What Remains of Heaven (29 page)

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Authors: C. S. Harris

Tags: #Fiction, #Mystery & Detective, #General

BOOK: What Remains of Heaven
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“Not that we know.”
Quillian opened his eyes wide in a parody of enlightenment. “So you’re suggesting . . . what, precisely? That Sir Nigel confronted me with evidence of my supposed traitorous dealings, whereupon I killed him to keep him silent?” Quillian frowned. “Yes, I can see where such a scenario has a certain element of logic. There’s only one problem.”
“What’s that?”
“I’m not a traitor.” Quillian pushed to his feet and threw off his silk dressing gown. “Although I realize that’s an easy thing to say. Not so easy to prove.”
“I’m told you didn’t arrive at Carlton House before ten o’clock on the evening of the Tuesday in question,” said Sebastian. “Where were you before that?”
Quillian looked faintly amused. “Not anyplace I care to tell about,” he said, selecting a freshly starched cravat from the pile laid out for him.
His attention all for his own image in the mirror, Quillian carefully wrapped the white Irish linen around his neck and began the delicate business of tying the ends. “I take it your attempts to identify the Bishop’s killer have not exactly been crowned with success. Is that why you’ve turned your attention to the events of thirty years ago? Surely you don’t think the Bishop and his brother were both killed by the same man?”
“I consider it one possibility, yes.”
Quillian leaned forward, his gaze intent as he made a few careful adjustments to the exaggerated knot of his cravat. “I suppose you know what you are doing. But I think you’re wrong.”
“Really? So what do you think happened to the brothers Prescott?”
“I think Francis Prescott killed his brother thirty years ago for the inheritance. And then, when my helpful interference brought the body of the good Bishop’s victim to light, he went rushing back to the scene of his crime—only to fall victim in his turn.”
“To whom?”
Turning away from his mirror, the dandy reached for a silk waistcoat of the palest salmon silk backed by fine white linen. “I did give you a little hint the other day. Did you not follow up on it?”
Sebastian frowned. “You mean William Franklin? Would you have me believe the American killed Bishop Prescott over a mere slight involving a couple of schoolboys?”
“Dear me,” said Quillian, deftly fastening the row of tiny pearl buttons that ran up the waistcoat’s front. “Can it be that you don’t know?”
“Don’t know . . . what?”
“The depth of the animosity William Franklin held for our good Bishop. You see, as one of the senior Loyalists to take refuge in London, William Franklin worked tirelessly on behalf of his fellow Americans, petitioning Parliament for their relief. Yet when Franklin’s own case came before the Parliamentary Commission, he was awarded a mere trifle. The bulk of his claim—amounting to nearly fifty thousand pounds—was disavowed.”
“Why?”
“Because Francis Prescott convinced the commission that Franklin’s loyalty was suspect, due to the treasonous activities of his well-known father, Benjamin Franklin. It was Prescott’s contention that Franklin
père et fils
had deliberately supported opposite sides of the conflict, so that no matter who won, the Franklins would come out on top.”
“When was this?”
“The commission’s hearings? The late eighties, I believe.”
“So you’re suggesting that William Franklin waited more than twenty years, until he was old and infirm, before suddenly deciding one night to follow the Bishop out to a rural parish church and bash in his head?”
“La vengeance est un plat qui se mange froid
. Perhaps now that his wife is dead, Franklin feels he no longer has anything to lose?” Quillian shrugged. “But you are the expert on murder, so I suppose I must bow to your superior knowledge of the subject.”
Vengeance is a dish best enjoyed cold
. Sebastian watched the Baron slip an intricately engraved gold watch into the pocket of his waistcoat. “I’m curious about one thing,” said Sebastian. “How do you come to know so much about Prescott’s dealings with William Franklin?”
Quillian added a fob to the end of his watch chain. “What’s the saying? ‘Keep your friends close and your enemies closer.’ Francis Prescott made himself my enemy. Therefore I made it my business to know all the dirty little secrets our good Bishop didn’t want anyone else to know.” Reaching out, he gave the bell a soft tug. An instant later, the Baron’s valet appeared in the doorway.
“Are we ready to put on our coat, my lord?” said the little man with a bow. “Shall I ask James to assist?”
Sebastian pushed away from the windowsill. “It takes the combined efforts of your valet
and
a footman to get you into your coat?”
“I should rather hope so,” said Quillian, looking affronted. “Any excess material would lead to unsightly
wrinkles
. And that would never do.”
Sebastian reached for his hat and gloves. “I’ll show myself out.” But he paused in the doorway to look back and say, “One of these days, an abolition act will make it though Parliament, with or without Bishop Prescott. You do know that, don’t you?”
“I know it,” said the Baron, positioning his cuffs as the valet held a flawlessly tailored a coat of superfine in readiness and the footman waited to assist. “But without Prescott, I can’t see it happening for another twenty years or more. And who knows?” The Baron smiled. “By then I may well be dead.”
 
 
William Franklin stood at one of the open sides of the long, low building that stretched out for hundreds of feet along the edge of Penton Place, near Hanging Field. Known as a ropewalk, the structure had low brick walls that reached only to hip height and a simple shed roof supported by rows of crude posts. Within its shelter, hemp fibers were spun into threads and then twisted into rope. The strands could be twisted together in a straight line only with the strands fully extended, which accounted for the ropewalk’s great length.
“Fascinating, is it not?” said Franklin when Sebastian strolled up to him. The old man had to shout to be heard over the
clickety-clack
of spinning metal wheels. “When I was a wee lad, my father used to take me down to the ropewalk near the harbor in Philadelphia. Ellen always enjoys it, too.”
Sebastian narrowed his eyes against the cloud of billowing hemp dust. It was messy work, the air heavy with the scent of hemp and tar and the whirl of the spinning fibers. “She’s not with you today?”
“She would have come, but she wanted to finish the letter she’s writing to her father.” The old man’s smile slipped slightly at the thought of his wayward son. “He keeps promising to visit her, but he never comes. He has my father’s papers, you know. I’ve been pressing him to publish them; I’ve even offered to help. But he’ll have none of it.”
Sebastian studied the American’s timeworn face. From what Sebastian had been able to learn, the domestic arrangements of the Franklin males tended to follow a similar, bizarre pattern. An illegitimate son himself, William Franklin had abandoned his own illegitimate son, Temple, to be raised by Benjamin. And Temple Franklin had, in turn, abandoned
his
illegitimate daughter, Ellen, to be raised by William. They were a brilliant but peculiar family. But then, Sebastian thought, perhaps most families were peculiar, each in its own way.
He said, “I’m told Bishop Prescott was largely responsible for the Parliamentary Commission’s decision to disavow the majority of your claim.”
Franklin cast him a knowing sideways glance. “So that’s why you’re here, is it? You’ve heard about the results of the commission.” He gave a soft chuckle. “Believe me, Lord Devlin, if I ever felt moved to kill Francis Prescott, it was twenty-four years ago. Not last week.”
“Sometimes these things build.”
“True,” said Franklin. “True.” He drew a plain gold pocket watch from his old-fashioned, snuff-stained vest and squinted down at the time. “I promised to take Ellen for an ice at Gunt er’s. But I’ve a few minutes yet.”
Something about the movement stirred the whisper of a recollection in Sebastian’s memory, a thought that was there and then gone before he could capture it.
He lifted his gaze to the ropewalk, where a man with a grooved wooden wedge known as a “top” drew the strands ahead of the twist, keeping it tight. The strands had to be kept under equal tension, without kinking, until the entire fathom of rope was twisted. The standard length of naval rope was a thousand feet.
The length required to hang a man for, say, murder, was considerably shorter.
Sebastian’s hands tightened around the top of the brick wall before them as he watched the strands of rope weave in together. “Good God,” he said. “Why didn’t I think of that before?”
Franklin shook his head, not understanding. “Think of what?”
Sebastian pushed away from the wall. “Thank you for your help, Mr. Franklin.”
“Anytime, anytime,” Franklin called after him. “And good luck to you, Lord Devlin.”
Chapter 38
 
Stopping by Brook Street, Sebastian slipped a small, loaded double-barreled pistol into his pocket. Then he headed for Bow Street.
He arrived at the Public Office to startle Sir Henry Lovejoy by demanding, “You said you were going to look into the circumstances of Jack Slade’s transportation. Did you?”
“Yes,” said the magistrate, carefully fitting his spectacles on his face and reaching for a file. “I’ve my notes right here. But I was under the impression you’d discounted the involvement of Mr. Slade.”
“I’ve changed my mind. Tell me everything you know.”
 
 
Jack Slade was trimming fat from a leg of lamb when Sebastian entered the butcher shop on Monkwell Street. The butcher had a bloody apron tied around his waist. The hand clutching the thin boning knife was bloody, too, as was the ugly-looking cleaver resting at his elbow. The pungent odor of raw meat filled the air.
Sebastian said, “You didn’t tell me it was Francis Prescott’s plea for mercy that saved you from the hangman’s noose.”
Slade glanced up, a smear of blood darkening one cheek, his lantern jaw set hard. “What if it was?”
Sebastian let his gaze rove the small shop, taking in the sides of beef and mutton hung from massive hooks in the walls. A tray of sausages rested on the counter; the battered green shutter that would be used to close the butcher’s shop when the day’s trading ended stood propped against the wall.
He said, “The thing is, you see, I find myself wondering something. Why would Father Prescott—I assume he was only a priest then, and not a bishop? Anyway, why would Father Prescott intervene to help a man convicted of bludgeoning his wife to death in a drunken brawl? That’s right,” Sebastian added when Slade’s eyes narrowed. “I’ve discovered you weren’t being exactly truthful when you said your wife died while you were in Sydney.”
The butcher sliced a ridge of fat and let it drop into the bucket at his feet. “Reckon he felt guilty. ’Cause o’ what his brother done to me family.”
“That’s one explanation,” said Sebastian.
“What other explanation is there?”
Sebastian shifted so that he had a clear view of the street, where a costermonger was pushing a barrel up the hill toward the churchyard. “Nice shop you have here. Been in business long?”
“Near on five years. Why ye ask?”
“It’s not often a man transported to Botany Bay returns home with the wherewithal to set himself up in business.”
Slade’s head came up, the handle of his knife clattering against the surface of the butcher block. “What ye suggesting?”
“That you were blackmailing Francis Prescott. That you blackmailed him decades ago to get him to use his influence to keep you from being hanged. And then, when you came back from Botany Bay, you pressed him again to give you the money you needed to set up this shop.”
Slade stared at him, forehead furrowed, nostrils flaring with each breath.
Sebastian said, “I suspect he was also periodically slipping you a little sum, was he? Is that why you were arguing with him on the footpath in front of London House on Monday? Because you thought the promise of an archbishopric in his future should increase the price of your continued silence, and he was unwilling to meet your demands?”
Slade swiped the back of his hard forearm across his sun-darkened forehead, leaving another bloody streak. “The Bishop was me friend, see? People know secrets about their friends. People help their friends when they can. Ain’t nothin’ wrong wit’ that.”
“And what secret did you know about the Bishop of Lon—”
Sebastian broke off, his preternatural hearing catching the whisper of shifting cloth, the subtle exhalation of a man’s breath. Sebastian threw himself sideways just as the giant thighbone of an ox still glistening with fat and gristle whooshed through the space where his head had been.
“Mornin’,
Captain
Viscount,” said Obadiah, his lips pulling back in a grin, his big body filling the air with the scent of hot, stale sweat as he swung the ox bone again.
Snatching up the tray of sausages, Sebastian slammed the wooden board into the man’s face hard enough to send him staggering back against the wall, his face dripping torn sausage casings and ground fat down the front of his leather waistcoat and breeches. With a roar, he pushed away from the wall, head bent like a charging bull.

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