Page 29

Chapter Sixteen

A Decision

Outside the theater, it was as chaotic as the inside had been. The audience spilled out onto the front steps, voices raised in a terrified din after what had just occurred. The sky was dark now, illuminated every so often by foreboding flashes of lightning in the distance.

A storm was coming. Though really, Beatrice thought, it was already here.

She pulled Mrs. Vane through the crowd, dodging ladies and gentlemen and errant candle boys, until they had come to the line of carriages along the street in front of the Sweet Majestic.

It was pandemonium as everyone tried to get into their carriage at once.

Drivers attempted to keep control over their horses as guests wove through the line, looking to locate their carriages for hasty departures.

Thankfully, Sir Huxley’s gleaming blue carriage stood out among the sea of vehicles, and Beatrice pulled Mrs. Vane straight toit.

Sir Huxley’s footman helped Mrs. Vane into the carriage.

“Please direct the driver to take us to the Vane estate,” Beatrice told him, “and then to my town house in the Carnation Quarter. I am seeing Mrs. Vane home to ensure she arrives safely.” And in the meantime, Beatrice thought, she would determine what the woman knew of the evening’s events.

“Where is my lord?” the footman asked, looking around.

“He is pursuing a murderer,” Beatrice said truthfully.

Evidently accustomed to this, the footman accepted the explanation and helped Beatrice into the carriage after Mrs. Vane. He closed the door, and they were finally enveloped in silence as the shrieks of the crowd were drowned out.

For a moment Beatrice did not speak, sitting quietly across from Mrs. Vane, who twisted her garnet ring around and around her finger. The poor woman had arrived for an evening at the theater with her husband and was now leaving alone. She deserved a moment to collect herself, Beatrice thought.

But to Beatrice’s surprise, it was Mrs. Vane who broke the silence first. “How could he do this to me?” she whispered, her voice small and far away. “How could he put me through such a thing? I never thought this would happen tonight….”

“We do not know that Percival Nash was the killer,” Beatrice told her.

Clearly Mrs. Vane felt betrayed by the actor she had supported, but they could not make assumptions.

Beatrice drew in a breath. It would be difficult to extract, but she needed the truth.

Before Sir Huxley arrested Percival Nash.

Before someone else was killed.

“Mrs. Vane,” Beatrice began, “when you left to fetch drinks, did you see anyone in the hallway outside the box? Anything you saw could be imperative to the case at hand.”

Diana pursed her lips. They were as pale as her face, her entire appearance ghostlike. “I was gone when everything occurred,” she murmured. “I suppose he did that on purpose, so I would not have time to know what was happening….”

“Likely, yes,” Beatrice said with a nod. “Whoever killed your husband was obviously only targeting him. They waited until you left before striking, so you would not be involved—but also so there would be no witness to implicate them.”

“I just don’t understand how he did it,” Diana said, her eyes becoming unfocused. Beatrice was losing her, she thought. “One moment Horace was beside me, and the next…” She did not seem to be speaking to Beatrice but to herself.

“If there is any detail you can remember about the attack—anything at all—it may help us find the killer,” Beatrice pressed.

At this, Diana’s eyes refocused. They sharpened upon Beatrice. “?‘Us’?” she repeated, raising an eyebrow.

Beatrice flushed. “I merely meant…we could help Sir Huxley, in his investigation….”

“I know that you and Inspector Drake have been poking around,” Mrs. Vane said, her voice weirdly dreamlike, though she was living a nightmare.

Now it was Beatrice’s turn to sit silently in shock. Mrs. Vane knew ?

“After I admitted you onto the list, I did some reconnaissance of my own,” Mrs. Vane continued. “I have been running the Rose for many years, Miss Steele. I would not let a stranger in our doors. There is little which goes on there that I am not privy to.”

“If you knew that Drake and I were investigators, why did you permit us to participate in the Season?” Beatrice asked, utterly confused by such a confession. “Sir Huxley had already been hired, after all.”

“I reasoned that he could do with a bit of competition,” Mrs. Vane said, her large eyes fixed upon Beatrice.

Yes, Beatrice thought, Mrs. Vane relished a challenge, lighting up any time one was before her. It seemed to excite her.

“And perhaps you have created such competition for both Sir Huxley and Inspector Drake, in more ways than one,” Mrs. Vane continued.

“I don’t know what you mean,” Beatrice said, feeling flushed.

“I think you do,” Mrs. Vane said, raising her eyebrows.

“You have misread the situation, madam,” Beatrice said, now filled with embarrassment and indignation.

Why were they talking about this, after what had just occurred? They were meant to be discussing murder, not personal matters, especially those that Mrs. Vane clearly misunderstood.

“As I told you, Miss Steele, there is little which goes on at the Rose that I am not privy to,” Mrs. Vane went on.

“Sir Huxley requested to join the season late after meeting an intriguing woman, new to London. Though his presence ruined the balance of gentlemen to ladies, I allowed it…for your sake.” Though Mrs. Vane held a handkerchief in her hand, her eyes were dry.

She seemed perfectly collected. The color was already returning to her cheeks.

It was eerie.

“It is best for men to know you have other options. This ensures their loyalty. Their dedication,” Mrs. Vane wenton.

“Is that why you were courting a poet before you accepted Mr. Vane’s marriage proposal?” Beatrice asked the question before she could stop herself. She immediately clapped a hand over her mouth. “I beg your pardon,” she said in a rush. “It was an inappropriate question, at such a time—”

“You do have a knack for speaking your mind. A dangerous quality, here in Sweetbriar,” Mrs. Vane said.

But the corners of her mouth had curled upward in a hint of a smile.

“Yes, I had other options before Horace. I did not think anyone still remembered Oliver. Of course, I never forgot him….” She looked almost—wistful, Beatrice thought.

“How did Mr. Vane win you away from Mr. Oliver…?”

“Beauchamp. Oliver Beauchamp,” Diana replied. She turned to the carriage window, pushing the curtain aside. “Why aren’t we moving?”

“Carriage jam,” Beatrice told her. “Everyone is trying to flee at once. We will simply have to wait.”

Silence stretched between them. Beatrice deliberately resisted the urge to fill it with questions. She had found that, when faced with such awkwardness, people would often volunteer more than they wanted to in order to end the quiet.

And there was something Diana was hiding. She felt certain.

“Horace was the appropriate match,” Diana said finally. “He was inevitable.”

“Inevitable,” Beatrice repeated.

“Do what is expected of you, Miss Steele,” Diana told her, “and you shall end up just like me.”

Beatrice wondered if this was meant to be encouraging advice—or a warning. “Where is Oliver now?” she prompted.

“Ran off to the colonies,” Diana said wistfully. “Some people don’t belong here in London, Miss Steele.”

At that moment the carriage moved forward, and Diana withdrew a cigar from her bodice. She stuck it between her teeth, unlit, then leaned back and let her eyelids close.

Was Diana Vane simply defeated? One never knew how a person might respond to grief, but Beatrice did know that she could not press Mrs. Vane further.

It would be disrespectful, considering everything that the woman had been through—but most important, Beatrice could tell that the patroness of the Rose would not give her any more information. Not tonight.

She looked out the window as they ambled down the cobblestones, in line with the other carriages fleeing the Sweet Majestic, deep in thought.

What if Diana’s former flame, this Oliver Beauchamp, was responsible for the murders?

He was a poet, the newspaper had said, meaning that he was a creative in his own right.

Was there any chance that he had returned from the colonies and decided to enact justice on behalf of local artists?

Perhaps he even meant to reclaim Diana, his lost love… .

It seemed like the plot of a tragic opera, she thought as they picked up speed, emerging into the wealthy Rose Quarter, where the Vanes’ estate was located. Perhaps the person best suited to making sense of it all was the man who had been entangled in everything from the start.

After all, as an actor, Percival Nash understood drama.

The carriage pulled to a stop in front of an imposing manor, and the footman opened the door. He held out a hand to escort Mrs. Vane out of the carriage. She took it but then turned back to Beatrice.

“It wasn’t Percival,” she said, her voice hushed. Determined. How had Diana known what she had been thinking?

“You mean, he is not responsible for the murders?” she clarified.

“I don’t know how…or who…I just know that Percival is not the killer,” Diana told her. “You cannot let Sir Huxley arrest an innocent man.”

“It may be too late for that already,” Beatrice told her.

“It can’t be too late. You must make sure of it,” Diana said fiercely. “If the artists are silenced, I shudder to think what might happen to the rest of us.”

“I promise that I will do everything I can to clear Percival’s name,” Beatrice said.

“Good,” Diana said, nodding. “Good…” With that, she drifted away into the night, disappearing into her palatial home.

Beatrice watched her go, ensuring that the woman got safely inside, and then turned to the footman.

“Could you please inform the driver that I do not wish to return to my town house yet?” she asked.

“Of course, miss,” the footman said with a bow of his head. “What destination shall I give?”

What destination, indeed, Beatrice thought.

Percival Nash had fled. But to where? She did not think he would stay at the Sweet Majestic, for this would be the first place anyone would look.

Really, anywhere close seemed risky, considering that Sir Huxley—and, thus, all of Sweetbriar—would be looking for the actor.

His fame would work against him, in this case.

Perhaps at the edge of town, he might find refuge at some place where no genteel person would think to go. Where the buildings were crumbling, the gin was cheap, and desperate people sold antiques for quick cash…

What had Caroline Wynn said about Mr. O’Dowde?

His parties—of course you could never secure an invitation to one. He only associates with true artistes ….

A trapdoor that could have been hiding some secret chamber, an antique shop owner who adored performers, and a whisper about exclusive parties…It was a hunch, yes, but while the Drake was away, the Beatrice would follow her hunches.

“There is a pawnshop at the outskirts of town,” Beatrice told the footman. “Dudley O’Dowde’s. Could you take me there?”

“We shall have to take the long way, as Bibble Bridge is down, miss,” the footman informed her.

“Yes, I am aware. Not a problem. Thank you ever so much,” she told him. He nodded and closed the carriage door once more.

It was a long shot, Beatrice knew—but one she might as well take. What did she have to lose?

As the carriage took off once more, neither Beatrice, the footman, nor the driver noticed another carriage, following them.

Another curious soul, hidden in the shadows.