C Harris - When maidens mourn

Childe's head jerked up, his step faltering, a succession of transparent emotions flitting across his cherubic features as his desire to maintain his schedule warred with the need to appear accommodating to a woman whose father was the most powerful man in the Kingdom.

`Actually,' he said, `I was just on my way to grab a bite...'

`It won't take but a moment.' Hero opened her parasol and inexorably turned his steps toward the nearby square.

He twisted around to gaze longingly back at the Pied Piper, the exaggerated point of his high collar pressing into his full cheek.

`But I generally prefer to take my constitutional after I eat...'

`I know. I do beg your pardon, but you have heard this morning's news about the death of Miss Tennyson and the disappearance of her young cousins?'

She watched as the pinkness drained from his face, leaving him pale. `How could I not? The news is all over town. Indeed, I can't seem to think of anything else. It was my intention to spend the day reviewing a collection of manor rolls from the twelfth century, but I've found it nearly impossible to focus my attention for more than a minute or two at a stretch.'

`How distressing for you,' said Hero dryly.

The scholar nodded. `Most distressing.'

The man might still be in his early thirties, not much older than Devlin, she realized with some surprise but he had the demeanor and mannerisms of someone in his forties or fifties. She said, `I remember Miss Tennyson telling me once that you disagreed with her identification of Camlet Moat as the possible site of Camelot.'

`I do. But then, you would be sorely pressed to find anyone of repute who does agree with her.'

`You're saying her research was faulty?'

`Her research? No, one could hardly argue with the references to the site she discovered in various historical documents and maps. There is no doubt the area was indeed known as Camelot for hundreds of years. Her interpretation of those findings, however, is another matter entirely.'

`Was that the basis of your quarrel with her last Friday? Her interpretation?'

He gave a weak, startled laugh. `Quarrel? I had no quarrel with Miss Tennyson. Who could have told you such a thing?'

`Do you really want me to answer that question?'

Her implication was not lost on him. She watched, fascinated, as Childe's mobile features suddenly froze. He cleared his throat. `And your... your source did not also tell you the reason for our little disagreement?'

`Not precisely; I was hoping you could explain it further.'

His face hardened in a way she had not expected. `So you are here as the emissary of your husband, not your father.'

`I am no one's emissary. I am here because Gabrielle Tennyson was my friend, and whoever killed her will have to answer to me for what they've done to her to her and to her cousins.'

If any woman other than Hero had made such a statement, Childe might have smiled. But all of London knew that less than a week before, three men had attempted to kidnap Hero; she had personally stabbed one, shot the next, and nearly decapitated the other.

`Well,' he said with sudden, forced heartiness.

`It was, as you say, a difference of opinion over the interpretation of the historical evidence. That is all.'

`Really?'

He stared back at her, as if daring her to challenge him. `Yes.'

They turned to walk along the far side of the square, where a Punch professor competed with a hurdy-gurdy player, and a barefoot, wan-faced girl in a ragged dress sold watercress for a halfpenny a bunch from a worn wooden tray suspended by a strap around her neck. A cheap handbill tacked to a nearby lamppost bore a bold headline that read in smudged ink, KING ARTHUR, THE ONCE AND FUTURE KING!

Normally, the square would have been filled with children playing under the watchful eye of their nursemaids, their shouts and laughter carrying on the warm breeze. But today, the sunlit lawns and graveled walks lay silent and empty. Gabrielle's murder and the mysterious disappearance of the two boys had obviously spooked the city. Those mothers who could afford to do so were keeping their children safely indoors under nervous, watchful eyes.

`I was wondering,' said Hero, `where exactly were you yesterday?'

If Childe's cheeks had been pale before, they now flared red, his eyes wide with indignation, his pursed mouth held tight.

`If you mean to suggest that I could possibly have anything to do with that... that... !'

Hero returned his angry stare with a calculated look of bland astonishment. `I wasn't suggesting anything, Mr. Childe; I was merely hoping you might have some idea about Miss Tennyson's plans for Sunday.'

`Ah. Well, I'm afraid not. As it happens, I spend my Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays at Gough Hall. The late Richard Gough left his books and papers to the Bodleian Library, you see, and I have volunteered to sort through and organize them. It's a prodigious undertaking.'

She had heard of Richard Gough, the famous scholar and writer who had been director of the Society of Antiquaries for two decades and who had made the Arthurian legends one of his particular areas of interest. `Gough Hall is near Camlet Moat, is it not?'

`It is.'

`I wonder, did you ever take advantage of the opportunity offered by that proximity to visit the excavations on the isle?'

`I wouldn't waste my time,' said Childe loftily.

Hero tilted her head to one side, her gaze on his face, a coaxing smile on her lips. `So certain that Miss Tennyson was wrong about the island, are you?'

No answering smile touched the man's dour features.

`If a real character known as Arthur ever existed which is by no means certain he was in all likelihood a barbaric warrior chieftain from the wilds of Wales whose dimly remembered reality was seized upon by a collection of maudlin French troubadours with no understanding of or interest in the world he actually inhabited.'

`I take it you're not fond of medieval romances?'

She noticed he was staring, hard, at another handbill tacked up on the wall of the house at the corner. This one simply proclaimed, KING ARTHUR, SAVE US!

Hero said, `Who do you think killed her?'

Childe jerked his head around to look at her again, and for one unexpected moment, all the bombastic self-importance seemed to leach out of the man in a way that left him seeming unexpectedly vulnerable and considerably more likeable. `Believe me when I say that if I could help you in any way, I would. Miss Tennyson was...' His voice quivered and he broke off, his features pinched with grief. He swallowed and tried again. `She was a most remarkable woman, brilliant and high-spirited and full of boundless energy, even if her enthusiasms did at times lead her astray. But she was also very good at keeping parts of her life of herself secret.'

His words echoed so closely those of Hero's father that she felt a sudden, unexpected chill. `What sort of secrets are we talking about?'

`If I knew, they wouldn't be secrets, now, would they?' said Childe with a faintly condescending air.

Hero asked again, her voice more tart, `So who do you think killed her?'

Childe shook his head. `I don't know. But if I were intent on unmasking her killer, rather than focus on Miss Tennyson's associates and activities, I would instead ask myself, Who would benefit from the death of her young cousins?'

They had come full circle, so that they now stood on the footpath outside the Pied Piper. The door beside them opened, spilling voices and laughter and the yeasty scent of ale into the street as two gentlemen emerged blinking into the sunlight and crossed the street toward the museum.

`You mean, George and Arthur Tennyson?' said Hero.

She realized Childe was no longer looking at her but at something or someone beyond her. Throwing a quick glance over her shoulder, Hero found herself staring at the watercress girl from the square. The girl must have trailed behind them and now leaned wearily against a nearby lamppost, her wooden tray hanging heavy from its strap, a wilting bunch of greens clutched forlornly in one hand. She couldn't have been more than twelve or thirteen, with golden hair and large blue eyes in an elfin face. Already grown tall and leggy, she was still boy-thin, with only a hint of the breasts beginning to swell beneath the bodice of her ragged dress. And Childe was looking at her with his lips parted and his gray eyes hooded in a way that made Hero feel she was witnessing something unclean and obscene.