats for my daughter, Julia,’ said Mrs Trefusis. ‘I’m trying to picture her wearing it with one of those leg-of-mutton blouses that girls like so much these days. What do you think, Miss Forrest?’

  ‘An excellent choice, Mrs Trefusis. Now this one here, with the dark purple band – this would go so well with one of the new striped blouses from Jeanne Paquin, who’s starting to take Paris by storm. As a matter of fact, I’m stocking a small selection of her better creations.’

  Ursula opened a glazed press, and pulled out a shelf on which lay a beautiful silk blouse, cream in colour, and with vertical purple stripes. Both ladies exclaimed with delight.

  ‘Oh! That would be ideal, Miss Forrest. I’ll take that one. Let me see – yes, the size is just right. And two of the hats. Two, in case she loses one, you know.’

  Ursula clapped her hands, and a young girl of fifteen or so appeared from a back room. She looked at her employer with a mixture of devotion and awe.

  ‘Céline,’ said Miss Forrest, ‘pack up these items, and tell Robert to take them immediately to 14, Queen Adelaide Gate. Shall I debit them to your account, Mrs Forrest?’

  ‘Yes, do. I’m so very pleased. Really, you have so many wonderful things here.’

  ‘Thank you, madam. I’ve always believed that quality tells. Lady Corrina, can I interest you in anything this morning?’

  ‘No thank you, Miss Forrest. I’ve just come to look around.’

  Ursula gave all her attention to Mrs Trefusis, who seemed disinclined to leave the premises.

  ‘Miss Julia, your daughter – I think you told me that she is approaching eighteen? Perhaps she is old enough to come to visit me unaccompanied – I mean just with her maid, of course. It’s quite a thrill for a young lady to visit a fashion house on her own!’

  ‘Well, she’s at a boarding establishment in the country at the moment, but she will be home for her birthday, so perhaps I’ll add a visit here as an extra treat!’

  Ursula smiled, and excused herself. She went into the back room where the girl called Céline was busy packing Mrs Trefusis’ purchases.

  ‘Mary,’ Lady Corrina whispered, ‘don’t insist on Julia coming here alone. I don’t think it’s quite nice, you know. I’m not one to gossip, but… .’

  At that moment the door of Miss Forrest’s private room opened, and a young woman dressed in a rather risqué bloomer suit emerged. She was struggling with a mahogany camera mounted on a wooden tripod. She smiled at the two startled ladies, and made her way to a small hydraulic goods lift in one corner of the room.

  Miss Forrest emerged from the back room, followed by a cheerful young boy, who was carrying the parcels that Céline had made up. He, too, made his way to the lift.

  ‘Robert will be at your house in Queen Adelaide Gate within the hour, Mrs Trefusis,’ she said. ‘I very much look forward to seeing you again before the autumn.’

  Once more, the door of her private room opened, and a beautiful young woman emerged. She looked flushed and excited. With scarce a glance at the two ladies, the young woman hurried through the swing doors that led to the stairs down to Old Bond Street.

  ‘Goodness me!’ said Mrs Trefusis. ‘I could have sworn that that woman was Julia’s headmistress in Oxford – Miss Frances Fowler. Oh, no, it couldn’t be. Although the undergraduates have gone down, Miss Fowler’s girls are still up till mid-August. She’s quite a beauty, you know, just like that girl who’s gone out.’

  Miss Forrest made as though she had not heard what her customer had said. After a few more civilities, she bowed the two ladies out of her salon through the swing doors.

  ‘Mary,’ said Lady Corrina Davenant, ‘don’t let Julia come here alone. I don’t like that woman. I’ve heard things… . Do you remember little Rose Jacobs, who threw herself in front of a train? She was only nineteen. Well, she was involved in some way with Miss Forrest. I’ll say no more, as some things should not be spoken of aloud in polite society. But you know what I mean. At least, I hope you do.’

  Mrs Trefusis was very quiet as they emerged into Old Bond Street, and walked the short distance to the spot where Lady Corrina Davenant’s carriage was waiting. She thought of her dear daughter, doing so well at Makin House, and speaking so highly of the young headmistress. To herself, she said: I’m as certain as anything that that was Miss Frances Fowler who came out of Miss Forrest’s room. When Ernest comes home tonight from the City, I shall tell him all about it.

  Frances Fowler’s heart was beating so rapidly that she wondered whether she was about to suffer a seizure. She sat back carefully on the seat of the cab, and closed her eyes. She would not feel secure until she was on the 12.30 train from Paddington to Oxford.

  The visit to Ursula and Rosalie had been one of the most thrilling events of her life. At last, having thrown convention aside, she was a fully-trusted member of the coterie. She had planned to return in a week to see the prints of Rosalie’s photographs. It was a prospect that had sent her blood racing.

  And then, as she left Ursula’s private room, she had come face to face with the mother of one of her girls! She had been wise to hurry from the shop, relying on the very improbability of its being she who had apparently been closeted in private with the fashionable milliner. Pray God that Julia Trefusis’ mother had soon convinced herself that she had been mistaken!

  But what if she asked her outright? If she admitted that it had been she, she would have to elaborate a tissue of lies to explain her presence there. She could say that she had asked to see Miss Forrest privately in order to question a bill that she had received. But the very fact of offering an explanation would in itself seem odd, a kind of justification for having done something as seemingly innocent as stepping into a milliner’s private room. Well, there had been nothing innocent about it.

  So much, then, for integrity. She had always stressed the necessity of truth to her girls – truth in their relationships with others, truth in the evaluation of theories and the interpretation of facts. But now, a vital part of her life had become a living lie. No one must know of her membership of the coterie. To outward seeming, she knew of no such group,
and would deny any knowledge of it. To maintain this kind of lie required constant vigilance. Was it Quintilian who said: ‘A liar should have a good memory’?

  What would happen if those photographs were ever made public? The parents of all her pupils would withdraw their girls immediately. There could be no doubt whatever about that. It would be the end of her school, the end of her career, and the end of her standing in society. Had something like that happened to the girl who had thrown herself under a train?

  And – oh, God! What if Timothy found out? Would he reject her? He had often spoken of God’s wrath at the commission of unnatural acts, and had once given a sermon on the text of Romans 1, verse 26: it was a condemnation of those who abandoned God in order to pursue their own wicked desires.

  ‘For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections: for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature.’

  Timothy must never know. No one must ever know. Only God knew the disposition of her heart, and perhaps He would, in His infinite mercy, forgive her.

  The village street of Clapton Parva was wide, but as yet unpaved, so that the two policemen’s feet sent up little clouds of dust as they walked. The left side of the street was flanked with farm labourers’ cottages, a few little shops, and a forge, but the right-hand side boasted a gracious, ivy-covered mansion, built in the early years of the eighteenth century. It was separated from the road by a low wall, with railings and gates, giving access to a well-kept lawn.

  ‘That’ll be the vicarage,’ said Inspector Antrobus. ‘Our Mr Timothy doesn’t live there – at least, not for the moment. He’s due to move in as soon as the ancient vicar is removed to pastures new.’

  ‘How did you know that?’ asked Sergeant Maxwell.

  ‘It’s my business to know things. Yours, too.’

  Their arrival in the village had not gone unnoticed, though the majority of the menfolk were out in the fields. But women talking at their front doors stopped to look at them, and whispered behind their hands.

  We’re both in sober civilian garb, thought Antrobus, but I wager that all those ladies will know that we are policemen.

  Confound this chest pain! It always came when his ravaged lungs were about to make him spit blood. Was there time to chew a pulmonic wafer? Yes. Doing that would give him relief for half an hour or so.

  He took a folded paper from his pocket, removed the quick-dissolving wafer, and put it in his mouth. As always on such occasions, Sergeant Maxwell looked away, and began to hum a tune. It was usually Rule, Britannia; today, for some reason, it was the Prussian national anthem.

  They turned off the main street into a lane, little more than a track, that led them through a coppice, and into a sort of clearing, in which stood the curate’s house. It was small, and very old, sagging with the weariness of centuries. The roof slates had turned green with lichen, and the wooden palings defining the little patch of garden were for the most part either broken or missing.

  ‘I’m not going to beat about the bush, Sergeant,’ said Antrobus. ‘A frontal attack will produce the best results. I know he’s there, you see, but he doesn’t know that I’m coming. The little wife should be there, too.’

  They rang the bell, and after what seemed like an age, the front door was opened by a tearful young girl in cap and apron. She shrank back from them in evident fear. What ailed the girl?

  ‘You’re the police, aren’t you? You’d better come in.’

  She stood aside, and they entered the little hallway of the decrepit house. She made no attempt to take their hats or coats. Instead, she began to sob.

  ‘It’s all my fault,’ she whispered. ‘I shouldn’t have told my dad what I saw… .’

  ‘You’ll be Lucy Hammond, I expect,’ said Antrobus. ‘Well, Lucy, you’ve done nothing wrong. So take me to see your master, the Reverend Mr Timothy Fowler. And when you’ve done that, go into the kitchen and talk to Detective Sergeant Maxwell here. My name’s Detective Inspector Antrobus. Come on, girl, take me to see your master!’

  As the weeping maid-servant ushered him into the dark parlour of the curate’s house, a clergyman dressed in a black frock coat, and wearing the Roman collar now coming into common use in the Church of England, rose from a chair, not so much as to greet him, Antrobus thought, as to confront him as a potential foe. He was a tall man, with fair hair, handsome and well made, but his eyes could not conceal his fear. The inspector handed him his warrant card, and the clergyman fumbled in his waistcoat pocket for a little pair of steel-rimmed reading glasses.

  Antrobus glanced around the room. There were some good pieces of furniture, but the carpets were worn, and the place looked in dire need of redecoration. A glance at the ceiling told him that gas had not been laid on. Presumably, Fowler, now the possessor of a considerable fortune, was ‘camping out’ in this genteel hovel for reasons of his own.

  The mantelpiece held a massive ebony clock, which had stopped, and beside the clock was a silver-framed photograph of a young woman. Presumably it was a likeness of Mrs Fowler. Antrobus had heard her described as ‘pretty’, but to his way of thinking that was an understatement. To judge from the photograph, Kate Fowler was beautiful. No wonder that her husband, seven years earlier, had stood by and watched his rival in love drown… .

  ‘Inspector Antrobus?’ said the clergyman, handing back the warrant-card. ‘We have not met before, I believe, though I have heard much about you. How can I be of service?’

  He had managed to control his voice, but his eyes still held a look of fear. Perhaps he fully expected to be arrested.

  ‘Mr Fowler, I’ll not beat about the bush. As you are aware, I am the police officer investigating your father’s murder, a murder motivated by the greed of gain. It was thought at first that he had died from circulatory collapse, consequent upon a fatal nephritis. But that was not so. He was poisoned most cruelly with a substance called mercuric chloride, and his murderer hoped that his death would be put down to gastroenteritis. Now, sir, how do you account for the fact that you were seen retrieving a packet of that poison from beneath your dead father’s bed?’

  Timothy Fowler jumped with fright, and sat down hastily on a sofa. He had gone deadly pale, and for a moment seemed quite unable to speak.

  ‘Good heavens! What are you suggesting? I never… .’

  ‘You were seen retrieving that packet, sir, and concealing it about your person. You brought it back here, to this house, and locked it away in your desk. I know that you benefited from your father’s death by inheriting a considerable fortune at a time when you most needed money. I tell you I know all these things, and it will be profitless to pretend that you did otherwise than I have stated.’

  ‘Retrieved? That is not so. I had knelt down to say some prayers, and saw the packet lying beneath the bed. I was curious to know what it was. I picked it up.’

  ‘Did you read the label? The label that said it was a packet of mercuric chloride?’

  ‘Yes, I did. Of course I did! But… .’

  ‘And then, instead of informing the police immediately – you would have found us in our headquarters in Oxford High Street – you put it in your pocket, and when you got home here, to Hampshire, you locked it away in your desk. Why did you do that? What am I supposed to think? I am sure that you found it difficult to make ends meet on a curate’s stipend of seventy-eight pounds a year. Your father’s death relieved you of all financial worries.’

  ‘This is outrageous! Are you accusing me of parricide? You have no right!’

  ‘I have every right. I have seen the frantic letter that your wife wrote to her sister-in-law, telling her what she had seen in your desk. Why did you lock it away? And where is Mrs Fowler? I need to question her, too. Is she not here?’

  The Reverend Timothy Fowler uttered a deep groan, and buried his head in his hands. He looked utterly forlorn. Instinctively, Antrobus realized that his wife had left him.

  ‘My wife – I thought it judicious to send her
to stay with her parents at Haddington, in Buckinghamshire, until this terrible business is over. But she knows nothing… .’

  ‘Knows nothing of what, sir? Does she know that you went up to Oxford on five occasions during your father’s illness, and stayed all day? Plenty of time to make deadly use of the packet of mercuric chloride that you later locked away so secretively in your desk. You went there on Wednesday, 23 May, and then on the Friday and Saturday of the same week, staying at the Mitre. You went again on Tuesday, 29th, and then on Thursday, the 31st, when you stayed at the Mitre again, remaining there until after your father had died.’

  ‘Do you really think that I, an ordained clergyman, could commit such an unnatural and heinous crime?’

  ‘Why did you take the packet of poison away with you, and conceal it? Did you, perhaps, fear that your brother, or your sister, had done the deed? If you are not guilty, then perhaps you want to accuse either of them of parricide? And as for committing such a crime, it would not be the first time, Mr Fowler, that a man close to you had died.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I am referring to a man called Adrian Fortescue, whom you deliberately left to drown, although you could have saved him. He, too, stood in your way, so you murdered him by default. Do not try to hide behind your Holy Orders in this matter, Mr Fowler. Be sure your sins will find you out.’

  There came a cry of anguish from the man on the sofa, and Antrobus saw that he had fainted: his deliberately relentless barrage of accusations had had more than their desired effect. He sat still, waiting for the stricken man to recover from his faint. He wondered what Sergeant Maxwell had contrived to find out from Lucy Hammond, the weeping maid known in that house as ‘the Slow Girl.’

  ‘Missus was terrified,’ said Lucy Hammond. ‘The rumours were flying round that Master had poisoned his own father with that stuff that he’d hidden in his desk. She waited until he was out of the house on his round of visits one day, and told me that she was going to run away to her mother in Buckinghamshire.’