exchanges rather tedious. So do many of us, but one must make the effort.” It was a statement, as if it were a fact agreed to by all.
Narraway wondered if she had made the remark to Quixwood on purpose. Catherine had been beautiful. Even in violent death the remnants of it were there in her face. Mary Abercrombie was agreeable enough and without obvious blemish, but she was no beauty, at least not to Narraway.
“Was that the last time you saw her?” he asked.
“Yes. Except briefly at a concert about two weeks ago.”
“Who was she with at the concert?”
“I’m not sure she was with anyone.” She raised her eyebrows slightly. “When we spoke she was alone.”
“Did that surprise you?”
“Frankly, no. Catherine was inclined to go to events alone. If it was something she wished to do, she would prefer to be alone to indulge in it, rather than go with company, who might require conversation from her.” Her disapproval of such behavior was clear, if still unspoken.
Narraway had a sudden vision of Catherine bent forward, listening to great, sweeping symphonies of music while the fashionable women around her were talking to one another, gossiping, flirting, or merely pretending to listen while they waited for the opportunity to recommence speaking. He imagined in her an inner loneliness he found disturbing, and frighteningly easy to understand.
Or was he simply projecting his own emotions onto her, because he had never known her alive and there was no one to refute his picture?
“Was there anyone to whom she was particularly close?” he asked.
“You mean someone who might know if she was … having an unsuitable friendship?” Mrs. Abercrombie asked, delicate eyebrows raised. “Possibly. But I cannot imagine that they would be indiscreet enough to speak of it, even had she been that foolish and disloyal. Poor Rawdon is suffering enough, don’t you think? And Catherine has certainly paid for any indiscretions.”
Narraway smiled coldly, feeling the temper like an ice storm inside him. “Actually, Mrs. Abercrombie, I was thinking of someone who might know if she was being troubled by unwanted attentions,” he corrected her. “Men sometimes look at a beautiful woman and imagine she has given them some encouragement, when in truth she was no more than civil-or at most, kind. Denials do not always persuade them of their error.”
She opened her pale eyes very wide. “Really? I have never known anyone so … disturbed.”
“No,” he agreed without a flicker in his expression. “I imagine not.”
The anger burned up her face. “But most perceptive of you to have realized Catherine may have,” she retorted. “Remarkable, because apparently you did not know her. But then, perhaps you know women like her.”
“Unfortunately not,” he said, keeping his eyes on hers. “From all I hear, she seems to have been unique. Please accept my condolences on your loss, Mrs. Abercrombie.” He rose to his feet and gave a very slight inclination of his head.
She remained seated, her eyes cold. “You are too kind,” she said sarcastically.
Still annoyed and somewhat confused in trying to make sense of Catherine’s seemingly innocent life, Narraway called on the police surgeon, Brinsley, to see if he had anything further to report.
Brinsley was busy with another autopsy, but he did not keep Narraway waiting more than fifteen minutes. He came into the sparse waiting room rolling down his shirtsleeves, his hair a little tousled.
“Afternoon, my lord,” he said briskly. He did not hold out his hand. Perhaps he had experienced too many people’s revulsion, their imagination picturing where it had just been.
“Good afternoon, Doctor,” Narraway replied. “Am I too soon to learn if you have anything further to say about Mrs. Quixwood’s death?”
“No, no. Preformed the autopsy this morning,” Brinsley’s face was pinched. “I’ve really nothing to add, unless you want the details of the rape? Can’t think it’ll help you. Very violent.” His voice sank even lower, grating with anger. “Very ugly.”
“Can you tell if she fought, or at least tried to?” Narraway asked.
Brinsley winced. “She tried. A few ugly bruises have come out. They do, after death, if they were inflicted just before. Wrists, arms, shoulders. He was unnecessarily brutal. Thighs, but you’d expect that. And the bite, of course, on her breast.” His mouth was tight, as if his jaw was clenched. “Only thing that might make a difference to you is that I’m now quite certain she actually died of opium poisoning. Overdose of laudanum, dissolved in a glassful of Madeira wine. Pretty heavily laced, I must say. Far more than enough to kill her.”
Narraway stood paralyzed, grief washing over him. He had hoped the doctor’s initial reading had been an error. Now he couldn’t help but picture the despair she must have felt, as if everything she was had been torn violently from her: her body, her dignity, the very core of herself damaged beyond hope.
“I’m sorry,” Brinsley said hoarsely. “I keep thinking that one day I’ll get used to it, but I never do. I can’t say for certain that it was suicide, since we don’t know if the man stayed long enough to force her to drink it, but that seems extremely unlikely. If he’d wanted her dead he could simply have broken her neck. I’m afraid everything suggests she crawled to the cabinet and poured herself enough to deaden the pain, and either accidentally or intentionally overdid the dose.” His face was bleak. “I’m sorry.”
Narraway struggled to picture it. “Could she have dragged herself that far? And why on earth would she keep laudanum in the cabinet in the hallway? Wouldn’t she keep it upstairs? In the bedroom?”
“I’ve no idea,” Brinsley said patiently. “But as far as we know, there was no one else in that part of the house, right? And from the bruising on her knees, I believe she crawled over to the cabinet. It isn’t difficult to assume that from there she opened it and poured and drank the Madeira. The dregs were full of laudanum, both in the glass and in the bottle.” He shook himself. “For God’s sake! The poor woman can’t have had the least idea of what she was doing. She just tipped the laudanum into the bottle and drank the whole damn thing. Can you blame her?”
“It doesn’t make sense. Why would she pour opium into the bottle? Why not just straight into her glass, then?”
“I don’t know,” Brinsley said. “I’ve just given you the facts, and I don’t see what else you can make of them. But I hope to hell you find whoever did it, and if you can’t hang him, literally, for murder, then find a way to get him for rape.”
“I’ll try,” Narraway swore. “Believe me.”
He visited and spoke with all the other people on Miss Flaxley’s list. He gained a wider view of Catherine Quixwood, but it did not alter radically from that already given him by Mary Abercrombie. Catherine had been interested in all manner of science, in the artifacts of other times and places, in human thought and above all in the passions of the mind.
She seemed to have skirted more carefully around the edges regarding passions of the heart. He wondered if they had frightened her, perhaps come too close to breaching the walls of her own safety, or her loneliness.
Or was that his overfanciful imagination seeking in her a likeness to himself? He could understand being drawn to the music of Beethoven, and yet at the same time frightened of it. It challenged all the flimsy arguments of safety and dared beyond the known into something far bigger, both more beautiful and more dangerous. At times he wanted to stay with what his mind could conquer and hold. To be enchanted by the brilliance of the mind was exciting, but without the risk of injury.
Look at vases of flowers, not the wild paintings of Turner in which all the light was caught and imagined on canvas. Look at the artifacts of ancient Troy, but do not think of the passion and the loss of the time. Always keep the mind busy.
Was that what Catherine had been doing?
At the end of three days Narraway had a plethora of facts, statements, and stories, but no fixed frame in which to place them. If she had made secret assignations with anyone, she had been sufficiently clever in concealing them that he had found no trace. She was charming to everyone and intimate with none.
About the only thing she did not appear to have had any interest in was the last few years of extraordinary
