Chapter 12 #2
Mr. Comstock was being dragged away from several black robed figures, all of them men, and all of them wearing elaborately grotesque masks.
One mask, a red-painted devil face with a black snake’s tongue protruding from an open mouth, stood out amongst the others.
The man wearing it had a head of curled jet hair touched by gray, and his robe had red piping while the others did not.
They were all gathered in a room, much like a library, though the edges of the vision were beginning to close in.
The men encircled a table, covered by some animal pelt, and in the gaps between the robed figures, Audrey could see the white linen of a lady’s shift, bare skin, and a woman’s arm, hanging limp off the edge of the table.
Overhead, a bird cage, disproportionally large, hung suspended from ceiling beams. One final push, and Audrey had found herself swimming in pure shadow.
“Audrey?” Hugh’s voice dragged her back into the safety of the carriage. Her eyes were hot with tears. “Tell me,” he implored, sitting forward.
She did. She forced the words out, detailing everything she’d seen, and as she spoke, Hugh’s countenance darkened. He flexed his hands in and out of fists.
“The initiation was just as I feared,” he said once she’d concluded. He sat back and scrubbed his palm over his cheek.
As they turned down another street, the setting sun blazed through the window, blinding her. She turned her head away, eyes watering. “We were too slow.”
“Casting blame upon ourselves is not the answer.”
She knew he was right, but still felt a sense of utter failure. Hugh held his hat in his hands, his gloved fingers passing the brim around and around, absentmindedly. He glanced at her, his expression desolate. She felt leagues apart from him right then, and she despised it.
“We should speak about earlier,” she said after another few silent moments passed. “Before we arrive at Sir Gabriel’s.”
“I don’t want to argue.” He sounded exhausted. Humorless. It suited the situation, but not him.
“Neither do I.”
The carriage clattered on, turning them down streets toward their destination. Hugh spent the time staring out the window, brow pleated in deep thought.
Then, out of the silence, he said, “You are the right woman for me. You are the only woman for me.” He turned away from the window and hinged his piercing gaze on her.
It pinned her to the seat and slowed her pulse.
“I am not a man who loves by half measures. I won’t apologize for loving you intensely. For wanting to protect you.”
Her breathing commenced again, though it was rough. How was it that this man could sear her to the bone with a hungry gaze and a few words?
“You don’t need to apologize,” she managed to say. “I only ask that you don’t try to change me.”
“I would never do that.”
“By asking me to stand aside, you are.” She gathered her mettle. “I will stand beside you. Or I won’t stand with you at all.”
He nodded, then again faced the window. Silence again consumed the carriage.
Hugh’s thoughts on her ultimatum remained locked behind his unyielding expression.
When they arrived on Tavistock Street and were about to enter Sir Gabriel Poston’s home, Hugh laid his palm on the small of her back.
Though he said nothing, the touch conveyed a desire for a truce. At least for the time being.
“Rebecca has gone to stay with Caro for the night,” the magistrate told them after they joined him in his study.
He looked undone—his jacket and cravat had been discarded, his cuffs rolled up.
His silver hair, usually slicked back, fell around his forehead in a disheveled fashion.
He sipped from a snifter of whisky, and by his red cheeks and hazy eyes, it wasn’t his first drink.
“I should have started searching for her the moment Rebecca asked me to,” he said, his words somewhat slurred.
Hugh went to the decanter and poured another whisky. He took it to Sir Gabriel, who finished the one in his hand before taking the one Hugh extended to him.
“The letter from Comstock was reason enough not to,” he told the magistrate.
“You cannot blame yourself,” Audrey added, which she realized Hugh had just said to her as well. It was futile to waste time laying blame upon anyone other than the person who had killed her. And from her vision, any number of men could have done so.
“Can you tell us how she died?” Audrey asked.
If she’d been found in the Thames, it was possible she had gone in on her own accord. But Audrey could not dispel the image of a woman’s limp arm hanging off the table. Though she hadn’t seen her face, it had to have been Bethany on that table. Not that she could share any of that with Sir Gabriel.
“It looks to be strangulation,” the magistrate said. “There will be an inquest.”
“So, nothing like the other bodies found at Vauxhall,” Hugh said. The magistrate lowered his whisky.
“Why would it be? Without doubt, Comstock has done this deed. I have men searching for him now.”
With an assenting nod from Hugh, Audrey explained.
“We spoke to Bethany’s friend, Miss Bertram.
It appears your niece did not set out to elope.
She set out to visit a secret society known as the Sanctuary.
Mr. Comstock took her there the night of her disappearance.
His maid confirmed that he returned to his home before dawn the next morning. Bethany, as we know, did not.”
“Comstock delivered the letter insinuating an elopement and demanding a larger annuity when he was no longer even with Bethany. He was home,” Hugh said.
“And his maid, as it happens, was the young woman who pretended to be Miss Comstock, his sister,” Audrey included.
“But you can call back your men. Comstock is also now dead,” Hugh said. “Of an apparent opium overdose.”
The magistrate goggled back and forth between them. He shuffled to his desk and sat heavily into his chair.
“How is it that you did not know about Comstock?” Hugh asked.
“I have no idea,” he rasped after taking another indulgent swallow of his whisky.
“I find it highly suspect that both he and your niece are dead a week after attending the Sanctuary together,” Hugh said.
“The letter,” Audrey began, her eyes on the carpet as she put something together that had been bothering her.
“What if it was a diversion? When Bethany did not return home as she meant to do, Comstock knew she would be missed. There would have to be a reason for her absence, and he would be the first person that Mr. Silas would contact.”
Hugh assented with a low groan. “Crafty bastard. Yes, I think you’re right. And as he’d already given a false address, Mr. Silas would not know where to find him.”
“Why advertise a parcel of land in the paper then?” Audrey asked.
“A land agent or solicitor might have done it for him. A steward perhaps,” Hugh answered. At the mention of a steward, for the briefest moment, she saw the edifice of 37 Berkeley Square. But then recalled their argument. She shook her head; now was not the time to dwell on that muddle.
It was also not the time to bring up the tenuous threads connecting Harlan Givens and Lord Stromburg to the Sanctuary. Audrey wasn’t certain the magistrate could handle more complications just now.
“You mentioned this Sanctuary place before,” Sir Gabriel said, raking back a hank of his silver hair. “A secret society you say?”
Audrey tensed her jaw and appealed to Hugh with a pleading look. He scrubbed the back of his neck and loosened his cravat before explaining to the magistrate what they had learned from Gwendolyn. Sir Gabriel stood from his chair, a vein in the center of his forehead beginning to pulsate.
“What in hell was Bethany thinking? Why would she do such a thing?”
“Excitement was the explanation we were given,” Audrey answered, echoing what Gwendolyn had told them.
“Foolish, foolish girl,” he seethed, coming out from behind his desk. “Why have I never heard of this despicable society?”
“I imagine it is because you are the chief magistrate at Bow Street.” Hugh’s blithe answer earned him a scowl. “Whatever does happen there, it is likely not legal.”
“I’d bloody well say so,” he thundered, “if young, innocent women are strangled there!”
The scene around the table in Audrey’s vision would support that theory.
Bethany had been killed that evening, strangled during the initiation, the details of which Audrey did not want to contemplate.
Mr. Comstock had returned home in a high dudgeon as the maid had reported, and the next day he began to formulate a diversion with the elopement ruse.
Had he killed himself a few days later out of remorse?
“If the members are high ranking in society, they would stand much to lose if the activities they participate in there were made public,” Hugh added.
Audrey thought of something and pulled out the sketch she’d drawn of the inverted cross. “This is the symbol connected to the Sanctuary."
Sir Gabriel whisked it from her hand. “Mmmm. It looks familiar.”
“Sir Oliver Pendleton wears cuff links with this symbol. Mr. Comstock did as well. I think they might be something members wear to mark themselves,” Audrey said.
The magistrate handed the sketch back to her. “I know Sir Oliver. I think a visit is in order.”
Hugh stepped forward, his hand raised. “I wonder if you might hold there, sir. We don’t want to tip off anyone that we are suspicious of the Sanctuary just yet. So far, any mention of it has been met with nervousness and hostility.”
Sir Gabriel grumbled but relented and sat back down into his chair.
“We need to discover where the Sanctuary is located,” Audrey said. “I say we follow Sir Oliver and see if he can lead us there. Then, we observe who else comes and goes.”
“That is assuming he goes there on a regular basis,” Hugh replied. “If he doesn’t, we could be waiting for him to lead us there for quite some time.”
“All right,” she conceded, impatient but in agreement. “But so far all we know is that it is near Vauxhall.”
Sir Gabriel grunted. “Bethany was found near the Vauxhall stairs. Her body was tangled in some fishing detritus. She’d been there for days…” He went quiet, his voice cut off under the strain of emotion.
“How long has Tyne been working the Vauxhall case?” Hugh asked.
“Since Stromburg was found dead. Why?”
Audrey thought she knew in which direction Hugh’s mind had gone. “The brothel madame was found two days after Stromburg. And two weeks after that, Mr. Givens. Who, it’s been suggested, had turned informant for someone.”
Sir Gabriel got to his feet. “Informant for whom?”
Audrey understood now. “Do you think for Bow Street? For Officer Tyne?”
Hugh nodded. “If someone learned Givens was spying at the Seven Sins, nosing around about the Sanctuary and informing the police on what he heard, it would be motive for someone from the Sanctuary to want to silence him.”
“Then what of Stromburg and Madame Lee?” Audrey asked. “Were they speaking out of turn about the society as well?”
“Madame Lee ran a specialty brothel that caters to wealthy men,” Sir Gabriel said. “The Red Lotus.”
And Stromburg, according to Princess Esterhazy, had possessed a disreputable taste in vice. At the time, Audrey thought only of the Seven Sins. But now, she crossed her arms with a twist of unease. “Specialty?”
She regretted voicing her ignorance when Hugh replied, “Certain brothels cater to different…proclivities.”
“Oh, I see.” She wasn’t entirely sure she did, but it sounded rather indecent, and she didn’t wish to continue the discussion with Sir Gabriel present. “If some of her clients were also Sanctuary members, she might have overheard things.”
“And thought to profit from them,” Hugh said. “In all his investigating, what has Tyne found?”
Sir Gabriel hitched his hands on his hips with a lowering frown. “Nothing to report.”
Hugh exhaled, his skepticism about the officer’s capabilities clear.
“We do need to find the Sanctuary. We also need to know how Madame Lee and Stromburg connect to it. I have an idea on how we can see to both things tonight.” He looked at Audrey.
“It will mean splitting up. At least for a few hours.”
A stone lodged in her stomach. She had a feeling she wasn’t going to like his idea at all.