‘On the contrary it is very pertinent – in the proper sense.’
‘Now you are being satirical! And you know …’
‘Yes, my dear Harriet, I know you do not like it. But I think you may forgive me when you know the direction of my enquiries.’
‘Very well then, you had better explain yourself.’
‘Well, Mr Coulson’s relationship to you accounts for all his attempts to discredit Harris Paynter. You see, I realise now that Henry Coulson does not mean to throw doubt upon the testimony Mr Paynter gave at the inquest, at all – which is what I thought at first. All these slighting remarks about the poor surgeon have been aimed at Silas.’ She cast another concerned look at the sleeping boy who had been bundled by his careful sisters, not only into a flannel waistcoat, but also two overcoats. ‘He hopes to make your brother careless of Mr Paynter’s sound medical advice, does he not?’
Harriet hesitated and then put her hand to her brow as if in relief. It was perhaps a comfort to talk of something that had been weighing upon her mind for weeks. ‘Yes,’ she admitted, ‘I believe he does. Mr Coulson has next to no fortune of his own, you know. I daresay it would suit him very well indeed if Silas succumbed to the asthma. But there are none so blind as those that will not see. I cannot make Silas distrust the tiresome man. He thinks Henry Coulson is the greatest friend he has ever had!’
Dido sank a little deeper into the damp-smelling leather of her corner and shifted about her cold feet in an attempt to revive a little feeling in them. ‘You are right,’ she said. ‘Mr Coulson is a very tiresome man indeed. I have known from the beginning that he was up to no good. But it was not until I first understood the great lengths to which Mr Paynter is going to help your brother, that I began to divine the cause of Mr Coulson’s defaming the surgeon. And then, of course, a great many other matters were brought within my understanding – matters such as the haunting of Penelope’s bedchamber.’
‘Do you believe Mr Coulson was the cause of that?’ cried Harriet, interested in spite of herself.
‘Oh yes, I have been sure of it from the beginning. But at first I believed he had acted on behalf of somebody else. Now I can see the cruel masquerade for what it was: a bid to take advantage of Penelope’s credulous nature in order to frighten her away from our neighbourhood.’
‘But to what end?’
‘That is what puzzled me – until I began to suspect the exact nature of Mr Coulson’s relationship to your family, and then, of course his motive was clear.’
‘Was it?’
‘My dear Harriet, besides your brother being cured of his asthma, what could be more inconvenient to Mr Coulson than the poor boy’s marrying and fathering a son? And I happen to know that Silas had confided his feelings for Penelope to “the best friend he has ever had”.’
‘Ah! Of course!’ Harriet sighed discontentedly. ‘Oh, I wish with all my heart we could be rid of the troublesome man, but I see no hope of his leaving Madderstone. He will stay, I am sure, until his dangerous friendship has destroyed Silas.’
‘Well now,’ said Dido with great satisfaction, ‘we come to my point: the reason why I believe you may become reconciled to curiosity and impertinent enquiry. You see I believe that these besetting sins of spinsterhood have led me to a solution of your problems.’
‘Have they?’
‘I would reveal it, but I fear you would think me satirical.’
‘Dido, just tell me.’
‘Very well then,’ said Dido, ‘I think that you should speak to Mr Coulson yourself, and represent to him the very great desirability of his leaving.’
‘That would not do at all. He would not listen.’
‘Oh, but I think he would. For, if he should seem reluctant, you might just mention to him the blood and the feathers which litter the ruined gallery at the abbey: suggest that they – and the lanterns which are seen in the ruins at night – should be brought to the attention of Mr Harman-Foote. I think that once you have done that you may find him much more willing to oblige you by taking himself out of the neighbourhood.’ The lights of cottages were now beginning to appear beyond the carriage windows and, as she looked out at them, Dido’s smile broadened. ‘And if you find the gentleman is still inclined to be awkward, you might mention that I saw him in the inn yard at Great Farleigh, delivering to the London mail-coach a box which smelt very strongly of game.’
There were stronger lights now shining into the carriage and showing Harriet’s face staring in half-smiling disbelief, as the wheels began to rattle loudly into the yard of the inn at which they were to stop for the night, shaking their companions awake.
They all climbed out into the welcoming lamp-and firelight that poured out of the open door onto the cobbles, stamping their numb feet and attempting to rub a little warmth into their hands. The others hurried indoors, but Harriet hung back and caught at Dido’s arm. ‘Are you sure of this?’ she asked.
They paused a moment in the encroaching dusk of the yard, where the edge of the year’s first frost cut through the smells of horses and wood-smoke.
‘Oh yes,’ said Dido with great conviction, ‘Mr Coulson has certainly been assisting the poachers – and, I don’t doubt, making “a mint of money” from the business. The carts carrying the felled trees to the sawmills at Great Farleigh have also been carrying away Mr Harman-Foote’s woodcock and partridges. And the ruins have made a very convenient place in which to hide the birds till they can be removed. Mr Harman-Foote is known to be lenient towards poachers, but I do not believe even he would countenance his kinsman abusing his hospitality in such a way.’
‘Oh this is wonderful news!’ cried Harriet joyfully, ‘I shall take the first opportunity of speaking to Mr Coulson!’
She hurried away indoors, but Dido stood a moment longer in the aching cold. ‘Now,’ she said quietly to herself, ‘the question is whether I have finished with Mr Henry Coulson, or whether he has yet another, more dangerous, role to play in these mysteries.’
Chapter Forty
My Dear Eliza,
‘Strange things I have in head that will to hand!’ Someone says that in one of Shakespeare’s plays I believe, and tonight I find myself in accord with the poor fellow. And so I shall begin upon a letter which it may be I shall never send. For my head is full of strange things which must be expressed before they can be understood and, since I have no one to whom I may speak them, I needs must write them down. Yet I do not know that even your patient affection can bear with the outlandish ideas which torment me tonight.
I have the parlour fire to myself now – which is a very great luxury. Although it is only nine o’clock, Margaret is gone away to bed with a headache. Francis is engaged upon a sermon; at least, he is in his study, deep in the perusal of a large book – though since it seems to be the writings of some old Greek philosopher that he is reading, I doubt the parishioners of Badleigh will gain much from it. So, I have been left to myself, with a precious handful of coals still in the box on the hearth – and a whole three inches of candle! It is a cold night – and very foggy. The fog was gathering with the dusk as I walked home from Madderstone four hours ago.
My business there was to look again at those pieces of gold and silver which were discovered with Miss Fenn’s body. And I regret to say that I found among them something which I had been sincerely hoping not to find …