The Egyptian Coffin (A Lord Ambrose Mystery) Page 3

  More murmurings. Then the gypsy voices again, agitated. “The gry, grycboring!” Which is to say, there was some agitation about horse-stealing.

  Horses, guineas, and theft are the three most common entanglements of the Romany world, and they occur in many and various colourful conjunctions. I was inclined to take no notice and dismiss the business as some foolishness that could soon be settled and might easily have waited till daybreak, without rousing me from my bed. But this was something of sufficient importance to agitate the gypsy woman and her daughter so that they would come to me in the middle of the night.

  I got a little more of the story from them, and looked down on their moonlit faces, sharp-boned and finely featured, and promised them I would do what I could.

  “Very well, let me speak to your man. Yes, if the matter

  will not wait another minute, as you say, then tonight. Will you fetch him here?”

  Now I was well entangled in the net of events. I should have stayed in my bed!

  The next day, Belos brought me my breakfast as I yawned in the library.

  “Your bacon and mushrooms, my lord.”

  “Ah, perfect, Belos. Any coffee?”

  “Yes, my lord — shall I pour it now?”

  As he poured the bitter and enlivening black fluid from a silver pot which was grand but somewhat tarnished, like so much at Malfine, Belos added, “The gypsies have cleared off. And they may have cleared off some of your lordship’s possessions, for aught I know — I never did think it was right they should be caravanned on your land in the first place.”

  “Belos, you were once yourself a strolling player, were you not, so have you no sympathy for the vagrant life?”

  “None whatever, my lord. And I was not a vagrant. I was an artiste.”

  “Well, I’m sorry to have offended your feelings, Belos — watch out with that coffee — you’ll have it on my lap! There now, you’ve got it all over this paper I’ve been writing.”

  “Beg pardon, my lord. Is it aught of importance, or was your lordship trifling with verse again?”

  Really, Belos is not made for a servant, which is, I suppose, why I take pleasure in employing him.

  But as to the paper from which I was wiping a pool of coffee even as he spoke, I will let it speak for itself later on.

  THREE

  Some few days after I had heard of the accident that befell the young heiress of Westmorland Park, I decided to pay my respects and offer suitable neighbourly assistance. This was, of course, entirely out of character, and I must confess it was prompted, not solely by concern for the daughter of my boyhood friend, but by a certain curiosity which the tale of the gypsies had aroused.

  Here at Westmorland Park, it seemed, there had occurred a riding accident in conditions which I, as an experienced breakneck hell-raiser in my youth, can personally testify are unlikely to foster such an event. There was Miss Lilian Westmorland, a skilled horsewoman, there were horse and rider well acquainted with the track they were following, the terrain being easy going, the weather perfectly fine. The horse, a valuable thoroughbred, had been so badly injured it was shot immediately after the event.

  Could these oddities fit together snugly to make a whole, like those wooden puzzles children turn over and over in their fingers, till, suddenly — click! — and the whole toy glides into place? We had a few strange happenings — no more, but the puzzle they would make when fitted together — ah, that aroused my interest. Sufficiently to propel me into the saddle and give Zaraband a good canter out towards the locality of the accident.

  At Westmorland Park, the door was opened by a small maid — who presumably was not accustomed to such duties, for she could not have noticed that her hair was escaping from her mob cap and falling round her thin face, as her arms struggled with the heavy weight of the front door. I assisted her to propel it open, and she squeaked in alarm. I tried to reassure her.

  “I am merely paying a friendly visit, I assure you! Is your mistress at home? I am Lord Ambrose Malfine.”

  This elicited yet more cries of alarm, and the little maid gasped out that she would “fetch Mistress Jennet straight away,” but this proved to be unnecessary, for an elderly female personage of the most damnable respectability was advancing down the hallway, in a black gown that clearly constituted an impregnable fortress of virtue, with a steel hussif’s chain clanking at her waist.

  She looked about as welcoming as the ghostly chatelaine, hung with skulls around her waist, of some Gothic novel or other, and her visage did not soften at the sight of myself. Rumour must have preceded me — of my foreign blood, my wicked city ways, or the like, for as I swept off my hat and bowed, she was fair twitching with anxiety.

  “Lord Ambrose Malfine, madam, at your service. May I express my sorrow for Miss Lilian’s misfortune, and offer my neighbourly assistance in any matter?”

  The personage was murmuring, rather grudgingly, I thought: “Oh, well ... thank you kindly ... your worship ... that is, my lord ...”

  “And I would ask you to convey my compliments to the invalid. But how did the accident come to occur, may I ask?” This question stirred things up. Mistress Jennet’s eyes rounded brightly and she was opening and closing her mouth like an anxious goldfish. I could see that there were two warring instincts there: the desperate longing to impart information natural to one of God’s own gossips, and her prudent nervousness of my own wicked reputation.

  “Well, sir — I don’t know nothing about horses ...”

  “Was Miss Lilian out riding on her own?”

  “Oh no, sir! That would be real shocking, a young lady out without a companion! What would people say? No, Miss Lilian would not go gadding about the countryside unaccompanied, I assure you!”

  “No, no, of course not!” I soothed outraged respectability till the hackles subsided. Genteel young ladies did not go out all on their own, without even a servant in attendance. They must be chaperoned at all times — even when going about such ordinary rustic amusements as the shires might afford. I doubted Miss Lilian could entertain any serious hope of being corrupted hereabouts, at least, I had found little enough opportunity when I was young, but Mistress Jennet would not share my views. No, of course young Miss Lilian was not unsupervised when the accident had struck her down.

  “Sir, the groom was with her.”

  “Ah, yes, the groom. Well, perhaps, he observed how the mischance came to happen. It may be, you know, that there is a branch across the riding path that should be lopped, or a molehill that needs digging out, or some such matter in which I can offer my services.”

  “Why, I don’t think there was any such cause, sir — it seems the horse stumbled and fell, and threw Miss Lilian with it, just up at the top of the path through the copper

  beeches — by that big clump to the right of the track — and all seemed quite as usual. As for the groom, well ...”

  Here an oddly fearful note came into the woman’s voice. She suddenly seemed unconfident.

  “He’s been dismissed, sir.”

  “Dismissed? Why, was he to blame for the accident? How could that have been?”

  “Oh, I wouldn’t like to say, sir. But Mr. Overbury sent him away without a character straight after the accident. Dismissed him then and there, and without a testimonial. And Adams had been with the family these twenty years, sir, but then, he said he were doing it only for Miss Lilian’s safety, that she were too precious to be set at risk ...”

  Her voice trailed off.

  “Who is Mr. Overbury?”

  “Miss Lilian’s uncle, sir ... he’s taken charge here she glanced nervously over her shoulder. “I’m sure he means all for the best, sir. You must excuse me now ... the doctor says she has some injury to her head.”

  I felt an anxiety that I had not anticipated. I had expected to hear merely about an injury and an invalid: here I found the horse vanished, the groom dismissed, and a stranger in charge. Still, the Westmorland estates had been in the hands of profliga
tes, and although my sympathy is ever with the wastrels, I admit that a prudent hand on the reins might well be in Miss Lilian’s real interests. Not all the world is willing to go to hell in my breakneck way. I almost took my leave at this point, but courtesy — or something more? — obliged me to inquire further. “Is Miss Lilian well enough to receive visitors, may I ask?”

  “I’m afraid Miss Lilian is asleep just now ...”

  A soft voice called out from somewhere upstairs: “Oh, Jennet, Jennet!”

  “Well, at any rate, she’s not receiving visitors,” said Jennet, defensively.

  “I quite understand, Mrs. Jennet, pray do not let me interrupt you any more. Please give Miss Lilian my compliments.”

  The door closed.

  I turned away towards the grounds of Westmorland Park. It was an idyllic setting, the perfect subject for a painter’s brush, the clear enamelled colours of a fine fresh morning in early September.

  Looking back, I saw Westmorland Park from a distance, a Queen Anne house in soft reds, set in a bright-green parkland. There alongside the west wing, apricots trained by careful gardeners climbed up the walls, and against the soft rusty tones of the old bricks, espaliered fruit trees enjoyed gleams of autumnal sun. A little further along from the fruit trees, the sunlight winked in bright points of light on the glass of a newfangled conservatory, almost the only addition since the house was built a hundred years previously.

  That morning, Westmorland Park was as mature and calm as the English country manor appears in a painting: a house set against a serene and perfect backdrop, an ideal image which an architect had conjured into life, into a solid reality in stout bricks and crafted plaster, and set down in lush green pastures dotted with old spreading trees.

  I continued my prowl in the grounds.

  A landscape painter, placing Westmorland Park amid emerald fields in the middle distance of his canvas, would note with professional observation that there is a charming detail which would, most effectively, draw the eye of the beholder into the picture: the little octagonal tower perched over the stables. Here, on this particular morning, a clock was striking its silvery notes through the freshness of the air. The stables are a short distance from the back of the house, for the owners here, unaffectedly horsy, have always liked to have their animals close at hand; the gentry at Westmorland Park were not used to waiting graciously at the front entrance for their mounts or their carriages to be brought round from the stables, but always had the habit of walking on their own two feet to the stalls and looseboxes at the back of the house, where they could inspect their equine charges, offer apples, chat with grooms, and generally revivify themselves through breathing in the beloved familiar scents of hay, leather, and prime horse-dung. I recalled my vanished friend, young Sam Westmorland, doing exactly that, on some hazy golden misremembered morning of our youth, which can never in truth have been such an idyll as it appears to me now.

  I turned into the stable building. Rows of empty stalls, all neat and orderly. There was one occupied stall in the row, where the placid head of a once-dappled pony, a staid, elderly beast, whose coat was turning white with age, looked out at me with a modest display of interest. Out of habit, I rubbed the creature’s nose, and peered into the other stalls as I passed along. In one, next to that of the pony, a length of dark tarry twine had been thrown in a disorderly sort of way, at odds with the general air of neatness which prevailed here.

  Another stall appeared to have been but recently vacated by its equine occupant. The floor was wet, as if it had been recently washed; someone had forgotten to remove hay from the rock, and a fine set of harness hung against the whitewashed wall.

  I peered down at the cobbled floor. Between the smooth stones, tiny rills of water still lay glistening, though the moisture was drying fast. All was orderly, silent save for the gentle shifting of the stout dapple in his stall.

  Turning away to the park, I began to walk along the ride among the beeches and began to imagine my dead friend’s daughter coming along here for her morning ride. That old grey fellow in the stables was likely the horse which the groom would have ridden. Miss Lilian Westmorland was noted as a bold young horsewoman — she had ridden a creature fit to whirl her along, as young riders love. I pictured her, with the red locks which she inherited from her father, flying out as she galloped along this very path towards the disaster which awaited horse and rider at the rise amid the beeches. Had I not heard she had a chestnut mare? A painter would have noted how the tints of the rider’s hair and the colour of the horse’s coat picked up the orpiment and saffron, the nut brown and tobacco tones, of the drying autumn leaves in the woods around.

  I was walking uphill now, towards the clump of beeches. The path was smooth and clear, the going firm and dry. No overhanging branches, no inconvenient molehills ... no trace of how the accident had come to happen here, unless one accepted that it had occurred through sheer chance, the irrational intervention of fate, or some fairytale about the workings of Divine Providence ...

  This must be where the fall had actually occurred, for the leaves and soil on one side of the path were scored and tracked, and marks crossed and trampled over, as presumably folk had come with a stretcher to carry the injured girl away. And to shoot the horse on the spot, put it out of its agony, and drag the wretched carcass away in a farmyard cart? There were no tracks of the kind that might be left by such a vehicle, nor which indicated a heavy load such as the dead body of a horse being pulled across the ground, but that signified little, for the ground was firm and solid, not apt to take impressions. There was no blood, neither, such as might have been caused by the pistol-shot that would have despatched the horse — again, that did not count for much; there would have been but little blood and the traces might now be buried under falling leaves in any case — but there were some smallish dark smears on the smooth trunk of a tree, one of a pair of graceful birch trees, planted on either side of the path. Blackish, sticky stains, near a deep groove in the smooth bark.

  I had now walked the terrain of the place where Miss Lilian Westmorland had suffered the accident, along the path which horse and rider had then followed, and made it my concern to note those signs which were accountable by subsequent events natural on the occurrence of such a disaster.

  Turning back towards the house, I confess I forgot to admire the beauty of its setting, so deep in thought was I as I approached it. I did not again seek to enter by the front door, but swung round the house in an arc which took me to the stables once more, and to my friend the dapple-grey who looked hopefully in my direction. But I had nothing in my pocket, no lump-sugar or apples, for such a contingency, and instead stood peering into the stall next to his.

  “What the devil are you doing here?”

  The voice came from the end of the yard, and a good voice it was, too, ringing, dramatic, deep-throated. Belos would have said its owner would have performed well upon the stage, for my manservant, as a former actor, is a connoisseur of voices.

  “I am Lord Ambrose Malfine! And who the hell are you?” But I was somewhat modifying my greeting, even as he walked towards me, for I could see that there was something strange about this man’s appearance: as he came closer, I looked into his face and it bore the marks of illness. Of a very severe illness, furthermore, for they were the scars of smallpox that disfigured his features. The poor devil had once been well-favoured enough, no doubt, but had fallen victim to a truly terrible illness, and one which he was fortunate to survive. I was reminded of my conversation with Sandys. Clearly, this fellow had not experienced the good fortune to have been vaccinated against the horrible infection.

  “I own the Malfine estate,” said I — surely he would have heard the word Malfine, for it was not only the title which I bore but the name of the greatest mansion in the county — “and have come out of a natural neighbourly concern for Miss Westmorland to see if there was aught I could do to assist here. I take a particular interest in livestock and came to see if you wanted
me to send over a spare groom to the Westmorland stables. But who, sir, are you?”

  The man came up close. “Lord Ambrose Malfine, I take it. My name is Casterman, your lordship — I am Mr. Micah Overbury’s man of affairs.”

  “Mr. Micah Overbury? I am not acquainted with the gentleman. I knew Miss Lilian’s late father, but I believe Mr. Overbury must be from the distaff side of the family. And I have not seen you in these parts before, Mr. Casterman.”

  “Mr. Overbury has premises in Bristol, near the docks, and I assist him there — his business is concerned with imports and cargoes. Mr. Overbury is the late Mrs. Westmorland’s brother — and now the trustee of this estate and Miss Lilian’s guardian. As to the horses, I do not believe you will find anything to interest you, Lord Ambrose. Miss Lilian had a fine mare, but it had to be destroyed after the accident. In fact, there will be no horses kept here at all, except for such as Mr. Overbury might require for his own use when he moves in here.”

  “Oh, and what will happen to Miss Lilian?”

  He stiffened. “I understand Mr. Overbury has made arrangements for her care. I am not at liberty to discuss his affairs.”

  “Tight-lipped, aren’t ye? But there, Mr. Casterman, I intend you no insult, for the ability to keep silent is a valuable commodity in a man of business. In any case, I daresay the whole district will know all about it within hours — there’s no point in being discreet in the countryside, man — why, the very turnips gabble in the fields! But” — here I turned back to the dapple-grey, standing patiently in his stall — “what will happen to our friend here? I suppose he is the last denizen of the Westmorland Park stables? They were once renowned throughout the county, you know.”