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The hackney turned a corner sharply, jerking her off balance as she sat there so stiffly. Guin put out a hand, jarred it against the door frame and felt the thin kid of her glove tear across the palm. Life was so fragile. Just like that glove.
A few minutes later in the sanctuary of her room she sat at the dressing table and stared at her hand.
‘My lady? Have you hurt yourself?’
It took her a moment to realise Faith was in the room. Guin held out her hand and let the maid peel off the ruined glove. ‘No, I had to catch hold of something when the carriage jolted, that is all.’
That jolt had done more than tear her glove, it was as though she had been shaken out of the endless treadmill of thoughts about Augustus’s murder, Francis’s death, and made to think about what she had just done. I cannot pretend it did not happen. I did proposition a man, as good as ask him to be my lover. She had wanted more than that taut, elegant, swordsman’s body, the protection of those strong shoulders and the lethal blade. She had wanted Jared’s friendship, she had wanted to laugh with him, talk with him about something, anything, other than death.
It seemed a long time since she had laughed freely, without inhibition. It seemed forever since she had a friend to whom she could talk about anything, anything at all. And she had never lain with a man of integrity and courage.
The summons to appear at the inquest arrived the next morning, along with a note from Doctor Felbrigg confirming that Augustus had died of poisoning, that the source had been the sweetmeats but that in all probability cyanide had not been involved despite the presence of almonds, nor could he eliminate other poisons such as a strong medicinal drug in overdose.
Fainting was no help, Guin told herself and smoothed out the paper that her clenched fist had crumpled. Tonkin, the valet was summonsed, as first finder. Faith and Twite and all of the footmen had been called and Mrs Cutler the housekeeper. And she must attend herself, of course. The inquest would be held the next day at the White Horse tavern, the nearest place with adequate room.
It was time she picked herself up and started to fight. There would be time to grieve and time for anger later. Guin rang for her butler. ‘Twite, please assemble the staff in the drawing room. Everyone.’
They shuffled in, subdued and uneasy, right down to the scullery maid and Sammy the pot boy, and waited in silence for her to speak. ‘Some of you have been summonsed to the inquest. All I would say to you is that you must tell exactly what you know, whatever that is. We must get to the truth and I ask you to be brave about this for Lord Northam’s sake and in his memory. If anyone has not been summonsed but thinks they know something that may be relevant, please attend and ask to speak. Has anyone any questions? No? Then thank you. Mrs Cutler, Twite, I would like a word, if you will remain behind.’
They waited, upright and dignified, while the rest of the staff filed out. ‘Please sit down. Doctor Felbrigg says that my husband was poisoned. I would like you both to think very carefully about what poisons and medicines we have in the house, make a list and then take an inventory. Is anything missing, has anything been disturbed? I expect the Coroner will ask you for that information and it will help if you can give it promptly and accurately. Twite, who took in the box of sweetmeats from Parmentier’s?’
‘Thomas did. I was below stairs at the time. The usual delivery boy came, handed them over, Thomas showed them to me and then took them up to your sitting room at my direction, my lady.’
‘Very well, thank you.’ Damnation, the usual boy. She had been hoping for a stranger, someone who might have intercepted the delivery, but now that hope had gone. ‘That will be all.’
When she was alone Guin sat down and penned a very careful note to Jared. In the most stilted terms she informed him about the doctor’s findings and who of the household had been summonsed to the inquest, explained about her inventory of poisons and the arrival of the box of sweets and signed it Guinevere, Countess of Northam, with all due formality.
Then she rang for Faith and set about assembling an outfit for the next day that combined the elegance due to her station – and to Augustus’s rank – with modesty and restraint.
‘Jewellery, my lady?’
‘Just the jet. No – let us remind them who I am, but subtly. The diamonds do you think? No, pearls, the earrings with the jet set in the centre and the single strand necklace.’ Somehow she had to project assurance and yet not arrogance, dignity but not coldness. And she felt so very lonely. So very, very lonely. Poor, dear, Augustus.
There was a tap at the door and Twite came in with a letter on a salver. ‘This has just been delivered by Mr Hunt’s man, my lady.’
The note was as formal as hers to him had been. Jared thanked her for the information about the household’s summonses, agreed that a poisons inventory was prudent and confirmed that he too had been told to attend at the White Horse.
I am your most respectful servant, J Hunt it was signed. Guin sighed.
Then, as she refolded the letter, a separate slip fluttered out. There were no words on it, simply a quick sketch of a rapier and, impaled upon it, an apple. An apple with a small bite taken out.
Oh, you wicked man. You wicked, wicked man. So, she had tempted the Adam in her Garden of Eden, had she? Then Guin shivered, hearing in her mind the rustle of scales, the whisper of a slither over leaves. Where was the serpent?
The inquest was as unpleasant as Guin had expected. Obviously repetition did not make them any easier. Escorted by almost half her household she had no trouble making her way through the gawping crowd who had gathered around the White Horse to stare and speculate. The inquest was being held in the room normally used for local working men’s gatherings such as the glee club and the pigeon fanciers and had the air of having received an urgent, and unfamiliar, scrubbing.
She was given a seat in the front row facing the table at which the Coroner and his clerk would sit, with the benches for the jury to her left opposite a chair for the witnesses. The jury, as was usual procedure, were with the Coroner inspecting the body. It had seemed a strange requirement, but it had been explained to her before the inquest on Francis that the purpose of an inquest was to establish legal identity as well as the cause of death and, if that was by human agency, to indicate who the jurors thought responsible. Viewing the body was, she supposed, a precaution against fraud.
Doctor Felbrigg would identify the body formally. It was easier to think of the body, not of Augustus. The room was hazy through her veil and she was glad of the air of unreality it gave. She asked Twite to sit on one side of her and Mrs Cutler on the other and the rest of the staff ranged themselves behind.
It all seemed to take a long time and when it was all over she was certain they would be no further forward. Someone had killed a dear elderly man with malice and deliberation. There was nothing she could do for Augustus now except bury him with dignity, treasure his memory and find out who killed him. Then see justice done. The way she felt about that person now, she would be happy to see that justice arrive at the point of Jared’s rapier.
Where was Jared? She did not dare turn around – besides anything else she would see the people jammed into the room behind her if she did that. Then there was the sound of more arrivals, of much shuffling and whispering and the confident, clear tones of the Duke of Calderbrook.
‘A chair for the Duchess, if you please. The front row? Excellent, thank you. And chairs for myself and Mr Hunt. So much obliged, sir.’
Whoever sir was, they scurried to oblige. Out of the corner of her eye she saw a sweep of deep blue skirts and then long legs in biscuit-coloured pantaloons and Hessians passed down the central space between the two ranks of chairs, followed by an equally elegant pair in black.
When they had all settled the man nearest her leaned across the aisle. ‘Good morning, Lady Northam.’
