Airs and Graces

by Roz Southey

  ‘My father was a brute,’ she said roughly. ‘The only decent thing he ever did was die and leave me an allowance. A paltry allowance, it has to be said, but enough to guarantee genteel independence.’

  ‘So robbing another Samuel Gregson in this world was an attractive prospect.’

  Heron was very still, but I’ve seen him leap into action in the fraction of a moment. I fixed my eye on him, ready to react, to play my part if he decided to act.

  ‘Very attractive,’ she said. ‘But we’re not fools, Mr Patterson – neither of us wants to hang.’

  She hadn’t denied the charge, I noted. ‘I don’t believe Balfour killed them,’ I said. ‘He can’t stand the sight of blood. His father was killed in front of him and he has never forgotten it.’

  ‘He killed in Kent,’ she pointed out.

  ‘He says the deaths were accidental.’

  She said nothing. There was no sense in holding back now; I said. ‘You killed the Gregsons. You or the other Alice. Which one?’

  A long, long silence. I tried to ease my aching back but she tightened her grip. Choking, I put up my hands to my throat but she kicked at my ankle. I nearly went down. The knife point pricked my throat and I felt the warm trickle of blood.

  Heron never moved.

  ‘The more you know, the less likely you’ll get out of here alive,’ Mrs Fletcher said softly. ‘Think twice, Mr Patterson – do you really want to know the truth?’

  She’d already told me too much to let me go. I was staking my life on Heron. I was frightened, but knew how good a swordsman he was, and how unflinching. ‘Yes, I want to know. Tell me.’

  ‘Really, Mr Patterson,’ she said, and laughed. ‘You’ve no concern for your own safety at all, have you?’

  She pressed the knife in harder. Heron started forward but she shouted at him and he jerked to a halt. Hot blood ran down on to my coat.

  Oddly, there was no pain. ‘What exactly happened?’ I felt her warm breath on my cheek, heard it quicken and catch. Then an infinitesimal relaxation of her arm.

  ‘Why not?’ she said, as if to herself. ‘Very well, I’ll tell you. Alice came for me about an hour before Balfour was due to arrive. She brought with her the box of coins from the cellar. Not the old coins but the recent takings of the shop – there was fifty pounds or more there. Then we came back to the shop in this world.’

  She paused; I said encouragingly, ‘And then?’

  ‘Alice went downstairs to wait for Balfour to arrive while I killed the people upstairs.’ Her voice was steady but I felt the hand with the knife tremble. ‘You have no idea how many years I have wished to lay hands on Samuel Gregson.’

  So many years that she killed another man: a man with the same name, but a different person nevertheless.

  ‘When Balfour came,’ she continued, ‘Alice let him in, and told him where the coins were. He went down into the cellar, I came downstairs and killed the apprentice; we’d left him alive until then so Balfour heard his snoring and was reassured. Then Alice took me back to my own world.’

  She took a deep breath; I felt the knife turn slightly against my throat as she took a firmer grip. ‘Alice came back to this world to leave a trail. It had to look as if she was fleeing for her life, so she slid down the rope to escape. She was to go to the derelict house to wait for the furore to die down; when the spirit told her Balfour was captured, she’d have run out and told her story.’ She added wryly, ‘She’d have told it very well. She’s extremely good at wheedling and winning her own way.’

  I thought of the girl I’d encountered in the alley. Mrs Fletcher spoke of her with some exasperation, yet when we had arrived, she had said she loved her dearly.

  ‘Just before she slid down the rope, she woke the child so the alarm could be raised,’ Mrs Fletcher said. ‘Unfortunately, Balfour was more alert than we’d anticipated, and escaped. Which left Alice the only suspect.’

  My back and leg muscles were beginning to twitch from the unnatural position. ‘I can understand why you killed Samuel but what about the others? The girl, Sarah, and the apprentice? Why did they have to die? And then you attempted to blame the boy for the killings!’

  She laughed harshly. ‘Oh, don’t have any sympathy for them! Sarah was going to marry a man four times her age just for the money. And the boy was no saint – he was always creeping out to some girl or other. Well, he should have crept out that night, or not come back so early.’

  ‘So it was their fault you killed them.’

  She was still holding on to me firmly; Heron was watchful but I knew there was nothing he could do, unless I could break Mrs Fletcher’s hold. And there was only one way to do that – to make her careless with anger.

  ‘You want us to believe you killed them,’ I said. ‘You know – I don’t believe you. I think the other Alice did it.’

  ‘Don’t be stupid,’ she said roughly. The knife shifted at my throat. ‘I’ve told you the truth.’

  ‘Nonsense. You’re an intelligent woman; you’re not foolish enough to think you could get away with something like this. But the other Alice – she’s a silly impetuous child, acting on impulse, without thinking of the consequences.’

  ‘I did it!’ she said. ‘Not Alice.’ And her anger broke the surface. ‘Can’t you understand, you stupid fool!’

  Her weight shifted, the knife quivered. Her grip on me loosened.

  I kicked backwards.

  I caught her shin. She shrieked. Heron was already halfway across the room, lunging forward, sword coming up. Mrs Fletcher struggled to get a firmer grip on me; we stumbled sideways, fell against the table, toppled it over. It crashed down—

  Mrs Mountain’s voice floated up from below. ‘What’s going on! Mr Patterson! Mr Heron!’

  It was only a momentary distraction but Mrs Fletcher seized her opportunity. She pushed me. I stumbled against Heron; he whipped the sword away with a cry of alarm – and then Mrs Fletcher was out of the door.

  Mrs Mountain screamed as Mrs Fletcher went headlong past her, knife in hand. She was standing where the stair took a turn on to a second flight; she grabbed at my arm as I stumbled against her. ‘Mr Patterson – oh, dear God – blood!’

  Heron vaulted over the banisters, landed awkwardly on the lower flight of stairs, regained his balance and rushed on. Mrs Mountain whispered, ‘Blood . . .’ and crumpled in my arms.

  I dumped her unceremoniously on the floor but the door to the street was already slamming back. I leapt down the stairs, fumbled with the lock, pulled it open, skidded as I stepped out on to ice. Snowflakes stung my cheeks.

  The street was empty.

  I yelled for a spirit. One came with alacrity and didn’t even ask what I wanted. ‘Left at the end of the street!’ it shouted. ‘Then into the alleys on Pilgrim Street!’

  ‘Damn!’ Once she was in those alleys there were a dozen ways she could go. I dashed out into Pilgrim Street, ran for the nearest alley – and met Heron coming back towards me.

  He shook his head.

  Thirty-Nine

  Odd how the unexpected ought always to be expected. And the lady was so charming, too.

  [Letter from Louis de Glabre to his friend Philippe

  Froidevaux, 24 January 1737]

  I woke with a burning pain at my neck; instinctively, I put up a hand to touch the raw flesh. There was the smell of . . .

  Chocolate.

  I opened my eyes. Esther was sitting on the edge of the bed, in a haze of candlelight, a dish of hot chocolate in her hands. She was still in her diaphanous nightgown, her blonde hair in a braid down her back, and she was looking at me with such an enigmatic expression . . .

  ‘It really wasn’t my fault,’ I said.

  She shook her head. ‘George has had the entire story from one of the spirits at Mrs Mountain’s. Admittedly, I think he probably exaggerated the swordplay but judging by what I can see, and the blood on your coat and shirt, I would say he has the story generally right.’

  ‘It’s
just a scratch,’ I said. ‘Heron said it wasn’t anything to worry about.’ It didn’t feel like a scratch; it was very painful. More painful than it had been at the time.

  She said nothing.

  ‘It probably was a mistake to try and apprehend Mrs Fletcher,’ I admitted, ‘but I thought she’d escape to the other world.’

  She shook her head. ‘I know you too well, Charles. You didn’t think at all.’

  I sighed and heaved myself up against the pillows. The candle flames fluttered wildly. ‘No. But I did have Heron and his sword with me.’

  ‘Oh, I’m sure he would have caught her if she’d killed you,’ Esther said sarcastically. ‘Charles . . .’

  She pushed the dish of hot chocolate into my hands. It was so hot I nearly dropped it over the bedding.

  ‘I know better than to think I can stop you trying to unravel these puzzles,’ Esther said. ‘I even admire you for it – after all, someone should bring such people to justice. But . . .’

  An odd, uncharacteristic hesitation. As the silence lengthened, I started to say that I’d take more care in future, but she interrupted me. ‘I wish you would not put yourself in danger, Charles. It is important to me.’

  My heart contracted; I looked down into the dish of chocolate.

  ‘And,’ she said, with an air of great determination, ‘to our child.’

  I stared at her. At the candlelight gleaming on her pale hair, the fine strands escaping from the braid to curl against her neck. At the flush on her cheeks, the wary look in her grey eyes. I should have known, of course I should. Her recent erratic health, her lack of appetite and unusual longing for sweet things . . . I’d been so tied up in the mystery of the Gregson’s deaths that I hadn’t paid any attention to what was going on in my own house!

  And my principal feeling was – fear.

  Esther was watching me closely. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘It is alarming, isn’t it? Particularly with the ladies agog over stories of Alice Gregson’s misdeeds, relating the endless ingratitude of sons and daughters, saying how impossible it is to control even young children.’

  I’d like to see any child disobey Esther. I cleared my throat. ‘I disliked my father,’ I said. ‘Very much.’

  ‘I loved mine,’ she said, and gave me a careful, tentative smile.

  Forty

  I am in the middle of my preparations to come home and I find I have left my belongings and scattered halfway across the country, in inns here and there.

  [Letter from Louis de Glabre to his friend Philippe

  Froidevaux, 24 January 1737]

  We had an enormous argument after that. I wanted Esther to go back to bed, and not overtire herself. Esther insisted she had to finish the Norfolk estate accounts. I said she must leave all that to me now. She burst out laughing. In the end, of course, she had her way, and we breakfasted in amicable silence, broken only by sneaking looks at each other and giggling like two young girls.

  ‘Well,’ Esther said, as I finished my coffee. ‘What do you plan to do today, Charles?’

  This was plainly dangerous territory – she was still smiling, but a trifle fixedly. I didn’t pretend to misunderstand her. ‘There’s no point in trying to find Mrs Fletcher again. She’ll have met up with our Alice and stepped through to the other world by now.’

  ‘You don’t propose to go after her there?’ Esther said lightly.

  I shook my head. ‘Searching that world would be as big a task as searching this one. I thought I might look at Balfour’s rooms, and at Mrs Fletcher’s. I think we have to admit the murderer – whichever Alice it is – has escaped us, but we may be able to clear up what mystery remains. We don’t know, for instance, where Balfour put the hoard of coins or Hugh’s ring.’

  ‘Ah,’ she said, with some annoyance. ‘I forgot to tell you. George has had an exchange with one of the spirits in the watchmen’s hut. Balfour is apparently recalcitrant; he refuses to divulge the location of the artefacts.’

  ‘I suppose I could talk to him,’ I said doubtfully.

  ‘I knew you’d forget, Mistress,’ George said, startling us both by sliding up the table leg on to the edge of a used plate. The gleam of the spirit was bright – he was evidently happy today. ‘I’ve got another message now. From Mr Heron. He says to tell you Mr Fowler has left the house and is wandering about the town and if you see him, will you please tell him to go home again, or Mr Heron will dismiss him, and he really means that.’

  I doubted that last bit. I sighed. ‘Fowler will be looking for Alice. He’s always been convinced she killed the Gregsons.’

  ‘He was right,’ Esther pointed out, and raised an eyebrow. ‘He must have been a good friend of the apprentice to take such pains over hunting his killer.’

  I felt myself reddening. ‘I believe so.’

  My throat was on fire as I went out into the cold air in the square. The cuts, as I’d seen in my mirror, were indeed not deep or long, and when I was dressed they were hidden beneath the folds of my neckerchief. Unfortunately, the cloth chafed the cuts horribly. At least the pain in my arm was now only a dull distant ache.

  New snow had come down overnight and covered up all the old footprints; servants and carters had laid down new tracks. Looking up, I saw the sky covered in a greyish layer of cloud; in the east, the grey was darkening to pewter. I walked briskly out of Caroline Square, towards Westgate Road. One of the church clocks struck eleven. Hugh might well be teaching, but if he wasn’t, he might come with me.

  He was indeed teaching; I heard the screech of his kit fiddle as I climbed the stairs, and the heavy thump of feet on floorboards. That sounded very much the way I danced. The dancing schoolroom door was ajar and I poked it open cautiously. Hugh had a little cluster of eight young ladies, none of them older than fourteen, partnering each other in a country dance, with their mamas – allegedly chaperoning them – chattering away to each other over a glass or two of what was almost certainly sweet wine.

  The lesson was plainly coming to an end, and the young ladies were doing their best to remember the steps, although there was a great deal of pushing and shoving as the better dancers tried to remind the worse ones which way to go. I lounged in a corner for a moment, until one of the mamas signalled to me and I went across to talk. I only heard half she said; I was looking at the young ladies and thinking that in a few years time my daughter might be thudding away at her dance steps. If she turned out to be anything like me, she would have two left feet.

  Or it might be a son, of course . . .

  The young ladies were dismissed, swooped into their mamas’ arms and ushered out. As I stood back to let them pass, I slipped on a stray piece of orange peel and nearly fell. Ridiculous; I was going to be a father and I had suddenly become accident-prone.

  ‘Hugh,’ I said, when the room was empty, ‘I was wondering . . .’ and instead of asking him whether he wanted to come and search Balfour’s room for his missing ring, I said, ‘Esther is with child.’

  I hadn’t meant to say it in such a doom-laden voice. Hugh burst out laughing. He slapped me on the back. ‘Congratulations, Charles! A family man, at last! I want to be godfather, mind.’

  Dear God, I hadn’t thought of complications like that. My own father had been judicious in his choice of godparents, picking out the rich gentlemen who were his patrons with an eye to future advantage. He couldn’t have predicted that my own wealthy godfather would die in a fall from his horse within three months of my birth and prove of no use at all.

  Hugh was grinning from ear to ear. ‘Is it common knowledge, or am I to keep quiet about it?’

  ‘Hugh,’ I said. ‘I’m not fit to be a father. I get myself in scrapes every other day. I nearly got myself killed last night . . .’

  Of course, he wanted to know all about it and took me off to the nearest tavern so I could have plenty of time to explain. He regretted missing the excitement at rather too great length but did say that he thought Heron had probably been more use than he would have been. No
t that Hugh isn’t a good swordsman too; dancing masters usually are. He was only too eager to come with me to Balfour’s room, having no more lessons until the afternoon.

  ‘Mind you,’ he said, ‘there’ll be no more gallivanting for you. You’re a respectable family man now, Charles. You’ll be reading books of sermons to the servants next!’

  ‘Never!’ I said fervently.

  I wished he wouldn’t grin so much.

  Balfour’s room had been left untouched; possibly the people at the George didn’t yet know he was in custody. We stood in the doorway for a moment, looking about. His travelling trunk stood under the window; a coat and waistcoat were laid neatly on the bed, as if put out to wear. The plans for the Assembly Rooms were tucked down between the table and chair; I pulled them out and unrolled them. The loose sheets of paper on which Balfour had been writing fell out of the roll; one was covered in the almost illegible writing of the letter Mrs Fletcher had shown me. I could make out hardly any of it, except for one sentence, which was underlined: Why did you do it?

  The room yielded no clues. There were no other letters, no hidden store of money, and certainly no ancient coins or ring.

  We went on to Mrs Fletcher’s rooms – a bedroom and a sitting room – which we searched to the accompaniment of Mrs Mountain’s indignant requests for reparations. Heron had evidently got his sword tangled up in her best curtains, or so she said, and there was a great slit in them. She wanted the cost of new curtains. She went very coy, however, when I asked to see the damaged curtains and said she’d show them only to Heron. I recommended her to do so and shut the door on her. Leaving her, no doubt, to go for her scissors to slit the curtains.

  Mrs Fletcher’s rooms were not as tidy as Balfour’s. She seemed to have made herself very much at home, with her own teapot and dishes, and a caddy full of an expensive blend of tea. She had a drab selection of dresses, in keeping with her role as a widow, a novel or two, and a copy of the latest Courant.

  ‘There’s a box here,’ Hugh said, picking it off the mantelshelf. ‘It’s locked.’ He broke it open with a pocket knife before I could protest. ‘Letters.’ He turned them over. ‘Addressed to Miss A Gregson at an address in London.’ He laughed. ‘I don’t know what Alice told everyone but this is not a fashionable address. Heron would turn up his nose at it.’