Stranger at the Dower House (Strangers Book 1)

by Mary Kingswood

  “Yes?” Agnes said eagerly.

  “I think he is a bachelor, but he is a dreadful flirt, Miss Agnes. If you will take my advice, you will be very wary of such a man. I should hate you to have your heart broken by him.”

  “Oh no, I am in no danger of that,” she said breezily. “I never fall in love. Mr Truman was very attentive for a while, but when he turned his eyes elsewhere, I was perfectly unaffected by it, so Mr Chandry will not break my heart. I know his sort very well, but if he is hanging out for a wife, I should be very willing. There are so few eligible men in the neighbourhood and none who look twice at me, and I should so like to be married,” she added wistfully.

  “Somewhere in the world exists the perfect man for you,” Louisa said. “You are young still, and need not despair of one day finding a man who will love and cherish you as a husband should cherish his wife.”

  “I do not mind about being cherished,” Agnes said robustly. “Nor do I care if he is what Mama calls suitable. I just want to be a wife, and have my own establishment and some children. It is not much to ask, is it?”

  “No, indeed,” Louisa murmured, but her heart ached for the girl. She could only hope she would not marry incautiously and suffer for it.

  At length, Miss Cokely handed over the new bonnet, and Louisa and Esther made their farewells.

  “Such lovely creations!” Esther sighed, as they walked back to the Dower House. “I cannot wear anything but the plainest of bonnets, for Dr Deerham does not approve, but I may still admire pretty things, may I not?”

  “I have never seen anything wrong with wearing clothes with a little dash,” Louisa said, “especially when it keeps poor Miss Cokely and her mother from starving. There is something wrong with the world if a clergyman’s daughter is reduced to making bonnets to put food on her table.”

  “Do you think so?” Esther said. “Dr Deerham says that the poor are necessary so that those more fortunate may show them compassion. “Blessed are the poor for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.’”

  Louisa had to choke back the acid response that rose to her lips.

  ~~~~~

  With Esther as cook, Louisa enjoyed her first good dinner in the Dower House. On Sunday, she took her friend to church, and observed with interest the slight wariness with which Mr Truman greeted Esther, remembering her reservations about him. It was nothing much — that he had not been well liked at school, had inherited some money from an elderly churchman and had manoeuvred to obtain the Great Maeswood living. Nothing of substance, mere rumour and hearsay, but she recalled Laurence’s opinion of him, that he was oily… he had had reservations about Mr Truman too. What had he said of him? That he was too puffed up in his own importance, that was it, and seeing him talking to Lady Saxby and her daughters, she conceded the truth of it. Miss Saxby held out her hand to him, and he took it and lifted it to his lips in a most forward way for a clergyman towards his noblest parishioners. When he was using his hands to make a point, he even touched her on the shoulder, in the most improper way. Yet there was no sign of displeasure from them, for they smiled and stood talking to him for some time, parting on the most cordial terms.

  She noticed Miss Agnes watching Mr Chandry, but as they had not been formally introduced, she could not approach him. Louisa could not resist a little match-making, for why should not Agnes Saxby, plain as she was, have her chance of happiness too? She deftly detached Agnes from the group clustered around Mr Truman, and strolled about from group to group gathered outside the church until, seemingly by chance, she came across Mr Chandry. Introductions were made, Agnes swiftly engaged him in conversation — she was not shy, that was clear — and Mr Chandry responded as any young man would to such obvious interest. Louisa did not anticipate a betrothal, for she suspected Michael Chandry to be far too experienced to allow himself to be drawn into matrimony, but one never knew.

  Monday was such a fine, sunny day that Louisa and Esther ventured out in the gig, and found themselves, almost without realising it, entering Market Clunbury.

  “Well, I did not intend to travel so far, but since we are here, shall we do a little shopping?” Louisa said. “Look, there is a respectable-looking inn where we may leave the gig.”

  They spent a happy two hours acquiring a number of interesting packages, and had begun dawdling back to the Lamb and Pheasant, when a man strode out of a side road in front of them.

  “Why, Captain Edgerton, fancy meeting you here,” Louisa said. “Judging by your frown, you have not been so agreeably engaged as we have.” She waved her armful of packages gaily.

  He laughed. “No, nothing so pleasant. But allow me to offer you my escort, and relieve you of some of your burdens.”

  Gratefully, Louisa agreed to it, for they were rather overladen, and they made their way back to the inn, where the captain joined them for refreshments.

  “You caught me in frustrated mood,” he said, after the food had been laid out and the first pangs of hunger had been assuaged. “I am trying to find out more about the mysterious Miss Labett, but I cannot find a single employment agency who knows of her, or an attorney or bank or post office with any knowledge of a Labett family. I have been to both Shrewsbury and Ludlow, without success, and am now engaged in eliminating the last possibilities. I can only conclude that she was not from Shropshire. You are aware of our enigmatic lady of the wine cellar, I take it, Mrs Deerham?”

  “Oh, yes! A most intriguing case! And she was a governess at the Grove, as I understand it? She just… vanished, one day, without a word of warning, or anyone knowing anything was amiss. How very curious it all is. How did they account for it, at the house? Did they look for her at all?”

  “No one suspected that she had been murdered, ma’am,” he said with a slight smile. “They just thought she had left.”

  “Oh! Then her things were gone, too? I assumed that she went off one day to meet her gentleman friend and ended up dead, so her belongings would have been left at the Grove, but if they had gone too—”

  Captain Edgerton gave an exclamation. “What a fool I am! Her belongings! Where are they? Clearly, they were not left at the Grove, or she would have been looked for. I wonder if anyone would remember, after all this time, whether she had a box or just a portmanteau.”

  “Does it matter?” Louisa said.

  “Of course!” Esther said, looking at her in astonishment. “A box would need a man to lift it, whereas she could have managed a portmanteau or two herself. You are not very practical sometimes, Louisa.”

  She acceded to it rather guiltily, for her plans for Mr Gage had run aground for just such a lack of practical forethought. “So she simply walked out of the house with a portmanteau in her hand, and no one noticed?”

  “She would have left at night, of course,” Esther said, as if this was obvious. “Either her gentleman friend came to help her with a box, or she carried her own luggage. I cannot imagine she had much to take. But that does mean that she had no intention to return. She was leaving for good, and not seeing out her notice or hoping for a reference for another employer. She was finished with being a governess.”

  Captain Edgerton chuckled appreciatively. “If ever your husband can spare you, Mrs Deerham, I shall recruit you to the ranks of Edgerton, Chandry and Associates. That is admirable deduction.”

  She coloured with pleasure. “Oh, but it is obvious, do you not think?”

  “It is obvious now, but I confess I had not seen it in that light before,” he said. “If I can confirm that she took all her clothing and so on when she left, then yes, we can safely say that she was finished with being a governess. Since it seems unlikely that she had suddenly inherited an independence, or stolen her mistress’s jewels, we must assume that she was about to put herself under the protection of a man.”

  “To marry her gentleman friend,” Esther said.

  “Or to be his mistress,” the captain said.

  “No, because he would hardly need to murder her if that were so,” she said
solemnly. “There had to be a reason for him to kill her, and it could only be because she expected him to marry her and for some reason he could not.”

  “Perhaps he was married already?” Louisa suggested.

  “She would have known that, because he was local,” Esther said.

  “How can you possibly know that?” Louisa said, rather amused at her friend’s confidence.

  “Because he had the keys to the Dower House, of course. He either killed her and then secreted the body in the wine cellar, or he lured her into the Dower House somehow and murdered her there. In either case, he must have had the keys.”

  “Miss Labett herself might have got hold of the keys and opened up the house,” Louisa said. “He might have been a stranger to the district.”

  “Then how did he get to know her, and meet her over a period of months?” Esther said.

  “Excellent points,” Captain Edgerton said. “We have already investigated the matter of the keys. The Saxbys’ steward kept them in a drawer in his office, both sets. But he only checked the Dower House two or three times a year, just as a precaution against leaks and so forth, and the rest of the time anyone could walk into the office and remove the keys whenever they liked. Everyone at the Hall knew where the keys were kept. In fact, half the village knew, because he kept spare keys for all the village cottages that Lord Saxby owned, which is most of them.”

  “So Miss Labett could easily have found that out and taken the keys herself,” Louisa said.

  “No, dear,” Esther said patiently. “Remember that she was locked into the wine cellar with the key to the inner door in her pocket. Since she was murdered, clearly someone else locked her in with the other key. Both sets were used, so someone took both and set off for the Dower House knowing that he was going to kill poor Miss Labett and lock her in the wine cellar.”

  Louisa pondered that. “Knowing that he was going to kill her… that sounds so cold-blooded. Is it not possible that they met at the Dower House, quarrelled and he killed her in a rage, and then tried to make it look like a suicide by leaving the key in her clothing? Or perhaps he threatened her with violence, she locked herself into the wine cellar for safety, and he then fetched the other set of keys, opened the door and murdered her?” She sighed. “No, there is something cold-blooded about it whichever way one looks at it, and he must have had both sets of keys, for the other key to that door was missing, and only the murderer could have disposed of it. I cannot suppose that we will ever know exactly what happened that day.”

  Captain Edgerton leaned forward, eyes gleaming. “But we can say one thing with certainty, ladies — if Miss Labett’s luggage was not left at the Grove then she must have taken it away somewhere, and where more likely than the same place where her body was found?”

  “The Dower House?” Louisa said, surprised.

  “The attics!” Esther said. “It is full of old boxes, Captain. Perhaps Miss Labett’s is amongst them.”

  Nothing else would do for Captain Edgerton but to leave at once, immediately and without a second’s delay. In vain Louisa protested that Miss Labett had been dead for a quarter of a century and a few more minutes would not hurt her. Shaking her head in amused dismay, she gulped down her glass of wine and grabbed a Bath bun to sustain her while they waited for Goronwy to be hitched to gig. The captain was mounted on a rangy black horse, and he rode sedately behind them as the gig threaded its way through the thronged streets of Market Clunbury, but once on the open road, he galloped ahead and then was forced to wait impatiently while they caught up. Louisa could not quite see the urgency, but she hurried Goronwy along at a fast clip, slowing only for the villages of Astley Cloverstone and finally Great Maeswood. Esther’s sigh of relief was audible, and she finally released the rail to which she had been clinging tightly.

  Ahead of them, the captain turned into the Dower House driveway, and Louisa flicked the reins to follow in his wake. Goronwy trotted on, oblivious.

  Louisa groaned. “I had forgotten that he likes to return to his old home. Hold tight. I am just going to swing round in front of the house.”

  She gave the pony a nudge to speed him up, and away he went, racing up the drive, faster and faster. Esther was clinging to the rail again. They approached the turning to the stables but Louisa was firm and by sheer determination held the gig on course. They slowed, trotted round in front of the entrance steps, then set off down the drive again. Once more speed deterred the pony from trying to turn towards the stables and the gig successfully made its way back down the drive and into the Dower House next door.

  Captain Edgerton was pacing about in front of the house. “What happened?” he cried.

  Louisa explained, and his face creased in laughter. “You need a carriage, Mrs Middlehope, with a respectable coachman on the box and a footman behind. I am sure that is what you are used to.”

  “True, and I shall buy my carriage in time, I daresay, but just for now the gig suits me well enough, however faulty the pony’s homing instincts. Esther, will you take Captain Edgerton inside and let him loose in the attics while I take the gig round to the stables?”

  By the time she returned to the house, laden with parcels, there were scraping and banging noises emanating from the attics. Louisa left them to it, and went to change her dusty gown, as Marie fussed with her hair, and pinned a fresh lace cap atop her hair.

  “Il y a une lettre pour vous, madame. De la baronne. Là bas.” There is a letter for you from the baroness.

  “A letter? From Lady Mountsea? Where? Oh, I see it… hmm, trouble with a wheel but they arrived home safely. The children are well… what a relief, I was prostrate with anxiety about that. Oh! She wants Chambers to train Mrs Nokes, so I have to wait for my man-cook, I suppose. More bread and cheese, Marie. Still, at least she is two hundred miles away from me again.”

  “Ce n'est pas assez loin,” Marie muttered. It is not far enough.

  Louisa’s French was not up to the task of translation so she merely laughed and patted Marie’s cheek. “I am sure that was impolite, but so long as you are impolite about my dear sister-in-law, I do not mind. Be impolite about me and I will turn you off without a reference, you cheeky creature, you.”

  “Seulement si tu peux me comprendre.” Only if you can understand me.

  Louisa shook her head in bewilderment. “I shall wear the pale green crêpe tonight.”

  “Oui, madame.”

  “Thank God I am out of mourning at last, Marie. I was so tired of black. I bought some very pretty sarcenet, today, such a lovely clear blue colour. I am sure you can make me something charming from it, but no train. I believe trains are quite out of style now. How are you getting on with the new round gown?”

  “C'est fini. Voulez-vous le porter demain? You wear tomorrow?”

  “Why not? Thank you, Marie. You should speak English more often, then I might understand you better.”

  “Pfft. Il n'y a pas de plaisir là-dedans.” Where would be the fun in that?

  “You see? I did not get a word of that.”

  Marie only laughed, and Louisa went to find Captain Edgerton in the attics. Tilly had done some cleaning already, so the worst of the spiders’ webs had gone, but the air was still thick with dust. The whole floor was covered with boxes, old half-broken bits of furniture, several paintings, some rolled up rugs and, rather incongruously, a shrouded shape that could only be a harp. All the boxes were open, their contents jumbled up. Captain Edgerton sat disconsolately on a rickety chair.

  “Captain? Have you found anything?”

  “Who can say?” he said mournfully. “Tell me what you see here, Mrs Middleton. All these boxes — tell me what you see.”

  “I see a lot of clothes, all mixed up. You have made a thorough search, I see.”

  “This is exactly how they were when I opened the lids,” he said. “There must be… oh, twenty boxes here. If any one of them belonged to Miss Labett, it is beyond my ability to determine it.”

  “Well, this
did not!” she said, picking up a lamp and holding it high to illumine a very large box. “Solid mahogany, by the look of it. Heavens, how heavy that must be! And this one… see how the inner portion opens to reveal all these little drawers? These big, ornate boxes look as if they were designed for the Grand Tour.”

  “Very true,” he said, brightening. “So we must look for a small, plain box, like that one over there.”

  She walked round it, holding the lamp close to examine it. “The lid is engraved ‘Captain James Saxby’. But this one is small enough and plain enough to belong to a governess. Oh, but that cannot be right,” she said, laughing, pulling out a vast hooped skirt of heavy brocade, encrusted with embroidery in gold thread. “What a monstrosity! No governess ever wore this. In fact, no one at all wore such things even in Miss Labett’s day, for such styles were quite out of fashion. Oh but… wait a moment.” She pulled out a chemise. “Now this is more of a governess’s style. See how thin and cheap the fabric is? And it is almost grey with age. This does not at all belong to the same lady as the sack dress.”

  “Then everything has become muddled,” he said sadly. “The murderer hid Miss Labett’s clothes by mingling them with the old clothes already here. It will be impossible to find them all.”

  “Courage, Captain!” Louisa said. “It will be a painstaking task, but not impossible, I fancy. We need only remove every item from every box and determine those which may have belonged to the governess. That is something you may leave to the ladies.”

  “You are a treasure, Mrs Middlehope,” he said with a smile.

  18: Memories And Discoveries

  Laurence had much to occupy his mind. Lady Day had come and gone, the rents in and safely stowed in the bank, salaries paid and the tradesmen’s bills settled. That meant that the accounts must be worked on and his plans laid for the coming year. There would be long, difficult discussions with his steward to determine what must be done, what would be useful to do and what could wait for another year. There was always too much that had to wait for another year.