A sinister revenge, p.29
A Sinister Revenge, page 29
“Lorenzo, he loved his nicknames,” Pietro said faintly. “Beatrice, his little star. And he called Augusta the stranger because she was the newest to our group. He said it with affection, I think.”
I wondered. His feelings towards Augusta seemed complicated in the extreme. If he, with his burdensome sense of honour, found himself attracted by his friend’s fiancée, perhaps referring to her only by a nickname was a means of holding her at arm’s length. But that was a secret Lorenzo had taken to his grave.
Sir James puffed out his cheeks, his moustaches trembling with emotion. “This is a fine story, if you like melodrama and the destruction of an innocent lady’s reputation. But you’ll find no proof of it because it never happened. And without proof, my solicitors will bring suit against every last one of you. I will hound you until you’ve nothing left but the clothes on your backs and you will have to sell those just to afford air to breathe, d’you hear me?” He looked at each of us in turn, fixing us with an accusatory stare.
I turned to J. J. “That, I think, is your cue.”
Sir James blustered again as she rose and came to stand beside my chair. “Must we be bothered by the tittle-tattle of maids now?”
“This young lady is not a maid,” I told him. “J. J. Butterworth is an investigative reporter frequently published in the Daily Harbinger. She is a journalist of note, and I believe she has a piece of evidence pertinent to this case.”
I gestured and J. J. reached into her pocket. Wrapped in a handkerchief was a small glass bottle shaped like a scallop shell. I turned to Pietro. “Count, do you recognise this bottle?”
“Yes, it is the bottle my Beatrice used to carry her tonic. It is engraved with her monogram.”
J. J. turned the bottle so that Sir James and Tiberius could see the silver cap, incised with b d’a s.
“Undeniably Beatrice’s tonic bottle, the one used to poison her with strychnine—the one Augusta took from her dead body as she lay upstairs,” I said.
Pietro gave a low, mournful moan.
“Where did you find it?” Tiberius enquired.
J. J. nodded towards Augusta. “In Lady MacIver’s dressing room. Not even hid properly, just stuffed into her toilet case.” It had occurred to me that the missing piece of the entire puzzle was Beatrice’s tonic bottle. If Augusta had—as I believed—retrieved it after poisoning Beatrice, she would have had no opportunity to dispose of it. I had instructed J. J. to begin her search as soon as Augusta was released from her room. The fact that she had arrived in the drawing room a scant few minutes after Augusta meant she had made quick work of the task—and knowing J. J. she had hared down to the drawing room so as not to miss a second of the proceedings.
Tiberius nodded gravely. “Incontrovertible evidence, I think, James.”
“You dared search our things! You sneaking, conniving, little—” He surged out of his chair, but before he could lay a finger on J. J., I plucked a minuten from my cuff and drove it into his wrist.
He howled in outrage and fell back, plucking the pin free and sucking at the bright red bead of blood that welled up.
“I’ll have you up for assault for that,” he assured me.
“Do feel quite free to bring charges,” I said with a tight smile. “And I will be certain to make sure that J. J.’s newspaper publishes every detail of what has happened here.”
He puffed again, like an adder will before it strikes, but Stoker raised a lazy finger.
“Sir James, I literally have one hand tied, but I will still thrash you into the next century if you threaten either of these ladies with violence again.”
Something in his face gave Sir James pause, for the baronet changed tack. He subsided into his chair, muttering, his complexion quite puce, as I looked at J. J. She flicked me a glance of annoyance. We had had the situation well in hand, but some men will only ever respect the strength of other men. It was frankly exhausting.
J. J. slipped the bottle back into her pocket and returned to her chair.
After a long moment, Sir James turned to Augusta. “But why? Why would you want Lorenzo to die? You barely knew him.”
Augusta roused herself at last, turning to her husband with a look of contempt. “Barely knew him? I lay with him, James. I knew him, carnally. You made rather a bad bargain in our marriage, I am afraid. You got no virgin bride on your wedding night.”
Angry colour suffused his cheeks. “Augusta, it is not your fault that bastard forced you—”
Augusta’s laugh was sharp and cruel. “Forced me? I seduced him, James. I wanted him. And I had him.”
“I do not believe it,” he said stubbornly. “I cannot believe it. You are unwell, these are sick fancies.”
“Fancies! James, my god, can you not face the truth like a man? Shall I tell you what it was like? Perhaps then you will believe it. Very well. I went to his room. I took off my clothes and I got into his bed. I touched him and I kissed him and we did whatever we liked with one another. It was the only time in the whole of my life I have understood what it meant to be satisfied.”
The lash of her words must have stung him deeply, for James shook his head, dumbly, as a donkey will do when it cannot decide in which direction to go.
Her anger subsided as soon as it had flared, and when Augusta spoke again, it was milder, a note of pity threading her words. “But I did not want to marry him. I wanted to marry you and he would have prevented it. He said he would tell you everything because of his precious honour. You would have broken our engagement and I could not have that.”
It took a moment for the full implication of her statement to penetrate his shock. “Do you mean to say you killed him solely to marry me?”
“Yes, James. I wanted our life together. Our homes. Our boys. And I did what must be done in order to make that happen.”
She raised her chin, daring him to sit in judgment on her, and I realised then she was not sorry. She justified what she had done, and moreover, she would do it again if faced with the same choice.
Something of this must have finally communicated itself to James, because he looked at her in horror. “You do not regret it, do you?” he asked in a hoarse whisper.
“No,” she said, folding her hands calmly in her lap. “I regret nothing.”
“You’re mad,” he said, shrinking back in his chair. “I do not know you.”
“I did what must be done,” she repeated.
“You killed a man!” James said, shrinking further still. “You killed a man.”
“A man who would have destroyed any chance at the life we have made for ourselves,” she told him.
“But Beatrice—” he began.
“Beatrice would have happily killed me for the sake of vengeance,” she said shortly. “You cannot blame me for that.”
“It was cleverly done,” I told her. “Murders committed with audacity and a complete lack of fear. The only loose end was Lorenzo’s notebook.”
“It haunted me,” she said. “I did not even know if the thing still existed or if it had been with the rest of his things. And even if Beatrice had it in her possession, had Lorenzo written anything damning in its pages? I had to try to find it.”
“That, with the tonic bottle, was why you volunteered to sit with her body when she was first carried up to her room,” Stoker said.
She nodded. “Yes. But there was no time. As soon as Pietro left her, I had only a moment to retrieve the bottle before you came in and sent me off to bed. I had to sit up half the night, waiting for James to fall asleep so I could slip back downstairs and search again. I spent ages, looked through everything, but still I could not find it. I began to hope that Beatrice had never had it.”
“It was with me,” Pietro said wearily. “When we quarrelled the previous night, she showed me the notebook as proof that Lorenzo had been murdered. I confiscated it, told her I would keep it with me until we had the chance to discuss things properly. I held it as a bond for good behaviour, told her if she harmed anyone else, I would burn it, this treasured possession of her brother’s. I kept it in my pocket. It was still in my evening coat when she died.”
“And then we come to the matter of attempting to take Veronica’s life,” Tiberius said wearily. “There is no possible justification, Augusta.”
“I pushed her,” she said with astonishing frankness. But she seemed almost relieved, as if she had lived too long behind a mask and was content for everyone to know her as she actually was. “I pushed her quite deliberately. I intended for her to die, and that is premeditation.” She smiled at Tiberius, a ghost of her usual winsome expression. “Is it to be the hangman’s noose for me?”
James, who had been silent through the recitation of her crimes, leapt suddenly at her, hands at her throat, screaming abuse as he throttled her. Stoker and Tiberius dragged him off, pinioning his arms at his sides. Still he flung invective, spittle flecking his moustaches as he trembled in rage. Augusta had scarcely attempted to defend herself, putting her hands up only for the worst of the blows. Her hair had come undone and she smoothed it, her fingers shaking a little as she did so.
Stoker eased James back into his seat. “Stay in that chair or I will lash you to it,” he warned. James’ colour was not good, mottled red and white, perspiration dampening his brow. “You are not my wife,” he said to Augusta as he subsided into his chair. “I renounce you.”
“But she is your wife,” Tiberius pointed out. “And you are responsible for her.”
“I am not responsible for that monster,” James began. He broke off, dropping his head in his hands. “Oh, my poor boys! What’s to become of us? The scandal of it all will ruin them.”
The room fell to silence, broken only by his ragged breathing and the ticking of the mantel clock. At length, I ventured a suggestion.
“It does not have to be their ruination,” I said. James lifted his head. Augusta did not even turn to look, so spent was she by the confrontation.
“What do you mean?” James demanded. “This means the law and prison and a trial, all of it written up in the most lurid newspapers for all and sundry to see. She will be hanged, damn you. And the MacIver name, dragged through the mud and tainted forever.”
“What if it were not?” I asked. “What if there were a way to keep her name out of the newspapers? What if she were not hanged, and no one ever knew about any of this?”
They turned to me as one and I laid out my idea, elaborating and building as I went. When I finished, silence reigned once more until Tiberius spoke. “It must be left to Pietro to decide. It is his justice which must be satisfied.”
James turned anguished eyes to Pietro. “Please, man.” His voice broke as he pleaded. “I do not ask it for her. But for my boys. It is the only way they may have a hope of escaping this. And she will pay. I promise you that.”
Pietro drew in a deep breath, letting it out slowly. The weight he had been manfully shouldering seemed to drop away. “Beatrice believed vengeance was the only way. But I am a modern man. And I believe justice which harms the innocent is no justice at all. I will agree, James. For the sake of your sons.” James gave a broken exclamation of gratitude as Pietro held up a hand to stop him. “But I will have a confession from her hand, and witnessed by those in this room. I will keep it as my insurance that she will never be permitted to go free.”
“Done,” James said, putting out his hand. Pietro took it after a moment, and it was finished, a gentleman’s agreement that disposed of a murderess without so much as a look in her direction.
CHAPTER
35
Augusta was once more locked in her room, but she made no attempt to escape. The next morning, when the closed coach arrived, she emerged, dressed soberly, in a plain black gown, no jewels or fine lace. The coach from Milverton House had brought the director of the asylum and two muscular attendants, who escorted her into the carriage as we watched from the hall. She did not turn back, although the doctor tarried on the step.
“I assure you, we will take excellent care of her ladyship,” the director said to James. “I am only sorry to hear that she has proven insensible to the remedy of fresh air and change of scene that you have provided her here,” he added, looking around. “And I hope that we may, in due course, nurse her back to her full capacity.”
James smiled coldly. “Her ladyship’s reason has entirely broken down. She cannot ever return home, no matter what progress she makes in your facility. Do we understand one another?”
The director, who had been genial, now adopted a graver mien. “We do indeed, sir. Say no more. I will see to it that she is comfortable and well attended, but we shall not anticipate her leaving Milverton House.”
“Correct,” James said. “And we will not require correspondence from her. It would only upset my sons.”
“Naturally,” the director replied, nodding. “These are sad cases, but you must put it behind you now. She is in good hands, and no longer your concern.”
He bowed, lifting his hat as he made his good-byes. Just before he reached the carriage, J. J. emerged from the house, clutching a small carpetbag, Tiberius holding her firmly by the arm.
“Do not forget your other patient,” he called. The director turned back.
“Ah yes. The young woman you telegraphed about. Melancholia, you said?” He peered at J. J., who looked downcast, her eyes fixed upon the stones at her feet. “Yes, I see it. We will be happy to take her into our care. I will write within the week to let you know how we get on. She looks young and healthy enough. I am certain she will respond well to treatment.”
Stoker started forward, clearly about to protest, but J. J. flashed him a warning look as I put a hand to restrain him.
We stood upon the step as the director leapt into the carriage, slamming the door behind him. The driver sprang the horses and they were away. Tiberius guided James back into the house and Stoker turned to me. “Would you care to explain?”
“I owed J. J. a story. She pointed out to me that I have been significantly less of a friend to her than she to me, and I wanted to rectify the situation. So I arranged with Tiberius that she would be committed to Milverton House for a period not to exceed a fortnight.”
Comprehension dawned on his face. “Nellie Bly,” he said, invoking the name of the intrepid American journalist who had recently spent ten days in an asylum, emerging to write an exposé on the treatment of the insane to clamorous acclaim. And not only acclaim; it was hoped that the brutality of the situation of those locked up for their mental woes might be mitigated with proper reform. Already, some institutions were exchanging small, dark rooms and inhumane treatment for sunshine, fresh air, and a little human kindness, and J. J. was determined to accomplish the same in England. Thus far no female journalist had possessed the courage of Miss Bly, but J. J., for all her sins, was never one to shrink from a challenge.
“Precisely,” I affirmed to Stoker. “It required only enlisting Tiberius to help.” Committing a woman to an asylum was, under the present laws, a matter of terrifying ease. It wanted only a man of standing to swear to a woman’s mental state to have her held against her will. And if the man chose, he could have her liberated with equal simplicity. Tiberius had promised to ensure J. J.’s timely release from the asylum.
“I am surprised you got him to agree,” Stoker told me.
I smiled. “J. J. and I appealed to his better nature.”
“I wasn’t aware he had one.”
“He feels responsible for the way matters ended—and for the fact that I was very nearly killed. This is an opportunity for him to help do some real good for once. Perhaps he might make a practice of philanthropy.”
The entire system was one calculated to accommodate abuses of the worst kind, and I was happy to see J. J. championing the cause of the unfortunates who had been locked away from the world. I had little doubt she would effect great things.
“Who knows?” I said to Stoker. “Perhaps she will create such a sensation that our laws will be changed to help those who are most powerless.”
“The very laws that helped us to lock up a murderer,” he countered.
“Her husband did that. We just suggested it,” I reminded him. “And would it really have been a better thing for her to have been arrested? Tried by a jury? Hanged in a public execution for all to see? What would that have done but feed sensationalism? It would not bring back her victims and it would only have created new ones in her children as they suffered through the trauma of having a mother made so notorious.”
“They will suffer for not having her love, her presence,” Stoker said wistfully, looking up at the façade of Cherboys. He had been only twelve years of age when his own mother died, and I wondered if he felt her presence here.
“Is that why you never come back here?”
He nodded slowly. “Sometimes, when I turn a corner too quickly, I imagine I can smell her perfume or hear the rustling of her skirts. A fantasy, perhaps.”
I tucked my arm through his. “Come. Let us walk to Dearsley churchyard. We can cut late roses for her grave. It is time you put your ghosts to rest.”
* * *
• • •
Over the next few days, the remaining guests departed. James mapped out a plan to visit his sons’ schools in turn to explain as much as he could to them, whilst Pietro arranged for Beatrice’s body to be taken to Italy to be buried. Tiberius was able to have Lorenzo’s casket disinterred, and so Lorenzo d’Ambrogio would at last lie in the land of his fathers, his sister at his side. Perhaps this would bring peace to them both. And to everyone’s astonishment, Merryweather accompanied him. He had shown a flair for pastoral work, providing gentle comfort to Pietro in his hour of grief, as well as a surprising capacity for practical detail. There was still one last thread remaining unwoven to this sorry business, but I did not trouble Merryweather to explain why Beatrice had gone to see him the day she died. It was simple enough to imagine what had transpired. There was no erstwhile dalliance with Merryweather, only a grieving sister who had gone incognita to pay her respects to the grave of her brother. Whether Merry had discovered her wandering in the churchyard or found her in prayer inside St. Frideswide’s, it did not matter. She had concealed her true purpose with that particular brand of charm I should always associate with Beatrice d’Ambrogio Salviati. Besides, I was rather abashed at having suspected Merryweather of such indelicacy as an inappropriate flirtation with a married woman. I had grown fond of him, and it occurred to me as we discussed his imminent departure that I should miss him as he embarked upon his travels.
