Walker glared at his wife. “I am not writing that down. You are saying that in Wilma’s mind, she believes if she wants something, it will happen if she gives everyone a little shove.”
While Clare and Meera bickered over the wording, Kate and Brydie shook their heads in dismay. Rafe understood their confusion. Dealing with the delusional required round-about thinking.
Fletch brought the audience back to attention. “But according to Jasper, Wilma didn’t give him poison mushrooms. Vivien did.”
Fletch kept his voice calm but his fingers clenched, Rafe noted uneasily. His friend had kept his fists remarkably restrained earlier, but everyone had limits. Fletch’s coat sleeve was still damp from attempting to wash out Wilma’s blood.
Unfortunately, his partner had jumped into the weakest point in an already weak case. With a little more understanding of human nature than Fletch, Rafe tried to explain. “Both Morgan and Wilma claim Vivien knows nothing of mushrooms. Vivien says her sister gave her the basket in interest of helping her courtship and told her not to eat any of it, to leave it all to Jasper because there wasn’t enough to feed a young man.” Rafe cracked his knuckles, knowing Vivien was the biggest question mark in their case. “Then Lavender sent Vivien away, as she usually does. And since she has no real interest in Jasper, Vivien left the basket and took the opportunity to work on a gown for herself at the manor.”
“Have Lavender verify that,” Hunt ordered, gesturing for a footman to find the missing modiste. “This case is so full of holes, we could use it for a sieve.”
Rafe grimaced, knowing he was right. They had witnesses to Wilma holding a knife on her own child and attacking Fletch. Morgan had admitted to carting off Lavender, although he didn’t consider it kidnapping. Both Morgan and Wilma had been present when Kate had found Lavender tied up and drugged.
But Vivien. . . Rafe tried to talk out his doubts. “If Vivien knew nothing of mushrooms, we must assume they didn’t expect her to help them carry out Kate?”
Kate carried that thought further. “If Vivien were part of their plot, she would have stayed at the inn, and they wouldn’t have taken the wrong person. Instead, Vivian returned to the manor, which, I suppose establishes an alibi. She did finally finish those hems as well as her own gown.”
Hunt frowned, not at all happy with the lack of any clear tale. “If I understand this insane plot rightly. . . Two dimwitted lunatics poisoned young Jasper in order to kidnap Kate. Discovering doors locked, Morgan broke through a window. Finding a female passed out on the floor, with a bonnet covering her hair, he assumed Wilma had knocked out Kate, as promised, so he hauled her off in the actors’ cart. And then what? They planned to imprison her at the Hall, while they moved into Kate’s house?”
“Kate was a major obstacle to Wilma’s plans. It’s more likely she meant to kill Kate and blame it on the actors,” Fletch offered, causing everyone to wince. “But then, Wilma discovered Morgan had mistakenly taken Miss Marlowe. By the time we arrived, she was in a panic. Hugh was merely thinking of his stomach. But proving any of this is impossible unless one of them confesses, and I’m not certain either has the capability to do so.”
Fletch being sensible. . . Rafe twitched his shoulders in relief as some of the weight of his duties fell off.
“And the court might rightfully reject the meanderings of witless lunatics,” Hunt agreed with a frown.
Rafe wondered where Damien was. Their lawyer was the one to speak on what the courts might accept.
“What about poor Ana Marie?” Clare Huntley demanded, giving up on the current case and returning to the original one. “Did they kill her, believing she was Kate?”
Another thorn in his side. Rafe scowled. “Vivien swears she was carrying gowns up and down the front stairs, not the service stairs where we found Mrs. Marie. A maid who dusts the vestibule confirms Vivien always uses the front rather than the back stairs. The maid is incensed by the breach in protocol and remembers clearly.”
Having been summoned, Lavender arrived with her sewing basket while Rafe was speaking. The crowd parted to let her in so she could reply. “I spoke with my workers. Odila is the only one who conversed with Ana Marie. She encouraged her to apply again, but to me, in person. She told her to take the service stairs down so Mrs. Upton wouldn’t catch her away from her appointed tasks. Odila didn’t speak up because she thinks the fall was an accident and she is feeling guilty.”
“Wilma wasn’t in the manor to push her. She didn’t show up until a day or two after Ana Marie died,” Kate said worriedly. “If neither Wilma nor Vivien did it, could it have been an accident?”
Rafe knew that was what she wanted, but he had doubts about that as well. “The children tell me they arrived weeks before their mother started working for Lavender. Their landlord threw them out after Vivien left and Wilma couldn’t pay the rent. Vivien was not pleased when they showed up. She says she warned Wilma that Ana Marie worked at the manor, so she couldn’t take a position there. I daresay Wilma simply didn’t show her face until Ana Marie was. . . removed.”
Hunt continued to glower. “We are to believe Miss Vivien? Does she say that her sister somehow stole inside the manor, found the stairs, followed Ana Marie, and shoved her?”
Rafe shrugged. “Vivien can’t or won’t verify that.”
To his relief, Fletch stepped in again, looking as if he’d rather chop wood. “This might not be for the ears of ladies.”
“This is about us,” Clare cried. Kate merely sent him a scorching glare and waited. Not a single woman in the room departed.
“This is not proof of anything except Vivien’s possible innocence.” Fletch rubbed his nose to organize his thoughts. “Last night, I took one of your footmen to the crypt to talk to Hugh. I threatened we’d break both his arms if he didn’t tell us everything he knew. He’s pickled what few wits he ever possessed, and he rambles. I can barely understand his thick dialect. You might have to check with James to verify he understood the same as I did.”
Hunt gestured at Walker. “Make note to take a statement from James.”
“Just tell us the way he told you. It doesn’t have to make sense,” Kate suggested, urging Fletch to continue.
Fletch grimaced but went on. “Morgan swears Miss Vivien is his daughter, that Wilma had her when she was only fifteen. As best as I can translate, Morgan left before he knew of the child. Wilma’s mother raised Vivien as her own, as if they were sisters, so Wilma could find a husband.”
The women murmured, but no one interrupted while Fletch gathered his thoughts and tried to find an acceptable way to finish his tale. “Even Miss Vivien didn’t know that Wilma was her mother, until after they buried Wilma’s husband last year. Morgan stepped up to claim he was her dad and she had to do what he said. He had been working on their farm, off and on. At some point in his winding tale, he told Wilma his brother died and left him his farm.”
“Before or after Wilma’s husband died?” Rafe asked cynically.
Fletch shrugged. “You try to pry a straight answer out of him. He just says he stepped up and claimed his rightful place in the household. From his ramblings, I gather the thefts began when the crops failed and they couldn’t pay their rent. After she lost her position with the actors, presumably because of Wilma’s thefts, Vivien stormed out, swearing never to speak to them again. Wilma and Morgan lost the farm and followed her.”
