Carrie Bebris - The Intrigue at Highbury

Mr. Perry called directly after he returned from London. Though his mission had required little more than four-and-twenty hours to complete, it had yielded intelligence of significance. Barely had he taken a seat in the armchair opposite Darcy than he commenced his report. “My colleague confirms my suspicions,” he said. “Edgar Churchill almost certainly died of belladonna poisoning.”

The news came as no surprise to Darcy. The more he had heard about Frank Churchill’s encounter with the gypsies and the fact that the band apparently included an herb-woman, the less he believed Edgar Churchill’s death had occurred by natural means.

“What did his physician say?” Mr. Knightley brought a third chair from the writing table so that they might have a more intimate discussion. “Had he been taking any medicines that might have contained belladonna?”

“None at all. Mr. Flint reported that other than experiencing occasional fits of gout, Edgar Churchill was in good health and seldom had need of his services. It was Mrs. Churchill who kept him and the local apothecary employed. She suffered from nervous complaints and took several physics regularly. I spoke with the apothecary. They were standard remedies, nothing unusual about their composition.”

“The peddler who has lately been in Highbury sells a cure for gout,” Darcy said. “I purchased one for you to examine.”

“I will have a look. Did you learn whether Mr. Churchill might have bought one? He did not have anything of that sort on his person when he died.”

“We found no such items among his possessions,” said Mr. Knightley. “What of Mrs. Churchill’s final illness? Were her symptoms similar to Edgar’s?”

“No. To all appearances, she died of apoplexy.”

“The physician is quite sure?” Darcy asked.

“Mr. Flint was with her at the end, but she was too far gone for his ministrations to have any effect. He is insistent, however, that Mrs. Churchill died of natural causes.” He paused. “Mr. Flint is a physician of no small renown. He did not appreciate my questioning his professional judgment.”

Darcy had never met Mr. Flint, but he had met his ilk: medical men so full of their own self-importance that their patients were an afterthought. He had probably taken great umbrage to the suggestion that he could have failed to recognize a murder occurring before his eyes, particularly as it had been voiced by a mere apothecary. “Mr. Flint sounds unlikely to reconsider his diagnosis. We should therefore focus our efforts on resolving Edgar Churchill’s death, which we know more about. What that investigation brings to light might then illuminate Mrs. Churchill’s.”

Mr. Knightley agreed. “Perry, what did you learn from Edgar Churchill’s solicitor?”

“Mr. MacAllister set down the particulars for your reference.” Mr. Perry produced a sealed packet and handed it to Mr. Knightley. “As is generally known in Highbury, when Frank Weston reached his majority three years ago, in exchange for legally adopting the name ‘Churchill,’ Edgar designated him his heir.”

“Is anyone else named in the will?” Darcy asked.

“Edgar inherited Enscombe unentailed, so it was his to leave to whomever he chose,” Mr. Perry said as Mr. Knightley broke the seal and scanned the pages. “Upon his marriage, Edgar wrote a will granting Agnes a life interest in the estate should he predecease her, with the property then passing to Edgar’s issue upon her death. As they had no children by the time Frank attained his majority, and Mrs. Churchill was past childbearing age, they formally adopted Frank.”

“Even so,” Mr. Knightley said, still reading, “the codicil adding Frank to the will leaves the estate to him only if Edgar Churchill died without issue.” He looked up from the page. “Under these terms, if Edgar had remarried and produced a child, Frank would have been left with nothing.”

“Was Edgar Churchill likely to remarry?” Darcy asked.

“Neither Perry nor I knew him well enough to answer that,” said Mr. Knightley. “This visit to Highbury was his first. To all appearances, he was still grieving, but that is not to say that remarriage would never have entered his mind. He did, however, seem to truly bear affection for Frank and regard him as a son, so I cannot imagine him deliberately cutting off Frank altogether.”

“Might Frank have killed him to prevent the possibility of remarriage ever occurring, thus insuring his inheritance?”

“That would seem an extreme, premature act,” Mr. Knightley replied, “given that there was no actual marriage on the horizon.”

“Premature to you or me, yes,” Darcy said. “But to an impatient young man who spent his life subject to the caprice of a controlling benefactor, ever conscious that should he cross his aunt he could be disinherited? With the estate unentailed, Edgar was free to change his will at any time, and by all accounts Agnes had tremendous influence over her husband. Though Edgar’s affection was steadier than Agnes’s, and Frank’s future therefore more assured after she died, Frank’s status as heir to Enscombe could never be entirely secure until the moment of Edgar’s death.”

Darcy paused, another thought occurring to him. “Too, you have stated that you were not well acquainted with Edgar Churchill, had never seen him outside of this single visit to Highbury. Though remarriage might not have yet entered his mind, it could already occupy the thoughts of some enterprising lady — or her mother — among their larger circle. Many a young woman has wed an old man, willing to invest a few years in a short marriage that leaves her a financially independent widow. Mrs. Churchill has been dead nearly five months, during which time her widower likely received countless expressions of sympathy and solicitude. If Frank suspected a particular lady of scheming to become the second Mrs. Edgar Churchill, now would be the ideal time to act — before an impending marriage made his motive more apparent, and before his uncle had an opportunity to change his will for any other reason.”

“Indeed, Edgar Churchill might already have intended to change his will,” Mr. Perry said. “Mr. MacAllister told me that on the day of Mr. Churchill’s death, he received a letter from Edgar requesting a meeting.”

“On what business?”

“Mr. Churchill did not specify.”

“He could have wanted to discuss any number of matters,” Mr. Knightley said. “We cannot assume that he wished to discuss his will.”

“The search of his chamber at Randalls turned up no physics or other evidence of belladonna, but were any papers found?” Darcy asked. “Perhaps he retained a draft of his letter to Mr. MacAllister, or received correspondence from somebody else that might have prompted the need to consult his solicitor.”

“If he did, those documents were gone by the time anybody thought to look,” Mr. Knightley answered. “With no such proof of his intent, I am afraid there is but one person who might have been privy to Edgar’s thoughts: Frank Churchill.”

The reestablishment of the Donwell party at Hartfield much soothed Mr. Woodhouse. He had not been easy while his beloved daughter and Mr. Knightley resided, however temporarily, at Donwell; indeed, his imagination conjured more horrors to be endured in an old abbey than any gothic novelist could invent. Let readers of Mrs. Radcliffe and Mr. Lewis shudder over skeletons and clanking chains; to Mr. Woodhouse, these terrors were nothing to the potential threat of drafts, damp, or food prepared by any cook but Hartfield’s own Serle.