by M. C. Beaton
Unused to approaching strangers without a formal introduction and frightened of social censure—although surely it was not the same as approaching a man—Jane shyly said she was staying at Number 67 Clarges Street and that she had recently learned Miss Lucas had been a friend of the late Clara.
“My poor Clara,” said Miss Lucas with a little gasp. “How I miss her! Come apart. I would like to talk about her. I have never had such a friend since.”
She drew Jane a little aside into a rustic bower where there was a bench. Both ladies sat down together. Miss Lucas began to talk … and talk. Jane listened in increasing disappointment. According to Miss Lucas’s story, she, Miss Lucas, had been the belle of the Season and therefore confidante and advisor to the less fortunate Clara. The catalogue of Miss Lucas’s virtues went on and on.
People passed to and fro behind them and in front of them through the forest effect created by the evergreens while Jane wondered how she could escape. Miss Lucas appeared to be all eyes and teeth and made Jane feel like that unfortunate wedding guest who was trapped by the ancient mariner.
At last, when Miss Lucas paused for breath, Jane said, “But did Miss Vere-Baxton have any beau other than Mr. Bullfinch?”
“Well, as to that,” said Miss Lucas, laying her finger alongside her nose in a most vulgar way, “Clara told me in confidence that … oh, I have dropped my fan.”
“I think it fell under the seat,” said Jane, rising. She leaned across Miss Lucas to see if the fan had fallen on that side of the bench when something made her twist round and look over her shoulder. A hand, a very white hand with a large mole on it, appeared through the shrubbery behind the bench. The hand held a dagger. It stabbed viciously down exactly at the point where Jane’s back would have been had she remained sitting.
Jane screamed and screamed.
Miss Lucas, not knowing what the matter was, but feeling that Jane was outdoing her in dramatics, began to scream as well. Soon they were surrounded by concerned faces.
Breathlessly Jane told them what had happened. After the initial shock and consternation, several of the gentlemen began to laugh and said it was no doubt another of Grace Baillie’s entertainments.
Mrs. Baillie was appealed to. Although she knew nothing about it, she quickly grasped that the idea of a mysterious hand with a dagger could only add a welcome Gothic note and enhance her reputation as a hostess. To do her justice, Miss Lucas’s behaviour had convinced Mrs. Baillie that both girls had been imagining things. So Mrs. Baillie took the credit and Jane’s insistence that someone had tried to kill her was pooh-poohed.
Then Mrs. Baillie got one of her own footmen armed with a wooden dagger to leap out at people from corners and so there was nothing Jane could do but insist she was sure the attack on her had not been a hoax. There had been something so deadly about that thrusting steel—and the footman did not have a mole on his hand.
She became too frightened to think of anything other than getting home. In any case because Miss Lucas was now laughing at her own fright and making a mockery of Jane’s screams to some bored listeners, she could not be encouraged to go on about Clara.
Jane wandered off in search of her mother. Mrs. Hart was only too ready to leave. She had been at the far end of the rooms when Jane had been attacked and so did not know anything of her daughter’s scene. The Marquess of Berry had cut her and Euphemia was sulking. Mrs. Hart pronounced the evening sadly flat.
They made their way through the intricate passages towards the street door.
Jane looked back with a shiver, wondering who it had been who had attacked her. It was then that she saw Mr. Gillespie and Mr. Bullfinch standing in an ante room, their heads together. As she stared, they both looked up and saw her.
Mr. Gillespie gave his triangular smile and Mr. Bullfinch smiled as well. Jane tried to drop a curtsey but her legs were shaking too much. She stumbled after her mother out of the house.
Rainbird was waiting for them when they arrived home. “A letter has arrived, delivered by one of Lord Tregarthan’s servants,” he said, handing the sealed parchment to Mrs. Hart.
She took it with the tips of her gloved fingers and looked at it disapprovingly. “No doubt it is another letter explaining he is not about to propose to Jane,” she said crossly while Euphemia tittered. Jane blushed miserably and followed her mother and sister into the front parlour.
While Euphemia poured tea and complained about the Marquess of Berry, Mrs. Hart crackled open the letter. She stared at it and then turned it over.
“Why, it is from Mr. Hart,” she said faintly. She fumbled in her bosom for her quizzing glass while Jane carried a branch of candles and set it on a table beside her.
Mrs. Hart read the letter slowly and then read it again with many “bless-my-souls” until both Euphemia and Jane felt they would die from curiosity.
“All most irregular,” said Mrs. Hart at last. “Your father and Lord Tregarthan appear to have gone to France to rescue an English family”—she raised the letter and squinted at it through her glass—“the Hambletons, from a prison in Rouen where they had been incarcerated by Napoleon’s troops. It all had to be done in the greatest secrecy, which is why he says he was unable to tell me anything. They are at Dover, or rather, that is where Mr. Hart sent this letter from. Felice went with them as interpreter. Baggage! Mr. Hart stood by with a schooner on the coast while Lord Tregarthan went to rescue them. It seems they needed Felice to ask questions in the town and find out which of the guards would be most likely to accept a bribe. They were chased by Napoleon’s troops and only escaped by a hairsbreadth.”
“Felice had no right to be so sly,” complained Euphemia. “I would not take her back if I were you, mama.”
“She is not coming back,” said Mrs. Hart. “Lord Tregarthan has supplied her with a dowry and she has gone to live in Brighton. Pah! Paying off his mistress, no doubt.”
Jane looked at her mother in a kind of wonder. Could she, Jane Hart, possibly dislike her own mother? As Mrs. Hart prattled on, reading the letter out loud over and over again, Jane remembered that interview with Lord Tregarthan in the kitchen. Now that she knew he had been on the brink of a perilous adventure rather than a journey to see his tailor, his behaviour began to seem as if it might contain more of the lover than the fop.
But Jane was afraid of hoping too much. Lord Tregarthan would surely now be more beyond her reach than ever. He would return a hero and be feted and courted. Jane thought of Felice and felt a stab of jealousy that the lady’s maid should be allowed to share the adventure.
And yet, taken up as she was with thoughts of Lord Tregarthan, wondering how she should treat him on his return—coldly, a dignified nod, or to a casual smile and a handshake?—she had not forgotten the mystery of Clara. Someone had tried to kill her at Mrs. Baillie’s. Someone who would try to kill again.
By next morning, Mrs. Hart was planning a rout to celebrate the captain’s return and Jane felt she could not bear her company any longer. She said she had the headache and wished to retire to her room. Mrs. Hart looked at her sharply. “You must remember that Mr. Nevill is calling this afternoon to take you out, Jane.”
Jane was almost on the point of saying she did not want to see Mr. Nevill, but then she thought that Mr. Nevill would know the hour of Lord Tregarthan’s return, and Jane had a longing to see him, to look into his eyes and see whether he cared for her just a little. As she went out of the dining room, she met Rainbird, who was coming down the stairs from the attics. She gave him a faint smile and said, “Well, Mr. Rainbird, it appears my father is to return to us soon.”
Rainbird clutched the bannister. “And Felice?” he asked.
“Not Felice,” said Jane. “She is to be an independent lady with a dowry. Oh, I see you know nothing about it.” She told him the contents of her father’s letter.
“Did Felice write? Did she mention me?” asked Rainbird.
“No,” said Jane. “Were you expecting a letter?”
; Rainbird shook his head sadly. “No, of course not.” He went slowly down the stairs. It was some time before he could bring himself to tell the rest of the staff the news.
The first thing that Mr. Nevill said after he drove off with Jane that afternoon was that he had received a letter from Lord Tregarthan.
“Really?” said Jane with affected indifference. He had not written to her. Why should he? Once more, her hopes sank. She had been an amusing diversion, nothing more.
At last Mr. Nevill noticed her sad eyes and asked her if she were feeling unwell.
“No,” said Jane curtly.
Mr. Nevill reined in his horses under a tree and looked at her anxiously. “You can talk to me, you know,” he said.
Jane could not tell him of her love for Lord Tregarthan, but she suddenly felt she could tell him about her other fears. She poured out the whole story of Clara, of the party in Queen Street, and of that hand holding a dagger.
Mr. Nevill heard her out in silence. Then he removed his curly-brimmed beaver and scratched his head in perplexity. “You say both Bullfinch and Gillespie were there? But they are both highly respected gentlemen. I mean, you don’t get a City banker or one of the King’s doctors going around stabbing young ladies?”
“The trouble is,” said Jane, “that people are always blinded by rank and position. If Mr. Gillespie and Mr. Bullfinch were Mr. Bloggs and Jones of Hungerford Stairs, mudlarks by profession, everyone would cry, ‘Jane, one of them did it. Seize the villains!’”
“Why don’t you discuss the matter further with Tregarthan?” asked Mr. Nevill. “Marvellous head on his shoulders. He should be with you tomorrow at the latest.”
“I do not know whether I want to see him again,” said Jane in measured tones. “I have not made up my mind.”
“Here, you can’t say that!” said Mr. Nevill angrily. “I’ve been calling on you and squiring you around just so’s no one else could whisk you away. He told me to look after you. Besides, he said he was looking forward to seeing you and I’m blessed if I know what he’ll say to me when I tell him you don’t want to see him.”
Jane took a deep breath. “Lord Tregarthan mentioned me in his letter?”
“Yes, I have it here.” He fumbled in his many pockets and at last produced a crumpled piece of paper. “Here we are … let me see … ‘curst bad crossing, Felice sick, captain sailed like Neptune’ … ah, I have it. ‘All I want to do is see my little Jane as soon as possible. I hope you have taken good care of her.’ There!”
“So that is why you have been so kind,” said Jane, her eyes like stars.
“Of course it is. You didn’t think … I mean, not that you ain’t a pretty companion, it’s just … Oh, I say!” For Jane had leaned forward and kissed him on the cheek.
“I did often wonder, Mr. Nevill,” said Jane, “why you called on me so much. I did not know until last night that Lord Tregarthan had gone off with my father to save that family in France. He … he told me he was going to see his tailor in the south country,” laughed Jane. “Before he left, he told me to leave the mystery of Clara’s death alone.” She clasped her hands, her eyes shining. “But would it not be wonderful if I could manage to find out who killed her before his return?”
“No,” said Mr. Nevill, looking alarmed. “It all sounds a hum to me, daggers and bodies. Why don’t you go home and get some rest. Tregarthan will be with you very soon.”
Jane smiled and nodded, but the happiness that had flooded her brain when she had learned of Tregarthan’s desire to see her again seemed to have cleared it. She was sure if she sat down with pencil and paper and wrote down all she knew, then she might arrive at the correct solution.
When they returned to Clarges Street, Mr. Nevill refused her offer of refreshment and drove off. Jane found her mother in the front parlour. “Mr. Gillespie called when you were gone, Jane,” she said. “What is all this about you throwing an hysterical scene at Mrs. Baillie’s? There is some story going the rounds that you claimed someone had tried to stab you. It is making me look quite ridiculous, for you said nothing of it to me. Someone told me last night that a couple of females had started screaming at one of Mrs. Baillie’s novelties.”
“I made a mistake, mama,” said Jane. “My nerves are a trifle overwrought.”
“That is what Mr. Gillespie said and he kindly left some pills with instructions that you should take them and go to bed for the rest of the day. Really, Jane, I am your mother, or had you forgot? It seems incredible you should believe an attempt had been made on your life and say nothing of it to me.”
“I am sorry,” said Jane. “I felt very silly when Mrs. Baillie explained the whole thing had been a hoax.” Jane did not want to tell her mother of her suspicions or of the news that Lord Tregarthan cared for her after all. All her mother would do would be to trot out all the old scandals about the beau’s love life and the futility of Jane nourishing any hopes in that quarter.
“I should have known better than to take you out anywhere,” said Mrs. Hart fretfully. “Does Nevill show any signs of proposing?”
“No, mama.”
“Well, I am not surprised. You are looking quite hagged. I must say there was a while when you looked very well. You are too intense, Jane. Excess of emotion can be very unflattering.”
Jane thought again about Lord Tregarthan, about how he had asked Mr. Nevill to look after her, and another sunburst of happiness flushed her face and brightened her eyes.
“And you look feverish,” said Mrs. Hart. “Take your pills. You are to take two right away.” She poured a glass of water. “Take them and go and lie down.”
Jane looked at the two pills lying on her mother’s out-stretched hand. They were as red as rubies.
Jane slowly took them from her mother’s hand. “I shall take them in my room,” she said slowly.
But once in her room, she laid the pills on a clean piece of paper, drew forward another sheet of paper and began to write down everything she had discovered about Clara and about the events at Mrs. Baillie’s. She gave a little shiver and then rang the bell and asked Jenny, who answered its summons, to fetch Rainbird. Rainbird came in, looking curiously at Jane’s white and rigid face. “Sit down, Mr. Rainbird,” said Jane. “There is something I must tell you, and then there is something you must do for me.”
“I am going to fetch Mr. Gillespie to examine Miss Jane,” said Rainbird some time later to Mrs. Hart.
“Very well,” said Mrs. Hart.
“Do you not wish to see her?” asked Rainbird.
“Well … I am sure it is nothing serious. Jane is a very resilient girl. You will find me at Mrs. Baillie’s at six o’clock should there be any cause for concern.”
“Selfish woman,” muttered Rainbird as he made his way out and along Clarges Street. Although he blamed Captain Hart more than Lord Tregarthan for supplying the means by which Felice had been able to secure her freedom from service—for if Captain Hart had not taken Felice away, she would still be in Clarges Street—he still liked and admired the man and felt he was a fool to return to such a querulous and domineering wife.
As soon as the captain returned, Rainbird planned to ask for a few days’ leave. He was sure if he were to travel to Brighton and see Felice, he might be able to persuade her to marry him. He would need to find work outside of service where Palmer could not touch him, but somehow they would manage. Rainbird was too obsessed with Felice to worry overmuch about the fate of the other servants at Number 67. Love gave him mad hope. He was convinced that he would not only be married to Felice but also that somehow Mr. Hart might help him find posts for the others.
Mr. Gillespie was at home. As soon as Rainbird told him about Jane, he said they must make all speed. He was so white and tense that Rainbird had the impression he had been waiting for hours for such a summons.
Mr. Gillespie mounted the stairs two at a time to Jane’s bedchamber. But when he was outside the door, he hesitated, and then turned to Rainbird, who was right behi
nd him. “Mrs. Hart, and Miss Euphemia, are they at home?”
“No, sir. They are at Mrs. Baillie’s.”
“I shall examine Miss Jane in privacy,” said Mr. Gillespie. “Leave me alone with her. Do not come near, no matter what you hear. Young ladies can become very nervous during examinations and I feel a crise des nerfs has distorted Miss Jane’s wits. She is best left alone with her doctor.”
“Perhaps Mrs. Middleton should be in attendance?” suggested Rainbird.
“No, no,” said Mr. Gillespie heartily, clapping Rainbird on the shoulder. “Do not look so worried, man. There is a great deal of fever about. That may be the cause of her disorder. None of you should risk catching it.”
He waited until Rainbird had gone down the stairs and then he went into Jane’s bedchamber and shut the door.
The curtains were drawn and the light was dim. She lay propped up on her pillows, her eyes wide and dark in the gloom.
“Now let me have a look at you,” he said.
He walked towards the bed, stripping off his dogskin gloves as he did so. His hands were white, strong, and well-shaped.
On the right hand, there was a large mole.
Jane stared at it, and drew a long breath.
“You,” she said.
“It was you.”
Chapter
Twelve
See how love and murder will out.
—William Congreve, Amoret
Mr. Gillespie stood very still, looking down at her.
Although her face was pale, she did not look ill in the slightest.
“You did not take the pills I left for you,” he said in a flat voice.
“I had them examined at the apothecary’s in Curzon Street,” said Jane. “They contained a very strong measure of quinine—enough to make me appear as if I had the fever. Mama would have sent for you.”
