The Duke's Agent

by Rebecca Jenkins

  ‘Gladly.’ Jarrett took a cigarillo and bent towards the Irishman to accept the proffered light. ‘I’ll warrant you have an easier time of it in the regular theatre.’

  The actor snorted. ‘Aye! To think we playing folk call this resting. Her damned cuts! As if we’ve not already lost one knight, a eunuch and two lawyers. I swear she’d take Celia’s part and Volpone’s too but for the difficulty of playing a telling seduction with oneself. Pardon me, saire. I’m as bitter as soot tonight,’ he ended with angry self-mockery. Jarrett returned a wry smile and they smoked in companionable silence a moment under the broad night sky.

  ‘And where might you have travelled from, Mr Jarrett?’

  ‘I have just come from Woolbridge – do you know it?’

  Mulrohney shrugged. ‘And what news from Woolbridge?’ he asked lightly, his tone at variance with the discontented look he threw out across the shadowy parkland. ‘None, I’ll warrant, for ’tis plaguey dull in the country, that it is.’

  ‘Oh, it has its native drama, Mr Mulrohney. Why, just before I left there was a tragic death of a young girl in Woolbridge. Some black-haired laundry wench of great beauty, so I was told. It sounded to be a great tragedy – the stuff of ballad singers.’

  The twilight robbed his eyes of detail, but Jarrett thought he caught the flicker of a start from the man. The actor straightened up abruptly as he crushed the ember of his cigar under foot.

  ‘I sing ballads,’ he said. Someone came to the window and called Mulrohney’s name. ‘And I am engaged to sing one now. The good lady dotes upon me warblin’, so she does,’ he elaborated, assuming the comic brogue again. ‘It’ll not do to keep her waiting.’

  ‘Mr Mulrohney – if you would care to walk with me to my inn afterwards, may I entertain you with some punch? I’ll wager you have a store of amusing tales.’

  Mulrohney turned, illuminated by the candlelight streaming from the drawing room. ‘We players are renowned good company, that we are. I’ll accept your hospitality gladly, Mr Jarrett. ’Tis a queer play-actor who can bear to turn down an opportunity to talk of himself.’

  *

  A breeze had got up and the moon hid behind a bank of clouds. The dark path was patchily illuminated by the lantern Mulrohney carried aloft.

  ‘The gel you spoke of – the one that died in Woolbridge – her name’d not be Sally Grundy, now, would it?’

  Mulrohney had stopped and faced him under the insufficient lamplight. It swung from his raised hand throwing deceptive shadows that made the vegetation around shift and dart as if alive. Jarrett kept watch for movement from the man’s concealed hand, as he sketched a nod of assent. Mulrohney held his eyes a moment. Then, with a jerky gesture of his head, he resumed his progress. ‘I knew her. She worked in the laundry up at the house now and then.’ There was a plain simplicity in the way he said the words that left Jarrett at a loss how to respond. They walked on in silence. The buildings of Gainford appeared and soon the Blue Boar could be seen across the green, the ruddy light from its windows glowing like a heart beating in the dark emptiness of the night.

  Despite the lateness of the hour the dregs of the evening’s drinkers still lingered in the tap. The innkeeper settled the two gentlemen in his back parlour. He livened up the small fire in the grate and carried in a tray of ingredients and a bowl. Jarrett occupied himself making punch while his guest stretched himself out in a deep chair by the hearth. He looked up as Jarrett brought him a glass.

  ‘Well, won’t you look at me now! Pardon me, Mr Jarrett, I’m not such good company tonight.’ He raised his glass with a flourish. ‘May this soap me tail for me and let me slip through the rest of this performance. To two more weeks!’

  Jarrett lifted his own glass and drank the toast.

  ‘And what after two more weeks?’

  ‘Two more weeks and, praise God, I’m back to Dublin for a season at a proper playhouse with proper actors!’

  ‘So you knew the black-haired girl who died in Woolbridge, Mr Mulrohney?’

  For a moment Jarrett regretted the question. A wild look flared up in Mulrohney’s eyes and then passed.

  ‘A beautiful creature, so she was,’ he said simply. His chin sank down into his neck-tie and he returned to gazing into the fire. ‘Ogh, this land o’ craim and honey! Sally Grundy – who would have thought? She had a notion to go on the stage.’ He looked up, defiant. ‘She came to me to teach her. And I did … some few things. A speech or two; the way to stand and move about the boards. She had the makings of a good little actress.’ He sat forward and poked a finger in the air to underline his point. ‘She had a voice and the presence for it and she was a worker, so she was.’ He slumped back, self-mocking once more. ‘With a pretty ankle on her, too.’ He took a long gulp of the brandy punch and threw back his head to gaze at the ceiling. ‘Sally Grundy – dead.’ His mouth twisted on the words and he closed his eyes. A bead of moisture seeped from the corner of one lid, catching the light. He sat up, planting his feet with a growl, as if shaking himself awake. ‘I need more punch! Melancholia is but the second stage of an Irishman’s inebriation. Help me on me way to the next, Mr Jarrett.’

  ‘Isn’t that oblivion, Mr Mulrohney?’ Jarrett asked as he poured him another glass.

  ‘Hell, no – you’ll be forgetting “fighting merry”, Mr Jarrett, that comes well before oblivion.’ The Irishman set down his glass and met his host’s blue eyes steadily. ‘You’ve precious little interest in the theatre, Mr Jarrett; this is about Sally Grundy. What is it you’re after?’

  Jarrett rotated the heavy glass in his hand. The dancing flames beyond fired the liquid into a magical ruby red.

  ‘A good fire, a warming punch – they call for a good tale. So why not – tell me how you met this sad girl, Mr Mulrohney.’

  ‘Sad! Sally Grundy was never sad! Not as I knew her, Mr Jarrett. She was the merriest piece!’

  ‘But talk in Woolbridge was that she might have taken her own life.’

  Mulrohney’s expressive face was frankly astonished.

  ‘Take her own life, Sal? Never!’ He was emphatic. ‘There are few things certain under God but Sally Grundy would never take her own life. Why, she was on the very eve of a great adventure. Last I saw of her she was full of plans. Full of plans.’ He trailed off, mesmerised by the pictures the flames drew for him. ‘We had plans.’

  ‘You had plans?’

  The actor gave a slight gesture, his hand falling open as if letting go of something.

  ‘We had plans,’ he repeated. ‘She was coming with me to Dublin, Mr Jarrett, to try her luck on the boards.’ He raised his head to meet his companion’s curiosity full-face. ‘She would have made her mark on the stage. I swear to you, sir, Sally Grundy must have been robbed of her life, for she’d never have thrown it away.’

  ‘How long had you been acquainted with Miss Grundy, Mr Mulrohney?’

  The shifting light from the fire deepened the lines on the actor’s face, endowing it with gravity and weight. At that moment Francis Mulrohney might have played King Lear.

  ‘A few weeks perhaps.’ He dismissed the importance of time. ‘But when you are closeted together, as you must be to coin a part or a play, Mr Jarrett, you soon get to know a body. We were of a kind, her and me.’

  ‘And you had no suspicion that anything troubled her?’

  ‘No.’ He shook his head as if the motion itself was soothing to his troubled spirits.

  Jarrett could not help wondering about the scene they played there in that room, coloured by the red glow of the fire. Had Francis Mulrohney been on stage so long that it had become second nature to perform his emotions, or was he playing a part assumed for the occasion?

  ‘There was an old suitor who’d vexed her,’ he was saying. ‘Some booby who’d married another. Taken the easier path, I reckon. Sal was not the wifely kind.’

  ‘How vexed was she? Might she have made trouble for the man?’

  ‘How? What could the lass have done? Full sure, she was
affronted, but no more than that. She might have been planning a bit of mischief – she had an impish spirit, my Sal – but she was not the kind to bear grudges. Besides, I tell you, Sally Grundy was about to leave Woolbridge and all its kind behind. Why should she concern herself?’

  ‘She would not have sworn out a breach of promise against this man then, do you think?’

  ‘Sal, go to law? The girl I knew would as soon think of flying!’

  *

  ‘I hope Mr Mulrohney made it back to the big house safe and sound, sir. The Irish, they surely know how to put it away!’ The innkeeper had just brought in a fresh pot of coffee. Jarrett had woken with a thick head after the heavy drinking of the night before, and he loitered over his breakfast.

  ‘You are acquainted with Mr Mulrohney, then?’

  ‘He comes by every now and then. Sometimes I reckon he likes a bit of peace and common sense away from all them fancy folk up at the Hall. He’s well-liked these parts, is Mr Mulrohney.’

  ‘Has he been here long?’

  The innkeeper rocked his considerable weight back on to his heels, straightening his back while he thought about it.

  ‘More than a month it’d be now, I’d say, Mr Jarrett. A week or so back he was coming in pretty regular with a dark-haired lass; pretty as a picture she was. He would hire my back parlour to rehearse.’ The big man gave a rumble of belly-laugh. ‘My good wife would have it they were up to all sorts of tricks. She slipped about, hoping to catch them at it, if you get my meaning.’ He gave a heavy wink. ‘And blow me down but they was play-acting, just like he said!’ The innkeeper laughed good and loud at the memory of his wife’s discomfiture. ‘He’s a good sort of man by my reckoning – for an Irishman.’

  Jarrett smiled back. ‘I think I agree with you, innkeeper.’

  He lingered over the papers, trying to work up the energy to set out once more on the road to Woolbridge. There was a knock on the parlour door and the innkeeper put his head round.

  ‘You have a visitor, Mr Jarrett.’

  The innkeeper stepped aside to reveal his companion of the night before. Francis Mulrohney came into the parlour dressed with a careful correctness, marred only by the slightly over-exuberant yellow of his waistcoat. He came forward stiffly. His casual conviviality seemed to have abandoned him in the broad light of day. His sallow skin bore the marks of excess, and there was a chalky look about his red-rimmed eyes. He put together a smile that was but an echo of his old charm.

  ‘You are returning to Woolbridge today, Mr Jarrett?’

  ‘I am. I took my leisure this morning. May I offer you some coffee?’

  ‘No, I thank you. I brought you this.’ The Irishman handed him a letter addressed in a florid black hand: ‘“To whom it may concern”. Read it. I’ll wait,’ he added awkwardly.

  Darting the man a puzzled look, Jarrett unfolded the document and read:

  I, Margaret, Lady Yarbrook, do solemnly testify that Francis Mulrohney, native of the City of Cork, County Cork, has been a guest in my house, Mannerly, at Gainford these past six weeks. On the night of Wednesday, 31 July past, he formed, as usual, one of the company who dined with me. I am able to swear to his whereabouts for there was a storm that night and my guests and I were occupied conducting certain electrical experiments under the tuition of Mr Wilsbury of Chichester, the renowned scientist, until past 5 o’clock of the following morning.

  I and the undersigned, who were also present, vouch for this to be the truth.

  The other signatories to this document included an archdeacon, a poet whose name Jarrett recognised and Mr Wilsbury of Chichester himself. He looked up at the Irishman.

  ‘I told her of the matter,’ he explained. ‘My generous patroness, Lady Yarbrook, has offered to pay my expenses should I be required to travel to Woolbridge to testify before the magistrates,’ he added formally.

  His face melted into a disarming frankness and the real Francis Mulrohney slipped out, a wry, shrewd Irish adventurer, well acquainted with himself and the world.

  ‘You’ve no need to say it, Mr Jarrett, and I’ve no need to ask who you are, but you think Sally Grundy was murdered and there is no reason on this earth why you would trust the word of an unknown Irish vagabond.’ He shrugged, indicating the document. ‘So I took me precautions.’

  ‘This must put you beyond suspicion.’

  Mulrohney nodded. He let out a breath and offered his hand. Jarrett shook it firmly.

  ‘I am glad to make your acquaintance, Mr Mulrohney.’

  The actor’s face lifted with a roguish smile.

  ‘Would that it had been under happier circumstances,’ he agreed. As he reached the door he paused and turned. ‘Last I saw of Sally Grundy she was swinging away down the lane, light as a bird. She laughed at me and said she was off to give a performance that night. When I asked her to tell me more, she just called out that she might tell me one day. She was a nice little creature. It’ll be many a long day before I forget Sally Grundy.’

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Jarrett dawdled his way back towards Woolbridge after the interview with Mulrohney. Somewhere a mile or two beyond Gainford he took a wrong turn. It was not until a blissful sweep of country opened out before him, and he gave Walcheren his head, that it occurred to him the mistake had been deliberate. The big bay’s legs stretched out below him and they flew over the ground. They galloped up rises of turf and jumped down steps of moor like mad things. On Walcheren’s back he was free of the past; free of the looks, the murmurs and speculations. In those brief, self-sufficient moments there was nothing but sunlight and sky and open ground and two healthy animals moving in harmony.

  At last they were both tired. Walcheren’s chestnut flanks foamed white and Jarrett’s own muscles grew dull. He reined the animal back and turned him for home. The hedgerows were lengthened by shadows as he brought them back to the valley where Woolbridge lay. Lulled by the rhythm of Walcheren’s hooves striking the baked earth, he found himself in the lane that led past the gateway to Oakdene Hall. Perhaps Sir Thomas had returned. He should call to present his apologies. The Colonel’s petty session now fixed for the next day would prevent him keeping the appointment he had made with the baronet. Besides, he had several hours to fill before his assignation with his informant in the churchyard and he was loath to drag them out at the Queen’s Head with Tiplady fussing around him.

  The drive forked and he took the left-hand branch that circled to the rear of the hall. Cresting a gently rising lawn, he saw a rose garden encircled by a set of clipped box hedges. He caught a snatch of the pastel rose of a woman’s dress as it flitted past a gap between the dense green blocks. Intrigued, he dismounted and led his horse across the lawn.

  The honeyed amber light of the setting sun seemed to encompass him in a dream. Spikes of parched grass snapped under the leather soles of his boots. The long shadows from the rose garden stretched out to draw him near. Wafted through the soft stillness, with the scent of roses, he heard a woman’s voice singing. It was an Irish air with a strongly marked beat. The dreamlike quality of the scene was accentuated by an unmistakable pianoforte accompaniment executed with forceful precision.

  ‘Oh, stay! Oh, stay!’

  sang the voice gaily.

  ‘Joy so seldom weaves a chain

  Like these tonight, that oh ’tis pain

  To break its link so soon.’

  It was a tuneful voice and it conveyed the words with playful aplomb. Jarrett approached the hedge and paused, concealed, to peep into the magical enclosure of the rose garden.

  First he saw Lady Catherine, a large white chip hat forming a pavilion over her eccentric shape. She rested her hunched frame on a high stool while her thin hands jumped about the keys of a decorative little pianoforte. As she struck out the gay melody her body moved from side to side with the lilt of the music. Before he could recover from the astonishment of this sight, he saw the singer. Bound up in the spirit of her song, Henrietta Lonsdale danced in a pale pink dress
against the rich backdrop of a profusion of crushed-velvet roses.

  An Englishman’s upbringing does not excel in preparing him to meet unconventional behaviour with equanimity. Jarrett’s first reaction was a sort of smirk that so respectable a pair of ladies should disport themselves in such a fashion. But as he stood at the edge of the garden, peering in on the scene, its charm crept up on him. Henrietta’s graceful form embodied the joy of the music completely, uninhibited by the plastic manners that society imposes. He caught himself admiring her honesty and sensed a fleeting melancholy that his own nature would never allow him to experience a similar freedom. As the first flush of embarrassment receded, his artist’s eye gradually perceived in Lady Catherine’s awkward movements a graceful dancer made clownish by the misfortune of a misshapen body. He watched in rapt silence, the spirit of the rose garden infecting him with a sliver of regret that he should be excluded from the intimacy of the two performers.

  The song ended. Henrietta bowed to her pianist, flushed and laughing. Lady Catherine beamed back in a way Jarrett would previously have thought inconceivable. All at once he was aware of his dilemma in lurking behind the hedge. The violent consciousness of his guilt in trespassing on so private a moment rooted him to the spot. Embarrassment piled up on confusion as he overheard Miss Lonsdale speak his name.

  ‘What connection might Mr Jarrett be to the Marquess, do you suppose, Lady Catherine?’

  There was a ribald chuckle from the old lady.

  ‘Connection? Connection, Miss Henrietta? It seems to me Mr Jarrett don’t wish to acknowledge any connection between them.’

  Miss Lonsdale’s tone shifted, reflecting curiosity half-reined in by a desire to smooth over a potential faux pas.