Cain His Brother (41 page)

“We must make the coroner believe there is a question of murder,” Rathbone went on with rising eagerness. “If he thinks it is accident or suicide he will simply close the matter. And darrunit, that is going to be hard. The only possible guilty party is Ravensbrook, and that won't sit easily with any coroner I know.”

“So we had better begin now,” Monk said decisively. He looked at Goode. “I assume you will demand a full coroner's inquest for your client, and time to gather evidence?” He turned to Rathbone. “And you will ask to represent the Crown, since you are the prosecutor?” He turned lastly to Hester, assuming her agreement without it crossing his mind to ask her.

“You and I will begin to delve into Angus's past. We shall have to do it separately, because there is no time to do it together. You already know far more about Genevieve than I do.” Humor and self-mockery flickered across his face. “And you seem to be a far better judge of her character. Find out all you can of Angus from her, including where, when and how they first met, and all she knows of his relationship with Caleb, and Ravensbrook. This time, the truth. I shall go to Ravensbrook's country home and see what I can learn there. That is apparently where the brothers grew up.”

“What about the Isle of Dogs, and Limehouse?” Rathbone asked.

“I'll go there,” Hester said immediately. “After I have seen Genevieve, and perhaps Titus Niven.”

Goode was aghast. “You cannot go to Limehouse, Miss Latterly! You have not the faintest idea what it is like, or you would not entertain such a thought. A gentlewoman like yourself would be-”

“I have been nursing the typhoid victims there for more than a month, Mr.

Goode,” she said patiently. “I am in an excellent position to investigate in that quarter. I daresay I know more of the individual residents than anyone else. I could name you at least two hundred, and tell you their families and their ancestors. And I could tell you who they have lost recently. They will talk to me as they would not to any of you. That I can swear.”

Goode looked taken aback, and considerably impressed.

“I see. Perhaps I had better stick to my own last. Would I be presumptuous to be concerned for your safety?”

“Not at all, but probably unnecessarily worried,” she replied with a generous smile. “Since Caleb is dead, no one is going to feel the same urgency tþ defend him now, or fear the reprisals for betraying him by the truth.”

Rathbone rose to his feet. “I think a good night's sleep is called for, before we begin. Let us meet here again in three days' time and discuss what we have learned.”

“Agreed.” Goode rose also. “Miss Latterly, may I find you a hansom and escort you as far as your home?”

“Thank you,” she accepted graciously. “That would be most agreeable. It has been a somewhat exhausting day.”

Ebenezer Goode woke very early the following morning, unable to sleep any longer because his mind was churning over the extraordinary events of the preceding day. He had not liked Caleb Stone; indeed, privately he had had little doubt that Stone was guilty of the murder of his brother exactly as he was charged. But there had been an extraordinary vitality in the man, a core of passion which made his death unexpectedly hard to accept.

He lay with the blankets up to his chin, turning over and over in his mind what Rathbone had said, and that odd fellow Monk. Did the nurse really know what she was talking about? Was it conceivable that Milo Ravensbrook could either have willed Caleb's death, or worse still, have brought it about?

The thought was especially hideous when he remembered the remarkable face of Lady Ravensbrook, the strength in it, the power of feeling and imagination, even ravaged by recent disease as it was. There was something in her which awoke an extraordinary interest in him. He found even while he was thinking of ways and means of discerning the truth, and the near impossibility of proving it, it was her features impressed on his closed eyelids, her expression, her mouth, even her voice in his ears. She had said barely a dozen words to him, and every inflection remained.

He rose at half past six, while it was still dark, sent for water from a very surprised housemaid, then shaved, washed, dressed and requested breakfast by quarter past seven. His cook was not in the least amused, and allowed it to be known. He did not care in the slightest, although good cooks were not easy to obtain.

He left the house at eight and walked briskly, swinging his rather handsome stick, and so deep in thought he passed a dozen acquaintances without seeing them, and addressed two more by their fathers' names.

By five minutes past nine he was outside Ravensbrook House, and saw his lordship leave in his own carriage. Goode mounted the steps and pulled the brass bell knob.

“Good morning, sir,” the footman said with only the merest surprise.

“Good morning,” Goode replied with a charming smile. “I am sorry to disturb the family so early, but there are matters which cannot wait. Will you ask Lady Ravensbrook if I may speak with her? I shall await her convenience, naturally.” He passed over his card.

“Lady Ravensbrook, sir?” The footman was uncertain he had heard correctly.

It seemed absurd. What could the lawyer have to say to Lady Ravensbrook?

“If you please.” Goode stepped inside and took off his coat and gave the man his hat. He had no intention of being turned away, and he was used to pressing his cause. He had not become one of London's leading barristers by being easily refused or overridden. “Thank you. So good of you. Should I wait in the morning room? Yes?” He had been here only once before, but he recalled it was the second door to the left. He assumed consent, and strode across the hall, leaving the footman holding his clothes, and with little choice but to accede.

He was obliged to wait nearly three quarters of an hour in the calm, ornate room with its heavy curtains and shelves of books, but when at last the door opened, it was Enid Ravensbrook who stood there. Instantly he felt guilty. She looked desperately afraid. Her lavender-colored gown hung on her, in spite of the fact her maid had taken it in as much as was possible without recutting it altogether. Her hair had lost its luster and even the cleverest dressing could not conceal how much of it had come out in her illness. Her skin had no color at all, but nothing could dim the intelligence in her eyes or the underlying strength in the lines of her cheekbones and jutting nose and jaw. She looked at him with unwavering courage.

“Good morning, Mr. Goode. My footman tells me you wish to speak with me.”

She closed the door and walked quite slowly, as if she were afraid of losing her balance.

He made half a gesture towards helping her, and knew instantly that he should not. He ached to reach out and give her his strength, but it would be an intrusion. He did not need to meet her eyes to know it.

She reached the nearest chair and sat down, smiling at last.

“Thank you, Mr. Goode. I am obliged to you. I hate being an invalid. Now, what is it you wish to say to me? I presume it is to do with poor Caleb. I knew him very little, and yet I cannot help grieving that he should die so.

Although, God knows, perhaps the alternative was worse.”

“But you knew Angus,” he said quickly. “With Lord Ravensbrook's regard for him, and his own gratitude and affection, he must have come here often.”

It had been a statement, as if he did not doubt it, yet the look on her face was one of uncertainty and denial.

“No.” She shook her head fractionally. “He came, of course, but not so very often, and he seldom stayed long. I am not sure if it was because Genevieve felt a certain… uncomfortableness here? I think my husband overawed her to a degree. He can be…” Again she hesitated, and he had a sudden sharp perception that it was not the words she was struggling with, nor even if she should express the thought to him, but the thought itself. It was something she had long avoided facing, because of its pain. He was stunned by how much it distressed him.

He hesitated. Perhaps it was not worth pursuing at such cost. It could all be left to the coroner to cover with polite decencies.

But the doubt lasted only a moment. He could not live with such cowardice, and it was not worthy of her.

He smiled, “Please, ma'am, tell me the truth as you feel it, as you saw it.

It is not a time for lies, however gently meant, or seemingly kind.”

“Isn't it?” She frowned. “Both Angus and Caleb are dead, poor creatures, and their hatred with them, whatever it was for. It is gone now…

finished.”

“I wish it were.” He meant it profoundly. “But there will have to be an inquest into Caleb's death. We need to know why suddenly he launched himself into such a violent and hopeless act.”

“Do we'?” Her face was calm, her inner decision made. “What does it matter now, Mr. Goode? It seems he never lived in peace. Cannot he now at least be buried and left to rest in whatever ease his soul can find? And we with him. My husband has known little but grief of one sort or another since he first took them into his home.”

“Even with Angus?”

“No. No, that was quite unfair of me. Angus brought him great joy. He was everything he could have wished.”

“But?” he said gently, insistently.

“He was!”

“There is a shadow in your voice, a hesitation,” he insisted. “What is it?

What was it in Angus, Lady Ravensbrook, which made Caleb hate him so passionately? They were close once. Why did they grow so hideously far apes?þ “I don't know!”

“But you guess? You must have thought about it, wondered. Even if only for the pain it brought your husband.”

“Of course I thought about it. I lay awake many hours wondering if there were some way they might be reconciled. I searched my mind. I asked my husband often, until I realized he knew as little as I, and that to speak of it gave him pain. He and Angus were not…”

“Not what?”

She spoke reluctantly. He was dragging the words out of her, and he knew it.

“Easy in each other's company,” she admitted. “It was as if the shadow of Caleb were always there, a darkness between them, a wound that could never be completely forgotten.”

“But you liked Angus?”

“Yes, yes I liked him.” Now the shadow was gone, she spoke wholeheartedly.

“He was extraordinarily kind. He was a man you could admire without reservation, and yet so modest he never put himself forward, was never pompous. Yes, I liked Angus enormously. I never saw him lose his temper or perform a cruel act.” The marks of grief were plain in her face, but simple loss, without doubt or underlying darkness.

He hated himself for persisting, and yet the nagging anxiety was in his mind like a toothache, dull and ever present, and sometimes giving a stab so sharp it robbed the breath.

“Never?”

“No,” she said as if she had not expected to feel so. “Never. I am not surprised my husband loved him. He was all he could have wished in a son, had he been granted one.”

“He must have hated Caleb for destroying him,” he said gently. “It would be understandable if he could never forgive such an act of treachery. Most especially since Angus still kept such loyalty towards Caleb.”

She turned away, her voice even lower. “Yes, I could not blame him. And yet he does not seem to feel the anger I do. It is almost as if…” He waited, leaning forward, the silence in the room prickling his ears.

She turned very slowly to look at him.

“I don't know what you expect me to say, Mr. Goode…

“The truth, ma'am. It is the only thing clean enough, the only thing which will in the end stand above all the pain.”

“I don't know it!”

“It was almost as if… what?” he prompted.

“As if he had known one day it must happen, and it was like a blow he had long awaited, and the reality of it is the end of the tension, almost a solace. Is that a terrible thing to say?”

“No. It is merely sad,” he said gently. “And if we were honest, perhaps something we might all say. One can become very tired.”

She smiled, for the first time some brightness reached her eyes.

“You are very kind, Mr. Goode. I think perhaps you are well named.” For the first time in many years, he felt the color warm in his face, and a strange mixture of pleasure and an awareness of how lonely he was.

Oliver Rathbone was in court when it reconvened. The benches for the crowd were almost empty. The newspapers were blaring headlines that Caleb Stone had tried to commit another murder, this time of the man who had been a father and a benefactor to him, and a greater justice had prevailed-he himself had become the victim. The matter was ended.

The judge looked for Ebenezer Goode, saw his absence, and raised his eyebrows at Rathbone.

“There is no one to defend, my lord,” Rathbone said with a shrug. He did not know where Goode was, and was privately a little disconcerted that he was not present. He had counted on his support.

“Indeed,” the judge said dryly. “Not an entirely satisfactory explanation, but I suppose it will have to suffice.” He turned to the jury and in formal manner told them what they all already knew. Caleb Stone was dead. There was no possibility of proceeding with the trial, since he could not now give evidence or speak in his own defense.

Therefore there could be no verdict. A mistrial was declared, the jury thanked and dismissed.

Rathbone saw the judge afterwards in his oak-paneled chambers, the early March sunlight shone pale through the high windows.

“What is it?” the judge asked with some surprise. “You have no more interest in this, Rathbone. Whatever we may believe of him, we cannot pursue Caleb Stone any further. He has made the only escape which is beyond us to retrieve.”

“I know that, my lord.” Rathbone stood in front of him looking down to where the judge sat in his leather chair, a small man with lines under his eyes. “All I want is to be sure that his escape was either an accident or of his own planning.”

“I don't understand you.” The judge frowned. “Ravensbrook said it was an accident, but if it was suicide, are you really so passionate in prosecution you want it proved?” His mouth tightened. “Why, man? You want him buried in unconsecrated ground? It is unlike you to be so vindictive.

It has nothing to do with providing for the widow, or allowing her to marry again, in due time, if she so wishes.”

“I don't believe it was suicide,” Rathbone answered.

“Murder?” The judge's rather tattered eyebrows rose in astonishment. “Did you not hear what happened? Lord Ravensbrook went in to see-“

“I know what he said,” Rathbone cut across him. “I was there within a few minutes of it. I saw Ravensbrook and saw the body. I think there is a possibility Ravensbrook murdered him.”

“Lord Ravensbrook?” The judge was not shocked, he simply did not believe it. “Do you realize what you are saying, Rathbone? Why on earth would Lord Ravensbrook murder anyone, let alone his own ward, appalling as the man was? And before the defense, which could conceivably have made a case for an accident.”

“That is something I intend to find out,” Rathbone said through his teeth.

“I have Monk on the case now.”

“You've taken leave of your senses,” the judge said with a sigh, leaning back in his chair as if he needed the softness of its leather padding to cushion his bones. “The idea has no foundation whatever.” His eyes narrowed. “Unless there is something quite extraordinary which you are concealing from the court. If there is, you place yourself in considerable jeopardy.”

“There isn't,” Rathbone replied with feeling. “I know nothing beyond what has already been revealed, but I believe that something exists. I would like the coroner to open the inquest, and then adjourn it so we may find the evidence to prove it.”

“And you expect me to tell him this?” The judge's pale blue eyes were wide with incredulity. “I'm sorry, Rathbone, but even if I did, without some evidence to support you, he would think me as mad as I think you. You'll have three days at the most.”

“It's not enough.”

“Maybe that's as well. Now if that is all I can do for you, allow me to prepare for my next case. Good day to you.”

Hester also rose early, and took a hansom to Genevieve's house. She had reason to believe she would be at home, since she was no longer required to help Enid, and there was no further business to be hoped for at the Old Bailey. In the prevailing tragic circumstances, she would hardly be either receiving social calls or making any. The business of Angus's death would have to wait upon legal procedure.

She was not disappointed. Genevieve looked pale and exhausted, but reasonably composed.

“How are you?” Hester said as she was led into the kitchen, the only room in the house with any warmth. It was spacious and full of agreeable smells of baking bread and fresh linen drying on the large airing rack across the ceiling, let up and down on a rope pulley fastened to the wall. There was no one else present. Presumably the cook had been allowed to go, in the interests of the increasingly stringent economy. A housemaid had answered the door, and perhaps there could be a woman come in to do the heavy work once or twice a week. No doubt the nurserymaid would be the last to be let go. A manservant would have been too expensive even to consider.