A Corpse in Shining Armour

by Caro Peacock

  Tabby said it in a matter-of-fact way, as if cuffs round the head were only to be expected. I tried not to let my anger show.

  ‘And what was this “shopping”?’

  ‘He drove us up near a chemist shop, gave me some money and said I was to go inside and ask for a bottle of laudanum, the strongest solution they had. He made me say it over and over until I got it right. So I went in and got it and gave it to him, and we went back to where the carriage was parked and waited there all day, until evening. Then we walked back to the hall. He gave me the bottle and said I was to take it in at a side door he’d show me and put it by Lady Brinkburn’s bed. I said I didn’t know where her bedroom was and I wasn’t setting foot in that house again, no matter what he did. I wasn’t going to have them laughing at me again.’

  Even now, with Tabby standing beside me, my heart lurched at the danger she’d been in.

  ‘He must have been very angry with you.’

  ‘He was, first go off. He got hold of my ear and twisted it till I thought it would come away from me head. And that was when he said about Handy.’

  ‘What exactly?’

  ‘“I had another servant called Handy. He got above himself and wanted a lot of money before he’d do as I told him, so I took a hammer and cracked his head open like cracking a boiled egg.”’

  She even managed an approximation of that elderly, arrogant voice.

  ‘So what did you do?’

  ‘I told him if he tried that with me, I’d take the hammer to him first.’

  Again, the voice was matter-of-fact. She wasn’t boasting. In her world, that was how things were done.

  ‘Weren’t you afraid he’d kill you there and then?’

  She shrugged again.

  ‘He didn’t in any event. He just started laughing.’

  ‘Laughing!’

  ‘Yeah. He was still holding on to me ear, so he was jerking it up and down from laughing. Then he said I had the cheek of the devil, so perhaps I was Handy rein-something or other.’

  ‘Reincarnated?’

  ‘Something like that. So then he let go of me ear and took the bottle back and said he supposed he’d have to do it himself and to wait there. Then he came back and we went and found his carriage again, and he drove us all day, to the big house.’

  ‘What big house?’

  ‘The place where we started from this morning.’

  ‘The asylum?’

  ‘I didn’t see any mad people there, it was only us and some people who looked after the place. Unless he was mad.’

  ‘Do you think he was?’

  She considered.

  ‘Dunno. We talked about it one day, when he’d come back from somewhere and was in a good mood. He gave me a glass of wine and said he supposed I thought he was mad. So I said I thought he was no madder than a lot of other people, and he laughed and said I was right and he just liked to live the way he wanted to, and that other people were always out to stop people like him living the way they wanted to. But they were ordinary people, so didn’t matter, and him and me weren’t ordinary.’

  I wished, for several reasons, that I could have heard that dialogue between the lord and the gutter urchin.

  ‘Was that when he told you about the plans for his own funeral?’

  ‘Yes. He said there were a lot of people wanted to see him dead, so he was going to give them what they wanted, only he didn’t plan to die just yet. So we’d have this big funeral, and he’d travel in the coffin for the first stage to make sure things were being done the way he said, then someone would come and help me let him out and the coffin would go on a boat with nothing in it but a suit of old armour. By then, we’d be on the other side of the water, laughing at them.’

  ‘So you were you supposed to go away with him?’

  ‘He said I could go with him to Italy. Is that a long way?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘He said it was always warm and sunny there and a man could do what he wanted.’

  How long would it have stayed warm and sunny for Tabby if his plans had succeeded and she had gone with him? Weeks or possibly months before she’d done something to annoy him again, and that time he would have killed her instead of laughing, just as he’d killed Handy when he’d baulked at helping his employer commit murder. But in spite of everything, there’d been a touch of regret for a lost adventure when she’d talked about going to Italy.

  ‘I got the surprise of my life when I saw you in there with the coffin,’ she said. ‘Until you screamed, I thought you was all part of the plan.’

  ‘You saved my life, diving through that window,’ I said. ‘You took a risk. He could have killed you instead.’

  She shrugged.

  ‘I didn’t think about it. I just went.’

  Disraeli caught my eye. His look said, Can we believe her? I nodded and stood up.

  ‘You sit down and wait here, Tabby. I’ll be back in a moment.’

  Disraeli and I walked into the corridor.

  ‘She’d be a good witness,’ I said.

  He made a face.

  ‘I hope to God it won’t come to that.’

  ‘Why? For the good name of the aristocracy?’

  ‘It’s not as simple as that.’

  ‘It seems to me quite simple. He’s killed two people at least. If he were some poor tradesman, they’d hang him without thinking twice.’

  ‘Lord or tradesman, the man’s insane. We don’t hang madmen.’

  ‘So what will happen? Will he be allowed to go off to Italy, or be shut in some other so-called asylum with freedom to come and go?’

  ‘We’d have to make sure that didn’t happen again.’

  ‘We?’

  ‘I’ll have to speak to his sons, of course.’

  As before in our acquaintance, it struck me how much Disraeli needed to be at the hub of things. Favours to friends, or even friends of friends, who might be useful in his political career were only part of it. He wanted to know how society works, the way a clock-maker wants to know about cogs, springs and ratchets. That knowledge was power to him, though what he hoped to do with the power wasn’t clear to me.

  ‘I shall speak to Lomax when he’s recovered,’ he said. ‘You’ve earned your fee and it should be paid.’

  ‘I’m sure he won’t see it that way. I was supposed to help settle the question of succession smoothly and quietly. It’s still not settled.’

  ‘Ah yes, the succession. I have an idea that the old man won’t outlive the humiliation for long. Of course the eldest son will have management of the estates as soon as Brinkburn’s declared officially insane.’

  His tone was musing, almost absent minded. My question had been a test to see how much he knew.

  We came into the stable yard. It was full of grooms and lads dealing with a mass of over-excited black horses. Amos stood head and shoulders above the rest. He gave the halter ropes he was holding to a couple of lads and came over to us, raising his cap to Disraeli. Disraeli, who knew Amos’s worth, returned the compliment with a tip of his silk top hat. I asked Amos if any of the horses had been hurt.

  ‘Nothing worse than a strain and scratch or two. They’ll be all right when we get them settled.’

  ‘Is the hearse here?’ Disraeli asked him.

  ‘Couple of draught horses are bringing it in now. I sent the carriage back for the gentlemen.’

  Disraeli said he would wait inside, and please to tell him when the gentlemen arrived. I had a word with Amos, then went to reclaim Tabby. She jumped up when I came in.

  ‘Are we going back to London now?’

  ‘Not quite yet. I’m going to ask them to send you in something to eat and drink, but I want you to do an errand for me first. Would you please find the landlord and ask how the gentleman is who was brought in wounded.’

  She grinned and went. I settled into a chair, thinking that even Disraeli didn’t know anything. With his appetite for secrets, he’d have relished those two syllables I’d heard from
Robert Carmichael. But I’d no intention of telling him. Not yet, at any rate, and perhaps never.

  Tabby was back within minutes, grin even wider.

  ‘He wants to see you.’

  ‘Who? The landlord?’

  ‘Nah, the gentlemen who got shot. I couldn’t find the landlord, so I asked somebody where the gentleman’s room was and went in. He says…’ She screwed her face up, trying to remember accurately. ‘He says, “My compliments to Miss Lane, and if she can spare a few minutes I’d be very grateful for a talk with her.” Second room on the left, it is, top of the big staircase.’

  No point in lecturing her about keeping to instructions, so instead I took mine from her and went.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  I knocked on the door. It was opened by a man carrying a doctor’s bag. He was on the point of leaving.

  ‘He’ll do very well,’ he said to me. ‘Nothing but gruel and toast for the next twenty-four hours and total rest. I’ve left him a sleeping draught. Make sure that he takes it. I shall return tomorrow to change the dressings.’

  He obviously took me for a relative. I didn’t disillusion him. The room was dim, curtains drawn. A maid stood at the washstand, piling bloodstained cloths into a bowl. Robert was in a bed by the wall, propped up on pillows.

  ‘Miss Lane, thank you for coming.’

  His voice was strong but his face was as pale as the borrowed nightshirt he was wearing. He glanced at the maid then looked a question at me. I asked her if she would be so kind as to tell the kitchens to make gruel. She left, taking the bowl of cloths with her.

  ‘Thank you. Are they back yet?’

  ‘On their way.’

  ‘Would you come over here–I’m sorry I can’t get up.’

  I sat on a chair by the bed.

  ‘Are you hurt at all, Miss Lane?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘I want you to do me a favour.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Forget what you heard me say to him.’

  ‘You called Lord Brinkburn father.’

  He tried to smile.

  ‘A man may say anything when somebody’s pointing a pistol at him.’

  ‘It’s true though, isn’t it?’ I said.

  He didn’t answer. I shifted the chair round so that I was looking him in the face.

  ‘If I’m supposed to keep your family secrets, you’d better tell me why. You’re his son by the first wife, Natalie Stevens, aren’t you?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Did Stephen and Miles know?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘And she?’

  ‘Sophia knew from the day I walked out of the blue and into her life. It’s unbelievable, that woman’s generosity. That’s why I’m asking you to do this, in her memory. It’s all a wreck and a horror, but we must save something for her sake. You liked her, didn’t you?’

  ‘Yes. So did you just come to her and tell her who you were?’

  ‘I didn’t intend it to be as brutal as that, but heaven help me, it must have seemed that way to her. I grew up knowing Brinkburn was my father, I even have a few faint early memories of him. I was too young to know or care about legitimate or illegitimate. Then my mother died. Brinkburn paid for my education, public school, Cambridge, but always through lawyers and on condition that I used another name, not his. I chose my mother’s father’s name, Carmichael. I never saw Lord Brinkburn in all that time. As I grew older, I was curious enough to make a few inquiries about him. I found out that he was married with sons and assumed that I was a by-blow, perhaps one of many.’

  ‘Weren’t you unhappy about that?’

  ‘Boys are tough creatures. I thought he was behaving quite generously in the circumstances. I assumed that, when I’d finished my education, he’d send word of what I was supposed to do. I had some idea of going into the army, but I’d need his approval and a little of his money if I wanted a commission. So I hiked blithely from Cambridge to Buckinghamshire to see him, not knowing he was living in Italy. I’d no intention of embarrassing him, of course. My idea was to deliver a note asking for the favour of a meeting. I was walking up the drive with it, and met Sophia.’

  ‘And told her, just like that?’

  He moved awkwardly and winced.

  ‘Almost. You saw how quick she was to form impressions. She guessed there was something. And she made it clear from the start that there was no affection left between her and Lord Brinkburn, if there ever had been any. I told her he’d paid for my education. When she suddenly asked me if I were his son, I saw no reason to lie to her. I said yes.’

  ‘What did she do?’

  ‘She asked me to stay. She said she needed a tutor for her sons.’

  ‘Your half brothers. Wasn’t that awkward?’

  ‘They didn’t know, of course. Oddly, it wasn’t awkward. I liked her and I liked them. And I suppose I was young, not knowing much of the world. It seemed a reasonable arrangement to me. I’d tutor them, put by a little money, then off to the army. Only, when I’d been with them a few weeks, Sophia said she couldn’t in honour keep quiet about it any more. She told me the story you’ve read in her journal. She said my mother had been legally married, I was my father’s legitimate heir and she knew enough about that first marriage to help me prove it to the world.’

  ‘What did you do?’

  ‘Told her she must do no such thing.’

  ‘Didn’t you believe her?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Didn’t you want a title and a fortune?’

  ‘No.’

  He said it with a force that set him coughing. I poured water. He drank it and leaned back on the pillows, and talked without taking his eyes off my face, as if he needed very much to convince me.

  ‘After what she’d told me, I didn’t want my father’s name, whether it had a title in front of it or not. As for a fortune –I’d always expected to earn my living. I shouldn’t know what to do with a fortune, particularly one I’d taken from a boy who’d done me no harm.’

  ‘Why did she tell you, do you think?’

  ‘That quixotic sense of justice of hers. And another thing…’ He hesitated.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘She was already beginning to convince herself that Lord Brinkburn had poisoned my mother when it suited his purposes to have her out of the way so that he could marry Sophia legally. She thought she owed me a debt.’

  ‘Do you think she was right, that he did poison your mother?’

  ‘I don’t suppose I’ll ever know for sure. I doubted it until today. Now I think he was quite capable of it.’

  ‘Was Sophia surprised that you wouldn’t claim what was yours?’

  ‘I think she was already beginning to know me by then. I said if she tried to do anything about it, I’d go abroad and never come back. She had to accept that. I thought nobody would ever know but the two of us; Stephen would succeed to the title and that would be that. Then she developed this prejudice against Stephen and…well, you know the rest.’

  I couldn’t help glancing at the small bottle on his bedside table that held the doctor’s sleeping draught. His eyes followed mine.

  ‘Yes, that affected her judgement too. Would you please put that wretched bottle somewhere I can’t see it. I’d rather lie awake for the rest of my life than touch laudanum.’

  I took it away and put it in a cupboard. His eyes followed me there and back.

  ‘So, will you do as I ask and forget what I called him?’ he said.

  ‘Stephen and Miles heard.’

  ‘I shall deal with them. Stephen will succeed, Miles will be properly provided for, and that will be an end of it.’

  It was their tutor’s voice speaking as well as their elder brother’s. I believed him.

  ‘I can’t forget,’ I said, ‘but I won’t tell.’

  Particularly not Disraeli.

  Amos, Tabby and I stayed at the inn overnight. Late in the evening a message was brought up to say a gentleman wanted to see me downstairs. Steph
en was waiting in the private parlour. I’d never warm to the man, but came near to pitying him. His face was haggard, with a nervous twitch to the mouth.

  ‘I apologise to you, Miss Lane. I should never have implied that you were in my brother’s pay.’

  I nodded acceptance of the apology. I wanted him to go. He stayed, shifting his weight from one foot to another.

  ‘I’d been driven half mad. I’d watched my father. I knew something was happening, but nobody would listen to me.’

  ‘What’s going to happen to your father?’ I said.

  It seemed to me I had a right to know. His reply was reluctant.

  ‘Lomax says no legal offence has been committed, although the funeral was a joke in very bad taste. It has been agreed that my father’s mental condition makes it necessary that he should be kept in a secure establishment for the rest of his life. That is being attended to.’

  In his words I heard the soft thuds of the upper classes closing doors against unpleasantness. I wanted to scream that two people had died. No use. Stephen added, in a voice so low I could hardly hear it: ‘And Robert says we are to thank you.’

  Before we left next morning, I went to inquire after Robert’s health. He heard my voice at the door and called to me to come in. The doctor stayed tactfully in a corner packing up his bag. Robert looked better and claimed to have slept well.

  He smiled and put out his hand to me.

  ‘Stephen spoke to you?’

  ‘Yes. I guessed you’d sent him.’

  ‘I had a talk with both of them yesterday evening. They’ve seen sense, I’m glad to say.’

  If the doctor had been listening, nothing in Robert’s manner or voice would have told him his patient had just talked his way out of fortune and title. Trying to keep my own voice as light, I asked what he intended to do now, as if we were simply discussing plans for the next few days. His reply showed he knew I meant more than that.

  ‘In all honesty, I don’t know. Nearly all my adult life has been looking after Sophia. I feel as if I’m coming out of a chrysalis and I don’t know yet what kind of creature I am.’

  ‘I think a good one,’ I said.