Death of a Dowager (12 page)

Chapter 23

“Mags?” Lady Grainger peered down at the dog in her butler’s arms. As the man lifted the dog toward the Lady, the pup’s head rolled back on its neck. All of us watched in horror as its mouth fell open and a pink tongue dangled from one side.

“Mags,” Lady Grainger said wonderingly, as though trying to understand. “What is wrong with Mags? Oh, oh!” she said, and she sank back into her chair.

Stanton stood up, holding the limp beast. The expression on the butler’s face was one of horror. “She’s . . . gone.”

“This tears it,” muttered Waverly as he stepped over the dead woman to examine the dog more closely.

“Please? May I . . . hold her?” Lady Grainger sounded childlike as she turned to her servant. No one spoke as Stanton gently transferred the pup to the woman’s arms. Something broke loose inside of Lady Grainger; even the grief she’d felt for her sister-in-law did not compare to this. She moaned, a sound that came from deep in her heart.

“My dear, dear little Mags! My friend. How could you have left me?” Lady Grainger repeated. Lucy rushed to her friend’s side and embraced Olivia Grainger with great strength. The lady turned to Lucy. “Something is wrong. First Silvana, and now Mags. What is happening? Do you know?”

One blow after another had been dealt Lady Grainger, and her mind was struggling to catch up. Her eyes were vacant, her face slack, and she moved like an automaton.

Lillian and another female servant had come to the door. They stood wide-eyed on the threshold, peeping around the doorsill to watch.

A quick glance at the Marchioness told me that she was surprised by this turn of events. I could almost see a sparkle in her eyes as she pondered what it might mean—and how she might use the situation to her advantage.

“Someone fetch me a glass of water,” Mr. Lerner snapped at them. “She’s had a shock.”

The young man reached into his messy satchel, disturbing several sheets of paper. After a search, he withdrew a small brown bottle. When the water appeared, the doctor added a few drops of laudanum. With great care, he guided the glass to Lady Grainger’s lips. “Drink this. Come on. Good. That’s right.”

Setting the glass down, the doctor spoke to Stanton. “We need to get her to her bedroom and see that she lies down. She needs to stay quiet. Once she’s there, I can attend to her in privacy.”

Waverly moved closer to our hostess, his presence offering aid.

“Ma’am?” said Stanton, and he held out his arm to his mistress. Still clutching the dog, Lady Grainger wobbled to her feet, but when it was obvious that she might collapse, Stanton and Waverly reached behind her, forming a sort of chair with their arms. Lady Grainger did not seem to notice that she was being carried. As the men moved her, she clutched the soft white curls even closer to her breast. Her lady’s maid fell in behind them.

Mr. Lerner turned his attention to the rest of us. “Ladies? I suggest you remove yourselves to the library.”

Lucy led the way. Blanche stopped in the middle of the hall, wrapping her arms around her waist and whimpering, “I feel light-headed. I think I’m going to . . .”

But Mr. Lerner caught her before her knees buckled.

Mary gave her sister a hard look before following them into the library.

I waited beside the Marchioness. She stared up at me snappishly. “Fetch Waverly. Tell him I have had enough. We must leave! Right now.”

“Of course, Lady Conyngham,” said Mr. Waverly as he returned to the drawing room. “But first I must make certain of your safety. Lady Ingram is dead. Miss Ingram nearly collapsed just now. Lady Grainger is incapacitated, and her dog is dead as well. Don’t you see? I can’t take you back to Carlton House until I know what is happening here. I can’t risk it. Not for your sake or for our sovereign’s.”

She did not like it, but she could not argue with him. Leaning on Waverly’s arm and grumbling in his ear, she stumped her way into the library. Once there, Lucy helped Mr. Waverly make the Marchioness comfortable, bringing her cushions and adjusting a footstool. Then he turned to me. “Mrs. Rochester? Will you accompany me to Lady Grainger’s room? I think it improper for me to go alone.”

I nodded. Of course, Waverly’s explanation was nonsensical because Lady Grainger would be attended by her lady’s maid, but he pronounced it with such seriousness that Lady Conyngham took him at his word. I suspected that as long as she felt herself to be cosseted, she would concur with him.

With due haste, I rose and followed the man down the hall.

The lady’s maid responded to our quiet knock on the door. Lady Grainger rested under her covers with her eyes half closed. However, she had not relinquished her hold on Mags. In fact, the dog was wrapped in her arms, tightly, as a child holds a stuffed toy.

“What is your name?” Mr. Waverly asked the abigail.

“Dorsey, sir. Dorsey Evers.” She kept her chin tucked down and her gaze on her feet.

Something caught Waverly’s attention, and he craned his neck to get a better look at her. It was the first time since arriving that I’d seen the abigail up close, and when I followed his gaze, I saw what intrigued him.

“Your face,” he said. “What happened?”

Dorsey kept her eyes on the floor. “Lady Ingram struck me.”

“Why? What incurred her wrath?”

“I canna please her, sir. I tried, but I canna do it. May she rest in peace.”

“Yes, well.” He shook his head. “Please assist me. I need to look at the dog. I don’t need to take him.”

“Her,” corrected Dorsey.

“Her. And I don’t want to alarm the Lady.”

“I’ll do my best.” Dorsey joined him at the side of the bed. Speaking in soft tones to Lady Grainger, she soothed the nearly unconscious woman while Mr. Waverly bent close to the pup’s mouth. I watched as he opened the animal’s jaws, peered at the gums, and then put his own nose next to the dog’s mouth and smelled it.

“That’s all I needed. Thank you. You were very helpful.” He gave a courteous half bow to the maid before using a jerk of his chin to beckon me into the hallway.

We walked to a spot at the opposite end, as far from the library as we could get, so we could talk privately. “What do you think happened, Mrs. Rochester?”

“Sir?”

“I know you to be observant and clear thinking. I ask that you share your opinion.”

“First, Mr. Waverly, please tell me: Did the dog smell of coffee? I saw it lap at the liquid that ran out of Lady Ingram’s cup, but Lady Grainger scolded the pup, so I don’t know whether the dog managed to consume any of it or not.”

“Its mouth did smell of coffee. So you can guess what I was after: Someone poisoned Lady Ingram.”

Chapter 24

My mind reeled at this news. Poisoned? That would mean that someone in this house was a murderer. And try as I might, I could not conceive of such a thing. Lucy? Lady Conyngham? Mary? Blanche? Lady Grainger? No, no, no, no, and no. There had to be another explanation. “Couldn’t it be that she simply reached the end of her days? That her heart gave out?”

“But the dog . . .” said Mr. Waverly.

“What do you know about poisons?” I asked. I had only recently learned about ratiocination, the art of solving a puzzle by applying logic, but Mr. Waverly had worked as an enforcer of the law for some time.

“Not much. Oh, we have the odd case here and there where a bloke foams at his mouth and thrashes about, but . . .”

I shook my head. “This was nothing like that. Lady Ingram simply rolled off of her chair. I was there the entire time. I saw nothing suspicious! We all ate from the same tray. Although, I suppose it’s possible that both Lady Ingram and the dog ate the same biscuit or pastry.”

In silent agreement, we went into the drawing room, where the doctor was bent over the corpse, working to arrange Lady Ingram’s arms over her chest. Willing myself to look away from Mr. Lerner’s activities, I pointed out to Waverly where the older Ingram girl’s coffee cup still sat on the side table. “See there, Mr. Waverly? There’s only a bit left in the bottom of the cup. If there had been poison in this, Miss Ingram would have—should have—died, too. If the drink was poisoned, how can one explain that Miss Ingram is still alive?”

“Hmmm.” Mr. Waverly had his thumbs tucked into his vest pockets and regarded me thoughtfully.

“Both Lady Ingram and Blanche Ingram drank coffee from the same pot. If the Dowager was poisoned, why did her daughter not suffer its ill effects as well?”

“Tell me exactly what happened here,” said Waverly.

I revisited the afternoon’s events leading up to this moment, ending my summation with, “As you can tell, those two events happened concurrently—Lady Ingram’s demise and the dog’s death as well.”

“I take your point, but until I investigate further, I shall reserve judgment,” he said. “Come, let us return to the others.” Mr. Waverly took off for the library as I followed right behind.

The Ingram sisters each occupied a chair. They were both crying softly. Lucy had taken a spot at Lady Grainger’s desk, where she stared out the window, as did Lady Conyngham from her seat deep in a tapestry-covered wingback chair.

“Miss Ingram, how are you feeling?” the Bow Street Runner asked solicitously, inclining his head toward Blanche. “I mean to say, how is your general health?”

“I’ve been a bit under the weather,” she said, blotting her face. “And my head was spinning when I stood up.” She paused and her eyes narrowed. “Why?”

He turned on his heel and left the room. Low voices told us he conferred with Mr. Lerner as they reentered the library together. The young doctor rummaged in his bag before withdrawing a small envelope. He rang for a servant, and when Lillian appeared, he requested a large carafe of water and enough glasses to serve all of us ladies.

“I shall need more water, please, and dry toast, too. Cook it as near to burned as possible,” he said to Lillian. Walking from one person to another, the doctor dispensed what looked like small lumps of charcoal, such as can be found in the hearth after a fire.

“Swallow these, please, with a full glass of water. Drink another full glass as soon as you’re able. I’ll want you to each eat a slice of toast or two, and consume as many glasses of water as possible throughout the day.”

Lady Conyngham stared at the black lumps in her hand. “Whatever for?”

“A precaution, ma’am,” inserted Mr. Waverly.

“Precaution for what?” she demanded. “Enough. I want to go home. I am tired. The King will be very cross with you, Waverly, when he learns you did not obey me.”

“I dearly wish I could, Lady. As it stands, I need to speak to all of you.” He waited until the Ingram girls gave him their attention. “I regret to say this, but I have reason to suspect that Lady Ingram has been poisoned.”

“What? Poisoned! Poisoned? What makes you think that? What?” Mary shrieked.

“What?” Lucy’s jaw dropped.

“Are you saying that someone killed my mother?” Blanche glared at Mr. Waverly.

“It is possible. I can say no more than that.”

Blanche sank down further in her chair. A sheen of perspiration covered her forehead. She grabbed the arms and gripped them tightly. She swayed a bit in her seat. “Then perhaps I was poisoned, too, because I feel horrid.”

Mary turned to her sister. “Don’t be ridiculous, Blanche. You’ve been feeling poorly all week. It’s a game you play. Nothing more.”

Blanche shook her head in violent disagreement. “But I have been ill lately! You know that!”

“Could it have been cumulative?” asked Waverly in a low voice to Mr. Lerner.

The young man pursed his lips speculatively, but said nothing.

“The girl is not alone in feeling unwell.” The Marchioness wiped her forehead with a trembling hand. “Oh my. I am quite certain that I was the intended target. Waverly, you know how jealous people are of my friendship with His Majesty. That’s all the more reason that you must take me home at once. I want to be away from here!”

“Yes, Lady Conyngham. I am nearly done here.” Mr. Waverly bowed to her. “As soon as a constable arrives, we can go.”

I reflected that the Marchioness had felt perfectly fine until she heard Waverly’s analysis. Furthermore, given the vast quantity of sweets and tea she had eaten, there was no way that the poison had been in our food. If so, the Marchioness should have been the first stricken. No, I was certain it had come from the coffee. That alone would account for the deaths of Lady Ingram and the dog.

“And, Samuel, do you agree with him? That our mother was . . . poisoned?” In her unhappy state, Mary Ingram had called the young doctor by his first name, but no one else seemed to take note of this impropriety other than me.

“I think it possible,” the young man admitted slowly, “but it is early days.”

Waverly intervened. “Lady Conyngham, if you could narrate your visit, I might be able to send you on to Carlton House.”

“Yes, of course,” she said. “I am desperate to leave.”

Then it dawned on me that this was not only a tragedy for the Ingram family, and a loss for Lady Grainger, but a huge blow to all concerned in the eyes of society. When word went out that someone had been poisoned at a gathering attended by Lady Conyngham and hosted by Lady Grainger, our hostess would be persona non grata in the ton. Of course, Lucy’s reputation—and mine—would suffer apace, especially as the last known activities of the dead woman had been to publicly slight us. Here we’d hoped a visit would quiet problems—and now the situation was made worse! Much worse!

The Marchioness started talking, and I decided to concentrate on her words. “We had gathered for tea. Just us ladies. The Dowager Lady Ingram was drinking hers when she dropped the cup and fell to the floor.”

Not exactly
, I thought.

“After Lady Ingram died, Lady Grainger’s poor little dog Mags was found under her chair. Dead,” Lady Conyngham continued her dissertation.

“Ah, but what was the sequence of events?” Waverly pulled his briarwood pipe from his back pocket. He paused to pack the bowl but did not light it, preferring to chew on the stem. The rich scent of cherry tobacco filled the small, crowded library.

“We were drinking tea and eating when the Dowager’s neuralgia flared up,” said Lucy.

“What did each of you eat and who served it? Miss Ingram, could you start?”

Blanche lifted her chin. “I had a crumpet. Only a half. My digestion has been delicate of late.”

“I ate a crumpet with bilberry jam and a scone with clotted cream,” Mary said.

Lucy closed her eyes and thought. “A biscuit with candied ginger, a scone with a dab of clotted cream and strawberry jam, and a crumpet.” She blushed. “I neglected to eat breakfast this morning.”

“One crumpet,” said Lady Conyngham.

To our credit, no one laughed at this blatant falsehood. By my recollection, the woman had eaten at least two crumpets, if not three, and two scones, plus a handful of biscuits.

I reported my own lone crumpet and the bilberry jam.

“And the beverages?” he asked. We explained we had all been drinking tea up until the time that Lady Ingram’s pain had intensified. At that point, Mary left us to get the rose hips.

“What took you so long?” her sister chided.

The girl blushed. “I thought the rose hips were in Mama’s room, but they weren’t. I searched for them there before I looked in the kitchen.”

“And where did you find them?” asked Waverly.

“Under a tea towel in the kitchen. I must have misplaced them.”

Blanche agreed. “That wouldn’t surprise me, Mary. Not one bit. You’ve been off woolgathering lately. Of course, it’s also possible that one or more of Auntie’s staff helped themselves to the rose hips. Servants do that, you know. Mother was particularly put out with the lady’s maid. Perhaps she took the rose hips just for spite.”

Waverly did not dignify this with a response. Tears streamed down Mary’s face.

“In the meantime, Dowager Lady Ingram drank something else?” Waverly pressed Blanche.

“Coffee. I made it for my mother and myself. I have a tin that I bought at Fortnum and Mason,” Blanche said. Her voice was rough from crying, and despite our history, I felt great sympathy for her. As bad as this was, the coming days would be worse. We don’t lose people in one blow, but piece by piece over the days as we yearn for them and remember anew how they have moved on.

“How much did your mother drink?” asked Waverly.

“One cup only.” Lucy picked up the thread. “When the Dowager Lady Ingram collapsed, she dropped her teacup, and it rolled along the carpet. That was when Mags lapped up some of the liquid, before Lady Grainger stopped her.”

“Then what did the dog do?” the Bow Street Runner asked.

“She disappeared,” Lucy said. “She crawled under Lady Grainger’s chair.”

Waverly chewed on his pipe stem thoughtfully. “I know this will be distressing, but if you could all think back—did any of you notice any change in Lady Ingram before she fell? Did she mention discomfort? Difficulty breathing? Heart palpitations?”

“None but her neuralgia,” Blanche said. She set her face in a scowl. “I think you are mistaken about poison, sir. Our mother died from the stress placed on her heart, made worse by long-standing sciatica. If my sister had gotten her the rose hips promptly, as our dear Mama requested, the pain would not have overburdened her heart. She would be alive today.”