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

by Elizabeth Bailey

  “Shut it, if you please. And stay back.”

  Ottilia did as she was bid, setting her shoulders to the door and remaining there. Her eyes went directly to the four-poster, where Tamasine was indeed lying, her eyes closed. There was a bandage on one of her hands and Ottilia recalled her injuries from putting her hand through the glass. At least someone had found time to complete the task Ottilia had begun, if belatedly. Scarcely surprising, under the circumstances, that it had been forgotten.

  There was little besides the bed in the room, bar a single press and a washstand. There were no mirrors, which must mean Tamasine relied upon another to assist at her toilette. Miss Ingleby? Or was there a maid willing to risk the girl’s uncertain moods.

  Troubled by the companion’s last remark, Ottilia wondered briefly if the woman still sought to convince her of Tamasine’s full command of her senses. Surely not, with everything that had passed? But then, what in the world could she mean by insisting Tamasine had a degree of rationality?

  She watched Miss Ingleby approach the bed, which she did with some caution. But she had no truck with the pretence of sleep.

  “Tamasine, did you drink your medicine?”

  What medicine? Ottilia looked swiftly around, but there was nothing to support the notion any sort of medication was kept in the room. Then she noted a bedside cabinet, and wondered if it might be inside.

  The girl opened one eye. A little smile escaped her and she sat up in a bang. “Did you think I was asleep?”

  “No,” returned the other, repeating, “Did you take your medicine? Did Mrs Whiting give you a dose?”

  Tamasine stretched lazily. “Can’t you see I’m better?”

  “I must take that for my answer, I suppose. I desire you will remain here for the moment, for there is much work come upon me with your guardian’s decease.”

  “What work? You are meant to take care of me.”

  “True, but I am not your guardian and there is a good deal to be settled.”

  “I don’t need a guardian.” The tone was petulant. “I am of age.”

  Miss Ingleby chose not to answer this, and Ottilia’s mind roved the last few exchanges, astonished at the ability the girl had shown to take part in the give and take of conversation. She had not done so when they met earlier this morning. Perhaps the companion’s charge of rationality had some substance.

  “Someone must see to your affairs,” Miss Ingleby said, “for I have no such authority. I will write to your Aunt Ruth.”

  Tamasine nodded, swinging her legs off the bed. “Oh, yes, and Simeon must be sent for.”

  Miss Ingleby’s lips folded, but she did not argue and Ottilia surmised she had regained sufficient control of her grief to be able to choose her responses. It was clear her policy under normal circumstances was to avoid any confrontation. A wise precaution, blasted by her earlier shock.

  The companion stood back from the bed, looking down at the girl. “Rest, Tamasine. I will come for you in an hour.”

  Ottilia noted a change in the blue gaze directed up at the duenna. Tamasine was wearing a faintly calculating look. “Will you lock me in?”

  “Yes.” No hesitation. “I cannot have you running off again today.”

  The girl’s expression did not alter, but she essayed a slight smile. “Can I have Hemp to play with me?”

  There was a brief pause. Ottilia could not see Miss Ingleby’s face, but suspicion sounded in her voice. “What do you want to play?”

  “Fox and Geese, if Hemp will bring the board.”

  “If you will promise not to try to persuade him to release you before I return, then I will send him up to you.”

  Ottilia heard this with both interest and amazement. For one thing, was Tamasine capable of playing a game demanding intelligent strategy? For another, were they in the habit of allowing the child to be alone in company with a male servant? And a girl of Tamasine’s undoubted lack of discretion? Were they not fearful the fellow might forget himself and take advantage of her? She did not know Hemp, who was clearly well acquainted with the girl, but that he cherished an extraordinary regard for Tamasine she could not doubt.

  The girl’s quality ought to protect her, but Ottilia’s naïve faith in the discretion of servants and mistresses had been severely shaken when she investigated the death of Francis’s sister-in-law.

  The companion headed for the door and Ottilia moved aside. She caught Tamasine’s glance, receiving one of those blinding smiles.

  “Farewell, Lady Fan,” sang the girl.

  “Au revoir.” Ottilia moved into the corridor, where she waited for the companion to lock the door, lowering her tone. “What is the medication you use?”

  “Laudanum.”

  “You know it is addictive.”

  To her surprise, a faint gasp emanated from the companion and she threw the back of her hand to her mouth in a gesture Ottilia remembered from earlier. Was it habitual, denoting agitation? She spoke from behind it, a gruff note in her voice.

  “Yes, I know.” Miss Ingleby gestured down the corridor. “I beg you will go back downstairs, Lady Francis. If you insist upon remaining, pray don’t come up here again. I must fetch Hemp, and then I have letters to write.”

  Ushered without ceremony, Ottilia had perforce to retrace her steps along the corridor towards the front of the house. As she turned into the main passage that led to the gallery, she realised Miss Ingleby was no longer behind her. Halting, she looked back along the corridor, but there was no sign of the woman. Ottilia concluded she had taken another route, perhaps one set aside for the servants.

  Ottilia continued on her way, a myriad questions running in her head. Sir Joslin Cadel’s untimely death had seemingly unleashed a hive of hidden passions.

  Never having seen his brother-in-law in action, Francis watched with interest, tempered by the anxiety instilled by what Giles had told him. He was missing his breakfast, and not even the spectre of his nephew’s involvement in this affair had the power to distract his mind fully from the pangs of hunger. His hopes centred on Patrick Hathaway discovering the death to have been, if not natural, at least unconnected with any sinister intent.

  Doctor Hathaway stood for a while at the foot of the bed and cast his eyes the length of the man’s still body. Tillie was standing back from the bed, allowing him full access, and she caught Francis’s glance.

  “Patrick never touches until he has fully observed,” she said, on a note of pride.

  Hathaway did not glance up from his work. “The limbs are out of true.”

  “Yes, he was badly misshapen.”

  Tillie described the position in which Sir Joslin had been found at the bottom of the garden steps, while Patrick listened with concentrated attention.

  Francis had taken to his brother-in-law at the outset, finding in him an echo of the common sense approach that characterised his sister. They were much alike, Patrick possessing the same clear grey gaze and well-defined cheekbones. Like Tillie, he was lean, though considerably taller, and loose-limbed with broad shoulders and a hearty handshake. He was much given to laughter and, so Francis thought, bore the burden of his ailing complainant of a wife with cheerful fortitude.

  His advent at this bedevilled house was fortuitous, as he had explained to Francis as they waited in the parlour for Tillie to reappear, partaking of the coffee brought in by Cuffy a couple of minutes after Patrick’s arrival.

  “We lay not ten miles distant last night, Fan, having halted when the snow began to fall. When I found it to be clear this morning, I had the horses put to in short order so that we might arrive before any further fall could make the roads impassable.”

  Francis had wholeheartedly applauded this decision, only regretting the circumstance that had prevented his and Tillie’s being at the Dower House to receive them. But Patrick waved this aside.

  “You could hardly have done so. But no matter. Your mother gave us all the particulars, and as it seems this fellow Sutherland cannot be found, she d
esired me to come here directly.”

  For which Francis was heartily thankful. Particularly after his interview with Giles, who had seized opportunity and escaped, much to Francis’s chagrin. The hideous prospect of his nephew falling under suspicion of murder had thrown him back into those dark days of his sister-in-law’s death. Was he to go through it all again? Common sense told him nothing could be more unlikely, but he could not shake the apprehension. Should the conversation reported to him come to the ears of a coroner, there was no saying where it might end.

  When Tillie arrived in the parlour, he had necessarily to wait for the brother and sister’s effusive greeting before mentioning the matter to his wife. He supplied her with coffee, and was conscious of delaying the inevitable, taking opportunity instead to apprise his brother-in-law of the events of the day leading up to his arrival. But Tillie, with her usual astuteness, had divined his disquiet.

  “What’s to do, Fan? You look disturbed.”

  He tried to shrug it off. “It’s nothing, my love, don’t fret.”

  Tillie’s clear gaze rested on him. “You spoke to Giles?”

  Patrick looked interested. “Is that the young fellow I saw in the hall?”

  “The wretch made good his escape while I was answering the door. After I had specifically told him to wait, mark you.”

  “What did he tell you to trouble you so, Fan?”

  Francis turned back to his wife. “Tamasine spoke to him of a reckoning concerning her guardian.”

  Tillie’s brows went up. “Did she indeed? How interesting.”

  “Interesting! The silly clunch was fool enough to make a joke of the girl’s desire to be rid of her guardian in order to admit this cousin of hers into the house.”

  “Simeon?”

  “Yes, but that fellow is of less importance than my nephew, who must needs put himself squarely in the firing line when you go ferreting for suspects.”

  “Good God!” exclaimed his brother-in-law. “Surely you don’t imagine there has been foul play?”

  “Until we know better, it is always a possibility.” But to Francis’s relief, Tillie gave him an understanding smile. “However, I cannot imagine we need waste any time on the proposition that Giles plotted with Tamasine to rid her of her guardian.”

  “That’s what I’ve been trying to tell myself. But she did ask him to help her get the fellow out of the way.”

  “Dear me. A trifle too close to the bone, I agree.” Tillie laid aside her cup. “In that case, the sooner we discover how Sir Joslin died, the better.”

  Francis headed for the door, gesturing as he went for his brother-in-law to accompany them. “My dependence is all upon you, Patrick.”

  But the sight of Sir Joslin’s dead body so revived his anxiety that he could scarcely contain his impatience.

  Tillie’s recital of finding the body ended, Patrick’s attention was once again on the corpse, and he proceeded in a methodical fashion, first checking the limbs. “This leg is broken, likely severely. He would have been permanently lamed had he lived.”

  “He already is lamed,” Tillie said. “At least, Miss Ingleby spoke of a chest condition, brought on, she thinks, by pleurisy.”

  “That will come to light with the post-mortem.” Patrick laid down the hand he had been checking. “This wrist is also broken.”

  “We thought so,” Francis put in. “It was the only thing holding him in position.”

  Hathaway laid a hand to the man’s face, and like Tillie before him, slipped it inside his coat. He glanced up towards Tillie. “Was he damp like this?”

  “Yes, but still warm. He had only just died when we got to him.”

  Patrick made no reply to this, but lifted the dead man’s eyelids one by one. He paused, a slight frown creasing his brow, and then lifted the lids again.

  Francis knew an impulse to demand to know what he had seen, but he withheld it, watching in some puzzlement, and no little revulsion, as Hathaway leaned to the man’s mouth, forced it open and sniffed. His nose wrinkled and he gave a slight shake of the head.

  “What is it, Patrick?” Tillie demanded.

  “I was hoping for a certain aroma, but it is unlikely to show so readily.”

  It occurred to Francis that the usual pungent odours of death were lacking. “That’s odd.” He moved from his post at the door where he was keeping lookout. “He doesn’t smell of anything much.”

  Tillie cast him a sudden startled glance. “Heavens, Fan, how right you are! I knew there was something, but I could not put my finger on it.”

  It gave Francis an obscure kind of pleasure to have beaten her to the post, but he was too eager to hear what it denoted to make any teasing comment. He directed a questioning look at his brother-in-law. “Does it mean anything?”

  “Assuredly. It is all of a piece with the sweating and the contracted pupils.” He looked across at Tillie. “You thought he was in a stupor, you said?”

  “Yes, and he looked just as peaceful in that position of discomfort as he does now. Miss Ingleby said he looked asleep and she could not tell when he stopped breathing.”

  “Yes.” Patrick’s tone was musing and he continued to regard the body, evidently deep in thought.

  Impatient for more, Francis looked at Tillie and found her gaze fixed upon her brother. Unusually she refrained from question and Francis recollected that Hathaway had been her mentor. All she knew of medical matters she had learned from him. Francis was both touched and faintly amused, despite his disquiet, to discover in his forthright wife a tendency to defer to the judgement of one she clearly deemed her superior, at least in the medical field.

  Patrick looked up at last. “You were thinking of apoplexy, I dare say?”

  “Yes, but I could see it might not be so,” said Tillie, eager now. “Surely the pupils should have been dilated? But Sir Joslin put his hands to his head and made sounds indicative of pain before he fell. I thought that might denote a cerebral inflammation. That contusion on his temple must be from the fall, so I have discounted it as a prior cause. I have been trying to discover if he was prone to headache, but to no avail.”

  “It may not have been pain, but giddiness,” Patrick suggested. “Did he convulse?”

  “Not that I know of, but I confess I did not think to ask.”

  “We can check that, but I suspect not. His countenance is not bloated, which I would expect with apoplexy. And, if my direction of thought is accurate, there will have been a promotion of perspiration, accompanied by a suspension of the excretion of urine and faeces, which would account for the lack of such odours.”

  Urgency prompted Francis. “What then, Patrick?”

  “Only a post-mortem will tell us, but I am inclined to suspect an overdose.”

  “Overdose?”

  “What, of some drug?” asked Tillie, an intent look in her features.

  “Yes, a narcotic. Very likely opium.”

  Chapter 5

  Her brother’s suggestion took from Ottilia all power of speech as the implications jumped in her head. As at a distance, she heard Francis speak.

  “Are you saying he was an opium-eater?”

  “Not necessarily,” said Patrick. “Ottilia spoke of a chest condition. He might have been merely in the habit of taking it against the pain.”

  “Laudanum.” Ottilia glanced at her spouse. “Miss Ingleby feeds it to Tamasine.”

  “For pity’s sake! What sort of household is this? They are all crazy, Patrick.”

  “No, only Tamasine is deranged.” Ottilia became brisk. “Shut the door, Fan. We don’t want to be observed.”

  He hesitated, a frown descending onto his brow. “Why shouldn’t we be observed?”

  “Because we must hunt for the laudanum.”

  Her brother snorted. “Oh, come, Ottilia, you are not seriously suggesting someone did away with the fellow?”

  “She sees murder wherever she goes,” rejoined Francis. “But now that we know the fellow may have been an addict,
we can surely discount that theory.”

  Ottilia saw relief in his face and could not withhold a rueful smile. “I realise that is just the outcome you wish, my dearest, but I fear you are too sanguine.”

  “How so?” demanded her spouse, a rough note in his voice.

  “Because there is nothing to say an overdose of opium could not have been administered by another,” said Ottilia doggedly. “Indeed, it is the more likely explanation for anyone in the habit of taking it must know precisely how much would be safe. Addicts in particular.”

  At this, her brother entered the lists. “I cannot agree with you. It is far more likely to have been an accident. I have known of a number of cases where the accepted dose has been exceeded and resulted in death or near fatality.”

  “In opium-eaters?” asked Francis eagerly.

  Patrick looked disconcerted. “No, you have me there. Still, I submit that over-indulgence in an addict would not be surprising. His judgement must be impaired.”

  “Nevertheless, it is well to be certain.” Ottilia looked across at her spouse again. “Pray shut the door, Fan.”

  He did so, a world of discontent in his features as he crossed to the press standing to one side of the room. “I suppose I must concede that if Sir Joslin was in the habit of taking laudanum, he is certain to have a bottle of it handy.”

  He began looking along the top of the press which was crammed with bottles and jars and Ottilia headed for the bedside cabinet.

  “Even if you find a bottle of laudanum, what will that prove?” asked Patrick, moving to join Francis, who was rapidly casting through the potions, glass clinking against glass in his haste. Ottilia noted that her brother did nothing to aid him, merely watching his motions with an air of scepticism. She had hardly taken hold of the handles of the small drawer in the cabinet when Francis uttered an exclamation.

  “Here it is!”

  She turned to find him holding up a small brown bottle. Patrick took it from him and crossed to the window, holding it up to the light. She moved to join him.