The Constant Companion

by M C Beaton

  “I shall drop you at your lodgings and then call for you in a couple of hours,” said Lord Philip. “What shall we do with the cat?”

  “Leave it here,” said Peter indifferently. “I don’t want it. Do you?”

  As Lord Philip left his friend at his lodgings and watched Peter climbing up the stairs, he noticed that the cat was clinging for dear life to the back of Peter’s redingote. He made a movement as if to call after Peter and tell him about the animal, and then changed his mind. Peter would no doubt digress forever on the iniquities of the cat and would probably forget to change his clothes.

  The musicale had already begun when Peter and Philip walked into Lady Eleanor’s mansion. Mr. Evans and her husband had not yet returned, she said somewhat crossly. Lady Eleanor had hired a full orchestra for the occasion, and had invited the cream of Society to the event. Lady Amelia was not among the guests. Peter sat himself near the door where he could look into the hall and note when Mr. Evans arrived home.

  Lord Philip moved quietly up the stairs. He slipped a footman a guinea and asked him to direct him to Mr. Evans’s private chambers.

  The footman led the way to the top of the house. Mr. Evans’s quarters were comprised of only a small sitting room which led to a sparse cupboard of a bedroom. Lord Philip began to feel ashamed of his suspicions of the meek secretary. Everything in the rooms breathed of respectably straitened circumstances. There were no incriminating letters or papers of any kind. The names of Godwin, Wolstonecraft, Holcroft and Thelwall on the bookshelves showed that the secretary had radical tastes, but that was all. Lord Philip was just about to leave when he noticed the edge of a tin trunk sticking out from under the bed. He felt suddenly grubby, but driven by that recurring nagging feeling that Constance was somehow alive, he pulled it out and opened the lid.

  He found himself looking down at a full-dress court outfit which rivalled his own in richness and elegance. Wonderingly, he drew it out. There was a violet satin frock coat with white satin lining, waistcoat and breeches embroidered in gold and green, a set of jeweled buttons, a fine lingerie shirt with cravat and collar points, white silk stockings, black pumps with gold buckles, a black felt bicorne with a white frill, and lastly a dress sword hanging on a broad lilac silk ribbon. Mr. Evans had no call to wear court dress. It could not have belonged to, say, a more affluent relative, for it was brand-new and obviously tailored to fit Mr. Evans’s slim form. Lord Philip felt his eyes drawn to a long looking glass on the other side of the bedroom. He had a sudden vision of Mr. Evans parading in the privacy of his bedroom in full court dress. With a frown he turned again to the jeweled buttons. They were ornamented with tiny diamonds of the first water and deep dark rubies. How on earth could a mere secretary afford such splendor?

  I shall go and ask him, thought Lord Philip. Enough of this sneaking about.

  He placed the clothes carefully back in the trunk and made his way downstairs.

  Mr. Evans was just entering the hall with Mr. Rider as he reached the bottom step. Philip moved quickly forward. “A word with you, Mr. Evans,” he said. Did the man turn pale—or was that his imagination?

  Mr. Evans mutely led the way to the small book-lined study at the back of the house.

  “Sit down,” commanded Lord Philip. Mr. Evans took the chair behind a rococo pedestal desk and stared apprehensively at his visitor. But then, Mr. Evans always looked apprehensive.

  In a flat emotionless voice, Lord Philip outlined his suspicions of Bouchard, told Mr. Evans exactly how the comte had died, and then went on to explain how and why he had searched the secretary’s rooms. “I have no apology to give, other than the fact that I have a feeling my wife is not dead.” He held up his hand as Mr. Evans gave a stifled exclamation. “I did, however, come across an exceedingly fine suit of court clothes. Do you intend being presented, Mr. Evans?”

  Mr. Evans flushed a dull red, and to Lord Philip’s acute embarrassment, the secretary’s weak eyes filled with tears. “You had no right, no right whatsoever, my lord, to go to my rooms without my permission,” said Mr. Evans. “But I shall tell you how I came by that dress. I went to Newmarket last year, if you will recall, with Mr. Rider. I had just received my yearly salary. I was overcome with a strange madness and put it all on Small Beer.”

  “I remember Small Beer was a hundred to one,” nodded Lord Philip.

  “Exactly. So I had a small fortune. The madness was still on me. I knew I would never be presented at court, never wear it, but I wanted a court dress. I wear it when… when I am alone,” finished Evans in a low voice.

  It was all so pathetic, thought Lord Philip getting to his feet and walking edgily about the room. But Evans had been alone in the house on the day his wife had disappeared. Therefore Evans had been the last to see her—that is, if Bouchard had masqueraded as her. Therefore, Evans had still a few questions to answer. Lord Philip turned his eyes away from the other man’s miserable face and stood looking at a George I bureau cabinet. He idly opened down the writing flap, and then closed it again before turning to ask his next question.

  Then he slowly turned back, opened the writing flap, lifted it gently down and stared at one of the pigeonholes at the back of the cabinet.

  He leaned forward and took out a fan and spread it open, staring at the pretty painted picture of two peacocks promenading on an emerald green lawn. He was transported back to that evening in the library when Constance had fluttered a fan in front of her face. Then he remembered Peter sitting among the refreshments at Almack’s, idly fanning himself and then explaining it was Constance’s fan.

  Lord Philip’s eyes began to burn with a murderous light as he turned about and held the fan open in front of the secretary’s terrified eyes.

  “My wife,” he said grimly. “What have you done with my wife?”

  “Nothing!” screamed Mr. Evans over the sound of the cascading woodwinds of “La cambiale di matrimonio” from the musicale.

  It would be a long time before Lord Philip Cautry could listen to Rossini without a shudder.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Joe Puddleton took a great swig at his tankard of shrub and looked hopefully round the tap. But he was no longer the focus of attention. The villagers of Upper Comley had lost interest in the poor madwoman in his care, and no one seemed prepared to buy him a drink in order to receive the latest bulletin.

  And on this blustery cold day, Joe would have loved to talk, not to be the center of attention, but to ease a little feeling of anxiety that was beginning to surface in the primeval bog inside his head which passed for a brain. In his slow countryman’s way, he mulled over the facts.

  The gentleman from London had said his missus was deranged, and deranged she looked with her hair all anyhow and screaming and pleading. She was to be kept fast in Lumley’s old cottage down by the river, and no one was to be allowed to come nigh.

  Joe had been warned that the poor mad creature was under the impression she was a titled lady with a lord for a husband. He was to take meals to her daily, and check that the bars on the windows and the locks on the doors were secure. On fine days, she was to be allowed out into the small garden at the back of the cottage for a short airing. Several times she had tried to escape only to be foiled by himself, a fact of which he had been very proud, and for which the London gentleman had paid him a bonus.

  But of late, the lady had gone very quiet, paying him not much attention, head bent over a piece of sewing. Then, this morning, she had begun to speak to him in a deadly reasonable voice. She had stated that the gentleman who was paying him was a French spy, and that if he did not immediately release her then he would find himself dangling at the end of the nubbing cheat. She had actually said hangman’s rope, but Joe had translated that into his own cant.

  She had seemed very sane, terrifyingly so. All Joe could do was to wait until the gentleman from London called on one of his rare visits, and see if he could get to the bottom of it.

  His musings were interrupted by the arriv
al of a stranger who drew out a chair and pulled it up close to his own. In his slow way, Joe disliked the stranger on sight. He had a crafty look, although his sober clothes were of good cut.

  But the stranger insisted on buying Joe a quartern of the landlord’s best ale, and under its influence Joe looked at the stranger with a more benevolent eye. He only looked a mean cove, decided Joe, because of the strange crab-ways movements of his long body. By the second tankard, Joe was prepared to slowly move his conversation from the poor harvest and give the generous fellow the story of his strange charge.

  The stranger listened with flattering attention, until Joe at last ponderously voiced his doubts as to the lady’s insanity. “I’m a-telling you, Mr… er… that that there mort sounds as right in ’er ’ead as what you or me does. ’Appen she’m be telling truth.”

  But at this fascinating piece of news, the stranger seemed to lose interest, putting his well filled purse away, shrugging himself into his caped carrick, and taking his leave. His lack of interest made Joe think that perhaps he should keep his thoughts about the young lady’s sanity to himself. Obviously people would rather hear about a madwoman. By the time he had staggered from the inn, he had convinced himself once more of his charge’s madness.

  Bergen jumped on his horse and rode hard in the direction of London. He was very worried. He had found himself at a bit of a loss after quitting his employ at Lady Amelia’s. Thanks to the sale of the jewels, he had money enough and more. But his plotting nature was restless for lack of interest. He worried and wondered as to the reason for the murder of Lady Philip. And that was how he came to shadow Evans, following the secretary every time he left the house. The secretary’s calls and duties seemed boringly respectable, until one evening Bergen had seen him setting out in a hired carriage and had spurred his horse in pursuit.

  His pursuit led him to the outskirts of a small village near Hounslow Heath. He watched Evans entering a barred and shuttered cottage. A light had then appeared in the downstairs window in one of the rooms where the old shutters were slightly broken. Bergen had crept up cautiously and put his eye to a crack.

  He had nearly fallen back into the garden in amazement. Lady Philip Cautry was sitting in the candlelight talking vehemently to Mr. Evans.

  Bergen could not make out the words, but the couple seemed to be very companionable together. He felt a cold knot of fear in his stomach. Constance had been unconscious when he had appeared on the scene with Bouchard, but what if Evans had told her about them? Rumors had reached Evans that Lord Philip did not believe his wife dead.

  He had decided to wait around and see what news he could pick up. His investigations had led him to Joe. He decided now to go straight to Evans and strangle that gentleman until he told him what he was playing at. If Evans or Constance ever spoke, then he and Bouchard would find themselves on Tyburn tree dangling at the end of a rope.

  On reaching town, he called at Bouchard’s lodgings in the rabbit warren of Soho. The ex-lady’s maid listened to him in growing fear and terror. “Let us go to Mr. Evans immediately,” she cried. “He owes us some explanation.”

  But as they reached Lady Eleanor’s house, they were stopped short by the sight of the secretary being dragged down the steps by Lord Philip. In the flare of the flambeaux, the secretary’s face was puffy and bruised and tears were running down his cheeks. The couple drew into the shadows and listened.

  “You could have saved yourself a great deal of pain had you told me the whereabouts of my wife in the first place,” Lord Philip was saying. “You shall conduct me thence, and then I shall turn you over to the authorities. You are a spy and a traitor and shall be treated accordingly.” Lord Philip turned to address Peter Potter who had appeared on the steps of the mansion. “Peter,” said Lord Philip, “help me guard this useless piece of carrion until I get my traveling carriage ready.”

  Bouchard gripped Bergen’s arm. “That gives us time,” she hissed.

  “For what?” queried Bergen, his face like a death mask in the flickering shadows.

  “Don’t you see?” said Bouchard desperately. “It’s either them or us. We must kill them all.”

  “You’re mad,” shivered Bergen. “How can we?”

  “Get to the cottage first,” whispered Bouchard, “and when they’re all inside, bar the doors and set fire to it.”

  “What of Cautry’s servants?” exclaimed Bergen. “D’ye think they’re going to stand back and watch us burn their master to death?”

  “Fool! I shall get rid of them. Come, monsieur, I repeat—them or us. Do you think they will forget about us? Cautry will have every Runner scouring the countryside for us!”

  “Quickly, then,” said Bergen, pointing with his weighted walking stick to two fine mounts tethered outside Lady Eleanor’s mansion. “Those will do. Can you ride?”

  “Of course,” said Bouchard. “To save my neck I can do anything, mon bonhomme. Vite!”

  Somewhere in Constance’s long imprisonment, the half frightened, rather immature girl had disappeared leaving an angry desperate woman. On each of his brief visits, usually during the dark hours of the night, Mr. Evans had been adamant. She would never escape, and must think herself lucky that he was a humane man and could not bring himself to kill her.

  She had listened in growing dismay to his revelations. He believed in Napoleon Bonaparte as the savior of England. When the Emperor took his rightful place at St. James’s, the old effete aristocracy would be put to the guillotine and be replaced by the new—which would of course be comprised of men like himself. Mr. Evans had a vivid imagination, and his favorite dream seemed to be the one where Lady Eleanor was borne through the jeering crowds on a tumbril to have her haughty head lopped off.

  The comte’s suicide had moved him greatly, and he also dreamed of erecting a monument to the “martyr.” All this nonsense seemed at odds with the secretary’s usual timid bearing and correct manner. Constance had at first wept and pleaded with him, but under the secretary’s timid exterior burned the fires of the zealot.

  So Constance passed her weary days dreaming of her handsome husband, and often wondering how she had ever had the temerity to be rude to such a god. Only let her be safely back in his arms again, and he could choose her whole wardrobe if he liked and never, never would she raise her voice to him again.

  Mr. Evans had bragged about his cunning in finding Bergen and Bouchard. Constance had not been at all surprised at the part taken in the plot by the sinister Bergen, but had been amazed at the evil of her own lady’s maid.

  “I had that one marked out a long time ago,” Evans had said proudly. “Bouchard was once a lady’s maid before your employ, and lost her job then. She was suspected of taking her employer’s jewels, although nothing could be proved against her. No, she does not believe in our cause. She is simply a low type of woman who will do anything for money.”

  “And what of Joe Puddleton?” Constance had asked.

  Oh, Joe was nothing more than a village bumpkin, Evans had replied, with an aristocratic dismissal quite foreign, surely, to his democratic principles. Constance’s hopes had risen, and she had commenced her appeals to her jailer for help. But until this very morning, the stolid Joe had appeared to treat all her cries for help with great good humor and two large, deaf cauliflower ears.

  The cottage in which she was imprisoned was built of wattle and half timbered. It had a heavy thatched roof. A small garden at the back was enclosed on both sides by high impregnable thorn hedges, and bordered on a swift river.

  She looked out of the window at the front of the house at the cold wind sweeping across the stubble of the fields, and awaited the return of Joe.

  The cottage consisted of two rooms, one for sleeping and one for eating. A small kitchen had been added to the back. Constance kept her prison well scrubbed and dusted. It was very cold that day, and Constance sat with a blanket wrapped around her shoulders and debated which of the sparse pieces of furniture she should break up for firewo
od should Joe fail to bring any of the promised logs.

  On days like this, she began to fear that Mr. Evans would succeed in keeping her locked away from the world forever. Would Philip be searching for her? Or would he console himself as he had done in the past with some available lightskirt? The thought of Philip in another woman’s arms made her feel slightly sick, and she closed her eyes in pain.

  The wind howled and moaned in the chimney, and Constance turned her gaze back to the window. In the bare fields opposite, she remembered, she had watched the men gathering in the harvest and had beat against the barred windows, yelling and screaming until her voice was hoarse and her hands had bled. They had turned their heads away in a sort of embarrassed manner, and Constance realized hopelessly that, like Joe, they all considered her mad.

  The burly figure of Joe appeared in view, carrying a basket and struggling with the large key to the cottage door which he kept tucked into his belt.

  A wave of excitement suddenly crept over Constance. What if she were to stand behind the door with, say, the poker, and stun the man as he entered?

  Desperate for freedom, she seized the brass poker and pressed herself against the wall behind the door.

  Joe Puddleton stood on the threshold of the little parlor and stared about. “Now where mun ’er be…” he began when Constance brought the poker down on his head with all the force she could muster.