Rustication (38 page)

Even if I could find a way to prove Euphemia’s guilt, I don’t want to send my sister to the gallows in my place.

· · ·

It’s as if I were sitting in a darkened theatre waiting for the curtain to rise on a play whose script I have already read: I will be arrested and tried and convicted and hanged and I can do nothing about it. Everything I will say in my defence will be seen as the rantings of a lunatic or a man desperate to save himself from death. Euphemia will brush aside my allegations against her. Why will she care if I impugn her reputation? She will be married to a wealthy man.

What witnesses will I have to speak in my defence? Old Mr Boddington? But he can say nothing to overturn the evidence against me. It will be claimed that Bartlemew posted on my behalf the defamatory letters that I was writing and although he will deny it, once his character has been established, he will not be believed.

· · ·

Idle thought: I wonder what was in the part of the letter that the earl did not let Wilson read. Was there some hideous allegation against the murdered man that would have brought shame on his memory?

· · ·

Mother believes that I am guilty of the murder and that is why she has refused me an alibi and even volunteered to Wilson that damning piece of evidence against me. That is the high Roman style: My son has done wrong and I will not defend him. But does she not understand what will happen? Does she not see the inevitable consequence of her decision? As to why she would not tell a lie to protect me, is there something that I don’t yet know about? Is it to do with what happened in the autumn? And that terrible secret she threatened to reveal to me?

I must talk to her alone.

3 o’clock.

I found her in the parlour. I said:
Mother, I’m in dreadful danger. I need to know everything. And I’ll be equally frank and tell you all that occurred in Cambridge
.

Without giving her a chance to respond, I went on:
I borrowed money from Edmund but then I needed more than he could give me and we conceived the idea of my taking a loan from his father using my own father as security. That’s how I obtained the seventy pounds
.

She looked at me in surprise.

No, you’re right. My father didn’t consent to that. He knew nothing of it. Edmund’s father’s bankers, of course, required his signature guaranteeing repayment. I knew he would never sign it and since the loan was between friends and Edmund promised to pay it back when he reached his majority, we didn’t think it mattered
.

I thought it would be hard to confess but she seemed to be paying little attention to my words. I went on:
So I forged my father’s signature. But then Edmund and I quarrelled. At that moment my father died and the news of his death upset me so much that I wrote a cruel letter to Edmund accusing him of having made me an opium-smoker and then seduced me into forging the signature in order to put me in his power. Edmund saw me as his only friend in the world and if he chose to die—and I don’t know if he did—then my letter might have tipped him over the edge. It was found beside his body. Edmund’s father used it to press the authorities to make trouble for me. He convinced himself of the absurd idea that I had a hand in Edmund’s death because he was my creditor. That was why the Dean and Master rusticated me and reported me to the police for fraud. And perhaps worse
.

She said:
I don’t know why you’re telling me this now
.

I said:
Because I want you to tell me the truth with equal frankness
.

When she didn’t speak I said:
Mother, I had nothing to do with the death of Mr Davenant Burgoyne
.

She did not even look at me.

I said:
I suspect that this terrible event has something to do with whatever happened between Euphemia and him while I was in Cambridge. I’m surely entitled to know about it now?

Still she kept silent.

I said:
They’ll say I killed him because he publicly humiliated my sister in the sight of Thurchester society
.

She put her hands up as if to shield herself from my words.

I asked:
What happened, Mother?

She just shook her head.

I said:
Mother, I beg you. You know me. You can’t think I wrote those filthy letters? That I killed a man?

She made no response. How could I persuade her that I had nothing to do with those crimes without pointing towards Euphemia? I had no choice. I had to tell her. I warned her that I was going to tell her something that would shock her terribly.

I said:
This involves Willoughby Lyddiard
.

And then I told her what I had seen at Thrubwell on Sunday morning. I said:
He was sneaking into the house like a criminal and I know he had just killed Mr Davenant Burgoyne
.

She remained impassive. I concluded:
I implore you to tell me everything you know. My one chance is to find something that I can produce as irrefutable evidence
.

She said:
This is all nonsense. You’ve taken leave of your senses. It’s because of what you’ve been smoking in your room that your conduct has been so irrational since you returned from Cambridge. That wicked practice has addled your wits
.

I said:
Please listen to me. Lyddiard is the man who has done the things that I’m being accused of
.

I went over the evidence that will surely convict me if I am put on trial: my threats at the ball; the letters attributed to me—especially the one sent to Davenant Burgoyne; and finally Mr Fourdrinier’s famous dibber.

All the while she stared at me, shaking her head as if mourning my insanity.

I said:
There is something much worse, much more painful that I have to break to you. It’s going to distress you terribly. I fear that my sister knew at least something of what Lyddiard was planning
.

She turned her head away and did not answer me. I suppose she was hiding her shock.

Then I said that Euphemia had been somehow persuaded or intimidated into helping him write the defamatory letters at the house of Lady Terrewest which he then posted in Thurchester. He had plotted the murder of Davenant Burgoyne in order to inherit the fortune that would come to him on his death and it is possible that Euphemia at least had some inkling that he was planning that. I put it that way to soften the blow for her.

Now for the first time Mother turned to look at me. In a harsh voice I had never heard before, she said:
Leave Euphemia out of this
.

I said:
I can’t. It was she who first involved me!

Mother hissed at me:
You will not interfere with your sister’s plans. You will not ruin her life as you have ruined your own
.

½ past 3 o’clock.

Even if Mother thinks I am guilty, why would she not tell a small lie to protect me? She must believe that to exonerate me is to endanger Euphemia.

Is there something that I don’t yet know about? If so, Miss Bittlestone might have the answers. I must pay her another visit.

4 o’clock.

Up the lane and just before the turning to Netherton there was a horse and trap with a postboy on the seat and a man sitting beside him who was in civilian dress but was very obviously a policeman. He had a shotgun propped beside him. When I had gone a hundred yards up the lane I looked back and of course he was following me. He tagged me through the afternoon and I’d stake my life that he or his relief will be there all night guarding the only path from here. This house has become my prison.

When I pushed open the door in response to her call, Miss Bittlestone greeted me without any surprise:
Oh, Mr Shenstone, this terrible news about poor Mr Davenant Burgoyne!

She showed no fear or even unease at the sight of me. It was very cold and there was no light in the cottage except from the glowing embers of the fire. She cannot read in that gloom and I wonder what she does hour by hour alone in the near-dark with no living creature save her cat.

I said:
We both know, don’t we, Miss Bittlestone, who will inherit his fortune now?

She nodded slowly. Then she pointed to the battered but heroic old chair once reserved for her most illustrious visitor and said:
Please be seated
.

As I did so she said:
I wish never to see that chair again. When I saw your mother on Saturday I asked if you could come and take it after the service on Sunday morning but she said you would not be able to
.

With great ceremony she reached into the scuttle and put another lump of coal on the fire in my honour.

The cat emerged from a corner and began to weave a pattern around his mistress’ feet. Miss Bittlestone said:
I’ve got such a treat for you, Tiddles
.

She bent down and offered him a small piece of meat. I suspect she gets more pleasure from feeding her cat than herself.

The old lady saw my eyes fall on a newspaper lying on a dresser,
The Thurchester Intelligencer. Kind
Mr Lloyd gives it to me when he’s finished with it
, she said.

So the Quances’ enemy has become her ally—like a rival empire taking on a vassal state from which the opposing troops have been withdrawn.

I looked at the shipping pages.
The Hibernian Maid
of the Black Ball Line sails with the first tide from Southampton on Thursday the 14
^th
bound for Newfoundland. I still have Uncle T’s mandate to her captain.

Miss Bittlestone was anxious to tell me her news: the detective, Sergeant Wilson, had visited her earlier today. She said:
He is a very charming person, extremely courteous. Only he does have a strange manner of conducting a conversation. I even wondered at one moment if he were intoxicated
.

I asked:
And what did he want to know?

I’m afraid he was dreadfully inquisitive about you and what he called your “nocturnal perambulations” which made them sound very sinister. I assured him that there was nothing in the least reprehensible about them. He asked if you had “bothered” the Quance girls with unwanted attentions. I said the contrary was more probably the case
.

(Now there’s a surprise!)

I told her that for all his affability Mr Wilson believes me to be the author of the abusive letters and a murderer.

She gasped and covered her mouth.

I said:
There’s something I need to understand
.
Just before I went up to Cambridge, Miss Whitaker-Smith and Mr Davenant Burgoyne were close to announcing their intention to marry. Then the engagement was broken off. Can you tell me what happened?

She was quite pink with embarrassment. Eventually I extracted the story from her. Euphemia met Davenant Burgoyne at Maud’s house and set out to steal him from her best friend. In the middle of October she was seen coming out of his lodgings in Hill Street at ten in the evening in a risky attempt to force him to marry her by creating a scandal. It seemed as if the ploy had worked and he had proposed.

The old lady came to a halt and I had great difficulty coaxing her into going on.
Mr and Mrs Whitaker-Smith approached your mother and warned her that unless your sister withdrew, there would be a worse scandal
.

I don’t understand
.

It involved Miss Whitaker-Smith’s brother. Perceval
.

Maud’s tearful younger brother. As soon as she uttered those words, it all fell into place: His singing lessons with my father. His membership of the Cathedral choir. Bartlemew’s joining it at my father’s behest. Everything that I had seen and understood at The Dolphin.

The old lady stared at me, unable to go on. I helped her out:
I understand. They threatened to expose my father unless my sister ended her attachment to Mr Davenant Burgoyne?

She nodded, eyes averted.
But your mother must not have believed they would do such a thing
.

She called their bluff? She defied them to denounce my father?

She nodded timidly.

I heard the blood dinning in my ears. Miss Bittlestone’s revelation turned everything upside down. Far from her misfortunes having fallen upon her head from a clear blue sky, it was my mother who had herself precipitated the scandal that destroyed my father and ruined all of us. And she had done it because she had taken a cold ruthless decision: that the parents of a child of twelve would choose not to put him through the experience of having to give evidence about the wrong that had been done to him.

A phrase from one of those foul letters sprang to mind:
the lyes that dirty little Pursniffle tole
. The person who wrote those words hated Perceval because he had revealed the truth.

Now I understood the obsession with Bartlemew. He had played a role in putting Perceval in the power of my father and then extorted money in return for his silence.

My mother had risked everything for the chance of Euphemia marrying her future earl and millionaire. Well, the earldom had gone now but if the plan succeeded, her daughter would be the wife of a rich man. Whom would she not sacrifice to achieve that goal?

I didn’t listen as the old lady wittered on about her diet and her cat.

After a minute or two I asked her to continue with her account. She said:
The Whitaker-Smiths took their son to the Dean to tell his story
.

My father was dismissed
, I said.
And it came out that he had been embezzling to pay off a blackmailer. The strain of all that brought on his fatal heart-attack. And my mother’s gamble failed since Mr Davenant Burgoyne threw Euphemia over as soon as the scandal broke
.

Then Miss Bittlestone said:
There has been the saddest news in the last couple of weeks. Perceval was at home for the holiday and it seems he was very unhappy at his public school where he had been cruelly bullied once the other boys found out what had happened to him in Thurchester. On the morning of Christmas Day he was found to have vanished from the house and he has not been seen since
.