Fall From Lace

by Emily Claire

  Behind Isabella, Mr. Pemberton stood on the house’s steps. He watched Lydia, his eyes dark and his expression calculating. She gave him a quick nod. I’ll be fine, she tried to convey. You needn’t worry.

  The tight line of his jaw didn’t ease.

  25

  Mr. Buxton clicked at his horse, and the coffee-brown animal set off at a clip that felt fast to Lydia but would have lulled Isabella to sleep. She wrapped her arms around the basket and held it tightly against her. The hot stones at her feet gave off a pleasant warmth that did nothing to stop the wind from sliding down the back of her coat and chilling her gloved fingers.

  “I’m so wonderfully pleased for you and Diana,” Lydia said once the phaeton had turned onto the tree-lined drive toward the estate gates. The expansive park of Hollybrook House stretched out on either side of them, skeletal tree branches clacking against one another in the night breeze. Mr. Buxton sat uncomfortably close to her, but not so close that the heat of his body did anything against the winter night. “When do you expect you’ll be married?”

  “I daresay within two months. One, if we can manage it.” He smiled. “Diana will have to order her wedding clothes, of course, but I think she’d like to be married when the crocuses are blooming.”

  “That does sound beautiful,” Lydia said.

  Her heart ached; Diana wouldn’t have her spring wedding, not this year and not to this gentleman.

  “I say, we ought to celebrate,” he said. “Hold these, will you?”

  He handed her the reins, and she took them gingerly, careful not to pull or create any tension the horse might interpret as a cue to go faster. She had heard enough horror stories about phaetons tipping over, and while Caroline had once insisted that such accidents had more to do with the driver than the vehicle, she felt disinclined to take the risk.

  Mr. Buxton stood in order to rummage in his pocket without shoving Lydia right off the seat. A moment later, he sat back down, a small white paper box tied with a pink ribbon on his open palm.

  “I forgot to give these to Diana this evening.” He took the reins back from her and squeezed them between his knees, leaving his hands free. “I’m afraid they’ll have melted a bit in my pocket, rendering them hardly adequate for an engagement present. I’ll buy her more the next time I’m in London.” He untied the ribbon and removed the lid. Inside, a few fat but slightly squashed chocolate discs sprinkled with nonpareils winked up at them, the moon casting a slight sheen on the glossy candies.

  “Heavens, what a treat,” Lydia said. “I couldn’t.”

  “You must,” he said. “It would be a shame to eat all this myself.”

  He popped one of the lopsided chocolates into his mouth and held the box out to her. In spite of his friendly smile and open demeanor, she couldn’t bring herself to reach for one of the confections.

  “It’s Lent,” she said apologetically. “I do so try to abstain during this season.”

  “Come, Miss Shrewsbury, I won’t tell a soul,” he said.

  He picked one of the chocolates from the box and handed it to her, leaving her with nothing to do but accept.

  He was being so kind. How could someone this jovial and generous be a murderer? She took the chocolate with a gloved hand and a forced smile. Was she suspicious of the wrong man? It wouldn’t be the first time.

  But no. In a flash, the facts lined themselves up one by one. There was logic to the chain of events in her mind, but even so, it wasn’t logic that twisted her stomach right now. That was fear, colder than the February night and twice as capable of worming its way past her coat and down her spine.

  The carriage jolted over a rock, and Mr. Buxton’s hands flew to the reins to steady the horses. While his eyes were diverted, Lydia tossed the chocolate over the edge of the phaeton’s high seat. She pretended to chew, and even made a show of sucking on the chocolate for good measure.

  Chocolate candies were such a rare treat. Perhaps she was being foolish and over-cautious.

  Still, she thought, she was a vicar’s daughter and a sensible spinster besides. It was in line with her character to be over-cautious to the point of rejecting luxurious candies, particularly during Lent. And anyway, being circumspect was certainly better than being dead.

  “What is your opinion, Miss Shrewsbury?”

  Lydia frowned at him, and he smiled and nodded his chin at the box still on his lap.

  “The chocolate?” he prodded.

  “Absolutely divine,” she said warmly.

  Saints help her, she thought, may her parents never learn how comfortable she had become with lying.

  “Diana is always fond of chocolate, whether it be for drinking or a confection such as this,” he said.

  “I daresay that applies to us all. You said you purchased them in London?”

  “There’s the most charming little confectioner’s shop in Berkeley Square,” he said.

  The carriage trundled over a dip in the road, and Lydia clutched the side of the seat. She did not share Isabella’s taste for phaetons, she decided. The height and openness of the bench on this one made the carriage seem as if it was going far too fast.

  “They sell very agreeable candies and caramels and a wide array of flavored ices,” Mr. Buxton continued, as if oblivious to the uneven ground beneath his carriage. “I particularly like the little violet-scented icing-sugar drops. They put one in mind of spring.”

  Lydia clutched the seat with one hand and gripped the handle of her basket with the other. A gust of wind blew against her face, stealing her breath.

  “I should very much like to try one of those,” she managed to say. “I am feeling particularly ready for spring just now.”

  “I’m sorry you won’t be able to enjoy it,” Mr. Buxton said kindly. “Still, I’m sure you’ve appreciated the splendor of a good many springs, which is more than some can say.”

  She glanced sidelong at him. His face, though flushed with the cold, remained cheerful, and his voice betrayed nothing.

  “I hope to enjoy a number more.” An increasingly familiar irritation flared. “I am not so old as people like you and Diana seem to suppose, Mr. Buxton, and I am still capable of savoring good weather. It may surprise some, but reaching one’s twenty-eighth birthday unmarried does not immediately steal all a woman’s joy.”

  Immediately, Mr. Buxton’s expression transformed to one of apology.

  “I in no way meant to criticize your capacity for happiness, nor fault you your age,” he said. “Indeed, to do so would be most ungentlemanly.” He frowned, and his eyes took on a distant, almost tragic expression. “I meant only that I wish you had future sunny days to look forward to.”

  “Do I not?”

  He didn’t answer.

  Her irritation cooled, then cooled some more until it sat like a brick of ice in the pit of her stomach. Finally, after a long, drawn-out silence punctuated only by the rattling of the carriage wheels across the dirt road, Lydia cleared her throat to no avail.

  “Mr. Buxton,” she whispered. “What have you done?”

  His lips tightened. He glanced at her, his expression apologetic.

  “I am sorry,” he said. “I never wanted to hurt you, nor any other innocent. I cannot begin to tell you the mortification I experienced when Mr. Pemberton fell ill from the poisoned chocolate. His suffering was unnecessary.”

  Her heart pounded, and suddenly, his voice sounded very far away, muffled by the rushing in her ears.

  “Indeed, I regret everything to do with that blasted pot of chocolate,” he continued. “I miscalculated the cyanide necessary, and while I suspect it would have managed to dispatch you more easily than it did Mr. Pemberton, it’s entirely possible my error would have come to light in either case. You are a reasonably small woman, but I am inexperienced in poisons. You may have suffered and then recovered just as he did. I trust you will suffer less now, or at least more briefly.”

  “You poisoned the chocolate pot,” she said.

  Sh
e had known it already, but speaking the words aloud made them real in a way she had not anticipated. The world around her sharpened: his voice seemed too close rather than too far away and her heartbeat was so pronounced she thought her ribcage might rattle apart and fall to pieces.

  “You tried to kill me,” she said.

  “I have killed you,” he corrected gently. “The chocolate you just ate contained arsenic—enough to kill you or a grown man such as Mr. Pemberton, and it will take effect before we reach the vicarage. You cannot be too angry with me, Miss Shrewsbury,” he added. “You have clearly been investigating that monstrous curate’s death, and if you were to uncover the truth, that would be the end to Diana’s happiness.”

  “You knew how he treated her,” Lydia breathed. “You knew, and you killed him for it.”

  He snapped the reins, and the horse picked up its pace. It wasn’t just her imagination now; the carriage was going too fast, and the wheels seemed scarcely able to keep up with the horse on the irregular road.

  The vicarage could be no more than a quarter of a mile up ahead. She could run that distance if she had to, and cutting through the fields would prevent the phaeton from following her. But how to escape the speeding carriage and the smiling devil driving it?

  “I didn’t mean to kill him,” Mr. Buxton said, his eyes still sad but his expression as pleasant as if they were back in the Wycliffes’ drawing room. “I only meant to make it clear to him that he wasn’t to trouble Diana any further. He resented my intrusion and Diana’s clear preference for me, and I was forced to defend myself.”

  “You murdered him!”

  “The courts are likely to think so,” he said. “Fortunately for me, everybody seemed happy to think his killer was some traveling burglar.” He scoffed, as if he found the idea as ludicrous as Lydia had. “Everybody except you. You were too curious after Mr. Pemberton was poisoned. Then I overheard your conversation with Cooper.”

  Lydia stared at the dark road ahead. It dropped off into ditches on either side of the carriage here; she would have to wait for level ground before she attempted to leap to safety.

  “In the library?” she asked. No, that couldn’t be right. Mr. Pemberton had overheard her in the library.

  “In the street. You could have had no reason to duck into an alley with the Wycliffes’ butler, so I followed you. The alley has a linen-draper’s shop to one side. It was no great matter to crack the window and hear every word of your conversation."

  These blasted gentlemen and their blasted need to be part of every conversation that didn’t concern them.

  “Are you feeling unwell?” he asked, sounding truly apologetic. “I’m sorry I couldn’t manage a faster-acting poison. Arsenic was all I had on hand.”

  “You didn’t obtain it at a charming little poison shop in London?” she snapped.

  He smiled regretfully. “If there is such a thing, I assure you I would be the last to know. My cook made the chocolates. I mixed the arsenic with the sugar grains on top.”

  “You ate one,” she accused.

  “The only one not sprinkled with rat poison, kept wrapped in paper to the side of all the others,” he said. “I can be clever at times, you see.”

  He pulled a whip from the holder at his side. He cracked it above the horse’s back, and the poor creature launched into a full gallop.

  Lydia knew this road, even in the darkness. A corner waited for them up ahead, a sharp bend that was liable to send the phaeton and its passengers in two different directions.

  “You must slow down, or we’ll both die,” she exclaimed.

  “That’s the idea, Miss Shrewsbury,” he said, whipping the horse onward. “This carriage will slip on a patch of ice a moment after I leap free. That’s what will kill you, or so everyone will believe. A tragic accident, entirely preventable. I will swear off phaetons from that moment onward.”

  “You disappoint me, Mr. Buxton,” Lydia said through gritted teeth. “You’re nothing more than a demon in a well-fitting waistcoat. Diana deserves better.”

  At last, a blow had struck. He flinched, and his jaw tightened. “Diana will never know of my sins,” he said. “I intend to treat her like an angel all her life. You may die knowing that.”

  She gripped the handle of her basket, and, without taking her eyes from his face, slid her hand beneath the cloth that covered the dead partridge.

  “I have never understood how a man could be so barbaric as to attack another person with intention to kill,” she said. “Now I must thank you for broadening my mind. I might be a dreary old spinster, but it seems even my life still has room for new sensations and experiences.”

  He hadn’t heard her. He was half-standing now, his hands tight on the reins and his gaze fixed on the pale ribbon of moonlit road ahead. It turned abruptly into a stand of trees as the road twisted hard to the right. The wheels clattered on the road, and the horse strained to pick up speed and avoid the crack of its master’s whip.

  Silently, her mind impossibly clear, she untangled her skirts from the blanket on her lap. She set the basket on Mr. Buxton’s now-vacated seat and took a deep breath.

  The phaeton swayed. The wheels clattered. The horse charged onward, and the driver stood, a mad gleam in his eyes as he dropped the reins.

  Lydia stabbed Diana’s knitting needles into his back in one swift motion.

  Mr. Buxton cried out, a hideously strangled sound, but she was already in the air, leaping free from the carriage with her hands outstretched. Her body hit the frozen earth with enough force to send lightning skittering through her vision, and then—

  The horse whinnied in shrill fear. The phaeton scraped its way across the icy road. The carriage landed on its side with a sickening series of cracks, and creaking and shattering echoed through the air until at last, silence reigned.

  And then, from what sounded like very far behind her, came galloping hoofbeats and a single, agonized cry.

  “Lydia!”

  26

  A face swam into Lydia’s view, pale and wide-eyed. Mr. Pemberton’s hands gripped her shoulders, and his gaze searched hers. Pure fear stretched his cheeks taut.

  “Lydia,” he said urgently, shaking her gently. “Lydia, stay awake. Speak to me. Are you all right?”

  She blinked and tried to determine a truthful answer. Her hands felt as if they were on fire, and she had without question done something terrible to one ankle. The elbow on the other side throbbed with pain, though even that wasn’t nearly as agonizing as whatever had happened to her shoulders when she’d hit the ground.

  Hot liquid poured from her forehead; she touched the stream gingerly, and her shredded glove came away black and wet.

  “I seem to be alive,” she said.

  She twisted to look at the carriage and winced at the pain of moving.

  That was no good. She didn’t have time to be in pain.

  Hurriedly, she scrambled to her feet, ignoring the agony shooting from her ankle and knees, and rushed toward the carriage.

  Mr. Pemberton pulled her back before she’d made it two steps. “What the devil are you doing?”

  “Mr. Buxton,” she said.

  “Hang Mr. Buxton!”

  She shook her arm loose from his grasp and hobbled forward. “That’s precisely what I mean. He’s the murderer.”

  “I came to rescue you,” Mr. Pemberton said, his long strides more than matching hers. “Do me a kindness, Miss Shrewsbury, and don’t repay me by charging headlong into danger.”

  “You needn’t rescue me,” she snapped. “I was more than capable of dispatching that miscreant myself. If you want to be useful, go check on the poor horse.”

  A strangled moan rose from the carriage debris, and she glanced at Mr. Pemberton. Whatever courage had supported her through these past few moments was quickly fading in response to the fire creeping up her legs and across her shoulders and hands.

  “On second thought, perhaps I could check the horse while you go ensure the gentlema
n doesn’t seize this chance to escape?” she suggested.

  Mr. Pemberton nodded sharply. “A much better idea.”

  He held his arm out, and, resenting the necessity, she took it and gave him most of her weight as she faltered toward the wreckage of the phaeton.

  She knelt beside the horse, whose eyes were rolling in terror but who seemed otherwise less injured than she had expected. She unfastened the mare as best she could while Mr. Pemberton attempted to free Mr. Buxton from the wreckage.

  Lydia noted with some satisfaction that Mr. Buxton had not managed to leap free before the carriage had turned the corner. On the contrary, he had been pinned to the frozen earth by his own bench and was now suffering the indignity of resting eye to eye with a dead partridge.

  Mr. Pemberton was none too gentle as he yanked Mr. Buxton out from under the phaeton seat and tied his hands tightly behind his back with strips torn from his own cravat.

  Lydia should not have enjoyed the sight of Mr. Buxton wincing at each new knot, but knowing that did nothing to banish her satisfaction in his misery. The man had tried to murder her twice, killed a curate, and poisoned Mr. Pemberton besides. She would reserve her Christian charity for the horse, she decided, patting the creature’s cheek and whispering soft reassurances. She felt a degree of kinship with the animal; it could not have wanted to be part of a hideous phaeton crash any more than she had.

  Mr. Pemberton fastened Mr. Buxton to a tree. He had bound the man’s mouth with another strip of cravat; a wise precaution, Lydia thought, as the smothered grunts and moans emanating from behind the mask suggested Mr. Buxton wasn’t being entirely gracious in defeat.

  “There’s a little box of chocolates somewhere amid that mess,” Lydia said. “Find them and gather them, but for goodness’ sake, don’t touch your mouth after. The constable will have to feed them to some poor rat, but they should prove Mr. Buxton’s guilt decidedly enough.”

  “He’s lucky I didn’t run him through the heart,” Mr. Pemberton muttered, crouching amid the rubble and searching through the debris. “Although it seems some wood from the carriage almost did as much. He’s got quite an injury on his back.”