The Dead Songbird (The Northminster Mysteries) (30 page)

“It’s understandable in the circumstances. It made quite a noise. What a night!”

“I am frightened by shadows now,” she said. “What must you think of me?”

He took the candle from her bedside and lit it. The room became tolerably light.

“I think that you are frightened of someone who has treated you badly and who may be dangerous. You are allowed to be frightened. Besides, fear makes us vigilant. It is a useful emotion at times.”

“Yes, I suppose I know that well enough. There is a moment before a performance – I have experienced it sometimes – well, it is indescribably terrifying – when one must go out and perform. It feels as if utter failure is imminent and disaster is inevitable.” She wrapped her shawl about her. “So I should know better.” She pressed her hands to her face and breathed deeply attempting to steady herself. “Really I should.” But he could see she was shaking, and he heard her teeth chattering – whether from fear or the cold, he could not say.

“You are hard on yourself,” he said. “And you should get back under the bedclothes. You must not catch cold. Lord Rothborough would never forgive me.”

“He will never forgive you if he hears you were here,” she said, managing a slight laugh. “Poor dear man! I really wish he did not feel so... so! My life would be a great deal simpler if I did not seem to make Cupid fire off his arrows indiscriminately!”

“It must be a terrible affliction,” he said, glad to hear the levity in her voice. He went to adjust the logs on the fire and stir up the flames while she got back beneath the blankets.

He was making for the door when she said, “Oh must you go?” Then she sighed. “Oh dear, you will think everything that is said about me is true from that tone of voice. What I meant is – I do not feel safe alone. I ought to try, of course, but... I know the moment you are gone and the door is closed that I shall...”

“Would it help if I were to sleep on the floor?” he said.

“I would feel ashamed to make you sleep on the floor on my account,” she said. “No, I am being foolish. I will manage.”

“I will sleep on the floor. It will be no hardship for me, and I will rest easy knowing that you feel comfortable.”

“I will not be comfortable if you are on the floor,” she said. “I can’t bear the thought of such unnecessary gallantry. This is a large bed – if it is not indelicate to point out that fact. Would it be so wrong if you were to lie here beside me? You will die of cold on that floor. If I am under the covers and you wrapped in your blanket, we will be like a bundling couple tucked up by a vigilant parent, and the Bishop of Northminster himself could not find fault with it!”

He could not help laughing.

“I am serious,” she said.

“I know you are,” he said, still laughing.

“A grown man and a woman – we ought to be able to contain ourselves,” she said, and she reached out and patted the space beside her.

“Very well,” he said, and went and fetched his blanket from the other room.

When he returned she had tucked herself up under the covers, facing away from him, but he could see she was still shaking from the cold.

“I am not very hardy, am I?” she said. “I can’t seem to get warm.”

“This is ridiculous,” he said. “Excuse my pragmatism, Mrs Morgan, but there is one way we can solve this, if you will permit me?”

And he climbed beneath the covers and pulled her into his arms.

“You are a bold man,” she said, with a gasp, but she relaxed at once in his embrace, pressing herself against him as she did so. He relaxed too. She had issued an invitation and he had accepted it, it was clear enough now.

“I cannot have you losing your voice,” he said. He could smell her hair now, for she had moved so that she lay in a crescent against him and there was not a chink between him and her. Somehow their fingers had knitted together, too.

She began to shake with laughter. It was indescribably pleasant to feel it, and he could not help laughing too at the absurdity and outrageousness of what they were about. Yet he felt a deep sadness at the same time, knowing it was nothing but a mockery of something he profoundly desired. This was how a husband would treat his wife on a cold night when she was in distress. He would pull her close for comfort and whisper sweetly into her ear, filling his nostrils with the sweet fragrance of her warm hair.

“If I did not laugh I would cry,” she said, speaking aloud his own thought. “This is too...”

“Yes,” was all he could manage to say, and buried his face in her hair. Her fingers tightened in his grasp and then she rolled about to face him, and pressed her lips to his for a long moment. Her cheeks were wet with tears.

“Now, don’t cry,” he said, “Please.”

“I am crying because you understand me,” she said.

He reached out and dried her tears with his fingertips, near to tears himself.

“I have recently been a great fool with a woman,” he said, tracing his finger again down her cheek. “I don’t deserve to trifle with you.”

“Nothing you do is trifling,” she said. “I have watched you this last week – I have seemed to see nothing else but you. Last night I dreamt of you. I dreamt you took me away to America and chopped down a grove of trees to make a me a garden with a view of a river. It was as clear as something I read in a book.”

“But I can never do that,” he said. “I wish that I could, with all my heart...”

“I did not say it to reproach you,” she said, “or to taunt you. Just to tell you that is my heart’s desire. I am not such a fool as to think we will ever have more than this.”

“No,” he said. “But we can have this,” and returned her kiss. “We can and we shall.”

Chapter Thirty-nine

Over breakfast, they agreed that there would be one last embrace and then she would go away directly to his sister’s, driven in the trap by Holt. Nothing more would be said of the night before. They had agreed to lock up the remembrance of it their hearts. It had happened, and nothing more could come of it, no matter what they might wish.

But that last kiss was hard to break from and she clung to him as much as he did to her, and he knew she was stifling a sob as she let down her veil and made for the front door. He did not see her into the carriage. They had agreed on that, too. He remained in the house, and only went to the window to see the carriage drive away. When he saw her later it would be only as an acquaintance. The night was over, and that was that.

He left the house soon after, taking a householder’s care to damp down the fires and leave all in order. One of Sally’s servants would be there to clean and tidy, but he rather furtively smoothed one set of pillows, wondering whether the bed looked as though it had been occupied by two bodies and not one. He was used to looking for such incriminating details. He realised he was thinking like a rogue, seeking to cover his actions.

But what had passed between them brought him no shame. It had not been furtive. It had been like a night in a marriage that could never exist between them, but which they had both wanted ardently. The sleep that had come after had been sweet, and Snow had climbed up onto the bed and joined them in the small hours, as if she too understood it all.

Now Snow leant against him and whimpered. She had liked her new mistress and did not care to see her leave. He caressed her head and was thankful at least to have a companion. Nancy’s road was far harder.

He walked back to Northminster with Snow across the field road by which he had come, a path he knew would soon become familiar. The facts of his life could not be avoided, nor could the facts of Nancy’s existence. She had confided that she planned to go to America; she had been asked to go some time ago. Now her mind was made up. She would leave Northminster, in two day’s time.

He quickened his step. He had work to do.

***

Felix had not slept well. Two large drams had done nothing to help. He lay twisted up in his blankets on his narrow bedstead, in his cold slot of a bedchamber. The ancient structure of the building had been set shuddering and groaning by the fierce wind, but it seemed to him like a diabolical chorus, brought on to deny him any rest when he most wanted it. Oblivion he could not find. Even his pillow was determined to attack him – a feather escaped the casing and ripped across his face, threatening him with another scar.

He threw the pillow across the room, feeling at the scratch with his finger tips, and then the scar on his cheek. It was a woman who had caused that, and now it was a woman who again seemed to be intending to send him to Hell. Mrs Morgan... oh dear God above, Anna Morgan!

Mrs Ridolfi’s words were etched into his being, like acid on glass. Had Major Vernon really succeeded with Mrs Morgan? If he had, what did that mean about her? If she was apparently so liberal with her favours, then why had she rejected him? What had he done, or failed to do? Was there some vital step in this game that he had failed to learn? He felt peevish with envy and unable to find any satisfactory answers. For several long hours, he found himself unable to do anything but imagine in some detail what might be passing between them, and his entire body ached with an agonised mixture of disgust and fascination.

He felt he might have stood it better to know that she was with Lord Rothborough. That would have been explicable – there was a lot for a woman like that to gain from being the mistress of Lord Rothborough. If she was that sort of woman, which was the thing he could not establish for certain. But Mrs Morgan and Major Vernon – he was the last person in the world he would have imagined permitting himself to get involved in such an imbroglio. He had shown no signs of susceptibility, neither had he seemed much moved by her beauty or her charm, beyond conventional compliments. However, he was a man good at keeping his opinions to himself, and apparently his actions as well.

At length Felix did sleep, waking later than he ought, and was obliged to scrabble to get dressed and decent. The water in the washstand had frozen in the night, meaning he would have to defer his shave, and his clean shirt felt as if was fashioned out of ice. He wondered if he should employ a man to bring him a little domestic comfort.

As he pulled on his coat, the little drawing of Lady Nina fell out of his pocket and went flying across the room as with a will of its own. It lodged itself under his bed and he was obliged to lie flat on his belly to retrieve it. Getting back onto his stockinged feet, her eyes looked at him reproachfully at his ungallant treatment. It was indeed a beautiful and intriguing face. She did not simper, and there seemed to be little affectation about her. He turned it over and noticed that there was a competent sketch on the reverse showing, curiously, some form of fungi, with the Latin name written beneath it and initialled N.D. Had Axelmann taken an abandoned piece of sketch board from his subject to draw upon? That suggested a comfortable intimacy, Felix thought. He hoped she were madly in love with him and at that moment planning an elopement.

That would serve Lord Rothborough right, Felix thought, and turned the card back so the portrait faced him, finding he did wish to look at her again. Lord Rothborough had got his taste so right and that annoyed him extremely. Although the scheme seemed ridiculous, it was impossible for him not to wonder what it might be like to marry such a girl, and indeed what marriage might mean in general. A warm bed and a calm night, perhaps. In that moment the idea was infinitely desirable. He put the portrait on the mantelpiece, hoping it might act as a lesson to him.

He had just put on his boots when he heard knocking on the door to his consulting room. He went to open the door, expecting his usual morning queue of patients. Instead he found the Major himself, dressed in his mackintosh cloak and looking as if he had come straight through the storm, which was still hard at work outside.

“May I come in?”

Felix gestured that he might, not entirely trusting himself to speak. He went to the fire and stared down at the dirty grate, full of last night’s ashes.

“I need a fire,” he said.

“Let’s go to my quarters – I’ve got one,” said Major Vernon. “I have some some good news for you as well. About Miss Pritchard.” He started off down the corridor.

Felix went along after him, wondering how he might begin his attack. He felt it would have to be an attack of some sort. His spirit was demanding it, but it was no easy matter to cross swords with Major Vernon.

There was a pot of coffee as well as a fire in the Major’s office. A mud-spattered Snow lay sprawled asleep on the hearth rug. “She is going to need a bath,” remarked Major Vernon as he poured the coffee.

The coffee was strong and sweet, just as Major Vernon always took it, and Felix was grateful for it. He turned to the papers relating to Barnes’ death which the Major had pinned on the wall, and the Major came and stood next to him, looking over them also.

“I have forgotten to congratulate you,” he said.

“For what?”

“For bringing in Harrison, not to mention Fildyke.”

“Oh,” said Felix. “Well, yes, it is hardly a matter for congratulation. A lucky chance.”

“Did he say anything of interest to you?”

“About Barnes’ murder?” Major Vernon nodded. “He denies it.”

“Of course,” Major Vernon said, scratching his temple.

“You think it is Harrison?”

“He is a candidate. But then again, we have an interesting business with Miss Pritchard and Mr Watkins – I am not convinced they have told me the whole truth about the discovery of the body.”

“Miss Pritchard and Mr Watkins?”

“They are a secretly engaged. That was the good news I had for you.”

“Watkins?” said Felix said, struggling to understand this. “She is engaged to Watkins?”

“Yes, and has been for some time. You have been employed to throw the Dean off the scent. A decoy fiancé.”

“But that makes even less sense,” Felix said.

“Miss Pritchard went to the tower for a tryst with Watkins – and it was she who discovered poor Barnes’ body. When Watkins arrived, they decided he would report the discovery of the body in order to preserve their secret engagement. At least that is what they have told me, but there are a few inconsistencies there. I think there may have been more to it.”