He went out, closed the door behind him, and leaned back against it. His shock at Mrs. Falkland's outburst of grief had died down, but a deeper shock took its place. The pattern he had sought was emerging at last. And it was horrifying.
18: An Alibi Shattered
Julian returned to London late that afternoon and stopped at Bow Street. He was lucky enough to find Vance in. Vance shook his head sombrely when he heard of the attack on Mrs. Falkland. "Seems it wasn't enough for our man to kill Mr. Falkland—he had to serve out Mrs. Falkland, too. And that's too bad, sir—taking it out on a lady, or a babe not even born."
Julian had his own ideas about this, but as they were only half formed, he kept them to himself. "I suggested to Sir Malcolm that he report this to the local authorities and ask them to make the initial enquiries in the neighbourhood—for strangers, suspicious characters, that sort of thing."
"I'm glad to hear it, sir. We've enough to do to handle the investigation in London."
"Have you made any progress with the gig and horse?"
"Not much, sir. It's been a busy day, what with a parcel of banknotes being stolen off a mail coach and a gang of footpads kicking up a shine on the Hounslow road. Still, you don't need to hear all that, do you, sir? I'll tell you what I
have
done: I sent Bill Watkins out to nose around Long Acre. That neighbourhood's full of coachmakers, and it's just the other side of Covent Garden from Cygnet's Court. If anybody'd remember a particular gig and horse, it'd be folks in the business of selling carriages, wouldn't you say?"
"That's a good thought. And you know, that neighbourhood would have been an ideal place for the driver to be rid of the gig and horse—by selling them to a coachmaker, for example."
"Assuming he had reason to be rid of 'em, sir."
"Well, Jemmy says he used them to take an unconscious lady out of Cygnet's Court on the night of the Brickfield Murder. There are traces of brickearth in Mrs. Desmond's house, and both Mrs. Desmond and her maid are missing. It's hard to avoid the conclusion that that man, and that gig and horse, were mixed up in something very rum."
"Well, if anyone in Long Acre has 'em, we'll find 'em, sir. And maybe if we're lucky we'll get a description of the driver."
"Maybe." Julian shook his head wryly. "But somehow I think our gentleman knows a trick worth two of that."
*
Dipper met Julian at the door of his flat. "You've got a visitor, sir. Mr. Talmadge."
"Eugene? He's supposed to be in Yorkshire!"
"He couldn't very well be, sir," said Dipper reasonably, "on account of his being here."
"An unassailable piece of logic." Julian gave Dipper his hat, gloves, and riding whip and asked grimly, "Where is he?"
"In the study, sir. I tipped him some grub and a plug of malt from the coffee-house, 'coz he was dead-and-alive when he come here. Looked as if he'd been knocking about the streets since lightmans. And he ain't wearing the boots for it."
"Hell and damnation. What is that troublesome cub doing two hundred miles from where he ought to be?"
"Sleeping, sir. Leastways he was last time I looked."
"Then he's in for a rude awakening. He's certainly given me one."
Julian went into the study. Warm air and an aroma of beef and beer assailed him. The fire was burning so brightly, the little room had grown hot and close. Eugene was still asleep, sprawled in an armchair by the fire. He looked much cleaner than he had when Julian last saw him. In place of the limp, soiled neckcloth, he wore a glazed black stock so high and stiff he must be completely exhausted to be able to sleep in it.
Julian relented a little, seeing his own advice carried to such zealous excess. "Mr. Talmadge."
Eugene stirred, blinked, scrambled to his feet. "Mr. Kestrel—I—you must be wondering what I'm doing here—"
"That's merely a faint echo of my sentiments." Julian crossed the room and opened a window. The rush of cold air made Eugene shiver.
Julian motioned him to sit down again and took a seat opposite. "Let's begin at the beginning, shall we? Yesterday Sir Malcolm put you on a post-chaise to Yorkshire at nine in the morning. Is that correct?"
"I—I think so," stammered Eugene. "I don't remember the time exactly."
"We'll call it nine. Now I wish to know exactly where you were and everything you did from that time until you came here."
"But why?"
"Allow me to ask the questions for the present. Believe me, you're in no position to make terms."
Eugene looked at him uncertainly. At last he drew a long breath and commenced, "I didn't want to go away to school. I especially didn't want to go to a school in Yorkshire, because whatever Belinda says, those schools are for boys nobody wants, and horrible things happen to them there—much she cares! I saw there was no changing her mind, so I decided to run away. I didn't know what I would do, or where I would go—I only knew I couldn't face the boys and the masters. They'd all know about my father, and worse still, they'd know about Alexander. They'd say I killed him. They might even try to hang me. I know the sorts of things they do.
"I didn't really have a plan when I set out yesterday. But the third time we stopped to change horses, I saw a London-bound stagecoach stopping too. So all at once I made up my mind. I paid off the post-boy and lugged my portmanteau over to the coach. I talked to the guard, and he talked to the coachman, and they let me have an outside seat."
Julian was not surprised. Taking up a passenger not on the waybill—"shouldering," as it was called—allowed the coachman and guard to divide the fee between them, instead of passing it on to the coach proprietor. "Go on."
"So I climbed up on the roof and had to sit next to a man who chewed tobacco and kept spitting it off the side of the coach, only sometimes it landed on my coat, and there was a woman with a baby that cried all the way to London. But the view was smashing from up there. I'd never ridden on top of a coach before. We got into London and stopped at an inn called the Belle Savage—"
"What time was that?"
"About six o'clock. Everyone got off the coach and went about their business—but I didn't have any business. I didn't know what to do, and the portmanteau was confoundedly heavy to lug about. So finally I took a room at the inn and had dinner. After that I was fagged out and went to bed."
"Did anyone see you at the inn that evening?"
"Don't you believe me?" Eugene stared at him in bewilderment. "Why would I lie?"
"Be so good as to answer my question. Did anyone see you?"
"I think, sir," said Eugene, with careful politeness, "that your question is rather insulting. But as I haven't anyone else to turn to, I suppose you may ask what you like. Yes, people saw me in the coffee-room, but I don't know who they were. The waiters saw me. And a maid came to my room just before I went to bed and took my boots away to be cleaned."
"What time was that?"
"I don't know! It might have been nine o'clock, or a little after. I know it was early, because I woke up at dawn. Everything looked grey and dismal. I went out—you want to know what time, I suppose; I think it was about six—and I stopped at a street breakfast for coffee and bread and butter. After that I just wandered around. I watched the clerks coming to work in the City. Some of them were younger than I am, and I thought how lucky they were to have a place to go—"
"They were probably thinking how lucky you were not to have to go anywhere."
"Yes, but they have work, they earn their own money, they're independent! I have to go where people tell me, even if it's to a beastly school in Yorkshire. I wondered if I might get work, but I don't know how to do anything, and I don't have a character. I don't think you can get work without a character, can you?"
"It depends on how fastidious you are about keeping within the law, or the bounds of decency."
Eugene nodded. "I was afraid of that. Anyway, I just kept walking, and I liked seeing parts of town I hadn't seen before, but my feet got sore, and I was more and more worried about what would become of me when my money ran out. Finally I was so desperate, I decided to come to you."
"You've put that rather inartfully."
"I didn't mean it that way. I meant that I know I haven't any claim on you, and you've no reason to help me, but I thought since you're a man of honour, you'd at least respect my confidence and not give me away. And you know the world—you might be able to advise me. I feel so lost. You don't know what it's like to be my age and feel everyone is against you, and you have nowhere to go except home, and you'd rather die than go there."
"Actually," said Julian quietly, "I know exactly what it's like."
Eugene looked at him respectfully. "I believe you."
"That's very gratifying." Julian nipped the subject in the bud. "But we digress. Have you anyone who can vouch for your whereabouts from six o'clock this morning until half past nine?"
"No. I was just walking about the City. Why are you asking me all these questions?" he pleaded. "What have I done?"
"What you've done, you exasperating infant, is pitched yourself into a devil of a mess." He added, watching him, "I have some grave news for you. Your sister was in an accident this morning."
"An accident! Is she all right?"
"She twisted her ankle. And she lost the child she was carrying."
"Oh, poor Bel! Is she very ill? Will she get well?"
"The surgeon thinks so."
"How did it happen?"
"She was thrown from her horse."
"But she's never thrown! She's a bruising rider!"
"This time she had help. Someone drove two nails into her saddle."
"You mean—to make her fall? But that's monstrous! Who would do a thing like that to her?"
"Some people may want to know if you have any ideas about that."
"I—I don't understand—"
"Then I'll put it more bluntly. Your inheritance was conditioned on Alexander's dying childless. Now he has."
"Oh, no," Eugene whispered, shaking his head. "Oh, no."
"So you see, you're in an awkward spot."
"But—but—I didn't—I wouldn't! I'd never have hurt her like that! I wouldn't do anything so mean and base to anyone, let alone my sister! I didn't even know she was in the family way! She never told me."
"She was ill when I saw her last Sunday. You might have deduced from that that she was going to have a child."
"I never even thought of it. She said she must have eaten bad food. And that was exactly how it seemed."
"Yes," said Julian, nodding, "that would fit quite well."
"Fit what?"
"Never mind. I was thinking aloud."
"You do believe me, don't you? You don't think I drove those nails into her saddle?"
"You had ample opportunity. You could have stolen off to Hampstead early this morning, set the trap, and returned to London at your leisure."
"Well, perhaps I could have, but I didn't!"
"Surely a young man with your bad blood would think nothing of playing a trick like this?"
"Look here, I know I said the other day I had bad blood, but—but that was—well—"
"Self-indulgent rubbish?"
Eugene lifted his chin. "Yes. Yes, it was. I may have been an ass then, but I'm not a liar now. I didn't hurt Belinda, and I didn't kill Alexander. I swear it."
Julian regarded him for a short time in silence. "What do you mean to do now?"
"I don't know." Eugene collapsed into childhood again. "What do you think I ought to do?"
"There's only one course open to you. You must go back to Hampstead at once."
"To—to Sir Malcolm's house? I can't! Everyone will suspect me, Belinda will hate me, she'll think I killed her baby!"
"What were you proposing to do instead? Disappear? You might as well sign a confession of guilt and be done with it."
"But she'll look at me, and I'll know she's thinking:
Did he do it? Is he a murderer?
And what will I say?"
"Anything is better than staying away and letting your absence speak for you. Who do you think is going to believe in your innocence, if you haven't the courage to proclaim it yourself?"
Eugene was silent. At last he swallowed hard and asked, "Will you come with me?"
Julian felt he owed him that. He could not pitch him into the lions' den and then leave him to fight it out alone. Besides, he wanted to see how Eugene was received in Hampstead. "Very well," he said, rising.
"Must we go now?"
"Of course if you'd rather hang about here brooding and imagining how it will be—"
"No!" Eugene shuddered. "No, sir," he amended politely. They went out into the hall. Julian glanced wryly at his reflection in the looking-glass, but decided that in this emergency he could permit himself to go out in the evening in riding dress. Eugene, too, stole a look in the glass and gave a few tugs to the formidable black stock around his neck.
"It's a distinct improvement," Julian told him. "But you know, you needn't wear it
a la guillotine
."
"It
is
a bit high," Eugene admitted. "But you said I ought to learn to hold my head up."
"You seem to be making progress."
"I could hardly help it, wearing this."
Julian smiled. "I wasn't talking about your neckwear."
*
It was nearly sunset by the time they arrived in Hampstead. Shadows of trees and gaslamps stretched like pointing fingers along the streets. Eugene sat up tense and taut in the hackney coach. Julian had an idea he would resound like a tuning-fork if touched.
Sir Malcolm received them in the library. Mrs. Falkland had been carried up to her room, and Alexander's portrait was back on the wall, looking out with laughing eyes on the troubles and torments of his family.
Julian left it to Eugene to explain how he had run away and returned to London. Eugene flushed and stammered a little but got through his story fairly bravely. At the end, he drew a long breath and said, "I should like to see my sister."
Sir Malcolm took Julian aside. "I don't think we should let him see her. You said yourself he had the most obvious reason to want her to lose her child. Now we know he had an opportunity to tamper with her saddle. She's bound to realize that herself, and it might upset her terribly."