“But a coldness on the part of a strange society, in itself, should hardly lead to murder,” I persisted. “Surely that is another order of violence altogether, Captain?”
“I have been taught to think so.” He rose, and took up his hat. “A sense of what is due to my friend Grey, Miss Austen, must prevent me from speaking plainly. I may only tell you that his wife's enemies were thick upon the ground. You might look no farther than the lady's own household.”
I gazed at him narrowly. “I cannot believe you would accuse your oldest friend, Captain Woodford, of doing away with his wife. This cannot be what is due to him, as you put it.”
“I, accuse Valentine Grey? Impossible!” he cried. “I merely meant to underline, Miss Austen, that Denys Collingforth is hardly the only man in Kent who has reason to think ill of the dead.”
“And what was his reason, Captain, for despising her?”
Woodford eyed me uneasily. “That is a question best answered by Mr. Collingforth. I am sure your brother, the Justice, has considered of it.”
“Mr. Collingforth appears to think ill of any number of people,” I observed, as I conducted the Captain to the door. “Had you not been present to prevent it, he should certainly have served our poor Mr. Bridges with violence! You are owed a debt of gratitude in this house, sir.”
“Mr. Bridges is possessed of such happy manners as may ensure his making any number of friends,” Woodford replied, with a bow. “Whether he is equally capable of retaining them, is another matter. Good day, Miss Austen.”
IT WAS ABOVE AN HOUR BEFORE THE CLATTER OF Neddie's horse, pulled up hard before the door, was heard on the sweep. He looked overheated and cross, and entered the house with a rapid step and the briefest of salutations. After an interval of respectful quiet, and the consumption of a quantity of ale drawn from the barrel in the cellar, good humour and volubility returned.
“I have seen Grey,” the Justice announced, as he took up his customary place before the cold library hearth, “and he has seen me. It remains uncertain which of us was most scarred by the encounter — but I shall leave it to you to decide, Jane, when I tell you that the gentleman chose to offer me his glove!”[19]
“Good Lord!” Lizzy ejaculated, and set down the books she had commenced packing. “I cannot think when you have been served such a turn before, Neddie!”
“It is unique in my experience,” he admitted, “tho' I am almost ashamed to say as much. Every sprig of fashion is required to have a history of such meetings. It is a poor show I've given you, Lizzy!”
“Pray do not trouble to kill yourself on my account, sir,” she replied serenely, and retrieved the books. “Do you require breakfast and the witnessing of a will at dawn?”'
“Nothing so romantic.” Neddie peered at the spines of the volumes she had selected, and pulled several from the box. “Pray leave these, my dear — they had far better be burned with the sainfoin, I am sure.”
“Beast.”
“What occasioned Mr. Grey's challenge?” I enquired at last, being provoked beyond endurance.
My brother threw himself into a chair and gazed at me idly. “My unwillingness to clap Denys Collingforth in chains, I suspect. But let me relate the whole, I beg, in an orderly fashion. The exercise might do much for the composure of my mind.”
And so the Justice undertook to convey the essence of his morning's work: how he had achieved The Larches just after nine o'clock, and found the master of the house breakfasting serenely in his parlour; how Valentine Grey, a compact, powerful man with weary features and the acutest gaze, had appeared in excellent health, despite his broken night. He had enjoined the Justice to take coffee with him in the saloon, and tho' his spirits appeared a little disordered, they were in general composed. A man who looked less the part of a mourning husband could hardly be conceived, Neddie assured us; and from that moment forward, he assumed there had been little of love in the Greys' union.
In the saloon, all was ease and congeniality at first. Grey placidly expressed himself shocked — quite beyond comprehending the event — and wild to see justice done. Neddie said all that was correct and feeling in a man condoling with the bereaved. It was after the coffee, however, when Grey had at last enquired as to the conduct of his wife's case, that the outburst of temper had broken like a thunderclap over my brother's head.
“Do I understand, sir, that you have done nothing to apprehend the scoundrel responsible for her murder? This is not to be borne!” The widower rose and stood menacingly over my brother, who could not conceal his surprise.
“I am afraid, Mr. Grey, that I am less hasty than yourself. I cannot apprehend a man before I know his name.”
“But it is obvious! Collingforth is the man. My poor wife's corpse was discovered in his chaise!”
“In such matters, the obvious may prove a doubtful guide,” Neddie returned steadily. “Mr. Collingforth's movements are vouched for by his acquaintance. It seems almost impossible that he should have murdered your wife on the Wingham road, and returned her body to his own chaise. I fear we must look farther afield for the responsible party.”
Valentine Grey commenced to pace the length of the saloon in agitation, then halted before French windows giving out onto the gardens, one hand pressed to his brow.
“Can you offer any reason, sir, for your wife's brutal end?” Neddie enquired.
“How can any man be expected to explain such a horror! She must have fallen into the clutches of a fiend!” Grey wheeled to face him, an expression of agony on his countenance so at variance with his earlier behaviour, that Neddie must confess himself amazed. “Can you bear to contemplate it, man? A lady alone — unprotected— quite disregarded by those in whom she placed her trust—”
“Her trust?”
Grey's next words had all the viciousness of a challenge. “Do not deny, man, that she was hated by the entire neighbourhood! Those who should have embraced and protected her as one of their own, rejected her from the first. Do not think I was ignorant of the coldness in which she lived. I saw all, I knew all — and it tore at my heart!”
“Your wife, Mr. Grey, was not entirely one of Kent's own,” Neddie countered. “She was a Frenchwoman. In such times as these, her end must be suggestive.”
“An act of war, you would say?” Grey laughed harshly. “Impossible. Francoise did nothing to excite a peculiar hatred.”
“And yet she is dead,” Neddie observed bluntly. “Is it so unlikely that she should be killed by a fool? A simple-minded fellow who resented her triumph at the races, as he resented French victory on the battlefield? Such an one may have thought to strike at the Monster by murdering your wife.”
Grey merely snorted.
“You have failed to propose an alternative, Mr. Grey,” my brother burst out in exasperation.
“Because there is none that I may offer.”
“You can think of no one who might bear your wife ill-will?”
“That is for yourself to determine, Mr. Austen, as the embodiment of the Law. I am told you are the Justice in these parts. Why, then, do I find you at such a loss? Is it perhaps because my wife was merely a French lady, that you exert yourself so little?”
Neddie admitted that he began to grow angry. I am sure that he flushed, and controlled himself only with difficulty. But when at last he spoke, it was with admirable coolness. 'You have every reason to vent your anger at me, my dear sir. I should far rather you expressed yourself thus in the privacy of this room, than in the public venue of your unfortunate wife's inquest. It was exacdy my hope that we might speak in private before that distressing event, which is to occur on the morrow, as there is a matter of some delicacy I had hoped you might resolve.”
19
Edward Austen refers here to a demand for satisfaction in a matter of honor, in which the offended party usually threw a glove at his opponent's feet or, in extreme cases, struck him with the glove across the cheek. An affair of honor was usually settled at pistol-point. If either party killed the other, the survivor could be charged with murder. —