The Hanging Cage (The Northminster Mysteries Book 4)

by Harriet Smart

  “We are colleagues in the Northern Counties Criminal Investigation Office. Major Vernon is Superintendent of the division and I am the consulting surgeon. We are here to investigate the death of Miss Barker, and now that of Mr Gosforth.”

  “They are both suicides!” said Latimer. “Surely that is self-evident? What is there that needs to be prodded and poked over at such length, Mr Carswell, with people sent to spy in people’s houses without so much as a warrant?”

  “I could see no harm in it!” exclaimed Mrs Rivers. “And she saved her life! You were not here. She saved her life!” And then she burst into tears and ran upstairs. Latimer stared after her, as if casting silent curses upon her.

  “Surely such things are best left lying, sir?” Latimer went on. “Especially when these tragedies occur among gentle people. There will be enough gossip already among the lesser folk – there is scant enough respect left in this day and age! The world is falling to pieces as it is!”

  “I was always taught that respect needs to be earned by exemplary conduct,” Felix said.

  “What do you mean by that?” Latimer said.

  “You say you are a friend to this family,” Felix said. “One might read that several ways, Mr Latimer, given your concern for that young woman’s reputation.”

  “You will read it as entirely disinterested, sir,” said Latimer after a moment. “If you have any sense about you.”

  Felix did not feel the threat on his own behalf – he knew he was safe enough from such bullying – but he felt for those unfortunate souls who must live under Latimer’s authority. At that moment, Sukey’s suggestion seemed eminently plausible.

  -o-

  Giles had not gone into the house looking for Lord Milburne, but found him anyway, in the comfort of his mother’s little sitting room. Still in his dressing gown, he was stretched out on a sofa with Meg, the loyal pointer, beside him, acting as canine nurse and guardian. A folded cloth covered his eyes, which he lifted gingerly as Giles came into the room.

  “I haven’t come to hector you,” said Giles said quietly, seeing him wince at the light. “I was looking for Patton.”

  “She has gone to get me some broth,” Milburne said. “She will be back soon. I don’t know if I shall manage to drink it though she will force me.” He straightened himself a little on the sofa and took the cloth from his forehead. “What is all this about a body in the culvert?”

  “A partial skeleton of a woman,” Giles said. “It’s quite a puzzle.”

  “Poor woman,” Milburne said. “My mother is upset – though she does not say it, of course. I’m glad you are here to deal with all this,” he added.

  “Think nothing of it,” Giles said.

  “I haven’t spoken to her yet about last night,” Milburne went on, “but I shall, I promise. I thought this evening, and then tomorrow, I will go and speak to Miss Rivers. Yes?”

  “Miss Rivers is not well,” Giles said, taking the chair by the fire and wondering how much he should say.

  “No?” said Milburne sitting up abruptly, and then wincing at the pain it caused him. “What has happened?”

  “My colleague, Mr Carswell, who is a surgeon, has been attending her this morning. Quite a serious business, I understand.”

  “What does that mean?”

  Giles took a breath and said, “She appears to be in a state of some mental distress. She seems to have attacked herself with broken glass, wounding herself with it.”

  Milburne gazed over at him, shaking his head.

  “No, no –”

  “I am afraid so, my Lord. But she is out of danger now. Mr Carswell is an excellent man and she has a good nurse as well.”

  “But...” Milburne began, and then stopped, shaking his head.

  “There is something you might be able to help me with,” Giles said. “Something that might help Miss Rivers, in fact.”

  “Yes, anything,” said Milburne. “Anything! May I go and see her?”

  “I don’t know about that,” Giles said. “You would have to speak to Mr Carswell. She may not be ready for visitors.”

  “Yes, yes, of course. But what I can I do? I must do something.”

  “Last night you told me about Miss Barker’s infidelity,” Giles said. “Do you have any idea who her lover was?”

  “How will that help Louisa?”

  “Because she and Miss Barker were so close. They may have shared a great many secrets. Consider – Louisa may have acted out of fear and shame of the discovery of some terrible secret, just as Miss Barker may have done, albeit less successfully, fortunately. It is a brutal fact of our society that we often judge innocent women for the sins that men commit upon them.”

  Milburne studied his hands and nodded.

  “You did say last night,” he said after a moment, “that I should not blame Miss Barker. I had not thought – I was so angry on George’s behalf that I did not think it could be anything but her fault. But you are right. It might not have been. And if you are telling me that Louisa might too have – then, no, I cannot bear the thought of that, sir. It is too...” He looked across at Giles imploringly. “If it’s true, then...”

  “It’s just a theory. When I am looking for answers I ask a great many questions, and sometimes they are the wrong ones. But Louisa was provoked into her actions by something and I must look for probable cause. Do you have any idea who this man might be?” Milburne shook his head. “Let us unpick the thing a little. How and when did George tell you his suspicions about Miss Barker?”

  “It was that Monday at the Black Cat. The day before the ball,” said Milburne after a moment.

  “And for the sake of clarity,” Giles said, taking out his notebook, “did you know about the marriage at that point?” Milburne glanced away. “My Lord?” Giles prompted.

  “Yes, yes I did. But I swore I would not tell a soul. I gave him my word! And I have told you enough –”

  “All right,” Giles said. “Just tell me what happened at the Black Cat that day.”

  “He was miserable. At first he would not tell me why, but then I got it out of him. He and Bel had finally – well, you know what I mean, sir, and he had discovered that she was not – pure.”

  “And did he say precisely how he came by this idea?” Giles said.

  “I believe there are signs – that it’s clear enough.”

  “How many virgins had your friend slept with?” said Giles. “To know with such certainty?”

  “None!” exclaimed Milburne. “He had saved himself for his wedding night.”

  “Then his ideas will have been based entirely on hearsay,” said Giles. “And often, in matters of the bedroom, that means nonsense.”

  “He was certain of it.”

  “She told him she was not a virgin?”

  “No, of course not.”

  “Then how was he so convinced? What was the sign he meant?”

  “He didn’t say in particular. He was speaking of his new wife!”

  “Whom he was accusing of fornication,” Giles pointed out.

  “He told me he was certain of it.”

  “But did he discuss this with her?”

  “He did not say that he did. He was asking me what I thought he should do.”

  “And you said?”

  “I don’t know. I was so shocked I hardly knew what to say.”

  “But you believed him in the end?”

  “Of course. George wouldn’t lie to me! He was miserable.”

  “It never occurred to you that his inexperience might have misled him?”

  “No. He was certain, and since I have no knowledge myself, I thought...”

  Giles nodded.

  “And he had no suspicions who this other man might be? You didn’t discuss that?”

  “No,” said Milburne. “But I have wondered about it, after we talked. There is someone who...”

  “Yes?”

  “Earle,” said Milburne after a moment. “I think she liked him somewhat. I saw
them talking together and wondered. And I know he is not a good man.”

  “What do you mean by that?”

  “It was something I heard Patton saying to my mother. About Mrs Earle always having trouble getting new maids because girls who worked for her were always getting with child. I took that to mean that he was behind it. That’s common enough, I believe.”

  “Unfortunately, yes,” said Giles.

  At this moment Patton came in with the broth. As she bullied Lord Milburne into drinking it, Giles asked her if she had heard any stories from the villagers about missing women.

  “No, sir, I have not,” she said. “And I wouldn’t believe them anyway – most of them are a dirty, idle lot, truth be told. They see my mistress’s kindness and generosity as a right rather than a blessing and it would not surprise me if they were in the habit of consigning their dead to rot in culverts instead of burying them like Christians.”

  When he took his leave of Lord Milburne, she followed him from the room, and said, in the same blunt manner, cloaked in only in the most superficial deference, “I must ask you something, sir – about my mistress. I have to ask, if you’ll forgive me, but what are you intentions?”

  It had not been the easiest question to answer in the moment. He had not yet asked himself such a question and he was startled by her saying it, and with so little provocation. He was almost sharp with her for what was, by any standards, an impertinence. Yet, he saw the concern that lay beneath her extraordinary manner and understood her absolute loyalty to her mistress. He knew it would not do to offend her.

  The question itself was a disturbing one. It suggested that Mrs Maitland had said or done something to set the woman on to him, like a strange sound or movement would set a guard dog barking in the night. Perhaps it had been the dress she had chosen to wear that night at dinner, or the trouble she had gone to make his room so comfortable. Had Mrs Patton read these signs as deviations from a common standard? She was evidently unsettled by Mrs Maitland’s behaviour, and it had made her bold.

  “If you’ll forgive me, sir,” she added, after a moment of silence, and this time there was more sincerity than before, almost a touch of desperation.

  Giles nodded, and managed to find some suitable words: “An old acquaintance is something to be cherished, Mrs Patton, and never presumed upon.”

  “I’m glad we understand each other, sir,” she said, made her curtsey and left him standing in the passageway, wondering what he would say to her mistress when he next saw her. He had not been guarded, it was true.

  Minutes later, he found Mrs Maitland in a large drawing room, where what furniture remained was covered in striped dust sheets. She was removing the cover from a marble-topped table, the legs of which were made of writhing gilt myrmidons.

  “The taste of our grandfathers!” she said. “I wonder what we could get for it.”

  “It hasn’t come to that, surely?” he said. “And can you sell that? Isn’t that part of the entail?”

  “You are probably right,” she said. “I shall have to look at the inventory. It is so ugly, though! Would anyone miss it?” She reached out and caressed the bearded chin of one of the mermen. “Forgive me, gentlemen.” He could not help smiling.

  “They will probably come back into fashion,” said Giles.

  “Yes, as everything does, in time,” she said. “And if I did sell it, I should do at the wrong moment and lose a potential treasure. Such is my luck.”

  “You sound like a hardened speculator.”

  “Fortunately I do not have a penny spare to put into railways or mines, or unfortunately – depending on how your luck runs. I have been given tips by Miss Yardley, and she has the luck of the devil.”

  “Miss Yardley?”

  “She makes a study of the markets,” Mrs Maitland said. “I was rather startled by it, when I first heard her talking so.”

  “Then it is more than luck,” said Giles.

  “I suppose so. She has money to play with and the inclination to study company prospecti and so forth. She says there is luck in it, but that she cultivates her luck.”

  “I have yet to meet this lady,” said Giles. “Nor Mrs Yardley. It sounds a strange family. I have only met Mr Yardley very fleetingly and could form no opinion of him, but Mr Carswell was not impressed.”

  “He is not impressive. And the way he calls himself the Squire is, well, ludicrous. If anyone is the Squire of Whithorne it is Miss Yardley. She manages everything – he would have nothing if it were not for her. She even arranged his marriage. Mrs Yardley is worth twice as much as he is, and her trustees would never have allowed the match if Miss Yardley had not been there to reassure them that it would not be squandered.”

  “She is a queen regnant, then, like you?”

  “I am nothing of the sort,” she said. “At least not on such a scale. But I suppose the analogy holds; the trouble is that Yardley has never grown out of his childishness, and spends money like water on his antiquarian fancies. This is why I worry about Charles so – I see a man like that, and I worry that my boy...”

  “He will not. He has the best inheritance: your common sense.”

  “I wish I could believe you, but I don’t see much sign of it.”

  “It’s like growing asparagus,” Giles said. “It takes a while to establish itself. Seven years, I think, to get asparagus ready to harvest.”

  “Common sense is like growing asparagus?” she said, laughing. “Does it also have a short season?”

  “A bad analogy, then,” said Giles. “I shall have to think of a better one.”

  “You had better,” she said. “One that does not make the chamber pot unpleasant.” She covered her mouth away and turned away. “Excuse me,” she muttered. “I am rather...” She was blushing now. “As I said, I talk too much.”

  Her embarrassment at betraying this slight vulgarity was both painful and touching. He reached out and took her hand and pulled her back to face him.

  “You are a soldier’s wife,” he said. “There is nothing to excuse.”

  She pulled her hand away, shaking her head.

  “You make me forget myself,” she said.

  “I will happily take all the blame,” he said. She smiled a crooked smile at that, which made him want to take a step closer to her, but he remembered what he had said to Patton. He would not presume. “I must get back to work, though,” he managed to say.

  “Yes, yes, of course you must,” she said, gathering up the dust cover into her arms. “And so must I.”

  “Oh, before I go,” Giles said, remembering what he was about. “Can you confirm something I heard about Mr Earle. It is a probably gossip, but...”

  “Mr Earle?” she said.

  “His character with women,” Giles said. “Well, more particularly women servants.”

  “Oh, that,” she said with a sigh. “I only have what Patton told me. I did not speak with Mrs Earle about it. Perhaps I should have, since she sent me the girl and gave her a character.”

  “You took on one of her servants?”

  “Yes, briefly. She left us after a month or so.”

  “Of her own free will?”

  “Yes – which was a relief, for it turned out she was with child when she got to us, and then one never quite knows the right thing to do. But she was unwell, and decided to go back to her family after a month or so with us. I hope they were kind to her. I gave her some money and linen for the child of course. I was at first rather cross with Mrs Earle for passing on the responsibility to me when I had asked her in good faith if she knew any young women looking for positions, but one cannot pick quarrels in such a small place as this.”

  “And Patton implied that Mr Earle was the father?”

  “She did. She told you that?”

  “Your son overheard the conversation.”

  She nodded and went on: “And the other reason I did not confront Mrs Earle about it, is that it’s hardly her fault. She must be mortified if it’s true that he
is so... Frankly, it would be more honourable if he were to go whoring! At least there is an element of –”

  “Quite,” Giles said quickly, wishing to spare her any embarrassment from her plain speaking, although he found it admirable. “What was the girl’s name, and where was she from?”

  “Mary Pearne,” she said. “I think she came from one of the hamlets a few miles to the east of Whithorne, one quite near the coast. I can’t remember the name offhand. It is bleak country out there. I do hope her people were understanding.” She gave a great sigh. “I should have made her stay, should I not?”

  “If she decided to go, then what could you do? But it’s a difficult question at the best of times.”

  “A few guineas and some baby clothes,” she said. “It feels shabby.”

  “You did all you could – and you’ve been helpful to her now. I shall need to have a sharp conversation with Mr Earle. He can take responsibility for his pleasures. And I hope that will loosen his tongue on another matter. He was being decidedly coy with me earlier. Thank you!”

  She gave a gracious nod and they made their farewells.

  “Eadesham,” she said, just as he reached threshold. “That was the name of her village!”

  Chapter Nineteen

  Felix spread the labels on the table in front of Major Vernon.

  “Found in Mrs Rivers’ bedroom,” he said.

  The Major picked one up and examined it. He whistled, and examined another.

  “Tell me more.”

  “Her room is across the landing from her daughter’s. I was speaking to her on the landing and she left the door open. She went downstairs and I saw the open press and various bottles on the table. So I slipped in, but was only in there for a moment. There was a large press in the wall, full of pots and bottles – a regular dispensary. Sukey is going to try and have another look if she can.”

  “How is the girl?”

  “Steady enough, all things considered. Physically, that is. Her mental state is uncertain,” he said. “When she has recovered a little more strength and there is less need for opiates, then we might make a beginning with that. Sukey had an idea that she might take her back to Silver Street.”

  “That’s a good idea. If her mother is concocting and supplying poisons then it’s best to get her out of that house.”