Suspense and Sensibility Or, First Impressions Revisited: A Mr. & Mrs. Darcy Mystery (24 page)

      "The other victims were willing participants in their own entrapment," Elizabeth said. "Harry Dashwood was not."

      "Precisely," Randolph said. "The king and his successors were drawn in because they could not resist the sight of their former selves. Harry Dashwood, however, was in the full bloom of  youth. He was not yet vulnerable to the mirror's temptation and would not be for some time. I suspect that Sir Francis, already incarcerated for more than thirty years, grew impatient and forced the exchange"

      Darcy remained unconvinced. "If he was trapped in the glass, how did he gather his former Hell-Fire Club together to perform the rite?"
      "That I don't know."

      "And if Sir Francis was a victim of the mirror," Darcy pressed, "why do no accounts of his death mention the accelerated aging suffered by the others?"

      "If he was already elderly and very close to the end of his natural life, the effects may have gone unnoticed. His body might have died within hours or even minutes of the mirror's previous occupant taking possession of it."

      "So short a time?" Elizabeth's brow creased with worry. "Sir Francis has occupied Mr Dashwood's form for a month now. How much time do you think he has left?"

      "How old is Harry's body supposed to be. and how old did he look when you saw him today?"

      "He is one-and-twenty, but he appears fifty at least."

      "Do we know how old Sir Francis was when he died?"

      "In his seventies."

      Professor Randolph withdrew a handkerchief from one of his many pockets and wiped his spectacles. "It sounds as if Harry Dashwood's body is aging rapidly, indeed, and to compound matters, I understand Sir Francis has not been the most gentle tenant. I would guess your friend has perhaps a fortnight, if that, to reclaim himself."

      "He is not our friend," Darcy said. "And he has made it very clear to me that he does not want our assistance or interference in his affairs."

      Elizabeth stared at him a long moment. His wife's gaze made him uncomfortable, and he shifted under the weight of her disapprobation. When she rose and came to the window, came to him, he looked away. On the sofa, Randolph replaced his spectacles and consulted his book once more.

      "Darcy," she said, speaking in tones so soft that they reached his ears alone. "It is Sir Francis, not Harry, who has behaved so uncivilly toward us."

      He sighed heavily. "Elizabeth, this is all too far-fetched to be believed. At least by me. I can barely listen to it, let alone acknowledge it as possible."

      "If you had seen what 1 saw, you would think otherwise."

      "But I did not."

      He at last faced her. Sadness spread across her face, and he disliked himself for having caused it. Worse, her eyes, normally bright with exuberance, dimmed with disappointment.
      In him.

      "Darcy, when we were last at Netherfield, we both stumbled into danger because you believed in reason more than you believed in me I know what I experienced today. Will you not this time trust my perceptions?" She laid a hand on his arm "I am certain that the Harry Dashwood we first met, the Harry Dashwood who won Kitty's heart, whom you considered as a
brother, still exists. He desperately needs our aid, and how I shall live with myself if we fail him, I do not know. If you will not act for Mr Dashwood's sake, will you do so for mine?"

      She had struck upon the only argument she could have used to win his cooperation. For a worthless rakehell he would do nothing. But to prevent the blackguard from causing his wife a moment's further anguish—and to remove that expression from her eyes—he would do anything.

      "Professor Randolph, what must be done to release Harry?"
      He cast her a meaningful look "Hypothetically?"

      She smiled.

      "The mirror will demand a soul for a soul." Randolph replied, "and if Harry is to get his own body back, that soul  must be Sir Francis's. We must therefore trick Sir Francis into staring at Harry's reflection long enough to effect the exchange."
      "The person presently answering to the name Harry Dashwood is many things, but he is not a fool. You said that without such a ceremony as Sir Francis arranged, a victim must be complicitous in his own entrapment. Sir Francis will never allow himself to risk re imprisonment." Darcy said.
      "In fact," Elizabeth added, "he schemes to rid himself of the mirror altogether. I heard him say that Lord Phillip Beaumont would retrieve it tomorrow."

      Lord Phillip? Darcy suppressed a groan. Why the countess's brother, of all people? Despite his skepticism over the whole enterprise and his recent rebuff from Lord Phillip himself, Darcy now felt himself obligated by his friendship wiih the earl to at least keep the mirror—whatever it might or might not be—out of Beaumont's possession.

      'Why does Sir Francis not simply destroy the glass?" he asked.

      Randolph pushed his spectacles back to the bridge of his nose. "There is no account of any previous owner attempting to do so. Perhaps once released into a new body, a victim's continued existence yet depends on the mirror's enchantment. Or the victim may merely fear it does. However brief his new life may be, the newly freed prisoner is unwilling to risk it ending any sooner than it must."

      The archaeologist shrugged. "Whatever his reasoning, let us be grateful for Harry's sake that Sir Francis has not destroyed the glass in all the time he's had to do so. But with Lord Phillip planning to take ownership of it, we now must devise a strategy quickly, as our task becomes far more difficult if the mirror leaves Sir Francis's proximity. We also need to rescue Harry before  Sir Francis wears out his body. If Sir Francis dies, Harry could be trapped inside the mirror indefinitely. He would be forced either to wait until another unsuspecting victim fell prey to the mirror's curse, or to ask us to destroy the mirror with him in it, putting an end to the cycle "
      "Let us formulate a plan, then, and go directly." Elizabeth said.
      "I will go." Darcy corrected. "You will stay here, out of danger and well away from anyone named Dashwood. "

      She appeared about to object, but Professor Randolph did it for her "Mrs. Darcy's participation may prove critical to our success. From her description of her encounter with Harry's reflection, it sounds as if he was surprised that she could see him. Indeed, I expect most people can't, or surely the servants would have noticed him by now, the way the mirror's been moved around lately. Mrs. Darcy may possess a sensitivity to her environment which surpasses that of the average person."

      Darcy disliked the reminder of a fact he preferred not to contemplate too often. If he acknowledged to himself that his wife's perceptions were legitimate, he must also acknowledge that there were forces in the world that he could not himself perceive and therefore could not protect her from. It was far easier to deny the existence of cursed mirrors than to admit his own powerlessness.

      He felt the gentle press of her hand on his arm "I promise to be very careful." she said. "And you shall be with me."

      He did not like this, any of it. Supernatural issues aside, the Mr. Dashwood who moved freely in the world—whichever Dashwood he might be—was an unpredictable rogue. Darcy would not put it past him to become violent if sufficiently provoked, and should that happen, he wanted Elizabeth nowhere near. Indeed, he would rather himself not be anywhere near. But somehow it had fallen upon them to make one final attempt to reclaim his soul—either from the mirror or from perdition itself. He took his wife's hand and went to sit near the professor again.

      "All right." he conceded. "How do we do this?"

      Randolph tapped the page he'd been studying. 'I have just thought of a strategy."

Twenty Eight

"I came determined to know the truth; though irresolute what to do when it was known."

 –
Colonel Brandon to Elinor Dashwood,

Sense and Sensibility,
Chapter 31

      "But my business with Mr. Dashwood is most urgent," Elizabeth insisted to Harry's housekeeper "I would never call upon him at this hour were it not." She hoped she sounded convincing. Her errand was indeed urgent, though should Sir Francis know its nature he might hold a different opinion. Releasing Harry from the Mirror of Narcissus and becoming reincarcerated himself probably did not top his pnorities this morning "Tell him Mrs. Darcy calls."
      "Oh, I know who you are. ma'am. The master is not at home."

      As Elizabeth pulled her wrap tight against the light rain, her hand brushed Professor Randolph's amulet, which she wore on a chain round her neck. She resisted the urge to steal a glance at the carriage, where the archaeologist and Darcy concealed themselves. Seeking admission alone had been her suggestion, one Darcy had resisted until the moment the coach stopped in Pall Mall. He had not wanted her to enter Mr Dashwood's townnhouse without him—and she had not even told him about Sir Francis's indecet advances yesterday. But relations between Darcy and Sir Francis had become so strained that she feared Darcy might no longer gain entree any time of day, and she hoped that Sir Francis might be sufficiently intrigued by her call, coming unaccompanied so early in the morning that he would receive her. Unfortunately, he had not yet been given that choice—first she had to pass Cerberus.

      "May I please at least step in from the rain while you ask
whether he will receive me?" While the housekeeper was thus occupied, Elizabeth would let in the gentlemen, who would make their way to the room with the mirror and wait for her to lead Sir Francis there. That was the second part of the scheme Darcy disliked. Actually, he disliked all parts of it, particularly those that involved her.

      To be honest, she was not bubbling with enthusiasm over the plan herself. Nervous about todays events, she'd gone to bed nauseated, woken up nauseated, and probably would remain so until the situation was resolved. She hardly looked forward to being once more in proximity to Sir Francis, the source of her indisposition.

      "I'm telling you truly, ma'am, the master is not at home. He's not in his chamber, nor anywhere in the house—"

      A woman's scream resonated somewhere deep in the house

      "Beg your pardon, ma'am."

      The housekeeper hurried off, swinging the door behind her.
      Before it shut, Elizabeth caught it and stepped inside. The hall was empty, and she could hear a commotion belowstairs. She went back to the door and beckoned Darcy and Professor Randolph to come quickly.

      "The housekeeper claims Mr. Dashwood is not at home," she said when they joined her "The servants are all below—someone just screamed."

      "The scream came from downstairs?" Darcy asked.

      "Yes," she said. "Go up to the chamber with the mirror, as planned. You will never have a better opportunity to reach it unseen, I will determine whether the scream warrants our concern."

      Darcy shook his head emphatically. "You stay here with Professor Randolph while I investigate the scream."
      "And how will you explain your presence in the house?"
      "That is immaterial."

      "Mr. Darcy, I must concur with your wife." the professor said. "If you reveal yourself now, our whole scheme falls to pieces. We cannot risk failure over a scullery maid spying a mouse."

      Darcy released an exasperated breath and cast his gaze about the hall. It came to rest on the dining room door, which stood open. "We will wait for you in there," he said. "If someone is screaming, I do not want to be three stories away from you. Tell us what you learn, and we will proceed from there."

      But how will I report back to you without the servants noticing?"

      Her husband looked at her confidently "If I know you, Mrs. Darcy, you will find a way"

      It was not difficult to determine how to reach the lower hall; she simply followed the noise. Nor was it hard to overhear the cause of the excitement and return to the dining room undetected by the preoccupied staff.

      We no longer have a need for subterfuge," she announced to Darcy and the professor "Sir Francis is dead."

      "I just knew those ices would be the end of him." The cook shook her head sadly. "Only, I thought he'd eat himself to the hereafter. I never expected this."

      "I doubt anyone did" Elizabeth tried to sound sympathetic, but her mind was only half engaged in the conversation. The other half wondered what they were going to do about Harry, now that Sir Francis had died. A glance at Darcy and Professor Randolph revealed that they didn't know, either.

      "The master was in that larder every night, don't you know, dipping into the ices. Usually after all of us had gone to bed. Lemon was his favorite. I think his lady fnend preferred strawberry. Liked to sneak down there himself, instead of waking the servant—made it seem like more of a guilty pleasure, I think. I'd get up in the morning and find the empty pans." She
dabbed her eyes with her apron. "This morning I found him."

       The cook had discovered Sir Francis in the sub-cellar larder, his body as cold as the ices of which he was so fond. It was her scream that Elizabeth had heard and that had summoned the whole staff. The servants were in such a state of shock over their employer's demise that when Elizabeth had returned to the scene with Darcy and the professor in tow, no one had looked askance at their sudden appearance. In fact, many of them recognized Darcy from previous visits and gratefully looked to him as a gentleman, as some sort of authority figure who could provide direction.

      "How did you come upon him?" Darcy asked.

      "After I started breakfast, I went down there to get ice cream for the master's strawberries—"

      "Ice cream at breakfast?" Elizabeth could not help but interrupt.

      "He used to simply have ordinary cream, but since he built that larder, now he wants ice cream. So I give him ice cream." She shrugged. "That was nothing. Gentlemen have all sorts of peculiar tastes—if you'll pardon my saying so, sir—but the master had more than anyone else I've ever worked for."

      "Continue," Darcy said, "You went down to the larder?"

      "Yes. When I opened the door, there he was on the floor. All huddled up, like he'd been trying to keep warm."

      "Was the door locked?"

      "Bolted, sir.'

      "And that is normal?"

      "Well, of course, sir. The door must stay shut to keep the cold in."

      "Would Mr Dashwood have closed the door behind him
when he entered?"

      "Oh. I doubt it, sir. Though he was well into his cups last night, and you never know what a man what's been drinking will do."

      Elizabeth recalled Sir Francis's state when she'd seen him the previous afternoon. He'd still seemed in possession of his faculties, but if he'd continued to consume brimstone at the rate she had observed, he would have been pickled by midnight.
      "The bolt can be operated only from the outside?"
      "Yes, sir."

      "Might someone have seen the open door and closed it, not realizing Mr. Dashwood was inside?"

      "No one else was about. I'm always the last of the kitchen staff to retire. Last night I left a fresh pan of lemon ice in the larder before I went to bed. This morning, I was the first person with cause to go down there. The lemon ice was still there—along with the master ."

      Darcy raised his gaze to Elizabeth's, and she saw that they had both reached the same conclusion. Someone had murdered Sir Francis.

      Further conversations with the staff confirmed as highly unlikely the chances that their master's death was accidental, sometime between midnight and five o'clock, when the cook retired and risen, an intoxicated Sir Francis had descended to the larder to indulge his sweet tooth. Someone had either followed him or happened upon him, bolted the door, and left him to die of cold. His mind muddled by drink, he quite possibly had not even heard his captor or realized his peril until it was too late. The room was so well insulated and so deep in the house that with the door sealed, no one would have been wakened by a shout.

      When Darcy dismissed the last servant, who joined her fellow domestics in hovenng outside the drawing room waiting for instruction, he shut the door. Elizabeth was glad to finally have a chance to discuss the situation privately.

      "Have you learned enough to identify a suspect?" she asked.

      "All London"

      "Splendid. I was afraid we would be unable to narrow the field."

      "Apparently, Sir Francis had instructed the staff to leave the back entrance unlocked at night so that his paramour might come and go as she pleased in anonymity. Though no one can say with certainty whether she visited the house last night, neither can anyone say she did not. That unlocked door, meanwhile, offers easy ingress to anyone who might harbor less than amiable feelings toward the house's owner. The way Sir Francis
had been conducting himself, that list includes everyone from jealous husbands to government officials."

      "There is plenty of motive within the house, as well," Elizabeth said.                 "From what I was able to learn, it sounds as if he seduced half the female staff."

      Professor Randolph entered. He had gone downstairs to have a look at the corpse.

      "The body is as they describe." Randolph said. "Very cold, very stiff, and from the smell of liquor, very well preserved. His hands are quite bruised—I expect from beating against the door, trying to escape."

      "We should summon the authorities," Darcy said.

      "Not yet." countered Professor Randolph. "Once they arrive we'll lose all opportunity to help Mr. Dashwood."

      "I think he is beyond help."

      "Imeant the one in the mirror."

      "So did I," Darcy said. "Assuming Harry's soul is indeed trapped in the glass—an assumption about which you know I harbor doubt—with Sir Francis dead, we have no spirit to exchange for Harry's. His has left this earth, we certainly are not going to offer one of ours, and allowing anyone else to fall victim to the mirror is unconscionable."

      Darcy had voiced the conundrum that had weighed on Elizabeth's mind since the moment Mr. Dashwood's lifeless body had been discovered. Without Sir Francis, what were they to do?The murder had left them with a horrible dilemma: They could not sacrifice an innocent party to release Harry, but neither could they abandon him to an eternity of imprisonment
in the glass. The whole situation had her stomach in knots.
      "Professor, is there not some way we can yet rescue Mr. Dashwood?" she asked.

      "I have been pondering that question. Sir Francis's death profoundly complicates matters. I must say, his murder occurred most inconveniently."

      "Murder usually does." Darcy said. "At least to its victims."
      "We are fortunate, however, in the manner of Mr Dashwood's death, as I believe the circumstances have left his body still viable. Between the cold and the liquor, it has not yet started to deteriorate. If we can release Harry's essence very soon, his body might yet sustain life."

      The weight on Elizabeth's chest eased. Her heart had grown heavier as the morning passed, but now she rejoiced that there was any hope at all for Harry

      "Very well." Darcy said. "His spirit has a place to go. But how do we transfer it there?"

      "That is the more difficult part. However, one account of the mirror suggests that it may be possible for a spirit to leave the glass and roam incorporeally for limited periods. It was a passing mention—an unsupported speculation, really. But the notion caught my attention, as it could explain how Sir Francis gathered his former associates to conduct the ceremony that

imprisoned Harry."

      "It could also explain all those occasions when people observed him in places he later claimed he had not been," Elizbeth said.

      Randolph regarded her keenly. "What occasions?"

      "There were so many of them." She looked to Darcy for help. "He was seen in Bond Street, and outside Boodle's ..."

      "At the Pigeon Hole and other gaming establishments . . ."

      "All over town the week he was in Devonshire."

      "Yes. I saw him myself that week in his window."

      "Indeed?" Randolph asked. "Did these incidents occur before or after the night of the transference ritual?"

      "Before." Elizabeth said "We all went to Norland for Mr Dashwood's birthday, and the
on-dits
started shortly after we returned."

      "Is this when he first brought the mirror to London?"
      "No." said Darcy "He brought it wiih him on a previous trip."

      "He did, however, return at that time with this portrait of Sir Francis - Elizabeth pointed to the painting that still hung above the fireplace.

      Professor Randolph pondered that intelligence, and the portrait "This image of Sir Francis looks remarkably like the young Mr Dashwood I met in March. The people who saw Mr. Dashwood about town, after this ponrait arrived—they were quite sure it was Harry?"

      "They were all positive," Elizabeth said. "Though he ignored those who knew him best, and many thought they saw him in costume, as his clothes were quite out-of-date."

      Randolph nodded at the portrait. "That far out-of-date?"

      Elizabeth suited at the sudden realization. Darcy, deep in contemplation, stared at the portrait.

      "Think back. Mr. Darcy Are you certain you saw Dashwood in the window?" Randolph asked "Or could it have been Sir Francis?"