The Daughters of Gentlemen (10 page)

‘I do not,’ said Frances.

‘I did ask Mrs Robson if Matilda had received any visitors or messages,’ said Mrs Venn, ‘and she told me that someone had delivered a note at the kitchen door that morning. Whoever it was did not come in, and she did not see the person.’ Sharrock wrote laboriously in his book.

The study door opened and a young constable who Frances did not recognise peered in. ‘Nothing, Sir,’ he said, and Frances realised that Matilda’s room had been searched. She glanced at Mrs Venn, who remained stonily determined not to mention that Matilda’s twenty sovereigns were in her strongbox.

‘Very well,’ said Sharrock, ‘but I can tell you now, both of you, that I am not entirely satisfied with your co-operation and you may be sure that I will return as soon as the inquest has delivered its verdict. Good-day.’

The Inspector pulled out his handkerchief, applied it to his nose, and departed. From down the hallway came the melancholy sound of the brass instrument section of a small orchestra.

Frances turned to Mrs Venn, whose face had lost all hint of colour. ‘If the police are concerned that Matilda’s death was more than an accident, we can no longer withhold from them the precise reasons why I am here,’ she said. ‘We may both already have committed a crime! My duty to the law must outweigh any promises of confidentiality I have made. We may assume that nothing will now be decided until next week, but it is my intention to go to the police and tell them everything I know that may have a bearing on the matter. And since it is the school governors who employ me, and not you, I will be obliged to inform them that my enquiries are being impeded by the fact that you are keeping information from me.’

‘Miss Doughty,’ exclaimed the headmistress in desperation, ‘you must believe me – I do not know who wrote the pamphlets or why, neither do I know who put them in the girls’ desks or what possible motive they can have had for doing so.’

‘Then why did you destroy them?’ asked Frances bluntly.

‘I have already told you – it was not material I wished anyone here to see. Please – I must ask you expressly not to reveal anything that might do damage to the school. What if you were to say something and then it later appeared that it was unnecessary for you to do so?’

‘Well,’ said Frances, after some thought, ‘I will say nothing for now, but I cannot promise that this will always be the case. I agree that it is unpleasant to think of such material being placed before innocent young girls. Whoever did so is prepared to stoop very low indeed, and may do so again.’

‘If their only wish is to destroy everything I have worked for, they may already have succeeded,’ said Mrs Venn unhappily.

Frances remained certain that Mrs Venn had not told her the truth. She knew that she could use the authority of the governors to try and force the information from her, but to do so would make an enemy of the lady, and she felt that she needed her as an ally.

Later that day Tom brought two notes for Frances that had been delivered to her previous address. Her recent messages had resulted in an invitation to take afternoon tea with Miss Gilbert on Monday, and an appointment later that same evening to call at Mr Paskall’s residence to discuss the investigation with the three governors. It was more than ever essential that she locate a copy of the pamphlet and see it for herself.

A
fter church on Sunday morning Frances suggested to Sarah that they take a walk in Hyde Park. It was a natural spot for refreshment and entertainment for people of all classes. On Sundays between the hours of twelve, when congregations emerged from morning service, and two, when they returned home for dinner, the park played host to a great variety of visitors, some of them ostentatiously holding Bibles and hymn books to demonstrate their piety, whether they had actually been to church or not. In winter when the Serpentine was frozen, gentlemen and not a few ladies donned their skates and displayed their athleticism on the ice, while the women and children who stood watching, muffled in scarves and shawls, munched on hot chestnuts fresh from the vendor’s brazier. In the summer there were concerts and teas, and the Serpentine was crowded with swimmers and boats. March was only a promise of summer, but the air was invigorating, the freshness of new greenery made dull days brighter and visitors could almost feel as if they were enjoying the countryside without going to all the trouble of leaving town. It was an excursion which Frances had seldom been permitted in the past, since her father had deplored anything smacking of entertainment on a Sunday afternoon, and would, she was sure, have had her working in the chemist shop’s stockroom making up mixtures and lotions if he could have squared this activity with his principles. She recalled only a few brief happy afternoons when the sun had shone and she had walked in the park with her brother, and listened to the speakers who in recent years had had the freedom to stand on a box and talk about any subject that moved them. It was an extraordinary thing to do and she had secretly wondered what that must be like.

Frances and Sarah walked down the long curving drive that divided Hyde Park from Kensington Gardens. The grasslands of the park were emerging from their faded winter gloom and here and there a few scattered clumps of flowers had prodded their way through the turf to enliven the scene. As they approached the Serpentine they could see through the heavy clustering bushes and bare black branches of trees, the still grey water mirroring the clouds that hung thickly above. There were a few spots of rain, but the breeze of the last few days had stilled and the cool air had lost its sting.

As they neared the bridge they passed the Magazine, the old munitions store, which in recent years had also served as the Park’s police station. Hyde Park, so her uncle had told her, had once been a most lawless place, with thieves and footpads roaming the darkness, but nowadays it was patrolled by police both by day and night, and no one in distress need ever be far from help.

‘What I don’t understand,’ said Sarah, echoing Frances’ thoughts on the subject, ‘is how Matilda came to fall in without anyone noticing? I’m sure if
I
was to fall in, I would make a great noise about it and then all the police and boatmen would come and pull me out.’

‘It is not well lit at night, I understand,’ said Frances, grappling with the image of perspiring attendants hauling Sarah’s water-soaked bulk from the Serpentine, ‘but I agree, the police and boatmen are very diligent, and one is always reading in the newspapers about them rescuing bathers in distress.’

‘And then there are the poor souls who come here to put an end to themselves,’ said Sarah with a shake of her head, ‘but from what I’ve heard of Matilda Springett she wasn’t the sort to do that. Too much salt and pepper about that girl. I could see her stepping into danger, careless-like, but not taking her own life deliberate.’

‘Perhaps she was playing a silly game as people do, and fell from the bridge and struck her head,’ said Frances, but she hardly believed that herself. Matilda had impressed her as a girl with more than a hint of daring, but not that kind of foolhardiness which would have led her to risk her life for a senseless game.

The road curved into the approach for the bridge, and Frances, examining the width and height of the stone parapet and comparing it with her memory of Matilda’s small stature, found it hard to imagine how anyone so diminutive could topple from the bridge by accident. Up ahead, Frances saw two figures, a man in the Sunday best suit of an artisan and a woman in black with a heavy veil, being supported by him. Both were standing by the parapet staring disconsolately into the water below. To her discomfiture she recognised Jem Springett, and felt sure that the lady with him was his mother. Both had a mournful restless air, as if they were hoping that peering into the still cold water where Matilda had died might bring them enlightenment.

Frances was unsure if she should approach them and as she paused, her mind was made up for her as Jem saw her and walked his mother over to greet her. ‘Miss Doughty,’ he said, with less hostility than he had shown her before.

Frances greeted them and introduced Sarah as her companion, Miss Smith.

‘Mother wanted to come here, to try and see – try and understand – but it’s very hard. We don’t even know why Tilda came here.’

‘It was the very last place my girl was alive,’ whispered his mother.

‘Perhaps she came here to meet someone,’ Frances suggested.

‘I can’t imagine who that might be,’ said Jem. ‘She said nothing to us.’ He hesitated. ‘It’s been said, Miss Doughty, that you are a detective.’

‘I am,’ said Frances.

‘I don’t really know what it is detectives do, unless it’s to go about and ask a lot of questions that sometimes the police don’t think to ask,’ he said. ‘Would you help us? We want to find out what happened to Tilda.’

‘It’s a little early to think of that,’ said Frances. ‘Let us wait until after the inquest has brought in its verdict. Things may be much clearer then.’

‘You didn’t see her poor body,’ said Jem, and his mother gave a small wail of distress. ‘It was clear enough to me. Great dark bruises on her neck. Someone, Miss Doughty,’ his lips trembled with grief and anger, ‘someone took my little sister by the throat and choked the life out of her, and then they threw her in the water, hoping she would be found a suicide. But there was no water coming out of her – she was put in already dead.’

‘Oh!’ exclaimed Frances, appalled at this revelation. ‘I am most distressed to hear it – what a terrible thing for all of you. Mr Harris must be desolate with grief.’ She glanced quickly about, but Davey was not within sight.

‘That’s another thing,’ said Jem, grimly. ‘Davey is a good, steady man, a quiet temperate soul, and he thought the world of our Tilda and was working all hours to make a home for them when they were wed. And now the police are asking him questions about where he was when it happened.’

‘Davey,’ said Mrs Springett, her voice little more than a croak, ‘who wouldn’t hurt the smallest creature, not a mouse, not a fly! Why would they think he could do such a thing?’

‘It is the first thing they think of,’ said Frances, ‘a sweethearts’ quarrel, jealousy – it does happen very often, but I am sure they will soon realise their mistake.’

‘Only they think they have their man,’ said Jem. ‘Davey was out that night – he went to see his sister who lives out Marylebone way – they think he could have met up with Tilda here on his way home.’

‘But there are many hundreds of people who could have been here that evening!’ said Frances.

‘What they’re saying is, she wouldn’t have trusted a stranger to get so close. And Davey has some scratches on his arms, like a woman’s nails.’

‘I see. How does he explain those?’

Jem sighed. ‘His sister sometimes takes too much to drink, if you understand me, and then she hardly knows where she is or what she’s doing. She sees things that she thinks are attacking her and then she needs to be pacified. Davey said she did scratch him that night. But of course she’ll have no memory of it.’

Frances reassured him that she would do whatever she could. She learned that the inquest would open the following morning at Mount Street Infirmary, a place she had often read about, where coroner’s juries met to contemplate the sodden corpses of the unhappy or the unlucky, taken from the Serpentine. Frances promised to attend, and she and Sarah took their leave of the grieving pair and left them still staring into the water, like mystics searching for a truth that would not appear.

Frances and Sarah walked back along the bridge with Frances deep in thought. At last she said, ‘If what Jem Springett said is true, then it was undoubtedly murder, but it seems like a curious place to carry it out, within such a very short distance of a police station.’

‘If she was throttled, very quick, then she wouldn’t have had a chance to call out,’ said Sarah.

‘True, which means that the murderer was standing very close to her and took her by surprise. The police are right – it was someone she knew and trusted.’

‘Her sweetheart,’ growled Sarah.

‘Or perhaps a woman, who she felt posed no threat. I do think it unlikely that this was a woman’s crime, but Matilda was small and slight enough to be killed in that way by a stronger female.’

Frances stopped suddenly. ‘And there is another thing,’ she said. ‘Jem thought that Matilda was strangled on the bridge just above the place where her body was found, and then thrown over the parapet into the water. Did no one hear a splash? Such a sound would carry a long way at night and the police must surely be alert for noises of that very nature.’

They were walking beside a mass of large bushes and trees, some of them heavy with pale blossoms, and the space opened to reveal a small narrow path sloping down to the bank of the Serpentine. ‘I wonder …,’ murmured Frances, and turned to follow the path. At the water’s edge she found a wooden boathouse with a gabled roof, and a row of ten narrow rowing boats drawn up beside it, all furnished with oars and boathooks. Set slightly behind the boathouse was a building surrounded by railings, its imposing entrance flanked by noble columns. Above the doorway was inscribed ‘Receiving House. Royal Humane Society.’

‘Oh, this is where they take the poor souls they pull out of the water,’ declared Sarah. ‘There’s many a creature doesn’t know which way to turn, what with drink and debt, and throws themselves in. Or the young men who go swimming to impress the ladies and then faint. I’ve heard they’ve got all sorts in there – doctors, nurses, medicines, hot blankets, warm baths. And they do things to try and squeeze the water out.’ She clenched her hands as if wringing out a sponge, then shook her head. ‘Never does any good.’