Page 65 of Secrets of the Heart

“Why do you think so?”

“What else could it mean? I racked my brain trying to think of something. But, I mean, obviously Doreen had died of the sort of illness that could have been poison. Couldn’t it?”

Michael nodded, his eyes never leaving Anthony’s face. “Some poisons, certainly. Arsenic, for instance, builds up in the body. Given in small doses, it makes the person sick but doesn’t kill until enough of it has built up to do so. And it does remain in the body after death—in the hair and nails.”

“It was as if they were threatening me,” Anthony said, fear in his eyes. “As though they were telling me that they could make everyone believe that I had killed my wife. It’s absurd! But then I began to think—how can one prove that one did not do something?”

“Why would someone want to do that?” Michael asked. “Make it appear that you killed Mrs. Birkshaw?”

“I think—I think it must be that they want me to do something for them. This ‘favor for favor’ bit. All I can think is that they are going to ask me to do something I wouldn’t want to or—or, I don’t know, pay them money or something, with the threat that if I do not, they will tell everyone I did it.”

Michael gave him a long look. “So you are saying that someone whom you don’t know decided to kill your wife in the hopes that a few months later they could blackmail you into doing them a favor?”

“I know it sounds bizarre,” Anthony protested stiffly.

“That is something of an understatement,” Michael replied.

“But what else could it be?” Anthony’s expression was frantic. “Why are they plaguing me with these things? Won’t you please find out what happened? I know I have no right to ask anything of you—”

“You are correct in that.”

“But I am a desperate man. I cannot imagine what I will do if—”

“Of course we are going to help you, Mr. Birkshaw,” Rachel put in. “Why, we—he, I mean, is already working on it. Aren’t you, Michael?”

“I am looking into it,” Michael agreed shortly. “My dear, I think it is time we left. Birkshaw.” He rose, nodding toward Anthony, and held out his hand to Rachel.

She took his hand and walked with him out of the room, leaving Anthony looking after them. They had barely gotten out the front door when Michael whipped around to look at her, exploding, “It’s an idiot’s tale! Surely he cannot expect me to believe that!”

“It is exceedingly odd,” Rachel admitted. “But does it not make you wonder why he would make up something so silly?”

“Because he has cotton batting for brains, that’s why.”

Rachel could not suppress a giggle. “Perhaps. But let us look at this logically.”

“I’m not sure that is possible,” Michael retorted.

“Try,” Rachel replied firmly. She felt much better suddenly, and she realized that the reason was that the constraint between her and Michael had vanished. It was like being with James again, words flowing between them freely.

“There are only two possibilities,” she went on. “Anthony either killed his wife or he did not.”

“Agreed.”

“Now, if he killed his wife and everyone assumed she died of an illness, if even Bow Street had investigated it and come up with nothing to show that she was murdered—then why, six months later, would he start the whole thing up again by asking you to investigate her death? What could he possibly hope to accomplish by setting a man known to be superior at investigating things on his own trail? And if, for some reason we cannot fathom, he did do this, why would he then make up an idiotic story as some sort of…I’m not sure what. Alibi, I suppose? A note and a bit of a tin of rat poison are scarcely proof of innocence,” Rachel pointed out.

“I agree. It makes no sense.”

“But if he did not murder his wife, you have the same questions. Why ask you to investigate? Why give this foolish story as the reason? I cannot see why anyone would…unless it was the truth.”

Michael cast her a caustic glance. “Killing her in the hope that Mr. Birkshaw would do them a favor?”

Rachel shrugged. “I admit that it does seem a rather iffy proposition. But perhaps there is something more to it. Something we simply don’t see.” She paused, then went on. “The other thing that struck me was that the fear on Anthony’s face was quite real. I don’t think he is pretending.”

Michael sighed. “No. I saw that, too. But perhaps the fear is that he will be caught. It is a given, you know, that it is commonly the person who benefits who is the murderer,” Michael stated firmly.

“But surely there are times when it is not so,” Rachel argued. In the heat of her argument, she unconsciously laid her hand on Michael’s arm. “When someone else murders them.”

“Yes, of course.” Michael wanted to clamp his hand over hers and hold it there. It took all his willpower to continue walking and talking as if nothing had happened. “I have been working on a case where the most obvious suspects are all clearly not involved in the crime. It’s been bloody hard to solve, too.” He told her the story of the Earl of Setworth’s stolen illuminated manuscript, adding, “I assume that case is the one which Red Geordie went to such great lengths to warn me off from. But I cannot imagine why anyone would have been concerned about my getting too close to the truth. I was not close to anything. It was an utter failure, just like another case about a year ago. My last few cases have been rife with failure.”