I hoped for a full account this morning, but was most tediously put off — for when I sought the breakfast-parlour at ten o'clock, I found only Lizzy in possession, and a very cross Lizzy, indeed.
“Your brothers are already gone, Jane,” she said over her teacup, “for the inquest is to be at noon, and Neddie would search the hedgerows with that detestable man Pyke, before he might face the coroner with something like self-possession.”
“Then let us hope that Pyke has consulted his lad,” I returned, “that Neddie's efforts might end in something.”
“You do think of everything, Jane.” Lizzy set down her cup and dusted her fingertips for crumbs. “I am sure that Neddie should be lost without you and Henry to give him spur. I required him to return to the house before venturing into Canterbury, by the by, in the event you wished to accompany him….”
Lizzy's natural delicacy prevented her from adding the words, “… since you have made such a habit of inquests of late, “and I mentally praised the excellent breeding of baronets' daughters. I settled myself into a chair.
“Tea, Daisy, I think — and perhaps some toast.”
“Very good, miss.” The housemaid bobbed vaguely in my direction, and quitted the room with obvious reluctance. I leaned conspiratorially towards Lizzy.
“What of Collingforth and the interesting note?”
“I could get nothing from your brother — except that Collingforth was not to be found at Prior's Farm, and his wife has not seen him since Monday e'en. Neddie says that she was quite distracted, and fainted twice in a quarter-hour.”
“Did they show her the unfortunate note?”
“Why else should she faint?”
“I suppose we must conclude the hand to be Collingforth's, then. And Mr. Everett?”
“—was naturally your brother's next resort. But when Neddie arrived quite late at the Hound and Tooth, it was to be greeted with the intelligence that Mr. Everett had settled his bill some hours since, and had quitted the place entirely.”
“Then it is as Henry feared. Collingforth and Everett have fled in terror of the Law.”
Lizzy nodded expressionlessly. “I confess your poor brother has taken it quite to heart. He feels himself to be excessively to blame, and utterly in neglect of his duty— however little any of us should tell him so.”
“You may be certain that Mr. Grey will not be so forbearing.”
“This flight cannot help Collingforth's chances before the coroner and his panel,” Lizzy added.
The passage door swung open, and Daisy's young face appeared over a tray of tea and toast. I accepted it gratefully, and poured out a cup.
“It must look like an admission of guilt,” I agreed. “But I wonder—”
“You cannot believe him innocent, Jane!”
“A wider experience of the world has taught me, Lizzy, that I am capable of believing any number of things. Denys Collingforth might be a murderer, it is true — or he may be merely a man pushed past endurance, by an unhappy congruence of circumstances. Ruined by debt, and now suspected of murder — what desperate fellow, unsure of his chances, might not resort to flight?”
Lizzy considered this in silence, while I consumed a quantity of toast. Godmersham's stillroom was evident upon the table, in an admirable preserve of quince, that I knew I should long for in the relative deprivation of a Bath winter.
“I suppose anyone might have murdered the woman, and placed the note in her bodice,” Lizzy observed at last.
“But the handwriting?”
My sister shrugged. “Let us suppose that Collingforth sent the letter after all — that he sent it well before the events of Monday, and the note survived in Mrs. Grey's correspondence.”
“But Monday's date is inscribed above.”
“It is a small thing to forge a date, Jane — hardly of the same order as the forgery of an entire note.”
“Very true. I confess, Lizzy, that I had no notion you possessed so cunning a mind. You display a decided talent for subterfuge, and were Neddie aware of it, he should never trust you farther from home than Chilham.”
“I have spent the better part of my existence in deceiving my friends,” she returned with complaisance, “and if you betray me to the world, Jane, I shall deny you the freedom of Godmersham forever.”
“Your secret is safe with me. But there is one point on which I should like your opinion. A note of Collingforth's, placed to advantage and quite out of context, should serve, like the body in the chaise, to throw suspicion far from the actual murderer. But why conceal the note in the habit? Why not leave it in Mrs. Grey's dead hand?”
“Perhaps to underline its plausibility,” Lizzy offered. “Two such items, found together, might appear excessive. But placed at a distance, and discovered by individual parties, entirely without reference to one another—”
“Admirable.” I partook of the last bit of toast with regret. “The coroner is unlikely to exhibit so much imagination, however.”
“You comprehend, Jane, that our notion is only possible if we suppose the murderer to possess an intimacy with Mrs. Grey's correspondence.” Lizzy refolded her napkin and arranged it beside her plate. “Someone of her household, perhaps.”
Or someone familiar at least with her desk. The image of Captain Woodford and Edward Bridges in the lady's saloon the night of her murder filled my mind. But I only gazed at Lizzy speculatively.
“You are in a fever to indict Mr. Grey, my dear. And the poor man has done very little that we know of, to deserve it!”
“He had the shockingly bad form to marry that woman in the first place,” she replied caustically, “and to challenge my husband in the second. I cannot like him, Jane, however little I love poor Collingforth.”
“We must hope that somebody loves poor Collingforth,” I observed, “for the coroner most certainly shall not.”
Chapter 7
A Canterbury Tale
21 August 1805, cont'd.
NEDDIE AND HENRY RETURNED SOON AFTER BREAKFAST, shaking their heads at the duplicity of men in general, and Constable Pyke in particular. The fellow had drunk the better part of his sovereign in the Hound and Tooth, and was utterly insensible at the appointed hour for meeting. My brothers dallied along the Wingham road for some time, expecting Pyke at every moment. A breathless boy proved their messenger instead — trotting along the hot and dusty road with the constable's regrets. Mr. Pyke was indisposed, and Neddie's errand for nothing.
“Lizzy assured me that you would wish to attend the inquest,” he said to me now, over a cooling glass of lemonade, “and I have returned to Godmersham expressly that Henry and I might convey you into Canterbury in the barouche.”
“You are very good—”
“Do not tell me that you intend to refuse!” He set down his glass with an emphasis that might have shattered a lesser piece. “Am I to be sent on a fool's errand every hour of the day?”
“Of course I should be happy to accompany you into Canterbury,” I said quickly. “I might complete a few purchases towards my toilette, before tonight's Assembly.”
“I see that Lizzy was entirely mistaken in your character,” he returned, amused. “She was convinced you should be drawn to the macabre deliberation as a fly to jam.”
“It is just that I have learned to despise the coroner and his panel, Neddie.”