The Path of the Wicked (33 page)

It was, if you managed to concentrate on it, a splendid service. The choir and organist were as good as I'd heard anywhere. I was just aware of that, but most of my attention was elsewhere. It was hard to pick out one person from another because, apart from those in robes of office, all the men, both clergy and laity, were in various forms of black and merged together. I thought I'd identified our man near the end of a pew but couldn't be sure from the back. I kept my eyes on him, waiting for any movement. An anthem, a reading, a hymn all passed. We knelt to pray, a long list of prayers, including several for the judges, justice in general, repentance on the part of sinners. We finished praying and sat for the sermon, to be given by the high sheriff's chaplain. He mounted the pulpit and read out his chosen text slowly and sonorously. It echoed round the cathedral like a voice from a sea cave.

Proverbs chapter four, verses fourteen and fifteen. Enter not into the path of the wicked, and go not in the way of evil men. Avoid it, pass not by it, turn from it and pass away.

A shuffle of approval at the appropriate choice of text went through the congregation, but I didn't share it. It was hard to be certain in the ranks of black backs, but I thought our man wasn't there any more. While we were praying, he'd disappeared. I got up and signed to Mr Godwit to come with me. He looked horrified but followed. As I went out of the door, I heard him explaining to the usher that his niece had been taken ill. Evidently, I'd been promoted up the family tree. He caught up with me in the close and I hurried him back down towards the hotel.

‘Him?'

‘Yes.'

My doubts had left me now we were out and moving. When we got to the hotel, I practically ran upstairs to Mr Godwit's room, with him not far behind. We found the door shut and nothing looking out of the way. I thought I'd been wrong after all, until Amos's voice came from inside.

‘That you, Miss Lane?'

‘Yes.'

‘Hold on a minute.'

Scuffling came from inside and a man's voice, slurred but protesting. Mr Godwit recognized the voice and so did I. He looked at me, his expression saying that I was right, but he still didn't want to believe it. Tabby opened the door just enough to let us in. A man in black was slumped in a chair, his nose bleeding, Amos standing beside him. The man raised his head, another gout of red jerking from his nose on to his shirt front.

‘Penbrake?' Mr Godwit said to his fellow magistrate.

What he intended by making it a question, I don't know. Perhaps, what are we going to do about it? If so, Penbrake gave him an answer by jumping up suddenly and making for the door. Amos and Tabby moved in front of him. Penbrake turned, swerved past me and Mr Godwit and went straight out of the window, through frame, glass and all. A woman's scream sounded from the pavement. When Amos and I reached the window, Penbrake was already on his feet. He lurched away, across the road into a narrow street leading downhill. For a moment it looked as if Amos intended to vault across the sill through jagged glass and follow him the most direct way.

‘Don't,' I said. ‘He can't get far like that.'

Far enough, as it happened. We lost the trail because when Amos ran down the stairs to the hotel lobby, the hotel manager and two porters tried to stop him, assuming that the fracas upstairs had been his fault. Even when I arrived and explained as best I could, they were slow in understanding. Looking back, maybe I can't blame them. But it meant that by the time Amos, Tabby and I were across the road, all we had to follow was a trail of bloodspots and eventually we lost even those in a maze of small streets leading down to the docks. If it hadn't been a Sunday morning, there would have been more people on the streets to see him or even stop him.

As it was, they didn't find him until well into the afternoon, floating in the arm of the docks where the barges tie up, close to the canal entrance and almost within sight of the prison where Joanna Picton had spent her last few weeks in her native country. I wished there was some way of letting her know that, but by then the ship that carried her would be near the other side of the world.

L
ater that afternoon, Mr Godwit and I took our story and the book with Mary's letter to St Jude. He'd managed to have a meeting with his client, and Jack Picton's reaction to Penbrake's name had been much as I expected. Yes, he had seen Penbrake when he waited in the woods at the back of the Kembles' house. That was the name he'd intended to spring on the court in the morning. By then rumours were flying around the town and some of them weren't far from the truth. Now Penbrake was dead in such strange circumstances, his old associates were remembering stories about his ways with women that they'd chosen to disregard when he was their colleague and dining companion.

When Picton's barrister stopped doubting our sanity and realized what we were bringing him, he practically ran off to arrange meetings with the prosecution and possibly a judge in chambers. We decided to stay an extra night in Gloucester to hear the result, and he came to see us after dinner, looking like a man who'd put his money on an outsider and seen it romp home.

‘Case adjourned.'

‘Only adjourned?' I said. ‘Why aren't they releasing him?'

Shocked at such impatience, Mr Godwit and the barrister explained that the law did not work like that. There must be more legal discussion and, at some future point, an appearance before the judges when the prosecution would state that they were presenting no evidence.

‘A few more weeks in prison won't make much difference to Jack Picton,' Mr Godwit said cheerfully. ‘As soon as they let him out, he'll probably do something to get himself put back in again. And it's better than being hanged.'

‘What about Penbrake?' I said. ‘Will it come out in court that he killed Mary Marsh?'

That depended on a lot of things, it seemed, but the answer was ‘Not necessarily'. I had to accept that, but resolved that I'd do all I could to make sure the facts were publicly known. Telling Mr Crow would be a good start.

Early next morning we set out towards Cheltenham as we'd come, myself on Rancie, Amos and Tabby on the skewbald cob, Mr Godwit some way behind in the gig. He'd invited me to stay for a few days longer and I'd decided to accept, mainly to get Rancie well rested for the ride back to London. I wasn't looking forward to it on my own and wondered whether I should ask Amos, as a final kindness, to find a sturdy pony for me to buy so that Tabby could ride with me. I could afford it. Mr Godwit had agreed to pay my fee, plus a generous amount for travelling expenses. The darkness of the cloud that the case had cast over his contented life was obvious now from his relief when it was lifted. When we came to Mr Godwit's house, Amos dismounted to help me down.

‘There's something I should do first,' I said. ‘It won't take long. Can you wait here until I get back?'

He nodded and I rode to the Kembles' house, turning off the drive towards the stable yard. As I'd hoped, I found Rodney Kemble there, talking to the head groom. He looked at me, told the groom to take Rancie and then led the way to a place where we could talk. As it happened, it was under the tree where Mary Marsh had sketched him from her window. The news of Penbrake's death hadn't travelled this far. I told him about it as simply as I could.

For a long time he said nothing. Then: ‘I wish she'd told me what she was going to do. I wish she'd sent that letter.'

‘At least it's done something that she'd have wanted,' I said.

The letter that she'd never sent to him, now in the hands of the lawyers, had given every last detail of Joanna's story: how, on the day of the fair, Penbrake had taken her from the cell where she was locked up with the other women and offered her freedom in exchange for what he wanted. Confused and terrified of the consequences if she had to appear in court, she'd given in to him. Later, when she knew she was expecting his child, she'd gone to him, but he'd threatened her with even worse consequences if she told anybody. When she faced hanging, he'd had to change tactics. He managed to see her in prison and promise to save her, provided she kept quiet. If the sentence hadn't been commuted, she'd have found out how worthless his promise was on the gallows.

‘Mary should never have gone to face him on her own,' Rodney Kemble said. ‘It was madness.' He was trying to shift his anger against himself on to Mary.

‘Brave madness,' I said. ‘And maybe not madness. Perhaps she was going to offer him a bargain: she'd keep quiet about what he'd done if he'd help get Joanna Picton back from transportation.'

I guessed that she'd have hated having to make any kind of bargain with Penbrake, but she was a practical woman, using what resources she had.

‘She must have known she was putting herself in danger,' he said.

‘People don't expect to be murdered.'

There was nothing I could say to console him. Time might do that, or perhaps another woman as remarkable as Mary, if he happened to be lucky enough to meet one. As we walked back to the yard, I risked asking after his sister.

‘She's marrying Paley in October.'

He said it through gritted teeth. I smiled inwardly to think that Barbara had got what she wanted. I could understand her brother's anger. Although Peter Paley had not been as guilty towards Joanna as Rodney had believed, his record was not the sort that a brother would welcome. I thought, but didn't say, that married happiness was an unpredictable affair and the union might well turn out better than he expected. Barbara and Peter loved each other, were young enough to learn some sense, and both families had plenty of money. The omens could be worse, though it might be some time before Barbara got back the book with the engagement ode.

As Rodney Kemble and I parted, he said, ‘I wish you could have met Mary. I think you would have liked each other.'

‘I think so, too,' I said.

Back at Mr Godwit's house, Amos was waiting for me at the paddock gate. He helped me dismount and then untacked Rancie and turned her out. We watched as she rolled like a puppy in the grass. There was so much I wanted to say to him, but I didn't want to speak because that would be the beginning of goodbye. He broke the silence.

‘Well, I suppose I should be going.'

‘Yes, if you're planning to get home to Herefordshire tonight.'

‘Not that far. Just down to the town to take back the cob.'

Then on home tomorrow, I supposed. After all that had happened to us together, he deserved more than my silence.

‘Amos, with all my heart I wish you and your bride my very best. I'm sure you'll be happy. You deserve to be. Write when you can and let me know you're well.'

But he'd never been a great man for writing. Rancie was on her feet now, shaking herself and making that contented ‘hrrrr' sound. Amos was looking at her, not at me.

‘So we're not going back together?' he said at last.

I tried to laugh. Had it just occurred to him? ‘I don't think your wife-to-be would like that,' I said.

‘I don't reckon she's got a lot to say in the matter, considering she's not my wife-to-be any more.'

I stared at him. ‘What do you mean?'

He looked back at me, his expression unreadable. ‘Elopement seems to be the fashion. I had a message from home a couple of days ago to say she's gone off with my cousin. I always knew she liked him best, any road.'

Relief and pity for his loss hit me together. I'd like to say pity was the greater, but I don't know.

‘Amos, I'm so sorry.'

‘Need a good horse when you're eloping,' Amos said. ‘Has to carry the pair of you.' His face was still expressionless, so I thought the remarks were just his way of hiding his hurt, until he suddenly grinned at me. ‘So I made sure they had one – my wedding present to them.'

My laughter made Rancie turn and stare and set the spaniel barking and the white ducks quacking in Mr Godwit's quiet pond.