Bad Miss Bennet

by Jean Burnett

  ‘I just wanted you to know what I did, madam.’

  ‘Which was?’

  ‘I used to watch Lady Caroline’s comings and goings. Up to all sorts she was, even though she was married. Sometimes she would soak her muslin gowns and wear them like that. The muslin would cling to her body showing everything.

  ‘To be exact, I used to give titbits of gossip to one of the scandal sheets – the Chronicle, it was. Them writer fellers would wait outside the ’ouse for me and pay me for the information.’

  ‘My goodness!’ I muttered, being lost for words.

  ‘I just wanted you to know, madam.’

  ‘And can I expect the same treatment?’

  Adelaide assured me that she was a reformed character. ‘It was the boredom what made me do it,’ she explained. I realised why she had to fake her references.

  ‘Did Lady Fortescue discover what you were doing?’ I asked.

  ‘Yes,’ she admitted, ‘someone betrayed me and I was dismissed at once.’

  I could not reproach her. In the circumstances I might have done something similar. My maid and I were well suited.

  As we left the inn to continue the journey Adelaide uttered a scream when Selena and Miles popped out of an adjoining room and accosted us merrily.

  ‘We could not pass this opportunity to take the sea air in good company,’ my friend gushed to an astonished Mr Getheridge.

  ‘Yes, indeed,’ said Miles, who declared that he was feeling quite jaded and needed perking up.

  My patron did not exactly gnash his teeth, but he appeared to restrain himself with an immense effort. Miles placed an arm affectionately round his shoulders and steered him towards the carriage. Selena quickly drew me aside.

  ‘We could not allow you to continue this ridiculous adventure alone,’ she lectured. ‘After the incident with the highwayman I realised that your judgement was seriously awry and that you needed to be protected from yourself.’ I shook her hand away.

  ‘Do not be ridiculous. You were encouraging me to encourage Mr Getheridge only a short time ago.’

  ‘I have had time to review the situation,’ she said, breathing deeply. ‘There is a delicate balance to be maintained if we are to advance our position. We cannot afford to outrage society. I am here to restrain you, if necessary.’ I felt vexed by her remarks and even more so when I admitted to myself, reluctantly, that she was right. Selena was usually right. It was most annoying. I tried to sound confident.

  ‘He has taken rooms for me in George Street,’ I told her. ‘He will be staying in his own house. It will look perfectly respectable.’

  ‘Then we will take rooms nearby,’ she said firmly. ‘Miles says there is an inn on George Street, the King’s Head. We will lodge there.’ I deduced that their finances had taken a sudden turn for the better or that Lord Finchbrook was assisting them.

  When I told Mr Getheridge of their intentions he turned puce and began to sweat profusely. ‘The King’s Head you say? No. I would not advise that at all.’ From then on he huddled in a corner of the coach muttering under his breath. I began to fear that I had taken up with a mad man. Adelaide was obviously of the same opinion. Sitting in the opposite corner she rolled her eyes at me in a suggestive manner while indicating the gentleman in a discreet manner with a jerk of her thumb.

  Despite my fears, I was happy to be in Brighton as the coach rolled along the Steyne with the elegant new houses gleaming in the silvery light from the sea.

  My rooms were adequate if not luxurious. Mr Getheridge departed promising to arrange delivery of new furniture and furnishings. I left Adelaide to unpack and made my way across the street to visit my friends.

  The black and white façade of the King’s Head was exactly opposite my lodgings. Miles was already fitting snugly into a window seat with a jug of claret when I entered. Selena and I went up to their room. The innkeeper was adamant that only the rooms on the second floor facing the front were available, although there were very few other guests to be seen.

  ‘There is something altogether odd about this place,’ Selena remarked when we reached the room at the end of a long corridor. There are scarcely any guests but the upper floor is closed off.’ I agreed that it was most peculiar. I had already decided to demand that Getheridge rent an entire house for me on the Marine Parade. My friends could then take over the lodgings across the street.

  As we had driven into town my patron had pointed out Mrs Fitzherbert’s gracious residence. Why could not this widow do as well for herself as that widow? Of course, Getheridge was not the Prince Regent, but he probably had more money than Prinny who was always in debt due to his lavish lifestyle.

  The three of us dined at the King’s Head in a private room. Other diners were conspicuously absent. Miles was the worse for drink and announced that he would take a stroll up to the Castle Hotel where he would find other drinking companions.

  My friend agreed to accompany me back to my rooms to inspect my new yellow muslin gown. A decision had to be made about the choice of a blue or green bonnet with a striped velvet ribbon. How we women must suffer in the cause of fashion. The prospect of promenading on the sea front in the continuing grey, cold and windy weather wearing only muslin and silk was frightful. I hoped that I would not be wearing blue skin to complete the ensemble.

  Preoccupied with these details we crossed the street and entered the rooms to find them in complete darkness. There was no sign of Adelaide and my shout was greeted with deafening silence. We groped our way into the drawing room where one candle sputtered on the mantelpiece. I seized the light and looked around the room. Selena grabbed my arm and pointed wordlessly at the sofa which was placed diagonally between two corners.

  On it lay a man of about thirty dressed in the height of fashion. His buff trousers were spotless and without a crease, and his Hessian boots gleamed in the faint moonlight filtering through the uncurtained window as they rested on the carved, scrolled ends of the sofa. He was covered in a pale grey riding coat with many capes and silver buttons. A lock of dark hair fell over a white face where a dried trickle of blood emerged from a neat bullet hole in the middle of his forehead.

  We clutched each other and shrieked in unison. ‘He’s dead!’ With one accord we bolted from the room into the adjoining bedchamber where we sat on the bed shivering uncontrollably.

  When we had recovered a little I wished devoutly for some brandy. We found our way to the kitchen where I lit more candles and we discovered a bottle of red wine among the provisions laid out on the table. A glass or two revived our spirits a little and we tried to decide on a sensible course of action.

  ‘We should call the watch,’ Selena said.

  ‘Think of the scandal, of my position.’ We shook our heads. ‘We must wait for Miles to return,’ I said. Selena pointed out that he would be of little use when he returned, if he was not already face down in a gutter somewhere.

  ‘I could send a message to Mr Getheridge.’ I thought of the fearsome women and decided against that course of action. We agreed to return immediately to the King’s Head and wait in Selena’s room.

  I suddenly remembered the maid. ‘What shall we do about Adelaide?’

  ‘She was probably murdered or kidnapped by the intruders. There is nothing we can do until morning.’ We rushed out of the apartment, locking it behind us.

  Chapter Seven

  We were scarcely outside the door when I unlocked it again and returned inside, to my companion’s dismay. I put my finger to my lips urging silence. I thought I heard something as we made our hasty exit. Sure enough, there was a faint knocking sound … knocking on wood.

  Selena seized my arm and tried to drag me away. ‘Who knows what horrors we shall unearth if we remain here? One dead man is enough – too much for one evening.’

  ‘At least we know he cannot be knocking,’ I remarked. She shuddered and pressed herself against the wall. ‘It must be Adelaide,’ I cried, ‘she is locked away somewhere. Come, help me to search for
her.’

  We worked our way around the apartment by the light of two candles, carefully avoiding the salon where the corpse lay. We found the maid in the closet in my bedchamber. She had locked herself away when she heard male voices in the adjoining room and had been too overcome to open the door when she heard our voices. We persuaded her to turn the key and she eventually fell at our feet in a dishevelled heap, her face green with terror.

  When she heard the shot, Adelaide had been convinced that she would be discovered and murdered. Now, when we showed her the corpse on the couch, her face turned from green to chalk white and she collapsed once more.

  After pouring a considerable quantity of red wine down her throat she could tell us only that she had heard the voices of two or three men. She had seen nothing.

  ‘I was arranging madam’s dresses at the time,’ she told us. ‘I heard the men enter the apartment. Their voices were rough and I knew that they could not be friends of madam’s, especially at such an hour.’ She gave me a sly look at this point and I resisted the urge to slap her.

  ‘Go on, child, go on!’ urged Selena, recklessly pouring more wine.

  ‘When I heard the sound of something heavy being dragged along the floor, and the threatening voices of the men, I hid in the closet and locked myself in. I thought I was going to be murdered.’ She started to sob at this point and Selena comforted her while I looked inside the closet. Obviously, Adelaide had burrowed among my gowns. The yellow muslin was sadly disarranged.

  When the girl had composed herself a little we all returned to the kitchen and sat at the table. Selena was terrified the men responsible might return but I considered it unlikely. It seemed to me that the body had been brought to this place and left on the sofa quite deliberately. The killers would not return to the scene of their crime. There was now the problem of what should be done with the body. The two women looked at me in horror.

  ‘You surely cannot imagine that we will dispose of it?’ said Selena, her voice trembling. ‘There is no question, we must call the watch, and bring my husband,’ she added for good measure. I decided that my friend must be deeply shaken if she needed recourse to her uniquely useless spouse.

  ‘You are forgetting the scandal that will ensue,’ I reminded her. ‘My name will be besmirched. Yours also. We were both in the apartment, after all.’ The maid looked from one to the other in fascinated alarm. Then she spoke in a small voice.

  ‘We could carry him down to the cellar, madam. I am strong and between the three of us I think we could manage well enough.’ I pointed out that we could not leave him there for long. Servants would visit the cellar for coal and other necessities as soon as it was daylight.

  ‘Well,’ said the helpful Adelaide, ‘perhaps madam’s husband could remove the body before morning.’

  ‘We are being ridiculous,’ said Selena. ‘Even if my inebriated spouse could carry the man unaided, where would he take him? He could hardly stagger along the Steyne with a dead man on his back and throw him into the sea.’

  ‘He wouldn’t need to do that, madam’ said Adelaide. ‘He could just take him across the street to the inn. In an hour or two there won’t be a soul around. He can take him to the back of the inn and dump him in one of the store houses. I saw them when I was in the inn’s kitchen with the servants. There won’t be no scandal to you if they find a body at the Kings ’Ead.’

  After this little speech Adelaide took another swig of wine while we regarded her with admiration. I had struck gold when I employed this young woman. Her resourcefulness was remarkable. I wondered if she was related to Jerry Sartain.

  In the end it was necessary for all of us to assist in the disposal of the body. As we expected, Miles arrived back at the inn in a sorry state. We three women were waiting for him in the room at the King’s Head. We were forced to immerse his head in cold water for some time before he was able to understand the bare facts of the matter. Even then, as we dragged him back to the apartment he seemed to be at a loss.

  The sight of the body did not alarm him. He was at Waterloo, after all. He muttered something about a ‘deuced fine greatcoat and boots’, then turned unsteadily to me and winked in a gross manner.

  ‘My god, what have you done to the poor fellow, Mrs Wickham? He seems quite overcome.’ Selena pulled him down towards the couch and held the candle so that the gunshot wound was visible. ‘Well, I’m damned,’ he remarked. At this point his exasperated wife placed the candle carefully on the chest of the dead man and smacked her husband’s face.

  After many reproaches all round Miles accepted the gravity of the situation and agreed unwillingly to the plan. He proved incapable of hoisting the man on his back. The night’s activities had taken their toll and the corpse was a good six feet tall.

  The quick thinking Adelaide removed the greatcoat and boots to lessen the weight and placed them in my closet. In the coming days we both forgot they were there, which later proved to be a grave mistake.

  We began to move the body with some difficulty. A grotesque procession staggered across the black, deserted street, carefully avoiding the lamp lit above the main door of the inn. Selena and I supported Miles on either side while Adelaide went ahead to show us the way. I prayed that no dogs would be alerted on the premises but all was quiet as we deposited the unfortunate man in an outbuilding used for storing furniture.

  Like criminals we scuttled back to our respective rooms. My gown was bedraggled and filthy and my own arms ached from holding up the dead man’s at an unnatural angle. His shirt had been of the finest linen and his skin as smooth as a girl’s. It seemed a dreadful waste.

  Within the hour I was lying in my bed turning over certain worrisome thoughts. I presumed that the intruders in my apartment could not have known that I had taken up residence only a few hours before. The intention must have been to terrorise the owner of the property. When a dead man is deposited on one’s sofa it tends to send a clear message.

  Mr Getheridge told me that he had ‘taken rooms’ for me. Who then, was the real owner of the premises? I had seen no-one in the rest of the house, although there were two other apartments. My patron had said that it was too early in the season for full occupancy. I needed to make urgent enquiries as soon as it was light. I had an uneasy feeling that Mr Getheridge had not been strictly honest with me. I knew he owned a number of properties in Brighton and I suspected that my current residence was one of them.

  This led me to conclude that the gruesome warning had been intended for my patron. As to the unfortunate victim, what had he done to warrant such an end? I recalled his handsome, pale face, his elegant body and equally elegant clothes. He must have been a person of some consequence.

  I thought about gambling debts, affaires of honour, espionage. Lurid scenes filled my head but they would not serve. I remembered on my first visit to Brighton more than three years ago hearing someone remark that everything that happened in the town centred around the Prince Regent’s court. The prince was always short of money and Mr Getheridge was a banker. There were conclusions to be drawn somewhere but I needed to prise the facts from him.

  At least my experiences would give me an excellent reason to be moved to larger and more luxurious quarters. I would demand a body guard, my own carriage and definitely more jewellery. Only then could I begin to recover from the shock.

  Adelaide said she was too frightened to sleep alone in her room. She insisted on dragging her truckle bed into my chamber. I was kept awake for the rest of the night by her moans, groans, whistles and snores. I was not excessively diverted.

  Getheridge arrived at ten o’clock in the morning enquiring about the reason for the commotion at the inn across the street. The body of the unknown man had been discovered an hour or more ago and the place had been in uproar ever since. I had sent Adelaide to investigate and she confirmed the facts.

  I gave him a meaningful look before informing him of the events of the previous night. The news had an astonishing effect upon him. He sank into
a chair, burying his head in his hands. His face turned a distinctly unhealthy colour. For several minutes he lamented and exclaimed about murder and his own anticipated death, carrying on to such a degree that my insistent request for an immediate change of lodging fell on deaf ears.

  This behaviour on the part of my declared protector and patron was tiresome to say the least. It also confirmed my suspicions that the body had been left as a warning to Getheridge. I needed to know what was afoot but I had little joy in prising information out of him. I offered wine and spirits to revive him, brought back from the inn by Adelaide. When he stopped shaking and crying I repeated that I could not possibly stay in this place and he must either install me elsewhere or I would return to London immediately.

  ‘Yes, yes,’ he murmured feebly, ‘of course you must leave. I have another property on the Steyne. You can remove there.’ I assured him that I would not stay in any property of his for fear that misfortune would follow me.

  ‘If you cannot tell me the truth about this matter, sir,’ I remarked sternly, ‘I fear our association must be at an end.’ I made no mention of returning the jewellery and Mr Getheridge had weightier matters on his mind. An inspired thought struck me.

  ‘Has this matter any connection with the Prince Regent?’

  He cringed and looked away but I seized his chin and turned his face toward me.

  ‘You must be truthful, sir. My life could have been at stake. If Adelaide and I had surprised the murderers, if we had arrived a little earlier, I have no doubt that we would have been like lambs to the slaughter.’ Getheridge’s lip quivered a little but he remained silent.

  ‘Have you no conscience?’ I cried. ‘Do I mean so little to you that my death is of no consequence?’ My companion was by now on the verge of tears. Various parts of his anatomy began to tremble.

  ‘Oh, my dear, I would not have involved you in this matter for the world. It was the most fearful accident. There are matters concerning the prince that I have undertaken. I cannot speak of them, but there are people who wish harm to our rulers and to this country who seek to frustrate my efforts.’