Secret Lament (31 page)

“No,” I said firmly. “You must let him pass. Just be ready to stop him retreating.”

She frowned but nodded; I added. “And avoid the skillet – he’ll be dead for sure if you hit him with that!” She giggled.

I turned back to the others. “He’ll try to get through to the front of the house,” I said, and ruthlessly overrode Hugh who wanted to ask how I knew. “Fowler, I want you
just on the house side of the servants’ door. Esther – ” I saw Fowler blink at my use of Esther’s Christian name. “Position yourself by the library doors. He
won’t go in but he might try to get out that way and I need to be sure he can’t. Hugh, I want you opposite the drawing room door – you should be able to find somewhere to hide in
the shadows of the stairs. Corelli, stand by the front door in case he tries to get out that way.”

Corelli nodded. “And where will you be?”

“In the drawing room.”

“Why the drawing room?” Hugh insisted. “What’s so special about the drawing room!” Then he went silent. “You don’t mean – Charles – he
can’t be! He’s not from – from – ”

Esther glanced round. “You mean – he does not belong here.”

“I think not,” I said levelly.

“I don’t care who he is or where he comes from,” Corelli said. “So long as we get him.”

He was very quiet, had been ever since we met an hour ago at St Nicholas’s Church. I knew he had not told me everything and that worried me. Clearly I would have trouble keeping him from
killing the murderer; I had expected that. But there was something more. Perhaps he was not sure of it himself – he had the air of a man trying to puzzle something through and not greatly
liking the answers that suggested themselves.

I told them to get to their positions. Catherine and Esther went off upstairs, first to light candles and then to put them out again as if they were going to bed in the ordinary course of
events. Tom went ostentatiously round the house showing himself at every window, checking all the locks. Fowler went briefly into the garden to piss; Hugh and Corelli walked off to the library,
discussing fencing.

I pulled out a stool and sat down next to Ned in the candlelit kitchen.

“You’ve got to stop drinking, Ned.”

“Go to the devil,” he said thickly.

“You’re in a fair way to finishing the work Julia started.”

He showed me a sour face. “What do you mean by that?”

“Hanging Richard,” I said again, brutally. “You’re the danger to him now.”

He laughed mirthlessly. “Perhaps I’d better hang myself then. Get myself out of his way.”

“Yes, yes,” I said dryly. “And you think he’ll be safe on his own? How much common sense do you think he has, Ned? He was the one who told Julia, wasn’t
he?”

Ned stared at me then looked away, at the puddles of beer on the kitchen table.

“The Colonies – you think we’ll be safer there?”

“Possibly. Or try Paris. They tend to let people get on with their own lives there, I’m told.” I leant forward. “As long as you’re discreet. Do you know the meaning
of the word, Ned? Discreet, spelt S-A-F-E.”

That sour look again. “I can spell.”

“Doesn’t look like it from my point of view.”

“I don’t speak French.”

“Hugh will teach you.”

“And what are we supposed to do for money?”

I hesitated, thought of the hundred guineas under my mattress and sighed. “I can lend you some.”

“You’ll not get it back,” he said sharply.

“Surprise me. Become Monsieur Reynolds – France’s greatest actor.”

That brought a wry grimace. “It’s been a long time since I imagined that sort of thing was possible, Charlie.”

“Perhaps you’d better start thinking of it again.”

Ned laughed weakly. “God, would you do all this for a fool like me?”

There was a clatter from the passageway outside; Tom came back into the kitchen, beaming with excitement. “Everything’s locked except the back door, sir.”

“Good. Then get to your post.” I got up, leant over Ned. “Come and see me after Julia’s funeral tomorrow and we’ll sort out the details.”

He nodded. “I keep thinking – ”

“Yes?”

“That there’s something I ought to be telling you.” He frowned. “Something Julia said when she was telling me I had to marry her. But I didn’t listen properly. I
couldn’t think of anything but Richard, about saving him – ”

“It doesn’t matter,” I said. “I know who the murderer is.”

He grimaced, plainly annoyed with himself. “You’d do better to kick me from here to Paris, Charlie. You’ll be throwing good money away.”

“That’s my choice.”

I thought ruefully of that hundred guineas as I left the kitchen. Esther would be furious if she knew I was giving some to Ned. And it had represented ease and a troublefree mind for at least
the rest of the year. Yet perhaps I was not so distressed –it represented obligation too, and charity. Yes, perhaps that was the worst of all. Call it pride, but I wanted to meet Esther on
equal terms through my own efforts.

I knew that was almost certain never to happen.

I went through the house checking that everyone was where they should be. Tom was eager for the intruder to show his face; he had even found rope with which to tie the rogue up. Esther had
positioned herself in the dark library just behind the harpsichord, with one of her lethal duelling pistols close to hand.

“I was hoping to catch him alive,” I said uneasily.

“No, you were not,” she corrected me, coolly. “You are hoping he will go back into the world whence he came and not trouble us any more.”

I could hardly see her face in the darkness – it was a pale blur – but I could smell her scent.

“I think he is from that other world, yes,” I agreed. “That’s why he kept trying to get in.”

“He lives here in that other world?”

I nodded. “It’s a shabby lodging house there. I told you that world was both like and unlike our own? Well, the key to the garden is the same in both worlds, but the house lock is
different.”

“I had it replaced,” she said. “Last year. Tom broke the key in the lock. So when the intruder tried to break into the house, he thought he was merely trying to get back into
his own lodgings?”

“Yes. That’s why he kept coming back.”

“Then –” She hesitated. “This is fiendishly complicated, Charles. Does that mean he does not know he is not in his own world?”

“I think that at the very least he is confused.” I gestured at the pistol. “He is bewildered, uncertain and weak. You will not need that pistol.”

“I do not have the least concern about the intruder,” she said coolly. “It is your safety that concerns me. And that means the pistol is essential. Or may be at any
rate.”

“I am in no danger.”

“You cannot know that,” she said into the darkness. “I meant what I said, Charles, I am not prepared to live in constant fear. I do not know whether these dangers seek you out
or whether you go looking for them, but I will not sit idly at home and let you deal with them alone. You must know that already.”

“Esther – ”

“Yes,” she said. “We should talk of it later. I agree. Now is not the time. But let us be clear – the opinion of society means nothing to me. I will have my own
way.”

There was nothing more I could say. How could I argue against something I wanted so much, yet knew to be so foolish? But I could not agree with her. I had just come from berating Ned Reynolds
for putting his lover in danger; how could I turn around and do something equally detrimental to the woman I loved?

Shadows surround us; we are liable to be thrown into darkness at any moment. All the more reason therefore to cling to the light, to all things good and decent.

[Letter from Lady Hubert to her eldest daughter on the death of the latter’s child, September 1731]

Hugh was lingering in an ornamental alcove opposite the drawing room. A small table that held the bust of a Roman matron had originally stood in the alcove and he had moved it
to one side, turning the face of the matron to the wall.

“Couldn’t stand her looking at me like I’d just taken her last macaroon,” he whispered. “Charles, if he gets into the house, how do we know he won’t just snap
his fingers and go back to his own world before any of us can get near him?”

“It’s not as easy as that. Anyway, wherever he goes, I’ll shadow him. I’ll be no more than an arm’s length away.”

“So you can grab him? Damn it, Charles, you’ll get drawn into this other place too!”

“I can come and go as I please,” I said. Praying that it was true, and glad that he couldn’t see my face in the gloom. As I said before, I am not a good liar.

Corelli, by the front door, was morose and unapproachable. “This is all my fault.”

“No.”

“If I had not been so stupid as to agree to Father’s plottings!”

“Julia was killed by someone else,” I said, not feeling up to explaining the other world to Corelli. “Her death was nothing to do with your father.”

“Maybe I put the idea into his head.”

“Then you can make amends by helping me catch the fellow tonight.”

He said nothing. I sighed inwardly. Admirable though it was to see so much attachment to family, it was also wearisome. Corelli no doubt had many admirable qualities but cool detachment did not
seem to be one of them. And was he far enough away from the drawing room? Could I get Julia’s murderer back in his own world before Corelli put a shot his way. If he could deliberately miss
an entire crowd, shooting one individual in near-darkness was probably child’s play to him. Then I saw that he had a sword, not a pistol; I fancied he intended to toy with his victim, rather
than put him out of his misery with a single shot.

I planned to wait just inside the back door, so I could follow the intruder into the house, to ensure that he did not somehow slip away from us. By the time I got to the servants’ door,
Fowler was leaning wearily against it, rubbing his eyes.

“Did you have trouble getting away from Heron?”

He grinned. “The opposite. Said I could have the evening off as he wanted to read Ovid. And as I was leaving – ”

“Yes?”

“He said:
Give my regards to Mr Patterson and tell him not to take foolish risks
.”

“Damn it,” I said, “Does the man know everything?”

“Well nigh, I reckon,” Fowler said, grinning again.

I wondered if that included Fowler’s
interests
.

In the kitchen, Catherine was pouring hot chocolate for herself and Ned. The window shutters did not quite meet and let in a thin line of moonlight. She nodded at the gap. “That
moon’s a nuisance. Will he risk coming here tonight when a casual passer by might see him clear as day?”

“I don’t think he’s thinking as rationally as that.”

She looked sceptical.

I took up my place just outside the scullery in the kitchen passageway. Tom hid by the door to the garden; he was to allow the intruder to pass, then lock the door and stay to guard it. He had
looked mutinous at my repetition of these orders but said nothing. And there we waited while the moon drifted in and out of the gathering clouds, alternately bathing the garden in brightness, then
plunging it into impenetrable darkness. The house was silent except for the chiming of the hall clock; distantly I heard it chime twelve times.

Then came the sound of the key in the door.

The fellow was ridiculously obsessive, I thought; why try the key after finding three times that it did not fit? But then I had accidentally encouraged him to try again.

Silence. Then a creak. Moonlight flooded the scullery and spilled out into the passageway, pooling on the stone flags. I stepped back quickly, afraid that the intruder would see me, retreated to
the butler’s pantry, standing just inside the room to try to obtain a good view of the passageway. The scullery door clicked shut; the moonlight died.

The intruder’s footsteps seemed to hesitate, then came up the passageway towards me, stopping then going on. He passed – I saw a faint blur of movement in the darkness. To my horror,
I heard the kitchen door creak open. Surely he must be able to see Catherine and Ned in the light shining through the ill-fitting shutters?

I heard a whisper, hardly audible, barely made it out: Julia’s name whispered on an outbreath. The moonlight from the kitchen shone out faintly – I could see the intruder’s
figure, slight and blurred.

He moved on, through the servants’ quarters, to the door that separated them from the main part of the house. Here he was again a mere blur of movement. I heard him open the door; when I
followed, I could not see Fowler even though I knew he would be there. No doubt another skill he had learnt in his disreputable past. On, past the library, towards the drawing room. I had known he
would go there; I should have known, or guessed, everything when the young seamstress in the other world had asked me if I knew where her father was.

An almighty crash behind me.

The shadow started, swung round. Behind me, Tom was swearing and Hugh cursing him. The table with the Roman matron on it: Tom must have disobeyed me and followed, tripped over the table Hugh had
moved –

I grabbed at the shadow. He slipped free, darted for the front door. Corelli’s massive shape came at him out of the darkness. I saw a glint of brightness, heard the hiss of a sword. But
the intruder ducked under Corelli’s arm, stumbled, headed across the hallway.

“The dining room!” Hugh cried. We all ran after him. I was cursing and yelling. “Corelli, stay by the door! Tom, back to the scullery. Now!”

Huge shadows flared as I shouldered my way into the dining room – someone behind me must have lit a branch of candles. The dancing light revealed an empty room – and a door swinging
on the other side.

“Servants’ stairs!” Fowler yelled. I heard his footsteps clattering back into the bowels of the house. Esther and Hugh crowded in behind me, Esther carrying a branch of candles
half-lit. Corelli was staring over their shoulders in a murderous rage. “Back to the front door!” I yelled, frustrated. Was no one capable of doing what they were told! I seized
Esther’s arm. “Go upstairs. Make sure he can’t emerge in one of the rooms up there. Maybe we’ll need George after all. Tell him to keep alert. And shout your loudest if you
find the intruder. You’ll need help to deal with him.”