The Deathly Portent (29 page)

F
rancis could not resist a flying glance towards his wife. Tillie had foreseen this outcome, but her anticipation had been for Henbury to make the jump. Her frowning look at the old man Wagstaff told Francis this came as a surprise, but she did not speak. Meldreth took the matter up.

“That is highly unlikely, Wagstaff. It was Hannah who found your daughter this morning.”

“That be nowt,” argued the old man. “If’n her found her that be no proof as her bain’t put Moll there.”

“That is true, but—”

“If’n you bain’t done it yet,” interrupted Wagstaff, “it be time as Pilton be sent for.”

“I have already sent the stable boy for both Pilton and Lord Henbury.”

A grunt of satisfaction greeted this statement. “Then it be nowt but a moment afore Hannah Pakefield be fetched to lock-up. If’n you be ready, Doctor, I’ll take and see my girl now.”

“And me,” piped up Tisbury, coming alive again.

Francis saw no point in arguing. “Ryde will remain with you, Meldreth.” He turned to his groom. “Make sure neither of them touches anything.”

Ryde nodded and crossed to enter the coffee room ahead of Meldreth, who preceded the two most nearly concerned with the deceased.

Tillie had shifted out of their way, and as Francis turned, she motioned towards the front door.

“While they are occupied, let us go and see if there are marks to be found.”

Francis nodded. “The place will be swarming with villagers in no time. You can hope to find nothing if it has all been trampled.”

She looked struck and quickened her pace. Francis opened the front door for her, and she paused on the threshold.

“And then we must make a thorough search of Hannah’s chamber.”

Shocked, Francis very nearly forgot to follow her out. “What in the world will you look for?”

She did not answer immediately, her eyes travelling across the green. Already there were huddles of villagers, whispering and pointing in the direction of the Blue Pig.

“Not a moment too soon,” Francis commented, forgetting he had not received a response to his question.

Tillie headed out across the cobbles, her eyes trained upon the ground. Francis did likewise but could see nothing to suggest a body had been dragged across the area. He joined Tillie.

“Do you see anything?”

“I don’t expect to right here. Her shoes were scuffed, but that is unlikely to show on the cobbles.”

Francis watched her raise her head and scan the road intervening between the green and the cobbled yard. He glanced across and saw only footprints in the dust, which could have been made by a number of persons who had been to and fro already this morning, including Kinnerton and the doctor.

“Ah, there we are.”

Tillie was moving fast, and he followed, his eyes coursing the area for whatever she might have seen. When she halted, he followed the direction of her gaze.

“There, do you see?”

Two grooves led out across the road, directly out of the edge of the green. The grass was a trifle overgrown, and Francis could clearly see a pattern where it had been flattened. He looked towards the lock-up, but the drag did not reach as far.

He automatically moved when Tillie did, following the pattern for a matter of a few feet. Then she halted, carefully examining the grass.

“She was killed here, I think,” Tillie said. “Whoever it was must have persuaded her to come this far. Look if there are bloodstains on the grass, Fan. See how it is flattened? She must have fallen on this spot.”

There was no shape to be made out, but a small patch of the greensward did indeed look as if something heavy had been laid upon it for a while. Squatting, Francis made a careful examination.

“I can see no blood. There are one or two brown stains, but that might be anything.” He wiped at one and lifted the finger to the light. “No, I can’t tell.”

“Never mind it,” Tillie said, turning and retracing her steps back to where the grooves began on the road.

Rising, Francis followed and looked where she pointed.

“The grass must have been wet enough to cause the dirt to turn to mud. See, it fades out quickly.”

He followed the line, where the heels of Molly’s shoes must have dragged, rapidly drying over the dirt. Then he made a discovery.

“It turns to the side.”

“Yes.”

Tillie’s gaze rose, and she looked towards the side of the Blue Pig, where the archway gave onto the back premises.

“They headed for the stables.”

But when Francis accompanied his wife to the archway, he was disappointed to find no further trace of grooves, either on the road or on the gravelled track that led around the side of the building. Following past the stables and all the way to the two back doors, he could see nothing to indicate the passage of a person hauling a body.

“You will not convince Henbury with this,” he said grimly.

But Tillie was standing by the door nearest to the side, scrutinising the area around it. She swept a hand in an arc to encompass the yard.

“Do you suppose Hannah’s servants are so scrupulous as to sweep the yard on a daily basis?”

Francis’s mind jumped, and he cast his eyes down again. Sure enough, there were clear signs of brushstrokes crisscrossing one another.

“Very thorough was our murderer,” Tillie said, an echo of the old mischief in her voice.

Awed, Francis agreed. “Indeed. But then how was it he did not think of the grooves or the flattened grass?”

Tillie shrugged. “I daresay the business of arranging the body suitably drove it from his mind.”

“Or hers, if it was Hannah.”

“It wasn’t Hannah.”

Francis frowned. “You are very positive.”

“Yes, but that does not mean I am confident of proving it.”

“And there is still the matter of a key,” he pointed out. “I cannot think the servants leave the back doors unlocked.”

Tillie’s mischievous look reappeared. “Well, we know people are apt to get hold of keys, do we not?”

Which was all too true, keys having figured prominently in the unravelling of the puzzle in his own family last year.

“You suppose someone possessed themselves of the appropriate key beforehand.”

“It is possible, you’ll admit. It will be easy enough to
discover if one has gone missing. I had best speak to the girl Patty without more ado.”

“I thought you wanted to search Hannah’s rooms,” Francis reminded her.

“Yes, and who better to assist me than the maid. I can question her at the same time.”

T
he paralysing horror that had gripped Cassie was dissipating, giving place to a feeling of violent nausea. She had drunk but two mouthfuls of the tea Tabby had forced upon her, unable to act or think beyond the appalling fact that it had happened again.

The arrival of the Reverend Kinnerton had done nothing at first to mitigate her condition. She recalled only his sitting alongside her at the table and holding her hand. She had been aware of his voice, soothing in tone, but his words had not penetrated the fog in her mind.

Now, as breaks began to filter through the woolly sensation, Cassie realised Aidan had fallen silent. Warmth at her hand brought her eyes down to find it cradled in a comforting clasp. And then the sickness welled up.

Snatching her hand away, she pressed it with the other at her stomach.

“What ails you, Mrs. Dale?”

The tone had a sharpened edge, and Cassie looked up, gasping out her distress. “I am going to be sick!”

Tabitha suddenly came to life, startling Cassie as she leapt from a chair in the background.

“Oh, Lordy! Hang on, Miss Cassie. I’ll fetch a basin.”

Aidan had risen to his feet. “What can I do?”

“Keep out of the way, sir, if you don’t want it all over your shoes.”

As Tabby hurried into the kitchen next door, Cassie put her hands to her mouth, pressing tightly as the welling nausea threatened to overwhelm her.

“Here now, take this.”

She opened her eyes to find Tabby holding a china basin under her chin. She did not dare release her mouth to seize it. But a pair of strong hands moved in to relieve her of this necessity.

“I will take it. You may be as sick as you wish now, Mrs. Dale.”

With a gasp of relief, Cassie took her hands away from her mouth and retched horribly. A little liquid came out, but nothing more, even as the spasms racked her so that she vomited painfully several times more.

“Nothing inside her, that’s what,” came tersely from Tabby.

“She is recovering a little, I think.” This was Aidan again. “Will you fetch a glass of water, if you please, Mrs. Hawes. And a cloth.”

The retching at an end, Cassie sat back, her head lolling uncomfortably as the inevitable sequel of faintness attacked her.

“You should be in bed,” came on a worried note from the vicar.

Feebly, Cassie shook her head. Speech was as yet beyond her, but at least the dreadful numbness of shock had left her, along with the purge. She closed her eyes.

Presently, a cool sensation passed across her lips and about her brow. Opening her eyes, she discovered Aidan gently applying a dampened cloth to cleanse her face. Gratitude swept through her.

“You are so very kind. Any other man would have retreated.”

The bright gaze met hers, close and gentle. “Not at all. Only a monster would leave you at this juncture.”

A glass was put to her lips, and he bade her drink. Obedient to the tone of command, though gently delivered, Cassie swallowed a few drops of the blessedly cool liquid. She began
to feel a little recovered, and inevitably the memory swept back, and she gave a little cry.

Aidan’s brows drew together. “What is it?”

Cassie pushed the glass away, and he set it down. Unthinkingly, as urgency engulfed her, she groped for his hand, and it closed reassuringly about hers.

“I must leave this place!”

He nodded gravely. “Yes, I think you will perhaps be safer at Lady Ferrensby’s establishment.”

A little sob escaped her as her heart contracted. “Not that. I mean this village. I must leave here altogether. I am too dangerous. None is safe from me.”

The hand about hers tightened suddenly, and Aidan’s voice became harsh.

“I will not have you talk so. It is not your blame that someone took it into their heads to use what you saw. Lady Francis says it was a deliberate act to copy your vision and use it to incriminate you.”

The laceration at her heart did not abate. “So she said of Duggleby. But if I had no vision, none could use it.” Her voice thickened, but she was hardly aware of the threat of tears. “I should not have spoken. I should have kept it inside.”

“That, perhaps yes,” said the parson unexpectedly.

Taken aback, Cassie looked at him, the desire to weep receding. “You are a strange man. You seek to comfort me, and yet you do not refute it when I blame myself.”

A little smile lifted the corners of his mouth, and Cassie experienced the oddest leap in her breast.

“We must all recognise the extent of our responsibility. The visions you cannot help. But you have a choice about whether to speak out. You did not know it, but in the event, it turns out to have been unwise.”

A helpless laugh escaped Cassie and broke in the middle. “Now you are making too little of it.”

“No, I am being truthful.”

She regarded him with renewed interest, a glow spreading through her veins.

“I like that in you. My—” She broke off. Her unruly tongue! Too easily she might give it all away. She corrected the slip. “Lady Ferrensby is the same. I can trust her. But she has less patience.”

“If that means you are minded to trust me, Cassie, I am glad.”

The use of her name on his lips and a particular note in his voice spoke deeply to something inside Cassie, and for a moment she was overjoyed. Then she recalled the peculiar circumstances of her life, and her spirits dropped. Without thought, she withdrew her fingers from his grasp.

“Of course I trust you.” Dismayed at the gruffness of her own tone, she looked at him again and tried to smile. “You are a gentle man, Aidan Kinnerton. A gentleman and a gentle man. I will never forget your kindness.”

A shadow crossed his face, and Cassie felt the full force of his disappointment through the curse of her overactive sensibilities. If only she were worthy! She would give anything to be able to retract her implied rejection, but she could not. She did not trouble to hide from herself what she had sensed. That Aidan liked her more than a little. As she did him, Lord knew! But Cassie Dale had no business encouraging the attentions of this man. They thought her evil, a witch, but she had more heart than to allow Aidan Kinnerton to cherish false hopes.

He had not spoken again, and his silence reproached her. Cassie cast about for a way through and turned to Tabby, hovering at her shoulder.

“May I please try the tea again?”

Her maid’s clucking assent provided a useful interlude, and Cassie was able to turn the subject. Not indeed into a channel any less painful, but at least it had the merit of steering away from matters of the heart.

“Do they blame me? The villagers?”

The vicar rose from his chair, an abstracted frown creasing his forehead.

“As yet there has been no outburst.”

His voice was even, but Cassie thought she could detect a modicum of hurt in the faint edge that overlay the apparent calm.

“But you think there may be.”

He had retreated to the window and was looking out across the river towards the green. “I dare not suppose otherwise. At present, I imagine Tisbury is too occupied to take action, or he would have done so before this. But I cannot think it will be long before some idiot encourages him to seek revenge upon the only enemy visible to him at the moment.”

Cassie eyed him, bleak at heart to note the reduction of warmth in his voice. “I am thankful you do not seek to hide your suspicions from me.”

He turned at that, his keen glance piercing across the little room. “I could do you no good thereby.”

Cassie looked away, wrung by the implication in his words. “You have already done me good.”

He did not speak, and she felt compelled to look at him again. What she saw in his eyes made her lose sight of all caution.