The Deathly Portent (28 page)

Tillie nodded, giving no more attention to his comment than a brief grimace. “It was good of Doctor Meldreth to take on the horrid task of informing Tisbury.”

To Francis it was a matter of the fellow’s duty, but he refrained from saying so. “It is a good thing Kinnerton elected not to go with him.”

“Indeed. Besides, I doubt anyone could have kept him from racing off to Cassie Dale’s cottage.”

Francis had to laugh. “Besotted!” He threw a teasing look at his wife. “What is it about these murderous affairs that brings out the romance in a fellow, Tillie?”

To his delight, a delicate colour fluctuated in her cheek. “Evidently the malaise is not confined to the male sex.”

This piqued his interest briefly. “You think Cassie is similarly
épris
?”

“Oh, entirely—though I fear there is some barrier on her side.” He was about to ask what it might be when Tillie returned to the matter at hand. “In any event, Kinnerton is in no mood to hear Tisbury’s accusations, which I have no doubt will be voluble. Not to mention violent.”

“Undoubtedly,” Francis agreed. “Well, his business with Tisbury’s wife is done, so we must allow him to indulge his anxiety for Mrs. Dale’s welfare.”

Tillie nodded. She was wearing her faraway look, he decided. If she had been briefly distracted from the play of events with a reminder of the budding romance in which she had shown an interest, it was plain her thoughts were now otherwhere. He had at least the satisfaction of watching her tuck into her repast with an increasing appetite.

He eyed her covertly, dismayed by the strain in her face. She was a trifle paler than usual, and he suspected she was maintaining her sangfroid with an effort. A telltale muscle twitched now and then in her cheek, and she showed a tendency to avoid his gaze.

“Tillie,” he said softly.

Her eyes came up, and the fork stilled on its way to her mouth. He read apprehension in her face and smiled.

“Don’t look like that. You’re taking this badly.”

A little gasping sigh escaped her, and she looked away for a moment. Then her glance came back to him, and he recognised a look she had worn right at the end of the ordeal they had shared last year. He knew what she was going to say before the words came out of her mouth.

“I blame myself.”

Wrung, he took refuge in an angered response. “Don’t be absurd!”

“But I do,” she protested. “That quarrel was my fault, for I set Molly off. She thought Hannah had said something, especially when I threatened her with Pilton.”

“What the devil has that to do with anything?”

She waved the fork roughly, and the meat flew off onto the floor.

“Don’t you see, Fan? It was the fight with Hannah that fully triggered Cassie’s vision, which must have given the murderer the idea.”

“Then he must have been looking for an excuse,” Francis objected tersely, rising to retrieve the errant morsel and disposing of it on the tray. “You can’t take the blame for that.”

“And who better than Molly for a victim?” Tillie went on, disregarding this. “Just the creature most likely to set the villagers in a riot.”

Francis understood well enough, but he cast about for excuses, anything to take away the agonised expression in that beloved face.

“You are forgetting he used the Blue Pig. That must have been a deliberate attempt to throw suspicion on Hannah Pakefield.”

“Oh, a convenient side issue,” uttered Tillie, her tone distraught. “The vision was seen in the coffee room; it involved the coffee room. It was meant to set the village onto Cassie.”

A knock at the door sent Francis to his feet. “The coffee.” Setting down his platter, he added in a murmur, “If that wretched girl had not seen fit to bruit the story of the vision abroad, you could at least confine your suspicions to those present in the coffee room at the time.”

As predicted, Patty was standing outside the door, her youthful features a combination of nervousness and harassment. She was holding a small tray containing a single cup and saucer, accompanied by a silver coffeepot, a jug of cream, and a sugar bowl. A tankard of ale stood alongside.

Francis took it from her and thanked her for her trouble. Patty dropped a curtsy.

“It’s no trouble, sir.”

She hurried away, and Francis shut the door, setting the tray down on the already overburdened table. Then he realised Tillie was staring into space.

Arrested, he watched her. Just so had she looked once or twice last year when she was making some connection in her thoughts. Then he had been unwilling to delve, feeling intrusive. Now, in the intimacy of marriage, he had no such qualms.

“What is in your mind?”

Her eyes focused upon him, and she reached out for the coffeepot, suddenly brisk. “That we had best eat quickly. I want to look for signs outside to see if Molly was dragged in by the front or the back.”

“I
telled her not to go, I telled her.”

The words, delivered in a hoarse monotone, bore witness to the state of shock that had enveloped the landlord of the Cock and Bottle. Forcibly removed from the fateful coffee room by Ryde and Meldreth, Tisbury had sunk down onto the stairs in the Blue Pig’s gloomy hallway. Ottilia had come upon him as she descended and, despite her spouse’s protest, had promptly sat down beside him and taken hold of his slack hand.

“Why did she go, Tisbury?” she asked gently.

He answered dully, staring before him. “A message it be.”

“What sort of message? Was it written or did someone bring it?”

Tisbury’s head shook slowly from one side to the other. “Bain’t writ. Nor I don’t know who brung it.”

“What did the message say?”

“I bain’t knowing more’n it said for Molly to go by the lock-up. Molly said as all the world be a-going to know once for all as the witch done for Duggleby.”

Ottilia’s blood chilled. An obvious trap, and the woman had fallen for it.

“But how should Molly think that might benefit her?” she asked, struggling to maintain a casual tone.

Tisbury’s broad, ruddy features turned to her, his eyes lacklustre. “Knew as you thought it be her as done for Duggleby.”

Ottilia exchanged a quick glance with Francis, standing close by—for fear of the man turning surly with her, Ottilia suspected.

“How could she know that?” he demanded sharply.

Tisbury did not answer. He was still gazing at Ottilia, and a measure of life had begun to return to the fixed stare.

“It be you as said it. Molly done it and come to me after, for as I’d brung the roof down and set a fire going in the smithy.”

“Will again!” burst from Francis. “By heavens, but that tapster of yours has a deal to answer for!”

“What do you mean, Lord Francis?” cut in Meldreth.

“He has a pack of females in his train who eavesdrop on his behalf. And one of them is the maid here. She must have had her ear to the door last night and could not wait to run to him with the news.” He regarded the bereaved man with a kindling eye. “Is that it, Tisbury? Did Molly have it from Will?”

Tisbury snapped suddenly. “And if’n he bain’t said, we
bain’t knowing as you be fetching Pilton on my Molly next. Her bain’t touched Duggleby, nor I bain’t brung down the roof nor set the fire on, neither.”

“We know that now,” Ottilia said quickly, in an attempt to hold back the tide of his growing anger.

“Now, aye. Now as Molly’ve took and died, too, at the hands of that cursed witch!”

He was making to rise, his eyes fixed on Ottilia, and Francis hastily gripped her arm and pulled her up from the stair. She found herself behind him.

“Ryde, to me!”

The groom left his post at the coffee room door and flanked Francis, his fists raised.

To Ottilia’s relief, the doctor moved in, catching at Tisbury’s arm.

“Calm yourself, Tisbury. There will be no fighting in the presence of the dead. Show respect to your wife, man!”

Peeping from behind the protection of her husband’s broad back, Ottilia saw the man’s high-coloured cheeks deepen to a richer red, and the burgeoning fire in his eyes died down.

“Aye, I’ll do none a mischief with Molly laying by.” His tone strengthened. “But if’n Pilton nor that there Lord Henbury don’t take up that witch, I’ll see to her myself.”

Ottilia could not let this stand. She pushed past Francis and confronted the man.

“Have a little sense, Tisbury, do. Why in the world should Mrs. Dale call Molly out in the middle of the night? Especially if Molly went to discover something about Mrs. Dale being responsible for Duggleby’s death.”

But Tisbury was ready for that. “It be a trick, bain’t it? A witch her be. Likely her spelled whomsoever brung the message. Then as her’ve lured Molly out, her’ve killed her.”

“But if she was able to use magic, what need had she to bring Molly out of the Cock?” pursued Ottilia, refusing to despair of making the fellow see reason. “Why not simply make magic to ensure she died in her bed?”

“For as her’ve had them visions, bain’t her? Her’ve seen as Molly be dead in the Blue Pig. Her tricked her so’s her’d do her here like her’ve seen.”

“But Molly was not killed here, Tisbury,” Ottilia protested. “Ask Doctor Meldreth if you do not believe me. She was dragged here and put in the position she is in just so that you would think it the mirror of Mrs. Dale’s vision. Don’t you see? A trick has been played, yes. More than one, perhaps. But it had nothing to do with Mrs. Dale.”

She thought for a moment that she might have got through to the man. His jaw hung slack as he stared at her, blinking slowly as if he tried to take in the sense of her words. His eyes swung to Meldreth.

“It’s true, Tisbury,” said the doctor, to Ottilia’s relief. “Molly was killed elsewhere. If the message took her to the lock-up, it’s likely that was the place.”

For a moment the outcome hung in the balance. Ottilia discovered she was holding her breath and silently let it go, her eyes never leaving the man’s face.

It began to work a little, his mouth moving as if speech was struggling to come out. His eyes reddened, glistening, and a trickle of moisture dripped from one nostril. When the voice came at last, it was low, painful with suppressed grief.

“Her said as you be on the witch’s side, Molly did. Her said as Lady Fan be one with the devil, too. Now Molly be killed and all. Her be sitting in there with Hannah Pakefield’s skewer in her neck!”

His voice rose towards the end, but Francis had not waited. Ottilia was shifted bodily out of the way, and by the time Tisbury reached the end of his accusation, Francis had him by the edges of his brown frock coat.

“You dare speak of my wife in such terms! Lord help me, but if you lay a finger on her, I shall thrash you within an inch of your life!”

“My lord!” Thus Meldreth.

Ottilia saw him close in, trying to wrench Francis’s hands from the man’s coat. She stepped quickly forward.

“Fan, leave him be, I pray you! He is bereaved. He is not responsible for his words.”

Her plea fell on deaf ears. “Then he had better be responsible for his actions,” Francis growled.

But he let go, thrusting the man away from him. Tisbury dropped back onto the stair and sat there, dumbly staring at the floor between his knees.

Ottilia seized the opportunity to drag her husband away, whispering urgently.

“As well he is too numb to respond, Fan. I wish you will not take up the cudgels so violently.”

The wrath was still in his face as he eyed her, speaking low. “I mean it, Tillie. The fellow is ripe for any violence, and I will not have you become a target for his rage.”

“I am sure he speaks only from his grief, Fan.”

“Well, so am I not. You keep away from him, do you understand me?”

Ottilia put a finger up to his cheek and stroked it, venturing a smile. “I will do whatever you wish, my dearest one.”

A little of his fury seemed to abate, but he took her strongly by the shoulders. “Yes, but will you? I know you, Ottilia. When you become involved in the moment, you are utterly reckless of your own safety.”

Ottilia set her hands against his chest. “I promise I will be careful.”

He still looked dubious, but there was no further opportunity to thrash the matter out, for the main door to the building burst open, and the elderly little figure of Mr. Wagstaff thrust limping into the hall.

“Where be her? Where be my Moll?”

Francis, ready for any fray, left Tillie and strode forth to take on this ancient progenitor of the deceased woman.

“You’ve arrived, have you? Let me tell you, Wagstaff, if
you are bent upon supporting your son-in-law in his ridiculous accusations of my wife—”

“My lord, let be!”

He found Meldreth at his side and stopped short. “Let be? After what has been said?”

“Mr. Wagstaff is unlikely to support any such notion, I think you will find.”

“Which notion be that, hey?” chimed in the ancient, glaring up into both their faces.

Francis took this without hesitation. “Your son-in-law had the gall to suggest that my wife is in league with the so-called witch.”

“Tisbury believes Mrs. Dale is responsible for your daughter’s death, Wagstaff,” said Meldreth, taking it upon himself to elucidate.

The old man’s eyes snapped. “Bain’t no witching in Witherley. Daft they be as say so, ’cluding my girl, if’n her be gone and all.”

“I am sorry to say she has gone, Wagstaff,” returned Meldreth.

Francis watched the confirmation hit the old man squarely. He did not shift from his antagonistic stance, but his eyes narrowed, his face went grey, and his knees wobbled slightly so that he leaned the heavier on his staff.

“Dead, then,” he said dully. “As like her ma as nowt to ninepence. Knew as her temper ’ud do for her one day.”

Arrested, Francis stared at the man. “Your meaning?”

The rheumy eyes found his, and there was black hatred in their depths. “Bain’t no secret. Seen by all the village it be. My Moll scratched her face for her, and her’ve took revenge. Bain’t need to look no further than Hannah Pakefield.”