The Fatal Engine Read online

  “Yes, certainly,” said Felix.

  Eleanor now sat down in the chair the great man had occupied, stroking the arms.

  “It was a little strange for him to call here first, though,” Felix said.

  “As if you care about such rules!” said Eleanor.

  “No, I don’t, but it is...” – he hesitated – “a trifle bold. For someone of his background.”

  “That doesn’t matter since he’s a genius. Anyone would think you do not want to know him. You like his books as much as I do.”

  “Oh, I don’t know –”

  “What if it had been Sir Walter Scott?” she said.

  “I’m sure he would have waited for me to call first,” Felix said. “And as entertaining as Mr Truro is, he is not to be compared with Scott. I certainly don’t think he’s a genius. Clever, yes, but –”

  “I suppose you will always be prejudiced in Scott’s favour, being your fellow countryman,” Eleanor said, “but I believe Mr Truro will stand as his equal in the eyes of posterity.”

  “I wouldn’t put money on it,” said Felix, sitting down opposite. “There is a lot of silliness in those books and that last one was really contrived. I enjoyed it, yes, but then I completely forgot it. The hero was such a milksop – even you said so.”

  “I said no such thing!” said Eleanor.

  “Yes, you did,” said Felix. “I remember it well. It was that part when –”

  “I did not say anything of the sort,” Eleanor said. “And, for your information, Mr Truro had a perfectly good reason to call. It was because I invited him to do so. I met him this morning, when I was out in the pony carriage – fortunately I went out before the weather decided to become so filthy. He was supervising the unloading of his books and there were so many of them, I could not help but stop and stare. A man who travels about with books must be stared at, surely, Felix, given that most of the people in this village consider books the work of the Devil at least? I had to wonder who he was. And it is a large property, White Lodge. He was evidently a gentleman.”

  “I’m not so sure he is,” Felix said. “Those trousers –”

  “Oh, what twaddle! There was nothing wrong with them.”

  “Except they were hideous.”

  “Mr Truro is as much a gentleman as your beloved Mr Harper,” said Eleanor. “And when he presented himself, how could I not invite him to call? Especially with the weather setting in. And of course, I told him to bring his wife. She would have come too, but she is resting.”

  “And so he brought that other fellow instead.”

  “Mr Hepworth, yes, who is equally respectable. I could not find fault with either of them. And Mr Truro is as charming as his books. Really, Felix, why must you be so peculiar? You sound like my mother.” She got up, went to one of the bookcases and began to pull down various volumes. “We must put out all his books. Perhaps he will sign them.”

  “I am sure he will,” said Felix. “Where is your mother, by the way?”

  “She went to bed after lunch. She said she had a cold coming on.”

  “Is she all right?”

  “I would imagine so,” said Eleanor.

  “I’d better go and see how she is,” he said.

  “I don’t suppose it’s anything serious,” said Eleanor. “And it’s just as well she did go upstairs. I suspect she would have turned poor Mr Truro away.” She was flipping through the pages of a book. “I shall have to read them all again. Goodness, I have so many questions for him...”

  Felix left her and found Jacob waiting in the hall with his slippers, which had not been warmed. That was too much to expect or ask of a servant, Felix reflected, as he climbed upstairs to Lady Blanchfort’s room.

  He knocked on her door.

  “Ma’am? It’s Felix – may I come in?”

  “Yes,” he heard her say, and he went in.

  The room was darkened, with only a couple of shaded lamps and the fire to give any light. She was sitting up in bed.

  “Eleanor said you were unwell. A cold –?”

  “It is not a cold, so much as a headache. But it is nothing really.”

  “Are you quite sure?” said Felix, coming to her bedside and feeling her brow. “Any fever?”

  “A touch, but I have been much more comfortable for being in bed. Although I am a little ashamed of myself for it. I should probably have stayed downstairs. I gather Eleanor had some visitors.”

  “Yes, I just saw them. Mr Truro and Mr Hepworth.”

  “She was giddy at luncheon with talk of him. Perhaps that was what gave me a headache.”

  Felix smiled at that.

  “Just a headache? Any other pain?”

  “My back is sore, I must admit. But really, it’s nothing for you to trouble yourself about.”

  “It’s no trouble. You sound hoarse. Is your throat hurting you?”

  “Perhaps.”

  “I think I should examine it,” Felix said. “I will get a little more light, if I may?”

  “It is a great luxury to have a physician in the house,” she said, as he went about the room, adjusting the lights. “Especially one in whom one may have confidence.”

  “Thank you.”

  “I hear many good things of your talents in the village. I know you take trouble where there is no need for you to do so.”

  “Ah, but it is easy for me to go about and be useful,” Felix said. “It’s you who takes the real trouble with the baby clothes and the broths and the sides of bacon. They like you very much for all that. The bacon especially. Now, open wide, would you?”

  She obliged and he peered into her throat.

  “I think you had better rest for a few days,” he said. “There is an inflammation there that looks threatening. Nothing serious, but I am sure you do not wish to be laid low unnecessarily.” She shook her head. “So you must drink lots of black tea and honey.”

  “Do they really say they like me?” she said after a moment.

  “Yes, of course.”

  “That surprises me,” she said. “I don’t expect to be much liked. To tell you the truth, I have always found such visits an awkward duty. You see statues and paintings of Charity personified and she is always so graceful. To me it feels graceless – a sort of bribery, perhaps? It changes so little. Oh dear, I am thinking such strange thoughts. Perhaps I am feverish.”

  At this point the door opened and the cat slipped into the room.

  “Ah, Byron has come to find you,” she said, as the cat walked about, making a careful survey of the situation. “You were not in your study.”

  “I’m not so sure he has been looking for me,” said Felix, as Byron leapt onto the bed, turned and turned about again, before gently descending into a warm recess in the quilted counterpane.

  “He is devoted to you,” said Lady Blanchfort, reaching out to stroke his head. “I’m only sought out when you are at work.”

  “I think he has come to nurse you. I have heard remarkable stories of cats, in that regard. I was at the workhouse infirmary and the matron there told me that where she had worked before – I cannot remember where – at any rate, there was a tabby cat, to keep down the mice, of course, but this tabby had a curious habit of going to lie on the bed of any of the old people who were near to death, as if to comfort them in their last hours. Oh, forgive me, that was a ill-judged story! I did not mean to –”

  “No, no, it is a lovely story,” she said, laughing. “And I like it very much. It is –” She choked down a little sob and turned her attention to Byron. “Oh goodness, how affecting! It is like those stories of the ox and the ass kneeling at the stable in Bethlehem.” At which she began to cry. “Please excuse me.”

  He had never seen her cry, and he felt somewhat at a loss as to how to comfort her.

  “I’m really not myself, am I?” she said, pressing her hands to her face for a moment. “It does not help that as well as this rheum, or whatever it may be, it is that treacherous time for a woman.”

>   “Oh that, yes, quite,” said Felix.

  “Have you observed this in your other patients?” she said. “I wonder if women speak of it to their physicians. I know that it can make invalids of some of us, month after month. It is no wonder it is called the curse! Forgive me,” she said, “I’m far too frank today. I seem unable to stop my tongue, but it has made me wonder so often. Oh dear Lord, I’m so hot –”

  He went to the washstand, soaked a towel and gently bathed her face and neck with it, washing away her tears.

  Suddenly the atmosphere felt dangerously intimate. He wanted to put his arms about her and let her give way to her grief, but her night-gown was already slipping from her shoulders and revealing too much. He could hand her a shawl but it was better for her fever that she did not cover herself. He pulled himself away and went to the door, feeling that any more nursing on his part would be thoroughly indecorous.

  “I will go and get your maid,” he said. “We must get you well again for Friday, and Eleanor’s great dinner.”

  “Yes, yes, of course,” she said, looking away and adjusting her nightgown.

  He went and gave the necessary orders and then went into his own bedroom. Eleanor was in the adjoining dressing room.

  “How is Mama, then?” she said. He went in and saw she was looking through the contents of her wardrobe.

  “Rather wretched,” he said.

  “It is not like her to be ill,” she said.

  “No, I don’t think so,” he said, sitting down and watching her as she held a bodice against her and looked at herself in the glass. “She was –” He was going to say that she had been crying, but he wondered if she would not want Eleanor to hear of it, so held his tongue. Her pride would not admit it, even to her daughter. “Feverish.”

  “She will be all right, though?” said Eleanor.

  “Oh, I think so. With rest and a little care.”

  “I have never known her to be ill,” Eleanor said. “It is strange.”

  Chapter Four

  “He’s in the back, Mr Carswell,” said the constable who was waiting for him at the door. Felix had been called to a house in Oil Mill Lane from the Infirmary. “This way, if you will, sir.”

  Felix followed the constable through an ill-lit passageway and down a couple of steps into a large but equally gloomy workshop. There were two large windows and a skylight, but the iron grey light of the morning and a thick layer of dirt on the panes was doing little to illuminate the scene.

  “Over there, sir,” said the constable. “By the foot of the ladder. I went in to see if he was dead and then came straight out. I remembered what you said in your lecture, you see, sir, about an unexplained death. And there’s a lot of blood on the floor.”

  “Good work, Constable,” said Felix, reaching into his pocket for his box of lucifers. “Let’s get some light in here.”

  He struck one, and finding a candle stub on one of the work benches, lit it, and proceeded cautiously towards the staircase. He could see at once that the blood pool was considerable, and in the centre of it, face down, lay a man’s corpse.

  “Oh, and I sent for Major Vernon,” said the constable, who was now setting about lighting what lamps and candles he could.

  “Excellent,” said Felix, crouching down and reaching to check the man’s pulse. Given the amount of blood that surrounded him, now revealed as a glistening lake, this was probably a formality; but sometimes humans survived the severest physical trials.

  “Who is he?”

  “His name is Roper.”

  “And how was he found?” Felix said.

  “His younger daughter, Miss Amy Roper, came in this morning and found him lying there. He sleeps out here – slept – she said he has a bed up there, and she usually brings him a cup of tea –”

  “Which she dropped,” Felix said, noticing a broken cup.

  “She’s in a bit of a state. She came out into the street screaming murder, apparently. I think she’s with her sister now, and a neighbour.”

  Felix knelt down in order to lift the dead man’s head. There was a deep contusion on his right temple which would have been the cause of the extensive bleeding. At the same time, he felt the blood soak through the knees of his trousers and he thought it was just as well he had ordered new ones. He gently laid the head down again and felt over the rest of his head for any further damage. It was possible that there was another contusion on the back of his head, although it was difficult to tell, and he was just reaching for his hand lens when he heard Major Vernon’s voice.

  “Good Morning, Constable Watkins. I see you have Mr Carswell hard at work already.”

  “Yes, sir. I wasn’t sure if I should call you yet, sir, if it was only an accident –”

  “You were right to call him,” said Felix. “There is something ambiguous here. This is the late Mr Roper, by the way – found by his daughter approximately an hour ago.”

  Major Vernon was not looking at the cadaver but at the room.

  “There looks to have been some sort of struggle in here,” Major Vernon said. “Unless this was the ordinary state he kept the place. Nothing seems quite straight, does it?”

  Now that the place was reasonably well lit, this was obvious. Indeed, it looked as if a violent gale had swept through the premises, upsetting everything that was not nailed down.

  “A struggle in which our dead man gets his head smashed open,” said Felix, now standing up and looking about him, “against a sharp corner.” The culprit lay directly in sight, the five-inch-thick corner of a work bench which lay in close proximity to where he had fallen. He went and examined it. “Signs of blood and skin on here, so that’s the root of it.”

  “And that would be enough to kill him?”

  “Yes. Probably.” Major Vernon frowned. “I think there might have been a blow to the back of his head as well,” Felix added, indicating the area where he had discerned the other contusion. “Here. But I cannot yet tell how recent it was.”

  “So,” said Major Vernon, picking his way through the blood pool, and going to stand at the dead man’s feet, “he fell forward onto the bench, perhaps propelled by a whack to his head –”

  “Which I am not certain is related to this at all. It may be an old wound. In which case, he may have simply stumbled or tripped and smashed his head against the bench. An accident.”

  “But given the state of his surroundings,” said Major Vernon, “and a possible second wound, we cannot leave it at that. I will go and see the coroner.”

  “You had better clean the blood off your boots first,” said Felix.

  “A good point,” said Major Vernon. “The kitchen is through there, I suppose?” He pointed to the door near to where the broken cup lay on the flags.

  “Yes, Major,” said Constable Watkins. “Miss Roper came from there with the cup of tea for her father.”

  “And who else is in the house?”

  “Just the two daughters,” said Constable Watkins. “And a neighbour is sitting with them. I saw them all go upstairs and I told them to stay there until they had my say-so.”

  “I will go and see them. Perhaps you had better come too, Mr Carswell, if you have nothing more to do here.”

  “I’ll just take his temperature,” said Felix. “He is still warm, and rigor has not set in. He did not die so long ago.”

  “Poor man,” said Major Vernon.

  “He would most likely have been unconscious from the outset,” said Felix. “But if anyone had come in earlier, something might have been done to save him.” He peered again at the wound to the man’s head, doubting himself. “Well, perhaps. The force with which he fell must have been quite considerable.”

  “And simply stumbling or tripping might not be sufficient to cause that level of damage?” said Major Vernon.

  “It would be unlucky, yes,” said Felix.

  The Major nodded and went into the kitchen, leaving Felix to finish his cursory examination. When he was done he went to the kitchen, w
ashed his hands and wiped down his own boots as best he could, before climbing up a narrow stair which opened onto a broad landing. This was a room in itself and seemed to serve as the family sitting room. It was plainly furnished, but there was a good fire going in the hob grate, and three women bundled in shawls were sitting about it, drinking – by the look of the bottle on the table – tea laced with brandy.

  “This is Mr Carswell, the surgeon, ladies,” said Major Vernon. “Mr Carswell, we have Miss Amy Roper, Miss Sarah Roper and Mrs Steele, their neighbour. I was just asking Miss Amy if she could recall the time she went into her father’s workshop.”

  “It was just after eight,” said Miss Amy. “That’s usually when I go in. He doesn’t like me to disturb him earlier, and he comes in for his breakfast at nine.”

  She was the youngest of the three women and she was still in her wrapper, as was her sister.

  “And when did you last see him?” Major Vernon said.

  “Last night,” said Miss Amy. “About seven. We had dinner and he went into the workshop as he always did.”

  “And you did not see him after that?” Miss Amy shook her head. Major Vernon turned to the eldest sister. “Miss Roper?”

  “No,” she said, after a long moment. She was sitting closest to the fire and was twisting the fringe of her shawl in her fingers. “He shut the door and didn’t even say goodnight. But then he never said goodnight. Never thought of us enough to even extend us such a common courtesy. No thanks either, for anything, though it was hard enough to put food on the table.” She had a curious, flat tone to her voice, edged with a noticeable slur.

  “Sarah, you mustn’t...” Miss Amy started.

  “Am I supposed to cry?” said Miss Roper. “I’m afraid I cannot!” with which she got up from her seat and pushing past Mrs Steele, headed across the room, staggering as she did so. Whether she was ill or intoxicated, Felix could not be sure, but he went to assist her, and she pushed him away.