The stairs shook under Frau Siegwart as she led Spandrel up to the first floor and she was panting by the time they reached the door of the best room in the house. She knocked at it briskly, then more briskly still when there was no response. ‘Ich verstehe nicht,’ she said with a frown. ‘Wo sind sie?’ She listened, knocked again, then tried the handle.
The door was not locked. Frau Siegwart pushed it open and peered into the room. There was no-one there. Glancing in over her shoulder, Spandrel noticed at once what a sharp intake of the landlady’s breath suggested she too had noticed. The drawers in the chest beneath the window were sagging open. And they were empty.
For a moment, while Frau Siegwart mumbled to herself and looked around, Spandrel struggled to understand what had happened. Where was she? Where were they? If Estelle had fled, as she well might have done, she would surely not have taken Zuyler’s possessions with her. Unless, of course, they had fled together.
‘Jupe,’ he said aloud. ‘Where’s Jupe?’
‘Wie bitte?’
‘Jupe. He’s staying here. Mr Jupe.’
‘Der Engländer?’
‘Yes. That’s right. He’s English too. Jupe.’
Grasping apparently that her other English guest might be able to shed light on the disappearance of Mr and Mrs Kemp, Frau Siegwart clumped off towards the stairs. Spandrel followed.
Another two flights took them to a low-ceilinged landing at the top of the house. Frau Siegwart, breathing now like a bellows, rapped at one of the doors. There was no response. She tried again, with the same result. Then she grasped the handle and turned it.
Jupe’s door was also unlocked, which somehow surprised Spandrel. But his surprise on that account was rapidly overborne by the shock of what he and Frau Siegwart found themselves looking at through the open doorway.
Jupe and Zuyler lay next to each other at the foot of the bed. There had been a struggle of some kind. The dressing-table had been overturned and the rug was bunched and ruckled beneath them. A pool of congealed blood extended across the rug and the floorboards around it. There was no movement, no sign of life. Both men, Spandrel realized at once, were dead.
‘Mein Gott,’ said Frau Siegwart, crossing herself as she spoke.
Spandrel stepped cautiously past her into the room and leaned forward, trying to see and understand what had happened. Zuyler was lying on his side, his face partly concealed by a fold of the rug. But enough of it was visible for there to be no doubt that he had died in agony. His eyes were bulging, his tongue protruding. There were splinters of wood scattered around him. One of his knees was sharply raised and the heel of his boot had gouged at the boards. He was wearing the greatcoat Spandrel had seen tossed over the back of the chair next to him in the tavern the night before. He did not seem to have been stabbed. There was blood beneath him, but no sign of a wound. The cause of his death looked to be the narrow leather strap wrapped around his neck. It was loose now, but there was a deep red line beneath to show where it had been drawn tight.
The blood belonged to Jupe. He lay on his back, staring sightlessly up at the ceiling. A knife was buried to the hilt in his chest and his coat was sodden with blood. His left hand held the knotted loops of the strap, trailing in his stiffening fingers. It looked as if he had strangled Zuyler, who had managed to stab him with the knife as he did so. The wound had proved fatal, but not quickly enough to save Zuyler. Even as his life’s blood had drained away, Jupe had finished what he had set out to do.
But why? What had they fought about? Spandrel’s gaze moved to a knapsack lying open by the chest of drawers, with a bundle of clothes beside it. They were Jupe’s, presumably. Had he been packing for a journey? If so, he would not have thrown his clothes on the floor. If he had stowed them in the knapsack, however, in readiness for his departure, and someone else had then pulled them out in search of something concealed beneath them—
‘Herr Jupe,’ Frau Siegwart wailed, suddenly realizing who the dead pair were. ‘Und Herr Kemp.’ She clapped her hands to her cheeks. ‘Fürchterlich.’
‘You should call for help,’ said Spandrel.
But a different thought had struck Frau Siegwart. ‘Wo ist Frau Kemp?’ Then she forced out the words in English. ‘Where … Mrs Kemp?’
It was a good question. Indeed, it was a better question than Frau Siegwart could possibly know. Where was Estelle de Vries? And what did she have with her? Spandrel looked down at the two dead men. ‘I don’t know where she is,’ he said, truthfully enough, though he could have hazarded a good guess at where she might be going. ‘I don’t know anything.’
‘We’ve been a pair of fools, you and and I,’ said McIlwraith an hour or so later, when Spandrel had finished describing to him the gruesome scene at the Pension Siegwart. ‘You see what this means, don’t you?’
‘I think I do,’ said Spandrel. ‘Estelle de Vries didn’t destroy the Green Book.’
‘No more she did. But we’d have gone on believing her tearful little story save for something a sight more reliable than our judgement. Greed, Spandrel. That’s what’s undone them.’
‘Them? Jupe was on their side, not ours?’
‘You have it. He saw us arrive here, then went to Zuyler and his lady love and convinced them that, without his help, they’d not escape us. Remember her confusion about who I represented – the Government or the House of Commons? Jupe must have told them I was a Government agent. A natural enough assumption, in the circumstances.’ McIlwraith pounded a fist into his palm. ‘Jupe was the sceptical one, wasn’t he? “I’m still not convinced.” “I shall keep my eye on them.” He overplayed his hand and we still didn’t see the cards up his sleeve.’
‘He hid the book in his room?’
‘Aye. Then they performed their touching masquerade in the hope that we’d give up and go away, leaving them to go on to Rome and sell the book, sharing the proceeds among the three of them.’
‘What went wrong?’
‘It sounds as if Zuyler caught Jupe in the act of decamping with the book. I don’t suppose they trusted one another for an instant. It was an alliance of necessity. Realizing that there’d probably be a Government agent coming after them in due course as well must have cast its own shadow.’
‘Will there be?’
‘Aye, man, of course. You don’t think we have the field to ourselves, do you?’
‘You never told me that.’
‘Did I not? Well, perhaps I didn’t think you needed to worry your head over it. And no more you do.’ But there, though he did not say so, Spandrel begged to differ. ‘Nor about Zuyler and Jupe, now they’ve done for each other. There’s only one person we need to consider.’
‘Estelle de Vries.’
‘The very same. She must have gone to Jupe’s room when Zuyler didn’t return and found them dead. Whether she shed a real tear for her lover to add to the false ones she sprinkled over us last night we’ll never know. What we do know is that she took the book from Jupe’s knapsack and—’
‘We can’t be sure she did.’
‘You said you searched the room.’
‘Yes. After the landlady rushed off to raise the alarm.’
‘And the book wasn’t there.’
‘No. But—’
‘For pity’s sake, man. Why else would she leave without raising the alarm herself?’
‘No reason, I suppose,’ Spandrel reluctantly admitted. ‘It must be as you say.’ But it was such a cold-blooded thing to have done. Even now, he could hardly bring himself to believe it of her.
‘She’s gone and the book’s gone with her,’ said McIlwraith. ‘The question is: where?’
It was not an easy question to answer. Even if she had lied to them about Zuyler selling the chaise, she could hardly have driven it away herself. She might have hired a driver, of course, but she would surely have realized it could not be long before they learned Jupe and Zuyler were dead and drew the correct conclusions. To attempt to outrun them on the road was futile
. So, McIlwraith reasoned, she would prefer to travel by the first available public coach and set off for the Simplon Pass from wherever the coach took her.
The Drei Tassen happened to be the principal coaching inn of the city. Enquiries revealed that no services had left for any destination since the previous afternoon. At noon, however, the Basle and Interlaken coaches were both due to leave. She would hardly head back to Basle. Interlaken, lying forty miles to the south-east, was the obvious choice. Rather too obvious, however, for McIlwraith’s liking.
And so it proved when they stood in the inn yard at noon and watched the coaches load and depart. There was no sign of Estelle de Vries. By then, word of the murders at the Pension Siegwart was abroad. The consensus of tap-room wisdom was that you could never tell with foreigners. It was at least a blessing that this pair had killed each other and left the locals un molested. Old Frau Siegwart should choose her guests more carefully.
By dusk McIlwraith and Spandrel between them had visited just about every inn, stable and boarding-house in the city. No un accompanied Englishwoman, or Dutchwoman come to that, was to be found. Nor was there any word of such a person hiring transport or even asking how it might be hired.
‘Where can she be?’ asked Spandrel, as they made their way back to the Drei Tassen through the darkening streets.
‘She may be lying low,’ said McIlwraith. ‘Privacy can be bought, like most things.’
‘Could she have persuaded some traveller to take her with him?’
‘She could. There aren’t many who’d refuse a woman like her … well, near enough whatever she wanted.’
‘Then she could be anywhere.’
‘Or on the road to it. Aye. But where do they say all roads lead? She won’t give up now, Spandrel. Sooner or later, she’ll turn south. It has to be the Simplon Pass. That’s where we can be sure of catching her. She might be hiding here somewhere. But I’ll waste no more time and boot leather looking. We’ll leave in the morning.’
Nothing, Spandrel knew already, despite the brevity of their acquaintance, changed McIlwraith’s mind once it was made up. He was a man of firm will and fixed decisions. But even firmness can be pushed aside by a greater force. There is no decision, however fixed, that cannot be out-decided.
As they walked along the passage towards their room at the Drei Tassen, a door ahead of them some way short of theirs slowly opened, the light from a lantern beyond the windows at the rear of the inn falling unevenly across a figure that stepped out into their path. McIlwraith pulled up at once and sucked in his breath. He knew who the man was. And Spandrel sensed that he did not like him.
‘I saw you coming,’ the man said. He was a squat, burly fellow, with a head too large for his body. His face was in shadow, but there was menace enough simply in his posture. Spandrel felt suddenly cold. ‘You should be more careful.’
‘Colonel Wagemaker,’ said McIlwraith quietly. ‘What brings you here?’
‘The same wind that’s blown you in.’
‘Is that so?’
‘I’m in the King’s service, McIlwraith. I outrank you. In more ways than one.’
‘I can only think of one, Colonel. And that wasn’t always the case.’
‘Where’s the widow de Vries?’
‘I don’t rightly know.’
‘Nor would you tell me if you did.’
‘True enough.’
‘But she does have the book, doesn’t she?’
‘Book?’
‘Don’t try to play blind-man’s-buff with me, McIlwraith. Jupe and Zuyler are dead. But she slipped through your fumbling fingers, didn’t she? Cloisterman’s at the Town Hall now, trying to—’
‘Cloisterman’s with you?’
‘He is. And that’s Spandrel you have skulking beside you, isn’t it? So, we have our seconds ready-made for us, don’t we?’
‘Seconds? You surely don’t mean to—’
‘Kill you? Most certainly. Unless you kill me. I told you that if we ever met again I’d finish it between us. Well …’ Some thing in the tone of Wagemaker’s voice revealed the smile that Spandrel could not see. ‘We meet again.’
Chapter Eighteen
Old Scores
‘QUITE A TURN-UP, eh, Spandrel?’ said McIlwraith, as he sat by the window of their room at the Drei Tassen and gazed out at the blank Bernese night. By the flickering light of the single candle, Spandrel saw him raise his whisky flask to his lips and sip from it. ‘Just what we didn’t need. Just what I didn’t want.’
‘You’re really going to fight him?’
‘I have no choice. Despite appearances, I lay claim to be a gentleman. Colonel Wagemaker demands satisfaction. And I must give it him. Tomorrow, at dawn.’
‘This is madness.’
‘A form of it, certainly.’
‘What’s it about? Why does he hate you?’
‘He blames me for his sister’s death.’
‘And are you to blame?’
‘Aye. I am. But so is he. We share the blame. I believe that’s what he can’t stomach.’
‘How did she die?’
‘It’s not a story I’m fond of telling. But since we need to consider the possibility that I may not be alive tomorrow to correct the cholerical colonel’s version of events …’ McIlwraith chuckled. ‘As my second, you come close to being my confessor, Spandrel. You know that?’
‘I haven’t agreed to be your second.’
‘You’ll do it, though. I know you well enough by now. We may despise the forms of this world, but we observe them nonetheless. It’d be as cowardly for you to refuse to stand by me as for me to refuse to stand against him.’
‘And, if so, I’m entitled to know why.’
‘Aye. So you are.’ McIlwraith took another sip of whisky. ‘It goes back to the war. Like so much else in my misdirected life. Glorious days and grievous: they were the way of it. But we didn’t mind. Not while Marlborough led us. A hard man. And a harder one still to read. But a leader, in his heart as well as his head. You’d have followed him into the fissures of Hell. Blenheim, Ramillies, Oudenarde, Malplaquet. I was at all of them. And proud to be. Then the politicians did him down, as good soldiers always are done down by backstairs intrigues and closet bargains. The Government changed its hue. The Captain-General was dismissed. Peace talks began. We surrendered in all but name. Most of the British troops went back to England, while the negotiations dragged on through the spring and summer of 1712. I was with Albemarle’s Allied division during those months. Nobody knew what we were supposed to be about. Most of the officers were Dutch or German. There were precious few British left. And precious little spirit left either. The French seized their chance, crossed the Scheldt and attacked us at Denain. Seventeen battalions were lost. I was one of the many taken prisoner. We were sent to Valenciennes and confined there until a truce could be agreed. I fell in with an English officer from the garrison at Marchiennes, which the French had also captured. He was badly wounded and our captors made little effort to treat him. Before the truce was concluded, he was dead. His name was Hatton. Captain John Hatton. He was a good fellow. He made me promise to carry a letter he’d written to a young lady in England to whom he was engaged. His beloved Dorothea. You already know her surname.’
‘Wagemaker.’
‘The very same. The Wagemakers owned land in Berkshire. Still do, I dare say. When I was released and sent to rejoin what was left of my regiment, I was immediately discharged on half-pay. The country was done with us fighting men. Our time was over. I had no notion of what to do or where to go. I certainly had no wish to return to Scotland. I burned my boats there a long while ago. I had it in my mind to go back to what I knew best: fighting. There’s always an army somewhere in the world that wants a recruit. But before I set to thinking about that, I had to deliver Hatton’s letter to his betrothed. I wrote to her, warning her of my visit, then travelled to the Wagemakers’ house, Bordon Grove, on the edge of Windsor Forest.’
‘Was Colo
nel Wagemaker there?’
‘He was. Though he was only a lieutenant then. Reduced to half-pay, like me, and cooling his heels at home. Our Augustus saw himself as head of the family, following his father’s recent death, though his brother Tiberius had the running of the estate, such as it was. As for Dorothea, she was the pick of the bunch, as she’d have been of many another. Not merely beautiful, but sweet-natured and altogether lovely. A young woman of such breeding that you couldn’t help wondering how she’d acquired so ill-bred a pair of brothers. A lamb to their wolves. She thanked me for my condolences and for bringing the letter. She urged me to stay awhile. And so I did. I stayed, indeed, too long. Brother Tiberius offered me the rent of a folly on the estate. Blind Man’s Tower, it’s called, on ironical account of the staircase to the top being on the outside of the building, open to the elements, with neither guard nor rail. But the ground floor’s as cosy as a cottage. I took it just for the winter. By spring, I planned to be on my way.’
‘And were you?’
‘I was. But much had happened by then. What Wagemaker and I are to duel over was already done. I grew to know the family too well. That was my mistake. A soldier needs a billet. But he should never think he’s found a home. The Wagemakers were pressed for money. Their father had been a poor manager of their interests and Tiberius wasn’t the man to repair them. A loose-tongued aunt who lived with them and kept their invalid mother company muttered to me more than once about debts hanging round their necks. No doubt that explains why Tiberius was willing to rent me Blind Man’s Tower. Any income was useful. And it also explains why he and Augustus weren’t at all sorry that poor Hatton was dead. They never made any pretence that they were, speaking slightingly of him on several occasions, until they saw it tried my temper to do so and guarded what they said. They had a different, wealthier, husband in mind for Dorothea: Esmund Longrigg, owner of a neighbouring and better founded estate. Longrigg held the office of chief woodward or somesuch in the Forest hierarchy, which carried with it an enviable load of perquisites. He and Dorothea were put much together at balls and musical evenings that Christmas and Longrigg liked what he saw. But Dorothea didn’t. I couldn’t blame her for that. I didn’t like the look of Longrigg myself. Tallow to her beeswax. But moneyed. To her brothers, that was all that mattered. They encouraged her to accept his proposal if, or, as they saw it, when it came. And come it did.’ McIlwraith sighed and drank some more whisky. ‘She asked for time to think. Then she turned to me for advice. She detested Longrigg. But she knew how important it was to the family’s future that she marry him. Yet still she detested him. Her life with him would be a misery. What was she to do?’
Sea Change Page 16
