Autumn (33 page)

             
Another stable boy brought out the next set of horses to be exercised and Arabel knew she must not linger, so as to ensure Eli would not get into any trouble for not paying attention to his work.

             
“Will you come for supper this evening?” Arabel invited Eli.

             
His eyes shuttered briefly before he appeared to make a concerted effort to keep himself open.

             
“Your grandmo
ther-”

             
“Is at her club tonight.”

             
“Arabel-”

             
“Please, Eli,” Arabel leaned in toward him and planted a soft, hypnotic kiss upon his generous mouth.

             
Eli nodded at her, lost within her beauty. “Yes,” he responded, “I will gladly join you.”

             
Arabel smiled, victorious, and moved away toward the drive. She turned back, once, to see Eli still staring after her, a bemused smile upon his face, his eyes hungry for her and tracking her every movement. Arabel laughed and sent him an ‘I love you’ in her mind.

             
Now, she thought, it’s time to uncover the rubble of the past and examine it for clues. Arabel purposefully made her way up the drive and knocked firmly upon the impressive doors of Shelaine’s home. A manservant answered and ushered Arabel into the foyer as a young maid hastily went to inform her mistress that she had company.

             
Luckily, Shelaine was both at home and thrilled that Arabel had stopped by for an unexpected visit.

             
“You will never guess what has occurred! We are completely overdue for a catch-up conversation!” Shelaine declared fervently, kissing Arabel’s cheeks enthusiastically before bringing Arabel into a small, informal sitting room where a uniformed maid presently brought strawberry tea and lemon cranberry scones for their eager consumption.
             

             
“Yes, vastly overdue,” Arabel agreed heartily, tucking into an iced lemon and cranberry scone with unabashed relish.

             
Shelaine launched immediately into a detailed accounting of her newest infatuation, a young man by the name of Abelard Van Huesen. Shelaine had first met Abelard four days ago through a horse-buying friend of her father’s and he had called on her every day since then. Apparently Abelard was both heir to a vast fortune from some shipping venture of his family’s, and incredibly handsome.

             
Shelaine swore that this time, it was the truest of true loves. Her eyes were filled with a dreamy expression and Arabel could tell that her friend had seriously fallen for the young man.

             
“I can’t wait to meet him,” Arabel responded to her friend and Shelaine smiled widely.

             
“And that will be soon! Grandfather is going to give an autumn dance next week and Abelard has asked for the honour of escorting me! You must come to the Autumn Ball and bring Eli as your escort!” Shelaine grinned, delighted to be infatuated, and young enough to thoroughly indulge herself in all of the fantasies such an emotional state evoked.

             
“Does Eli dance?” Shelaine inquired and Arabel was momentarily brought up short.

             
“I really do not know,” Arabel confessed, “but I imagine so. The Gypsies all seem to have been born with music in their veins, but if for some reason Eli doesn’t dance, then neither shall I. I should be more pleased to sit with him and not dance than I would be content to dance with anyone besides Eli.”

             
“Why, Arabel Spade,” Shelaine teased, “you are as far gone as me this time!”

             
Arabel laughed and agreed, yes, far gone over Eli she most certainly was.

             
Some time later, when the excited talk of boys had died down, Arabel brought up the puzzling issue of her grandparents marriage and asked if the maid who’d told Shelaine the story was still employed at Murphy Estates. Shelaine told her that the maid retained her position, and once they’d finished their teas, Shelaine went to fetch the woman and bring her to Arabel for a quick conversation.

             
While her friend was out of the room, Arabel went to stand by the window. She peered out toward the stables, looking for Eli and Ira but she saw neither although the third story window from which she peered boasted a lovely view of the estate.

             
A moment later, Shelaine reappeared, towing a tall, thin woman with wiry grey hair beside her.  The woman’s name was Dorcas Harding and she bobbed a curtsey to Arabel while Shelaine left the room to seek out her mother for something. Shelaine promised to return in a little while, thus giving the two women ample time for a private interview.

             
Arabel invited Dorcas to sit with her and after a slight hesitation, the maid perched herself in the comfy chair Shelaine had just vacated.

             
“Miss Shelaine said you wanted to speak with me, miss, about your grandmother, Mrs. Johnston out in Crow’s Nest Pass?” Dorcas ventured uneasily and Arabel smiled warmly at her.

             
“Yes, that’s right, Dorcas,” Arabel replied. “I am most curious about the events leading up to my grandfather’s death. I’m wondering if there is any incident in particular which stands out in your mind as being a forerunner to the demise of their marriage and my grandfather’s passing. I must confess, I do not know the reason he died.”

             
Dorcas took a moment to measure Arabel’s words and then slowly began to relate a version of the tale Arabel had heard previously from Shelaine.

             
“Well, miss, I was around your age when I started work for Mrs. Johnston in Crow’s Nest Pass,” Dorcas began, “and she weren’t yet as old me, I reckon, and already the mistress of a great big house.” The maid’s eyes turned misty as she recalled her youth. “Mrs. Johnston was a young, timid thing, always wantin’ to do right by her husband-” 

             
At this junction in her recitation, Dorcas paused and Arabel assured her to please speak her mind, and to be honest, as Arabel wanted the truth as best as she could recall it. Although it baffled
Arabel entirely
to imagine Amelia Bodean as either young or timid, she said nothing to Dorcas but waited for the maid to continue the story, keeping her thoughts and
her
emotions as shuttered as possible.

             
The older lady began again, her voice steadier now and her tone a tad more enthusiastic as she warmed to her tale and Arabel received the feeling it was a story that had been told more than once over the years.

             
“Your grandfather was poisoned, miss, and there’s not one but two but seven I reckon that would point the finger at your granny.” Dorcas bowed her head. “I’m mighty sad t’ be the one telling you this, miss, but you said you wanted the truth, as best as I can know it.”

             
Arabel nodded, feeling slightly ill. “Yes,” she confirmed to Dorcas. “I do mean to hear the truth, please, as best as you can know it.”

             
Dorcas nodded in return at Arabel. The maid settled into the chair, leaning back, remembering; her eyes took on a hazy glaze as she gazed into the shadows of what once was.

             
“Well, your grandmother was young when she married, just a slip of a girl, an’ by all accounts, pretty far gone with loving your granddad. Miss Amelia Bodean had stars in her eyes it seemed, as Mr. Markus was much older, and she thought the world of him. He’d been married before, of course, but his first wife died in childbirth, and your granny was sure they’d be different, and have a barnful of bairns together.” Dorcas paused to take a breath and Arabel found she was on the edge of her seat, eerily riveted, as she listened to the sad tale of her grandmother’s heartache.

             
“But the whole time, miss, even right from the start, it was doomed. They say your grandfather was stepping out, miss, with a Gypsy woman named Paloma Porchetto, even when Miss Amelia Bodean was with child! She was married too, that Paloma was. To a bad man, miss, a very bad man; evil, you might even say. And he found out, this bad man, about your granddad and Paloma, and he told your granny, Amelia Bodean, and that’s how they say she got the poison. It was Gypsy poison miss, from the dark side!” Dorcas shuddered and Arabel had to refrain from instinctively copying the woman’s movement.

             
Arabel felt grimly hollowed out by this new information. All former traces of Arabel’s hopeful naïveté were now thoroughly dashed. Her grandmother Amelia Bodean– a pregnant murderess? Who would ever have fathomed it?

             
“Why did she not stand trial for his death?” Arabel questioned, determined to hear all of the bleak tale, regardless of the personal demons the information unleashed.

             
Dorcas shook her head. “Most said the Mayor was bought off, and the Chief too, though it wasn’t Chief Constable Bartlin back then, miss, it was Chief Constable Normandile, an’ everyone knew he was soft on your granny. The Johnston family, too, they had money, and weren’t keen on scandal. T’was all brushed away, so to speak, and Mr. Markus laid to rest in an uneasy grave.”
             

             
“No one was ever charged with his death?”

             
“No miss, the matter was just…dropped.”

             
A brief silence ensued as Arabel collected her thoughts and sought to rationally pursue the most advantageous line of questioning.

             
“And this Paloma woman? What happened to her?”

             
“She disappeared, just after your granddad’s murder. Folks thought her husband’d wrung her neck, he was cold enough and evil enough, they say, but her body was never found so there was never naught to prove.”

             
“Do you recall the husband’s name, Paloma’s husband?”

             
Dorcas shook her head. “I’ll think on it, miss, but I reckon I recall her name because it was so unusual-like. Their last name was Porchetto, but his first name, I don’t recall knowing.” The maid closed her eyes, again, thinking.

             
“Raoul!” she exclaimed a moment later, triumphantly. “Raoul Porchetto! That’s him, the evil man that was married to Paloma!”

             
Arabel smiled grimly. Raoul Porchetto. Paloma Porchetto. Two more names for the inquiry list.

             
“Alright. So, were you still employed at the Johnston’s when my mother met my father?”

             
“Yes, miss. I was there until your mother ran away to get married.”

             
Arabel was stunned. “Ran away? They didn’t get married in town?” she asked incredulously and Dorcas shook her head emphatically.

             
“Why, no miss. They eloped. Your granny said she’d disown Miss Vi if she wouldn’t let your daddy alone, but Miss Vi was stubborn, an’ she knew she’d found her man, so she left your granny’s house for good, and I reckon she never did step foot in it again, rest her poor soul.”

             
“What reason did my grandmother have for objecting to Patrick Spade?”

             
“Well I don’t rightly know, miss, Mrs. Johnston never came out and spoke plainly with Miss Vi. They argued, plenty, and your mama took to sneaking out at night to meet your daddy and some say she was already with child when they married at last but those are the tales folks say when they’re jealous and many were jealous of Miss Vi!”

             
“Why? Why were others jealous of my mother?”

             
“She was a great beauty, miss. And so keen on life! You’d think such beauty would make for a shrewish, selfish manner but your mama was a right lady, miss. A right lady.”

             
“But you honestly haven’t any clue as to what objection my grandmother took against my father?”

             
“No, miss, just his lack of fortune, I always reckoned.”

             
“He wasn’t involved in anything…unsavoury? Or perhaps, magical?”

             
Dorcas’ eyes lit with a sudden memory. “That’s it! Yes, there was something, now if only I can remember it!” The maid closed her eyes again, searching through the far away past for a glimmer of a memory she’d long since put away.

             
Arabel glanced out the window to distract herself while she waited on the maid’s memory. Arabel could see a faint sun attempting to poke through the thin veil of grey cloud; she tried to ignore her unhelpful desire to shake the maid until she dislodged the faint recollection from her brain. Arabel strove for patience. She wanted to scream, or cry, at the very least. Somehow this delving into the past was proving more painful than she’d thought it would be.