The Heiress of Linn Hagh (14 page)

Lavender smiled for the first time that day and thought about the irony of the situation. Woods was completely at home in the crime-ridden and festering maze of the London slums, where a cutthroat lurked around every corner; yet his constable was uncomfortable and lost in the countryside. The man was spooked by trees.

Now a dense patch of willow weed, eight feet high, reared up on either side of the path. It formed a sea-green tunnel above their heads, where the tips of the plants reached out and touched. The men trudged through in silence.

Suddenly, Lavender heard an animal—a large animal—grunting and pushing its way through the weeds towards them. He stopped. Dead branches cracked beneath the feet of the creature. The towering plants were forced violently apart and splayed out across the path in front of him.

A grotesque parody of a man half-stumbled, half-fell onto the ground before them. Blinking in the weak sunlight, the strange wild-haired creature stared with uncomprehending eyes at the two Londoners. His right cheek twitched in fear, and his slack mouth fell open. There was only one explanation for this sorry creature.

‘Mr Matthew Carnaby?’

Whimpering and shuffling, the man’s hand plucked at his torn and filthy woollen coat before he nodded.

Lavender watched with pity as the poor creature shrank back and lowered his head. Great scars snaked up the right side of his face, across his temple and into his hairline; white valleys of scar tissue, where the hair no longer grew, criss-crossed his close-cropped dark head. Puckered flesh distorted the corner of his eye and dragged it down into a grotesque shape.

Now, a coffee-coloured dryad glided out of the forest of willow weed and joined Matthew Carnaby on the path. Two identical pairs of blue eyes watched the police officers with distrust. The wood nymph wore a red scarf around her black curls, topped with a wreath of laurel. Silver hoops glinted at her ears when she turned her head to Matthew Carnaby. Silver rings flashed on her fingers. She pulled a dirty shawl tighter over her old dress and reached out for Carnaby’s hand.

‘Away, Matty,’ she said, and she led him back into the forest of willow weed.

‘Miss Geddes?’

But it was too late. The towering weeds swished back like a curtain as they disappeared. The plants swayed and were still. Lavender heard again the distant roar of the waterfall and a crow cawing mournfully in the tree canopy. It was as if Matthew Carnaby and the gypsy girl had never been there. The ancient woodland had just swallowed them up.

Isobel Carnaby was not pleased when Anna told her that the London detectives were at the door of Linn Hagh and seeking admittance. She snapped at Anna to wait a few moments while she took off her apron and tidied her hair. By the time Anna showed Lavender and Woods into the Great Hall at Linn Hagh, the young girl could see that her mistress had made some attempt to brush and pin back the tendrils of wiry hair that escaped from her cap and had added rouge to her sallow cheeks.

The small, sharp-featured woman glared coldly at the detective when he bowed low over her hand.

‘I’m sure that I heard you promise my brother you would meet him, Ingram and Ralph Emmerson up at Greycoates Hall this morning.’ Her voice cut through the air like ice.

‘Please pass on my apologies to your brother, Miss Carnaby. Unfortunately, something important came up.’

‘Really? In your investigation into my sister’s disappearance?’ Her dark eyes regarded him shrewdly.

‘Yes.’

‘What is it?’ she demanded. ‘Do you know where she is?’

‘I need to see Miss Carnaby’s bedchamber again before I report back to Mr Armstrong. He has been most insistent.’

There was a short pause while Isobel Carnaby tried to assess this unexpected situation—and the man before her. Anna, who had remained quietly at the back of the room, did the same. As the bright morning light filtered through the dirty mullioned windows of the hall, Anna decided that the thin detective was not as scary as she had at first thought. He had a quiet determination in his voice. The phrase ‘before I report back to Mr Armstrong’ particularly impressed her.

Anna hoped that Miss Isobel would not show herself up and try to bully these policemen like she did Constable Beddows. There was something different, something alien about these unknown men from London. They didn’t fit into the usual order of things in Bellingham—even she could see that.

She had the laundry list Constable Woods wanted, secreted down her bodice. It rustled slightly as she breathed.

In the end, Isobel Carnaby dropped her harsh tone and became the charming hostess.

‘Of course, Detective, anything I can do to help. Naturally, I want my little sister returned to the bosom of her family as soon as possible. You say you want to start with Helen’s bedchamber?’ She moved towards the staircase.

‘Actually,’ Lavender’s voice brought her to an abrupt stop. ‘I wonder if you could just explain to me the layout of Linn Hagh. I didn’t have time to study the whole building on our last visit.’

‘Certainly,’ she said, and waved her hands in the direction of the three closed doors that led off the Great Hall. ‘It’s quite simple. There are three bedchambers on this floor: mine, my brother George’s and a guest room. Upstairs, there are two further bedchambers: one where the female servants sleep and Helen’s room.’

‘Did Miss Helen object to sleeping on the same floor as the servants?’

Isobel Carnaby seemed genuinely surprised.

‘No, why should she? You have to remember, Detective, that Helen has hardly been at home over the last few years. She returned in January to nurse her dying mother, and my brother and I were surprised that she stayed here after poor Esther died. I understand that the school in Whitby offered her a teaching position again for September last. She is always welcome at Linn Hagh, of course—it’s her home—but she is not in any position to complain about her bedchamber being on the same floor as the servants.’ She seemed happy to fit in with our arrangement.’

‘Of course,’ Lavender said. He fell quiet.

In the silence that followed, Isobel Carnaby began to bluster.

‘Mind you, she did manage to complain about other things. The food was never to her liking—she always wanted something different. Her room was too cold. She needed more coal for her fire . . .’

‘Did she ask for extra coal on the night she disappeared?’ Lavender interrupted sharply.

Yes, she bloomin’ well did,
thought Anna.
And she would be askin’ for it agin if she were here today.
Once the master had left the Great Hall that morning, the fire had been allowed to die out as usual. It was cold now, and Anna shivered beneath the thin cloth of her black uniform.

Miss Isobel cast an accusing glare across the room at Anna, who squirmed beneath it.

‘Yes, it would seem that she had persuaded our maid to give her an extra scuttle full of coal that evening. This didn’t come to light until we discovered her room empty—with coals still hot in the grate. Is that significant, Detective?’

‘It may be.’

‘Let me show you . . .’

‘Where does Master Matthew Carnaby sleep in Linn Hagh?’

Isobel Carnaby paused halfway across the room and froze to the spot. Her face turned ugly with anger.

‘Mr Armstrong told us about your unfortunate younger brother,’ Lavender continued smoothly. ‘I believe we’ve just come across him out in the woods.’

The colour returned slowly to Isobel Carnaby’s cheeks.

‘Yes, yes, Matty—poor Matty,’ She sighed. ‘He should have been placed in an institution years ago, of course, but my father was soft, and my brother—is also a kind-hearted man. Matty takes a simple pleasure in roaming Hareshaw Woods; he enjoys flowers and birdsong. It would have been cruel to have locked him away.’

Anna was horrified at how convincing she sounded.

‘He sleeps downstairs in a small room off the kitchen. It’s warm in there for him, and Cook and Peter, our manservant, can keep an eye on him: Cook watches him during the day, and at night Peter sleeps in the next room.’

‘Do you think Mr Matthew Carnaby knows anything about Miss Helen’s disappearance?’

Miss Isobel paused thoughtfully.

‘We asked him of course . . .’

Asked?
thought Anna.
You all screamed yer heads off in his face and then threw him outside into the snow to go and track her down like some sort of human bloodhound.

‘. . . but he has no speech and fails to understand the simplest of things. My sister was kind to him—in a distant sort of way—but he barely seems to have noticed her absence over these last few weeks.’

Safe and unseen, behind Miss Isobel’s back, Anna shook her head sadly. Matthew Carnaby had wailed for days and roamed from one end of the parish to the other, trying to find Miss Helen.

Chapter Fourteen

S
tephen Lavender crouched down on the floor of Helen Carnaby’s bedchamber and pretended to carry out another examination of the debris still littering the floor. He slipped his hand into his pocket and pulled out the candle stub end he had found there two days ago.

‘Do you make your own candles, Miss Carnaby?’ he asked.

‘Yes, in the autumn we render mutton fat and make tallow candles.’

He kept his back to her.

‘Do you have beeswax candles at Linn Hagh?’

‘A few. I keep a few in our cold store for when we entertain guests. We used beeswax candles the night Emmerson and Ingram stayed—the night Helen disappeared.’

‘So that is why Miss Carnaby used beeswax candles up here in her chamber—because you had guests?’

The smile dropped from Isobel Carnaby’s face.

‘No. Helen should not have lit beeswax candles up here. I was most clear about that. They’re so expensive to buy from the chandler and are solely for use in the Great Hall when we are entertaining guests. Helen should have burnt tallow candles up here in her room.’

Silently, Lavender held up the creamy candle end towards her. She snatched it from him.

‘This will not do!’ she exclaimed. ‘Yet again she defied me!’ Her face contorted with anger.

‘Would you like to check how many of your beeswax candles are missing?’ Lavender suggested quietly.

‘Yes! Yes!’ She flew out of the room. Lavender followed her down the stairs of the pele tower. When her bony arms reached out to steady herself against the stone walls, Lavender thought she resembled an ungainly and vengeful black bat.

Isobel led him through the smoky kitchen and into a back storeroom. She yanked the lid off a large tin and pulled out a handful of beautifully crafted, creamy beeswax candles, each item an almost exact reproduction of its neighbour. She laid them out on a shelf, then painstakingly counted them before she reached for the housekeeping ledger where she kept her records.

‘Six!’ she exclaimed. ‘Six! The thoughtless wench took six of our most expensive candles for use in her bedchamber.’ Her hands shook with rage when she replaced the precious items in their box.

‘I can understand how distressing this must be for you,’ Lavender said sympathetically. ‘Did Miss Helen exhibit other acts of selfishness?’

But Isobel Carnaby would not be drawn out at that moment. She flushed and pressed her thin lips angrily together. Wisps of her hair escaped their pins and fell untidily across her creased forehead.

‘Would this be a good time for you to show me Master Matthew Carnaby’s bedchamber?’ he asked.

She threw open another wooden door behind him, gestured him inside and returned herself to the kitchen. While he searched languidly amongst the stinking rags that covered Matthew Carnaby’s bed and the curious collection of rocks, dead plants, sprigs of laurel leaves and driftwood that littered his floor, Lavender heard Isobel Carnaby snarling at Mistress Norris. He could not make out the cook’s reply, but her voice sounded indignant, as if she defended herself from accusations of negligence or complicity. He hoped that Woods and the maid had finished their search upstairs.

As soon as Lavender and Isobel Carnaby had disappeared, Woods spun round to Anna.

She had already pulled the laundry list out of her bodice.

‘Good gal.’ Woods grinned. ‘Let’s just check and see that nothing has been taken in the weeks since her disappearance, shall we?’ He pulled open the doors of the closet and the crushed material of her gowns splayed out and swayed in the draft. Anna held up the list and began to check off the dresses with her finger.

‘I don’t know how you and that detective gadgie think she gets in and out of her bedchamber unseen,’ she grumbled. ‘I can tell you . . .’

She stopped and frowned—glanced at the closet—and then back at the list.

‘Is something missing?’ Woods asked hopefully.

Anna’s frown deepened.

‘There’s two dresses gone.’

‘Ah.’ Woods sighed with relief. This was more evidence that Helen Carnaby was still alive—and somewhere nearby.

‘What about the linen?’ he asked. ‘Undergarments and so forth.’

Anna moved towards the dresser and opened the top drawers. A few moments later, she glanced up.

‘Her two best sets are missin’ .’

Woods nodded and smiled.

‘Unfortunately, I think I may know where they are,’ she said. ‘You’re not goin’ to like this.’

‘Oh?’ His face fell.

‘Follow me.’

She led him down the stone staircase back into the Great Hall. There was still no sign of Miss Isobel or Detective Lavender. Anna moved swiftly across the flagged floor towards the bedchamber at the back of the hall. She entered the middle room, and Woods realised at once that she had taken him into Isobel Carnaby’s bedchamber. The dressing table was scattered with hairpins and powders; a heavy scent hung in the air. Woods compared the richness of the furnishings, bed hangings and ornamentation of this room with the spartan little garret of Miss Helen, upstairs. Anna threw open the doors of Miss Isobel’s dark mahogany closet, sighed and pointed to two gowns hanging there.

‘That’s them,’ she said. ‘Miss Isobel’s takin’ Miss Helen’s clothes again.’

Woods swallowed his disappointment.