Chapter Seventeen
HAVING SPENT THE entirety of New Year’s Day curled into a ball, silently weeping into her pillow, Charlotte was rather hungry when she awoke on the second of January.
She washed quickly in the ice-cold water on the washstand, dragged a brush through the last of Nora’s curls, dressed, and made her way down to the kitchen.
She was pathetically glad that she had pled “ill” after the New Year’s Eve assembly; it meant the only questions she would face concerned her health.
The true cause of her misery—the hollowed, bruised feeling in her chest—would remain her own secret.
Though she did worry that Mrs Mifford—who was something of a hypochondriac—might expect her to recount every symptom in agonising detail, so that she might repeat them herself when the need arose.
“You’re alive!” Mrs Mifford cried gaily as Charlotte pushed open the kitchen door.
Her aunt, uncle, and Nora were gathered around the table, each with a plate of appallingly creative leftovers before them. Mr Mifford was solemnly gnawing on a cold goose leg, while Mrs Mifford sat beside him smearing berry conserve onto a day-old Yorkshire pudding as though it were bread.
“We were worried about you,” Nora said, as Charlotte joined them at the table. “Mrs Mifford had you at death’s door—she was in a panic all evening, so she was.”
“My best funeral dress probably won’t even button after all this food,” Mrs Mifford explained gravely, revealing the true source of her distress.
“And Nora is refusing to make even a simple bowl of porridge until we’ve cleared what’s left over.
Though if you ask me, she’s refusing to cook because she’s still feeling under the weather after the assembly. ”
“I have not refused to cook,” Nora protested weakly, as she poked at her bowl of trifle. It deflated into a soggy mess of cream and runny jelly and she visibly balked, before rallying. “But we’ve a larder full of perfectly good food, and it’d be a sin to waste it. Wouldn’t it, Mr Mifford?”
“That’s very true, Nora,” Mr Mifford said, setting his goose bone neatly upon a saucer. “Though I must observe that your interest in doctrine usually only arises when you wish to deploy it to prove a point.”
Before Nora could argue back, the back door opened, admitting Jane and a gust of chilly air that caused Mrs Mifford to give a squeak of protest.
“Sorry, sorry,” Jane apologised as she unwound the scarf from her neck. “I just came down to check on the patient. I’m glad to see you looking well today, dear.”
She smiled so kindly across the room that Charlotte suspected her cousin knew the true cause of her “illness.”
“And,” Jane continued, shrugging off her coat, “I also wished to speak with Father about Mr Cleeve.”
Charlotte perked up at once; was there news on the investigation?
“Oh?” Mr Mifford murmured through a mouthful of spiced beef.
“Apparently Mr Postlethwaite attempted to blackmail him over a letter he received from an politically minded friend,” Jane said, settling herself at the table and—after a rueful sigh—giving in to temptation and pulling the bowl of trifle toward her.
“Mr Postlethwaite was of the opinion that the contents of the letter would horrify the school governor enough to have Mr Cleeve dismissed.”
Mr Mifford snorted merrily at this. He waved a hand as he chewed furiously on the dried beef and, once he had swallowed, began to explain himself.
“Yes,” he said with a sigh. “Mr Cleeve explained it all to me when he called the morning of the bazaar. He was quite upset, certain that I would remove him from his position. Imagine thinking that a vicar would dismiss a man for believing the world might be improved if the rich shared more of their wealth with the poor.”
“I don’t understand,” Charlotte interrupted, glancing between her uncle and her cousin in confusion.
“In his excitement over thinking he had one over on Mr Cleeve, Mr Postlethwaite forgot that Our Lord had very little time for the rich and powerful,” Mr Mifford explained congenially. “‘It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle,’ and all that. Isn’t that right, Nora?”
Nora nodded in agreement through a mouthful of pudding.
“So, Mr Cleeve didn’t murder Mr Postlethwaite?” Charlotte clarified, her mind whirring as she realised that her shared investigation with the Comte had borne no fruit at all. Except heartbreak, of course.
“He had neither the motive nor the means,” Jane confirmed. “Mr Marrowbone vouched for his whereabouts on the night of the murder—they were together the whole time.”
From the pointed roll of her eyes as she said it, Charlotte deduced precisely where the two men had spent the night.
She bit back a sigh. She and Gabe were no closer to solving the murder than before. Though perhaps it was more accurate to say she was no closer.
Gabe’s interest, she suspected, had always been more intermittent than her own. He had probably regarded the whole thing—her theories, her clues, their long walks—as nothing more than an amusing diversion to pass the days of his visit.
A lark.
Just like his courtship of her.
Self-pity threatened for a moment, but a stubborn spark rose to meet it. The Comte might have tired of the whole affair, but she had not. Her twenty-fifth birthday would come all the same, and if she must face it as a spinster, she preferred to do so as a spinster who had solved a murder.
“Do you know,” she said quickly, pushing back her chair, “I feel a walk to the village might do me good, after being cooped up inside all day yesterday.”
Before anyone could offer to accompany her she sprang from her seat and made for front hall. There, she snatched her cape from the coat hook, rammed a hat upon her head, and gave her reflection in the mirror an encouraging smile.
“I won’t be long,” she called over her shoulder, as she tugged open the front door.
Outside, she found the ground coated in snow so fresh it momentarily dazzled her with its brightness. Once her eyes had adjusted, she ploughed through it with grim determination, not entirely certain where—if anywhere—she was headed.
Think, Charlotte, she urged herself, as she trudged through the snow. She made a mental inventory of all the clues they—here she gulped, quashing a fresh surge of hurt—had gathered.
The deadly brandy—its poison most likely collected somewhere along the London Road.
The subsequent murder—a shovel to the head required brute strength.
Mr Postlethwaite’s meddling in other people’s post—perhaps Mr Cleeve was not the only one whose secrets the postmaster had unearthed?
Inspiration struck then, sharp as the cold air in her lungs, and Charlotte hurried toward the village, urgency in every laboured step.
She found Plumpton quiet beneath its blanket of white. The few villagers braving the cold moved briskly, heads down against the biting breeze. Though there was one person even the weather could not deter.
“You look in a hurry, Miss Mifford,” Mrs Canards called as Charlotte hurried past Mr McDowell’s. “I’m always suspicious when I see someone rushing.”
A sharp retort—that loitering outside the greengrocer’s in the freezing cold was equally worthy of remark—rose to Charlotte’s tongue, but she swallowed it. Instead, she halted her admittedly fast stride and stared at Mrs Canards, as a thought struck with surprising force.
“I know you said you wouldn’t tell me anything about the gossip Mr Postlethwaite promised you, Mrs Canards,” she said, abandoning all pleasantries. “But have you any idea what it was? Anything at all? Perhaps something with a political bent?”
Mrs Canards snorted at that through her scarf.
“Political? Certainly not!” she declared indignantly. “I’ve no interest in politics. Dreadful subject—it gives people ideas above their station.”
Charlotte nodded vaguely, though her heart gave a quick, startled thump. If Mr Postlethwaite hadn’t been preparing to share Mr Cleeve’s secret, then whose? Luckily, Mrs Canards enjoyed speculating about gossip nearly as much as gossiping itself.
She leaned forward, lowering her voice. “No, my dear, by all accounts this was a proper scandal.”
Charlotte’s pulse quickened. “About whom?”
“Well!” Mrs Canards preened, delighted to be asked. “He didn’t say—only that it concerned an ill-advised love affair.”
Charlotte blinked. “A love affair?”
“That’s what he hinted,” Mrs Canards confirmed with a nod, “Before he decided he didn’t need my favours anymore—he probably decided to blackmail the culprit directly. Good riddance to him.”
She gave an irritated sniff as she finished, most likely recalling all the menial labour she had performed for the postmaster without reward.
“Now, if you’ll excuse me, Miss Mifford,” she said, hoisting her basket higher. “I’ve no time to stand about gossiping all day, unlike some. Good day to you.”
She straightened her hat, then marched off along the snowy path, exuding a sense of superiority that might have made Charlotte bristle—had her mind not suddenly leapt ahead of her.
Because Mrs Canards had very possibly solved the case. Quite unintentionally, of course.
Mr Postlethwaite had uncovered an illicit love affair and, finding Mrs Canards insufficiently profitable, had decided to blackmail the parties involved instead. They had clearly thought his price too high… and had decided to silence him.
The only question now was who.
Charlotte’s heartbeat quickened as she set off at once for her original destination—the receiving office.
“Miss Mifford, a happy new year to you,” Tom Boden called as Charlotte entered the shop.
The young lad rose from his chair, an uncertain smile tugging at his lips as he took in Charlotte’s harried appearance. She knew she must look a fright—half-frozen, windswept, and ever so slightly manic—but she didn’t care.