Crowther 02 - Anatomy of Murder

by Imogen Robertson

  The contrast between the image and the present gloom of the chamber was distressing. The keys of the harpsichord were covered and the stool tucked firmly away. It took Harriet a few moments to see the model of the player in the room itself, but as they reached the center of the chamber Mr. Leacroft moved in his seat, and her eyes found him in the gloom. He was lost in the folds of a great armchair that looked through the streaked window into the ill-kept garden beyond. He turned toward them, and Harriet was surprised to see a much younger man than she had expected. He could be no more than forty, and his face was unlined. His head had been shaved, but though he wore no wig, he was decently dressed. An auburn stubble marked out the edge of a high forehead and his eyes were as green as Harriet’s own. He looked very tired, and having blinked once at the company who had intruded on him, turned back toward the garden.

  “Angel, demon or fool? Who visits today?” he said. His voice had the weariness of all time about it, but was still clear and cool. Its habits of musicality could not, it seemed, be hidden even in this air of fatigue. Harriet approached.

  “We are none of these, Mr. Leacroft, I believe, and we are sorry to trouble you, but there are some things we must ask you.”

  He continued to stare into the garden and sighed but did not speak. Lady Susan moved toward the harpsichord. Her fundamental nature as a musician best showed itself in that whenever she entered a room where there was an instrument, she could not rest until she had tried it. Crowther, meanwhile, pulled the portrait of Bywater from his pocket again and placed it in front of Leacroft’s eyes.

  “Do you know this gentleman, sir? We believe he came to see you twice some little time ago.”

  Mr. Leacroft neither responded nor looked at the paper in front of him.

  Harriet caught Crowther’s eye. He removed the paper and put it into his pocket again.

  “We are sorry to trouble you, sir, but it is a matter of the greatest importance,” Harriet said.

  Susan had lifted the lid, adjusted the stool, and was beginning to try the keys. Her hands found their way into a piece of music Harriet had heard her play many times before in Berkeley Square. She had never really listened to it, nor did she pay much mind now, as she was too preoccupied with keeping the irritation and frustration out of her voice.

  “Do you know the name Fitzraven, sir?”

  A gentle animation spread over Mr. Leacroft’s features, and Harriet began to hope for an answer, but rather than speak to her, he stood and, ignoring Harriet and Crowther entirely, crossed over to the harpsichord. Susan stopped suddenly, rather frightened by his approach, but he smiled at her with genuine warmth.

  “No, no. Play on.” He took a seat beside her, and Susan began again, a little hesitantly at first, then with greater confidence. After listening a while with an air of great pleasure, he said, “You like Mr. Mozart very much, don’t you, my dear?”

  Harriet leaned toward Crowther and whispered, “Who is Mozart?”

  Crowther shrugged. “There were a couple of children brought to London in the sixties. Their name was Mozart. I thought them a curiosity, like dancing bears. Performing monkeys.”

  Susan nodded very hard at Mr. Leacroft, enthusiasm lighting up her face.

  “My father saw him when he played as a little boy in London, sir. Then a friend of his brought this home with him from a trip to Paris. Father made me learn it at once. It was a great favorite of his.”

  Mr. Leacroft’s eyes widened and he suddenly laughed out loud. “Why! You are Susan Adams—Alexander’s daughter! I heard you play this before—when could it have been? In early seventy-nine, yes, yes . . . and thought you a prodigy, though you did not play it so well then as you do now.” He put his arm round the girl and kissed the top of her head. Susan grinned up at him as he went on, “Alexander had only a manuscript copy, is that not right? Did not Herr Mozart write it out himself for their friend?”

  Susan laughed. “He did. Though Herr Mozart was rather drunk when he did so and wrote something rather rude about the old organist of Versailles at the end. Father copied it out again before he would give it to me to learn. Even though I didn’t speak French then.”

  Mr. Leacroft rocked forward with laughter. “I remember! I borrowed the original and made my own copy. It was one of the last things I remember before coming here. I still have it, and sometimes when I am well I play it again. One can be lost and reborn in such music . . .”

  He became suddenly serious again. Harriet made to move forward, but found Crowther’s hand on her arm.

  Susan began to play again. “I think this is my favorite part,” she said. Leacroft tilted his head to one side and listened.

  “From the Presto. Yes. You have taste as well as talent, Miss Adams. It has a dark sort of pressing forward to it, does it not? The melancholy of A minor, it is like a hand across the sun of the major key. But how is your father, my dear? And you have a little brother, do you not?”

  Susan’s hands became still on the keys. “Papa is dead, sir. But my brother is well.”

  Leacroft covered her fingers briefly with his hand. “I am sorry to hear it, dear. He was a good man.”

  Susan did not lift her eyes. “He was. Mrs. Westerman and Mr. Crowther here found who killed him and saved Jonathan and me.”

  Leacroft looked up rather wonderingly at Harriet and Crowther; it was clear he had forgotten they were in the room.

  Susan removed her hands from the keys and Leacroft began to play himself. It was a mournful, empty sort of sound. “Why are you here, sir?” Susan said quietly. “You do not seem mad to me.”

  He continued to play. “I am not always as I am today, Susan. You have woken me a little, you and Mr. Mozart. But there has been such coming and going in the last little while. An old friend came to see me yesterday. She sang to me. It is strange, I had thought seeing her would make me very happy, but I felt as if she had brought all of London into the room. All the hurry and finery of it. I felt she was dragging something out of me. It made me very tired. Though I am glad she is well, I hope she does not come again.” His hands paused. “Do you understand? I know it is difficult . . .”

  “I think so, sir,” Susan replied. “I went to the opera on Saturday. It was wonderful, but it is exhausting to be so bright all the time.”

  He nodded and smiled slightly, and his hands began to move on the keys again. Susan suddenly frowned and began to pick out a tune over the chords he played. Harriet concentrated. She was sure Susan was playing the theme from the “Yellow Rose Duet.” Leacroft continued to play as he asked, “You know this piece of mine? The young man in their picture stole it then.” He indicated Harriet and Crowther with his chin. “Strange. I wrote it thinking of Isabella. Then she came yesterday and sang it to me. She was amazed when I played alongside her. She asked too about that young man. Everyone does. It made her unhappy. I do not care that he took it.” He gave Susan a slightly twisted smile. “He came when I was in one of my shining moods. At such times I play and write day and night and think myself a king. He listened like a thirsty man drinks.”

  Susan suddenly paused in her playing. “That part is different. In the opera house the harmony is this.” Leacroft raised his hands from the keyboard and Susan repeated the passage they had just played.

  Leacroft shook his head. “No, no. The bass collects what has been, and hopes for what is to come.” He played the phrase again. Harriet could only tell it was different from the way Susan had played it, though it seemed more mournful, a deeper color somehow in the air.

  Lady Susan seemed to hold her breath, then nodded very slowly. “That is a great deal better.”

  Leacroft kept his eyes on the keyboard. “Yes.”

  “Do you really not mind, sir, Mr. Bywater saying he wrote this piece when it is yours?”

  “Miss Adams, I cannot feel it. I do not want the world to come and look at me. I was unhappy in the world. Here I am content. Perhaps that is enough to show I am mad.”

  Susan looked down at her ha
nds. “May I come and see you again, sir?”

  He stopped for a second and looked into her face with calm consideration before he said, “Yes, my dear. I think I should like that. Who takes care of you now?”

  “Mr. Graves. And Mrs. Service who lived opposite the shop.”

  Leacroft looked up into the air to his right. “I remember Graves a little. He wrote for newspapers. And Mrs. Service. A quiet lady. How far away it seems. Yes. You may come, and bring Mrs. Service to watch you, but no one else, and not too often.”

  “Thank you, sir.” She watched him for a little while, the way his hands moved over the keys. “I think perhaps you are weary, sir. We should go now.”

  “Thank you, Miss Adams. Yes. I think so.”

  Susan stood and gave him her hand; he bowed over it from his seat without standing, then returned to the keyboard. Susan walked toward the door. Harriet and Crowther simply followed in her wake, unnoticed.

  Mr. Gaskin met them on the porch as they put on their cloaks. Susan fastened hers at her throat and, cutting across Mr. Gaskin’s compliments, turned and said to him, “Mr. Gaskin, I am Lady Susan Thornleigh. My brother is the Earl of Sussex. Theophilius Leacroft is my friend. We shall send manuscript paper for him to write on when the mood takes him.”

  Mr. Gaskin’s greasy smile froze on his face and his eyes darted about in confusion.

  “But, my lady, they are mere scraps! All in confusion! He writes on what he likes and leaves them fit for nothing but the fire.”

  Susan was very still and spoke quietly. “We shall send paper. If he does not wish to keep his work by him, you must send it to us in Berkeley Square, and you will be paid for doing so. But if you put one more note of that gentleman’s music in the fire, I shall burn your house down.”

  With that she turned and her footman handed her into the carriage. Harriet and Crowther, having nothing to add, followed her in silence, leaving Mr. Gaskin gasping and bowing on the gravel.

  Harriet felt Susan trembling a little beside her. After a while, the girl turned toward her, and Harriet found herself looking down into her clear blue eyes. They had a thin rim of gold that matched her hair: it reminded her of Rachel.

  “I did not want to be a lady, or rich, Mrs. Westerman,” she said. “But there are times when it is very useful, I think.”

  Harriet put her arm around her and Lady Susan settled into her shoulder with a sigh.

  “Indeed it is, my love. Indeed it is.”

  4

  The man Jocasta was looking for did not have any fixed place of business. He kept his wife and two boys in a first-floor room and saw that they ate well enough, but one was not likely to find him there after dark. His nature was not settled, nor did he hunger for domestic comfort, and he had made enemies enough in his time to make him wary of fixed sleeping places. His business made it needful though that he could be found by those who wanted him, so he had his public haunts. She knew he’d be in one of half a dozen places, so was ready to visit them in turn. The Season had started, so the Quality were beginning to run back to Town and get through their allowances. That meant the start of his hunting season, and as long as there was blood in the water he’d be in one of his haunts, though where he laid his head on any night remained a secret even from his woman.

  Jocasta had taken a slow walk around Seven Dials, went first to the Peacock and then to the George’s Head before she found him hunched over a pint pot and with a clay pipe of cheap tobacco in his dirty hand. His face was hidden by the pointed brim of his hat and his figure shrouded by the shadows of the dark corner in which he sat curled, but she knew him well enough. Jocasta set herself down on the opposite side of the table. Sam stood behind her like a scrubby footman with Boyo in his arms.

  “How do, Molloy?” she said.

  The hat tipped slowly back to reveal a face so lined and cracked it looked like a milk jug smashed and restuck a dozen times. His cheeks were caved. He let the smoke drift out of his mouth softly, softly, like fog rising off the river.

  “Mrs. Bligh. And a young friend. There’s nice.”

  “I need a little tutoring from you, Molloy.”

  “Them cards gathered you a bit of capital, have they? Want to learn how to send it to work in rich men’s pockets?”

  Jocasta sniffed and folded her strong arms. “I’ll leave that business to you and the long beards in Whitechapel,” she retorted, then let her words come out slow after that. “I want tutoring in the ways of your former trade.”

  Molloy leaned back, putting one arm along the back of the settle, his mouth twisting round his pipe.

  “And what might that be, Mrs. Bligh? I don’t rightly know what you mean.”

  Jocasta pulled out the pack from her pocket.

  “You forget, I’ve been round here a time. And people who are proper and tight-mouthed in their day-to-day get chatty about all sorts of things when they look at the pictures. I know where you got that first guinea you lent to some fool and made into two. Take a card.”

  Molloy reached warily into the pack, looked at the image on the card in his hand and slapped it down on the table. Jocasta spoke over her shoulder to Sam. “Remember this one, boy?”

  The lad concentrated hard, then his face suddenly brightened. “Thief!” He caught the look on Molloy’s face and dropped his eyes, mumbling into Boyo’s fur, “That is, can say a few things, like pulling apart, but mostly that’s thief, thieving and that.”

  Molloy watched him go red then he reached forward and slid the card suddenly back to Jocasta, following it with his thin body till his cracked face was up close to hers. She didn’t flinch.

  “Ha! A pretty trick, lady! Say what you like. Old stories and I know how to keep quiet.”

  Jocasta looked into his eyes, all reddened with the smoke, his blue irises swimming about in them like devils in hell. “Me too, Molloy.”

  He pulled away from her again, took the pipe from his mouth and blew a smoke ring into the dusty air, watching her cautiously. “I suppose I can hear you out. What’s the matter of it then, Mrs. Bligh?”

  She spoke low. “I need to get in somewhere quick and quiet, then out. And I don’t want to leave any sign of my coming or going.”

  Molloy considered the ceiling for a while.

  “You after something of your own, or something of theirs?”

  “Something that belongs to another, I reckon. And I reckon they should have it back.”

  His eyes narrowed. “That smacks of philanthropy to me.”

  “It’s known you’ve done a favor before where there was no need.”

  “I don’t like that put about. Doesn’t do any good for a man in my business to get a reputation for charity.” He spat on the floor, thick and yellow it came from him, and sank into the wood. “When?”

  “Tonight.”

  “You’ll never learn the trick of it in a day,” he said angrily, “even if I were willing to share. Locks are like your fancy cards. They take learning and a little love.”

  Jocasta remained still. “It needs doing, Molloy.”

  Behind them, a man rolled up to the bar and set down a coin. The barmaid gave him a measure of gin without a word, and without a word back he drank it and turned to go. Molloy didn’t move, but Jocasta could see the blue devils swimming the way the man went out of the room.

  “Give me the hour and place and I’ll open up,” he grunted. “Then I’m gone. You see trouble, it’s all yours. Coin, and you share—and don’t think I won’t find out if you don’t. Good enough for you?” He put the pipe back into his mouth.

  “Good enough. Nine o’clock,” Jocasta replied evenly. “Top of Salisbury Street.”

  She stood and walked out of the room, feeling him watching her all the way.

  5

  Knowing that Harriet and Crowther were to attend the second performance of Julius Rex that night, Mrs. Service had arranged for dinner to be brought forward, and so the company sat down at the rather country hour of four o’clock. The interim had bee
n consumed with an intense debate between Harriet and Crowther as to the wisdom of going immediately to see Mr. Tompkins’s acquaintance, Gladys, with only Mr. Bywater’s picture in their hands, or whether they should wait till Mr. Crumley’s artistry had provided them with a full set of the leading figures at the opera house. Harriet wished to go at once. Crowther urged caution and was in the end successful, if only because the time had become impossibly short. Susan they had delivered back into the bosom of the household as soon as the carriage had drawn up. Beyond hearing Graves’s general greeting as he returned from the shop and various footsteps throughout their discussion, the rest of the household did not enter the library.

  “Fitzraven must have been attempting to blackmail Bywater,” Harriet stated with great determination. “He went to visit Leacroft as soon as he saw the parts for the duet. He wished any romance between Bywater and Isabella to end, and no doubt thought he could put some of Bywater’s wages in his pocket too. He would never have been able to resist. No doubt he told Bywater what he knew and arranged for him to visit and discuss terms on Thursday afternoon, then they fought.”

  Crowther leaned against the library desk, watching her stride back and forth in front of the fire like a general.

  “But what of the French, Mrs. Westerman? What of the spies and Mr. Palmer?”

  Harriet threw up her hands. “Whatever else they are guilty of, perhaps they are innocent of this. Mr. Palmer himself thought it odd that Fitzraven was killed.”

  Harriet was surprised to find a certain uneasiness in the air when they sat down at table. Graves remained polite, but was distinctly reserved. Rachel looked serious and quiet, and Susan looked rather unhappy and confused. When Graves begged for a moment of her time before she went to dress for the evening therefore, Harriet followed him into the library with a feeling of distinct dread.