The Murder Stone Read online

  The young woman in the veil was next in the line of guests. She pressed Francesca’s hand as if she had known her for years, and spoke briefly. The older woman followed her, and then the angry man she’d noticed in the church, his face still blotched with fury. He merely nodded curtly, as if he couldn’t force himself to say even the platitudes of polite condolence.

  “I wonder who he is,” Branscombe was saying, staring after him as he also passed on into the hall and from there into the drawing room.

  Finally the last of the guests had straggled past, and Francesca turned to find Mrs. Lane at her elbow with a cup of sweet tea. She drank gratefully, and was looking for a place to set the cup when Richard Leighton came up to relieve her of it. “Sit down,” he said. “You have done your duty.”

  It was an unexpected kindness, and she turned to anger to strengthen her backbone.

  “I wish you’d had the decency to stay away today! You’ve been prowling the cemetery—talking to the rector—asking questions of half the village— That makes a mockery of coming to honor the dead.”

  “It’s true. I’ve no reason to mourn the man you called your grandfather. I suppose I wanted to be sure he was dead. If there’s any justice in heaven, he’s already answered for his crimes.”

  “You’re rude,” she said impatiently, and walked away, only to be cornered almost at once by the angry man.

  He said in a low, strained voice, “Look, my name is Walsham. I’ve come about the estate in Essex.”

  Startled, Francesca said, “Indeed?” They were standing a little distance from the other mourners, and no one could overhear them.

  “Yes. My father, a rather foolish man, lost it to your grandfather at cards. I demand the right to buy it back. I ask your permission to speak with your solicitor on Monday morning.”

  “I know nothing about the property in Essex—” she began, but faltered. Tall and fair, his face flushed, he would surely have reminded Peter of a Viking on the attack, but Francesca wasn’t amused. It was as if the man believed that sheer persistence would persuade her. Or was used to having his own way by the force of his choleric personality.

  “I can afford to pay a fair enough price for it.” He was clearly trying to hold his temper in check. This wasn’t, she could see, a recent resentment but a long-simmering rancor. “The Essex estate has been in my family for four hundred years or more. I have the right to ask for first consultation.”

  “But I haven’t even seen it—I can hardly decide—”

  “That has nothing to say to anything,” he told her hotly. “The property is mine. My father was cheated, I tell you! But I’m offering you—”

  Leighton was unexpectedly at her elbow. He said, staring at Walsham, “It doesn’t matter what you’re offering. I suggest you say farewell to Miss Hatton. Contact her solicitor at your convenience and his.”

  Walsham opened his mouth to argue, but something in the younger man’s face made him think better of it. Leighton escorted him out.

  Her head throbbing, Francesca slipped away to the small sitting room down the passage. Stepping inside, she leaned against the door, her eyes shut and her whole body struggling to soothe away the tension of the morning. She had been so afraid something untoward would happen—and it had been a close run thing.

  She nearly gasped when someone in the room cleared his throat.

  It was the gruff man who had appeared with the undertakers. She hadn’t seen him standing there between the windows. He made no effort to introduce himself, but said, “Where is it? I should like to be allowed to look at it.”

  “Where is what?” she asked, irritated. “And what are you doing in here? The rest of the company is in the drawing room!”

  “I’ve searched the house,” he replied baldly. “It isn’t here as far as I can tell. My box. The tricky devil refused to hand it over, even after I’d met his exorbitant price! I’ll not be cheated, I tell you. I want what is mine.”

  Francesca had no idea what he was talking about. “If he won this box from you at cards, I know nothing about it! Now if you’ll please leave—”

  “It wasn’t lost in a card game, woman! Are you witless? I paid for it. And I want to see it. Francis Hatton knew what I was about—he knew why I wanted it. And he agreed I should have it! Now I’ve come for it, and I won’t be denied.” He spoke English with a pronounced Scottish accent in the r’s. “He was a bastard, Hatton was, but I always believed he was honest. Now I know differently!”

  “I suggest you see my solicitor if there’s something you want from this estate,” she told him coldly. “I am not discussing business on the day my grandfather is buried!”

  “It’s none of the solicitor’s bloody business! If you had any sense, you’d see that. Nor is it yours to keep—it never was!”

  Francesca whirled and went to find Branscombe. The man reluctantly followed.

  One of the women she hadn’t recognized in the church, the younger one, stopped her in the passage with a hand on Francesca’s arm, a tentative touch that indicated shyness. The man on Francesca’s heels brushed past contemptuously.

  “I wanted to ask you,” the woman began diffidently, “if Mr. Hatton had left anything to me in his will. My name is Elizabeth Andrews, and your grandfather saved my life when I was a child. I’d have been put into an orphans’ home, if he hadn’t found a family to take me in. I wondered if Mr. Hatton had remembered me at the end. . . .”

  Her head giving her no peace, Francesca said, “I’m afraid I’ve never heard your name until now.”

  Miss Andrews looked crestfallen. “I—I do apologize!” she stammered. “What he did loomed so large in my life—I thought perhaps it might have mattered to him as well—”

  “My grandfather was a secretive man in some ways,” Francesca heard herself saying. “I didn’t know anything about his business affairs.”

  Miss Andrews stepped back, her cheeks flushed with embarrassment.

  Will these people never go—

  But then Francesca took pity on the girl, no more than a few years younger than she was. Eighteen? Barely! Perhaps a small legacy would have helped her find a decent start in life—

  “You must speak to my solicitor,” she said, summoning kindness to her voice. “He knows more about my grandfather’s dealings than I do. He’s the man who was beside me as I was greeting guests.”

  The gray eyes were tearfully grateful. Francesca felt a stab of shame.

  Why didn’t you tell me all these things? When you were rambling through the events of your life, why did you leave out so much? What was Elizabeth Andrews to you—!

  A Valley woman came up to her, taking Francesca’s hands and holding them as she spoke of Francis Hatton with affection and warmth. A good neighbor, she was saying. “We will remember him that way, too. Now, if there’s anything George and I can do, you have only to send word! Or are you returning to London?”

  “I don’t know, Mrs. Tallon—I haven’t thought much beyond today.”

  “Of course you haven’t!” Then Mrs. Tallon added, with some feeling, “Mary is grieving still for Freddy. I hadn’t realized there was so much affection there. I can’t believe they’re all gone, all those wonderful boys.”

  Francesca said, “It would have been a happy match, I think, my cousin and your daughter.” There the conversation ended. Francesca made her way through the crowd of people, finally reaching Stevens.

  The rector smiled down at her as she laid a hand on his arm.

  “Just talk to me. About anything—the weather—the service—I don’t care—as long as no one else interrupts.”

  “What’s wrong?” he asked, instantly concerned. “Is there something wrong?”

  “People are coming up to me wanting things—I’m half afraid to speak to anyone anymore. It’s impossible to tell what’s true and what isn’t.”

  Looking at her sharply, Stevens asked, “Did you eat any breakfast this morning?” He took her hand and tucked it through the crook of his arm.
“Never mind! Come along, we’ll step outside where you can breathe a little fresh air.” He led her out the door and across the drive to the lawn. “Is that better?”

  Francesca brushed a hand across her eyes, letting the quiet sink in. Then she thanked him with a smile.

  “You haven’t let yourself grieve properly, you know,” he reproved gently. “Your grandfather lived a long and full life. It isn’t like your cousins, cut down in their prime. We ought to rejoice that he has gone on to a better life, no longer bound to his bed and suffering.”

  It isn’t his death that has dismayed me, it’s his life, she thought. “You must have noticed them. That man who looks as if he’s an undertaker—the Scot—claims my grandfather stole something from him. Mr. Leighton you know about. There’s a young woman who feels he ought to have left her something in his will—another man is demanding that I return his Essex estate. He claims my grandfather cheated his family at cards. I’ve never heard of any of them before—”

  “Funerals often bring vultures in their wake. Money is usually what they want. In one fashion or another.”

  Francesca wondered if that was what Leighton wanted—a sum to keep his mouth shut? How much would it cost to make them all go away? But even as she thought it, she was ashamed. Her cousins would have faced them down. Was she such a coward? No . . . It was the anxiety of the last few months that had drained her spirits. If only she could sleep—

  Mrs. Lane was coming across the lawn, her face distressed. “That man,” she said even before she reached the rector and her mistress, “was wandering about in Mr. Hatton’s bedchamber! I have never seen anything like it!”

  “Who? Mr. Leighton?” Francesca asked, alarmed.

  “No, the other one, the one with no manners—”

  “I’ll see to him,” Stevens said. “Find another cup of tea for Miss Hatton, if you will, Mrs. Lane. I don’t think she was allowed to finish the first one.”

  The housekeeper said worriedly, as the rector limped back to the house, “I hope they don’t come to blows—it wouldn’t be right, in a house of mourning!”

  Francesca let herself be led indoors. The hall now seemed dark and malevolent to her, waiting for her like an animal in its lair. Everyone was in the drawing room, and she hesitated, unwilling to set foot in there, either. It was where the coffin had stood, a haunted place now. Mrs. Lane pressed another cup of tea and a plate of sandwiches in her hand and led her to the verger’s wife, an affable woman who had raised a large family and took most things in her stride.

  “Sit down, Miss Hatton, do! A bite of food will do you good,” she said solicitously, offering the chair beside her. “You’re pale, my dear. And small wonder, with this crowd. But it’s a proper turnout, isn’t it? Very fitting! Well, now, will you be staying on with us? I do hope it’s true; we haven’t seen nearly enough of you since this war began.” She sighed. “Only last week, we lost three more of our lads from the Valley. Gassed, one of them, and the others maimed and not likely to live. We need to stay close, those of us who are left!” Her Devon accent was pronounced, the a’s broad. “Perhaps you can help us roll bandages or knit gloves and scarves for the soldiers. It will take your mind off everything to stay busy!”

  “I don’t know what I shall be doing, Mrs. Danner. It’s early days yet.”

  “And so it is,” she answered with the warmth of a woman accustomed to offering comfort. “Healing must come first— Lordy, look who’s just come in! She’s always uneasy in company. I glimpsed her at the back of the church, but I never expected we’d see her here.”

  The woman at the door was draped in half a dozen shawls, as if the autumn air was more chill than she cared for. Thin and angular compared to the plumpness of most of the wives from the village, she had pinned her hair back into a knot, but the tendrils of graying curls seemed to defy capture. It was difficult to judge her age, but everyone knew her. She lived in the cottage beyond the church, and was regarded as being a little touched in the head. Miss Trotter, she was called. Leighton had visited her earlier, Francesca recalled.

  Walking tentatively across the polished flagstones to where Francesca stood, she held out a thin hand and greeted her in a reedy voice. “Your grandfather was a good man, child, he had a heart that was pure.”

  “You’re confusing him with Galahad, Miss Trotter,” the rector interposed lightly, coming up to join them. “Your visitor has gone, Francesca—he thought it best not to say good-bye.”

  Miss Trotter said, “The Scot, you mean. He’s not a nice man, that one. Political, I’d swear it.”

  “Political?” Francesca asked in surprise. “How on earth would you know that?”

  “I can’t really say,” Miss Trotter answered vaguely. “It’s just the way he strikes me.”

  “Will you have a cup of tea and a plate of ham, Miss Trotter?” the verger’s wife asked, coaxing her gently toward the drawing room.

  “I don’t mind if I do,” she answered, following in a cloud of lily-of-the-valley scent. Over her shoulder she smiled at Francesca and remarked softly, “He’s at peace, you know. I can feel it.”

  Francesca felt a wave of warmth reach out to her.

  “They always say that people like Miss Trotter see more clearly than most,” Stevens commented, watching the two women walk away. “She came to the church the other day, and told me that I ought to think less about what to say over Mr. Hatton and more about the Henley child. And I hadn’t even known Betsy was ill!”

  “Had Miss Trotter been looking after her?”

  “That was the odd thing—no, she hadn’t. She just came to me and said what she had to say and was gone. But it was a timely warning. Betsy had a high fever and I sent for Dr. Nealy.” He shrugged. “I daresay Miss Trotter heard the news from someone who came to her for—um—other help.”

  There was no doctor in the village—Dr. Nealy drove down from Tiverton to serve the people of the Valley. Miss Trotter’s store of herbs (and, some claimed, charms) were called upon discreetly from time to time. Stevens turned a blind eye—the help the old woman dispensed had nothing to do with attendance at services or his parishioners’ faith in God on Sundays, and he was wise enough, he had once told Francesca, not to meddle.

  People began to make their farewells, thanking Francesca for “doing him proud” that day, as “his blood would do,” suggesting that she had filled her cousins’ empty shoes to the satisfaction of the Valley. It was an accolade.

  Soon she could grieve in private, she promised herself, her public duty done.

  Leighton turned to take his leave of her. “I should like to speak to you on Sunday if I may,” he said, glancing at Stevens, but directing his request to Francesca. “It won’t take long.”

  “You’re leaving, are you?”

  “On the contrary.” He offered her what she chose to regard as a nasty smile. “I think I’ve found what I’ve been searching for. Good day, Rector.”

  And he was out the door, leaving her alone there with Stevens.

  CHAPTER 8

  When Mrs. Lane arrived the next morning, she brought a sealed envelope with her to the small sitting room.

  “This was pinned to the front door. I saw it as I came up the drive. Uncivilized way to leave a letter, I’d say.”

  Francesca took the envelope and examined it. A good-quality stationery—but not posted, instead hand-delivered.

  She broke the seal on the back and opened it to find a single sheet inside.

  You don’t remember me—you didn’t recognize me yesterday. I was your nanny before I left to marry my late husband. I wonder if you’d be willing to give me an hour of your time? I’ll come to the house around ten this morning, if that’s convenient for you.

  There was no signature.

  Francesca looked up at Mrs. Lane. “Did I have a nanny when I was a child? I have no memory of her—just of sharing Mr. Gregory with my cousins.”

  “There was a woman who tended you when you arrived from Canada. Mr. Hatton was at his
wit’s end, you a baby not yet two and crying most of the time. She was living in Somerset, I do think, and he brought her here looking like a man who’d found salvation. But she didn’t stay long; she was young, and there were no eligible bachelors in the Valley to walk out with her. Although Mr. Hunt, over in the next valley, took quite a fancy to her. Your grandfather soon sent him about his business! Scandalous, that was. He was married, you know, Hunt was, and didn’t give tuppence for his wife.”

  “She’s coming to call at ten. What was her name?”

  “The nanny? Weaver, I think it was—Miss Weaver.”

  “She’s a widow now. I wonder what she wants?”

  “My dear! You’ve grown so like your mother!”

  An attractive woman in her late forties came into the room smiling, her face alight as she held out her hands to Francesca. She had been at the church, but hadn’t spoken more than a few words at the reception.

  “And of course you’ll have no recollection of me! My name is Passmore, now. Henry and I were married for twenty years. It was a happy time!”

  “Mrs. Passmore. Please, do be seated. You knew my mother? But I thought—she was killed in Canada with my father, while traveling. An accident.”

  “Yes, of course, that’s true! I must have been thinking of your cousin’s mother. Simon’s mother. She was a lovely young woman. But tubercular, you know. She went away to Switzerland, for a cure. And sadly never came home.” Mrs. Passmore reached into her purse and handed a photograph to Francesca. “She gave me this, before she went away. She asked me to keep it, a good luck charm, you might say, to bring her back again.”

  Francesca looked down into the face of a woman holding a baby in her arms. She was fair, slim, and very pretty, her smile warm.

  “This is Simon?” Francesca asked, studying the sleeping child. Smothered as it was in a lace cap and a long beribboned gown, it was impossible to tell whether the infant was a boy or a girl. “But, no, Simon had brothers. This must be Harry, then. The youngest.”