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

by Elizabeth Bailey

  “Come, child, why did you send for me? What is the matter?”

  Gathering her courage, Phoebe looked him in the eye. “I believe Giles is cured of his tendre for — for the girl. But…”

  “But?”

  She swallowed. “It is this open verdict, Robert. I had not realised you were no longer involved in the investigation.”

  “And if I were?”

  “Well … well, even if you are not, I felt I could not do better than to consult you.”

  His brows rose. “What has this to do with your young gentleman, my dear?”

  “Well, that is just it, Robert.” Her anxiety surfaced and she swept on. “Has it anything to do with him? He cannot be supposed to have plotted with Tamasine, can he? I know Sir Joslin did not approve his suit, but surely you cannot suppose Giles would go so far as to help her dispose of her guardian?”

  Robert’s expression altered, and a measure of his customary disdain entered in. “This is because of that business with his father, I take it? You are afraid of history repeating itself?”

  Phoebe gripped her fingers together in her lap, and nodded.

  “As I understand it, my dear, there was a cogent reason for Polbrook to be suspected of making away with his wife. It is manifest, now that he has married the creature.”

  “Yes, I know, but he did not do it, did he? Nor, I venture to say, would Giles dream of any such undertaking.”

  A faint smile curved Robert’s mouth. “My dear girl, there is no evidence to suggest Bennifield had anything to do with Sir Joslin’s death. Moreover, I could not find, from sifting the details of the inquest when I prepared the report for Lovell, that Miss Roy, despite her unfortunate condition, could have been instrumental in her guardian’s death.”

  “But Lady Francis believes he was murdered.”

  Robert’s tone became sceptical. “Yes, I have heard of the lady’s apparent prowess in that line, but I take leave to doubt of anything useful coming from her poking her nose into what does not concern her.”

  “It concerned her because Giles was involved,” Phoebe said, unable to help a resentful note. She had taken to Lady Francis Fanshawe and formed a good opinion of her common sense. “Her husband is his uncle, after all.”

  “I am perfectly well acquainted with Lord Francis, I thank you, Phoebe. I have known the family for some years. And I may say, I am in agreement with your father that if it were not for Polbrook’s rank and fortune, an alliance with them would be out of count.”

  “Well, it does not now look as if there will be an alliance, so Papa may rest easy,” Phoebe flashed.

  “Oho, so that is it, is it?” Robert’s look became indulgent. “My dear Phoebe, I trust you will think well before you throw away such an advantageous opportunity, merely upon a whim.”

  “A whim? When I have been insulted and degraded? Thrown aside as of no account?”

  At which inopportune moment, one of the footmen entered upon his knock and announced Lord Bennifield.

  Giles halted upon the threshold, his gaze going at once to Delaney, who rose to his feet. Phoebe felt a flush rising in her cheeks, her embarrassment in no way mitigated by what Robert chose to say.

  “Ah, Bennifield, there you are, my dear boy. I believe Lady Phoebe has something she wishes to say to you.”

  Phoebe kept her eyes lowered, a riot in her bosom as she heard Giles’s response and recognised an unwonted humility in his tone.

  “How do you do, sir? Am I intruding?”

  “I will be leaving directly. Phoebe desired my — er — advice.” A pause and then, “Phoebe, my dear?”

  She looked up. “Yes, Robert?”

  “Send for your maid, my child. Unless you would wish me to remain?”

  “No!” Realising this was scarcely polite, she amended it. “No, indeed, there is no necessity for either. We are accustomed to leave the door open whenever we —”

  She broke off, conscious all over again, and was unable to help shooting a look at Giles. He appeared pale, but his expression was determined. Lord help her! What did this visit betoken? What would she say if he meant to proffer an apology? She did not feel in the least little bit forgiving.

  Delaney looked from her to Giles and back again. Then he walked over to the door, pointedly setting it wide. He looked back to where Phoebe remained, still in her chair, her clenched hands on its arms.

  “Remember what I said, Phoebe.”

  She kept her eyes on him, refusing to look again at Giles. “Yes.” It was non-committal, but she did not feel like giving the assurance he sought. She was by no means certain she wished any longer to marry Giles, even should he offer for her, which she doubted was his present intention.

  Robert nodded at Giles and passed out of the room. Phoebe kept her gaze steadfastly on her lap. In the periphery of her vision she saw Giles approach. He did not sit, although Robert had left the chair conveniently placed. The silence lengthened.

  “Phoebe!”

  It was tensely said, a wealth of feeling in the one statement of her name.

  She could not prevent her eyes from rising to meet his. The green orbs were shadowed with fatigue. Or was it emotion? A pang smote her bosom.

  “You look dreadful.”

  He grimaced. “I feel it.”

  “You had best sit down before you fall down.”

  Aware her tone was grudging, Phoebe watched him drop into the chair, heavily, as if he were burdened with the weight of the world. A flash of memory struck her. Thus had he looked when first he had come to her after the death of his mother. Her heart ached. Had he truly loved Tamasine after all?

  “You are hurting, are you not, Giles?”

  It was not at all what she had meant to say. Nor had she dreamt of softening her tone towards him. He nodded dumbly, and Phoebe experienced a shaft of hatred for the mad girl. She wanted to rake her nails down that china doll of a face. The realisation brought her up short. Where was her dignity? It had lain in the dust long enough, had it not? She hardened her heart.

  “I dare say you will get over it in due course.”

  A flare at his eyes brought the old Giles back for an instant. Then it faded. He lifted his hands in a hopeless gesture and Phoebe was shocked to see a tremor in his fingers.

  “I deserved that perhaps.” He drew in a breath. “No, not perhaps. I did deserve it.”

  “It was not meant to flay you, Giles.”

  He bit his lip. “Then it should have been.”

  Another silence fell. Phoebe felt as if her heart cracked aloud and she had all to do to remain quiescent in her chair. She did not know whether she wanted to slap him or throw herself into his embrace. Both probably. How dared he come to her in such a guise? Bemoaning his lost love and abasing himself in a fashion as lamentable as it was unnerving. Never before had she seen him lose his assurance so completely. Phoebe could not endure it.

  “Don’t do this, Giles!”

  His brow furrowed. “Do what?”

  “Scourge yourself as if you have broken the Ten Commandments. For heaven’s sake, stand proud!”

  A mirthless laugh escaped him. “Proud? After what has passed? I’ve been fifty kinds of a fool.”

  “You have indeed, but that is no reason to bow your head and beg for my sympathy.”

  His eyes flared again at that. “I’m not begging for sympathy!”

  “Then what are you doing, may I ask?”

  He flung up off the chair. “Begging for forgiveness, you impossible female! Or I would do, if you would not take up such an intransigent attitude.”

  Phoebe was likewise on her feet. “What attitude did you expect? I’ve been humiliated, assaulted and cast aside like an old glove. By rights I ought to beat you about the head with a footstool!”

  “Well, do it then! I don’t care what you do to me, if you will only cease behaving like a tragedy queen!”

  “Tragedy queen? How dare you!”

  All control gone, Phoebe swung her arm, her hand flying towa
rds his face. Giles caught her wrist and held her off, glaring with a violence to match her own.

  “No, you don’t, you little shrew?”

  “Let me go, you brute!”

  “Never in this life!”

  She let out a strangled scream of rage, trying to wrench her arm away. For an eon the issue hung in the balance as she struggled against his iron grip. Then a tide of colour overspread his features.

  “What in hell’s name am I doing?”

  He let her go so suddenly that she almost fell. Giles stepped forward and caught her. Phoebe froze in his clutch, her heart leaping like a scalded cat.

  “Phoebe…”

  It was guttural. Instinct told her what it meant, but the fleeting thought was overborne as Giles jerked her hard against him and set his lips to hers and the world exploded.

  Sensation was all she knew for a while and she came adrift at last with her heart singing and her eyes opened to a wild look in Giles’s eyes as they seemed to devour her face.

  “Phoebe, I didn’t know. I swear I didn’t know.”

  Did not know his own heart? But she did not ask, a hushed expectancy warning her that words alone would never serve the moment. She brought up one hand and brushed his lip with her finger. Then she smiled at him.

  “You know now.”

  Leaving her spouse and Patrick in the front parlour, Ottilia penetrated to the nether regions of the establishment, following Cuffy, who had let them in, and walking boldly through the green baize door and into the usual rabbit warren of corridors that comprised the servants’ quarters.

  Discovering her on his tail, the footman turned, exhibiting some degree of astonishment. “You wish for something, madame?”

  Ottilia smiled. “Indeed I do. Pray be good enough to conduct me to Mrs Whiting’s room.”

  Cuffy hesitated, but she stared him out and at length he nodded without comment and turned to take the lead. Ottilia recalled the stillroom as she passed from the last time when she had inspected Mrs Whiting’s books, although she could not remember the precise route. Noise and chatter from the kitchen reached her, along with the aroma of spices, coffee and the inevitable smell of half-cooked vegetables.

  The housekeeper was at her desk, writing in a ledger and looked none too pleased at Ottilia’s invasion. Forestalling criticism, she got in first.

  “I trust you will not object to my calling upon you here, Mrs Whiting. I have been requested by Mrs Delabole to discover anything I can to shed light upon the mystery of Sir Joslin’s death.”

  The housekeeper humphed and set down her quill in its receptacle on a china ink stand. “I don’t recollect as you needed anyone’s permission at the off, my lady.”

  Touché! But Ottilia let it pass, calmly taking possession of a chair set by the wall and bringing it close enough to converse. The place was cramped, the inevitable locked cupboard taking up the bulk of the available space. The desk was little more than an aged writing bureau and a comfortable cushioned armchair took prominence near the door, a footstool before it and an occasional table to one side.

  Ottilia set her chair between the footstool and the desk, beginning without further preamble. “Would you object to telling me more of your erstwhile mistress? I mean Tamasine’s mother Florine.”

  She was quick to note the tell-tale flutter of a couple of fingers where Mrs Whiting’s hands now rested in her lap, the moistening tip of a tongue catching at her lower lip.

  “What did you wish to know?”

  A good question. One could hardly give utterance to the uppermost thought. Ottilia tried an oblique approach, albeit touching on the meat of the matter. “I gather she was eventually found to be too prone to mischief to be permitted to roam abroad.”

  A snorting laugh escaped Mrs Whiting. “Mischief? You could call it so. Yes, we had to shut her away. For her own good as much as anyone else’s.”

  “As you did Tamasine the other night?”

  The woman flinched. “How do you know that?”

  “Come, Mrs Whiting, let us be frank. The girl is deteriorating, is she not? Is it the transition to this country, do you think? Or the unsettling events that have occurred? I cannot imagine it has been anything but deleterious to have her in such an excitable state.”

  The housekeeper let out her breath in a whoosh. “You have no idea! If only the Master hadn’t died and we’d not to bring her to England, I could’ve kept her calm in the places she knew. We had to put her back in the attic last night and all, for she went off into one of her fits when Mrs Delabole tried to reason with her.”

  Ottilia could not but feel sympathy for the aunt, thrust into a situation of which she was fairly ignorant. “What happened?”

  “I scarcely know. It were all chaos by the time I got into the dining parlour, which is where it all started. There was Master Roy, who had grabbed hold of young Tam, and what with her screaming the way she does and Miss Ingleby screeching at Master Roy, and poor Mrs Delabole with her hands over her ears and looking bewildered, I can tell you, ma’am, it was a right do.”

  “It sounds so indeed. Did you not at once call for Hemp? He seems to be eminently capable of controlling Tamasine.”

  “Yes, but Hemp wasn’t there, for now Master Jos has gone he’s the only one who can drive the carriage and Lomax sent him for supplies, what with the company augmented beyond our expectations and Cook threatening to give notice. I tell you, it took Simeon Roy and Cuffy both to get Miss Tam up to the attic and I had the devil’s own job to get a dose into her too.”

  The housekeeper’s unusual garrulity spoke her anxiety more than the creases of concern in her face. Ottilia knew not what to say to mitigate the horrors of an evidently painful scene. But she need not have been concerned for Mrs Whiting sighed with a sound of defeat.

  “It’s a nightmare, ma’am, the whole thing. God knows what’ll happen now! With Master Jos gone, and this Mrs Delabole with a numerous family of her own and vowing she can’t have Tamasine in the house upsetting her own brood. Not that I blame her after last night, for she’s a mother and she’s to think for her chicks. But what’s to become of the poor child, that’s what I’d like to know?”

  “Indeed.” Relieved at the woman’s access of sudden confidences, Ottilia took immediate advantage. “How would you have managed her in Barbados?”

  “Put her in the same house we kitted out for the mistress. She’d the run of the place, and as long as I kept the dosage up, she weren’t too much trouble.”

  “You had charge of her?”

  “She’d a couple of slave minders in there with her, but I supervised it all, yes.”

  The moment seemed propitious. Could she probe now? “Mrs Whiting, is it true that Florine attacked Sir Joslin?”

  There was no mistaking the sudden fury in the woman’s eyes. “Who told you?”

  Ottilia ignored this. “You see, Tamasine seems to be under the illusion that the position was reversed. She seems to believe Sir Joslin had a hand in her mother’s death.”

  She had expected a scornful rebuttal. It did not come. The housekeeper eyed her, chewing her lip the while. Ottilia waited, and was rewarded.

  “The child’s confused. Likely she’s been fed such lies.”

  Ottilia’s mind took a leap. “By Simeon Roy?”

  Now the scorn came, evident in a curled lip and a cold stare. “He’d say anything to gain a point. Foolish boy! To think he could make a wife of the girl. Did he suppose Master Matt had not tried it before him? Aye, and failed miserably. I could have told him, for I’ve seen her worsen as the years have gone by, just like her ma.”

  “You were with Florine before she married Matthew Roy?”

  “Me and Lomax both. We come with the property. I knew the mistress from a child.”

  “That’s why you were detailed to care for her needs?”

  “I knew how to do. Been doing it for years.”

  The woman was well softened up now. Ottilia dared to probe the mystery at the forefront of her mi
nd. “Mrs Whiting, there is one other thing I meant to ask you.” She paused, letting the tension grow as the housekeeper’s expression became wary. “It is about the Flora Sugar confections.”

  “Confections?”

  Was that a flash of fear? Ottilia dug in. “I found them in Sir Joslin’s drawer.”

  “Ah, yes.” A faint breath. Relief? “He was fond of those. We brought packets and packets with us.”

  “And you feed them to Tamasine?”

  “Why shouldn’t she have them? Little enough pleasure she has as it is.”

  Ottilia pounced. “What about those large ones? The laudanum sweets?”

  Was it a faint look of alarm in the woman’s eyes? To Ottilia’s chagrin, a commotion in the corridor beyond cut off the interview. Voices were raised, and the door swung open in a bang. Hemp looked into the room, his face grim.

  “Miss Tam has escaped, Mrs Whiting.”

  “Oh, mercy me, here we go again!”

  Mrs Whiting leapt up with alacrity, waddling purposefully into the corridor as Hemp vanished from sight. Ottilia followed more slowly, cursing the ill timing of this interruption. Hemp was ahead, pounding towards the hall, Cuffy in pursuit and the housekeeper steaming along behind. None paid the least heed to Ottilia in the rear.

  She reached the hall behind the rest and caught sight of Francis looking towards the green baize door, his gaze anxious. She waved and he pushed through to her side.

  “Thank the lord you’ve come back! The place is in uproar.”

  Her spouse did not exaggerate. Mrs Delabole was standing just in front of the bookroom door, looking bewildered. Hemp and Cuffy were deep in discussion, but Miss Ingleby overbore the male voices as she rounded on the housekeeper.

  “I told you not to let her out too soon. Did you not give her the laudanum last night?”