by Beth Andrews
She expected no heads to turn upon her entrance, unless she tripped over her train.
As usual, she was correct in her assumption. Entering the abode of which she had heard so much these past three days, they were greeted with gracious condescension by Mrs Wardle-Penfield, and hustled off to a whist table where they were introduced to their partners, the Misses Digweed. These were two middle-aged spinster sisters who resided not far from their own house. It was from the lips of these two garrulous ladies that Lydia and her aunt first heard the news.
They had been involved in play for several minutes, and Lydia was already learning that her aunt was not the ideal partner. Lydia was an accomplished player who regularly bested Papa, but Camilla seemed doubtful as to what game they were playing. She frequently forgot to follow suit, and it soon became clear that they were almost certainly destined to lose. There was nothing Lydia could do, but sigh softly to herself and accept her fate as gracefully as possible.
‘I suppose,’ the younger Miss Digweed said, with an arch look at Aunt Camilla over the top of her cards, ‘that you have heard about the murder, Miss Denton?’
‘Murder!’
Lydia feared that her aunt was going to swoon. She clutched her cards against her breast while something resembling a spasm passed across her face.
‘Oh dear!’ the other Miss Digweed cried. ‘It seems that you have not heard.’
It was an opportunity too enticing to resist. There is nothing so sweet as the pleasure of being the very first to relate bad news to a listener who hangs upon every word. In this case, they were doubly fortunate in having not one but two auditors who received their story with all the wide-eyed attention they could have desired.
The tale unfolded so rapidly, and with such fluctuations from one Miss Digweed to the other, that Lydia was soon uncertain as to just what had happened - and indeed, whether anything had happened at all.
‘A young woman—’ Miss Janet Digweed began.
‘No, no,’ Miss Digweed corrected her at once. ‘An old man.’
‘In Wickham Wood.’
‘Or very near it.’
‘Stabbed—’
‘Beaten—’
‘Found yesterday morning—’
‘Evening—’
‘By young Tom Fowle—’
‘His brother, Jimmy—’
‘Dreadful!’
‘Horrible!’
‘But - but is it certain?’ Aunt Camilla at last halted this interesting narrative. ‘I cannot believe it!’
‘Forgive me,’ Lydia cut in, addressing both sisters at once. ‘Who has been killed?’
The Misses Digweed appeared quite startled. Such a question had apparently never occurred to either of them.
‘Well really,’ the elder answered, ‘we do not know.’
‘Nobody knows.’
‘But someone is certainly dead.’
‘It reminds me of the other time,’ Aunt Camilla said, her lips trembling pitifully. ‘I never thought—’
‘I think,’ Lydia said decisively, ‘that you had best have a seat on the sofa, Aunt. You have had a shock.’
The sisters smiled kindly upon their neighbor, pleased with their share in her discomfort.
‘Perhaps some negus,’ Miss Digweed offered helpfully.
‘A glass of wine,’ her sister suggested.
Excusing herself happily from their company, Lydia led her aunt to a corner of the room which was then unoccupied. Signalling to a servant, she managed to procure a small glass of brandy, which she forced upon her aunt. All this attracted the attention of their hostess, who bore down upon them purposefully.
‘What is the matter?’ she demanded, looming over the two seated on the sofa.
‘Dear Mrs Wardle-Penfield,’ Aunt Camilla whispered, ‘I had not heard until tonight. I did not know....’
‘What are you saying, Camilla?’ the older woman asked, with justifiable irritation.
‘We have just been told about the death in Wickham Wood,’ Lydia answered for her.
‘Oh, that.’ The murder was dismissed with a slight shrug and a twist of the lips which conveyed the impression that murder was a social solecism of which Mrs Wardle-Penfield definitely did not approve. ‘Some drunken lout, I’ll warrant, who fell and dashed his head against a stone.’
‘Does anyone know the identity of the dead ... man?’ Lydia enquired hesitantly.
‘I should think not!’ the haughty dame was scandalized at the suggestion. ‘Such persons assuredly do not move in our circles.’
Having thus distanced herself from anyone who was so ill-bred as to permit himself to be murdered, she returned to the subject of her dear friend’s nerves. Declaring that Aunt Camilla’s constitution was far too delicate, and that it was a wonder she was so well-preserved for her age, she recommended Doctor Humbleby’s Tonic as an unfailing remedy for anyone prone to the vapors. Then, with a bracing pat on the shoulder, she returned to her other guests.
* * * *
Miss Denton’s distress, however, had been perceived by at least one interested onlooker. The French gentleman, Monsieur d’Almain, soon made his way over to them. He expressed genuine concern, and his gentleness and soothing murmurs had a calming effect upon the afflicted lady.
Perhaps a quarter of an hour passed before her aunt had recovered sufficiently to rejoin the whist players. The company had increased considerably by that time, and there did not appear to be many openings for another partner at any of the tables. Eventually, a place was found for Camilla. However, Lydia was left to her seat against the wall. This was very much to her liking, as she did not relish sharing a table with her aunt. It was much more interesting to sit quietly and observe the assembled company. It was better for her aunt to be occupied, in any case, so that she did not have an opportunity to dwell upon the tragedy.
Within a very few minutes, Lydia spied a large head protruding above the others in the room. It was the young gentlemen they had met a few days before: Mr Savidge. Despite his boyish looks, she had learned that he was on the brink of achieving his majority. To her surprise, he soon made his way over to her and established himself on the settee beside her.
‘You are not playing, Mr Savidge?’ she asked him, once the obligatory greetings had been dispensed with.
‘Don’t like cards,’ he confessed. ‘Waste of time, if you ask me. Prefer the races myself.’
‘Do you often visit Lewes?’
‘As often as I’m able.’
‘I know little about horseflesh,’ Lydia said apologetically. ‘But I must confess that it does sound more entertaining than such an evening as this.’
‘It could hardly be less entertaining, could it?’
His face folded into a mischievous smile which was quite infectious.
‘You find life in Diddlington a dead bore?’ she asked him boldly.
‘Oh, it’s not so terrible.’ He shrugged philosophically. ‘I mean, one makes the most of whatever’s offered.’
‘The Misses Digweed have informed us that there has been a rather ... unusual death in the vicinity of the woods hereabouts.’
‘Indeed.’ He nodded. ‘I make no doubt they made a pretty mess of it.’
Lydia giggled. ‘I can hardly be sure whether the corpse is male or female.’
‘To tell you the truth,’ he lowered his voice, leaning his head toward her somewhat conspiratorially, ‘it was hard for anyone to tell much about it. Very nasty, I assure you.’
‘You have actually seen the body?’ She could not quite disguise the envy in her voice. Gentlemen always seemed to have more fun than ladies.
‘Oh yes,’ he said, not boasting but simply as a matter of course. ‘My father is Diddlington’s Justice of the Peace.’
‘Is he?’ She was surprised. ‘I had thought your father owned the Golden Cockerel.’
‘So he does,’ young Mr Savidge said. ‘But he’s also one of the wealthiest men in town. By rights, Sir Hector Mannington should be the JP, but he
’s over ninety and not up to snuff any longer, poor man.’
‘And you say that the person who was murdered was unrecognizable.’
‘Seems to me,’ John Savidge said with slow deliberation, ‘that somebody wanted to make certain that he wasn’t recognized.’
‘How so?’
‘Well, the face had been smashed in with a large stone which was found nearby. Also—
Here, their little tête-à-tête was interrupted by Mr Savidge’s father himself. Like his son, Mr Thomas Savidge was a large, beefy-handed man. But whereas the younger man seemed to have a rather placid disposition, the innkeeper was a loud, boisterous fellow whose voice could have substituted for a hunting horn. He immediately took over the conversation, paying outrageous compliments to Lydia which she took no heed of since it was clear that they were simply what Mr Savidge mistakenly believed to be proper etiquette in addressing young ladies.
‘You mustn’t prose on about horses or anything to this fair damsel, John,’ he chafed his son. ‘Don’t want her to be bored by idle chatter.’
‘We were discussing the murder,’ Lydia informed him.
Mr Savidge frowned. ‘What a cod’s head you are, boy!’ he cried loudly, causing several heads to turn in his direction. ‘A fine thing to be filling a young lady’s head with nightmares and such. You have no notion how to get on, my boy! Flirting: that’s the ticket.’
‘Oh, I do not mind at all,’ Lydia hastened to inform him. ‘I find it absolutely fascinating. And I assure you, I know no more of flirtation than your son does.’
The innkeeper would have none of it, however. He continued to instruct his son in quite improper ways of dealing with the fair sex, until he was finally abducted by Mrs Wardle-Penfield and incarcerated at one of the card tables. Lydia and John were therefore free to resume their discussion.
‘Sorry about m’father,’ John muttered.
‘Oh, don’t be!’ Lydia said. ‘I thought him prodigiously amusing.’
‘He can be a little - overwhelming.’
‘I am surprised that his hostess can so easily control him,’ she answered with more truth than tact.
‘No trouble in that quarter.’ John chuckled. ‘Papa thinks Mrs P can do no wrong. Hopes to rise in society under her patronage.’
‘And you?’
‘Oh, I’ve no such ambitions.’
‘Thank goodness for that!’ Lydia was very pleased by her companion’s easy, unaffected manners. He neither was, nor considered himself to be of the gentry. It was most refreshing.
‘No use pretending to be what you ain’t. I may have been educated at Harrow, but I’m an innkeeper’s son and not ashamed of it.’
‘But tell me more about the murder,’ she persisted.
‘Whoever the guilty party might be,’ John told her, ‘they either had a grudge against the victim or didn’t mean for anyone to know his identity.’
‘But the victim is a man?’
‘Definitely.’
‘Horribly disfigured by a stone, though....’
‘More than that, Miss Bramwell.’
‘Good heavens! What more could there be?’
‘The body was covered in oil and lit on fire—’
Lydia caught her breath. It was better than she could ever have imagined.
‘How horrible!’ she breathed. ‘No wonder, then, that nobody can tell who it is.’
‘I have my suspicions.’
‘Do you?’ She eyed him with growing respect.
‘I’m almost certain it’s your friend, the Nose.’
In spite of herself Lydia blushed. Still, she could not allow embarrassment to spoil her fun.
‘The gentleman from the Mail?’
‘That’s right. A Mr Cole.’ John nodded emphatically. ‘He was putting up at the inn, but hasn’t been seen in several days. Left his bag and his belongings there, though.’
‘Could it really be him?’
‘I’d bet a goodly sum on it.’
Lydia glanced around the room at the smiling, gesticulating group. Her eye fell on an ornate clock which graced the mantel on the opposite side of the room and a sudden thought came to her.
‘Do you know if there was a silver watch found on the - the body?’ she asked.
A look of surprise crossed the face of Mr Savidge. ‘I believe there was.’
‘Carved with some kind of grotesque faces?’
‘The masks of Comedy and Tragedy.’ He nodded.
‘I saw him take it out several times on the journey,’ she explained. ‘I believe he wanted to impress Ears with it.’
Naturally, she then had to explain the curious appendages of Mr Cole’s travelling companion, which almost caused John to go into whoops. When he had gained control of himself, he said that he would pass along this information to his father. It seemed that the dead man had now been identified beyond all reasonable doubt.
Chapter Five
A NEW FRIEND
‘But then,’ Lydia said to her aunt the next morning as they sat together over their breakfast, ‘it makes no sense.’
‘I do wish you would leave off this subject, Lydia,’ Aunt Camilla protested faintly. ‘My nerves are all a-jangle as it is.’
Of course there was no possibility of ignoring such a momentous event, even had Lydia wished to do so. However, she had no such wish.
‘If the motive for killing Mr Cole was robbery,’ she persisted, heedless of her aunt’s sensibilities, ‘why was his watch not taken? From the looks of it, I’d wager it was his most valuable possession.’
‘Well then, there must have been another motive,’ her aunt snapped, apparently accepting the fact that there was no escaping her niece’s morbid fascination with this unfortunate incident.
‘Precisely. But what reason could there possibly be?’
Lydia demanded. ‘Why would anyone in Diddlington murder a perfect stranger?’
‘Perhaps it was an accident,’ Camilla suggested hopefully.
‘I think it unlikely that anyone could accidentally smash someone’s head in with a stone; nor could they set fire to the corpse in error.’
Camilla shuddered at the vivid images which this speech conjured up in her mind.
‘Please ...’ she whispered, fortifying her nerves with a few sips of strong Gunpowder Tea.
‘John thinks that it was all an attempt to disguise the identity of the victim. But then it would be foolish to leave the watch. Of course,’ she mused aloud, ‘that may have been an oversight.’
‘I daresay one can be quite forgetful when committing a murder.’
This was a more trenchant remark than was usual for her soft-spoken relation, so Lydia deemed it politic to keep any further conjectures to herself. If she wished to discuss the matter with anyone, the most logical person was John Savidge. He was in a position to know more than any other of her aunt’s acquaintance, and he certainly seemed more intelligent than anyone else she had met in Diddlington.
* * * *
Her estimation of the mental powers of the village’s inhabitants was not improved by developments over the following week. No sooner had the first wave of astonishment crashed upon the imaginations of the populace than it was followed by a surging tide of superstition and fantastic supposition.
From the meanest yeoman farmer to the most exalted residents of the hamlet, speculation swelled from a furtive whisper to the deafening roar of a mighty torrent.
To begin with, there was what was now grandly termed the ‘previous incident’. This telling phrase referred to another murder which had occurred some three years before in almost the same spot. Nobody had ever been charged, and the unsolved crime had been banished from the collective imagination of Diddlingtonians until it was brought so forcefully to mind by what appeared to be its twin.
‘Horrible it was!’ Mr Berwick, the vicar, intoned piously, when Aunt Camilla mentioned the matter to him. He had called to see how the two ladies got on and, naturally, he did not refuse the offer of tea - espec
ially since he had timed his visit precisely at the hour when he knew they would be partaking and would undoubtedly include him in their repast.
‘Dear Mr Berwick,’ Camilla said, catching her lips between her teeth to keep them from trembling. ‘What has anyone in Diddlington done to deserve this - this display of divine wrath?’
‘The wrath in this case seems rather human than divine,’ Lydia opined before the gentleman could respond.
‘Indeed, you are quite right Miss Bramwell,’ the good man agreed. ‘The human heart, as the Scripture saith, “is deceitful above all things and desperately evil.” Who can know the wickedness hidden within it?’
This did little to console the elder of his two charming companions. Camilla continued to bemoan such a terrible occurrence until Mr Berwick’s stomach was full and he dismissed himself.
But while he might be of the same mind as Lydia, others had far more dramatic views of what had happened in the darkness of Wickham Wood. It was said that the wood had once been the meeting place of a coven of witches. Many expressed the view that the spirits of these long-dead practitioners of the Black Arts continued to haunt the groves where their perverse ceremonies had been held.
‘The Devil is in it, mark my words!’ This phrase, or some variation thereof, was heard more than once on the street and in the tavern where the men gathered to while away the evening hours.
But even this was not enough to satisfy those who apparently had read The Monk one too many times. Knowing that Mr Cole’s corpse had been burned beyond recognition, these folks looked back toward an even more distant and mysterious past. There were local legends of a fire-breathing dragon which had menaced the countryside in the days of St Augustine. The hardy old saint had vanquished him with a silver crucifix. Perhaps this beast had risen, phoenix-like, from the ashes and was bent on reclaiming what was left of the woodlands he had once inhabited!