The Deception at Lyme: Or, the Peril of Persuasion (Mr. And Mrs. Darcy Mysteries) (27 page)

The launch had been a subject of anticipation throughout Lyme for at least a se’nnight. Apparently such events were a spectacle that drew even the most casually interested observers. The Harvilles planned to take their boys, and had encouraged the Darcys to attend.

“It is a merchant ship, I understand,” Darcy said.

“Yes, an Indiaman, the largest vessel Lyme’s shipyards have ever built,” Mr. Elliot said. “Or so I am told.” The hint of pride in his voice betrayed his feigned indifference.

“Does it belong to the East India Company?” Elizabeth asked.

“No, I believe she is a West Indiaman, owned by a group of individual investors. I am afraid, Mrs. Darcy, that exhausts the intelligence I have on the subject. Perhaps Lieutenant St. Clair possesses more?”

St. Clair, who to this point had been attending Mr. Elliot with the same deaf ear to that gentleman’s pretended lack of interest as were the Darcys, now continued Elliot’s performance. “Only that she should have little trouble hiring a crew. There are many able seamen in Lyme eager to sign on with her.”

Mr. Elliot appeared satisfied with St. Clair’s answer.

Elizabeth was not. She wanted to know why Mr. Elliot and Lieutenant St. Clair were understating their knowledge of the
Black Cormorant.
She wanted to know the meaning of the conversation she and Darcy had just overheard. She wanted to know how in heaven’s name she had been able to overhear it in the first place.

“Do you plan to observe the launch?” she asked them.

“I hear she is a handsome ship,” Lieutenant St. Clair replied. “I would like to obtain a closer look at her.”

“And you, Mr. Elliot?”

“Perhaps. It is something to do in Lyme besides bathing or visiting the Assembly Rooms.”

“There is always fossil-hunting.”

He smiled. “Only for those who do not mind getting their hands dirty.”

Mr. Elliot’s smiles increasingly caused Elizabeth’s flesh to creep. Despite his perfectly manicured nails, she suspected his hands were as dirty as his secrets.

*   *   *

They were off the Cobb and halfway along the Walk that connected the hamlet to Lyme proper before Elizabeth felt comfortable discussing what had just transpired, without fear of being mysteriously overheard.

“So, Mr. Elliot owns partial interest in a new merchant ship,” she said, “but does not want anybody to know.”

“He does not want
us
to know,” Darcy replied. “Apparently he is not hiding the fact from Captain Tourner or Lieutenant St. Clair.”

“Well, no wonder he has continued in Lyme since Mrs. Clay’s death. I thought it curious that he did not go home. Now we know what has occupied him—overseeing the completion of the
Black Cormorant.
”

“And hiring someone to command her.”

“How was it that we could hear the conversation between Mr. Elliot and Lieutenant St. Clair from such a distance?” she asked. “Moreover, how did you know we would be able to?”

“The day Ben Harville wandered onto the Cobb, I discovered quite by accident that the curve of the wall lends it unusual acoustical properties. I was standing just past the gin shop, while Captain Harville and Captain Wentworth stood where you and I were today, and I heard them speaking. Believe me—I was as astonished as you. I hypothesized that the effect worked in both directions, but I was not certain until now.”

“Did you tell the captains?”

“I told neither of them, nor did they seem aware of it. Apparently the phenomenon is not broadly known, or Lieutenant St. Clair and Mr. Elliot would have exercised more caution.”

“Or at least not stood there immediately afterward equivocating to us, disassociating themselves from the very ship they had been discussing. How long do you suppose the two of them have been in collusion? Did it begin aboard the
Magna Carta,
or predate that voyage?”

“That depends on what they are colluding about.”

“Well, at present Lieutenant St. Clair wants employment from Mr. Elliot, but some sort of anonymous partner is standing in the way, along with Captain Tourner. It sounds as if at one time St. Clair and Tourner were on more cooperative terms—jointly taking care of Mr. Elliot’s ‘problem’—but that now St. Clair is willing to step over him to get what he wants.”

“They say there is no honor among thieves. I expect that applies to scoundrels of any type.”

“Yes, but I thought there was some honor among His Majesty’s sea officers.” They passed the steps upon which they had first encountered Lieutenant St. Clair, the afternoon they had arrived in Lyme. Elizabeth recalled the impression he had made on her then, and the following day when he had delivered the sea chest. “Lieutenant St. Clair disappoints me. I did not want to believe him capable of treachery, but having discovered him to be on such familiar terms with Mr. Elliot, who we know to be a snake, only causes me to wonder which of them is
more
lacking in honor, and—”

She stopped. She had been about to say “which one is the bigger thief.” But from “thief” her mind leaped farther ahead—to the as-yet-unknown thief of two particular objects.

“And?” Darcy prompted.

“And whether Lieutenant St. Clair handled Mr. Elliot’s problem and the problem of the gold artifacts in a single shot—because they were the same problem.”

“You believe Mr. Elliot was involved with the idols?” Darcy asked.

“I am not sure what I believe, but somehow he was a party to them—directly or indirectly. If he did not handle them himself, he had knowledge of them. Let us consider what we
do
know: The figurines were found in a cask of sugar that, let us assume, came from Mr. Smith’s plantation. As his friend and advisor, Mr. Elliot was intimately familiar with Mr. Smith’s business—to hear Mrs. Smith tell it, perhaps more familiar than Mr. Smith himself. From your cousin’s diary, we know that Elliot and Smith, as well as Lieutenant St. Clair, were frequent dinner guests of Captain Tourner, so they were all well acquainted. And we know that St. Clair, as caterer for his mess, arranged to have the cask brought on board.

“Now,” she continued, “what if this particular cask was meant to be stored with St. Clair’s personal belongings, but mistakenly ended up with the mess provisions? A cask that was never meant to be used during the voyage gets opened, the artifacts are discovered, and suddenly Mr. Elliot and Lieutenant St. Clair have a problem that St. Clair does not want brought to the captain’s attention—at least, not by your cousin.”

“Or not while the captain was in Mr. Smith’s company.”

“Yes, we do not know how far the collusion extended.”

“Or why, if Mr. Elliot was the one behind the gold’s presence in the sugar cask,” Darcy said, “he did not simply transport the artifacts with his own belongings aboard the
Montego.
”

“He thought they would be safer on a ship of war?” Elizabeth sighed. “I have not worked out all the details, and my theory probably has more holes than a leaky rowboat. What did Captain Wentworth have to say about all of this?”

“He thought there were enough irregularities in what I described to warrant investigation. Obviously, he does not know about the conversation we just overheard, which I shall inform him of without delay. Mr. Elliot’s character he already knows better than we do; in fact, he described him as a ‘talented schemer.’”

“See? Mr. Elliot must have a hand in this somehow.”

“Wentworth is not personally acquainted with Lieutenant St. Clair or Captain Tourner, though he might know the midshipman who conducted the inventory—Mr. Musgrove.”

“I had forgotten about the midshipman. What did the captain say of him?”

“If he is indeed the Mr. Musgrove who served under Captain Wentworth, he was a troublemaker. As for St. Clair and Tourner, Wentworth said he would learn what he could about them and their service histories, including applying to Admiral Croft for information. Croft is Wentworth’s brother-in-law, so he anticipates the admiral will readily assist us. He plans to speak with him this week.”

“I look forward to the results of that discussion,” Elizabeth said. “In the meantime, we must call upon the Wentworths once more, so that you can tell the captain our latest news before he meets with the admiral, and I can consult Mrs. Wentworth on a point of fashion.”

“Fashion?” Darcy took her arm as they reached the end of the Walk and began the arduous climb up Broad Street. “After all this discussion of villainy, that is where your thoughts have carried you?”

“I want to know what one wears to a launch. We need to see Mr. Elliot’s new ship.”

Twenty-six

He had, in fact, though his sisters were now doing all they could for him, by calling him “poor Richard,” been nothing better than a thick-headed, unfeeling, unprofitable Dick Musgrove, who had never done any thing to entitle himself to more than the abbreviation of his name, living or dead.

—Persuasion

True to his word, Captain Wentworth performed discreet enquiries into the naval careers of Lieutenant St. Clair, Captain Tourner, and Mr. Musgrove.

The last was simplest. Dick Musgrove was a younger brother of Charles Musgrove, husband of Anne’s sister Mary. Captain Wentworth was on genial terms with the entire Musgrove family, including Charles and Dick’s parents, and already knew part of Dick’s history.

A troublesome youth, Dick Musgrove had been sent off to sea in hopes that naval discipline would make a better man of him. It had not. By the time Captain Wentworth had the misfortune to inherit him, he was as lazy, brutish, and self-serving a midshipman as Wentworth had ever dealt with, and the captain’s efforts to instill sense and better self-regulation in the recalcitrant young man had proved as futile as raising sail in a dead calm. Wentworth had literally breathed a sigh of relief when, in consequence of another ship’s heavy casualties, Musgrove had transferred to another frigate in desperate need of midshipmen. Any pangs of conscience Wentworth might have felt at passing off a problem officer to Dick’s new captain were alleviated by that captain’s having passed off a different problem midshipman to Wentworth the year before. It was simply the way of things.

But death and time have a softening effect on memory, resulting in Dick’s mother recalling him more fondly in death than he had ever deserved in life. Whenever the senior Mrs. Musgrove indulged in sighing over her “poor Richard,” she fancied Wentworth a sympathetic listener. No other captain, she said, had taken such good care of her son during his years in service. (That much was probably true.) And so, when Wentworth wrote to Mrs. Musgrove seeking names of the ships on which Dick had served after leaving the
Laconia,
she had been happy to review her son’s old letters (most of them requests for money) and send him by return post a chronological list.

Dick had indeed served under Captain Tourner aboard the
Magna Carta.
It had been the last ship on the list.

Wentworth anticipated similar ease of obtaining intelligence regarding Lieutenant St. Clair. A letter to one of his own former instructors at the Naval College in Portsmouth had yielded a comprehensive summary of St. Clair’s history, and he now looked forward to obtaining a more personal account from Admiral Croft. Wentworth’s sister and her husband were come for a brief visit to satisfy Mrs. Croft’s desire to meet Alfred, and the admiral’s desire to tease Wentworth about his sudden and unexpected new commission as a foster father.

“Well, well, Frederick!” The admiral issued a hearty laugh. “Master and commander of the Elliot heir! This was a sea change you did not see coming, I warrant. How are you liking your new course?”

“I find it quite satisfactory,” Wentworth replied.

“I suppose a young fellow like you needs something to do now that the peace has set us all ashore, but I expected your new wife to have provided sufficient occupation. Women are quite good at finding little tasks and errands for their husbands to attend to, are you not, Sophy?”

Mrs. Croft cast the admiral a look of affectionate exasperation. “Pay him no mind,” she said to Wentworth and Anne. “He has been as eager as I to meet your new charge.”

“Charge, ha! I wager the little commodore is already the one issuing orders. Deny it if you can, Frederick. There! I see in your face I have got the truth of it. Well, where is he? Let us determine whether he passes muster.”

Alfred indeed passed inspection. When the proper number of compliments had been paid and signs of promise observed, they all gathered in the sitting room, where they were joined by Mrs. Smith. Later, Wentworth and the admiral retreated to the study.

Though he had seen the room before, Croft looked round and nodded appreciatively. “I have been thinking of making over the study at Kellynch Hall in this manner. Do you think Sir Walter would approve?”

Wentworth thought Sir Walter would die of an apoplectic seizure at the very suggestion, and told the admiral so.

Croft laughed. “He probably would. Though I suppose the question would then fall to his heir, and you could persuade Alfred to decide in my favor.”

“No persuasion will be required. Alfred will grow up adoring his aunt and uncle Croft.”

“Well, even if he does not, I have no doubt he will turn out a fine young man. You always did well by your boys and midshipmen.”

“Those among them who were disposed to take direction,” Wentworth replied, thinking of Dick Musgrove.

“As I told you when you received your first command, there are always a few maggots in the flour. You just do your best to keep them from contaminating the remainder.”

Wentworth recalled the conversation. Admiral Croft, for all his present status and power, was a salty old sailor at heart. In a profession where promotion was often driven by influential connexions, he had advanced largely by his own merit, and for this Croft won Frederick Wentworth’s respect even before he won the affections of Frederick’s sister, Sophia. He was a forthright, sensible man of sound judgment, and when he gave advice, Wentworth listened.