“He certainly swore he intended to do so. But would he have actually carried through with the threat?” Knightly tipped his head to one side, then shrugged. “I honestly don’t know.”
Sebastian stared at him. “You’re saying Preston threatened to disinherit Anne if she married Captain Wyeth?”
“He told me the day before he was killed that he would cut her off without a farthing if she did. But I can’t say whether or not he ever threatened Anne herself. He was like that, you know-full of bluster and passion, saying he was going to do things he would later realize were folly-once he calmed down.”
“Men of that nature frequently accumulate enemies.”
“Unfortunately, yes.”
“Can you think of any-apart from Oliphant and Wyeth?”
Sir Galen studied his empty teacup, as if lost for a moment in thought. Then he shook his head. “I’m afraid I can’t, no. As I said, his passions sometimes ran away with him, leading him into careless or hasty speech better left unsaid. He doubtless alienated more people than he realized. But can I think of anyone else angry enough to kill him and cut off his head? No.”
“Any idea what Stanley Preston might have been doing at Bloody Bridge that night?”
“No. I hadn’t actually given it much thought, but you’re right; it is odd for him to have been there so late, is it not?”
“He didn’t often walk at night?”
“Only to the pub and back. There was a time not so long ago when Bloody Bridge had a well-deserved reputation for violence. I can’t imagine him going there alone, at night.”
“Did he say anything to you about some Stuart relics he was considering buying?”
Knightly shook his head. “Not that I recall, no. But then, I’m afraid I sometimes didn’t pay a great deal of attention when Stanley would start prattling on about his collection.”
Sebastian set aside his wineglass and rose to his feet. “Thank you. You’ve been very helpful.”
Sir Galen rose with him and tucked his paper under one arm in an awkward, self-conscious gesture. “He was a good man, you know. My uncle died the summer I was fourteen, when we were in Jamaica. I had already lost my grandfather, and my parents long before that. Stanley Preston took me under his wing. I was nothing more than a tiresome adolescent, but he treated me like a man grown. You couldn’t ask for a truer, more loyal friend. Whoever killed him-” He broke off, as if fearing the intensity of his emotions might lead him into the kind of intemperate speech he’d just credited to Stanley Preston. He pressed his lips together and shook his head, then said, “Whoever killed him left the world a poorer place.”
“Who do you think did it?”
The question seemed to surprise Knightly. “Me?” He paused. “If it were me, I suppose I would look into Captain Wyeth’s movements.” A self-deprecating smile touched his lips. “But then, as I said, I’m not exactly disinterested in that quarter.”
“It sounds to me as if this Captain Wyeth may well be our man,” said Lovejoy as he and Sebastian stood on the terrace of the vast pile of government offices known as Somerset House, looking out over the sullen gray waters of the Thames. “He readily admits he has no alibi for the time of the murder, and given that Preston was opposing the captain’s ambitions of marrying Miss Preston and had promised to disinherit her if she wed against his wishes, he also possessed a powerful motive.”
“Just because he had a motive and no alibi doesn’t mean he did it,” said Sebastian, watching a crane fit into place a large stone on the new Strand Bridge. “I’m still not convinced Henry Austen is being entirely honest about his quarrel that night with Preston. It might be worthwhile to send a constable to talk to the Monster’s regular patrons; one of them may have overheard something interesting.”
Lovejoy nodded. “Good idea. We’ve recently discovered Preston received a visitor on Sunday morning, by the way-a physician named Sterling. Douglas Sterling.”
“Preston was unwell?”
Lovejoy shook his head. “According to Miss Preston, her father was in the best of health-at least, as far as she knows.”
“What does this Dr. Sterling say?”
“Very little, unfortunately. I sent one of my best lads-a Constable Hart-to speak with him, but Sterling claims the visit was medical in nature and refuses to discuss it further. When Constable Hart tried to press the matter, the good doctor became quite agitated and stormed off. Hart thinks he’s hiding something.”
“Interesting. I’ll have to have a go at him.”
Lovejoy cleared his throat. “I should perhaps have mentioned this Dr. Sterling is quite aged.”
“How aged?”
“Nearly eighty. He’s been retired for years.”
“So why was he treating Preston?”
“He claims he saw him as a favor.”
“They were friends?”
“Miss Preston says he’s the former colleague of a some relative-a cousin of her grandfather, I believe.”
Sebastian turned to stare at him. “Lord Sidmouth’s father was a physician-and her grandfather’s cousin.”
“Was he? Then perhaps that’s the connection.”
“Where does this Dr. Sterling live?”
“Number fourteen Chatham Place. But I gather he spends most of his time at a coffeehouse near the bridgehead. He sounds like a crusty old gentleman. I suspect you’ll not find him easy to coerce into talking, if he’s made up his mind not to.”
“Perhaps I can appeal to his better nature.”
“After listening to Constable Hart,” said Lovejoy, turning away from the river, “I’m not convinced he has one.”
Chapter 24
Douglas Sterling proved to be one of those aged gentlemen who still clung to the powdered wigs considered de rigueur for men of birth and education when they were in their prime.
Sebastian found him in a coffeehouse on the east side of Chatham Place, seated near the bowed front window where he could watch the steady stream of traffic passing back and forth on Blackfriars Bridge. He was hunched over a medical journal that lay open on the table before him, but looked up and frowned when Sebastian paused beside him.
His face was heavily lined with age, the skin sallow and blotched with liver spots. But his frame was still lean, his hands unpalsied, his dark eyes shiny with a belligerent intelligence. “You’re obviously not from Bow Street,” he said, his voice raspy but strong. “So what in blazes do you want with me?”
“Mind if I have a seat?”
“As a matter of fact, I do,” said the old man, and returned pointedly to his reading.
Sebastian leaned one shoulder against a nearby wall, his arms crossed at his chest. Through the window he could see a massive farm wagon heavily laden with hay jolting and swaying as it came down off the bridge’s span. “Nice view,” he said.
“Yes.”
“Come here often, do you?”
“You must know I do; otherwise, you wouldn’t have found me here, now, would you?”
“I understand you’ve retired from the practice of medicine.”
“Pretty much.”
“Yet you consulted with Stanley Preston the very day he died?”
“I like to keep my hand in, now and then.”
“Now and then?”
“Yes.” The aged physician gave up all pretense of reading and leaned back in his chair. “Who are you?”
“The name’s Devlin.”
Sterling’s eyes narrowed. “The Earl of Hendon’s son?”
“Yes.”
“I hear you’ve taken a fancy to solving murders. In my day, gentlemen left that sort of thing to the constables and magistrates.”
“Like Constable Hart?”
Sterling grunted. “The man is beyond impudent.”
Sebastian studied the old doctor’s watery, nearly lashless dark eyes. “He thinks you’re hiding something.”
Rather than become flustered, Sterling simply returned Sebastian’s steady gaze and said, “He’s welcome to think what he likes.”
“It doesn’t disturb you that someone lopped off Stanley Preston’s head less than twelve hours after you saw him?”