Death Devil's Bridge

by Robin Paige

  If Harry had had a gavel, he would have struck it smartly on the table and declared the meeting adjourned. “Thank you, gentlemen,” he said. “I see no need for further consideration of this matter. I shall exhort Young Jessup not to make unfounded allegations.”

  The doctor chuckled. “Better you than me, Harry, old chap. I’m afraid your work is cut out for you, the way he’s roaring round.” He took the lid off a tin canister. “Would anyone like another biscuit?”

  But if the coroner had expected the victim’s son—a dark-complected man in his early twenties, with dark hair and flashing eyes—to resist his exhortation, he was a good deal surprised. Young Jessup heard the doctor’s opinion, the constable’s report, and the coroner’s conclusion, and nodded his head slowly.

  “You agree, then, that there is no need to convene an inquest?” the coroner said, much relieved.

  Young Jessup nodded again, briskly this time, and the business was concluded. There would be no inquest, no jury, and no allegations of murder.

  Which was not, of course, the end of the matter. For what Coroner Hodson and the others could not know and would not discover for some days to come, was that Young Jessup’s agreement to a finding of Death by Natural Causes had been encouraged (some might even have said that it was purchased) by the payment to his mother of a substantial sum of money. Who paid this money and what the motive might be, only Young Jessup would be able to tell. But when Harry Hodson bade the boy a cordial goodbye and congratulated himself upon bringing this disagreeable affair to such an agreeable conclusion, he was deceived.

  There was more to come. Much more.

  6

  Tis not wise to change a cottage in possession for a kingdom in hope.

  —English Proverb

  It was a Thursday evening late in September and the sun was dropping westward. Lawrence Quibbley, on his way home from his evening’s work at Bishop’s Keep, thought to himself that the next few days—the weekend of the annual Harvest Fete and of the grand motorcar exhibition and balloon chase—looked to be fair.

  As he came up the dusty path, the kitchen door opened and Amelia stepped out. “Ooh, Lawrence, look at the sunset,” she cried. “Isn’t it beautiful?”

  Lawrence turned to look over his shoulder, then turned back to his wife, her skin the color of a ripe peach kissed by the sun. “An’ so be you, Amelia,” he said, almost shyly.

  Amelia blushed and half-smiled, and then bit her lip and her eyes brimmed. “Yer supper is ready,” she said with a heavy sigh, and brushed a tear from her cheek. “Come an’ eat, dear.”

  Lawrence’s heart wrenched. “Don’t cry, Amelia,” he said, putting his arms around her. “It’ll all come right i’ the end, dear. Truly it will.”

  “I’m sure,” Amelia said, with a sad lack of conviction. She pushed Lawrence away and returned to the task of cutting the steak-and-kidney pie she had baked in the kitchen at Bishop’s Keep while she finished up her day’s work. Lady Kathryn made it possible for the Quibbleys to sup together at home by giving Amelia the freedom of her evenings, except for special occasions.

  To Lawrence Quibbley, it might have seemed that life held many promises. Only two short years ago he had been a junior footman at Marsden Manor, required to carry coals to the grand Marsden bedrooms, trim the many Marsden lamps, and serve as valet to any Marsden guest who was without a manservant. It was on such a temporary assignment that he had first served Sir Charles Sheridan, who had recently married the lady who employed Lawrence’s wife (once her personal maid) as her housekeeper.

  His wife! The word still struck Lawrence with a feeling akin to awe. He and Amelia had been married only six months, scarcely long enough for him to have become accustomed to lying in a bed warmed and scented by her lovely body, or rising to the sunshine of her morning kiss. Lawrence had never imagined himself a married man, and certainly not a married man living in such a palatial cottage, with a magnificent Daimler motorcar stored in the barn.

  For such were Lawrence’s living arrangements. The Quibbleys lived in Lady Kathryn’s gate cottage, only a short walk from Bishop’s Keep and a fifteen-minute bicycle ride from Marsden Manor. Lawrence was no longer a mere footman, but was Lord Bradford Marsden’s chauffeur and mechanic. Unfortunately, Lawrence’s automotive responsibilities had to be concealed from the senior Marsden, Lord Christopher, whose hostility toward motorcars was so unreasonable that the junior Marsden found it politic to deposit his Daimler (with Sir Charles’s consent) in the barn at the gate cottage, where Lawrence maintained it. To complicate matters even further, Lord Bradford, as payment for an outstanding note, had arranged to loan Lawrence to Sir Charles for a time. Hence, Lawrence and Amelia lived in the rose-covered gate cottage and Lawrence divided his time almost equally between Lord Bradford’s Daimler and Sir Charles’s various improvement projects.

  With this arrangement, Lawrence’s prospects had risen substantially. Last winter, Lord Bradford had sent him to the Daimler Works in Germany, where he observed every stage of the motorcar’s manufacture and assembly, from the casting of the block to the packing of the bearings. He had assembled and disassembled every part until he could do it blindfolded, learning how each part worked and why, and what one did when things went wrong, as they inevitably (and often catastrophically) did. Lawrence could look to the future with confidence, for men with such skills would be in great demand once the automobile came into its own.

  But of equal advantage to Lawrence was his work at Bishop’s Keep. Sir Charles, an amateur photographer of no small reputation, had shown him how to load and unload plates and cut films into dark slides and slide boxes. He learned to mix gold, silver, and uranium into developers and toners, and he spent hours under the dim light of the ruby lamp in Sir Charles’s darkroom, fascinated by the photographic images that gradually appeared on negatives and prints—and then more hours washing, enameling, and varnishing prints to preserve the images.

  But even that did not describe the full scope of Lawrence’s duties. Sir Charles and Lady Kathryn had been married scarcely a month when Lawrence oversaw the installation of a water system. Then it was the gas plant, an outdoor coal-burning furnace that heated three long ovens and a large copper reservoir in which the gases were stored, necessitating gas pipes, valves, and lighting fixtures in the main downstairs rooms and a gas cooker in the kitchen. This was no sooner completed than two wagonloads of machinery arrived and Lawrence and Sir Charles set to work on the Otto stationary engine. In their hands the machinery came to life, the great piston popping irregularly in the enormous cylinder, the flywheel whirring, the leather belts creaking as they turned the dynamo shaft, magically producing electricity. Lawrence could be forgiven a certain smug pride in his feats. And considering Amelia’s recent promotion to housekeeper in Lady Kathryn’s household, Mr. and Mrs. Quibbley seemed justified in believing that life could scarcely be improved.

  But a few days ago this happy situation was jeopardized. Lord Christopher Marsden, who had been away for the greater part of the year, was soon to return. Young Lord Bradford, whose relationship with his father was not of the best, planned to take up permanent residence in London and intended that Lawrence should come and bring the Daimler. “Bring Amelia, too,” he had added brusquely. “My housekeeper can put her to work, and you may have rooms in the attic.”

  Lawrence had received this news with a stunned silence; Amelia with a torrent of tears. While some country folk might consider going up to London a step in the right direction, the Quibbleys knew better. Amelia was heartbroken at the thought of abandoning her new position as Lady Kathryn’s housekeeper, Lawrence did not want to leave his interesting work with Sir Charles, and neither of them wished to trade their rose-covered cottage and garden for cramped rooms in a London attic.

  Avoiding Amelia’s tearful look, Lawrence drank his tea and ate his steak-and-kidney pie, wishing he had not told her about the summons to London. After a bout of tears, she had brightened and suggested what was, on the face of it,
the simplest and best solution.

  “Why don’t ye ask Sir Charles to take ye on? Lord Bradford cud surely find somebody else to work on the motorcar. ’Twud be the best thing, seein’ as we’ve the cottage.” And she had cast a fiercely possessive look around the snug kitchen, with its cheerful blue teapot and the red geranium blooming brightly at the gingham-curtained window.

  “ ’Tis not as simple as that,” Lawrence said testily. Lord Bradford had invested a substantial sum in his training at the Daimler Works and would not happily let him go. Nor did Lawrence feel that he could ask it.

  “I still don’t un‘erstand why ye won’t tell Lord Bradford ye’r not goin‘,” Amelia said now, pouring herself another cup of tea. “It’s not like ye’r a slave, y‘know, Lawrence. Ye’r free to work where ye want.” She thumped the teapot onto the table with a stormy look. “Where we want. Mark me, Lawrence Quibbley, I will not leave me cottage an’ me duties as ‘ousekeeper to live in Lon’on.”

  Lawrence sighed. He loved Amelia, but she had a certain independence of spirit that sometimes made it difficult to deal with her. In this instance, her protective instincts toward home and hearth—a woman’s deepest and truest instincts—were reasonable, and hardly to be denied. And yet, on the other hand, his employer’s request was reasonable as well, indeed, many would say, more than reasonable. He had but to tell his wife to pack their belongings, and that would be the end of the matter.

  Poor Lawrence. His happy and simple life had become wretchedly muddled, and he could not think how to un-muddle it.

  7

  In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, a fierce debate raged over whether gasoline, steam, or electricity was the most efficient motive force for the automobile. It is d¡ff¡cult to say precisely why the gasoline-powered spark ignition engine, with all the engineering problems it posed, became the engine of choice, especially when one acknowledges that it offered no clear intrinsic advantage over steam or electricity. It is likely that many agents other than efficiency—social, political, and economic factors—were responsible for the primacy of the gasoline engine.

  —IRA PISTON, JR.

  The History of the Infernal Combustion Engine

  It was a pleasant Friday morning, the day before the Harvest Fete and the motorcar exhibition, and Kate was seated at her Royal typewriter in the sunlit library at Bishop’s Keep, trying to keep her attention focused on Beryl Bardwell’s current fiction. She was having a hard time of it, though, for she was distracted by the memory of an encounter that morning with Amelia. Her new housekeeper, it appeared, might be compelled to follow her husband to London, which would be a great pity.

  “I told ’im I wudn’t go,” Amelia had said dramatically, twisting her hands, “but I fear the worst.”

  Kate put down Amelia’s list of household linen replacements. “Would you like me to speak to Sir Charles about a permanent position for Lawrence? I count on you for so much, Amelia. And now that you’re settled in the cottage—”

  “The blessed cottage!” Amelia cried, clasping her hands at her breast. “Oh, the cottage, wi’ all its roses! ‘Tis the dearest thing in my life, besides you, mum, an’ this post—an’ Lawrence, o’course.” This proclamation heralded more tears. “But it’s not Sir Charles ‘oo must be spoke to, yer ladyship,” Amelia managed at last, wiping her eyes. “It’s Lord Bradford. ’E’s the one ’oo’s determined as we’ll go to London.”

  Kate said nothing to Amelia, but she determined to speak to Bradford on the subject. And to Charles, too. When the exhibit and the balloon chase were over, she would corner both men and see what could be done.

  Having concluded this much, Kate felt better, and went back to her typewriter. Her current story featured two intrepid women who adventured around the world by motorcar and balloon, solving various mysteries en route. This ambitious narrative was to be climaxed with a display of forensic virtuosity in which a certain evil genius was discovered through the use of fingerprints.

  Beryl Bardwell, however, had a tendency to create plots that demanded more technical knowledge than the author herself possessed. In the matter of fingerprints, Kate thought she had found a way to test Beryl’s assumptions. But where balloons were concerned, she needed help. She turned to her husband, who was seated in the leather chair beside the window, reading the Times.

  “Charles,” she said, “I need some information.”

  Charles scowled. “The Kurds are killing the Armenians again,” he muttered, “with the connivance of the Turkish authorities. What a bloody corner of the world!”

  “I need your advice about a balloon, Charles,” Kate said. “Can you tell me how big it is? What it is made of? How it is controlled?”

  Charles spoke in a lecturish tone. “The aeronaut uses bouyancy to ascend or descend until he locates an air current that will take him in the direction he wishes to Sy.” He put down his paper and looked at her. “Why are you asking?”

  “She,” Kate said.

  Charles was blank. “I beg pardon?”

  “Beryl is working on a new story, and her character is an aeronautess. She uses bouyancy to etcetera etcetera.”

  “Of course,” Charles said, a smile hidden in his brown beard. “What a dunce I am.” He went back to his paper.

  As he read, Kate studied his face. The close-cropped brown beard, rising to the high cheekbones. The well-shaped nose, the broad forehead, the nearly invisible scar on the temple. The laughter-lines at the corners of the firm mouth, the droop of the brown mustache, the questioning quirk of the eyebrow. It was a face she had come to love, although she had not plumbed all the mysteries behind it.

  There was a rattle of gravel in the drive outside. Charles looked up, caught her eye, and smiled. “As to size and fabrication,” he said, standing and going to the window, “come and see for yourself, Kate. Charlie Rolls has arrived, and brought a balloon.”

  A freight wagon pulled by a team of horses had stopped outside. The wagon was covered by a canvas tarp and topped with what looked like a giant-sized wicker picnic basket, turned upside-down. Charlie Rolls, nattily attired in tweeds and a golf cap, was dismounting from a horse.

  “That basket is the gondola,” Charles said, pointing. “That’s where your aeronautess will ride.”

  Kate frowned, thinking that it looked very small and fragile. Tomorrow, Charles would be shooting thousands of feet into the air in that flimsy thing, with nothing to break his fall should the balloon spring a leak and the whole contraption fall to the ground—as had on occasion occurred, and recently too. But that was not something she cared to think about. She spoke instead of Rolls.

  “That young man,” she said. “I wish I knew him better. There’s something about him—”

  “He’s a charming chap, but rather a daredevil,” Charles said. “Knows no limits.” He frowned. “I saw him driving that Peugeot of his at something close to fifteen miles an hour.”

  “The villagers think he frightened Old Jessup to death with his careless driving,” Kate said. “And Lady Marsden would certainly accuse him of behaving recklessly with her daughter.” She smiled. “Although to give the devil her due, Patsy is equally reckless. And neither Great-aunt Marsden nor Squire Thornton can do a thing about it.” Patsy’s great aunt was of virtually no use as a chaperon. Patsy did exactly as she pleased, without regard to her aunt’s objections.

  “Roger Thornton?” Charles asked in surprise. “What does he have to do with Patsy Marsden?”

  Kate raised her eyebrows. “Why, didn’t you know, Charles? The Marsdens have virtually promised Patsy to him.” It had to be the antiquity of the Thornton line and the extent of the Thornton lands—and perhaps the reputation of the Thornton stables—that made the squire a suitable son-in-law. It certainly was not his person, or his personality. A sterner man Kate had never met, nor one so prone to sudden ire.

  “But Thornton is twice the girl’s age,” Charles objected. “And a man of violent temperament.”

  “And jealous, int
o the bargain,” Kate said. “I saw him last Sunday at church, positively glowering at Rolls, who was down from Cambridge for the weekend and had escorted Patsy to the service. I can’t think what Lady Henrietta will say when Squire Thornton tells her that her daughter has lost her heart to an itinerant balloonist.” She had spoken lightly, but sobered as she added: “He will, too. He is the sort to carry tales.”

  Charles smiled. “Throughout all my life, Kate, I have missed these little nuances of human behavior that you notice so readily.”

  “It’s Beryl Bardwell,” Kate replied modestly. “She notices things like that.”

  Charles laughed and held out his hand, his sherry-brown eyes warm. “Shall we give Beryl something to do besides worrying about Patsy Marsden and her suitors? Rolls’s balloon is about to be unpacked and inflated. Perhaps Beryl would like to observe.”

  “More than observe,” Kate said. “She intends to fly.”

  “Truly?” Charles asked, and when Kate nodded, he smiled. “That’s my brave wife!” he said approvingly. “We shall arrange a flight for you.”

  Outside, Kate watched while Charles and Rolls directed the men to lift the gondola from the wagon and pull back the tarpaulin, revealing a neatly packed silk envelope striped red, yellow, and blue. They carried the silk bundle to the croquet lawn adjacent to the back garden, where Charles’s gas-generating plant was located. When the balloon was laid out in its web of hemp rope, they connected it to a canvas tube, in turn connected to Charles’s plant, and began the long process of filling it. Nearby lay the rest of the apparatus: the metal ring that would support the gondola, the ballast bags, the mooring lines and trailing rope.

  Kate was on her way back to the library when she heard a great clatter of motorcars and turned to see a parade of them—four, she counted—coming up the lane. They stopped, and the drivers alighted and came toward her, led by Bradford Marsden.