by S K Rizzolo
***
“May I have a word, Miss Sandford?”
Following in the butler’s wake, Penelope halted in surprise as a pale, somewhat disheveled young man stepped into her path.
“I’ll show her out, Jewkesbury,” he told the butler. “You go about your business.”
Giving an elfin smile, the young man introduced himself as Ambrose Tyrone, brother to Constance, though she had at once recognized him from the funeral at St. Margaret’s church. It didn’t suit the proprieties for her to be drawn into a tête-à-tête with a strange young man, but this was a boy really. A boy moreover who studied her, eyes startlingly bright in the dimness, as if she were a rather intriguing but unlikely species.
“Will I do?” she asked, diverted.
“Hard to say. I think perhaps you will one day. You remind me of my sister.”
Penelope bowed. “A compliment, Mr. Tyrone, I thank you. In what way?”
He pondered for a long moment before answering. “The same intensity, I think. Also the same fear.”
She stared at him. “Fear of what, pray?”
“Of life…and death. What else is anyone afraid of? But some people let it keep them from what they most desire. Constance wasn’t one of those.” He pushed aside his hair impatiently. “That wasn’t what I wanted to speak to you about, Miss Sandford. You’re from the Society, are you not?”
“Yes, I’ve come on an errand and been most hospitably entertained by your father and brother, and now you.”
“I rather think you were not received with much warmth by my father,” he said dryly. “A woman with her own will and a voice to speak it sets his back up. Which is why Constance was something of an embarrassment to him and even to Bertram actually.”
“But not to you?”
“No, not to me.” He moved closer. “That wasn’t what I wanted to say to you either. I’ve a message to charge you with for Miss Elizabeth Minton. Will you deliver it?”
Surprised, she nodded her agreement.
“Tell her that Sir Giles does not intend to contest the terms of Constance’s will. For once, the lawyers have been forthright enough to admit the futility of such an attempt.”
“Why should he wish to dispute your sister’s wishes?”
Ambrose’s eyes glowed. “You knew she was an heiress? Oh yes, my aunt left Constance some four or five thousand pounds per annum. Aunt Emily had no liking for Bertram or me for that matter.” His face wrinkled in mock dismay. “Now Constance has left one-third of her fortune to be held in trust for her charitable society with Bertram as executor. The rest to my brother and me in equal shares, nothing to my father.”
“He disapproves?”
“You’ve met him. I am sure you can imagine his sentiments. And now that Bertram has means of his own, even my father won’t be able to keep him on such a tight rein.” He darted a quick look at her face as if to see if he had disconcerted her. “Not that my brother is not a dutiful son. You know he’s soon to be wed? A most respectable match, Sir Giles says.” A chuckle escaped him.
“Your father must be pleased to have one of his children suitably settled. Sir Giles mentioned that your late sister had little interest in such matters?”
“Oh, Constance was far too clever to be caught thus. Told my father she wouldn’t marry until a truly worthy suitor presented himself. But somehow none of ’em ever came close to deserving her.”
“No, they wouldn’t, would they?” She felt a sudden sharp sadness. “Your sister’s bequest will be welcome news to Miss Minton. Sir Giles does not intend to relay this intelligence?”
“He chooses to leave her in uncertainty for a time.” It was as if he spoke of strangers.
“Would Mr. Bertram Tyrone choose likewise?”
“Part of him desires to respect Constance’s wishes. The other part thinks the money would line his own pockets a good deal more comfortably.”
“And yet he seems so grief-stricken. It must have been quite dreadful for you all when she did not return.”
“No one was worried at first. I had told the servants she had an errand. I almost believed it myself.”
“But why?”
“Because it might have been true. If she had forgot to send a note, I didn’t want to give Father any more fuel for his ranting.”
His gaze shifted, going out of focus, and he seemed to be in rapt contemplation of the wall in front of him. Penelope looked into the raw, glowing embers that were his eyes and wondered how this fey boy managed living with a man like Sir Giles, who had probably never had an original thought in his life. There was something so alone about Ambrose.
“I must go now,” she said softly.
He nodded and as though issuing a royal command said, “You will carry my message to Miss Minton.”
Chapter Eight
Ignoring the discomfort in his leg, Chase knelt by the French window outside Constance Tyrone’s office. The daylight was beginning to fail; he would have to hurry his observations. The lock had been damaged, not in itself surprising under the circumstances. But it looked as though someone had merely made a few jabs with a sharp object, scratching the metal on either side of the keyhole—hardly an efficacious method of gaining entry. A rank amateur might have smashed in the door. A cracksman would have picked the lock delicately, with precision.
He sat back on his haunches. Elizabeth Minton had assured him she could find nothing missing. Many of the valuables had been in the receiving room, packed up to be returned to the family. But there were still items worth the taking in Constance Tyrone’s office. Why run such a risk and steal nothing? And how could a thief be certain no one would be around to nab him? Surely it would have been more prudent to wait until the women went home.
Chase walked through the office and entered the anteroom where the doorkeeper Winnie Skirl stood by the fire, trying to ward off the chill of the coming darkness. She had packed up her mending basket and shut the curtains. Her shawl lay ready on the table.
“Hell itself wouldn’t warm these old bones,” she muttered. “Eh, Mr. Chase, you gave me old heart a turn. You finished in there? I can’t be staying longer. Not easy in my mind after sundown.”
He watched her closely. She had not been present on his prior visit, and he had questioned her only briefly today. “Have you far to go, Mrs. Skirl?”
“Not far. I’ll just tell Miss ’Lizabeth and take my leave.” She made as if to shuffle toward the door.
“I’ve a few more questions, but I shall only keep you a minute. That is, if you answer me true.” Chase used his most officious voice, but softened it as he took in her huddled form. “You’ve been ill?”
“Wait till you’ve my years,” she said sourly. “My joints ache awful bad with the rheumatism, my teeth is loose, and nothing settles on my stomach proper no more. Ain’t fun, not that I expect life to be.”
“I see they treat you well here. Miss Minton seems a kind mistress.”
Perching on the edge of a chair, she sniffed contemptuously as if his spurious pity had somehow reassured her.
“What was you wishful to ask me? Sure isn’t the state of my health you’d be after.”
“Did you observe Miss Tyrone’s departure on that last afternoon, Winnie?”
“No, sir. I went home early that day, feeling poorly. I don’t reckon as anyone saw her go. Miss ’Lizabeth was busy with the women.”
“Aren’t the children cared for upstairs in this building?”
“They are and a rare rumpus they makes.”
“Little devils, eh? Do you suppose one of them may have scratched the window?”
“But…but that was the thieves, of course. You’re not accusing one of the children?” She grabbed at her fingers as if trying to loosen the gnarled knuckles.
“I’ve known mere babes to turn criminal, not that I mean to imply such a thing of this lot. But you see, Winnie, it’s an odd kind of thief who takes his knife and slashes the outside of a lock. More like child’s play, wouldn’t
you say? Especially since the vase was shattered, and nothing seems to have been stolen.”
A strange expression flickered across her face. It didn’t look like relief although his suggestion ought to have reassured her. A bit of mischief from a high-spirited child would have caused no real harm.
“I suppose as that may be,” she allowed. “You’ll have to ask Bet, the nursemaid.”
“You’ve said the French window in Miss Tyrone’s office was fastened this morning. But what about in here?” He pointed at the door leading to the churchyard. “That door remains unlocked during the day, does it not, so that the business of the Society may be conducted? Were you away from your post at all?”
“No sir, I told you. I sat right here all morning, and when I heard a noise I went to look, but he was already gone.” She stared stolidly ahead, her heavy jowl quivering.
Chase sensed she was not telling him something. But why would Winnie lie? If she knew she had been careless about securing the office and didn’t wish to own up, perhaps. And with the rest of the women at work next door for much of the day, she was alone here.
“You’re a brave woman, Winnie. Do you realize you must have frightened away the thief before he could take anything? It was a close run thing.”
Instead of preening at his compliment, she went still, watching him, eyes drawn to his.
“I wouldn’t be surprised had you forgot to check that window what with all the flurry around here lately. Could it be it was getting late last night, and you were thinking of getting home?”
“I…I been in a fidget, there’s no doubting. Perhaps I did forget.” As if on cue, tears began to well up in her already red-rimmed eyes.
Chase was about to press further when Penelope Wolfe entered, accompanied by a young woman dressed in the Society’s sober garb. What the devil is happening here, he thought in astonishment.
Mrs. Wolfe regarded him with the look of consummate disapproval he had come to expect in their short acquaintance. She looked every inch the lady, down to the polished half boots on her feet and the beaded reticule in one gloved hand. The sight of her filled him with intense annoyance.
As if a spell were broken, Winnie stood and moved toward her with an awkward step, a few tears trickling down her flabby cheeks. Taking the old woman’s shawl from the table, Penelope draped it gently around her.
“Good afternoon, ma’am,” Chase said. He nodded to the red-haired woman who waited beside her.
Penelope spoke. “Maggie, why don’t you take Winnie to Miss Minton? That is, if Mr. Chase is quite finished.”
“I rather think I am. For now.”
Her eyes gleamed. “I do beg your pardon for the interruption.”
“You’re sure, mum?” asked Maggie, studying Chase with some doubt.
“Just go, if you please.” Penelope smiled in reassurance. “I hope to see you again, Maggie, and I thank you for your company.”
“Do you have some stake in this affair which is yet to be revealed, Mrs. Wolfe?” he said when the door had closed behind the two women. “Or is it idle curiosity that draws you?”
“Is it idle curiosity to desire the truth? I do, after all, have reason, as I told you when you attended me to Jeremy’s lodgings. My husband has vanished.”
He saw that underneath her bravado she was worried, yet saw also that she wanted to know merely for the sake of knowing. If anyone could recognize the signs of that particular trait, John Chase could. He walked around Winnie’s worktable to stand in front of her. “You might find that ‘truth’ is rather less palatable than you had imagined.”
She grinned at him. “You are no doubt correct, sir. I might.”
Disconcerted, he added in a brisk tone, “Why are you here, ma’am?”
“Oh, I called this afternoon just prior to the housebreaking’s being discovered. I wanted to make Miss Minton’s acquaintance and see if I could offer any assistance. I also came to apologize on my husband’s behalf for those sketches.”
“She knows your identity yet has made you welcome?” He didn’t trouble to hide his disbelief.
“She is willing to give me a chance, I believe.”
“A chance to do what precisely?” he said impatiently. “Deceive these women into thinking the impulse of charity has brought you here? I see you are not above a little manipulation of circumstance.”
“I see you are not above browbeating old women,” she retorted, adopting the lecturing tone he remembered from their last encounter. “When I came in, your face wore the precise look of that merciless devil on the window at St. Margaret’s. You looked as though you intended to cart off poor Winnie.”
“That may just be more appropriate than you realize. If you hadn’t interfered, I might have obtained a better notion of this so-called robbery. I am convinced she lies about something.”
As they talked, the darkness had grown subtly so that the rich color of Mrs. Wolfe’s gown had begun to blend with the shadows. Strangely, the gloom only seemed to accentuate the expressions playing across her face. He watched her irritation fade to be replaced by eager interest.
“You mean, sir, that you suspect her of connivance with the housebreakers? That would explain—” A telltale blush mounted in her cheeks like a beacon.
“Explain what?”
“Why, your distrust of that pitiful, old creature!”
That wasn’t what she had been about to say. The second woman to lie to him in less than half an hour…
He eyed her speculatively. “If you seek a clue to your husband’s disappearance, I take leave to doubt that you’ll find it here. Have you considered where he might have gone?”
“No. Are you planning to interrogate me, Mr. Chase?” She drew herself up.
“Not a bad notion. Why don’t we step into Miss Tyrone’s office for a few minutes?” Before she could object, he opened the door and bowed politely; perforce, she preceded him into the chamber. He left the door ajar as a sop to the proprieties.
Walking to the desk, Chase turned up the lamp and perched on the chair to begin poking around in the drawers. When he glanced up, he surprised an incredulous expression on her face and realized it was because he had dared to sit while she remained standing. Not the act of a gentleman, but then he had long ago renounced whatever claim to that honor he once possessed.
He waved a hand at the wing chair across from him, and she took a seat, trying to appear unconscious of his lapse in manners. So Penelope Wolfe, who seemed to enjoy flouting convention, was not entirely free of that ingrained upper class code. Her circumstances were not affluent, he believed, yet he sensed an arrogance in this woman that spoke of breeding.
“Where did you and Maggie go this afternoon?” he asked.
“Miss Minton asked me to supervise the return of Miss Tyrone’s belongings to her family.”
“You saw Sir Giles? What do you make of him? He’d rather give Beau Brummell the cut direct than cooperate with the likes of Bow Street.”
“He was most gracious,” she said with faint sarcasm.
Chase smiled. “Miss Tyrone was heiress to a tidy sum held in a trust to be administered by Sir Giles until her thirtieth birthday, which would have been in the new year. Poor girl. She could have tweaked her nose at them all.”
“Perhaps she did anyway. Ambrose says the Society is to gain one third of the estate with the two brothers sharing the remainder. And Constance named Mr. Bertram Tyrone as trustee.”
He gave a low whistle. “So not a farthing to compensate Sir Giles for the loss of a thoroughly unsatisfactory daughter? A pity for him and for me since I had supposed he had a pecuniary interest in her death. What of Bertram Tyrone?”
“While he disapproved of his sister’s activities, he seems genuinely grieved at her death.”
“Still, one wonders whether Bertram knew of the arrangements. Maybe he thought to inherit all.”
“Sir Giles recently arranged an advantageous match for him; the girl is well dowered, I believe, though I am not ce
rtain whether Mr. Tyrone himself favors the marriage. He and his father are at outs.” Penelope went on to describe her impressions of Ambrose. “An odd boy, secretive and self-contained, yet he admired his sister. Certainly greed would never govern him.”
Chase remarked, “A boy of his age and class ought to be away at school. There are whispers about him—he’s a bit ‘touched,’ according to one servant I questioned. Apparently, his father deems it better to keep him under the family’s eye.”
Penelope sat up straighter. “What persuades you that the attack wasn’t random robbery as Sir Giles claims? Surely Ambrose, at any rate, was tucked up at home on the night of the murder? Where were the others?”
“The boy remained in his bedchamber, according to his valet and several other servants. As for Sir Giles, he spent the evening at his club, but it was a quiet night, and he spent some time alone in the library. The porter is unable to vouch for his uninterrupted presence.”
“And Mr. Bertram Tyrone?” she inquired.
“He was with that surgeon fellow, Strap. Witnesses place them in various low taverns.”
Chase perceived that she didn’t like to think of villainy so cold-hearted as to disregard close ties of blood. He could have told her that much garden variety viciousness was perpetrated by husbands, fathers, wives, sisters, brothers.
Elizabeth Minton appeared at the door. “Mr. Chase, you wished to speak with the curate? He awaits you in the sewing room.”
“Thank you, Miss Minton.” He stood and turned to Penelope. “Wait here, ma’am. I shall see you safely to your lodgings.”
“That won’t be necessary.”
He bowed. “I insist. It’s the least Bow Street can do.”
When he walked out, Miss Minton hesitated. She looked frail and exhausted, but when she spoke again, her lips twisted in scorn. “Many of the ladies we usually call upon for assistance find themselves otherwise engaged at present. Should your offer hold, Mrs. Wolfe, I shall be obliged if you would return tomorrow afternoon. I have some business to attend to in the parish, and I prefer not to leave the women on their own.”