Jane and the Unpleasantness at Scargrave - Stephanie Barron [19]
“Dear Jane!” my friend cried, reaching a white hand to me from her chaise longue; “I begged you to remain at Scargrave, only to desert you for the comfort of solitude. I fear I have made a sad hostess.”
I glanced around Isobel's bedchamber in some surprise; in this room, at least, Scargrave's musty ghosts were banished. In anticipation of his bride, the Earl had refurbished the apartment with elegance and taste; its furniture was light and pleasing, fresh paper graced the walls, a fire burned brightly in the grate, and the image of Frederick, Lord Scargrave, gazed down upon his wife from a gilt frame above the mantel. A book and a saucer of tea stood companionably on a table at Isobel's side; all was quiet and order. I understood, now, her unwillingness to appear in the chilly rooms below. But the comfort of her boudoir had done little to raise her spirits; indeed, an unaccustomed languor spoke from every limb, and by her ravaged looks, I knew sleep had escaped her these few nights past.
“Never could I reproach you in such an hour” I said, dropping to the floor at her side. “Do not trouble yourself about me. Your nearest relations have been at pains to ensure my comfort. But tell me, Isobel, how may I be of service to you? May anyone hope to relieve such melancholy as this?”
“Jane, do not tempt me to thrust aside my sorrow,” the Countess replied bitterly. “It is the last honour his wife may offer poor unfortunate Frederick.” She turned her eyes upon the hearth, her red hair undone and hanging in a curtain about her face, and suffered in silence a moment. Then she sought my hand with her own and gripped it fiercely. “But to melancholy, dearest Jane, I fear I must add a greater burden. And in this, I fondly hope, you may indeed be of service.”
My aspect was all curiosity.
Isobel handed me a slip of paper. “This misbegotten note arrived by the morning post. I hardly know what it is about; and I would have your opinion.”
The letter bore Isobel's direction, was sealed with such cheap wax as the taverns provide, and written remarkably ill.
It may plese you to think that you are free of the soupçon, milady, you and the tall lord who is so silent and who looks thru me; but the hanging, it is too good for you. I must keep myself by the side of my Saviour; and no one is safe in your company; and so I have gone this morning and you shall not find me out ware. The next leter, it will go to the good Sir William; and then we will see what becomes of those who kill.
“There is no signature,” I said.
“That is not the least of its oddities.”
“Putting aside, for the moment, the accusations it contains,” I said, glancing at Isobel over the paper's edge, “we must endeavour to learn what the note itself may tell us. It is clearly written by a person of the serving class, on common paper with cheap ink; a person of little application in the art of writing, to judge by the formation of the letters, and for whom English is not the native tongue. From the tenor of the message, we may conclude that the author is of French origin; the word soupçon, inserted for suspicion, being the strongest indicator. From the reference to the Saviour, I must infer that the writer is female, and probably of the Church of Rome—for a man is hardly likely to be so pious when accusing his mistress of murder.”
“Jane!” Isobel exclaimed, sitting straighter on her chaise, “you have managed marvellously! I might almost think you wrote this letter yourself.”
“Indeed, I did not. But I may venture to guess who did.”
“By all means, share your apprehension.” My friend's voice trembled with eagerness.
“Your maid Marguerite,” I said soberly. “Have you seen her since this letter arrived?”
The Countess's face was suffused with scarlet, then overlaid with a deathly pallor. “I have not,” she answered unsteadily. “Marguerite attended me this morning and has been absent ever since. I assumed she felt all the burden of this unhappy house's misery, and would leave me to endure