A Woman of Consequence (8 page)

…
Well, Eliza, I have very wisely determined to give myself no more pain by worrying over this visit of Mr Lomax. The resolution is, I think, a great proof of my strength of character. Though the keeping of it may prove my weakness
…

But I shall write no more upon the subject – except to remind you of your promised secrecy – which you must be particularly careful to preserve if you should happen to see our cousin, Flora, while you are in town looking after Charles. I would not for the world have any of my acquaintance know of Mr Lomax’s offer, for I do not think there is one among them – excepting, of course, your dear self – who could resist advising me upon the subject. And that would be insufferable.
 

I certainly have more than enough carrying on here to distract me. And I hope, instead of pining, to prove myself worthy of my resolution by being useful to poor Mrs Harman-Foote. For the more I look about me, Eliza, the more certain I become that a
very great injustice
has been done: that Miss Fenn is innocent of the dreadful calumny which is charged against her and has been cast out into that terrible grave for no reason.
 

I must tell you about the drained pool.
 

I went to look at it yesterday, you see, and it provided a 
great deal
more interest than one could reasonably expect from a muddy depression in the ground.

It was a bleak enough sight! Indeed there seemed to be a kind of gloom hanging over
everything
yesterday. Though it pains me to admit it, Margaret was right in supposing it would be rather dark before I reached the abbey. The sun was low in the sky. It was cold and still and damp, with the smoke from the house chimneys hanging low and sullen, and the grounds deserted, except for two men up on the lawns lopping branches from the fallen trees.

There was a sad, winter smell about the place: smoke and freshly cut wood, mud and bruised grass. When I first descended the steps in the bank and looked down into the pool it seemed unpromising. But there is this to be said for the business of mystery-solving: it can enhance the dullest scene with the thrill of discovery. For here was only an expanse of gently sloping mud, with a sort of large puddle collecting at its centre and its edges dry and cracking, except for the great wet hole – a yard or two from the bank and all trodden round with boot prints – which showed where the remains had been dug out.

And yet, there were two great points of interest. Can you discern them from my description? I charge you not to read on until you have tried to find them out
…

Well, did you notice, first of all, that I said there was water collecting in the centre of the pool?

As yet it is no more than an inch or two deep, but it alerted me and, when I looked to the end of the lake, I saw that the dam is repaired. The pool is being refilled! Soon the place in which Miss Fenn lay will be lost once more beneath the water – and all its secrets sunk with it!

Do you not think that this has a very suspicious appearance? Why has the plan to redirect the stream been changed? Does it not seem as though
someone
is anxious to have the place, and any information it can offer up, concealed? Who, I wonder, has decided it should be done? Was Mr Harman-Foote giving orders to effect it when I passed him and Mr Coulson on my way to dinner yesterday?

All this, Eliza, is puzzling enough, but … I wonder whether you have yet noticed the other strange detail in my description: the fact that the place where the bones were discovered is no more than a yard or two from the bank?

Now, I am sure that this is of the very greatest significance.

For, as Mr Wishart observed, the sides of the pool slope very gradually indeed. And, though I am inclined to agree with him that this renders an accidental falling-in unlikely, I cannot agree that, in this case, a suicide is more probable.

I shall tell you what I did. I took up a stick from the bank: as long and straight a one as I could find. And, putting one end of it against the place where mud ends and grass begins – the place which marks the margin of the old pool and the level of its water – I held it out towards the hole. By this means I was able roughly to calculate the depth of water in which Miss Fenn lay.

It was, I am sure, no more than three feet!

And so you see, even allowing for her sinking six inches or so into the mud of the lake-bottom, she
cannot
have been beyond her depth in that place. The water would not have reached to her shoulders – unless she was
remarkably
small of stature. And I have certainly never heard her described so.

I confess that this observation threw me into a very melancholy train of thought.

I stood upon that muddy bank in the gathering gloom, with no company but the ringing of axes echoing back from the house-front, and I imagined coming there in a state of utter despair and loneliness. I imagined walking down into the green, weedy water with the intention of extinguishing life, of ending for ever worry and pain. I declare that I could almost feel the chill of the water rising against my shrinking flesh, the soft silt sucking at my feet as I surrendered up misery, loneliness and humiliation
…

You are perhaps wondering, Eliza, why I should distress myself – and you – with such terrible thoughts. But there is a purpose. You see, it is all but impossible to imagine
lying down
to die in the water. I am sure, that if one had made up one’s mind to self-destruction, and had the determination to carry out the intention, the only way to accomplish it would be to walk on until the water became so deep it was impossible to save oneself. In short, I believe that, while the continuation of life remained possible, the body would insensibly struggle for it, even though the heart and brain were determined upon destruction.

A woman bent upon suicide would have no choice but to walk out into the deep water at the very centre of the lake – and that is where her remains would be found.

Well, this conclusion was as grim as the thoughts which had brought me to it, and you may imagine how I began to shiver in the gathering dusk. For it would seem that I am being forced to agree with Anne Harman-Foote’s opinion and declare, with her, that it is impossible for Elinor Fenn to have taken her own life. And little by little, I am being brought to contemplate the alternative: murder
…

Dido woke from an odd dream of despair, loneliness and cold, encroaching water, to find that she had fallen asleep remarkably awkwardly. Her writing desk was still upon the bed and the covers were slipping away from her, leaving her feet exposed and thoroughly chilled.

It was still rather early. The light falling through the little window was thin and grey, and there was no movement from the house below, only the slow heavy sound of Rebecca descending the attic stairs to begin her duties.

She pulled up the covers and attempted to rub some warmth into her frozen feet, but the gloom and wretchedness of the night seemed still to hang about her. Nor was there much comfort to be found in anticipation of a day carrying out Margaret’s orders as the vicarage was prepared for its visitor.

In fact, there was but one way to dispel desponding thoughts: she drew the little writing desk back onto her knees, turned herself about to gain as much light as she might from the window, and resumed her letter:

…
I mean to be rather selfish this morning, Eliza. I shall keep to my room until Margaret has gone out upon her early morning errands and then I shall attempt an escape 
to Madderstone. It is not a course of which I think you will approve, but I am quite determined to pass as much of the morning at the abbey as I am able – for once Mr Lomax is here it may become rather more difficult to pursue the matter of Miss Fenn’s death.

And, while I wait for Margaret to leave the house, I shall attempt to divert your thoughts – and my own – by giving an account of an amusing and very surprising little encounter which followed my discoveries at the pool yesterday.

I was just turning away when I saw that I was not alone. Silas Crockford was walking along the opposite bank, with a very distracted look upon his face and a pencil and a tablet in his hand.

Poor Silas … It is odd, is it not, how often the epithet accompanies his name? But I cannot help it, it is nearly always ‘poor Silas’ with me. Perhaps it is his sickly air; or his sisters’ constant chiding; or his great brown eyes and little pointed chin which always put me in mind of a child. I do not know why it should be, but there is something which never fails to arouse a pitying fondness whenever I see him. And yesterday he appeared more than usually pathetic, for, can you guess what he was about, Eliza?

He was attempting to write a poem.

It is true: little Silas Crockford has turned poet! He told me all about the poem he is writing: it is the tragic story of the Grey Nun’s doomed love and is to be composed ‘in the style of an old-fashioned m … minstrel’. Of course, he begged that I would not mention the matter to Lucy or Harriet. For he was sure there would be ‘a g … great carry-on’ about it if they knew.

I agreed immediately upon secrecy, but I doubt my complicity will result in a work of towering literary merit, 
for the poor boy did not seem to be going on very well. He showed me his page and was very eager to know whether I could suggest a rhyme for ‘drooped’ or ‘b … bonnet’. ‘W … what do you think, Miss Kent? I should be very g … glad to know your opinion.
’

Altogether this did not seem to be a proper way of going about the business of poetry to me. At least, I do not think that Mr Pope ever asked advice, nor can I suppose that dear Mr Crabbe is forever troubling his friends for rhymes. Though, of course, I may be wrong. I know very little about poetic genius … Except that I believe I know what has turned young Silas into a poet.

He is in love, Eliza!

I began to suspect it as soon as he mentioned poetry, for the two generally go together, do they not? But I became sure of it soon after, when he asked in a very anxious voice if I could assure him that Miss Lambe was quite out of danger.

I said that I believed she was, but his anxiety did not seem to be entirely done away. He shuffled his feet about like an embarrassed schoolboy, evidently wishing to ask more, though it was some minutes before he could manage to stammer out, with flaming cheeks, ‘I s … suppose that she is a great deal in c … company with C … C … Captain Laurence?’

Poor Silas! Oh dear, I have said it again. But the pain in his eyes cut me to the heart. ‘Oh no,’ I said quickly, ‘I am sure she is not in company with the captain at all. She is still too unwell to leave her bedchamber. So, of course, he cannot visit her.’

‘I am very g … glad of it,’ he stammered. ‘That is, I am glad she does not see the c … captain, I am not g … glad she is unwell …’

He stopped and we both stood quietly for a moment or two, looking down at the muddy waste, and the dark pool of water in which were reflected flying storm clouds and the last light of the day.

I was thinking he had little chance of succeeding with Penelope if he were indeed opposed to such a man as the captain – and I believe his thoughts had taken a similar turn. For he soon shook his head regretfully and said – very fast, in the way he does when he wishes to express his thoughts before the stammer can intervene – ‘I had hoped, that while Pen … Miss Lambe was with us at Ashfield, we – that is, she and I – would be able to improve our f … friendship. I hoped that before she returned to Bath I should be able to d … d … dec … to tell her how I feel. But then there was this c … confounded accident, Miss Kent, and now she is sh … shut away from me … And C … C … C … And Laurence is there on the spot with her all the time …’ His poor face burnt as red as the sunset reflected in the water.

I expressed my concern at this unfortunate situation – and he became confiding.

‘Henry,’ he said eagerly, ‘– that is, Mr Coulson, you know – he says that I should declare my passion, that I should write such an ardent letter, Miss Lambe could not resist. That I should tell her I will d … die if she is not k … kind to me. Henry says that that sort of thing never fails with women.’

I ventured to suggest that Mr Coulson’s information might be a little inaccurate.

‘So you think I had better not?’ he said

Oh dear, Eliza, he looked so wretched! I could not help myself: I turned matchmaker on the spot!

‘But,’ I said firmly, ‘it may be possible for you to convey 
your sentiments – to raise yourself in Miss Lambe’s esteem – without an outright declaration.
’

He looked doubtful. ‘The devil of it is, Miss Kent, if I don’t d … declare myself, then I cannot write to her at all. For that would be most improper – c … corresponding, you know, when there is no engagement. Harriet w … w … w …’

‘Harriet would be very angry indeed. Yes, I quite see your point.’

We both considered a while. It was becoming more gloomy than ever. The sound of the workmen’s axes had ceased, and, overhead, rooks were calling harshly as they flocked to roost in the park. I was wondering how such a dear, gentle boy as Silas might gain the advantage of a worldly fellow like Captain Laurence with his coarse good looks and his interminable stories of high-seas gallantry, and I confess that, for a while, I was utterly perplexed.

But then I considered the character of the lady … And I saw a possibility.

I suggested to Silas that his poem might make a great appeal to Penelope’s romantic disposition … and that the character of a poet might make an even greater appeal.

He looked more than a little frightened, but he is not lacking in understanding and he caught my meaning well enough. And so, before we left the side of the pool, we had agreed upon our plan. When he has written some part of his great ballad – I was careful not to condition for the completion of the whole, which I rather fear may never be accomplished – when some part of it is completed, he is to show the work to me; and I am to convey it to Penelope.

Do you not think it a rather good plan, Eliza? I am extremely proud of it.

I grant that there would seem to be some danger in the probable badness of the verse; but I am trusting that Penelope’s taste in such matters is not too nice.

It will not be easy, for Harriet has always opposed any attachment of her brother’s – love no doubt being considered as dangerous to his constitution as ragouts and port wine. But I confess that I am very glad to have another scheme on hand to divert me a little from gloomy thoughts. And I would dearly love to rout Captain Laurence. Somehow, I just cannot like the man. Nor can I escape the feeling that I have detected in him some kind of duplicity or deception. And yet I cannot quite remember what it is that has made me suspect him.

For some reason my mind keeps returning to that moment upon the gallery when we saw the men discovering the bones. It seems ridiculous to suggest it, Eliza, but I feel as if in that moment he revealed something about himself: something very suspicious.