Imogen Robertson - Island of Bones

As if she could hear the thoughts running in his head, she reached into her pocket and brought something out from it, her fist closed.

‘I wonder if you can guess what I have here?’ Either she had failed to sense his mood entirely, or, more likely, it was simply unimportant to her. He looked up at her from his seat by the window.

‘I fear you mistake me for one of your children, Mrs Westerman.’ She gave a small sigh and opened her hand. He looked. ‘A pocket-watch.’

‘Yes,’ she said, sweeping out her skirts as she settled into the other arch of the windowseat. ‘I saw it in a shop window as I returned from that appalling little solicitor, and it has lightened my mood considerably.’

Crowther turned away to glower at the cobbles outside. A small boy looked up at him from the yard, and seeing his expression retreated further into his mother’s skirts.

‘I am delighted that this town has provided you with an opportunity to spend your pin money. The day has not been wasted, then.’

There was a long pause, and it was with a creeping sense of uneasiness that Crowther turned to face Mrs Westerman again.

‘This, my lord, is your nephew’s watch.’

‘I don’t understand you,’ Crowther replied, but his tone was rather more careful.

‘Perhaps not, Crowther, but if you can resist frightening any more of the children of the town for a moment, I will explain to you.’ He waited, and after a pause she continued in slightly less clipped tones. ‘As I say, I noticed it, recognised it and asked to speak to the owner of the shop. I then told him, a little tearfully, that it was my late father’s and my brother had sold it to cover a gaming debt and begged him to let me purchase it again.’

‘He actually believed you to be Felix’s sister?’ Crowther then came as near to biting his tongue at this point as he had in the last thirty years.

‘Yes. He was most sympathetic,’ she replied neatly. ‘He suggested a price, I was shocked and said my brother had told me he had got only thirty shillings for it. He was sorry to see me so deceived by this wicked youth, and fetched his account book to show me that the price Felix received for the watch was three pounds and ten shillings. I paid three pounds twelve shillings with a trembling hand, hoping my husband would not blame me for the expense, and we parted with mutual expressions of regard.’

‘Mr Leathes already told us that Felix wanted to sell his watch,’ Crowther said a little sulkily, then the significance of the amount came to him and he continued, ‘My apologies, Mrs Westerman. Three pounds and ten shillings. Mr Hurst had three pounds and fifteen shillings on his person.’

She smiled. ‘Indeed, the sums are too alike. And why would Felix give every penny he had over to Mr Hurst and then kill him? Even if he were driven to it, he would not leave his last coins on the corpse. If there was time to conceal the body, there would have been plenty to search it. Also consider this, Crowther. Mr Hurst obviously had no time to spend the money and, given his landlord was pressing him to settle his account, we must assume that he was murdered shortly after he received it. Though I cannot like him greatly, I do not think your nephew a murderer. You may escape assassination yet.’ She paused and swung the watch from side to side. ‘At least, I think it less likely you will be killed for your money. Your manners will always leave you in some danger.’ Then, before he could speak: ‘I do suspect Felix may have been the last person other than his killer to see Mr Hurst alive though. We shall talk to him this evening. At least we know he has not the blunt to eat anywhere other than at Silverside Hall.’

Harriet had been enjoying herself watching the glint of the silver watchcase and was now ready to receive Crowther’s congratulations. He was silent and she looked up. To her surprise he was bent forward with his head low, supporting his forehead with his hand. She reached across the space between them and placed her hand on his shoulder.

‘Crowther?’

He reached up his own hand, keeping his head hanging forward and she felt his fingers brush brief and dry on her own.

‘Thank you, Mrs Westerman.’ He sighed and straightened his back, then passed his hand over his eyes. ‘I am most impressed by your ability to recognise the watch. I did not observe it.’

Harriet felt a blush warm her cheeks. ‘I was considering a watch as a present to Daniel Clode to mark his engagement to Rachel, and I noticed Felix’s the day we arrived, as I thought it might be just the thing Clode would like.’

The dinner-hour was long passed when they returned to Silverside. Harriet could only comfort herself she had sent word before leaving for Cockermouth that they would not join the rest of the party that evening. Felix was not in the house. The Vizegrafin informed them that her son had decided to experience the delights of the waterfalls at Lodore at dusk. Crowther retired to the old brewery and disappointed, Harriet made for the comfort of her private sitting room.

On her way upstairs she entered her son’s rooms and found him and Mr Quince going over his Greek translation. Mr Quince still looked unwell but he was, Harriet thought, showing signs of recovery. The fact that he felt himself equal to instructing her son must demonstrate it. Mr Quince smiled, and told her that Stephen had been a delightful companion to him all afternoon, and Harriet closed the door on them wishing them a good night. She was not certain if she was pleased her son had chosen to stay close to home, as she was sure she should be, or slightly disappointed that he had not spent the whole day ranging over the hills with Casper, searching for the missing Agnes. She pushed open the door to her room wondering if it showed a lack of spirit on Stephen’s part, and condemned herself for the thought.

She took a seat at her desk to start a letter to her sister and, having made her pen and twisted her mourning ring, began by asking Rachel for news of her daughter. She wondered if little Anne were sleeping peacefully in the nursery at Thornleigh Hall. To think of her youngest child was like pressing on some fresh bruise in her side. She thought of the look of fierce concentration her daughter so often had as she dreamed, the way her small hands became fists. What sort of mother might she make? What sort of wife, what manner of sister to the gentle boy bent over his Greek a little way along the corridor?

Harriet bit her lip. She could not unmake herself, and she could not regret that she had lived a life out of the normal pattern, but she feared what Anne and she might make of each other as the child grew. Harriet was afraid her daughter would become a stranger to her if she lived a conventional existence as a respectable wife and mother, but if she followed Harriet’s path she would risk the censure of society and make herself as vulnerable to harm as an adult as she was now as an infant. Harriet would be forced to watch that happen, and blame herself.

Some hour or so later, Mrs Briggs came to join her in her rooms. Harriet had been trying to write to her sister words that were honest, but that would not alarm or enrage Rachel unduly. She found herself concentrating on giving an account of their speculations as to the history of Crowther’s father, but the whole was still so confused she more than once dropped her pen mid-sentence and folded her arms. The interruption was welcome therefore, but seeing Mrs Briggs’s face at her door made Harriet realise she had once again deserted the poor woman to the Vizegrafin. Her mind was already full of guilty whisperings about her behaviour and fitness as a mother as she wrote to Rachel, so Harriet felt herself in a holly-patch of discomforting emotions. She was very glad then, to see no sign of reproach on the face of her hostess.