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

by Elizabeth Bailey

  “Do you sleep with it under your pillow?”

  Mrs Whiting gaped. “Sleep with it under my pillow? No, of course I don’t.”

  “Then is it possible someone could have sneaked into your housekeeper’s room at night and abstracted it?”

  A disbelieving laugh escaped the woman. “What, and sneaked back in afterwards to return it? Rubbish! It couldn’t have gone. I’d have noticed it missing. Moreover, I’d have noticed if the level in the bottle of laudanum had gone down. I told you, I keep it strictly controlled. I can show you, if you like. I write it all down in my book.”

  She stopped, breathing hard. Ottilia smiled. “Thank you, Mrs Whiting, I would like to see it.”

  It was clear from the expression that swept across the housekeeper’s face that she was outraged. She glared at Ottilia and shoved herself forward so she could place her feet flat on the floor and push herself up from the chair.

  “You better come with me.”

  Nothing loath, Ottilia threw a conspiratorial glance at the two men and followed her from the room.

  Francis had barely managed to exchange a brief word with his brother-in-law when the door opened again and the butler came into the room. He eyed them both with undisguised irritation.

  “Still here then, sirs?”

  Francis’s hackles rose. “As you see.”

  Lomax’s lip curled in an insolent fashion. “Found your murderer, have you, my lord?”

  With difficulty Francis kept a rein on his temper, and fired a broadside. “Not yet. But then we haven’t questioned you, Lomax.”

  The man’s brows snapped together. “I didn’t kill him!”

  “No?”

  “No! Nor, I may add, did anyone else in this house.”

  “That remains to be seen.”

  “So he took opium, so what?” A sneer crossed the man’s face. “Did you think Miss Ingleby wouldn’t tell me? Not that we didn’t know that already.”

  “Then it rather leaps to the eye that one of you might have helped him to his overdose.”

  Lomax closed his lips tight. He was plainly unnerved, for his gaze swivelled from Francis to Patrick and back again, a faint twitch attacking his cheek, which was certainly a degree paler than it had been.

  Taking a leaf out of his wife’s book, Francis pressed his advantage, his mind flitting over the various bits of information Tillie had so far garnered. He seized one at random.

  “Tell me about Flora Sugars, Lomax.”

  “The master’s manufactory?”

  To see the man so rattled could not but give Francis a feeling of satisfaction. His annoyance settled and he began to enjoy himself. “By master, you mean Mr Roy, I take it? We took it for a trade name for his products. Was that correct?”

  Lomax’s frown spoke his growing puzzlement. “Yes, but I fail to see what that has to do with —”

  “Did he name the place after his wife?” Francis interrupted, keeping the pressure on. “Florine, was it not?”

  “It wasn’t Mr Roy who called it that. It was Mrs Roy’s father. She inherited the place.”

  “And it became Mr Roy’s property when they married?”

  Lomax nodded, looking more and more perplexed by this line of questioning.

  “Sounds like a handsome dowry,” commented Patrick, drawing the butler’s glance.

  A derisory look overspread the man’s features. “A handsome bribe, sir.”

  Francis could not repress a gasp of shock. “You mean he knew Florine was deranged when he married her?”

  “The master thought it a worthwhile bargain.” The cynical note was pronounced and Francis watched him closely. “Had an eye to the main chance, had Mr Roy. And the mistress was easy-tempered to begin with.”

  “You were there?”

  “I came with the property. I was a footman then.”

  So his loyalties were rather with the wife’s family than with Roy. Less likely to be loyal to his master then?

  “It would appear Miss Ingleby is the most recent addition to the family circle.”

  Lomax blinked in a baffled way, as if the change of subject confused him.

  “I believe she joined you only when Miss Tamasine was fourteen,” Francis pursued. “A relative newcomer then?”

  “You won’t find anyone ready to include her in the family circle.” The old derisory look was back. “She wouldn’t have been, if Mr Martin hadn’t died.”

  “Who was Mr Martin?”

  “Overseer. Miss Ingleby came out to marry him. One of these arranged marriages. Martin perished of fever before she arrived and she’d no money to go back to England.”

  “So your Mr Roy gave her a post as governess to his daughter,” put in Patrick, a note of approval in his voice. “He sounds a most considerate fellow.”

  Lomax had nothing to say to this, and it was plain to Francis that his opinion of his former master’s character left something to be desired. He shifted ground.

  “We understand that all the black fellows had to work in the sugar manufactory from time to time. Was that true of all those in Mr Roy’s service?”

  “You wish to know if I had a hand in distilling,” stated the butler flatly, his cynicism once again rife. “It wasn’t part of my duties, but I was interested enough to learn a bit. Some of it had its uses.”

  “Such as the making of rum?”

  Lomax shrugged. “Make of it what you will, sir. But if you’re trying to discover whether I laced his rum with opium to poison Sir Joslin, I fear you’ll be disappointed. I doubt there’s anyone in the house who doesn’t know he kept a bottle hidden in the stupidest place you could think of. Who empties chamber pots but the servants?”

  “I should have thought of that,” Ottilia said fretfully, when Francis relayed this tidbit over a luncheon back at the Dower House.

  The meal was attended only by the three of them, the dowager having roused herself to take Sophie Hathaway to visit one of their neighbours. There was no sign of the boys, who were doubtless off on some adventure of their own.

  “Is it still worth taking an analysis of the bottle, Patrick?” asked her husband.

  “We must be thorough. If we should find a fatal dose, you may at least console yourself with the reflection that your nephew is not the perpetrator. He cannot have known about the hiding-place.”

  “Unless Tamasine told him,” put in Ottilia, earning herself a black look from Francis.

  “I thank you. Just when I was beginning to feel a trifle relieved.”

  Ottilia sighed. “Yes, and it is not of the least use to be sanguine, for I am obliged to concede that Tamasine’s laudanum is strictly controlled, just as Mrs Whiting claims. I would defy anyone to get into her cupboard, and her records are impeccable. Only she could have used that particular source.”

  “If she did,” Patrick said, a faint frown wrinkling his brow, “it would be easy enough for her to cook her books, would it not? Quis custodiet ipsos custodes, eh?”

  “Miss Ingleby,” said Francis, “if it concerns the girl Tamasine.”

  But Ottilia regarded her brother with interest. “Detection, Patrick? Am I to understand the man of science is shifting his ground?”

  Patrick grinned. “You are very persuasive, sister mine.”

  “Isn’t she just?” put in her spouse.

  “Not that I’m convinced, but the flaw in Mrs Whiting’s testimony rankles.”

  “Yes, I do not think we can rule her out,” Ottilia agreed.

  “Or anyone, come to that,” Francis said on a note of irritation. “If you ask me, the lot of them are capable of murder.”

  “I’m afraid you are right, Fan. And that is not all, for we have still this fellow Simeon to take into account.”

  “Yes, but he wasn’t even here,” objected her spouse.

  “That doesn’t mean he is not culpable. I doubt some of Tamasine’s more bizarre notions came out of her own head.”

  “But how would he instruct her from a distance, if the wretche
d girl cannot read or write?”

  “An accomplice?” suggested Patrick.

  Francis jumped on this. “Someone on the spot, yes. But who?”

  Ottilia ran a mental eye across the inmates of the house. “Not Miss Ingleby, I think. Mrs Whiting perhaps. Or Lomax.”

  Francis was drumming his fingers on the table. “That fellow Hemp seems to be as thick as thieves with the chit.”

  The idea startled Ottilia, throwing doubt into her mind. She had thought to have conveniently pigeon-holed the footman into the Willow Court scenario, but had she overlooked this possibility? If she was right about Hemp, would he knowingly aid and abet the fellow Simeon in whatever scheme he had dreamed up? His grief had been real. He would not have connived in a plot to murder his master. The same applied to Cuffy. The fellow would have to be a supremely gifted actor to be as convincing as he had been. And had not Hemp told the boys Simeon was a lazy fellow? Did such an opinion preclude helping Tamasine to correspond with the man? For if one of them was writing on Tamasine’s behalf, it must surely be the educated Hemp.

  The silence at the table impinged upon her consciousness and Ottilia came to herself to find that both gentlemen were staring at her intently. “What?”

  “You were deep in thought. If I’ve learned nothing else in these months with you, my love, I’ve learned when to let you be.”

  Ottilia smiled as she put out her hand across the table. Francis took it and kissed her fingers, holding them lightly as he quirked one eyebrow. “Well?”

  “I don’t think either Hemp or Cuffy killed Sir Joslin,” she offered, giving a brief summary of her reasoning.

  “Then that leaves Mrs Whiting, Lomax, the Ingleby woman and Tamasine herself,” Francis recited, ticking them off on his fingers.

  “And Simeon, I infer,” put in Patrick, “if only by proxy.”

  A flurry of footsteps in the hall interrupted the conference as Ben and Tom erupted into the dining-parlour, both out of breath and bursting with excitement.

  “And where, may I ask, have you been?” demanded their father, with an assumption of severity. “Absent without leave, and no message to explain —”

  “We did leave a message!” broke in Tom. “At least, we would have left one, if we’d thought of it.”

  Noting Patrick’s twitching lip and Francis’s faintly raised eyebrow, Ottilia quickly intervened. “You look as if you are big with news, the two of you. What is afoot?”

  As one, the boys dashed past their father and crowded about Ottilia’s chair, almost falling over their words in their hurry to get them out.

  “We’ve been talking to Hemp and Cuffy, Auntilla,” disclosed Ben.

  “Yes, and you’ll never believe what they told us!”

  “It’s about the madwoman.”

  “Tamasine?” asked Ottilia.

  “Not that madwoman, the other one,” came scornfully from Tom, as if she should have known.

  His brother cuffed him. “Let me tell it, you’re not making sense.” Ignoring Tom’s loud-voiced protest, Ben turned back to Ottilia. “It’s the madwoman’s mother, Auntilla. You know, the one they call Florine.”

  “She was mad too,” put in Tom irrepressibly.

  “What about her?” asked Ottilia, trying to stem the tide.

  “I’ll wager you don’t know how she died,” said Ben, blue eyes fairly blazing with excitement.

  Ottilia’s heart missed a beat as her mind took a leap and she eyed Ben’s angelic features with concentrated attention. “Tell me.”

  Tom elbowed his brother in the ribs, glee in his face. “Go on, Ben.”

  “She got poisoned too. With opium.”

  Chapter 10

  The drive from Polbrook to Willow Court was relatively short, but Giles took it at an easy pace, having a care for his horses. His conscience pricked him, for while his black mood held, he had driven the greys into a lather, careering about the countryside in a vain attempt to throw off the memories invoked by his grandmother’s words.

  Failing to find relief, he sought it instead in the brandy bottle and the effects of his potations kept him at home while his father and the Frenchwoman he was obliged to acknowledge as stepmother showed themselves in church for Sunday Service, accompanied by his two half-siblings. He could wish his sister had not retired to stay with their Aunt Harriet the moment the festivities had concluded. He might have confided in Candia, for she was never critical. They had besides grown closer through the adversity of recent events. If the worst came to the worst, he could follow her to the Dalesford’s estate.

  His distresses subsiding, the reflection struck him he had failed to attend upon Tamasine for too many days, which scarcely accorded with the conduct of an affianced husband.

  Honesty compelled Giles to admit a faint reluctance to present himself at Willow Court. Not that he was in any way regretting his hasty proposal. He wanted nothing more in life than to marry Tamasine, yet unworthy doubts plagued him of her mental capacities.

  The blame lay with his relatives, and with Phoebe’s forthright condemnation. Giles would not have thought it of her, and was inclined to resent her attitude. Anyone might suppose her all but jilted, which certainly was not the case. He had never given her reason to think he would fall in with the scheme concocted by their respective fathers. Nor had she shown any disposition to encourage such a match.

  His sense of ill-usage grew. By heaven, but apart from his sister, he was unlucky in his association with females! Not only did the girl he had hitherto considered his greatest friend condemn him, but the chit with whom he’d fallen in love had jockeyed him into making a declaration before he’d had time to consider his position.

  The infelicity of this thought jabbed into his mind and he tried to quash it. Had Tamasine not been such an innocent, he might with justice make the complaint. But her charm lay in the natural insouciance that paid little heed to the dictates of convention. He admired that in her. If there was a sneaking traitorous thought that such a wayward character did not augur well for a future marchioness, Giles was resolute in crushing it out of existence.

  But he could not avoid the lessening of enthusiasm with which he directed his cattle towards the dwelling of his inamorata. He must set that down to the slight headache that still afflicted him from his depredations upon the brandy bottle.

  Pulling himself together, he turned the equipage into the drive and trotted the greys around behind the house to the stable block. His groom jumped down and went to the horses’ heads, steadying them even as one of the stable lads came out to his assistance, and Giles was able to alight.

  “Giles!”

  The cry came from behind, and he turned to find Tamasine coming towards him from the vegetable garden situated at a little distance from the stables. The brightness of her welcoming smile in the matchless countenance set his doubts to rest, and Giles strode forward to meet her.

  “You must forgive my tardiness.” He hunted for a plausible excuse. “I was detained on business and I would not disturb you on a Sunday.”

  Tamasine did not appear in the least put out. She smiled sunnily upon him as she came up, putting out her hands. “They are all gone and you can know the secret first.”

  Giles took her hands and raised first one and then the other to his lips. “You are as lovely as ever.”

  Her delighted laughter smote his ears. Belatedly he took in the import of her words. He looked down into her innocent orbs and sighed anew at the sheer impact of her beauty.

  “But it is our secret, my dearest, is it not? I already know it.”

  Tamasine did not respond to this sally, but pulled her hands away and turned. Her wave drew attention to a figure a few paces behind, which Giles had not noticed until this instant.

  “Simeon, come!”

  He stared blankly at the gentleman addressed, his hackles instinctively rising as he took in the bland good looks and easy carriage. As the man approached, he noted dark locks falling from under a beaver hat, a tall and we
ll-formed figure and features that placed the fellow’s age at a few years his senior.

  “Lord Bennifield, I infer?”

  The newcomer sketched a slight bow with a careless grace that made Giles set his jaw.

  “You have the advantage of me, sir.”

  “Simeon Roy, my lord. I am Tamasine’s cousin, you must know.”

  The implication struck Giles like a blow. This was the fellow concerned in Tamasine’s “reckoning”. They had sworn vengeance together, she’d said. He wondered uneasily if he had been too sanguine in supposing it had been a joke between them.

  “Simeon has come,” Tamasine announced unnecessarily. “I knew he would. I told them all. And he will avenge me.” She turned a glowing face towards the man. “Won’t you, Simeon?”

  The fellow Roy gave an indulgent laugh that grated on Giles’s ear, and his tone was positively avuncular. “I am your obedient servant to command, my dear Tam.”

  “Yes, and they will be sorry.” Gleeful, she turned back to Giles. “Simeon won’t let them put me in my eyrie, and I can wander as much as I like.”

  “As long as you don’t set the countryside by the ears, my pet.”

  A form of address that could not but revolt. As if the girl was a dog. To Giles’s satisfaction, Tamasine ignored the remark, addressing herself to him instead.

  “Joslin wouldn’t let him come, but now he’s dead and he can’t stop Simeon any more.”

  A twinge of something like disgust attacked Giles, but he brushed it aside, and tried to capture her hand, speaking in a low tone meant for her ears alone. “Can we talk, Tamasine? Where is Miss Ingleby?”

  To his chagrin, Roy chose to answer this. “I gather that Lavinia, along with Lomax and Mrs Whiting, has gone to attend the inquest. I found little Tam here in the charge of Hemp.”

  Shock jerked at Giles. “Inquest? So soon?”

  Why had no one mentioned it to him? Not that he had been next or nigh the Dower House since Grandmama chose to ally herself in the enemy camp. But his uncle Francis might have sent him word. Especially as there had been this ridiculous notion that he could be involved in Sir Joslin’s death, merely because of his association with Tamasine. His chagrin increased when Roy answered on Tamasine’s behalf.