by Clare Jayne
“Yes, that is true.” This had occurred to Ishbel, although there was no immediate evidence to give certainty to the idea.
“Poor man,” Ewan said. “The situation is clearly difficult enough for him without the fear of a threat against him.”
“Yes.” Ishbel turned to Mr Williamson. “I can see now why you said that Lord Strand could not be the killer. Having seen his grief, I also cannot believe that he could ever have harmed his mother.”
They reached the carriages and agreed to continue the discussion at Lord Strand’s home. The journey was a short one through the damp cobbled streets to the grand house. Lord Strand’s butler was waiting to admit guests and his footmen were ready with refreshments.
Ishbel caught sight of Lord Strand talking alone with Mr McIntoll, both of them looking close to tears.
Mr Williamson came into the drawing room and walked over to them. By silent agreement, they found a quiet corner of the room so that they could talk in private.
“Did you look into the subject of the late Lord Strand’s Will?” Ewan asked Mr Williamson.
“Yes, but I could find nothing that might cause the murder of Lord and Lady Strand. He left her only paltry items, presumably expecting his son to look after her needs. The solicitor refused to divulge the details of her own Will before it was read out to the new Lord Strand, which will be today. I imagine that her jewellery will have been her most valuable possession, so it will be interesting to find out today who inherits that, but if that was what the killer wanted why would they kill her husband?”
“It seems impossible for the reasons to be unrelated,” Ishbel agreed. “What of the notion of a vendetta? Have you found anyone who could be a suspect for that?”
“There was a young unmarried lady from a wealthy family whom Lord Strand seduced. She was, of course, ruined and her father was injured fighting Lord Strand in a duel over it. They left Edinburgh six years ago, after the fight, and I am trying to find out where they are now.”
“I suppose they could have wanted to kill everyone in Lord Strand’s family,” Ewan said doubtfully.
“Six years is a long time to wait for revenge,” Ishbel said. This did not seem to fit the facts but perhaps there was more to the story and Lady Strand had been involved in some way. “Could a member of their family have returned to Edinburgh?”
“Possibly or they could have hired someone to do their killing for them. I will find out what I can.”
“Mr and Mrs MacPherson.” They turned to see that it was Lord Strand speaking to them. “Could I talk to you privately?”
Chapter Thirty-Seven
“MISS CHIVERTON.” He bowed to her and she curtsied.
“Mr McDonald.” She regarded him coolly. “Please sit down.”
Fiona had only been home for a few hours before his visit. Her father and brother had returned and had been more angry than she had ever seen them, saying that she would have to work hard to ever regain their trust and, once again, forbidding her to see Eddie. They had also repeated what Anne had said about the subject of marriage. As far as everyone but her was concerned, she must marry Mr McDonald.
She regarded him now as he sat down opposite her in the drawing room of her home, trying to imagine what a future with him would be like. There were worse alternatives but she did not think she could ever be happy. She did not care that he was a plain man but he was conventional and wanted someone obedient like Anne. Everything about him made it clear that he would want a dull, ordinary life with her. The idea of such a marriage was stifling, but there seemed no escape from it.
He met her gaze. “I must offer you my apologies.”
“For what?”
“If I had left it to your brother or father to defend your honour from Gell then your reputation would not now be the source of gossip. I behaved rashly, without thinking.”
She had not thought him capable of acting in a rash way and was not displeased to discover he could. “Mr Gell was the one at fault, trying to harm me because he was angry that I turned down his proposal.”
“His actions were dishonourable.”
“I suppose I should have listened to you and not encouraged his interest for the sole purpose of searching for Lord Strand’s killer.”
He straightened slightly in his chair. “You never liked him?”
“Not in the least.”
He nodded, clearly glad about this. “Miss Chiverton, I would be delighted to marry you. If you are willing, we could announce the engagement as soon as your father wishes.”
She searched her mind for a way out of this mess and could find none. He was not so bad and she believed that he did care about her, at least. He was a far better choice than any her father would have made and few people of her class married for love.
He was watching her intently and his expression grew downcast at what he saw. “I would not want you to feel forced into a marriage you do not want. If you were able to announce your engagement to someone else I could say that my action was precipitated by there being an understanding between us that had not led to an engagement. There would be some speculation over it but it would not harm your reputation.”
It would not help his own reputation and after her frequent frustrations with him in past meetings and her unwillingness to marry him, she was impressed by his chivalry in suggesting it. She tried again to tell herself that a life with him would not be so terrible but she heard her brother’s voice in her head saying that he wanted more for her than a husband who she found to be only bearable. “That is good of you but there is no one else I love or could imagine sharing a life with.”
They both sat in silence and considered this. Now that she knew he would help her avoid the marriage, she felt there ought to be an alternative, but she could still not think of one. “Even if we both agreed not to wed each other, my father has made it clear that I must announce my engagement at once. He will choose someone for me himself and that would be the worst possible outcome.”
“Then may I propose another course of action?”
She nodded, her heart lifting at his words. “Please do.”
“We could become officially engaged and, when you found someone you would rather marry, you could end the engagement. You would have to suffer some snubs and impolite comments when you did so but at least you would be marrying a man of your own choosing.”
It was the best possible idea. “But you would be publicly embarrassed by receiving such treatment from me.” He would, for a time, be mocked for it and people would wonder what he had done to make her jilt him in such a damaging way.
“It was my action that led to this situation. I wish only for you to be happy.”
He really did care about her: perhaps he even loved her. If only she were able to love him back everything would be so different. “Then I thank you for showing such generosity and kindness to me and I agree to a false engagement to you.”
Chapter Thirty-Eight
ISHBEL AND Ewan followed Lord Strand into a dark study, lit only by the glow of the fire in the grate opposite. Lord Strand folded up a piece of paper, lit it in the fire and used the flame to light several candles. The room brightened with an amber glow that revealed that the candles were sitting on a desk strewn with papers; there were a few chairs around the room and Lord Strand sat down in one of them and gestured for them to do the same. On the wall behind him, against wallpaper covered in scarlet leaves, Ishbel saw a painting of a blond-haired handsome man that she took to be his father; the man in the painting looked to be not much older than the current Lord Strand and had an air of command. Ishbel looked in the painted face for signs of the cruelty she had been told about but could not see them.
“Mr Williamson tells me you are still willing to find the killer – the person who undoubtedly murdered my mother as well as my father – and for that I am grateful. I did not take your offer seriously before but my mother was a truly good woman – she can have done nothing to deserve her fate – and I want the person
responsible to be caught and hanged.”
“We will do everything possible to help Mr Williamson catch the killer,” Ewan promised.
“Thank you. Are there questions you wish to ask me? I will answer anything you wish to know.”
This was a very different man than the one they had previously met and Ishbel wondered, cynically, if it was the possible threat to his own life that made him suddenly want to help them. His grief was real, though, of that she was sure, so perhaps his concern really was mostly for his mother. “Is there anyone you know of whom your father might have badly offended?”
He looked at her with a frown and spoke with his English aristocratic accent. “My father was an unpleasant man. I did not take his murder as seriously as I should have because I can imagine that a very great many people would have been glad to see him dead. I foolishly thought that my life and that of my mother would be happier without him. I apologise if that shocks you.”
“It does not,” Ishbel said. “One’s parents can affect us more than anyone else can and, when they are not the kind-hearted people one would wish, they can cause us a lot of unhappiness.”
She did not know what rumours he might have heard about her past but he looked at her as if seeing something in her that he recognised, a shared pain perhaps. “Yes, that is it. I spent all my youth trying to please my father before I realised he did not wish to be proud of me: he enjoyed mocking and berating me and had no wish to give it up. I fear I cannot help you as I wish to, though, since I was in England at school for nearly a decade so I only caught glimpses of his behaviour to others. Mr Williamson told me of the young lady my father wronged and I was horrified: I knew nothing of it.”
“Perhaps his enquiries into the matter will provide the answers we all seek,” Ishbel said.
“I hope so, although I cannot see why anyone would blame my mother for anything my father did.”
“Can you think of anything at all that someone might have held your mother responsible for?” she asked. “Perhaps on the subject of honour or money?” He was shaking his head, so she added, “Then does anyone you know of benefit in any way from your mother’s death?”
“The two deaths make no sense when put together,” he said, steepling his hands as he considered this. “The only good I can think of that my mother’s death would do anyone would be if someone had wanted to marry my father and gain access to some of his wealth, but of course he died first, so that cannot be it.”
“Are you considering marriage to anyone?” Ewan asked and Ishbel followed his thinking that the son’s inherited wealth could have been a reason to kill both parents.
“I am thinking of marriage in general. I was in school with other boys in England and spent little time in the company of women and I have not spent sufficient time in Edinburgh until now to form a strong attachment to anyone.”
That seemed to be the end of that idea.
“Might we ask you a couple of questions about people of your acquaintance who we were considering for your father’s murder?” Ishbel asked.
“Of course.”
“Did Mr Gell have any acquaintanceship with your mother?”
“Gell? He was always civil to her but they certainly had no friendship, or enmity for that matter. Why would you suspect him?”
“We discovered that he was in need of money and he benefited from your father’s death because he convinced you to invest with him but, without his having any possible reason to harm your mother, that means nothing.”
“Yes, I see. No, I saw him in the company of my mother and neither of them seemed to wish to be anything more than the most casual of acquaintances. Gell is a decent fellow from what I have seen but my mother was nearly twice his age and knew nothing of investments.”
So he would have had no reason to befriend her, Ishbel concluded. “What of Mr McIntoll? He had reason to be angry with your father over the loss of a family heirloom but we understood that he had a fondness for both you and your mother.”
“That is true.” Lord Strand looked into the fire, his face partly in shadow. “He was like family to us both. My mother valued his friendship and he is nearly as distraught as I am over her death.”
“Did Lady Tabor have any sort of relationship with your mother?”
He looked round at her, seemingly surprised by the question. Perhaps it had never occurred to him to suspect a woman of murder. “They saw each other regularly at social events as they mixed in the same circles and I believe my mother disliked her, although she did not say as much.”
Ishbel looked over at Ewan, their questions having made no progress from what she could tell.
“If you can bear it,” he said, “would you tell us of your mother’s death? How could the killer have got to her?”
“That part was simple,” Lord Strand said, a quiver in his voice. “My mother was killed in the garden behind us and it can be accessed from the street outside, through a gate. In the daytime there are always servants about and people in the house who would see a stranger outside, but the crime occurred at night. My mother often walked in the garden as she found it relaxing but she usually had a maid with her. On the night of her death, she was alone. How could the murderer have known that unless the meeting was planned?”
“Perhaps she was tricked into it somehow,” Ewan suggested.
“Thank you,” Ishbel added. “That information could certainly help us. We will let you and Mr Williamson know immediately if we find the guilty person before he does.”
She and Ewan headed to the study door but Lord Strand spoke before they reached it and they turned to look back into the shadowed room. “I do not know if this means a thing but I did ask my mother a week ago if she knew who had killed my father. She said she thought it must be someone who wanted to make our lives easier.”
He said no more and they had no answer for this, so they left him alone.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
“THE NEW Lord Strand certainly did not kill his mother,” Ewan said when they got home from the funeral. They had been allowed to be present for the reading of Lady Strand’s Will, but it had suggested no new suspect or reason for her death. A few minor items had been left to members of her family – nieces and nephews – but her jewellery had all been left as an heirloom, to be passed to her son’s wife when he married.
“No,” Ishbel agreed, equally convinced of his innocence. “But it seems to me as if we have ruled out everyone we suspected. We are aware of no one who had any cause to want Lady Strand dead. I think that Mr Williamson might find the solution in the form of the lady the late Lord Strand seduced. Her life was ruined by him and her family was humiliated – there might well have been someone amongst them who decided that Lord Strand’s entire family should be destroyed over it.”
“The person might even be someone we have met,” Ewan said.
“Surely not,” Ishbel said. “The late Lord Strand knew them all so he would not have invited someone from a family who hated him to stay at his home.”
“From what we know of him, I think he might have thought the idea amusing, not realising what the person intended.”
She considered this further. “It happened ten years ago. I suppose a sibling might have grown up in that time – if they took on a different name Lord Strand might have not actually recognised them. Mr Gell could possibly be just young enough and perhaps Lady Tabor too.”
“We should certainly ask Jed to look into this and tell him of our suspicions.”
She nodded. “Would you speak to him? I have arranged to visit your sister this afternoon for tea.”
“We should arrange a small dinner party for Matilda and Lord Picton,” he said, his face softening at the mention of his family. Seeing him with his nieces and nephew made her long for a child of their own, although her own bad experiences with her parents made her nervous about what sort of mother she might make and, of course, her cousin and Lord Huntly had never been able to have children. Ishbel too might wish for them
to no avail. Ewan went on speaking, oblivious to the turn of her thoughts. “Perhaps Lord and Lady Huntly could join us, to make it a proper family meal.”
“That would be lovely.”
The butler interrupted the conversation, entering the room and saying in his gruff tone, “Miss Chiverton is here to speak to you both.”
“Please show her in,” Ishbel said. She had not seen the younger woman for nearly a week, she realised.
Miss Chiverton entered the room, dressed in a mauve striped walking dress which brought out the colour in her cheeks and suited her blonde hair. She curtsied to them and they all sat down.
“I have some information to share about the murders,” she said after they exchanged greetings, “and there is also something I wish to tell you so that you do not form the wrong impression. I have become engaged to Mr McDonald, but I have also not.”
Ishbel did not know what to make of these words. “I know that your parents wanted you to marry as soon as possible.” Miss Chiverton had told her much of her home life and her worries about her future but Ishbel had not spoken of this to Ewan, not wanting to betray a confidence.
“I refused Mr Gell’s offer of marriage five days ago and I was upset and worried about my family’s reaction over me turning down yet another offer, so I convinced Eddie to take me out of Edinburgh for a few days.”
“Your family did not object?” Ewan asked, since he knew from his friend of their refusal to speak to him.
“I did not tell them I was leaving.”
Ishbel stifled a smile, admiring Miss Chiverton’s bravery. “When did you return?”
“Three days ago, but where we went is something that will interest you, since we visited Lord Strand’s country estate and managed to spend the night there and speak to the servants.”
Ewan straightened at these words, clearly interested to hear more, although he said, “You must be careful with a murderer about. Ishbel and I and those associated with us have faced violence in the past by asking the wrong questions about dangerous people.”