Place of Confinement (12 page)

‘And so, everybody is quite sure that this…’ Dido hesitated. A terrible suspicion was laying hold of her. ‘Everybody is quite sure that this
other gentleman
is to blame?’

‘Aye,’ said the apothecary comfortably. He drew a small phial from the bag. ‘The constables have been sent off to find him.’

Dido began immediately to run away from the inn, down the green slope and out onto the terrace, her heart jarring fearfully at every step. Raising her hand against the sun which was glaring under the brim of her bonnet, she gazed anxiously along the straight walk, past strolling gentry and dusty workmen. Two dark, sturdy figures were striding briskly towards the bench upon which Tom Lomax still lounged.

When they were about fifty yards from him, Tom looked up and saw them approaching. He jumped immediately to his feet, stumbled against the pile of stones that the builders had left beside the bench, and half fell. The constables, seeing that he was attempting escape, began to run. Tom recovered himself and seemed to recognise that flight was impossible. He remained where he was; when the men reached him and laid their hands upon his shoulders, he was nonchalantly replacing the scattered stones, as if he had not a care in the world.

‘Och! That’s a shocking sight,’ said a voice close beside Dido. Mr Sutherland was now approaching, shaking his head solemnly. ‘It’s a very shocking sight to see a young fellow of decent family taken for such a crime!’

Dido nodded, too overcome for speech. For her mind was ahead of him in anticipating the suffering of that ‘decent family’ – and of one dear man in particular whose heart would surely be broken if his son was convicted of murder …

Chapter Twelve

‘I cannot believe it,’ said Dido; but her voice shook as she spoke. She tried again, willing herself to be firm, to convey that certainty which she was quite determined to feel. ‘I
will
not believe it. I know that Mr Tom Lomax is indolent and selfish and yet I
cannot
believe him capable of murder.’

There was a kind of comfort to be found in stating her conviction – even though Mr Lancelot Fenstanton and Mr Parry were both looking at her very doubtfully and showing no sign of sharing her opinion. She felt still inside her the heavy blow which had fallen as she saw the constables take Tom. A jarring chord of shock was yet vibrating somewhere within her and she quite ached to be alone; but that was a privilege which was many hours distant.

On her return from Charcombe she had found Mr Parry already arrived with news of the murder and everyone in the house eager to hear her account. She had only escaped to hurriedly change her dress as the dinner hour approached. Now everyone was gathering in the hall – and Mr Lancelot had drawn her away into the seat beneath the great window, to talk the business over again before Mr Parry.

Charles Parry, it seemed, was in the Commission of the Peace and it had fallen upon him to make enquiries into Mr Brodie’s death. He listened courteously to Dido’s protests, but continued to look very grave. Though perhaps little could be imputed to this, for gravity was the gentleman’s common expression. Indeed his face was so heavily folded and lined that one could no more imagine him smiling than a bloodhound.

‘It is a very terrible thing to be forced to acknowledge that any acquaintance is capable of murder, Miss Kent,’ he said with dignified concern. ‘And I am sorry, very sorry indeed, that you should have had it forced upon you.’ He folded his hands behind his back and took a ponderous little turn about the bay of the window. ‘Upon my word, I should not like any daughter of mine to find herself acquainted with a
murderer.
’

He stopped and looked down upon Dido regretfully. ‘But there can be little doubt of young Lomax’s guilt. The folk at the inn heard him quarrelling with the gentleman that is dead. And,’ with a look towards Mr Lancelot, ‘my friend here has now told me all about the disappearance of Miss Verney – and the note which he received yesterday from Mr Brodie.’

‘Oh!’ Dido’s hands were trembling in her lap so that she was obliged to still them by wrapping a corner of her shawl about them. She had been thinking of nothing but Tom’s danger since she had first detected it in Mr Sutherland’s words, and yet it was a shock to hear it on another’s lips. ‘You believe that Mr Lomax killed Mr Brodie in order to prevent him reaching Charcombe Manor with his information about Miss Verney.’ She stated the worst of it as calmly as she could; but she could hear the tremor in her own voice and could not prevent her fingernails driving into her palms under cover of the shawl. ‘You believe that he has abducted the young lady and has now committed murder in order to hide his crime?’ She raised her eyes and looked from Parry to Fenstanton, desperately hoping – all but pleading – that they would contradict.

The gentlemen exchanged looks of compassion.

‘It is the most reasonable conclusion,’ said Mr Parry, his words slow and precise as the ringing of a death knell.

‘Oh, but there are a great many reasons for its being a false conclusion!’ she cried, even as her distraught mind sought out those reasons. For his father’s sake she would not believe Tom guilty. There
must
be arguments for his innocence. ‘We are by no means certain that Mr Tom Lomax is responsible for Miss Verney’s disappearance. If only we could discover what has become of the young lady – then we would know whether or not the young man had any motive for murder. Remember that he strongly denies any knowledge of her whereabouts.’

‘But that is entirely of a piece with his being guilty,’ put in Mr Lancelot. ‘I don’t doubt the damned fellow has got the girl hidden away somewhere.’

‘But why has he not devised a better excuse?’ Dido turned eagerly from her host to the magistrate. ‘Mr Tom Lomax is a clever man,’ she said. ‘Cunning, perhaps you would rather call him; but in this case cunning and cleverness must count for the same thing. And, throughout this whole business he has not behaved as a guilty and cunning man might be expected to behave.’ She thought for a moment and found she liked the argument. ‘He must have known that he had been heard exchanging heated words with Mr Brodie. I cannot think that he would have been so foolhardy as to shoot that gentleman immediately afterwards and not a quarter of a mile away.’

‘Regrettably,’ said Parry, ‘murder is not always a rational act. But I beg you will cease to trouble yourself, Miss Kent—’

‘Ha!’ cried Fenstanton, striking his hand against the stone frame of the window. ‘I see it now! What I think happened was young Tom tried to dissuade Brodie from coming to me and, when he failed, he became desperate: ceased to think quite sensibly. Do you see? I daresay he had had a little too much to drink – the fellow at the inn says he was pretty free with his calling for whisky. And so he shot Brodie – almost in a moment of madness.’

Mr Parry nodded solemnly.

And Dido herself could not help but admit that it was all horribly plausible. But she persisted. ‘Was there a weapon in Mr Lomax’s possession when the constables seized him?’

‘No,’ said Parry.

‘But a pistol is very easy got rid of,’ added Mr Lancelot. ‘Tossed out into the sea, most likely.’

That was true enough – and she remembered that Tom had been very near the cliff top when she met him. But, as she recalled that meeting, the desperate hope of innocence revived – and with it the spirit of argument.

‘When I spoke with Mr Lomax this morning,’ she said, ‘he seemed so very much at ease. He was, of course, concerned about Miss Verney’s disappearance. But, for all that, he seemed easy – not at all like a man who had recently committed murder and left the body lying close by.’

‘Now then, my dear, are you qualified to make that judgement?’ asked Mr Lancelot with a gentle smile. ‘I mean, are you much in the habit of talking to murderers?’

‘I will not be teased out of my opinion!’

‘Forgive me.’ He sat down on the window seat beside her. ‘I do not mean to tease, my dear Miss Kent, I only wish to say how very strong the evidence appears against the young fellow.’

She began upon another protest, but it was cut short by the approach of Mr George Fenstanton, who was looking more than usually red about the face and pink about the scalp. He addressed himself to the gentlemen, seeming not to notice Dido at all and making no apology to her for his interruption. But his words drove even her own arguments from her head.

‘Now then, Lance, my boy,’ he said speaking again to his nephew in the authoritative tone which had ceased to be appropriate more than twenty years ago. ‘What’s this you were saying about Parry here wanting us all to look at the dead body at the inn? I don’t think we can allow any such thing.’

‘Ha!’ cried Mr Lancelot. ‘I regret that I
must
allow it. And I mean to speak to everyone about it after dinner.’ But, looking around, he found that his uncle had left him no opportunity of delay. Dido was not the only person waiting for an explanation. Every head was now turned in his direction.

Martha Gibbs was positively staring, and the ball of yarn which she had been rolling had escaped from her fingers to unravel a long pink strand across the grey flags of the hall floor. Mrs Bailey, meanwhile, was clasping her hands to her breast as if posing for a tableau entitled ‘Innocence Surprised’. Even Aunt Manners had roused herself from her doze in the place of honour beside the fire; and Miss Fenstanton – who was just returning from one of her many visits to the library – had paused in crossing the hall and had gone so far as to lift her eyes from the book in her hand, though one finger still rested at her place on the page.

‘Well then,’ said Mr Parry, clasping his hands firmly behind him, leaning his long body forward and pacing out into the room. ‘I had better explain.’ The company waited in silence. ‘And first I must apologise, especially to the ladies, for being the cause of such an unpleasant inconvenience. Upon my word, I would not wish any daughter of mine to look upon a murdered man.’

There was a little pause as he gathered his thoughts – during which, unfortunately, the whole company heard Aunt Manners mutter, ‘The old fool hasn’t got a daughter.’ Miss Gibbs giggled.

‘Well now,’ said Mr Parry loudly, his folded cheeks blushing red. ‘As you may imagine, there is a great deal of business to be settled over Mr Brodie’s death. For, besides bringing a case against the young man who killed him…’ He caught Dido’s eye and bowed courteously. ‘The young man who
seems
to have killed him,’ he amended. ‘Besides all that, we must find out just who Mr Brodie was. His friends must be found and informed of his death. And there is…’ he cleared his throat with a great show of delicacy ‘… there is the little matter of the
funeral costs
to be settled.’

‘But I daresay the landlord at the inn can supply all the information you need,’ said Mr George, and he attempted to dismiss the difficulty with a wave of his hand.

‘But it seems that he cannot. All that is known in that quarter is that Mr Brodie came up on the Plymouth coach two days ago, engaged a bed for a few nights, and…’ he paused and turned his head from side to side, surveying the company and looking for all the world like a bloodhound seeking the scent. ‘And the only other thing that is known about the unfortunate man is that he intended to come here, where, by his own account, an old acquaintance of his was paying a visit.’

There was a short silence before everyone burst out with fresh denials of knowing the dead man. Dido looked eagerly from face to face, trying once more to determine who it was that was lying.

Lancelot rose from his seat and held up a hand. ‘Well, well,’ he said soothingly, ‘it is all a very great mystery. But Parry, you see, wishes to make quite certain; he thinks perhaps someone may recognise the fellow if we go to look at him; that perhaps someone
does
know him and the name only has been forgotten.’

The whole company now began to cry out at the idea of looking at the dead man.

‘Lord!’ declared Miss Gibbs with some enthusiasm, ‘I ain’t ever looked at a murdered man before! And I don’t know how I shall like it.’

Miss Emma was philosophical. ‘“The sleeping and the dead are but as pictures”,’ she quoted, with a grin, ‘“’tis the eye of childhood that fears a painted devil”.’

But there was a sharp intake of breath from Mrs Bailey’s quarter of the room. And Dido was extremely interested to see that lady looking red and anxious – and hurrying to hide her right hand beneath the needlework in her lap. And, before the fingers were entirely obscured, she noticed that they were crossed – very much as if Mrs Bailey was frightened and felt herself to be in urgent need of good luck.

Dido was instantly possessed of the idea that this was the culprit – the liar who wished to deny a knowledge of the dead man – but she was, unfortunately, prevented from making any further observation by a coming on of enervating symptoms.

The mention of a murdered man had proved too distressing for the delicate nerves of Mrs Manners – she was now half prostrate. And Dido could stay no longer in the hall; she must attend her aunt to her chamber and administer a large measure of brown medicine. It was exceedingly inconvenient to be called away at this most interesting juncture – and she had no wish to hear her aunt’s opinion of recent events.

‘It is too bad of Mr Parry to put us all to so much trouble,’ she said fretfully when Dido and the maid had at last settled her in her bed. ‘I am not accustomed to looking upon murdered bodies!’

‘No, Aunt.’

The dainty little hands plucked at the edge of the sheet. It was an unpromising sign; Dido was apprehensive of a ‘comfortable chat’.

‘It is all the fault of this wicked young man,’ complained Mrs Manners, ‘this Tom Lomax, as he calls himself. He has stolen away Letitia and hidden her and, I daresay, ruined her, and now he has killed this man at the inn. And I do not see why
I
should be made to look upon a dead man on
his
account.’

‘It is by no means certain,’ said Dido as calmly as she could, ‘that young Mr Lomax is guilty.’