Stephanie Barron - Jane and the Canterbury Tale

“Julian!” hissed Mrs. Thane.

He thrust himself out of his chair and began to pace before the fire like a caged animal. Fanny, I observed, had flushed becomingly and her eyes glittered as she watched his progress; Thane’s energies were palpable in the room, a current that ensnared and compelled. He was unlike any young man she had yet encountered in Kent, and knowing too much of rogues myself, I sympathised with her fascination.

“Do not be a fool, Mamma,” he muttered. “If James’s pistol fired the killing ball, then some one in this household employed it. We must all be suspect until the murderer is discovered.”

“Nonsense,” she said quellingly. “It is as Joanna says—a footpad did away with Fiske, and stole the gun from Chilham first.”

Thane stopped his revolutions upon the hearth and stared at her in disbelief. “Good God, Mamma! Do you wilfully cultivate the credulous?”

The lady shrugged defiantly. “I do not see why my explanation should be any worse than another. Indeed, I regard it as the truth.”

“Perhaps that is because you are not in possession of all the facts,” I interposed quietly, before she could respond. “There is the matter of the tamarind seed, for example.”

A pause followed these simple words, a pause so profound it was as tho’ air and light had left the room, paralysing all within it except myself.

I glanced from one Thane to another, conscious of Fanny’s confused hesitation beside me. “It was a silken pouch of tamarind seeds Curzon Fiske delivered to this house on the night of your wedding, was it not, Mrs. MacCallister?”

“How do you … we cannot know it was Curzon who …”

“I advise you most strongly, Adelaide, to say nothing further to this woman,” Mrs. Thane spat out. Her suspension of breath had subsided; her gaunt face was livid with fury. “Despicable presumption! She is no better than her brother’s spy! I must beg you to leave us at once, Miss Austen!”

Fanny rose, and with a swift bob was halfway to the door when Julian Thane reached her, and clasped her wrist.

“Don’t,” he said. “Don’t go—yet. Your aunt interests me strangely.” He shot me a look. “What are you talking of, with your tamarind seeds? I know nothing of them, tho’ my sister and parent obviously do.”

“Were you not present when the footman presented a gift to Mrs. MacCallister, in a silken pouch, in the midst of the ball? He had received it of a stranger—a common enough looking fellow , I believe he said—at the Castle’s front door.”

“When was this?” Thane demanded.

“During Andrew’s toast,” Adelaide supplied faintly.

“Ah. I was from the ballroom at the time—and returned only as the glasses were raised. A silken pouch, you say?”

“Inside was a collection of largish brown beans,” I explained. “Or so I thought them to be. Mrs. MacCallister received them with little pleasure.”

Thane crossed to Adelaide, and stared at her broodingly. “You told me nothing of this.”

“I thought it irrelevant.”

“Irrelevant, Addie! Fiske sends you his calling card—”

“Enough, Julian!” Mrs. Thane bellowed.

“It was only later,” I persisted, “when we discovered a similar bean in Mr. Fiske’s pocket, that the coroner explained to me what it was.”

“Curzon had a tamarind seed in his pocket?” Adelaide repeated. “I suppose it slipped from the pouch. It must have been he, then, who stood at the Castle’s door. Oh, Julian!” She covered her face with her hands. “Only consider of it! Standing alone and friendless in the dark, while his wife wedded another!”

“The seed did not slip from the pouch,” I said.

Adelaide lifted her head from her hands and stared at me. “How can you possibly know that?”

“Because it was twisted inside the note that summoned him to his death,” I explained. “A sort of token—perhaps that he might put faith in his murderer?”

Her dark eyes were wide and pitiful in her pale face, all hint of gaiety vanished; and her brother, for the moment, was deprived of speech.

Our interrogation had reached this interesting point, when Andrew MacCallister entered the room.

22 October 1813, Cont.

“Forgive me, Adelaide,” the Captain said as he hesitated in the doorway. “I did not know you entertained guests.”

“It is only the Magistrate’s daughter, Miss Knight, and her aunt, Miss Austen,” his bride returned. “They accompanied Mr. Knight on his business.”

“I see.” MacCallister’s voice and expression were heavy; gone was the joy I had read in his countenance at his wedding. His gaze drifted from Adelaide to her brother, and fixed upon Julian Thane’s face; with a flicker of his sandy eyelashes he said abruptly, “The Magistrate wishes to see you again, Julian—there having been a variance in our accounts. I am sorry for it.”

“Our accounts?” Colour rose in Thane’s face, and to my surprize, his eyes slid towards Fanny. “What would you mean, Andrew?”

“Merely that I told Knight the truth as I knew it—and I collect that you did not.”

Thane stiffened as tho’ a glove had been flung in his face. “Do you call me a liar?”

“Of course not.” MacCallister walked wearily into the room and took up a position behind Adelaide’s chair, his hands resting on her shoulders. She glanced up at him searchingly, but said nothing. “A liar utters falsehoods. You said nothing at all.”

“I do not pretend to understand you,” Thane returned, on his dignity.

“You withheld certain facts , Julian. I urge you to disclose them now. Mr. Knight is waiting. He holds all our fates in his hands.”

There was a silence; then, without another word or look, Thane strode to the drawing-room door and quitted the room.

MacCallister sighed. “Pray present me to your acquaintance, Adelaide.”

“They were about to take their leave,” interjected her mother acidly.

“Tho’ Mr. Knight is as yet engaged?”

“Andrew,” his wife said intently, “what did you mean, just now? About Julian?”

He glanced down at her. “Present me to your acquaintance, Adelaide. I should prefer Julian to speak for himself, once he determines to do it.”

I observed her delicate throat to constrict, as she swallowed her fear with effort, and returned her gaze to ourselves. “Miss Knight—Miss Austen—may I present my husband, Captain MacCallister, to your acquaintance?”

Fanny and I rose, and curtseyed as MacCallister bowed.

“You were our guests at the wedding ball, I know,” he said, “but with such a crush of people—there may have been as many as two hundred in the room—I cannot pretend to have retained the names of most of my well-wishers. Let us say that we renew our acquaintance—and I shall undertake to greet you both with greater civility in future.”

“You are very good,” I said. “I do not believe there is one bridegroom in ten who may discern an individual from the mass of those at his wedding celebration!”

“And now I fear we must take our leave,” Fanny said firmly. “If you would be so good as to summon a footman, Captain MacCallister, I will request my tilbury to be brought round.”