by K. B. Owen
Reynolds faltered, and looked confused. “You think that I—I had something to do with Arthur’s death? That’s absurd! Why on earth would I do such a thing?”
“Why indeed?” Miss Hamilton said. She opened the ledger. “The entries here, and your actions today,” she gestured to the broken desk drawer, “reveal your complicity with President Richter and Miss Lyman in misappropriating college funds. You knew of the existence of this ledger, and were desperate to find it, and destroy it. You knew suspicion was centering upon the president, and that he planned to flee and leave you to shoulder the blame. You had sufficient motive to kill him: self-preservation, revenge, perhaps both.”
Concordia listened in silence. Julian shook his head vehemently.
“No, I did not! I admit that I wanted to examine the ledger, and discover what was in there that might implicate me. But that is all.”
“Oh, there is a great deal in here that implicates you. You are the owner of the Signal Printing Company, are you not?” Miss Hamilton asked, looking up from the ledger.
Concordia started. The Signal Printing Company. That name had been stamped on the back of Reynolds’s photograph albums.
Julian shifted uneasily.
“Of course, you are not named as the owner,” Miss Hamilton continued, “there were several trails of orphaned companies I had to follow before I found your name. Over the past two years, Bursar Lyman and President Richter authorized rather sizable payments from college accounts to Signal Printing.”
Julian turned to Concordia and gave her a pleading look. “It was only temporary, I assure you, Concordia. I was going to pay it back, as soon as the business revived.”
Concordia remembered the neglected back rooms of Julian’s house, filled with worn furnishings and cold hearths; the immigrant maid, speaking little English, inexperienced in basic parlor maid duties; the costly photography hobby; Julian Reynolds’ impeccable wardrobe. It was an expensive pretense to maintain. She understood it now, but wondered at how she could have mistaken the façade for the man.
Miss Hamilton broke the silence. “But you would not have been able to pay it all back, would you, Mr. Reynolds. Not with Arthur Richter and Ruth Lyman also taking a share of the money.”
Julian shrugged. “Perhaps. But the funds were only divided between Arthur and myself.”
Miss Hamilton raised an eyebrow. “Miss Lyman helped you steal, but kept none of it herself? But why? You are sure of this?”
“Arthur told me himself. He had deliberately hired her for the bursar position because he knew he could compel her to adjust the books for him. She had done it once before, at another school, without getting caught. Arthur found out, somehow. He threatened to ruin her if she didn’t comply. She didn’t want to. Arthur laughed at her assertion that she was reformed. Once a criminal, always a criminal, at heart. Perhaps she was assuaging her conscience by refusing to touch the money? She tried to thwart us at every turn, I do know that.”
How horrid, Concordia thought. Poor Miss Lyman.
“Do you know why Arthur did it?” Miss Hamilton asked.
“He lost a great deal of money in the market failure of ’93—more than is widely known. He was planning to retire soon. I had the impression that he was giving part of his share to someone else, too, but he would never confirm that.”
“But was this person aware of the scheme?” Miss Hamilton asked.
Julian grimaced. “I had hoped he wouldn’t be so foolish, but it concerned me greatly.”
“Do you know why Richter killed Miss Lyman?” Miss Hamilton asked, changing the subject.
Julian started. “She did not kill herself?”
“No. I am convinced Richter killed her elsewhere—perhaps by means of that head wound the coroner noticed—and dumped her body, weighted down, in the pond. But the weight broke away, and that’s why she was found sooner than he had planned. You knew nothing of this?”
Julian shook his head vehemently. “Arthur told me that she had grown despondent, and had taken her own life because she couldn’t deal with the guilt.”
“Even if that were the case, Mr. Reynolds, you would still bear responsibility for her death,” Miss Hamilton said sternly.
“But it makes no sense,” he protested. “Why would Arthur have murdered her? The scheme was working so well. He would not have wanted to jeopardize it by killing her.”
That made no sense to Concordia, either. But other mysteries were becoming clearer to her now, as she looked at Julian. “You targeted Miss Hamilton—with the knife in the doll, and the fire in her office. Why?”
Miss Hamilton raised an eyebrow in silent appreciation.
Julian flushed. “I believe I have said enough,” he said curtly.
Concordia, in a cold fury, stood up, leaning over him. “Nine of us were trapped in that burning building. It is only by the grace of Providence that we escaped. You, sir, are despicable.” She started toward the door.
“Concordia, no, please!” Julian cried, face growing pale. “I will—I will tell you—everything.”
Concordia looked at him for a long moment, then resumed her seat.
Reynolds continued. “After the trustee meeting in January, I happened to overhear a conversation, hinting that a private inquiry agent was placed at the school, to discover who was behind the money losses. It did not take me long to realize who that would be—Miss Hamilton, of course.” Despite his current circumstances, Julian Reynolds looked pleased with himself.
Miss Hamilton gave him a steely look. “So the knife, placed in my likeness after the students had orchestrated their prank, was intended to frighten me away from my investigation? How did you know what the girls were planning?”
Reynolds snorted. “Really, Miss Hamilton, those young ladies fall all over themselves to get my attention. It was a trifling matter to discover what they were up to.”
You ladies are not very good at keeping secrets, Julian had once told her.
Concordia felt her stomach clench at the arrogance of the man, even as he was caught in flagrante delicto. She gritted her teeth.
“But you did not frighten easily,” Reynolds continued, “so I had no time to waste. I knew Miss Lyman kept a ledger—the transactions were too complex to keep track of otherwise. But I was concerned about how incriminating it could be. After her death—remember, I thought she committed suicide—I worried that she intended to expose us through a suicide note and the ledger, to be found afterward. So after Miss Lyman’s death I went to Arthur, who assured me that the book was safely hidden. But I was suspicious. Each time I asked he refused to produce it.”
“I decided to take matters into my own hands,” Reynolds continued. “I planned to begin my search for the ledger in Arthur’s office, naturally. But I found that the room had already been rather sloppily rummaged through”—this said with a condescending look in Miss Hamilton’s direction—“so I assumed that you had it, Miss Hamilton. I would think, as a professional, you would be more discreet in your methods. But perhaps you lack the skill and experience a man would have.”
Concordia gave Miss Hamilton a puzzled look, but neither of them volunteered the fact that Miss Hamilton had already searched both the bursar’s office and President Richter’s office months before. Who then, had searched Richter’s office in February, when Reynolds had found it in disarray?
“Did you put the threatening note on the door?” Concordia asked.
Julian shook his head, and plucked an invisible speck of lint from his trousers. “There was no note on the door until later—when we all discovered it there. I confess to being quite confused about that.”
“Perhaps the president did it himself, to deflect suspicion?” Concordia suggested, looking over at the lady principal.
Miss Hamilton shrugged. “Perhaps.” She turned to Julian.
“You searched my office next,” Miss Hamilton prompted, “on the day of the basketball game.”
Concordia listened in silence. It made sense now: the
sound she and Miss Landry had heard within the lady principal’s office. It must have been Julian knocking the book to the floor. And her sense that there was something out of place that she could not identify. It was a smell that did not belong there. Of course—his cologne. Why hadn’t she realized it before?
Julian nodded. “It seemed an ideal time to search, when everyone else was occupied. Or so I assumed.”
“You must have stood just behind the door when I looked through the transom,” Concordia interjected. “I couldn’t see you at all.”
“You nearly had me there,” Julian admitted.
“Why did you set fire to my office?” Miss Hamilton demanded.
Reynolds lips trembled, and he looked at Concordia, now staring down at her clenched hands. “I had no idea you would be trapped. You must believe me. I would never do anything to harm you. Concordia, I swear!”
Still, Concordia would not look at him.
“You did not answer my question, Mr. Reynolds,” Miss Hamilton said.
Julian hesitated. “I had no more time to search. My prolonged absence at the basketball game would have been noticed. I set the fire so that, if the ledger was indeed in the office and I missed it, it would be destroyed. I also wanted to throw suspicion upon the college’s mysterious mischief-maker.”
Down below, they heard the bang of the front door.
Miss Hamilton stood. “The police have arrived for you, Mr. Reynolds.”
Chapter 54
Week 18, Instructor Calendar, June 1896
The green fields whizzed by in a blur, air rushing over her face and through her hair. Concordia pedaled her bicycle, past the grassy hills, over the old sheep tracks, beyond the college grounds, beyond people, as hard and as fast as she could endure. The sun was out with the full force of late afternoon, and her blouse was soon damp and clinging to her back.
Finally, exhausted, she stopped, lay down in the grass, and wept.
She was much calmer when David found her, at the top of Rook’s Hill, watching the sun stretch lingering rays of gold and crimson across the campus grounds below.
He sat down beside her, careless of the damp grass staining his trousers. “The news has spread throughout the campus—and beyond it now, I’m sure—about Reynolds. I came to find you when I heard. I thought you might be here. Are you all right, Concordia?”
She glanced up at him with a wan smile. “I will be.” She shook her head. “I was so wrong about him. How can I trust my own judgment anymore?”
David put an arm around her shoulders. “He fooled us all. It was impossible for you to have known.”
“It’s still confusing. I accept that he was responsible for a great deal of wrongdoing—the doll, the fire, the stolen money—looking back now, it all makes sense, the little things that I didn’t understand at the time. But the murder? I’m not sure what to think.”
Concordia looked at him steadily. “And I am tired of secrets, David.”
He knew what she meant. “You want me to explain why I was in that—questionable establishment.”
“Yes. And why you visited Sophia Adams, instead of going to Boston, and kept it from me.”
“You know about that, too?” David shook his head. “They are each connected to the other, actually.”
Concordia looked skeptical.
“No, truly,” he protested. He was silent for a moment.
“Did you know I have a younger brother, Lawrence? I have never talked with you about him, for good reason.”
Concordia started. Lawrence Bradley. Sophia had mentioned that name.
“Lawrence has been spoiled his entire life,” David went on. “He never had to work for anything. He fell into dissipated habits, along with other such men he called his friends. Any entertainment and stimulation would do: gambling, drinking, music halls—and—and brothels.”
Concordia began to see. “So when Julian saw you at that house –”
“—it must have been the day I finally found Lawrence and went to get him,” David finished. “He had been missing for a week. I was planning to seek him out among some of his favorite haunts in Boston, when I discovered that he was still here in Hartford. He was the man who created the disruption at the rally, Concordia. I learned about it the day after the attack on Sophia.”
Concordia looked at David in surprise. “The man at the rally is your brother?”
David nodded. “He has little memory of the time. That’s not surprising, as he was still drunk when I found him. If Reynolds had watched the house for just a while longer, he would have seen me dragging him out.”
“But why would your brother go to the rally in the first place? And how is Sophia connected—no wait, I remember—she recognized him. They know each other, don’t they?”
David grimaced. “Miss Adams and my brother go back a long way. They were childhood friends. He is a few years older than she, and she idolized him like a big brother. He let her follow him around. I ran with a different crowd, so I didn’t really know her. They drifted apart, of course, as they grew older, but she must have learned of Lawrence’s dissolute behavior. A few weeks before the rally, she took it upon herself to visit him in his rooms. Unaccompanied. To give him a good talking-to, no doubt. She’s a very headstrong young lady.”
Concordia nodded. “That is Sophia’s way.”
David sighed. “Lawrence was inebriated, and angry, when she called on him. He was abominable to her. Shouted terrible things, called her a meddling spinster, even threatened violence, before she finally left. In a fit of remorse, he told me about it, at least what he could remember of it.”
“So why…?”
“Don’t you see, Concordia? When you and I found Miss Adams that morning, Lawrence had already been missing for days. He had threatened her with violence once already, and then I learned that he had disrupted the rally as she was standing upon the stage. I have known him to hold grudges and become uncontrollably angry while intoxicated. I thought the worst. I felt guilty for…not keeping a better watch over him.” He faltered, and fell silent.
“You decided to visit her in the infirmary,” Concordia prompted.
“Yes. I’m not even sure why, myself. Perhaps to apologize for Lawrence, even if she could not hear me? It seems absurd, I know.”
He continued. “You were not the only person to notice my visit. The night of the ball, Miss Hamilton practically interrogated me. It was difficult to evade her questions.”
So that was the conversation Concordia had interrupted.
David gave a shaky laugh. “I was actually glad to learn that Lawrence was at that—establishment—the entire time in question. It was a relief, at least, to know that he could not have attacked Sophia.”
Concordia was quiet for a while. Finally she spoke. “What will happen to him?”
“Our parents have decided that it is best to get him away from the bad influence of his friends. They are sending him on a South American tour. He sails with my uncle next week.”
Concordia looked down at the peaceful-looking campus below, and shook her head. “That’s a heavy burden to carry. At least you won’t be responsible for him now.”
David took her hand in his. “Then you do believe me, Concordia? I know that others have shaken your trust, but I promise you that I will not.”
“Yes. I believe you,” she answered absently. His words had brought her thoughts back to Julian.
He looked worried. “Are you sure? You don’t sound convinced.”
She focused steadily on the horizon. The sun was sinking lower, and a cool breeze was beginning to dry her damp blouse. It would be dark soon.
“I’m thinking again about President Richter’s murder. The more I consider it, the harder it is to believe Julian killed him.”
“I know you have feelings for Reynolds, Concordia, but—”
“No, it’s not sentimentality,” she interrupted. “There are some pieces to this which do not make sense. Why lure President Richter to the tower, for
instance, and kill him there? And, if Julian was the murderer, why would he return that night? Wouldn’t he want to be as far from the place as possible? And why use a knife? It’s a very messy way to commit the deed, and Julian is meticulous in the extreme. Would he not have chosen a cleaner way to do it?”
David was silent for a while. “I’m beginning to see your point. But that would mean that we still have a murderer among us.”
Concordia shivered. “That’s exactly what it means.”
She lay awake long into the night, listening to a chorus of tree frogs in the distance, one question uppermost in her mind.
Who murdered Arthur Richter?
She turned over restlessly, tugging at her nightgown, which was hopelessly bunched and twisted. There had been so much death this year. First Ruth Lyman, then Mary, and Henry, and now President Richter. They had nearly lost Sophia as well. All the ugly attributes of human nature—lust, greed, fear, bitterness, self-preservation at the expense of others—each of these had been laid bare.
And yet…the brighter side of humanity had revealed itself to her this year, too. She had seen courage: in her students, as they faced being trapped in the fire; in Sophia, playing her part on the stage in front of her would-be murderer; in Miss Hamilton, doing what Concordia had seen no other woman do, staring down a criminal over the barrel of a pistol. Concordia had also seen loyalty and compassion: in David, in Ruby, in Miss Bellini, in Nathaniel. And yes, even her mother has shown her softer side, she thought, recalling the day of the fire.
Amidst it all, people laughed, they loved, they danced….
What a set of contradictions we are, she thought. Miss Banning’s words about Macbeth drifted back to her: He is human, like the rest of us. No matter how kind, well-intentioned, or amiable we may be, we are each equally capable of malice, under the right circumstances.
What were the “right circumstances” to provoke a murder? The threat to one’s safety, perhaps? Had Arthur Richter threatened anyone with physical violence? Perhaps he had posed a different sort of threat. Who else besides Julian, Richter’s co-conspirator, would have felt threatened by him?