T.F. Banks - The Emperor's assassin

The count had cast off his mistress for betrayal, and then she was murdered. Morton would have been more surprised to find that the old man was not moody.

“Did anyone visit?”

“No, sir. No one since the Count d'Auvraye arrived yesterday afternoon. He comes here to get away from all that, I think, Mr. Morton. I've never been there, but it's said his house in London is a regular hive of comings and goings.” She raised a finger. “Though there was one man, sir, last week when the count was in residence.”

Morton leaned forward. “Who?”

“I am sorry to tell you I don't know his name. None of us liked the looks of him, though. The master seemed to feel the same way, and so did Monsieur Rolles. They were both very agitated after he'd left.”

“You mention Monsieur Rolles, ma'am. I do not see him here today. Did he not come down from London, then? I mean, this time.”

“He came with the count yesterday afternoon. But then the count sent him back to London, in the early evening. I believe he had a message of some sort for him to deliver. After that the count was alone. Neither Madame Countess, nor the two misses, nor anyone else were with him last night. But 'twas not unusual.”

“What did last week's visitor look like?”

“A man of normal height, aged some thirty years, dressed as you might expect a foreign music-master or wine-agent to dress. Nothing much to distinguish him, sir, except that he had a red stain on his head-a raspberry-mark.”

Morton sat back and gazed at the estimable Mrs. Barkling. Boulot, again.

“How did these two men get into the house?” he wondered aloud. “I suppose Armand must have answered the door and let them in. Did anyone hear the knocker?”

None of the women in the room could recall hearing it. Morton spent some time questioning these other women, while Mrs. Barkling listened impassively, side by side with Gladys Boynton. No one else had seen either of the two men or heard Armand's words. Most of them had been either in the kitchen or on the second floor. One had been out to market. At the sound of shots, they had all hidden themselves. One or two had seen the visitor the previous week but could say nothing more about him. There had been an air of secrecy about his visit.

Finally Henry Morton drew back, and his attention returned to Mrs. Barkling. One strong hand lay in her aproned lap, and her severe features were set in a frown. Morton's imagination called back to his mind's eye the moment of confrontation. The peaceful house suddenly, unexpectedly, erupting with noise and terror. And below, that unhesitating response, reaching for a weapon and heading straight for the danger itself. Then, face-to-face with murder-and not backing down.

“I salute you, ma'am,” he said, moved. “You are a woman of spirit. The wound you inflicted will not be easy to conceal. With luck, you have delivered these vicious persons into our hands.”

But Mrs. Barkling was impervious to flattery. Her response was sharp.

“See that they are caught and hung, sir, and you'll repay our trust in you. Innocent working folk are not to be threatened in their places of employment, whilst going about their proper tasks. Now, if you have nothing more, we must be about laying out these two bodies.”

He asked them not to do this yet, as the coroner would very certainly need to see them in their current condition. He would surely be up from London before the day was out and would also doubtless be planning an inquest. They should rest now, and after he had taken a last look at things as they lay, they could perhaps put the house to rights. He warned them, too, that there would be an onslaught of people-officers of the crown but also writers from the newspapers, and the merely curious. A double murder, and one of them of a notable foreign personage, was not so usual a thing in England.

He found Jimmy Presley in the White Hart, the tavern at the west end of the terrace, where he had set up shop in the taproom, questioning the townsmen.

“There are a half dozen of them as say they saw the murderers, Morton. Four of them say there was but two, and the other two, they say there were three .”

Morton tossed his hat down on the oaken table and laid the murderer's pistol beside it with a sigh. He gestured to the tapster for refreshment.

This was about average. Folks' stories never matched up exactly. The third man might have been one of the party, or an unrelated man, glanced in the distance. Or he might have been a product of the imagination altogether.

“How did they describe them?”

This too was not very consistent. The large man, whom Mrs. Barkling had wounded, seemed to come through in some of the descriptions, as did the not-very-helpful observation that the other man was smaller. No one mentioned anything that sounded particularly like Boulot. But plainly enough no one had seen any of the men close up or for more than an instant.

Morton picked up the pistol that lay on the table and turned it slowly in his hands. The caustic odor of black powder still clung to the steel. A fine inlay of silver wire decorated the grip and stock, and upon the lock a stand of arms stood proud. It was a greatcoat pistol, smaller than a duelling pistol-about ten inches long. It was not a new gun, dated 1783, though by the looks of the steel it had been lightly used. The maker's name, engraved upon the barrel, was Twigg, London.

“That's a fine gun,” Presley said.

“Yes.” Morton tested the grip. “Made for someone with a small hand.” He held it up, aiming toward a post not a few feet away, cocked it, and pulled the trigger. A small shower of sparks scattered off the steel as the flint struck. He slid the gun across the table to Presley. “See if you can find its mate,” the older Runner said.

Presley picked up the pistol, gave it a cursory examination, then slid it into a pocket. “I shall go speak with Mr. Twigg, gun maker.”

“Unfortunately, John Twigg left the gun maker's trade before you were born.” Morton glanced round the room. “We shall have to linger here until the other Bow Street men arrive,” he said, as he received his ale and bread. “Then we're for London again, to speak with the count's family and consult with Mr. Townsend. We need to find Boulot more than ever now.”

Presley wanted to know what the maidservant had seen, and Morton relayed to him the tales he had heard in the house. At the description of Mrs. Barkling's battle with the tall intruder, the young Runner whistled.

“All to protect her master. There's loyalty.”

“I'm not so sure it was her master she was protecting,” Morton said quietly. But he went no further. There were certain kinds of truth he suspected Jimmy Presley was not quite ready for, and Morton had no desire just now to listen to shocked denunciations or crude jests. His knowledge of Mrs. Barkling, and everything she was, he kept for himself, in a place he could do it honour.

Arabella stood upon a small footstool while the costumer, Madame Beliveau, draped silk about her. They were in the costumer's chambers in the upper reaches of the theatre, the noise of the city only a dim rumble, punctuated sporadically by the voices of the rehearsing players.

“The skirt will fall like so,” she said. “Do you see?”

Arabella admired her reflection in a mirror.

The elfin dressmaker glanced up at the mirror herself, assessing the effect. “Good, yes?”

“ Tres belle, oui,” Arabella agreed.

“Then the lace. Can you hold…?”

Arabella pinched the fabric between her fingers and held it tight to her waist. Madame Beliveau found a swath of lace.

“That is exquisitely made,” Arabella said.

“Yes, it is from France,” the other woman said in her clear, almost unaccented English. She seemed to offer only the occasional French word, for emphasis, not out of necessity. “There is none finer. We use nothing else.”