Jane and the Unpleasantness at Scargrave - Stephanie Barron [65]
“Miss Austen was so good as to retrieve it from the paddock this morning,” the magistrate replied.
“The paddock …” Isobel's face drained of its last vestiges of colour. “But I have not been to the paddock these several days. Jane—” Her eyes sought mine in confusion.
“It was lying by the gate, Isobel,” I told her quietly “From its appearance in the snow, it was quite recently let fall.”
Sir William interposed smoothly. “Have you any recognition of the hand that penned these words, Countess?” He took from his waistcoat the bloody slip of paper I had retrieved from Marguerite's bodice.
Isobel bent to study it with indrawn breath. She looked at me and then at the magistrate. “But what does it mean?” she said.
“The hand, my lady?”
With her eyes fixed upon the Earl's face, she replied slowly, “I should swear it to be Fitzroy's.”
Tom Hearst cleared his throat and pushed back his chair. As I watched, he folded his arms across his chest— the better, perhaps, to contain himself. Our eyes met, and his eyebrow lifted—a mute plea for some sense from all this muddle.
Sir William turned to the Earl, and withdrew his hand from his pocket. In his open palm sat a clutch of small brown objects. “My lord,” he said, “is it in your power to name these?”
Fitzroy Payne frowned and replied in the negative.
“And you, my lady?”
Isobel peered at the fruit, each one as small as a seed, in the magistrate's hand. “Why, they are the nuts of the Barbadoes tree!” she exclaimed. “The humble folk of my native island swear by them as a physick. But where did you find them?”
“Wrapped in velvet—in the present Lord Scargrave's gun case, my lady,* Sir William replied, and his face was very grave. “I had thought it possible, but could not be certain, that they were the very seed you have named.” He placed the nuts carefully on a serviette that lay upon the sideboard, and folded it into a neat package.
“And have you journeyed to the Indies unbeknownst to me, Fitzroy?” Isobel looked at the Earl, her brown eyes troubled. She retained admirable command of her voice, but I saw the pulse throbbing at her throat, and knew her heart was racing.
“You know it to be impossible,” Fitzroy Payne replied. “Sir William, are the nuts wholesome?”
“The taste is so delightful, that to eat one is to eat them all,” Sir William said, “which is what we may judge the late Earl to have done. For the Barbadoes nut is poison, Lord Scargrave; so deadly a purgative, in fact, that illness commences but a quarter-hour after ingestion, and death is achieved in a very few hours.”
Tom Hearst leapt to his feet, his hand upon his sabre hilt. “Good God, man, what do you mean to say?”
There was a small sound, almost a whimper, from Isobel, whose face had gone a deadly white. Her hands were clenched on the table edge, as though without its support, she should crumple to the floor.
“Sit down, Tom.” Fitzroy Payne's voice was weary.”Sir William intends us to believe the nuts caused my uncle's last illness.”
“But, Fitzroy, are you mad? The fellow is suggesting—”
“I know what the Justice is suggesting.” At his cousin's look, Tom Hearst stiffened, but regained his seat. Fitzroy Payne inclined his head to Sir William. “Pray continue.”
“It is my duty, Lord Scargrave,” Sir William said slowly, his eyes upon the floor; “to ask that the body of Frederick, Lord Scargrave, be exhumed from its resting place in the Scargrave vault.”
“To what purpose, sir, would you so disturb my uncle's rest?”
“I should like Dr. Philip Pettigrew, of Sloane Street, who attended his lordship at his death, to reexamine the body.” Sir William's eyes came up from the floor at that, and the coldness in them startled me.
“And what end may that serve?” The Earl's voice had lost its accustomed courtesy. “Pettigrew has already declared the man to be dead.”
Sir William glanced at Isobel, and following his gaze, I saw my friend's hand had gone to her throat. “It is possible, my lord,” the magistrate