Murder in the Shallows

by Byers, Beth

  Violet rose to pace while Jack examined Nathan Tanner. He was young, and this was a terrible burden. He’d be all right with time, Violet thought. Her gaze, however, was on Jack. If Jack could come home from the war and restart his life, not once, but twice after Miss Allen, then Nathan Tanner could move past this.

  As though he read her thoughts and understood them, he rose from his seat. “I watched her die. I thought her health was finally failing her, and I watched her die.”

  Violet had no idea what to say to that.

  “I made peace with it,” Mr. Tanner said in a hoarse whisper. “As much as you could, I did. I told her I would always love her. I told her I would never forget her. I promised her that I would love again. I thought she was too good to live. I thought God had taken her home because she was an angel. I…that…oh bloody hell…” Mr. Tanner stood again, moving rapidly across the room as though chased by the hounds of hell. He spun, staring at the two of them as they looked on his pain, and then he slammed his fist into the wall over and over again.

  Violet jumped with each sound of his hand striking the wall, but she bit her lip to hold back objections. If he couldn’t cry, he had to process what he was feeling somehow. Violet, however, could cry for him. The tears came in a steady stream by the time that Mr. Tanner had stopped beating the wall. He pressed his face into it, breathing heavily. Great gasps filled the room as he struggled to gather himself.

  Finally, he spoke, his face still pressed into the wall. “I would have preferred to believe God took her home. I…I always knew it wouldn’t be all that long with her. I always knew if we wed as we hoped that the clock was ticking away for her. I would have savored our time together. I would have made her happy. I would have loved her so fiercely she would have carried it with her to heaven.”

  “She did,” Violet told him gently. “Of course she did.”

  He didn’t answer, but he slowly turned. He was so pale, he’d gone from white to ghostly.

  “I…want to help. I’ll do whatever it takes to catch this person.”

  “You’ll stay here,” Jack told him. “You’re at risk until we figure this out. Victor will get you a room. Victor!”

  “Consider it taken care of,” Victor said, as he came through the doorway. He crossed to Kate, pulled her to her feet, and drew her out of the room with him.

  “Let’s start with what Jeremy told you,” Jack said to him, taking a seat again and waiting while Mr. Tanner collected himself enough to move back to the chair and sit. He had gone, Violet thought, from a whimpering rabbit who was struggling to carry on, to a coiled tiger. They would have to find the killer before Mr. Tanner did. Otherwise, Violet would find herself at odds with Jack when she helped another killer to escape justice.

  Chapter 15

  “We all loved her.” Mr. Tanner spoke when Violet was ready to believe he wouldn’t speak at all. His voice was hoarse.

  Violet couldn’t help but reach for Jack at the pain in Mr. Tanner’s voice. She held onto his hand as though she could keep someone from stealing him away like Miss Morgan had been taken from poor Mr. Tanner.

  “I never understood why she loved me,” he continued. “Elijah is quite eloquent. He’s rich. Charming. He adored her. He used to write her poems, and by Jove, they were good.”

  “He was the one Daniel wanted her to marry, I think,” Jack said.

  It seemed as though Mr. Tanner wasn’t going to reply, but he finally nodded jerkily. “Professor Morgan is quite fond of Elijah. We all are, to be honest. I am still baffled by her loving me over him. Sometimes, at night, I play it through my head. Remembering and wondering if I have somehow painted a fairy dream that wasn’t true. If I am misremembering the sound of her voice promising to love me even in heaven. That can’t be true? Can it? What is there to love about me?”

  Violet wanted to ask questions, but it sounded as though the story was being ripped from his soul.

  “If Jeremy’s guess about the tea was right,” Mr. Tanner said, gathering himself, “and you rule out the professor and the servants, it could have been any of us who were his research assistants. That would be me, Jeremiah—even though he was just a hanger-on—Elijah, Theodore, and Alexander.”

  Violet pressed her lips together to hold back her questions, but she didn’t quite manage it. “There were no others who were there often? A secretary or other professors?”

  “Well, Professor Snag works with Professor Morgan quite a bit. He is often there. Or was. He was often there then. They had an article they were working on together. I…” Mr. Tanner ran his hands over his face. “I suppose there were a few more of the boys who were around then. They’ve since graduated.”

  “They don’t matter,” Violet told him.

  “They could have put the poison in Rachael’s tea.”

  “But they wouldn’t have killed Jeremiah if they’re no longer in Oxford.”

  Mr. Tanner blinked a little stupidly before clarity came over his expression. “I suppose I really only care about Rachael’s murder. Does that make me a villain?”

  “It makes you a man in love,” Jack told him. “Understandable.”

  “I thought to join Scotland Yard someday.” He laughed derisively. “Scotland Yard? When the woman I love was killed under my watch and I didn’t even realize what losing Allen meant.”

  “You are very young in investigating,” Jack told him.

  “Lady Violet saw it,” Tanner said, shaking his head.

  “Don’t be confused by Violet,” Jack replied. “She’s far more experienced than her powder and lipstick would indicate.”

  Violet squeezed his hand threateningly. “All of you loved her?” she asked Mr. Tanner.

  “To varying degrees. You have to understand, photographs and paintings don’t do Rachael justice. She had a way of looking at you, this softness and sweetness that never can be captured by a photograph. It was ensnaring. She was merry too. Ready to laugh. It wasn’t only me. She inexplicably loved me over them, but we all loved her.”

  Violet wasn’t sure that would have been true in other circumstances. There were other females at the university, but this one was something of a captive bird. Perhaps they all fancied themselves as knights and rescuers even if it didn’t sound as though she were trying to escape.

  Maybe they each fancied himself as her next keeper? They’d ‘rescue’ her from her uncle and then protect her themselves? Violet imagined that the idea could appeal to a romantic but very young heart.

  “How did Mr. Allen get the photograph from you?”

  Mr. Tanner glanced at Violet. “You weren’t the only one who realized what I’d done. I don’t work for Professor Morgan anymore. I avoid his lectures. I avoid him at all costs if I can. I needed to see her face. I couldn’t go the rest of my life and forget the shape of her smile. I had notes from her to cling to, but I needed her face. I…just needed it.”

  “So he asked you for it?” Violet asked gently. “He saw you take it too? And he found you?”

  “I walk a lot at night now. He knew that. He’d followed me too many times, trying to find out what I was up to. He challenged me for it. Told me he’d tell Morgan what I’d done if I didn’t give it to him. I…” Tanner sighed. “I was going to take it back later. It wasn’t worth the argument.”

  “Who did she encourage?” Jack asked. “Did he want the photograph because he loved her?”

  Violet answered for him. “If she was giving someone else hope, she wasn’t doing it while he was around.”

  Mr. Tanner flushed furiously, and Violet felt certain that the transition between pale and red as grief and anger hit him in waves was going to have him fainting like his sweet Miss Morgan. Violet rose to pace.

  “Was this Elijah rich?” Violet asked. “The one who Mr. Morgan wanted her to wed?”

  “Ah, well, yes,” Mr. Tanner answered.

  “You hesitated.” Violet turned and pursed her mouth as she thought. “Was he rich by your standards? Or was he rich by the non-schola
rship student standards?”

  Mr. Tanner had to think about that for a few minutes. “Elijah needed to have a career. His expected income from his family wouldn’t have been enough to support him without working.”

  “That’s the way it is for most these days.” Jack watched Violet, who nodded.

  “There can only be so many rich great aunts,” Violet said sarcastically and continued to pace, moving on to fiddling with her ring. She glanced down at it and wondered if Jack had a ring in his pocket. Did he get into the water with the ring? Did it have river water and dead body fluid on it now? She shivered but knew she’d clean it well and wear it happily. Knowing Jack, however, he had already cleaned it should it have gotten wet.

  Her gaze lit on him, and her heart lit with love. There was a man who would have noticed if she was being slowly killed and would have saved her. Not that she blamed anyone who hadn’t seen the slow death of Miss Morgan. Violet felt certain that there was every reason to believe her heart was failing her and not that she was being murdered.

  “How did Mr. Allen know?” Violet asked Jack. “What made him think it when no one else did?”

  “I think it might have been a wild guess,” Jack replied. “When he was a boy, he saw a crime in every movement. He was like Ham is—prone to see a pickpocket in every bumped shoulder, a murder in every dead body, a grand scheme in every passed note. He was still young. He might not have grown out of that yet.”

  “He hadn’t,” Mr. Tanner replied. “He believed that one of the students in our class had stolen the test questions. He believed that one of the religion students was running a brothel. He…his ideas were wild, and he was a joke.”

  Violet winced for the boy and realized he must have been a laughingstock. “He used his father’s money to propel him. He must have had quite an excess to get people who had money themselves to take note.”

  “He paid for everything, all the time.” Tanner shook his head. “He’d order cases of things to an excess. I haven’t bought myself cigarettes since he started hanging about. He would just fill up your cigarette case. He was recklessly generous. He told me once that someone was taking the cash from his rooms, and that was the only crime I ever believed. He’d leave it in a bowl on his desk. He never even changed his habits after he said that. He kept leaving it in a bowl on his desk and tried to catch the fellow.”

  “He never did?” Violet asked.

  “I don’t think it was only one person,” Tanner admitted. “I think it was a few of them, and he ruled out people I wouldn’t have ruled out. He ruled out everyone who was very wealthy, but I think the lads who were doing it did so to watch him scurry around, not to take the money. At least the ones who kept taking it.”

  “That poor fool,” Violet murmured. She glanced at Jack, who looked pained for the lad. He had cared about Jeremy once. He had never stopped, Violet thought, and this must be killing him. “He stumbled onto a real crime in a sea of shadows.”

  Jack cursed, revealing just how much he was affected. Was he seeing the boy he’d once known? Violet bet that it was awfully like how she felt about Ginny. Violet’s Ginny—Vi would throw herself into the lion’s den for the girl.

  “Jack…” Her sympathy was evident in her tone, and he turned to her, letting her see the pain in his gaze. They both glanced at Tanner, but he was drowning in his own pain. Violet crossed to Jack, looking down on him where he sat. His shoulders were as tense as Rodin’s Thinker. Violet took hold of his shoulder. He was not alone. He wasn’t going to be alone again.

  “I didn’t think it could be right,” Jack muttered low. “I thought, like Tanner, I thought Jeremy was on another one of his pirate treasure hunts like when he was a boy.”

  “It’s not our fault, Jack,” she said quietly, but Tanner looked up at the comment. “It’s not Tanner’s fault he thought Jeremy was wrong. It’s not my fault that I didn’t give into Miss Allen’s blackmail. It’s not—”

  “Blackmail?” Jack’s cold tone made Violet flinch.

  She hesitated, but Jack’s expression made it clear that he wasn’t going to accept anything less than a full story. “We were right about her guesses with V.V. Twinnings. She felt that the knowledge would be sufficient for me to bend to her will. And then bend you to her will.”

  Jack’s eyes narrowed and the muscle in his jaw clenched repetitively. “How?”

  “She wanted you to fix things as much as possible with her brother’s professors. I suppose, looking back, she realized he was on one of his random investigations. She wanted you to step in and straighten him out.”

  “Why would I do that for you and not simply because I care about Jeremy?”

  “Because,” Violet said, inwardly wincing to have to repeat it, “you would do anything for the woman you love. She said no one knew that better than her.”

  Chapter 16

  Jack took Tanner with him to find Hamilton. He placed the journal in Violet’s hands and asked her to read it for him. Something Jeremiah Allen had stumbled across was something worth killing over. With any luck, Violet would recognize what was real in the sea of nonsense.

  It suddenly made sense to Violet why Miss Allen had handed the journal over. She had no idea which of her brother’s wild theories caused his death and which were paranoid fantasies.

  Violet cleared her throat and took a long breath in as she opened the journal. She blinked rapidly and then stared. Mr. Allen had written in multiple languages. It might even be in code. She realized it was an excellent thing that her twin had fallen in love with a woman who was far cleverer than Violet. Especially when it came to things like languages and codes.

  Violet went to the bedroom where Beatrice had gone with the dogs. She found the maid mending stockings with both spaniels at her feet.

  “My lady?”

  Violet smiled at her and asked, “Did you get some tea?”

  The maid shook her head, but her expression was hesitant. “I made a mistake, my lady.”

  “Just throw the stockings out, dear. Don’t worry.”

  “No, I mean…the stockings are fine. But I…when I was packing your things at Mr. Morgan’s house, I added the writing chest to your case. I should have realized I didn’t pack it for you when you left.”

  “Don't worry, love. We’ll send it back with Jack and our apologies.”

  Beatrice nodded but acted as though there was more to it. “My lady…I dropped it. And there was a hidden compartment.”

  Violet’s eyes widened as curiosity hit her. Now Beatrice’s worry made sense.

  “What secrets did you find? Shall we have to send a whole case of liquid apologies? This is why we keep Victor around, you know.”

  “There are love letters,” Beatrice said. “I didn’t mean to see them. But I was afraid…I mean…”

  “You wanted to know how badly your mistake might be.”

  The maid nodded. “I thought you would be very upset.”

  Violet winked. “Don’t worry, love. I would be lost without you.”

  When Violet returned to the combination sitting and dining room, Victor and Kate had come back. She set the letters from the writing chest down on the table and looked at her brother.

  “We got Tanner a room,” Victor said. “But it seems we’ve lost him.”

  “Jack took him to find Hamilton. I think Jack believes him, but he won’t be leaving any of the suspects here with us.”

  “With you,” Kate said, smiling.

  Violet shrugged and then tossed the journal to Kate. “I have a job for you, darling. Mr. Allen’s journal is written in multiple languages, and Jack has entrusted us with discovering what we can.”

  Kate took it, grinning. “What fun.”

  Violet recapped what they’d learned from Mr. Tanner before Kate retreated to dig through what she could of the journal. While Violet had been speaking, Lila and Ginny had returned and Denny had awoken from his nap.

  “Do the thing,” Denny told her. “With the journal and the list.”
<
br />   She showed them the love letters first, and Denny rubbed his hands together and picked up one. He cleared his throat before reading.

  R,

  Seeing you today and being unable to take you into my arms was more painful than torture. Your eyes…

  Denny looked up. “It’s just full of praise and compliments. Lila darling, shall I plagiarize this for you?”

  “I’ll pass,” Lila said dryly, “but it seems young Ginny is intrigued.”

  Ginny leaned forward and tugged the letter from Denny’s hand. She glanced it over. “Who is E? Is that the one that went off with Jack? Do you think that he will mourn her endlessly? Like Romeo would if he’d lived?”

  Violet glanced at Victor, who shuddered at Ginny’s reference to Romeo and Juliet. “What is it with these ladies and that bedamned tale? Ginny, would you truly want the man you loved to kill himself if you died?”

  Ginny considered and then admitted, “It is romantic.”

  “That’s all it is, my dear. As we have discussed before, Victor, Romeo and Juliet is not a real story and real children did not die.”

  “Well, if they had lived, they were too stupid to carry on,” he muttered.

  Violet snorted and smacked her brother on the shoulder.

  “What about you, Violet? Would you want Jack to love again if you died?” Ginny’s gaze was fixed on Violet, who nodded immediately.

  “I would want Jack to enjoy every second of his life. That’s part of loving, Ginny darling.” Violet paused a moment and then asked, “Did you say E? An E signed the letter?”

  Denny nodded.

  “Are you sure it isn’t an N?”

  Denny showed Violet the letter, then she flipped through the whole stack. There were two sets of handwriting. No…there was a third as well. The last was feminine, and Violet guessed that it was Rachael herself.