A drowned man. Mr Murdstone, without a shadow of a doubt.
Mrs Chillip had been mistaken. When Jane Murdstone identified the bloated body she stated quite clearly that it was not her brother who had become hooked on a schoolboy’s line like some grim, gigantic fish. She did, however, know the dead man’s identity. His name was Passnidge and he had been with her brother the evening he disappeared.
The local constable, it seemed, had concluded that the man, a stranger in the district, had lost his footing and slipped into the water. But I suspected this was idleness on the constable’s part. The body was too damaged by its time in the water to yield any clues as to the manner of death but I was certain, given Murdstone’s disappearance, that it had been no accident. Murdstone, I was sure, had followed the unfortunate victim and killed him, in spite of his sister’s insistence that they had parted on the best of terms. However, I needed to prove it and when I succeeded, my old tormentor would swing from the gallows as a common murderer. Once again, I chided myself for my lack of forgiveness. I should count my blessings and not dwell on past wrongs.
I decided to call upon Miss Murdstone to ask some questions. I also hoped for a glimpse of Dorothea, for this elusive, unhappy woman was beginning to haunt my dreams. Her fate reminded me so much of my own dear mother and perhaps it was this that made me so keen to make the woman’s acquaintance.
Jane Murdstone received me with cold politeness and I sensed a new wariness in her manner. It seemed she had convinced herself that her brother had caught up with Mr Passnidge on the evening of his disappearance and both had been attacked by ruffians. She feared that Edward had lost his memory and was wandering somewhere, perhaps unaware of who he was. He must be found, she said, before he came to further harm. She looked drawn and anxious. Anxious perhaps that when her brother was found, he might be brought to justice for Passnidge’s murder, although she adhered steadfastly to her version of events.
While she was in a co-operative frame of mind, I seized the opportunity to question her further about her brother’s life. He still had business interests in London, it transpired, but of late his energies were concentrated on his Calling, as she named it. As we talked I probed with gentle questions and discovered that the Chapel of the Divine Nature lay in the grounds of the house and that, on a good Sunday, Mr Murdstone attracted an enthusiastic and dedicated congregation of ten or twelve, mostly ladies. The sister went on to praise her brother’s eloquence and spiritual gifts – gifts I had never witnessed during my childhood, unless cruelty and coldness are gifts of the spirit. I suspected the ladies of his congregation were swayed by his charismatic charm and his dark good looks and wondered if one of their brothers, husbands or fathers had sought revenge for some reason. But I am an author and by nature imaginative. I ordered myself to consider only facts.
When I asked to see the chapel, my request was granted and Miss Murdstone led me across the gardens, notable by the absence of any colour other than green – flowers not being favoured in the Murdstone household. The small chapel itself looked fairly new and had been built, I was told with the generous contributions of the congregation. “Such is his triumph against his enemies who will be consigned to perdition,” she added with a sly gleam in her black eyes. I said nothing. Edward Murdstone had always been adept at extracting money from women and this thought made me even more eager to set eyes on the present Mrs Murdstone.
The chapel was painted a deep blue with gold painted stars on the ceiling and furnished with fine oak pews. At the front was what looked like an altar, covered in dark blue velvet and upon the altar stood a likeness of Mr Murdstone, a little smaller than life sized, a benign expression on the carved face, arms raised in benediction. I stared for a while at this blasphemy in stone.
“My brother, the Divine Nature,” Miss Murdstone said proudly in an awestruck whisper. I did not reply for I was lost for suitable words.
As we were leaving the chapel, I asked the question that was at the forefront of my mind. “May I speak with Mrs Murdstone? She may know something of your brother’s whereabouts.”
Jane Murdstone snorted like a pig. “She knows nothing. At the time of his disappearance she was asleep. She cannot help you.”
“Nevertheless,” I said firmly, “I should like to see her.”
“That is impossible. I should be most grateful, Mr Copperfield, if you would make enquiries in the town for my brother. It may be that someone has seen him.”
This was doubtful, I thought. If he was at large, somebody would have reported it. I had another idea.
“As I am in the district, I may visit my childhood home at Blunderstone,” I said after a few moments. “It was once your brother’s home so there is a chance he might have returned there if his memory is lost. Besides, I should like to visit my parents’ grave.”
“There is nothing at Blunderstone,” Miss Murdstone said sharply. “Some old man – little more than a lunatic – was living there but now he is dead and the place has quite fallen to ruin.” Suddenly her expression softened. “Perhaps my sister-in-law will be well enough to see you tomorrow,” she said.
I made a small bow, sensing the sudden promise of a meeting with Dorothea might be intended to divert me from my visit to Blunderstone. I told her I would call again and when I walked off down the drive, I turned to look at the house. This time I saw a woman at an upstairs window. She possessed a pale beauty and she was dressed all in white – a nightgown perhaps. She stared down at me for a few moments before stepping back from the window. And in those few seconds I saw fear in her large, pleading eyes.
“Oh what news and gossip we have.” Mr Chillip beamed all over his face. “What a great observer Mrs Chillip is to be sure.” The little man capered into the house and I followed, anxious to learn what Mrs Chillip had observed.
“Oh, Mr Copperfield,” Mrs Chillip greeted me as I entered. “The brother of my friend Mrs Dumpleford is a lawyer in Lowestoft and it seems he is acquainted with the late Mr Passnidge. He is visiting his sister presently and when I called on her, I heard all.”
“Mrs Chillip is a great observer,” Mr Chillip repeated gleefully.
I urged the lady to continue.
She leaned forward and looked around, as though she were afraid of being overheard. “It seems Mr Passnidge has rather a reputation for dishonest dealing and honest folk decline to trust him with their affairs.” She paused, a look of triumph on her face. “And there is something more. Daisy, our maid, was talking to the carter and he says Mrs Pipkin’s son was walking near the river on the night Mr Murdstone disappeared and he saw a ghost.”
“A ghost?”
“Hideous, it was. He said it seemed to float on the water, its garments billowing.”
“Was it the ghost of a man or a woman?”
The question seemed to silence Mrs Chillip. She gave the matter some thought before she spoke again. “He couldn’t say,” she said slowly. “And, in truth, Mrs Pipkin’s son is a simple soul. But he saw something that night – no mistake about that.”
An hour later I was face to face with Lemuel Pipkin, a great pudding of a boy not yet in his sixteenth year. Mrs Chillip had been truthful when she called him a simple soul but he kept to his story. On the night Mr Murdstone had vanished, he had been walking on the river bank when he’d seen a figure he had taken for a ghost. It had seemed to be floating on the water or, perhaps, on the bank. On closer questioning I surmised that the phantom was probably running and that Pipkin had heard a splash and a cry before he caught sight of it. He thought it was a man in a voluminous cloak but he could have been mistaken.
Satisfied that he had told me all he knew, I left Pipkin. I had a journey to make. And I had Passnidge’s Lowestoft address safely in my pocket.
I had always loved sea air, ever since those happy days of my childhood staying with Peggotty at Yarmouth. As I walked the streets of Lowestoft in search of Passnidge’s lodgings, I breathed in deeply and my spirits were lifted by the salty tang in the bree
ze.
With the aid of a gentleman who furnished me with detailed directions, I found the lodgings down a small side street, little more than an alleyway, and up some rickety stairs. The landlord, I discovered, lived downstairs and, for the price of a coin, this thin, hungry-looking man was willing to admit me. It seemed Mr Passnidge used the premises for his business as well as his residence and, as the landlord let me in, I saw that the rooms were shabby and uncared for, the only sign of prosperity being a large oak desk beneath the window of the type seen in the more respectable kind of lawyer’s office. The landlord left and I began my search for anything that connected this man to Edward Murdstone.
As I sorted through the pile of documents on the desk, my attention was caught by Murdstone’s name on a set of deeds. I read the papers more closely and discovered that the said Murdstone was the owner of a house in Blunderstone known as the Rookery. My heart beat faster. This house was my birthplace and had passed into Murdstone’s ownership on my dear mother’s death, but I had thought it sold long ago. I then discovered a cryptic letter signed by Murdstone referring to a Mr B at the R needing extra care and dated a year ago.
After this, my search produced nothing of interest so I left, slipping the landlord another coin for his trouble. I had an uneasy feeling that the answer to all my questions would lie at Blunderstone, where I had first seen the light of day.
Blunderstone was much as I remembered it and I visited my parents’ grave beneath the tree in the churchyard, bowing my head as I recalled my dear mother’s face. I then walked to the Rookery. Last time I had seen the house the rooks had gone, the tall trees had been lopped and the garden had been left to run to wilderness. Now the garden was more overgrown and there was no sign of life in the house. On my last visit I had observed the old lunatic gentleman sitting at my little window looking out on the churchyard, but now every window was shut up.
Suddenly I heard a deep growling and saw a dog of considerable size bounding towards me. As I began to run, a harsh voice called the dog off and two roughly dressed men hurtled out of the house onto what used to be the lawn. I hurried away. The dog was baring its teeth and I had no wish to encounter the beast at close quarters.
I was walking to the vicarage to make enquiries about my former home when I met a boy, a large lad with ginger hair and abundant freckles who had the alert look of one who knows what is going on in the neighbourhood.
“Good day,” I said and the boy returned my greeting. “I see my old home, the Rookery, has been left to decay. Do you know the house?”
“I do indeed, sir,” the boy replied. “You lived there, you say?”
“I was born there,” I replied and the boy nodded earnestly. “Who lives there now?”
The boy’s face clouded. “In truth, I do not know, sir. There was an old gentleman but I have not seen him for many months and I am afraid to go near for fear of the dog, sir.”
“Tell me about the old gentleman.” My interest was captured and I wondered if this could be the elderly lunatic I had heard of many years before.
“His name was old Barty, sir. Folk called him a lunatic but I talked with him when the people left him at the bottom of the garden. It is true that his mind was befuddled, sir but he said when he didn’t take the drinks they gave him he could think quite clearly.”
The boy’s words alarmed me, although I doubted if he realized the significance of what he had said. He put his hand into his pocket and produced a small silver box which he held out for me to take.
“He gave me this, sir. He said I should keep it always.”
I took the box and examined it. It was the sort used for snuff, very handsome and embossed with flowers. I opened it carefully and saw a name inscribed upon the inside of the lid – Bartholomew Barton – and a date, 1836. I thanked the lad for showing me his treasure and asked him where Bartholomew Barton was now. With an expression of great solemnity on his cheerful face he told me he did not know. But as he had not seen the gentleman for a long time, he feared that he was dead.
I pressed a coin into my new friend’s hand and took my leave. I would call at the church to seek out Bartholomew Barton’s grave. If such a thing existed.
The old man was dead but the Vicar of Blunderstone had not been called upon to conduct the funeral ceremony. He knew of Mr Murdstone and his ownership of the Rookery but, as Murdstone only paid occasional visits – and none of them recent – he did not know the man well. He had learned of Mr Barton’s death some weeks after the event and had heard that the burial had taken place in a neighbouring parish. I could tell he thought this a little strange but, as he pointed out, there was probably some simple explanation such as some strong family tie with the other parish.
I thanked him and took my leave before walking to the next village where I found many fine monuments bearing the name of Barton but none for a Bartholomew. It was my good fortune to meet the Rector there, who was new to his post but was pleased to let me peruse the registers. I found no mention of Bartholomew Barton in the burial register. But I found his marriage and the birth of his only child. A daughter named Dorothea.
I stayed at the inn in Blunderstone and returned to Bury St Edmunds the next day, setting off early. I had to ensure that what I suspected was true so I visited a church in the town to peruse the marriage register and then, armed with my new knowledge, I called upon the Chillips to inform them of my plans. The good little doctor was eager to accompany me and I considered his offer for some time before concluding that the presence of a doctor might be beneficial. We arrived at the Murdstones’ house just before dark and found the place still and silent. I suddenly felt afraid and I was glad of my friend’s company even though, at his age and stature, he would hardly strike fear into the heart of an enemy.
I was about to knock upon the door when I spotted a shape flitting across the garden, making for the chapel. It fluttered across the grass, white like a ghost, and I abandoned my knocking in order to follow it.
“What is it?” Mr Chillip asked as he fought to keep up with me.
“I suspect that’s our river bank ghost,” I replied.
We were closing on the figure. I could see now that it was a woman in a voluminous nightgown, her long fair hair streaming behind her. In the twilight she looked ethereal, like a creature from another world, lighter than air. But as I drew nearer, I could see that she was thin with the pallor of one who had been confined for years in some dark prison.
I called out. “Dorothea. Have no fear. We are friends. I wish to speak with you.”
She turned and I saw her face for the first time. She looked very young and she must once have been beautiful but her lack of flesh and the dark circles around her wide eyes gave her face the look of a skull.
I approached her slowly as I would approach some shy, wild creature. “My name is David Copperfield and this is my good friend Mr Chillip. Mr Chillip is a doctor. There is no need to fear. We wish to help you.”
She stared for a few moments, ready for flight. Then suddenly she collapsed to the ground in a faint and I rushed forward to scoop her up in my arms. She was as light as a bird as I carried her towards the house. If Miss Murdstone was there, she would not dare to defy me now that I knew the truth about her brother’s evil dealings with the Barton family.
Miss Murdstone, however, was absent. The servant, Daw-kins, now fearful, said that she was visiting some member of her brother’s congregation who claimed to have had a vision that Edward Murdstone, the Divine Nature, had been taken up bodily to Heaven. The man’s face was impassive as he said the words and I wondered if he, like me, was thinking that Hell was a more appropriate destination for his master.
Dorothea said little, except that in her sister-in-law’s absence, she had not taken the usual drink that Jane always brought for her in the early evening and had thus been able to escape her prison and walk in the grounds. She was weak and confused and Mr Chillip surmised that the Murdstones had dosed her with laudanum to ensure her compliance.
The good little doctor insisted that she be taken to his house where Mrs Chillip could nurse her back to health. I readily agreed and the Chillips’ carriage was sent for.
We did not press Dorothea for her story that night and she slept like the dead until late the next morning. Mrs Chillip bustled around finding suitable clothes for the young woman and by midday she was seated in the parlour, looking pale but well on the road to recovery from her ordeal which, I surmised, had begun soon after her marriage. For over twelve years she had been kept by the Murdstones, locked in her chamber and subdued with laudanum. It would take her some time to recover from such an existence and I could see that she was nervous, glancing at the window as though she expected her husband or her sister-in-law to arrive any moment to claim her and return her to her prison. I began to wonder whether Edward Murdstone was truly dead or whether he was hiding somewhere, biding his time. I thought of the Rookery with its guard dog and shuddered. If he was hiding there, keeping his sister in ignorance of his whereabouts, it would be up to me to flush him out.
The next day I set off in the carriage with Mr Chillip and a couple of burly manservants for Blunderstone.
We had taken the precaution of bringing some meat along to pacify the dog and the beast availed itself readily of our bounty as we marched past it to the back door.
Fortune was on our side, for the rough men were nowhere to be seen and the only answer to our knock was a distant cry from somewhere deep within the house, like the voice of a ghost. The windows were all shuttered and, if I had not known otherwise, I would have supposed the house to be unoccupied. However, somebody was at home and I felt that I would soon be face to face with Edward Murdstone, the man who had married Dorothea Barton when she was little more than a child and kept her prisoner, as he had her elderly father. I had no doubt his motive was to gain her inheritance. He had, I was sure, killed the old man and had him buried somewhere far away where no questions would be asked. My aunt Betsey Trotwood had unwittingly hit upon the truth when she observed that the name Murdstone sounded like “murderer”, for surely that was exactly what he was.
The Mammoth Book of Dickensian Whodunnits Page 26