The Stuart Sapphire Page 14

  She sprang to her feet and curtseyed.

  ‘Why are you here, Simone? Shouldn’t you be with your mistress?’

  Simone blushed. ‘My aunt who lives at Whitdean, Your Grace – she was very ill and her ladyship gave me leave to visit her.’

  ‘When was this?’

  Simone thought for a moment. ‘On Friday, sir.’

  ‘Where was she going?’ It was usually London.

  ‘To Brighton, Your Grace, to visit friends.’

  A week ago, thought Sir Joseph. ‘And who were these friends?’

  Simone shook her head warily. ‘If it please Your Grace, her ladyship does not tell me their names.’

  That was a lie. She knew perfectly well Lady Sarah’s destination and her assignations with the Prince Regent but, a simple soul, as Sir Joseph’s brow darkened ominously, she was terrified that this interrogation might make her reveal the truth about her mistress’s secret apartment.

  ‘I – believe – that she visits the gaming tables – with these friends.’

  Sir Joseph’s face was growing scarlet. A week in Brighton at the gaming tables, losing his money as she always did. He would have to put a stop to this. Drumming his fingers on the windowsill, he swung round on the now trembling Simone.

  Why hadn’t she taken her maid with her? Who would unlace her, dress and undress her? An unwelcome vision from the uninhibited pre-marriage days flew into his mind and was speedily banished.

  ‘Did she say when she was returning?’

  Simone shook her head, looked at the floor. ‘No, Your Grace,’ she whispered. ‘She did not.’

  That was another lie. Because of the Masque next day Simone had expected her mistress to return very early in the morning, as she sometimes did after spending the night with the prince. Arriving in a closed carriage, she entered by the servants’ quarters, the door conveniently left unlocked by Simone.

  The servants all knew, of course, that her ladyship had been out all night: ‘Cat on the tiles,’ they whispered and winked behind her back. But this time she hadn’t crept up to her room, to take the bath Simone had prepared for her. And there had been no word since.

  Simone was a little concerned but not very. She quite understood that her mistress preferred the Pavilion and the prince to any Masque at Creeve House and she was well paid by her ladyship to mind her own business. As well as feeling secretly proud that her mistress was involved with the future King of England, Simone was always glad of a chance to spend another day with her lover, the alleged sick aunt from Whitdean.

  Back in his study, Sir Joseph, rereading the details of the gruesome murder story which he had only skimmed, and putting away his fourth glass of brandy, was about to doze off when the footman announced an unexpected visitor.

  John Townsend.

  Sir Joseph opened his eyes, emerging from the brandy haze with difficulty, and struggled to get to his feet.

  ‘Ah, Townsend. Welcome! Haven’t seen you for a while – busy catching criminals as usual. Here to see your nephew, are you? He is doing very well indeed – we are very pleased with his progress. An increase in his wages is on the cards,’ he added with a smile.

  But Townsend wasn’t smiling in return. He looked very grave.

  ‘Bad news, Townsend, someone ill in the family, is that it?’

  Townsend gave a deep sigh, shook his head and said awkwardly: ‘Will Your Grace be seated again, please.’

  Sir Joseph, who was swaying somewhat, staggered back into his chair. ‘What on earth is it, man?’ Pausing, he squinted up at Townsend. ‘Not the king – not the prince,’ he whispered.

  ‘Neither, Your Grace. Worse than that.’

  ‘What could be worse?’ The old man glanced anxiously towards the window. He could hear six-year-old Timothy playing a noisy game with his tutor and a new puppy on the terrace. ‘Not invasion, is it? Dear God, the French haven’t landed—?’

  ‘No, Your Grace. May I beg you to listen for a moment.’

  Sir Joseph sat back in his chair. ‘Go ahead, go ahead. Let’s hear your worst,’ and since nothing could be worse than some ill befalling Timothy, or the Prince Regent, he added: ‘Though I cannot imagine—’

  ‘No, Your Grace, I am afraid you cannot,’ Townsend interrupted. ‘I have just come from a most bitter and unhappy experience.’ He paused and shook his head, wondering how to continue. ‘From identifying the dead woman who was found near the Lewes Road.’

  ‘Oh, that!’ said Sir Joseph pointing to the newspaper. ‘I have just been reading about that. Wanted to show it to Lady Sarah, she always enjoys a spicy bit of sensational news. Not much usually, is there? Finds life dull here. But highwaymen and the corpse of an unknown naked woman, that would cheer her up.’

  Awkwardly Townsend reached out and put his hand on Sir Joseph’s shoulder. ‘Your Grace, you must prepare yourself for a shock.’

  ‘A shock! How? Why?’

  ‘The body I have just identified in the mortuary – it – is that of – her ladyship.’

  Sir Joseph stared at him with disbelieving eyes, then he fell back in his chair and closed his eyes, shaking his head wildly. ‘Never – never.’

  The study door opened and Townsend signalled Sir Joseph’s physician who had been leaving the house after attending to the housekeeper’s broken wrist. He confessed that he was also keeping an eye on Sir Joseph’s health which would not improve after hearing the Bow Street officer’s shocking news.

  Coming forward, he whispered: ‘Wait outside, Mr Townsend, His Grace may want to have further words. I will give him a sedative – this kind of shock, his heart, you know.’

  Townsend didn’t know but was glad to have a chance to visit the stables where his nephew was out exercising the Creeve horses for the forthcoming Whitehawk races.

  Returning half an hour later, he met the physician, who was just leaving. ‘He will see you now, I think, Mr Townsend. I persuaded him to take a rest. Yes, he is much calmer and anxious to know what happened to Her Grace in more detail.’

  Townsend cautiously entered the study where Sir Joseph reclined on the sofa. ‘I am truly sorry, Your Grace. Please accept my condolences—’

  Sir Joseph made a gesture of impatience and in a voice tinged with hope he whispered, ‘You are sure – certain sure.’

  Townsend took a deep breath. ‘I am, alas, Your Grace. I have had the honour to become acquainted with Lady Sarah over the years as a guest here in your house.’ He shook his head. ‘I am deeply shocked and I can only offer Your Grace my deepest sympathy.’

  Sir Joseph nodded wearily. ‘Dear God, dear God. On her way home to the Masque – attacked by highwaymen, the newspaper said. That is why she never arrived and I thought she had changed her mind. She does – did – that sort of thing quite often.’ He paused, looking towards the window again.

  ‘That carriage accident, going down the embankment like that. And stripped of all her clothes – and her jewels. Left naked – naked! How disgraceful!’

  ‘Disgraceful indeed, Your Grace,’ said Townsend as Sir Joseph went on:

  ‘So the highwaymen, those devils, are back again to plague us. I understood we no longer had anything to fear from them in this area. As a magistrate it did my heart good to see justice done and the lot of them hanged years ago.’

  ‘Nevertheless, Your Grace,’ said Townsend, ‘the theory is that it was highwaymen or some such disreputable characters, who seized the chance of robbing – a – dead person.’

  Sir Joseph sat up, thumped his fists together.

  ‘Then they must be found – and hanged, do you hear? No explanation is acceptable, whoever was concerned must be punished – by hanging. I will put notice out of a reward – a substantial reward – for any information leading to their capture.’

  Chapter Seventeen

  Not everyone shared the Prince Regent’s relief as he wrote letters of sincere condolence to the marquis on the loss of a beloved wife and to his brother Frederick on the death of a close and dear friend
.

  Mention of highwaymen terrified travellers, especially rich ones, and some carriages had built-in secret compartments beneath the seats where passengers, especially ladies, if they had enough warning could hide their jewels, presenting the highwaymen with “bad purses” containing a few worthless coins.

  The report of a Gruesome Discovery in the normally mild, genteel and thoroughly boring social news with which the newspaper sought to fill its columns flew like wildfire around the town arousing alarm and despondency.

  This was sensational, dangerous and it threatened all travellers. Even those unable to read, and there were quite a few, implored their more literate friends and neighbours for a true account, which regretfully was often given with more relish than accuracy.

  Before the dead woman was named, there was some speculation as to her identity and the town’s whores were counting their numbers. Unidentified also meant the possibility of being given to the doctors for dissection, a terrible fate. But there was worse to come. The word ‘murdered’ was also being whispered.

  Princess Charlotte did not share the terrors of the female population as she waylaid Tam in one of her accidental meetings. Such was her alacrity that he suspected she must sit in her room which overlooked the gardens, or had maids posted as sentries, to alert her to his appearance.

  ‘Is it not exciting news – and so infamous – the marchioness being the victim?’ she said cheerfully, then perhaps aware of Tam’s look at her lack of feeling, she took his arm and whispered: ‘I must confess, I have never cared for her, so it is no use pretending or shedding false tears. She was a very bad influence on my father. The beastly woman coveted jewels – jewels that should be mine by right—’

  Tam tried not to listen to her railing against the marchioness, and leaving her as hastily as politeness allowed, he hurried towards his favourite place, the peaceful promenade. Watching the rollers creeping gently up to the shore, he decided that the Prince Regent still had cause for alarm. He had not been as discreet as he thought, especially if the voluble and tactless princess’s gossip reached the marquis’s ears.

  Townsend had earlier hinted at a number of complications. The marchioness had died a week ago. Her body had lain above ground for several days in very warm weather, and so it had begun to decompose. Its condition was not at all helped by the multitude of small animals, inquisitive predatory crows and insects that had enjoyed a nibble at her flesh.

  Nor could the funeral be arranged with all the pomp and ritual proper to her position in society. Solemn invitations to members of the royal family and the many aristocratic families to whom the marquis was related, either by marriage or the constant yearly celebration of hunts, shooting parties and weekend house guests, had to be abandoned, and the marchioness laid to rest immediately in the interests of health and hygiene since, even confined to the coolest regions of the mortuary, there were distinct and ominous odours of decay floating upwards.

  There was however one further complication. Dr Brooke, who had carried out a meticulous examination of the corpse on arrival, prided himself on his accurate knowledge of the time of death acquired over many years. This expertise told him that the marchioness had not died as a result of the carriage accident and that the highwaymen, whatever else they were guilty of, were not to blame for her death. She had been dead for several days before the carriage journey. And what was more, she had been strangled. Marks around her neck indicated that life had been extinguished by a rope or some other means.

  Despite the fact that the funeral should have already taken place and the victim laid to rest, Dr Brooke, a conscientious physician, decided that a solution must be found and the murderer apprehended, tried and hanged for the crime.

  This information he eagerly passed on to Townsend whose fame as a criminal catcher and thief-taker had long since reached Brighton and he was therefore the most competent officer to take charge of the case and carry out the investigation.

  All of which Townsend dramatically reported to Tam, suggesting that they go on the instant to the scene of the accident and search for clues.

  ‘Dr Brooke knows a thing or two,’ he said respectfully. ‘Strangling, he says, is not in character for highwaymen, who are brisk about their business. They would not waste time looking for methods of strangling their victims, they might even, with good reason, be superstitious about using ropes, which they live in dread, but would use the speedier method of pistols.’

  Tam, who knew most of the story from first hand, was not confident that they would find anything at all, but at least it was a diversion from the wearisome and futile daily search for the missing sapphire. Even Townsend had to admit they were running out of places to visit and suspicious persons to interrogate.

  And so the Brighton Herald had another field day. Dr Brooke, eager to instigate a search for the marchioness’s foul murderer and, finding the Bow Street officer a little slow to appreciate his observations, took it upon himself to introduce himself to the marquis, thereby risking an attack of apoplexy.

  His Grace, however, rallied sufficiently to insist on another reward notice being posted, asking for any information which would lead to apprehending the marchioness’s assassin.

  This did nothing for the Prince Regent’s peace of mind. It was what he dreaded most, all his nightmares come home to roost.

  Townsend decided that Tam should accompany him to the funeral, in the hope that there might be clues to the murderer’s identity, a forlorn hope based on a firm belief that murderers often return to the graveside of their victims whose wounds thereupon reopen and dramatically begin to bleed again.

  Tam was not quite sure how he was equating this macabre idea with the fact that the victim had been strangled, and failed to share Townsend’s faith in such an easy solution to murder.

  Approaching Lewes they turned into splendid gates leading down a drive towards a handsome timber-framed building mellowed in time. This was Creeve House, dating from the sixteenth century, where already carriages were lined up, as mourners emerged for the funeral in the family chapel.

  Tam wore his black cloak. Townsend retained his long and perhaps his only overcoat but conceded to custom with a black cravat.

  At the door a footman solemnly consulted his list. Their names were not there. Townsend explained that he was a personal friend of the marquis but, perhaps considering his informal dress unsuitable for such an occasion, the footman shook his head. No name, no admittance. He added that as the private chapel could only accommodate family and close friends, the gentlemen might wait with the other mourners in the gardens to pay their last respects as the late marchioness was laid to rest in the family crypt.

  Townsend, somewhat huffed, returned to the carriage, and informed Tam that as he was sorely in need of refreshment, the inevitable pint of ale and a pie, they might as well adjourn to the Old Bull in Lewes, an ancient establishment once the lodging of Thomas Paine, the reformer and author of The Rights of Man, in his time as an excise officer.

  Tam was impressed by his first melancholy visit to Lewes, the small county town whose quaint and charming hilly streets enjoyed unrestricted access to the Sussex countryside, its roots sunk deeper into England’s history than the Brighton he had just left.

  As the carriage rattled along the main thoroughfare, the high street, he had a glimpse of buildings considerably older than the Marine Pavilion, while Townsend eagerly pointed out the site where the Protestant martyrs had been burnt in the reign of Mary Tudor.

  Townsend knew Lewes well from his visits to Creeve House, and was eager to tell Tam something of its history. Dating from the Norman Conquest, the castle built by them was deserted in the fourteenth century and eventually disappeared almost completely thanks to later generations using its stones for building purposes.

  ‘Practically all the old mansions you see have something of Lewes Castle in their foundations,’ Townsend said, pointing out Barbican House, a sixteenth-century timber-framed building. ‘If we had time I’d show yo
u the house Henry the Eighth gave to Anne of Cleves as part of their divorce settlement.’

  ‘One piece of local history you won’t know, being from Scotland, is that after the Battle of Lewes in 1264, fought on the Downs out there, King Henry the Third was defeated by Simon de Montfort and the ensuing terms of peace led to the beginning of the English Parliament.’

  Leaving the carriage alongside the Old Bull, across the road was St Michael’s Church. ‘It’s been recently renovated but it dates back to the fourteenth century. Very important church, lot of tombs of ancient families. If Creeves hadn’t a private chapel, then the funeral would have taken place there.’

  They were speedily served and Townsend, refreshed in body and spirit, decided they had given the chapel service a decent interval and that they had best make haste to return or they would miss the best part of the ceremony.

  They had left Brighton that morning in brilliant sunshine with few clouds hovering over the horizon, but as they emerged from the inn it seemed that summer had forsaken them.

  By the time they were heading down the drive to Creeve House, the mourners were already gathered in the gardens and the distant rumbles of thunder promised a storm violent enough to make the ensuing ceremony at the crypt short indeed. The minister’s words were almost inaudible as the coffin, covered with its black velvet pall and the Creeve coat of arms, was placed in the crypt.

  Tam watched the marquis supporting a small boy about six years old and, at his other side, a slim girl, clad like the other female members of the family in mourning weeds, a black veil fluttering from her bonnet concealing her face.

  As the rain began servants rushed forward with sheltering umbrellas to be held over the mourners as they started to walk quickly towards the house.

  The girl hurried past close to where Tam and Townsend had taken somewhat inadequate shelter. Tam was conscious of her eyes watching him from under the veil as Townsend hissed: ‘That’s the ungrateful daughter who has disgraced the family and broken her poor father’s heart. She was no friend of poor Lady Sarah either, I can tell you.’