“Will what matter? The thylacine? Of course it does; the thing is damned near extinct in the wild. Getting hold of a trophy like this one is the find of a decade for a natural historian,” he said.
I rolled my eyes in exasperation. “Not the thylacine. Jonathan Hathaway. What if I cannot ever say with certainty it is or is not he?”
Stoker thought a moment, then shrugged. “I suppose if you cannot, then it may not be helped. Perhaps Sir Hugo can find someone else who knew him. A school friend? Another traveling companion?”
“But it might be too late at that point,” I said. “If he is a villain, bentupon some scheme, he may already have accomplished his aims and preyed upon this family.”
“How?” he asked bluntly. “His grandfather’s will was quite specific. With Jonathan Hathaway dead, Charles inherits all. Now that Jonathan is come back—if it is indeed he—he cannot take the house. He cannot get his hands on any of Mary Hathaway’s money, for that comes from her father. The land goes with the house, and I suppose, with expensive legal counsel, he might make a claim for a few head of sheep, but I cannot fancy him with a shepherd’s crook and a dog at his heels,” he added with a smile.
“No, nor can I. But there are valuable things in Sir Geoffrey’s collection,” I began. I was thinking aloud, torn between my desire to protect Harry from his own worst impulses and my duty to expose him for what he was. Neither prospect filled me with pleasure, and I was unaccountably irritated with Stoker that he had not intuited my unsettled feelings. What, I began to wonder, was the point of allowing a gentleman access to one’s bed and heart if he could not interpret a lady’s most irrational moods?
He went on just as if I were not standing in front of him, glowering like a thundercloud.
“Of course, any zoologist would know, the thylacine is the most precious thing in the house, but it will take a proper crate and a few men to move it. And even if he managed to lay hands upon it, what would he do with it? There is no one to whom he could possibly sell it if he wanted to retrieve even half its value without us getting word of it. The world of natural history is a small one,” he reminded me. “And he is not known within its confines. Too many have been swindled by fakery. Collectors with money to burn are cautious now. It is no longer the heady days of Mr.Barnum and the Feejee Mermaid.”
I shuddered thinking of Mr.Barnum’s repellent specimen. He had presented it during the height of the fashion for cryptids, creatureshalf out of myth, displayed to a gullible public audience for the price of a small coin. This particular item had been fashioned from sewing a fish’s tail to the torso of a monkey. One look at the thing and any person of science would have rejected it out of hand, but the average individual yearning for entertainment would be more persuaded by novelty than accuracy. There had been a fad for such things after the publication of Mr.Darwin’s text. WhenOn the Origin of Specieshad first burst upon the scene, many misread its premise of a common ancestor shared by man and ape to mean that men were descended from monkeys—a perfectly ludicrous notion. But the idea was just sensational enough to persuade people to part with their hard-earned money to see proofs in the shape of horrible hominids, patchwork mannequins fashioned of simian limbs and human features. The fact that such grotesqueries were displayed at fairgrounds and pleasure palaces instead of respectable scientific institutions should have been sufficient to ensure their ridicule, but too often I had seen perfectly intelligent and rational people convinced by one of these repellent fakeries. Our intrepid journalist acquaintance, J. J. Butterworth, had even written a series of articles after spending a fortnight with a traveling show. She had pasted false hair onto her face and arms and displayed herself under the bill of the Ape Woman of Nova Scotia, for which she was paid the princely sum of ten pounds.
Before I could return to the subject of Jonathan Hathaway, Stoker dropped a heavy hand to my shoulder. “In any event, all you promised Sir Hugo was that you would try. You made him no guarantees of success,” he reminded me. He dropped his hand and gathered up his stack of paper parcels. Several were marked with the label of a scientific supplier, but the smallest bore a bright red and white string and an illustration of a dancing sweet.
“Honey drops,” he said, grinning. “And now I am for my thylacine,” he told me with an unholy light in his eyes.
I might have stopped him then, told him I had something of importance to discuss. But his attention had already wandered; he was withhisthylacine—I had noted the use of the possessive pronoun. Whatever price Lord Rosemorran paid for it, I was certain Stoker would always take a proprietary interest in the beast.
“Go on, then,” I said, forcing a smile to my lips. “I must clean myself before I befoul Mrs.Desmond’s carpets any further.”
He left me then in a swirl of frock coat and honey drops. I made my way to my room on leaden feet. But in half an hour I had rung for hot water and washed myself thoroughly, dressing in my blue gown once more and sending my tweeds down to be cleaned along with my boots. The pieces of my butterfly net were wrapped in a spare petticoat with the same reverence the Egyptians of old gave to their mummies. I laid the bundle in my carpetbag with a sigh of regret. That net had collected as many memories as butterflies—trekking the lush foothills of the Andean alps, venturing to islands beyond the edge of the world, sunrises and sunsets and every moment in between. How I missed my adventures!
I dashed away a sudden bit of moisture from my eyes and stiffened my spine. This would never do. Being with Harry had resurrected so many ghosts, and my emotions were in tumult as they had never been before. I had prided myself on knowing precisely who I was and what I believed. Yet in the two years since I had come to London, that had been tested, over and again, the bond between my image of myself and my own identity stretched until it had at last snapped. I would have said firmly and without hesitation that I was a forthright person who valued honesty and plain speaking, that I would stride boldly into difficult situations and face them head-on, prepared to take my stand whatever the cost. Instead, I found myself beset by emotion at the sight of a broken butterfly net, hiding in my room as I kept a terrible secret from the one person I ought to have told. Why this devilishconcealment? Was it pure cowardice? I searched my heart and found that it was not reluctance to endure Stoker’s wrath which decided my course. I had withstood his temper often enough—in fact, I have admitted in the pages of my recorded adventures more than once that I found his displays of spleen to be invigorating as his eyes shone and his muscles flexed with indignation or fury. Had I any expectation of his committing any violence, it would not have been so. But Stoker, more than any person of my acquaintance, would never harm me. I knew that as well as I knew my own name. He was incapable of inflicting suffering upon me.
But, oh, how I despised myself for inflicting it upon him! I knew that concealing my past from him would divide us, but the truth would be wounding, I had no doubt of it. It would come as a blow, both the fact of my marriage and the fact of its concealment. I would have to deliver the strike in a time and place that would permit him the agonies he would no doubt experience. Anger, wounded pride, betrayal—these were uneasy sentiments and he deserved to grapple with them privately, not in the company of strangers such as the Hathaways.
At least, that is what I told myself as I left my room, justifying my choice to delay telling him the truth. I was also mindful of Jonathan’s—how quickly I had come to think of him by that name!—unsubtle hints as to his intentions should I reveal his secrets. I split no hairs; I appreciated no sophistry. He could twist it however he liked, but the plain fact was that he had chosen blackmail. He trusted not in my long-dead affection for him but in the fervor of my feelings for Stoker to shield him from the consequences of whatever crimes he chose to perpetrate. And for all his pretty speeches about Lady Hathaway and new beginnings, I did suspect he nurtured some less wholesome scheme to divide that lady from her wealth.
There was only one proper course to be taken, I decided. In order to protect Stoker for as long as possible and to keep Lady Hathawayfrom becoming the victim of Jonathan’s villainous plot, I would have to remain at Hathaway Hall, keeping a watchful eye upon everyone, ready to unleash my own particular hell in defense of those who did not understand what sort of viper they nursed within their bosom.
Refreshed if not wholly persuaded by my logic—I am keenly aware of my own hypocrisies even as I indulge them—I bathed my tear-swollen eyes and dressed for dinner in the one silk gown I had brought. It had been freshly sponged and returned to my room, and I fancied the violet silk flattered my eyes and skin. I took extra care with my hair, plaiting and coiling it atop my head. I felt once more in possession of myself, and it was with fresh resolve that I descended to dinner, determined to keep a firm grip upon my emotions and apply rational principles to my situation. I would watch Jonathan (Harry!I corrected myself sternly) with the keenness of a raptor. I would harden my heart against his protestations of innocence and remind myself that he had engaged in a polite exercise of extortion in order to get me to do his bidding. Well, two could play at that sort of game, I decided. All I required was to find the weakness in his armor. I am, it has been noted by criminals of the loftiest distinction, a worthy adversary, and although it would pain me to view Harry in that light, I would balk at nothing to keep Stoker free from his clutches. Thus determined, I went to dinner in a mood of dangerous optimism.
CHAPTER
17
I was, unfortunately, destined for disappointment. Harry was, in a word, delightful. He flattered Mary, complimenting the dinner as well as the elegance of the table although both were entirely due to the efforts of the sterling Mrs.Desmond. He asked thoughtful questions of Charles about sheep and insightful questions of Stoker about advances in the taxidermical arts. He attended Lady Hathaway with a closeness that would have been called fawning under other circumstances. He even, I was nauseated to see, indulged his erstwhile nephew and nieces when they appeared, washed and brushed and dressed in starched nightgowns to present their scrubbed cheeks for kisses before they retired for the night. He permitted little Ada to search his pockets for sweets while urging young Geoffrey to display the gruesome little cage and its new inhabitant (an unlucky mouse). Even Effie came under his spell as he expressed interest in viewing the rising moon through her decrepit telescope before it began to wane.
He flattered, he cajoled, he entertained—in short, he had them nibbling from his palm. And the occasional glance he darted my way, a blandly innocent look delivered from under his demurely lowered lashes, showed that he knew exactly what he was doing. He evenforestalled my plan to speak with Stoker by challenging him to another game of billiards.
Stoker hesitated, looking at me, but Harry went on, smiling. “You must allow me the chance to win back the money you took from me last night,” he said, laughing. “It is only sporting.”
If there is one thing against which an Englishman is powerless, it is being thought unsporting. Stoker gave me a shrug and followed Harry into the billiards room whilst I took myself upstairs for a sulk. I was determined to wait up as long as it might take to speak privately with Stoker, although I knew Harry would do everything in his power to prevent it.
So I took up a book, the latest Arcadia Brown adventure, filched from Stoker’s carpetbag, and resumed my post in the window seat, fully dressed. The moon was high, peeking out from behind the scudding clouds and shedding a silvery glow upon the gardens below. My book proved rather less interesting than I had anticipated—no fault of the intrepid Arcadia, who was on the hunt for a villainous wretch who had abducted her sidekick and loyal companion, Garvin—and I found myself watching instead the shifting shadows. As I peered into the darkness, one of the shadows seemed to detach from the stone wall, moving into the moonlight, gliding over the dew-spangled grass. I watched as it drifted in the direction of the summerhouse at the end of the gardens. From my perch, I could see the edge of the moor beyond, a vast, inky emptiness. It was uncanny enough in the daylight, but at that hour, it seemed not entirely impossible that it might play host to all manner of spectral things.
As if conjured by my very thoughts, at that moment, a tiny ball of light appeared on the moor. It proceeded towards the summerhouse, growing larger as it came closer, bouncing erratically, as if propelled by some supernatural movement. Light upon the moor could well be a shepherd searching for a lost lamb, but a lantern would have shedwarm, yellow light. This illumination was fed by cold fire, a chill and lifeless blue light that glowed with an unnatural fury.
I threw down my book and took to my heels, blessing the instinct that had caused me to remain dressed. I had no weapon, for what weapons may one employ against the spectral? I had no light, and as I pounded down the stairs to the garden door, I realized I needed none. The clerestory windows permitted enough illumination to guide my way, and I found the garden door unlocked and standing slightly ajar.
I burst through, putting on as much speed as my evening frock and thin slippers would permit. I had gathered the skirts into one hand, lifting them free of my feet, but I tripped nonetheless just as I emerged into the garden and fell heavily. I swore loudly and looked ahead to where the dark, cloaked figure was just opening the summerhouse door. It turned and seemed to stare directly at me from across the green sward, its face shrouded in the shadows from its hood.
“Hold there!” I ordered. The figure in black seemed to hesitate upon the threshold of the summerhouse, indecision writ in every line of its posture.
