A Curious Beginning (18 page)

“Peculiar habits,” he commented. “Anything that struck you at the time as curious.”

“The only habit I can recall is that they insisted upon purchasing a newspaper every day and it had to be the
Times
. They liked to keep current on affairs of the world. Aunt Nell was quite serious, always preoccupied with needlework and the Bible. The only present she ever made me was a motto for my bedroom: ‘The Wages of Sin Is Death,'” I told him with a shudder.

“Christ,” he said.

“Exactly. But Aunt Lucy made up for it. She was lively and kind, a great gardener. She did not like my traveling, but she understood it. My first butterfly net was a present from her, and she gave me a compass to mark my first expedition,” I said, touching the little instrument pinned to my bodice. If I closed my eyes, I could still see her, with her cloud of fluffy white hair and her gentle hands, pressing it into my palm. “So you will always find your way home again, child,” she had said, her eyes bright with unshed tears.

Stoker had fallen into a reverie, but he roused himself then, like an opium dreamer slowly emerging from a fugue. “I think I have it,” he said. “Your aunts were hiding out after committing a crime.”

“Stoker, you astonish me. I cannot believe that your imagination could lead you so far astray as to suggest that those two harmless old women were criminals!”

“Think of it,” he insisted. “It is the only logical solution. They have money, enough to live comfortably, but they will not divulge its source. They do not encourage friendships or correspondence. They move from village to village. It makes perfect sense,” he finished, sitting back with an air of satisfaction.

“I can think of a dozen explanations just as likely, and none of them involving felonious old women,” I returned.

“You cannot name one.”

I opened my mouth, then shut it abruptly. “Very well,” I said after a moment. “I cannot think of one at present, but I have no doubt I could, and something just as outlandish as you propose. Tell me, Stoker, since you are so persuaded as to their guilt, what crime do you think they committed?”

My voice was sharp with sarcasm, but Stoker's was triumphant. “Kidnapping.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“I think they stole you, Veronica. You did not belong to either of them. Where did you come from? They must have taken you. Perhaps your nursemaid was inattentive or your mother very young. You were left in a pram somewhere, no doubt in a park or on a village green, and in a moment of inattention, the Harbottle ladies snatched you up and carried you off.”

“Stoker, in spite of your protests to the contrary, I can only assume that your taste in literature tends towards the sensationalist and absurd. The Harbottle ladies did not carry me off. I was a foundling.”

“Ah, and where, precisely, were you found?”

“Oh, for heaven's sake, I cannot say! I never asked and they never told me. They were very close about their past. We did not speak of such things.”

“What did you talk about?”

I puffed out a sigh. “I told you—gardening with Aunt Lucy, needlework and sin with Aunt Nell. Those were their sole interests and comprised the bulk of their conversation. Aunt Nell also supervised the cooking; Aunt Lucy taught me the rudiments of nursing. I read aloud to them in the evenings. That is the whole of it.”

“It sounds a dreary life,” he said suddenly.

“Of course it was dreary, but it was all I knew, and that made it bearable—at least until I discovered butterflying and the freedom it provided. When I was eighteen, I left on my first expedition to Switzerland in search of Alpine varieties. I sold the specimens to collectors and made enough money to fund another expedition, this one further afield, and that is how matters progressed for the next several years. The aunts did not like it, but the money was my own, and so they could not prevent me. I traveled, I came home for visits, and I nursed Aunt Lucy and later Aunt Nell.”

“Tell me about your aunt Nell's death.”

I sighed. “A series of apoplexies. Her first was some months ago, a little after Christmas. It was quite a severe one, robbing her of much movement and most of her speech. The doctor wrote to me in Costa Rica and I organized my passage home. I found her much altered from the woman I had always known. The doctor dosed her heavily with morphia to keep her calm and quiet. A few months after her first attack, she suffered another apoplexy, much more violent than the first, and when she regained consciousness, it became clear she had entirely lost the power of speech. She tried to write, but that, too, was beyond her abilities, and the doctor said it was kinder to keep her under the spell of morphia until she passed. When she died, I will confess, it was a relief to me. I did not like to see her thus. She had always been a person of great energy and purpose, and it was difficult to see her reduced to so little.”

“I can understand,” he said softly. I did not much care for his sympathy in that moment, and I hurried on. “Surely even you must see that this line of inquiry is a dead end. The baron's past is a far likelier vein than mine. Let us begin with the poor gentleman himself. Had he enemies?”

Stoker shook his head. “None of which I am aware.”

“He was a foreigner. Do you know whence he came?”

“Coburg. He studied in Brussels for a time and then attended university in Bonn.”

“Excellent. And when did he come to this country?”

“Early in the '40s. He was a childhood friend of Prince Albert. After the Prince Consort married Queen Victoria he had some trouble settling in, and he asked Max if he would come and make his home in England. Max had no ties of his own left in Germany. His parents were dead and he had no siblings, so he came.”

“Did he see the prince often?”

“Not very. The queen was a demanding wife,” Stoker added with a ghost of a smile. “But when she could spare him, the two men had the occasional dinner or ride together. Most often they corresponded by letter. I suspect the prince simply felt more at ease for having one of his own countrymen close at hand.”

“No doubt,” I mused. “But as interesting as his connection with the prince might be, Prince Albert has been dead for decades and, as far as we know, the baron lived unmolested. If there was any sort of motive to harm him from his friendship with the prince, surely it would have caused some villain to act long ago.”

“Agreed. So if the motive is not to be found in his friendship with the Prince Consort, we must look to his more recent past.”

“How did you meet him?” I inquired.

“He was a guest lecturer when I was at university. We had common interests, and he was kind enough to act as mentor to me when I had few friends. Later, much later, he saved me,” he finished simply.

“Was that the debt you both spoke of when he left me with you? The reason you felt you owed it to him to protect me?”

He nodded, and I thought that would be an end of it, but he spoke, each word as slow and heavy as if he were hewing them from a burial place—a burial place deep within himself. “When I was injured in Brazil, what followed was for me a very dark time. I do not speak of it. I do not even let myself think of it. But there are depths to which a man can sink, and I have plumbed them all. I could not bring myself out of it. I was content to stay there and to die there. My wounds had healed, but my body was in a far better state than the rest,” he recalled with a bitter twist of his mouth. “Max sailed halfway around the world to bring me home. If he had not made it his business to search me out, I would have stayed, rotting in a prison I had made for myself, too sunk in despair to find my way out again. It was Max who found me, who cleaned me up and brought me back to England.”

I said nothing, and he went on, speaking in a strangely detached voice, as if in a dream. “I did not appreciate it, not at the time. He wanted me to stay with him in London, but I was still too angry, too lost in my own misery. So I left him and went to the traveling show, running away from the truest friend I ever had. He let me go, at least for a while. Eventually, he found me again and asked me to come back to London. By then I was ready to accept the hand he extended. I took the warehouse for my workshop; I resumed my work. But still I resisted his efforts to rehabilitate me completely. It was as if, having once fallen out of the habit of civilized life, I could no longer find it again. Yet Max never gave up on me. He never stopped believing I could pull myself out of this abyss into which I had stumbled.” He paused and gave a sharp laugh. “It's funny, really. Do you know what his specialty was? Restoration. He loved nothing more than to take old paintings—pieces damaged by neglect or time or war—and make them whole again. Pity he never finished with me.”

He looked suddenly away, and I realized he must be feeling the baron's loss far more keenly than I had suspected.

“You said he owns—owned,” I corrected sadly, “the building where you reside.”

“Yes, I took it from him at a peppercorn rent when I left the traveling show. I . . . wanted a place where I could work in solitude.” His eyes were shadowed, and I suspected the memories he tried so valiantly to keep at bay were wrestling their way in.

“How long ago was that?”

“Two years.”

“And you have lived there since?”

“Yes. Max was generous to a fault. He came round once a month to collect the rent himself and we went to dinner—I suspect more for him to ensure I was having a proper meal than to get his money.”

“He was a good friend,” I said softly.

Stoker said nothing, just nodded. Impulsively, I touched his hand and he gripped it hard before turning loose of it. “Get on with the questions.”

“Did he form any other close attachments that you know of?”

“None. He knew many people, but distantly. Max was more comfortable in his solitude than any person I have ever known. He was entirely happy alone. He had his books and his music and his specimens, and that was all he required. He also carried on a wide correspondence. His friends were far-flung across the globe, but none of them intimate. I probably knew him as well as anyone.”

“What of his servants? Did anyone live in?” I asked.

“His housekeeper of twenty years, Mrs. Latham. She looked after him with the help of a succession of rather stupid maids, none of whom lived in. Mrs. Latham broke her leg last year, and Max held her post for her. He even paid the doctor's bills. She has never forgot that. Poor old hen would probably have died for him if she had caught the intruder who killed him.”

“Just as well she never got the chance,” I said soberly. “If the blackguard showed no compunction at killing the baron, he would have easily murdered her as well. Would she have profited by the baron's death?”

He shrugged. “A small legacy, but Max and I talked once and he told me he intended to leave his fortune—modest as it was—to various museums. Nothing for the servants to tempt them to murder.”

“No, and even if they had, that would not explain the ransacking of his study,” I said, thinking aloud.

“Unless they were attempting to cover up the crime.”

“What a morbid imagination you have,” I told him admiringly.

“Veronica, I spend my days up to my elbows in the gore of dead animals. And that is the
least
gruesome occupation I have had.”

His mouth had twisted into something like a smile, and I found myself smiling back. The moment caught and held, and in that fleeting connection, something between us shifted. He reached out suddenly and took my hand in his, and when he spoke, there was nothing of the harshness he wore as armor. His voice was low, his eyes pleading.

“Let me go to the police. Whatever happens, you will be safe then.”

I felt a hot flicker of anger. “That is not possible. They might—
might
—put me in some sort of protective custody if they believe our story. But it is far likelier they will not. And what happens to you if that is the case? If we take the risk and we're wrong, it is the hangman's noose for you.”

“Veronica—” he began.

“I will not gamble with your life!” His gaze held mine, and I wanted so desperately to look away. But I did not, and in the end, he released my hand.

“Very well. I was afraid you would be obstinate, so I made arrangements with my Cornish friend. There is a property in London at our disposal, but only if we are very discreet. There is a skeleton staff in the house at present, and we must keep out of the way.”

“What house?”

“Bishop's Folly. It belongs to Lord Rosemorran, the client who owns that bloody elephant. In Marylebone—not the fashionable part, which is all to the good for our purposes. The house itself is massive, but there is another structure on the property, the Belvedere. It was built as a sort of ballroom, but Rosemorran has stuffed it to the rafters with specimens from his travels. With a great deal of luck, we just might manage.”

“Very well. We will throw in with Lord Rosemorran and hope for the best,” I replied.

Stoker looked as if he wanted to say something else, but instead he merely turned and looked out the window at the passing view and said no more.

S
ome half an hour later the train arrived and we disembarked amid the bustle of late morning London going about its business. My inclination was to hurry, particularly when I spied a bobby about his rounds, but Stoker held my elbow, restraining my pace. He pointed out, quite rightly, that undue haste might attract unwelcome attention, and so we strolled, for hours it seemed, until we came to our destination. A high brick wall separated us from what I had begun to think of as the Promised Land, but Stoker made no effort to enter by the main gates. Instead he led me to a smaller gate accessible only to those on foot.

“Why are we going in this way?” I asked.

“Because the main gate is always busy. Servants, tradesmen, the family—everyone sees what happens in the main court. This entrance is hardly ever used, and my friend has left us a key.”

The brick wall was thickly tapestried in ivy, and Stoker began to burrow behind the fall of greenery, testing the bricks for a loose one.

“That was kind of Lord Rosemorran,” I remarked.

“I was not speaking of Lord Rosemorran,” he said, removing a brick and brandishing the key that had lain behind.

Before I could ask whom he meant, the gate swung open, and a slender figure clad in black stepped out.

“Cordelia!” Stoker exclaimed.

The lady in question smiled faintly as she beckoned us inside. “Hello, Stoker. Keep the key,” she instructed. “You will need it to come and go.”

Stoker did as he was bade and we slipped inside the gate while the lady locked up carefully behind.

“Cordelia, you were supposed to be in Cornwall. What are you doing here?” Stoker demanded. He looked none too happy to see her, but it did not seem to distress the lady.

She turned to me, her gaze as forthright as it was welcoming. I must have presented quite a sight, travel-stained and weary, but she was as courteous to me as if I had been a duchess. “You must be Miss Speedwell. I am Lady Cordelia Beauclerk. My brother is Lord Rosemorran and this is his home, Bishop's Folly.”

We shook hands, behaving for all the world as politely as two acquaintances at a tea party while Stoker fairly vibrated with impatience. When the niceties had been observed, she turned to him.

“I was in Cornwall, but I decided I could be of more use to you if I were close at hand. I've only just arrived back.”

Stoker began to speak, but Lady Cordelia shook her head. “Not here. Come.”

She turned and we followed. This part of the Rosemorran estate was a sort of pretty wilderness, thick with trees and laced with paths. She led the way down one and then another, twisting us around to the heart of the property. Dotted here and there were the most fantastical buildings I'd ever seen—a miniature Parthenon, a small Gothic chapel, and even a Chinese pagoda. These she sped past, but when we came to a little pond overlooked by a small cottage joined to a miller's tower, she paused.

“Is that—”

She looked at me and smiled. “A replica of Marie Antoinette's toy village? Yes. My great-grandfather was a trifle eccentric. He collected miniature buildings for his amusement. They're mostly crumbling to bits. Fortunately, the Belvedere is quite a different matter. It is utterly enormous and in somewhat better shape, although it is not luxurious,” she warned.

“Fear not, Lady Cordelia,” I said. “I have lived rough everywhere from the slopes of a Sicilian volcano to an island in the Andaman Sea.”

She smiled. “The Belvedere has another advantage. We shan't be disturbed there.”

Another bend in the path led to the Belvedere, and I stopped in my tracks, overcome with delighted surprise. The building was far larger than I had imagined, but it was not the size that charmed—it was the complete hodgepodge of architectural styles. A combination of Chambord, Castle Howard, and its namesake in Vienna, this Belvedere was an expanse of honeyed stone capped with lacy towers and a small, elegant dome. Somehow the effect was harmonious even though upon closer inspection it was clear that the place had been imperfectly cared for. One of the towers was crumbling a little, and the windows were overgrown with tendrils of ivy reaching to clasp each other across the panes of glass.

I realized then that Lady Cordelia had paused for my reaction. “It is spectacular,” I told her truthfully.

She smiled. “You may not be so generous after you have seen the inside.” She made to enter, but just as her hand came to rest upon the latch, there was a noise behind us, the scrape of a shoe upon gravel, and the three of us whirled as one.

A servant stood there, a lady's maid judging from her sober silk gown and elaborate lace cap. Her expression was avid as she looked from Stoker to me to Lady Cordelia. She held in her hands a taffeta evening slipper.

“I beg pardon, milady, but I have only discovered your slipper is torn. If you wish to wear it tonight, I must mend it now, but there is the unpacking to do. Which shall I do first?”

The question was the rankest pretense for snooping—that much was apparent even to me. She must have smelled an intrigue and followed her mistress to discover what she was about. But the intrusion did not seem to ruffle Lady Cordelia, who merely inclined her head.

“Ask Mrs. Bascombe for the loan of one of the parlormaids to help you unpack, Sidonie,” she instructed. “When that is finished, you will have plenty of time to mend the slipper. And please tell Cook I shall want a cold luncheon but I intend to dine out tonight.”

The maid was well trained. She asked no questions, merely bobbed a curtsy and turned to do her mistress's bidding, but her eyes were curious, and they lingered on Stoker with real warmth. She darted a glance over her shoulder at him as she walked away, but if Lady Cordelia noticed, she pretended not to. For his part, Stoker appeared acutely uncomfortable, and he hurried inside the Belvedere as soon as the door was open.

I followed, and for a few moments, while my eyes adjusted to the gloom, I saw nothing but monstrous shapes lurking in the darkness. The ivy at the windows provided a shifting, aqueous light, but Lady Cordelia lit a series of lamps, bringing warmth and life to the place. I moved into the heart of the Belvedere. Beyond the entrance lay an absolute wonderland, a paradise the likes of which I could never have imagined existed on earth. To call it a room was to make a new definition for that word; it was larger and grander than any room ever to claim the name. The ceiling was so high I could scarcely make it out. It soared nearly sixty feet overhead—alternating panels of painted plaster and wood with enormous skylights, the whole of it culminating in a dome painted with images of the nine Muses.

Two galleries circled the perimeter of the room, one atop the other, joined by a series of staircases, no two alike. The galleries were lined with bookshelves and display cases, each more crowded than the last with specimens. On the ground floor, cases and cabinets and plinths displayed what seemed at first impression to be a microcosm of the world itself. Art, nature, artifact—all were gathered there, as if to pay homage to the accomplishments of man and universe. A stuffed pangolin peered inquisitively at an Egyptian sarcophagus while a Leonardo sketch kept vigil over a mask from the Inuit people of the polar regions. A statue of Hermes, naked and muscular, skimmed past a pair of nesting dodos on his winged feet. Just behind him, a collection of corals fanned out in fiery precision, a flaming backdrop to a tortoiseshell some four feet across. And these were merely the treasures I could see. The rest of the vast room stretched before us, populated with thousands of such specimens.

I turned to Stoker and he gave me an unaccustomed grin. “Go on.”

I followed Lady Cordelia as she wove her way through the great hall, pointing out her brother's prizes, each more astonishing than the last.

“This is from Pompeii,” she told me, drawing my attention to a recumbent form. It was a dog, curled protectively into death, and I stared at Lady Cordelia, aghast.

“Oh, do not be alarmed, Miss Speedwell, it is not the real thing, I assure you. It is a plaster model acquired by my grandfather on his Grand Tour. That is the trouble with the Beauclerk men. They are acquisitive as magpies. They see something they like and crate it up and bring it home, no matter the impracticality.” She sighed. “And the result is that they have stuffed both houses—this one and the country seat in Cornwall—to the rafters. I have many times suggested that his lordship open it to the public, charge admission, and let people enjoy these treasures. It hardly seems fair to permit these things to molder away in here with only a handful of people ever seeing them.”

I turned slowly, taking in the enormity of the room and its many treasures. “A generous impulse.”

Her expression was rueful. “One that may be left to my nephew. There is so much work here, one hardly knows where to begin.”

She nodded towards the lower of the two upper galleries. “There is a snug of sorts up there—a stove and a few sofas, even a campaign bed that once belonged to the Duke of Wellington. I think we ought to make some tea and hold a council of war,” she said decisively.

I followed her up the stairs, turning once to look back to Stoker. “I have only myself to blame,” he muttered, and I smiled to myself, thinking that he did indeed seem to be beset by managerial females.

In spite of her lofty rank, Lady Cordelia lit the stove and set to making tea, and I was able to observe her at my leisure. She was taller than I, and slender, although I suspected she owed this more to art than to nature. Her complexion was purest English rose, a gentle flush of pale pink upon an alabaster cheek, and her hair was dark gold, waving against her temple becomingly. In her first youth, she must have been extraordinarily pretty, but now—approaching thirty I guessed—she was handsome, the sort of comeliness that owes everything to elegant bones and serenity. She moved quietly and calmly, and it was this very tranquility I found so appealing. I aspired to such sangfroid, but I had found it impossible to reconcile detachment with passionate fervor. One may be elegant or enthusiastic, but seldom both.

If she was aware of my scrutiny, it did not offend her, and in a very short time we were comfortably ensconced with a tin of shortbread. She handed me a cup and smiled. “Napoleon's wedding china,” she told me.

“Rather different from Stoker's notion of hospitality,” I remarked.

She looked to him and they exchanged smiles. Their friendship was a comfortable thing, and no doubt of long duration to make them so easy with one another.

He put down his cup. “Lady C.,” he began.

“Do not think to scold me,” she remonstrated softly. “I read the newspapers before I sent them on. I could not stay away and do nothing to help. I know how black things are against you at present.”

“All the more reason for you to have stayed in Cornwall,” he argued. “If this all goes south, you might have at least been able to persuade the authorities that you had no notion we were here. Now—”

“Now I shall be able to offer you and Miss Speedwell proper assistance,” she finished. Her smooth brow furrowed slightly. “It is unfortunate that Sidonie saw you. She is a terrible gossip, but if I explain the danger properly,” she said to Stoker, “she will hold her tongue. You know how she feels about you.”

I tipped my head. “How does she feel about you?” I asked Stoker pleasantly.

He flushed a dull red, but it was Lady Cordelia who replied. “My maid has conceived a tendresse for Stoker. Somehow she got it into her head that he is a proper buccaneer and she has never quite recovered. The French can be very suggestible,” she added. I was beginning to like Lady Cordelia.

She turned to Stoker. “You must know it never entered my mind that you might be guilty,” she said quietly.

“Bless you for that.”

Her smile was tinged with sadness. “I know how much the baron loved you. You would never have repaid that affection with violence.”

I interjected. “You, too, knew the baron, Lady Cordelia?”

She nodded. “Through my brother. His lordship collects, well, everything, really, as you can see,” she said with a gesture that encompassed the whole of the Belvedere. “And the baron enjoyed art. My brother first made his acquaintance a decade ago. They attended an auction, both of them bent on acquiring a painting of lovebirds rumored to have belonged to Catherine the Great. The bidding was furious, and in the end, both of them were outbid. They consoled each other by way of a rather splendid bottle of port.”

“Friendships have been built upon less solid foundations,” I mused.

Her smile deepened. “Indeed. In any event, they became quite good friends. It was through the baron that we met Stoker. We were deeply saddened to hear of the baron's murder,” she added with a pensive look.

“How did you learn of it?” I asked.

“Veronica,” Stoker said, a warning edge to his voice. “What are you implying?”

“Nothing. I merely wanted to know his lordship's reaction.” It was a lie of omission. Naturally, I was curious about the earl's reaction to his friend's death, but it also occurred to me that the Beauclerk family was the common ground between Stoker and the baron. Perhaps they knew more than they ought.

Stoker guessed my thoughts and disabused me of them swiftly. “His lordship and Lady Cordelia would be as likely to bludgeon Max to death as the queen would to ride naked in Trafalgar Square,” he said brutally.

To her credit, Lady Cordelia was not offended. She lifted a graceful hand against my quick apology. “Please, do not trouble yourself. It is the most natural thing to wonder, and I should have doubted your intelligence if you hadn't. The truth, as it so often is, Miss Speedwell, is quite prosaic. The baron was a friend who came to dinner two or three times a year. He and my brother occasionally met for lunch or attended art lectures together, but that is the whole of it. We did not know his friends, save Stoker, and we had no motive to harm him. I give you my word.”