Chapter Twelve
“WELL, WE’VE GOT someone else contradicting Mr. Hardy’s story,” said Byron, as they led their horses up the path from town to Jane’s house. They were not going to ride, but instead walk together.
“Yes, it does seem tidy to think that Mr. Hardy is the one lying,” said Jane. “Otherwise, it’s both Mr. Eves and Mr. Seward lying.”
“But it doesn’t quite make sense,” said Byron.
“I suppose we don’t need to know why Mr. Seward was being blackmailed,” said Jane. “Just that he was.”
“Well, we do need to know,” said Byron. “So, I think, tomorrow, we go back to see Mr. Hardy and ask him.”
“Didn’t we just get done saying he was a liar?” said Jane.
“We did, and he may lie, but he may not have anything to lose now and may tell us everything,” said Byron. “Of course, I don’t know when we’ll have time to speak to him, not when we’re going to Farnham to find that midwife, or see if she is some fiction.”
“We should do that first, before speaking to him, because if we do find out he was lying, we can confront him with evidence of his falsehood, see if he changes his tune.”
“Ah, that is brilliant,” said Byron. “Good thinking, Miss Jane.”
She found herself smiling at him.
“All right, how hard must we work to convince your sister to come along?” said Byron. “She will do it, will she not? It will please your mother, since she didn’t like the two of us alone.”
“I don’t know if it will please my mother,” said Jane.
“Should we invite her along, too?” said Byron.
Jane chuckled. “I don’t know. Perhaps. Though I think she would be horribly scandalized when she found out we were searching for a midwife who doles out wild carrot seed.”
“Yes,” said Byron. “Perhaps it’s not wise to tell your mother everything.”
“Perhaps not,” said Jane.
“I THINK IT’S entirely clear,” Cassandra was saying.
It was the following day, and they were all in a carriage bound for Farnham. Cassandra had acquiesced to coming along readily enough the evening before, saying it sounded like a bit of a lark, traversing all over to try to get their questions answered.
Then, she had kept Jane up late asking question after question, trying to get straight whatever it was that Jane and Byron had discovered with their inquiries.
Jane had told her all of it except for whatever the implications were between Byron and Beaumont.
She had been a bit hazy about the wild carrot business, she supposed, mostly out of embarrassment, but she had recounted that as best as she could.
Cassandra had listened to everything and she had said very little.
“You think what is entirely clear?” said Jane.
“All of it,” said Cassandra.
“All of what?” said Byron.
“Mr. Hardy and Miss Seward were lovers,” said Cassandra.
“At least, it seems they were when they took possession of the tavern together. Probably, whatever it was that Mr. Hardy had on Mr. Seward—the younger one, the alive one—it was something that Miss Seward provided for him. But then, at some point, she jilted him and left him all on his own, something he could hardly bear. So, he began to plot a way to get rid of her. He didn’t have any intention of killing her.
He simply wanted to get the tavern away from her. ”
“Why would he do that, though?” interrupted Jane. “Because he does seem very distraught about the inn passing to Mr. Seward.”
“Yes, but Mr. Seward says that Mr. Hardy came to see him,” said Cassandra.
Jane sighed. “I suppose we did say that it makes better sense if it’s Mr. Hardy who’s lying, did we not? Carry on with the theory, Cassandra.”
“Well, then,” said Cassandra, “he went to see Mr. Seward to tell him that he would not stand in the way if the man wished to take possession of the tavern, but when Mr. Hardy got back to town, he saw something that made him too angry not to take action. Perhaps it was Miss Seward with another man, I cannot be sure. But he administered that poison and then took back everything he’d said to Mr. Seward. ”
“That’s what you think?” said Jane. “That Mr. Hardy is the murderer?”
“Oh, quite,” said Cassandra. “And I don’t think we’ll find any midwife at all when we arrive in Farnham. I think Mr. Hardy made that up entirely.”
“You could be right, of course,” said Byron. “It does not look good for Mr. Hardy, I must say.”
“You don’t sound convinced,” said Cassandra. “Who do you think did it?”
“I don’t know,” said Byron, tapping his chin. “I’m thinking that perhaps it’s Mr. Seward, after all. But we thought he was killing her for the tavern, but instead, I think he may have been doing it to keep her from telling his secret, whatever it may have been.”
“Well, how does that work?” said Jane. “Because even after Anne was dead, there is still Mr. Hardy, running here and there, and with full knowledge of the secret.”
“Yes, true,” said Byron. “I think he planned for the laudanum to do away with both of them, expecting them both to be in Anne’s bedchamber.”
“Because, you agree with me that they were lovers,” said Cassandra.
“Oh, likely,” said Byron. “But maybe Anne Seward had a number of lovers.”
“Oh, you would think that,” said Jane witheringly.
“Anyway, this is why he tells us this story about Mr. Hardy coming to him and saying he would not tell his secret, because it removes any motivation that Mr. Seward might have had to do the deed in the first place,” said Byron.
“That does make sense,” said Jane. “What sort of secret would a man kill over, do you think?”
“You think it’s Mr. Seward, also?” said Cassandra.
“I didn’t say that,” said Jane. “I just said that it made sense as a reason Mr. Seward lied, if, in fact, he did lie. We’ll know more about that if this midwife remembers Mr. Hardy.”
“So, then, who do you think did it?” said Byron to Jane.
“I don’t know,” she said. “I really don’t feel as if we have enough information to make an accusation at this point.”
“Oh, fair enough,” said Byron. “Be a coward about it.”
“I’m not being a coward,” said Jane. “I’m just going to wait until I feel I’m right to make a judgment.”
THEY ARRIVED IN Farnham and decided they would inquire at the dry goods store about Amelia Blethens, since it was the first store that they came to.
The man at the counter said, “Oh, yes, Mrs. Blethens lives just outside of town.” And proceeded to draw them a map for how to get there.
So, the midwife was not a fiction, at the very least. She was real.
They gave the map to the driver of the carriage, and then they set out for Mrs. Blethens’s house.
Jane was expecting some sort of hovel that sat under a curtain of trees, hidden away from sight.
Well, it was spring time, so there weren’t much in the way of leaves yet on the trees, but she thought it would be small, some sort of two-room hut, perhaps with dried herbs hanging from the eves and several cats curled up on the small stoop in front.
She didn’t know why she was imagining a witch’s house from a children’s story, but there it was.
At any rate, she was quite surprised, when the house was rather nicely situated, two stories, with a charming garden, and a circular drive where they could pull up their carriage.
The servant who met them at the door was a bit perturbed. No one had been expected, after all, and she didn’t know what it was they were doing there. But she showed them into the house, which was tidy and proper with tasteful decorations, and led them into a sitting room to wait for her mistress.
Cassandra and Jane sat on a couch together, looking all around at the decor in the sitting room—subdued, in grays and blues—and Byron sat down in a chair, clutching its arms.
“This is not at all what I expected,” said Cassandra.
“No,” said Jane. “This woman doesn’t seem to need to be employed as a midwife.”
“Well,” said Byron, “he did say she was sort of a midwife, I think, if I remember correctly.”
They were there on their own for some time, nearly twenty minutes, which they passed mostly in silence, because they were too nervous to strike up any kind of conversation.
Eventually, however, a woman came into the room. She was a serious sort of woman with dark hair pulled severely on top of her head. She carried herself with a certain sense of gravity. She stepped into the room and all of them got to their feet, silent, gazing at her.
“I am Mrs. Blethens,” she said. “I wasn’t expecting any visitors today. You’ll have to excuse the fact that I’m not prepared for such a thing. I would offer you refreshment otherwise.”
Everyone was quiet. Jane had her hands clasped behind her back and was looking down at her shoes, not at Mrs. Blethens. She cast a glance over at Cassandra, who was looking at the woman but not saying anything. Then she cast a glance at Byron who was shifting the weight on and off of his bad foot.
Oh, dear, it was going to fall to her to say something, wasn’t it?
Jane swallowed. “We’re terribly sorry to barge in on you like this, Mrs. Blethens. We only want to ask you a few questions. Hopefully, it will not take too much of your time.”
Mrs. Blethens fixed Jane with her stare and came further into the room. “Questions, you say. What sort of questions?”
“Well, just questions,” said Jane.
“We were told by a Mr. James Hardy that he was with you several nights ago,” spoke up Byron. “Has he visited you lately? We simply need to confirm that.”
“James Hardy?” said Mrs. Blethens. She moved with a purpose through the room and sat down in a chair next to Byron. “What is this all about?”
“Do you know who it is we speak of?” said Jane.
“I do,” said Mrs. Blethens. “Yes, I am quite well acquainted with James Hardy.”
“Have you heard anything recently about the tavern where he lives and works, or about his employer, Miss Seward?” said Jane.
“I heard,” said Mrs. Blethens, “that Miss Seward had died. Is that true?”
“It is,” said Jane.
Mrs. Blethens folded her hands into her lap, shaking her head. “That’s horrible. The rumors say it was murder, but they also say she simply drank too much laudanum. Which is it?”