Chapter 5

“How is your wrist this morning, Mr. Stackpoole?” Cecilia asked when she saw him awaiting them the next morning at the base of the inn stairs. James followed behind her as they descended to the taproom floor.

Stackpoole glanced down at his arm in a sling, his hand wrapped to keep it still. “Much better, thank you,” he said. His clothing looked a little rumpled, but otherwise clean. He brushed a lock of brown hair away from his glasses with his good hand.

“Glad to hear that,” James said gruffly as he and Cecilia attained the ground floor. “Are we ready to leave?” he asked curtly.

Mr. Stackpoole drew back at James’s tone.

Cecilia laughed. “Don’t mind my husband,” she said, leaning forward confidentially. She straightened and tucked her arm through James’s arm. “He is quite put out with me and has been like a grouchy old bear since last night after you left, and I told him my scheme for helping Lord Soothcoor.”

“I don’t like it,” James said as they left the inn and walked to their waiting carriage.

“What plan is this?” Mr. Stackpoole asked as he trailed behind them then hurried forward to hear what was said.

“For James to check me into Camden House,” she said as she ducked into the carriage.

“What!” exclaimed Mr. Stackpoole.

“Those are my sentiments, precisely,” James said. He followed his wife into the carriage and sat next to her on the forward-facing seat.

Mr. Stackpoole climbed in after them, tripping on the carriage edge.

James reached out a hand to help him catch himself.

Mr. Stackpoole blushed bright red as he got both feet into the carriage and sat facing them. “Thank you, Sir James,” he said.

James tapped the roof of the carriage to signal Mr. Romley they were ready to leave. The carriage started out briskly, without rain to impede them.

“I don’t think Camden House would admit you, Lady Cecilia,” Mr. Stackpoole said, as they rocked to the motion of the carriage. “Dr. Worcham says he must see evidence of issues.”

“I am recovering from a severe influenza,” Cecilia explained.

“Lady Cecilia was sick in bed for over two weeks. We were worried for her and the child she carries…,” James said softly. He looked down at Cecilia and gently squeezed her hand.

Cecilia nodded. “There was worry for the health of the babe,” she said, “I’ve suffered terribly with fatigue and lack of energy. It is only the news that Lord Soothcoor needs us that has dragged me out of that affliction.”

“For which I am grateful, not that I wish that it be in this manner!” James stated.

She looked over at Mr. Stackpoole. “I clearly remember the worst of those feelings. I am certain I can bring them forward such they will convince the good doctor. How is it your mother seems to come and go from Camden House?”

“The doctor claims her condition is rooted in seasonality and the weather that comes with the seasons. And she and the doctor’s wife have become good friends.Do not mistake me, after the holidays her mien is quite distraught. There is only so much of my father she can handle for any length of time, and the weather this year has been especially troublesome.”

Cecilia nodded. “I sometimes wonder if we’d had spring sun and spring warmth on more days, I would have improved faster. The rain and cold has been hard on everyone.”

“How might I help with your investigation? I had intended to do some investigation on my own, anyway. I don’t wish to be acting in cross purposes to what you do,” Mr. Stackpoole said earnestly while grabbing the leather strap and swaying with the carriage as it crossed a particularly bad patch of road.

With one hand James grabbed the strap at his side and, with his other, he anchored Cecilia to his side.

“You can serve as our referral to Dr. Worcham and the sanatorium.”

“Easily!”

“And I should like an introduction to your mother,” Cecilia said. “She knows the people and attitudes of those within the sanatorium now. She could be invaluable to my investigation.”

Mr. Stackpoole nodded. “I can do that. I think she would be supremely amenable to assisting in your inquiry. I have heard her mention a Mr. Montgomery in the past. The library is one of the common areas for men and women, and I believe she used to discuss books with Mr. Montgomery in that room—I just never connected the Montgomery she mentioned with my Aileen’s father!”

“There is no reason you should have as Miss Montgomery’s father was supposedly deceased,” James observed.

Mr. Stackpoole’s brows drew together, and his lips compressed.

“What is it, Mr. Stackpoole? I can see something has you bothered,” Cecilia asked.

“I don’t understand Dr. Worcham. I’ve always known him to be an upright gentleman. He had to have agreed to this farce.”

“Farce?” James said.

“Yes! Mr. Montgomery faking his death. He probably has no idea the depths to which it has affected his family.”

“He may not know he has any family other than his cousin who helped him enter the sanatorium.”

“I suppose there could be truth in what you say. Aileen told me he has lived with his affliction for years. She could not understand what changed to make him decide to enter a sanatorium.”

James and Cecilia exchanged glances.

“I’m sure he felt he had a good reason. Perhaps he felt he was getting worse and wanted to go away to protect the family,” James suggested.

“And to preserve blessed family memories,” Cecilia offered.

James nodded.

“But fake his death?”

“From some things Mrs. Montgomery told us, I gathered he did not want them to visit him while he was in the sanatorium, and he didn’t want them holding false hopes that one day he might be cured. They needed to get on with their lives.”

Mr. Stackpoole snorted. “Which Mrs. Montgomery was trying to do. He didn’t think through the ramifications of his ‘death.’ Did he honestly think she would never want to remarry? That is cruel and disrespectful,” he declared.

“We cannot know what was in the man’s mind and heart,” Cecilia said with a sad sigh.

Mr. Stackpoole leaned back against the carriage squabs. “I could never believe Lord Soothcoor to be a murderer. Do you think it is possible Mr. Montgomery could have taken his own life?” he asked.

“We don’t know,” James said resignedly. “We have much to learn.”

The Branstoke’s carriage rolled into the courtyard of The New Bell Inn as sunset colors brushed the sky with faint pinks and oranges, muted by the persistent overcast weather. Cecilia thought in any other year than the miserable cold year they’d had, the colors would appear as a vivid blaze across the fenlands.

James took her arm to lead her into the sprawling redbrick inn. She was surprised at the Georgian styling of the building, obviously a newer construction than many inns where they stayed.

“Mr. Price is the innkeeper,” Mr. Stackpoole said, hurrying to come alongside them. He pushed his round glasses frames higher on his nose.

A tall, angular man came out of the inn. He looked all legs and arms. “Sir James Branstoke?” he said, his voice higher pitched than Cecilia would have guessed from looking at him.

“Yes. Has my staff arrived?” James asked.

“Two hours ago, sir.”

“Excellent. We have added one more to our party, Mr. Stackpoole, here. Might you have a room for him as well?”

The man bobbed his head at Mr. Stackpoole. “I knows him from other times. We can accommodate him on the floor above yours. Small room, though.”

“That’s fine,” Mr. Stackpoole said hurriedly.

“This way then,” the man said. At the top of the stairs, he pointed to a room on the right. “This be yer parlor, and right down here a pace be your bedroom.” He ushered them into a room at the back of the inn away from the sounds of the comings and goings of the travelers in the courtyard.

“Dinner in one hour in the parlor?” he asked.

“That should be fine,” James said.

The innkeeper nodded. He turned to Mr. Stackpoole. “I’ll show you to your room now.”

“Thank you.”

“We’ll see you at supper then,” James told Mr. Stackpoole.

“What do you think?”Cecilia murmured to James as Mr. Price led them to their room.

He shrugged, nodding toward their host who led the way before them.

Sarah, Cecilia’s lady’s maid, and William, James’s valet, met them in the hall before their room. William wore his austere mien, Sarah stood with her eyes downcast, her hands folded before her.

Cecilia and James exchanged glances.

“Is everything all right?” Mr. Price asked William.

William nodded curtly. “All is in readiness,” he said, his gaze flicking over to James and Lady Cecilia.

“An hour, then, in the parlor,” James said to the innkeeper.

“Yes, everything will be to your liking, I assure you,” Mr. Price said as he bowed and turned away to return the way they came.

There was silence in the group gathered before the door to the room as they watched the man leave.

Cecilia raised a brow in mute inquiry to her maid. Sarah nodded and opened the door to their chamber to lead them inside.

“What is it?” Cecilia asked, once they were all in the bedchamber and the door closed after them. Though the room was large by inn standards, with the four of them standing beside the bed, it seemed tight.

“Strange doings with the sanatorium,” Williams said heavily.

“What do you mean?” James asked.

“It has always been a good neighbor in the area, for years and years, the staff here says.”

“By the way you say that, I gather that is no longer the situation,” James said as he removed his hat and pulled off his gloves.

Williams hurried to take them from him and assist him out of his greatcoat. Sarah assisted Cecilia, hanging her cloak on a hook near the door.

“Rumors differ. Some say it changed after the new superintendent was hired. Others think the changed happened after a woman, a resident of the sanatorium, was found drowned in the canal that runs around the property. The events were near to each other. I couldn’t get a clear answer as to which came first. I was loath to press too hard.”

“Understood,” James said, nodding approval at his man.

“A woman drowned?” Cecilia asked? “A patient of the sanatorium? Not a maid or matron?”

William turned toward her. “Yes, my lady,” he said differentially. “Now, they claim her ghost walks along the edge of the canal at night.”

Sarah appeared to shiver at the thought while Cecilia giggled, then broke into a full laugh. “I’m sure they do! It’s a perfect story for a drowning—and a sanatorium.”

Sarah smiled thinly. “I suppose it would be at that,” she said.

“Don’t let the waves of imagination and stories sway you,” Cecilia told Sarah. “Seeing would be my belief.”

“I suspect I’m too timid to want to see any specters,” Sarah ruefully admitted.

The others laughed.

“You shan’t. Not here at any time with us. They should most likely run before us.”

“Careful, Cecilia, that you do not rile the dead into thinking you have issued a challenge,” James said.

“Not you, too!” protested Cecilia.

“No, but, I learned long ago not to doubt too loudly. There is much in the world we don’t know.”

Cecilia screwed up her face in conflicted doubt. “I should wish to hold my monsters at bay. I fear your tales might make my thoughts and imagination run rampant.”

James shook his head. “You are much too pragmatic, for all your feigned fragility—I am curious why you did not adopt the fragile wife mien when we arrived.”

“You mean, start as I mean to go on?”

“Yes.”

She shrugged. “We were so comfortable with Mr. Stackpoole that I didn’t think of it. You think I should have?”

“If you are determined on your course of action to become a patient at the sanatorium, then, yes, I think so. We don’t know who here might know someone who works at the sanatorium.”

Sarah turned back from setting out Cecilia’s night things. “You want to be a patient there? Even after what I told you about that woman’s death?”

“Mr. Stackpoole told us of the young woman’s drowning during our journey here, without the added embellishment of the ghost story. I am not concerned. Her death was a year ago.”

“Mr. Stackpoole?” William asked.

“Ah, yes. You would not know of the travel companion we acquired yesterday. He is on his way to Camden House as we are. He knows the Earl of Soothcoor, and like those who do know him, he finds it hard to believe him to be a murderer. His mother is a patient in the sanatorium so he thought he would talk to her about Mr. Montgomery’s death.”

A knock at the door ended their discussion. William opened the door to admit a maid with hot water for the Branstokes to freshen up with before dinner. Cecilia immediately slumped against James.

“How lovely,” Cecilia said faintly. “I should love to clean my face and hands. Sarah, can you find my lavender water? I need it, I fear.”

Sarah’s eyes widened, but she quickly recovered. “Right away, my lady,” she said, turning to a valise set next to the window.

“Is there anything else you need?” asked the maid, staring at Cecilia as she leaned on James.

“No, no. My wife is recovering from a long illness,” James said. “Come, why don’t you lay down for a few minutes before dinner,” he said to Cecilia as he led her to the bedstead.

William crossed to the door and opened it. “Thank you. Sarah or I will let the proprietor know if James and Lady Branstoke have additional requirements.”

The maid nodded and curtsied, then scurried out of the room.

After washing up and changing his neckcloth, James dismissed his valet for the evening and told Cecilia he would go on the parlor while she washed.

“I should also like to change my dress,” she said. “I need to proceed in my weakened role and clothing can be part of that role.”

James shook his head. “I don’t like it when you play the weak, unwell female though I’ll own it has served us well in the past. That duality of consideration makes me a hypocrite, and I don’t like that, either.” He ran a hand through his hair.

She grinned at him. “My height and coloring play so well with the role,” she said, waving her hand from her head to her toes in reference to her short and slight stature as well as her pale skin and almost white-blonde, flyaway hair. Sometimes James referred to her as his fae nymph.

James shook his head and left the room, leaving Sarah with Cecilia.

James hadthe private parlor to himself. He’d sent a barmaid for a mug of ale before he’d entered the room and now sat in one of the brown, jacquard-covered wingback chairs that flanked the large fireplace, with the ale mug clasped loosely between his hands. The room had more the look of a gentleman’s library than a parlor. Warm, golden oak paneling covered the walls, a material not common in this part of the country. He stared into the cold stone fireplace. He considered asking for a fire to be laid as rooms chilled with the coming night. Cecilia chilled easily.

He looked up when he heard rain against the already wind-rattled windows. Though approaching summer, the weather stubbornly held onto winter. A fire would be welcome for all. He rang the bell.

While a servant coaxed fen-sourced peat bricks into a fire, James thought about Malcolm Montgomery.

Had he killed himself? It was not outside the realm of imagination. If he loved his family, as he appeared to, the sacrifice he made to leave them and enter a sanatorium attested to his love. If he’d learned his wife wished to remarry, might he have chosen suicide to clear the way for her legally? He wished he knew his manner of death, that would inform their investigation. He wondered why Mrs. Montgomery had not been told. And why was Soothcoor so quickly a suspect?

He didn’t like Cecilia doing covert investigation as a patient. His delightful wife was intelligent. —She could also be impulsive. He counted her and himself lucky that nothing had yet happened to her due to her impetuous nature. She cared deeply and that, he knew, was the root of her behavior.

The servant kneeling in front of the fireplace rose to his feet. “There you go, sar,” he said. “Don’t know what experience yous had with a peat fyr ’afore, but a peat fyr don’t burn hot likes a wood fyr, but ’tis more even-like heat. It’ll warm this room up, you’ll see.”

“Thank you,” James said, rising to his feet. He slipped the man a coin.

When the man left, he almost ran into Mr. Stackpoole, who stumbled backward, then recovered and slid past him into the room. He came toward the fireplace and its heat.

James passed a mug of ale toward Mr. Stackpoole when he sat opposite him before the fire. “The inn is quite modern. Do you know anything of its history?” James asked.

Mr. Stackpoole nodded as he took a sip of ale. “It was built right before John Rennie became the engineer involved with building canals for more fen drainage,” he said, “an investment by the Marquis of Widmirth.”

“The inn or the canal project?” James asked.

“What—? Oh, both!” he said. “He organized a new group of Gentlemen Adventurers—much like the Earl of Bedford did in the 17th century—for investment in both projects.”

“You seem to know a great deal about the area,” James observed.

He shrugged. “I read history at the university and I’m curious. I like to know things, so I ask questions.” He frowned. “My father says I ask too many questions.”

“I imagine the ability to ask the right questions would be an advantage in diplomatic work,” James observed.

“Yes! Exactly my thought!” Mr. Stackpoole said excitedly.

James swirled the ale in his mug. Mr. Stackpoole’s curiosity could be a benefit or a hindrance to their investigation.

“Mr. Stackpoole,” he said carefully, “I would caution against your natural curiosity at Camden House.”

“I beg your pardon? Caution me, why?” the young man bristled.

“Sometimes one learns more by silence,” he said. He raised his eyes from contemplating his ale. “And patience. Silence and patience—though I’ll own those are not habits of Lady Branstoke,” he said ruefully as the door to the parlor opened.

“What are not my habits?” Cecilia asked as she entered the parlor, then, looking over her shoulder, louder, “You were right to encourage me to rest, James,” she said in a plaintive voice. “Sarah rubbed some lavender water into my temples and that helped as well. Oh, that this melancholy might lift!” she whined, crossing to the bench before the fireplace.

A maid walked into the room behind her carrying a large tray. She set it down on the round table in the center of the room. “Mr. Price says as how you’d like sum brandy now after your travels, along with hot tea, and the mistress said as how my lady should like a soothing tisane as she’s feeling peaked.”

“Did you bring enough for me as well?” Mr. Stackpoole asked. “I like Mrs. Price’s tisane after a day of traveling. I’ve had it many times over the years. I’ve tried to get the recipe from her; but she rebuffs me with a laugh,” he told the Branstokes.

“There is plenty, Mr. Stackpoole. Mrs. Price knew as how you’d like some, too. She even had me bring honey as she knows you like it with honey. It’s a jar Baron Stackpoole left here.”

“My father left a jar of honey here?” He laughed. “He must have received it as a gift. He hates honey. Or at least claims to,” he explained to the Branstokes.

“That is very kind of Mrs. Price. Please tell her so,” James said.

“Aye, sar,” the maid said. She bobbed a curtsy then left the room, closing the door carefully, though not completely, behind her.

James frowned and rose to quietly push the door until it latched.

Lady Cecilia’s lips quirked up on the side as she saw his action. She straightened on the bench. “While I appreciate Mrs. Price’s thoughtfulness, I should rather have a watered ale,” she declared.

James laughed and crossed to the table to pour her a mug of ale and add water. She did like an occasional mug of watered ale for her digestion.

“If you do not mind then, I’m for the tisane. It is wonderfully relaxing for me,” Mr. Stackpoole said. “I’m still feeling chilled on the inside, and my room lacks a fire.” He poured himself a cup and sat in a chair at the table.

“Why don’t you request a fire be laid in your room?” Lady Cecilia asked as she accepted her brandy from James.

“Too tired.”

“Nonsense,” Cecilia said. “We shall engage the staff to build a fire for you when they come with our food. The room can then be warm when you retire.”

“I don’t?—”

James interrupted him. “It is a waste of words to argue with Lady Branstoke,” he said laconically. “I have had to devise other means of persuasion,” James said, smiling down at his wife.

She cuddled closer to him. “Odious creature,” she said playfully.

“A toast then, to my odious nature,” he said, raising his glass. They clinked their glasses as they stared into each other’s eyes for a moment, then Cecilia closed her eyes and relaxed against him.

James squeezed her closer, relaxing for the first time since he’d received Mrs. Montgomery’s letter. He rested his chin on her head as he watched the peat fire burn.

His Cecilia was back, and James felt his heart ready to burst from his chest. He loved this tiny, slight, fae, intelligent, impetuous, determined, and willful woman. He allowed that his role in their marriage was to cherish her and protect her—sometimes from herself. Woe be to anyone who tried to hurt her or come between them.

The fire crackled and hissed as they contentedly sipped their drinks. A clock on the mantle ticked the quiet minutes by.

A low moaning groan came from behind them.

Cecilia raised her head as James turned toward the sound.

Mr. Stackpoole did not look well. He tried to rise to his feet. “My apologies. I fear I am to be sick,” he said, stumbling against the table. He held a hand against his stomach, his face an unnatural white. His body convulsed as he tried to move toward the door.

Cecilia quickly rose from the bench and grabbed a large bowl underneath a pitcher of water available for guests to wash their hands. She thrust it at him just as his body heaved again and released the contents of his stomach. She squeezed her eyes shut and turned her head away from the foul stench of regurgitated matter.

“So sorry,” he whispered before his body heaved again.

James took the bowl from her and set it on the table. Cecilia pulled out the handkerchief she’d stuffed into the end of the long sleeves of her dress and held it to her nose.

“I think that is all,” Mr. Stackpoole said weakly. He sank back down in his chair, sweat now beading on his brow. He closed his eyes, rocking back, his expression contorted.

James opened the door to call for a servant.

A burly waiter came to James’s call. He reeled back at the awful sink in the room.

“Oi best fetch da missus,” he said, backing out of the room.

James grabbed him by the shoulder. “No, you stay here with Mr. Stackpoole. Lady Branstoke and I will notify the innkeeper of this occurrence,” he said.

He pulled Cecilia to her feet and hurried her from the room.

“Thank you,” Cecilia said. “Though I may feign illness at times, I cannot stand illness. It turns me from a spectator to a real patient,” she whispered.

James nodded. “I understand. For me, after the smells coming from the battlefields in Spain with their sick, dead, and dying, noxious smells no longer traumatize me.”

He led her down the stairs, only stopping once to call out to a passing servant to notify the Prices of a sick guest.

James led Cecilia toward the large hearth in the pub room. A young man seated by the fire saw their approach and jumped to his feet. “Here yar, please to give da lai-dy my seat,” he said, quickly doffing his brown plaid cap.

“Thank you,” James said as he led Cecilia to sit down. “Will you be all right while I speak with Mr. Price about Mr. Stackpoole?” he asked her.

She smiled up at him. “Yes, I shall be fine.”

“We’ll watch after da lai-dy,” the man said as he stuffed his cap in his coat pocket.

The other men heartily agreed.

“Now go, go,” Cecilia encouraged. “I have work to do,” she whispered as he leaned over her.

James straightened and raised his eyebrows as he looked down at her. “That is what I’m afraid of.”