She looked quickly at Roland, on this, and away, fixing her eye on the photograph of Ash, which was beyond him, between him and Val.
"If you sold them to the British Library," said Blackadder, "you could benefit the Resource Centre in other ways." Leonora said, "If scholars came from all over the world to the Centre, that would benefit it." Roland said, "I wish Lady Bailey could have a new electric wheelchair."
Everyone suddenly turned their attention to him.
"She was good to us. And she's ill."
Maud flushed to her hairline.
"I had thought of that myself," she said, with a touch of anger. "If the letters are mine-if I sell half or all to the British Library- we could help with the wheelchair."
"He'd probably throw it back at you," said Roland.
"Do you want me to give him the manuscripts?"
"No. Just to find a way-"
Blackadder looked at the developing quarrel between the two original researchers. "I should like to know," he said, "how you came across the correspondence in the first place."
Everyone looked at Maud, who looked at Roland.
This was the moment of truth. Also the moment of dispossession, or perhaps the word was exorcism.
"I was reading Vico," he said. "Ash's copy of Michelet's translation of Vico. In the London Library. And all these papers sprang out. Stationery bills, Latin notes, letters, invitations. I told Professor Blackadder, of course. But I didn't tell him I found-I found two drafts of a beginning of a letter to a woman-it didn't say who- but it was after he went to breakfast with Crabb Robinson-so I did some research-and found Christabel LaMotte. So I went to see Maud, who was suggested to me-oh yes, by Fergus Wolff-I didn't know of the family connection, or anything-and she showed me Blanche Glover's journal-and then we began to wonder about whether there was anything at Seal Court-we went past just to look at it-and met Lady Bailey-and were shown Christabel's turret-and Maud remembered a poem about dolls keeping a secret, and investigated a doll's bed-it was still in her room-and there it was-there they were, the letters-hidden in a cavity under the mattress… "
"And Lady Bailey took to Roland, who saved her life, he forgot to tell you, and said he might come back and look at the letters and advise-so we went at Christmas-"
"And we read them first and took notes-”
“And Roland worked out that LaMotte might have gone to Yorkshire with Ash on his zoological expedition in 1859-”
“So we went up there and found-a lot of textual evidence in both poets that perhaps both were there-Yorkshire phrases and landscapes in Melusina-the same line in both poets-we think she was certainly there-"
"And then we found out that LaMotte had been in Brittany in the lost year before the suicide of Blanche Glover-"
"Ah yes, so you did," said Leonora.
Maud said, "I was very wrong, Leonora. I took your letter from Ariane Le Minier and went without telling you-because the secret wasn't mine but also Ash's-and Roland's-or so it felt at the time. Anyway, Dr Le Minier gave us a copy of Sabine de Kercoz's journal, and it became clear that a child had been born there-which can't be traced-"
"And then you came, and Professor Cropper, and we came home," said Roland briefly.
"And Euan appeared as if by magic with the Will-"
"I know Sir George's lawyer, we share a horse," said Euan to the great puzzlement of Beatrice.
"It seems clear," said Blackadder, "that Mummy Possest is directed at LaMotte's association with Hella Lees, and that LaMotte was present at the seance which Ash infamously interrupted, and I would conjecture that Ash believed that LaMotte was trying to speak to her dead child in the seance, which if it was his child, would have angered him immensely."
"And I know," said Leonora, "because I have a good friend and sister-feminist who works in the offices of the Stant Collection, that Cropper has been reading faxes of letters containing great guilt from LaMotte to his spiritualist-socialist-feminist-mesmerist great-greatgrandma, Priscilla Penn Cropper."
"Which brings us," said Blackadder, "to two, or three, final questions.
"One: what became of the child, alive or dead?
"Two: what is Cropper trying to find out? On what basis of knowledge? "And three: what became of the original letters?" Everyone looked at Roland again. He brought out his wallet and unfolded the letters from their safe place inside it. He said, "I took them. I don't know why. I never meant to-to keep them forever. I don't know what possessed me to do it-it seemed so easy, and they seemed to be my find-I mean, as no one else had touched them, since he put them away in Vico, as bookmarks or whatever. I'll have to give them back. Whose are they?"
Euan said, "If the book was a gift or bequest to the London Library, they probably belong to it. The copyright belongs to Lord Ash."
Blackadder said, "If you give them to me, I guarantee they can go back to the Library with no questions asked, of you, anyway."
Roland stood up and walked across the room, and handed the letters to Blackadder, who could be seen to be unable to resist reading them then and there, to turn the paper lovingly, possessively, recognising the writing.
"You have been very resourceful," he said drily, to Roland.
"One thing led to another."
"Indeed."
"And all's well that ends well," said Euan. "This feels like the ending of a Shakespearean comedy-who's the chappie that comes down on a swing at the end of As You Like It?"
"Hymen," said Blackadder, smiling slightly.
"Or like the unmasking at the end of a detective story. I've always wanted to be Albert Campion, myself. We still haven't tackled our villain. I suggest Dr Nest tell us what she overheard."
"Well," said Beatrice, "they came to look at the end of Ellen's journal, that is, not the end, but her description of his end, and the mention of that box that Professor Cropper has always been so interested in, the one that was seen to be intact when Ellen herself was buried, you know the one. And I went out to the ladies' room-it was a day when no one else was there, Professor Blackadder, no one was in your part of the office at all-and as you know, it's a terribly long walk, to the cloakrooms and back-so when I came, they weren't expecting me, and I heard Professor Cropper say-this isn't verbatim but I do have a good verbal memory and I was very shocked-he said, 'It could remain quite secret for several years, a secret between the two of us, and then when you have inherited it would appear, we could come upon it-you couldfind it-and I would purchase it from you-all above boardI And Hildebrand Ash said, 'Morally it's mine, isn't it, whatever the Vicar says?' And Cropper said, 'Yes, but the Vicar's a most obstructive person, and there are all sorts of silly English laws about disturbing burials and needing a Faculty from the Bishop and I don't think we can afford to risk all that.' And Hildebrand Ash said again, "It's my own property." And Professor Cropper said it belonged both to Hildebrand and to the world, and that he himself would be a 'discreet custodian.' And Hildebrand said it would be a Hallowe'en adventure, and Professor Cropper said severely that it would have to be a very serious professional undertaking, and soon, as he was due back in New Mexico…