by Anne Perry
“Possibly. Of interest as a religious retreat. Or to a painter or, even more likely, someone writing a book. A lot of peace.”
He had let go of her arm and they walked along the street slowly.
“Or a smuggler?” she suggested.
“Smuggling what? There aren’t enough people here to buy much. Tobacco? Brandy? I thought they took that sort of thing into Cornwall.”
“They probably do. I don’t know. It’s halfway between France and England, but it’s a lot shorter straight across the Channel from Dover to Calais. I want to see the doctor, Dr. Mullane. See what he says.”
“You think she was murdered!”
“I won’t be satisfied until I’ve proved to myself that she wasn’t.”
“Then let’s find him.” Daniel started forward determinedly. “And after that, we can see if there is someone who deals with the sale of houses. Or who can at least tell us something about whoever was interested in buying May’s house. From the postmistress’s description, it certainly wasn’t Sidney.”
* * *
—
IT WAS TWO hours before Dr. Mullane was free and could see them. This time they had decided that Daniel should begin the conversation and Miriam ask questions only if necessary, at least to start with.
Mullane was in his late forties, with a full head of untidy, sandy-colored hair turning white at the sides, and a pleasant, wind-burned face. Daniel liked him immediately. He decided to be candid.
“No medical particulars,” Daniel responded when the doctor inquired what he could do to help. “At least not anything for which there is any treatment now.” Daniel had already introduced himself and Miriam, without of course mentioning Miriam’s qualifications. “I’m a lawyer representing a man on trial for a crime for which, if he is found guilty, he will lose his reputation and career and, at least for a while, his freedom. Quite apart from the fact that I must do my best to represent his interests, I believe he is innocent. Others have made him look guilty, to cover a far more serious crime.”
Mullane looked frankly confused. “So how can I help? I can give you no medical opinion without seeing the patient.”
“Of course not,” Daniel agreed. “I would not ask it of you. But you can tell me medical facts of a case that is already closed, and with which I think you are familiar.”
“Not without the permission of the patient.”
“She cannot give it. Unfortunately, she is dead.”
Mullane started to rise from his chair, his face dark with distaste.
“Miss May Trelawny,” Daniel finished. “There seems to be a great deal at stake here, Dr. Mullane. I think her death may not have been accidental.” Had he just committed himself to a collision course with failure?
Mullane froze. “She was kicked to death by one of her own horses,” he said quietly. “How can that be deliberate? And who on earth would wish that on an elderly lady of moderate means and great charm?”
“For the house?” Daniel suggested.
“What? Don’t be absurd.” Mullane looked stunned. “I’m sorry, that was rude. But it’s a very ordinary house of quite modest proportions, and in need of major repair. I happen to know that the estate has not sufficient means to effect them. I believe it goes to a goddaughter. I think that is what May said.”
“May?” Miriam raised her eyebrows only slightly.
“May Trelawny,” Mullane said.
Miriam smiled. It was delicate, and a little shy. “You called her May. That suggests you knew her quite well, even that you were friends?”
“We were. She was a woman of character, kindness, imagination, and…and fun.” He said it warmly, and there was sweet memory in his eyes. “I miss her deeply.”
“That’s what Rebecca Thorwood said of her,” Daniel put in. “That is her goddaughter. I don’t think she knows exactly how Miss Trelawny died. I will not tell her, if it is not necessary. I think she believed Miss Trelawny was a good horsewoman.”
“She was,” Mullane agreed. “It was a…” He stopped, raising his hands in the air, and then shrugging. He fell silent.
Daniel looked at Miriam. If they were ever to find out more about May Trelawny’s death, it was now or not at all.
Miriam understood. She nodded so slightly it was almost imperceptible. “Dr. Mullane, what happens to the house?”
Daniel drew breath to remind them that the postmistress had said someone wanted to buy it, then realized that that was not the issue.
“What are you thinking, Miss fford Croft? Mr. Pitt mentioned the death may not be accidental before. The horse was startled by something and lashed out. It appears to have panicked, but we will probably never know what happened. May’s injuries were very violent, as if the animal that caused them were in great fear or pain, but there was nothing to account for that. And certainly there was no one else seen in or near the house. No reason for the incident but terrible mischance. If you are thinking that the animal was drugged with something, we tested its blood and there was nothing discovered.”
“No injuries?” Miriam asked.
“Nothing but a few bruises. Poor May was trampled. Horses are very heavy animals. If you have even been trodden on, you will remember it.” He looked palpably distressed.
“May we see the animal?” Miriam asked earnestly. “Please?”
“I don’t know what good that will do, but of course you may.” He rose to his feet and gestured for them to follow. He led the way out of the side door of his house and into the yard, to the stables and carriage house. It made sense that he would keep a trap and horses. If he were needed urgently, he would not waste time walking, even though nowhere was more than a couple of miles. The stable was quite a large building. He probably kept a store of both hay and grain there in the winter.
“I’ve two horses of my own as well,” Mullane told them as he opened the door and led them inside, showing them the stalls. All the animals pricked their ears as they heard the steps. One of them whinnied. “All right, Acorn,” he said gently. “Nobody’s going anywhere. Hello, Hazel.” He touched the next horse where it poked its head over the half gate. “We’ve come to see Rosie.” He stopped by the last stall where a beautiful bay mare was watching him, and then Daniel and Miriam. She stepped backward sharply. “All right, Rosie,” Mullane soothed. “Nobody’s going to hurt you, girl.” He turned to Miriam. “Perhaps you would talk to her, Miss fford Croft? She’s been more used to a woman, though she’ll have to get used to me now, I suppose.” He turned to Daniel. “Sorry.”
Daniel stopped.
Miriam went ahead, very softly now, talking to the horse all the time. She opened the stable’s half door and went in.
Daniel was holding his breath. He wanted to stop this. What if the animal really was damaged in some way, frightened or hurt, and she kicked whoever was there, as she had apparently done to May Trelawny? How would they stop it?
Miriam hesitated.
Daniel thought she was going to come back out again, but she stood where she was, beside the animal, still talking to it. It was a one-sided conversation, and quiet, but the horse’s ears flicked. She was listening.
“What happened, eh?” Miriam said, reaching out and touching its neck.
The horse stood perfectly still.
“Did something frighten you?”
Daniel was hardly breathing.
Miriam slid her hand over the horse’s neck, still talking quietly. “What happened, eh? Was someone there, other than May? Someone you didn’t like?” She moved her hand farther down its back. “Did they hurt you?” Her hand moved another six or seven inches.
No one moved.
She slid it a little farther, and suddenly the horse threw its head back and lashed out, kicking violently behind it.
Miriam went white as a sheet and leaped away, but she did not cry out.
Mull
ane shot forward and grasped the horse’s halter. “Quiet, Rosie! Quiet, girl. There now! Nobody’s hurting you.”
Daniel started forward to help Miriam, and then realized a sudden movement might only make it worse. He froze.
Seconds ticked by.
The horse quieted. Slowly they all relaxed.
Miriam came out of the stall and moved over toward Daniel. Without thinking, he put his arm round her. She was shaking.
Mullane gradually settled the horse.
Miriam walked away from Daniel but took his hand and pulled him along with her. She was going toward the saddles and harnesses in what was almost a separate room. She ignored the two larger saddles and went to the graceful side saddle, a little dusty from weeks of disuse in an atmosphere where hay and corn were stored. She went to pick it up, and Daniel reached across and lifted it for her. She turned it over and stared at it, examining it closely.
Daniel watched her, and then looked at the saddle. He saw it first, perhaps because he was looking more closely thanks to her. It was a small spot of blood, dried, smaller than a little fingernail.
Then Miriam saw it and turned to him, her eyes shining.
“What is it?” he asked.
“Rosie,” she replied. “The horse. I found the corresponding wound on her back, hidden by her mane. It looks like something in this saddle spiked her. It’s not there anymore, but it left a sore on her back. It became infected and it’s suppurating now. It must hurt like hell when any pressure is put on it. You can’t see it, because it’s partially healed over, with a splinter or something still there. That may be why she lashed out.”
Daniel stiffened. “Mullane?”
“No. He would have taken it out and done something to heal the wound in the horse before it got worse, if he knew about it. Then there’d be no trace of it. I expect he touched her lightly—nothing more than a brush now and then. She’s very skittish. I daresay May’s death frightened her badly.”
Daniel saw Mullane walking toward them. “Are you sure?” he said to Miriam.
“Please God, it wasn’t him!” she said under her breath.
“Are you all right, Miss fford Croft?” Mullane asked anxiously.
“Yes, thank you.” She took a deep breath. “But I’ve got a lot of questions to ask you. And I think Mr. Pitt may need you in London.”
Mullane looked from one to the other of them. “I don’t understand. This…this proves that poor Rosie is to blame. I’d rather let her just go to breeding—or not be used at all. I’m not—”
Daniel took a risk, not a very carefully evaluated one. He knew it was rash even as he said the words. “Somebody put something very sharp in her saddle. It hurt her. The wound is still there, partially healed over, but suppurating and infected. That’s why she lashed out, when Miriam touched it.”
Mullane started to speak, then stopped.
Daniel smiled. “You’re a doctor. If you’d done it, you’d have had the sense to treat the wound, wouldn’t you? It must be only a small piece of something sharp like a thorn still left.”
Mullane was pale. “What son of a bitch would do that? To a woman like May Trelawny? Or to the horse?”
“I don’t know,” Daniel replied. “But I mean to find out.”
“I’ll help you all I can,” Mullane said fervently. “But you’ll need more than my word for this. I’ll take photographs. We’ll get them developed in the post office. We’ll take them with us to London on tomorrow’s boat. But be quick. I want to get that horse treated!”
“Yes,” Miriam agreed, surprisingly not moving from Daniel, who again had his arm around her.
He did not move either.
CHAPTER
Twenty-two
“WE’VE GOT A lot more to do before getting the last boat back to England tomorrow afternoon,” Daniel said to Miriam, when Mullane had taken photographs of Rosie’s back and of the blood mark on the saddle, and set out to deliver them to the postmistress for immediate development.
“There’s only one boat to Cherbourg, and then to Portsmouth,” Miriam replied. “We should book a place on it, in case there are too many passengers going back after their holidays.”
“Yes, of course,” Daniel agreed. “But we’ve got to get a much clearer picture of what happened to May before then. We know exactly what day Miss Trelawny died, and we can find out who was on Alderney then, or at the least who definitely was not. Did it happen in the stable, do you think, like the postmistress said?”
Miriam considered it for a moment. “No. That spot was rubbed badly. The prongs of the thorn were quite small, but very sharp. But the saddle was on there for a while. Something must have increased the pressure.”
“Perhaps when she mounted?” he suggested.
“Longer than that. And she wouldn’t mount in the stable. The ceilings are too low. She’d have to duck right down to get out of the door. Maybe whoever did it had intended it to look as if she fell when she was out riding and was kicked and dragged when the horse panicked.” She winced. “There must have been a lot of blood, from the injuries the doctor described. If we look, we’d find traces of it in the stable.”
“What will that prove?”
“I’m not sure.” For a moment she looked puzzled. “There’s something missing, because it doesn’t make sense. The thorn in the saddle was to bring about a riding accident and yet May was supposedly kicked to death in the stable…”
“Mullane would have seen the difference between an accident out riding and her having been kicked in the stable. And the postmistress said May was killed in the night.”
“Yes, of course. That’s what I don’t understand. And whoever did this had to get the burr, or whatever it was, in place. Maybe he meant to take it out again, but, anyway, nobody found it until we looked. And we found it only because we knew where it would be. Miss Trelawny’s death would have been seen as an accident by everyone. Being killed in a riding accident is not unusual, especially for an older woman.”
“Then why didn’t that work?” Daniel asked. “Perhaps it did but she kept control of the animal? Or had regained control by the time she got home?”
“Possibly. And then when she took the saddle off, she unintentionally dug the thorn in deeper, not knowing it was there.” Miriam was thinking aloud. “But, of course, that can’t be entirely right, as Miss Trelawny wouldn’t have just been for a ride at night.”
“Of course, there’s another alternative,” Daniel said quietly.
“What?”
“That the horse wasn’t involved in May’s death at all. May was beaten with something as hard as a horseshoe, and with great force, and left in the stable for the horse to get the blame.”
Miriam frowned. “That’s horrible, but much quicker and easier. No chance of it going wrong. Not dependent on an animal. But why use the horse and a thorn in the saddle at all?”
“Because that would make it look like an accident, should anyone find the thorn. The last thing whoever did this wants is to have the police called in. It must all look ordinary, but very sad. Elderly woman has thorn in her saddle. Doesn’t see it. Rides the horse and when the animal is hurt enough, it kicks her. No investigation. No delay in putting the will through probate. Nothing to draw the attention, and certainly nothing to connect it in any way with…anyone.”
“Yes, but who?” Miriam asked. “And even more, why?”
“I don’t know.”
“Then we will take the rest of the afternoon to find out,” she answered. “One of us should search the house. I hate going through the personal belongings of someone who died suddenly, with no time to hide or destroy what was private. It seems such an intrusion. But we must.”
“You should,” he said with a twisted smile that was meant as an apology. “It’s better that a woman does it. You would not just be less intrusive, but you might s
ee things that I wouldn’t understand. And I’ll get the photographs from the postmistress and make inquiries about who visited around that time, and interest in buying the house—who asked, if anybody knew what was offered—and anything else I can find.”
“Be careful!” she said quickly, then blushed. “I mean…if the perpetrators really beat the old lady to death over it, they may feel so safe they are happy to let us poke around as much as we want. But they may not. We are getting a lot closer.”
“Then perhaps you shouldn’t be alone here.”
“Shall we pack up and leave?”
“What?”
“Shall we—” she began.
“Yes, I heard you.” He searched her face, trying to find out if she meant it, if underneath the bravado, the anger at injustice, the violence, she was actually afraid, and would be grateful for the chance to leave and not look cowardly. There was nothing of that in her face. It was anger in her greenish-blue eyes, not fear. One thing he was certain of: she would not take kindly to being supposed a coward. Should he leave the question to her?
He replied instinctively. “I thought not. Lock the doors when I go. I know! I know! Anyone could break in. But that would make a noise. Don’t fight them. Hide.”
“For heaven’s sake, Daniel! Nobody’s coming. All the people involved in this are in London, waiting to see Philip Sidney convicted of all the crimes he is charged with, and put away before anyone believes anything he says. Go and get the photographs from the postmistress. There’s still time to take more if those aren’t any good. And see what else you can learn. See if anybody saw a man like Sidney. Or Thorwood. Get several descriptions of the man trying to buy the house. That couldn’t have been Sidney.”
He was about to argue, for argument’s sake, but he realized it was emotion speaking, in both of them. They were afraid. May Trelawny’s death had been a violent and terrible one. Whoever had caused it was the dark center of the whole elaborate web of accusations and lies, the unseen shape they had been looking for all the time. They could not run away from it without losing all the things that mattered to them both, but to try to say that would be clumsy, and he was afraid she might think he did not understand.