The Dead Queen's Garden (22 page)

‘Bless you, Melicent,’ she whispered, in a warmer, more affectionate voice than she had ever used to the former governess, words she had never thought to hear herself say. ‘You’re being very brave; let’s hope we can save the day between us.’

There was no time for further exchanges and armed with her
makeshift weapon, Charlotte sped back up the spiral staircase, only to hear her own name spoken.

Lady Granville still sounded rational as she confided to her reluctant audience, ‘In case some mischance led the finger of
suspicion
to point in my direction, I made sure that young Mrs Richmond could testify that I was distraught at the thought that there had been at least three attempts on my son’s life. That being so, there could naturally be no question of my involvement in any other incident.’

The voice tailed off into a murmur and Charlotte took a deep breath. It’s now or never, she told herself, devoutly praying that it could be never, but knowing she had passed the point where she had a choice.

‘You foolish creature,’ Lady Granville sounded calm again, but there was still that distinct menace in her voice. ‘You’ll fall, of course, and I shall be distraught. Oh heavens,’ she affected a sob. ‘I shall weep and say the young lady was so insistent when she heard about the ruins, that I could not disappoint her, but somehow she tripped – just there; yes, by the break in the battlements, so tragic – and before I could reach out to her, she fell. Such a sad, unfortunate accident.…’

‘I don’t think so,’ Charlotte stood at the top of the stair, the artificial leg concealed in the folds of her skirt. ‘Lady Granville, I think you should allow Miss Armstrong to go down, if you please. By the stairs, that is,’ she added. ‘Not by the means you have just suggested.’

The moon came out from behind a cloud and shone down on the two women on the tower; shock and anger on the elder’s face, dawning hope in the younger. For a moment all three stood in frozen silence then Charlotte swallowed. ‘I think you should be aware that I’ve just found Miss Cole’s body,’ she said, and watched with fearful interest to see how Lady Granville reacted.

‘Do you think to alarm me by telling me that?’ She shook her head. ‘The woman clearly had a sentimental impulse to wander round the garden one last time before deserting her post and I suppose she tripped, or had a heart attack, or something similar. I found her last night just before the snow, but I had other matters on my mind, so it seemed sensible to leave her there.’

She turned to Charlotte and, although she had shown no apparent interest in the fate of her erstwhile companion, there was now real pain in her expression. ‘And now Mrs Richmond, you tiresome girl, you will have to fall too. It will be clear that you made a valiant but vain attempt to pull Miss Armstrong back from the brink.’ She shook her head, in genuine regret. ‘I thought I had put you off the scent, you know, by masking my intention. I made an outcry at the church, and when that foolish old man was felled by indigestion.’

‘But you didn’t even know me,’ protested Charlotte. ‘That time in the church, we had barely spoken, apart from when Lily introduced us. Why should you wish to deceive
me
?’

‘You – your sister-in-law – anyone at all. It made no difference to me, as long as I was able to instil some suspicion in case my plan went wrong. Indeed I wish it had
not
been you, I liked you so much, Mrs Richmond. We could have been friends, for I have seldom met with such intelligent understanding when it came to my garden, but now.…’

Lady Granville’s attention was held for the moment by Charlotte, who noticed out of the corner of her eye that Sibella was edging her way towards the spiral stair, her back up against the parapet. Charlotte dared not make a sound, or any movement herself, but she approved wholeheartedly of what Sibella was up to. Only a few more feet and the enraged older woman would be between Sibella and Charlotte. Surely there must be some way to deflect her maddened strength?

Sibella stumbled and for a moment Charlotte thought her heart would stop. She hastily broke the silence, to draw Lady Granville’s attention to her.

‘It’s what you told me about history, isn’t it?’ Charlotte
stammered
a little, but Lady Granville stared at her, a glint of interest lighting her face. ‘You said history teaches us how to solve
problems
. You felt you were like Eleanor of Aquitaine, wife of Henry II, didn’t you? The Queen of England who is said to have poisoned her husband’s mistress, Rosamond of Woodstock.’

Her diversion seemed to be working, as the older woman nodded almost in approval, so Charlotte ventured another
question as Sibella resumed her stealthy progress. Only a little further….

‘Does Lord Granville know about all this?’ she asked, trying to keep her voice even, ‘about Oz and Sibella?’

‘What?’ Lady Granville stared at her in patent astonishment. ‘Are you mad, girl? Of course he does not. We led separate lives, in many ways. He held a position in the government and I devoted myself to my garden and my tours of famous abbeys and shrines.

‘My maid discovered this wretched young woman’s secret, though not the name of the child’s father. That was left to me to deduce, knowing as I did my husband’s taste in young women. I had noticed his increasingly admiring glances in her direction so it was not difficult. The only other people who were privy to the business were my late maid and Cole.’ She broke off for a moment and clicked her tongue. ‘Dunster was nearly 80 and senile so I couldn’t trust her loose tongue. I was up here one day last week and spotted her limping up the drive. She stopped for a rest immediately below me so I dropped one of these small ornamental cannonballs on her head.’ Lady Granville sounded indifferent as she continued, ‘I’m a good shot with a ball but either way, killed or maimed, Dunster would be a threat no longer. Cole was here in the garden so I sent her out to bring the ball back here, but she turned out to be a fool and a dangerous fool at that, so I had to silence her too. She was proud of herself, like a dog bringing me a bone, as she told me yesterday how she stuck a hatpin into that pony’s flank at the church. She hoped to make it bolt and get rid of you that way.’ She cast a darkling glance at Sibella who shuddered. Lady Granville heaved a dramatic sigh as she went on,

‘When I found out that there was to be a child fathered by my husband it seemed the answer to my prayers. I knew my husband could have no suspicion as I had never refused his occasional demands, so there was no danger that he would question what I told him.’

Her voice rose and she turned back to Sibella. ‘I watched you tonight.’ Her voice grated, harsh with emotion. ‘Vile, ungrateful creature, you were making overtures to Osbert, talking to him,
making him like you.
My
son. You were going to turn him against me, but I can’t allow that. I’ll kill you first.’

Taking Charlotte off her guard, Lady Granville sprang towards Sibella, hands reaching out for the younger woman. ‘He is mine. Mine alone.’

As Sibella, gasping denials, recoiled and fought to pull aside the hands that were clawing at her throat, Charlotte recollected Melicent’s artificial leg. She grasped the foot and swung the makeshift weapon like a bat, seized by the memory of her
conversation
about sports with Oz, and with her stepfather’s laughing injunction in her ear,
‘Hit her for six, young Char!’

Sibella’s harsh gasping filled the air as she was forced to the stone floor, so Charlotte raised her makeshift weapon and smashed it down with all her force on to Lady Granville’s arm. At the same moment a familiar yowling reached her ears and the unkempt ginger cat leaped up, dancing on its hind legs, to bat at the leather strap dangling from the harness on Melicent’s leg.

Sibella managed to struggle back to her feet, pale and terrified, and she and Charlotte faced up to Lady Granville, who, sobbing with pain and cradling her right arm, began to stumble backwards. The cat abandoned its chase of the exciting flapping thing and advanced towards the maddened woman, as it renewed its plaintive cries for food, for love, for attention.

Out of the corner of her eye, Charlotte saw light spilling out from the glass door to the garden and, with a sob of thankfulness, heard a familiar, much loved voice calling her.

‘Char? Are you still out here in the cold? Bless the girl, what folly is this?’

Barnard, dear Barnard, had come to find her. She did not dare call out to him, but she turned to her erstwhile hostess.

‘Please, Lady Granville,’ she implored. ‘The squire is heading this way. Come down from the tower, this can all be forgotten. Sibella and I will swear never to speak of this again.’ She hesitated and, seeing her stalwart brother-in-law, clearly visible as he looked irritably around him, she whispered, ‘Please, Lady Granville, for Oz’s sake?’

The older woman glanced down into her garden and towards
the house, then the cat, emboldened by the sudden silence up on the tower, began to rub its head against her skirt.

As she shrank away, she turned her ravaged face towards Charlotte, tears glistening in her dark, tortured eyes. ‘My son,’ she whispered. ‘My little, little son.’

And then she jumped.

I
N
THE
AFTERMATH
of St Stephen’s Day and all it had brought, Charlotte found herself fully occupied, first and foremost with comforting Oz Granville, bereft of the only mother he had ever known. His father too, asked constantly for her opinion on this course of action and that. How to word the announcement of Lady Granville’s death? What order of service should be chosen? Did Charlotte think this hymn or that one would be appropriate? And which day did Charlotte consider would be most suitable for the funeral.

To her dying day, Charlotte was to recall her relief that Barnard had obeyed the summons passed on to him by the footman. When the air was rent by Charlotte’s cry of distress, along with a tremulous scream from Sibella, as they lunged in vain to try to halt Lady Granville’s leap, Barnard broke into a run, followed by Dr Perry who had accompanied him to the door, saying he too would enjoy some fresh air.

Almost gibbering from shock, she reached for Sibella, both of them desperate for human comfort, and Charlotte, even though her teeth were chattering, managed to impress upon Sibella that they must say Lady Granville had tripped over the cat and fallen through the broken part of the battlement.

‘We must never, ever tell anyone what really happened,’ she whispered, shivering as she did so. ‘I’ll get hold of Melicent too and swear her to secrecy, though I don’t think she can have heard anything that was said.’

There was no time for more. Barnard was leaping up the stairs two at a time, exclaiming as he encountered his sister’s former governess. ‘What the devil? Wait there, Melicent,’ he barked, as
though the poor creature had a choice, Charlotte shivered. ‘Char?’ In two strides Barnard crossed the icy roof and folded her in his arms. ‘What in God’s name has happened here?’ He gave her a little shake. ‘I couldn’t see what happened exactly but when I saw a woman tumbling from the roof, for one ghastly moment, Char, I thought it was you.’

Charlotte found it impossible to stop shaking but she managed to summon enough presence of mind to stammer out some kind of explanation.

‘Lady G – Granville, she fell. Oh, Barnard, she went over the edge, by the broken wall.’ He held her tightly in his left arm and, in a gesture that spoke volumes of his kind heart, reached out his other hand to pull Sibella Armstrong into his warm, safe embrace. ‘It’s so icy and then the cat, the cat must have been curious and come up to see what we were doing, but she didn’t like cats. She told me so the other day so she just kept going backwards….’

At this point Charlotte burst into a storm of sobs, broken only by a sudden cry. ‘Oh, Barnard, you mustn’t let Oz see her, it’s too dreadful. Make them keep him indoors, he mustn’t come out.’

He barked an order to the bewildered pair of servants at the foot of the keep and turned back to the two women. ‘You must come down now, Char, and you too, Miss Armstrong. You’ll catch your death….’ He coughed and continued briskly, ‘Yes, yes, don’t worry, Char. They’ll keep the boy indoors, but Lord Granville has been called for. And don’t fret about Melicent, poor soul, we’ll get her carried indoors and Dr Perry can take a look at her.’

Charlotte barely comprehended her journey from the top of the tower to the warm sitting room she had left only half an hour before, but when she was laid on a sofa and wrapped in shawls and blankets, she sat up with a startled cry.

‘Oh, Dr Perry,’ she was glad to see him in the doorway. ‘How could I have forgotten? You must send some men out to the far corner of the garden. I found Miss Cole’s body there, she’s by the stream.’ She began to stammer, then Lady Granville’s voice rang in her ears and she knew what she had to say. ‘I think she must have packed her trunk, and written her note, then decided on a last look
round the garden before leaving. It’s the only explanation. She must have slipped and the heavy snow covered her.’

‘Good God.’ The doctor frowned fiercely at her and hastened to the outer door where she heard him issuing abrupt orders. He returned and came to feel her pulse. ‘Aye, well, you’ll do, Char, with a night’s sleep, but what a mare’s nest it all is.’ He stared down at her, pursing his lips. ‘So that’s what you’re telling me, is it? Her ladyship fell when she backed away from the cat, and Miss Cole either had some kind of seizure or she fell and knocked herself silly, then froze to death?’

She looked him straight in the eye. ‘Yes, Dr Perry. There can be no other explanation.’

As a widow, albeit a young one, Charlotte was permitted to make long visits to the Abbey unchaperoned and untrammelled by the proprieties. After the first dreadful hours, which she had spent on the sofa in Oz’s bedroom, Charlotte deemed the stricken household able to cope with her absence and she stepped thankfully into the Brambrook carriage which was turned out for her next morning.

First there was Gran to be comforted. ‘Oh my dear child,’ Lady Frampton kept repeating the words over and over, unable to say any more as tears ran down her round red face. ‘You could have been killed, dearie,’ she managed in the end. ‘Thank God it wasn’t you what tumbled off the tower, that’s all I can say.’

After a few further broken words of thanks to Barnard and a surprisingly warm and tearful embrace from Lily, Charlotte made her way upstairs to see Sibella who had been packed off to bed the night before, but now professed herself quite fit and ready to go downstairs later.

Their greeting was warm but subdued. The moments of utter terror that they had shared formed a bond between them and Charlotte was aware of a sense of friendship, something to explore when all this was behind them. She was conscious also that Sibella already seemed less bowed down now by her situation and the reason was soon forthcoming.

‘Only to you, dear Charlotte,’ she whispered, clasping the other
girl’s hand. ‘Only to you can I admit to this feeling of relief, even though I feel guilty at the thought. I’d made a life for myself and managed well until Verena discovered my secret. Since then the burden has been intolerable, but I know now there is no chance of Lord Granville and – and Osbert, discovering the truth, for I can trust you with my life.’

They drank the tea Lily had thoughtfully sent up and agreed, almost without a word spoken, that the events of the previous evening should never be mentioned to another living soul; Charlotte kissed her new friend and went to her own room.

Refreshed by a few hours’ sleep, and after some discussion with Lily and Barnard, Charlotte returned briefly to Brambrook where she sought out Lord Granville.

‘Barnard wishes me to give you this note,’ she told him. ‘He asks, most pressingly, that you and Oz should come back with me to Finchbourne Manor for a few days. He and Lily feel it would spare him the initial strangeness and sadness of his home and that you and he might find it more comfortable to be with friends.’

Lord Granville fell upon this idea, a wistful look on his usually rubicund face, but he could only accept on his son’s behalf, and not his own. With robust good sense he roused himself and nodded agreement to all her stratagems, saying:

‘Well, poor lad, that’s a good plan, let him be free of all this for now. I thank your brother for his kindness, indeed I do, most generous of him and his lady, but I’ll be better seeing to it all here. But aye, keep the sadness right away from the lad, d’ye see? You’ll bring him here for the funeral, of course? That’s good, that’s right and after that, I think I might take him up to London for a spell, get him away from these sad associations, what?’ He frowned as a sudden thought struck him. ‘Trouble is, my dear, that tutor of his has taken it upon himself to go and get married, so I’ll have no-one to keep an eye on the boy. Take some thinking about, hey?’

Charlotte was inspired. ‘I wonder, Lord Granville,’ she suggested with a diffident smile. ‘I wonder if it might be better for Oz to have a governess for a while? I’m sure your housekeeper would prove a splendid chaperone and it would just be a temporary arrangement,
of course. A woman’s company might help to soften the blow, and I think a puppy would be a comfort too.’

He turned to her in astonishment. ‘Is there no end to your usefulness, my dear Charlotte, hey?’ He chuckled, then remembered hastily that levity was out of place, and took her hand in his own. ‘What a capital notion, why that’s just the thing, a pup and the woman’s touch, hey? But where are we to find such a lady at this short notice? Dare I hope that you would do it my dear?’

‘I’m afraid Barnard wouldn’t allow that,’ Charlotte shook her head, gently withdrawing her hand. ‘There is someone on our very doorstep, however. Miss Armstrong is without a situation at present, which is why she was at liberty to come to Winchester with her late sister. I am sure she would be happy to consent to help. She and Oz are already acquainted and having had a brother of her own, Miss Armstrong is well able to manage a boy and enter into his interests and pursuits. I’m sure they would deal delightfully.’

‘I have acted as
deus ex machina
, Elaine,’ Charlotte said airily. ‘I have delivered the mother to be companion and I hope, trusted friend, to the son. Lord Granville’s eyes nearly popped out of his head but I was all innocence and explained that Sibella is now alone in the world and urgently in need of employment. He took a turn or two around the room as he harrumphed a little and peered at me from under his brows, and then he agreed with my suggestion without a murmur. I believe Miss Nightingale has it right and his disposition is sanguine enough to dismiss the old story and march on with the new. Sibella is willing, so who knows? Propinquity, combined with the former affection, may do its work and as soon as it is decent, Oz may have a stepmother who is more closely related to him than he or his father will ever know.’ A thought struck her. ‘Speaking of Miss Nightingale, I must write to decline her flattering offer once and for all, and I shan’t now be recommending Sibella to her.’

‘How
do
you do it, Char?’ Elaine Knightley had received her friend in her room, too frail to undergo the ordeal of being dressed and carried downstairs after the illness of the past few days. Her voice was weak but she was bearing up surprisingly well.

‘You seem to be a magnet, attracting desperate characters and
untimely accidents; only recollect our visit to Bath last summer. No,’ she smiled slightly. ‘I absolve you this time, you could not help becoming embroiled in Lady Granville’s drastic attempts to
maintain
her secret, and I am only too thankful to know you and the young boy are safe. As for your prediction, I’m sure you’re right. His lordship is by nature a cheerful man who likes his comforts and I suspect Miss Armstrong will keep him from straying, so they will settle down to a happy family life.

‘It seems beyond belief that he knew nothing of Sibella’s
pregnancy
or his wife’s lack of one,’ she smiled with a flash of her old impishness. ‘But my experience of men is that they are the most unobservant of creatures, to which we may add that the Granvilles met infrequently in those days, though as you say, her ladyship, poor woman, seems to have been certain that they had encountered each other at least once somewhere near the appropriate date.’

She glanced at Charlotte’s pale, drawn face and settled herself comfortably to distracting her visitor, her own needs typically set aside. ‘Are you at liberty to give me any details, Char? You know I will be as silent as the grave.’

At Charlotte’s gasp, Elaine gave the ghost of her mischievous grin. ‘Oh my dear, I beg your pardon, but you must allow me a few moments of amusement, however inappropriate. Don’t be afraid, I’ll compose myself now and indulge in no further shocking behaviour.’ She held out a hand. ‘There now, am I forgiven? Then tell me all the details that must otherwise be concealed for ever, beginning with why in the world Lady Granville and Miss Armstrong were up on the tower on such a winter’s night?’

Charlotte squeezed her hand and laughed. ‘You’re incorrigible,’ she said, and they both ignored the sob in her voice as she continued, ‘I managed to have a private conversation this morning with Sibella and we routed out all the secrets and, as you say, agreed that the subject must never again be mentioned.’

‘I told you, did I not, that the Granvilles were very kind to us all?’ Sibella had begun, as they took refuge in Charlotte’s room at the manor, knowing that Oz was recovering sufficiently from his shock and grief to go for a ride with Barnard.

‘My brother was received almost as a son, so great was their affection and trust in him, which was what made his behaviour such a betrayal.’ She bit her lip. ‘What I did not mention earlier was that Lord Granville paid me particular attentions. I was lonely and his kindness made my misery less dreary, so that gradually we slipped into an affair that would have grieved my parents, though I did feel a sincere affection for his lordship and, I believe, his feeling for me was similarly warm.’

She bowed her head for a moment and Charlotte silently refilled her glass. ‘I had no idea that I was with child until the day after my brother’s treachery was discovered, when I called on Lady Granville to see whether she knew of Edward’s whereabouts. All I knew was that he had left town in a great hurry, leaving no forwarding address and not even a note of explanation to me.

‘Lady Granville received me very angrily and regaled me with the whole history of Edward’s perfidy, and I was so shocked by the discovery that I fainted. Her maid was summoned and finding me in a sad state, made some very personal enquiries. In the end Lady Granville came to me and told me that they believed I was with child and that, from her own observations, the father of the child was none other than her own husband.’

She raised tear-drenched blue eyes to Charlotte, who took her hand in a warm, companionable clasp. ‘You can imagine my sentiments. I was mortified and frightened and so ashamed but Lady Granville, having left me to recover for an hour or so, became brisk and informed me that if I consented to do exactly as she ordered, nobody would ever know of my shame. Situated as I was, I had no option but to obey so shortly afterwards I was sent down to Bournemouth, to a small house she had taken. In my ignorance I was already well into my fifth month, so Lady Granville told her husband that she was once again with child and had concealed the news until she felt that this time she had some confidence of reaching term. In due course she arrived to take up residence in Bournemouth.