Chapter 14 #2
“Does his work allow him to have Saturdays off?” Mr. Armitage asked.
I wasn’t sure. Now that I thought about it, Mr. Larsen had been home when I’d called last time too, and that had been a Wednesday.
He’d also been repairing his own boots and Mrs. Larsen had been baking, perhaps to make ends meet if her husband was out of work.
If they were in financial difficulty, it would explain why they needed money from Pearl.
“He seems devoted to Millie,” Mr. Armitage said.
Yes, he did. Where Mrs. Larsen had no patience for her daughter, Mr. Larsen had it in abundance. He adored her. So if he thought Pearl was going to take Millie away from him, he might have done whatever was necessary to stop her.
I felt sick to my stomach.
Mr. Armitage led the way, his strides long and purposeful. I dragged my feet, but ended up at the same destination. I introduced the two men. By the end, my mouth was dry.
“Have you ever been to the Piccadilly Playhouse?” Mr. Armitage asked.
Mr. Larsen lifted Millie off the cart and put her on the ground. “No. Why?”
“Why aren’t you at work today?”
Mr. Larsen’s jaw set. “I don’t see how that’s any business of yours.”
“Just answer the question.”
Mr. Larsen took Millie’s hand and led her away.
I stepped in front of him. “I need to speak to you, but I don’t think Millie should overhear what I have to say.”
“Then don’t say it.”
“I have to, and I will say it right here if you don’t step away.”
He glanced down at the girl. “Stay here, Millie. You understand? Don’t move.”
I walked a few feet away and he followed. Mr. Armitage joined us. “We know Millie is not your child. She’s Pearl’s, and Mr. Culpepper is the father.”
Mr. Larsen rubbed the back of his neck and his shoulders slumped. He was a deflated, defeated man. “She’s as good as ours. We’ve raised her. No one knows that she’s not ours, only Pearl, Culpepper and now you.” He shrugged. “What of it?”
“Was Pearl going to take her back?”
“No!”
“Did you need more money for Millie’s upkeep?”
“I can provide for my family,” he ground out. “She’s just a little girl. She doesn’t cost much.”
“But you’ve lost your job, haven’t you?” I pressed. “Have you taken in boarders? Is that why your parlor is closed off, because you’re sleeping in there while your boarders rent your bedroom?”
“I don’t have anything to say to you. Good day.”
“Then I’ll speak to your wife.”
“She’s not in.”
“We know she confronted Pearl about money at the Playhouse, and lied to me about it. Indeed, she told me she’d never been there.
I think she learned the layout of the theater then went back the following day and lured Pearl up to the dress circle on some pretext or other then pushed her over the balcony. ”
He shook his head, but his gaze did not meet mine.
“Mrs. Larsen hated her sister, didn’t she? She hated her for being more beautiful, more popular, more talented. She hated that she wouldn’t take responsibility for her child. A child that your wife isn’t particularly fond of. A child she calls simple.”
He stepped forward, his hands curled into fists. He bared his teeth in a growl. “She’s not simple.”
Mr. Armitage grabbed his arm and jerked him back, away from me.
“No, she’s not.” I looked at the girl, taking a tentative step forward, one hand extended in front of her. “She’s quite musically talented. Unfortunately, your wife couldn’t see it, and nor could Pearl. But you saw it. You love her and want to nurture her talent. But that requires money.”
“She can develop her music ability here, without instruments or a teacher. She’s content enough and there’s time later for her to have proper lessons.
I’ll pay for them when I get a new job. You’ll see.
I’ll pay for her music lessons if I have to work my fingers to the bone. We didn’t need help from Pearl.”
He was right. Millie was young. They had time.
So why did they need the money now? It was clear he adored his daughter, although his wife wasn’t quite so loving.
To her, Millie was not quite right. But it was clear to me she wasn’t so simple that she couldn’t function in society.
With some love and patience, she could grow up to be like other girls.
Millie took another tentative step forward. “Papa?”
Mr. Larsen spun around. “Millie, wait!” He raced to her and took her hand then led her back to the cart.
I followed them, watching as Millie felt around, her hands skimming over her surroundings, before settling down. “She’s blind,” I murmured.
Mr. Larsen made sure she had one hand grasping the cart’s edge before he let her go. “Aye. Has been since birth, although we didn’t know for months.”
A woman like Mrs. Larsen, somewhat selfish herself and certainly impatient, would consider a blind child a burden.
Particularly if she didn’t love the girl as a daughter in the first place.
Lady Wrexham had called Millie “damaged”, so I suspected Pearl had told Lord Wrexham about Millie’s blindness and his wife had overheard.
Lady Wrexham and Mrs. Larsen were of like-mind in their view of blindness.
To Lady Wrexham, Millie was a social burden.
To Mrs. Larsen, she was a financial one.
Mrs. Larsen had demanded Pearl give her money for Millie on Christmas Day, and I suspected it was more than the usual monthly amount. And I knew why.
“There’s a school for the blind you want to send Millie to. She alluded to it when I was here. But it costs money, doesn’t it?”
Mr. Larsen leaned back against the cart with a heavy sigh. “The school itself isn’t costly, but it requires us to move to a more expensive area. We can’t afford it, right now. Not until I find work.”
“And your wife did not want the financial burden to fall on you both, so she asked Pearl to fund your move. When Pearl didn’t pay straight away, Mrs. Larsen sought her out at the theater and they argued.
Perhaps Pearl told her then that she was trying to get the money.
But your wife ran out of patience and returned the next day.
Do you know if it was an accident? Or did Mrs. Larsen push her over the balcony on purpose? ”
Mr. Larsen dragged a hand over his face. When it came away, his skin was ashen. “She’s my wife. The mother of my child. I can’t tell you what happened. I won’t.”
I stepped closer, but Mr. Armitage put his arm out, blocking me. He shook his head in warning. “Is that the woman you want raising Millie?” I asked. “A woman capable of murdering her own sister and showing no remorse?”
He squeezed his eyes shut and buried his face in his hands.
“Tell me what happened on the day Pearl died,” I said gently.
Footsteps pounded on the cobbles behind me. I swung around to see Mrs. Larsen wielding a glass bottle above her head. I stumbled back, arms up to protect myself, as she brought it down.
Mr. Armitage caught her wrist, the bottle just inches from my head.
She screamed in frustration, like a starving hawk denied her prey. “Stop talking to them!”
Mr. Larsen stood in front of Millie, his hands at the ready to capture his wife if she got free of Mr. Armitage. But Mr. Armitage held her firmly. He wrenched the bottle from her and gave it to me then forced both her hands behind her back. She spat and snarled, cursing us and her sister.
A neighbor must have heard the commotion and emerged from her house. Mr. Armitage asked her to fetch a constable. She raced out through the arch, past the basket Mrs. Larsen had set down on the ground.
“Nellie deserved to die!” Mrs. Larsen shouted. “She was the most selfish, inconsiderate person you’d ever meet. She didn’t care about her daughter. She’d forget to pay us for her upkeep some months.”
“We didn’t need the money,” Mr. Larsen said. He sounded exhausted, but not surprised or angry. He’d known all along that his wife killed Pearl.
“You lost your job! It was left to me to bake pies just to make enough to put food on the table. We would have starved if it weren’t for me.
Nellie didn’t care. And then you went and mentioned that bloody school to Millie.
Once she got the idea into her head, it was all she spoke about, when the idiot of a girl did speak.
Over and over, every day. It was driving me mad! ”
“She’s not an idiot.”
She scoffed. “I wish Nellie had wanted her back. I’d have gladly got rid of her.”
“You don’t mean that.” He picked up Millie and cuddled her, but the girl seemed unaware of the events unfolding around her.
“You admit you did it?” Mr. Armitage asked. “You pushed her over the balcony?”
Mrs. Larsen tried to wrench free of his grip, but it was useless.
She growled in frustration and kicked out at me, standing directly in front of her.
I dodged her foot and kicked back, hitting her in the shin with the toe of my boot.
She howled in pain. It was the only way to stop her from doing it again.
“I don’t regret it,” she snarled. “Nellie got every advantage in life. It all came so easily to her. From the time she was born, our parents doted on her, their beautiful little girl. They gave her whatever she wanted, let her do what she wanted. And she repaid them by bringing shame to them when she took to the stage. The world is better off without her, and I will not apologize for that.”
Two sisters, both so different, yet one was wildly jealous of the other to the point where it consumed her, and turned her into something unrecognizable.
Was that how my mother and Aunt Lilian were before my mother left to marry my father?
Aunt Lilian told me she’d been jealous of my mother’s easy, friendly nature, her natural poise and intelligence.
If she thought my mother had been given every advantage, could she too have become consumed by hatred if my mother had never left?
But my aunt wasn’t like Mrs. Larsen. She had a good heart and she admitted that she regretted her jealousy. Nor was my mother as selfish as Pearl. The two sets of sisters couldn’t be compared.
The neighbor returned, bringing two constables with her. Mr. Armitage gave them a brief account as he handed Mrs. Larsen over to them. They handcuffed her and wrote down our details then took her away.
Mr. Larsen watched them go, his gaze unblinking. He looked pale and his hands shook as he set Millie down on the ground.
She started humming, rousing him from his stupor. “What happens now?” he muttered.
“A Scotland Yard detective will come and talk to you,” Mr. Armitage said. “Be honest with him and you’ll have nothing to worry about.”
“Yes, but…what happens now?” He looked down at Millie, holding his hand and humming quietly to herself. “I have no work and Nellie is no longer alive to give us money every month. And the school…I can’t afford to move closer.”
“What about the things your wife took from Pearl’s flat?”
“Already sold to pay off debts.”
I clasped his arm, but nothing I could say would help. He was in shock. He’d lost his wife today. I felt sorry for him yet all I could give was empty assurances that all would be well, somehow.
I left with Mr. Armitage, happy that he offered to escort me to the hotel. I was also in shock. I hadn’t liked Mrs. Larsen, but I’d not thought her capable of murdering her own sister.
Mr. Armitage helped me up the step into the hansom, one hand at the small of my back, the other cradling my elbow. “Thank you,” I said as he joined me on the seat. “I’m glad I brought you along.”
He opened the hatch above our heads to give the driver instructions then closed it again. “You did it all, Miss Fox. You worked it out.”
“But you stopped Mrs. Larsen from braining me with that bottle of cordial.”
“It would have made quite a mess.”
I laughed softly, despite my heavy heart.
I settled in for the journey home, our arms touching in the close proximity of the small hansom. His presence was a comfort, but I could never admit that to him.
Once I was back at the hotel, and Mr. Armitage went on his way, I told Frank, Goliath and Peter that I wanted to see them in the staff parlor during their afternoon break. One of them sent word to Harmony and Victor, so that we all met in the parlor at three-thirty.
Over cups of tea, I told them how the investigation had ended. “Thanks to your help, Pearl’s murderer has been arrested.”
“We didn’t do anything,” Peter said. “It was all you, Miss Fox.”
“It was a little bit us,” Goliath admitted.
“Quite a lot actually.” Harmony gave Victor a sideways glance. “Some contributed more than others, however.”
Victor stretched out his legs and crossed them at the ankles. “That we did.”
She opened her mouth to retort, so I cut in before she could rise to his bait. “Does anyone know if Lord Rumford is in his suite? I ought to give him the news.”
“He checked out this morning,” Peter said.
“I thought he was staying until tomorrow.”
Peter shrugged. “He checked out at around ten.”
I slumped into the chair. There went any possibility of getting paid for all our hard work.