The Tale of Holly How (21 page)

26

Ruth’s Revelation

It was late when Will Heelis came down from Cuckoo Brow Wood and learned that Caroline Longford had been found, and that she was staying the night with Miss Potter at Belle Green. He wondered how the girl had found her way to Miss Potter, and why. But mostly he was glad and relieved, for the longer their search had gone on, the more anxious he had felt, picturing Caroline lying sprawled at the bottom of a cliff, like Ben Hornby, or wandering, wet and terrified, through the darkest depths of Cuckoo Brow Wood.

Exhausted and dripping, Will decided to stay the night in Sawrey rather than drive back to Hawkshead, where he lodged with his two spinster cousins, Cousin Fanana and Cousin Emily Jane, at Sandground. They retired early, and his late comings and goings always disturbed them. He took a room at the Arms, jotted a note to Miss Potter to thank her for sheltering Caroline, and gave it to Mr. Barrow for delivery first thing in the morning. Then he surrendered his damp outer clothing to Mrs. Barrow to be dried in front of the fire, borrowed a pair of Mr. Barrow’s pajamas, and fell into bed, where he dropped into a restless and fitful sleep.

Early the next morning, he was awakened by a light rapping at the door. “Come in,” he called groggily.

“Good morning, sir,” said a light voice, and he opened one eye to see a hand putting a tray with a cup of tea and two slices of buttered toast on his bedside table. He opened the other eye and saw a familiar face framed by curly dark hair under a maid’s cap.

“Ruth?” he asked, surprised. “Ruth Safford, is that you?”

“It’s me, sir,” said the young woman cheerfully, going over to draw the draperies so that light streamed into the room. “Sorry to be so early, sir, but Mrs. Barrow thought you’d want to be called. She’s brushed your suit, sir, and I’ve brought it up for you. Your boots and stockings, too.”

“But I thought you were in service at Tidmarsh Manor,” Will said, sitting up and knuckling the sleep out of his eyes. He was acquainted with Ruth, having a few years before successfully represented her brother John in a case involving a runaway horse and wagon. He had spoken to her several times at the Manor, when he had gone to visit with Lady Longford.

The young woman pouted. “Indeed I was, sir, until Miss Martine gave me the push.”

“She did?” Will asked. “Why? And how do you come to be working here at the Arms?” He reached for his tea, frowning. He hadn’t understood that it was Miss Martine’s responsibility to manage the servants.

“As to why, sir, you’d have to ask Miss Martine,” Ruth said crisply. “As to my coming here, Mr. Barrow is my father’s cousin, y’ see. He thought Mrs. Barrow could do with a bit of help to make up the rooms and serve at table, and I was glad to oblige.” She went to the door. “Mrs. Barrow says to say that ye’ve a lady waiting to see you, and that breakfast is hot downstairs.”

“A lady?” Will asked, now even more surprised.

“Miss Potter, sir. And she has Miss Caroline with her.” She turned, her hand on the knob. “How would you like your eggs, sir?”

“Scrambled, please,” Will said. Miss Potter? he wondered. At this early hour?

“Thank you, sir,” Ruth said, and was gone.

Ten minutes later, washed and combed and dressed in his now-dry suit, Will went into the dining room. It was empty except for Miss Potter and Caroline, who were seated at the round table in front of the window that overlooked the Kendal road.

“Good morning, Mr. Heelis,” Miss Potter said. “I hope we didn’t wake you.”

“Of course not,” Will lied heartily. “Good morning to you. And to you, Miss Longford. I am glad to see you looking none the worse for your adventure” He smiled as he pulled out the chair and sat down. “I do hope you weren’t too awfully lost.”

“I wasn’t lost at all,” Caroline retorted with a hard-edged look that reproached him for his patronizing tone, and flicked one braid over her shoulder. “I was in the shepherd’s hut at the top of Holly How.”

“Oh, really?” Will asked in surprise. “I must confess, it’s not a place I thought to look.” He wasn’t pleased to hear that she had taken refuge there, since Ben Hornby had fallen to his death not far away. “Ah, thank you, Ruth,” he added, as the young woman set a plate in front of him, laden with scrambled eggs, bacon, sausage, kippers, and sliced fried tomato. “Won’t you have some breakfast?” he asked his guests.

“Thank you, Mr. Heelis,” Miss Potter said politely. “We ate at Belle Green. But a cup of tea would be nice.”

“I’ll just brew another pot, then,” Ruth said. “Won’t be a minute.”

As Ruth went back to the kitchen, Miss Potter leaned forward and lowered her voice. “I shouldn’t have troubled you so early this morning, Mr. Heelis, except that Caroline has something I think you need to hear. I hope you won’t mind if she tells her story whilst you eat your breakfast.”

“Not at all,” Will said, tucking comfortably into his eggs and bacon. But as Caroline talked, he lost that sense of pleasant, relaxed self-indulgence that accompanies a highly satisfactory breakfast. And by the time she had finished her story, he was scowling darkly.

“Are you
sure
that’s what you heard?” he demanded.

Caroline regarded him. “I know it doesn’t sound . . .” She hesitated, and then her mouth took on a determined set, and in her features, Will could read something of her grandmother’s stubborn look. “But that’s what I heard. Miss Martine and Dr. Gainwell have some sort of plan, and whilst I don’t know what it is, I know it has something to do with Grandmama, and that they think I’m in their way. That’s why I didn’t answer when I heard him calling my name—out there in the woods, I mean.” Her eyes narrowed. “I
am
telling the truth, Mr. Heelis.”

“I believe you.” Will smiled gently. “Solicitors have to listen to all kinds of people, you know. Some are truthful, and some aren’t.” He cupped his hand behind his ear and leaned forward. “We develop an ear for honesty, you see. It helps us do our job. And I think you’re telling the truth.”

“But we don’t know enough of the details,” Miss Potter said, frowning. “And I can’t think how we might find out more.”

“We might ask Mrs. Beever,” Will suggested. “She’s been at the Manor for some years, and—”

“Mrs. Beever doesn’t know anything,” a voice put in, somewhat scornfully. “She stays in the kitchen. Emily works upstairs, but she curries favor with Miss Martine, and anyway, she’s not very bright, which is why she’s still at the Manor. You won’t get anything out of her.”

“Why, hello, Ruth!” Caroline exclaimed, her eyes widening. “So this is where you’ve come to work!”

“Hello, miss,” said Ruth, putting the teapot on the table. “I’m sorry, Mr. Heelis,” she added, in a repentant tone. “I couldn’t help overhearing what the young miss said. I don’t know the gentleman she’s talking about, since he’s just come, but I have to say that I think she’s right about Miss Martine. That person is up to no good, in my opinion. Always so meek and mild to her ladyship’s face, but behind her back, it’s all brow-beating and bullying.”

“I think Mrs. Beever would agree,” Miss Potter said with a little smile. To Will, she added quietly, “She told Miss Barwick so when she—Miss Barwick—delivered a ginger cake for her ladyship.” At Will’s mystified look, she added, “Ginger helps to settle the stomach, you know. Lady Longford has been suffering with stomach trouble.”

“That’s right,” Ruth said. “Anyway, when her ladyship got sick, Miss Martine took over the running of the household, the menus and the supplies and settling accounts and all of that. And giving medicine to her ladyship, and changing out the servants—” She sniffed. “A legacy hunter, is what I call that one. Angling after some little bit in her ladyship’s will.”

Miss Potter gave her a sharp look. “Medicine? Was this something that the doctor left for her ladyship?”

“The doctor?” Ruth gave her a doubtful look. “I don’t think so. It was something Miss Martine had. A narrow strip of brown paper, y’ see. It’s soaked in water, and then the water is used to make tea.”

“Did you ask her about it?” Will inquired.

“No,” Ruth said, with a little shrug. “I just assumed that’s what it was. I didn’t much like the idea of her making up medicine for her ladyship, though. No more than I liked her other tricks. Didn’t seem right to me.”

Nor to me, Will thought. He said nothing, but as he glanced up, he caught Miss Potter’s eye and had the uncomfortable impression that it didn’t seem right to her, either.

He smiled. “I think,” he said to Ruth, “that I should like another sausage and rasher of bacon, please.”

“Oh, yes, sir,” Ruth said. “I’ll get it right now. And perhaps for the young miss, too.” She turned, then paused. “I hope you don’t think I spoke out of turn,” she said apprehensively, “or that I said too much. I shoudn’t like for Miss Martine to hear that I—”

“No, of course not, Ruth,” Will replied briskly. “You’ve been very helpful. And Miss Martine will learn nothing from us.” When she had gone, he leaned forward. “Well, Miss Potter,” he said in a low voice, “does this suggest anything to you?”

Miss Potter hesitated. When she spoke, she said just two words—words that might have been incomprehensible to a great many people, but which Will Heelis understood perfectly.

“Mrs. Maybrick,” she said.

27

A Breakfast-Table Conference

“All’s well that ends well, I suppose,” said Captain Miles Woodcock, folding his napkin and pushing his chair back from the breakfast table. “Although it certainly was a trying evening for all of us. Every able-bodied man in the village was out there, beating those woods.”

“It’s left us with a puzzle, too,” his sister said. She put down her coffee cup, frowning. “Why Caroline Longford should come down to the village and go to Miss Potter—instead of going home, I mean. It doesn’t seem that she was lost at all, which makes me wonder if perhaps there might have been some trouble at the Manor.”

“Trouble?” Miles asked. “What sort of—”

The door opened and his sister’s frown dissolved into a wide smile. “Why, good morning, Dr. Butters!” she said cheerily. “How nice to see you so early this morning. What can I get you? Eggs and bacon?”

“Ah, Butters,” Miles said warmly. “Dim, ask Elsa for another plate.”

“I’ll just have coffee, Dimity,” said the doctor, holding up his hand. “And a private word with Captain Woodcock, if you wouldn’t mind, my dear.”

“Not in the least,” Dim said warmly, pouring a cup of coffee. “I’ve a rather unpleasant task this morning, which I have been putting off. But now I really must face up to it, I’m afraid.” She turned down her mouth. “The flower show is just a fortnight away, you see, and if Mrs. Wharton is allowed to judge the dahlias again, the whole village will rise up in revolt. Yesterday, the committee asked Mr. Calvin to do it, and he has agreed. I’ve been commissioned to break the news to poor Mrs. Wharton, although for the life of me, I can’t think of a kind way in which to do it.”

“You may stop fretting, Dimity,” said the doctor, seating himself at the table. “I happened to see Mrs. Wharton on the ferry yesterday. She was on her way to the station at Windermere, to catch the train for London. Her daughter Margaret is expecting twins, and she’s planning to be gone for at least a month, perhaps longer. She seemed rather frantic. I daresay that flower shows and dahlias have flown right out of her head.”

“Oh, what a blessing!” Dimity exclaimed. “Now I can get on to Mr. Charles and the garden vegetables.” She stood. “I’ll leave you to your discussion, gentlemen.”

“Fine woman, your sister,” said the doctor thoughtfully, when Dimity had left the room. “If I weren’t married already, she’d be the first I’d ask.”

“You wouldn’t get her away from me without a struggle,” Miles said with a grin. “Although I suppose that’s a prospect I should welcome—for Dim’s sake. I’m sure she’d prefer a husband and family of her own to life with a dry-as-sticks brother. And since you’re not available, I’ve my eye on Heelis. Haven’t said anything to him, though,” he added hastily, “so don’t you go meddling. He’s very shy around the ladies, and will want the right kind of encouragement.”

“Heelis, eh? One of the finest men I know. Make Dimity an excellent husband.” The doctor’s eyes glinted. “And I never meddle in other people’s love affairs. I never meddle at all, of course, unless it’s something urgent—as it is now. I came to talk to you about Lady Longford.”

“The girl’s been found, you know,” Miles said. “Late last night. It appears that she presented herself beneath Miss Potter’s window and asked asylum, as it were. In fact, I saw the two of them—Miss Potter and the girl—a short while ago, going into the Arms. To talk to Heelis, I assume. It was rather late when he got back to the village, so he stayed at the pub.”

“I knew that she’d been found,” Butters said, “although I didn’t quite get the circumstances. Asylum, eh? It’s that Martine woman, I suppose.” He sipped his coffee and put the cup down. “I was at the Manor last evening, you know. I was called up there to see to her ladyship.”

“That stomach ailment again?”

Butters nodded. “It’s got me scratching my head, Woodcock. The problem responds to treatment, and she’s almost her old self. Flares up again, and she’s at death’s door. One would almost think—”

The door opened and Heelis came in. “Ah, glad to see that I’ve caught the two of you together,” he said. To Miles, he added, “I’m here so often that you’ll think I want to move in.”

“Any time,” Miles said. “I daresay our accommodations are more pleasant than those at the Arms, and Dimity certainly enjoys your company. Coffee?” At Will’s “Yes, thank you,” he poured, remarking with a grin, “I trust that you enjoyed your early-morning conversation with Miss Potter.”

Heelis took the cup with a wry chuckle. “There’s nothing like a village for news, is there?”

“Nothing like,” Butters agreed with a malicious twinkle. “Next thing you know, they’ll have you and Miss Potter married.” Heelis reddened, Miles glowered, and the doctor went on, hastily, “You saw the girl, too, Woodcock says. She’s all right, is she? No harm inflicted by her wanderings in the wilderness?”

“She didn’t wander,” Heelis said. “She spent the evening in the shepherd’s hut on Holly How, in the company of young Jeremy Crosfield, and then both of them came down to see Miss Potter. Caroline left the Manor rather precipitously, it appears. She overheard something that troubled her.”

Miles frowned. “And what was that?” He and the doctor listened intently as Heelis told them what Caroline had heard outside the library window at the Manor. At the end of it, Miles whistled incredulously. “And you credit this wild tale?”

“Well, it does explain one or two puzzling things, it seems to me,” Heelis said. “As I recall, none of us were very impressed by Dr. Gainwell’s performance in the interview. He left too many holes, too many loose ends. He left me wondering, for instance, just where he’d served as a missionary. And what his subjects were at Oxford.”

“He did seem uncomfortable,” Miles said, “although I chalked it up to lack of preparation. I got the idea that he thought the appointment was rather a sure thing, and that he hadn’t expected to be quizzed.” He frowned. “But this plan Caroline mentions—what do you think it is?”

Heelis looked from one of them to the other. “For that, I’ll have to tell you something I learnt from Ruth Safford, a former maid at Tidmarsh Manor.”

“Former?” Butters asked. “She’s no longer working there?”

“Right,” Heelis replied. “Miss Martine discharged her. She’s at the Arms now. Served me my breakfast.”

Butters gave him a sharp look. “Miss Martine has taken to managing the servants, then?”

“So it would appear,” Heelis replied. “There’s more, though, Butters—in your line, too, I should think. It seems that she’s taken to making medicine.” And he told them what Ruth Safford had reported.

“So
that’s
it!” the doctor exclaimed, pushing his chair back. He jumped up and began to pace, clasping his hands behind his back. “Narrow strips of brown paper, indeed. By Jove, Heelis, I had my suspicions. But I never—” He stopped, shaking his head, and his voice grew harsh. “I tell you, I have been entirely too naive. I should have guessed.”

Miles stared from one of them to the other. “I haven’t the foggiest idea what you’re talking about, you know. Would one of you care to oblige me with a clue?”

Heelis looked up, his eyes steady, his mouth hard. “Does the name Florence Maybrick mean anything to you?”

Miles put down his pipe, his jaw dropping. “You’re joking.”

“I’m afraid not,” Heelis said in a regretful tone. “Actually, it was Miss Potter who brought up the name. But the minute she said it, I could see the whole thing. Can’t you?”

Miles stared at him, incredulous. Yes, he could see it, and he was stunned.

Some years before, in Liverpool, a woman named Florence Maybrick had been convicted for the murder of her husband. The servants had seen her soaking flypaper strips in a basin of water, thereby obtaining the arsenic that she then fatally administered to her victim. The case had become sadly infamous, and anyone who read a newspaper during the time of the trial could not fail to know every detail of the case.

“Heelis is right, I’m afraid,” Butters gritted, between his teeth. “All the signs and symptoms are there, Woodcock. Headaches, coldness of the limbs, gastrointestinal difficulties. I’ve been a blind fool. I didn’t make the connection.”

“Why should you?” Heelis asked evenly. “Don’t reproach yourself, my dear Butters. Intentional poisoning isn’t a usual occurrence in your practice, I shouldn’t think.”

“No, and thank the good Lord for that!” the doctor exclaimed. “My patients have enough troubles.”

“So you think Miss Martine is attempting to
poison
her ladyship?” Miles asked, staring at the both of them.

“Arsenic poisoning is certainly consistent with the symptoms,” said the doctor darkly.

“And her motive?”

“Ruth Safford claims that she’s a legacy hunter,” Heelis said, in a grave voice, “and I think it’s entirely possible. A wealthy old woman with no immediate family—at least, no family in evidence. Miss Martine probably knew that Lady Longford had disowned her son, and that he had died in New Zealand. She might not even have known about his daughter until the girl appeared on the scene.” He shook his head. “In fact, Miss Martine told me some time ago that Lady Longford intended to speak to me about making a new will. Nothing’s been done yet, but I suspect that she was laying the groundwork.”

“We must act, then!” Miles exclaimed, pushing back his chair. “Her ladyship is in grave danger!”

Heelis shook his head. “I don’t think so. At least, not in imminent danger. The old will is still in place, you see. Everything goes to charity. Although I suppose it’s possible to make a fatal mistake.” He glanced inquiringly at the doctor.

“It’s possible,” Butters said. “Arsenic poisoning is not an exact science. However, if Miss Martine is indeed a legacy hunter, she must first get rid of—” He pressed his lips together.

“Exactly,” Heelis said. “It is likely, then, wouldn’t you say, that her granddaughter is in even greater danger?”

Miles stared at him. “By Jove,” he whispered. “Yes, I see it. Yes, of course. Miss Martine believed that Lady Longford had no descendents, and when the girl arrived on the scene, she upset the apple-cart entirely.”

Heelis smiled grimly. “One can scarcely blame Caroline for taking to her heels, can one?”

“Well, then,” Miles said, “the first thing to do is to apprehend Miss Martine, and—”

“I doubt it’s that simple,” Heelis said. “On what charge? And with what evidence?”

Miles stared at him. “Why, man, attempted murder, of course! On the testimony of that servant you talked to this morning. Miss . . . whoever she is. And then we’ll go and look for the flypaper and—”

“But Ruth Safford cannot swear that the poison was administered to her ladyship,” Heelis pointed out. “Arsenic-water has other purposes.”

“Heelis is right,” Butters said heavily. “Mrs. Maybrick argued that she intended to use it for cosmetic purposes. Simple possession proves nothing, I’m afraid.”

“But then what?” Miles asked, throwing up his hands. “We can’t just stand by and let murder be done!”

“Right, old chap,” Heelis agreed, with a glint in his eye. “So let me tell you the plan that Miss Potter proposed to me, and to which I have agreed. Caroline has been detailed to work in Miss Barwick’s bakery here in the village for a day or two, where she can no doubt make herself useful whilst she is being kept safely out of the way. And Miss Potter is going to Tidmarsh Manor to conduct a brief inquiry.” At Miles’s astonished look, he added, rather sheepishly, “She insists that it is entirely safe, of course, or I should not have allowed her to go.” He took out his watch and looked at it. “She’s probably on her way by now.”

“ ‘Allowed her to go, ’ ”
Miles muttered ironically, shaking his head. “I doubt if anyone in the world could keep that woman from doing anything she pleases.”