by Alan Finn
One of the Willoughbys had decided to pay me a visit.
The door swung open when I reached the brougham. Inside was Violet, staving off the chill with a wool blanket and one of the hats that had made her family’s fortune.
“Violet?” I said. “Have you been waiting long?”
“An hour or so.”
“For heaven’s sake, why didn’t the two of you go inside? Winslow looks like a drowned rat up there.”
“Quite honestly, Edward, I don’t want to enter your home.”
Although Violet was looking in my general direction, her eyes refused to meet mine. Instead, her gaze settled somewhere on my chest and remained there, not budging until I entered the coach and sat beside her. Then her focus shifted to the window.
“Why would you say such a thing?” I asked, fumbling beneath the blanket until I found her hand. Violet pulled it away as soon as I touched it.
“Bertie told me everything, Edward,” she said. “How he saw you at Mr. Barnum’s party. How you ignored him and ran away.”
In hindsight, I should have known this conversation was coming. Yet Bertie and even Violet had been forgotten during the course of the day, eclipsed by bees and secrets and the pale, gaunt face of my father.
“Yes,” I said. “It was quite a coincidence.”
“He said you were with someone. A woman.”
“I was,” I replied. “Her name is Mrs. Lucy Collins.”
“The same Mrs. Collins suspected of Mrs. Pastor’s murder?”
“Like me, she’s one of the suspects, yes,” I said. “But I have no doubt about her innocence, nor does she about mine. Which is why we have been working together to prove it.”
“Is that what you were doing at Mr. Barnum’s ball?” Violet asked. “Trying to prove your innocence?”
“As a matter of fact, we were. We had questions to ask of Mr. Barnum.”
“I suspect you didn’t get the answers you were seeking,” Violet said. “Bertie told me it appeared as if the two of you were arguing as you left the hotel.”
“He was mistaken,” I said.
Violet edged away from me. Not by much, but enough for me to notice the slight space that widened between us.
“He also said you ran when he spotted you.”
“I did,” I admitted. “It was foolish of me. It was my assumption that if Bertie spotted me with Mrs. Collins, he would assume the worst. And so he has. I should have simply introduced the two of them and avoided all this trouble.”
Yet there was more to it than that. Bertram Johnson had seen Lucy dancing in my arms. He had seen me lost in her company. I wasn’t certain if he had mentioned that to Violet, but it was my suspicion that he had.
“How badly do you want to marry me, Edward?” Violet suddenly asked. “Do you truly love me?”
“Of course I do,” I said. “How can you even question that?”
Sadly, I already knew the answer. Violet doubted my devotion because I had given her good reason to. Flitting about the city with Lucy. Dancing with her. Coming perilously close to kissing her. Looking back on my actions, Violet had every reason to question what was in my heart.
Yet I was certain that I loved her. I had loved her ever since that first bite of cake at that silly veterans’ dance. Only lately, that love had become more complicated, thanks to the presence of Lucy Collins in my life.
I certainly had no intention of pursuing a dalliance with Lucy, nor did I expect us to remain friends once our names were cleared. Yet my feelings for her had undoubtedly evolved since our first meeting—a fact that caused much guilt where Violet was concerned.
“I don’t question it,” Violet replied. “But everyone else does.”
“I don’t give a damn what everyone else thinks.”
“Neither do I,” Violet said. “I’ve said the same thing to Bertie and to my parents. But I don’t like secrets, Edward. Everything you have done could be forgiven if you had simply told me about it.”
“I’ve told you all along that I’m attempting to clear my name.”
“But you didn’t say how,” Violet replied. “You could have told me that you struck up a friendship with this Mrs. Collins and were investigating the crime together. You could have told me of your intentions to attend Mr. Barnum’s masked ball. I, of all people, would have understood. But for some reason, you felt you couldn’t trust me. You refused to share your plans with the woman who wants to be your wife. That is the part I can’t forgive.”
It suddenly became clear what was happening. So clear, in fact, that I felt stupid for not seeing it sooner. Violet hadn’t come here to ask me about Lucy Collins. The purpose of her visit was far worse.
“You’re breaking off our engagement, aren’t you?”
“I am,” Violet said, her tone heartbreaking in its finality.
She finally faced me, revealing how much she had changed since we first met. She was no longer the bright young thing marching after me as I left that soldiers’ ball. No longer the pretty girl concerned only with frocks and hats and the gossip of her friends. Now heartache pinched her delicate features and pain filled her blue eyes. Sorrow weighed on her, and it was all my doing. In my effort to shield her from harmful information, I had only caused more damage.
Yet there were many things I didn’t dare confide to her, no matter how much she wanted me to. My mother, for example, and how she had spoken to me from beyond the grave. Or my father and the crime that he had committed. Then, of course, there was my biggest, most shameful lie—that the name everyone but Lucy knew me by wasn’t truly my own.
Sitting in that brougham, listening to the rain pounding on the roof, I realized our entire courtship and engagement had been a folly. How stupid I was for thinking none of that would eventually affect Violet. How utterly crazed I was for believing it possible I could marry into one of the city’s richest families without my past coming back to muck it all up.
But now I knew the truth. There was no escaping my past. At least not where Violet Willoughby was concerned. I should have known that it would snake its way back into my life somehow and tear the two of us apart.
“You’re right,” I said quietly. “I was wrong not to trust you. And I accept your decision.”
“I’m truly sorry.” Tears had formed in Violet’s eyes, brimming over and threatening to spill down her porcelain cheeks. “Perhaps we can be friends at some point.”
“I hope so,” I replied. “For I wish you nothing but happiness.”
After that, there was nothing left to do but part ways. I gave Violet one final kiss on the cheek before easing out of the brougham and letting the rain once again surround me. I remained standing in the downpour until the brougham departed, its wheels sloshing through the growing puddles in the street. Only when it was out of sight did I turn and go inside.
I entered a dark and empty house, Mrs. Patterson having gone home to her husband hours earlier. Instead of making noise or trying to brighten the place, I welcomed the pitch-black stillness. In the parlor, I dropped into the first chair I could find, staring at the darkened walls and waiting until my head was clear of painful thoughts.
I don’t know how long I stayed there. Not being able to see the clock on the mantel, time passed in a hazy, unpredictable way. It could have been an hour or five minutes. I probably would have remained there the entire night had it not been for a sudden pounding on my door, which forced me to get up and light a lamp.
Opening the door, I found Barclay standing on the other side, rain dripping from the brim of his hat. His presence wasn’t a surprise, seeing how he had said he was going to stop by later. Still, I asked, “What are you doing here?”
Barclay took one look at me and knew something was amiss. “What’s wrong? Has something bad happened?”
“Violet just broke off our engagement,” I said.
Barclay’s mouth dropped open. “Oh, Edward, I’m so sorry. Was it because—”
I raised a hand, effectively stopping him.
“Not entirely, no.”
“You don’t know what I planned to say.”
He was correct. I didn’t know, really. But whatever cause he was going to suggest, I knew it wasn’t the sole reason for the loss of my fiancée. There were many factors for why Violet was now out of my life. The biggest one, incidentally, was me.
“I assume you’re here to fulfill the promise you made to me earlier,” I said, having no desire to speak any more of Violet.
“I’m sorry I left you in the lurch like that,” Barclay replied. “What the Krugers told us led me to believe I knew the identity of Mrs. Pastor’s killer. I needed to do one more bit of investigating before I could be sure.”
“And are you now sure?”
“Positive.” Barclay, still standing in the doorway, gave a few quick glances both indoors and out. “Do you mind if we talk about it inside?”
I led him to the parlor, where I poured us both a brandy. Barclay, as was his habit, pulled out his pipe and stuffed it with tobacco.
“So you know without a doubt who killed Mrs. Pastor?” I asked dully.
“And Sophie Kruger,” Barclay added.
“Do you feel like sharing the name of the killer?”
“I do,” Barclay said, lighting his pipe. “It was Lucy Collins.”
I at first assumed he was making a joke in an attempt to cheer me up. But as I searched his features through the haze of his pipe smoke, I saw that he couldn’t have been more serious.
“That’s ridiculous,” I said. “She was right next to me the whole time when Mrs. Pastor died.”
“How can you know for certain? You said yourself there was a moment of darkness. And as for Sophie Kruger, Mrs. Collins could have easily paid her a visit in the middle of the night.”
“But why would she do such a thing?”
“The motive is plainly clear,” Barclay said. “She wanted to get rid of her competition.”
Although it angered Barclay, I couldn’t help but laugh. The notion that Lucy was the killer was preposterous. Barclay didn’t know what I knew. About ways of collecting bee venom or the noseless Corinthian Black. He hadn’t seen Lucy tirelessly try to clear her name. Most of all, Barclay didn’t know about the Praediti.
“Has Mrs. Collins told you about Declan O’Malley?” he asked.
The name caused my laughter to immediately cease. When I replied, it was with a cautious, “She has, yes.”
“So you know all about her previous life as Jenny Boyd?”
“Not everything,” I said. “Just that it was part of her past.”
“And you didn’t think to tell me about this?”
“I didn’t know it was important.”
Barclay, disappointed, shook his head. “Well, as it turns out, it was, Edward. When Mrs. Collins’s brother told me last night that they hailed from Richmond, I took the liberty of contacting a policeman friend who works there. He told me a young woman who fit Mrs. Collins’s description vanished with her baby brother almost a decade ago. Her name was Jenny Boyd, and there were rumors she had married and gone north.”
“That’s not so strange,” I said. “She got married and moved away.”
“Edward, she lied,” Barclay said. “Not only that, but she changed her name entirely. Newly wedded wives don’t do that unless they have something to hide.”
Or else they’re ashamed of their family, I thought. That was certainly my excuse. Perhaps it was also true of the woman now known as Lucy Collins.
“What does this have to do with Declan O’Malley?” I asked.
“He was Jenny Boyd’s husband. Although there’s no proof that they actually were married, they lived together as man and wife. He was a laborer. She stayed home to mind her infant brother.”
“So they might have been living in sin,” I said. “That doesn’t mean she’s a murderer.”
“Then she probably mentioned how Mr. O’Malley died.”
I nodded. “It was a stomach ailment.”
“I suppose you could call eating beef stew laced with arsenic a stomach ailment,” Barclay said. “Most people, though, call it poisoning. The police weren’t able to prove it was her, but they knew she was behind it. They kept an eye on her for weeks afterward, hoping she’d do something to give herself away. Before long, she was gone, having slipped away in the night.”
By that point my heart was in my throat, beating so quickly it made me cough. I spent a moment or two hacking like a man dying of consumption while my thoughts raced. And going through my mind was the distinct possibility that Lucy really had killed Declan. Knowing this made me doubt everything else she had ever told me.
The more I thought about it, the less certain I was that she hadn’t killed Lenora Grimes Pastor as well. I thought she was near me the whole time, but it would still have been possible for her to dash to Mrs. Pastor in the dark and plunge a needle into her neck. As for Sophie Kruger, I had no inkling of Lucy’s whereabouts the night she died. She had no alibi for when the poor girl was killed.
More and more, it was starting to look like Barclay was right.
Earlier that week, outside the Dutton residence, Lucy had joked that she could have had me wrapped around her little finger if she wanted to. Looking back on it, I realized that I already was. I had gone along with nearly everything she had suggested, from teaming up to investigate the crime to showing up at Mr. Barnum’s ball. I had been so quick to presume her innocent, when, in fact, I should have doubted her all along.
My coughing died down but my heart continued to race and desperate thoughts still galloped through my head. Was Lucy Collins really a killer? Had all of her words and actions—the kindnesses, flirtations, even her attempted kiss—merely been a way to fool me into thinking she was innocent?
Marching among all these questions was one louder and more urgent than the rest: By helping her, what, exactly, had I gotten myself into?
“Do you plan on arresting her?” I asked Barclay.
“Not yet,” he said. “If Mrs. Pastor and Miss Kruger had been killed by arsenic, Mrs. Collins would already be in chains. But right now, I can only do what the police in Richmond did—wait.”
I, on the other hand, could not wait. If I had been fooled by Lucy, I wanted confirmation of that fact immediately. But I couldn’t do it with Barclay sniffing around. For all I knew, he planned on hauling Lucy to jail the next morning. I needed to take him off the scent. Just for a day or so until I could confront her myself.
“You might have to wait,” I told him.
“What do you mean?”
“Mrs. Collins . . . has gone to . . . New York. For a few days . . . at least.”
The lie was so blatant that I had trouble saying it. The words came out haltingly, so much so that I was certain Barclay didn’t believe a word of it. Yet to my surprise, he sat up and said, “Are you sure?”
“Positive. I put her and her brother on the train myself.”
“Did she say why she was going?”
“Family business,” I replied, the lie expanding by the second. “Something to do with her late husband’s sister. It was all very sudden.”
“When will she be back?”
“I’m not sure. I believe she said the day after next.”
“Will you notify me if you learn of her return?”
“Of course,” I said. “She’s a murderer. She must be brought to justice.”
Barclay, pipe in mouth, eyed me through the smoke. Perhaps I hadn’t been so convincing after all. I sensed that, for the first time in our friendship, he quite rightly doubted what I was telling him.
“Well then,” he said, standing, “I suppose I should go home and get a good night’s sleep. You should, too. Nothing heals heartache better than rest and the passage of time.”
I saw Barclay to the door, wishing him a good night and assuring him that I’d contact him if I heard from Lucy Collins.
Two minutes after he was gone, I prepared to leave as well. Steeling myself with a gulp of brandy, I gr
abbed my hat and coat and rushed back outside, right into the heart of the storm.
X
I must have pounded on Lucy’s door for a good five minutes before someone answered it.
When it finally opened, Lucy herself was on the other side, dressed in a cotton nightgown and carrying an oil lamp. Her hair, twisted into a braid, hung over one shoulder. Her other shoulder was fully exposed, the fabric of the loose-fitting nightgown having slid down her arm. When she saw me, surprise shot through her sleep-clouded eyes.
“Edward? What are you doing here?”
Lucy’s surprise increased once I pushed through the door and, gripping both of her shoulders, backed her against the wall.
“Is it true?” I asked, my body shaking with rage and disbelief. “Did you kill Declan O’Malley?”
“How dare you come here and utter that name!” Lucy hissed. “Go home, Edward. Go home and don’t come back until you’ve calmed down.”
Using an outstretched foot, I slammed the door shut. “I’m not going anywhere.”
I remained in the foyer, pressed so close against Lucy that I could feel the wild thrumming of her heart beneath the thin cotton of her nightgown. I was soaked to the skin, the water rolling off my clothes to form a miniature rainstorm indoors. The coldness of the water combined with the warmth of the house to produce small tendrils of steam that rose around us.
“Edward, you’re scaring me.”
“I need to know what happened to him,” I said.
“We already went over that.”
“Yes. Only you left out the part about the arsenic,” I replied. “So now I want the truth—did you kill him or not?”
Lucy couldn’t bear to face me. “That was years ago. I don’t see how it matters now one way or another.”
“It matters because I trusted you!” I shouted. “I believed every damn lie you’ve ever told me!”
A floorboard creaking on the second floor alerted us to the presence of someone else. Lucy shoved me away as we both looked to the staircase. Thomas was there, standing on the top step, barely visible in the darkness.
