“I wonder why you stay there, then; I thought you came to Bath to open your own establishment.”
“I will require much more than I thought to set up my own shop. I am working at Walton’s only until I save enough — only a few more months, I swear it. Then I will be my own man. And now that our obstacle is removed — ”
Miss Beauclerk gave Catherine another conscious side-glance. “No! No, sir, do not speak so. My mother would not allow it, any more than my father did.”
“You are of age, Judith — ”
“I would be cut off from my family, and all good society. Do not ask this of me, sir. You know I have not the courage.”
Mr. Shaw’s handsome head drooped over her hand, still held tightly within his own. “Will I see you at the theatre tonight, at least?”
“Yes, we will be there.”
“May I sit with you?”
“You know that is not within my power.”
“But you will slip away and meet me, then?” His voice lowered. “I shall bring your potion.”
She sighed and gave a little toss of her head. “I shall try.”
He raised her hand to his lips and kissed it with violent affection. “Do I have your promise, my love?”
“Yes. Yes, you have it. Just be sure to bring the potion.”
Catherine thought a lover should look happier to make an assignation than Miss Beauclerk looked at the present moment, but she had not had experience of such clandestine romance before; nor of a gentleman who made love to a lady in the street, in front of several interested loungers and passersby.
“Until tonight, then.” He bobbed a sort of bow at Catherine and hurried back towards the shop.
As they walked back to Laura-place, Miss Beauclerk seemed inclined to be quiet, and Catherine allowed her to be so. Finally she said, “Mrs. Tilney, I must ask you a favor; on such a short acquaintance as ours, I have no right; but I pray you will not mention this to my mother.”
“Yes, I suppose she might worry if she knew about your tonic.”
Miss Beauclerk looked her surprise. “She knows about my tonic, and what it contains. She uses something similar herself. It was due to her influence that I asked Mr. Shaw to provide it. Mother has her own supplier. But I meant meeting Mr. Shaw. She does not quite approve of my seeing him. I did not intend to — but it is too late for that. I pray you will not mention it.”
Catherine promised that she would not as they entered Laura-place.
“Will you come in for a moment?” asked Miss Beauclerk. “You may take leave of Mamma, and let her know that I have not been wandering the streets of Bath alone, and getting into mischief.”
Catherine thought her request rather extraordinary, but did not know how to refuse it.
They arrived at the door of Lady Beauclerk’s house at the same time that a dowdy chaise, drawn by a pair of shaggy horses, drew up. An elderly servant in well-worn livery climbed down heavily from his perch and, seeing Miss Beauclerk staring at him, waved and grinned toothlessly.
“Oh, Lord,” said Miss Beauclerk under her breath.
Catherine looked at the servant curiously. “Who is that?”
“He is my aunt Findlay’s man. Well, Mrs. Tilney, it seems that you will have the opportunity to meet one of the more eccentric members of my family, arrived with her usual fortunate timing just as we thought to pass ourselves off creditably in Bath.”
Catherine, unsure how to respond, said, “I have a great-aunt who likes to read me lectures.”
“Then you understand what it means to have a relative whose main purpose in life is to mortify one.”
The servant opened the chaise door and let down the steps, and his mistress emerged: a woman tall and solidly built, with a great beak of a nose and a long chin to match. She looked up at the house and said, “Of course she took one of the grandest houses in Bath. Such unwonted extravagance! But that is your mother all over, Judith. What my poor brother would have thought of it, I am sure I do not know.”
“Good day, aunt,” said Miss Beauclerk.
“Good day, indeed! Do not think I have not heard what you all have been up to, aye, and that ne’er-do-well nephew of mine, too. I have my informants, miss.”
“I am sure you do, aunt.” Seeing how Mrs. Findlay stared at Catherine, she added, “May I present Mrs. Tilney to your notice?”
“Tilney, eh? I have heard that name, oh yes indeed. I know what your set is up to.” Mrs. Findlay swept past both ladies and the footman who held the door. “I trust I need not send up my card; I trust the dowager will see her poor widowed sister.”
“Oh, dear,” whispered Miss Beauclerk. “Mamma will not like it if my aunt insists on calling her ‘the dowager.’”
“Perhaps I should just go back to our lodgings,” said Catherine.
“No, no; Mamma will take it amiss if you do not come up, just for a moment. Pray do, ma’am.”
Catherine could not resist a supplication made with such softly pleading eyes; and she was herself interested in seeing her ladyship’s reaction to being called “the dowager.”
The footman said to her, “Begging your pardon, ma’am, but your dog looks like he could use a drink of water. I can take him to the kitchen if you like.”
Catherine looked at MacGuffin’s hanging tongue and agreed, and the Newfoundland padded down the hall behind the footman as the ladies climbed the stairs to her ladyship’s sitting-room.
Sir Philip was there, paying his daily duty call upon his aunt; he acknowledged Catherine with a nod and a smile, which she returned, still grateful for his kindness of the previous evening.
Mrs. Findlay was berating her sister-in-law. “It had to be Laura-place, did it not, Agatha? No Queen-squares for you, ma’am! And my poor brother not cold in his grave. ’Tis not enough that one of you disposed with him, but you must revel in it by making merry with his fortune!”
“I am sure that I do not know what you are talking about, Fanny,” said her ladyship; though her blush did not escape Catherine’s sharp eye.
“I believe you do, Agatha; I know one of you does. You,” she said, looking at Sir Philip, “or you,” turning a glare upon her niece.
“What are you suggesting, madam?” asked Sir Philip, his voice low and dangerous.
“I suggest nothing, sir; I state it for all to hear. I am come to Bath to determine which of you murdered my brother.”
Chapter Six
Murder and Everything of the Kind
Mrs. Findlay’s words shocked all present into silence.
“Really, Fanny,” said Lady Beauclerk in a faint tone of voice. “You must be reading horrid novels to imagine such a thing. Poor Sir Arthur, murdered! After he suffered so! I am sure that no man could have been more tenderly nursed by his wife and daughter.”
“Giving you the perfect opportunity to assist his exit from this world. And you,” said Mrs. Findlay, rounding on Sir Philip, “always hanging around and ingratiating yourself with the old man. You did not think he would hear about your unsavory adventures, did you? You are fortunate he did not cut you out of the will!”
“Beaumont is entailed,” said Sir Philip. “Whatever my uncle thought of me — and I think, and hope, he thought well — he did not have the power to disinherit me.”
“From the title and the estate, perhaps not; but what of the funded monies? I know of a few provisions in the entailment that would have put you in a very uncomfortable situation indeed: master of a great estate, and unable to afford to run it!”
“There was no reason for my uncle to change the provisions of his will,” said Sir Philip with a touch of impatience.
“No reason? After the way you carried on in Brighton last summer? To think I would live to see a Beauclerk involved in a criminal conversation!”
Catherine was paying little attention to the argument between Sir Philip and his aunt. She was thinking over everything she had learned that afternoon: that Sir Arthur’s sister thought his death had not been natural; that both Lady Beauclerk and her daughter had private, secret access to strong poison; and that the apothecary who provided Miss Beauclerk with that poisonous potion had tended Sir Arthur in his last days. A younger Catherine might have reached a most alarming conclusion indeed; but as Henry had once bid her, she now consulted her own sense of the probable. It did not seem possible that a man such as Sir Arthur Beauclerk, tended by a retinue of servants and physicians, could be the victim of a murderous plot; but the Beauclerks were an unhappy family, and who could tell to what measures the desperate might resort?