Mister Harris brightened. “Not an expensive property, mistress, but a loss all the same.” He blushed slightly. “My hard work was simply part of my regular work, but I thank you for your consideration. Certainly the setting of fire to hide the crime was wicked destruction, and nearly all that alley, so I understand, went up in flames.”
Emeline, on the other side of the hall, shifted slightly. The earl was patting her knee. Removing her knee from his vicinity, she looked to her other side where Sysabel sat quietly next to her aunt on the settle beside the long shuttered windows. Neither spoke. Aunt Elizabeth was half asleep and Sysabel, although her embroidery was on her lap and the needle in her hand, stared into space and showed no desire to move.
A sudden blink as the nearby candle flared in the draught. Aunt Elizabeth opened one eye. “Still here, my dear? Good girl. But such a warm evening. I am just a little drowsy, you know.”
“Yes, aunt.” Sysabel stared straight forwards into the small bright flame. Slowly she lifted one finger, short, pale, the nail clipped low and straight. Then she reached forwards as if pointing, and pierced the centre of the light with her finger. The flame shuddered as if in recoil, then blazed anew. Sysabel watched as it crawled around the tip of her finger, licking it in fire. “But isn’t it strange,” she said very softly, “how much pain one person can bear, if they are obliged to.”
The Lady Elizabeth yawned, eyes closed, and resettled. “Pain? Ah yes, my dear. But life is not always kind. Nevertheless, I shall make a point of telling your mother what a good girl you’ve been.”
The flame was growing, lapping as if hungry now it had found food. Sysabel did not remove her finger. She said, “If you wish, aunt. But you may remember that my mother died nine years gone.”
“Sweet, warm sleep,” murmured Aunt Elizabeth.
Sysabel slowly pushed her finger down, flattening the wick until the candle flame was entirely extinguished and, with a small hiss, the light was gone. She smiled and retrieving her finger, examined it. The skin was dark and blistered all around and the nail had singed, melting a little in one uneven line. There was soft warm wax on the tip. She put it in her mouth, sucking away the pain as if savouring the taste. Finally she murmured, “Sleep sweet? One day, aunt. One day all of us will.”
It was in the furthest corner that Nurse Martha sat. She had been knitting. Now the wool lay unattended in her lap. No one else was present in the hall except the hovering page, ready to refill cups. Adrian had left the house shortly after breakfast and had not yet returned.
The earl said, “You’ll have shunsh too m’dear, with luck. Carry on the title, do the proper thing. P’rapsh young Nick will grow up in time – take reshponshibility, be the man hish brother would’ve been.”
“Sons? Oh dear,” said Emeline. “I think it’s time I went to bed.”
Although a cluster of candles had been lit, the drifting twilight elongated the angled shadows while, since the shutters had not yet been lifted, the windows echoed the rising star shimmer.
“Ish that late?” His lordship was surprised. “But you young thingsh – all that energy – besht shleep early no doubt.”
Emeline was in bed when Avice came to her.
The door was pushed silently open, no creaking hinges or squeak of wood, just a faint breeze and the sudden scramble from corridor to bounce upon the mattress. “I’m running away again,” whispered Avice, grabbing at her sister’s knees through the bedclothes, “and this time you have to come with me.”
Emeline opened her eyes, blinked, and elbowed herself up against the pillows. “Avice, go away.”
“That’s exactly what I’m going to do,” Avice said. “I have an idea. But you have to come too.”
Emeline rubbed her eyes. “For goodness sake, I’m at home. What am I supposed to run away from? We aren’t prisoners, Avice. Are you mad?”
“Run away from what might happen. From mother. From the earl. From being watched. But it’s what I want to run to that matters. Don’t you see? Mother thinks Father’s killer is some silly little boy, or that poor pickle brained secretary who’s all so proud because he thinks mother likes him at last. Actually I think he thinks I like him too, and I used to but I don’t know. He’s prissy and cabbage eyed. Besides, I don’t imagine he’s capable of killing anyone unless he sticks his quill down their throats and drowns them in ink. But there’s worse than that, because Sissy secretly thinks it was Nicholas and his uncle together who killed everyone. And I wouldn’t be surprised if the horrid earl thinks it was Nicholas too.”
“Oh, pooh.”
“But I know who it was. And he’s gone off. He keeps going off somewhere. I think he’s trying to find Nicholas, and kill him too.”
“Adrian?” Emeline felt suddenly cold.
“Of course.” Avice lowered her voice. “Don’t you realise, Adrian is the Chatwyn heir after Nicholas. First Peter is got safely out of the way before he could marry you. Then when the fire after your wedding didn’t work, probably Adrian meant to wait so as not to look too suspicious. But now he knows you like your husband after all, so he has to act quickly before there are any children to push him out of line.”
“Avice,” Emeline muttered in threatening undertones, “you’re the one who’s pickle brained. Adrian is a respectable if stuffy young man and look how protective he is of his sister. And remember how he came all the way down from Nottingham when I wrote saying I was worried Nicholas hadn’t returned, and might be dying of the pestilence.”
“Exactly,” said Avice, wide eyed. “He was hoping to find Nicholas dead of disease – most convenient – contagion doing the job for him. But he ordered Sissy to stay behind – didn’t want her in the way even though coming to see you would have made it more proper to bring her. He didn’t want her here either, and was really cross when he saw her – well, murder gets harder if your sister is watching.”
“So why leave her here then, instead of carrying her straight back to Nottingham?”
“Because,” said Avice gleefully. “now he’s too busy rushing off to do the deed.”
“Visiting friends. Business. Trade. He’s entitled to make a little money on the side, isn’t he?”
“But he never does. He’s not well off,” Avice pointed out. “They live off that old aunt’s money according to what Sissy said while we were away. So he’s after the Chatwyn inheritance and quickly needs to take advantage of Nicholas travelling alone somewhere.”
“Nicholas isn’t alone. He has armed guards.”
“Probably Adrian won’t know that. He’s too busy thinking of himself, and Sissy and getting enough money for an easy life and the castle and a decent dowry for Sissy too – otherwise she’s nobody and no one important will marry her. But even if he does have to face armed guards, he can always ask Nicholas to walk off alone with him somewhere. I mean, Nicholas wouldn’t suspect him, would he?”
Emeline took a deep breath. “Even if you were right, which you’re not, why on earth would he murder Papa?”
“Perhaps because,” here Avice paused, lowered her voice further, leaned over and mumbled, “Papa found out and Adrian had to stop him telling anyone. Or perhaps he just disapproved since he is stuffy, and he found Papa with a whore and got angry.”
“He disapproves of adultery but he cheerfully approves of murder?”
“Well.” Avice chewed her lip. “Alright, either Papa found out he’d killed Peter, and had to be kept quiet. Or perhaps with Papa dead, Adrian thought we’d be rich, and he could marry me.”
“Avice, you’re far too fond of thinking people want to marry you.”