Aurora (12 page)

All this was heard with a sinking heart. Having come at last to the conclusion that the man was Kenelm, she disliked being thrown into uncertainty again, but there was enough of possibility in Clare’s remarks, especially with regard to the school friends and Lady Alice, that it could not be discarded entirely. No reply was necessary. Clare was so incensed she was soon off on another tirade.

“It is said in the village that he means to give Marnie the Gypperfield mansion for her part in pretending to believe him.”

“She does believe him.”

“I come to think I should let on he is Kenelm myself, if he has that sort of money to throw around. I wonder what sum he wouldn’t give to shut me up.”

“You say it is Kenelm in the unmarked grave, Clare. How did he die?”

“Don’t ask, child. I made a vow of secrecy to my husband, and would not tell it to a soul if it were not for this man’s trying to take over little Charles’s inheritance. I mean to persuade the magistrate to make a vow of secrecy on those few who must hear it. It is the least I can do for . . . Ah, but I can’t speak of it. It is too painful.” she raised a hand to her brow and looked away, but there were no tears in her eyes.

She was able to bring herself to speak of other things after a moment, however, and in a surprisingly calm voice. “So he has said nothing about what he means to do? Has given no idea at all?”

“None. He can do nothing till the body is exhumed and identified.”

“How sly he is. Getting Marnie to tell him everything, and he says nothing but how pretty she is, and what he will give her for supporting him. He had better hold onto his cash. He will have to repay the estate for the emerald necklace he stole—” She stopped suddenly.

“Or Kenelm stole.”

“They are half brothers, Aurora. Blood runs thick. Kenelm
did
steal it, but I doubt he was alone in the matter. Where did this fellow, Rutley, get so much money? There is more to this than I ever suspected before.”

There was such a plentitude of possibilities that Rorie’s head was reeling, but as she rode home, only one of them was subjected to much scrutiny. Was Clare right, and did all those people questioning him help him along with the answers? The fact was, no one liked Clare in the least. No secret she had had a falling out with Aunt Hennie and Uncle Alfred. Quite possibly the old footman as well, and the testimony of the schoolmates she had managed to cast a doubt on. Really, one was no closer to the truth than ever. The man
had
held out a very enticing bribe to Marnie in the Gypperfield mansion. It might be the impulse of a generous nature, or it might be bribery. Who could say?

Chapter Eight

Marnie had returned from viewing the mansion while her sister was at the Hall, and a rare mood she was in. Not a
good
mood, considering her most recent occupation and her companion. Either one should have been enough to put a smile on her lips, but she was clearly in the boughs about something.

“Did you not like the house?” Rorie asked.

“It was gorgeous,” Marnie said, still scowling.

“Too expensive?”

“No. I don’t know. It is very dear, but Kenelm didn’t specify a price, and I imagine he knows the price, as he suggested it, and had spoken to Hudson.”

“Berrigan,” Malone informed Aurora from behind the sofa, where she had taken up her position of vigilance.

“What has Mr. Berrigan to say about it?” Aurora asked.

“Mr. Berrigan, if you please, has seen fit to
forbid
me to accept a house from my brother-in-law,” Marnie informed her.

“Isn’t that nice of him,” Rorie responded in the proper spirit of irony.

“He’s right,” Malone decreed.

“Hush up, you foolish woman,” Marnie chided. In an emergency, she occasionally tried to take control of her household.

“Dead right,” Malone added mulishly. “Ain’t fitting. Why should he be giving you such a grand house for? Doesn’t look well.”

“He is the head of the family, and as rich as Croesus,” Marnie pointed out.

“I wonder—is it because we aren’t quite sure he is Kenelm?” Aurora asked.

“Certainly not. We
are
sure. It isn’t that.”

“What is it, then?”

“He says it is too much—indicates too close an alliance between us. If it were old Lord Raiker he would not object, he says. Don’t stare, Rorie . He means Kenelm is in love with me.”

“Oh.”

“And of course it is no such a thing. He
likes
me—flirts a little, of course—but he does that with all the young ladies. It is his way.”

“Berrigan is in no position to forbid anything, so far as I can see,” Rorie mentioned, surprised Marnie hadn’t raised this rather obvious point herself.

“He will not continue my friend if I accept the house. Oh, it is so mean of him I could . . .” She threw up her white hands to indicate the crime was too bad to be put into words.

“Widgeon,” Malone erupted. “He wants to marry you. How would it look, Kenelm giving you a fancy house, then
he
moves into it?”

“Why didn’t he say so, then?” Marnie asked angrily. There was more futile bickering of the same sort, but the mystery was cleared up. Lady Raiker’s pique was rooted in the fact that Berrigan hadn’t come out and made the offer in form. He was taking to himself the fiancé’s privileges without a declaration, and it was not to be borne. Not in silence, at any rate. Marnie flounced from the room.

“That one could manage to make a sow’s ear out of a silk purse,” Malone declared. “What did Clare want with you?”

“Just snooping. She is not happy with the outcome of the questioning, of course. She suspects deceit and collusion.”

“She’s the number would know about deceit, and as to collision, I wouldn’t put that a rung beneath her either. She’d try her luck banging up against anybody.”

The Gowers, Hennie and Alfred, arrived at the Dower House in the late afternoon, and were very excited about the return of Kenelm, even more excited about Clare's plans to install Charles.

“That woman is up to anything,” Hennie announced at once. She was tall, thin, pale faced and gray-haired, but gave no impression of grayness or dullness. She was alive with curiosity and spirits. Her husband, on the other hand, had jet-black hair and red cheeks, but was silent and colourless in personality.

“What old Charles meant by marrying a mischief-making chit as common as dirt is beyond me. A Miss Marlowe from Somerset—no one ever heard of them. Oh, she appears well enough—has learned the right accent and speaks like a lady. I refer to her pronunciation only, and as to the content of her speech, it is best forgotten. Always after the men, too—always had an eye to them. We came to meet her right after the wedding. You weren’t married to Bernie yet, Marnie, and I don’t scruple to say the woman was rolling her eyes at him shamelessly, right under Charles’s nose. Well, at Kennie too if it comes to that, and he no more than a schoolboy, though he was always a handsome rascal. She’d have been happy enough to have a go at my Alfred as well, if he’d had the gumption to raise his eyes from his boots. Look up, Alfred.”

Alfred looked up shyly, but made no oral contribution. Marnie said, “I am aware of her behaviour. Bernard mentioned it to me.”

“Bernie behaved very well, my dear. There is no cause to poker up. He was aghast at her carrying on. He never made up to her in the least, but certainly Kenelm had an eye to her, the rogue.”

Rorie became alert at this. She found it not in the least difficult to believe, and was strongly inclined to hear more.

“Tell me, Marnie,” Hennie ran on, her faded eyes flashing, “for you were here at the time. Did she have any fellows on the string when old Charles died?”

“I was not here till immediately after the death. She had no one then, I am convinced. She never left the house. Later, when Bernard and I were living at the Hall, we had little enough to do with her. We maintained cordial relations, but were not bosom bows. She had her own set of friends whom she met here at the Dower House. I don’t know that one of them was any special beau.”

“She’d be happier keeping court,” Hennie decided.

“A handsome gel,” was Alfred’s only contribution to the talk. He was rewarded with a pair of scowls.

“Who does she have her eye on since she’s been working at getting little Charles made baron?” Hennie asked next.

“She has dropped the old crowd. I never see any of them at the Hall. She has very few callers, to tell the truth. I think she must be lonesome. She is not much taken up by the respectable people and no longer favours the other sort. I suppose
we
are the closest she has to a friend.”

“Lord, and not a man in the house save the servants. She’ll be setting up a flirtation with the butler if we ain’t careful. Wouldn’t put it past her,” Hennie said, slapping her knee in delight. “Wilkins, isn’t it? She won’t get far with that old stick. He never had any use for her.”

The Gowers were to remain a few days. Hennie said bluntly she wouldn’t miss the exhumation for a thousand pounds. She was too curious to see who Clare had murdered, and how she had done the deed.

She didn’t actually get to see the corpse. Rumours of the digging up had leaked out, and to avoid a crowd, the thing was done at seven-thirty in the morning, in the middle of a cold, drizzling rain. The dowager Lady Raiker was there with Coons, the man who called himself Lord Raiker was there with Cleary, and the officials appointed by the court were there. There were as well two gravediggers, but this was the complete audience for the grizzly show. With so much animosity existing between those present, there was not a word spoken as the shovels dug into the firm earth. In the ten or so years the ground had been allowed to settle, it had baked into something resembling black clay, and was not easy to disturb. But eventually the shovels hit wood, and as the top layer of dust was scratched away hearts beat faster, breathing was quick and light. After an eternity, a raw wooden box was lifted out, rougher even than the coffin of a parish pauper. The lid had been nailed shut, but the wood had begun to decay, and no hammer was required to pry it off. The two gravediggers did it with their bare hands.

There was a gasp of surprise. Lady Raiker reeled back into the arms of her solicitor, but Lord Raiker stood staring in fascination. Ten years had been sufficient to remove any human features from the corpse. There was black hair, teeth, bones, with some congealed matter adhering to them in patches, but gruesome as this sight was, it received scant attention. The remainder of the box’s contents were too bizarre. A mildewed, spotted uniform covered the remains of the person. It had once been scarlet, was now mottled with purple and blue, The brass buttons and gold lace too had lost their lustre, as had the medals on the chest, but the skeletal hands crossed over the chest bore two magnificent untarnished rings. One was a heavily chased gold affair with a large ruby glowing in the hazy light of dawn. The other was a signet ring, also gold, with a diamond in the lower left corner of the ring’s crown.

They were both familiar to anyone connected with the Raikers. The signet ring was a sixteenth birthday present to Kenelm, a replica of that given to Bernard at the same time, and the other family heirloom also given on his sixteenth birthday, by tradition, to the younger son. What they were doing in the coffin, and even more curiously what the body was doing in such a handsome uniform, was a matter of great interest. The uniform too was familiar to the Raikers and their associates, though it had never before been worn by anyone.

Lord Raiker, old Charles, like all the nobility in the area, had established a volunteer brigade to protect the coastal area in case of attack by Napoleon. It had been set up some years prior to Kenelm’s departure, but still existed at that time, and Kenelm had been made one of its captains on his return from school that spring. To please an adolescent son, Lord Raiker had had a gaudy uniform designed and made up, and this was what remained of it. It had never even been tried on. At the time of the family quarrel, in fact, the sleeves were only basted in, and the thing had not been finally fitted. What it was doing on this or any other body passed imagining.

The dowager recovered sufficiently to recognize the rings and uniform. Lord Raiker stood staring, his face blank with astonishment. For a long moment he looked, taking in every detail of the spectacle before him, then he raised his eyes slowly to Lady Raiker’s white face. It was impassive. Not triumphant, not frightened, certainly not surprised—it was cold. Satisfied, perhaps, was the closest he could come to reading that white mask. He went on regarding her closely for some time, then turned to his solicitor.

“It is time we heard Lady Raiker give us her explanation of this matter,” he said.

Clare nodded her head in acquiescence, and they all walked, carriages being ineligible in the graveyard, to Raiker Hall, which had been chosen as the scene of her deposition. They said not a word as they walked through the rain, but their separate minds were seething with conjecture. Within a quarter of an hour the principals in the drama were installed in the study. The gravediggers hauled the coffin onto a wagon and took it to the local doctor for examination.

The magistrate asked Clare in a polite tone for an account of the proceedings that had led to this death and her knowledge of it, along with her reasons for withholding her evidence for so many years.

She composed heir face to gravity, only her breast heaving up and down revealing that she was at all ruffled. “It all happened eleven years ago,” she began in a low voice, “when Kenelm came home from school. He was—attracted to me,” she said simply.

Kenelm sat with his jaws and fists clenched, but uttered not a word of contradiction.

“He used to follow me around, pester me—try to make love to me,” she said, her voice falling lower on the last phrase, while a blush suffused her cheeks. “I made a joke of it at first—did not want to be rude to him because of my husband, but told him firmly he must not be so foolish. One night my husband retired early and I went to my own study to read. Kenelm came in—he had been drinking. Drinking a great deal, which he did not normally do, of course. He began making advances, very improper advances. I hesitated to call for help because of making a scene before the servants—it would be bound to get around the neighbourhood. I fought him off as best I could, but he forced me to the sofa, a chaise longue I used to sit and read on. When I saw he was going to overpower me, I called for help. Unfortunately, it was my husband who came in and saw what Kenelm was about. He ordered him from the house on the spot. Told him never again to darken the door. I left then. That is all I know firsthand, but I learned the rest later.”