From the Charred Remains (16 page)

Mrs. Danforth was certainly pleased when she entered the kitchen a little while later, finding Lucy hard at work preparing a bit of porridge and salted potatoes she’d found in the stores. “A blessing you are, my dears,” she’d said, inspecting the pots Lucy and Annie had scrubbed the night before. “Tell Horace Aubrey he can send you to me anytime. Why don’t you just finish up these dishes, and help me get supper on. Lord knows I could use a good supper on His day.”

An hour later, at seven, Annie and Lucy were just finishing up in Mrs. Danforth’s kitchen when the constable knocked briskly at the door. He’d obviously found comfortable accommodations elsewhere, since he was whistling a bit and looked clean-shaven. He was wearing the same dark suit as yesterday. “Ready?” he asked, looking at her apron quizzically. “I hope you don’t mind walking. I asked Ivan to meet us with the wagon later.”

“Of course not,” Lucy quickly untied her apron and handed it to Mrs. Danforth. “Let me just tidy my hair.”

She was conscious of him studying her appearance, taking in her Sunday dress. For a moment she thought he would pay her a compliment, but he didn’t. “I’ll wait for you outside.”

“He’s a handsome one, ain’t he?” Mrs. Danforth said, reaching up to straighten Lucy’s cap.

“I suppose,” Lucy said. She hoped the constable was out of earshot. He was waiting a few paces away.

“Got your hooks in him, eh, honey?” The woman elbowed Lucy in a friendly way. “I can tell.”

“Oh no, Mistress Danforth,” Lucy said, floundering a bit. She started toward the door. “You’ve got it all wrong.” She threw a mute plea to Annie, who had heard every bit of the exchange.

“Lucy’s betrothed already,” Annie said loyally. “To my master’s son. Her sweetheart’s a barrister.”

“Is that so?” the fishwife said, chuckling. “So, banns been read?”

“No,” Lucy said, suddenly feeling miserable. “It’s hard to explain—”

“No need to explain at all,” the fishwife said, waving at Duncan. To Lucy’s deep chagrin, she called out loudly, “She ain’t betrothed to that barrister, you know that?”

“I know that!” Duncan said, glancing at Lucy. What he made of the fishwife’s comments or her own mortified expression, she couldn’t tell. Thankfully, he didn’t say anything else. “Ready for church, then?”

When they reached the south entrance of St. Mary’s church a few moments later, Lucy touched the swirling columns that framed the door and porch. She’d never seen anything like them. The churches she’d been to in London only had straight Roman-style columns, and of course the one she grew up attending in Lambeth had no columns at all. The columns of St. Mary’s twisted, drawing her eyes upward. There she could see the majestic image of the Virgin Mary holding the baby Jesus in one arm, standing in a scalloped throne, looking out at Oxford. Jesus was crooking his finger in eternal blessing to all those who passed within the church. It was a blessing Cromwell hadn’t destroyed the church in his effort to rid England of all papist influences. She whispered as much to Annie.

“Ah, but see these holes there?” Duncan asked, having overheard her remark. He pointed to a pattern of gouges in the side of the church. “Cromwell’s men turned their guns on the church during the war.” He sounded disgusted. Once again, Lucy wondered what his experience in the army had been like. Now was not the time to ask.

As they passed into the church, Lucy let out an audible sigh. St. Mary’s was magnificent indeed. Immense stained-glass windows lined the walls and great arches gracefully framed the painted ceiling. The vicar had not yet climbed the small winding stairs to his pulpit. Instead, he was speaking to a small group of parishioners clustered around him.

“Let’s sit toward the back,” Duncan said, resting his hand lightly on her waist to guide her.

Stiffly, Lucy took Annie’s arm and moved the younger girl to a pew at the back of the church. Duncan followed, sliding in beside Lucy. The church was growing crowded, and latecomers had to position themselves against the walls in preparation for standing through the long service.

Glancing around, Lucy could see that Ivan had probably directed them toward the right church. She could see that St. Mary’s was full of scholars from the university, attending the service with their families. Unmarried Fellows might have attended the smaller private services connected with the different Oxford colleges. Like Merton College, Lucy sighed to herself.

The church grew quiet then as the vicar mounted the pulpit and called them into prayer. When he began his sermon, Duncan put his head close to hers. “Is that her?” he whispered, pointing his finger ever so slightly toward a young woman a few pews ahead of him. She was seated beside an elderly man dressed in faded gray breeches and shirt.

Lucy shook her head. “No, Miss Water’s hair is darker.”

Hearing them, a man seated in front of them turned around, giving them a warning glance.

“Pardon,” Lucy mouthed. The man turned back around.

“What about her?” Duncan whispered again. Lucy shook her head.

They did this several times. “This isn’t working,” Lucy whispered. Catching the eye of an elderly woman leaning against the wall, she stood up and gestured to the woman to take her seat. Gratefully the woman slid into the pew that she and Duncan had vacated. Annie didn’t even seem to realize that they had left her.

She and Duncan made their way down the side aisle, trying to bring as little attention to their movements as they could. Fortunately, the vicar had just called everyone to stand, and they were able to walk hastily toward the front of the church, stepping carefully among the parishioners who lined the walls. She kept her face down, hoping if Miss Water were there she wouldn’t see Lucy first. Duncan stood slightly behind her, so that the back of her shoulder was touching his arm.

Peeking out through her lashes, Lucy could tell that she had a far better vantage point to see the congregation than before. She let her eyes sweep over the church, especially toward the front where the most important families usually sat in their inherited pews. She studied each brunette female in turn. Some noblewomen, some servants, a few gentry. One or two looked enthralled by the vicar’s sermon, but most wore the same slightly bored expression that she was used to seeing on the faces of churchgoers at home.

A woman delicately blowing her nose into a bit of red silk caught her attention. Lucy caught her breath, and she craned closer. The woman was seated next to an older man who was nodding his head at the vicar’s words. Could it be—? Yes. It was the woman who called herself Rhonda Rivers. The woman whom Lucy believed was Rhonda Water.

Reaching slightly backward, Lucy tugged on Duncan’s sleeve. He leaned in. “Do you see her?” His breath tickled her cheek.

She nodded, not wanting to lose sight of Miss Water. Eventually, when the vicar bestowed his final blessing on the congregation, Lucy and Duncan began to move their way to the back, keeping their eyes on Miss Water, so that they would not get caught in the crush of the congregation leaving the church. As people passed them by, eager to get home to their Sunday suppers, Lucy could see that Miss Water was still standing beside the older man, who she could see now was dressed as an Oxford fellow. She assumed he was Rhonda’s father, Master Water. He had become engaged in a conversation with some other men. As Lucy watched, Rhonda said something to the man and left his side, making her way out of the church. Lucy followed, hoping Duncan would look after Annie.

Miss Water moved out onto High Street, turning toward the church graveyard. It was there that Lucy caught up with her.

“Miss Water?” Lucy said. “May I have a word?”

Miss Water stared at her. “You!” she exclaimed. “Whatever are you doing here?” She looked anxiously around. “How did you know my name.”

“I came to find you.”

“However did you discover where I live?” the woman looked about anxiously. “I know I never told you.”

Lucy pulled out her crumpled copy of the
London Miscellany.
“It’s here, in the first line. See, Darius wrote an anagram for you, within the acrostic. Rhonda Water. That’s how I knew your full name.”

Miss Water’s eyes misted over. “He loved puzzles, Darius did.”

“You had told me your father taught at Oxford,” Lucy went on, feeling her stomach churn a bit. She did not want to cause the woman any more distress. “From there, it was not too hard to discover a scholar of the mystic East who had a daughter named Rhonda. It wasn’t too hard to learn that he was at Merton College. We knew you would attend church. And the rest”—Lucy waved her hand—“well, here we are.”

Miss Water pulled out her own much handled copy from her pocket. “How many times have I read these words, without realizing he had anything more to say to me. How could I have missed it?”

“You were grieving,” Lucy said softly.

The woman continued to stare at the poem. “Was that all he said? Did you find … anything else?”

“Not in the poem. If there is anything else hidden in there, we could not find it.”

“We?”

“Constable Duncan and myself.”

Miss Water turned away. “Oh, Lucy!” she cried. “I asked you not to involve the constable! My poor Darius is gone, there’s nothing we can do for him now.”

“Except inform his family of his death,” Lucy said. “Don’t they deserve to know the truth?”

“Yes, I suppose.” She rubbed her hands against her skirt. “You must think mighty poorly of me.”

“Why ever would you say that?” Lucy asked, noticing for the first time how mud had splattered across her own skirts. Standing beside Miss Water, in her beautiful, tailored clothes, Lucy felt like an absolute peasant. Her mother would not have been pleased, had she been able to view them right now.

Miss Water sighed, and sat down on a small stone bench. Instead of answering, she pointed to a white gravestone with a beautifully carved angel a few feet away. “That’s my mother’s grave,” she said.

Lucy knew the pain of losing a parent. “I’m sorry,” she said, even as she wondered what that sad fact had to do with anything.

Hearing the question in Lucy’s voice, Miss Water continued, “My mother died a year ago. Distemper, I think, although Father said otherwise. We were living in London at the time.”

Lucy nodded. A year ago the plague was just starting to hit London, although in the beginning no one wanted to admit it. Many people hid when members of their families had taken ill, even as their sons and sisters lay dying, or else the King’s army or the London authority would be likely to quarantine them all in their houses, imprisoned until they all succumbed to the inevitable.

“After she died, Father had to get away. Get away from London. He took me away to the furthest place he could think of. A place he had long studied from afar.”

“Persia,” Lucy stated. “Where you met Darius.” She had a quick image of a woman standing in robes, amid the fragrant flowers of a beautiful hanging garden, waiting for her beloved to appear.
Come to the garden in spring. There’s wine and sweethearts in the pomegranate blossoms.

“Yes,” Miss Water said, interrupting her momentary reverie. “I never knew his last name. He was just Darius to me, beautiful, lovely Darius.” Then angrily she added, “I don’t know what he was doing in a place like the old Cheshire Cheese. He didn’t drink much, and he never gambled. What was he doing playing cards?”

The whole journey to Oxford was for naught, Lucy thought. “Perhaps you’d like to claim some of the other items that he had with him?”

“What kinds of things?” Miss Water asked, a slight catch to her voice.

“Well, a small ivory brooch. That might have belonged to another man, though.”

“A brooch? That would seem strange to take if it belonged to someone else.”

“A signet ring,” Lucy said. “With a coat of arms on one side, and a hunting scene on the other.

Miss Water shook her head. “Darius had no such thing. What else?”

“A green elephant. Made of jade, I think. Duncan said it was a rook, from a chess set. Wait, what’s wrong?”

Miss Water had paled, and looked like she was about to faint. Tears had sprung to her eyes. She was trying to speak, but seemed quite overcome, half crying, and, inexplicably, half laughing. Truly, she looked quite hysterical.

Lucy looked about anxiously. She saw the well she had taken a drink from earlier, and brought Miss Water a dipper full of water. She watched Miss Water drink, waiting impatiently for her to speak.

Finally, she did. “The murdered man!” Miss Water uttered, her voice oddly strangled.

“Yes?” Lucy asked. “What about Darius?”

“No!” Miss Water said. Inexplicably she began to giggle. “Don’t you see? Oh, how you can see? It wasn’t Darius. The murdered man was someone else! Darius must be alive!”

Lucy stared at Miss Water. “Whatever do you mean?” Perhaps the shock over Darius’s death had finally touched her wits.

The woman swayed back and forth. For a moment, she was quite overcome. Finally, she spoke. “Tahmin. It must have been Tahmin. Oh, poor Tahmin.”

“Tahmin?” Lucy asked. “Who’s Tahmin?”

Wiping the tears from her face, Miss Water stumbled to explain. “Tahmin was Darius’s friend. Or even his manservant. He was so protective of Darius, he sometimes seemed like his bodyguard. But Darius was just a translator, why would he need a bodyguard?”

“I don’t know,” Lucy said, trying to follow Miss Water’s wild speech. “Tell me why you no longer believe the murdered man was Darius? You were so sure, when we first met at the Golden Lion. I told the constable.”

“You should not have done that,” Miss Water said, frowning. “How can it possibly matter now?”

“The constable’s job is to restore order. Find justice.” Lucy cocked her head sidewise. “How do you know it was—Tahmin, did you say? Not Darius.”

Miss Water waved her hand. “’Twas the rook, you see. Tahmin never let it out of his sight. I think it was his good-luck charm. Darius used to josh him about it. It makes sense. Tahmin was the card player, the gambler. Not Darius.”

Lucy thought back to Jacques’s description. “Sickened by cards,” he had said. From the way that Miss Water had described the two men, she was beginning to agree that it was indeed Tahmin, not Darius, who had been murdered in the tavern. “What’s the matter?” Lucy asked. Miss Water had gripped her arm.