A Sickness in the Soul

by William Savage

  When Foxe finally entered her house, Mrs Danson received him quietly and graciously, as was her habit. They sat once more in her drawing room, drinking tea and exchanging polite conversation in the approved manner. Poor Foxe was still looking for ways to postpone the inevitable. He looked around him and complimented his hostess on the taste with which she had furnished and decorated the room. He admired the walls, painted a pale lavender colour to set off the natural whiteness of the plaster mouldings. He remarked on the long mirrors set opposite the windows to reflect the light. He praised the carefully-chosen paintings: a mixture of portraits and landscapes in the Dutch style. He noted that there was a distinctly feminine feel to the room, enhanced by the display of fine Chinese vases and bowls. He asked if all this was due to the first Mrs Danson or the present one. All in all, Foxe declared himself delighted with almost everything he saw.

  What he kept secret was that his delight extended to the lady before him. Mrs Danson was wearing mourning dress, as would be expected. The sombre colour set off to perfection the delicate shades in her skin and her lustrous hair where it escaped from under a simple lace cap. Foxe wished — oh, how he wished! — that she was less beautiful and less amiable in her manner. It was going to be bad enough, without the attraction he couldn’t help himself feeling towards her.

  Eventually, the proper preliminaries had been exhausted and the moment had come for him to say what he needed to say. Much of the night before, all through breakfast and at every step of his walk to her house, Foxe had cudgelled his brain to find a gentle way of doing it. It was all to no avail. Everything he could think of sounded false or insincere. Now, in desperation, he abandoned all such attempts and plunged ahead.

  ‘Why did you lie to me, Mrs Danson?’ he began. ‘There was another visitor to this house on the day your husband died, wasn’t there? A person who came after Mr Wake, or whatever his name was, had left. It was your brother, George Stubbings, wasn’t it?’

  ‘I didn’t lie to you, Mr Foxe,’ she said calmly. ‘No one else came here on that particular day. My brother came the day before. Would to God he had not done so! I hadn’t seen him for more than two years. I devoutly hoped never to set eyes on him again. Then there he was, grinning all over his face and asking for money, as ever. He told me he’d heard that I had married a wealthy man and expected me to share my wealth with him. He even held out his hand. If I had had a weapon at that moment — and he were not almost twice my size — I would have struck him down where he stood. Instead, I explained that my husband handled everything to do with money. All I had was what little pin money I had saved. He was welcome to that, if only he would go away and leave me alone.’

  ‘What did he say?’

  ‘Little enough. He took my money of course. He also cursed me for being what he called “a vengeful unnatural hag who forgot her kin when she had at last lifted herself out of the gutter, which was where I truly belonged”. A delightful way for a brother to address his only sister, wasn’t it? Then he left, vowing to return very soon for more.’

  ‘Did he?’

  ‘Once more. That was on the day after my husband had been killed. I assumed he’d heard about it somewhere. He came in, gloating, saying I was a rich widow now and could give him all the money he needed. When I asked him what for, he said it was to allow him to get away from this city and go somewhere people couldn’t find him. Why did he want to do that, Mr Foxe? He’d already been away from Norwich for years. Why come back only to talk about leaving again as soon as he could?’

  ‘Wherever your brother had been living – probably King’s Lynn or Cambridge, I would guess — he’d taken to thieving to support himself. Before long, he was taken and brought before the magistrate, who sent him for trial at the assizes. There he was condemned to death, as the law demands. That sentence was swiftly commuted to transportation for seven years, probably because of his age. How old was he, by the way?’

  ‘George is five years younger than I am,’ she replied. ‘That makes him nineteen now.’

  ‘Then he would have been seventeen at the time he was sentenced. Unless the crime is very serious, no judge wishes to send a person of that age to the gallows. Instead, he was sent to a prison hulk at Portsmouth to await a suitable ship to take him to America. Unfortunately, he managed to escape along with two others, killing a guard while doing so. Both the others were soon recaptured. Both swore your brother had been the killer. Whether that was to save themselves or the plain truth hardly matters. In the eyes of the authorities, young George Stubbings was now a murderer. When he was caught, there would be no reprieve this time. He would be sent to the gallows.’

  By now, Mrs Danson’s face had lost all its colour and Foxe could see tears on her cheek.

  ‘Georgie always was headstrong and violent, even as a boy,’ she said, ‘but I never thought that he would sink so low as to kill a man. He is the only kin I have, Mr Foxe. Even if I’d known what you’ve just told me, I don’t think I could have handed him over to the magistrate — not to be hanged.’

  ‘I fear that wasn’t the only murder on his hands,’ Foxe replied. ‘He must have laid low somewhere until the hue and cry after him had died down. Then he came back to Norwich, he began to work for an apothecary who also acted as the most unscrupulous kind of moneylender. A certain Mr Craswall.’

  ‘Mr Craswall! But I know him! He came here often to talk with my husband. I thought it was to discuss my husband’s health.’

  ‘I’m afraid it’s clear from some papers I found in your husband’s library that wasn’t the case. Dr Danson had been lending Mr Craswall large amounts of money on a regular basis and at high rates of interest.’

  ‘It must have been to pay for more and more purchases of his beloved books,’ Mrs Danson said. ‘I could never work out how he could go on finding the large sums he spent on them. However many he possessed, he never felt he had enough. It wouldn’t have been so bad if the library he put together was something to be proud of; something he could show to visitors and share with his friends. Instead, it’s full of books about his other obsession. His belief in some kind of hidden knowledge to explain the world about us and open the way to understanding all the mysteries of this life. When we were first married, he tried to explain it to me, for it obsessed him even then. To my mind, it was all so much silly superstition, blended with large doses of imagination, supposed magic and a good deal of heresy. What do you think of it, Mr Foxe? Is it as some men say? That a woman’s mind is too feeble to be able to grasp such serious subjects?’

  ‘I have met many women whom I would rate as being at least as clever as I am, Mrs Danson, several of them more so. As for the rest of it, even as a man, I heartily endorse your view. It was all nonsense. Yet, as a bookseller, I know there are people willing to pay large amounts of money for such books.’

  ‘Then I will ask you to sell them for me as soon as I am granted probate. However, that is for another time and another meeting. What bothers me now is whether my husband knew what Mr Craswall was using the money for.’

  ‘I believe he must have known,’ Foxe said. ‘It couldn’t have taken him long to realise that no legitimate small business would have needed such regular inputs of capital. Nor could any have generated enough profit to cover the high rates of interest he was charging — let alone generate an adequate return on top of it.’

  Mrs Danson shook her head as if by doing so she might drive away the pain and misery she was feeling. Inwardly, Foxe cursed the malevolent fate which had caused him to be the one to inflict such misery upon this woman. Of course, she would have to know sometime. Better that she should hear in this way than through the sideways looks, malicious hints and exaggerated gossip. Better than in open court. He had to hope so.

  ‘Let me be clear on this,’ she said after a moment. ‘My brother was working for Mr Craswall in his activities as a moneylender, and my husband was involved as well.’

  ‘I’m sorry to have to tell you that your brother was one of this man
’s paid ruffians,’ Foxe said. ‘He went around threatening or doing harm to those who didn’t pay what they owed on time.’

  ‘Curse him! I’ll never give him another penny, however much he bullies me. As I told you, he threatened the second time he came here to keep returning with fresh demands. If I tried to escape by informing on him to the magistrates, he said he would swear I had asked him to kill my husband to set me free to marry another. I knew many would think as much anyway. When you came here today, that thought was upper most in your mind also. I could see it in your face.

  ‘I didn’t love my husband, Mr Foxe, but I was happy with him and he looked after me well. Why should I want him dead? Certainly not to marry another, younger man. I’ve had many, many young lovers in my time. Most were nothing more than fumbling wretches, no more able to give a woman pleasure than they were of learning Arabic. Few even tried. They used me for their own pleasure and set me aside, to use me again or not, as and when they pleased.’

  That remark cut Foxe to the quick. Was he a man such as that? He would find it more than hard to deny the charge.

  ‘You won’t have to fear your brother ever again, Mrs Danson,’ he said. ‘He’s dead.’

  Foxe hadn’t meant it to come out so baldly, even brutally, but he could see no other way of putting it. For several moments, Mrs Danson was silent, her eyes shut, and her hands clasped into fists. Then she gave a great sigh and opened her eyes once more. He could see the tears staining her cheeks and longed to take her in his arms to comfort her.

  ‘Poor Georgie!’ she sighed. ‘I wish he’d had a better life. Now you tell me it’s past almost before it had properly begun. Until this news, I suppose I was clinging to the hope that one day he might reform. Now even that has ended. How did he die?’

  Here was the question Foxe had been dreading most. To know her brother was dead was bad enough. To know how he had died would be many times worse. He would have avoided giving an answer, had it been possible. Now the look she fixed upon him through her tears denied him the chance of any further evasions.

  ‘So far as I can make out, he was sent to persuade a clerk — one who worked for the city treasury — to pay the money he owed to Mr Craswall. The clerk had become involved in gambling for high stakes. In time, his losses far outstripped his ability to make them good. Then he must have fallen into the hands of Mr Craswall and asked to borrow to pay his gambling debts. That was bad enough, given the enormous rate of interest Craswall would have demanded. Sadly, he then made things worse by continuing his habit and losing still more. He even stole money from the place where he worked. I do not know whether that was to settle some of his debts or make further wagers. Like many another before him, he soon reached the point where he could neither repay what he had borrowed nor meet the interest demanded.’

  ‘George went to extract whatever he could from the man — by force if necessary?’

  ‘Exactly. It was something he must have done many times before. However, this time he went too far and killed the poor fellow. Not only would that make Craswall furious, he might even hand your brother over to the magistrate to avoid coming under suspicion himself.’

  Mrs Danson raised her hands to her face in horror. ‘Please don’t tell me he killed Mr Craswall as well.’

  ‘No, not that. Something even more stupid. He tried to blackmail the man, just as he threatened to blackmail you, and probably for the same reason. He knew he’d never be safe now until he was far away from here. He needed the money to make his escape. If he’d thought about it at all, he would have realised that Craswall would never pay. He should also have known the moneylender was more ruthless and more cunning than he was himself. The man simply used some of his other ruffians to make sure your troublesome brother wouldn’t bother him again. Your brother’s body was found in the river. His throat had been cut.’

  ‘God forgive me! I told him he would come to a bad end, Mr Foxe. Now I have been proved correct. I never dreamt that would be what actually happened. Nor that it would happen so quickly.’

  ‘Your brother was a petty criminal, who was foolish enough to take on hardened rogues, Mrs Danson. He should have realised how dangerous that was.’

  ‘He was only nineteen, Mr Foxe. We all make foolish mistakes at that age.’

  Foxe hesitated. He had already caused this woman so much pain. If he continued, he must inflict still more. Should he leave and return on another occasion? Should he get it over with here and now, so he could assure her there would be nothing worse yet come? Both paths were equally repellent to him at that moment. In the end, he chose the latter, as much to save himself further anguish as to avoid inflicting it on her.

  While he was making up his mind, Mrs Danson spoke again. ‘You have brought me a great deal of bad news today, Mr Foxe. First you tell me that my younger brother — my only living kin — is a thief and murderer. Now it seems my husband was no better than a rogue and a criminal himself. Worse! I have seen what such moneylenders can do and the misery they bring to all who fall into their hands. You tell me my brother was working for such a man and my husband was providing him with the means to continue his filthy business. Even now, your face tells me that there is more to come. Tell me at once, I pray you. Don’t leave the threat hanging over me. I couldn’t bear that.’

  ‘From all that I have learned, Mrs Danson, I fear there is another murder to be set to his account.’

  ‘Not my husband? Not that! Oh God, not that! To think I let George leave this house and didn’t report to anyone that he had been here. I thought he was only trying to get money from me, as he had done many times before.’

  Foxe reminded her that the medical examiner gave evidence her husband had died from a heart attack. Even if it was George Stubbings who had stabbed him, he would not have been the cause of the man’s death. Foxe had been certain of events in his own mind before today. All he’d lacked was firm evidence that Stubbings had been to the house on the day Dr Danson died. Mrs Danson had now admitted he’d been there the day before and the day after her husband’s death. She was adamant that no one else had visited on the fateful day other than Mr Wake. If what she said was true — and Foxe felt certain it was — Stubbings could not have been responsible for Dr Danson’s death. He now searched in his mind for another way forward.

  ‘Did anything else unusual happen on the day your husband died, Mrs Danson?’ he asked. As so often, it proved to be the most seemingly random shot which went straight to the mark.

  She thought for a moment.

  ‘Nothing important. Wait,’ she said. ‘There was one thing. Someone left the front door open. Gunton told me he found the door ajar just before he went into the library and discovered my husband’s body. That’s why he went into the library, even after my husband had expressly told him not to. He thought his master or his visitor had gone out without telling him.’

  ‘Had Mr Wake gone by that time?’

  ‘I believe so. Why not ask Gunton yourself, Mr Foxe? I’ll call him.’

  When he came, the butler confirmed all his mistress had said. After he had shown the visitor into the library, his master told him they were not to be disturbed on any account. He would call when he needed him again.

  ‘What did you do after that?’ Foxe asked.

  ‘I went on my way, sir, first to the kitchen, then to my own room. There I spent some time polishing the knives and silver labels. You know, sir. The ones which hang around the necks of the port and sherry bottles. After I had finished, I took a cup of tea with the housekeeper. That is something we usually do at some time during the morning. It helps us to stay in touch with whatever the other one is doing. After that, I went back into the hall to make sure the visitor’s coat and hat were ready for him when he left. I found both gone and the front door ajar. It wasn’t like the master to let someone out without telling me, sir, but he could be unpredictable at times. To make sure his visitor had indeed left, I went to the library and listened outside the door. Finding no sound of voices
from within, I opened the door and looked inside.’

  ‘That was when you found your master dead,’ Foxe said.

  ‘Indeed so, sir. The moment I looked into the room, I could see him slumped in his chair. At first, I thought he must be ill, only when I got closer could I see the blood on his chest and stomach. He’d fallen over to one side and his head was thrown back. That must have been why his wig was lying on the floor. He must have struggled against his killer. When I looked closer, I could see his hands were clenched into fists. I thought there were signs of a blow to his head as well. The thought went through my mind that he and Mr Wake had quarrelled in some way and Mr Wake had struck him. Then, horrified at what he had done, the man went back to the hall, snatched up his coat and left.’

  Yes, thought Foxe, that’s the most plausible answer. He could never be certain until he could track down this mysterious visitor and question him.

  ‘Did you find a strange knife or a dagger?’ he asked the butler. ‘Or anything else that might have been used as a weapon to kill your master.’

  ‘No, sir. Nothing of that kind. At the inquest, the medical person said he thought the master might have been stabbed with a paperknife from his desk.’

  ‘Did you agree with that observation?’

  The butler shook his head. ‘I did not, sir. When I saw the blood, I thought immediately of the paper knife myself. There was no blood on it, sir, I’m sure of that. Nor was there any blood on the desk. The paperknife was on the floor, lying beside the wig. That was why I looked at it. To my reckoning, it must’ve fallen to the floor some time earlier. The master had been slitting the pages of the book he’d just received when I took Mr Wake into the library. He could easily have knocked it to the floor, when he jumped up to welcome his visitor.’