A Woman of Consequence

However, Eliza, I do not quite agree that Mr Lomax’s being provoked was unnecessary. For if the poor misguided man will persist in expecting me to be what I am not, then I must conclude that his disappointment is inevitable. He has no reason to suppose me reformed since our last meeting in Richmond; no cause at all to suppose me less curious or more inclined to rest contented with half truths when a little effort might uncover the whole.

Well, I suppose he is now congratulating himself upon his happy escape; for this morning’s little discussion must have proved to him how very unquiet his domestic life would have been had I accepted his offer of marriage.

She stopped. To her very great surprise a tear was splashing down upon the letter. And now a fit of sobbing seized her, shaking her whole frame – and even the frame of the bed. It was quite unaccountable: she had never in her life indulged in such an excess of sensibility – had always supposed herself quite incapable of it. But the pen was slipping from her hand, smearing the counterpane with ink, and the writing desk was clattering to the floor. She was curling up upon the bed.

Astonishing – impossible – though it seemed, Miss Dido Kent, that most composed and determinedly rational of creatures, was giving way to a fit of hysterics.

* * *

This outburst was all the more remarkable for following on a day of the most rational and useful pursuits. The little disagreement with Mr Lomax had not overset her at the time. Indeed, she had been rather pleased with her own composure in the face of his anger and, although she had rested about a quarter of an hour upon the bridge after he left her, at least seven and a half of those fifteen minutes had been spent in considering, not his displeasure, but his information.

It was that, she had rapidly decided, which must concern her. His ill temper was his own affair. She would not give it another thought … But his certainty that Mr Harman-Foote had not written the letter was of the first importance. It not only disproved her strongest suspicion, it also pointed a way forward for her investigations.

And, upon this subject, she had even had the grace to admit that Mr Lomax’s impatience was well-founded. It had, of course, been very stupid of her not to think before of comparing the handwriting, for such an undertaking might serve not only to discount the innocent, but also to uncover the guilty man.

Tapping her fingers on the rail of the bridge, she counted out the objects of her suspicion – the men whose handwriting she must try to get a sight of.

There was Mr Portinscale – though how she might gain a look at his writing she could not yet determine; and there was old Mr Harman – some correspondence of his might survive in his daughter’s possession, or in the library at Madderstone; and there was Captain Laurence … She stopped. But, of course, she knew the captain’s writing already! She recalled the looped characters of the message written to Penelope on the Navy List – and hurriedly unfolded the letter she was holding …

No. She was quite sure that there was no likeness at all. The writing of Miss Fenn’s ‘Beloved’ had no loops upon it. It was strong and straightforward with a vigorous forward slant.

Dido was on the point of putting up the letter when, quite suddenly, it flashed into her mind that the hand was not entirely unfamiliar to her. Spreading out the page in the dappled sunshine of the wood, she became quite certain that there was something about it which she recognised. She had seen a hand rather like it – and seen it recently. But where? The actual details eluded her – but the suspicion was extremely useful in dispelling any lingering solicitude over Mr Lomax’s behaviour.

She folded the papers away and turned resolutely towards Madderstone. She would busy herself about her mystery: she must begin to look about her for examples of handwriting – and she must also discover whether Miss Fenn had had any confidante who could be applied to for information concerning Mr Portinscale’s offer of marriage.

She certainly had no time to waste upon idle regrets.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Dido found Mrs Philips busily watering plants in Madderstone Abbey’s great hothouse and lost no time in bringing forward a question about Miss Fenn’s friends and acquaintances.

‘No, miss,’ said Mrs Philips, setting down her pail and pressing a hand to her back as she straightened up, ‘I don’t reckon there was anyone hereabouts that Miss Fenn was what you might call intimate with – though she always had a pleasant word for everyone, I’m sure.’

‘There was no one she visited?’

The housekeeper frowned thoughtfully and Dido waited with the sun shining through the glass and warming the back of her head.

‘No.’ Mrs Philips pinched a dead leaf from a myrtle bush. ‘At least,’ she said, ‘she’d not paid many visits since she stopped going to call on that Mrs Pinker.’

‘Mrs Pinker?’

‘Yes, she used to visit her; but she wasn’t from round here. Lived over Great Farleigh way I believe.’

‘And did Miss Fenn visit her often?’

The shadows of clustering vine leaves shifted across Mrs Philips’ face as she struggled to remember. ‘She used to go to her once a week … on a Thursday afternoon,’ she said. ‘That is, she used to go the first few years she was here. Used to drive herself over there in the pony carriage. But she’d left off going lately – I mean a year or two before she disappeared.’

‘I see.’ Dido was very disappointed to find that the friendship had lapsed before Mr Portinscale’s courtship began. But the information might be of use. If Mrs Harman-Foote could be persuaded to make her carriage available, a visit to Great Farleigh ought to be made. Mrs Pinker might not know how the clergyman’s advances had been received but she might be able to tell something of Miss Fenn’s character and connections. Yes, she thought, she would call upon Mrs Pinker at the earliest opportunity. It was at least something to be doing. Activity, and having something to think about, seemed to be of the first importance with her just now …

Meanwhile, her companion was dusting a little earth from her hands and looking anxious. ‘Miss Kent,’ she began, ‘I wonder whether I might make so bold as to ask how you are going on with finding out about the ghost?’ As she spoke she looked out through the vine’s crowding foliage to the ruins, just visible beyond the despoiled lawns. ‘Have you found out what might be carrying on over there? Pardon me for asking about it, but Mrs Harman- Foote told me you’d been kind enough to say you would … look into it.’

Dido was forced to confess that, as yet, she had no notion of what might be ‘carrying on over there’.

‘Ah dear,’ said Mrs Philips. ‘I was in hopes you might be able to talk a little sense into the housemaids. They’re all full of it and now Mary-Ann says she’s so scared of the ghost she means to leave at Christmas. I declare, miss, I’d be very glad if you could get to the bottom of all this business of lights and haunting.’

‘Lights?’ repeated Dido rather puzzled – and then she remembered Lucy Crockford mentioning lights being seen in the gallery.

‘Yes,’ said Mrs Philips, looking very troubled. ‘There certainly are lights, miss. At first I paid no attention to what was being said – I thought it was all in the girls’ heads. But then Mrs Jones came to me and said she had seen a light in the old ruins – when she was coming back late from her afternoon off. “Dear me!” I thought. “We are in a sorry state if such a steady old thing as Mrs Jones is taking fancies into her head!” So the next night – close on midnight – out I go myself. And, sure enough, there was a light! Just a faint one – and darting about a bit.’

‘Like a ghost?’

The housekeeper looked at her shrewdly, her brows raised. ‘Well, miss,’ she said, ‘I wouldn’t know about that on account of never having seen a ghost. But I’ve seen a lantern being swung about as it’s carried – and that’s what it looked like to me.’

‘Did it, indeed?’ Dido stepped past the pots of marjoram and myrtle and pressed her face to the warm,