A trio of keys, p.8
A Trio of Keys, page 8
“About that. You think the murderer set his room on fire? It wasn’t that Fraser chit?”
Moira Fraser had displayed no erratic derangement that might lead Lord Chalmsley to suspect her of the arson. Why would his lordship expect her to be guilty of it? “The murderer burnt some papers on the bed, my lord. That speaks to a correspondence between Kennington and his murderer. I do not believe Miss Fraser guilty of any crime.”
“Going to tell her that? Or her parents?”
“It would be remiss of me to do so until I have an arrest, my lord. I regret that I must ask that they remain at Chalmsley Court until I have more evidence that will point to the murderer or clear them of suspicion.”
Chalmsley bent back to the ledgers opened on his desk. “If you seek only evidence, then Beatrice has my leave to assist you.”
“Thank you, my lord,” but he left the study with a growing anger, first for the enforced separation eight years before and second for the slight against him now.
Chalmsley had not wanted Hector and Beatrice to form an attachment. Bee, his newly orphaned niece, with an inheritance to manage, could not be removed from Chalmsley Court. The only person his lordship could remove from the situation was Hector, and he had quickly bundled him off to London. Dependent on Sir Richard Ford’s good will and the quickly dwindling competency Lord Chalmsley had placed in the London bank, Hector was forced to remain in London and seek his own way in the world.
Had Lord Chalmsley interfered between Hector and Bee in other ways?
Bee had promised to write. Had she done so? Had Chalmsley intercepted those letters? Had he intercepted the letters that Hector wrote to her from London?
All correspondence to the Court went first to his lordship before being parceled out to the rightful recipients. It would be a simple matter for Chalmsley to pick up Hector’s letters to Bee and burn them. And an even simpler matter for him to burn Bee’s letters to Hector rather than frank them and send them on by post.
None of this mattered now, not after eight years. Bee would marry this summer. She had found a name with a rank attached to it. She deserved more than a no-name nobody with little substance.
With clenched fists, he went to locate his new assistant. After last night’s antagonism, he wasn’t certain how Bee would accept her new role with him.
. ~. ~ . ~ .
When a man loomed close, Bee looked up from sorting her aunt’s embroidery silks. Hector stood before her. Constable Evans, she reminded herself and wished her heart hadn’t tripped faster.
“Lady Chalmsley, I have come to steal away your assistant.”
She thought for a long moment that Great-Aunt Lucille would not acknowledge his intrusion, then she spoke firmly. “I need her. No one has Beatrice’s eye for matching colors. Not that goldenrod, my dear, not with pink.”
“Lord Chalmsley has agreed that she might provide to me several insights into your guests.”
Although Bee gave a quick upward glance to him, she continued to offer the bright yellow skein to her aunt. “Have you ever noticed the yellow center of the pink roses?”
“I have.” Her aunt took the skein then matched it to the pink already worked into the linen. “I would never think of putting those colors together. See, Hector, I do need Beatrice.”
“My regrets, my lady. She will return as soon as she answers several questions for me.”
That sounded ominous. Hiding a new apprehension, Bee dusted snippets of silk and thread from her skirt. When she stood, Hector led the way from the sitting room and into the entrance hall.
She slowed when he turned toward the conservatory. “You have more questions of me?”
He turned, and she was snared by his smiling eyes and the light gleaming on his blonde hair. “I need your assistance,” he repeated.
“I am flattered you still trust my word. May I inquire what special assistance you need?”
“I want your honest opinions of the people here. The guests and the servants. The guests, primarily.”
Quick-witted Bee picked up on his focus. “Then you don’t believe a servant killed Mr. Kennington?”
He glanced around. “I don’t believe so, but I won’t rule it out completely.”
“You are cautious.”
“Without more evidence, I must be cautious. Will you help me, Bee?”
When he asked that way, with a smile and a pleading tone, he reminded her of the youth who had enticed her away from her studies to go fishing at the river or climb trees to catch the summer’s wind or lay on their backs and study cloud formations.
Those days were long gone.
“I will help you, Hector. Yet if it’s an honest opinion that you want, we should not talk in here. Anywhere inside will be too public.”
“I thought the conservatory—.” He stopped as her point was proved by a maid passing through, carrying a coal hod.
Together, they went to the back entrance, with its pegs crowded with outerwear. Bee separated out her old coat while Hector shrugged into a large greatcoat, “big enough for Sampson,” he laughed.
“Not by half,” she countered with her own laugh. “Perhaps big enough for Daniel. He’s almost as tall as his father and nearly as broad.” She led him outside, through the knot garden. The path split, leading to the kitchen garden or Great-Aunt Lucille’s roses or the terraced lawn with its path down to the river. Bee turned toward the river and hoped he wouldn’t stop her from pursuing the longer walk.
Hector followed without commenting on her choice. “Where is Sampson?” he asked. “I expected to see him, and I haven’t. Not a whisker. And Daniel? Are they still on the estate?”
“Of course. Sampson would never leave the Seddars and Chalmsley Court. He and his son are—they’re with George.”
Crows lifted from the lawn and flew to the trees. One remained, stalking over the snow-buried grass. It kept a beady eye on them while the others scattered to different trees then cawed back.
“I understand George is in Europe. Isn’t that dangerous with Napoleon still rattling the saber, even after his disastrous invasion of Russia?”
“My great-uncle believed the importance of George’s rest-cure out-weighed the threat. He is at a hospital in Vienna.”
“He’s ill?”
“Not ... ill. We had a tragic incident here at the Court. We keep this secret, Hector. George attacked one of the upstairs maids.”
He stopped walking. “How badly did he beat her?”
Bee paused, checked to ensure he came with her, then began the long drop to the next terrace. “It wasn’t that kind of assault.”
Her high color helped Hector fit the pieces together. “Rape,” he said, to have it clear.
“Yes. When she fell with child, he denied anything to do with her. I believe Great-Uncle Hamilton intended to give her a pension and remove her to a distant estate.”
“That would not be acceptable to George, not when he denied responsibility.”
“You remember him well. He did learn patience, a horrible patience. When the girl delivered the baby, a little boy, George took him and drowned him.” She choked as if the words damaged her throat.
“Drowned?” Hector expected violence from George, but the deliberate drowning of a helpless innocent appalled him. The shock unlocked the guard on his tongue. “Damn him. How did he escape a hanging?”
“The way he always did.” Her bitterness was as caustic as acid. “The constable was old Sommersby, you remember? He refused to investigate. My great-uncle claimed George was riding with him all that day. How could George have stolen the child while the mother slept? He claimed the girl had no evidence. And she didn’t. No one witnessed George take the child. No one witnessed—.” She pressed her hand to her mouth.
“And Lord Chalmsley smoothed everything over by paying the girl off and sending her away? His modus operandi when I was a boy here,” he explained. “I am surprised that he sent George to this sanitarium. Or is it an asylum?”
“An asylym,” she admitted, “although my aunt and cousins will merely admit that it is a hospital.”
“Sommersby’s no longer in the district. I checked, last spring. Was he pensioned off as well, a reward for protecting the heir?”
“Constable Sommersby is dead. He had an apoplectic fit not long after the girl and her family left. And my great-uncle thought you would serve him well.”
“I won’t serve in Sommersby’s manner. I won’t cover up a crime, not for George or anyone. Was nothing else done except send away the girl and her family? No one protested? I know many here are creations of Chalmsley, but surely someone knew these actions were egregiously criminal.”
“My great-uncle’s riding accident followed hard on the baby’s death. Once George left, afterwards, with Sampson and Daniel as his escorts—.”
“As his guards, you mean?”
She nodded, although she didn’t put her agreement into words. “Once George left for Vienna, no one agitated for anything more. I think everyone was just vastly relieved.”
“We cannot blame George for Kennington’s murder. He is far away in Vienna. Someone must have had a dire grudge against Kennington.”
“I think you do not need my assistance to talk about George, did you? I thought you had a murder to solve.” She took his offered hand to negotiate the icy steps of the lowest terrace. When she tried to loosen her grip, however, he kept her hand.
“Bee, I don’t want—may we speak without last night’s hostility?”
The question surprised her. “I wasn’t hostile.”
“I apologize. Hostile is the wrong word. I don’t want to argue with you. I don’t want us to be antagonists.”
Somehow, his admission breached one of the walls around her heart. Its fall lightened her restraints. “Not even if I’m your murderess?” she teased then was appalled at her question.
He was still the Hector she had known her so well. “Are comments like that designed to set me off? Are you my murderer, Bee?”
“I am not,” she said firmly, reining back any thought of teasing him.
“Will you once more be my friend?”
Oh, that was sneaky. He knew her too well. “I would like to be, Hector, truly, but I need to understand—.” No. He didn’t want her antagonism; he’d said so. Bee determined that she would not set conditions before him. Her heart was not so little. No matter how much the past hurt, she would be his friend. No matter what walls came up, friends supported each other. “I am your friend, Hector. Ask whatever you wish. What do you want to know?”
“The very thing we are taught not to speak. I need your honest impressions of the guests, Bee. Brutally honest, please. I am searching for a murderer.”
When Hector had found his murderer, he would leave Chalmsley Court. She would marry Edmund Tretheway and remove to his home in the faraway fenlands. Bee would never see Hector again.
She swallowed. Tucking her hands into her sleeves, she headed down the sloping lawn. “Do you want my honest opinion of the men and women? Last night, you seemed to focus on a woman.”
“I am. I have. Nine women, to be exact. But your impressions of the men can help me understand the women. I hope. Tell me what you thought of William Kennington.”
She gave a huffing laugh. “Are you certain you want my opinion? You did say brutally honest, didn’t you? William Kennington didn’t like women.”
Hector skidded on the snow-covered grass. “I beg your pardon? I understood that he flirted with several of the women here.”
“Exactly. Mr. Kennington didn’t care when he broke hearts. Not if, Hector, when. He charmed woman after woman, and he didn’t care what results came of his casual charm. He flirted with Portia, so seriously that I thought he would propose. She flitted on to someone else, however, and he shifted his attentions as well. Even after that, they walked together on several occasions.”
He trod beside her, his gaze on the river’s glistening water. His scowl, though, revealed that his thoughts were not on the wintry scene. “Portia did mention that Kennington was hers. ‘He was mine,’ she said. I didn’t know what she meant.”
“They flirted madly for a fortnight.”
“Then she turned her attention to Brougham Paton.”
“The honorable Mr. Paton was not next in line. He was fifth or sixth. I stopped counting. But you asked for my reading of William Kennington. I will tell you that I believe he didn’t care whose heart he broke.”
They had reached the last terrace and had to use the steps to drop over six feet to the lower field that ran down to the river. Again Hector steadied her. “Your hands are cold.”
“I forgot my gloves.” Yet when she would have retrieved her hand, he tucked it under his arm, against his body.
“That only warms up one hand,” she complained.
“I’ll warm this one on the way down to the river, then the other on the way back. Now, give me an example of Kennington’s behavior.”
Bee didn’t hesitate. “I can give you more than one. He would spend all evening focused on a young lady then ignore her at the next party. Even after he proposed to Moira Fraser, he flirted with other ladies. He spent one evening teasing me when he had no one better, poor man. I was definitely a means to stave off boredom.”
He jogged her arm. “You shouldn’t denigrate yourself. I have never found you boring.”
“I thank you kindly, dear Hector. But Mr. Kennington’s main conversation was gossip and fashion. He talked the latest styles so he could touch a young lady’s hair. He talked fabric so he could touch her gown. He insisted that he knew the newest dances and would teach her the steps, lessons that entailed his hand on her waist or hip or neck as he turned her through the pattern.”
Hector stopped and faced her. “Bee, did you fall victim to him?”
“Not I. I watched it happen, though, too many times. And poor Cordelia—the night he died, he had focused on her for a little while before playing up to Lady Paton.”
“Moira Fraser, how did she react?”
She shifted her gaze away, remembering the evening, remembering her pity for both her cousin Cordelia and Moira Fraser and her growing loathing for William Kennington. “She tried to flirt with Mr. Nashe, but he has eyes for Missy Wilton, I think.”
“You don’t like Missy Wilton?”
Bee tried to remember the exact comment that had tarnished her view of the young debutante. “I’ve barely spoken to her,” she admitted. “I dislike her sister, with whom I have labored through several conversations since we met them in London. As for Missy, that girl has the world wrapped around her finger. I envy her. She knew what she wanted, and she snared it.”
“You are calling Alex Westover an ‘it’.”
“I did, didn’t I?”
He chuffed. “Clever Bee. The lord’s heir and little more, is he?”
She smiled sunnily. “Ask about another.”
“Let’s eliminate a few. Who do you like?”
“Are you operating on the belief that my esteem absolves that person of murder?”
His grin didn’t diminish. “I do have to pare down my suspect list. Now tell me, who passes muster in Bee Seddars’ eyes? John Nashe?”
“Except for his fascination with Missy Wilton.”
“Wallace Osgood?”
“A prig. He wouldn’t sully his hands with murder. He’d hire it done.”
Hector snorted. “Brougham Paton?”
“Portia will lead him a merry chase.”
“Barrington Pierpont?”
She paused. “I did not esteem him when Portia snared him.”
“He is betrothed to Cordelia, isn’t he?”
“He is. It’s something else I held against him, the quickness with which he transferred his supposed affections to Cordelia. Yet he treats her so sweetly. He hasn’t lost patience, not once, when she is stressed and has to line everything up with the edges of the table or the desk. He has honestly tried to learn how to manage the estate he will inherit. From a couple of conversations that I overheard—.”
“Eavesdropped on.”
“That I overheard. He has taken over the management from his father and actually turned a good profit for the past three years.”
“Clarence Wilton?”
“That young man is following in his father’s footsteps. He will marry a silly woman who will never realize that her husband is a narrow-minded dictator.”
“Ouch.” He paused then said, “Edmund Tretheway.”
Bee paused. “A good man. Better than I deserve. I really do not wish to talk about my fiancé, please, Hector. He is a good man.”
“Have I omitted anyone? No? Well, then, tell me about the other young ladies. I know your view of Missy and Christina Wilton. I think I can guess your view of Moira Fraser, a little gullible, out of her depth with Kennington. Phaedra Dunham?”
The abrupt change surprised her, but Bee was quick and didn’t hesitate over her answer. “Not a blanc mange, but calm. Serene. That girl has poise. She will go far. Typical, that her father does not have a title or great wealth to promote her higher on the marriage mart. She has managed to snare the Osgoods’ interest. I would not wish to see her married into the Osgoods. She deserves better than Wallace.”
“Daphne Herrick?”
“She seems sweet. I really have no good reading of her personality, Hector. She follows where the others lead.”
“I think she has a tendre for John Nashe.”
“Splendid. That’s a good match, if her parents can be brought to see the sense of it.”
“You don’t think she’s guilty of murder?”
An adamant shake of her head, and Bee felt her chignon loosening. “I have seen no instance of strong emotion from her, and a murder requires an element of strong emotion, doesn’t it? Hatred. Lust. Revenge. Ambition. Jealousy. I don’t think Daphne Herrick is capable of those emotions.”
“You believe the murder was motivated by one of those?”
They neared the riverbank. The current ran swiftly, evidence of the recent snowmelt that still swelled its banks. Bee clung to Hector’s arm and watched the water sweeping bits of debris. “I have considered a motive since yesterday morning. I do not think it possible to divine the murderer from the air. A motive would help narrow the suspects. That is your difficulty, isn’t it? You have very little evidence, and you have very little knowledge of the motive. I would think hatred must drive Kennington’s death. Ambition and jealousy do not fit this particular crime, do they?”
