The Lady Fan Series: Books 1-3 (Sapere Books Boxset Editions)

by Elizabeth Bailey

From somewhere outside her immediate concentration, she heard a calm voice drive into the hubbub.

  “What in the world is the matter here?”

  Turning automatically, Cassie discovered the strange female who had spoken to her in the smithy on the previous day.

  “Is it the invariable custom of this village for females to quarrel in the open street?” pursued this lady, a laugh in her voice that did more to pour oil on these troubled waters than might another raised voice. “Come, come, ladies. I must beg you to release one another. There can surely be no occasion for such violence.”

  These words acted powerfully on Mrs. Winkleigh at least, for she let go of Molly and pulled back, dusting off her hands. The Tisbury woman was slower to react, but she ceased her struggles upon being released, and her gaze shifted towards the newcomer.

  “Are you quite well, Mrs. Dale?” said the latter, reaching out a hand.

  Cassie took it and held it, relieved to feel the fog in her brain dissipating.

  “Thank you,” she gasped, and a memory stirred. “You are Lady Fan.”

  The other woman smiled. “I am indeed.” Then her gaze shifted back to the erstwhile antagonists.

  Molly’s frown reappeared. “Lady Fan, is it? You be her as seen the body. You be asking all manner of questions.”

  Lady Francis inclined her head, and Cassie noted the keen glance that raked Molly’s face.

  “That is so. And you, I think, are Mrs. Tisbury. Am I right?”

  Molly gaped. “Aye, but how you knowed it I can’t tell. Be you another witch?”

  A light laugh escaped the newcomer. “I am merely observant, Mrs. Tisbury. And I have yet to learn that there are any witches in Witherley.”

  Cassie’s heart leapt, but Molly scowled.

  “Like that, is it? You be on her’s side.”

  “I am on no one’s side,” came tartly from Lady Fan, “unless it be the side of truth.”

  She turned her attention to Mrs. Winkleigh, who was, Cassie realised, appraising Lady Fan with a critical eye.

  “You, I fear, have the advantage of me.”

  Cassie made haste to make the housekeeper known, but Mrs. Winkleigh’s slightly suspicious air did not abate one jot.

  “I’ve heard about you from the master, ma’am,” she said bluntly. “I’ll not deny I was hard put to believe any lady’d poke her nose into such matters.”

  “Poke her nose, aye,” burst from Molly Tisbury. “Poking into my life her be, making the likes of Pilton tell on me.”

  Lady Fan’s bland gaze turned on the woman. “Is there something of import to tell, Mrs. Tisbury?”

  To Cassie’s amazement, Molly blenched a trifle, closing her lips tight shut. Lady Fan eyed her levelly for a moment and then turned back to Mrs. Winkleigh.

  “I take it you disapprove of my interesting myself in these matters?”

  “Ain’t my place to do so, ma’am,” said the housekeeper. “Nor I didn’t say that.”

  “True, but you implied it. Never mind. I shall hope to prove myself in due course.”

  “Prove? What be you a-going to prove, as if’n it bain’t known?” Molly had recovered herself more swiftly than Cassie could have wished, for the woman pointed a bony finger at her. “Her it be as done for Duggleby. Bain’t need of no questions.”

  Once more the woman came under the beam of Lady Fan’s level regard. “I’m afraid I disagree, Mrs. Tisbury. But you need not suppose my interest is solely in you. I am questioning everyone who may have had a grudge against this man Duggleby, and I gather there are a number of persons in this category besides yourself.”

  Molly’s black eyes snapped fire. “Who telled you as I’ve a grudge agin him?”

  Lady Fan merely smiled and refocused her attention on Cassie. “I was coming to visit you, Mrs. Dale.”

  Cassie stared. “Me?”

  “Why not?”

  “Because people don’t.” Then she remembered Mrs. Winkleigh and put out an apologetic hand. “You came for your master, though you have been kind.”

  Molly Tisbury exploded again. “Kind! Foolhardy more like.” She turned on the stranger. “Be it Hannah who telled agin me? You be staying at Pig, bain’t you? It be Hannah, bain’t it?”

  Lady Fan’s brows rose. “Dear me, Mrs. Tisbury, you will make me believe there is certainly something to be found out. In which case, I hope you will be willing to talk with me in the not too distant future.”

  “Talk with you? So as you can poke that nose of yourn more deep? Not I, Lady Fan. Nor it bain’t no use talking, seeing as you be sided with her.”

  A toss of her head in Cassie’s direction made the latter wince.

  “I hope you will think better of that decision, Mrs. Tisbury,” said Lady Fan, her tone perfectly calm. “I should hate to be obliged to call upon young Pilton to bring you to me for questioning.”

  A gasp from Mrs. Winkleigh hardly took Cassie’s attention, her eyes fully taken up with the staggered expression in Molly’s face. She could not help a rise of satisfaction to see the woman confounded.

  For a full minute the look held, and then with a grunt, Molly wrenched her eyes away and pushed past Lady Fan, heading for the bridge.

  Mrs. Winkleigh looked after her and then gave a grunt of her own. “Good riddance! Ask who’s next, would she? Wouldn’t surprise me if she was, horrid creature.”

  Lady Fan made no comment on this, instead looking at Cassie. “I don’t wish to detain you. Were you perhaps on your way to visit Bertha Duggleby?”

  Cassie blinked at her. “How did you know?”

  The other smiled. “As I told the delightful Mrs. Tisbury, it is merely a trick of looking. Your position here and your encounter with Molly leads me to suppose it, that is all.”

  Mrs. Winkleigh gave a gruff laugh. “That’s what the master said. You look and listen. He said he noticed it particular, for he has to do the same himself.”

  “Then I am sure he is very good at his job,” returned Lady Fan.

  Cassie had made a deduction on her own account. “You wish to see Bertha Duggleby yourself.”

  Lady Fan’s clear gaze had something of a tease in it. “We may yet make a true witch of you, Mrs. Dale.”

  No one ever teased Cassie. It gave her an odd feeling of companionship — something to which she was almost a stranger. On impulse, she gave a rare smile.

  “Come with us, pray.”

  The blacksmith’s widow looked gaunt and ill, and her greeting was lacklustre. It did not seem to Ottilia that she showed any hostility towards Mrs. Dale, which was surprising. When she was asked whether the house had suffered in the fire, she looked blank.

  “Bain’t close enough to the forge. ’Cepting if’n the flames had took hold and jumped the gap, like Tisbury said.”

  “Tisbury suggested this?” Ottilia asked at once.

  “Said as how they would’ve if’n the storm bain’t come.”

  “But the storm did come,” protested Mrs. Dale, in that intense way she had. “I told Duggleby it would come. I warned him. I said the storm would bring the roof down.”

  Bertha Duggleby eyed Cassie Dale in a dull way, but she said nothing. Before Ottilia had a chance to take this up, however, Mrs. Winkleigh intervened.

  “I’ve need of a girl at the vicarage, Mrs. Duggleby. I hear you’ve a daughter who might do.”

  For the first time, a hint of animation entered the widow’s look and voice.

  “My Jenny? You be wishful to take my Jenny?”

  Mrs. Winkleigh backtracked a little. “Provided she’s a willing worker.”

  “Her be a good girl, m’am,” said Mrs. Duggleby, almost eager, rising from her seat in the neat room obviously kept for visitors and meant for a parlour, if a house this size could be said to have one. “Her be willing, all right. I’ll fetch her.” With which, the widow dragged herself to the door and disappeared through it.

  Ottilia looked at the housekeeper.

  “I trust she may be found satisfactory
, Mrs. Winkleigh. I daresay you may find it hard to repudiate her after this.”

  Mrs. Dale stretched out her hands to the woman. “Oh, take her, take her, I beg you! And when Bertha is forced to leave this house, perhaps you may have Jenny to live in the vicarage.”

  Mrs. Winkleigh frowned. “Not so fast, Mrs. Dale. She’s to prove herself first. I’m sorry for the woman, but I’ll not keep the girl from charity.”

  Ottilia noted the tragic look in Cassie Dale’s eyes and wondered how it was the creature had grown so very unworldly. It was clearly not given to her to recognise how the housekeeper’s own work must suffer should she be burdened with inefficient help. As well not have anyone at all.

  But when Bertha Duggleby returned with her daughter, a strapping child of perhaps thirteen years of age, it was evident to Ottilia there was no need for concern. Intelligence showed in her eyes and in the deference she accorded her prospective employer, although she looked a trifle askance at Cassie Dale.

  Mrs. Winkleigh appeared to have judged the girl in much the same light, for she lost no time.

  “I tell you what, young Jenny. You come with me to the vicarage this moment, and I’ll show you what I need. If you think you can manage it, we’ll make our arrangements then and there.”

  Jenny dropped a curtsy. “Bain’t afeared of hard work, m’am. I been helping Ma to make nails for the forge nor five year or more.”

  Which evidently satisfied Mrs. Winkleigh. While the departure of the housekeeper with the girl was in train, Ottilia took time to wonder at the coming fate of Mrs. Duggleby. A new blacksmith would no doubt be installed in due course, and she could only suppose the local community would take responsibility for the widow, if she was destitute. Which, according to Miss Beeleigh, remained a question.

  As soon as the business concerning her daughter was concluded, there was an instant deflation of the little animation that had illumined Bertha Duggleby momentarily. Ottilia tried a throw to revive her.

  “Well, there is one of your troubles on the way out, Mrs. Duggleby.”

  The woman raised her head, the dull gaze training on her visitor. “Bain’t nowt but a drop. There be the boy to think on.”

  “How old is he?”

  “No more’n six. He be learning his pa’s trade, but the forge be gone now. Bain’t no call for ’prentices round here, not at six year.”

  Cassie Dale’s eyes filled. “He will be cared for, Bertha, I promise you. Lady Ferrensby will see to it.”

  The widow nodded, but the gloom of her bearing turned sour. “Like him it be to leave all to her ladyship. Provide for his family? Not he. Bain’t his way.”

  Ottilia pounced on this. “But your husband was in a very good way of business, by all accounts, Mrs. Duggleby. I gather he was not dependent merely on this village, but took his customers from miles around.”

  Bertha Duggleby looked across at Ottilia, and there was sudden venom in her gaze. “Bain’t saying as the forge’d done bad. Bain’t saying as he’d not kept a roof over our heads, nor food on the table, neither. Only where be the new gown he promised me nor five year? Where be the schooling as he boasted all around for his own boy? I tell you where. On the backs of his string of ladyloves be where. Perfumes and toys and neck-handkerchiefs and I don’t know what more besides. My new gown, for all I know. If’n there be a pot of gold hid like he boasted, bain’t hid here.”

  “Pot of gold?” Ottilia repeated, stemming the onslaught.

  Bertha shrugged. “Gold guineas, he said. I bain’t seen ’em. Nor I bain’t seen no goods bought for this household as had ought to be if’n he’d seen half such wealth.”

  Cassie was looking distressed, but Ottilia wasted no time in idle commiserations, though there was little doubt the woman had been hard done by.

  “When did he tell you about this gold, Mrs. Duggleby?”

  The brief fire had died, returning the widow to apathy. She barely made the effort to shrug. “It be nigh three month he’ve been boasting of it. Never believed him at first.”

  The precise period of time caught at Ottilia’s interest. Did it not tally with the death of Mrs. Uddington? She filed it away in her mind.

  “When did you begin to believe in this gold, Mrs. Duggleby?”

  “Don’t know as I did. Not ’til he said as he caught me looking for it and beat me.”

  A wave of sympathy for the woman came over Ottilia, and she glanced at Cassie Dale, expecting to see horror in her face. Instead she found only pity. A surprising creature, Mrs. Dale.

  “I fear you were unfortunate in your husband, Mrs. Duggleby. Did you dislike him? Hate him perhaps?”

  Bertha’s eyes burned briefly at Ottilia. “Enough for to kill?”

  “No,” Ottilia said, keeping her gaze steady on the woman’s face. “I daresay you might have killed him for the money. But not for hate.”

  To her surprise, the widow nodded. “Aye. But not the forge. I’d never burn the forge.”

  Satisfied, Ottilia rose. “Thank you, Mrs. Duggleby. You have been most helpful.”

  Cassie got up, too, but she was looking puzzled. “Is that all?”

  Ottilia smiled. “I think so.” Then a thought occurred to her. “Stay! Mrs. Duggleby, did you know your husband was carrying on with Molly Tisbury’s kitchen maid?” She heard Cassie’s shocked gasp and smiled at the widow, who had not turned a hair. “You have been quite frank with me, Bertha, so I do not scruple to ask you such a question.”

  “She be with child, I heard,” said Mrs. Duggleby, her voice back to the dull monotone of their early conversation. “Yes, she decamped in the night.”

  Bertha nodded. “Likely her’ve got a few of them gold guineas.”

  “If they exist.”

  “Aye.”

  Ottilia took a chance. “And Mrs. Uddington is dead.” Bertha jumped in her seat. That got through, thought Ottilia with satisfaction. The woman’s eyes were wide as she stared up at her visitor.

  “What is it you mean, Lady Fan?” asked Cassie Dale in a hushed tone, her gaze going from one to the other.

  Ottilia did not take her eyes off the widow. “Bertha knows what I mean. It was the first betrayal, was it not, Bertha? That was the one that hurt. Did you think he meant to set you aside? He could not have done so, you know. Mrs. Uddington was disgraced. Duggleby could not have married her.”

  At last the woman spoke, her voice hoarse with dread. “I thought as he’d kill me. Poison so’s none’d know. He wanted her bad, I know that. If I be gone, he’d have her.”

  Disgust rose in Ottilia, and she went across to lay a hand on the widow’s shoulder. “Did he tell you so?”

  She nodded numbly. “Aye.”

  “You poor creature. It was an empty threat, Bertha. More boasting, I suspect. You must be relieved to be rid of him.” At that, the woman’s features crumpled and she burst into noisy sobs. Cassie Dale ran across and knelt at her feet, catching the creature into her arms and holding her tightly. Through the cries came words, only just coherent.

  “Hate him? No. Loved him, I did, spite of all. Aye. Bain’t nowt but a fool, me.”

  Ottilia waited until Cassie pulled back and caught her gaze. “I will await you outside,” she said softly and quietly let herself out of the parlour.

  “Why did you push her so? Is it not enough that she is bereaved?”

  Cassie Dale’s tone was reproachful, and Ottilia turned to look at her as they made their way around the back of the forge.

  “If we are to find out who is responsible for Duggleby’s death, my dear Mrs. Dale, we cannot afford to leave any stone unturned.”

  The dark eyes scanned her face, searchingly, as if their owner could not fathom what she saw. “You can’t think Bertha murdered her own husband?”

  “I’m afraid it is all too possible. Violence within families is far more likely than outside of it. And there is the matter of the gold.” She smiled at the girl. “However, I am inclined to think Bertha is innocent. But that does not mean I am ri
ght.”

  “You hold by this theory of Doctor Meldreth, then? That the poor man was hit with a hammer?”

  Ottilia raised her brows. “Well, he was certainly not killed by any supernatural means.”

  A flush mantled the girl’s cheek, and she looked away. “I thought it was the roof falling on him, until Sam told me otherwise.”

  “No. That was a deliberate blind to hide the truth, as was the fire.”

  Mrs. Dale halted in the smithy courtyard and turned to look at her, a plea in her dark eyes. “Then it was not my fault? I did not cause it to happen?”

  “Of course you did not,” Ottilia said, catching at the creature’s thin shoulders. “I wish you will rid yourself of any shadow of blame.”

  The girl drew a shaky breath. “I wish I might. Yet even could I do so, the rest of the village will not.”

  Ottilia released her, a sharp note entering her voice. “No, because our killer chose his time well. He took advantage of your warning.”

  Shock leapt in Mrs. Dale’s eyes. It was plain this notion had not previously occurred to her. “Deliberately? To set the villagers on to hound me?”

  “Yes,” said Ottilia frankly, believing the more she understood, the less she would fear. “You were a convenient scapegoat.”

  Pain crossed the girl’s vision, and the tragic look returned. “Cruel! But it was ever so.”

  Ottilia frowned. “What do you mean?”

  Cassie shivered. “Even my siblings used my propensity to see things, even if I had not. They used to tell my father that their mischief had been foretold, as if they had no control of it. As if I made them do it.”

  Small wonder the poor girl was so chafed. “What you need, my dear, is someone to guard you from such cruelties.”

  “I have Tabitha and Sam.”

  “Your servants?”

  “My maid and her husband.”

  It was plain to Ottilia that Mrs. Dale had little understanding of her meaning. She probed a little. “I daresay your own late husband was of help, too.”

  Something flashed in Cassie’s eyes. She glanced away and back again, and Ottilia thought she saw a rapid change of emotions cross her features — shock, fear, and dismay.