The Sans Pareil Mystery (The Detective Lavender Mysteries Book 2) (16 page)

Olaya cast a last, lingering glance of regret at the unfinished plate of food then rose to leave with her sister.

‘Do you still find a place and an opportunity to pray and take Mass in this heathen country, Doña Magdalena?’ Juana asked as she fastened her cloak.

‘Oh yes, I pray all the time,’ Magdalena lied blithely and pointed across the room to the curtains which hid their sleeping quarters. ‘I have a devotional corner where I keep my Bible and the family reliquary. But I don’t have a priest to take my confession.’

‘That is another reason why you should come and stay with us for a while,’ Juana said. ‘Felipe has found us a priest, a Father Hernandez. I’m sure you have much to confess,’ she added, with a sly glance. ‘But it’s good to hear that you had time to remember to pack your religious items before your dramatic flight from Spain.’

And with that final curt statement, she turned on her heel and marched out of the door, Olaya trailing in her wake.

Magdalena breathed a sigh of relief when the rigid figures of the Menendez sisters finally disappeared down the stairwell. However, her relief was short-lived. She was shrewd enough to realise that there must be a reason why those dreadful women had called on her today. Two nights ago they had turned their back on her at the theatre. There was something behind this sudden flush of friendship and she doubted it was her brief popularity with the Duke of Clarence. She wasn’t sure what had prompted their renewed interest or offer of hospitality, but their quick departure after the discussion about Stephen left her uneasy.

Chapter Nineteen

Lavender, Woods and Magistrate Read stared silently at the innocuous piece of paper on the desk. The longcase clock ticked gently in the background. Dusk was falling and the gas-lamp lighters would soon be out but Lavender could still hear the cries of the market vendors outside in the cold streets of Covent Garden, shouting out their wares. London never stopped. This was the time of the day when frugal housewives would arrive at the fruit and vegetable market in the hope of buying produce at reduced prices and the fruitiers and florists vied with each other for customers, desperate for a last few coppers.

Read and Woods were silent for a considerable time. They had a lot to think about, Lavender realised. They had been shocked when he told them about April Clare’s deception and how she had been masquerading as her dead sister for the last few days. However, when he explained how genuinely scared the woman had been and that he believed the kidnapping had been an attempt to retrieve the document that lay on the table before them, their irritation had quickly turned to concerned curiosity.

‘What
has
this woman got herself mixed up with?’ Read took off his wig, tossed it onto the desk and scratched his close-cropped head. He pointed an ink-stained finger from his other hand at the sheet of paper. ‘What do you think it is?’

‘I think it’s in code,’ Lavender said. ‘A code that gives the location of ships. The location of our naval fleet in the Indian Ocean, probably. I have no idea about how accurate it is – or how relevant.’

Read frowned. ‘If you’re right, then we have a grave situation before us.’

Beside the magistrate, Woods scratched his stubbly chin. The glow from the flickering oil lamp on Read’s desk illuminated the tired confusion on the faces of both men.

‘Miss Clare had put her play script into Captain Willoughby’s bureau?’ Read asked.

‘Yes.’

‘Well, it may simply be one of his old papers that had become mixed up with her script. It is not inconceivable that a naval captain might be thinking about navigation and jot down a list of the degrees of latitude and longitude.’

‘That’s what she thought, at first,’ Lavender said. ‘But I don’t think that Captain Willoughby wrote that list. He sailed away from England over a year ago and that list has been written since November.’

‘How do you know that?’

‘Because of the line drawn through the word “Victor”. HMS
Victor
was a French ship called the
Iéna
. We captured her from the French in 1808 and renamed her HMS
Victor
. But she’s no longer one of ours. The French recaptured her in November last year. I read about it in the news-sheets. One reporter likened her to an inconstant mistress because she was forever swapping from one master to another.’

‘We’re grateful for your prodigious reading and excellent memory, Stephen,’ Read said.

Lavender glanced up, suspecting sarcasm but the magistrate’s praise was genuine. It seemed their earlier disagreement had been forgotten in the light of this new and disturbing development.

‘The
Victor
has been crossed off this list because she’s no longer part of our fleet. She’s back in the hands of the French,’ Lavender continued. ‘Captain Willoughby couldn’t have made this mark on a paper back in England because he was on the other side of the world when the ship was retaken.’

Read observed him shrewdly. ‘That is one explanation, I suppose, but you put a lot of significance into a single line through one word, Stephen.’

‘Don’t forget that somebody has gone to extreme lengths to retrieve this document,’ Lavender insisted. ‘Every mark on it has significance. These villains have kidnapped the woman they thought had taken it, ransacked her lodgings and possibly murdered Darius Jones so they could gain undisturbed access to Raleigh Close in order to hold their victim prisoner. This list is significant to someone.’

‘What is so damned important about a piece of paper with a few degrees of latitude and longitude marked on it?’ Woods jabbed a finger in the direction of the paper on Read’s desk. ‘Why would those coves kidnap and terrify two innocent gals in order to get it back?’

Read sighed. ‘We won’t know the answer to that question, Ned, until we have determined exactly what the paper is. But if Lavender is right, and this document does give the whereabouts now – or at some point in the future – of our naval fleet in the Indian Ocean, then the situation is more serious than I ever imagined.’

‘Why?’ Woods asked.

‘Because such information is classified,’ Lavender explained patiently. ‘If it landed in the hands of the French, then the lives of thousands of our seamen and officers may be in danger.’

‘Gawd’s teeth!’ exclaimed Woods. He sat back in his chair in horror. His gaze flicked between Lavender and Read. ‘Have we stumbled across a Froggie spy ring?’

‘I don’t know,’ Lavender said. ‘But a document like this shouldn’t be lying around the green room of the Sans Pareil Theatre. Someone has been careless.’

‘That woman in the Hart Street bakery, that Jacquetta Higgin, claims she heard foreigners talkin’ outside her shop one evenin’,’ Woods reminded them. ‘She thought they were French.’

‘Do you think that somebody who works at the theatre is involved?’ Read asked.

Lavender shrugged. ‘There has to be some connection to the theatre. That is the only other place where Miss Clare took her play script; the paper before us must have become caught up in her script when she put it down in the green room.’

‘I thought Admiral Lord Nelson had destroyed the French fleet at Trafalgar.’ Deep furrows embedded themselves into Woods’ broad forehead. ‘Why would it matter if anyone knew where our ships were in the South Seas? The French have no ships left. Britannia rules the waves!’

‘Not quite,’ Lavender said smiling. ‘The French still have substantial frigate squadrons at the Île-de-France and Île Bonaparte in the Indian Ocean. They use these islands as raiding bases to disrupt our trade links with British India. The East India Company sends millions of pounds worth of goods back to London every year. The Royal Navy is dominant in these waters and protects the heavily laden East Indiamen as they sail home. But French warships have become a real nuisance; they capture or sink trading vessels and isolated British frigates.’

‘So this case is about ruddy piracy as well as spyin’?’ asked Woods. He had raised his eyebrows so high they disappeared beneath his hair.

Read smiled. ‘No doubt Napoleon Bonaparte would call it an act of war, rather than piracy, Ned,’ he said. ‘Remember that not all wars are fought on an Iberian battlefield under the command of Viscount Wellington. Some wars are more subtle, more remote – but still as devastating to our island nation.’

‘We need to verify this document,’ Lavender said. It had been a long day and he was tired.

‘I have a contact in the Home Department in Whitehall,’ said Read. ‘Captain Sackville will know what it is. I will pass it across to him first thing tomorrow.’

‘What do you want us to do?’

‘Go home,’ Read replied. ‘Miss Clare is safe under the watchful eyes of our constables and there is nothing else you can do tonight. Things will be clearer in the morning when my contact has had a look at this document. Call on me at midday after I have finished my early session in court. Then we will know how to proceed.’

‘Let’s get a brandy,’ Lavender said as he and Woods pulled up their coat collars and descended down the steps of the building onto Bow Street. Despite his exhaustion, Lavender’s mind was still in turmoil with the day’s events and he welcomed the opportunity to wind down for a while in front of a blazing tavern fire with Woods’ company and a large glass of brandy. ‘It’s early yet and Betsy doesn’t expect us all for supper for a while.’

‘I can’t be long,’ Woods warned. ‘And neither can you. Don’t forget you have to collect Doña Magdalena. I’d better get back and give Betsy a hand. She’ll be mad if you’re late.’

‘Just one brandy in the Nags’ Head, Ned,’ said Lavender. ‘I have something else to tell you. Besides which, I know Betsy well enough to realise that she won’t appreciate any help from you; you’ll just get under her feet.’

Woods thought for a moment and glanced down Hart Street at the welcoming glow that emanated from the small-paned bow windows of the Nag’s Head tavern. ‘All right,’ he said. ‘But just one drink, mind you. I’ll get the rollin’ pin across my lugholes tonight if I stagger home fuddled with brandy.’

It was quiet in the Nag’s Head. Centuries old, the ceilings of the public house were low and smoke-blackened, the windows small. Behind the bar, tiers of mirrored shelving displayed a wide range of brandies and other spirits in a wonderful array of glass bottles that glittered in shades of emerald and sapphire. The light from the chandeliers full of dripping tallow candles reflected in the glass and went someway to lifting the gloom in the ancient tavern. The place was popular with the Bow Street officers and the landlord nodded to them in recognition as they strode across the uneven floorboards towards the back of the inn where they found a couple of vacant settles next to the stone fireplace.

Woods sat and stretched out his legs. His boots were still splattered with mud from his ride to the Five Fields. ‘I can’t believe that the gal pretended to be her dead sister,’ he said. ‘She had me fooled.’

‘It was an accomplished act,’ Lavender said. ‘But she had good reason to lie. She was scared for her life.’

‘I know what it is you want to talk to me about.’ Woods gave Lavender a conspiratorial wink across the hearth. ‘It’s about that arrogant sawbones, Allison, isn’t it? You want to tell me that I was right and the jumped-up little dandyprat got it wrong, didn’t he? Mrs Willoughby has had a child.’

Lavender smiled. He took up the poker, leant forward and stoked up the small fire in the grate. ‘Actually, Ned, he was right. I believe the child in the Willoughby nursery belongs to April Clare – not Harriet Willoughby.’

‘What?’

A barmaid with a stained gown and a mob cap on top of her thick mop of unruly hair appeared by their side. She poured them both a large glass of glinting amber liquid. She gave Lavender a beaming, toothless smile when he tossed her a coin and told her to leave the jug.

‘I don’t understand,’ Woods said. ‘How is that possible?’

‘You remember that April Clare previously worked at Drury Lane Theatre before the fire?’

‘Yes.’

‘Well, she had an admirer there, another actor; an Irish fellow by the name of Mr Seamus MacAuley.’

‘Where does he fit into the kidnappin’?’

‘He doesn’t. He returned to Ireland after the Drury Lane fire and works in the Theatre Royal in Cork. As far as Miss Clare knows, MacAuley is still there but I have already written to them to confirm this. We need to eliminate him from the inquiry. Lovers can behave erratically – especially if there has been a tiff. There have been several examples of spurned men kidnapping women. But I don’t suspect that MacAuley had anything to do with this case; I think he is safely in Ireland. However, I do suspect that when MacAuley returned to his native country he left April Clare with more than a broken heart.’

Woods stared hard at him; trying to understand his meaning. As realisation slowly dawned, his constable’s jaw slackened and his mouth gaped open with surprise. ‘You think he left her with child?’

‘I’m quite sure that he did. That would explain Miss Clare’s mysterious absence from the theatre during last summer. There is no sick aunt in Gloucester. I believe that April Clare took the time off from her career and disappeared out into the provinces in order to give birth to a child.’

‘And her sister, Mrs Willoughby, agreed to bring up the actresses’ by-blow as her own?’

‘Yes.’

‘But why the secrecy and the lies? London actresses, married and unmarried, have children all the time. That tragedy queen, Sarah Siddons, has several – and Dorothy Jordan had a few before she even got with the Duke of Clarence.’

‘Yes, actresses have illegitimate offspring,’ Lavender said. ‘But the daughters of barons do not, especially if their sisters have married respectable naval captains. The scandal would have been huge. It was essential for the reputation of both sisters – and Lady Caroline – that Miss Clare’s indiscretion didn’t become common knowledge.’

Woods nodded. ‘Ahh – how did you work it out?’

Lavender took a long drink from his glass, sat back and undid the buttons of his greatcoat. Their corner of the tavern was warming up nicely. He found the scent of the woodsmoke and the gentle crackle of the fire soothing. As the brandy warmed his innards, he felt the tension ease from his tired body and mind.

‘It was those ill-fitting shoes that finally solved this riddle for me,’ he said. ‘Magdalena told me that when she carried her son, her feet grew larger. Suddenly it made sense. The two women may be identical twins but April Clare had slightly larger feet after the birth of her child. When the two women swapped clothes to play their little trick on Lady Caroline, poor Harriet Willoughby got a pair of shoes that didn’t fit.’

‘Gawd’s teeth!’ Woods exclaimed. He burst out laughing and held up his glass in a toast to Lavender. The amber liquid swirled, caught the light and glinted. ‘Well done, sir! Mystery solved.’ Woods drained his glass, poured more brandy and sat back. ‘I’ll tell you what though, I’m surprised that Captain Willoughby agreed to this. I can’t imagine that many respectable naval captains would have voluntarily taken in their sister-in-law’s nipper as their own.’

Lavender glanced at his constable through partially veiled eyes. ‘Perhaps Captain Willoughby doesn’t know the truth,’ he said slowly. ‘Maybe he thinks that the child in the crib in his Wandsworth house belongs to him and his wife.’

‘What?’ Woods’ drink slopped onto the flagstones. He reached for the earthenware jug and poured himself another. ‘You think those women have gulled him?’ He looked incredulous.

‘Think about it, Ned,’ Lavender said. ‘Captain Willoughby sailed away at Christmas last year. It would be easy to fool him. In the summer a child is born. If Mrs Willoughby pretended to be with child and padded out her clothing, who was to know any different? All she had to do was disappear with her sister into the provinces when the birth drew close and return with an infant. How would anyone know whose baby it was?’’