Brisbane held a chair for me near the fire and I seated myself, pleased to find that the chair cover, while faded and shiny with use, was perfectly clean.
Mrs. Birch watched as Brisbane settled himself, her hands busy with the tea things. She looked him over with the appraising eye of a woman who has seen a good number of naked men, both dead and alive. She seemed appreciative.
By the time the bread was cut and the cups assembled, the kettle was boiling. While she busied herself with the teapot and packet of tea, I took careful stock of the room. It was a home that had known hardship, that much was evident from the furniture, worn with polishing and hard use. But the walls were cheerfully, if cheaply, papered, and the floor was spotted with a few rugs of an unlikely shade of green. Garish but happy, rather like Mrs. Birch herself. I realized that she must be a woman of some sense and great resourcefulness to have made a pleasant home for herself and her children under trying circumstances.
Beside me, Brisbane was silently watchful, and I imagined he was making much the same assessment of Mrs. Birch and her little home. Finally, the tea things were ready and Mrs. Birch presented them to us with no apologies.
"I've cut a loaf of new bread, and that's fresh butter, mind you, straight from my sister's farm—none of that dyed muck they try to sell up at the shop. I don't know where that comes from, but you mark my words, a cow had nothing to do with it."
She gave us thick slices of bread with butter and hot mugs of strong, perfectly brewed tea. It was like being in the nursery again, and I ate with abandon. For all her fancy ways, Cook had never sent up a tea tray half so tempting. Mrs. Birch settled herself and took up a gentleman's shirt, finished but for the buttons. Her nimble needle whipped through the linen, stitching buttons into place while she talked. She scarcely looked at her hands, but the needle never missed, setting stitches so tiny, so precise they were almost invisible.
After my second piece of bread and several minutes of desultory conversation between Brisbane and Mrs. Birch, I came to the point.
"I believe that you attended my husband, Sir Edward Grey, after his death."
She nodded. "I did, and I hope you will permit me to offer my condolences. It's a hard thing to lose one's man, I know, my lady."
I did not speak for a moment. Her simple expression of sympathy had touched me more than the elaborate condolences I had received from her betters.
"Thank you. Although, I have at least had the consolation of a comfortable living and no young ones to worry over. I know your own lot must have been very difficult."
She stared at me, her expression pitying. "No, my lady. You've got it backward. The young ones are my consolation."
I took up my tea to swallow down the lump in my throat. Sometimes I simply wanted to disappear through the floor. Naturally her children were precious to her. I had seen them only as a pack of mouths to feed. No wonder I had not been blessed with children, I thought bitterly. I did not deserve them.
"It were a pleasure to wash Sir Edward," she said. She paused and took a thoughtful sip of her tea as Brisbane threw me a quizzical look.
"Pleasure?" he put in softly.
"Oh, yes. I never mind scrubbing the quality. Such nice, clean ways they have—well, most of them. There's some that would better suit a barnyard than a ballroom, but you'll hear no scandal from me. Sir Edward was a nice, clean gentleman."
"Mrs. Birch, I must beg your discretion for what I am about to reveal," I said.
She nodded once. "You have it."
I believed her entirely. She did not seem the sort that would sell my secret as a bit of gossip over the wash line. Besides, she was country-bred, and in the country there was still a strong tradition of loyalty to the gentry. Some might call it feudal, but as it served my purposes, I was not about to argue with it.
"We have reason to believe that my husband's death might have been hastened. Do you take my meaning?"
"Oh, was it murder, then?" Her tone was as casual as if she had just offered me another slice of bread. I stared at her.
"Mrs. Birch, you astonish me."
"Oh, I am sorry. Did you not mean murder?"
"I did, as a matter of fact." I had the strangest sense that Brisbane was trying to hide a smile behind his mug.
"I believe that Lady Julia is simply surprised at your quick grasp of the situation, Mrs. Birch," he said smoothly. "She does in fact mean murder."
Mrs. Birch sipped contentedly at her tea. "There's nothing to be embarrassed about, my lady, indeed there isn't. It does happen in the best of families, you know."
Her voice was reassuring and I felt almost as if she had just patted my hand. The entire conversation was taking an extraordinary turn.
"Thank you. Am I to understand that you have had some experience with such matters?"
"Of course I have, my lady. I have washed the dead of this parish for nearly twenty years. I've seen stabbings and slashings, garrotings, stranglings, head-coshings…" She trailed off, doubtless reminiscing pleasantly.
"Have you ever seen a poisoning?"
She put a hand under her cap and scratched, thinking hard. With the cozy glow from the fire, and the lines of her face soft with thought, I could see that she had once been a handsome girl. A handsome girl of good sense and an excellent constitution. Her only liability had been a lack of fortune and good birth, and because of that, she lived in a tiny set of rooms, existing hand-to-mouth as she raised seven children, patching and darning her things to make them last from year to year. I, too, had been born handsome and sensible and healthy, but because my father sat in the Lords and had an annual income in excess of more than a hundred thousand pounds, I had every advantage while Mrs. Birch washed the dead to feed her children. Murder might be an interesting puzzle, but Fate is by far the greatest mystery of all, I mused.
"Poisonings," she said thoughtfully. "Yes, I have had a few. There was the poor girl who came from Leeds. Her man topped up her ale with arsenic when she got with child…then there was the old lady in South Street. Her nephew, I always thought, slipped her a bit of belladonna." She shrugged a sturdy shoulder. "Hard to say. So many of them just look like normal dying, if you take my meaning. But I suppose some of them might be poisoned."
"Might one of them have been Sir Edward?"
She smiled, showing an almost complete set of strong teeth.
"Might is a large word, my lady. Anything is possible."
I sighed, wondering how on earth I had come to be discussing philosophy with a charwoman of Jesuitical bent.
Brisbane inserted himself seamlessly into the conversation.
"A woman of your considerable experience would doubtless have noticed if something were amiss," he began.
I almost snorted into my tea. If he managed to achieve by flattery what I had failed to gain by appealing to her intellect…
"Now that I think of it, there was something," she said slowly.
Brisbane and I leaned forward as one man, so to speak.
"Yes?"
She looked carefully from one of us to the other, weighing her response. "I will tell Her Ladyship. You will have to go, sir," she said firmly.
Brisbane rose, placing his mug carefully upon the table.
"Of course. I will await Her Ladyship on the front step. Mrs. Birch, thank you for your hospitality. I will see myself out." Over her head he shot me a look that was unmistakable. He expected me to wring every bit of information out of her, and the look had been a warning. I had better not fail this time.
I stared at the fine tailoring of his retreating back while Mrs. Birch ogled something else.
"That your man?" she asked after the door closed behind him. Her expression was friendly, and I did not take offense.
"No."
She clucked her tongue. "Pity. He's got lovely legs. My Jimmy had lovely legs. Long and—"
"Mrs. Birch," I said sharply. She laughed, and this time she did pat me on the arm. She poured herself another cup of tea and I allowed her to fill m
ine for the sake of companionship.
"It's all right, my lady. It's just us hens. You can tell me. Do you fancy him?"
I could feel my rings beginning to cut into my hands. I forced myself to relax.
"Mrs. Birch, you said you would tell me what you noticed about my husband's corpse."
She regarded me a moment, judging my humour, I think. Something of my edgy mood must have shown itself, for she settled down at once. She told me what she had seen, to the last detail. I questioned her closely, but she did not vary her story, and in the end, I realized I believed her entirely.
"Thank you. I appreciate your assistance," I said, rising. "But I must warn you. You cannot repeat this to anyone—not what you have just told me, or even that I called. If my husband was murdered, anyone who possesses knowledge of the crime must be in danger."
She waved me off. "I am an oyster, I am. I've too much to think about, keeping the little ones fed and clothed to waste my time with idle gossip. Besides, it would be a poor thanks for your kindnesses to tell your business on the street."
I gave her a surprised look and she laughed. "I know it is you, my lady. No butler would think to put books in the baskets for the kiddies. And there's always a packet of hair ribbons for my girls, pretty new ones. And good leather shoes for the boys. Most ladies leave the baskets to their servants and they never know if we get the scrag end of beef and the burnt-down ends of candles. You always send us good meat, and a bottle of wine at Christmas. I do not forget it, my lady."
I could not think of a reply. I had always instructed Aquinas to prepare the baskets, only occasionally troubling to add something myself. She was praising Aquinas' generosity, not mine. I must remember to commend him.
Mrs. Birch saw me to the door. "If that Mr. Brisbane should die soon…" she began hopefully.
"I will send for you at once," I promised, smoothing my skirts.
"Oh, that is kind of you, my lady."
"Not at all. And to answer your question, I suppose some would find him fanciable."
She sighed and pulled open the door. "Just as I suspected, my lady. We are not so very different after all, if you will pardon the observation."
I thought of the society ladies I knew and how outraged they would be by such a statement coming from a woman of Mrs. Birch's ilk.
I smiled at her, knowing that if I had been born poor and disadvantaged, I would have ended my days rotting in a ditch, rather than mistress of a tiny, cozy home and proud mother of seven.
"On the contrary, Mrs. Birch. I take it as a compliment. A very fine one."
THE TWENTY-EIGHTH CHAPTER
If you fear the wolf, Do not go into the forest.
—Russian Proverb
Brisbane had hailed a hansom and was waiting for me at the kerb. He handed me in and gave the direction of Grey House to the driver. I fussed with my reticule, pretending to search for a tin of lemon pastilles, then my handkerchief. Anything to avoid revealing to Brisbane what Mrs. Birch had disclosed.…I had just begun burrowing about for a bit of lip salve when his nerve broke. "All right, I know it must be something fairly awful. You might as well tell me now."
"I'm not entirely certain that I can. How do you know it is awful?" I asked mildly.
"You've fidgeted so violently that you have managed to rip the cording of your reticule completely off. Tell me."
"Very well, but you must look out of the window."
I sensed his eyes rolling in exasperation, but I would not turn my head.
"I beg your pardon?" His voice was even—quite a good effort, I thought, given how annoyed he must have been at this point.
"I simply cannot say it if you are looking. I know that we are supposed to be quite grown-up about such things, but I cannot help it."
"About what such things?" he asked with deliberate patience.
"You are still looking at me."
This time the eyes definitely rolled, punctuated with an audible sigh. But he turned, edging his broad shoulders toward me, his gaze clearly fixed out of the window.
"I am not looking now, nor shall I."
I cleared my throat. "Very well. Mrs. Birch said that when she washed Edward she noticed that there was some discoloration—some rather violent discoloration."
"What sort of discoloration?"
My cheeks were warm and I fanned my face with my hand.
"How explicit must I be? Something was not the colour it should have been. It was discoloured."
"I am conversant with the meaning of the word, my lady. I am inquiring as to the location and the extent of the discoloration," he said coldly. "In plain words, what part of his body and in what manner discoloured?"
"Oh, you are beastly. Very well, if you must know, it was his—his manly apparatus."
Brisbane gave a little choking noise. I do not like to think that it might have been a laugh.
"His what?"
"His penis, Mr. Brisbane. His stem of fertility, his manly root."
By this time his shoulders were definitely shaking, but to his credit, there was not a trace of amusement in his voice.
"She is quite certain? I mean, it is quite customary for the, er—manly apparatus to be of a different coloration than the rest of a gentleman's skin."
"Is it quite customary for it to be the colour of a vintage Bordeaux?" I asked venomously. "Mrs. Birch has washed more bodies than you or I have had hot meals. I take her opinion as the valuation of an expert."
"No doubt," he said gravely. He fell silent, ruminating as I recovered my composure. My cheeks felt marginally cooler, and by the time he straightened in his seat, gripping the head of his walking stick, I was almost myself. His face was lit, his expression rapturous, like St. Paul's on the road to Damascus, I imagined.
"What? What are you thinking?"
He was fairly quivering. The hound had once more picked up the trail.
"That was how the poison was introduced."
I stared at him, not bothering to conceal my scorn.
"You are barking mad. How could someone possibly introduce poison to a man's…well, his…person without his knowledge?"
He gave me a slit-eyed stare. "Perhaps it was with his knowledge."
"Are you saying it was suicide? That I find very hard to believe, and I must warn you that if you intend to pursue that particular line of investigation, I will stop this hansom right now and leave you here before I will have my husband's good name—"
He grabbed at my hand, squeezing hard, then dropped it suddenly, as if remembering himself. "I am suggesting nothing of the sort. I believe Sir Edward was murdered by a person with whom he was intimately connected."
"Oh, God, you think I did this!" I sagged against the seat, regretting with every atom of my being the day I had engaged him on this case.
"You will have to learn not to take such flying leaps of imagination if you ever hope to make an investigator, my lady," he said, rubbing at his temples. "I believe it must have been someone who knew his most intimate habits. It is the only way it all makes sense. He must have used a contraceptive machine—a sheath. A condom."
I was finally beginning to grasp what he was saying.
"And this sheath was poisoned? On the inside?"
"Precisely. It would account for the discoloration of his genitals, while no other part of his body bore traces of poison."
"What sort of person would do such a thing? Could do such a thing?" I murmured.
Brisbane shrugged. "Someone who hated him, that much is obvious. Someone who knew he would possibly use a prophylactic device during his amours. His valet, possibly, but far more likely it was a lover."
He seemed to have forgotten entirely that I had been Edward's wife. We were colleagues now, and I was not certain if I minded this or not. "His amours. That is quite a leap, is it not? You assume that he had mistresses, but you have no proof. Your entire theory hangs on the question of my husband's fidelity."
Brisbane turned to me, his eyes cool and pitiless. "I do not
suppose it, my lady. I have proof. I have had ever since you gave me the inventory of his rooms."
I returned the cool stare. "Of what are you speaking, Mr. Brisbane?"
"The inventory listed one object that proved your husband had carnal relations with other women."
"Impossible. What object could possibly reveal that?"
A smile crossed his lips. It was feline, almost cruel, and I knew he was thinking of the case and not of me at all.
"There was a small porcelain box, painted with the image of Pandora, opening her own legendary box, the gift of the gods."
My lips went dry. "What of it?"
"If it is the one I suspect, I know those boxes. They are made to order for one of London's most notorious brothels. And they are only given to the most illustrious and profitable of patrons."
I said nothing. He settled back against the cushion, basking a little in his brilliant deduction. I felt my upper lip begin to grow moist. I blotted it discreetly with my gloved finger and waited for what I knew must come next.
"All we need do now is retrieve Sir Edward's box from Grey House, and I will use it as entrée to the brothel, where I shall discreetly question the inmates."
I swallowed hard and steeled my nerve. "Except that the box is not at Grey House."
He went very still. "Where is it?"
"I gave it to Magda. I knew she did not kill Edward, the very idea was ludicrous, and yet I feared you meant to hang her. I sent her away."
"With the box." His even, measured tone was far worse than any shout would have been. He reminded me of a cat that Cook had kept at Bellmont Abbey when I was a child. It would sit for hours, quite still, quite harmless-looking, but always watching with ravenous eyes. The poor, doomed mice never even saw the pounce. I licked my lips.
"And a pair of Sèvres candlesticks. I did not have any cash to hand and I knew she would need money."
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