Phoebe regretted not having the courage to decline, but of course, as her aunt said, they would be at home for someone of her ladyship’s calibre.
Lewis ushered her in, and Phoebe felt a fleeting sense of satisfaction at the look on Lady Halliford’s face. People often had that look when they entered the house for the first time and saw her staircase.
It was a look of wonder, and sometimes, as was the case with her current guest, of envy.
“I had no idea you lived in such an elegant house, Miss Hillier. You should host a party here. I could help you with the arrangements.”
Phoebe dipped into a curtsey. “Good afternoon, Lady Halliford. How lovely to see you.”
Lady Halliford stopped short, and her small mouth pursed into a perfect O. She inclined her head. “And likewise, I’m sure.”
Behind her, Lewis’s lips twitched, and he closed the door with a flourish.
Aunt Dorothy shot Phoebe a look of horror. One did not point out a social superior’s lack of manners. “Won’t you take a seat, my lady. How gracious of you to visit.”
Lady Halliford gave her a nod and sank elegantly into a velvet armchair, looking at the low table around which the chairs were set in surprise. “You do not take cake with your afternoon tea?”
“We do, but I’m afraid you find us a little in disarray today. A new tea tray is coming.”
Phoebe caught her aunt’s eye and made sure she knew Phoebe would not countenance a single word about Sheldrake as she sat down, herself.
“I’m sure disarray is an understatement, Mrs. Patterson, although why just today? Surely since Sunday evening?” Lady Halliford smiled, eyes gleaming.
Phoebe stared at her, and Lady Halliford held the look for a moment before looking down, modestly, at her clasped hands in her lap. Her smile remained fixed in place.
“I beg your pardon?” Phoebe saw her aunt wince at the aggressive edge to her question.
Eyes shining even brighter, Lady Halliford lifted her head. “You and Sheldrake, of course.” She gave a little frown, as if confused.
“What about Sheldrake and I?”
“Oh, my dear girl.” Lady Halliford gave a little cluck, like a contented hen. “When I heard about how he threw you over and left the country, I was horrified. I felt it my duty to come and speak to you, and extend my commiserations. I would have come sooner, but this dreadful business with the prime minister delayed me until today.”
Phoebe could do nothing but sit mute.
Lady Halliford presided, plump and elegantly dressed in pink silk, artful ringlets framing her face; a perfectly sweet bonbon with a poison centre. “And from what a little bird told me this morning, you haven’t let the grass grow under your feet.” She lifted her eyebrows at Phoebe’s blank stare. “You and the Duke of Wittaker? I scarce think he’s been to a single respectable gathering this season, so I can’t imagine how you are acquainted enough for an early morning visit. But word is you are.” She gave a sugary smile.
Aunt Dorothy made a noise beside her. A little animal groan that she swallowed as soon as the sound emerged.
“I’d very much like to know how you came by your information.” At last her jaw loosened enough for speech, although her words were stilted. Phoebe had the small satisfaction of seeing Lady Halliford lose a little of the pink of excitement in her cheeks when she caught sight of Phoebe’s face.
“Why, it is all over town.”
“No, it isn’t.” Phoebe was quite sure of that.
“But…” Lady Halliford frowned again, although this time in genuine confusion. “I heard…”
“You find us unsettled because Lord Sheldrake is dead. He died yesterday. The Duke of Wittaker kindly took the time to inform me of the news this morning.”
For the first time, Lady Halliford looked out of her depth. “Dead…” She fiddled nervously with the rings on her fingers. “I wasn’t aware—”
“Weren’t you?” Phoebe kept her gaze fixed on Lady Halliford, but she would not look at her, now.
“No. How perfectly rude of you to suggest I would—”
“Who told you Sheldrake broke off our betrothal?” Phoebe’s question was sharp, cutting through the bluster.
“Why, it was…” She paused, then rose to her feet, her cheeks flushed with anger, now, not excitement. “Your attitude is hardly appropriate, Miss Hillier. I will excuse it in light of the shock you must be in, but I’m sure my source was accurate, he hasn’t ever been wrong in these matters before. Which puts you in an awkward position. You are neither the grieving financée, nor the disinterested acquaintance.” At last, all pretense was gone, all artifice. She looked down on them both with a supercilious expression.
“Why did you come here?” Phoebe rose to her own feet.
“I…” Lady Halliford hesitated, and Phoebe guessed her purpose had been derailed by news of Sheldrake’s death.
“I don’t think it’s appropriate of me to impose myself on you further, given the tragedy of the moment.” Lady Halliford took up her reticule and straightened her gloves.
Aunt Dorothy rose, almost swaying on her feet at the prospect of the scandal about to hit them.
Sheldrake. Wittaker.
One or the other would be bad enough. It looked like they would have to contend with both.
Phoebe’s temper spiked even higher.
She looked directly into Lady Halliford’s eyes. Let her see she had made an enemy for life. She pulled the cord for Lewis and he appeared almost instantly.
“Lady Halliford is going, Lewis. Please see her out.”
They exchanged stiff, polite nods, and then her ladyship swept out of the room.
In the quiet that followed in her wake, Aunt Dorothy began to weep.
Chapter Eighteen
Bow Street Officer John Vickery was a large man, but with a surprisingly gentle face. His blue eyes fixed on James with interest as he stood from his desk and made a formal bow.
“Good afternoon, Your Grace.” His gaze flicked to the clock on the wall behind James’s shoulder. “The magistrate says you’ve come here straight from the Attorney General’s office.” There was a suspicious lack of inflection in Vickery’s voice.
“Yes, the Attorney General kindly allowed me to read through the transcripts of the proceedings, and I have a few questions for you, if you don’t mind.” James kept his voice neutral, as well.
Their thoughts on Vinegar Gibbs went unspoken, although James sensed their views would probably align quite nicely.
“The Attorney General is most insistent that I have something for him by tonight, Your Grace, and if I don’t get going very soon, I’ll miss an important appointment.” Vickery glanced at the clock again.
“I’m more than happy to walk with you and talk, if it will make things easier.” James stepped to the side and indicated the door, and with a reluctant nod, Vickery walked out of the station, with James following behind.
Vickery wanted to ask him what his interest was, James could see it in the way he hesitated on the pavement, but he couldn’t bring himself to question a duke.
“If Sir Vicary has sent you because he’s getting anxious, you can tell him I will be round with Sir Harry Combe, the magistrate, tonight.” Vickery stood, stoic and unmoving.
James shook his head. “This has nothing to do with the Attorney General. I’m interested for my own reasons, and as I say, I’m happy to walk with you, so as not to impede your progress.”
Vickery hesitated another moment more, then accepted he would have the company of a duke for some of his afternoon and began to walk.
“I saw from the transcript you found a great deal of evidence against Bellingham in the room where he was lodging?” James kept up easily with Vickery’s long stride.
“A cast to make bullets. Gun powder. Papers and pamphlets.” Vickery kept his eyes ahead.
“That all cost money.”
Vickery slowed, and gave him a sideways look. “It did.”
“And I also r
ead his landlady is holding a promissory note for twenty pounds for him.”
Vickery grunted in assent.
“The pistols would have cost money, too, unless he already had them—”
Vickery made a sound at the back of his throat, then stopped.
“What? You don’t think he did?”
Vickery hesitated, then shook his head. “The guns were special. Designed to be concealed and broken down into smaller pieces. They looked custom-made and I wouldn’t have thought someone like Bellingham would have had pistols like that lying about.”
“Something like that would be expensive.” James was forced to walk behind Vickery as they edged past a fruit seller taking up most of the pavement. “I wonder where he got them?”
Vickery looked over at him suspiciously. “You seem caught up in the cost o’ things. You know something I don’t?”
James shook his head. “As I said, I’ve just come from reading the transcript, and in Bellingham’s own words, he was destitute by the end of February. How did he support himself?”
Vickery shrugged. “Something worth looking into, I’ll grant you, but I’ve got no time for that. Might have had some money sent down to him from Liverpool, maybe? It’s all we can do to get the facts straight in the time we have. Sir Vicary wants an open-and-shut case, he says. No room for doubt.”
“Will you be able to give it to him?” James’s sense of Vickery was that he was straight. And thorough.
The big man gave a nod. “No doubt he did it. Made the bullets, even if he didn’t buy the gun. He’s well-known to everyone, even some clerks at Bow Street have spoken to him. He’s been all over with those pamphlets, demanding justice. Took justice into his own hands, looks like.”
His voice was calm, but something in the tone told James he was angry at the thought of Bellingham taking the law into his own hands. If that was what he had done.
He hadn’t known what to expect of the Bow Street officer, but so far this big, steady man impressed him. He didn’t want James with him, but he’d taken his presence with good grace.
“Where are we walking to?” James noticed they were in the commercial district now, coming up to High Holborn.
“A Mr. Taylor sent a note round. Has some information.” Vickery didn’t say anything else, but James guessed the note said more than that, to have gotten the head investigator’s attention with so little time at his disposal.
“Do you mind if I accompany you to the interview?”
Vickery’s face tightened.
“I won’t introduce myself, or talk.”
Vickery waited for a carriage to pass, and then crossed the road before he finally gave a nod.
James liked him all the more for his obvious reluctance.
Vickery slowed his pace as they approached a tailor’s shop. He gave James a last look, as if willing him to change his mind, and when James looked back at him with a smile, he sighed and pushed the door open.
A small bell rang to announce them, and a thin man with receding blond hair in shirt sleeves and a waistcoat stepped out from the back room. He was using his sleeves as pin cushions, with silver pins woven into the fabric all along the cuff.
“Mr. Taylor?” Vickery stepped forward and shook the tailor’s hand. “I’m Vickery, from the Bow Street Magistrate’s Office.”
He didn’t introduce James and James took his cue, standing quietly to one side, as if only an observer.
Taylor peered at him in the gloomy light, and then faced Vickery, fiddling nervously with the pins at his wrists. “Saw what they said in the paper. About who killed the prime minister. My Mary, she tells me to send round a note to you. We knew him. Or, I did. From the tavern down the road a little ways, near Red Lion Square. And I did some work for him, though now I know what it was used in, maybe I shouldn’t admit to that.” His words tumbled over each other, like water down a steep mountain stream.
“No harm will come to you.” Vickery looked like every word he said could be trusted.
James wondered if it could.
“Well.” Taylor looked cautiously at James again, nervous not knowing who he was. “Bellingham caught me a few weeks ago, by chance, I think. We bumped into one another up on Guilford Rd, and he asked me if I could do a sewing job for him, seeing as I’d made a few other things for him. Right away, he wanted it. A small pocket sewn into the inside of his jacket. He ran to his lodgings to draw the size and shape of it for me, and brought the pattern down to the shop.”
“What jacket was this?” Vickery made it sound like it didn’t really matter, but James noticed he looked sharper than he had. More aware.
“Dark brown jacket. Very good fabric and the most up-to-date style.”
“And what was the pocket for?”
Taylor flicked a look at him, then away. “He didn’t say, but given the shape and size, I’d say to conceal a pistol. ’Twas a pistol, wasn’t it? That he used on the prime minister?”
Vickery rocked back on his heels and ignored the question. “Do you have a record of the transaction? A receipt for payment?”
Taylor nodded. He reached behind him, to the counter, and took up a ledger. He lifted it up for Vickery to see, running his finger along an entry.
Vickery leaned in to look. Gave a sharp nod. “Appreciate your help, Taylor. Most likely, I’ll have to call you as a witness. I’ll let you know when the trial is scheduled.”
Taylor did not look happy about it, but he murmured his assent.
James stepped in a little closer. “Can you tell me the name of the tavern where you became acquainted with Mr. Bellingham?”
Taylor’s gaze jerked up to him, and then to Vickery, who was staring at James with no little annoyance on his face.
“Legge’s.” Taylor’s gaze shifted between the two of them.
“Thank you.” Vickery spoke as if it were he who had asked the question, gave Taylor a small bow in farewell and led them outside.
He kept his silence, but when they were a few doors away from the shop, heading back to Bow Street, he looked across at James.
“I know I said I wouldn’t speak.” James kept his tone mild and apologetic. “I’m sorry, but I wanted to know the name of the tavern, and couldn’t think of a way to get you to ask it for me.”
Vickery sighed. “No harm done. I suppose.” He focused on the pavement ahead of them. “This is the final nail for Bellingham, you know. He’s going to swing.”
James frowned. “Why do you say that?”
“We have his confession. And the pamphlets. And the weeks of badgering officials for his blessed compensation. And asking reporters in the gallery at the Houses of Parliament over the last month to point Mr. Perceval out to him. But more than that, now, we have Mr. Taylor telling us Bellingham arranged in advance to have a hidden pocket sewn into his coat, so he didn’t have to put the gun together at the scene. He screwed it together beforehand and hid it inside his jacket.”
“Completely premeditated, you’re saying.”
Vickery laughed. “Well, it’s not the actions of a madman. This wasn’t done in the heat of the moment, or in a fugue. He planned it weeks in advance.”
“Perhaps.” James wasn’t convinced there wasn’t some madness there, though. Could a man be so in the grip of a certain idea, so obsessed with something, that he became mad in that thing alone, but could otherwise behave in a way that looked normal?
Whatever it was, he was convinced someone helped Bellingham. Pushed him along and encouraged him. Funded him.
“How did he pay for it all?”
“Back to this, are we?” Vickery shrugged. “He didn’t stint himself at his lodgings, I’ll give you that. He paid extra for a fire in his room, and sent his clothes to be laundered down the road.” Vickery spoke slowly. “He must come from money, or have saved some.”
“According to him, that’s not the case. And if he’s telling the truth, where did he get it? He’s been in London since December with no means of support, let alone enough t
o pay for new clothes, and rent, and the guns, if he bought them and wasn’t given them by someone. He also commissioned those pamphlets, not to mention the second application to the Prince Regent for compensation.” James was talking to himself, but he saw Vickery stiffen a little.
“I don’t have time to find out about that. Gibbs wants answers by tonight.”
James said nothing.
“What are you implying?” Vickery’s voice was a little strident, now, either forgetting James was a duke, or not caring. “That he was paid to do what he did? That someone was funding him?” The Bow Street officer’s eyes were narrowed.
“No.” James walked more slowly, and Vickery cut his own pace to match. “He says he acted alone, and I think he believes that. But someone made sure he could keep going. Fed his obsession.”
Vickery shook his head. “Even if they did, what can I get them on? Giving money to a murderer? He’s the one who planned it. He’s the one who pulled the trigger. Can’t get him to say different.”
“You’re quite right.” James saw Vickery flinch at his soothing tone. The big detective gave him another narrow-eyed look.
He stopped, and James realized they’d reached Bow Street.
Vickery squared his wide shoulders, and looked up at the building where he worked, then back at James. There was something in his eyes. Frustration, but acceptance as well. “It doesn’t matter. It should, probably, but in this case, it doesn’t. With what I’m going to take to the Attorney General tonight, Bellingham is going to hang.”
Chapter Nineteen
Phoebe couldn’t stand being inside any longer. Her aunt’s dread pressed in on her and the stench of malice left by Lady Halliford lingered in the rooms. She needed air.
She stepped out into the landscaped area in front of the library, and watched Jake, the gardener, deadhead the roses to her left.
He would come to her rescue if someone scaled the wall again. And besides, it was daytime.
She had the feeling whoever meant her harm preferred to work under cover of darkness.
A Dangerous Madness Page 9