The Convenient Murder

by Clare Jayne

  She scrunched up her face. “No and I can think of little else. Did you hear that Lady Strand has also been murdered?”

  “Yes. Her son must be devastated.”

  “Indeed. If the killer wishes harm to the whole family, he might not be safe either. I spoke only a handful of words to Lady Strand but she seemed such a quiet, meek woman I cannot imagine anyone hating her.”

  “While I do not seek any particular knowledge of such things, I have read enough newssheet accounts of murders to know that other emotions can be just as destructive.”

  She stopped and he did the same. “What emotions?”

  “Greed can lead to murder. So can a jealous or possessive kind of love.”

  “Yes.” She thought this over. “I had not considered that.”

  Chapter Forty-Four

  “I DO not believe that the idea of a vendetta is a sound one after all,” Mr Williamson said when they met him at his home the next day. Ishbel could hear his children playing and laughing in the garden outside as they sat in his drawing room and conversed.

  “Why do you say that?” she asked. She had been hoping this would provide the solution, since they had no other likely suspect left.

  “The young lady who Lord Strand wronged managed to find a husband a couple of years after the family moved to Glasgow and she is reportedly very happy with him. The rest of her family are still with her in Glasgow, with the exception of a younger brother, who emigrated to America. I have had confirmation that they were all far from here when Lord and Lady Strand were killed.”

  She and Ewan told him what Miss Chiverton had discovered about Lady Tabor and described their meeting with her. Ewan added, “She is still a suspect in our eyes, but we are at a loss to understand why she or anyone else would kill Lady Strand.”

  “It is possible that no one wished her dead,” Mr Williamson suggested, “and that she somehow guessed who had murdered her husband.”

  “So she was killed to stop her revealing that information,” Ishbel concluded. “That seems more than possible.”

  “It would mean she must have seen something on the night Lord Strand was killed,” Ewan said.

  “I will ride to the family’s country estate tomorrow and speak to the servants again to find out who saw her last and what guest she might have seen.”

  “It is also possible that she knew the murderer and, rather than seeing anything, immediately suspected a particular person when her husband died. She did tell her son that she thought the murderer had tried to help them.”

  “Then why did he or she kill her?” Ewan asked.

  “Perhaps Lady Strand’s conscience bothered her or the murderer did not expect anyone to know who they were.”

  Mr Williamson said, “Then I will also ask the servants who Lady Strand spoke with on the night her husband died. It might tell us something useful. Would the two of you care to accompany me?”

  Ishbel looked at Ewan, who shrugged, leaving the decision to her. “I am sure you will find out anything important that the servants know,” she said to Mr Williamson. “If we stay here and speak to the current Lord Strand he may be able to tell us more about his mother’s acquaintances.”

  He agreed and they took their leave of him, leaving his house and walking over to their carriage. Ishbel paused beside it. “Who would you say Lady Strand and her son would have been most likely to turn to for help?”

  Ewan stopped close to her and considered this for a moment. “Mr McIntoll?”

  “Yes. That is what I think.”

  But, if they were right, how could an attempt to help her have led to Lady Strand’s death?

  Chapter Forty-Five

  “...AND THEN Lizzie told me... Jed! You’re not listening.”

  Jed put down his mug and reached out to tousle the blond curls of his youngest brother. They were sitting at the dining table in his family’s home, which was far too small for a family with eight children, but Jed was just grateful that Harry was here with him, as energetic and talkative as ever, when a year ago the lad had nearly died. In desperation, when none of Ma’s remedies worked, Jed had sent for a physician, who had bled Harry to bring down the fever and had treated the wet cough that had plagued the boy for a month. It had taken Jed six months to make enough money to pay off the physician’s fee but it was more than worth it to have his brother alive and well again. “You tell me the full story tomorrow and I promise I’ll listen to every word. For now I need to find out about a kerchief.”

  “A kerchief?”

  Jed got up and leaned over to kiss the top of his brother’s head. “Tell Ma I might be out late.”

  He left the house and hurried through the cold smelly streets. With all his contacts, it did not take him long to track down the thin thief again. He had not been told to arrest the lad who had stolen from Lady Strand, so he had let the man go, telling him – probably to no avail – to get an honest job.

  Jed heard the man’s lilting Welsh accent before he saw him in the busy tavern and he followed the sound to the dark-haired, neatly dressed man. The thief – Ianto Morgan – caught sight of him and his words tailed off, a wary look entering the dark eyes. Perhaps he was wondering what fresh crime Jed might be after him for.

  Jed waved him over and, with a quick glance at the tavern door and a smiling apology to the ladies he had been talking to, Morgan joined him. “I just have one more question about the theft at Lady Strand’s house.” It would probably turn out to be nothing, but Jed had not been able to shake the conviction that he had failed to ask the right question when he had last had the thief in his grasp.

  Morgan’s expression cleared at Jed’s words. “Would the answer to this question be worth anything?” he asked and, with that kind of nerve, Jed began to see why the man could afford to dress smartly.

  Jed checked what coins he had in his pocket and withdrew the smallest, aware that he was probably about to lose it for no good reason. “Tell me about the handkerchief.”

  Morgan gave a lazy smile, as if the question made perfect sense to him. “McIntoll asked me to get it for him: something personal belonging to the lady of the house. A fond keepsake, perhaps?”

  Jed handed over the coin with a grin, pleased that his instincts had led him right. “Aye, I think that’s just what it was.”

  It was dark outside and colder than ever after the heat from the tavern fireplace. It was too late to go to Mr and Mrs MacPherson now, he decided. His discovery would have to wait until the morning. He doubted a few hours would make any difference.

  Chapter Forty-Six

  “I HAVE conversed with Mr McDonald’s mother on a number of social occasions,” Anne said to Miss Chiverton as they sat embroidering in the sewing room, “and she seems a very pleasant good-natured lady. I am sure you will be happy sharing a house with her. Of course, it is the men you will have to obey: Mr McDonald and his father. The older Mr McDonald does not seem overly stern, though, and since you are fond of Mr Padraig McDonald I am sure you will find it easy to behave in a manner he finds acceptable.”

  Fiona suppressed a shudder at the idea of acting like a different person to please a man and put the unnecessary thought from her mind. They would not marry, although she would have to choose someone before too long. “Did you see Lady Strand talking to anyone at the dinner party at her estate?”

  Anne paused in her work, holding her needle over the piece of cloth. “Have you not forgotten about that yet? Why must put so much thought into such useless matters?”

  “I doubt the young Lord Strand would consider it useless.”

  “I am sure a gentleman is far more likely than you to be able to find out what happened to his parents.”

  “Once the matter is solved I will have no reason to give it another thought,” Fiona suggested.

  Anne sighed. “Very well. I will answer this one question and no more.” She looked upwards, as if searching her memories. “I saw Lady Strand greeting guests, including our party. Lord Strand spoke to you and t
hen we all went into the dining room. Lady Strand spoke to Mr McIntoll, but you must know that as you were beside him. I saw her speak to the guests on either side of her but in the way of answering their questions, not in the way of holding a conversation. Dinner ended and we mostly went to the ballroom where you danced with Lord Strand. Lady Strand spoke to a few ladies...”

  “Was Lady Tabor one of them?”

  “No. I never saw them speak.”

  “Who else.”

  Anne pursed her lips but gave the question thought. “I only saw her speaking once again to Mr McIntoll. He was most attentive and they danced together, although he was not graceful.”

  “Mr McIntoll... Mr McDonald was right.” She jumped up, nearly knocking over the small table beside her. She steadied it and dumped her embroidery on top of it.

  “What are you doing?” Anne asked, her voice growing high-pitched. “Where are you going?”

  “There is someone I must speak to,” Fiona said as she hurried out of the room. She was not certain how it all fitted together but she was sure that she was about to find out.

  She hurriedly changed into a more suitable dress, with the assistance of her confused lady’s maid, and grabbed her bonnet. She was running down the stairs in what was doubtless a thoroughly unladylike manner when Mr McDonald walked through the front door.

  “Oh, very well,” she said, not slowing down. “You may accompany me.”

  Mr McDonald and the butler exchanged a look before the gentleman followed her outside. “Where are we going?”

  His carriage was waiting nearby, which saved time, and she let him take her hand to help her into it. “We are going to ask Mr McIntoll whether or not he is a murderer.”

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  MR McDONALD had insisted on stopping to find a Town Guard to accompany them, which was tiresome, but Miss Chiverton could see that confronting a possible killer alone might not have been her most sensible of ideas. She had been so excited at the idea of having worked out who was the guilty party that she had not considered how Mr McIntoll might feel about being accused.

  They reached the gentleman’s house and Mr McDonald said to her, “Perhaps it would be wise for you to wait here.”

  “Aye, that would be for the best,” the grizzled officer sitting opposite her agreed.

  She did not even bother to give such words a response as she jumped down from the carriage and marched to the front door. The two men caught up with her as she rapped on it with the doorknocker. A butler opened the door and took in the party standing there with a frown.

  “We need to speak to Mr McIntoll immediately,” Fiona said.

  “Perhaps the rough-looking gentleman should remain outside,” the butler suggested and Fiona followed his gaze to the guard.

  “Yes,” she agreed with amusement. “Perhaps that would be for the best.”

  She turned away too soon to see his response and the butler led them to a parlour, vanished to speak to its inhabitant and then gestured for them to enter the room. “Should tea be served?” he checked with Mr McIntoll.

  “Yes, certainly.”

  Their host stood up to bow to them and Fiona responded with a curtsy, the everyday behaviour striking her as ridiculous given why they were here. She accepted the offer of a seat and the gentlemen sat down nearby.

  “This is a pleasant surprise,” Mr McIntoll said and she recalled that she had liked him when they were seated together at the dinner party at the late Lord Strand’s estate. He had an affable look about him with his greying hair and genial bearded face.

  “I know that you killed Lord Strand because he was cruel to his family and you were in love with Lady Strand.” She had not intended to speak in quite such a blunt manner but she saw that she was right from Mr McIntoll’s reaction. His expression went blank and then his eyes flashed with fear and he half rose out of his chair before subsiding again.

  “I having been waiting for someone to confront me but I certainly did not anticipate that it would be you, my dear. Yes, I killed him. No one deserved it more.”

  “Then what happened?” she asked, ignoring the startled reactions of Mr McDonald and a footman to this confession. “How was it that Lady Strand died?”

  Mr McIntoll rubbed at his beard, a far away look in his eyes. “Do you know how long I loved her? Since before she ever married Lord Strand. I even spoke to her father but I was too poor and ordinary for his liking. If only I had managed to convince him... I watched over Hannah and her boy for so many years, seeing the misery inflicted on them by Strand, until I could take it no longer. He took the drink that I had poisoned behind his back without a qualm and even wished me good health as he drank from it. He was mocking me over my loss in a recent card game when the poison hit him and he still did not understand: he ordered me to fetch him assistance. I stood and watched him die and I felt no more guilt than I experienced earlier that day when I shot a rabbit. He deserved it. You cannot know what he was like.”

  “Did Lady Strand guess what you had done?” Fiona asked quietly, not wanting to completely pull him out of his remembrance.

  “Yes. She said nothing at first, shutting herself away from me in that terrible house. I did not see her again until she returned to Edinburgh and I asked her to meet me in secret in her garden. The moon was nearly full and she looked like a young woman again in its light.” He got up abruptly and Mr McDonald stiffened, watching what he would do, but Mr McIntoll simply walked across the room and poured himself a large glass of some alcohol that, as he returned to his chair, smelt like whiskey. “I had waited so long for her and this should have been the night that made it all worthwhile. I asked her to marry me...”

  He tailed off but Fiona could see the events now as if she had been there with them. “She turned you down.”

  “She said she would never marry again. I told her how much I had always loved her and she looked surprised. All that time and I had been sure she felt the same way that I did and longed for us to be together but it had never even occurred to her. She saw me as a friend and nothing more. Seeing myself through her eyes, I had an image of an old man whose entire life had amounted to nothing and I... I was not myself. You have to believe me. Her reaction ripped at something inside me and I turned into someone unrecognisable. I was hardly aware that my hands were round her throat until I became myself again and saw her dead at my feet.”

  Fiona stood up. “Do you understand that you must be arrested and stand trial for the murders?”

  He stared up at her, fear in his eyes. “No! I will admit to killing Strand but not her. Anthony, her son, is the only person akin to family that I have left and he would never forgive me if he knew. Spare me that.”

  She was half tempted to agree. He had killed two people and all she felt for him was pity. It was not her decision, though, and the dead woman deserved the justice of having her murderer named. “I cannot help you. I am sorry.”

  “Then so am I.”

  She ordered the footman to fetch the Town Guard as Mr McIntoll moved, lurching out of his seat and racing through a second door. She paused impatiently at this door and when the guard ran in she told him, “This way.”

  They all followed the fleeing man, cornering him as he tried to unlock a back door to the house. The wild-looking guard pointed a musket at Mr McIntoll and said, “I am here to arrest you.”

  “For the murder of Lord and Lady Strand,” Fiona told him. “He admitted as much.”

  The guard only glanced at her for a second, hearing exactly what crime had been committed for the first time, but Mr McIntoll used that instant of distraction to throw himself at the man, trying to grab the gun. They fought for it and the weapon discharged with an almost deafening noise that made Fiona shriek.

  Mr McIntoll seemed equally shocked and let go of the gun, which the guard used to hit him with. Mr McIntoll fell down seconds after the thump of another body. Confused, Fiona turned round to see Mr McDonald lying on the wooden boards, clutching at a wound on his che
st that was staining his clothes red.

  Her mind struggled to recognise the people who appeared behind him as her friends, Mr and Mrs MacPherson. Focused on Mr McDonald and full of panic, she said, “Someone, send for a physician at once.”

  Chapter Forty-Eight

  MR McINTOLL had been arrested and taken away by the Town Guard but the rest of the group had had to stay at Mr McIntoll’s house. Mrs MacPherson had been the one to say that Mr McDonald must not be transported anywhere or he might lose more blood, which could prove fatal. Mrs MacPherson had then instructed someone to press on the wound while the footmen carefully carried him to a bed upstairs. Fiona had done nothing. Mr McDonald had only been here because of her and she could not help him in any way. He might die...

  “Are you all right?” Mrs MacPherson asked her, while they waited outside a closed door for the physician to tell them Mr McDonald’s fate. “You should sit down.”

  Fiona allowed Mrs MacPherson to lead her where she wished and obediently sat where she was told. “This is my fault.”

  “You did not shoot the musket.” Mrs MacPherson crouched down beside her chair and took her hands. “I have been in this position too, seeing Ewan hurt as a result of our work searching for criminals.”

  “But Mr McDonald wanted nothing to do with it. He accompanied me to Mr McIntoll’s house only because he happened to call on me as I was leaving. I never thought there would be any danger. How could I have been so naive?” If he died it would be on her conscience for the rest of her life. He was a good man and he should not have been at the house with a killer.

  “You care for him.”

  “Of course I do.” She spoke without thinking and now that she took in what she had said, she realised how true it was. She had always resented Mr McDonald’s interference in her life but a life without him seemed oddly empty. “I cannot marry him.”

  “It would not be entirely inconvenient,” Mrs MacPherson suggested. “You are, after all, engaged to him.”