hadn’t been disturbed.
Fellows disturbed it. He tugged up one stake and gouged the area with his boot.
He was aware of the magnitude of his actions. Misleading the police or covering up a crime could have him arrested, possibly convicted and sent to Dartmoor to break rocks alongside the men he’d helped put there.
He didn’t care. Louisa was innocent, and he wouldn’t let her go down for this crime. Fellows had been a detective long enough to know when a person was guilty and when he or she was not. His instincts were never wrong. The only time he’d been wrong had been in a case involving Ian and Hart, and in that instance he’d let his hatred for the Mackenzie family override his instincts.
Wasn’t he letting his emotions do the same now? some niggling part of him asked.
He’d made an error of judgment when he’d thought Hart and Ian Mackenzie had committed a few murders, but at the same time, Fellows had known those men to be capable of it, Hart especially. Fellows himself was capable of murder as well.
Not Louisa.
Few truly good people existed in this world, and Louisa Scranton was one of them. She had a fiery temper —he’d seen that a time or two—but she also possessed a vast kindness and generosity that made her beautiful. She was like a firefly, bright and energetic, lighting up those around her.
Fellows would do everything in his power to keep her safe.
He finished arranging the scene of the crime as he wanted it, took a few more samples from the smashed tea things, and departed the tent.
The Bishop of Hargate’s funeral two days later was well attended. Louisa went with Isabella and Mac, the three of them standing a few feet behind Hargate’s family and friends.
Rain trickled down, spotting the black umbrellas, which had opened like dark flowers as soon as sprinkles began. The tiny drumming on the canvas made Louisa’s already tight nerves stretch tighter.
Mac held an umbrella over Isabella, his arm around his wife’s waist. He was never embarrassed at displaying that he’d married for love, which Louisa had always found rather sweet. The Mackenzies were volatile, emotional men. She didn’t think they knew
The other Mackenzie who stood at the very edge of the crowd was volatile and emotional too, but he kept a tight rein on himself. Lloyd Fellows wore severe black today, his hat in his hand as he bowed his head for the prayers. Rain darkened his hair—no umbrella for Chief Inspector Fellows.
Three days had passed since the bishop’s death. Louisa had followed Fellows’ dictate that she remain inside and away from the Season’s social whirl. She understood why, but the confinement chafed. Though Isabella’s house was cheerful and full of children, Louisa had been happy even for the excuse of the funeral to come out into open air, as chilly and dank as it was.
The churchyard contained many prominent people—both above and below ground—Hargate being no less prominent. Hargate’s father was an earl, and marriages had made him cousin to a marquis, another bishop, and a few baronets. The crowd at the burial ground today must encompass several pages of
The two Scotland Yard detectives stayed well back, being respectful of the family’s grief. But Louisa knew Fellows was watching, looking for signs of feigned sorrow among the guests, a betrayal of glee that Hargate was gone.
The bishop who conducted the service finished with the usual prayers about man being dust and his life on earth nothing. The casket was lowered, and Hargate’s family sadly bade him farewell.
As the crowd dispersed, Louisa moved next to Hargate’s mother and offered her condolences. She was rewarded with a cold stare. Hargate’s father gave Louisa a look of open viciousness before he and his wife turned their backs and walked away from her.
Louisa moved back to Isabella as though nothing untoward had happened, but her heart was hammering, and she felt ill. Hargate’s parents had just cut her dead, and the entire gathering had witnessed it.
Isabella closed her fingers around Louisa’s arm. “Never mind, darling. They’re upset. Only natural.”
“They think I killed him,” Louisa said numbly. “Don’t they?”
“Please don’t think about it, dearest. We’ll go home and have lots of hot tea and stuff ourselves with cakes. You know this will blow over when Inspector Fellows clears it all up.”
Inspector Fellows had resumed his hat, but he remained on the edge of the crowd, watching every person walk by. He wasn’t part of them, and his stance said that he didn’t want to be.
He saw Louisa. Their gazes met, held for a heartbeat, two. Louisa grew hot in spite of the chill rain.
Finally Fellows gave her a nod and lifted his hat. Louisa nodded back as politeness dictated, but her head and heart ached.
Louisa usually found it soothing to sit in Mac’s studio and watch him paint. But the day after the bishop’s funeral, she paced restlessly in the wide upper room while her brother-in-law slapped paint onto canvas.
His children were there—Aimee, Eileen, and Robert—Aimee and Eileen playing together, baby Robert fast asleep. Mac Mackenzie, clad in his kilt, old boots, and loose shirt, his hair protected by a gypsy scarf, painted in a kind of frenzy, never looking away from his canvas or palette.
When Louisa paced past him for about the twentieth time, however, Mac dropped his palette with a clatter and thrust his brush into oil of turpentine.
“Louisa, lass, for God’s sake, sit down. I can’t concentrate with you rushing past a dozen times a minute.”
Louisa bit back snappish words and sat down with a thump on the threadbare sofa. The sofa was old and thoroughly worn from children playing and napping on it. Louisa knew Isabella modeled for Mac on it, and not for modest pictures. Little Robert had been conceived on it, Louisa believed. A very family-situated sofa.
“I beg your pardon, Mac. I am tired of being confined to the house.” Hearing nothing, knowing nothing. Fellows had sent no word and had not called himself. “It’s a bit frustrating.” An understatement, but Louisa had been bred to be so very polite on every occasion.
Mac softened. “Aye, I know. I’m sorry. Forgive my temper.”
“You’re an artist,” Louisa said lightly. “You can’t help yourself.”
Mac burst out laughing, a big, booming Mackenzie laugh. “A good excuse. Ashamed of myself for employing it. Why don’t you tell Isabella to take you out? No reason you should sit here day after day. If anything had happened . . . was wrong . . . the good Fellows would tell us, yes?”
Mac’s stammering around the subject did not give Louisa heart. He meant that if policemen were about to swoop down and arrest Louisa, Fellows would warn them.
“Be kind to her, Papa,” Aimee said. “She’s afraid people will accuse her of poisoning the bishop.”
Aimee was five years old, nearly six. Mac and Isabella’s adopted daughter had red hair a similar shade to Isabella’s, steady brown eyes, and a burgeoning intelligence. Unkind people made out that Mac was Aimee’s father in truth, her mother one of Mac’s models, and Isabella a fool to take Aimee into her home.
The truth was harsher—her father had been a man who’d tried to kill Mac, her mother a Parisian woman who’d died of illness and neglect. Mac’s and Isabella’s compassion had saved this little girl. Aimee was turning into a sweet, amiable, and clever child. She knew she was adopted, but the only parents she remembered were Mac and Isabella.
Mac stared at Aimee now in surprise. “Where did you hear talk like that, wee girl?”
Aimee returned his look without blinking. “You and Mama. And a few ladies who came to visit Mama yesterday. I hid in the second drawing room and listened to them talk. I like to look at the ladies in their dresses. Some of them are beautiful, though Mama’s dresses are the prettiest.”
Mac had his mouth open. On a big man wearing a kerchief, the expression was comical. “Aimee . . .”
“Perfectly all right, Mac,” Louisa broke in. “We shouldn’t hide things from her. Aimee, sweetie.” Louisa took Aimee’s hands. “It is true that some people will say I killed the Bishop of Hargate, but that is untrue.”
Aimee still looked troubled. “The ladies said you hated him for what happened with your father. And one said you’d been his lover. What does that mean, exactly?”
Mac’s Highland Scots became pronounced. “Lass, never listen to the likes of women such as they. I’ll tell
