Death of a Schoolgirl: The Jane Eyre Chronicles (32 page)

When we reached the shoulder of the coffin, Rufina and I stopped to “say good-bye.” We both pivoted slightly so as to be facing Selina Biltmore’s mortal remains.

What a shock!

Selina Biltmore had been no child—she was a full-grown woman!

Miss Miller had said Selina was just sixteen, but one glance affirmed that she had been quite mature for her age. Although death had distorted her facial features, it was clear that Selina Biltmore had been blessed with a noble profile. As for her figure, the contours of her shroud revealed that she tended toward corpulence. I lingered, trying to get a better sense of this young woman, but Rufina’s hand flew to her mouth and she made a retching noise. Fearful that she was going to be ill, I hurried us along.

No wonder she’d been so successful at bullying the others
.
Selina had been an adult in a world full of children.

*  *  *

After I prepared for the day’s lessons, I revisited my list of possible murder suspects and decided to start at the bottom of the building and work my way up.

“Lo and behold! Our scholar! Bet ye’ve coming sniffing around for somethin’ to eat, right?” A puff of flour blew up around Cook, enveloping her in a powdery white aura.

“Please, ma’am.” I settled on the kitchen stool. It was as good a pretext for my presence as any.

She slid a scone onto a plate, generously slathered it with clotted cream, and slopped a dollop of jam on the side. From the stove, she grabbed a kettle and poured water in her china teapot. The gold trim on the lid and graceful forget-me-nots painted on the body suggested a grand provenance—although the two large chips marred its beauty. The triangle knocked from the spout made pouring tea a challenge, but the chip from the pointed handle on the top of the lid was more of a cosmetic failing than a functional one.

“Your teapot is lovely.”

“Aye, it was a gift from my daughter. The toffs at the manor where she worked planned to toss it into the bin. Larissa asked for it. They took a half crown from her pay. They who was going to get shod of it! On account of a chip in the spout! My darling daughter knew how much I likes my tea,” she said in a gruff voice as she poured me a cup. “It’s all I’ve got left of her. That and a lock of her hair. Such a dear girl. I use that teapot every day and it makes me feel closer to my baby. Can’t visit her grave, you see. It’s too far. Feels like she’s far away, too.”

“Maybe,” I said. “But I would guess she’s close to you, nearer than you think.”

“I hope so.” Wiping the back of her hand across her eyes, Cook smeared more flour on her prominent forehead and bustled away from me.

“I am sorry for your loss.”

“Thank ye. Ain’t just my loss. The world lost an angel.”

“That’s a shame,” I said with sincerity. “I regret that I’ll never have the chance to meet her. No one thinks that way about Selina, do they?”

Cook’s laugh was more of a short bark of derision than a nod to real humor. “That one? She’s probably busy dancing with the demons!”

A neat segue, and I seized upon it. “Mr. Waverly has been questioning people regarding Selina’s death. Hard to believe, but they say the girl may have been murdered.”

Cook bustled around the kitchen, keeping her back to me. Finally, she said, “And what if she was? Whoever did it would have rid the world of one of Satan’s own. They ought to be thanking whoe’er done it, and that’s a fact.”

“You didn’t like Selina?”

“Weren’t nobody liked that one.” Slapping a large glob of dough onto the counter, Cook turned it over twice. “There was a mean streak in her, miss. I suspect her parents hoped Mrs. Thurston could cure her of it, discipline it out of her, but that’s rot, ain’t it? You cannot turn a cat into a dog, or a dog into a rat, and you cannot make a body something they ain’t. Besides, Maude Thurston ain’t nobody’s fool. She closes her door at night and lets the girls fend for themselves, don’t she?”

Cook worked the dough. She did not turn to face me, but her words rang loud and clear. “A bad seed. Fruit of a diseased tree. That girl caused a world of hurt and heartache in her short life—and she would have done more mischief if she could! Her father thought the sun rose and set on his precious child. She could do no wrong in his eyes. Well, he was a blind man.”

With that, she gave the dough a ringing slap.

“The world’s a better place without that she-demon.” Cook punched the dough so hard that it tore. “I’m telling you the God’s honest truth.”

Miss Miller continued to evade me. I tried to catch her in the hallways, but she proved more elusive than the dream ghost of Helen Burns. Once she stuck her head in my classroom and borrowed Rufina to mind the Infants for “a while.” By the time I was on my feet and within whispering distance, she had turned tail and vanished. At the luncheon table, she sat stiffly and played with her food. All the while, she took elaborate pains to avoid my glance.

The girls changed from their mourning slippers into boots so we could go to Hyde Park. On our way out, we bumped into Miss Jones, coming from the parlor and carrying in her hands a fulsome hank of long chestnut hair. Selina’s hair.

“For the mourning jewelry,” said the tall teacher. “I have a braiding frame made from a man’s top hat, and a new pattern for a finished brooch that resembles a bow. It should look quite lovely, I think.”

She winced and touched her fingers to her temple.

“Sick headaches,” she said. “They attack me regularly and keep me up all night. I believe I shall be forced to take a bit
of medicine and lie down. Would you ask Signora Delgatto to take over my class when you return from your plein air class? I fear I will be sound asleep. Probably right through dinner. It is an inescapable side effect of the drops.”

“Yes, of course. I shall do so when we return. Meanwhile, allow me to help you upstairs. Rufina? Lead the girls outside, please.”

I bore the teacher’s weight as best I could while Miss Jones and I climbed the stairs. Because she towered above me, her limbs put a heavy burden on mine. After she took to her bed, she directed me to look in her top drawer. There I found a dark brown glass bottle labeled
LAUDANUM
. There was also an eyedropper and a small jar of honey. As per her instructions, I added the tincture and a spoonful of honey to a glass of water. While she drank, I arranged her pillows and helped her remove her mourning slippers, noting the length of her feet—they certainly could have been the same size as the footprints leading down the stairs because hers were long and slender. As I tucked her slippers next to her boots, my fingers brushed against the leather. Soaking wet. She must have worn her boots outside!

My mind raced. Sometime in the night, Parthena might have left the building—and since the footsteps only went down the stairs and not up, she must not have returned until after I mopped up the powder.

“Please, could you see to the dead girl’s hair?”

At her direction, I started to wrap a hank of it in a clean linen square.

“There are two large pieces of hair there, am I correct?” she asked.

“I see but one.”

“Ah, then I dropped the other. I hate to ask but…”

“I shall go downstairs and retrieve it.” I retraced our steps to the landing, down the stairs, and through the hallway, but I did not see the missing locks of hair. There was only one other place to look. Opening the door quietly, I let myself into the parlor.

The snoring of the old midwife shook the ornaments on the shelves of the whatnot cabinet she leaned against. Each shudder included a snort at its end for punctuation. The slack-jawed look of the woman told me I need not worry about being seen. She was sound asleep, and from the stink of her, too drunk to care about my presence.

I walked around the coffin but did not find any hair on the floor. There was only one other place where the hank of hair could have fallen. I steeled my nerves for the examination I planned to conduct. Disregarding the unpleasant sensation of cold flesh, I gently tugged at the muslin wrapped around the dead girl’s head to keep her jaw in place. When the fabric was removed, it disclosed two bare spots, one on each temple. The denuded areas were huge! The hair had been completely shorn! Miss Jones had cut the hanks, and in the process robbed the corpse of its natural adornments. This shocked me. Although I knew little about the making of such a keepsake as a piece of funerary jewelry, logic suggested that any hair taken could be cut from the back of the scalp, thereby doing the least to disturb the appearance of the dead. Of course, one could argue that the theft would have gone unnoticed, except for my poking about. But even so. There seemed to be something wantonly cruel about this harvest.

With my eyes, I traced the length of Selina’s body. Again, her size astonished me. She probably weighed nearly as much as Edward. Although death had started its inexorable task of destruction, it was clear that the girl’s skin was smooth as porcelain, the shape of her countenance a perfect oval, her hair lush and dark as it fell in loose curls, and her mouth perfectly contoured.

The midwife sighed in her sleep. One lonesome eyetooth stuck out from the roof of her mouth, and a thin rivulet of drool hung from her loose lower lip. I needed to find the missing hair in a hurry and go.

I stooped down to look under the coffin, and finally I found the curls coiled in a shadow over by a large floral offering.

I tiptoed out of the parlor and took my prize back up to the Junior dormitory. Miss Jones opened one sleepy eye to watch as I tucked the second hank of hair next to its twin.

“Your kindness overwhelms me,” she said. A grimace of pain overtook her, but she managed to add, “Thank you, my friend. I will not forget this.”

She could barely keep herself awake when she bid me good-bye.

I climbed back down the stairs, thinking about what I had seen, and the rapidity with which Miss Jones had fallen asleep.

Was it possible that Miss Jones had dosed Selina? She had access to the Senior dormitory. She could easily have put a few drops of her laudanum in Selina’s evening tea. But what would have been her motivation?

Walking briskly through the foyer, I went down the front steps and a few yards along the sidewalk to where the girls were gathered around a dog, a small terrier, held on a leash by its owner, an elderly woman. Rufina succeeded in making the pup dance for a bit of bread. The girls turned to me expectantly.

“Oh bother!” I said as I reached into my pocket and discovered only one glove. “Rufina, pray continue to watch the others.”

Back inside Alderton House, I crossed the marble tiles of the entryway once more, being as silent as possible. My movements were quiet, as the dead seem to demand of us a certain reverence. Perhaps we feel compelled to rehearse the silence of the grave. I made no sound as I slipped into the parlor.

Signora Delgatto stood with her back to me, leaning slightly over the polished walnut coffin. I froze there in the doorway, so as not to startle the elderly woman, who cleared
her throat, hawked, and spat. Her spittle landed on Selina Biltmore’s face with a splat.

“You no-good spawn of the devil.” Signora Delgatto spoke directly to the corpse.

I gasped. The music teacher turned to stare at me, her eyes twin pools of milky brown, the clouds within them obscuring any sense of the woman’s soul.

“Have you come to spy on me?”

“No, signora. I lost my glove. Is it on the floor? I cannot afford to replace it.” Such a simple lie, one that came easily to my lips.

“You will tell Mrs. Thurston what you saw?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“Why would I?”

“Let me tell you about this, this
demon
.” She pointed at the body. “You have heard of Fräulein Hertzog? The teacher you replace? She was a long-suffering sojourner. A woman who had endured much, and who recognized the same in me. Such a friendship! So much in common! So rare to find another soul with whom you have such a connection. Fräulein Hertzog loved singing, but God in His glory denied her a voice. But oh, how she loved music. So one day when we were walking at the market, she bought a canary. She named him Figaro. What a singer he was! So glorious! He brought my friend much joy.”

In her exuberance, the old woman threw open her arms and nearly lost her balance. Slipping my hand under her elbow, I walked her to a chair and eased her down onto the seat.

“Do you know what Selina did? That evil girl twisted the bird’s neck and fed it to the cat! She did it only to hurt Fräulein Hertzog, who loved her little pet.”

“Why?” I asked. “Why would she do that?”

“It was an act of revenge. Pure and simple. Fräulein caught Selina slipping out of the building. Two times. Fräulein told Mrs. Thurston—and there was a quarrel.”

“Between Mrs. Thurston and Selina? Or between Selina and Fräulein Hertzog?”

“Mrs. Thurston and Selina. They screamed at each other. Mrs. Thurston decided to punish the girl.”

“Did she?”

“Mrs. Thurston told Fräulein to make Selina copy verses from the Bible. But the girl refused. Back and forth they went.” Signora Delgatto raised a dingy handkerchief to her eyes and wiped away tears. “Then came a man in a handsome carriage to visit Mrs. Thurston. They spoke in private, and everything changed. Poof!” The woman snapped her fingers. “Like that, Selina became the favorite of Mrs. Thurston. I could not understand why. No one could.”