A Stroke of Malice

by Anna Lee Huber

  The body had belonged to a man, that I could tell, and a gentleman, if his clothes were any indication of his class. He had stood at an average height with an average build, and possessed hair a shade of pale sandy brown. There was almost nothing distinguishable about him—at least nothing that the rats had not ruthlessly obscured—except for the small chip in one of his front teeth and the fact he possessed only one boot. I glanced toward the corner across the room where Lord Edward had dropped the boot he’d tripped over in the tunnel, confirming that it appeared to be a match for the black leather Wellington the man wore. Perhaps there would be something more significant to note beneath his clothing, but I was not about to conduct a more thorough examination under such circumstances, though the nun’s habit I wore would undoubtedly prove to be an effective apron.

  I glanced at Lord Edward, who stood to my left, staring at what remained of the man’s face. His complexion was pale, but he did not seem in danger of casting up his accounts. “You recognize him.” I stated it as a fact not a question, and his troubled gaze shifted to meet mine. “Or at the least, you have a strong suspicion.”

  He didn’t reply at first, but then he slowly nodded, reaching up to remove the paper crown from his head. “Yes.” He hiccupped a shallow breath through his mouth, struggling, like Gage and I were, not to inhale the stomach-churning smells through his nostrils. “My first thought was . . . well . . .” He hesitated. “He reminds me of Helmswick.” His brother-in-law and Lady Eleanor’s husband. “But it can’t be him. Helmswick left for Paris over four weeks ago.” With the crushed crown, he gestured to the corpse. “So this can’t be him.”

  I bit my lower lip, doing a quick mental calculation. “Actually, it could.”

  Both men turned to me in surprise.

  “I know that seems incredible, but given the environmental factors . . .” I glanced around me “. . . the cold temperatures inside this crypt, and the fact that it’s the dead of winter, as well as the heavy sack he was wrapped inside protecting him at least temporarily from scavengers, it means it’s just possible he might have been deceased for that long.”

  I contemplated my previous experiences with corpses, and the lengths of time Sir Anthony had been able to utilize them before putrefaction became too advanced. The conditions in his private anatomical theater were far less auspicious than this for preservation, despite all the methods my late husband had employed to keep the bodies from decaying too quickly. But there had been a particularly cold January in 1829. One when ice had even formed on the Thames. I remembered how bitterly cold the cellar was where Sir Anthony performed his dissections and experiments. But in spite of my cramped fingers, I also couldn’t help noting how the chill had slowed the normal rate of decomposition.

  I wrapped my arms tighter around my body as a shiver worked through my frame. “I would say it’s most likely the man has been dead somewhere between two to four weeks, and a few days beyond that is not outside the realm of possibility.” I shrugged one shoulder. “Of course, if he was killed somewhere else and then left there for a period of time before being transferred down to these subterranean chambers, his death might have been more recent, but I doubt it.”

  “That’s a broad range,” Gage remarked, resting his hands on his hips.

  I grimaced. “I might be able to narrow it down if I take a closer look at the body, but it’s doubtful. Time of death is often difficult to judge even in optimal conditions, and these certainly aren’t those.”

  “Then this couldn’t be a guest from the Twelfth Night Ball?” he asked more for clarification than out of genuine curiosity.

  “No, this man died before Hogmanay,” I asserted, wondering if Gage had harbored the same initial suspicion I had upon watching the arm slide out of the sack. That perhaps someone had used a forged note like the ones some of the other guests had received to draw the victim down here to their death. But the body was far too decomposed to continue entertaining such a possibility.

  “Can you tell how he died?”

  I began to shake my head as I allowed my gaze to slide over what features remained of his face again, but then stopped. “There. On the skull.” I leaned closer. “I think that’s a fracture.” I lifted my hands to roll the man’s head to the side, but Lord Edward stepped in.

  “Here, allow me.”

  I wasn’t about to object, and waited until he’d turned the head to the left before dipping my head to examine the wound. It was indeed a fracture, radiating back toward a rather large indentation. Someone had coshed the man in the side of the head with such force that it had splintered the bone, causing jagged shards to pierce inward toward the brain.

  “What would cause such a violent injury?” Gage ruminated in an aghast voice as he peered over my shoulder.

  “Maybe a large stone or brick,” I posited, but if so, the wielder would have needed to be incredibly strong and his victim lying on the ground in order to generate enough force. But then another thought occurred to me. I looked up at Lord Edward. “Or a mace.”

  His mother had mentioned that the guard room housed ancient weaponry, and I had seen it hanging on the walls myself when we arrived at the castle.

  His somber expression turned even grimmer, but he did not argue with this assessment, perhaps having already thought of it himself.

  Gage reached into the pocket of the man’s jacket, and I backed away so that he could have the space to search him for any belongings or some form of identification. When the sleeve of the man’s coat shifted upward to reveal some of the skin underneath, I did note it seemed to retain a yellow cast, but given the poor lighting and Gage’s hasty movements, I couldn’t be certain of it. In any case, his clothing yielded nothing of use, nor did he wear jewelry of any kind. “That’s odd,” Gage declared, wiping his hands on his handkerchief. “Did the killer take them, or did he possess nothing portable to begin with?”

  “Given the fact he’s dressed in the clothing of a gentleman, I find it difficult to believe it’s the latter.” I scowled. “Wouldn’t Helmswick have at least worn a signet ring?” He was an earl after all.

  Lord Edward scoffed. “Helmswick would have worn a great deal more than that. Jeweled stickpins, pearl-inlaid pocketwatch cases, gold quizzing glasses—Helmswick embraced the sartorial trappings of a nobleman.”

  I glanced down at the man. “Then if this is the earl, someone must have taken them.” Either because their aim all along had been to steal from him, or to obscure his identity. But which was it?

  The horror of the situation suddenly seemed to seize me. Not only did we not know who this unfortunate man was; we had no apparent way of identifying him. His clothing would have to be checked for markings, but unless those yielded some result, we would have to wait until contact could either be made with Lord Helmswick in Paris or not. And while we had identified what appeared to be the cause of death, there was a wide window of possibilities for the time it may have occurred. Perhaps one of the surgeons from London or Edinburgh who had recently begun to focus on the relatively new field of medical jurisprudence might be able to more accurately tell when death had occurred, but I was at a loss.

  What was worse was the realization that this man’s death—be it Helmswick or someone else—and the stashing of his body in this crypt, pointed to someone in the duke’s castle as being the culprit. And if the body did, in fact, belong to Helmswick, then the field narrowed even further. I didn’t want to believe that someone in the duchess’s family could be capable of such a thing, but who else had been here in the month leading up to the Twelfth Night Ball?

  Lord Edward’s jaw hardened as if he were contemplating the same blunt fact.

  “What of that small chip in his tooth?” I queried softly in one final feeble attempt at identification.

  “I . . . I don’t recall one.” His shoulders slumped as he turned to me, voicing what he knew I was already thinking. “But of course, it
could have occurred during the struggle.”

  His gaze held mine and I could see the wariness swimming in the dark depths of his eyes. Already he was wondering what information he should share and what he should withhold, whether I could be trusted.

  “Whoever he is, his body needs to be transported back to the castle,” Gage stated, seemingly oblivious to the undercurrents swimming between me and Lord Edward. However, I knew my husband well enough to suspect he was not so insensible. He was choosing to ignore it. He nodded toward the torch affixed on the wall beyond Lord Edward. “Can that be lighted?”

  “Let’s find out,” Lord Edward replied, reaching up to remove the wooden staff.

  “It might not keep the rats at bay entirely,” Gage remarked as the duchess’s son attempted to light the cloth wrapped around the top of the torch with the lantern he held. “But the light should act as some deterrent until we can fetch a board of some kind to carry the body on.”

  It took several attempts, but the torch finally caught fire, and was secured in the sconce on the wall. Meanwhile, Gage had tied the canvas sack around the remains as best he could. I stood back, breathing measured breaths through my teeth as I watched them, knowing what was to come would be much worse.

  The hour was now long past midnight, and I could feel fatigue dragging at my bones. With the combined stress of carrying a child and discovering a dead body , it was no surprise I was longing for the comfort of a soft, warm bed. There I might pull the covers over my head and at least attempt to forget the horror of the last quarter hour.

  But there was too much to be done. The duke and duchess would have to be informed, the body secured somewhere safe from human tampering and further scavengers, and a servant would need to be sent to notify the local procurator fiscal. If the duke asked us to investigate, and I had a sinking feeling he would, then any further examination of the corpse would need to be undertaken sooner rather than later. If I made it to bed before sunrise on this cold, dark winter night, I would be surprised.

  Stifling a whimper, I huddled closer to Gage’s side as he wrapped an arm around my waist to hasten me back down the tunnel after Lord Edmund. As if conscious of the ache in my back I was struggling to hide, he cupped my opposite elbow where it bent and lifted, alleviating some of the weight pressing downward on my spine. Though he could have reminded me I was the one who insisted on following our Lord of Misrule on his ridiculous ghost tour, and hence the reason we had stumbled across a body in these underground passages, he held his tongue. Perhaps because he knew as well as I did that one way or another, once that body had been discovered, we would have found ourselves drawn down here, either by invitation or by misgiving after hearing reports of the others’ frightful encounter.

  I wanted to believe that the duchess’s family would not have tried to conceal the discovery of the body, but truthfully, I didn’t know any of them very well. Half a dozen portrait sessions with the duchess did not make us friends, even if she had been willing to reveal a vulnerability with me that she showed to few. My longest conversation with her youngest child, Lord Henry, had been an interrogation during our investigation into the death of the woman he loved. As for the others, the duke and Lord Traquair were merely social acquaintances of mine, and I’d just met Lady Eleanor, Lord Edward, and Lord John at this very house party.

  I’d heard reports of them, of course. Everyone talked about them. They were the children of a duke and duchess, after all, and rather notorious ones at that. The four youngest of the six children were widely accepted to have been fathered by other men, though the duke had claimed them as his own. I’d never dared to ask the duchess if it was true, but from everything I’d observed of their family, I also did not discount it. The duke had his fair share of sideslips as well, born by his string of mistresses, and while none of them had grown up in the ducal household, they had been acknowledged and provided for. At least, that was what the rumors claimed.

  Our trek back through the tunnel seemed faster the second time, and soon we were crossing the stone corridors of the doom and climbing the spiral staircase to the servants’ domain. At this level, Lord Edward stopped a passing footman and ordered him to return with Tait, the butler. I’d expected him to send for the duke, as well, but then I recalled that His Grace had been rather foxed when we departed on our ghost tour nearly an hour past. Who knew what sort of state we would find him in now?

  “Perhaps I should go in search of the duchess,” I suggested, knowing that I would not be needed in the task of moving the body, and that my presence would only make the servants uncomfortable. The duchess, while tipsy, had not appeared to be altogether muzzy, and I somehow anticipated she would still be in control of her faculties. If so, she should hear what we’d discovered as soon as possible. As should Lady Eleanor. If the body was, in fact, her husband, then she might know more than the others how he could possibly have met such an end.

  I only hoped she hadn’t helped him to it.

  Gage’s shoulders lowered, almost as if he was relieved I had presented him with a way to remove me from our current situation. “Yes, I think that’s a good idea.”

  My husband’s respect for my intelligence and investigative abilities would forever be at war with his protective inclinations, especially now that I was carrying our first child, and I couldn’t fault him for that. Not when I’d experienced an entire lack of consideration from my first husband. Gage’s care and concern made me feel cherished, even when they grew tiresome.

  Fortunately, in this instance, I was more than happy to avoid another trek through that tunnel.

  I turned toward Lord Edward, whose lips had flattened into a tight line. He was clearly conflicted about what to do.

  “Unless you think I should alert Traquair?” I asked. As the duke’s eldest son and heir, he would be the natural choice to appeal to next. But knowing what I did about the duchess, I didn’t think she would take kindly to being overlooked in favor of her son, particularly if the victim in question was her son-in-law.

  “No, I think the duchess would be best,” he agreed.

  I nodded and turned to climb the circular staircase, wasting no time in beating a hasty retreat as Tait and the footman came striding down the corridor bordering the kitchens.

  This particular staircase climbed all the way from the doom below ground, up through the ground-floor servants’ quarters, past the first-floor receiving rooms, and the second floor with its state chambers and large ducal suite, to the third floor, which had largely been given over to guest bedrooms. I could have exited on the first floor and traversed the corridor outside the dining room where we had eaten the Twelfth Night Cake before passing through one of the back hallways to the ballroom staircase and up to the staterooms. However, I elected to continue on to the second floor instead and retrace my and Gage’s earlier route, cutting through the library and then the picture gallery.

  The library had intrigued me almost as much as the portrait gallery where I’d spied paintings by Holbein, Rembrandt, and Reynolds. But I couldn’t afford the distraction of examining either the artwork or the dark shelves lined with old books, some of which I suspected would be quite rare. Even so, the smell of leather and parchment that assailed my nostrils as I crossed the threshold was as comforting as it was enticing.

  The library was divided into two rooms, the first of which was almost half the size of the ballroom. Which was why I didn’t hear the voices issuing through the open door into the next chamber until I was already three-quarters of the way across the room. I slowed my steps at the sharp tone of the first speaker’s voice. The answering lazy drawl left me no doubt as to whom the second speaker was.

  “Well, someone in this family needs to make it their business,” the first voice retorted. “Have a care, Marsdale.”

  “Do you think I don’t know that?” he snapped in a harsher tone than I’d ever heard the roguish marquess use. “Do you think I don’t
understand? If he was still here, why I . . . I would wring his neck!”

  CHAPTER SIX

  At this pronouncement, I hesitated in taking the last step that would bring the speakers into sight. However, from the silence that had fallen, it was evident they were already aware of my presence. I wondered briefly if I should have masked my approach so that I might discover whom Marsdale and the other man were discussing, though I had a fair idea. In any case, to hang back now would only make the encounter more awkward, so I strode through the doorway into the room, which appeared to double as a study.

  Marsdale leaned back against a desk, his arms crossed over his chest. His face carefully masked the turbulent emotions made evident in his outburst, but there was no denying the relief that seemed to soften his posture as he realized it was me.

  His companion was not similarly eased. In fact, Lord John’s spine seemed to stiffen further. He watched me with what could only be described as wariness. It was a caution that seemed out of proportion to the words I’d overheard, but he was rumored to be a very private man—much more so than Marsdale—and we didn’t know each other beyond a passing acquaintance. Perhaps he was simply uncomfortable having such a conversation aired before a veritable stranger.

  Or given our gruesome discovery in the crypt, maybe it was an indication he knew far more than he wished me to realize.

  “Am I interrupting the final denouement?” I asked with forced levity. “Has our knight finally captured our villain?”

  Lord John summoned a tight smile. “Something of the sort.”

  Marsdale cast Lord John a look from beneath his hooded eyes that for once I could not read. “Where’s Gage?” he asked. His gaze lifted to scrutinize me and I could tell from the flat gleam of his eyes and the rosy hue of his skin that he was far more sotted than the relatively clear enunciation of his words would have led me to believe. He nodded to my rounded belly. “Given your state, and the state of everyone else here, I’m surprised he let you out of his sight.”