“Surely it must be regarding Nicholson. It is three weeks since he was murdered, so perhaps the villain has been caught.”
Bertram hardly liked to think about the murder. He read about death and war and unspeakable horrors every day, butthey were safely in the past, distanced from real life by thousands of years, and most of what he read was mere fanciful mythology, not even real. It was another matter entirely when a man one had known well, an uncle by marriage, died by violence. Arthur Nicholson had been chaplain to the Earl of Rennington for many years, and was married to the earl’s sister, Lady Alice — a genial, inoffensive man, Bertram would have said. Yet someone had taken an axe to the room where he slept and hacked him to death. It was too dreadful for words.
His father clicked his tongue. “But how can that affect the family… or us? Unless… surely it cannot be one of the family? No, that would be unthinkable. It cannot be anything to do with the murder.”
“Well, scandal, perhaps? Money troubles? The castle is about to fall down and they all want to come and live here?”
His father laughed. “You are right, of course. It is futile to speculate. Most likely it is some legal matter. He went haring off to York last week, remember, so perhaps he saw the lawyers. Whatever it is, we shall learn of it soon enough. Let us go and tell your mother.”
Futile as it might be to speculate, nevertheless that was all the family did for the rest of the day. First his parents invaded Bertram’s library, then his brother Lucas, and then his sisters drifted in. It needed only his little brother Philip to arrive from the nursery, and there would be a veritable party in progress.
By the time they assembled in the drawing room before dinner, they each had their favoured theory. Lucas had settled on financial woes — Lord Rennington was in the basket and wanted their father’s fortune to bail him out. Julia, with all the wisdom of her twenty years, thought it was some fresh scandal involving their cousin, the earl’s heir.
“Birtwell has got himself into some mess or other, you may be sure. A girl, most likely, and Uncle Charles is looking to us to help him patch it up. Or Bertram, perhaps.”
“Nonsense,” their father said tersely. “Birtwell has never been one to get intothatsort of mess.”
“George, please,” Mother said. “This is hardly a fit topic of conversation in front of the girls.”
“Julia started it,” Lucas said.
“And she should not have done,” Mother said, lips pursed. “Most unladylike. Depend upon it, this is to do with the Dowager Countess. She must be on her deathbed at last, and how she has lasted as long as she has is more than I can fathom.”
“That would merely be a letter to inform us of her death, not this odd summons,” Father said.
Penelope, who at sixteen thought everything related to marriage and romance, said, “Perhaps the earl wishes to arrange a match for Bertram.”
“Ooh, good idea,” Julia said. “But with whom? Not Olivia!”
The three girls collapsed in giggles.
“Olivia will make a great match,” Mother said. “An earl’s daughter with a good dowry and as pretty a face as hers will marry into the nobility, you may be sure. She will certainly not marry her own cousin.”
“Tess Nicholson, then,” Penelope said. “Her father left her a fortune, so she is quite a catch now.”
“She will be in mourning for her father for quite some time,” Mother said. “Really, girls, you are too fanciful by half.”
“We shall find out what this is all about soon enough,” Father said.
***
The carriage was ordered in plenty of time, for it would never do to be late for such a meeting. Besides, Bertram and his parents were agog with curiosity by the time they arrived at Corland Castle, the principal seat of the Earl of Rennington. The castle was a monstrously ugly building, in Bertram’s view, for although it was newly built, it was very much in the heavy style of the Normans, with four corner towers linked by uncompromisingly solid façades. The interior was austere, and festooned with collections of swords, pikes, maces and a multitude of other sharp, malevolent objects whose sole function was to kill in as unpleasant a manner as human ingenuity could contrive. The whole place made Bertram heartily glad he was born in a less warlike and more enlightened age. He liked his violence strictly between the pages of a book.
Simpson and Wellum, the butler and under-butler, greeted them in the echoing entrance hall, its stone floor and marble statuary chilling the air, despite the summer heat outside.
“Good day, sir, madam. Good day, sir. You are in excellent time.”
“What is this all about, Simpson?” Father said, as Wellum collected hats and gloves and canes.
“I couldn’t say, sir. His lordship has not taken me into his confidence. Lord Birtwell is already in the study with Lord Rennington, and the others are gathering in the library.”
“The others? Who else is summoned?”
“Lady Rennington, the Lady Alice Nicholson and Miss Nicholson, Mr Kent and the Lady Olivia are already here. Mr Eustace has not yet arrived.”
“That boy is always late,” Father muttered.
Simpson showed them into the library, where the door to the earl’s study was resolutely closed.
