The Spider's Touch

by Patricia Wynn

  “He applied for a place in my cousin’s household. He was refused because Sir Humphrey let it slip that Colonel Potter’s loyalty was being questioned by the King.”

  Lady Oglethorpe gave Anne another furious look. “You see! It would have been better if we had never made friends with Sir Humphrey. He was much too open to be trusted.”

  Anne’s face held even more fear now. She looked suspiciously near tears. “My poor Harley! Do you think Sir Humphrey could have told anyone about him?” She asked this of Gideon and her mother, both.

  Gideon knew that Anne had been Lord Oxford’s lover for many years. He was married, but Anne was his true love. She had sacrificed a chance for home and family to be his mistress, but with the upbringing her mother had given her, she was destined to lead a life of sacrifice to some man, whether it be her sovereign James or another.

  Evidently the fear Anne felt was not for herself, but for her lover.

  Gideon answered her question with one of his own. “Has Lord Oxford considered leaving for France?”

  She shook her head. “He cannot leave. He is not well enough to travel. But when he went to the House of Lords to justify his conduct on Saturday, there was no one with the courage even to acknowledge him as a friend. Even Lord Poulet was shy of him, he said!

  “If only Ormonde would act, there would be no reason for him to flee!”

  Gideon nodded. He worried for them all, but tried not to show how troubled he was. If Ormonde did not act quickly, it would surely be too late for Anne’s lover. And Gideon had come away from the Duke with no sense that he planned to move any time soon.

  He tried to steer the conversation back to Sir Humphrey’s murder. “It would seem that Sir Humphrey was a danger to someone at least, however unwittingly. If he had no discretion, as you say, then he often would have made free comments about his Jacobite friends.”

  He moved on. “Who is Mr. Blackwell?”

  Lady Oglethorpe looked startled. Gideon could see her struggling over an answer.

  She took the safest route. “I do not see what Mr. Blackwell can have to do with Humphrey’s murder. He scarcely knew him.”

  Gideon directed her a look, meant to show that he would not accept an evasion. “And, yet, he was a guest in Sir Humphrey’s box. He disappeared before the performance was over. During the intermezzo, which was when Sir Humphrey was killed.”

  “I fail to see why I should be questioned about my friends when you should be asking Mr. Mayfield why he killed him! Perhaps the lady who informed you about my friends had reason to leave out the news that he tried to murder Sir Humphrey over a simple game of a cards.”

  Again, she implied that Isabella was his informer.

  “Not at all,” he said, letting amusement show. “I was told of that incident. I would like to know who informed you of it, though.”

  Lady Oglethorpe was a woman very accustomed to hiding secrets. He could not tell if she was lying, as she smoothed her skirts and shrugged. “It is all over town. A story like that is certain to be repeated. I will not hide from you that Mr. Mayfield is strongly suspected of the murder. If you wish to be his friend, you should help him to leave the country before it is too late.”

  “I would hardly be the man to encourage that course, madame. Not unless there were no other choice.

  “But you say this Blackwell is a friend of yours? He has been described to me, and it appears that he has spent a great deal of time in France.”

  “You English are all alike! You think that only villains can come from France!”

  Gideon tried to stem her temper with a loud sigh. “You forget that my estates and my title come from your country, madame. That is not an accusation that can be made of me. I merely point out what is generally known about the gentleman. And if you wish to defend him, then the truth will be best.

  “Besides, have you forgotten who sent me? I never should have been here at all, if not for your daughter Eleanor. I have come at her bidding, so I hope you will trust me.”

  For that was her reason for refusing to give him the information he sought, Gideon realized. His questions made her nervous. For all she knew, he could be an agent of the government trying to discover who was implicated with the Jacobites.

  Lady Oglethorpe squared her shoulders more calmly then. “I know who sent you. It was I who suggested it. I know that you did not kill your father. But since you did not seek to help his Majesty on your own, your loyalty to him must not run very deep, monsieur, surely not as deeply as your father’s did. And there must be other ways to regain your estates.”

  She had practically accused him of spying for the government. That did not bother him nearly as much as her comment about his father had pricked him. He tried to shove that hurt aside, so she would not see how effective her barbs had been.

  “I told your daughter and your husband the truth, and I will tell it to you now. I am not convinced that another civil war is the best thing for England and Scotland, no matter how just James’s claims are. I agreed to discover what his adherents’ plans are and to report back to him. I did not promise to fight. But should I find the rebellion just and right, I shall fight for him and never for George.”

  She almost sneered at this. “Then you are no better than many of his so-called friends, who wait for someone else to incur the risks.”

  “That may be. I do not pretend to be a hero, madame.”

  Irony lit her eyes. “But you should be,” she said. “Was it not a Gideon who led the armies of God, monsieur? If you have not read the Bible, as you Protestants are reputed to do, I suggest you read that part and ask yourself why your father chose such a name for you.”

  She was trying to shame him. And doing a fairly decent job of it, he thought with a burning pang. Gideon did not trust her enough to let her sway him, though. He would never believe that God sent messengers in the form of Lady Oglethorpe, nor would he liken a Jacobite rebellion to the armies of God. He did not know why she had bound herself so tightly to the Stuart cause, but it seemed that her very nature demanded that she be a partisan. And, once committed, she would hold to that side until every resource at her command was exhausted.

  He tried to calm his anger with the thought that whether his father had liked her or not, he would have honoured her for her devotion to the cause.

  “I did not come here to talk about me, madame. I came for your help. If Sir Humphrey was indeed your friend, I fail to see why you would not want to help me catch his murderer. And if none of these gentlemen killed him, I will discover that, too.

  “Who is Mr. Blackwell, and where do I find him?” he asked again.

  It was Anne who finally volunteered the information. “Blackwell is not his real name. His name is George Menzies. He travels back and forth with messages and money to Boulogne. He takes whatever money can be raised in England to Lancelot Ord, his Majesty’s almoner in France, who uses it to pay the Irish troops living along the coast.”

  The name Menzies stirred a memory. It was only a moment longer before Gideon recognized the name of the mysterious stranger who had stopped at Lade’s and offended Tom. “I have heard something of this gentleman. Where do I find him?”

  Anne looked at her mother, but Lady Oglethorpe shrugged. “I do not know where he stops when he is here. The name he uses here belongs to a printer in London, so you could ask this printer where to find Mr. Menzies. I know that this printer is very active in our cause. He raises money for the King.” She shrugged again. “Menzies may lodge with him, for all I know.”

  “Do you know where Blackwell’s shop is?”

  She shook her head. “No, but it is certain to be near Stationers’ Hall.”

  This was no particular lead, since most of the printers’ shops stood in that quarter.

  “I’m sure to find it. And you have no need to worry that you may have offended him by telling me. As a matter of fact, I’ve heard that the gentleman has expressed a strong desire to meet me.”

  He thanked them bot
h and bowed himself out, convinced that he would get no more from Lady Oglethorpe. It was good that he had sent for Tom, for false name or not, Tom would be able to recognize Menzies on sight.

  * * * *

  The inquest into the cause of Sir Humphrey’s death was held at the Court of King’s Bench in Westminster Hall, and was presided over by the Lord Chief Justice himself. As the principal coroner in the kingdom, it was his prerogative to exercise his jurisdiction in any corner of the realm, and, given the illustriousness of the victim, not to mention the other personages involved, he had chosen to involve himself.

  The Court took up only the southeastern corner of the ancient hall, where once coronation banquets and even tournaments of honour had been held beneath the vastness of its hammerbeam ceiling. The Court of Chancery stood in the opposite southern corner, with the Court of Common Pleas in the middle of the west wall. The remaining walls were lined with shops and booksellers’ stalls, and the cavernous building resounded with muffled echoes from the shoppers’ voices and the plaintiffs’ pleas at the other courts.

  It was neither the most comfortable nor the most convenient site for an inquest, since there were no chairs or benches on which to sit. The witnesses had to stand in front of the justices’ bench, which had been built so high that the justices’ faces loomed a good six to eight feet above them. They were intimidating in their robes and long periwigs, but Hester reckoned she would have been just as nervous anywhere else.

  The formalities were soon got through. The sheriff led the jurors into an antechamber to view the body. They all returned with sober faces, one man holding a handkerchief to his mouth.

  The calling of the individual witnesses followed. One of the watchmen gave his version of how he had been called to the scene of the suspicious death. He reported the finding of the bloody curtain through which Sir Humphrey had surely been stabbed, and the evidence he had taken from the gentlemen who had sat in Sir Humphrey’s box.

  The Lord Chief Justice then passed on to hear that testimony himself. From the nature of his questions, Hester began to believe that the Crown had other motives in employing its highest permanent judge in the case.

  Lord Chief Justice Parker could not very well accuse the witnesses he called of being Jacobites, disloyal to the Crown—not without more evidence—but his suspicions were apparent to Hester from the start. He seemed particularly keen to know about Harrowby’s relationship to the deceased, which would seem to have little bearing on the crime. Hester understood, even if her aunt and cousin did not, the danger of their association with Sir Humphrey and his friends, but Harrowby’s answers seemed to convince his lordship that there had been nothing sinister in their friendship.

  The Lord Chief Justice also took a great deal of interest in Mr. Blackwell, who had still not been found. The only evidence that Hester was required to give concerned this gentleman’s departure from the box. When she was dismissed, she was relieved not to have been questioned about her cousin Dudley, for her willingness to help him did not extend to perjuring herself.

  Her aunt was eager enough to do that. When it was Mrs. Mayfield’s turn to be questioned, she tried to distract the Lord Chief Justice from her son with an extreme show of grief. But after a few minutes of her tears, his sympathy became short-lived.

  “I daresay this has been a terrible shock for you, Mrs. Mayfield, but if you cannot contain these emotions, I shall have to ask you to step aside.”

  Hester wondered if he could see her aunt’s dry eyes from the bench, where he sat, looking down on the standing witnesses. Mrs. Mayfield had kept her features hidden in her handkerchief, and the only redness in her eyes was the result of vigorous rubbing. She peered up at his request, however, and promised to try to control her grief.

  “It is the understanding of this court that you left Sir Humphrey’s box on his arm at the start of the interval. Is this true?”

  “Yes—but we was only together for a minute. Just a short, short while. I’m sure your lordship will be ready to spare my blushes if I tell you that I had a very private errand to attend to, so I parted from poor dear Sir Humphrey right outside the box. If I had known what was going to happen to the old dear, I never would have left him for an instant. But no lady would drag a gentleman with her on an errand like that, as I’m sure your lordship will allow.”

  If she had thought to captivate her listener with coyness, she was doomed to disappointment. Lord Chief Justice Parker scarcely managed to hide his grimace of distaste. The sudden change in the witness’s demeanour led him to focus on what she might be trying to hide rather than what she showed.

  “Did you descend the stairs?”

  “No, there was a servant in the corridor with a chamber pot. I gave him a penny to let me use it and was done.”

  “Did you see if Sir Humphrey stopped to talk to anyone?”

  Mrs. Mayfield answered, “No.”

  “Did you see Sir Humphrey go downstairs?”

  She responded to this so quickly as to make him prick up his ears. “No, he did not go down. I am certain of that.”

  “If you are certain, it must be because you never took your eyes off the deceased, in which case you should be able to give us some idea of the persons to whom he spoke.”

  “Well, I know he didn’t go down, but no, I can’t say who he spoke to. The crowd was something furious, you see. I really couldn’t see him from where I was.”

  “Then how can you be sure that he did not descend the stairs?”

  She stiffened, until an answer came to her. “I should have seen him if he did, because he would have walked right past me!”

  Lord Chief Justice Parker gave an impatient frown. “My dear Mrs. Mayfield, are you not aware that there are two sets of stairs on that side of the theatre—one on each end of the corridor we are speaking of?”

  Hester’s aunt refused to be daunted. “That may very well be, your lordship, but all I know is Sir Humphrey did not go down those stairs with my son, and so I swear.”

  Hester hid a wince. She had never known her aunt to be so clumsy with her lies, but his lordship acted as if this was not first time he had questioned a mother in fear for her son’s life. He did nothing but sigh, and with an impatient look, thanked Mrs. Mayfield for her testimony. Then he asked the sheriff to call the next witness.

  Both Isabella and Harrowby gave their evidence, including confirmation that the knife had come from Hawkhurst House. It was the knife that Isabella used to carve joints when she served their guests, but neither she nor her husband had the slightest idea how long it had been missing from their house, since they had not entertained guests to dinner for several days. Neither did they know how it had come to be at the opera in Sir Humphrey’s back.

  They were not questioned very long, for in the case of both, it soon became apparent that their attention had been on themselves and the friends they had gossiped with during the intermezzo, and neither had anything useful to say. Isabella had sought the same relief as her mother, so Lord Lovett, who had escorted her from the box, had left her to her privacy. When, on emerging from behind the curtain, she had not found him, another gentleman she knew had hailed her and escorted her back to the box, where she had stood talking until her husband had joined them. She had seen no sight of Sir Humphrey or any of the others, but as she ingenuously said, she had not really been looking for them either.

  The Lord Chief Justice was rather harder on Colonel Potter, which is what made Hester believe that he had been instructed to get to the bottom of the event by someone in the government. He asked the Colonel about his movements during the interval, and the Colonel responded much like the others, with the added information that he and Dudley had gone first for a drink. Colonel Potter said that he had left Dudley with the bottle, though, in order to speak to a fellow former officer of the Guards who had passed them.

  When asked if had seen Dudley after they parted, he paused for a moment before saying no. Hester thought he appeared to be lying, but could think of
no reason he should.

  Colonel Potter also said that he had seen neither Sir Humphrey nor anyone else in their party until he encountered Lord Lovett on his way back to the box.

  “Did you know this other fellow, Blackwell?” Lord Chief Justice Parker asked. He glared at the Colonel from under his massive periwig.

  Colonel Potter hesitated, before saying, “I met him once—yes. I think Sir Humphrey presented him to me at some assembly or other. I cannot recollect where.”

  This falsehood startled Hester. She looked about her to see if anyone else had noticed it, and caught Lord Lovett’s glance. He understood her quandary, for he raised one eyebrow as if to ask what she meant to do about it. Hester felt an answering flush. She could not accuse the Colonel of lying to the bench when she had no proof. She could remind him that she had seen him at Lady Oglethorpe’s house with Mr. Blackwell, but that would only bring Lady Oglethorpe into the case, and she was loathe to do anything concerning that lady without first consulting St. Mars. For her cousin’s sake, too, she would rather not reveal the fact that they had visited the house of a well-known Jacobite.

  She turned her attention back to the Colonel’s testimony, feeling Lord Lovett’s gaze on her profile. She did not know whether he studied her in amusement or approbation, but she was almost certain both feelings were mixed in his look.

  The Lord Chief Justice was pressing harder with his questions about Mr. Blackwell. He asked the Colonel why Sir Humphrey had invited a relative stranger to share his box.

  Colonel Potter steadfastly refused to admit that he knew anything about it. He said that Sir Humphrey might have known this Blackwell better than it had seemed, but that he had most likely invited him merely to be cordial.

  “Sir Humphrey Cove was an amiable sort of gentleman,” he said. From the way he said it, Hester could not be certain that he intended it as a compliment. He could just as well have been sneering at Sir Humphrey for his kindness. The Colonel’s sullen manner often made it very hard to tell what his true feelings were.