‘Helen, please!’
‘Upsets you, does it, hearing your father spoken of that way? Well, I reckon he had some pretty unpleasant characteristics to hand on. Richard was a coward and Max, oh, Max was something else.’
Helen rose and walked over to the wide bay window, through which could be seen a three-quarters full moon floating serenely over the garden. Ursula remembered it in all its glory on the night of the Dowager’s birthday fête.
The Colonel watched her.
‘We had our affair and I – I fell in love for the second time in my life. The result was Harry and, for his sake, I can never regret our affair. I watch, though, I watch very carefully to see if he has inherited any of his father’s less pleasant characteristics.’
‘Such as?’ asked the Colonel.
‘Such as turning blackmailer.’
‘Blackmailer?’
‘Oh, yes. Max forced me to pay him not to reveal who Harry’s father was. I told Richard and said that if it was my word against Max’s, who would believe him? But Richard said I had to pay him because there were things Max knew that he couldn’t allow to be general knowledge.’
‘What things?’ the Colonel ground out.
‘Apparently when Richard was about eighteen, your father caught him fooling around with a stable lad. Yes, Charles, I mean exactly what, judging by your face, you don’t want to believe. Impotence didn’t play any part there.’
It was hard from what she said to know what Helen actually thought. Primarily it appeared to be bitterness at her father-in-law. ‘Richard told me there was hell to pay. The stable lad was paid off, but somewhere Max had come across him. Max could get people to tell him anything. He said if he told what he knew, the scandal would ruin us; we’d have to go abroad. It would destroy your mother and what chance would Harry have?’
‘How long has this been going on?’ the Colonel asked incredulously.
‘Five years, ever since Harry was born. Finally, when he knew his mother didn’t have long to live, Max asked for enough money to set him up for a new life in America. I wanted to refuse but Richard said he was fed up with life at Mountstanton; he wanted to “be himself”, whatever that meant. He told me to give Max half of what he was asking for in bearer bonds and to give the same amount to himself. He would then disappear; I could live exactly as I wanted and he’d see that Max didn’t trouble me any more. All I had to do was provide the money and ask Max to dinner at Mountstanton for one last time, so I could tell him I’d agree to pay him off. He didn’t want anything in writing.’
‘How did you think he was going to make sure Max didn’t ask for more?’ the Colonel asked harshly.
Helen swung round. ‘I don’t know! I only know that I was going crazy. My father kept asking how the restoration of this place was going,’ she glanced around the gracious room. ‘A restoration Max had made impossible. Then Papa wanted me to invite Belle over. He was worried about her behaviour in New York. And all the time Richard became more and more distant. I needed a life! I needed to be told I was beautiful, that someone loved me, wanted to cherish me.’ Tears were once again falling down her cheeks. ‘I thought if I asked Belle over, gave her a debut Season, I would at least have some fun.’
‘You seemed to be having fun with William Warburton,’ Ursula could not resist saying as she tried to distance herself from the appalling tale Helen related.
‘William was nothing more than a diversion,’ Helen said dismissively. ‘You must see that I needed one.’
‘Did Richard tell you what he was going to do?’ The Colonel’s voice was urgent.
‘No, merely that I was not to distress myself over anything that happened. He would give the bonds to Max and make sure he was warned off ever coming back. Then he would arrange his freedom with his share.’
‘Was it Richard who asked Max to come to the belvedere the night of Mama’s birthday fête?’
‘He said he’d run into Max out riding. Max had booked a passage to America. He was going to, “shake the dust of England from his shoes and go somewhere that would appreciate him,” was what Richard said he’d told him. Max then said he’d come and collect the bonds on his way to the boat. “A last look at what should have been his,” was apparently the way he put it. It just happened to be the evening of the fête.’
‘So you knew it wasn’t Richard’s body in the belvedere?’
She nodded. ‘Yes, Charles. Though at first I thought it was. The face, of course, was unrecognisable but there was the Mountstanton finger, and Richard had been so moody and volatile recently I did for a moment think that this was his way out. But then I undid his waistcoat and shirt and I knew it was Max’s body. He was more muscular than Richard, and hairier.’ Her face crumpled. ‘I remembered everything Max had once been to me and I wanted it to be Richard there,’ she wailed.
Ursula remembered Helen’s wild grief, how she’d thrown herself on the body.
For a little while the only sound in the library was Helen’s crying.
The Colonel pulled his hand down his face as though to wipe away the pictures Helen’s words had conjured. He helped himself to more brandy. Finally he came back to the fire, his shoulders square and resolute. ‘So,’ he said finally, ‘Richard must have knocked Max out, then dressed him in his clothes – and that must have been some task; I should think he would have needed help. By using a shotgun, it meant Max’s body could pass for his. Max’s bearer bonds and passport were in his saddlebags. No doubt he had the bonds his darling wife,’ he said bitterly, nodding at Helen, ‘had given him ready to add to them. Then he had everything he needed to start a new life.’
There was silence.
‘What about Polly, Helen?’ asked the Colonel roughly. ‘Did Richard kill her, too?’
‘I don’t know! I never thought it was important until you started interfering.’
‘You never thought it was important?’ Ursula repeated, horrified.
Helen managed to look ashamed. ‘Well, at the start we just thought she’d gone off. She was like that. Once I knew who her father was, though, I reckoned she had brought her death upon herself.’
‘What do you mean?’ Ursula asked, wondering how she could make Helen realise how callous she was being.
‘Because it was she who had seduced whoever was the father of her child. No wonder he wouldn’t take responsibility for her. She flung herself down that hill because she couldn’t bear the shame.’
‘I don’t believe Polly would ever have taken her own life,’ the Colonel said.
Helen shrugged. ‘Well, I don’t suppose we’ll ever know the truth.’
‘I can tell you what happened,’ said John.
They all turned. The footman, in full livery, stood in the doorway.
‘You can?’ said the Colonel. ‘What do you know about it?’
Ursula was certain she knew what John was about to say and that the last aspect of this tragic story was about to be revealed.
‘Well, Colonel Charles, I’d never tell this normal, like, but this isn’t normal, is it, sir?’
‘Get on with it, man.’
John, standing stolidly before them seemed to exude a quiet confidence and she remembered how efficient he had been the night Belle had disappeared.
‘His lordship loved me, sir. And, well, I loved him. At first I thought it was just one of those things. I’ve always known what sort I am but I thought he was just amusing himself.’ There seemed no bitterness in his tone; he was just a man who recognised what he was up against. ‘But his lordship kept saying that with me he could be himself. He didn’t have to drink or pretend to be someone he wasn’t. And I could see what his father, that is, his late lordship, was doing to him.’ John’s expression twisted at the thought. ‘We was very careful – used the woodman’s cottage over the other side of the estate.’
No wonder he’d known exactly where to go to find Belle!
‘But that’s where Max and I …’ started Helen, who then stopped and gazed at the fo
otman horror-struck. ‘Richard told me about it once; his father set it up, said it made an excellent location for a liaison.’
John shifted from one foot to the other. ‘I know, my lady. His lordship always seemed to know when you would be there.’
‘But what happened to Polly,’ said the Colonel impatiently.
‘She was a right little thing, she was,’ John said, bitter at last. ‘After me for a time, until I told her to keep her hands to herself.’ He took a deep breath. ‘His lordship told me he’d had a letter from her saying she’d found out she was his half-sister, that she was in the family way and needed him to take care of her.’
‘My brother told you that?’
‘He told me everything, sir,’ John said simply. ‘Told me what happened when he met up with Polly. He couldn’t stand the thought that yet another of his father’s bastards – forgive the word, my lady – wanted to blackmail him. That was the word he used.’
‘He killed her to keep her quiet?’ The Colonel sounded appalled.
‘No, sir! It was an accident. He told me. He just got so angry with her because she’d started to make insinuations. About him! She couldn’t have known anything, otherwise she’d have come out with it, but, well, she was always clever with her tongue. He lost his temper and hit her. She fell onto a rock and died. Just like that!’
It was the scenario Mr Jackman and she had discussed, Ursula realised. Except they had never envisioned it had been the Earl who struck the fatal blow.
The Colonel sighed deeply. ‘Then he rolled her body down the slope?’
John nodded.
‘And was it you who helped my brother change clothes with Mr Russell?’
‘Not really, sir. His lordship had asked me to bring a bottle of champagne to the belvedere. No glasses, just the champagne. When I got there, Mr Russell was with him. They were laughing. His lordship bet him that he couldn’t fool one of the guests at the fête that he was the Earl. All he had to do was change clothes with him and go and have a chat. If Mr Russell won, then he’d double the money.’
‘What money?’
‘Don’t know, sir. But Mr Russell seemed to understand. I left them there.’
‘So, when the body was discovered, you believed it was the Earl’s?’
The footman shifted his feet again. ‘Sort of, like. But the day before, his lordship had given me money for a fare to America. Said we were going to start a new life over there; that when he wrote to me, I was to come. So I did wonder a bit. I both wanted to believe it wasn’t him and also that it was, if you can understand?’ he said painfully.
‘I think so, John. But you do know now?’
‘Yes, sir. When I heard Mr Russell’s body was in the carriage house in a coffin, I knew I had to have a look.’
‘And who told you it was Mr Russell’s body?’
‘It had to be. We all knew Mr Jackman and Miss Grandison had gone up to Liverpool to interview him. Who else’s could it have been?’
What was it the Dowager had said, that the servants always knew everything?
‘Can we trust you not to let anyone else know?’ the Colonel said.
John looked injured. ‘I’ve kept his lordship’s secret for six years, I’m not going to let anything out now.’
‘Good man.’
Helen looked incredulous. ‘You will have to go, you know that, don’t you, John?’
He turned to her and said, gently, ‘I shall be handing in my notice and buying that ticket for America.’
John gave them a small bow, turned and left the room.
The Colonel sighed and flung himself into a chair.
‘So that’s what Richard meant by “be himself”,’ Helen said, sounding disgusted. ‘No wonder he didn’t want to tell me everything.’
‘What would you have done if he had?’ the Colonel asked quietly.
‘Left him, of course. I wouldn’t have divorced him; the scandal wouldn’t have done Harry – or me – any good. But at least I wouldn’t have had to look at him, knowing what we’ve just been told.’ The contempt in her voice was devastating.
The Colonel looked sad. ‘I wish he’d confided in me. I’d have helped him work something out.’
‘Maybe if you had been here,’ Helen said viciously, ‘he would have done.’
Ursula looked from one to the other of them. The air seemed to vibrate with shock, horror, despair.
After a few moments the Colonel stirred and said, ‘What the hell do we do now?’
‘Oh, for God’s sake, Charles. It’s obvious, isn’t it? We don’t do anything. Unless,’ Helen’s eyes narrowed, ‘unless you are after the title? Let me warn you that, if you are, I’ll fight you every step of the way. You won’t make much of a figure in the witness box trying to fling mud at your brother and sister-in-law and turning your nephew into a bastard. He was born in wedlock, let me remind you.’
The Colonel rose and looked at her, stunned. ‘Helen, I will assume that everything you have been through over the last week has addled your brains. Of course I’m not after the title. The last thing I want is to be Earl of Mountstanton.’
There weren’t many men, Ursula thought, who could make that statement sound sincere but the Colonel was one of them.
Helen stood up. ‘Then what is there to discuss? You have a funeral already arranged for your brother. You have his dead body. No doubt you can think of some way to switch the coffins. Though why it should matter which one of them lies in the family mausoleum is beyond me. You are the only one who has been pursuing the truth of how Polly died; officialdom has signed off on her. I assume you can pay off your bloody investigator. I am sure Ursula, sensible and confidential Ursula, will keep her mouth shut.’
‘I always have,’ Ursula said, rising from her chair. ‘But there is one thing I have to tell you. Your husband’s last words were, “Helen, forgive me”.’
Helen stood still, then said very quietly, ‘Thank you, Ursula.’ Tears started to well up in her eyes. ‘I must go and see how Belle is,’ she said and walked swiftly from the room.
Ursula felt drained. She looked at the Colonel.
‘I must go and nail down that coffin properly,’ he said, picking up the hammer he’d put on the mantleshelf. ‘I hope Max’s uncle, the Viscount Broome, will not cause us difficulties. Something he said last time we met suggested Max was an embarrassment to him, especially over the last few years.’
‘But for his death to be put down as suicide?’
‘Instead of him being branded blackmailer?’ The Colonel sighed deeply. ‘And there’s Helen’s reputation to be protected, if only for Harry’s sake. I foresee a difficult meeting with the viscount. I need to have a word with Jackman. Heavens, I promised to take his report tonight.’
‘I don’t suppose he will mind if it is postponed until tomorrow. Would you like me to find him and tell him?’
He looked at her gratefully. ‘Once again, Miss Grandison, you come to my rescue.’ He turned at the door. ‘I tell you, if it’s the last thing I do, I’ll see to it that it isn’t Russell’s remains that lie in the Mountstanton mausoleum.’
Ursula watched him leave the room. Then she sat down again and emptied her glass of brandy. There seemed nothing left for her at Mountstanton and, in truth, it was not a place she wanted to spend any more time in.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Ursula found Thomas Jackman in the Smoking Room, his feet up on a low table, puffing a large cigar, a glass of whisky at his side. He looked thoroughly content.
‘Mr Benson gave me the freedom of his lordship’s humidor and provided me with the whisky decanter,’ he said, rising to his feet. ‘How have you been doing, Miss Grandison? Have you come with a summons from the Colonel or can you join me for a few moments?’
She sat down and wondered if it was the brandy that made her feel so disconnected from reality. What, after all, was real about Mountstanton? So much of what Helen had told them she had already surmised, yet to hear it spelt out in that way ma
de living in the rough and ready world of a Californian mining community seem a haven of sanity.
‘I’m afraid the Colonel has got tied up, Mr Jackman. He asks if he can meet with you tomorrow instead of tonight.’
‘Suits me.’ The investigator settled down into his chair again and raised the cigar. ‘Fine smoke, this. Cuban.’ He waved it in the direction of a side table. ‘Only thing is, that needs to be taken proper care of. Thought it should be put into the Colonel’s care.’
Sitting on the table was a commodious carpet bag.
‘Ah,’ said Ursula. ‘Was that Mr Russell’s?’
Thomas Jackman nodded. ‘The White Star Line officials were not too happy for me to take either it or the body. But, as I said, what were they to do with them if I didn’t? Russell hadn’t been arrested; neither they nor the harbour police had authority in the matter. Whereas I had the Colonel’s authorisation and the backing of the Met’s Chief Constable. They soon realised I could remove a nasty piece of nuisance.’
‘How sensible you were to approach the Chief Constable before going up to Liverpool, Mr Jackman.’
‘That was Colonel Stanhope’s suggestion and it was his letter that swung it for us.’
Ursula was not surprised. She looked towards the carpet bag. ‘Have you checked the contents?’
‘One of the officials insisted we did that. Said he didn’t want any complaints from the deceased’s next of kin.’
Ursula remembered what the Colonel had said about the viscount.
‘Anybody else know what’s in there?’ Mr Jackman asked, sounding slightly inebriated. ‘Or can we abscond with the takings?’
Ursula laughed. ‘Remove the dust of Mountstanton from our feet and, what, see the world?’
‘There’s an awful lot of world to see.’
‘Is it really a lot of money?’
‘It’s bearer bonds, not quite ready money but they’re accepted by any bank, no questions asked. There’s enough to make us both very, very wealthy.’
‘If only we were that sort of people.’
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