C. Harris - Who Buries the Dead

“Who do you think did it?”

The question seemed to surprise Knightly. “Me?” He paused. “If it were me, I suppose I would look into Captain Wyeth’s movements.” A self-deprecating smile touched his lips. “But then, as I said, I’m not exactly disinterested in that quarter.”

“It sounds to me as if this Captain Wyeth may well be our man,” said Lovejoy as he and Sebastian stood on the terrace of the vast pile of government offices known as Somerset House, looking out over the sullen gray waters of the Thames. “He readily admits he has no alibi for the time of the murder, and given that Preston was opposing the captain’s ambitions of marrying Miss Preston and had promised to disinherit her if she wed against his wishes, he also possessed a powerful motive.”

“Just because he had a motive and no alibi doesn’t mean he did it,” said Sebastian, watching a crane fit into place a large stone on the new Strand Bridge. “I’m still not convinced Henry Austen is being entirely honest about his quarrel that night with Preston. It might be worthwhile to send a constable to talk to the Monster’s regular patrons; one of them may have overheard something interesting.”

Lovejoy nodded. “Good idea. We’ve recently discovered Preston received a visitor on Sunday morning, by the way-a physician named Sterling. Douglas Sterling.”

“Preston was unwell?”

Lovejoy shook his head. “According to Miss Preston, her father was in the best of health-at least, as far as she knows.”

“What does this Dr. Sterling say?”

“Very little, unfortunately. I sent one of my best lads-a Constable Hart-to speak with him, but Sterling claims the visit was medical in nature and refuses to discuss it further. When Constable Hart tried to press the matter, the good doctor became quite agitated and stormed off. Hart thinks he’s hiding something.”

“Interesting. I’ll have to have a go at him.”

Lovejoy cleared his throat. “I should perhaps have mentioned this Dr. Sterling is quite aged.”

“How aged?”

“Nearly eighty. He’s been retired for years.”

“So why was he treating Preston?”

“He claims he saw him as a favor.”

“They were friends?”

“Miss Preston says he’s the former colleague of a some relative-a cousin of her grandfather, I believe.”

Sebastian turned to stare at him. “Lord Sidmouth’s father was a physician-and her grandfather’s cousin.”

“Was he? Then perhaps that’s the connection.”

“Where does this Dr. Sterling live?”

“Number fourteen Chatham Place. But I gather he spends most of his time at a coffeehouse near the bridgehead. He sounds like a crusty old gentleman. I suspect you’ll not find him easy to coerce into talking, if he’s made up his mind not to.”

“Perhaps I can appeal to his better nature.”

“After listening to Constable Hart,” said Lovejoy, turning away from the river, “I’m not convinced he has one.”

Douglas Sterling proved to be one of those aged gentlemen who still clung to the powdered wigs considered de rigueur for men of birth and education when they were in their prime.

Sebastian found him in a coffeehouse on the east side of Chatham Place, seated near the bowed front window where he could watch the steady stream of traffic passing back and forth on Blackfriars Bridge. He was hunched over a medical journal that lay open on the table before him, but looked up and frowned when Sebastian paused beside him.

His face was heavily lined with age, the skin sallow and blotched with liver spots. But his frame was still lean, his hands unpalsied, his dark eyes shiny with a belligerent intelligence. “You’re obviously not from Bow Street,” he said, his voice raspy but strong. “So what in blazes do you want with me?”

“Mind if I have a seat?”

“As a matter of fact, I do,” said the old man, and returned pointedly to his reading.

Sebastian leaned one shoulder against a nearby wall, his arms crossed at his chest. Through the window he could see a massive farm wagon heavily laden with hay jolting and swaying as it came down off the bridge’s span. “Nice view,” he said.

“Yes.”

“Come here often, do you?”

“You must know I do; otherwise, you wouldn’t have found me here, now, would you?”

“I understand you’ve retired from the practice of medicine.”

“Pretty much.”

“Yet you consulted with Stanley Preston the very day he died?”

“I like to keep my hand in, now and then.”

“Now and then?”

“Yes.” The aged physician gave up all pretense of reading and leaned back in his chair. “Who are you?”

“The name’s Devlin.”

Sterling’s eyes narrowed. “The Earl of Hendon’s son?”

“Yes.”

“I hear you’ve taken a fancy to solving murders. In my day, gentlemen left that sort of thing to the constables and magistrates.”

“Like Constable Hart?”

Sterling grunted. “The man is beyond impudent.”

Sebastian studied the old doctor’s watery, nearly lashless dark eyes. “He thinks you’re hiding something.”

Rather than become flustered, Sterling simply returned Sebastian’s steady gaze and said, “He’s welcome to think what he likes.”

“It doesn’t disturb you that someone lopped off Stanley Preston’s head less than twelve hours after you saw him?”

“Of course it disturbs me-as it would any right-minded gentleman.”

“Yet you refuse to divulge information which could conceivably lead to the apprehension of his killer.”

“It is only your assumption-and that of the ridiculous Constable Hart-that I possess any such information.”

“Are you by chance acquainted with the Home Secretary, Lord Sidmouth?”

“Huh. Knew him before he was even breeched, I did-although I doubt he’d acknowledge the likes of me now that he’s become so fine. Lord Sidmouth, indeed. And his father no more than a simple physician, like me.”

“You were colleagues?”

“We were. Although it was years ago, now.”

“Yet you still maintained an acquaintance with Stanley Preston?”

“That strike you as odd?”

“I suppose not. Tell me this: Did Preston seem at all anxious when you last saw him? Frightened?”

“Hardly.”

“How often would you see him?”

“Not often.”

“Yet he consulted with you over a medical problem his own daughter didn’t know he had?”

“I don’t discuss my health with my daughters. Do you?”

“I don’t have a daughter.”

“A son?”

“Yes.”

The old physician gave a throaty grunt. “Strapping young man like yourself, bet you think you want sons-carry on the name, make you proud at Oxford and on the hunting field, and all that rot. But mark my words: You get to be my age, it’s a daughter you’ll be wanting.”

Outside in the square, the hay wagon had caught a wheel in a rut and shuddered to a halt. Someone shouted as the driver cracked his whip.

Sebastian said, “What did you think of Preston’s interest in collecting the heads of famous men?”

The old physician thrust out his upper lip and shrugged. “Ever see the collection of anatomical specimens amassed by the late John Hunter? They’re in the care of the Royal College of Surgeons these days.”

“Can’t say that I have.”

“Mind you, Hunter’s collection was based on anatomical peculiarities rather than whatever fame or infamy the individuals may have managed to acquire in life. But his point was the same.”

“Was it? I’d have said the impetus behind Hunter’s collection was education and research.”

“He liked to think it was. Could even have started out that way. But if you’d ever observed his pride in his specimens, you’d know better.”