Chapter 33
Arrested
It did not surprise, but it grieved …
Jane Austen, Persuasion
When Rosalind stepped back into the parlor, she found Mrs. Lynn standing by the window. She had lifted the curtain just a little and was staring down into the yard.
“You heard,” said Rosalind.
A mirthless smile flickered across Mrs. Lynn’s features. “Eavesdropping is another of my bad habits, I’m afraid.”
“I did not know this was going to happen.”
Mrs. Lynn looked directly at her. For the first time, Rosalind thought she might be seeing the real woman underneath the many facades. She was tired, but clearheaded. Her eyes were sharp and the intelligence behind them unsparing.
Rosalind, much to her own surprise, felt her throat tighten from Mrs. Lynn’s pointed scrutiny.
“No, I don’t think you did know,” said Mrs. Lynn at last. “But I should have.”
“The sheriff will not be prepared to wait for long,” said Rosalind.
Mrs. Lynn’s gaze flickered toward the door.
“Don’t,” said Rosalind urgently. “It is bad enough you decided to leave in the middle of the night. If you try to run now, you will be hunted, and will very likely be caught. As it is, there will be little sympathy for you with the courts or the public, given the nature of the crime. If there is a chase, you will be even more sensationalized, and by the time you do reach the Magistrates’ Court you will have lost all your chances.
If you are cooperative and humble, there remains the possibility you will save your own life. ”
At the words “cooperative and humble,” Mrs. Lynn’s mirthless smile returned.
“Then you do believe me?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” Rosalind admitted. “But I believe there are some questions that should be answered.”
“Will you help me?”
Rosalind hesitated. A thousand different thoughts and feelings surged through her, but she had no time to resolve any of them.
“If I can,” she said. It was the closest she had to an honest answer.
“Well,” said Mrs. Lynn. “That’s all I can expect, and probably more than I deserve.” She batted fruitlessly at her skirts and then reclaimed her bonnet and gloves, and picked up her portmanteau. “How convenient it is that I’m already packed. Shall we go?”
Mrs. Lynn’s formal arrest proved a remarkably swift and efficient affair.
When she and Rosalind came downstairs, Mrs. Leigh took them to the mews that ran between the inn and the stables.
A clearly bored and much bewhiskered driver slouched on the box of a closed carriage.
A raw-boned man with a long, horsey face and an equally bored demeanor slouched against its side.
Rosalind recognized this man as the sheriff by his staff of office, which he rested casually against his shoulder.
As they approached him, he straightened, and dropped one broad hand on Mrs. Lynn’s shoulder.
“Mrs. Sylvia Lynn, I hearby arrest you in the king’s name,” he intoned. “And do charge you with the willful murder of Sir Anthony Thomas Whittiker Kinsdale, baronet.”
“I am innocent,” she told him calmly.
“Doubt that,” he replied with equal calm. “But it’s not my concern. In you get.” He opened the door to the closed carriage and let her climb inside.
Rosalind stood, silently enraged at her uselessness. Surely there must be something she could do, some assurance or understanding she could give.
But there was nothing. She watched the driver touch up his horses and set them walking almost daintily down the narrow alley. They took the corner carefully and without scraping the side of the carriage against any wall, and then disappeared from sight.
Rosalind’s mind was an unaccustomed blank as she returned to the inn’s common room. She was aware that Mrs. Leigh watched her with a mix of indignation and pity, but she found she did not have the energy to stop and speak with her.
I will apologize later. And explain.
She climbed the stairs to the parlor and closed the door. She sat down and—because she could not think what else to do—she poured herself a cup of tea. She sat there for a long time, not drinking, just holding the cup, staring at the curtained window and trying to organize her churning thoughts.
It was then she noticed that a letter had been propped up on the mantelpiece. She set her cup aside and went to get it. She recognized the hand at once as belonging to Sanderson Faulks.
Her heart leapt into her throat. Rosalind quickly broke the seal and opened the letter.
My dear Miss Thorne: (she read)
Sanderson had beautiful handwriting, although, perhaps he was overfond of curls and flourishes.
I am writing on behalf of your many London friends. We are all very pleased to tell you that through the diligence of Mr. Littlefield and Miss McGowan (both of whom send their fondest greetings), we were able to locate that young lady who called on you so unexpectedly the other day.
You will not be surprised to learn that she is not the schoolgirl she represented herself as. Indeed, Miss McGowan was able to trace her to the gaming club, Barron’s. There she proved to be very familiar not only with the roulette wheel, but several of the gentlemen who were playing.
A conversation with a friend (who is himself a habitué of Barron’s) revealed that our adventurous miss is one of that company of fair ladies who are allowed entry to the club in order to encourage the gentlemen to drink more, play more, and generally spend as freely as possible.
He also said that she was reported to be operating in her own line of business, quite apart from the interests of the club owners.
It would seem that once the young lady has made herself fully agreeable to a gentleman, he is then induced to take what we may assume is a fatherly interest in her affairs.
She will tell him of some venture she has encountered, and beg him to look it over for her and advise her as to whether it is sound enough for her to risk investing her tiny savings.
This the gentleman does—again I refer to that fatherly concern—and in the end, he generally bolsters her “investment” with some amount of his own.
I will not insult your intelligence—or that of Mr. Harkness, with whom you are surely sharing this letter—by suggesting that anything happens with this money other than that it vanishes entirely.
My friend says that her current scheme is related to horse racing, and either the purchase of, or investment in, a thoroughbred who is guaranteed to win its race. I cannot believe that this is all there is to the tale, however …
Rosalind got no further. The parlor door opened, and Adam entered, his expression grim.
“Mrs. Lynn has been arrested,” he told her.
“I know,” Rosalind said. “She was here, and I watched it happen.”
Adam kissed her brow and dropped himself onto the rush-bottomed chair that Mrs. Lynn had recently vacated.
“What did she want here?”
“My help. She says she did not kill Sir Anthony.”
“Did she present any proof? And may I?” He gestured toward the remains of the meal.
“Of course,” said Rosalind. “And she had nothing substantive.”
As Adam loaded his plate with some of the remaining food, Rosalind fixed his cup of tea and set it in front of him.
“Mrs. Lynn did freely admit that she had no proof as to her assertion,” Rosalind told him. “Nor did she know who might have committed what she is nonetheless certain was a murder. She claims she does not care who did it, only that it be proved that she could not have done it.”
Adam stared down at his plate as if suddenly dissatisfied with all his choices. “That may be difficult.”
“What’s happened?”
“Elizabeth Kinsdale has thrown her friend to the wolves.” He pulled his memorandum book from his coat pocket and laid it on the table. “She’s made a sworn statement with the coroner. I was able to copy down the salient points. What do you have there?” He pointed his knife at Rosalind’s letter.
“It’s from Sanderson. Miss Smith has been found.
” She held out the letter to him. “It seems our initial assessment was correct. She is not a schoolgirl. But my real surprise is that Mrs. Lynn has acknowledged the young woman as her natural daughter. Of course, it may be they simply agreed on the story beforehand.”
Adam read Sanderson’s letter between bites of roll and ham salad. At the same time, Rosalind—who had become perfectly accustomed to Adam’s minute shorthand—looked over his notes.
Adam gave a low whistle. “Well, if nothing else, now we know what Mrs. Lynn and her friends were up to.”
“Do we?” Rosalind raised her brows.
Adam nodded. “There’s a very old cheat in racing.
And a relatively simple one. A horse is entered in a race.
It’s a broken down creature that’s got no business running the length of the paddock, let alone two full miles.
Of course, no one bets on that animal. Instead, bets are laid on a favorite, or at least on an animal with a better chance.
With each bet laid on a different horse, the odds against the broken down animal increase.
“But at some point, usually just before the horses are brought to the post, the broken down animal is diverted and a lookalike is put in its place. Only this new animal can actually run.
“This lookalike horse enters the race and, ideally, wins, and the few people who knew to bet on it collect a tidy sum.”
Rosalind frowned. “I will admit that racing cheats are not my particular area of expertise, but even I know that the more people who bet on a horse, the lower the share of winnings for each person. Miss Smith is supposed to be rounding up a great many ‘investors.’”
“And she’s succeeded, or Mrs. Lynn has,” said Adam.
“I went up to Lansdown and met a groom there named Charlie Foote. He said there’d been a steady stream of what he termed ‘London gents’ up to look at Kinsdale’s Pride.
He further indicated he was of the opinion that not one of them knew a horse from a hole in the ground. ”
“I don’t understand it,” admitted Rosalind. “If Mrs. Lynn and company were engaged in this lookalike scheme, why would they want more people to bet on their horse?”