“I’m resolved to do my part in keeping the situation as civilized as possible.”
“I appreciate that, but keeping things civilized will be largely my responsibility, and I cannot guarantee success,” he warned. “Nathalie may well pitch the tea service at my head.”
“Have you thought of asking your solicitor to come down to Cornwall?” Sophie asked. “I’ve heard there’s nothing like the presence of lawyers for ensuring a professional atmosphere.”
“You have a point, love. I’ll take it under advisement. Now,” he added, running a caressing hand down her side, “as this is our last night here, I refuse to spend another moment thinking about lawyers, divorces, or anything except you, me, and our time together.”
She dimpled at him, once more the carefree girl he remembered. “Carpe diem?”
“Carpe noctem,” he corrected, and kissed her.
Later, as she slept beside him, he thought of one other thing he’d meant to give her.
Something that, like the pearls, he had kept in his vault in London and meant only for her. But the time was not quite right for that, he sensed. And he did not want to foredoom the moment by acting too precipitately. Better to wait until he was truly free to offer that last gift. When he could call her affianced wife not just in the eyes of God, but in the eyes of the world.
***
They left at first light, just as they had planned. From Witney to Oxford, Oxford to London—the train connections were made quickly and easily.
Sophie dozed with her head on Robin’s shoulder, lulled by the rhythmic clacking of the train’s wheels, bearing them closer to their final destination. He shook her gently awake as the engine pulled into Paddington.
“This isn’t the first time I’ve fallen asleep on you,” she observed, sitting up and stifling a yawn. “After this past week, you must be getting weary of it.”
Robin smiled. “Perhaps after forty years I will. But for now, I find it infinitely comforting, because it means you’re here, with me.”
They collected their valises and stepped out onto the fog-shrouded platform, hoping to locate a hackney.
“Sophie. Pendarvis.”
Sophie almost jumped out of her skin at the disembodied voice emerging from the fog. Peering through the mist, she saw a tall figure striding toward them. With a shock, she recognized Thomas Sheridan, but his face was drawn and grimmer than she’d ever seen it.
Dread gripped Sophie’s heart. If anything had happened to Amy or little Bella…
“Sheridan?” Robin sounded puzzled. “What are you doing here? Is something amiss?”
“I’m afraid so,” Sheridan replied. “A telegram’s come, not two hours ago, from Cornwall.” He hesitated a moment, then grasped Robin’s arm. “There’s no easy way to tell you, Pendarvis. Your wife has been murdered.”
Sixteen
Cover her face. Mine eyes dazzle. She died young.
—John Webster, The Duchess of Malfi
Once again Sophie embarked upon a railway journey she could remember nothing about afterward. Well, nearly nothing… she remembered Robin, pale as a ghost beside her, his mouth set like stone, and his eyes as far away as his thoughts clearly were.
The news of his wife’s death had stunned them both. No question of an accident, illness, or even a suicide, in this case. According to the telegram and the subsequent telephone conversation Thomas had had with James, someone had choked the life out of Nathalie Pendarvis the previous night. Her hysterical lady’s maid had discovered the body in the morning, lying crumpled beside her dressing table. Most of Nathalie’s jewels were missing, suggesting that she had surprised a thief at his work.
Robin’s face had grown greyer with every detail he’d absorbed, but speech had seemed beyond him just then. Sheridan had instantly borne him and Sophie off to Sheridan House, where Amy had plied them with food and strong black coffee, insisting they break their fast before undertaking the necessary arrangements. Two hours later, their trunks packed and the Pendarvis Hotel informed of Robin’s imminent return, he and Sophie were aboard the Sheridans’ private railway coach, bound for Cornwall.
Sophie longed to say something comforting, but all that came to mind were soulless platitudes. Her rival, Robin’s wife, the mother of his child, was suddenly and horribly dead. What could she possibly say that wouldn’t sound banal, insincere, or worst of all, ghoulish?
In the end she settled for saying nothing, but remained close beside him throughout the four-hour journey. At least he had accepted her presence. Once his initial shock had worn off, he had tried to persuade her to remain in London, shielded from the ugliness that awaited him in Cornwall, but she’d flatly refused to let him make this terrible passage alone. This wasn’t the way they’d expected or wanted it to happen, but they were a couple now, for better or for worse.
It was late afternoon when they arrived in Newquay, and a carriage was already waiting for them at the station. They got on in silence, and were soon driving through the gates of the Pendarvis Hotel. Glancing out the window, Sophie saw a man standing on the front steps and recognized him, with a shock, as her eldest brother.
The moment the carriage door opened, Harry was there, his face strained and anxious.
“Thank God you’re here, Rob.” The words tumbled out of him. “I’m so sorry—”
Robin held up a hand and climbed down from the carriage. “Where is she?”
“Upstairs—in her chamber.” Harry swallowed, as distraught as Sophie had ever seen him. “I wasn’t sure what to do. Whether to have her remains taken to the mortuary—or leave her where she was until you came. Because you are still her husband, in spite of—” He broke off, his whole face changing as he caught sight of his sister alighting in Robin’s wake. “Good God, Sophie, what are you doing here?”
“I was present when Robin received the news,” Sophie replied evenly. “So I traveled down with him. I felt he should not make such a journey alone.”
She could almost see the questions forming on Harry’s tongue, but after a moment’s visible struggle, he capitulated. “No, of course not. I’m—glad you had one of us there to support you,” he added to Robin, stepping back so the coachman could unload the trunks.
Robin glanced at Sophie, his bleak gaze warming fractionally. “Miss Tresilian was a great comfort to me” was all he said, before turning back to his partner. “You did the right thing, Harry—I wouldn’t have wanted Nathalie moved, not until I had the chance to see her. I assume the police are here?”
“Two constables, a sergeant, and an Inspector Taunton, sent over from Newquay,” Harry confirmed. “They’re waiting inside. With the coroner.”
“Do our guests know of this?” Robin asked. His professional facade was firmly in place, Sophie saw: the hotelier whose first concern was the safety and comfort of his guests.
Harry nodded. “No way of avoiding it, I’m afraid. A few wanted to depart the moment they heard, but cooler heads prevailed. Besides, Taunton’s confined all the guests to the premises until things are more—resolved.” He passed a weary hand over his face. “Praed and I have been trying to keep them calm and contained. Mrs. Dowling has been doing the same with the staff. They’re all at sixes and sevens, especially that wretched maid—” He broke off, jerked his head toward the steps, where a sandy-haired man in a plain overcoat was now standing, flanked by his subordinates.
“Mr. Pendarvis?” the sandy-haired man inquired.
Robin nodded. “I am he.”
“Inspector Taunton,” the other man identified himself. “I am sorry for your loss.”
“Thank you,” Robin returned levelly, his expression giving nothing away.
“I regret the necessity of this,” Taunton continued, “but would you be so good as to accompany me—upstairs?”
Robin did not hesitate. “Of course,” he said, and followed the inspector into the hotel.
Sophie watched him go, her heart aching for him. However well he hid it, she knew this loss was
a blow for him. And he would have to break this terrible news to his daughter too…
Beside her, Harry cleared his throat. “Sophie, what were you—”
“Not now, Harry. Robin’s situation is what matters. Everything else can wait,” she added, not ungently, as she turned to look at him—the beloved older brother who’d been almost a father to her after their own father’s untimely death. As a child, she’d eagerly sought his approval and good opinion. She would always love and respect him. But she was of age now, a grown woman who made her own choices and was not obliged to answer for them, even to her family.
Something of that realization flickered across Harry’s face as he studied her, taking in her subdued but fashionable traveling dress, her modish hat, and, perhaps most persuasive of all, the added inch or two of height she’d attained in the last four years. “Very well,” he conceded with a sigh that told her how much strain he was under at present. “But we will speak of this, later.”
“Of course.” Sophie paused, then held out her hands. “It’s good to see you, Harry. I’ve missed you and everyone else dreadfully.”
He gave her a lopsided smile and took her hands, squeezing them gently. “I’ve missed you too, Snip. Welcome home.”
***
No one who has been strangled is ever beautiful.
Robin stared down at the body, laid out carefully upon the bed. For a mercy, someone had closed Nathalie’s eyes and mouth so her tongue did not protrude, but her face was still congested and livid, and the reddened abrasion around the tender skin of her throat—where a garrote of some sort had been wound and then pulled fatally tight—betrayed just how determined her killer had been. When Robin’s mother had died so many years ago, she’d looked for a time as if she were merely sleeping. Nathalie looked dead.
The worst thing was that he could still recognize the woman he’d married in this pallid corpse. The silver-gilt ringlets, the triangular shape of her face, the dainty figure—all were horribly familiar. So were the pretty hands, now piously crossed upon her breast—he remembered how they’d used to flutter, like little white birds, when she was excited. Strange to see them so still now. She wore no rings, not even a wedding band, and the ink stains on her right middle and index fingers stood out dark as bruises against her porcelain fair skin. She’d kept a diary—un journal—when she was a young girl. He wondered suddenly if she still did… had… What could it matter now? Whatever essence or spirit that had made Nathalie who and what she was had gone forever.
He was faintly surprised that he did not feel sick. Perhaps that would come later, when the reality of what he was seeing had finally sunk in. The younger of the two constables looked slightly green about the mouth, though his colleagues appeared to be made of sterner stuff.
“Sir?” the older constable prompted.
Robin suppressed a shiver, feeling cold and somehow insubstantial—almost as if he were dead himself, and it was his spirit standing there, identifying Nathalie’s remains. Forcing that gruesome thought away, he straightened up. “Yes, that is—was—my wife. Nathalie Pendarvis.”
His voice sounded very far away in his own ears. At a nod from Taunton, the coroner drew the sheet up over Nathalie’s face.
Robin exhaled slowly and turned away from the bed, trying to focus on something—anything—else. In their four years of uneasy coexistence, he had entered Nathalie’s chamber no more than a handful of times, usually on some matter pertaining to the children. Now his gaze swept restlessly over the room: the pale blue wallpaper, the even paler blue window curtains, the gilt chair lying overturned before the white-draped dressing table… a stark reminder of how and where she’d met her death. His mind shied away from that as from an open grave, and he registered with relief the sound of a throat being cleared, a reminder that he was not alone.
“Mr. Pendarvis.” Taunton exchanged a glance with his sergeant. “Will you come down to the police station and give us your statement? There are some questions we wish to ask you.”
Robin took a breath and said evenly, “I will answer whatever questions you have, but not today. I have been traveling for the last four hours. I have a hotel to run, guests to reassure and, most important of all,” he held Taunton’s gaze, “a daughter who doesn’t yet know that her mother is dead. My place is with her now.”
“Understood.” Taunton inclined his head. “Tomorrow morning will be soon enough. Meanwhile, have we your permission to remove…” He gestured toward the bed and its shrouded occupant.
Robin nodded. “You do.”
Steeling himself, he turned and watched without flinching as the woman who’d once borne his name and honor, only to shame them both, departed from Pendarvis Hall forever.
***
“Robin.” Sophie touched his hand, felt a flash of alarm at how cold it was. “Dear heart, you must eat something,” she cajoled.
They were sitting alone, in his private parlor, a plate of sandwiches and a pot of tea before them. Robin had just got back from consulting with Praed and Mr. Pascoe, the concierge, on how to handle this crisis at the hotel. Meanwhile, Harry was continuing to soothe and reassure the most anxious guests that this tragedy was an isolated incident, not a harbinger of future mayhem. Moreover, it had occurred not in the hotel itself but in the private residential part of the Hall, where the security was far lighter. And the police had been on the scene all day, searching for evidence to identify Mrs. Pendarvis’s killer.
Sobered by the reminder of the victim’s identity, the guests were quick to express their sympathy for their host and willing to cooperate with Taunton’s request—for now, at least. Sophie had remained discreetly in the background, letting her lover and her brother handle their business and clientele as they saw fit. From what she heard and saw, however, she gathered that the hotel staff respected “the master” and Sir Harry highly, and were doing their best to help them through this “dreadful business.” What any of them felt toward Nathalie she could not begin to guess, although she had not witnessed any great outpouring of grief thus far, more a sense of general disquiet and distress than any personal loss.
To Sophie’s surprise and gratification, some of the staff recognized and remembered her—perhaps even with affection. So when she asked for tea and sandwiches to be sent up to the master’s parlor for his return, her request had been speedily granted.
Robin had appeared soon after, composed but still ashen. Sophie did not think he’d had normal color in his face since he’d first got the news. Sustenance was called for—hours had passed since the breakfast Amy had pressed upon them, and he’d eaten little enough of that. So she poured out a cup of tea, added sugar liberally, and set it before him, then piled a plate with three sandwiches—not bite-sized cucumber and cress dainties, but hearty constructions of ham and roast beef on thick new bread—and handed that over as well.
Still dazed, he stared down at the plate. “I don’t know if I can—”
“You must eat,” Sophie broke in sternly. “You’ll need your strength if you’re to be of any use to your daughter.”
Robin roused at that and took the topmost sandwich, slanting her a guilty glance. “I’m a rank coward, my love,” he confessed. “I told Taunton that my place was with my daughter, and yet, here I am, no closer to Pentreath than I was half an hour ago.”
Sophie touched his arm. “No one can blame you for not rushing to tell her this. Or for taking the time to—find the right words. If they even exist,” she qualified with a wry smile. “But in my experience, bad news can usually wait. Take a little time now, for yourself.”
He nodded, took a listless bite of his sandwich, and then another as hunger suddenly revived. Devouring the rest of it, he reached for a second and was halfway through that when Harry walked in, looking almost as weary as Robin. Unlike Robin, he required no urging to take some refreshment, falling upon the sandwiches like a man who hadn’t seen food for a week.
“Things appear to have settled down, for now,” he reported around
a mouthful of ham and cheese. “Of course it helps that the police appear to have left for now, and that none of the guests appear to be under suspicion.”
Robin took a sip of tea, blinked as though registering its sweetness for the first time, but swallowed anyway. “Praed tells me their movements are accounted for last night?”
“Surprisingly, yes. They were all abed when it happened, and the staff as well. Not that I want anyone here to have done this,” Harry added hastily. “But if not them, then…” His voice trailed off and he shook his head.
“Then who?” Robin finished for him, his mouth twisting in a parody of a smile.
Sophie suppressed a shiver and drank some tea herself. Who, indeed? If no one—guest or staff—on the premises had killed Nathalie, then it must be an intruder. Perhaps a thief, as had been previously suggested—and the missing jewels seemed to bear out that theory. But why only Nathalie’s? Surely there were women staying at the hotel who owned more costly jewels and valuables. Unless the thief had known Robin’s wing of the Hall was essentially unguarded…
“—Dowling’s got a bit more sense out of Enid, the lady’s maid.” Harry’s voice broke into her thoughts. “I don’t know how much stock to put in what she says, she was still half-hysterical at the time, but… she claims she heard a sound coming from her mistress’s chamber last night and got up to investigate.”
Sophie tensed in her chair, her attention now fully engaged. Beside her, Robin’s gaze sharpened. “She did?”
“She says,” Harry resumed slowly, “that she opened the connecting door, just a crack—and saw a tall, thin man standing behind Nathalie’s chair, throttling her.”
Robin’s breath hissed between his teeth. “Christ! Why didn’t she—”
“She fainted,” Harry said succinctly. “And she was unsteady on her pins as it was. Nathalie had dismissed her early because she had a toothache—Enid, I mean—and she dosed herself with some tonic that had laudanum in it. I’m surprised she could see straight at all, much less through a barely open door in the dark. When she came to, it was morning, and she thought she’d been dreaming or hallucinating, but—” He broke off, grimacing.
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