Julian looked down thoughtfully at the inscription on Alexander's headstone. "That suggests the gods destroy what they love, not what they envy."
"In Greek, the words 'to admire' and 'to envy' are the same. At all events, Alexander was like Polycrates: until he died that gruesome death, he simply couldn't fail. May I tell you something in confidence?"
"Of course, if you wish."
"It's not widely known, but Alexander was in grave difficulties shortly before he died. He'd been investing in South American mines, and of course some of those have been faring badly of late. A few months ago, two of his mining ventures went down the wind within days of each other. I didn't know about it at the time. He didn't talk to me much about his investments, and he always kept such a cool head about money matters that few people can have suspected he was so hard hit. He was left owing thirty thousand pounds."
Julian's brows shot up. "That's quite a considerable sum."
"Yes. But here's the most extraordinary part of the story. Alexander had borrowed the money to invest in those mining ventures, and given notes-of-hand to several men in the City. In fact, he'd been borrowing for some time before that. His investments were so successful, he was emboldened to increase them, I suppose. The life he led was very expensive. He had a reputation to keep up in society, and of course he wanted Belinda to have the best of everything."
Sir Malcolm looked at Julian belligerently, prepared to defend his son against any charges of extravagance. But Julian only said, "Of course," politely and waited to be further enlightened.
"Yes, well—" Sir Malcolm cleared his throat. "You must have met David Adams?"
"Yes, at one of your son's parties. And of course I know of him by reputation."
Adams was a dealer in securities. In particular, he was a broker of loans to the newly independent South American nations. Although only in his mid-thirties, he already had the confidence of foreign officials and English ministers alike. Julian had heard he was fiercely ambitious, a dangerous man to cross. Alexander had invested successfully in some of his projects; what was far more eccentric, he had drawn Adams into his circle of friends and invited him to his parties. No one less courted and admired than Alexander would have dared. The man was not only in trade—he was a Jew.
"Adams had been buying up Alexander's notes-of-hand at a discount," Sir Malcolm said. "Whether Alexander knew what he was doing isn't clear; certainly no one else knew except a handful of men in the City, and they kept their own counsel. By the time those two mining ventures failed, Adams held nearly all Alexander's notes. And about three weeks before Alexander died—he forgave them."
"You mean, he and your son reached an accommodation?"
"I mean that Adams cancelled the debt, the whole of it, without Alexander's lifting a finger or paying him a farthing in exchange."
"That's extraordinary." To be sure, Adams was wealthy— the commissions on South American loans were said to be immense—but even he could hardly afford to throw money away on such a scale. "I suppose he's been questioned about all this—not only why he forgave the notes but why he bought them in the first place."
"Oh, yes. He says he did it to oblige Alexander."
Julian cocked an eyebrow skeptically. "No man of business is as obliging as that. I could understand his making lenient terms with your son, but to forgive the notes outright—"
"Yes, I know." Sir Malcolm nodded glumly. "Of course, Adams doesn't pretend he did it wholly out of friendship. He says Alexander was useful to him, and I'm sure that was true. Alexander introduced him to wealthy and influential men— potential investors, members of Parliament, all sorts of people who could advance his business. Anyway, the point I'm trying to make is that Alexander led a charmed life. The one time he failed spectacularly, he was saved from the consequences. Until a little over a week ago, when some person, evil or mad or both, bludgeoned him with a poker and scattered his brains across the floor of his own study, while overhead a houseful of guests drank his wine and wondered where he was!"
Sir Malcolm clenched his fists and walked rapidly back and forth. Julian gave him a chance to recover himself, then asked, "Will you tell me now why you wished to see me?"
"I suppose you've already guessed. It was Peter Vance who suggested I write to you. He's the Bow Street Runner investigating Alexander's murder, and he's finding it uphill work. It's not his fault—this crime would baffle anyone. The murderer left nothing behind in the study. The weapon was one that anybody could have wielded. Nothing was stolen from the house, and there was no sign anyone had broken in. So the murderer was almost certainly one of Alexander's servants, or one of his guests. But there were eighty guests at the party that night, and only a few have alibis.
"Vance says our best hope is to find someone with a motive and try to connect that person with the crime. He says that with so little physical evidence, motive is paramount. But whenever he's tried to question the guests, he's been balked at every turn. People like Sir Henry Effingham and Lady Anthea Fitzjohn don't take kindly to being interrogated by a Bow Street officer. You know what the fashionable world thinks of Bow Street: an institution invented to interfere with all their wholesome amusements—drinking, gambling, knocking over watchmen's boxes, blowing each other's brains out in duels. And there's not much Vance can do to coerce them—at least not without some concrete evidence linking them to the crime. Ordinarily, Bow Street depends on rewards to loosen witnesses' tongues, and God knows I've offered them in abundance. But Alexander's guests are above accepting money for information. They insist they're eager to help, but they won't demean themselves by cooperating with Bow Street. And these people called themselves Alexander's friends!"
He drew a long breath and went on more calmly, "That's why Vance thought of applying to you for help. He remembered you from the investigation of the murder at the Reclamation Society."
Julian nodded. That had been six or seven months ago. Bow Street had not become involved until after Julian had solved the crime, but the subsequent arrest and trial had thrown him and Vance together a good deal. "You're fortunate to have him in charge of the investigation. He's canny and efficient, and completely imperturbable in a crisis."
Sir Malcolm smiled. "He says much the same thing of you. He also pointed out that you have access to all the fashionable world. Enquiries that would be offensive from a Bow Street Runner might be acceptable, even flattering, from you. I don't suppose there's a gentleman since Brummell with your reputation as an arbiter of fashion. I'm not flattering you—it's merely what everyone knows." He added in some embarrassment, "I hope you won't take this amiss, but before I approached you, I wrote to Samuel Digby. I knew he'd backed your investigation of the Reclamation Society murder, and he's a fine magistrate and an honest man. So I asked him for—well—"
"A reference?" said Julian, amused.
"Please don't be offended. It's just that solving this crime is so important to me! I've racked my brains over it, I've pestered poor Vance, I've been twice to see the Home Secretary, and still nothing's been accomplished—"
"I understand," Julian said gently. "I'm not in the least offended."
"I'm glad to hear it. Anyway, Mr. Digby wrote back to me that you were honourable, resourceful, and shrewder than any man has a right to be at your age. So there you have it, Mr. Kestrel. I'm appealing to you as a father, as a man of law, as a British subject—Why can I never say anything simply? After twenty years at the Bar, a man forgets what plain and honest discourse is." Sir Malcolm faced Julian squarely. "Help me, Mr. Kestrel. Help me find out who killed my son."
2: Portrait of Alexander
Julian was strongly tempted. How could he resist the chance to investigate a crime already so famous, with its challenging lack of evidence and its constellation of eminent suspects? And he was far from unmoved by Sir Malcolm's grief, bewilderment, and yearning for justice. But his first experience of solving a murder, at the country house of a proud old family, had made him wary of conducting investigations within a group of intimate friends and relatives. It meant becoming privy to their secrets, turning each against another, and all of them against himself—
He said, "You must realize, Sir Malcolm, these investigations can turn up painful, even shocking, information. The fact that your son wasn't robbed suggests that the murderer killed him for some personal reason, which means he or she was very likely someone close to him—a friend, even a relation. If I accept this task, I shall have to explore that possibility. I shall rifle through your son's possessions and papers; I shall ask impertinent questions, respect no one's privacy, treat nothing as sacred, and everyone not absolutely cleared as a suspect. I don't say this to alarm you—merely to make you see that, in embarking on an investigation like this, you must ask yourself, not merely what the truth is, but whether you wish to know it."
"Yes, Mr. Kestrel," Sir Malcolm said steadily. "With all my heart, I wish to know the truth, whatever it may be. Ignorance to me is the worst of torments—the most frightening and frustrating state a man can be in. And I swear to you here and now that, whatever questions you ask, and whatever you discover, I shall never reproach you. Any pain your investigation inflicts on me will be of my own seeking—the price of my conviction that light is always better than darkness."
"And Mrs. Falkland? Is she of your mind?"
"I talked all this over with Belinda before I wrote to you. I could hardly take such a step without her consent. She agreed that we should consult you. I can't say she showed much hope or interest, but that's her state of mind. She's too sick at heart to be roused to enthusiasm about anything."
There was a pause. The sun went behind a cloud, dropping a veil of shadow around them. Julian weighed Sir Malcolm's promise, wondered if he could keep it, and decided that it did not matter. In his heart of hearts, he had known all along what his response would be. "Very well, Sir Malcolm. I accept your proposal."
"Thank you, Mr. Kestrel!" Sir Malcolm wrung his hand. "I haven't a doubt that between you, you and Vance will get to the bottom of this crime! I hope you needn't go back to London just yet? I should like to take you back to my house—there's something there I want to show you. And I'm sure Belinda will want to thank you personally for your kindness in helping us. We'd best not tax her with questions, though, till she feels more the thing."
"I should only be wasting both my time and hers, trying to question her when I know so little about the crime myself. I've spent the past fortnight in Newmarket, and though I've been following the newspaper accounts, they're one part information to three parts drama and rumour. I need to see Vance and find out what he's discovered so far, in particular about suspects and alibis." He paused, eyeing Sir Malcolm consideringly. "There's one thing I had better ask you at the outset: On the night your son was killed—where were you?"
"Where was—?" Sir Malcolm stared in bewilderment. Then his eyes filled with horror. "You can't mean—oh, I understand. You're illustrating your point, that no one is above suspicion. And you're right, of course. I want you to be thorough. I was at home that night. My servants can confirm that I never left the house, let alone went all the way to London, killed my son, and came all the way back."
"Thank you, Sir Malcolm. I realize that was an appalling question." And he did feel for Sir Malcolm, but he also intended to ask Vance if his alibi was as sound as he claimed. Because it was not beyond imagination that Sir Malcolm had killed his son, and was now conducting a zealous search for the murderer in order to divert suspicion. True, he appeared to have loved and admired Alexander, but he had also observed:
In Greek, the words "to admire" and "to envy" are the same.
It would be highly inconvenient, at the very least, to harbour suspicions of parricide against the man who had brought him into the investigation. But the possibility had to be faced.
"You'll come, then?" said Sir Malcolm.
"I should be very pleased."
"Good, good! You rode here from London, I assume?" Sir Malcolm glanced at Julian's top-boots and riding whip.
"Yes. I left my horse at a public house called the Holly Bush."
"I live quite near there, in the Grove. We can walk, if you've no objection, and I'll send a servant to fetch your horse."
They left the church grounds by a side gate and ascended a steep, narrow street flanked by handsome brown-brick houses. Holly bushes clustered thickly in the gardens and along the grass verges. Laundresses had turned some of them into drying-racks; damp white-linen sleeves waved phantom greetings in the wind.
They reached Holly Bush Hill and turned into the Grove, a narrow, curving street lined with stately houses behind high brick walls. Sir Malcolm stopped before a gilded wrought-iron gate, which bore the initials of some former owner and the year 1705. The house beyond looked to be of about that period. It was square and solid, of brown brick, with red-brick borders around the windows. The roof was steep, giving the house a high-browed, thoughtful look. A small wing jutted forward on either side, connected by a simple but elegant white colonnade before the door.
Sir Malcolm and Julian entered. A servant met them and took their hats. He was an elderly man, probably a retainer of long standing, dressed in mourning like his master. Sir Malcolm told him to send to the Holly Bush for Julian's horse, then asked where Mrs. Falkland was.
"She's in the drawing room, sir. Martha is with her."
"Martha is her maid," Sir Malcolm explained in an aside to Julian. He turned back to the servant. "Run up and ask her if she's well enough to receive us."
"Yes, sir." The servant bowed and went upstairs.
"I'm being especially careful with her just now," Sir Malcolm confided. "As I told you, she was very ill a few days ago. At first I assumed she'd eaten something that disagreed with her, but then I began to wonder—" He dropped his voice. "It's been a great sorrow to me that Alexander left no children. I'm the last of my line, and God knows, I'm not likely to marry again, at forty-eight. I don't suppose any woman could tolerate my books and my solitary habits. But since Belinda's illness, I've dared to hope Alexander left something of himself behind. It would be a great consolation both to her and to me."