“Someone did,” Penelope said. “From our wander around the garden, it’s difficult to see how anyone could have come from outside and calmly climbed up to the terrace in order to drop that stone ball on Lady Galbraith. But someone must have met Lady Galbraith outside, either on the terrace or on the path below.”
Barnaby nodded. “And all indications are that that someone came from the ball, from the ballroom.”
“But,” Penelope said, “surely the critical point is what moved Lady Galbraith to go outside. Was she alone when she left the ballroom? Or was her killer with her?” Penelope glanced at Stokes. “She couldn’t have been killed in the manner she was if she hadn’t been out on the path—so why was she there?”
Violet frowned. “Might she have followed Hartley?” She met Penelope’s eyes. “To see where he was going, who he was meeting in the gardens.”
Penelope blinked. “You mean she noticed… Well, yes, that’s possible, isn’t it?” She glanced around the circle. “Lady Galbraith might well have noticed Hartley slipping away to meet secretly with someone. If she suspected something of a clandestine nature was going on—and she sounds like the sort to leap to the conclusion that he’d formed a tendre for someone entirely unsuitable—then at the Fairchilds’ ball, she might have been watching him, and when she saw him slipping away so very early, she naturally went after him.” Behind her spectacles, Penelope’s eyes gleamed. “And that would explain why she so cavalierly abandoned her three daughters, leaving them to fend for themselves. In Lady Galbraith’s eyes, Hartley, her firstborn and her husband’s heir, and who he is to marry, would unquestionably take precedence over her daughters’ futures.”
Barnaby frowned. “All right—so now we have Hartley leaving the ballroom at about half past nine to meet with his intended, who is already waiting in the folly by the lake. And Lady Galbraith follows him…why didn’t she go further? Because Hartley saw her and stopped and confronted her?”
Stokes stirred. He caught Barnaby’s eye. “That raises a rather disturbing possibility. At present, we have only Hartley Galbraith’s word for what he says happened. What if, instead, Lady Galbraith came after him and caught up with both him and his intended on the path below the terrace, or even as they were returning to the house. There’s a confrontation—there’s some reason Hartley and his intended have kept their attachment a secret, after all—and Lady Galbraith declares that she will never allow Hartley to marry the lady—over her dead body and all that. Leaving Hartley and his mother on the path, the lady involved storms up the steps, then, in a fury, she pauses at the top, picks up the stone ball, and drops it on Lady Galbraith’s head.”
Feeling rather pleased with his hypothesis, Stokes refocused on Griselda and Penelope, then, when they said nothing but just looked steadily back at him, he glanced at Violet, but she, too, remained silent. Unconvinced. “What?” Stokes said, straightening in his chair.
Rather primly, Penelope said, “I really don’t think any young lady would imagine that killing her mother-in-law-to-be in front of her prospective husband was likely to smooth her path into matrimony.”
“Ah.” Stokes held up a hand. “But we don’t know what Hartley’s relationship with his mother was. We do know that he hasn’t lived at home for years—perhaps there was some deep antipathy between them? Regardless, I can’t see him as being the sort to kill his own mother, but perhaps his intended knew how the land lay, and that removing Lady Galbraith wouldn’t, ultimately, turn Hartley against her—especially if his mother was determined to stand in the way of their marriage.”
“And we have to remember,” Montague said, “that Hartley did not report his mother’s death. He left the body lying on the path, returned to the ballroom, and kept mum.”
The ladies remained patently unconvinced, and even Barnaby didn’t look swayed. “Hartley,” Barnaby said, “claimed that he didn’t report finding the body because he was so shocked by what he’d seen that he couldn’t think past the conundrum posed by the lady fleeing the terrace wearing Lady Latimer’s shoes.”
“I would think,” Penelope said, tilting her head as she considered, “that given his lifelong connection with the Latimers, for him, seeing a lady wearing those shoes in that setting would create something of an emotional clash.” She paused, then added, “I can understand why he might have been unable, then and there, to decide what to do.”
“But,” Violet said, frowning slightly, “returning to Stokes’s point about us only having Hartley’s word about what he saw, do we even know that he and his intended saw Lady Latimer’s shoes at all? Or is that pure invention, in the circumstances the perfect suggestion to divert the investigation into an arena that will likely be rife with possibilities, given that all the Latimer ladies were at the ball?”
“Come to that,” Stokes said, “if you entertain the notion that what Hartley told us is a fabrication, we also have no reason to believe that his intended exists, and that it wasn’t he, himself, and no one else, who murdered his mother.”
A pause ensued, then Penelope grimaced. “Well, against that we have yours, Barnaby’s, and Carradale’s readings of Hartley as an honest and honorable man. On the other hand, no one else was seen leaving or returning to the ballroom, but that hardly means no one did.”
Montague stirred. “I feel compelled to point out that Hartley’s tale of having an intended meshes with him putting his affairs in order.”
“True,” Penelope said. “And, what’s more, there’s another hole in the theory that either Hartley or his intended felt moved to kill his mother. Namely that, as Hartley is nearly thirty years old, who he decides to marry is not subject to his mother’s approval.” Penelope looked at Montague. “I assume Hartley is independent enough financially to marry whom he pleases?”
Montague nodded. “That would be my understanding.”
“So,” Penelope expounded, “although Lady Galbraith might have created a great deal of unpleasantness and fuss, she couldn’t have prevented Hartley from marrying his intended. Thus, from either Hartley’s or his intended’s point of view, killing Lady Galbraith would not have been in their best interests. Indeed, it’s hard to see what might have motivated them—and if one is involved, then both are—to do such a thing.”
Barnaby shifted, stretching out his long legs and crossing his ankles. “I would have to agree. However, that said, we all know that the motive for murder can be, at first glance, very obscure.” Meeting Penelope’s eyes, he said, “As much as I’m inclined to believe Hartley, at this point I don’t think we can accept his version of events as uncontestable fact.”
Penelope wrinkled her nose. “All right.” She paused, her gaze growing distant as she rapidly reviewed their findings, then she refocused. “Either Hartley is lying, or he’s telling the truth. If he’s lying, then either he or his intended killed his mother—for some as-yet obscure reason—and subsequently Hartley concealed the crime. If that is the case, then his story of seeing a lady wearing Lady Latimer’s shoes leaving the terrace immediately after his mother had been struck down is pure invention, a distracting smokescreen with no basis in fact.”
Barnaby nodded. “Thus far, that’s sound.”
Penelope inclined her head. “Which leaves us with the alternative—that everything Hartley told you and Stokes is the unvarnished truth.”
“And that means,” Griselda said, “that the murderer is a lady wearing Lady Latimer’s shoes who followed Lady Galbraith out of the ballroom and onto the side terrace. From there, the lady dropped the stone ball on Lady Galbraith’s head, then turned and walked quickly back into the house.”
“Ah—but did the lady in Lady Latimer’s shoes commit the murder?” Violet asked. “Or did she follow someone else—or perhaps she came out intending to speak with Lady Galbraith but someone else was before her—and so she, the lady in Lady Latimer’s shoes, saw the murderer drop the ball on Lady Galbraith’s head? That might have been why the lady in the shoes rushed back into the ballroom and said
nothing about the murder—she might have recognized the murderer and been frightened. As for the murderer…” Violet paused, then asked, “I know you said it was unlikely that the murderer could have reached the terrace above Lady Galbraith if the murderer had come via the gardens, but could the murderer have come from the ballroom and left via the gardens?”
Penelope, Stokes, and Barnaby exchanged glances, then Penelope pulled a face at Violet. “I hate it when we have a multitude of perfectly believable but entirely different scenarios for a murder.”
Violet shrugged. “The question had to be asked.”
Stokes was frowning. “If the lady in the shoes saw the murderer and was frightened of him, surely the safest thing she could do is tell the authorities what she saw.”
A pause ensued while the others considered, then Penelope sighed. “In any other case, yes, but in this one? We have to assume, as I believe Hartley has, that the lady he and his intended saw fleeing the terrace is one of the Latimer ladies. And that being so, then no—to her, telling the authorities would not feature as her wisest course. If she speaks up, she stands a very good chance of being accused of Lady Galbraith’s murder, and regardless of any facts, that would be the ton’s verdict.”
Stokes growled, “Why is it that murders within the ton are never straightforward?”
Barnaby grinned fleetingly. “You love the challenge.”
Stokes grunted. “So what are our questions, and what do we do next?”
A lively discussion ensued. It was decided that Stokes and Barnaby would check with the police surgeon to verify the time of Lady Galbraith’s death and also that it was, as everyone had assumed, the ball falling on her ladyship’s head that had crushed her skull enough to kill her. Such details, Penelope pointed out, were important.
Montague was delegated to look more deeply into Hartley Galbraith’s finances to eliminate any other possible motive lurking there. He also volunteered to confirm the financial bona fides of the Latimers, given that, quite aside from the existence of the feud, the lady on the terrace, assuming she was real, had drawn the family into the investigation.
For their part, Penelope, Violet, and Griselda exchanged glances and merely agreed to meet on the morrow to define what investigative areas they might best address. Their husbands eyed them with a certain wariness, but did not venture any comment.
The evening broke up shortly afterward. A sense of camaraderie and expectation, of shared purpose and determination, followed the six into the front hall. Hettie, who had been watching over Megan, Stokes and Griselda’s barely one-year-old daughter, in the nursery, was summoned and brought the swaddled, peacefully sleeping bundle down. Griselda took Megan, and Penelope and Violet gathered around to peek and then drop soft kisses on one delicate rosy cheek.
Stokes looked proud and hovered protectively. Barnaby and Montague smiled.
Eventually, Penelope and Barnaby stood at the top of their front steps and waved the other couples, each in their own carriage, away.
Returning into the warmth and light of the front hall, Penelope paused, head tilted; her gaze grew abstracted, a frown slowly crimping her dark brows.
Barnaby halted beside her. He studied her expression, then reached for her hand and twined his fingers with hers. “What is it? Don’t try to tell me you’re not thrilled to have another case you can help investigate.”
Penelope blinked. “Heavens, no—it’s not that.” Glancing up, she met Barnaby’s eyes. “I was just thinking that my maxim about such investigations is continuing to hold true—a case is invariably more complicated when a romance is involved.”
Lips quirking, Barnaby arched his brows. “In this case, that’s proving to be an entirely valid observation.”
* * *
At eleven o’clock that night, Hartley Galbraith strode down the pavement bordering Hanover Square. Shoulders hunched against the chill breeze, he kept his head down and continued south into George Street. Glancing forward, he noted the dark bulk of St. George’s church ahead on his left.
Lips thinning, Hartley inwardly owned to amazement verging on disbelief at how many hurdles life had managed to strew in the path of what should have been the most straightforward of romances.
Drawing level with the church, he glanced around, then crossed the street and went quickly up the steps into the dark shadows of the pillared porch. At this hour, with the church closed for the night and no lamps burning along its façade, the porch was wreathed in near darkness and helpfully deserted except for the lady he had come to meet.
He’d sent her a note that morning, telling her of his change of address and stipulating this time, this place; she’d replied confirming the meeting, and had also urged him to reveal all to the police, regardless of the implications and possible repercussions. The truth, as she’d so eloquently stated, had to be paramount. Had to be their guide through this maze.
He glanced around as he strode to join her where she waited on one of the stone benches set in alcoves flanking the main doors. Her maid should have been somewhere nearby, keeping watch over her mistress, but Hartley couldn’t see anyone else.
His intended rose as he neared. He slowed and opened his arms, and she came to him with her usual directness. Halting, he closed his arms around her. She lifted her face, inviting his kiss, but he held back. Peering deeper into the shadows, he asked, “Where’s your maid?”
“She and Samuel, the undergardener, are standing just around the corner where they can’t see us, but they will hear if I call.” Through the dimness, his beloved searched his face. “Now kiss me.”
Thus adjured, Hartley complied, bending his head and covering her lips—lips of soft rose just made to be kissed—with his. She responded as ardently as she always did, and for several long seconds—which could have been minutes for all he knew—his senses spun, giddy with the taste of her, with the unvoiced promise not just conveyed but underscored by the svelte female form pressed so firmly, so trustingly, and so deliberately provocatively against his harder body.
They had always been intended for each other. That was why the phrase “my intended” leapt so readily to his lips when referring to her. From their earliest years, they had known there was a link, some special connection between them. Despite the closeness of their families and the fact that they thought of all the others as sisters, neither he nor she had ever viewed what lay between them, even in the years before it had fully blossomed, as anything even vaguely sibling-like.
From the very first they had known that, at some point, they would wed. Had known that their futures were inextricably linked, that them getting married wasn’t a possibility but rather a certainty. Yet even as they’d matured and the link had only grown stronger, more assured, they’d realized and had accepted that they would have to wait—that he would have to wait until she was deemed old enough to make her choice. Which had meant until she’d had her first Season and had seen what the ton had to offer in terms of eligible gentlemen.
Her affections had never wavered, any more than his had with the passing years.
He’d expected to ask for her hand at the beginning of last Season. That had been their plan.
Until the falling out—ridiculous and unnecessary but so very real—that had separated their families.
So they’d waited again, hoping, expecting, that it would blow over, that the rift was temporary and would soon enough be healed.
But that hadn’t eventuated; if anything, the situation had only grown worse.
Two weeks ago, they’d decided that they had waited long enough, that they could not put their lives and the future they were determined to share in abeyance forever. That they had a responsibility to themselves and that future to secure it.
He’d asked his man-of-business to get all in readiness for him to make a formal application for her hand. Neither he nor she foresaw any difficulty in gaining her parents’ permission, indeed, their support.
It had been his parents, his mother in particular, who woul
d have planted herself firmly in their way.
And then they’d seen her killed.
Not even the sweetness of his beloved’s kiss could yet counter the horror, sadness, and sorrow of that memory.
Hartley drew back from the kiss; raising his head, he drew in a tight breath.
Her palm cradling one lean cheek, Cynthia Latimer searched his face, then softly said, “I am so very, very sorry. No matter how difficult she was being, she didn’t deserve to die.”
Catching her hand, Hartley gently squeezed her fingers, then pressed a kiss to her fingertips. “I know. I’m still…” He grimaced. “Well, I would still be reeling if I had the time to do so.”
Releasing her, he waved her to the bench in the alcove. He glanced around, but there was no one passing, no one to see them. “I hate this,” he muttered. “All this sneaking around in the shadows.”
Gathering her skirts, Cynthia sat and sighed. “I know, but we can put up with that—we have for the last year and more.” They’d previously met at his lodgings, before he had moved back to Hanover Square, the better to take care of his family. She fully understood and accepted that necessity, but neither she nor, she knew, he was in any way accepting of the utterly unexpected turn of events. Quite aside from having to deal with the shock and the grief occasioned by his mother’s death, her demise would mean an unavoidable setback to their plans, but how much of a setback—how much of an obstacle it might prove to be—they had yet to divine; it was the latter uncertainty that weighed on them both. She studied Hartley’s face as he settled beside her. “How difficult has it been?”
“More or less what you would expect. Geraldine and Primrose ended in near-hysterics, and the doctor had to give them something to calm them. They’re still keeping to their beds. The pater, too, has been…unable to cope, but he’s starting to rally.” Clasping his hands, leaning his forearms on his thighs, Hartley went on, “But it’s Monica who worries me the most. She’s been weeping uncontrollably, and in between bouts, she just stares blankly at the wall.”