by Robin Paige
But Charles observed that the sergeant was a cautious man, not prepared to reject out of hand a gentleman's offer of assistance, whatever he might do with the photographs once they were in his possession. "T be sure, sir," he said with a show of earnestness. "If you'd be so kind as t' bring th' pichures t' th' station, I'll see as they gets put t' good use."
"Then I shall," Charles agreed. He pointed at the cart tracks and footprints. ' 'Perhaps your man might want to have a go at these."
"A-corse, sir," said the sergeant, as he stepped on one of the prints.
Observing that there was nothing left to be learned from the scene and litde additional help he might offer, Charles took his camera and tripod and walked away.
6
"It is a truth universally acknowledged, tnat a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife."
— JANE AUSTEN, Pride and Prejudice
Charles climbed into the barouche and placed his camera on the seat, his bag of exposed plates, tripod, and other gear on the floor. The man in the opposite seat lowered his newspaper.
"I must say, Sheridan," he said lazily, "I'm not altogether sure what fascinates you about those old Roman ruins. Not much of value being dug up these days, I'll wager."
Charles sat down with a slight laugh. "Perhaps not. But the remains that were dug up this morning were rather of interest. As it happens, there was a bit of foul play."
"You don't say." Bradford Marsden folded the newspaper and raised his voice slightly. "Drive on, Foster."
The coachman lifted the reins and the carriage lurched into its place in the stream of traffic on the cobbled street, behind a brewer's dilapidated dray and a farm wagon filled with baskets of fresh lettuces and cauliflowers.
"A foreign gentleman was unceremoniously dispatched and shoved into an excavation," Charles said. "The local constabulary were on the scene, going about a semblance of investigation." He leaned back in the seat, pulled down his hat brim, and began to reflect on the morning's events. To be truthful, they had stimulated him in a way that he rarely felt stimulated, except perhaps by the discovery of a new species of flora or the sight of an unnamed fossil. One of the hazards of having sufficient money to be at one's leisure was the hazard of continually finding oneself bored by the banality of one's existence and hence forced to seek new forms of intellectual stimulation. Murder was most stimulating.
To engage his mind, Charles had throughout most of his thirty-three years employed himself with various scientific studies. At nine he had accompanied his paleontologist grandfather in the pursuit of fossil shells and corals at Walton-on-the-Naze. At twelve he produced a field guide to local species of edible fungi, hand-illustrated and annotated. At fifteen, he devised a detective camera small enough to be concealed beneath the waistcoat, with the intent to take pictures on the sly. At Eton and Oxford, Charles did not exercise the discipline of narrow specialization in any science, but rather indulged himself in a broad study of all. His natural powers of observation were remarkably keen, exceeded only by his insatiable curiosity, his indefatigable memory, and his unflagging powers of inquiry. But he did require something of interest to excite those powers.
"Murder, eh?" Bradford folded the newspaper and tossed it aside. "If that's what it is, no doubt the papers will trumpet it. They're awash in blood. That extraordinary murder discovered in Great Marylebone Street, for instance-the woman who carried off the body of a murdered man in a trunk. One read of nothing else for weeks. I say, Sheridan," he added casually. "I've been meaning to ask your advice about an investment."
Charles glanced at him. "I'm hardly up on commerce. Too busy with other matters, I'm afraid."
"But inventions are rather in your line," Bradford replied as the carriage passed a green park where white-aproned nannies pushed black wickerwork perambulators in the afternoon. He took a cigarette out of a monogrammed gold case. "What do you think about these new motorcars?"
Charles raised his eyebrows. ' 'Motorcars? The mechanical problems are really quite intriguing-particularly those having to do with power transmission and steering. For instance, the rims of the inside and outside wheels do not travel the same distance in a turn. The outside actually travels farther than the inside-"
"What I mean to say," Bradford interrupted, "is what do you think about motorcars as an investment?" He lighted his cigarette.
Charles was thoughtful. "The mechanical problems are not insurmountable. In my view, the primary impediments are social and economic. For example, when cars can travel faster than twelve miles an hour-"
"They can now," Bradford said crossly, "but the law won't allow it."
"The laws will be changed to meet the times," Charles replied, settling into his explanation. "But faster speeds require superior roads, which will mean an increase in taxes. Building an adequate fuel-distribution system will take time, and eventually there will have to be an entirely new maintenance industry. All this could require twenty or thirty years. If the investors are looking for a quick return on their money, they will be disappointed."
Bradford sighed heavily and consulted an engraved gold
pocket watch. "We are just in time to meet Eleanor and Aunt Penelope at the railway station. I hope you don't object."
Charles pulled his hat brim down farther. "Object? Why should I object? Your sister is a delightful young woman."
' 'If constant chatter about weddings does not grate on your ears," Bradford replied, pocketing his watch. He was a handsome man with a certain negligent rakishness. But there were lines of worry about his eyes and he wore an uncharacteristically serious look. Charles wondered if perhaps he had lost more at the Steeplechase than he had admitted to doing. Or whether his worry was connected with motorcars. But Charles would no more inquire about his friend's investments than ask after his mistresses.
"Chatter about weddings annoys you, does it?" Charles replied in a tone of friendly banter. "Just wait, Marsden. When your mother has finished arranging your sister's wedding, she will turn her attention to yours. It must be high time to assure the continuation of the Marsden baronetcy."
Bradford Marsden shuddered and closed his eyes briefly. Then, recollecting himself, he turned to Charles. "You needn't be so smug, my dear chap. It has not escaped my attention that my mother would like to make a certain arrangement where you are concerned." The corners of his mouth quirked as he glanced at Charles's dusty hat. "Despite that ridiculous hat of yours."
Charles sobered. He had accepted Bradford Marsden's invitation to spend a month at Marsden Manor for the purpose of documenting the Colchester dig, as well as pursuing various interests, among them a few rare local flora and some fascinating Cenozoic coelenterates. He had no intention of being ambushed by a maternal attempt at matrimonial arranging.
"I presume," Charles said somberly, "that you are referring to Patsy."
If Charles was rarely frustrated in his determined search for knowledge, he was frequently frustrated when it came to the fairer sex. This had certainly been the case since his arrival the previous week at Marsden Manor. He had sensed from the outset that Lady Henrietta Marsden had her own
aims for his visit, and that those aims involved her younger daughter. To make things worse, the daughter's intentions in the matter were clearly those of the mother. The two were in cahoots.
Bradford raised his eyebrows. "Would that be such a disaster, old man?"
Charles's response was carefully diplomatic. "Your sister is liberally endowed with Marsden beauty and grace, as well as Marsden wit. But she is, after all, barely eighteen and not yet out. I am deeply honored and complimented by Lady Henrietta's consideration, but I think she would do well to look to someone nearer Patsy's age. I am too old for her."
He did not add, although he might have, that Patsy Marsden was a flibbertigibbet whose conversation flitted like a butterfly between balls and bonnets. She was the last woman in the world that he would have considered.
"Damn it all, man," Marsden g
rumbled, "don't talk as if you were poised on the verge of the grave. You're only thirty-three, even if you are a musty old scientist. And you come from excellent family. The Marsdens would be honored-/ would be honored-to entrust Patsy's future to you."
Charles smiled. "You forget," he said, happily falling back upon his strongest argument, "that I am a younger son."
Younger sons, as Bradford Marsden very well knew, were generally left without inheritance, while the family jewels, the family estate, and the family title, if there was one, were bestowed in their entirety upon the eldest son. In Charles's situation, the fact that his brother Robert had inherited the bulk of their father's money was fortuitously offset by a sizable legacy from his maternal grandmother-in other words, he was possessed of a substantial fortune. But Charles had several times successfully deployed his status as younger son as a shield against the menace of matrimony. He expected it to work in this instance as well.
But Bradford only laughed. "Come now, Sheridan, you can't hide behind that ruse with me. We've been friends too long. I know, as does Mother, that you've enough to support Patsy quite comfortably." Bradford did not add that the Mars-dens (whose fortunes had slipped into a lengthy decline precipitated by Grandfather Marsden's regrettable losses at the gaming table and exacerbated by Bradford's father's equally regrettable love of expensive but ill-fated horseflesh) would be greatly relieved if their younger daughter were to marry into Charles Sheridan's respectable family and quite ample fortune. His pale blue eyes twinkled. "And who knows? Perhaps a few months spent traipsing in out-of-the-way corners of the world, carrying those cameras of yours, might sober her sufficiently to allow her to think beyond the next new gown and slippers." In the distance, the train whistle could be heard, and the chugging of the engine, and Bradford leaned forward to tap the coachman's shoulder. "The whip, Foster."
"Patsy is quite delicious just as she is," Charles lied, as the carriage moved forward smartly. "I would not change her for the world. No, Marsden, you and your mother will have to indulge me. Patsy will make some fortunate man a loving, if not dutiful, wife, but I have not yet found the right woman. Perhaps-"
He paused. On the graveled footpath beside the street, two rosy-cheeked young women with elaborately piled hair and ruffled silk parasols smiled flirtatiously at the occupants of the carriage. For Bradford's benefit, he spoke heavily, a man weighted by disappointed hopes.
"— Perhaps I never shall."
"Nonsense." Marsden said, tipping his bowler at the two young women. "And don't be so quick to reject Patsy. She's young yet. With a husband's firm hand guiding her development, she could become a charming wife."
Charles pursed his lips. A wife, charming or otherwise, was not in his scheme of things.
7
"You nave read in the newspaper our murder I nope-you cannot think how much more interesting a murder hecomes rrom being committed at one's door."
— Jane Carlyle to her cousin Jeannie Welch
As the train from London pulled into the Colchester sta-tion, Kate eagerly rose from her seat in the first-class carriage she had shared with Eleanor Marsden and Garnet, Miss Marsden's personal maid.
"We're here," she cried excitedly, leaning from the open window to glimpse what she could of the platform. "At last!"
Then she remembered herself and pulled back from the window, flushing. Miss Marsden was rising in a leisurely way, directing Garnet to gather her cloak, her exquisite dyed kid gloves, her parasol, her reticule, and the half-dozen bags and bandboxes she had brought with her from London, stuffed with (as Kate had been hearing for the last several hours) wedding finery. To the sophisticated Miss Marsden, Kate thought, her pleasure in the sights and sounds of her arrival must seem terribly inexperienced and gauche, rather like a schoolgirl on an adventure.
Kate tossed her head. But she was inexperienced and this was an adventure for her. She could scarcely wait to see the massive walls of Bishop's Keep rising like a mossy ruin out
of the surrounding grove of ancient oaks, the sunset gilding its great stone turrets. If the truthful expression of pleasure in either her journey or her arrival was amusing to her elegant traveling companion, so be it. So she repeated with enthusiasm as she reached for her carpetbag, ' 'How lovely to be here at last."
Eleanor Marsden inspected the fluff of silvery blond bangs and the tilt of her plum-colored straw hat in the small mirror that Garnet held up for her. "You must be appallingly tired, my dear Miss Ardleigh. It is such a long, tedious journey all the way from New York."
It had been a long journey, Kate thought. But hardly tedious. To her surprise and pleasure, the steamship passage Mr. Kellerman had arranged at her aunt's direction, as well as the railway tickets from Liverpool to London and from London to Colchester, had been first-class accommodations, an acknowledgment, no doubt, that she was an Ardleigh, albeit a distant one. Had she been a mere secretary-companion, she would have been sent third-class.
But although Kate's unfashionable clothing and flyaway hair set her apart from the extravagantly gowned and coiffed transatlantic voyagers, she did not feel the least uncomfortable. On the contrary, the excitement of the journey had charged her. Her imagination examined each sight, each exchange, each person, as possible subject matter for the sensational stories that Beryl Bardwell had promised to post (Kate's secretarial schedule permitting) to Mr. Coxford. After all, Kate reminded herself, she had not accepted her new position because she needed the money (she was confident of supporting herself with her pen) but because she deeply desired adventure. If she were going to write sensational stories, she needed to live a sensational life. It was impossible to describe from the heart what she had not experienced! It had been the rarest and most wonderful chance that Aunt Sabrina had risen like a specter out of the mists to offer her this Excalibur of widened horizons. She would not squander the least moment of her journey. She would take note of it all.
So she was especially gratified when Mrs. Snodgrass's priceless diamond necklace was discovered to be missing and
the gossip at the table implicated the ship's steward, a man of (it was rumored) Egyptian origin, a swarthy fellow with slender, tapering fingers and an evil look. For the following two days, Kate alternately posted herself in the stuffy hallway outside Mrs. Snodgrass's stateroom and loitered on deck near the office of the steward, pretending great interest in the starboard vista. But to her frustration, she was not afforded the opportunity to enter either room unobserved (whether she would have was quite another question) and had to content herself with polite inquiries as to Mrs. Snodgrass's health and a casually phrased remark to the steward about camels, which met with a blank stare. She was downcast when Mrs. Snodgrass's maid turned up the missing jewels in the laundry. Thus it was that the embryonic "Deadly Diamonds" (which was to have followed "Amber's Amulet," on which she was just getting a start) was rudely aborted.
But everything else about her journey had been perfect, down to the perfect coincidence of discovering that her fellow traveler in the first-class carriage from London to Colchester was Miss Eleanor Marsden, of Marsden Manor, daughter of a baronet-and her aunt's neighbor. Marsden Manor, it turned out, was only three miles from Bishop's Keep. Life was indeed stranger than fiction!
Kate was very glad to have met Miss Marsden, whom she liked immediately. Clearheaded though she was about many things, Kate was given to forming quick opinions on the basis of short acquaintance. It was a character trait that Aunt Maureen had often cautioned her to curb, although Kate stubbornly felt it a strength to be cultivated. A writer, she thought, should be a quick study of personality, able to see through the social facade straight to the heart. In the case of Miss Marsden, the heart did not seem far to seek. She wore it like a talisman on her sleeve and loved to talk about what was in it.
"There they are," Miss Marsden called over her shoulder to Kate as she tripped across the platform, plum kid boots peeping from under the deep flounce of her elegant plum-colored traveling suit. "Yoo-hoo," she cr
ied, waving. "Bradford, Charles! Here we are!"
Kate watched with interest as a strikingly handsome, fair-haired young man ambled toward them. He was dressed in stylish gray flannels, flawlessly tailored, and wore a smart gray bowler. He was accompanied by a man whose clothes were markedly less formal.
"If it isn't our favorite spendthrift," the fair-haired man said jauntily. ' 'Did you leave anything in the Regency Street shops, Ellie?"
Miss Marsden tapped him smartly on the arm. "Not a solitary ribbon or plume, dear brother. And since poor Garnet could not carry the half of my extravagances, I ordered most of my purchases sent down by post. Wait until you see the lavish waistcoat I have brought for you, in the same shade of peacock as the one I purchased for Mr. Fairley."
Mr. Ernest Fairley, Kate knew from Miss Marsden's voluminous railway confidences, was Miss Marsden's Intended. His grandfather, the genius of Fairley's Finest Fancy Candies, had founded the family fortune on chocolate. If Miss Marsden's report were to be trusted, the marriage, which would take place at Christmas, was considered the match of the year. Kate had been aghast to learn that Mr. Fairley, a widower, was nearly twenty-five years older than his bride-to-be. Still, Miss Marsden, who from the moment of their meeting had scarcely stopped talking about Mr. Fairley's courtship, their impending vows, and the splendid Fairley family home in Kensington, did not seem unduly troubled at the thought of surrendering her carefree soul to a man who was her senior by a quarter of a century.
Kate, for her part, could not imagine such a thing. Or rather, she could imagine it all too clearly, and the image made her shudder. How could any thinking woman yield up her independence to the whim and will of some man who would become her guardian both in the eyes of the law and society? How could she bear to be treated as if she were a wayward child who required adult protection from the dangers of the world and from her own naive and ungovernable willfulness? Not for her, such a fate!