There was much talk of the fossil and his plans for it. He was adamant that the creature should end in a museum for the twin purposes of scientific study and public edification. One entry was apparently written in a passion, the pen scraping deeply into the page as herecorded his outrage that a portion of the cliff had crumbled away, taking several small bones with it. He lamented the fact that the fossil would be incomplete, although the bones themselves, sketched in detail, were obviously of modest significance, making up the very tip of the beast’s tail. He had carried his complaint to Lord Templeton-Vane, wanting security to be set over the exposed bones, but instead his lordship had forbidden anyone access to the site, explaining that a portion of the cliff had become dangerously unstable.
The last several pages were blank. It was apparent this was the final notebook he kept, proven by the date on the last entry and the thaumatrope tucked into the back. I remembered Merry’s recollection of the little toy and the fact that Lorenzo had intended it for his sister. It was, as Merry had said, a bit of card with a bird on one side and a cage on the other, two strings extending from the sides. I twirled it, causing the little bird to fly in and out of the cage, a simple optical illusion and yet magic to a small child.
I replaced it in the back of the notebook and reviewed the final entry with care. Previous notes were devoted to the fossil and Lorenzo’s regret that Lord Templeton-Vane had forbidden its excavation on the grounds that the cliffs had become too treacherous. Lorenzo seemed to accept this even as he deplored the necessity for it, but the last entry was different. With its bold handwriting and little errors of syntax or spelling, it conveyed a feel for the young man, offering a peek into his personality.
The local villagers seem certain the coming storms will be harsh ones, full of heavy rain and most powerful winds. I do not like to abuse thehospitlty hosipitalyhospitality of my host, but it is a thing that must be done. Of course, the[word obliterated by rats]wishes to help me and I am grateful for the extra pair of hands. I have had a note of conciliazion, assuring me that all will be well. Perhaps we can at last settle the matter between us once and for all. We will slipaway after the others are abed as this work must be secret, but I am uneasy tonight. Has someone been exvacating the bones of my fossil?
I gave a soft cry of triumph. Lorenzo had believed his fossil at risk and was determined to protect it, both from the depredations of late summer storms and from possible thievery.
I turned the page, but this was definitely the last, and dated the night Lorenzo fell to his death. It was proof he intended to go to the fossil and it was proof he did not mean to go alone. It was this passage that persuaded Beatrice someone was responsible for her brother’s death, and I could not fault her reasoning. Lorenzo was meeting someone else, against Lord Templeton-Vane’s contraventions, secretly and in the storm-tossed darkness, for the purposes of saving his fossil. There was the cryptic hint at some quarrel hitherto unmended, and Lorenzo’s mention of his unease. What bone-deep disquiet had he entertained about the night’s work? And more importantly, why had he not heeded it? Was it merely the danger of removing the bones of the dinosaur from a crumbling cliffside that unnerved him? Was it the violation of the rules of hospitality by thwarting Lord Templeton-Vane’s wishes? Or was it the primeval fear of being alone in the dark with a foe?
Of course, all might have been revealed had it not been for the word destroyed by rapacious rats, I thought darkly. I held the book to the light, attempting to make some sense of it with better illumination. It began with “strang,” and by an heroic effort, I managed to detect the beginnings of an “e” as well as the final letter: “r.” “The stranger!” I read aloud. “How very peculiar.” Peculiar indeed because no one staying at Cherboys ought to have been a stranger at that point. The Seven Sinners had been travelling together for some months. The Templeton-Vanes and their staff and neighbours and other guests were not strangers to Lorenzo.
I flicked through the pages again, looking for another mention of the word, and found only two. “The stranger is quarrelsome with metoday,” ran one entry, but the rest of the page was devoted to a sketch of the Pineapple Pavilion done in a puckish style. The other mention was even less instructive. “I must make a decision about the stranger soon. This situation cannot endure.” Cryptic and entirely unhelpful, I decided. I pocketed the book and continued to think. The word “stranger” was a curious choice. It conveyed a sense of alienness, a person apart. Had he meant it playfully? Was it a pet name given because this was an individual with whom he shared little?
But there are other connotations for the word in Italian, I remembered. It may also mean “foreigner,” and perhapsthiswas the meaning Lorenzo intended to record. Of course! I realised with a thrill of certainty. He was travelling with six other men, five of whom were not his countrymen. Only Pietro, another Italian, could be excluded from this list; only Pietro could, with certainty, not have been the person with him when he died. And this accounted for why Beatrice had never suspected her own husband. Pietro had not suffered her vengeance because she understood that he alone of the Sinners could not have been responsible for Lorenzo’s death. Only the others, not Italians, were potential murderers.
The “stranger” was clearly Lorenzo’s pet name for one of his friends, a friend who had engaged in some conflict with him, possibly over the fossil. Instantly my mind went to Kaspar von Hochstaden. He too had been a keen fossilist. Had he resented Lorenzo’s find? Jealousy was rife even amongst amateur natural historians. He might have deplored the fact that Lorenzo had succeeded in unearthing this glorious monster, which promised to be the find of a lifetime. Had he quarrelled with Lorenzo over its fate? Over how the excavation should proceed? Lorenzo hinted at such disagreements with the “stranger,” whoever he might be.
From my conversation with Sir James, I recalled that Lorenzo had a keen sense of honour. Would that honour cause him to include a fellow fossilist in his find even if the glory belonged solely to himself? I had a fair grasp of Lorenzo’s personality, I believed. It seemed entirely inkeeping with what I knew of him that he might have, out of generosity, consulted Kaspar. Perhaps in his moment of triumph, he had reached out to the German to include him and later had cause to regret it. It was all supposition, of course, but it was possible. Whoever the “stranger” was, he had clearly accompanied Lorenzo to the cliff that fateful night.
And whether Lorenzo’s death was accidental or due to some more malicious intent, his companion at the time had never come forward, never offered an explanation which might have given comfort to those left behind. This naturally led to the conclusion that the other party bore some responsibility. It may have been as small as failing to offer sufficient aid or it may have been as calculated as outright murder. In any event, there was a failure of heart, of courage, in permitting Lorenzo’s death to go unexplained.
Little wonder this document had sent Beatrice upon her errand of revenge. With only these few scant lines, she had constructed a plausible hypothesis—that someone had been with Lorenzo when he died and they had failed to save him. Was this worthy of her vengeance? Certainly not, but to a mind already twisted by the devastating losses she had suffered, the injustice of knowing Lorenzo had been robbed of his life whilst his companion had apparently gone on with theirs, it must have made a sort of grim logic. The fact that by killing each of the Sinners she must necessarily have killed a number of thoroughly innocent people seemed not to have troubled her at all. That spoke of a ruthlessness I had not detected in her, and a flaw I must deplore. Justice, for all that the law makes a stranger of it at times, must be carried out with the greatest care.
No justice that imperiled the innocent could ever be true, and Beatrice’s recklessness spoke volumes as to her rage. I did not much care for the common habit of ascribing certain views or habits to a natural character, but Beatrice was a Florentine, and that city had certainlyhad its share of bloody quarrels. Feuds and disputes between families were the stuff of legend, and only by settling scores could one satisfy the family honour. I ran a finger over the little bee cipher on the cover. How obliged she must have felt, the last of the d’Ambrogios, to avenge the lost members of her family—not just Lorenzo, but the parents whose deaths were hastened by his tragic loss. And how much more must she have felt the burden of this, knowing that her own days were to be short in number.
I felt a sliver of pity for her, but no more. I could understand her methods and her motivation; I could even sympathise, but I could not condone. She had ensured the deaths of Kaspar von Hochstaden and Alexandre du Plessis, and she had received her just deserts. Now, it was entirely possible that she had, in murdering them, achieved her vengeance, but I doubted it. Someone at Cherboys had deduced that she was the author of their deaths and taken pains to ensure she could not kill again. Was it to exact justice for Kaspar and Alexandre? Or was it to make certain she could not come for them? It was entirely possible that Lorenzo’s companion that dreadful night was still at large, killing Beatrice to protect himself, eliminating her before she could eliminate him.
Or her, I realised with a start. I turned feverishly through the pages again until I came to the sketches of the missing bones from Lorenzo’s fossil. And I knew precisely where I had seen them before.
CHAPTER
30
The excitement of the chase sped my steps as I hurried along the footpath towards the village. Not even the sight of a particularly handsome Purple Emperor flapping at the edge of the duck pond could slow my pace, although I regretted the lost opportunity to perhaps find a chrysalis to carry back to London and nurture to fruition in my vivarium. But this was too important a mission to permit any deviation from my path. I had recognised the elegant little drawings in Lorenzo’s book. It had taken me a moment to place them, but my mind whipped back to the morning in Wren Cottage. Whilst Augusta and Elspeth made polite conversation, I had spied the assorted trinkets arranged upon the mantelpiece—china shepherdesses and porcelain ducks. And tucked in amongst them, a handful of tiny bones of so distinctive an appearance there was no mistaking them. They were the very bones sitting on Elspeth Gresham’s mantelpiece. I had assumed they were Timothy’s bones, but how blinkered I had been! How could I have overlooked the possibility that the natural historian in the family was not the brother—with his weak head for heights—but the sister? The lonely, awkward sister who preferred books to beaux and fossils to fancy dress.
I arrived at Wren Cottage in a fever of anticipation. I stood upon the step, composing myself as I reached for the brass knocker. I rappedonce, twice, thrice, sharply—as sharply as the judge would rap the gavel to pronounce sentence upon the murderous Elspeth Gresham. I had not thought to bring a weapon beyond the usual minuten tucked into my cuffs and my customary corset blade, but I did not believe she would prove difficult to subdue. I had the advantage of surprise, youth, experience, and a comprehensive grounding in one of the more obscure of the martial arts. If nothing else, a stout scream in her face should shock her sufficiently to render her hors de combat.
It occurred to me only belatedly that it was rather unsporting of me not to reveal my deductions to Stoker, but with the wager on the line and his current mood, I far preferred to present him with a fait accompli in the form of a confessed murderess. I waited upon the step, anticipation rising as I listened to the click of footsteps upon the flags of the hall. Someone was coming near, ever near, and at last the door was flung back. Elspeth stood, enveloped in a starched pinafore, her colour rosier than I had yet seen it, looking almost attractive. A wisp of hair was loosened from her chignon, softening her face, and to my astonishment, she smiled.
“Veronica! You must excuse my appearance. I have been at the canning. The raspberries will not wait, you know. Come through and join us in the parlour. It is the morning for visitors, it seems,” she called over her shoulder as she led the way into the small parlour.
There, lounging insouciantly in her best armchair, teacup cradled in his hand, plate of cake on his knee, was Stoker. He smiled lazily at me as Elspeth surveyed her tea table. The cat was back and with it a spaniel of great antiquity. It lifted its head to peer at me through age-misted eyes, broke wind audibly, then settled back to sleep.
“Oh dear, we’ve run out of sugar.” Elspeth clucked her tongue. “I’ll fetch more.” She bustled out of the room, leaving me alone with Stoker and the flatulent spaniel.
“Hallo, Veronica,” he said, sapphirine eyes agleam. “I see we both had the same thought.”
“I hardly think so,” I said with a tight smile at Stoker. “I have come for avery specificpurpose,” I told him. I turned deliberately towards the mantel, but the bones were missing.
“Looking for these?” he enquired. He held out his free hand, and there, nestled in his palm, were the bones.
“Indeed,” I said, clipping the word sharply.
“I suppose you think they are of significance,” he went on.
“I know they are. There are sketches of them in Lorenzo d’Ambrogio’s notebo—”
