The Shadowcutter

by Harriet Smart

  Felix was scarcely listening, but he nodded.

  “And then, there is the matter of that other letter, the one we found at Mr Bryce’s. I think he will still have it safe somewhere – at least I hope he does. Perhaps that is the key that unlocks the others. By the way, you had better take these.” He took the dispatch case from inside his coat. “Since they were entrusted to your keeping.”

  Felix took the case from him.

  “And,” Major Vernon went on, picking up the blue bound folio that lay on the seat between them, “you might want to glance over the translation. It would be useful if you could. I have underlined some of the more relevant passages. It will be a distraction for you.”

  Felix took up the folio and unfastened the bows. He did not feel like reading, but he supposed he should make a show of it.

  “I do not need distraction,” he said. “Whatever give you that impression?”

  “Forgive me,” said the Major in that mild way of his that never failed to hit at Felix’s weakest spots. “Oh, and I forgot to mention, I had a letter from O’Brien yesterday. He has heard a good account of Mr and Mrs Hall. They are apparently excellent people – Quakers. She will not be treated like a servant there. It is a good place for her.”

  “And that is supposed to comfort me?” he said.

  “Yes,” said Major Vernon. “I for one am glad to think that she will be in good circumstances. We are all going to miss her – not just you.”

  Felix heard the reproach and it annoyed him.

  “If you don’t mind, sir, that is a subject I would rather not pursue just now,” he said.

  “As you wish,” said Vernon.

  In fact, he would have liked very much to pursue it. He wanted more than anything to unburden himself about all that had happened the previous day. He had been on the verge of it the night after dinner, but the Major had retired early, and then his father had insisted on a game of chess. This had been an interminable misery, to the extent he had invented a headache and gone to bed early himself, only to lie tossing and turning on the rack of physical longing and pierced through with a thousand swords of anguished love.

  In the small hours he had got up and dressed, intending to go to her room and talk to her, only to realise he had neither the courage nor the least idea what to say to her to make it right. Was that the bitter truth of it all now, that there was no future, no getting back to the ecstasy of that moment when she had pressed against him, her arms about his neck?

  He longed to speak of it, but he was afraid that Major Vernon would give him no hope. That was the long and short of it.

  He stared down at the first letter and the carriage rolled on towards Stanegate.

  -0-

  For once, fate had played him a useful card. Giles could not quite believe it. For there, at Mr Bryce’s fencing rooms, where they had called first intending to retrieve the document they had found behind the picture, was Don Luiz Ramirez in person.

  He had apparently brought his two sons for a fencing lesson with Mr Bryce. Don Luiz sat perched on one of the benches, watching them intently, occasionally giving some direction in Spanish. He was also dressed for fencing, and clearly actively engaged in the lesson. But the moment he caught sight of Giles and Carswell standing in the doorway, he came to greet them.

  “I wonder if he is still after that paper,” Giles murmured. “I hope Mr Bryce tucked it away.”

  “Perhaps, sir, you might care for a bout or two?” Don Luiz said.

  “Major Vernon will not be fencing today,” said Carswell. “He is a convalescent.”

  Giles could not deny the sense of this. Don Luiz would have made a formidable opponent in the best of circumstances. Yet he wished he might accept the challenge. There was something about seeing the flash of the foils in the sunshine that made him recall the intense pleasure he had had in the sport when younger. It had grown to be more than pleasure, but a careful and ritualised release from anger and frustration.

  Perhaps it might help to control the foul cloud of anger which was be brewing inside him, poisoning his sleep. Last night he had jolted into wakefulness from the most vivid and painful nightmare, a repetition of one he had experienced now for several nights running. He had found himself acting as the hangman at the execution of Lady Warde, standing there with the rope in his hands while a clergyman read the prayers. Fortunately he had woken before he had actually put the noose around her neck, but the texture of the hemp against his fingers remained, as did a feeling of desire mingled with horror. He had lain there, shivering, his heart pounding so violently that he thought he was about to die of apoplexy. Mercifully it had passed, and morning had come, with a sort of fitful sleep. But the memory lingered on to disgust him.

  “Oh, I don’t know,” said Giles, picking up a foil and enjoying the feel of it in his hand. “It is very moderate exercise – especially if Don Luiz is prepared to indulge me a little? It will not be great sport for you, sir, but perhaps, in memory of your cousin, a most expert fencer?”

  Don Luiz bowed.

  “It would be an honour,” he said.

  “My kit is still here, Bryce?”

  “Yes, sir,” said Bryce.

  “I really do not think I can advise this,” said Carswell.

  “Indulge me, Mr Carswell,” said Giles, strolling towards the dressing room.

  Carswell followed him.

  “Sir, you are not fit enough for this,” he said when they were alone.

  Giles pulled off his coat.

  “It will only be for a few minutes and I don’t mean to be anything but a feeble opponent,” he said. “I have no intention of attempting to win. I want to put Don Luiz at his ease, and what better way than letting him thrash me in front of his sons?”

  “Are you sure you can bear to do that?” said Carswell. “Your instincts may not allow you to hold back.”

  Giles glanced at him, a little unsettled that Carswell should read him so well.

  “Oh, I think I have them well tamped down at present,” Giles said.

  “It is just as well it is a game,” said Carswell handing him his chamois jacket. “And no more than a quarter hour of it? Yes?”

  “That will be more than adequate,” said Giles.

  He planned to show Don Luiz that he was no threat and a fellow sportsman so that he would talk comfortably to him about the acquisition of the bracelet. If he allowed himself to be defeated, he would not seem to be an enemy.

  But when he took up his position on the piste, he did feel the fierce urge to play to win, and preserve his honour. To make a plan was one thing, but suddenly he felt like throwing it to the wind.

  Don Luiz matched him in height, but he had a highly developed physique, that the tight fencing jacket displayed to some advantage. Giles was glad he was not engaging him in a bare knuckle fight. However, bulk and muscle were not necessarily to a fencer’s advantage: agility and a nimbleness gave a lighter man an edge, a fact which Giles, in his youth, had exploited to some effect. It was not entirely a lost cause to think of winning, even in his present enfeebled state.

  But fencing was a mental sport as well as a physical one, a game of chess played with swords, and he was about to face a practised politician. Don Luiz was the possible mastermind behind frauds and assassinations and he could, no doubt, project a dozen causes and effects simultaneously. That gave him him a striking advantage.

  He made for a fascinating opponent. It excited Giles to be standing there, waiting to begin. He decided to make a good show of resistance. He could not simply roll over like a dog. Don Luiz needed to see both his submission and his strength. That way he would gain the greatest respect.

  The eyes of the little boys were sharp on them. A handsome pair of children, and no doubt objects of great paternal pride. Edward would have been about the age of the elder one, he thought. Then quite unbidden, an image of Laura holding Edward in her arms half an hour after his birth came into his mind. It had been when he had come in to see them both togeth
er for the first time, and how in the silence of the early morning (it had been just before dawn) they had sat together, the three of them, in a sort of delirium of happiness that he had never known before or since. Edward was wide awake and looking at him with the strange wisdom of the new born child, as if his character was fully formed, and that each tiny gesture, each wide-eyed stare formed his part of the conversation.

  Then his ghosts, Laura and Edward, took possession of him and he longed for them to be anything but ghosts, while knowing that they could never be anything else. He knew that that they were lost to him forever.

  This knowledge brought an intense pain with it, as acute as if Don Luiz had advanced on him and stabbed his sword straight into his stomach. With the pain came anger that it should be so, and that drove him now, banishing the uncomfortable languor of the last few weeks, and filling him with a violent energy, that had him twitching on the piste.

  “En garde!”

  He engaged and attacked Don Luiz, as if his life depended on it, as if the foils were cutlasses and there were no masks or leather jackets to protect him. He wanted to see blood, or rather, he was seeing blood already.

  Don Luiz countered well enough, but Giles soon realised, with mounting satisfaction, that he had him on the back foot. He had no doubt expected something more mannerly, more restrained, not such a show of raw aggression, and he had no time to adjust his strategy. Giles scored a hit in moments and demanded they launch at once into the next bout, pressing the advantage he had already established. This time he determined to yield, but only just, giving Don Luiz the illusion that he still had a chance to win. And just as Giles hoped, Don Luiz, having won his bout, at once became a touch cocky. The final bout went just as he had wished: Giles made his hit and claimed his victory.

  He could, in fact, have gone so far as to knock the foil from Don Luiz’s hand, but decided that would be ungracious, especially in the presence of the children.

  He pulled off his mask and bowed.

  “Thank you, sir,” he said, but it was a struggle to find the breath to speak. He realised then he had pushed himself too hard. He turned and made his retreat to the dressing room.

  Carswell, who was lounging by the door, stared at him questioningly.

  “I changed my mind,” Giles said, with all the nonchalance he could manage.

  He staggered through to the dressing room, threw down his gloves and foil, and struggled to get out of his jacket which now was intolerably tight. He stripped off his shirt and sat down on the bench, breathless and sweating, wishing he had a pail of water to tip over himself. The effort had been greater than he thought. He felt weak with exhaustion now, but as the door to the dressing room opened, he reached for another towel and attempted to look a little more composed. It was just as well, for it was Don Luiz.

  Don Luiz made a slight bow.

  “You fight, sir, like a true warrior.” Giles managed a gracious nod. “But I do trust you have not made yourself ill, for the sake of my sport.”

  “As I said, it was in memory of Don Xavier. We could not disgrace his memory, sir, could we?”

  Don Luiz bowed again and began to get out of his own kit.

  “I am lucky to have run across you,” Giles said, when he had cooled off a little. He reached for his shirt, pulled it over his head. “I wanted to speak to you anyway, sir. You may be able to help me in a little professional business of mine.

  “Of course. I am your servant, sir.”

  “I believe you may have had some dealings with a man who was recently murdered.”

  “Oh?”

  “Nothing to alarm you sir, I assure you. We have the culprit. No, I am just making my case watertight. Justice must be done.”

  “Indeed, sir, it must. So how may I assist?”

  He was now standing at the looking glass, rearranging his cravat. Giles remained on his bench, still not feeling equal to standing.

  “I have been informed – and believe me, I shall use this knowledge with discretion – that you were present at a dog fight at Byrescough on the night of the Fifteenth.”

  “Explain a little further, sir, if you please?” said Don Luiz, glancing at him.

  “The thing is, sir, you may not be aware of this, but recent legislation has outlawed such traditional gatherings in this country. If it were to emerge you attended such an event it would be perhaps a little embarrassing for a man in your position, or perhaps, I should say, in your future position?”

  Now Don Luiz came and sat down opposite him.

  “I had heard something to this effect,” he said. “A regrettable piece of legislation, I think, sir, to deny the common countryman his entertainments. Now, might I ask how you heard I was there?”

  “I saw you myself,” Giles said.

  “You did. Ha! How interesting.”

  “You may be assured of my discretion, as I said.”

  “Because you wish for mine, perhaps?” said Don Luiz with a laugh. “I see you are a sportsman, Major Vernon. It is a shame I did not know you then – it would have been interesting to hear your opinions, and perhaps lay a wager or two with you.”

  “Those Irish dogs were impressive,” said Giles.

  “Yes! How I would like to take such a pair of hounds back with me to Santa Magdalena, and a couple of bitches too. But alas, I will have no leisure.”

  “That, as I said, I had heard also.”

  “You are a well-informed man, Major Vernon,” Don Luiz said, laying his palms down on his massive thighs and looking at him carefully. “This murdered man?”

  “Yes, I saw you in his company. Fellow named John Edgar. You were drinking together – with two young women as well, I could not help observing.”

  “Edgar? I am not sure I remember.“

  “You remember the girls, surely,” Giles said. “I do. A dark-haired girl in pink dress and the other, small and pretty, with nice white teeth. She would have been my choice,” he added.

  Don Luiz exhaled.

  “If I did speak to him, how does it help you?”

  “Edgar was a criminal,” said Giles, “and I was hoping he might have made a proposition to you, offered you something for sale? Any information you can give me will be of great assistance, sir.”

  “I do vaguely remember the man,” he said. “But that is all. I am sorry sir, sorry not to be able to help.”

  -0-

  Felix followed Bryce into his little office, where without saying another word, Bryce handed over the letter.

  “I’d better go and see if the Major is all right,” said Felix, tucking the letter into his coat. The Major’s display of bravado had been impressive but alarming.

  “I will make him some tea,” said Bryce.

  Don Luiz was just leaving the dressing room as Felix went in. He gave a civil bow and said, “Perhaps you gentlemen would honour us by joining us for luncheon? I know that my sister-in-law would like to repay your kindness to my late cousin.”

  “Yes, we would be honoured,” said Major Vernon.

  Major Vernon was sitting down, dressed in only his shirt. His colour was high and his skin looked glazed with sweat. His gaze, in addition, was a little glassy. Felix sat down beside him, and took his pulse and checked his temperature. Both, he was relieved to find, were settling to normality.

  “I needn’t have wasted my breath,” Major Vernon said. “He admitted to nothing.”

  “Oh, I don’t know,” said Felix. “Hasn’t he just invited us into the lion’s den?”

  “True,” said Major Vernon. “We can have another tilt at the lists.”

  “I have the letter,” Felix added.

  “Excellent. I only wish I had a clean shirt.”

  Chapter Forty-one

  When they arrived at the Queen’s Hotel, they were met in the hall by none other than Dona Blanca.

  “I must speak to you both alone,” she said. “Come, we do not have much time.”

  With which she hurried them outside into the gardens again, and led th
em briskly down a path to one of those secluded bowers in which they had talked the other day.

  “This will have to do. When Don Luiz said he had seen you both this morning, and invited you to lunch, I was alarmed. I think Lord Rothborough’s visit the other day was most dangerous. He may have guessed that there is an important connection between us,” she said glancing at Felix. “If that is known, it will cause me great difficulty.”

  “You do not trust him to be discreet about it?” Major Vernon said.

  She shook her head.

  “I have not trusted him for some time. Even before my husband’s death, I was wary of him, although Juan trusted him. In fact, Juan trusted him too much.”

  “And yet you decided to travel with him?” Felix said.

  “I was not yet certain. I am still not. I could not afford to break from him until I was. That dispatch case which I gave you may have the evidence I need. I hope you still have it safe?”

  “I have it here,” said Felix tapping his coat.

  “I wish you did not!” she said.

  “I should tell you, ma’am,” said Major Vernon, “that we have both read those documents.”

  “I see,” she said. “So you know what my suspicions are.”

  “About the death of your husband?” Major Vernon said. “I understand a little, but it is hard for me to form a clear picture.”

  “It is a complex business,” she said. “I have never believed that the man who murdered him was anything but a hired assassin. I spoke to him on the night before his execution. He was a devil, but he was in the pay of another devil.”

  “And you think that devil might be Don Luiz?” said Major Vernon.

  “Perhaps. So what do you think of them,” she said. “As evidence, I mean?”

  “It’s a little hard to judge,” Major Vernon said. “They paint a clear picture of a conspiracy, and Don Luiz is certainly implicated in it. But a great deal is hearsay – and without first hand accounts from witnesses, it is difficult to pin anything on him.”