Audrey pondered the words for several minutes. She shivered at the thought of them. The shadow man. The man wandering the orchards at night. The man her mother had seen. The man who could be perfectly innocent except for everything else she now knew. The names in a diary of dead people. The voices in the mortuary hallway. Marguerite and Alistair dead.
What did it all mean? What did Joseph’s visit mean? Was she trying to tell herself that Joseph was mixed up with this somehow? Rubbish!
But he had visited her cottage that night and then she had heard those voices in the hallway at the mortuary. Surely, she would have recognized his voice… But not necessarily. There had been a wall between them, and the voices had been faint.
She was making too much out of this. She saw a villain everywhere she looked now. He had been concerned about her. That was all. Nothing nefarious or devious—
She heard a creak somewhere in the house and stood up. A creak in the house. Someone was in the house!
She opened the door to her room and walked to the landing above the stairs. She listened keenly to the sounds around her and heard nothing. It was the creaking of an old cottage settling. She was imaging all kinds of things and would drive herself mad!
She checked once more on Frances and then returned to her room. Dressed in her simple white shift, she got into bed. She must not drive herself to think all sorts of crazy things. She must rely on facts and only facts. It would do no good to exaggerate items with no basis in reality.
She sat in bed with her knees folded and her arms around her knees. The list of the dead names could be verified, and that was where they must start. She would ask Henry tomorrow to see about obtaining the information she’d been unable to get tonight in the mortuary. The house creaked again, and this time she ignored it.
As she drifted off to sleep, she thought again of the skeleton-like trees in the orchard outside and how they appeared to look like a nightmare army guarding some unknown entity.
That night, Audrey slept fitfully and when she woke, she felt tired and lethargic. She fixed a small breakfast of porridge for herself and her sister. Even though they were fed by the workhouse, the meals could be scant, and she wanted to give her sister a good start for the day.
She sipped her tea thoughtfully, and when ready, she and Frances walked up the small path to the workhouse classroom. Audrey had trouble concentrating that day. Her thoughts were in a hundred different places, and when the students had quiet time of reading to themselves, she took a sheet of paper and began writing.
Her list was simple. She wrote down the names and surveyed them. It was her list of suspects. These were people who had access to the workhouse and could easily be involved with what might be going on. She placed a star next to Della and Nanette Keene because they were not true suspects, as they had no access to the workhouse, and she crossed out Theodocia entirely.
Cuthbert Meacham, Master
Elspeth Meacham, Matron
Dr. Samson Beesley, Doctor
Freeman Reed, Chaplain
Joseph Caldwell, Superintendent
Levi Penn, Porter
Della Keene *
Nanette Keene *
Henry Ryland, Board of Guardians
Theodocia Ryland
As much as she wanted to find out the exact nature of what was happening, she knew Theodocia was innocent of any wrongdoings. It wasn’t just because she genuinely liked the woman, she also had no access to the workhouse.
She stared at the list again and then looked up. Her students were still reading quietly, but soon it would be dinner and then recreation. She could revisit this list after dinner. She rang the small bell on her desk. The children looked up expectantly at her. She released them for mealtime, and they dispersed.
At mealtime, she normally spoke to Frances and other staff at the long table, but this time she remained silent. Quietly, she watched the other staff members eat and converse casually, and she narrowed her eyes, wondering who was creeping along the mortuary hallways and plotting the death of the inmates.
The afternoon went by as quickly as the morning, and eventually, she was able to send a note to Henry to have him meet her at the cottage. He arrived promptly as the mantel clock chimed the seventh hour. Frances had gone upstairs to read.
“Thank you for coming,” she said to him.
He carried a satchel with him and placed it at his feet as he sat down. “I’m sorry I’m late. I stopped to get something for you.”
She looked at him in surprise. “Something for me?”
“Hmmm.” He reached into the satchel and pulled out a large book. “This is the mortuary records for the last year. You see, there was no need to go breaking into the mortuary last night. You could have just asked me.”
Audrey frowned. “Why didn’t you tell me that?”
He gave her a pointed look. “Was I supposed to tell you before or after you decided to break into the mortuary on your own?”
“I didn’t break in,” she said, avoiding the question. “It was open.”
“If you had been caught, what would have been the reason for being there?”
“I was lost.”
“Sure.” He shook his head. “Here.” He placed the large ledger book on the small dining table next to the diary and names that they had worked on.
She took a seat next to him. “Would you like some tea?”
“If it’s not any trouble.”
She shook her head. “Of course not.”
She busied herself in the kitchen, making tea while Henry looked over the papers she had strewn about. When she returned, he frowned.
“What is this?” he said, pulling the paper forward and showing it to her.
“Ummm, that’s….” She set the tea tray down and tried to reach for the paper.
“Yes?” he asked, still holding the paper.
“It’s nothing. Just a list,” she said lightly, hoping he wouldn’t push farther.
He frowned. “A list of what?”
She sighed. “Of suspects, if you must know.”
He stared at her for a long moment before speaking. “You’re joking.”
“I’m not.”
Henry looked at her. “My mother is on this list.”
“She’s crossed out.” Audrey didn’t really think she was a suspect.
“I’m on this list,” he said angrily, raising his voice.
She shot him a sharp look. “Don’t speak too loudly. Frances is upstairs reading.”
“Don’t speak too loudly?” he asked, though he did lower his voice. “I’m on a list of suspects. You think I’m a suspect. You think I’m guilty of doing some sort of evil in the workhouse.”
“I don’t, Henry. Honestly, I just put everyone on the list that might have a motive. I even put Della and her mother.” He was silent. She sighed in exasperation. “Henry, I don’t think you’re a killer.”
“Don’t you?” he said coldly.
Chapter Twenty-Two
She rested her hand on his shoulder. “Henry, I don’t think that of you. I put down all the names of all the staff in the workhouse, those connected with it, such as you, and then people I’ve met. Della and her mother were added but obviously ridiculous. And your mother, also ridiculous.”
He grudgingly relented. “I understand. You are just trying to make sense of it all.”
“Exactly.” She suddenly became aware of her hand still on his shoulder and removed it.
“The ledger is quite large,” he said. “It’s used for everyone who dies in the workhouse. We should be able to cross-reference the names in the diary to see if they even match. Or indeed if Dr. Beesley is right about them being dead.”
“Thank you for this,” Audrey said.
“I want to get to the bottom of this just as much as you do.”
“I know that.” She poured out two cups of tea and handed him one saucer and cup while she took the other. She smoothed the papers with the names on it in front of her as he opened the
ledger.
“This goes back at least ten years. I think we should start at the most recent deaths and then work our way back,” Henry told her.
“Yes,” she said. “That makes the most sense.”
Henry opened it halfway and then began turning pages until he came to the last entries.
“How did you happen to come by the ledger? Did you take it?”
“I am a board guardian, Audrey. I don’t need to take things. I merely asked for it.”
She stilled. “Asked for it?”
“Of course.”
“Who do you ask?”
He frowned. “Nurse Durrant. She has the records of deaths in the infirmary.”
She pursed her lips. “So, Nurse Durrant knows that we have this.”
“That I have this, yes. What of it?”
Audrey’s eyes darted nervously about the cottage. “I don’t like anyone knowing you’re—we’re looking into this.”
“Well, I’m not going to steal the ledger. I’ve no reason to. And just because Nurse Durrant knows I asked for it, so what? Dr. Beesley saw your list of names. What of it?”
“The fewer people who know, the better.”
Henry took her hands in his. “Audrey, there are too many odds and ends here to be dismissed. We must look into this. I see that now. We will review the ledger to match the names from the diary and see what exactly we are looking at. We will go from there. But I am here. I won’t let anything happen to you.”
Audrey looked down at their entwined hands. “I think whatever is happening is larger than the two of us. I don’t think they can be stopped. And if we get in their way….” Her words trailed away.
He shook his head. “Nothing will happen to you. I promise,” he told her firmly.
She pulled the gas lamp closer to them so they could see the handwritten entries in the ledger. “There’s Marguerite.” She pointed out the name in the ledgers.
“Let’s go back a few weeks and look for these initials,” Henry said, pointing to the diary and the last initials Marguerite had noted.
Together, they looked down the long list, which listed the inmates’ names, gender, date of birth, date of death, occupation, cause of death, and doctor’s signature.
“There!” Audrey stopped her finger along the name that matched the one she had written next to the initials.
Henry read aloud the man’s name, the dates, and his cause of death. “That’s interesting,” he murmured.
“What is?” she asked.
“Black death is listed as the cause of death,” he pointed out.
She stared at him blankly. “What is so interesting about that?”
“It’s the plague,” he told her.
“I still don’t see what’s so interesting about it.”
“Well, there isn’t really anything interesting about it. If our king was Charles II and the year was 1665,” he told her.
“I’m not following you.” She shook her head.
Henry looked over the name and the entry of the inmate who had died with the death listed as black death. “The black death, the plague, just isn’t seen anymore. You know the black death was used by Homer in the Odyssey to describe the monstrous Scylla, and her mouths ‘full of black death.’ The bubonic plague first arrived in Europe in 1347. When it was finished, more than twenty million people in Europe were dead. It was devastating.”
Audrey listened quietly.
“Some thought the pandemic was a martyrdom and mercy from God, a believer’s place in paradise so to speak. For nonbelievers, it was a punishment. There was a second pandemic in the time I mentioned and a third twenty-five years ago that was not as bad for Europe and then nothing.”
“Nothing?” she asked.
“Not so far,” he mused. “But then sometimes these things lay dormant or around us and just don’t reappear.”
“So, you find it interesting because there is no plague in England now,” she asked him.
“Yes.”
“The death is odd.” She looked down at the name.
“The cause of death is odd,” he murmured. He came upon another name, and his finger followed all of the pertinent information until they came to the cause of death. “Black death” was again listed as the cause of death. Henry sat back in his chair and took up the cup and saucer.
“Coincidence?” she asked, though she knew better.
“Let’s keep going,” he suggested. “One is interesting. If they keep adding up, that’s not interesting. That’s impossible.”
The quiet of the night surrounded the couple as they looked through the large ledger and compared the names to those written down from the diary. An hour later, they had found several more names from the diary that matched those in the ledger. All had died by the black death.
“But if they weren’t killed by the black death, and we can say for the sake of argument that they did not, why put it as the cause? An incompetent coroner?” Audrey wondered. “They thought it was the black death?”
“It seems every time we take a step forward, we take a step back,” Henry said. The mantel clock chimed the late hour. “I should head home. It’s getting late. I’ll look at the ledger tomorrow. I’ll come by after work if that’s all right with you,” he asked.
“Of course.” She nodded.
He placed the large book back inside his satchel and turned to her. “Lock your door after I leave,” he instructed her.
“I will.”
“Keep an eye out when you’re about. Be careful,” he told her vaguely but she understood.
“You do the same.”
“I’ll see you tomorrow.” He pulled out a small brown bag from his coat pocket and handed it to her. “Some drops. Lemon drops. For you and Frances,” he said before leaving.
Henry hurried down the path from the cottages to the workhouse and into the street. A light rain had fallen while he was inside the cottage with Audrey, but it had since stopped, leaving the roads wet and slippery.
He turned down the street, intent on hailing a cab to get home. He had stayed too long with Audrey, but much like all the time spent with her, he found her company engrossing, and time slipped by. He hoped his mother had not waited for him and had gone ahead and eaten supper without him. He remembered his mother had said it would be roasted turkey and potatoes. His stomach grumbled at the thought of it. He had not eaten anything since toast and coffee that morning.
He saw a hansom cab moving slowly along the road in front of him and was about to yell out to the driver when everything went dark.
Henry blinked twice and heard someone speaking to him.
“I say,” the voice said. “I say, young man. Are you all right?”
Henry realized he was lying in the street. Two men and a woman were gazing down at him. They helped him stand. He felt a little lightheaded.
“I’m not sure what happened,” he said, rubbing the back of his head.
“I’m afraid I saw it all but I was of no help,” said the older man. “Someone came behind you and hit you on the head with something.”
“What?” Henry asked him.
“It’s true,” the woman agreed. “I saw him run down the street, but it was too dark to see his face.”
“They took your satchel as well,” the old man said as he leaned on his cane.
“Damn!” Henry swore.
The three strangers helped him get a cab home, and by the time he arrived home, his head was pounding.
Theodocia greeted him at the door. “My dear. You’re awfully late,” she remarked.
“I stopped after work to see Audrey,” he explained.
“Well, that’s all right then,” she said, smiling at the mention of Audrey’s name.
He put a hand to his head and winced. “I have quite the headache, actually,” he said, sitting down in the front parlor.
“Do you? Let me have Cook prepare some chamomile tea for you. That should help,” she said and rang for the parlor maid to give the instruction
s. “Have you had the headache long?”
“No, not long. I was hit in the head on the way home,” he told her.
Theodocia looked at him with alarm. “What? Someone attacked you? Henry!”
“Three people stopped to help me in the road and saw the whole thing. I was hit from behind.”
“I can’t believe this!” she said, staring at his son.
“It was very sudden, Mother. If those three people hadn’t stopped and helped me, I wouldn’t have known what really happened.”
Theodocia shook her head. “Disgraceful. People these days. They took money? Your pocket watch?”
“They took my satchel,” he said absently.
“A satchel? That’s odd. Well, you can get another one,” she said.
Henry had been leaning against the sofa, trying to stay still, when he suddenly straightened up. “They took my satchel,” he repeated.
“Yes, dear. I heard you,” his mother said patiently.
“No. In my satchel, there were some papers from work which weren’t important. But the mortuary ledger...” He trailed off.
Theodocia frowned. “The mortuary ledger?”
“Yes. I borrowed it from the workhouse for Audrey.”
“For Audrey?” Theodocia shook her head. “You aren’t making any sense, Henry. Did the attack affect you?”
Henry sighed. “No, Mother. I’ll explain.”
Taking the next few minutes, he explained about the diary Audrey had discovered, the deaths of Marguerite and Alistair, the shadow man Augusta had been seeing, the conversation in the mortuary, and the strange cause of death listed in the few entries they were able to find that evening.
“That is all most peculiar,” Theodocia mused.
“I didn’t think much of the theory in the beginning. I actually thought Audrey was jumping to conclusions. But it seems she’s on to something,” he confessed.
“I don’t like this, Henry. If someone hit you over the head this evening to take a ledger, what else might they do?” she said, a frown upon her face.
He shook his head. “I know. Whatever is going on here, and I can tell you honestly I have no bloody clue, I am worried for Audrey’s safety.”
Among the Darkness Stirs Page 24