The Heiress of Linn Hagh (8 page)

‘Faws?’

‘Gypsies. A travelling band of tinkers. Baxter Carnaby, Helen’s father, was always far too indulgent with them and allowed them to camp on his land. There have been mutterings of witchcraft in the town since Helen’s disappearance—linking it to one of the gypsy women.’

‘Has their camp been searched?’

‘Yes. This was one of the first things the local constable arranged. His men came away with nothing—except the curses of the faws ringing in their ears.’

‘What other steps did the local constables take to track down your niece?’

‘I’ve arranged for the local man, Constable Beddows, to call on us at ten o’clock. He will escort you to Linn Hagh and furnish you with further details of his enquiry.’

The door opened and a middle-aged woman came into the room. She was round-faced and plump, with a kind smile, and wisps of curly, grey hair escaped over her forehead below her lace cap.

Lavender and Woods rose hastily to their feet.

‘Detective Lavender, Constable Woods—may I present my eldest daughter, Miss Katherine Armstrong? Katherine runs the house for me since my dear wife died.’

Lavender bowed over Miss Armstrong’s hand. She smiled, nodded courteously to Woods and then moved over to her father and straightened his blanket.

‘Please excuse me, gentlemen; I’ve just come to check that Papa is not tiring himself too much.’

‘Don’t fuss, Katherine,’ her father whined. She ignored his protests and poured out a measure of dark red medicine from one of the bottles on the rosewood table beside his chair. He took the drink, swallowed it back in one gulp and grimaced at the bitter taste. His daughter sank gracefully onto a padded stool next to her father’s chair. Lavender instantly felt that she was a pleasant and likeable woman.

‘Helen’s disappearance has been so distressing for him.’

‘I’m sure it must have been very upsetting for everyone,’ Lavender observed. ‘You seem a close family. How was Miss Carnaby related to you all?’

‘Helen’s grandfather was my older brother, Thomas Armstrong. She is my great-niece. You may have heard of Thomas? While I happily settled for a steady career in law, my brother was a shrewd businessman and an entrepreneur. He made a fortune from various enterprises.’

Inwardly, Lavender congratulated himself. It was important to him that he was always thoroughly prepared for every case, and he usually carried out meticulous research on his clients before he met them. The good citizens of Northumberland would be amazed at how many parchment documents containing their details were now being held and filed, down in the dusty offices of the burgeoning British Home Department in London.

‘Was your brother, Thomas Armstrong, of the Newcastle shipbuilding yard of the same name?’ he enquired.

Armstrong looked impressed.

‘Yes! He had successful interests in several shipping lines and coal mining ventures. He amassed a fortune. Sadly, his son and heir died in infancy, which left him with only one child, a daughter named Esther. Helen’s fortune comes down the maternal line, from her mother and my brother.’

‘This George Carnaby you mentioned—is he your great-nephew?’

‘Heavens, no. They share the same father but had different mothers. George Carnaby has nothing to do with the Armstrong inheritance; he is Helen’s half-brother. I’ve a copy of my own brother’s will, Detective—if you think it would help with your investigation.’

‘Yes, thank you, it would be helpful, but I’ll pick it up another time,’ Lavender said.

‘Esther was my cousin,’ Miss Katherine told him as she rearranged her father’s blankets. ‘We were very close as girls, and we’ve always been very fond of her only child, Helen.’

‘Yes, Esther was a lovely woman.’ Mr Armstrong looked sad. ‘Unfortunately, she died earlier this year, in February.’

‘That was why Helen came home from school in Whitby,’ Miss Katherine explained. ‘She came to nurse her mother in her final few weeks.’

‘School? Exactly how old is Miss Carnaby?’ Lavender started with alarm. Had he missed something here?

‘She is twenty years old. When she finished her education, Helen stayed on as a pupil teacher for a while. She only returned to Northumberland in February when her mother became seriously ill.’

Ah, a pupil teacher.
That explained it. For one awful minute, he’d thought he had misread the information and was looking at child abduction.

‘Several of my sisters have sent their daughters to the same school,’ Miss Armstrong volunteered. ‘I understand Helen was well liked and very popular with the pupils.’

Lavender nodded and glanced at the clock. It was nearly ten o’clock.

‘Before we leave you to set off for Linn Hagh, I need to ask you if you have a likeness of Miss Carnaby.’

‘Yes, we’ve a small portrait of her.’ Miss Armstrong rose to her slippered feet and padded over to the great mahogany desk that stood by the window. She removed an oval-shaped frame from one of the deep drawers.

Woods leant forward and both men stared at the portrait in Lavender’s hand. A very pretty, fair-haired woman smiled back at them. Her skin was luminous, and her vivid blue eyes gleamed with warmth.

‘She is beautiful,’ Lavender said. ‘Were either of you—or any of your family—aware if she had any admirers? A beau, perhaps?’

Mr Armstrong shook his head. ‘We’ve been through this several times with Constable Beddows. As far as we know, Helen was not romantically attached to any young man. She was greatly distressed after her mother’s death and has just quietly lived at Linn Hagh since then.’

Lavender nodded again, but a new thought struck him, and his forehead creased into a frown. ‘Why did Miss Carnaby need to work? I understood she was quite wealthy. Surely she didn’t need the money?’

The two Armstrongs stiffened and glanced quickly at each other across the stuffy room. ‘I believe Helen wanted to teach at the school,’ Miss Katherine said carefully. ‘She enjoyed it and liked the independence she gained from having her own income.’

‘She doesn’t come into her inheritance until her twenty-first birthday at the beginning of January,’ Armstrong added. ‘Until then, she is still financially dependent on her half-brother, George Carnaby.’

Lavender had the curious impression that these answers had been rehearsed—or at least discussed beforehand. The Armstrongs delivered those lines with the wooden amateurism of the set of actors he had recently had the misfortune to watch at Vauxhall Gardens. Betsy Woods had dragged both him and Ned along to the play. Woods had nodded off in his seat and started to snore loudly. Lavender’s hand moved instinctively to rub the spot on his own arm where Betsy had battered her husband’s arm with her fan.

Lavender noted this slight change in the demeanour and tone of the Armstrongs, but he didn’t comment. His face remained inscrutable, his voice neutral.

‘Exactly how much is Helen Carnaby due to inherit in January?’

‘My brother’s fortune is invested for her. It amounts to around ten thousand pounds.’

An involuntary whistle escaped from Constable Woods’ lips.

Chapter Seven

W
hat’s that?’ Woods asked in surprise. ‘A castle?’

They had rounded a bend on the lonely road from Bellingham and caught their first glimpse of Linn Hagh. Woods reined in his horse and paused to admire the towering, cresselated stone rectangle that reached up into the brooding sky.

‘It’s a pele tower,’ Lavender said, drawing up beside him. ‘An ancient family home, common in these border regions. It’s fortified, of course.’

‘How’s that work, then?’

‘The walls will be three feet thick, and the roof is made of stone. In those days, the building was impregnable, even to fire. You see the bigger windows on the first and second floors? That’s where the family lived. Animals would have been stored in the building on the ground floor, and there would have been no staircase back then—just a wooden ladder up to a trapdoor in the floor above, which would have been hastily pulled up if they were under attack.’

‘Seems like a lot of trouble to go to.’

‘It was necessary. This area was completely lawless until the union of the nation under James the First. Before that, roving bands of reivers—from both sides of the border—pillaged and stole at will. Even royalty was nervous about travelling around here.’

‘Aye,’ their escort, Constable Beddows, agreed. ‘Rough lot around these here parts.’

Lavender and Woods didn’t reply. Their relationship with Constable Beddows had not got off to a good start when he had turned up at Mr Armstrong’s house with horses for the London officers.

‘That’s a right pair of queer prancers you expect us to ride!’ Woods had exclaimed in disgust as he ran his hand down the quivering, bony flank of the smaller nag.

‘Constable Woods is the finest horseman in the Bow Street Horse Patrol,’ Lavender told Beddows. He had trouble hiding his smile.

‘Is he now?’ Beddows shuffled uncomfortably, and his eyes would not meet Lavender’s. ‘I see our northern horses are not good enough fer you southerners.’

‘I’ve seen northern horses,’ snapped Woods. ‘On our last case up here, we ran into the Duke of Northumberland himself—and he had a right set of gallopers on his carriage. Don’t tell me you can’t get decent horse flesh in this part of Britain.’

Beddows’ thin mouth had gaped open at the mention of the Duke of Northumberland. Then it slammed shut.

They conducted most of their slow journey to Linn Hagh in silence. Both constables were sulking: Beddows was smarting from the criticism he had received from Woods, and Woods was fuming from the perceived insult of being given a couple of inferior horses.

However, the sight of Linn Hagh seemed to have roused Beddows back to his purpose.

‘It was snowing on the night of her disappearance,’ he announced. ‘All footprints were completely covered.’

‘What efforts did you employ to try to find Miss Carnaby?’ Lavender asked.

‘Well, George Carnaby and his guests searched the outbuildings of Linn Hagh and the surrounding area on the morning of her disappearance.’ He pointed at the single-storey buildings just visible behind the pele tower. ‘Later, us constables undertook a lengthy search of these here woods. We gave her description to the local tollgate keepers and the landlords of the coaching inns. Everyone was questioned to see if they remembered the lass passing through on the night of the twenty-first or the morning of the twenty-second. But damn me, she has disappeared without a bloody trace.’

‘And this Saturday you posted a reward notice for her, in the Hue & Cry section of the local newspaper?’

Constable Beddows bristled with pride.

‘Aye, that were my idea. I had a rum job persuading George Carnaby to pay fer it at first, but eventually he agreed.’

They rode up an overgrown, meandering path through meadows, where a few scattered sheep bleated mournfully. As they drew closer to the hall, they could see the dead moss clinging to the side of the stone building. Rusty farm equipment lay scattered around the entrance amongst the weeds. Window frames were rotten and warped. The whole place looked neglected and reeked of decay.

‘I can see someone’s got a fire blazin’ in the forest, o’er yonder,’ Woods commented.

The other two men paused and glanced to their right. A thin spiral of black smoke swirled and disappeared into the leaden sky above the treetops.

Constable Beddows spat onto the ground.

‘It’ll be them damned faws.’

‘Ah, the famous gypsies,’ Lavender said. ‘So that’s where they camp. I think we’ll have to pay them a visit at some point, Woods.’

‘Ye’ll not find owt,’ Beddows informed them sharply. ‘We’ve already searched their camp.’

‘Is there another way to Bellingham besides the road?’ Lavender asked.

‘Aye, there’s a path through the woods, but it ain’t no good fer horses. Damned woods are full of beggars and faws.’

‘Oh?’

‘Bellingham is a market town, Detective. Every week we’re swamped with beggars come to tap the crowds. They doss in the woods on a night. There are caves along the side of the gorge.’

To enter Linn Hagh, they had to climb a narrow flight of worn sandstone steps to a studded oak door. Grains of silica glistened in the sandstone staircase and the weathered walls around them. The frail wooden banister swayed dangerously beneath their grasp. Lavender hammered on the door with his cane, then used it to point upwards to a lip of stone above their heads. He turned to his constable.

‘That is where they poured out faeces and boiling water onto anyone trying to break their way in.’

‘Charmin’ ,’ said Woods.

They were greeted by an elderly serving woman with frizzy grey hair and wearing a scowl. She wiped her hands on her dirty apron and informed them that everyone was out except the master. She let them into a small, paved vestibule and swayed arthritically up the stairs to announce their arrival.

Lavender noted that only one room led off from the vestibule—a large, gloomy kitchen.

Eventually, the woman returned and told them that the master would see them now.

‘Thank you, my good woman,’ Woods said with a charming grin.

The cook seemed taken aback at his politeness. Lavender smiled to himself as they mounted the staircase. It was Woods’ job to ingratiate himself with the servants whenever they investigated a crime. His constable had made a start.

George Carnaby sprawled inelegantly across a faded armchair in front of the huge stone fireplace that dominated the back room of the Great Hall. A large grey cat sat purring in his lap. He was a plain man with a tanned, rugged face and close-set brown eyes. His unkempt dark hair was rapidly greying and loosely tied back with a black ribbon. His slack mouth drooped at the corners. He didn’t get up to greet them when they entered the room.

‘I had no idea you would be calling today. Armstrong told me he had employed Bow Street runners, of course, but he didn’t let me know you had arrived. You could have let me know, Beddows,’ he snapped at the constable.

The local man flushed and shuffled uncomfortably beneath Carnaby’s glare.

‘Shall I fetch tea for yer guests?’ the serving woman asked.