A Stroke of Malice

by Anna Lee Huber

  He shook his head defiantly. He was determined in this.

  “Then what of the forged notes that were passed on Twelfth Night?” I blurted, desperate to keep him talking. Those notes had been in the back of my mind for days, along with a suspicion as to who had sent them, but between the murder inquiry and my near fall, they had been crowded out by more pressing matters.

  He glanced up at me in veiled interest.

  “You know of what I speak. You sent them, didn’t you?”

  He crossed his arms over his chest. “Well, I was the villain, wasn’t I?”

  “But why?” I asked, allowing my bewilderment to show.

  He turned his head to the side, glaring at the painting of golden yellow cottages hanging on the wall. “Well, I had to do something dastardly, didn’t I?” He shrugged one shoulder. “So I decided to test the gentlemen’s loyalty.” His gaze flicked toward me. “Which Cromarty passed with flying colors.”

  “Yes, but Traquair and Mrs. Blanchard?”

  He smirked. “Didn’t you know? They had a liaison some years ago. Before she became friendly with the duke.” He shrugged one shoulder. “I suppose I wanted to taunt Traquair. He’s always been a trifle too high in the instep, and he can’t be happy with his father’s latest paramour. As for Mrs. Blanchard, well, she proved to be as faithless as they come.”

  That explained the animosity between the two, but once again, Marsdale was only making himself look guiltier by removing other potential suspects.

  “What of the information Lady Helmswick was going to use to blackmail her husband into letting her live separately from him?” I asked quickly. “Could that secret have gotten him killed?”

  However, Marsdale didn’t fall for my ploy. Shaking his head, he pushed past me. “Do what you must, but leave me and Nell out of it. We’re through answering questions.” And with that, he shut the door to her sitting room with a decisive slam.

  I scowled at the offending wood in frustration and dread, wishing he would talk to me. This behavior was unlike the droll, lovable rakehell I had come to know and call friend, and I couldn’t easily brush aside my fear of what that meant.

  “What a scapegrace,” my brother muttered behind me.

  I swiveled so that I could face him. “Trevor, what did you say to him?”

  He frowned.

  “I saw the way you two were nearly at each other’s throats.” I stepped closer to look up into his eyes. I had always been able to tell when he was lying, and I wanted to know if he was doing so now.

  “I merely asked if he had anything to do with your near tumble down the stairs.”

  “Trevor,” I bemoaned. “You all but accused him of it, didn’t you?”

  “No . . .”

  I glared at him.

  “I didn’t,” he persisted. “I only asked what he knew about it.”

  I rolled my eyes. No wonder Marsdale had refused to speak with us. “He had nothing to do with it.”

  “You can’t know that.”

  “Yes, I can. Marsdale would never harm me.” But even as I said the words, I felt doubt creep through me like an ugly slithering thing.

  “Kiera, your investigation is a threat to the woman he loves,” Trevor protested. “You can’t know that he wouldn’t hurt you to save her.”

  I glowered at the wall beyond his head, struggling to control my own roiling emotions. For he was right. I couldn’t know. And yet I didn’t want to believe it of him. That he would harm me, that he would harm my child . . . It was something I didn’t want to face.

  I tried to smother my reaction as pain lanced my side where my ribs still healed, but Trevor saw it. He reached out to take my arm, guiding me toward the stairs.

  “Perhaps you should rest for a time.”

  I opened my mouth to protest, but a throbbing in my back made itself known, my muscles there having been overused as my body tried to compensate for the pain in my obliques and abdominals. Simply carrying around the extra weight of this child was more exhausting than I’d expected. Add to that my injuries, and I supposed I should be glad I could summon the energy to rise from bed at all.

  So I meekly allowed myself to be led, weary in body and spirit, and grateful I wouldn’t have to navigate the castle and its staircases on my own.

  * * *

  * * *

  The following morning the sun rose bright and warm, and the frigid weather of the day before dissipated. The temperatures hovered above freezing, and the snow began to melt, making the road to Traquair passable by midday. Gage and I, as well as Bree, set out in our carriage, as anxious to escape the oppressive atmosphere of the castle for a spell as we were to uncover what the villagers might know.

  Gage had reported that the groomsmen had nothing to add to what the footman who saw Helmswick depart had already told us. His traveling coach was rigged up for his journey, and then never seen again.

  “Maybe one of the villagers saw his carriage pass through town as he departed,” he confessed. “If they caught a glimpse of him through the window, so much the better.”

  But knowing that the earl had departed at half past four on a cold winter’s morning, I didn’t hold out much hope of that.

  Traquair was a tiny village with naught but a single pub and one stone church, of relatively recent construction. The duke had told us over dinner the evening before that the town had once been more prosperous, but over the last century it had dwindled in size to barely half of its previous number of residents. He’d also boasted of the town’s once-famous thicket of beech trees, known as the “Bush aboon Traquair,” which even Robert Burns had apparently come to view. The village’s chief employers were the castle and its brewery, and the herds of sheep dotting the countryside, many of which were also owned by the duke.

  Despite the early hour, we decided the best place to go for information was still the village pub, The Sheep’s Heid, where I waited inside the carriage while Gage ventured into its shadowy interior. If I had not been six months heavy with child, I would have picked my way down the muddy, snow-strewn lanes toward the church, hoping to capture the interest of the village women. These countrywomen were usually overlooked, and yet more often than not, being tied to their homes and roused at all hours by their children, they saw far more than the men. However, even with Bree’s aid, I couldn’t risk slipping and falling on the slushy ground. Especially not with my current injuries. So we peered through the windows, hoping an inquisitive woman or two would happen by.

  Though we had to wait some ten minutes, we found we were in luck. Two women in drab but serviceable garments shuffled by on the opposite side of the road, baskets tucked under their arms, and their eyes devouring the sight of our shiny black lacquer coach. Bree climbed out to approach the women and ask if they might speak with us for a moment. Their eyes narrowed and their shoulders hunched with suspicion, but ultimately Bree’s gregarious nature and their own curiosity won out.

  I opened the door as they approached, leaning out as far as I dared to greet them. Their gazes dipped to take in the rounded bump which was accentuated rather than hidden by my close-fitting, velvet-trimmed, cobalt blue redingote. At the realization I was with child, their demeanors instantly softened, a circumstance Bree had evidently foreseen when she chose just such an ensemble for me. We conversed about my happy expectation, and one of the women even shared a remedy for bottom rashes, which she claimed had been passed down in her family for generations and never failed to do the trick. Bree declared that her family had a similar recipe, and so they chatted amicably about it for a few moments while I listened quietly, my hands tucked in my muff.

  However, the other woman, who had shrewd gray eyes, seemed to recognize I was not there to discuss baby rashes. “You’re here aboot that body was found in the crypt, are’na ya?”

  I couldn’t tell if she was hostile to this fact or merely plainspoken, but I dec
ided to be honest. “In a roundabout way, yes. I’m curious whether anyone saw a nobleman’s carriage pass through the village, leaving the castle, in the early hours of the morning about a month ago.”

  The woman narrowed her eyes. “Yer speakin’ o’ that earl what married Lady Eleanor, are’na ya? The one wi’ a eagle and a helmet on his crest.”

  I hadn’t thought to verify what the Helmswick crest was, but what she’d described sounded correct. “You saw it?”

  “I’ve seen it many o’ times,” she hedged as she and the other woman shared a speaking look.

  “And that morning,” I pressed. “December seventh. Did you see it leave Traquair for the toll road?”

  “Aye.” The woman’s gray eyes scrutinized me. “But not before he stopped and spoke to Colum Brunton on his way to the brewery first.”

  My gaze met Bree’s, neither of us having expected this. “Were you able to hear what was said?”

  “Nay.” She dipped her head toward a tidy house set near the fork in the road that led to Sunlaws to the west, and Innerleithen to the northeast. “Saw ’em through a break in the hedgerow on my way back from milkin’ the goat. I couldna hear what was said. But his lordship took braw Colum up in his coach and they set off back in the direction o’ the castle.”

  “Did they return?”

  She shrugged. “The coach did. I heard it clatter past no’ more than a quarter hour later.”

  Not long enough for Helmswick to have even walked to the abbey ruins from the nearest lane. But there would have been time enough to carry Colum Brunton to the verge near the castle gates as the earl conferred with him along the way. The question was, what about?

  “How long after this was it before Mr. Brunton disappeared?” I asked.

  Once again she conferred with her friend. “One . . . ?”

  “Closer to two weeks.”

  She nodded.

  “And no one has seen him since?”

  They shook their heads, but the woman who possessed the ointment recipe seemed less certain of this. I watched her, waiting for her to say more, but she kept her mouth tightly shut.

  “Did Mr. Brunton act any differently during those weeks before his disappearance?”

  But it appeared this was more than they were willing to share. “No’ that I can recall,” the gray-eyed woman replied, though I could tell that this was an obvious lie.

  Realizing we would get no more information from these women, I thanked them before Bree gave them each a sack packed with provisions from the castle. She’d been the one with enough forethought to ask the cook to have them made up. Money could too easily be spent at the pub, to the detriment of the rest of the family.

  Their relief that I had ceased my questions was evident, but mistrust arose again when I asked which home belonged to Mrs. Brunton, Colum’s mother.

  “She dinna ken any more than we do,” the shrewd one insisted. “You’ll only upset her.”

  I let them go with a nod, afraid if I pressed them they would only hurry ahead to her house to either warn her or whisk her away. If we were lucky, Gage would obtain directions from someone inside the pub.

  We waited for perhaps another minute before he emerged from the darkened interior smelling strongly of ale and peat smoke. “Well, it appears young Colum acquired a small windfall shortly before his disappearance. The proprietor claims he bought many a round of drinks for himself and his friends, and started to swagger about the place as if he owned it. Had to throw him out one night for brawling with another lad while they were both deep in their cups.”

  Bree and I sat looking at each other as he relayed what he’d uncovered, connecting the pieces with what the women had told us.

  Noticing our silent communication, Gage turned to us quizzically. “Why do I get the sense that none of this information is new to you?”

  “It is, but . . . we think we know where Colum got that money.” Then I explained what we’d learned about Helmswick taking Colum up into his coach.

  He listened with interest, rubbing his index finger over his lips as he did sometimes when he was thinking. “You believe Helmswick bribed him?”

  “Or hired him to do some sort of task.”

  He nodded, his eyes narrowing at the ceiling. “Yes, I suppose that makes more sense.”

  “Perhaps when he saw him walking toward the castle, he deduced that’s where he was employed. His decision to hire him could have been spontaneous.”

  “But what better way to keep an eye on his wife than to hire an estate worker to do it, and then give him enough blunt to bribe the household staff to share what they knew,” Gage said, finishing my thought.

  “Except he dinna use the money for bribes. Or no’ much o’ it,” Bree guessed.

  I frowned at the snow-dotted fields stretching away to the north toward the forests and braes surrounding the castle. “So what happened to make Mr. Brunton disappear? Did Helmswick return, expecting a report from him, or did he contact him somehow?”

  “I take it you’re as suspicious as I am that young Colum has truly disappeared,” Gage murmured drily.

  “People are far too reluctant to share all they know when asked about him.” I tilted my head. “I suppose that could be attributed to the fact that we’re aristocrats and so is Helmswick, but I don’t think so. I think they know he’s hiding. Which reminds me. Did you discover where his mother lives?”

  He nodded.

  “Then we’d best pay her a visit before the ladies we spoke to warn her first.”

  Needing no further explanation, Gage gave directions to the coachman and we set off down a rutted lane. None of the roads in this part of Scotland were well maintained, but this one was particularly bone rattling.

  The trek proved not to be worth the discomfort, for Mrs. Brunton did not answer her door. I didn’t know whether this meant she was not at home or she’d been warned not to speak to us, but it was frustrating nonetheless. We didn’t care whether Colum had taken a bribe for such an unscrupulous act. We only wanted to know why Lord Helmswick had taken him up into his carriage, and what, if anything, Colum had informed him.

  “I’ll speak to his friends at the brewery again,” Gage said as we jounced our way back down the lane. “Perhaps with a little more encouragement, and the understanding that we already know about Colum’s connection to Helmswick, they might be convinced to talk.”

  We could hope, but I worried it would do the opposite.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  We made one more stop in the village of Traquair at the simple block stone kirk surrounded by a small churchyard filled with several dozen weathered gravestones. Dried vines of creepers covered a portion of the walls while three lonely bare trees stood vigil over the spot. But the building was empty, save for the bare pews and sparse white walls, so we returned to the carriage.

  I gazed out at the cloud shadows skimming across the open fields and paddocks speckled with sheep and other livestock, my thoughts flitting nearly as quickly. If Helmswick had hired Colum Brunton to spy on his wife, then did that mean he hadn’t snuck back into the castle to confront her with Marsdale? Or had he simply done so two weeks later than we’d initially suspected, after Colum had shared whatever he’d learned, whether real or fictitious, depending on whether he’d actually paid any bribes to the household staff? Was Colum hiding from Helmswick or the killer? What did he know?

  I considered all the ways information was carried to and from the castle, all the tradesmen and villagers who came and went from the estate each day. The wheels of our carriage clattered past the row of picturesque cottages which housed some of the staff. A tartan curtain twitched behind one of the windows as we bowled by, our speed slowing only as we reached the narrow bridge spanning the gushing waters of the burn. As we climbed the sloped drive leading up into the grand portico of the castle, my gaze traveled across the long expanse of t
he gun terrace toward the sight of a wagon parked at the far corner of the castle, heavy with supplies. I suddenly realized we’d overlooked one critical element.

  “I need to speak with Mr. Hislop,” I announced, surging toward the door as one of the ducal footmen opened it. He assisted me down, and I strode through the castle doors into the entry passage, the heels of my boots clicking against the flagstones. Gage reached my side just as I entered the guardroom with its vaulted beamed ceiling, but he did not try to halt me.

  “Mr. Tait,” I declared to the butler as I tugged at the blue ribbons of my chip straw bonnet in an awkward manner with my left hand. “Is Mr. Hislop at his post?”

  “I believe so, my lady,” he replied with complete aplomb.

  “Excellent.” I passed him my hat, retaining my gloves and redingote against the chill of the room. “I may have a question or two for you in a moment.”

  “Of course, my lady. I am at your service.”

  I hurried off again, forcing Gage to scramble after me as I rapped on the door to the porter’s lodge. Mr. Hislop must have seen me approaching, for he swept it open almost before my second knock sounded.

  “M’lady, you’ve thought o’ somethin’.” His eyes gleamed with gentle humor.

  “Indeed I have.”

  He stepped back so that we could enter, and I immediately turned toward the visitors’ book open on his desk.

  “The ledgers you keep. They’re only for the main entrance to the castle, through the guardroom. But what about the other entrances, the ones for servants and tradesmen? Is there any ledger for their comings and goings?”

  “Nay, my lady. T’would be too much o’ a hassle. No’ to mention, no one cares.”

  I turned to Gage, and from the look in his eyes I could tell he realized what I was after.

  “But that doesn’t mean everyone who enters through those doors is of those classes,” my husband deduced and then frowned. “Though I can’t imagine someone like Helmswick not being noticed.”