Chapter 11 #2
“He said his father wanted her dead, but I don’t feel he has accepted that belief in his heart, in his soul.”
“He may not have; however, I do. His father, our magistrate, deliberately killed his daughter, Georgia Inglewood.”
Cecilia tucked her arm through her husband’s and leaned her head against his shoulder. “But there is no proof.”
“No, and it doesn’t bring us any closer to knowing what happened to Mrs. Jones.”
Coggins met James and Cecilia at the door to Summerworth Park. “You have visitors, my lady,” Coggins intoned formally.
Cecilia cocked her head. “Who?” she asked as they entered.
“A Miss Broadbank and a Miss Sandiford. I have taken the liberty of escorting them to the morning room and supplying them with lemonade and biscuits as I knew with the invitation from the Mortlakes, you would be returning shortly.”
“Thank you, Mr. Coggins,” Cecilia said. She turned to James. “I wonder what these young women want?”
“Most likely something about Miss Inglewood.”
“Yes, I’d best not keep them waiting lest they become doubtful of their errand and seek to leave. Do you wish to join me?”
“No, I’m sure the young ladies will talk more freely with you if I am not around. I’ll go upstairs to tell my valet and your maid we shall be going out tonight so they may take out and press appropriate attire.”
She nodded to him and turned to the morning room.
She paused at the doorway for a moment, looking at her guests.
They looked the picture of misery. That wouldn’t do.
“Hello, my dears! To what do I owe the pleasure of your visit?” she asked walking briskly into the room.
The young women sat side by side on the sofa, holding each other’s hands.
They stood up quickly. Cecilia saw their eyes were puffy and red when they looked at her.
She recognized one of the young women as Augusta Sandiford.
“Excuse us for presumption,” said Augusta. “But we really need to talk to you.”
“I am happy to talk to you. I find, however, that I do not know your companion…”
“Oh! Yes, I’m sorry,” Augusta said, red sweeping up her neck. “This is my friend Martha Broadbank.”
Cecilia smiled at Martha. “I have heard your name before. It’s nice to meet you. Now, let’s sit, and please have a biscuit and lemonade. Cook makes a delicious lemonade.”
She sat in an armchair at a right angle to them.
“So, tell me, what is the matter? What has you all in a dither?” she asked gently.
“Oh, Lady Branstoke, we killed her!” Augusta said, her voice breaking as she forced the words out.
“We didn’t know!” wailed Martha.
“Didn’t know what?” Cecilia asked.
Martha sniffed, followed by a shuddering breath. “We—we didn’t know pennyroyal was poisonous.”
Augusta nodded. She swiped a wadded and damp handkerchief across her nose. “Until you told me pennyroyal was dangerous, that it could easily kill if not handled properly, we just—just thought it was a tea that could get rid of an unwanted child.”
“Oh, I see. You’d never heard Mrs. Jones say anything against it?”
“She did. She stopped us after Sunday service and warned us.”
“But you did not believe her.”
Martha dropped her head to the side, scrunching her nose as she did so. “No,” she said softly, as if she were afraid to speak.
“Why not?” Cecilia asked.
“Because Georgia said not to,” Martha admitted in a smaller voice.
Cecilia sighed. “You didn’t assume it was the tea that killed her?”
Augusta shook her head. “The coroner and even her father—and he’s the magistrate—said it was iliac passion.”
“Why don’t you believe now that she died of iliac passion?”
“Because Mrs. Jones is dead,” Augusta said meekly.
Cecilia looked at them silently as she chewed on the biscuit Cook had provided with the lemonade. It amazed her how completely Georgia had had them under her power. She couldn’t have been all that manipulative and sarcastic to her friends to have earned the loyalty she saw in these young women.
“You’ll have to explain your thinking to me, but we—Sir James and I—believe you are correct in thinking she died from pennyroyal, but you cannot believe you are responsible.
Miss Inglewood asked many people to procure pennyroyal for her, and most did.
Besides yourselves, we know Mrs. Hester, her brother George, the Cathcart twins, and Mr. Vernon purchased pennyroyal for her.
And there may have been others we do not know about.
We’ve been told the apothecary in Maidstone is sold out of the plant. ”
Augusta’s eyes grew round. “It was not cheap.”
Cecilia nodded. “No, I don’t suppose it was,” she said patiently. “Why do you suppose Miss Inglewood asked so many people to purchase pennyroyal for her?”
Martha shrugged, one corner of her lip lifting as she did so. “Because she could?” she suggested.
Augusta nodded, a frown now creasing her brow. “She would want to see who did and who didn’t.”
“Why would that be important?”
The young women looked at each other. Martha turned back to look at Cecilia. “Maybe to see who she could trust?” she suggested tentatively.
“Or perhaps, who she could control?” Cecilia suggested in return.
Martha frowned, her voice edged. “Are you saying she controlled us?”
“Well, didn’t she? And didn’t she do the same with Summer and the Cathcart twins, and try to do so with Mr. Vernon and the viscount?”
“She did want everything just so,” Augusta admitted.
“Don’t you really mean she wanted everything her way?” Cecilia asked.
The young ladies squirmed in their seats. Cecilia decided she’d made her point and given them much to think about.
“Now, what does concern my husband and me is who killed Miss Inglewood. We doubt she would have taken any of that pennyroyal to drink. From everything we have learned, she was not the kind to take her own life.”
“No, my lady, that she weren’t,” affirmed Matha, “and that has had us concerned and confused since the day she died.”
“She did say her father kept urging her to drink the tea to purge the babe and get this over with.” Augusta shuddered.
“I can’t imagine doing that; never could.
Anyway, Georgia wouldn’t listen to him, said there was no need, that she was going to get the Viscount to marry her.
She even told him that her father would help her! ”
Cecilia’s eyebrows rose. “I assume the viscount did not take kindly to that assurance.”
“No, but her father was worse!” Martha said, rolling her eyes.
“I don’t understand,” Cecilia said.
“After we saw and heard the viscount’s refusal, we walked with her back to the Inglewood house. We met the squire on the steps. Georgia was still irritated with the viscount so she told her father to pressure the viscount to wed her,” Martha explained.
“More like she ordered him,” Augusta corrected, “and no, he didn’t like that. If we hadn’t been there, he might have cuffed her.”
Cecilia stroked the side of her cheek with one finger, her brow furrowing as she thought. “I wondered if that wasn’t the magistrate’s way,” she said, more to herself than to the young women.
“We’ve seen evidence in the past, haven’t we, Martha?” Augusta said.
Martha Broadbank nodded sadly.
Cecilia looked between the two women. Thoughts rushed through her mind. If the magistrate was abusive…
“But Georgia, she never backed down,” Augusta finished.
“Were you aware she wrote in a diary?” Cecilia asked, wondering how deeply the young women were in Georgia’s secrets.
“Yes, she actually kept two diaries, one in her bedroom and one in the cottage.”
“Two! Why two?” Cecilia asked. That there were two diaries was not something she had expected.
“She liked writing in a diary, but one day, Mrs. Hester spied her father in her bedroom reading her diary. She told Georgia. Georgia had always been afraid he might, so she hadn’t written about him hitting her or anything like that.
The diary she kept in the cottage was her real diary, and she said she could allow herself to say anything she wanted in that diary. ”
“Why keep writing in the diary she kept in her bedroom?”
“To keep him appeased, and, I think, because it amused her to know he was being fooled,” Augusta said.
Clever, Cecilia thought. “Have you read her diary? Either of them?”
They shook their heads. “No, we haven’t. We went to the cottage after she died to get the diary, but it wasn’t in her hiding place,” Augusta said.
If the Cathcart twins and these young women both knew of the hiding place, it wasn’t a hiding place. Still, she had to be certain that what the twins knew as a hiding place and what the women knew as a hiding place were the same.
“Where was her hiding place?” she asked.
“There was a loose board under the rug she put down. She kept it in there. I do worry where it might be now, and if the magistrate has it.”
It was the same place. That appeased Cecilia’s mind, but to the young women, Cecilia merely shook her head. “I don’t guess he has it, nor even knows about a second diary. I believe his actions, once he discovered it, would have given him away. He is a man who thinks he is inscrutable. He isn’t.”
“We thought she might have burned the diary,” Martha confessed.
“Or maybe Mrs. Jones had it,” suggested Augusta.
“Why might you consider Mrs. Jones would have had it?”
“She was angry that Georgia died. She asked us all a lot of questions, same as you.”
Cecilia blinked, her gaze sliding past her guests. Was Mrs. Jones investigating Georgia’s death? Could that be why she was killed?
Cecilia could not tell them she had Georgia’s diary, so she only nodded.
A nod could mean so many different things.
“You’ve given me a lot to think about,” Cecilia told the young women.
“I’m glad you came to me. I hope I have given you some comfort in the knowledge you are not responsible for the death of Georgia Inglewood. ”
“Yes, my lady,” Augusta said, rising to her feet. Martha hurried to follow her.
Cecilia saw the two women to the door, then turned to find James coming down the stairs.
“I believe you are right about the magistrate,” Cecilia said. “From what Miss Sandiford and Miss Broadbank told me, it appears Mrs. Jones was investigating Georgia Inglewood’s death. That could have been the reason for Inglewood’s rabid declaration that she killed Miss Inglewood.”
James nodded. “But did he kill or frighten Mrs. Jones to her death?” he pondered.
Cecilia sighed. “We still have more investigating to do.”
“But at the moment, it is time for Hugh,” her husband said, taking her arm to lead her back up the stairs.
Cecilia smiled happily. “Priorities. I do like the way you think, my dear.”