“But why put it in her hair?” Connor asked as he sewed.
“To hide it again?” Leo mused, picturing the moment in her mind. Helen had pried up the floorboard—evidenced by the minuscule particles of wood Connor had found underneath her fingernails during the examination. Perhaps she had heard someone coming, quickly grabbed the vial and speared it into her bun to whisk it out of sight. Had she put it into her pocket, whoever had joined her might have easily accessed it.
Connor nodded at that theory. “That would indicate she knew the interloper wanted the trinket as well.”
Leo had not considered that yet but agreed it made the most sense. As Connor continued to close the incisions he’d made, shepulled out the tiny cork stopper. A bit of it crumbled under her prying nail, but it came free mostly intact. Putting it to her nose, she inhaled a faint floral fragrance. Perfume.
However, she didn’t think the bottle had been intended to be a scent dispenser. She couldn’t be certain, but Leo thought it might be what was known as a tear catcher.
Like mourning jewelry and death photography, tear catchers were one of many morbid trends in the death industry. Grieving women would use the little glass tubes to catch their tears. The cork would seal the liquid inside, and purportedly, once it dried up, their mourning could end. It was an overly dramatic and fanciful practice to Leo, not to mention illogical. Grief did not evaporate like water. The fashionable trend was just another way to sell pretty trinkets to anguished people.
Like the tube that Helen had speared into her hair, tear catchers could be ornate and expensive, or plain and affordable. A pretty one like Helen’s would certainly serve well as a perfume dispenser after the initial tears that had filled it were gone.
But why had ten-year-old Teddy Stroud had it in his fist when he’d fallen to his death?
Leo replaced the cork and, after taking another thorough look at the swirled glass, placed the tube in her pocket to give to Jasper when next she saw him. She then assisted Connor in cleaning and dressing the corpse, and Leo even spent a little time tidying Helen’s blonde hair with a comb. She styled it afterward to cover the incision on the woman’s scalp as well as the two depressions near the front of her skull. The result was satisfactory, though not perfect.
A few hours after they’d begun the postmortem, the bell above the lobby’s front door chimed, signaling a visitor to the morgue. As it was nearly ten in the morning, Leo hoped it would be Jasper. He’d gone back to Harrow the previous night to question Anthony Dalton and the rest of Helen’s family, atask that could not have been easy, especially as he’d probably needed to rouse them from their beds. Jasper had hoped to return to London before noon today, and sure enough, when Leo entered the lobby, it was to find the detective inspector. He was not alone: Anthony Dalton and Frederick Cowper stood with him, their suits well-pressed and tidy.
Jasper’s clothing, on the other hand, was a bit creased, his honey-blond hair unruly as he removed his bowler. Though neatly trimmed, his golden bristle did give him a rumpled appearance. He’d always been handsome, but now that Leo had given herself permission to note it, even just to herself, his attractiveness had seemed to increase. She tried not to smile at him, as smiling was not something one should do when about to discuss the death of a loved one with family members.
“I’ll let the coroner know you’ve arrived for the formal identification,” she said, then turned to go back into the postmortem room.
“Must I truly see her?” Mr. Dalton asked, loud and brusque enough to stop her in her tracks. “If you and the inspector are certain it is Helen, then I don’t see the point.”
He appeared pale and a little sweaty along his forehead. Nerves, she presumed.
“I’m afraid it is protocol,” Jasper answered. He nodded for her to continue, and Leo went to inform Connor that Helen’s husband and uncle were here for the viewing.
He shed his stained canvas coat and tall, vulcanized rubber boots—neither of which Leo required, as she stood far enough away from the autopsy table during examinations to not risk splatter reaching her—for a more presentable coat and shoes. Together, they wheeled the table bearing Helen into the viewing room.
It was no surprise when Mr. Dalton did not do more than briefly glimpse at Helen once the sheet had been pulled downto reveal her face. Whether it was discomfort or something else wasn’t clear to Leo. Frederick Cowper, however, kept a steady, if somber, gaze on his niece. It was still such an odd thing to consider that he was her uncle. But perhaps that was only because Leo’s only uncle was Claude, an elderly man.
Connor cleared his throat. “Mr. Dalton, were you aware of your wife’s condition?”
Anthony peered at him with narrowed eyes, as if to impart that his question was an annoyance. “Condition? My wife was perfectly healthy.”
“Healthy, yes,” Connor was quick to say. “However, Mrs. Dalton was carrying a child at the time of her death. About four months along, in fact.”
Anthony’s face blanched. He shifted his awe-filled eyes to his wife and stared at her, no longer appearing squeamish. Only stunned.
“No. That is… That is not possible. You must be mistaken.”
“Mr. Dalton, the coroner is not mistaken,” Jasper said. “Why do you claim the impossibility of her condition?”
Anthony hinged his loose jaw, then, with a return of his composure, stalked from the room without answering. Jasper followed, while Frederick slipped his hat back onto his head and sighed.
“They could not have children,” he imparted to her and Connor, his voice constrained.
Leo moved into the lobby with Frederick, while Connor began to roll the table back into the postmortem room.
Anthony had gone to the lobby door, as if ready to leave. His hands were locked into fists. “It appears Helen was having an affair after all, Inspector. If she was with child, it was not mine.” His attention was fixed on nothing that she could discern, and Leo had the sense that he could not make eye contact with them due to shame. “A riding accident, many years ago, left me unableto…” He glanced at Leo, then away again. “It doesn’t matter. She was deceiving me with another man, clearly.”
He'd cut himself off, but Leo had an inkling as to what he’d been about to say. That the accident had made it so that he could be a husband in name only.
“Do you have any idea whom she was seeing?” Jasper asked.
“None at all. She kept to herself most of the time,” he answered, sounding petulant again.
