A Dangerous Mourning Read online

  “Was that what Octavia discovered and told to Septimus?” Hester said eagerly. “Perhaps that was what happened?” Then she realized how insensitive such enthusiasm was. After all, Fenella was still one of the family, even if she was shallow and vicious, and now, after the trial, a public embarrassment. She composed her face into gravity again.

  “No,” Beatrice said flatly. “Octavia knew about it ages ago. So did Minta. We didn’t tell Basil because we despised it but understood. It is surprising what one will do when one has no money. We devise little ways, and usually they are not attractive, sometimes not even honorable.” She started to fid-die with a perfume bottle, pulling the stopper out. “We are such cowards at times. I wish I couldn’t see that, but I can. But Fenella would not encourage a footman beyond silly flattery. She’s vain and cruel, and terrified of growing old, but she is not a whore. At least—I mean, she does not take men simply because she enjoys it—” She gave a convulsive little shudder and jammed the perfume stopper in so hard she could not remove it again. She swore under her breath and pushed the bottle to the back of the dressing table.

  “I used to think Minta didn’t know about Myles having forced himself on the maid, but perhaps she did? And perhaps she knew that Myles was more than properly attracted to Octavia. He is very vain too, you know? He imagines all women find him pleasing.” She smiled with a downward curl of her mouth, a curiously expressive gesture. “Of course a great many do. He is handsome and charming. But Octavia didn’t like him. He found that very hard to take. Perhaps he was determined to make her change her mind. Some men find force quite justifiable, you know?”

  She looked at Hester, then shook her head. “No, of course you don’t know—you are not married. Forgive me for being so coarse. I hope I have not offended you. I think it is all a matter of degree. And Myles and Tavie thought very differently about it.”

  She was silent for a moment, then pulled her gown closer around her and stood up.

  “Hester—I am so afraid. One of my family may be guilty. And Monk has gone off and left us, and I shall probably never know. I don’t know which is worse—not knowing, and imagining everything—or knowing, and never again being able to forget, but being helpless to do anything about it. And what if they know I know? Would they murder me? How can we live together day after day?”

  Hester had no answer. There was no possible comfort to give, and she did not belittle the pain by trying to find something to say.

  It was another three days before the servants’ revenge really began to bite and Fenella was sufficiently aware of it to complain to Basil. Quite by chance Hester overheard much of the conversation. She had become as invisible as the rest of the servants, and neither Basil nor Fenella was aware of her through the arch of the conservatory from the withdrawing room. She had gone there because it was the nearest she could come to a walk alone outside. She was permitted to use the ladies’ maids’ sitting room, which she did to read, but there was always the chance of being joined by Mary or Gladys and having to make conversation, or explain her very intellectual choice of reading.

  “Basil.” Fenella swept in, bristling with anger. “I really must complain to you about the servants in this house. You seem to be quite unaware of it, but ever since the trial of that wretched footman, the standards have declined appallingly. This is three days in a row my morning tea has been almost cold. That fool of a maid has lost my best lace peignoir. My bedroom fire has been allowed to go out. And now the room is like a morgue. I don’t know how I am supposed to dress in it. I should catch my death.”

  “Appropriate for a morgue,” Basil said dryly.

  “Don’t be a fool,” she snapped. “I do not find this an occasion for humor. I don’t know why on earth you tolerate it. You never used to. You used to be the most exacting person I ever knew—worse even than Papa.”

  From where Hester was she could see only Fenella’s back, but Basil’s face was clearly visible. Now his expression changed and became pinched.

  “My standards are as high as his ever were,” he said coldly. “I don’t know what you mean, Fenella. My tea was piping hot, my fire is blazing, and I have never missed anything in the laundry all the years I have lived here.”

  “And my toast was stale on my breakfast tray,” she went on. “My bed linen has not been changed, and when I spoke to Mrs. Willis about it, all I got was a lot of limp excuses, and she barely even listened to what I said. You have not the command of the house you should have, Basil. I wouldn’t tolerate it a moment. I know you aren’t the man Papa was, but I didn’t imagine you would go to pieces like this and allow everything around you to fall apart as well.”

  “If you don’t care for it here, my dear,” he said with viciousness, “you may always find somewhere that suits you better, and run it according to your own standards.”

  “That’s just the sort of thing I would expect you to say,” she retorted. “But you can hardly throw me out in the street now—too many people are looking at you, and what would they say? The fine Sir Basil, the rich Sir Basil”—her face was twisted with contempt—“the noble Sir Basil whom everyone respects, has thrown his widowed sister out of his home. I doubt it, my dear, I doubt it. You always wanted to live up to Papa, and then you wanted to exceed him. What people think of you matters more than anything else. I imagine that’s why you hated poor Harry Haslett’s father so much, even at school—he did with ease what you had to work so hard for. Well you’ve got it now—money, reputation, honors—you won’t jeopardize it by putting me out. What would it look like?” She laughed abrasively. “What would people say? Just get your servants to do their duty.”

  “Has it occurred to you, Fenella, that they are treating you like this because you betrayed their vulnerabilities in public from the witness stand—and brought it upon yourself?” His face was set in an expression of loathing and disgust, but there was also a touch of pleasure in it, a satisfaction that he could hurt. “You made an exhibition of yourself, and servants don’t forgive that.”

  She stiffened, and Hester could imagine the color rising up her cheeks.

  “Are you going to speak to them or not? Or do they just do as they please in this house?”

  “They do as I please, Fenella,” he said very quietly. “And so does everyone else. No, I am not going to speak to them. It amuses me that they should take their revenge on you. As far as I am concerned, they are free to continue. Your tea will be cold, your breakfast burnt, your fire out and your linen lost as long as they like.”

  She was too furious to speak. She let out a gasp of rage, swung on her heel and stormed out, head high, skirts rattling and swinging so wide they caught an ornament on the side table and sent it crashing.

  Basil smiled with deep, hard, inward pleasure.

  Monk had already found two small jobs since he advertised his services as a private inquiry agent prepared to undertake investigations outside police interest, or to continue with cases from which the police had withdrawn. One was a matter of property, and of very little reward other than that of a quickly satisfied customer and a few pounds to make sure of at least another week’s lodging. The second, upon which he was currently engaged, was more involved and promised some variety and pursuit—and possibly the questioning of several people, the art for which his natural talents fitted him. It concerned a young woman who had married unfortunately and been cut off by her family, who now wished to find her again and heal the rift. He was prospering well, but after the outcome of the trial of Percival he was deeply depressed and angry. Not that he had for a moment expected anything different, but there was always a stubborn hope, even until the last, more particularly when he heard Oliver Rathbone was engaged. He had very mixed emotions about the man; there was a personal quality in him which Monk found intensely irritating, but he had no reservations in the admiration of his skill or the conviction of his dedication.

  He had written to Hester Latterly again, to arrange a meeting in the same chocolate house in Regent S
treet, although he had very little idea what it might accomplish.

  He was unreasonably cheered when he saw her coming in, even though her face was sober and when she saw him her smile was only momentary, a matter of recognition, no more.

  He rose to pull out her chair, then sat opposite, ordering hot chocolate for her. They knew each other too honestly to need the niceties of greeting or the pretense at inquiry after health. They could approach what burdened them without prevarication.

  He looked at her gravely, the question in his eyes.

  “No,” she answered. “I haven’t learned anything that I can see is of use. But I am certain beyond doubt at all that Lady Moidore does not believe that Percival is guilty, but neither does she know who is. At moments she wants more than anything else to know, at other times she dreads it, because it would finally condemn someone and shatter all the beliefs and the love she has felt for that person until now. The uncertainty is poisoning everything for her, yet she is afraid that if one day she learns who it is, then that person may realize she knows and she herself will be in danger.”

  His face was tight with inner pain and the knowledge that for all the effort and the struggle he had put forth, and the price it had cost him, he had failed.

  “She is right,” he said quietly. “Whoever it is has no mercy. They are prepared to allow Percival to hang. It would be a flight of fancy to suppose they will spare her if she endangers them.”

  “And I think she would.” Now Hester’s expression was pinched with anxiety. “Underneath the fashionable woman who retreated to her bedroom with grief there is someone of more courage, and a deeper horror at the cruelty and the lies.”

  “Then we still have something to fight for,” he said simply. “If she wants to know badly enough, and the suspicion and the fear become unbearable to her, then one day she will.”

  The waiter appeared and set their chocolate in front of them. Monk thanked him.

  “Something will fall into place in her memory,” he continued to Hester. “A word, a gesture; someone’s guilt will draw them into an error, and suddenly she will realize—and they will see it, because she will not possibly be able to be the same towards them—how could she?”

  “Then we must find out—before she does.” Hester stirred her chocolate vigorously, risking slopping it over with every round of the spoon. “She knows that almost everyone lied, in one degree or another, because Octavia was not as they described her in the trial.” And she told him of everything that Beatrice had said the last time they spoke.

  “Maybe.” Monk was dubious. “But Octavia was her daughter; it is possible she simply did not want to see her as clearly as they did. If Octavia were indiscreet in her cups, perhaps vain, and did not keep the usual curb on her sensuality—her mother may not be prepared to accept that as true.”

  “What are you saying?” Hester demanded. “That what they all testified was right, and she encouraged Percival, and then changed her mind when she thought he would take her at her word? And instead of asking anyone for help, she took a carving knife to her bedroom?”

  She picked up her chocolate but was too eager to finish the thought to stop. “And when Percival did intrude in the night, even though her brother was next door, she fought to the death with Percival and never cried out? I’d have screamed my lungs raw!” She sipped her chocolate. “And don’t say she was embarrassed he’d say she had invited him. No one in her family would believe Percival instead of her—and it would be a lot easier to explain than either his injured body or his corpse.”

  Monk smiled with a harsh humor. “Perhaps she hoped the mere sight of the knife would send him away—silently?”

  She paused an instant. “Yes,” she agreed reluctantly. “That does make some sense. It is not what I believe though.”

  “Nor I,” he assented. “There is too much else that is out of character. What we need is to discover the lies from the truths, and perhaps the reasons for the lies—that might be the most revealing.”

  “In order of testimony,” she agreed quickly. “I doubt Annie lied. For one thing she said nothing of significance, merely that she found Octavia, and we all know that is true. Similarly the doctor had no interest in anything but the best accuracy of which he was capable.” She screwed up her face in intense concentration. “What reasons do people who are innocent of the crime have to lie? We must consider them. Then of course there is always the possibility of error that is not malicious, simply a matter of ignorance, incorrect assumption, and simple mistake.”

  He smiled in spite of himself. “The cook? Do you think Mrs. Boden could be in error about her knife?”

  She caught his amusement, but responded with only a moment’s softening of her eyes.

  “No—I cannot think how. She identified it most precisely. And anyway, what sense would there be in it being a knife from anywhere else? There was no intruder. The knife does not help us towards the identity of who took it.”

  “Mary?”

  Hester considered for a moment. “She is a person of most decided opinions—which is not a criticism. I cannot bear wishy-washy people who agree with whoever spoke to them last—but she might make an error out of a previously held conviction, without the slightest mal intent!”

  “That it was Octavia’s peignoir?”

  “No of course not. Besides, she was not the only person to identify it. At the time you found it you asked Araminta as well, and she not only identified it but said that she remembered that Octavia had worn it the night of her death. And I think Lizzie the head laundrymaid identified it too. Besides, whether it was Octavia’s or not, she obviously wore it when she was stabbed—poor woman.”

  “Rose?”

  “Ah—there is someone much more likely. She had been wooed by Percival—after a manner of speaking—and then passed over when he grew bored with her. And rightly or not, she imagined he might marry her—and he obviously had no such intention at all. She had a very powerful motive to see him in trouble. I think she might even have the passion and the hatred to want him hanged.”

  “Enough to lie to bring about the end?” He found it hard to believe such a terrible malice, even from a sexual obsession rejected. Even the stabbing of Octavia had been done in hot blood, at the moment of refusal, not carried out deliberately step by step, over weeks, even months afterwards. It was chilling to think of such a mind in a laundrymaid, a trim, pretty creature one would scarcely look at except with an absent-minded appreciation. And yet she could desire a man, and when rejected, torture him to a judicial death.

  Hester saw his doubt.

  “Perhaps not with such a terrible end in mind,” she conceded. “One lie begets another. She may have intended only to frighten him—as Araminta did with Myles—and then events took over and she could not retreat without endangering herself.” She took another sip of chocolate; it was delicious, although she was becoming used to the best of foods. “Or of course, she may have believed him guilty,” she added. “Some people do not consider it as in the least to bend the truth a little in order to bring about what they see as justice.”

  “She lied about Octavia’s character?” He took up the thread. “If Lady Moidore is right. But she may also have done that from jealousy. Very well—let us assume Rose lied. What about the butler, Phillips? He bore out what everyone else said about Percival.”

  “He was probably largely right,” she conceded. “Percival was arrogant and ambitious. He clearly blackmailed the other servants over their little secrets—and perhaps the family as well; we shall probably never know that. He is not at all likable—but that is not the issue. If we were to hang everyone in London who is unlikable we could probably get rid of a quarter of the population.”

  “At least,” he agreed. “But Phillips may have embroidered his opinion a trifle out of obligation to his employer. This was obviously the conclusion Sir Basil wished, and he wished it speedily. Phillips is not a foolish man, and he is intensely aware of duty. He wouldn’t see it as any
form of untruth, simply as loyalty to his superior, a military ideal he admires. And Mrs. Willis testified for us.”

  “The family?” she prompted.

  “Cyprian also testified for us, and so did Septimus. Romola—what is your opinion of her?”

  A brief feeling of irritation troubled Hester, and one of guilt. “She enjoys the status of being Sir Basil’s daughter-in-law, and of living in Queen Anne Street, but she frequently tries to persuade Cyprian to ask for more money. She is adept at making him feel guilty if she is not happy. She is confused, because he is bored by her and she does not know why. And sometimes I have been so frustrated that he does not tell her to behave like an adult and take responsibility for her own feelings. But I suppose I do not know enough about them to judge.”

  “But you do,” he said without condemnation. He loathed women who put such a burden of emotional blackmail upon their fathers or their husbands, but he had no idea why the thought touched such a raw nerve in him.

  “I suppose so,” she admitted. “But it hardly matters. I think Romola would testify according to whatever she thought Sir Basil wanted. Sir Basil is the power in that house; he has the purse strings, and they all know it. He does not need to make a demand, it is implicit; all he has to do is allow them to know his wishes.”

  Monk let out his breath in a sharp sigh. “And he wishes the murder of Octavia to be closed as rapidly and discreetly as possible—of course. Have you seen what the newspapers are saying?”

  Her eyebrows shot up. “Don’t be absurd. Where in heaven’s name would I see a newspaper? I am a servant—and a woman. Lady Moidore doesn’t see anything but the social pages, and she is not interested in them at the moment.”