“Lord Thornleigh is still in residence?”
“Yes, as is his second wife. But he is very ill. He had a seizure of some sort shortly after we arrived at Caveley and has not spoken since. He is very rarely seen and never mentioned. I believe he is cared for by his own staff in the upper part of the building. There are three sons. Alexander-the eldest, and missing heir to the title-and Hugh, whom you will soon meet, are sons of Lord Thornleigh’s first wife. His second wife also has a little boy, Eustache.”
“I have seen her with him driving past my house.”
“Yes.” Harriet paused, as if unsure what further to say. “Hugh served with the army in the Americas, and was wounded. He returned almost four years ago when his father was taken ill.”
Crowther thought of a gentleman he had noticed in the village; he had been searching for the book that had been his company over dinner one evening and from the front parlor, where he found it, he had seen this gentleman meeting friends outside the Coaching House, some little way along the street from his own front door. Or rather, he had heard a loud greeting and turned to see who it was who had reason to be so demonstrably pleased with themselves. He had seen a young and solid-looking gentleman in profile and Crowther had recognized in himself the typical mix of envy and contempt men of his age commonly feel for the young, and was meditating on the emotion in the gloom of his empty house, when the young man turned to greet another-and Crowther saw that the right side of his face from the middle of the cheek to the hairline was badly scarred, and one eye milky and dead. Even in the darkness of the evening the skin looked freshly torn. It was as if some devil had so envied the young man’s looks, he had forced a partial trade.
“A musket misfired,” he said, almost to himself, then catching Harriet’s look of surprise: “I have observed him from my front window,” this with a wry smile, “and the injury is distinctive.”
Almost at once Crowther heard steps coming up the path from Thornleigh. The gentleman himself was approaching fast.
He should, given his features and form, have been handsome, but the wound was violent, his expression was ugly, and his dress a little slovenly. As the distance between them shortened, Crowther took the chance to study him as he would a subject on a table: broken veins around the nose, a high color and darkly rimmed eyes. A drinker. Liver disease in all likelihood already advanced. Crowther would not be surprised to smell wine on his breath even this early in the day. It still surprised him how many great houses could turn out sons who failed, in his opinion, to be gentlemen.
The man began to speak in a hoarse baritone before he had quite reached them.
“Mrs. Westerman, do you know how many times in the years since I came home I have been asked to look at corpses of men likely to be my brother? Four. Two itinerants who decided to die in Pulborough without leaving any convincing address, one unfortunate drowned under Stopham Bridge and dragged up a month later when his own mother wouldn’t know him and one corpse in Ashwell who turned out to be dark haired and a foot shorter than Alexander was when he left home. And now you, ma’am, are scouring the countryside to find me others.”
Crowther glanced across at his companion. For the first time that morning she looked a little shocked, and he thought he saw a tremble in her hand. He stepped forward and bowed-low enough to suggest sarcasm.
“Well, at least, sir, this gentleman had the consideration to be murdered relatively close to your home. So the inconvenience is kept to a minimum.”
The young man started and turned to face him, Crowther realized he had been standing where Mr. Thornleigh’s damaged vision might have missed him, and wondered if he would have spoken in such a manner to a lady if he had not thought she was alone. He looked strong, powerful still in spite of the drink. Riding probably, though youthful bulk was already beginning to turn to fat. Crowther imagined what his muscular forearm would look like with its skin removed. The younger man cleared his throat, and had the decency at least to look a little embarrassed.
“You are our natural philosopher, Mr. Crowther, are you not?”
“I am.”
“I am Hugh Thornleigh.” He bowed and shook his head, and seemed to deflate a little. “My apologies, Mrs. Westerman. I spoke very ill-naturedly. Thank you for your note, and I hope the shock of finding this unfortunate has not been too great.” He paused again, and cleared his throat. “I hope your family is well.”
Crowther could almost like him now. There was a residual charm under the ill temper, a pleasing deference to Mrs. Westerman. It was as if when he had shaken his head it had dislodged a mask, and he had found his own better self beneath it. He was a bear in a frockcoat. A beast-domesticated. Crowther remembered his own brother.
Mrs. Westerman, though, was still angry. Her voice was cold, and she looked through the young man as she spoke rather than at him.
“We are all well, Mr. Thornleigh. Here is the body.” She flicked aside the cloak again from the body’s face with the tip of her crop. Thornleigh sucked in his breath.
“I had thought perhaps a vagrant. You did say murdered …” He stepped nearer. “Was anything found on him?” Harriet dropped the ring into his outstretched hand then withdrew, pulling on her glove again. Hugh shuddered a little as it hit his palm and caught the sun. Then he looked at them again quickly. “Nothing else?”
“We have not completed rifling through his pockets, I’m afraid,” Crowther said. “May I ask, sir, do you know this man?”
Hugh caught his tone and steadied himself.
“I am sure he is not Alexander, though this man is of his age and coloring. Again my apologies, madam. I do not know how he came by the ring, though. That is indeed Alexander’s. I wear one very much the same.” He extended his left hand, showing them the twin of the ring they had found, shining on his middle finger.
“Can you be sure?” Harriet asked. “I think you once said you have not seen Alexander for many years.”
“I saw him last in ’65, shortly before I joined my regiment. But I am sure. If Alexander ever lay before me, I would know him, however many years had passed. This man means nothing to me. I believe, therefore, it cannot be my brother.” He turned to Crowther. “My brother broke his leg badly as a child in a fall. After, he walked always with a slight limp. Would you be able to tell if this man had had such an injury, were you to examine him more fully? But perhaps I ask too much.”
“The injury would show, and I am happy to examine the body further.”
Hugh nodded shortly. “Well, that may serve as confirmation for the coroner and his men, and you have my thanks. But I am sure in my own mind that this is not Alexander. And thank God for that.”
Mrs. Westerman sighed. “Well, I am glad to hear it. I believe the body is just in Caveley Park lands, so I will have this poor man taken into my house till the squire arrives, and we find out what is to be done-unless you have any objection, Thornleigh.”
Hugh looked at her longer than perhaps he should have done before he spoke, and as he looked, Crowther saw an expression of longing and shame that made him think of a whipped dog, pass over his face. Crowther found himself speculating. The young, battle-scarred neighbor, the husband away at sea … Then he smiled at himself. He was turning romantic.
“Of course, Mrs. Westerman. Can I be of any further assistance?”
“No. The men from the park will be here shortly and we will accompany the body.”
“Very well.” And with no more than a bow to them both, Hugh turned and made his way back down the hill again-as fast, it seemed, as he could manage without running from the place.
“He drinks,” Crowther said, as he watched the blue frockcoat swallowed up again by the woodland. Harriet had leaned against one of the ash trees on the edge of the path.
“Yes, I’m afraid he does. The steward, Wicksteed, runs the place while he keeps company with a bottle.”
“It will kill him in the end-and fast, I think, if he is already at this stage in such relative youth.”
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“Good.”
Crowther twisted round to stare at her. An unusual woman certainly, but to say such a thing! He had not realized he could still be shocked by the speeches of a gentleman’s daughter. His manners must have remained more nice than he had thought. Mrs. Westerman continued merely to look at the ground in front of her, tapping her crop. It was only moments before he heard more footsteps and saw Harriet’s groom with another man approaching up the path. She sighed and lifted her eyes.
“My poor peaceful copse. It is as busy as Cheapside this morning.” She straightened and gave the men their orders with calm good sense, then turned back to Crowther. “Come over to the house with me, Mr. Crowther. We shall meet with the squire and then examine this man a little more closely.”
As her servants made ready to carry the body to Caveley, Crowther noticed her gaze at the path down which Hugh had disappeared. Her anger seemed to have dissipated, and her face was filled now only with regret.
5
Her fear that she was about to hear that Hugh had slit his own throat nearly within sight of her home had left Rachel pale and nervous for some time, but she had recovered enough to greet her sister and Mr. Crowther when they arrived and pour tea for them both without any shake in her hand.
She had seen Mr. Crowther once or twice in the street, and once through the upper windows of his own house, staring out into the road apparently unaware of anything before him, and naturally she had heard the gossip about him from her maid when he first arrived. A recluse and a mystery. She had not thought of him a great deal, however, over the year he had been in Hartswood, her mind being much engaged with her own concerns, but she was glad of the opportunity to study him more closely now. She guessed him to be in his fifties, he wore his own hair, he was very pale and almost painfully thin, but his height and the steady confidence of his deportment gave him a presence she could not help admiring. She had expected the brusqueness she associated with professional men, but his movements were smooth. There must have been a time, she thought, when he was used to company. His features were fine, though the lips were thin and his expression was, if not welcoming, then not outright hostile either. He looked around their salon with polite curiosity and so she decided to like him.
Rachel had often thought her sister was not the most gracious of hostesses, but even she was surprised at the complete lack of any attempt to make conversation with their guest. Harriet was staring out across the room with her chin in one hand, rapping her fingers against her cheek. Rachel felt the duty of the house fall on her shoulders; she was young and therefore keen to supply what deficiencies she sensed in others.
“I am glad to meet you, Mr. Crowther. You are a man of mystery in our society.”
Crowther looked at Mrs. Westerman’s sister and struggled for a minute to remember her name.
“I am not sociable, Miss Trench. I am sure it is my loss.”
Harriet snorted. “Oh, most definitely, Mr. Crowther. My sister is a fiend at backgammon and whist. You have missed any number of stimulating evenings by your refusal to know your neighbors.” There was an unmistakable sneer in her voice, and Rachel felt it directed at herself. She blushed and got up a little quickly.
“You must excuse me,” she said. “I need to go and speak to Mrs. Heathcote about dinner.”
Crowther barely had time to bow before she had left the room, and Harriet watched her go with a frown.
“Damn. I have upset her. I am an unfeeling sort of sister at times. But she is only eighteen, you know, and rather prim for her age.”
Crowther said nothing, but continued to observe Mrs. Westerman over the rim of his very elegant tea cup.
“I am trying to decide what is the right thing to be done, Mr. Crowther, and poor Rachel’s attempts to be polite were an irritant.”
Crowther decided not to comment on her temper, but asked instead, mildly enough, “And what do you conclude, Mrs. Westerman? What is the right thing to be done?”
She looked up into the corner of the room.
“I shall start by saying what I think will happen now, and trust you to catch me if my conclusions are faulty.” He nodded. “Well, then. First the squire will arrive, and tell us that the coroner is summoned and will be meeting with his jury in the Bear and Crown tomorrow afternoon. He will ask us for our opinions and agree we should examine the body for any further indications as to who the man might be, and why he has come here, and check that our unknown friend does not have a leg-break such as Alexander must have.” She ticked the points of her narrative off on her fingers. “We will find nothing conclusive to add to what we already know. Tomorrow the coroner will listen to us in a gentlemanlike manner, and the jury conclude that this unknown was killed by other unknowns for unknown reasons and ask God to have mercy on his soul. Ideally, someone will have spotted him coming from London and from there, as we know, all vice and evil makes its way. We shall therefore conclude that his destruction followed him from town, and that will be an end to it. Apart from the fact that you will be watched carefully for a day or two after the burial to check that you do not dig up the body to experiment on in your godless manner.”
Crowther smiled. “And that will be that.”
They were silent for a little while.
“Do you think, Mr. Crowther, that he was in those woods by chance?”
The question was asked lightly, but as he replied he looked at Harriet quite steadily.
“No. I think he went there to meet someone, and either that person or another who knew of the meeting attacked and killed him.”
“And given the meeting place …?”
“And given the meeting place, he expected to meet someone from either Thornleigh or Caveley. I think you believe the same, and yet I doubt you suspect anyone in your own household. But that does not necessarily help us understand what the right course of action might be.”
Mrs. Westerman stood and walked over to where the French windows gave out onto the lawns at the side of the house.
“My husband and I were a little naive perhaps, when we bought this estate. It has not been easy to manage a household of this size, and look after its interests while he is away. I did it all at first for my husband and my son.” She turned quickly, smiling at him. “I have a daughter too-just six months old. Her name is Anne. Born the day before her father sailed for the West Indies.” Her features softened a little when she spoke about her children. Crowther began to ready himself for some fuller discussion of their unique gifts and graces, but she moved on. “Perhaps if I had my own way, I would abandon it even now, but I can be stubborn, Mr. Crowther. This is now my home, the village is my home and Thornleigh seems to sit above it all like a great black crow. There is something wrong in that house. Something wounded and rotten. I am sure of it.”
He set aside his cup and looked up at her a little wearily.
“And have been sure for a while, I dare say,” he replied, “and now you have all the moral authority a corpse on your lands can give you, so you may have the adventure of exposing it. It will make a change from estate management. Oh, and as you described Thornleigh as nestling in its own valley a little while ago, I don’t think I can allow you to have it as a crow towering above the neighborhood. Perhaps the black dragon in its cave.”
She looked surprised. “I am glad I called you, Mr. Crowther. You are very frank.”
“You summoned me from my bed before noon, have shown a terrible lack of deference to the local lords and sworn at least once in my presence. You should not expect me to bother with the normal forms of politeness.”
She looked at him, but there was no sign of a smile to lighten his words.
“I prefer it so,” she replied, looking more pleased than he expected. “And you are probably right about my metaphors. I have always had a fondness for dragons, though I shall not malign them with comparison to Thornleigh. Thornleigh Hall can be a malignant spider’s nest when I next feel my rhetoric take hold of me.” He did allow himself to smile
a little now. She looked at him directly. “Are you not curious also? Do you not wish to know why this man died, and by whose hand? Those threads you gathered in the copse … I took that action to mean the puzzle interests you?”
He sighed and shifted in his seat.
“This is not a parlor game, madam. You shall not complete a riddle and gain polite applause for it. You must ask impertinent questions, and however just your cause, it is unlikely you will be thanked for it. Many good men and women have refused to go down that path and perhaps you should think about following their example. I confine my work to the dead as a rule because the dead speak a great deal more truth, and are often better company than the living. For many years now I have preferred a dead dog to a hand of cards.” Harriet was surprised into another laugh as he continued unemotionally, “Perhaps I will help you drive out your nest of spiders, or dragons or crows, but I do so from a position of strength. I have nothing to lose.”
“And I do? My reputation you mean? It is already known I can be a little outspoken, but yes, possibly I may do further damage to it by pursuing this business. So be it. I must do what I think is right if I am to look my family in the eye. Your assistance would be invaluable. I wonder how I can ask it, though. You may have nothing to lose, but I cannot see any gain for you in this. I do not flatter myself you offer your services for the pleasure of my company.”
“Perhaps you should.” She raised her eyebrows. “No, madam, I have no intention of flirting with you, but you spoke before about the dangers of being isolated and how one’s judgment may become warped as a result.” He looked down sadly at the design of the carpet under his black shoes. “I fear I am looking in the wrong place in my current work, so you take me from nothing of importance, and you know from my paper that I occasionally indulge an interest in the markers of murder. I have nothing better to do than help you ruin yourself.”
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