A Regimental Murder (14 page)

I also wondered why Brandon had suddenly
turned up at Astley Close, and why he'd just happened to have been
taking a walk this morning in Linden Hill Lane. I thought I knew
the answer, and beneath my stunned surprise at Breckenridge's
death, anger seethed.

Something caught my eye and I moved away from
the others. The soft earth at the side of the lane showed two
shallow furrows. They began about ten yards from where Bartholomew
had dropped the body and led straight to the edge of the road where
Breckenridge had gone over. The tracks were intermittent, sometimes
disappearing altogether, sometimes appearing for only an inch or
so.

I followed the trail back. "Look at his
boots," I instructed.

They stared at me collectively. Impatiently,
I bent over Breckenridge and turned the sole of his boot upward.
The edge of the heel was crusted in earth. The other was the
same.

I straightened. "He was dragged here, and
thrown over the side. He did not fall from a horse."

"But there's a horse gone," the stable lad
said. He removed his cap, wiped his forehead, and replaced it. "And
the tack. Someone rode out." He looked at me. "Thought it was
you."

"Which horse is gone?" I asked.

"Chestnut gelding."

"I rode a bay," I said. "I put him away when
I returned. Was the chestnut Breckenridge's own horse?"

"He was that."

I mused. "Even if he did ride up here in the
first place, someone dragged him from there to here." I pointed.
"Here, the brush is not as heavy. Easier to throw him down the
side. He would slide most of the way."

Grenville frowned. "But why, if he'd broken
his neck falling, would someone push him from the road? Why not lay
the poor man over the horse and bring him home?"

"Because I think the person deliberately
killed him and wished it to look as though he'd had a bad
fall."

Brandon snorted. "Who would do such a
thing?"

"A very strong man," I said. "Or a very angry
one. Or perhaps it was an accident. Perhaps they quarreled,
Breckenridge slipped and fell and broke his neck, and the second
man panicked."

"Seems unlikely they'd come all the way up
here for a quarrel," the stable lad pointed out.

I considered. "An appointment, perhaps."

"Or a footpad," Grenville said. "Tried to rob
him, broke his neck, and pushed him over."

I closed my mouth. I sensed strongly that
this had been murder with a purpose, but Grenville's suggestion was
logical, and arguing with it at present might look strange to the
others. It might have been simple robbery, but I did not think
so.

We all did agree about the need to search for
the horse. The stable lad and Matthias easily found the chestnut
gelding not a mile down the road, in a pasture of the farm that the
lane skirted. Whether he had wandered through an open gate on his
own, or someone had retrieved him and led him there, we could not
tell.

The horse seemed displeased at being found,
having had its pleasant meal of lush grass interrupted, but once
caught he was docile enough. He was about sixteen hands high,
fine-boned, and expensive. The head stall and saddle he wore were
the very ones I had ridden out with and left behind to be
cleaned.

Bartholomew and Matthias agreed to stay with
the body while the rest of us returned to Astley Close. The
magistrate would need to be informed and a cart sent to retrieve
Breckenridge. There would be an inquiry, and an inquest. I imagined
the coroner and jury would happily let the horse be the culprit,
but I was not so certain he had been.

We followed the lad into the stable yard. I
looked into the tack room, which was simply a horse box on the end
of the row used for the purpose. Saddles on pegs lined one wall,
and bridles and halters hung opposite. A wooden shelf filled with
curry combs, brushes, hoof picks, and cloths occupied the wall
opposite the door.

"Why would he use the saddle I had left to be
cleaned?" I asked as the lad unfastened the cinch and dragged the
saddle from the horse.

The stable lad shrugged. "It was nearby."

"It was dirty. In the middle of the floor,
where I left it. Why not use a bridle with a clean bit? Besides,
Breckenridge had his own saddle, a French cavalry saddle. He
boasted of it."

I pointed. The saddle rested on a peg at the
end of the row. Both pommel and cantle curved high, making the
seat, covered with a quilted leather pad, deep. The English saddles
had been similar. On campaign, we had strapped sheepskin to the
saddle for more comfort, the cinch wrapping across the top of the
sheepskin and fastening beneath the horse.

Breckenridge's stolen French saddle was a
fine thing, obviously the property of a high-ranking officer. I
knew in my heart that if he'd saddled his own horse and gone off
riding early, he would have used the cavalry saddle, not the one
I'd left, damp and dirty, on the stone floor.

The stable lad shrugged again, and moved off
to care for the horse. Grenville was watching me curiously, Brandon
impatiently. I sensed I would learn no more here, and the three of
us left the stable and trudged toward the house.

"I will inform Lady Mary," Grenville said as
we walked. "And tell her to send for the magistrate." He slanted me
a glance. "I think for now you should keep your murder theory to
yourself, Lacey. You would have difficulty convincing a magistrate
without more proof."

"We have proof," I said. "He would not have
used that saddle, and he was dragged down the road to a convenient
place to be tossed over the hill."

"What about my idea of the robber?" Grenville
asked.

I shook my head. "He still had his watch. I
saw it in his waistcoat. A robber would have taken the watch, not
to mention the horse."

Grenville deflated. "That is true."

"For God's sake, Lacey," Brandon broke in. He
had been striding along Grenville's other side in silent anger. "A
man has just died, and his wife waits in the house to learn of it.
She will not want to hear you going on about murder. Leave it
be."

I stopped. We stood halfway between the house
and the stables. The stable and yard lay beneath the curve of a
hill, the roof just visible from our position. The house sat a good
fifty yards ahead of us, rising like a sphinx from the green lawns,
arms extended.

"If he were murdered," I said doggedly, "it
was not done up on that road. He was killed in such a place as
this, where they would not be heard from house or stable. The
killer fetched the horse, saddling it with the tack I'd left, and
led it back to Breckenridge. He laid Breckenridge across the saddle
and led him up to the woods until he found a likely spot to dispose
of him. Then he slapped the horse on the rump and sent it on its
way. When the horse was found, the assumption would be that
Breckenridge had fallen from it."

"He did fall," Brandon said. "Why make things
complicated? If a man could know which horse was Breckenridge's,
why would he not know which saddle belonged to him?"

"Perhaps the murderer was not staying at the
house. Breckenridge rode out at an early hour every morning by
habit. Anyone staying at the village would have grown used to
seeing him on the chestnut, and assume the horse was his, or at
least the one he liked always to ride. But they might not have
noted the saddle."

Brandon still looked annoyed, but Grenville
nodded. "You may be right. I admit, if Westin were not dead, I
would not be as quick to agree with you. But two of the four
gentlemen involved in the incident on the Peninsula are dead,
seemingly by accident. Strange, is it not?"

He was closer to the truth than he knew.
Brandon did not stop scowling, but a worried light entered his
eyes.

Grenville nodded to us. "I will go break the
news to Lady Mary."

"Do you want me to come with you?" I
offered.

Grenville considered. "No. Best I do this
alone. I dislike Lady Mary, but Breckenridge was her friend. She
will doubtless take it hard."

He pivoted on his heel and marched away,
shoulders squared.

When he was out of earshot, I turned on
Brandon, other questions troubling me. Brandon had mistaken the
fallen Breckenridge for me; Breckenridge was dead. I feared, I very
much feared, that the idiot had done something irreversible.

"What brings you to Kent?" I asked him
sharply.

He met my gaze, his eyes chilling. "I like
the country."

My anger rose. "Balls. You followed me down
here. It was you skulking about the inn and the gardens, watching
me, and then again this morning, was it not?"

He did not answer, but his ice blue stare
told me I'd guessed right.

"Good God," I exploded. "Why?"

"Why the devil do you think?"

I balled my hands. To think I'd fretted about
the tracker, wondering if it were Westin's killer. All this time it
had been Brandon. It fit. He knew better than most how to follow
someone about without being seen. Hell, he had taught me.

My hands tightened. "You thought I knew where
Louisa was. You thought I'd come down here to see her."

"Can you blame me? Why else would you
gallivant down to the country? You do not even know these
people."

"They were at Badajoz," I said. "Did it not
occur to you that I was still poking into the question of Captain
Spencer's death?"

"Of course it occurred to me. You can never
let well enough alone. But one conclusion does not preclude the
other."

I stared at him. "Did you think I'd brought
her with me? How damned stupid do you think I am?"

We faced each other, fists clenched. The sun
shone down on us, the bright, soft morning belying the storm that
ever roiled between us.

Brandon was speaking again, rapidly. "I would
have thought you'd had enough of scandal. If you have her hidden
somewhere, I swear I will have you arrested."

"You are an idiot. I do not know where she
is."

"Damn it, Gabriel, do not lie to me. I am
surprised it is not all over the scandal sheets along with all your
other adventures."

I leaned to him. "It will be if you do not
stop making such a pig's breakfast of it. You can follow me all
over England and make scenes and look overjoyed when you think me
dead, but I still do not know where your wife is."

I watched him lose strength. A warm breeze
stirred his hair, brushed a loose brown lock across his cheek.
"Then where did she go? If she did not go to you, then tell me
where she went."

That question still troubled me as well. Lady
Aline's letter had only told me she was safe, and I trusted Lady
Aline to know that. But I wanted to know myself. I wanted to see
her, to hold her hand, to reassure myself that all was well.

"Louisa's note said she needed time alone," I
reminded him.

"Alone, where? Do you think she has gone to
the continent?" He paused and would not look at me. "Or to a
lover?"

"She would not disgrace you like that. If she
wanted to abandon you for another, no doubt she would look you in
the face and tell you so."

He did not appear convinced. But I knew that
Louisa had no slyness in her, no deceit. She would rather face her
husband with the truth than resort to trickery. She had left him
for some other reason, a reason he could not see beyond his fear
and jealousy.

A dart of pain laced my heart. On the
Peninsula, when Brandon had cast her out, Louisa had come to me. I
had been dreaming of that hot night when I'd walked down to the
bridge in the night I'd saved Lydia Westin. Louisa had come to me,
ill with weeping, and had thrown her arms about me. Her golden hair
had tangled on my shoulder, and for the first time since I'd met
her, I dared furrow it with my fingers.

This time, she had not turned to me. Whatever
Louisa had needed or wanted, she had known I could not give it to
her. This time, she had left me as well.

I ended the futile quarrel by turning from
him and walking back to the house in silence.

*** *** ***

The inquest of Viscount Breckenridge was held
the next day at the public house, the Crow and Cross, in the
village. The local magistrate had called in a magistrate from
London, Sir Montague Harris, a rotund man obviously fond of his
beefsteak and port, but one with a shrewd eye.

Colonel Brandon stood up and described how he
had found the body. He had been staying in the village, he said, in
fact, here at the Crow and Cross. He had decided the morning in
question to walk along Linden Hill Lane. He had wanted a brisk walk
and thought it would be just the thing.

This caused the coroner to ask why he was in
their corner of Kent at all? To take the country air after the hot
closeness of London, he replied. The Londoners in the crowd nodded
in commiseration.

Had he attended the exhibition of the
pugilist, Jack Sharp? No, Brandon replied. He did not like blood
sports. This caused a murmur of disapproval from all those who had
flocked down for their fill of the blood sport.

So far Brandon had delivered his answers in a
strong, matter-of-fact voice. But when he began to describe how he
had found the body and what he had done, his hands clenched into
hard fists, and he kept his eyes firmly fixed two feet to the right
of the coroner.

He had gone walking, as he'd said, about nine
o'clock that morning. Upon reaching the crest of the hill, he'd
notice that branches to the right of him had been snapped and
broken, as though someone had tried to force a path through the
undergrowth. Upon investigating, he had spotted the body of Lord
Breckenridge lying facedown in the brush. The man had been dressed
for riding, but no horse was about.

Had he gone down to the body? No? Why not?
Because, Brandon said, he could see at once that the man was dead
and Brandon would likely need help to lift him back to the road.
Thought it more sensible to go at once for help.