No Graves as Yet_ A Novel - Anne Perry [70]
“I want them to suffer, too,” he confessed quietly.
She lifted her head and turned slowly back to him, her eyes wide.
“I apologize,” she whispered. “I thought you were going to come and preach at me. Gerald tells me I shouldn’t feel like that. That it’s not really me speaking, and I’ll regret saying it later.”
“Maybe I will as well.” He smiled at her. “But that’s how I feel now.”
Her face crumpled again. “Why would someone do that to him, Joseph? How can anyone envy so much? Shouldn’t we love beauty of the mind and want to help it, protect it? I’ve asked the master if Sebastian was in line for any prizes or honors that might have excluded someone else, but he says he doesn’t know of anything.” She drew her black eyebrows together. “Do you . . . do you suppose that it could have been some woman? Someone who was in love with him, obsessed with him, and couldn’t accept rejection? Girls can be very hysterical. They can imagine that a man has feelings for them when it is only a passing admiration, no more than good manners, really.”
“It could be over a woman—” he began.
“Of course it could!” she interrupted eagerly, seizing on the idea, her face lighting up, the rigid line of her body relaxing a little. He could see in the sun the sheen on the silk of her gown and how it pulled over her thin shoulders. “That’s the one thing that makes sense! Raging jealousy because a woman was in love with Sebastian, and someone felt betrayed by her!” She put out her hand tentatively and laid it on his arm. “Thank you, Joseph. You have at least made sense out of the darkness. If you came to comfort me, you have succeeded, and I am grateful to you.”
It was not how he had intended to succeed, but he did not know how to withdraw. He remembered the girl in the street outside Eaden Lilley’s, and what Eardslie had said about Morel, and wished he did not have to know about it.
He was still searching for an answer when Gerald Allard came from the quad gate of the garden, walking carefully along the center of the path between the tumbles of catmint and pinks. It was a moment before Joseph realized that his considered step was due to the fact that he had already partaken of more refreshment than he could absorb. He looked curiously at Joseph, then at his wife.
Mary’s eyes narrowed at the sight of him.
“How are you, my dear?” he inquired solicitously. “Good morning, Reavley. Nice of you to call. However, I think we should speak of other things for a little while. It is—”
“Stop it!” Mary said, her teeth clenched. “I can’t think of other things! I don’t want to try! Sebastian is dead! Someone killed him! Until we know who it was and the person is arrested and hanged, there are no other things!”
“My dear, you should—” he began.
She whirled around, catching the fine silk of her sleeve on a stem of the moss rose. She stormed off, uncaring that she had torn the fabric, and disappeared through the door to the sitting room of the master’s house.
“I’m sorry,” Gerald said awkwardly. “I really don’t know . . .” He did not finish.
“I met Miss Coopersmith,” Joseph said suddenly. “She seems a very pleasant young woman.”
“Oh . . . Regina? Yes, most agreeable,” Gerald concurred. “Good family, known them for years. Her father’s got a big estate a few miles away, in the Madingley direction.”
“Sebastian never mentioned her.”
Gerald pushed his hands deeper into his pockets. “No, I don’t suppose he would. I mean . . .” Again he stopped.
This time Joseph waited.
“Well, two separate lives,” Gerald went on uncomfortably. “Home and . . . and here. Man’s world, this.” His arm swept around in a wide, slightly unsteady circle. “Not the place to discuss women, what?”
“Is Mrs. Allard fond of her?”
Gerald’s eyebrows shot up. “No idea! Yes! Well, I suppose so. Yes, must have liked the girl.”
“You put that in the past,” Joseph pointed out.
“Oh! Well . . . Sebastian’s dead now, God help us.” He gave a little shrug. “Next Christmas will be unbearable. Always spend it