The Murders of Richard III - Elizabeth Peters [90]
He hummed tunelessly to himself as he went buoyantly down the stairs. The house party was breaking up that morning; they had stayed the night, having their statements taken and resting up after the excitement of the day. He and Jacqueline hadn’t discussed their plans, but he assumed they would travel back to London together.
She was not in the breakfast room, but Wilkes was able to inform Thomas that she had been and gone.
“She and Mr. Strangways went off together,” the butler said. “I believe they said something about the library.”
Wondering, Thomas went in search.
He could hear the voices through the closed door of the library, which, in view of the solidity of that structure, suggested tones of considerable passion. Opening the door a crack, he listened. He recognized the voice and he knew the subject as well as he knew his own name. It was the two in combination that stupefied him.
“Richard has been cleared of all the other charges. No one seriously believes them. As for the murder of the boys, the weight of the evidence, such as it is, is strongly in his favor. If you could consider it dispassionately…”
“Now wait a minute.” Strangways sounded a little desperate. “Whether Richard murdered the boys or not, he was morally guilty. By deposing young Edward the Fifth, he essentially signed the kid’s death warrant. He—”
“Are you a historian or an early Church father?” Jacqueline inquired disagreeably. “You are not concerned with ethical questions, but with evidence. Maybe the word isn’t familiar to you—”
“You have a tongue like an adder,” Strangways shouted.
The sentiment seemed well expressed. Thomas opened the door.
Jacqueline and Strangways were standing at opposite ends of the room, Jacqueline behind Weldon’s desk and Strangways near the long library table. Desk and table were covered with books, most of them open. Jacqueline’s hair had been twisted back in a bun, but it was starting to disintegrate; agitated tendrils curled over her ears. Her glasses hung from the tip of her nose. Strangways, attired for travel in the proper English costume of suit, tie, and vest, had wrenched open the collar of his shirt. His navy-blue tie was under one ear.
Neither of them paid the slightest attention to Thomas.
“The hypothesis of Richard’s innocence explains every anomaly in the case,” Jacqueline said. “It is the only hypothesis that does so.”
“The fact that the boys weren’t seen again…”
“They were seen, or at least heard from. But you ignore that evidence, because it doesn’t fit in with your fat theories. Oh, I understand,” Jacqueline said. Her voice was as smooth as cream and as deadly as acid. “You started out being a logical observer. You believed the facts. Then the historical establishment got hold of you. It’s hard to fight men like Kendall and Myers and—”
“It is not,” Strangways bellowed.
“What evidence?” Thomas asked, advancing into the room.
Jacqueline didn’t look at him, but she answered his question because it happened to suit her purpose.
“The household accounts. The reference to the Lord Bastard, in 1485, must refer to young Edward. That’s what I mean about cheating; you say the entry refers to Richard’s bastard son, who was never in any other place referred to as a lord, because you can’t admit that Edward the Fifth was still alive. If you had not begun with the assumption that he was dead, you would never question the meaning of that entry. You are tailoring facts to fit a theory, not basing a theory on known facts.”
Strangways’s mouth opened and closed like that of a fish gasping for water. He was too furious to talk. Jacqueline proceeded.
“Another entry whose significance no one seems to have seen is the list of fancy clothes ordered by Richard for ‘Lord Edward.’ Edward was alive then, and getting expensive gifts from his uncle—and those gifts included equipment for horses.
“Was the boy going to practice equestrian exercises in the Tower of London? The inference is plain. Richard was planning to move the boys out of London, no doubt to one of his castles in the north, where the population