Chapter 26
By the time Sebastian reined in his steaming horses before Chalk Farm Tavern, the weak winter sun had long since disappeared below the horizon, leaving the night cold and tinged with the scent of woodsmoke.
He found the old farmhouse ablaze with light, although it looked as if most of the taproom’s regular patrons had fled.
He could see the bobbing lanterns of Lovejoy’s constables fanning out in what he suspected would be a futile search of the surrounding area.
“Don’t make no sense,” said Tom. “This killer offing her.”
Sebastian handed the boy the reins. “No, it doesn’t.”
He found Sir Henry in a tumbledown old stone barn some two hundred feet up the lane.
The magistrate stood just inside the door, his hands thrust deep into the pockets of his greatcoat, his head tipped back as he stared at the body of Alison Cross swaying gently at the end of a rope tied to the rafters above.
“What do you make of this, my lord?” he asked, turning as Sebastian paused in the barn’s open doorway.
Sebastian took one look at the dead woman’s distorted purple face and swallowed hard. “I can’t even begin to explain it.”
“It’s possible, I suppose, that her murder has nothing to do with what happened to Marcus Toole up on Primrose Hill. But that seems…” The magistrate hesitated.
“Doubtful?” suggested Sebastian.
“Yes.”
His heart weighing heavy in his chest, Sebastian went to stand beside the dead woman’s limp body and forced himself to take a closer look.
Her eyes were wide and staring, the features of her face dark and contorted with the terrified agony of her death.
Her arms hung limply at her sides, her nails torn, her fingers bloody.
She was dressed in the same simple gown of dark blue wool that she’d worn at that morning’s inquest, although the prim cap was gone.
“Well, hell,” he said softly, turning away to let his gaze travel around the shadowy, cobweb-draped interior of the old barn. The air smelled of moldy hay, mouse droppings, and dust; it didn’t look as if the place had been used in decades. “What was she doing out here?”
“No one seems to know. We’re told they realized she was missing several hours after the crowds attracted by the inquest had begun to disperse.
” Lovejoy dug his fists deeper into the pockets of his greatcoat, his head once again falling back as he stared up at the dead woman’s distorted features.
“I suppose it’s possible that she could have killed herself. ”
“She didn’t kill herself.” Turning, Sebastian went to stand in the barn’s open doorway and suck the cold, clean air of the countryside deep into his lungs.
He watched the wind ruffle the dead grass of a nearby field, watched the bared branches of an ancient oak shift against the star-strewn sky.
“She was in the taproom last Saturday when Toole and my nephew were there. And she was there the night Toole and his friends picked on Dudley Fenton. She’s the one who stopped them. ”
“I can’t see anything in that which would lead someone to kill her.”
“Neither can I. Which makes me think she must have known something—something she didn’t tell me. And whoever killed her did it to keep her from talking.”
“Knew something about what?”
Sebastian turned to meet his friend’s gaze. But all he could do was shake his head.
Sebastian returned to Brook Street to find Sir Lawrence Upcott drinking a cup of tea with Hero beside the drawing room fire.
A thin, bow-legged man with a balding head and gaunt features, the Baronet was probably somewhere in his late fifties or early sixties, but he seemed older, with the grayish, parchment-like flesh and sunken eyes of someone who has been ill for a long time.
“My lord,” he said, rising shakily to his feet with the aid of a cane.
“Lady Devlin has been kind enough to keep me company and provide me with sustenance while I imposed on her hospitality.”
“My apologies for keeping you waiting, Sir Lawrence. Please, sit down, and allow me to express my sincere condolences for the loss of your son.”
“Thank you,” said the older man, blinking rapidly as he sank back into his overstuffed chair.
“I’ll admit I’m still finding it all difficult to grasp.
It wasn’t until I met with the magistrates at Bow Street that I realized two of my son’s friends have recently suffered a similar fate. That can’t be a coincidence.”
“I don’t think so, no,” said Sebastian, pouring himself a cup of tea and going to stand by the fire. “When did you last see your son?”
“He came down to Berkshire at the beginning of the summer—early June, it must have been. Stayed for over a month, which was not typical of him.” The Baronet made a wry a face. “Phineas was not fond of the country, I’m afraid.”
“Did he seem nervous at that time? Anxious in any way?”
Sir Lawrence was silent for a moment, his thin, bony hands tightening on the arms of his chair.
“As it happens, he did strike me as a bit…off, for lack of a better word. I even asked if something was wrong, but he laughed and said no, of course not. At the time I put his mood—and the unusual length of his stay—down to the hounding of impatient creditors. But the unfortunate truth is, Phineas typically had no difficulty at all ignoring tradesmen’s bills.
And while I kept expecting him to ask for an advance on his allowance, he never did—which was also unusual, now that I think about it.
He wasn’t exactly what you’d call thrifty, my firstborn son.
I was always trying to coax him into spending more time down in Berkshire, interesting himself in the management of the estate, learning all the things he was going to need to know soon enough.
But he’d just laugh, say he wasn’t cut out to be a ‘farmer.’ It was my hope that maturity would bring with it wisdom and a deepening sense of what he owed his lineage.
Perhaps it would have, in time.” He paused, then said more quietly, “Perhaps.”
“How well did you know Phineas’s friends, Marcus Toole and Gilbert Keebles?”
Sir Lawrence shrugged. “I’ve seen them now and then over the years, but I can’t say that I knew them.
My estate lies in indifferent hunting country, so it’s not as if there was anything to draw them down to Berkshire.
And I don’t think I’ve been up to London myself more than two or three times in the last dozen years.
So if you’re looking for me to help explain what is happening, I can’t. It makes no sense to me. None at all.”
“Do you know of anyone Phineas considered an enemy? Someone he quarreled with, perhaps?”
Sir Lawrence shook his head. “He never did talk to me about that sort of thing. At one time he might have mentioned it to his mother, but she’s been gone these last eighteen months now.”
“I’m sorry,” said Sebastian, his gaze going to meet Hero’s. “Might one of his siblings know something?”
“I don’t think so, no. Can’t say he ever got on well with either Mary or Emma, his two sisters, and they’re both married and off on their own now. As for James—my younger son—he’s still up at Oxford. With so many years between them, the brothers were barely acquainted with each other.”
“Do you know if Phineas had any interest in the ancient Celts?”
Sir Lawrence stared at him. “The Celts? Not to my knowledge, no. He was never what you might call bookish, Phineas.”
“Have you ever seen this?” asked Sebastian, holding out the small wolf carving.
Sir Lawrence took the piece and turned it over in his hands. “I haven’t, no.” He looked up. “What is it for?”
“I have no idea. It was found on Primrose Hill, near where Marcus Toole was killed Saturday night.”
Sir Lawrence handed the piece back to him. “I’m told your nephew was there that night, too.”
“He was, yes. Passed out drunk some distance away—which is probably why he’s still alive.”
“A fortunate young man.”
“Yes. Do you have any idea what Phineas might have been doing out at Marylebone on Sunday night?”
“No. No idea at all.”
“And you can’t think of anything—however strange or unrelated it may seem—that might throw some light onto what happened to your son and his friends?”
“I can’t, no. I’m sorry. I’m told the inquest is tomorrow morning, although nothing is expected to come of it.
After that, I’ll be taking Phineas home with me.
Bury him with his mother and the three little brothers and two sisters who’ve gone before him.
But now,” said Sir Lawrence, heaving painfully to his feet, “it’s late, and I’ve taken up far too much of your evening.
” He bowed politely to Hero. “Thank you for the tea, Lady Devlin.”
“You’re welcome,” she said, rising with him. “I’m only sorry we had to meet under such sad circumstances.”
“Thank you,” he said again, swallowing hard as he turned away.
“I can’t begin to tell you how sorry I am that this has happened to you,” said Sebastian as he walked with the older man down the stairs to the front door.
Sir Lawrence nodded in silent acknowledgment, his fist tightening on the handle of his cane.
It was a moment before he trusted himself to speak.
“I won’t deny I’ve always thought it a queer thing for an earl’s son to do—interesting himself in murder investigations, I mean.
But I must say, it gives me some consolation knowing you’re intent on finding the truth behind this sad business.
I’ve no faith in that new Chief Magistrate they have at Bow Street—Sir Nathaniel Conant, heaven preserve us!
—to do what’s right; can’t trust a man of his ilk at all.
He’ll do what the Palace tells him to do and whatever best serves Sir Nathaniel Conant himself.
” He paused at the door, then turned to say, “You’ll let me know if you discover what it’s all about?
I don’t care how unpleasant; I need to know the truth. ”
Sebastian met the older man’s troubled gaze. “If that’s what you want.”
“It’s what I want.”
Sebastian stood for a moment, watching the Baronet carefully walk down the front steps toward his waiting carriage.
Then he returned to the drawing room to find Hero standing beside the windows, the flickering light from the linkboys’ torches below casting a dancing pattern of shadows across her face.
She said, “I’m glad he has other children. ”
“Yes,” he said.
She looked over at him. “Last June would have been around the time Emmanuel Royston-Jones and his friends parted ways.”
Sebastian went to stand beside her as they watched the Baronet’s carriage pull away from the kerb. “It would, wouldn’t it?”