Jane and the Stillroom Maid

by Stephanie Barron

  “Uncle! And Miss Austen!” Lady Swithin cried; she squeezed Hary-O’s hand and came swiftly across to us. “Is everything not dreadful! I still cannot believe it possible of Charles!”

  Lord Harold touched his niece’s cheek; she gazed at him imploringly, as though even now he might be capable of restoring Charles Danforth to life. “Stay with Hary-O, Mona—there’s a good girl.”

  The Countess nodded once and returned to her position by Lady Harriot’s chair.

  “Your Grace,” Lord Harold said formally. “Any word of Lord Hartington?”

  “Young fool stumbled home an hour since,” the Duke of Devonshire muttered, “with some tale of poachers in the woods near Haddon Hall. Gun was fired—mount threw him—dashed his head against a rock. Slept off the worst and walked twelve miles back. Lucky he wasn’t left for dead. Teach him to go hunting on another man’s turf.”

  “That is excellent news,” his lordship replied.

  The Duke peered around at the assembled company. “Bess’s with him now. Do the boy a world of good.”

  No one vouchsafed a reply.

  The drawing-room doors were thrust wide again, and a stranger was admitted to our midst.

  “Well, Bascomb?” Andrew Danforth enquired. “What is your opinion?”

  “Life was extinct from the instant the ball was fired,” the gentleman replied with a bow. “I cannot think that he suffered. The shot was certainly fired from the fowling piece.”

  “Are you Dr. Bascomb?” I cried. “Of Buxton?”

  “The same. But I confess that you have the advantage of me, madam, for I do not recall our meeting.”

  “My name is Jane Austen. You are come into the neighbourhood at my summons, I think.”

  “Ah!” the doctor returned, with a look of quickened interest. “The very lady. I looked for you first at The Rutland Arms, and was told that you were thought to have gone to Chatsworth. No sooner did I arrive there, than the Duke informed me of the sad events above Miller’s Dale. I have often served as physician to the Danforth family—as well you know; and so I availed myself of His Grace’s kind invitation, and made another of the party. Did you chance, Miss Austen, to carry with you the interesting stillroom book?”

  “I did. It is even now in the carriage. But you will wish, I think, to peruse the letter Charles Danforth left at his death.”

  Lord Harold reached for the paper he had thrust into his coat and handed it to Dr. Bascomb. The rest of the party were staring at us in obvious perplexity; Andrew Danforth abandoned his position by the window and came to stand near Hary-O’s chair.

  “Forgive me,” I said hastily. “Your Grace, Mr. Danforth—I beg your pardon. I requested Dr. Bascomb’s opinion regarding the Danforth children, and he has been so kind as to sacrifice his Sunday to my benefit. You will not protest, I hope, if he satisfies our curiosity?”

  “Eh?” the Duke replied. “Oh—of course. Very well. Proceed, man—proceed.”

  Dr. Bascomb gazed keenly around the room. He nodded once, then adopted a position by the fire.

  “I see from this letter,” he began, holding it aloft, “that Charles Danforth suspected the nature of his children’s deaths. Miss Austen has already discerned that I was in attendance upon little Emma, the eldest of the three; so much is noted in the stillroom maid’s book. I was called, as well, when Lydia Danforth was thrown into labour two months before her time; but in that case, I could do nothing. At the Duke’s insistence, a London doctor was called when Miss Julia fell ill in February; and though I looked in upon John d’Arcy in March, lie was already too far gone for my physick to save him.”

  Lady Harriot’s countenance twisted; she threw her face in her hands.

  “I was troubled by what I observed in Emma’s case. The child suffered a series of feverish attacks, each worsening in nature, over the course of a month; a slight indisposition became a gradual wasting; vomiting and violent purges ensued; and at the end, dehydration and death. In the intervals between these attacks, however, she appeared in complete health.”

  “Our Hary-O had a similar passage,” the Duke observed, “and three nursemaids were dismissed on the strength of it, until Georgiana discovered the child surfeiting on sweetmeats in the pantry corner. Greedy little minx.”

  “It was possible that the girl suffered from the sort of wasting complaints that every childhood is prey to,” Dr. Bascomb continued with a deferential bow. “I cannot number the young lives taken suddenly off, by a host of ills that plague every town in England. It is not even unusual for entire families to be lost. But in Emma’s case I suspected poison—arsenical poisoning, to be exact. I confided my fears to Charles Danforth. He was greatly disturbed in his mind, as should only be natural; but to his wife, who suffered greatly from her daughter’s death, he imparted nothing of my fears.”

  “Were you well acquainted with the late and lamented Lydia,” said Andrew Danforth, “you would not question my brother’s decision. His wife was excessively fearful for the health of her children.”

  “With cause,” murmured Lady Harriot.

  “Danforth undertook to search out any supplies of arsenic that might be lying about the Hall, and ordered them destroyed,” Dr. Bascomb said. “The gardener’s shed was the most obvious culprit, as arsenic is often employed in the control of rats and other vermin; but the gardener himself could not be suspected of malice towards any of the children. He had been first employed in old Mr. Danforth’s time, and was a great favourite; his grandchildren, the Arnold girls, had grown up on the estate. I believe that Danforth was inclined to regard my words as fanciful—or worse, as the result of my unwillingness to accept responsibility for having lost the child. Mr. Danforth destroyed the poison he found, and ceased to consult or confide in me. I heard nothing further of the Penfolds household, until word was received of the second daughter’s death.

  “It is significant, I think, that Charles Danforth was absent in London when Julia became ill. He was absent when John d’Arcy died suddenly, as well. The person responsible for their deaths made certain that she was unobserved by the one most likely to suspect her.”

  “Are you saying,” Andrew Danforth broke in, “that you believe my brother’s claim that poor Tess intended to murder his family? I must regard that accusation as nothing more than the delusion of a broken mind—a mind destroyed by the effects of grief and unaccountable misfortune. Surely the maid can have had no reason to wish my nieces and nephew dead?”

  Dr. Bascomb made no reply. His gaze, however, drifted over the room and came to rest upon me.

  “Tess Arnold did not kill the children with arsenic,” I told Danforth, “but with a common solution that has been used for time out of mind in the administration of medicinal draughts to children. Black cherry water, Mr. Danforth—the distilled essence of cherry bark boiled in spring water. It has a palatable taste, and may disguise whatever is given to the patient; but I believe I am correct in thinking, Dr. Bascomb, that it has only lately been judged a poison in its own right?”

  “Highly poisonous, Miss Austen. A single draught should be unremarkable, though vomiting might result; but when the application is repeated, and the doses increased, it is probable that the effect over time should be death.”

  “But Tess could have possessed no notion of the pernicious effect!” Danforth objected. “She learned her stillcraft at her mother’s feet. Her remedies were the stuff of incantation, passed down through generations of healing women; she merely did as she had observed others to have done. If she killed Emma and Julia with the intention of healing them, surely we may absolve her of guilt!”

  Dr. Bascomb merely lifted his shoulders. “I cannot profess to know the girl’s mind,” he said. “I only know that I had instructed her myself, most strenuously, never to give a draught in the common bitter waters to children. And yet, Miss Austen has found repeated references in the stillroom book to the employment of these very waters.”

  A silence settled over the room, broken only by th
e crackling of a log upon the fire.

  “But why?”

  Lady Harriot’s deep and penetrating voice carried across the room.

  “Why kill those children Charles loved so well?”

  I looked at Lord Harold and raised an enquiring brow.

  “It is possible,” he answered slowly, “that she did so at Charles’s bidding.”

  “Ridiculous!” Andrew Danforth cried.

  “Is it? He stood to inherit a fortune if his heirs predeceased his wife; and you will observe that they did. He was warned by Bascomb that the illnesses looked like poison; and so he contrived never to have Bascomb in attendance again. Two of his children died, moreover, when Charles was himself away—so that he might never be suspected of guilt, should questions arise. And finally, he silenced Tess Arnold—the only party to his crimes.”

  “He had no need of such a fortune,” Lady Harriot protested. “Charles was a wealthy man!”

  “But he may, my dear Hary-O, have felt desperately in need of you,” Lord Harold said harshly, “and his wife and children stood in the way.”

  She drew a sharp breath; her beautiful eyes blazed. “That is an unpardonable thing to say.”

  Lord Harold inclined his head, but failed to apologise.

  “I will never believe it!” Danforth exclaimed.

  “Naturally you will not.” I summoned courage for what must come. “For it was to your benefit that the children died, and not your brother’s. Emma and Julia and little John d’Arcy—they stood between you and your inheritance, Mr. Danforth. And Tess Arnold had great ambition for you. Or should I say—for you both?”

  Andrew Danforth went white. “Think well before you utter another word, Miss Austen, lest your speech disgrace you! A familiarity with Lord Harold may have taught you to forget what is due to civility; but a moment will suffice to recall it.”

  “The spectre of disgrace has no power over me, Mr. Danforth,” I replied calmly. “Your brother’s sacrifice has absolved us all. You will recall what he said in his final letter? Her reasons for so doing I will not name, lest they embroil the innocent. Charles Danforth suspected that Tess would murder his heirs and place you in his stead. In the interval provided after his wife’s death, he had time enough for reflection; it was not the maid’s habit to act precipitately. Tess had allowed months between the children’s passing away. And so your brother was suffered to remain in health throughout the first part of the summer. And then, two days before the maid was killed, he endured a bout of vomiting himself.”

  “That was the day he despatched a letter to me,” Dr. Bascomb explained, “and informed me that he had looked into the stillroom book. He described the remedies the maid had administered; he described the solution she gave at his wife’s labour, well before I arrived. His wife, I did not scruple to advise him by return of post, should never have gone into labour, but for the draught against histericks that Tess administered when young John d’Arcy died. It contained a quantity of rye, in addition to its healing effects; rye that had spoiled from the action of ergot. It is the most powerful spur to labour that is known.”

  “Your brother knew, then, how his children had died,” I told Andrew Danforth. “He knew that Tess Arnold was your friend of old; you had played together as children, when Charles was banished to the south. She should naturally have your interests at heart. He may even have observed the two of you meeting in an abandoned ice-house at the estate’s extent, and wondered at the nature of your connexion.”

  “This is abominable,” Danforth muttered between his teeth. “I would that Charles could hear you! What indignation you should arouse!”

  “He never suspected, however, that Tess acted at your behest,” I concluded softly. “Charles believed you innocent of the worst. And in that, Mr. Danforth, I fear your brother was a nobler soul than you yourself have proved.”

  “Are you suggesting—” Lady Harriot cried, in an accent of shock.

  “—that Andrew Danforth encouraged the maid to murder his nieces and nephew? Naturally. He taught Tess Arnold to hope for everything. And when she had played her part, he killed her.”

  “I killed her?” Danforth stared about the room as one amazed.

  “In the interval between the ladies withdrawing from the Chatsworth dining parlour Monday evening, and the gentlemen rejoining them over an hour later.”

  Lord Harold tore his eyes from Andrew Danforth’s face and stared at me. “Good God,” he said. “So that was how it was done.”

  “Sir James chanced to mention to me the entire program of that evening,” I said. “It was only later, in conversation with Lord Harold, that I detected the discrepancy. You left Penfolds, Mr. Danforth, for Chatsworth at about five o’clock, on a swift horse that might gallop the distance in half an hour. You dined at seven, and the ladies withdrew at half-past ten, much as we did the night of Lady Harriot’s birthday. Sir James was told that the gentlemen quitted the dining parlour at a quarter to twelve, having been much engrossed in a discussion of politics, and the prospects of Charles James Fox—a discussion that you, as a man ambitious in politics, might have been expected to join. But you did not.”

  “Andrew?” Lady Harriot gasped.

  “I thought you had gone after her,” Lord Harold muttered, his eyes on Andrew Danforth, “to dance attendance. You excused yourself not five minutes after the ladies retired. It never occurred to me that you quitted the house entirely—”

  “This story is absurd!” Danforth burst out. “If you will credit the notion that a man might race across open country, under a fitful moon, in order to shoot a girl he had no notion should be walking the hills at such an hour—”

  “But you did know, Mr. Danforth,” I persisted. “Because you supplied Tess Arnold with your brother’s clothes in the ice-house that very morning. She told you where she would be, and all that she intended, as a very good joke. You had often engaged in playacting together, as children. You are playacting now, I think.”

  Andrew Danforth emitted a choking sound.

  “You quitted the dining parlour perhaps five minutes after the ladies. You went swiftly out the West Entrance to the stableyard, and saddled your horse. The stable lads should never have been disturbed; Lord Harrington was much given to coming and going about the loose boxes at all hours of the night. You galloped hard across the country to the hills above Miller’s Dale, and tethered your horse beneath the same tree you chose for your brother’s mount today. We found your hoofprints there on Friday. You waited in a pile of rock for the maid to appear; and when you had shot her, you rode at great speed back to Chatsworth, and joined the ladies a few minutes in advance of the other gentlemen.”

  “Deuced cheek!” ejaculated His Grace the Duke.

  “You took a considerable risk, to be sure; but one that very nearly succeeded,” I went on. “An enquiry among the stable lads, however, will suffice. One at least must have remarked the curious fact that your horse was already damp with sweat, when you called for it at one o’clock, and quitted Chatsworth for your road home.”

  Danforth turned his head wildly, as though in search of a friend. The Duke stared with bulging eyes; Lady Harriot had buried her face in Lady Swithin’s gown; and a cruel smile played about Lord Harold’s lips.

  Danforth’s eyes came to rest on the amiable countenance of Sir James Villiers.

  “But Charles—You read the letter yourself—”

  “Charles confessed to a crime he did not commit,” I said implacably. “He did so from the same motives that have placed your solicitor, Mr. George Hemming, in the Bakewell gaol. Your brother took your guilt upon himself, Andrew Danforth, because he believed too much in your goodness.”

  His lips began to work, but no sound came.

  “Charles believed that you discovered the maid’s hideous work, and cut off her life like a poisonous snake’s. Why else should she have been killed so soon after her attempt on his life? He regarded you with gratitude; he thought you a man of honour. To kill from such
a motive is no different in a gentleman’s mind, I suspect, than death should be in a duel. And having exposed your neck to the noose on behalf of his children, Charles determined that you should receive a similar testament of loyalty. He suspected the reasons for George Hemming’s sacrifice—the solicitor was devoted to you. He saw that Lady Harriot looked upon you with favour. His own prospects of happiness had gone forward into the grave. Why not end such misery with a snatch at honour, and take upon himself your guilt? And so he wrote his letter.

  “Did he show it to you, in the hills above Miller’s Dale?”

  Danforth sank into a vacant chair, as though his legs would no longer support him.

  “I wonder if he understood what you really were, in that last moment before you killed him?”

  To Prevent Nightmare

  at nothing after three o’clock, and no nightmare will ever assert its suffocating presence.

  —From the Stillroom Book

  of Tess Arnold,

  Penfolds Hall, Derbyshire,

  1802–1806

  Chapter 28

  Cage We Cannot Help

  Monday

  1 September 1806

  ∼

  “MICHAEL TIVEY HAS CONFESSED,” SIR JAMES VILLIERS informed me, “to having anatomised the body of the stillroom maid. It is as you suspected—having gone in search of Tess Arnold when she failed to appear for their midnight appointment, Tivey discovered her dead body, and made use of it for his own despicable purposes. He thought to throw suspicion for the girl’s death upon the Freemasons, whom he cordially disliked for having rejected him; and thus endeavoured, as soon as her body was found, to put about the story of ritual murder. Being denied the full knowledge of Masonic rites himself, however, he could effect the wounds of a traitor’s execution only imperfectly. And so we suspected the tale’s veracity from the first.”

  Sir James sat in one of the hard-backed chairs of our parlour at The Rutland Arms this morning as the trunks were brought out. My cousin Mr. Cooper had carried his point; and but for this brief visit from the Law, I should have quitted Bakewell without learning how matters were disposed.