by Deryn Lake
My Dear and Loving Husband,
Hoping that You are in Good Health as I Am at the Writing Thereof. Despite This, I am now so Heavy that Walking is Hugely Difficult for I do Believe That the Babe has Started to Move Downwards.
For This Reason, and Also For the Reason that I Miss Your Company, I and My Good Mother shall Proceed to Nassau Street Within the next Two Days, There to Remain until I have Travailed.
Your Loving and Affectionate Wife,
Emilia Rawlings
There was also another letter, a letter which brought the Apothecary to his feet, calling out for Tom, who was taking his ease in the servants quarters. It was from Jocasta Rayner, informing John that her late father was to be buried not in London but at Stoke d’Abemon church, by mutual decision of the family. Gazing at the date of the funeral, John realised that it was that very day at two in the afternoon. Obviously the letter had arrived on the morning he had left London.
Hearing his master call, the coachman came running into the hall. “What is it, Sorrh?”
“Tom, borrow some of the Comte de Vignolles’s horses. We’re off to a funeral.”
“And whose would that be?”
“Aidan Fenchurch, the man who was killed outside his own house in Bloomsbury Square. Which reminds me, what did they say to my letter in Bow Street?”
“I took it to that old fox Jago. He told me to tell you that the two Brave Fellows would be setting off this morning to bring the woman concerned in for questioning.”
“God’s teeth, they may well be here by now.”
Tom shook his shaggy Irish head. “I doubt it, Mr. Rawlings. If there is one thing I pride myself on it’s my speed. Flying Runners they might be, but they will never outpace me.”
John nodded. “You’re probably right. Now, do you feel up to turning out again?”
“Oh yes indeed, Sir. I like it when we go to funerals. There is usually a good alehouse close to the church and besides the happenings are so exciting. There’s nearly always someone vomiting or fainting.”
John yelped a laugh. “Well, if that’s your idea of fun. Anyway, Miss Evalina is bound to do a really good swoon today. She’s probably been practising at home.”
It was the coachman’s turn to grin. “Why is it, Mr. Rawlings, that the burials you go to are attended by such a rum bunch of coves?”
“Usually because there’s a murderer amongst ‘em,” the Apothecary answered succinctly, and went to change into the darkest clothes he had brought with him.
* * *
Stoke d’Abemon, which despite its grand name proved to be little more than a hamlet, lay some ten miles or so north of West Clandon, yet despite its proximity was difficult to get at for want of a road. Therefore, having taken directions from the de Vignolles’s coachman, Irish Tom followed the course of the River Wey, which meandered serpentine through verdant pastureland, then eventually turned away from the stream and on to a well-beaten track. In the distance John could see the spire of the church, from which a solemn bell was already tolling, filling the countryside with a gloomy reminder of man’s mortality.
“Oh, I think this is going to be a fine one,” Tom called from the coachman’s box.
“Why do you say that?”
“I feel it in my bones, Sir.”
“I wonder why they decided to bury him in the country. It must have been a terrible effort to bring the body all the way.”
“Perhaps he came down by water, Sir. It would be much easier.”
“Yes, I suppose it would. What a depressing thought.”
“What?”
“That a river journey which should be so pleasant and sparkling, particularly in this green month, should actually be the one he never sees at all.”
At that moment John had a vision of Aidan Fenchurch’s anxious crab-like eyes and felt genuinely angry about the way in which he had met his end.
“Let’s hope the Brave Fellows find Mrs. Bussell and take her to Bow Street without too much difficulty,” he called up to Tom.
But even as he said the words the Apothecary knew that there was no hope of that happening. That Ariadne would start by being flirtatious and end by kicking and screaming as they hauled her away to London.
“Wretched woman,” he muttered as they rounded the comer and drew up outside the church. Then he froze in horror, his jaw arrested in mid air, his brain questioning what his eyes were actually seeing. For standing at the end of the church path, clad from head to toe in deepest black and leaning on a small, water- rat kind of man for support, was the woman he had just been thinking about. Ariadne Bussell had come out of hiding and was about to attend the burial of the lover whom she had most likely ordered to be killed.
“Drive round the front, Tom,” John whispered loudly, and crouched down on the coach floor as the equipage swept round and out of sight. “That was her,” he continued, straightening up and adjusting his hat.
“Who? The Bussell woman?”
“The very same. You were right. This is going to be an extremely interesting occasion.”
The main door was at the other side of the church and already some mourners had gathered there to await the arrival of the dead. Disembarking, John joined them, glad that Mrs. Bussell had decided to stay at the back of the building, presumably to avoid contact with the family for as long as possible. Or had she, wondered John, become nervous of leaving her hiding place, and was presently trying to remain away from prying eyes?
The crowd of mourners must be locals, the Apothecary thought, looking them over and not recognising a single face. He bowed to everyone in turn, putting on his good-citizen-in-sorrow expression. Many bowed back and one woman greeted him as if she knew him.
“So good to see you again, Sir. But what a sad occasion.”
Long experience had taught him never to correct such a misapprehension and John smiled, then lengthened his features even more. “Terrible, Madam, terrible. My heart is with the family”
“And mine, and mine. I pity poor Jocasta. First husband, now father, and all within an eighteen month.”
“I was in Scotland when…” John clutched wildly at his memory and plucked the name out of thin air. “… Horatio died. It was an accident with mushrooms I believe. Did it happen down here or in London?”
“Down here. Why, he is buried in the churchyard yonder.” A skinny arm gesticulated. “Poor soul. What a painful end. Dear Dr. Best could do nothing.”
“Humph,” grunted a figure standing beside her. “Horatio Rayner was a philandering goat and deserved everything he got.”
“Henry!” remonstrated the woman, clearly shocked. “How could you speak ill of the dead so?”
“Easily,” responded the man, who spoke so familiarly that he must be her husband. “It’s the truth, ain’t it? He was up the skirts of all the village girls and many more beside.”
John stood agog, amazed by this latest piece of information. It had never occurred to him that a striking woman like Jocasta could have been betrayed by an older husband. The next question came automatically.
“Horatio was considerably older than his wife, was he not?”
“Yes, some twenty years I believe.”
“He was still a stinking whoremonger,” her husband repeated doggedly.
“You must tell me….”
But he was silenced by the sight of black coaches drawn by horses with tosing black plumes arriving at the church gate. A country parson, red-cheeked and with matching nose, stepped forward to greet Evalina, who came crashing out of the first carriage, Cousin Millicent hovering like a small dark moth beside her. Jocasta Rayner was the third to descend, looking terribly thin but somehow gauntly attractive in her mourning clothes. From the next coach stepped the errant Louisa accompanied by Lieutenant Mendoza, redcoated but with a black armband. The third carriage disgorged elderly people; a brother, cousins perhaps? But it was the fourth coach, following closely those of the family but not quite with them, that caught the Apothecary’s attention. Mo
mentarily he thought that Mrs. Bussell was stepping out and wondered how she could manage to be in two places at once. But then he saw that it was a woman very similar to her in appearance, yet not quite so crass in manner. Preceded by a young man of about twenty, his face positively seething with yellow-encrusted pimples, who offered a hand to help her out, came what could only be Mrs. Trewellan. Large and really rather stupid looking, her expression bland, her black clothes floating about her so that she resembled a dark feather bed, she was very like the woman whom she had succeeded in the affections of the late Aidan Fenchurch. That is except for her eyes, which were a colourless blue, like the ocean in dull weather. The Apothecary spared a moment to debate the question that lovers repeatedly go for the same type, then thought of Coralie Clive, his former mistress; Elizabeth di Lorenzi, who had never been his mistress at all; and the angelic Emilia Alleyn, whom he had married. It was not true at all, he decided.
In Aidan’s case, though, the similarity between the two women he had loved spoke for itself. It was going to be a clash of heaving breasts, John thought, when the pair of them faced each other over the coffin. But Mrs. Trewellan, the spotty man - presumably her son - in tow, was bearing down on Evalina.
“Oh my dear,” she whispered in a wee, far-away voice. Aidan’s eldest daughter responded with a mighty eye roll. “Mrs. Trewellan,” she said icily, and gave the curtest inclination of her head. So she had not approved of her father’s choice.
It was just at this interesting moment that Mrs. Bussell, arm linked firmly through that of her water-rat husband, appeared sailing round the comer of the church. On sight of her rival, however, she stopped short, her mouth working. Then she hurried forward, red in the face, her entire demeanour suggesting that she was about to slap Mrs. Trewellan hard. This, John decided, was the time to intervene. He stepped directly into Ariadne’s path and bowed.
“Mrs. Bussell.”
She stopped short. “You! What are you doing here you horrible little man?”
The Apothecary adopted the grimmest expression in his repertoire. “I come to honour the dead, Madam. And you?”
Montague Bussell spoke up. “Who are you exactly, Sir?”
“My name is Rawlings, Mr. Bussell.” John bowed once more. “By trade I am an apothecary but I have another interest which I am currently pursuing.”
“And what is that?”
“I work with Sir John Fielding on behalf of the Public Office in Bow Street.”
“Oh,” said Montague Bussell, and gave the Apothecary a long hard stare.
He was quite slight in build and not particularly tall, giving the impression that his wife was twice as big as he was, which, strictly, was not true. The whiskery look was created by the fact that whoever shaved him did a poor job, leaving small patches of facial hair, all of which were grey. These hirsute clumps joggled when he talked, a fact that John found absolutely fascinating. However, despite his rattish features, Montague did not have the bright eyes of a rodent. Instead his were pale; a watery grey. Yet belying his insipid colouring, John got the feeling that a hard man lay beneath this dull exterior, that a certain set to Mr. Bussell’s jaw indicated that he was not to be trifled with. Yet again, the question of how much he knew about his wife’s affair and subsequent stalking activities rose in the Apothecary’s rriind.
Mrs. Trewellan, in response to her son’s whispering, turned round and regarded her rival, her expression hesitant. Ariadne’s vast teeth were bared in a travesty of a smile, though her conker eyes remained ice cold. The two women bobbed in each other’s direction, then turned away. But further confrontation was impossible for the hearse was weaving its way up the track towards the church. Behind it, led by a groom and all tricked out in black, came a riderless horse - presumably Aidan Fenchurch’s - his hat on the saddle, his riding boots, crossed, beneath it. If he had been an army man, no doubt his sword would also have been there, and John could only feel thankful that no one had suggested putting up a bottle of fine port to represent the deceased.
The hearse drew to a halt and some very feeble and ancient male relatives stepped forward to shoulder the coffin into church. Hoping to God that they weren’t going to drop it, the Apothecary was relieved when the dashing Lieutenant Mendoza left the crowd of mourners and courteously moved a bow-legged octogenarian to one side, taking the burden himself.
“Not family,” hissed Evalina in a loud whisper.
“He is now,” answered Louisa, and pulling of her glove flashed a wedding ring beneath her elder sister’s nose.
So they had eloped, thought John, but then his attention was wrenched back to the matter in hand as the coffin began its perilous journey up the aisle, wobbling dangerously at every step. Behind it, as custom decreed, came the eldest child, accompanied by poor Millicent, weeping copiously into a black trimmed handkerchief. Evalina, grim-faced, marched steadily however, presumably relishing the fact that every eye was set upon her. Thin as a reed, Jocasta walked behind with Louisa, who even despite the solemnity of the occasion had a hat with bobbing feather set on her sweep of red hair.
Thanks to the efforts of a sweating Lieutenant Mendoza, the coffin arrived at its resting place and at a sign from the parson, the congregation sat. There was a lot of subdued coughing and then the service began. John, as was his wont, made for the back of the church where he could see but not be seen. Two rows in front of him sat the Bussells, immediately in front of them, Mrs. Trewellan and son, an unhappy arrangement to say the least of it. Indeed, Ariadne went so far as to strike her rival with a bible, all under the pretence of accident, of course.
John’s mind was far away, in the coffin with the shattered remains of Aidan Fenchurch. Whoever had inflicted those blows. be they robbers or hired killers, had dark hearts and even darker souls, that much was clear. Yet could a woman have been behind such savagery? Was it possible that a female could have ordered such a dreadful execution? Shivering, John stared at Ariadne Bussell’s studiously turned back, and wondered, as she raised a handkerchief to dab her lips, whether she might perhaps be smiling behind its concealing veil.
Unusually, the scene at the graveside revealed nothing. Evalina was relatively calm, only letting out one enormous shriek as she threw a large clod of earth, which landed with a plop, on to her father’s lowered casket. Louisa leaned heavily on her new husband as they did the same, while Millicent scuttled like a miserable mouse, avoiding looking down into the grave’s greedy maw as she tossed in not earth but a bunch of rosemary woven round with wild forget-me-nots. After that the mourners filed past like a line of dark rooks. Mrs. Trewellan cried, while her son looked sly, like a dog who had stolen a string of sausages. Mrs. Bussell got her shoe caught in a fissure and stumbled at the grave’s edge, much to John’s delight. The water-rat husband, having rescued her, wobbled his whiskers in what was, presumably, a show of emotion, and then it was all over. Wondering if the Brave Fellows were going to appear at any moment and drag the principal suspect into their awaiting coach, John trudged up the church path, thinking that it hadn’t been as dramatic a funeral as he had hoped for.
Jocasta glided up to him, so silently that it made him jump. “Mr. Rawlings, you will come back to Foxfire Hall for the wake, I trust.”
He snatched off his hat. “Madam, I would not presume. You are family and neighbours. I am a mere outsider.”
“But you did so much for Father.”
“I only met him once.”
“But he trusted you, confided in you. Felt he knew you well enough to put his papers into your safekeeping.”
“I did what any other citizen would have done.”
“Not at all. I insist that you join us. Is your coachman here?”
“Waiting with the others.”
“Then I will give him directions how to find us.”
With that she walked away, leaving John no opportunity to argue further.
“So we’re going on, are we, Sir?” Tom asked as the Apothecary approached.
“It woul
d seem so.”
“Did anything fine happen at the funeral? Was anybody taken ill?” the coachman continued eagerly.
“No, not really. Let’s hope the wake will prove more interesting.” John became serious. “Any sign of the two Brave Fellows, Tom?”
“Not a sniff of ‘em, Sir.”
“When you’ve dropped me at the Hall could you have a look round the local tracks. They probably got as far as the Clandons and then lost themselves.”
“I’ll do what I can. How long do you expect to be?”
“One hour. No more.”
“Very good, Mr. Rawlings.” And Tom saluted with his whip as they turned through the gates and up a drive towards an imposing mansion. “By God, was this man titled?” the Irishman called out.
“No, all this was achieved through the consumption of fine wines and spirits.”
“Then we’re all in the wrong profession, so we are.”
And the Apothecary felt inclined to agree. For Foxfire Hall was vast; a huge Tudor edifice with curling chimney pots and mellow brick, built in the traditional E shape that indicated the reign of Elizabeth. Roses, in bud and leaf but not yet flowering, rambled over the walls in profusion. In summer, John imagined, the entire place must be filled with their fragrance to an overpowering degree. Where roses ended, ivy took over, so that the whole place seemed alive and bursting with growth. For once in his life, John felt that he could live in such a house with total happiness.
The heavy front door stood open, a footman on duty within the porch, another beyond who took John’s hat and cloak. Ushered within, the Apothecary almost immediately found himself amongst the other mourners, who mingled in an oak- panelled, tapestry-hung Great Hall. A table on which cakes and some sort of punch had been prepared stood to one side, the visitors not yet touching the refreshments but forming a line to pay their condolences to the family members who stood on the raised dais at the end of the hall. As luck would have it, John found himself immediately behind the couple he had met at the church door.
