20 Captain Edgerton Investigates
C aptain Michael Edgerton rode slowly down the road to Birchall village, and thence to Westwick heights, home of Mr George Atherton, younger brother to the Earl of Rennington. Mr Atherton, a genial man of around fifty, was at home and received him at once.
“John Whyte, eh?” Atherton said, handing Michael a glass of Canary. “He is an excellent groom, Edgerton. I sincerely hope this is a routine enquiry, and you are not going to haul him off to York Gaol.”
“I do not anticipate that, no, but he is Arthur Nicholson’s natural son, the only one we know of, and he discovered that fact shortly before the man was murdered. Added to which, his family is… well, inclined to be argumentative. There was a rowdy meeting at the White Horse with a great deal of anger expressed about Nicholson, and then mere days later the man is dead. I have to look into it, and would have done so sooner if Whyte had not been away in Lincolnshire with Mr Bertram Atherton. By the time he returned, Shapman had confessed and it seemed unnecessary to look at Whyte. But now…”
“Quite, quite. Shapman has retracted his confession and your attention naturally switches back to Whyte. I do see your point.”
“The visit to Lincolnshire… Whyte did not return with Mr Bertram, I understand?”
“No, he travelled separately with Bertram’s horse, Catullus, and there was an incident at a toll-gate. The horse was slightly injured, and Whyte thought it best to walk him home, all the way from Lincolnshire. Then he was so terrified of arriving with an injured horse that he stayed at his sister’s farm until he was quite sure there was no permanent damage. None of which we would have minded, but he was missing for two weeks with not a word, and we were worried, I can tell you. We had visions of the boy lying dead in a ditch somewhere, and how would we have faced his mother? And naturally we wondered if he had run off because he knew you wanted to talk to him. Bertram entrusted him with a very expensive horse and a purse heavy enough to cover all possible contingencies, so if he had been guilty, he could have quietly disappeared and that would have been the end of it.”
“But he came back,” Michael said thoughtfully. “That alone testifies to his innocence.”
“Yes, indeed. Not that we truly doubted it, since the other grooms swear he was in his bed all night, and I know them well enough to take their word for it. Besides, he is a good lad, Captain, a hard worker and willing, which not all the grooms are. When Bertram marries, he will take one of our footmen to the Dower House and I plan to train Whyte up to replace him. Just whenever we need an extra pair of hands, of course, for he is far too good with the horses to be banished from the stables entirely.”
“The legacy of growing up in a smithy,” Michael said easily.
“Indeed. How do you wish to talk to him — alone?”
“The boy is only sixteen. It might be helpful if someone he knows is with him, if only to reassure him that he is not in danger of losing his place here.”
“Of course. Then I shall accompany you, if I may, Edgerton. Such a reassurance will be most effective coming from me, I warrant.”
They had to wait a few minutes at the stables for Whyte to return from exercising one of the horses, but it gave Michael an opportunity to observe how comfortable he was in the saddle. He was riding a spirited hunter, yet controlled him without effort despite being a shade undersized for his age. His face was aglow with enthusiasm, but as soon as he saw Atherton and Michael waiting for him, his expression froze into sheer terror.
“There you are, Whyte!” Atherton called to him cheerfully, as soon as he clattered into the yard. “Here’s Captain Edgerton come down from Corland to have a word with you. Let Moreton see to Bradwell, and you come into the office for a few minutes.”
“Yes, sir. Of course, sir,” he muttered, dismounting with youthful agility and watching sadly as the horse was led away. It was clear he would have infinitely preferred the mundane chore of rubbing down to the horror of questioning by Michael.
The stable office was the usual scatter of papers, bits of tack, a couple of saddles, and shelves laden with all manner of unidentifiable oddments. Atherton moved things off chairs for Whyte and Michael and himself took the worn leather chair where the head groom usually sat.
“Now then, Whyte, since Shapman’s confession has fallen apart, Captain Edgerton is back in search of Nicholson’s murderer, you see, and you can help him.”
“I don’t know nothing about it, sir!” Whyte said, panic in his eyes. “I didn’t do it, don’t know who did. I were here all night, the other lads will vouch for me.”
“Indeed they will,” Michael said soothingly, “and already have, in fact. So no one suspects you of committing the murder, Whyte.”
“Certainly not,” Atherton said hastily. “No thought of that whatsoever, and no danger of you losing your place here, none at all. But you might still know something that would be useful to the captain.”
“But I don’t, sir, truly I don’t!”
“Ah, but you may not be aware of it,” Michael said. “Just imagine, if you should have noticed something odd, perhaps a day or two before the murder, if you were to mention it to me, it might be the vital clue that leads me to the murderer. Think what a hero you would be then.”
“Oh… a hero…”
“So let us start with you, shall we? When did you first know you were illegitimate?”
“I’ve always known it, Captain, sir. Leastways, I don’t remember a time when I didn’t.”
“What did your mother tell you about your father?”
“Only that he were a married man, an important man, but he were kind to her… special, she called him. A proper gentleman. I were a gentleman’s son, she said, so I were special, too.”
“But she never told you his name?”
“Never. Said it were best I didn’t know.”
“But then, somehow, you found out.”
Whyte shook his head. “Not me. I weren’t there. It were around Easter, when one o’ the Wishaw girls were wed, and ma took most of a bottle of old Ma Wishaw’s gooseberry wine. She came right out w’ it, seemingly, that it were Mr Nicholson done it. Mind you, she remembered nowt about saying it afterwards, but everyone else remembered it, right enough, and two o’ me uncles came up here to tell me. But it’s nowt to me, sir. I never cared who it was got me ma wi’ child. I had a good family round me, and never felt no lack. And now I’ve a good place here, and Mr Moreton says if I keep doing well, happen I’ll end up as head groom when he retires, which is more than I’d ever dreamt when I were a lad. There’s no way I’d ever do anything that’d put me in a hangman’s noose, not when I got prospects here.”
“Of course,” Michael said. “But some of your family were quite angry about it, I understand. There was a meeting at the White Horse one evening, and tempers were high. Or so I heard.”
Whyte shifted uneasily. “Aye, that were me grandda and me uncles. When they’ve had a few, they get a bit wound up. Two of me uncles had bumped into Mr Nicholson one day, and asked him straight out if he intended to do anything for me ma, seeing as how she’s nobbut a laundrywoman still, and he said he didn’t know her! They were spitting fire about that, I can tell you! So they got a bit agitated and talked a lot of nonsense about going up to t’castle to force him to own up to it, but me ma told them not to be so stupid and it all died down again.”
“So none of your friends or relations went off to the castle that night and took an axe to Nicholson?”
“No! Course not! They’d have marched in and thumped him on the nose, maybe, but creeping around at night? Not anyone I know.”
“Can you think of anything odd that happened around that time?”
“Oh, the vital clue?” Whyte said. “I wish I could think of something, but I don’t remember anything out of the way happening. And no one I’ve talked to has the least idea who might have done it.”
Which was no more than Michael had been told by countless others. He let Whyte return to his duties, and tucked his notebook away with a sigh.
“It is a frustrating mystery,” Atherton said sympathetically. “One would suppose there would be some evidence left behind to identify the culprit, but everyone seems to have been virtuously tucked up in bed on the night in question.”
“Not necessarily virtuously,” Michael said, “but tucked up in bed, certainly.”
Atherton chuckled. “Yet one person at least was not, and I do not believe it was merely a passing stranger. It must surely have been someone who knew Nicholson, and bore him a grudge for some reason.”
“That is the very heart of the matter. ‘For some reason’. I can find any number of ways in which the sainted Mr Nicholson was less than perfection personified, but none that would rile a person so much as to plan his murder.”
“It was planned, was it?”
“Oh yes. The axe was carefully hidden away, ready for use.”
“I thought it was part of the display on the stairs? One of my nephew Eustace’s assemblages of weaponry, where anyone could have removed it on the spur of the moment.”
“That was certainly what we thought originally, but experiment showed that it could not easily be removed from the display in the middle of the night. When I tried it, I brought the whole edifice crashing down. It would take the utmost care to remove one item from the display.”
“I see.” Atherton frowned. “So someone saw the opportunity, removed the axe at a convenient moment, hid it away until needed and then retrieved it on the night of the murder. I will not ask how you know all this, Captain. But what will you do now that you have talked to Whyte?”
“I must go back to Pickering,” Michael said, “and pick up the threads that were dropped there when Shapman confessed. Foolish man! So much time has now been lost. And I have taken enough of your time, sir. Thank you for permitting me to see Whyte.”
“Anything we can do to help,” Atherton said. “It is a ghastly business, and the sooner the murderer is apprehended the better.”
Out in the yard, as Michael waited for his own horse to be brought out, another horse was being saddled.
“What a fine creature!” he said, walking all round the animal.
“That is my son Bertram’s mount, Catullus,” Atherton said. “Ah, here he is now.”
Bertram Atherton was a slender young man of scholarly inclination, who would, one day, be just such another as his father, a respectable country gentleman spending much of his time shut away in his book room, letting the world pass him by unnoticed. It was perhaps unfortunate for both of them that the Earl of Rennington’s marriage had been rendered invalid and his children illegitimate, and Mr George Atherton was now heir presumptive to the earldom, and his eldest son after him.
“Captain Edgerton!” Bertram called out, as he strode into the yard, dressed for riding. “It is always a pleasure to see you, naturally, but I am very sorry that Shapman’s confession has now collapsed and you must begin your endeavours again.”
Michael had no wish to dwell on the dispiriting prospect of beginning again, so he made some bland response and then added, “I have not yet seen you since your betrothal to Miss Franklyn. May I offer my felicitations, sir?”
“Thank you!” Bertram said, his face lighting up. His father made a noise that might have been laughter, and Bertram chuckled too. “My family think I am insane, since I protested so vehemently against her when she threw over my cousin Walter and set her sights on me, but I am very happy with my choice, I assure you.”
“Have you set a date for the wedding yet? Mrs Edgerton will want to know.”
Bertram laughed. “Not yet. It all happened rather quickly, so we are not rushing things, but I hope it will be before Christmas. Ah, this must be your horse, Captain. No one else rides with a sword strapped on. Are you going back to Corland? If so, I can accompany you part of the way. I am bound to Highwood Place to ride with Miss Franklyn.”
“I planned to head out onto the moors for a while,” Michael said. “I need to ponder my next steps, and I can do that best if I can clear my head with a good dose of fresh air.”
“Then you may ride onto the moors with us, if you wish,” Bertram said easily.
“With a betrothed couple? I should be very much de trop.”
“Not in the least, and it would reassure Miss Franklyn to have you and your sword with us. She has become a somewhat nervous rider of late.”
“Oh? She had a fall? That can be distressing, even if no injury results.”
“Nothing like that,” Bertram said. “On several of her rides recently, she felt she was being watched. Spied on, possibly. On the last occasion, she was certain there was someone observing her from the woods to the north of Highwood Place. She turned her horse into the trees and gave chase, and heard noises but could not see the fellow. Happily, when she returned to the track, my cousin Mr Eustace Atherton was coming along, and he escorted her home. Since then, I have always accompanied her when she rides.”
“Was she riding alone? That is not a good idea, even without strangers wandering in the woods.”
“She had a groom with her, but she had outridden him, and it was not sensible to leave the track alone to pursue the fellow, whoever he was.”
“If Miss Franklyn does not object,” Michael said thoughtfully, “I should like to see the place where this man was lurking.”
“I am sure she will be happy to show you,” Bertram said.
The two mounted their horses, waved farewell to Mr George Atherton and trotted out of the yard.
Miss Beatrice Franklyn was a young lady of exuberant character, who had set her heart on marrying the Earl of Rennington’s son and heir in order to make herself a countess. When he had lost his inheritance, she had turned her gaze on Bertram instead, and somehow, in between her attempts to ensnare him and his to avoid this fate, they had contrived to fall in love. Even though it now seemed likely that the earl would marry again and sire a son or two to put Bertram out of the inheritance, Miss Franklyn was not troubled by the loss of the title. She had discovered the joys of Latin, and looked set fair to become just as scholarly as her betrothed.
She was delighted to see Captain Edgerton, and very excited to show him the spot where she thought the man had been hiding. Riding ahead of the two men, her abundant black curls bouncing vigorously, she stopped at a point on the track where the trees pressed close.
“In there,” she said, pointing with her whip.
“What precisely did you see?” Michael said.
She thought about that. “A movement. A glint of something shiny.”
“Any sounds?”
“No, not then, but when I turned the horse into the trees, I heard the fellow crashing through the undergrowth. I could not get very far, not without damage to Blackthorn’s legs, so I retreated and it went quiet again. But then Eustace came along, and when my groom caught up, Eustace went off himself to see what he could find, but there was no trace of anyone. He made me think I was imagining it, but I was not, I assure you.”
“Are there Romanies in the area just now?” Michael said.
“Not at this time of year,” Bertram said. “We had a small group of discharged soldiers last year, but they kept to themselves and quickly moved on.”
“I think, if you do not mind, I shall go and have a look for myself,” Michael said. “There may be traces of a fire, or rabbit snares, if anyone was camped out here.”
“You believe me, then?” Miss Franklyn said in some surprise. “Everyone else thinks I imagined the whole thing.”
“But it happened more than once, I understand. And the sounds of a man running away are very distinctive. You would not have imagined that . You will appreciate, Miss Franklyn, that I have a strong interest in any news of a stranger wandering these parts, a stranger who might have been here in June when Mr Nicholson was murdered.”
“Oh!” Her eyes widened. “Then… perhaps I saw the murderer!”
“It is possible. Or it might simply have been a worker taking an unscheduled rest from his labours, who knows. But I suggest you two enjoy your ride together, and I will brave the undergrowth to see what I can find.”
“I think we have the best of the arrangement, Captain,” Bertram said.
Michael grinned. “By no means, Mr Atherton. There is nothing I enjoy more than pottering about in woods looking for clues.”
He waved them away, then led his horse a few paces away from the track. Unstrapping the sword from its carrier on the beast’s side, he fastened it to his belt. He had no expectation that he would need it, but he felt vaguely undressed without it.
Within ten paces, he encountered the problem that had deterred Miss Franklyn, for the way was thick with brambles and other impenetrable growth. He pressed on, however, wielding the sword on the densest patches, hoping his boots and thick buckskin breeches were stout enough to survive more or less unscathed. Before too long, as the tree canopy closed fully overhead, the brambles died away and the going was easier.
It was less easy to be sure he was following the precise direction defined by Miss Franklyn’s pointed whip, but before too long he saw a small clearing ahead and was tolerably sure that this was the right location. A small rise and a conveniently positioned fallen tree trunk marked a comfortable spot where a man might sit to rest. And from there, he could see not merely back to the track where his horse was just visible, but a long section of track that curved away from the woodland. From here, a man with a telescope, say, could easily watch Miss Franklyn galloping along the curved section. She would be hidden by trees for a moment, only to reappear at the more open section where she had stopped and noticed the glint of something shiny — the telescope, perhaps.
The clearing held no clues, however. There was no fire, nor signs that there had ever been one. There were no horse droppings… but no, the man had run away, so he had no horse. Where would he run to? On the far side of the clearing were more brambles and other undergrowth, which presumably he had crashed through as he fled. Not far beyond lay a narrow track running at right angles. That would be much easier going for a man making a hasty escape, but which way would he go? Michael was a thorough man, so he explored both. To one side the track wound away through the woods, leading ultimately to the moors. In the other direction, the track soon led to a much larger clearing, where horses had been tethered quite recently — or one horse on several occasions, perhaps. From there several tracks led off in different directions, but it was impossible to tell which had been used recently.
Michael returned to his own horse in thoughtful mood. He could not find a way to connect this to the murder, for a man would hardly linger in woods nearby more than three months after the event. Yet he could not quite set it aside, either. It was yet another oddity that could not be explained.