The Truth about Love

8

She came to her senses, how much later she didn’t know. She was lying on the chaise in the drawing room; Millicent, Gerrard and Barnaby stood nearby, talking in hushed voices.

When she struggled to sit up, Millicent saw and rushed over. “You should stay lying down for a while, dear. You were in a dead faint when Mr. Debbington carried you up.”

Jacqueline glanced up at Gerrard, who had come to stand at the back of the chaise. “Thank you.”

His expression remained stony. “If you want to thank me, stay where you are.”

Millicent blinked, taken aback by his tone. “Ah…would you like some water, dear?”

“Tea would be nice.”

“Yes, of course.” Millicent hurried to the bellpull.

With Gerrard’s gaze on her, Jacqueline made a show of relaxing against the cushions. She looked at Barnaby, standing before the fireplace. “What’s happening?”

Barnaby glanced at Gerrard, then came closer. “Your father’s sent word to the magistrate. Meanwhile, Wilcox and Richards are overseeing the…ah, disinterment.”

A chill slid through her. “Is it possible to know…Can anyone tell when he was killed? Or how?” She focused on Barnaby. “Was he shot?”

Barnaby glanced at Gerrard again. Gerrard sighed and, waving Barnaby to a nearby chair, came around to sit on the end of the chaise. “Perhaps it’s better to discuss it, seeing she’s so determined.”

She shot him a look, but Millicent, taking the other armchair, nodded. “I can see no benefit in pretending we don’t have a dead body in the garden, and that it isn’t that poor boy, Thomas Entwhistle. I’m sure Jacqueline will be more comfortable if we approach the matter sensibly.”

“Yes, precisely.” Thank heaven for sensible aunts. Jacqueline looked again at Barnaby; he seemed to be the one with the information. “Is it known when he…Thomas, died?”

“Only that it was long ago.” Barnaby grimaced. “A year at least, probably more. When was he last seen?”

She thought back, added the months. “Two years and four months ago.”

“In that case, there’s nothing to say he wasn’t killed on that day. He was last seen here, wasn’t he?”

She felt the cold intensifying; slowly, she nodded. “Yes. By me.” She met Barnaby’s gaze, then looked at Gerrard. “I was the last person to speak with him…just like with Mama.”

Barnaby frowned. “Yes, well, that hardly means you killed them, does it?”

His tone, one of dismissive reasonableness, had her-and Gerrard, too-looking at him.

Barnaby’s frown deepened. “What?”

Gerrard shook his head. “Never mind that now. What else have you deduced?”

Barnaby grimaced. “Thomas was killed with a rock. A largish one.” With his hands, he outlined an object about twelve inches square. “About that size. Someone picked it up, and smashed it down on the back of his skull.”

Jacqueline swallowed. But Thomas was dead; he’d died long ago, and she needed to learn how. “I walked with him along the path to the stables. We parted just inside the Garden of Hercules and he went on. Why…how did he end up in the Garden of Hades? It’s quite some distance away.”

“Indeed.” Barnaby tapped the chair arm, then glanced at Jacqueline. “You parted just inside the Garden of Hercules-meaning some way before, and out of sight of, the junction with the side path, the one that follows the northern ridge through Hercules, Demeter, Dionysius and so to Hades.”

She nodded. “I wasn’t supposed to go beyond the terrace, but I walked just a little way-the path’s open until the edge of the Garden of Hercules.”

“Right.” Barnaby straightened. “So someone could have met Thomas deeper in the Garden of Hercules without you knowing.”

She frowned. “Yes, that’s true.”

“Would you have heard if he spoke with someone?”

“Not if you mean near the other path-by the time he reached there, I would have been back on the terrace. I wouldn’t have known he’d met someone unless he called out, and possibly not even then-the wind usually blows the other way.”

“I doubt he called out.”

“Why do you say that?” Gerrard asked.

“Because…well, Thomas was quite tall, wasn’t he?”

Jacqueline nodded; she glanced at Gerrard. “As tall as Gerrard, but thinner.”

“Yes, well, from the damage to his skull, whoever hit him was standing close behind him, possibly somewhat higher than he. I don’t think that would happen very easily unless that someone was a man Thomas knew.”

Gerrard saw the color drain from Jacqueline’s face. “A man-not a woman?”

Barnaby blinked. “A woman?” He considered, gaze distant, then shook his head. “I can’t see it-whoever lifted that rock had to be quite strong. Just grasping a rock that size would be difficult for most women. And as Thomas was tall, then even standing above him on the steepest stretch of the path, they’d have had to lift the rock high to bring it down with such force.” He refocused on Gerrard’s face. “A single blow, it was.”

A small, distressed sound escaped Millicent.

Coloring, Barnaby glanced at her. “Sorry. But, well, it couldn’t have been a woman-no ordinary woman, anyway. A giantess might have done it, but unless Thomas was acquainted with one hereabouts, well…” Barnaby smiled apologetically, clearly attempting to lighten the moment.

“You’re saying,” Gerrard reiterated, “that Thomas was killed by a man, almost certainly a man he knew.”

Barnaby nodded. “That seems the only reasonable conclusion.”

The drawing room doors opened. Barnaby and Gerrard rose as Lord Tregonning and an older gentleman they hadn’t previously met came in. Jacqueline swung her legs down; Gerrard gave her his hand and helped her to her feet. He didn’t like her pallor, or the way she stiffened; he wound her arm with his and settled her hand on his sleeve, his hand covering hers. Millicent rose, too, and moved to stand on Jacqueline’s other side.

The gentleman bowed to Millicent and Jacqueline, who curtsied.

Lord Tregonning waved at Barnaby and Gerrard. “This is Mr. Adair, who found the body, and Mr. Debbington, another guest. Sir Godfrey Marks, our magistrate.”

Barnaby and Gerrard shook hands with Sir Godfrey, and exchanged murmured greetings.

Sir Godfrey turned to Jacqueline. “I’m sorry to disturb you, m’dear, but your father showed me this watch, which was found on the body.” Sir Godfrey held out the watch. “Are you sure it was Thomas’s?”

The last vestige of color drained from Jacqueline’s face, along with all expression. She glanced briefly at the watch, then nodded. “I’m sure. Sir Harvey and Lady Entwhistle will recognize it.”

Sir Godfrey paused, searching her face, then he nodded and returned the watch to his pocket. “It’s a pity it’s so long ago now, but just refresh my memory-you walked with him to the stables and parted from him there?”

“No.” Jacqueline lifted her chin; Gerrard felt her fingers tighten on his sleeve. “I walked only a little way along the path-we parted where it enters the Garden of Hercules. Thomas went on, and I returned to the house.”

Sir Godfrey looked at Lord Tregonning, then glanced briefly at Jacqueline; the expression on his face looked suspiciously like pity. “So you were the last here to see him alive?”

Gerrard felt her fingers flutter beneath his, but her chin set; her expression remained impassive.

“Yes.”

Portentously, Sir Godfrey nodded, then turned to Lord Tregonning. “We’ll leave it at that.” His tone was heavy. “I’ll speak to the Entwhistles and let them know. Could have been gypsies or vagabonds, of course. No sense pursuing it-nothing will bring poor young Entwhistle back.”

Lord Tregonning’s face remained set and unresponsive. “As you wish.” His voice was devoid of emotion. He didn’t look at Jacqueline, or any of them, but stiffly returned Sir Godfrey’s nod and turned with him to the doors.

Jaw slack with amazement, incomprehension in his eyes, Barnaby stared at Gerrard, then glanced at Jacqueline. Before Gerrard could react, Barnaby started after the two men; he touched Sir Godfrey’s arm. “Sir Godfrey, about the circumstances of this death-”

Sir Godfrey halted. He frowned fiercely at Barnaby. “I don’t believe we need to delve deeper into that, sir.” He glanced fleetingly at Jacqueline, then met Barnaby’s gaze. “I’m sure I don’t need to remind you you’re a guest here. No point creating unnecessary distress-a sad occurrence, but there’s nothing more to be done.”

With that deliberate and emphatic verdict, Sir Godfrey nodded curtly, and departed, Lord Tregonning beside him.

Astounded, Barnaby stared after them.

When the door shut, he turned. “What the devil was that about?” He looked at Gerrard, then transferred his affronted gaze to Jacqueline. “The bounder behaved as if you’d killed Thomas! Why on earth would he think that?”

Gerrard felt the stiffness go out of Jacqueline; with a helpless gesture, she sank unsteadily down; he eased her back onto the chaise. “Because,” he said, his tone lethal, cutting, “too many people hereabouts believe Jacqueline killed her mother, so why not Thomas, as well?”

“What?” Barnaby stared at him, past incredulous. Then he looked at Jacqueline. “But that’s ludicrous. You couldn’t have killed your mother.”

Gerrard fleetingly closed his eyes and thanked the gods for Barnaby. Opening them, he saw Jacqueline, color returning to her cheeks, staring at his friend. She’d been taken aback when he’d seen her innocence, but for someone with no real connection or interest in her to so clearly declare it…she was dumbfounded.

Gerrard voiced the question he knew was in her mind. “Why do you say that-why ludicrous? Why couldn’t Jacqueline have killed her mother?”

Barnaby almost goggled at him. “Have you taken a good look at the balustrade on the terrace?”

“It’s a stone balustrade, the usual sort of thing.”

Barnaby nodded. “The usual thing-solid stone, a ten-inches-wide stone top, waist-high to a man, midriff-high to a woman of average height, which I understand Lady Tregonning was.

“A woman of average height”-Barnaby bowed to Jacqueline-“couldn’t push, tip or bundle another woman of average height, and, as it happens, greater weight, over such a high and wide barrier. It would be as close to impossible as makes no odds.”

He looked at Jacqueline, consternation and the beginnings of horrified comprehension dawning in his eyes. “When I say you couldn’t have killed your mother, I mean it literally. She had to have been lifted bodily to the top of the balustrade, and then pushed, or more likely thrown, over. I don’t think you could physically have managed it, not alone.” He hesitated, then asked. “They don’t really believe you did, do they?”

It was Millicent who answered. “Yes, they do.”

Briefly, Millicent explained to a flabbergasted Barnaby how matters had fallen out at the time of Miribelle Tregonning’s death.

“And so they all took it into their heads it was Jacqueline.” Millicent humphed. “I never subscribed to such nonsense, but by the time I learned of it, it was the general belief. Most of those in the area regard the notion as unproven fact.”

Barnaby was appalled. “Unproven facts aren’t facts at all!”

Given his belief in the application of logical deduction in solving crimes, Barnaby viewed the making of conjecture into fact as akin to heresy. Gerrard listened as Barnaby questioned, and Millicent elaborated, describing the way local sentiment had evolved, how the notion of Jacqueline as her mother’s murderer had taken root in so many minds.

It was frighteningly simple, yet the outcome was devastating. He glanced at Jacqueline. Not only devastating, but difficult to remedy.

She said little. She appeared to be listening; he wasn’t sure she was. Treadle brought in the tea tray and Millicent poured. Jacqueline accepted a cup and sat back, sipping. Barnaby and Millicent continued their discussion, moving on to consider how to rectify the situation. Jacqueline listened to that, but there was nothing new, nothing she hadn’t already thought of; he watched as her mind turned inward, and her thoughts slid away.

She’d just learned that a young man she’d cared for, and who had cared for her, had been brutally murdered. Even though she wasn’t looking at him, watching her face Gerrard sensed, not her thoughts, but her emotions.

Sadness, and more, too many swirling feelings for him to distinguish; one part of him, the polite gentleman, recoiled from intruding on her grief, another part, the painter, noted and cataloged, while the private man wanted to gather her in his arms and comfort her, to soothe and reassure.

He blinked; looking down, he set his cup on its saucer. He couldn’t recall such an impulse to comfort afflicting him before, not with such poignant force, with such sharp and clear empathy. Empathy was a necessity for an artist, yet it had never before had such a personal edge.

Never pressed him so keenly to act, to share the burden if not make it his.

From beneath his lashes, he glanced at Jacqueline. If he acted, how would she respond?

He hadn’t forgotten that moment in the studio, dramatically interrupted though it had been. They’d moved on, taken a definite step forward together, so where did that leave them-he and she, and what lay between them-now?

She finished her tea. Without glancing at him, she rose. When both he and Barnaby rose, too, Millicent broke off and looked up; Jacqueline smiled fleetingly, distantly. “If you’ll excuse me, I think I’ll retire for a while. I’m rather fagged.”

“Yes, of course, dear.” Millicent set down her cup. “I’ll look in on you later.”

With a nod, a wan smile and a fleeting glance at him, Jacqueline turned to the door. Gerrard watched as she walked out; he didn’t like the empty look in her eyes.

He turned back to Millicent and Barnaby.

Barnaby caught his eye. “I’m off to walk the path Thomas must have followed.”

He nodded. “I’ll come with you.” He needed air, and he needed to think.

Leaving Millicent in the drawing room, they walked out onto the terrace. They retraced the route Thomas and Jacqueline had taken more than two years before, then went on, turning down the path along the northern ridge, confirming that all Jacqueline had said was true; she wouldn’t have known if someone had met Thomas at the junction of the paths, nor could she have gone so far with him, not with her mother expecting her back.

They walked on through the gardens of Demeter and Dionysius, Barnaby speculating that, if the crime had been committed along the path, given Thomas’s height, it would have occurred at the steepest stretch, where the path dipped into the Garden of Hades. Using Gerrard as a model, Barnaby concluded the murderer was at most three inches shorter, a man Thomas had known well enough to be comfortable having close at his back.

Barnaby pulled a face. “I must engineer a meeting with Lady Entwhistle. Mothers always know who their darlings are consorting with. She’ll know who Thomas considered a close friend.”

They rounded a bend in the path and looked up at the spot where Thomas’s body had lain. “Looks like they’ve taken the body away.” Only Wilcox and Richards remained, the former leaning on a shovel.

Barnaby led the way up the steep slope, clambering over the thick roots of the cypresses clinging to the incline.

Wilcox and Richards straightened as they neared and touched their caps. Gerrard nodded in greeting.

Barnaby dusted his hands. “I was just wondering…you were both here when Entwhistle disappeared, weren’t you?”

“Aye.” Both men nodded.

“Do you recall any gentleman being near the gardens about the time Entwhistle left the house?”

Wilcox and Richards shared a glance, then Richards volunteered, “We’ve all been scratching our heads, trying to remember. Near as we can recall, young Mr. Brisenden was out walking along the cliffs, like he often does. Sir Vincent Perry, another local gentleman, was here calling on Lady Tregonning and Miss Jacqueline-he left the house when young Entwhistle arrived, but he didn’t come to get his horse until sometime later. Howsoever, he often walked down to the little bay-not the cove in the gardens, but the one down past the stables-before he came to fetch his horse. As for others…” Richards looked at Wilcox, who took up the tale.

“Both Lord Fritham and Master Jordan often walk in the gardens-we’re never sure when we’ll see one of them about. And there’d a’ been plenty of local lads out that day-fishing, hunting, it were the season for both. While they don’t normally come into the gardens, they sometimes cut through. Everyone hereabouts knows the paths over the ridges, and how they connect. Fastest way from Tresdale Manor lands across to the cliffs to the north.”

Barnaby pulled a face. “Why would any local lads want to kill Entwhistle? Was he well liked?”

“Oh, aye-very amiable young gent, he was.”

“We was all hoping he and Miss Jacqueline might marry-everyone knew that was the way things were heading.”

Barnaby’s gaze sharpened. “So there’s no known reason for anyone to kill Entwhistle, other than, just possibly, jealousy over Miss Jacqueline?”

The two older men exchanged a glance, then nodded. “Aye,” Richards said, “that’s true enough.”

Gerrard looked down at the mound of freshly turned earth. “Did you find anything more?”

“Not anything from the poor lad, but”-Wilcox pointed up the slope-“I’d be surprised if that rock there wasn’t what had done for him.”

To the side some yards upslope lay a heavy rock, roughly rectangular and close to the size Barnaby had postulated.

Barnaby scrambled up and across. He hefted the rock, using both hands, then glanced at Gerrard. “This would have done the trick.” He looked around. “That suggests he was killed here, or close by…” Noticing Richards and Wilcox exchanging looks, Barnaby stopped. “What is it?”

“Well.” Richards waved around them. “There aren’t many rocks hereabouts, not big ones like that. It’s the trees knit the bank together-the soil’s not all that rocky.”

“Only place you find rocks like that is up top of the ridge.” Wilcox pointed up the slope. “Up there, it’s all rocks, just like that one.” He indicated the rock Barnaby set down. “We was thinking if young Entwhistle and the blackguard who killed him had climbed to the ridge, then when Entwhistle was struck down, well, he’d roll down to here, most like, and the rock with him.”

“Easy enough then to cover him with old cypress needles.” Richards kicked at those underfoot. “There’s always a carpet of them here. In time, he’d become just part of the bank.”

“Nothing much for my lads to do up this way,” Wilcox added. “The trees look after themselves, and the needles don’t need to be raked.”

Gerrard stared up at the ridge; it rose to a point, an outcrop of weathered rock that crumbled away to the edge of the sea cliffs. “Why would any gentleman go up there?”

“Ah, they all do. A bit of a scramble, it is, but all those who grow up hereabouts know-from there you can see the blowhole. When the sea’s turned just right, it’s a grand sight.”

“Aha!” Barnaby’s eyes lit.

It didn’t take much persuading to get Richards and Wilcox to show them the way-the only way-up to the top of the ridge. From there, it was apparent that the head gardener and head stableman’s conjecture had merit; a body falling down the slope would indeed land amid the cypresses.

“And,” Barnaby said, his eagerness barely contained as, parting from Wilcox and Richards, they strode back to the house, “it accounts for the one point that stumped me-how did the killer bend down and pick up a huge rock without Entwhistle noticing?”

Gerrard glanced at him. “The killer would still have had to pick up the rock, even if they were standing on the ridge…” He broke off as a picture of two men on the ridge formed in his mind.

“Yes, but it would have been easy.” Barnaby’s voice held a note of triumph. “One, Entwhistle was absorbed, watching Cyclops. Two”-Barnaby caught Gerrard’s eyes-“Entwhistle wasn’t standing. You saw the area-what’s more natural if you were chatting with a friend and looking out into the distance than to sit?”

Gerrard’s mind raced. “That means the killer doesn’t have to be tall.”

“No-any height at all.” Barnaby frowned. “Damn! That increases our list of suspects dramatically.”

“But he still has to be a he-a man.”

“Oh, yes. The size of the rock-and there’s a good chance it was that very rock-makes that certain. Even with Thomas sitting down, a woman would have had difficulty picking it up-and with a lady, Thomas would have noticed. More, manners would have ensured if she stood, then he would have, too. No.” Barnaby shook his head. “It couldn’t have been a woman.”

They reached the steps to the terrace; with a fleeting grin, Gerrard took them two at a time.

“What?” Barnaby asked, eyeing that grin.

Gerrard glanced at him. “There’s another, even more definitive reason why the murderer wasn’t a lady.”

Barnaby scrunched up his face, cudgeling his brains, then sighed. “What?”

“Getting onto the ridge-we only just managed without serious damage.” Gerrard pointed to a scuff mark on his boot, and a smudge on his trouser leg. “As Wilcox said, it’s a scramble. No lady in a tea gown could have managed it, then returned to the house without being in the sort of state that would have created a furor. Everyone would have remembered that.”

“Excellent point,” Barnaby conceded. “It definitely wasn’t a lady.”

“Therefore,” Gerrard concluded, his jaw firming as he led the way into the house, “not Jacqueline.”

She didn’t come down to dinner.

“She asked for a tray in her room,” Millicent said in response to Gerrard’s query. “She said she needed a little time alone to absorb the shock.”

He murmured an “Of course,” and pretended to accept it, but his mind, his imagination, churned.

As always, dinner was a quiet meal, leaving him plenty of time to think. With a few stilted comments, Lord Tregonning made it clear he considered the subject of Entwhistle’s death closed. Barnaby shot Gerrard a questioning look, clearly asking whether they should challenge that; almost imperceptibly, Gerrard shook his head and mouthed, “Not yet.”

His first priority was Jacqueline.

After dinner, increasingly restless, he joined Millicent and Barnaby in the drawing room.

“This latest nonsense,” Millicent declared, “will simply not do! It’s dreadful for Jacqueline, and poor Thomas, too. While people assume it’s her doing, the real killer goes free!”

He and Barnaby assured her they had absolutely no intention of letting the matter rest. Mollified, Millicent confirmed that, although her friends in the neighborhood had always kept her apprised of local happenings, she’d never heard of any dispute involving Thomas, not of the sort that might have led to murder. Dismissing that as a motive, they turned to the other plausible reason, that someone had killed Thomas because he was about to offer for Jacqueline’s hand, and would most likely have been accepted.

Gerrard looked at Millicent. “Is that correct-that he was about to offer, and would have been accepted?”

“Oh, yes. The match was a favorable one on all counts.”

“So who,” Barnaby asked, “were the jealous hopefuls Thomas’s success with Jacqueline threatened?”

He suggested Matthew Brisenden, but Millicent dismissed that idea out of hand. She was adamant, even though Barnaby pressed.

“No, no-he’s cast himself in the role of her protector-a knight errant. His duty is to serve, not to marry her. You shouldn’t take his attitude to mean he has any serious matrimonial interest in her-I’m sure he hasn’t.”

Reluctantly Gerrard confirmed that Jacqueline had said much the same.

“Indeed.” Millicent nodded. “I don’t think you should imagine Matthew was jealous of Thomas.”

“Nevertheless,” Barnaby said, “Brisenden might have had some reason to view Thomas as a danger to Jacqueline. That’s an equally strong motive for him to attack Thomas, and he was known to be in the vicinity.”

Millicent pulled a face. “I hate to admit it, but that is a possibility. However, a better bet would be Sir Vincent Perry-he’s had his eye on Jacqueline for years.”

So Sir Vincent, whom Gerrard and Barnaby had yet to meet, went on their list, along with unknown others yet to be identified let alone discounted. The exercise left them disheartened. Barnaby admitted proving who killed Thomas might not now be possible. On that somber note they retired.

They parted in the gallery and went to their respective rooms.

Gerrard spoke with Compton; he’d heard nothing useful.

“They’re a bit shocked. In a day or so, as they mull things over, someone might remember something. I’ll keep listening, you may be sure.”

According to Compton, the staff had never imagined that Jacqueline was in any way involved with either Thomas’s disappearance, or her mother’s death. “Doesn’t seem to have occurred to them at all.”

Dismissing Compton, Gerrard stood before the windows; hands in his pockets, he thought of what they knew about both murders. If people viewed the facts rationally, with an unclouded mind, Jacqueline’s innocence shone like a beacon. But people hadn’t, and wouldn’t, because someone had clouded the issue. Deliberately.

Someone had, with malice aforethought, cast Jacqueline as a scapegoat.

Something dark within him leapt, all gnashing teeth and sharp claws. Muttering a savage curse, he suppressed it; now was not the time for that sort of action-he couldn’t see the enemy yet.

He looked out at the dark gardens, at the black and purple sky, at the roiling clouds forming fantastical shapes as they blew in from the west; a landscape artist’s dream, he barely saw them.

Rescuing Jacqueline was now critical to him. Not just for her sake, but for his, too.

How she felt, how she was. That was his immediate and all-consuming focus; since Barnaby had told them of the body, the question hadn’t left the forefront of his brain. He was worried, concerned, about her-anxious, with his heart uncertain and his gut tight.

Part of him wanted to pretend it was just his painterly instincts wanting to observe her in an emotional state, but that was balderdash. He cared for her in the same vein he cared for Patience, and other females like Amanda and Amelia…that was closer to the truth, yet still not all of it.

His imagination was too active not to create visions of her alone in her room, grieving, yes, but more-feeling her aloneness, feeling helpless. Thomas would have been her champion once, but he’d disappeared, left her alone-at least now she knew it hadn’t been deliberately.

But he was her champion now.

He swung from the windows and paced, frustration growing. The clock struck eleven; he glowered at it, at the reminder of how many more hours he would have to endure before he saw her again, before he could reassure this insistent and strangely vulnerable part of him that she was whole, still well…still willing to explore what lay between them with him.

That last part of his motive was there, to be sure, but somewhat to his surprise it wasn’t the predominant element; knowing she wasn’t weighed down with grief, worry, and especially fear, was.

He wasn’t going to get much sleep, not until he knew she was all right. Could he find out now, tonight?

He’d feel ridiculous knocking on her door and asking her outright, not at this hour…

Creative imagination was a wonderful thing. Inspiration gleamed; within seconds, his mind had filled in the details.

He didn’t stop to think. Turning, he strode to the door, opened it, and closed it quietly behind him.