I had just reached the bucket and lifted the lid when I heard voices. I started, thinking I was not alone in the laundry. But as they went on, I realized they were coming from the area above me. The pair had taken refuge behind the potted trees to the side of the front door and were speaking in low, harsh voices. I recognized them at once.
“I will give you one last chance to let go of my sleeve before I break your fingers.” To my astonishment, I realized that this was Brisbane. His voice was iron, cold as I had never heard it, and I had little doubt that he meant his threat, though I could not imagine what he was doing there, of all places. He had left Grey House an hour before.
Magda’s laugh echoed mirthlessly.
“Oh, I think not. You will not hurt me. There are still some of us who remember Mariah Young.”
These last words were a hiss, and they must have struck Brisbane like a lash, for I heard a scrape, like a quick footstep, and her sharp intake of breath. There was a little moan of pain.
“Do not interfere with me,” he told her. “I will ruin you if you dare.”
“Others have tried,” she spat back. “But you remember that I know who Mariah Young was—and I know how she died.”
He must have released her then, for there was a sharp clang against the railing and the sound of booted footsteps moving quickly away in the dark. And following him into the night was Magda’s laugh, low and throaty, like the rasping call of a raven.
THE SIXTEENTH CHAPTER
Oh, we are lords’ and ladies’ sons,
Born in bower or in hall,
And you are some poor maid’s child
Borned in an ox’s stall.
—Traditional Ballad
To my surprise, I slept rather well that night. The alcohol I had consumed, coupled with the evening’s strange events, proved entirely too much for me. I crept up the backstairs in order to avoid Aquinas, said little to Morag as she got me ready for bed, and was asleep almost as soon as she closed the door behind her.
But I woke early to the muffin-man’s bell, and lay awake, listening to the streets come to life and thinking hard about the previous night. Brisbane’s initial call had been unexpected, but not unorthodox. Whatever malady he suffered, it had been considerate of him to make the effort to warn me that he would be incommunicado for some days.
Father’s call was somewhat more puzzling. I could well believe him capable of encouraging me in as bizarre an undertaking as a murder investigation. What I could not believe was that he actually seemed to be regretting the fact that I had not taken Brisbane as a lover. That Father had never entirely approved of my marriage was no secret. Just before he walked me down the aisle, he had paused in the vestry and offered to take me away—France, Greece, anywhere I wanted if I had changed my mind. I had laughed, thinking him in jest, but after Edward and I had been married for some time, I began to notice things I had not seen before. Father, always a woolgatherer, became sharply observant whenever Edward was in the room. I watched him watch my husband, and wondered what he was thinking. I never had the courage to ask and he never said, but I suspected I knew already. Edward was the sort of man Father universally despised—wealthy, self-satisfied and utterly incapable of thinking or feeling deeply. Father’s sensibilities were so refined, he had been known to lock himself in his study and weep overTitus Andronicusfor hours. Edward had not even wept when his mother died. Father might deplore Bellmont’s stance as a Tory, but he applauded his convictions. Edward had had none.
Whenever the subjects of politics or religion or philosophy arose, generating a heated debate at the March dinner table, Edward would sit with a tolerant half smile firmly on his mouth and say nothing. No matter how fiercely Father baited him, he never rose to it, never offered an opinion on anything more serious than the cut of an evening suit or the vintage of a wine. He let the property at Greymoor decline—the most venal of sins to my own land-mad family. Marches had been taking the notion of stewardship seriously for centuries. We could no more leave a field unploughed or a hedgerow untended than we could keep from breathing. I remembered one conversation in particular. There had been a spirited disagreement regarding enclosure and my brother Benedick had appealed to Edward for his opinion. This was early days yet, when they had not realized that he was never going to take an interest in such things. They had all looked to Edward, eager for his view. He had simply smiled his sweet, sleepy smile and lifted his glass.
“Brother Benedick,” he had said, “I cannot think of such things when there is wine such as this to drink. You must tell me the name of your agent,” he concluded, turning to my father.
This was a blind, of course. Edward might like to discuss vintages, but he never bothered to keep them straight. His own cellar was a disgrace, not because he lacked the intellect to stock it properly, but because he lacked the initiative. Quite simply, he was the most indolent person I have ever known.
And just then, Benedick must have realized it, too, for I heard him as Father began to discuss the wine, mutter under his breath, “Bloody useless.” I raised my eyes just in time to see the tiny smile flicker over Olivia’s lips and the way Bellmont was carefully studying his plate. They all thought so. But Olivia’s smile was not malicious, and Benedick, for his disapproval, did not actually dislike Edward. They deplored his lack of energy, his casual ways and his refusal to properly manage his land, but they all liked him in spite of themselves. He had a way of endearing himself to people, a manner of charming them with clever conversation and self-deprecating humour that made them in turn feel quite witty. Everyone always felt brighter and sharper and more brilliant when Edward was one of our number.
“He is a diamond-polisher,” Portia once told me, and she was correct. He had a gift of being able to take one’s feeble little quips and shine them up into real cleverness. He never read books, and rarely newspapers, except to see if his name was mentioned. But he always seemed to know what was being said, and about whom, who was doing what, and to whom. I suspected it was this ability to keep his finger firmly on society’s pulse that multiplied the respectable fortune he had inherited into a tiny empire by the time of his death. He listened closely when others talked, and people always talked freely around him. He always cocked his head toward the person to whom he was speaking, enveloping them both in a warm intimacy. He knew just what questions to ask, and did so without anyone ever feeling that he had been intrusive or prying. He always prised just the precise nugget of information he needed, then passed it along to his man of affairs with instructions on how to act upon it.
I knew none of this until after his death, of course. It came out during a long session with the solicitor, Mr. Teasdale. We were making an exhaustive tour of Edward’s investments, and I was expressing my astonishment that his affairs had been so sophisticated, so diversified and far-thinking. Mr. Teasdale finally explained to me about Edward’s business practices, shamefacedly, as if it was something slightly tawdry. But ingenious, just the same, and behind Mr. Teasdale’s demure expression lay more than a little admiration for Edward’s abilities. I did not bother to explain to Mr. Teasdale that he might have saved his adulation. Edward had only engaged in his pony tricks for his own amusement. If making money had required anything more demanding than gossiping with friends and penning occasional letters to his agent, he would never have bothered.
It was rather like his pretensions to collecting art. Edward loved landscapes and would often come upon one that he loved at a friend’s home. A discreet inquiry would be made and, if his friend was amenable, a quiet sale would be arranged. But Edward would never have troubled to actually visit a gallery, or worse yet, commission an artist for himself. Even his tailor knew better than to require more than two fittings for any garment as Edward simply could not be bothered. He liked things that came easily to him—his inheritance, money, me.
It was highly interesting to me to see that what I always thought of as Edward’s little game—spending time quietly drawing people out of themselves—had in fact been an extremely lucrative business practice. I thought of all the people who had said to me over the years that Edward was such a wonderful listener, so very compassionate and feeling. They always envied me, although they needn’t have bothered. I was the one person Edward rarely listened to, simply because we were so seldom together.
But everyone else felt the warmth of his sunny attentions, never realizing that there was something slightly chilly and shadowy behind them. I found myself staring at my bedroom ceiling—pale bluish-grey, Edward’s choice—and wondering if anyone had guessed that his interest in them had been more calculating than convivial. Had someone been hurt by this? Betrayed, even? Could such a thing drive a person to murder? Possibly, under the right circumstances.
But what were the right circumstances? And what sort of person?
I toyed with that question while I listened to the cabs beginning to rattle down Curzon Street. Traffic was becoming appalling in London and I was longing for the country. I usually decamped by May, but not this year, I feared. Last year, just after Edward’s death, I had taken Simon to Bellmont Abbey. The journey was slow, in deference to his failing health, but he had loved it. He felt well enough to have his Bath chair out in the garden where we spent long hours, reading and working on word puzzles together. I painted sometimes, very badly, and we talked or remained silent as the mood took us. His cheeks were brown by the time we came back to London in September, but the city air was a vicious change. He took to his bed again immediately, his cough bad, his colour worse. That summer had been his last rally. Since then his strength had continued to ebb and I knew that if I tried to take him back to Sussex again he would not survive the journey. Even if Brisbane and I concluded our investigation, I would not leave Simon.
But I would regret the summer in the country, I knew. I would miss the fresh, jeweled berries and the sprightly games of croquet, the long sunny afternoons on the lawn stretching from luncheon to tea, the turns on the lake in the ancient rowboat Father kept, the thin muslin gowns that seemed almost indecent after the thick winter garments we had worn in town. Well, I could at least walk in the Park and instruct Cook to purchase berries, I supposed. There was no substitute for the long walks over the Downs, but I made a mental note to order some lighter things from the dressmakers and returned to my ruminations.
Father—and his curious visit. Now that I thought on it, it did not much surprise me that he suggested I take a lover, however discreet he had been. I must have been a sad disappointment to him with my quiet, conventional ways. I had sometimes caught him looking at me with a pensive, almost wistful air, as if he were waiting hopefully for me to do something dashing and romantic and decidedly Marchian. With a legacy of seven centuries of elopements, abandonments, disinheritings, and the occasional execution to spice things up, nothing I did would shock him greatly. And perhaps he and Portia were correct. Perhaps the attention of a man who appreciated me would prove a balm….
