Jane Austen Mysteries 08 Jane and His Lordship's Legacy (22 page)

The rector of St. Nicholas's straightened as I neared his gar-den, his hands full of lilies, and smiled at me benignly. "Ah, Miss Austen, is it not? I must offer my sympathy this morning.

Your cottage was violated, I understand, and a valuable article stolen."

172 ~ Stephanie Barron

"Thank you, Mr. Papillon," I replied with a curtsey. "I am sure my mother would join me in thanks, did she know of your concern."

"--And stolen, it seems, by poor Bertie Philmore! It is a dreadful business, when one of our fellow creatures falls in the way of temptation. We must certainly pray for him."

"Are you at all acquainted with the Philmores? I had under-stood them to be Alton people."

"And so they are, in the main--but Old Philmore, Bertie's uncle, is quite the Chawton institution. He is landlord to Miss Benn, you know, and a rare old character. I wonder that he did not appear in front of your home last evening, to intercede for his nephew. It is not like Old Philmore to preserve a respectful si-lence, when one of his own is in danger of hanging for murder!"

"Perhaps he is from home at present."

"Then it will be the first time he has shaken off our dust in the eight years I have lived here," Mr. Papillon observed. "I must send Elizabeth to Old Philmore's cottage, and make cer-tain he is not unwell. It would be a dreadful thing, if he were ly-ing alone on his cot, suffering from some disorder, while Bertie is in want of a steady hand and counsel!"

"Are the two men very attached?"

"Old Philmore has served Bertie in place of a father these many years. Indeed, they are most devoted--in the rough, un-schooled fashion of their kind. I could wish for the younger man a
kinder
example, perhaps--Old Philmore is very close with his money, quite the miser of Chawton, as Miss Benn has found!--but in truth, there is no real harm in either of them."

"I see." It was possible I saw a great deal more, in fact, than the rector. Old Philmore had been absent from the scene of Bertie's arrest. What better confederate for the younger man than the trusted figure of the uncle? Complicity within the fam-ily would surely ensure Bertie's silence in the hands of the Law; Jane and His Lordship's Legacy ~ 173

and if Mr. Papillon's opinion of their bond was to be believed, Bertie was unlikely to incriminate Old Philmore.

"It is decidedly odd," Mr. Papillon mused, "that we have heard nothing of Old Philmore this morning. I should have ex-pected him to have paid me a visit, with the earnest desire that I should bring the air of Christian charity to his nephew's gaol cell, as indeed I shall before the day is out."

The old scoundrel, I thought with sudden heat, was proba-bly miles from Chawton even now, and my chest with him.

I left the rector pulling off his paper cuffs, and finished my walk in pensive silence. I could not reconcile myself to the loss of Lord Harold's papers; it was too much like losing the man himself, all over again.

At my return to the cottage I was surprised to dis-cover Catherine Prowting waiting upon the doorstep with a cheerful, plain-faced young woman of perhaps twenty by her side.

"Good morning, Miss Austen," Catherine said. "My father has charged me with bringing Sally Mitchell to you, and offer-ing you her services as maid of all work. She is a good girl, reared in the village; her mother is our cook."

Sally Mitchell bobbed a curtsey. Tho' young, her hands were roughened and red from hard labour, and her general ap-pearance was of tidy cleanliness--positive signs in a domestic servant. Her dress had been neatly mended, and her half-boots were in good repair.

"I should have first consulted Mrs. Austen," Catherine said apologetically, "but that I knew her to be steadily at work in the garden, and did not wish to intrude."

I stood on tiptoe to overlook the hornbeam hedge, and ob-served my mother busily digging in the field beyond the privy.

174 ~ Stephanie Barron

She wore an old green sack gown and a battered straw hat, and tho' all of seventy, was turning the earth with a vigour that be-lied her years. She might have been taken, in fact, for one of her son's tenants. Could the prospect of planting potatoes have excited such ardent activity? Of Cassandra there was no sign; she was probably lying down in the bedroom with the shades drawn, after the exhausting journey by post-chaise from Kent. I must therefore interview the girl alone.

"Good day to you, Sally," I said. "Have you heard that this house is cursed?"

A startled look passed over her features, and then she opened her mouth wide and laughed. "Many's the time I've sat in Widow Seward's kitchen, and had a biscuit of her Nancy, beg-ging your pardon, ma'am," she said. "This here house is no more cursed nor what I am. I daresay it could do with a good scrubbing, however."

"Do you wish to live in, or out, Sally?"

"In," she said succinctly, "if it's all the same to you, ma'am."

"Better and better! We have two bedrooms over the kitchen reserved for the purpose. You have heard, I suppose, that our parlour window was broken and some articles taken from the house last night?"

"Bertie Philmore," she returned acidly, "what has a great lump for a brain. But he's got what's coming to 'im, so I've heard."

"It would greatly relieve our minds to have you living above the kitchen, all the same. I shall consult my mother as to your wages; you shall receive your board as well--and probably be cooking it. We expect another lady to join us next month, a Miss Lloyd; and as she is a great one for meddling with pots and fires, I hope you shall not mind another pair of hands in your domain."

Jane and His Lordship's Legacy ~ 175

"It's not my place to mind."

"We intend, moreover, to hire a manservant, if one can be found who shares your spirit of defiance. It is probable that he will be living
out.
"

Her eyelids crinkled merrily. "That will suit me very well, ma'am."

"You'll do."

Sally grinned at me again; and the thought occurred that I should often find the freedom of her good humour a welcome relief from the moods and oppressions of a household full of women.

"Pray go through the yard to the pump," I told her. "You will see the kitchen door on your right. We should be greatly obliged if you would undertake a thorough cleansing of the scullery area, Sally--and then proceed to dusting the parlour."

When she had bobbed in my direction once more, and made her way through the outbuildings towards the rear of the house, I turned to Catherine Prowting with a smile. "You are very good to think of us, my dear. I hope you will convey our deepest thanks to your excellent father."

"I shall certainly do so," she returned, in a voice of some trouble; "when next I see him. Father went very early to Alton, on this dreadful business of Bertie Philmore. Papa
will not
con-sider that the man may be innocent of murder."

"A predisposition towards guilt is a definite flaw in a magis-trate," I observed.

"I own that I am of your opinion." Catherine lifted her hands to her temples, as tho' yet plagued by the head-ache. "Is it true that we are all invited to visit Stonings tomorrow, Miss Austen?"

"So Major Spence and Mr. Thrace informed me, when I en-countered them this morning."

176 ~ Stephanie Barron

"Mr. Thrace . . . ? I had not the pleasure of seeing the Great House party." She lowered her head. "Do you know whether . . .

whether Mr. Hinton is also invited to Stonings?"

"I do not," I replied, "although from something Miss Beckford said, I believe he is otherwise engaged."

"That is a relief, indeed!" she burst out. "I may now look forward to all the charms of a great estate, without the oppres-sion of spirits under which I have laboured these several days!"

I frowned at her. "Catherine, has Mr. Hinton given you cause for uneasiness?"

She glanced at me, on the brink of confidence. "I hardly know what I should say. I fear my duty is to my father, first. But perhaps, Miss Austen--if you are free--we might walk in the di-rection of Alton together? I should like to unburden myself. I should feel clearer in my mind."

"Of course," I murmured. "Do but wait, while I fetch my bonnet."

"Well, Jane," my mother said as I nearly collided with her in the back passage, her face dewy with exertion and the hem of her old green gown six inches deep in mud, "I have made a fair start on the excavations. I cannot report that I have encoun-tered success, however. It will require some days, perhaps."

"You are planting potatoes, Mamma?"

"Potatoes?"
She stared at me incredulously. "What do I care for
potatoes,
you silly girl, when there is a priceless necklace of rubies to be found? Mr. Thrace was most adamant. The booty of Chandernagar is ours for the taking, Jane! You might assist me, if you can but find another shovel--"

"Pray enlist Cassandra, Mamma," I said firmly. "I am en-gaged to walk with Miss Prowting. Her father has hired a maid-servant for us--one Sally, who is even now established in the kitchen."

Jane and His Lordship's Legacy ~ 177

"That is excellent news!" she cried, brightening. "You might inform her, Jane, that I prefer a simple nuncheon of bread and cheese at eleven o'clock. She may bring it out to the field, so as not to interrupt the excavations. And if she has any ability with a trowel or hoe--"

I delivered the first part of this message to the scullery, my bonnet dangling from my hand.

"Sally," I said as almost an afterthought, "you are ac-quainted with Bertie Philmore, I collect?"

"All my life, ma'am."

"And also his wife--one Rosie Philmore?"

"Rosie's sister to my elder brother's Nell."

"Where in Alton does she reside?"

"The Philmores live in Normandy Street. Rosie takes in washing--you can't miss the linen and small clothes hanging in the yard."

"Thank you, Sally." The girl, I reflected, had already earned her day's wages.

Catherine waited until we had passed through the village and put the Great House Lodge behind us--the Lodge, where even now Jack Hinton might be gazing out his sitting-room window, and observing our progress--before she under-took to speak.

"You said last evening that the path of duty must always be clear, Miss Austen. And that it is the path of the
heart
that de-scends into obscurity."

"So I have found it."

"I lay awake some hours in my bed, considering of your advice."

"It was not intended as such. I could not undertake to 178 ~ Stephanie Barron

advise you, knowing you so little. I merely made an observation, based upon my own experience of life."

"But that has been considerably greater than my own," she returned in a low voice, "and as such must command my re-spect. I have known for some time where my duty lay. It was the urgings of my heart that counselled otherwise."

"Can you perhaps explain the circumstances?" I suggested.

"I have no right to force a confidence, of course; and if you be-lieve the particulars are better left unsaid, I will certainly un-derstand."

"No, no--" she cried. "It was to make a full confession that I begged you to accompany me. I feel, Miss Austen, that I have been a reluctant party to a very great injury that has been done to you and your family!"

I had expected some flutterings of the heart over Mr.

Hinton; had expected to be consulted in a painful affair of un-requited passion for Julian Thrace; but never had I considered myself as the
object
of Catherine's avowal.

"In what manner?" I enquired cautiously.

"As regards the corpse of that poor man discovered in your home." She came to a halt in the middle of the Alton road, the wide expanse of Robin Hood Butts stretching beyond her. "You see, Miss Austen--I know who placed him there."

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Chapter 15

Damning Evidence

7 July 1809, cont.

~

"I should explain, Miss Austen, that I have found it difficult to sleep of nights for some weeks past. The heat, per-haps, of July--"

Catherine broke off, and began to walk slowly once more in the direction of Alton. I studied her averted countenance, and recognised the marks of trouble; the girl had not been easy in her mind, I should judge, for too many days together. I had an image of her lying alone in her bedchamber, a picture of stillness beneath a white linen sheet, while a furious tide of thoughts swelled and resurged within her brain.

Resolutely, Catherine began again. "On the evening of Sat-urday last, I went to my room at ten o'clock, as is my habit. I was not conscious of the passage of the hours as I lay wakeful in my bed, the usual sounds of a summer night drifting through the 180 ~ Stephanie Barron

open window; but I recollect with the sharpest clarity the tolling of the St. Nicholas church bell at midnight. I sat up, and counted the strokes, and told myself that this wretched want of peace must end, or utterly destroy my pleasure in life. I lit my candle and took up the book that sits always near my pillow, and read for a little; and when the heaviness of my eyes suggested I might at last find rest, I first got up, and fetched a drink of water from the washstand. I was returning to the tumbled bedclothes once more--when I heard the most dreadful noises arising from the darkness."

She glanced at me appealingly, as tho' wishing to be spared the next few words. "It was the sound of men fighting. I went to the window and lifted the sash so widely that I might lean out into the summer's night. The moon was almost at the full, and the scene below was as clear to me as daylight. In the distance, well beyond the reach of our sweep and the angle of your cot-tage, two men were locked in a furious embrace, grappling."1

"Could you distinguish their faces?"

She shook her head in the negative. "I could not. The dis-tance at which they moved prevented me from recognising their features."

"But I thought you said . . ."

"Pray hear me out, Miss Austen," she demanded. "This is difficult enough."