euphemisms.
“Yes,” he conceded. “Yes, I suppose it is. Grief takes many forms, not a few of them unattractive, but she did not seem so much grieved as frightened-at least, that is the impression I received.”
“Of Murdoch?”
“I am afraid I am not receptive enough to be certain. I thought not, but then I also felt that he made her nervous… or anxious? I have no clear impression. I’m sorry.” He frowned. “But it is all of little importance now. I failed to persuade him to dismiss the matter. I am afraid it will proceed, and my dear, you must prepare yourself for it. I will do everything I can to see that it is settled as rapidly and discreetly as possible. But you must help me by answering everything you can with the utmost clarity.” He stopped. His eyes were steady and seemed to look through all her defenses as if he could see not only her thoughts but the mounting fear inside her. A day ago she would have found that intrusive; she would have been angry at his presumption. Now she clung to it as if it were the only chance of rescue in a cold quicksand that was growing deeper by the moment.
“It doesn’t make any sense,” she said desperately.
“It will do,” he insisted with a faint smile. “It is simply that we do not have all the facts. It is my task to learn at least enough of them to prove that you have committed no crime.”
No crime. Of course she had committed no crime. Perhaps she had overlooked something, and if she had not, then Mary Farraline might still be alive. But certainly she had not taken the brooch. She had never seen it before. A lift of hope brightened inside her. She met Rathbone’s eyes and he smiled, but it was a small, bleak gesture, a matter of determination rather than confidence.
Beyond the bare room in which they were sitting they could hear the sounds of slamming doors, heavy and resonating, iron against stone. Someone called out, and the sound echoed, even though the words were indistinguishable.
‘Tell me again precisely what happened from the time you entered the Farraline house in Edinburgh,” he instructed.
“But I-” she began, then saw the gravity in his face, and obediently recounted everything she could remember from the time she had stepped into the kitchen and met the butler, McTeer.
Rathbone listened intently. It seemed to Hester as if everything else in the world became distant except the two of them sitting opposite each other, leaning across the wooden table in desperate concentration. She thought that even with her eyes closed, she would see his face as it was now, every detail of it etched on her mind, even the silver flecks in his hair where it sprang smoothly from his temples.
He interrupted her for the first time. “You rested?”
“Yes-why?”
“Apart from your time in the library, was that the first occasion in which you were alone in the house?”
She perceived his meaning immediately.
“Yes.” She spoke with difficulty. “I suppose they will say I could have gone back to the dressing room and taken the brooch then.”
“I doubt it. It would be an extraordinarily dangerous thing to do. Mrs. Farraline was probably in her bedroom…”
“No-no, when I saw her, it was in a boudoir, a sitting room some distance from her bedroom, I think. Although I suppose I am not sure. Certainly it was some way from the dressing room.”
“But the maid could have come into the dressing room,” he argued. “In fact, her duties immediately prior to such a long journey would almost certainly have taken her there a number of times, checking that she had everything packed, all the necessary linen was clean, pressed, folded, placed where it should have been. Is that a time you would risk going in, if you were not supposed to be there?”
“No… no it isn’t!” Then her spirits fell again immediately. “And when I rested in the afternoon my valise was in the room with me. No one could have put the pin into it there.”
“That is not the point, Hester,” he said patiently.
“Of course,” she said eagerly. “She may have kept it in a jewel case in her bedroom. It would be much more sensible than having it in the dressing room.” She looked at his face, and saw a gentleness in it which gave her a curious prickle of pleasure, but there was no lightness in him which corresponded to hers. Surely if Mary had kept it in her room, that was almost proof Hester could not have taken the brooch?
He looked almost guilty, like someone who must disillusion a child.
“What?” she demanded. “Isn’t that good? I never went into her bedroom. And all the time except when I was in the library, or resting, I was with other people.”
“At least one of whom, my dear, must be lying. Someone placed the pin in your case, and it cannot have been by accident.”
She leaned forward urgently. “But it ought to be possible to show that I had no chance to take it from the bedroom, which will be where she kept her jewel case. I am almost certain it was not in the dressing room. To begin with, there was nothing for it to rest on.” Her voice rose in excitement as she recalled the details of the room. She leaned closer towards him. “There were three wardrobes along one wall, a window in the second, a tallboy with drawers on the third, and also a dressing table with a stool in front of it, and three mirrors. I remember the brushes and combs and the crystal jars for pins and hair combings. There was no jewel case on it It would have blocked the mirrors. And there was nothing on the tallboy, and it was too high to be reached.”
“And the farther wall?” He smiled wryly.
“Oh… the door, of course. And another chair. And there was a sort of daybed.”
“But no jewel case?”
“No. I am certain of it” She felt triumphant It was such a small piece of memory and reason, but it was the first. “It has to mean something.”
“It means your recollection is very clear, not a great deal more.”
“But it has to,” she said urgently. “If the case was not there, then I could not have taken anything from it”
“But, Hester, there is only your word that the case was not there,” he said very softly, his mouth pinched with concern and sadness.
“The maid-” she began, then stopped.
“Precisely,” he agreed. “The two people who would know that are the maid, who may well have been the one to place the pin in your luggage… and Mary herself, who is beyond our reach. Who else? The eldest daughter, Oonagh Mclvor? What will she say?” There were both anger and pain in his face, though he was attempting to be as formal as his profession demanded.
She stared at him wordlessly.
He reached one hand across the table as if to touch her, then changed his mind and withdrew it.
“Hester, we cannot afford to hide from the truth,” he said earnestly. “You have fallen into the midst of something we do not yet understand, and it would be foolish to imagine anyone involved in it is your friend, or will necessarily tell the truth if it is contrary to their interests. If Oonagh Mclvor has to choose whether to blame someone in her own household or you, a stranger, we cannot rely upon her either wishing, or being able, to recall and repeat the exact truth.”
“But… but if someone in her house is a thief, surely she would wish to know that?” she protested.
“Not necessarily, particularly if it is not a maid, but one of her family.”
“But why? Why just one brooch? And why put it in my case?”
His face tightened, as if he were suddenly colder, and the anxiety in his eyes deepened.
“I don’t know, but the only alternative I can see is to suppose that you did take it, and that is not tolerable.”
The enormity of what he had said became hideously plain to her. How could she expect anyone to believe she had not seized the chance, suddenly offered, and taken the brooch… then when Mary was found dead, suddenly become frightened and tried to return it? She met Rathbone’s eyes and knew he was thinking precisely the same thing.
Did he really believe her, in his heart? Or was he only behaving as if he did because it was his professional obligation to do so? She felt as if reality were slipping away from her and nightmare closing in, isolation and helplessness, endless confusion where nothing made sense, one moment’s sanity was the next moment’s chaos.
