A Murderous Marriage

by Alyssa Maxwell

  “Oh! Look where you’re going . . . Oh, it’s you, Lady Phoebe.”

  Just prior to their collision, Phoebe had rubbed the handkerchief on the skin around her eyes to redden them. She looked up only briefly and pressed the linen back to her face. “Excuse me, Miss Blair. I didn’t mean to . . . But today has been so stressful.” Peeking out, she saw the impatience on Miss Blair’s face. “Seeing my sister free, only to have her dragged back to that horrid place—it’s too much. And all for nothing, since the solicitor came only to say he couldn’t read the will. Why did he bother coming at all? Why would he toy with us so?”

  She hadn’t bothered to lower her voice, and now Miss Blair, looking alarmed, grasped her shoulder. “Do calm yourself, Lady Phoebe. Please.”

  “I’ve tried to remain calm, but how can I? My grandparents are at their wits’ end. We all are.” Phoebe slipped her arm through Miss Blair’s, as if to lean on her for support, and started walking with her toward the library, which, as Phoebe well knew, tended to be empty this time of day. Not that it mattered, at least not to her. What she had to say to Miss Blair could be overheard, for all she cared. Miss Blair resisted for an instant, but as Phoebe continued her lament, the other woman seemed all too happy to leave the lobby and the inquisitive stares.

  “It was cruel to release my sister, only to return her to the jail so soon after. A false promise of freedom. Do you know why the solicitor felt it necessary to come here, Miss Blair?”

  “He was sent for, apparently.”

  “Yes, but by whom?” Phoebe lowered the handkerchief, no longer concerned whether Miss Blair perceived the false nature of her tears. “Was it Veronica? Or Ernest? Are they so eager to know what Gil left them?”

  “One or perhaps both of them, yes.”

  A slight hesitation had preceded Miss Blair’s answer. All pretense gone, Phoebe smiled knowingly. “You’re named in the will, aren’t you? Did you send for the solicitor?”

  Miss Blair stepped back, as if struck. “You sent your maid to follow me.”

  “As a matter of fact, I didn’t, and it wasn’t Eva. But it doesn’t matter who saw you at the post office. The fact remains, you sent for Mr. Walker. Why the hurry, Miss Blair? Poor Gil isn’t even in his grave yet.”

  “Poor Gil.” Her lips turned down in distaste. “Surely you don’t believe that for a minute. If you do, you’re a fool, Phoebe.” Had Miss Blair meant to drop the Lady from her name? Or was she that flustered?

  “I have no illusions when it comes to Gil,” Phoebe said. “I believe he had secrets, and that one of those secrets might have caught up with him. The question is, How much do you know about Gil’s background, and did you use the information to your advantage?” Phoebe stated rather than asked the question, hoping to put Miss Blair even more on the defensive.

  The woman’s composure surprised her. “What you really wish to ask is whether I killed him. The answer is no. I probably had more affection for him, despite his many faults, than everyone else put together. And yes, I telegrammed Clarence Walker. As I’m sure your maid has already reported, the stampede for his possessions has begun. I’d hoped to head it off before matters became a tangle. Unfortunately, that is not to be—not for several weeks. Our fates now lie with your sister.”

  “And the entail, Miss Blair? Is it worth as much as Gil’s other assets?”

  “Suffice it to say Gilbert Townsend was an exceedingly wealthy man.” She started to walk away. Phoebe stopped her by once again moving in her way.

  “I’m not finished.”

  “Oh, but I am.” Miss Blair stepped around her and disappeared into the lobby.

  CHAPTER 18

  That night, when Eva returned to her room, she found Hetta in bed, turned toward the wall, the bedclothes pulled up to her ears. That didn’t fool Eva in the slightest. After sharing a room with the woman at home, she’d become accustomed to Hetta’s light snoring. She heard no such snoring now.

  She switched on the lamp on the dresser. “I know you’re awake. Please turn so I can speak with you.”

  Nothing happened for several seconds, and Eva began to think perhaps she’d been mistaken. Then Hetta rolled over. She peeked warily at Eva from behind a tangle of blond hair that had come loose from her braid.

  Eva perched at the edge of her own bed. “Why have you pretended you cannot speak English?”

  Hetta’s blue eyes widened with alarm. “I speak the English not so well.”

  “But you do speak it. You’ve been deceiving us, Lady Julia most especially. It’s a serious offense, Hetta.”

  “You tell Madame?”

  “Someone must. I’d rather it were you. Why the pretense?”

  Slowly, Hetta pushed up on her hands and sat up. She shoved the hair back from her face. “Something Madame Julia say when she meet me. She say to the countess, ‘With her, I won’t always have to watch my words.’ I realize she like me for being Swiss, for speaking German.”

  Eva held Hetta in her gaze long enough for the woman to become uncomfortable. Her color rose, and she began to fidget with the coverlet. “I think you understand even better than you speak.”

  “Ja, this is true.”

  “So you’ve been listening to conversations that might not have been held in your hearing had we known the truth.”

  Hetta’s head went down. “Ja. But I hear nothing bad.”

  “That is beside the point, and you know it.” Eva folded her arms.

  “Ja.” She raised her face, and the lamplight caught the trickle of her tears. “I go in the morning?”

  “No, Hetta.”

  Her face contorted. “I go now?”

  “No, that’s not what I meant. It’ll be for Lady Julia to decide, once she is free. But you must be honest with her.”

  Hetta nodded eagerly and wiped her tears with the back of her hand. “Ja. I tell her.” Her face fell again. “Do you think she is angry?”

  “I don’t know, really. She might be, at first. No one likes to be deceived. But you’ve given her good service so far. I know she adores the way you do her hair, and you’re quick and clever when it comes to keeping her wardrobe in tip-top shape. Besides, I have a feeling Lady Julia will be so relieved once this is all over, she’ll be inclined to forgive.”

  While a look of joyful relief filled Hetta’s broad face, Eva felt a sinking in her stomach. Lady Julia’s future depended on her and Lady Phoebe’s ability to clear her name, and the odds against them doing so were beginning to seem insurmountable. They had determined Lord Annondale’s circle of family and friends all had motives for wishing him ill, but until they could narrow their focus to a single individual, Detective Inspector Lewis would continue to dismiss the notion of Lady Julia’s innocence.

  * * *

  Phoebe handed the porter a coin in exchange for the message he had delivered to her. Upon reading its contents, she drained her teacup and hurriedly finished dressing.

  Amelia still wore her wrapper and was lounging on the settee, sipping her tea slowly. When she noticed Phoebe’s urgency to ready herself for the day, she put her cup and saucer aside and sat up straighter. “What is it? Has something happened to Julia?”

  “No. I have a visitor.” After scooping the message off the table, she handed it to her sister on her way out the door. As it closed behind her, she heard Amelia’s little cry of delight.

  The lift seemed to take an eternity, but when the operator finally set the car down on the ground floor, Phoebe let him open the gate but pushed through the door on her own. A moment later a pair of arms closed around her.

  “Owen. I didn’t expect you this soon. Thank goodness you’re here.”

  “There wasn’t time to let you know. I drove through the night and caught the first ferry over this morning.” He held her tightly for longer than was proper, but she didn’t pull away. The sensation of his serge-clad shoulder against her cheek was too delicious to resist. As they parted, she studied his face, as he in turn studied hers.

  “
You must have discovered something important, to come all this way.”

  “I did.” The second lift opened, and several people walked off. He glanced into the main lobby. “Is there somewhere we can talk privately?”

  “The library is usually empty during the day. It’s become something of an office for me.”

  On the way there, Phoebe asked a porter to have tea and breakfast sent in. “You must be exhausted and famished,” she said to Owen after closing the library’s pocket doors behind them.

  They selected a corner where, if someone were to venture in, they would still have a modicum of privacy. “Some good strong tea wouldn’t be unwelcome right about now,” he said.

  “Tell me, how were you able to get away? I know there are problems at the mills. Your workers—”

  “Are making demands, but not altogether unreasonable ones. The unions are not such a terrible thing, but sometimes what they perceive as being good for workers isn’t actually to their benefit. The larger problem is that with the war over, the country is in debt, the value of the pound is down, and the prices of our exports are falling because of competition from countries able to produce the same goods at lower prices. The unions are resisting lower wages, but I’m afraid keeping things as they are might lead to industries cutting back and fewer people working.”

  “I thought with the war over, business would be booming all over the country.”

  He sighed. “I’m afraid that’s not the case, and I worry it will lead to trouble in the coming years.”

  “What kind of trouble?”

  The pocket doors opened, and a waiter wheeled in a cart holding a tea service and covered platters. He brought it over to them, asked them if they needed anything else, and left them alone.

  “Never mind the fate of British business. We’ll leave that for another time.”

  Owen poured tea into both of their cups, while Phoebe uncovered the platters to reveal sausages and eggs, kippers and toast. She spooned portions onto the plates and opened a pot of jam and another of marmalade.

  Between mouthfuls Owen washed down with tea, he said, “I spoke to a friend who served in the war cabinet until recently, and he told me some rather interesting things that went on in Ireland during the last year of the war. Have you heard of the German Plot?”

  “I do remember reading something in the newspaper about the possibility of the Germans helping Ireland gain her independence.”

  “That’s right. Supposedly, Irish nationalists were encouraging the Germans to intervene and expel the British from the country, with promises of helping Germany win the war.”

  “The articles were vague, I remember, and then the stories disappeared altogether. It never actually happened, did it?”

  “No.” Owen cut into a sausage and speared a section with the tip of his knife. He held it up, waving it about, as he made his reply. “The Germans were rather busy with their own concerns at the time. The truth is, there never was a plot, and any such hopes in Ireland were shared by very few men. However, that didn’t stop Dublin Castle from claiming that the plot was real and that it posed a danger. They used it as an excuse to arrest a slew of Sinn Féin members, well over a hundred men, and transport them to England for trial. It was a mess, and in the end, it allowed the much more extreme Irish Republican Brotherhood to gain a military foothold in the Irish opposition movement. It also greatly increased the popularity of Sinn Féin itself. Tensions have been rising ever since.”

  Phoebe knew the British government had established a royal constabulary to help fight the uprisings in Ireland. Because of their uniforms, they were called the Black and Tans. She said, “The Black and Tan War, which has been going on for the past year or so.”

  “Exactly.”

  “So, what does this have to do with Gil? Weren’t they back in England before that began?” As soon as Phoebe asked the question, she remembered Gil’s place—and Sir Hugh’s—in the Dublin Castle administration, the British ruling body of Ireland. “Were he and Hugh somehow involved in the arrests after the German Plot?”

  Owen nodded as he chewed. “They were among the loudest proponents of the measure, and according to my source, Gil personally ordered the arrest of a half dozen men. And here is where things get a bit foggy, because the truth was never supposed to come out. A consignment of weapons was stolen from an armory outside Dublin and simply disappeared. No trace of them anywhere, but a pair of brothers were arrested for being the masterminds of the theft. They confessed to shipping the guns off to England, where they were sold on the black market. Now, I’m getting this information thirdhand, or perhaps even fourth, but before the pair were executed for high treason, supposedly they claimed two English officials were their cohorts.”

  Phoebe nearly choked. “I can’t believe it. Why would Gil and Hugh take such a risk? And if this is true, why weren’t they arrested and tried?”

  Owen held up a cautioning hand. “They were not named specifically, but almost immediately after the arrest, they were sent packing. To expose them would have opened up an investigation of all of Dublin Castle and brought too many men under scrutiny. With all the problems at the time, they didn’t need one that threatened to bring British rule in Ireland to its knees. Things were covered up, and the identities of the perpetrators, presumably Hugh and Gil and probably several others, were protected.”

  “But why would they do such a thing?”

  “Money. What else?”

  “I can understand perhaps for Hugh, but Gil had scads of money.”

  Owen shrugged. “I suppose he thought he could use more. Or maybe the thrill and the risk appealed to him.”

  “Are you certain it was them?”

  “Fairly certain, yes. This is more than hearsay. It’s an unofficial, off-the-record report of what happened.”

  “And you trust your source?”

  Owen nodded. Phoebe saw no trace of doubt in his countenance.

  “No wonder Hugh refuses to speak to the police. Blast him, he’d let Julia take the blame for Gil’s death rather than implicate himself.” Phoebe put her plate onto the cart—barely resisting the urge to smash it down in her anger—and came to her feet. “We have to talk to him. He can’t be allowed to get away with this.”

  Owen set his breakfast aside, as well. “That’s why I’m here.”

  * * *

  After discovering from Lady Amelia that Owen Seabright had arrived and Lady Phoebe had already gone down to meet him, Eva helped Amelia dress and then returned to her room. Hetta, too, had gone downstairs, leaving Eva with some time to herself. Finally, she had both the privacy and the daylight to peruse Mr. Mowbry’s photos from the Georgiana. She drew the envelope from the top dresser drawer and spread the photographs out on her bed.

  At first only the main focus of each one captured her attention. Lady Julia, the lines of her dress and veil, the positioning of her arms, the angle of her pose. Some included Lord Annondale, looking proud and very much like someone who had just won a contest. Yes, and Lady Julia was the prize. Not a woman, not a wife, but a kind of award or accolade to the man’s achievements. Other photographs included Ladies Phoebe and Amelia, and the rest of the family was featured in still others. Their expressions ranged from jubilance (young Fox) to satisfaction (the countess), to tender concern (the earl), to downright apprehension.

  Not one of them could have conceived what the next hours and days would bring. Not one could have predicted the disaster about to be visited upon the Renshaw family. Lady Julia least of all. In her eyes, Eva saw the full knowledge of the course she had set for herself, for good or ill. It was not what one should see in a young bride’s face. Eva’s throat constricted, and her heart broke yet again.

  She forced herself to concentrate on the smaller details of the vessel itself. Some of the photographs had been taken on the top deck. Those she set aside, being more interested in the ones taken along the main promenade deck, along the railing. The designer of the Georgiana had done a splendid job of seeing
that essential equipment blended with the general decor of polished oak, mahogany, and teak. Coils of rope and life rings hung at intervals along the outer walls of the main cabin and appeared more decorative than functional. Even the hoists for the lifeboats gleamed with fresh polish. Eva thought back and remembered them being of brass. Indeed, most of the outdoor fittings were brass. She scanned several photos, then went back to one of Lord and Lady Annondale that had been taken in the shadow of one of the lifeboats.

  The Georgiana carried two lifeboats, one port side and the other on the starboard. Both were located near the stern, where the blood had been found on the railing. The lifeboats, though not pictured, were suspended a good eight or nine feet above the deck, closer to the cabin than the railing. The mechanisms of the hoists were positioned directly below them, bolted to the deck, with lines that ran up along the walls of the cabin and were attached to the lifeboats from above.

  Could something have become wedged within the workings of one of the hoists?

  Eva’s heart began to race. It was unlikely, to be sure. If the murderer and Lord Annondale had struggled over the missing letter opener, it would probably have ended up in the water. Still, it was worth a look. She pressed a hand over her pounding heart to attempt to calm it. She mustn’t get her hopes up. Yet, for Lady Julia’s sake, she couldn’t help doing just that.

  * * *

  Phoebe positioned herself at a table on the veranda and held a newspaper up in front of her. She wore a hat and a light spring coat that matched her frock, and her leather pumps were made for comfortable walking. She kept her ears pricked while Owen moved past her to the man with the clean-shaven head, who was reading his own newspaper several tables away.

  “Good morning, Hugh.”

  Phoebe peeked around the edge of her newspaper as Sir Hugh let his own fall to the table in front of him. He frowned a moment before recognition dawned. “Owen Seabright. I thought you left Cowes.”

  “I’m back. The sea air called to me.”