Page 32 of Deadly Murder (Angus Brodie and Mikaela Forsythe Murder Mystery #14)

Twenty

Lily had stayed over again. And the office was somewhat nearer for our trip to St. Pancras Old Church to see what might be learned about the vicar, Mr. Chastain.

I made a telephone call to the parish church first thing in the morning and spoke with a clerk. As it was early and the middle of the week, there were no church services scheduled for the day.

She was to go me. We were given a time of one o’clock to meet with the vicar. Brodie was also to accompany us. He insisted after I had spoken of the two encounters—one across from the office and the other at King’s Cross station, before we left for Cambridge.

We ate at the Public House, then returned to the office on The Strand. Mr. Cavendish had just returned from the lift and met us at the entrance to the office.

“I took a message up to the landing. Appears to be from that man at the Agency. The bloody machine stopped twice between the ground floor and the second.”

The bloody machine being the lift. There have been some difficulties with it since it was installed.

As for the message that had been received, it appeared that it was from Sir Avery Stanton.

“Best take the stairs, miss,” he cautioned. “Or you might find yourselves trapped in the thing. I’ll send word round for people to repair it.”

Brodie followed on the stairs, his preferred means of traversing from street to the office. There was a frown on his face as he retrieved the envelope Mr. Cavendish had left.

Lily and I entered ahead. I set my umbrella in the stand, then removed my long coat and hung it on the coat rack.

Brodie’s frown deepened as he read the note, followed by a curse. He was not pleased.

“An official summons from His Highness for a meeting with the Home Secretary, and Sir Avery is to be included.” He thrust the note at me.

It was for this morning, and not something that could be declined, unless one found oneself run over by an omnibus or bound and thrown into the river.

Brodie looked over at me.

“Ye should wait until I return to go to St. Pancras, then I can go with ye.”

“It is the middle of the day. There will be others about. I doubt we will be in any danger in a church,” I replied. “And I do have the revolver.”

I was most anxious to learn what we might find there, particularly with the risk to the son of the fourth member of that exclusive club, the Duke of York.

“It would be far simpler, Mikaela Forsythe, if ye were a docile creature who did the laundry and cooking, and then waited for her husband to come home each day.”

Lily smothered a laugh.

“First of all, Mr. Brodie, the few times I have attempted laundry—one of them in a somewhat urgent situation that involved your shirt—you will admit that it was a disaster,” I replied. “The shirt had ended in the rag bin, a glorious shade of pink.”

“Aye.”

“Second, my attempts at cooking have not fared better. I have more pressing things to do than measuring this or that, then hovering over a hot stove all day.”

Although not for lack of trying, with a roast chicken that was somewhat the worst for it afterward and provided Rupert with a tasty meal. But then, he’d been known to eat any foul thing found on the street.

“I am aware of yer lack of abilities in that area,” he commented. “It is a wonder either of us have survived yer attempts.”

“And third,” I had saved this for last. “I have never been considered docile, nor am I one to simply wait at home for the master of the house to return. In conclusion, Mr. Brodie, you knew very well I did not possess, nor was likely to ever possess, any of those qualities when you proposed to me.”

“It must have been momentary insanity.” He pulled me against him.

I fought to control the laugher. “Momentary insanity?”

“Or a wee bit longer. I’m not certain there’s a cure.” He kissed me quite thoroughly.

Lily smothered a laugh behind her hand.

Brodie finally set me from him.

“And I presume there’s no talking ye out of going to St. Pancras,” he presumed correctly.

“Not at all,” I finally managed to say. “We will be there and back in short order. Perhaps even before your return from meeting with the Home Secretary.”

He read the note again.

“You might want to dress more formally for your meeting with the Home Secretary,” I suggested.

We had both met Henry Matthews, the present Home Secretary, in a previous inquiry.

He was quite formal in his manner, yet not the sort to look down on those who were not of the peerage, and had highly valued our participation in a particular case at the time. He had left the position of Home Secretary the year before, then was called back to his present term by Mr. Gladstone.

“Aye,” Brodie replied as he retreated to the adjacent room.

When he eventually emerged, he had been transformed into the very striking image of a gentleman, albeit with tie in hand.

“I can never tie the bloody thing,” he grumbled, and would have tossed it aside.

I retrieved it. I felt that dark gaze on me as I very efficiently tied it for him. When I had completed the task and would have stepped back, his hand covered mine and he stopped me.

“Be careful.”

“Of course. After all, who else would tie your tie when you are summoned to the Home Office?” I replied.

“Perhaps a woman on the street corner,” he suggested.

“Who would tolerate that Scots temper?”

The answer was in the half smile at one corner of his mouth. “Aye.”

“You would do well to remember that, sir.”

He held onto my hand a moment longer.

“Whatever ye learn, ye’re to return here and not set off on yer own.”

“Of course, dear.”

“We should leave no later than eleven o’clock because of the weather,” I told Lily after he had gone.

“It’s only a few miles, but that will give us plenty of time with traffic and depending on the road condition.”

She grinned at me. “Of course.”

St. Pancras Old Church was not far as the crow flies, according to that old saying. Less than three miles.

However, the way was often crowded with traffic, routes that changed due to the extension of the rail line, and then there was the weather.

Mr. Cavendish was able to secure the service of Mr. Jarvis once more. He was knowledgeable of most areas of London, and I was confident he would see us safely there.

Lily and I climbed aboard. Rupert the hound immediately followed and grinned up at us as he sat on the floor of the coach between us.

“Mr. Brodie might have mentioned that the hound should accompany you,” Mr. Cavendish commented as he closed the door of the coach.

And pigs fly, I thought.

“It must be comforting to have someone who cares so about you,” Lily commented as we set off.

I smiled to myself. It was.

We encountered no delays and arrived well in time for our meeting with the vicar. I asked Mr. Jarvis to wait.

True to his nature, the hound was excited to explore the churchyard that surrounded St. Pancras Church.

We were met by the clerk of the church as we stepped inside and were informed that the vicar had been called to a meeting at Westminster. However, the clerk, a slender young man by the name of James with a kind smile, had been authorized to assist us in whatever we needed.

“If you will follow me, the church records are in the library.”

The original church of St. Pancras was several hundred years old, with the new section added early in the 19 th century that included a sanctuary, chancel, and nave.

We passed the sanctuary where a sign noted that service would be held on the following Friday and then on Sunday as usual. Otherwise, it was quite empty.

The library was in what remained of the Old Church with hand-carved stone walls, the faint echo of our footsteps on the stone floor, and the familiar smell of books, hundreds of them.

“I’m told that it was far easier to keep this as the library, rather than rebuild it and then move all the books. Some of these are hundreds of years old from when the old church was founded,” the clerk explained.

“The records you are looking for should be here as all records of the church have been meticulously preserved.”

Following our trip to Cambridge, and St. Andrew and St. Mary’s church in Grantchester, Lily and I were quite familiar with church records.

“I took the liberty of pulling the records that cover the years the new church was built until present. They’re on this table. The vicar, Mr. Powell, indicated these should provide the information you’re looking for.”

“I will leave you to your search, as I have work in the office,” he explained. “I will return later if you have any questions.”

The records had been laid out on a reading table with an electric lamp. We both removed our coats before sitting at the table. I took my notebook from my bag and smiled as Lily did the same. We each spread a large leather-bound book filled with entries.

The beginning date of the one before me was 1762. The entries included a record of births, marriages, deaths, and the dates a new vicar arrived with an occasional entry noting the departure date of a prior vicar, Henry Winston.

He had arrived in May 1784, for a period of almost ten years! He departed for a new parish in June 1793, with the new vicar arriving a month prior, according to what had been written there.

There were other entries for clerks and the occasion of a visit by the bishop of the archdiocese as well as visits by notable persons, including a visit by the Duke of Kent, Queen Victoria’s father, April 1816. Most were written in Latin.

I quickly scanned each page as the years passed, the archive ending in January of 1860.

“It must be in the one you have,” I told Lily as I closed the book I’d searched. “An entry could have been made any time in 1861 or perhaps 1862, depending on the church record-keeping.”

It was tedious, although I was grateful for my ability to translate Latin, while Lily was unusually quiet.

“I can’t read most of this,” she finally said. “The year for each one is written in Latin as well.”

I glanced over her shoulder.