Chapter Ten #2
They both turned around to see that Mr. Hardy was approaching them on the street. “I have you to thank for urging me to send for Mr. Fields. Truly, I was not thinking clearly when we spoke yesterday. I would not have had the presence of mind to have done so. So, my thanks, with all my heart.”
“Oh, of course,” said Jane.
“If I was a bit gruff with you both, you must see that I was out of sorts,” said Mr. Hardy. He sighed heavily, looking up at the tavern. “It’s all quite a blow, I must say.”
“Yes, because you and Miss Seward were close,” said Byron.
“And because you are being turned out, I imagine,” said Jane. “You must have lived here most of your life. You worked for the late Mr. Seward here before his death.”
Mr. Hardy turned back to her. “Aye. It is my entire life, everything I know, gone in one fell swoop. And the current owner is in there attempting to sell the place right away. If he has his way, I shan’t have time to pack my things before he has a new buyer for it.”
“Perhaps the new owner will keep you on,” said Byron. “Is that not often the way of it?”
“I don’t think that the men in town, Mr. Eves in particular, wish this to be a tavern after it is sold,” said Mr. Hardy.
“No?” said Jane.
“No,” said Mr. Hardy. “He claims it’s about too much drinking and carousing, but I think it’s because he wishes to serve all the tavern’s customers at the taproom of his inn.”
“Ah, that would make sense,” said Byron. “I don’t rightly care for the fellow, truly, considering he did try to kill me. I have difficulty not holding a grudge about such things.”
“Mr. Hardy,” said Jane, “where were you the night that Anne was… that she died?”
“You were about to say murdered,” said Mr. Hardy. “You still think she was, despite the fact that Mr. Fields thinks it was accidental, do you? Because I have to say, I never knew Anne to imbibe much in the way of laudanum. After the way her father got at the end, she was wary of the stuff.”
Yes, this was likely part of the reason why the late Mr. Seward had not left behind a will and testament. He’d been badly injured, and then gotten habitual about his laudanum use, even after the injury was healed. He wasted away in his opium dreams, as Jane understood.
“I see,” said Byron. “We think someone may have come up that ladder, someone who poisoned her.”
Mr. Hardy’s expression hardened. “If so, I’d lay it all at his feet.” He nodded at the tavern.
“At Mr. Seward’s feet?” said Jane. “Mr. Reginald Seward?”
“He wanted this place and now he’s got it,” said Mr. Hardy. “He stands to make quite a pretty penny on the sale of it.”
“Yes, I suppose we can see why he might be motivated to do such a thing,” said Jane.
“I have never liked that man,” said Mr. Hardy.
“No, I suppose you wouldn’t like him,” said Byron.
Mr. Hardy eyed him. “What do you know of it?”
Byron raised his eyebrows. “Well, very little, truly. Only that he was here after the death of your late master, trying to take possession of the place, and that you sent him off somehow.”
“Oh, is that what they say?” Mr. Hardy’s voice was hard, but it had an edge to it, as if he were quite pleased with whatever he had done.
Jane spoke up. “Mr. Hardy, you have not answered my question. Where were you the night of Anne’s demise?”
He turned to look at her. “Does that matter?”
“If it can be verified by someone else that you were not here, I think it matters rather a great deal,” said Jane. “You can prove you were not here when she died.”
“You think I killed Anne,” said Mr. Hardy, astonished.
“We do not,” said Jane. “That is, we do not know who killed Anne, but if we knew for sure that you were not here, that would mean you were one less person to consider as the possible perpetrator.”
“Well, you can be assured I wasn’t here,” said Mr. Hardy.
“But where were you?” said Byron.
“I was away that night,” said Mr. Hardy with a shrug.
“Yes, but you see, all we have for that is your word,” said Jane. “Were you with anyone?”
“I was,” said Mr. Hardy. “Yes, I went to see a woman named Mrs. Blethens in Farnham.”
“A woman?” said Byron.
“Not like that,” said Hardy immediately, the corners of his mouth turning down.
“Well, it’s neither here nor there if it was like that,” said Byron. “All that matters, truly, is that someone can confirm you were not here.”
Mr. Hardy sighed heavily. “If you insist on knowing, I shall tell you that Mrs. Blethens is sort of a midwife, I suppose, but she provides wild carrot seeds to women who want them. And I was there to procure them for Anne. She would usually go herself, but sometimes she would ask me to do it for her, as if it were simply a normal errand, and I did as she asked.”
Jane bit down on her bottom lip. She was a bit confused. “I thought wild carrot was used if a woman was…” She lowered her voice. “Are you saying Anne was with child?”
“No,” said Mr. Hardy. “No, because of the wild carrot.”
“Right,” said Byron. “So she needed a regular supply of that, and she was always replenishing it.”
“I shan’t go telling tales on my mistress, even in her death, if that is what you are after,” said Mr. Hardy. “If she had been with child, it would have been a calamity.”
“If she would have been with child, there must have been a man responsible,” said Byron.
Mr. Hardy shook his head.
“Beaumont?” said Byron.
“Definitely not,” said Mr. Hardy, shaking his head. “No, no, she had nothing to do with him anymore. Besides, I think she came to discover that Beaumont’s interests ran to the irregular.”
“What do you mean by that?” said Jane.
“Nothing I’d elaborate on in front of you, ma’am,” said Mr. Hardy. “Unnatural sorts of interests.”
“Oh,” said Jane, eyeing Byron, who smirked.
“Is it you, then?” said Byron. “Is she ingesting wild carrot to expel your seed?”
“No,” said Mr. Hardy.
Expel seed?
Jane understood the mechanics of it well enough.
She’d even gotten her hands on Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure once, though she hadn’t read the whole thing, finding it less exciting and more disgusting than she quite knew what to do with.
But, at any rate, she might be innocent and pure, as an unmarried woman should be, but that didn’t mean she was ignorant.
She was entirely certain that wild carrot couldn’t expel any man’s seed once it was, well, planted. She wondered what it did do. How did it work?
“Is it possible,” said Byron, “that she was with child, and that she wanted a larger dose to put an end to her condition, and that this man, whoever he is, found out, was displeased, and did away with both the woman and the inconvenient child?”
“No,” said Mr. Hardy. “She was not with child.”
“You see why we need to know who it is, however,” said Byron.
“You think he’s the man who killed her.” Mr. Hardy’s voice was quiet.
“It seems quite possible,” said Byron.
There was a pause, and then suddenly, Mr. Hardy burst out with, “Eves. It’s Mr. Eves.”
Byron’s eyes widened. “Well, that would explain why he barged into her chamber so easily that morning.”
“Yes,” said Mr. Hardy, “but one thing I don’t understand is what you were doing there.”
“Oh, neither do I,” said Byron. “My memory of that night is rather patchy.”
“I see,” said Mr. Hardy, fixing him with a look of disgust.
“I didn’t kill her,” Byron protested.
Mr. Hardy only shook his head.