The gleam was dangerously close to a leer, and I set my mouth primly. “Perhaps, but I did not take a husband with an eye to losing myself.”
“A wise woman indeed,” he said, composing himself. “I might have married again myself if I had ever known a woman such as you.” He was pensive then, and melancholy touched him.
“I am sorry for your loss.”
He gave me a purgatorial smile. “You have a kind heart, my dear. But she is so far in my past now, I sometimes wonder if I dreamed of her. Perhaps she is only a fond imagining of a man who walks too much with ghosts.”
Before I could reply, Robin appeared triumphant. The little wickerwork cage now held a plump dark bird with white spots and a red bill. Its feathers were fluffed, but it cooed a little, and Robin spoke sweetly to it. The White Rajah looked on, and for those few minutes, I felt at my ease and forgot the matter of murder.
I was very nearly late to dinner at the Peacocks, for my visit to the White Rajah lasted some time. He regaled us with tales of his travels and several conjuring tricks—a bit of legerdemain for our amusement, and Robin and I laughed and clapped when he made a pair of pretty white doves appear on his hands, apparently from thin air. I was astonished that the slight deformity of his hand did not hamper his performance, for his movements were as graceful and beguiling as any professional magician’s. Beg as we did, he gave away nothing of his secrets, and in all, the White Rajah was an excellent host, and he pressed us to return as we took our leave of him. Robin made certain I knew my way down the regular path to the Peacocks and then set off, cross-country, butterfly net and stag beetle waving overhead as he disappeared into the underbrush. I had not questioned him about the valley or its inhabitants, I realised ruefully, but I had established myself as a person in whom he could confide, and I vowed to seek him out again soon to continue our conversation.
I was pleased to find Dr. Llewellyn at the Peacocks, emerging from Jane’s room with a brisk step and a clear eye. His hair was neatly brushed and his clothes were tidy, and I realised he was a rather good-looking young man now that I could see him properly.
“Lady Julia!” he said. Emotions warred upon his face—embarrassment, gratitude—but in the end gratitude won out, and he extended his hand to me. “Thank you for your kindness during my—”
“Indisposition?” I supplied.
He nodded. “A good enough word for it. I am having a good day today. I cannot speak for tomorrow, but I am well today.”
“I am glad of it. How does Jane?”
His brow furrowed. “Too much at the mercy of her emotions, I fear. I have seen it often enough. Expectant mothers are subject to every whim and fancy, and I know this has been an unspeakably difficult time for Mrs. Cavendish.”
“She is not in danger?” I asked sharply.
He gave me a gentle smile. “No, no. I think she is strong enough and the child as well. Mary-Benevolence was right to put her to bed, and I think it a wise precaution to keep her there until the baby is born. One hopes her fears and fancies will depart then. She will have the child to care for, and most often, that is all that is required to bring a mother to her proper frame of mind.”
I thanked him for his care of Jane and went to my room to dress for dinner, musing that solving Freddie’s murder might also go a long way toward easing Jane’s mind, provided she herself had not done the deed. If, like Lady Macbeth, she was tortured by conscience, there was no power on heaven or earth that could save her.
Dr. Llewellyn stayed to dinner and proved engaging company. He was a diverting conversationalist when sober, but the air simmered with tension, and I realised the atmosphere of the Peacocks was beginning to thicken. Portia was naturally anxious for Jane, and I saw a new watchfulness in both Miss Cavendish and Harry. They were eager for news of Jane’s condition, and it did not escape me that the birth that might threaten both their plans was fast approaching. Poor Miss Cavendish, with her spinster’s obsession for the only home she had ever known, and Harry, who might have made an excellent squire under other circumstances. He had a passion for the land and its people, and I had little doubt he had the makings of a gifted and generous landowner. The merest accident of birth had relegated him to waiting in the shadows for an inheritance that might never come, and now another birth threatened to wrest the Peacocks from him forever. Really, I mused, it was a wonder he did not simply go upstairs and smother Jane in her sleep.
Plum was quiet, but his reserve seemed pensive rather than sullen, and he and Brisbane seemed to have mended their quarrel. Mended it with clumsy fingers and knotted thread and the rent would always be there, I reflected as I watched them carefully avoid speaking to one another, but perhaps matters would settle in time.
We retired early, as was the custom during the tea-picking, and Brisbane and I finished our game of chess. I did not win. Brisbane never let me win on the grounds that it was patronising, and I seldom had the skill or the patience to best him. I was preoccupied, pondering the events of the day, and was rather relieved when Brisbane finally seized my queen. I yawned broadly and made a show of retiring, but the truth was, I simply wanted to lie awake and think. I had the oddest sensation of having missed something, of letting something significant brush past me, airy as a cobweb.
But however long I lay in the dark, I could not retrieve it, and I was still awake when I heard the soft sound of footfalls outside my window. Brisbane was breathing deeply as I slid from the bed. Harry was proving an ardent suitor, I thought with a smile, but as I peered into the silvery garden, I realised it was not Harry at all. Silhouetted against the lopsided glow of the moon was the unmistakable form of my brother.
As quietly as I could, I snatched up my dressing gown and slippers and eased through the French windows and onto the gallery beyond. There was a long staircase at the end of the verandah, and I ran noiselessly to it, descending into the garden. Plum had disappeared beyond the garden gate, but I had a good enough idea where he was bound. I followed, dithering between outrage that my brother should behave so improperly and the knowledge that what he got up to was none of my business.
Outrage won out, and I slid through the gate, peering into the gloom beyond. Plum was still silhouetted by the moon, and so long as I kept to the shrubberies, I could follow him as he made his way to the crossroads.
“Stupid man,” I muttered. It was entirely beneath his dignity to dally with a governess, never mind the destruction it could bring to the poor girl herself, and, I was certain, dalliance was his intention. If his schemes had been honourable, he would have called openly or at least at a more appropriate hour. If Miss Thorne’s employers discovered her in flagrante, she would be turned out at once without references, and then what would become of her? It wasn’t as if Plum could marry the girl. Father had been remarkably tolerant of my marriage to Brisbane, but even if he had not, I had money of my own as did my husband. Plum had no such independence. Father gave him a generous allowance as he did all of his younger sons, and when he married, Father would settle a sum upon him to enable Plum to purchase a home. But beyond that, Father would not go, and he certainly would not countenance marriage to a half-caste former governess. Father might be extremely liberal, but he was also a belted earl from an aristocratic family of long standing, and like every other example of his kind, he could be wildly inconsistent upon the point, demonstrating tremendous tolerance at times and raging snobbery at others.
I trailed after Plum, stones cutting through the thin silk of my slippers and the occasional thorn snatching at my dressing gown. The wind rose, scudding dark clouds over the face of the moon and obscuring my path. I cursed under my breath and stood still, alert to any sign of Plum. But even as I looked for him, I felt the hairs upon the back of my neck stand. Something in the shrubbery behind me breathed, and I remembered too late the warnings about the tiger that still stalked the valley. I had left in such a rush that I had not even remembered to bring the pistol with me. I thought feverishly, trying to recall if tigers were
nocturnal and wondering if Plum would hear me if I screamed. He did not even carry so much as a walking stick. Still he might be useful in a crisis, I decided, and opened my mouth to scream.
Just then, a hand clapped painfully over my mouth, silencing me, and I was dragged against a tall, hard body, clasped by unyielding arms—arms I knew only too well.
“I am taking my hand away, and you are not to scream,” my husband instructed in a harsh whisper, his lips brushing the curve of my ear.
I nodded and as he took away his hand, I drove my elbow sharply into his midsection. He gave a little cough and I rubbed at my mouth.
“Brisbane,” I hissed, “were you trying to frighten me to death? I thought you were a tiger!”
He clasped my hand and began to tow me back up the path toward the Peacocks. “By the time I finish with you, you will wish I had been.”
When we reached our room he was still in a towering rage but my initial annoyance had turned to amusement. He did not release me until he had closed the door behind us, and when he did, I chafed at my wrist.
“I do wish you and Portia would leave off manhandling me. I shall have to wear my pearl cuffs tomorrow,” I chided.
He folded his arms over his chest and blinked slowly. “I do not think you comprehend exactly how enraged I am with you.”
I waved a hand. “Yes, I know. It was very silly of me to follow Plum, but someone has to stop him.”
“Why, precisely?”
“Because he must not be allowed to think he can engage in this sort of activity.”
The familiar little muscle began to jump in his jaw as he stared down at me. “Why not? He is a man fully grown. What he chooses to do is his own business.”
I gaped at him. “Are you starting a fever? Because I think you are quite delirious. You are the one who stopped him from approaching Miss Thorne at the pooja, if you will remember. Why is it so much worse for me—his own blood sister, I will remind you—to stop him making a fool of himself over her by scarpering off to an assignation with her in the middle of the night?”
Brisbane considered this a long moment, then exhaled slowly. “I suppose you have a point.”
It was my turn to blink. “Really? You think so? How extraordinary. I expected we were going to quarrel about this for hours.”
“I mean, that I ought not to have interfered in Plum’s affairs,” he corrected. “And neither should you.”
“Brisbane,” I said, striving for patience, “we both know that no good can possibly come of Plum’s entanglement with Miss Thorne. Father will never agree to a marriage, and any less regular sort of arrangement between them is simply predatory on Plum’s part. The girl’s entire livelihood depends upon a spotless reputation and he is endangering it. Someone has to make him aware of his duty.”
“Not you,” he said flatly, and then, by way of concession, “and not me. We have made our feelings upon the subject known to him. If he chooses not to behave decently, then that is his affair.”
“And what of poor Miss Thorne? What will become of her when Plum has dragged her good name through the muck? Be reasonable, Brisbane. The girl must have a champion.”
“I suspect Miss Thorne is well-accustomed to looking after herself. Besides, are you not the one who is forever preaching to me about the intelligence and competence of the fairer sex?”
A palpable hit. “Yes,” I said with some reluctance.
“Then leave the intelligent and competent Miss Thorne to manage her own affairs.”
I sighed heavily. “Very well. But if he behaves badly and she requires a character or some money, we will be morally obligated to offer it,” I warned him.
“Agreed. Why are you smiling?”
“Because it is rather like old times,” I told him. “You apprehended me creeping about in my nightdress and now we are having a spirited disagreement. It feels just like the time we investigated the murder at Bellmont Abbey.”
In spite of himself, he gave a little smile. “It does. Except that at Bellmont Abbey we each went to our own beds and slept alone.”
“And tonight?” I murmured, reaching up to press a kiss to the sharp plane of his jaw.
His hands reached out to grip my shoulders firmly. “Tonight, you are going to practise picking locks until you can do it properly. The doorknob to Harry Cavendish’s office is a disgraceful mess of scratches.”
He brandished my set of lockpicks and produced a heavy lock and an evil smile. “Shall I time you?”
I snatched them from him and said a very nasty word. Brisbane was still laughing as I bent to work.
The Twelfth Chapter
Days come and ages pass,
and it is ever he who moves my heart
in many a name, in many a guise,
in many a rapture of joy and of sorrow.
—Innermost One
Rabindranath Tagore
I slept late the next morning, having spent the better part of the night working diligently under Brisbane’s tutelage to perfect my lockpicking skills. I was thoroughly annoyed that he had discovered my trespass into Harry’s office, but even as I felt the rush of irritation, I was conscious of a bone-deep satisfaction that we were once more discussing detection. Naturally Brisbane demanded to know everything I had discovered, and in the interest of fair play, I told him.
He raised his brows when I mentioned the payments to Miss Thorne, and furrowed his brow when I explained about her twin sister, Lalita.
“Curious that they lead such different lives,” he mused. “Good God, woman, loosen your wrist. You are about to snap the pick in two.”
I puffed my cheeks in irritation and shook out my wrist, setting to work once more, but with a lighter touch. “Not so curious,” I corrected. “They are both in service in respectable domestic positions. Lalita is a skilled cook and very likely has housekeeping skills as well. Miss Thorne may be better schooled, but I suspect Lalita is the more contented of the two. And I think Lalita harbours a tendresse for Dr. Llewellyn.”
Brisbane narrowed his eyes. “The world is not Noah’s Ark, my dear. Not everyone requires being paired two by two.”
“But Lalita is fond of him,” I insisted. “I saw a certain light in her eyes when she spoke of him.”
My head was bent to my task, but even then I could feel Brisbane’s suppressed shudder.
“Yes, I realise it is frightfully sentimental, but it is the truth. I know you would like to dress it up in some scientific terms, but the girl is attached to him. And attachment means motive.”
“In what way? How would Lalita profit from Freddie Cavendish’s death?” he demanded.
“I do not know,” I said primly, for I was thinking aloud and had just that moment considered the notion. “But I am certain I could find a motive for any person in this valley if I thought long enough.”
Brisbane stroked his chin, rubbing at the patch of whiskers that darkened his jaw.
“Money or revenge, the two most common motives,” he mused. “We have considered money. What of revenge? Your fingers have to be supple, Julia. Have you forgot? Feathers on your fingertips.”
I stretched the cramp out of my fingers and started again. Feathers on fingertips indeed. It had been the device Brisbane had used to encourage me to remember to keep my fingers light and delicate of movement.
“Revenge? Are you thinking of Jane again? The wronged wife undone?”
“Possibly. But are there others who might bear a grudge against Freddie?”
“Harry,” I supplied. “Perhaps a boyhood grievance nursed all these years. The same could be said of Miss Cavendish. The Pennyfeathers only came after Freddie left for school, so that lets them out of it, unless he managed to slight them savagely between his return and his death, and I cannot think of how. Cassandra Pennyfeather is entirely beyond the reach of insult. Oh, I forgot to mention that she wants to photograph you dressed—or rather undressed—as Achilles.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“She want
s to know if you would be willing to shave your chest as she thinks Achilles ought to be more austere.”
Brisbane said precisely the profane word I had imagined he would, and even as the word fell from his lips, the lock in my hands sprang open.
“And without a scratch,” I told him triumphantly.
He smiled. “Twenty-two minutes.” He took up the lock and snapped it closed. “Again.”
Dawn was just streaking pinkly across the sky by the time I fell into bed, but I did not mind. The night had been too like our encounters of old for me to regret it. Brisbane, insufferable and bossy, and me, his erstwhile partner in detection. I had even shared with him the few titbits I had gathered from the White Rajah, but these he dismissed with a wave of his hand as so much useless gossip.
He was gone by the time I arose, riding out with Harry to see if they could pick up signs of the tiger, and it occurred to me that he might well be using his daily excursions with Harry to pluck the proper conversational chords to make Harry sing to his tune. I had no idea what men talked of when they were alone together, but it seemed just possible that Harry might be persuaded to reveal much to a sympathetic listener, and Brisbane could make a pretense of sympathy better than anyone I had ever known. Even as I washed and dressed, he could be coaxing confidential information from Harry, I thought with a stab of irritation. If so, I had methods of my own, I decided, and as soon as I was dressed I dispatched a note to Cassandra Pennyfeather inviting her to luncheon.
She wrote by return that she was far too engaged with her work to spare the time, but issued a rather halfhearted invitation for me to call upon her. On the way, I stopped at Pine Cottage, a basket looped over my arm. Inducements to conversation, I thought with some satisfaction. I showed Lucy the warm nightcap I had brought for Emma and the volumes of poetry I had finished and meant to pass along.
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