Chapter Eleven

“I ’m not convinced she did it,” Constance said, when she was finally alone with Grey.

They had just finished tea with everyone else, during which Grey had told the company in tones of disappointment that the police did not believe that any of the servants—including Owen the boot boy—knew who took the murder weapon from the kitchen. Though Constance had surreptitiously observed the expressions around the table, she saw nothing out of the ordinary. If the killer sat among them, he probably knew perfectly well that no one had seen him—or her—steal the knife.

Now they were taking a walk, since Miriam was using their previous meeting place to write her letters.

“Not convinced that she did it,” Grey repeated. “That is not quite a ringing endorsement of her innocence.”

“No,” Constance allowed. “You see, she has the strength and all that emotion churning below the surface. She was hurt enough and angry enough, possibly even tipped over the edge of sanity… And yet she did not feel guilty. Of adultery, yes—of the greater crime, no.”

He regarded her quizzically. “Do you always know when your own girls are guilty of something?”

“Yes.”

“Because they confess?”

“Usually, they do. They are not afraid of me, you see. But that’s not how I know.”

“You know because they feel guilty?”

“You are laughing at me,” she said without heat. “But they do. Sometimes, you just have to ask the right questions to bring it to the surface.”

“Perhaps you did not ask Mrs. Bolton the right question.”

“Perhaps,” she agreed with reluctance. As they emerged onto a well-trodden path, she caught sight of Inspector Harris and Sergeant Flynn striding ahead. “Aha!”

Without thought, she grasped Grey’s arm and sped after them. He, after a startled resistance, just lengthened his stride and kept up easily with her trot. No doubt hearing the charge, both policemen turned and then paused for them to catch up.

“Something to tell us?” Harris asked.

“Something to tell us ?” Constance countered.

“No,” Harris said bluntly.

“Pity. Did Mrs. Bolton confess to her affair with Mr. Winsom?”

Harris stared through her.

Grey sighed. “You have Mrs. Silver to thank for that, you know. She sent her back to you when Mrs. Bolton confessed to her.”

Harris scowled. The sergeant grinned before composing his face more seriously in response to Harris’s glower.

“Do you know who committed the crime?” Grey asked.

Harris cleared his brow with apparent effort. “Not yet. They all seem to have a reason, and whatever their spouses say, they all had opportunity.”

“Except the youngest girl,” Flynn said. “I don’t see what her motive is.”

“Because you’re not looking beyond her pretty face,” Harris retorted, and Flynn blushed.

“Thank you for ruling us out,” Grey said.

“I haven’t,” said Harris. “I was just being polite.”

“I like you, inspector,” Constance said, smiling at him. He looked more alarmed than gratified, but before he could say anything, she asked, “Where are you going? Surely not back to London?”

“No, we have rooms at the village inn.”

“Excellent. Then we’ll walk with you and compare notes.”

“No, we won’t,” Harris said. “How many people do you think will talk to me if they know I’ll tell everyone else?”

“How many are talking to you now?” Grey inquired. “With any semblance of truth?”

“Oh, there’s truth in what most of them say. They just don’t tell me everything.”

Harris did not object any further to their presence. The brisk walk was pleasant, and as the sun came out, Constance realized she had no desire to return to Greenforth just yet. It was going to be a lovely evening. She liked the warmth on her face and the scent of grass and wild rosemary and a hint of roses on the breeze. And the gentle countryside was pretty. She felt oddly comfortable in this motley company.

It sounded like a joke one of her clients would tell: A gentleman, a policeman, and a madam walked into an inn …

“What happened at the inquest?” Constance asked. Grey hadn’t got around to telling her, although he had attended to give his evidence of the body’s discovery.

“Nothing unexpected,” Harris said. “Murder by person or persons unknown.”

“Seems pointless to go all that trouble to state the obvious.”

“Procedure must be followed,” Harris said sternly.

The path led into the village up the side of the inn. Flynn opened the gate, and Grey stood aside for Constance to precede them, just as though she were a lady.

“Back door,” Harris said abruptly. “Right.”

Constance could not help glancing left toward the front door. Randolph and Ivor Davidson sat together at the outside table, glasses of ale before them. Obediently she turned right. Harris led the way through the back to a pleasant coffee room where they were the only customers.

Grey ordered ale for three and a glass of rather good French wine for Constance.

“Well, Mrs. Goldrich ,” Harris said with faint mockery, jerking his head in the general direction of Randolph and Davidson, “what do you make of those two? Plotting together?”

“Only up to a point,” she replied. “Davidson, you know, is young Ellen’s possible motive.”

This time it was Flynn who frowned. Interesting.

“How so?” Harris demanded.

“He was flirting with her—possibly to annoy her father, who had just refused to invest in his latest venture, or perhaps he fancied an heiress for a wife.”

“Sounds more like Davidson’s motive to me,” Flynn said. “She’s little more than a child.”

“True, but don’t be fooled. There is hidden steel behind that sweetness.”

“There is sweetness?” Flynn asked in a slightly odd voice, as though he doubted it and believed it at the same time. Or wanted to.

“Oh yes. She is struggling and somewhat lost. I doubt you have seen her at her best.”

Harris pounced. “Meaning she’s protecting someone?”

“They’re all protecting someone,” Grey said broodingly. “Not necessarily the same someone, either.”

“Who’s your money on, then, sir?” Flynn asked, and received another scowl from Harris.

“I don’t have enough information,” Grey said.

“Evasion,” Constance accused him.

“What about you, ma’am?” Flynn asked.

“Davidson,” she said. “He’s still sucking up to one of the Winsom children. And you, inspector?”

Harris hesitated, turning his glass on the table. Then he said decisively, “Mrs. Bolton. She had the best motive and opportunity. She admitted being with him during the time he probably died.” He met Constance’s gaze. “You don’t agree with me?”

“I don’t think I do,” she replied. “The knife was stolen from the kitchen the night before, before Mrs. Winsom had delivered her congé. And besides, she didn’t return to the house over the flowerbed.”

The policemen looked baffled until Grey explained her theory of the trampled flowerbeds and the mud on the shoes of Davidson, Randolph, and Mrs. Winsom.

“The other reason I suspect Davidson,” she said.

“Not Randolph, who inherits everything?”

“He doesn’t really want to inherit the business,” Constance said, her voice just a little too defensive. She didn’t want the killer to be any of the Winsoms.

“I expect he’ll like the money, though,” Flynn said.

Grey looked at him. “Do you know much about the precise state of the bank and Winsom’s other businesses?”

“Do you?” Harris countered.

“Doing well, by all I could learn,” Grey said. “The bank—and Winsom himself—were well thought of.”

“But?” Harris asked with interest.

Grey shrugged. “But I’m going by hearsay, not by the books.”

“Flynn is going to the bank tomorrow to make general inquiries,” Harris said.

“Ask about a former employee who was dismissed for fraud,” Grey suggested. “Name of Framley. Apparently he bore a grudge, swore at Winsom in the street when he was in town with his family.”

“What for?” Flynn asked. “We’re looking at someone who was in the house at the time.”

“I know. It just nags at me.”

Flynn glanced at Harris, who nodded curtly.

“And what will you do tomorrow, inspector?” Constance asked.

“Look around. Speak to the widow again. And to Mrs. Bolton.”

“Not to Mr. Davidson?”

Harris regarded her over the top of his glass and said nothing.

“I could do that,” she offered.

Harris lowered his glass, scowling. “This is a police investigation. We are dealing with someone who committed premediated murder on a man he knew well. Stay away from it. Besides, we haven’t ruled you out as a suspect. Or Mr. Grey.”

Constance smiled. “Yes, you have, Mr. Harris, or you wouldn’t be talking about it to us at all.”

*

“Do you think that’s true?” Grey asked as they walked up from the village, where they had left the policemen to a hearty inn dinner. Randolph and Davidson had vanished, presumably back to Greenforth. “That Harris has ruled us out as suspects?”

“If he has, it’s because of you, not me. Neither of us has an alibi before midnight. On the other hand, neither of us has a motive in his eyes. If he knew my presence here had nothing to do with you, I’d leapfrog Mrs. Bolton to the top of his list.”

He looked down at her. The incongruous conviviality of their drink with the policemen seemed almost to have relaxed him. “I doubt you have a previous record of violence.”

“I learned early on to employ threat by proxy, namely that of large men.”

He lifted one eyebrow. “Are they kept busy?”

“No. But they are there.”

He looked away. She couldn’t tell if it was distaste or concern. But she had felt the hard muscle of his arms the first time she met him, when he pulled her from under the falling man in Coal Yard Lane. His kind of poise spoke of…preparedness.

“Are you a violent man, Solomon Grey?”

“What do you think?”

“I think you try too hard not to be read. But I would admit you to my salons.”

His gaze flew back to her, veiled as always, and yet she thought he was not pleased.

“It is a compliment,” she drawled. “Whatever you think.”

His lips twisted. “Probably one I don’t deserve. I am not a violent man, though I have always looked after my own. But what makes someone kill in one situation and not in another? If our culprit was easily spotted as a murderer, no one would have gone near him.”

She looked behind the words, behind the elegance and self-confidence, and still saw a man too much alone and too self-reliant. Like her, only he let no one near at all.

“What situation would it take for you to have murdered Walter Winsom?”

He met her gaze. “If he had harmed my brother.”

Her heart thudded. “Did he?”

“No. I had already found the proof before you entered the library the night he died. He was aboard the wrong ship at the wrong time.”

“And now you feel so guilty for your suspicions that you want to solve his murder.”

“Perhaps. Partly.”

“What was your brother’s name?”

He looked startled. “David.”

“Does he have to have been harmed? Couldn’t he have run away and lived his own life? Was he older than you?”

“Why else would he not have contacted me? He was a child, no older than me.” He glanced away from her. “He was my twin.”

She felt it then, the wave of bewildered grief and unbearable loneliness that never left him. Where there had been two, there was suddenly one. Still one. There was nothing she could say to ease that. Nothing she could do, not for him. Even an understanding touch of his hand would be intolerable. Especially, perhaps, from her.

And yet he had told her.

She walked along beside him in silent solidarity. After a while, he turned his head toward her once more.

At the narrow stream, easily crossed with a large step, he took her hand to help her. He didn’t like what she was, but he always treated her as a lady. At the other side, he placed her hand on his arm and they walked on to the house together. She felt almost…close to him.

*

Constance was tired enough to fall asleep almost as soon as her head touched the pillow, but she woke up early, disturbed by dreams of moonlight, blood, and threatening shadows that lunged into life, straight at her.

She lay still in the darkness, the dreams fading, even as she tried to grasp them. Unpleasant or not, there could have been something buried there that she really needed to know.

The first hesitant chirps of waking birds brought the same relief they always had, the promise of daylight after another night survived. A door to lock was a gift beyond price. She had locked her bedroom door here since the murder. She suspected everyone did—except perhaps the murderer.

She had told Inspector Harris her money was on Ivor Davidson, as though he were some promising horse in the next race at Newmarket. And in truth, she had as little faith in her choice. She knew nothing against him except her dislike of a mature man flirting with a girl almost young enough to be his daughter, and the fact that his shoes had been muddy, which could have had any number of reasons.

Harris, who had more experience of murderers, thought it was Mrs. Bolton. Winsom had carried her handkerchief like an accusation, and she could have guessed long before their last meeting that he was going to end their affair. There could have been some slow buildup of pain and rage in her, culminating in that lethal lunge… Like Constance’s dream.

She shivered. The lovers had met in moonlight, in the garden where anyone could have seen them. The swing was not visible from most of the bedchamber windows, but the attic ones were probably high enough. Besides, anyone could have walked that way. Had someone else seen them? Mrs. Winsom, perhaps. What if she had mistaken a final parting for an assignation?

How did one conduct such an affair, in any case? Surely the two couples had met together often, frequently at Greenforth, from what she had gathered. So where did they tryst? None of them had separate bedchambers here, and she could not imagine the dignified Mrs. Bolton being tumbled in the barn or tussling in the woods.

She rose and pulled back the curtains, looking for outhouses that might be more comfortable than they appeared. But what caught her eye was to the left, the old, crumbling stone of the disused wing, a place where the Winsom children had played before Randolph fell through the ceiling and it was blocked off.

Why had they never renovated it? The Winsoms were surely wealthy enough, although Grey had thought much of their money was tied up in the bank.

On impulse, Constance turned away, seized yesterday’s morning dress, and dropped it over her nightgown. She didn’t trouble to fasten it, merely whisked a shawl around her shoulders. Without the crinoline, she had to gather up the skirts over one arm. If she ran into anyone she would look damned odd, but it was still better than being caught in her nightgown. Although it was beginning to get light, she lit the lamp. After all, the old wing’s windows were boarded up.

With her feet in her soft slippers, she made little sound as she walked to the door. Unlocking it carefully produced only a slight click. She slipped out into the dark passage and crept swiftly to the end, past Grey’s room to the ancient door facing her that led to the old wing.

She found the old-fashioned latch more by feel than sight, but to her surprise, the door was not locked like the downstairs one. Nor did its hinges creak. It must have been recently oiled. Oh yes, this must have been where the lovers met…

Not quite sure what she was looking for, she slipped through the door and pulled it almost closed behind her.

She was glad of the lamp in this pitch darkness. Barely any dawn light found its way around the dusty window boards, but by the light of her lamp, she saw she was in a large, well-proportioned room that must once have been lovely once. Now it was bare and soulless.

She walked forward warily. On the left side of the apartment, she made out the rough floor repair—new boards nailed crosswise across the rotted patch to make an obvious warning. Presumably, this was where Randolph had fallen through. Though she peered carefully in front before every step, the floor beneath her felt solid enough.

The room was empty of all furniture, hardly an enticing love nest. It only had one door, and on her right, away from the rotted area, so she pushed it open.

Aha .

It was a different world. Even in the pale lamplight, she could see that the floor and the surfaces were clean. A dressing table with a mirror stood against one wall. A large mattress lay on the floor, made up like a bed with an embroidered coverlet and crisp cotton pillowcases. There was another door at the far end, leading perhaps to a passage or a landing. This must once have been a dressing room or a sitting room attached to the larger bedchamber.

She moved into the cozy space, noticing the comb and hairpins on the dressing table. Oh yes, this was where Walter and Alice had trysted. It almost looked romantic, until one considered the spouses on the other side of the latched door. Had that made it more exciting for them? Until Walter had been found out and was not prepared to defy convention and leave his wife. Or perhaps he had simply chosen his wife over his peccadillo. In his own way, he had probably loved her.

Constance knew only too well how men—some men—regarded their adulterous pleasures, as if they were entirely separate from the respectable lives they lived with their wives and children. This room was, essentially, Walter’s brothel.

She felt a twinge of distaste, which she never felt in her own establishment. Cut off from the rest of the house as it was, this was still Deborah Winsom’s home. For an instant, the dream figure who lunged across her mind’s eye was Deborah, hurt and furious beyond sanity, and wielding a long, sharp kitchen knife.

And Deborah had muddy shoes.

A loud creak jerked Constance out of her speculation.

Deborah, coming to torture herself, to assuage her guilt? Or did she somehow know Constance was here? Her heart hammered, because quite suddenly she had more to fear than the mere embarrassment of being caught where she had no business being.

The footsteps were not even particularly stealthy, merely slow and deliberate. Someone ascending a staircase, beyond the closed door. She only had one way out. She had backed silently into the outer room and turned down the lamp before curiosity overcame her once more.

Who else was braving the ban on this forbidden part of the house? And why?

She halted, trying to overcome her uneven breath, straining to hear over the sounds of her own heart, then began to move forward this time, once more toward the trysting room. This would surely tell her something, perhaps even solve the mystery of the murder…

She heard nothing. Surely she could peer around the door and glimpse whoever it was.

Without any warning at all, a dark figure filled the doorway between the rooms. A well-dressed man whose features were unrecognizable in the gray, shadowy light—until he moved a step inside with his own lamp.