The Mysterious Death of Mr. Darcy (63 page)

A weight to hold me down
. But he was not in the water as had been the men his cousin and McKye had pulled from the lake. If not to keep him in the box, what was the weight's purpose?
To keep others out.
The words exploded in his brain.

“They have buried Fitzwilliam alive!” Elizabeth called as she raced for the cemetery. She hiked her skirt and skipped over headstones and angelic statues to reach the cemetery's center. “We need light,” she shouted to the two men who had followed her. “We need to find a fresh grave.” In a panic, she turned in a circle. There were so many graves for such a small village.

“Go!” Edward ordered Cowan. “Pound on every door. We need lanterns.”

The tears rolled down Elizabeth's cheeks, but she did not bother to wipe them away. “Where do we start?” she pleaded.

Edward's eyes grew in disbelief. “I have no idea,” he admitted.

Elizabeth's heart screamed against the injustice. “Find the curate. Locate the sexton. Beat Mr. Gaylord senseless,” she demanded. “Someone knows which grave does not belong.”

The colonel swallowed hard. “Could you be mistaken, Elizabeth?”

She did not want to think of her dear husband buried beneath her feet, but Elizabeth did not doubt that it was so. “He is calling for me,” she said weakly. “Fitzwilliam believes he will die soon.” Her eyes fell on her husband's cousin. “He needs you, Colonel. Fitzwilliam needs us both.”

Edward nodded his agreement. “Holbrook is bringing Williamson with him. I will seek the sexton in the wait house.” He disappeared into the night.

Suddenly, Elizabeth was alone in the cemetery. Her eyes searched for any clue. “Not in the center,” she reasoned. “Those are the village founders.”

Methodically, she began to pace off row after row of markers. “Mr. Gaylord could not have had enough time to dig a proper grave alone,” Elizabeth said aloud as she stepped around yet another headstone. Surprisingly, the moonlight seemed to brighten the polished stone. “If the man could not accomplish the task alone, then it was likely the grave had been dug for another.
Was the earth even now stealing her dear husband's last breath
? The thought rocked Elizabeth's composure. A violent shiver ran down her spine.

How long could he breathe the little air which remained in the box before it would be no more? Darcy thought to scream, but he knew the futility of the act. He could smell the fresh earth surrounding the box.

“Elizabeth.” He mouthed the word. “My God. I will never see her again, and she will never know my fate. How long will my wife grieve? If they do not find me and identify my body, Elizabeth will be forced to remain married to a corpse. She would never be free to find happiness.” Sweat beaded his forehead, and his teeth clenched. The thought of how his wife would suffer tightened Darcy's throat in grief. He had thought to die to save Elizabeth's future. Instead, his dying would condemn his wife to a lifetime of mourning.

“The new graves from Woodvine,” Elizabeth said as she recognized the number of freshly dug graves. “Dear God, where do I begin?” She had worked her way along the rows of more recent headstones to arrive at a line of new graves. “Fitzwilliam!” she yelled in frustration. “Fitzwilliam!” But only the echo of her voice remained in the silent burial place.

“Elizabeth!” She turned to observe the colonel's hurried return. Behind him was the familiar face of the curate and a man with whom she had no previous acquaintance. Out of breath, Edward caught her hand. “Holbrook has brought both Mr. Williamson and the sexton, Mr. Sharp, with him.”

Elizabeth's relief nearly took her to her knees, and Edward caught her to his side. “Oh, thank you, Sir,” she gushed. “I fear a great injustice has been exacted against my husband.” Her words tumbled over one another as her anxiety rose. “I believe Mr. Darcy has been buried alive in one of these graves.” Elizabeth gestured to the newly turned earth behind her. “Can you tell us which of these sites should not be occupied?”

Even in the moonlight she could see the man's countenance pale. “Aye, Ma'am.” The man's voice betrayed his anxiousness. “Unless the deceased be one of the founding families, we place the departed in rows from the center to the outside boundaries. Of late, we have had more than our share.” The man laughed nervously when he realized what he said. To cover his
faux pas
, Mr. Sharp led the way along the path. “The gypsy known as Besnik and the stranger who assisted him in dishonoring the late Mr. Darcy's resting place be in the row with the charity cases, as is the one who attacked you, Ma'am.” Elizabeth shivered, and she pulled Darcy's coat closer about her. “Go on, Mr. Sharp,” she coaxed.

“I apologize, Ma'am, if I sound insensitive.” When Elizabeth did not respond, he nervously continued. “The two men not identified by Mr. Williamson or Mr. Holbrook be mixed among those.”

Edward encouraged, “A new grave, Mr. Sharp.”

“Yes, Sir.” He led them along a narrow path between the rows. “These graves be awaiting a marker,” Sharp observed. “This first one be Mr. Hotchkiss. Then Mr. Bates. Mr. Pugh.” The sexton counted his recent work on his fingers. “Falstad. Clarkson. Lawson. And Mr. Glover.”

Edward's voice asked the question Elizabeth could not. “Is that all of them?” A thirteenth grave remained open.

Sharp frowned noticeably. “The last one be for Mr. Barriton. Mr. Williamson asked me to prepare it today. We must put the Woodvine butler on the row with the gypsies and the other thieves and charity cases. Considering his crime and all. In most villages, those types would not be afforded a place within the church's land.” The man appeared proud of the village's benevolence.

Elizabeth clutched at Edward's arm. “There must be some mistake.” Her voice sounded hauntingly empty. “I am certain Mrs. Stowbridge and Mr. Gaylord have executed a most grievous crime against my husband. They had no time to dig a proper grave, and I am convinced the pair meant to place my husband in an open gravesite. As bizarre as this story sounds, are there any other possibilities?”

The man shifted his weight fretfully. “I kin think of none, Ma'am. All those in this area be accounted for.”

Edward pressed, “Are there other open graves on the property? Perhaps one for a villager not involved with the chaos at Woodvine.”

“Can't say that there are, Colonel,” Sharp responded. “Only one not occupied be the one reserved for Samuel Darcy. I prepared that one again after the incident with the explosion. I be thinking that someone would recover Mr. Darcy's body.”

“Why not bury Mr. Darcy in Mr. Darcy's grave?” Elizabeth murmured.

“Show us where Samuel Darcy's gravesite is located,” Edward demanded.

Sharp gestured behind him. “It be beside the Darcy crypt.” He led them toward the revered sites of the village elite. “I thought it best to keep it close so Mr. Darcy could be moved into his memorial once it was properly repaired.”

Elizabeth and Edward trailed close on the sexton's heels. “Please God,” she whispered. “Allow us to be in time.”

“The grave be right over...” The man stopped abruptly. “Someone has filled her in.”

Edward pushed past him. “How deep is this?” he demanded. He was digging the loose dirt out with his hands. “We need shovels, Mr. Sharp, and make it quick.”

Elizabeth dropped to her knees beside the colonel. She dug her hands into the packed dirt. “Hurry!” she yelled at the astounded sexton. The man scurried away. “Dig, Colonel,” she encouraged. “And pray.”

The air had grown thin, and Darcy knew his time had drawn near. He held no doubt Mrs. Stowbridge had exacted a most well-devised revenge: Darcy would know he was going to die and, therefore, grieve for his inability to change his fate. She had drugged him long enough to place him in another's coffin and lower him into a grave. A blanket lined the bottom and sides of the box. Darcy could smell the scent of freshly cut wood, but also the distinct smell of gunpowder. And it was that odor which worried him. He feared he had encountered Samuel Darcy's great treasure.

Darcy had no doubt the explosion which had killed Besnik Gry had been because of the torpedo with which Samuel Darcy had experimented before his death. “Likely placed in Samuel's coffin by Mr. Crescent,” he murmured. Samuel's valet had been willing to face Society's censure by preparing his master's body in the manner of the ancient Egyptians, so it only made sense that the valet had protected Samuel into the next world.

“Why did I not see the possibility earlier?” he chastised his foolish pride. “Because you were not on Death's threshold previously.” Darcy answered his own question.
Because your own mortality brings clarity.

Suddenly, Mrs. Stowbridge's words came back to him. “One lives. My youngest has recently passed. But the elder is a strong leader of my husband's family.”

Besnik Gry
, Darcy thought.
The lady ran off with a gypsy. Drewe's poem spoke of Mab and nomadic tribes. And Andrzej Gry argued with the woman we knew as Mrs. Ridgeway. These revelations explain why the housekeeper sold the horses to the gypsies and also why Stowbridge objected to their presence in the area. His wife's sons reminded the magistrate daily of everything the man had lost.