Page 60 of The Heir (A Young Queen Victoria Mystery #1)

I t was indeed a lengthy recovery. But every day Victoria found herself able to stay awake a little bit longer. Her headaches were absent more often than they were present, and sitting in the sunlight was no longer a torment.

Slowly, she was able to rise from the couch. At first, it took both Lehzen and Jane to support her as she tried to cross the room. Soon, however, it was just Jane, with Lehzen following behind and Dash scouting officiously ahead.

Of course, she was inspected. The Kensington board all came and stood about her couch and looked down at her, trying not to frown. Victoria felt a terrible urge to let her eyes roll up in her head and fall backward, just to see what all these solemn men would do.

She told Jane about that later. Jane said this was surely a sign of her returning health. Victoria found she tended to agree.

They saw very little of Sir John. He was constantly at Parliament or at St. James’s, delivering his reports and soothing tattered nerves.

Mama, of course, stationed herself at Victoria’s side and would not be shifted.

When she was not giving orders, she was complaining or despairing.

At last, it reached such a stage that Dr. Clarke suggested—very solicitously—that the duchess’s extremity of feeling could lead to a case of nervous exhaustion.

“I must insist, ma’am, that you lie down in your bed, quite still and in perfect solitude, for one hour every day. It is for your daughter’s sake,” he said solemnly. “You must remain strong for her. Lady Flora, will you please take her grace to her room?”

As he packed his bag and left, Victoria saw him wink.

The door was shut behind him and Mother.

“Quick, Lehzen,” Victoria croaked. Her throat still had not fully recovered. “Take me into the rose room. I want to talk to Jane.”

Jane looked to Lehzen, who nodded her agreement. There followed the endless fuss of moving Victoria to the new couch, of covering her properly, of touching her forehead and hands to make sure that the fever had not returned.

Victoria tried to bear it patiently, but she felt her patience straining. At last, Lehzen retired to her chair by the hearth, where she could simultaneously keep an eye on Victoria and Jane and the door.

“There’s word from the palace,” Victoria told Jane as she made room for Jane to sit next to her. “The board delivered a letter from Uncle King.”

“Are you being moved soon?”

It took Victoria a minute to be sure her voice would not shake. “It seems that due to my recent severe illness, it has been decided that establishing any independent household should be postponed at least until I am stronger.”

This was the real result of Sir John’s long days closeted with the board and the lords of Parliament. She knew it. So, clearly, did Jane.

Jane licked her lips. She looked out the window. “Will you tell them?” she asked. “What he did to you?”

“Who would believe me? No one else saw it.”

“But Lehzen—”

“Did not actually see it,” said Victoria. “She was kept out of the rooms most of the time.”

“Oh.”

“Yes. Oh,” she agreed heavily.

“I’m sorry,” said Jane.

Victoria reached up. She wiped her hand across the fogged window so she could see the autumn garden that much better. “Don’t be,” she said. “It won’t be forever.”

Jane bowed her head.

Victoria tapped her on the back of her hand. “None of that, Jane Conroy. You promised that when I was better, you would tell me about your conversation with Mr. Rea. Now I am better, so you can begin.” She folded her hands with exaggerated patience.

She expected Jane might smile, but she did not. She looked at the door, and she twisted her hands together.

“It seems Dr. Maton was not making enough money by blackmailing only one or two of his patients,” Jane said. “Mr. Rea said that his memoir was going to be filled with all the secrets he knew, or at least that’s what Dr. Maton was telling people.”

Victoria listened with growing horror as Jane described how Dr. Maton had concocted a scheme to extort money from his wealthy, and royal, patients by telling them he would keep their follies, their crimes and sins, and—most importantly—their names out of his memoir.

All they had to do was pay him the amount he asked.

“That’s why they wanted his papers burned,” Victoria breathed. “Whoever ‘they’ are.”

“That’s just it,” said Jane. “There could be dozens of people who wished those papers destroyed and Dr. Maton dead. How are we to even begin to find out? Anyone from Kensington to Gravesend might have killed him.”

“No,” said Victoria. “Not anyone.”

“Why not?”

“Because he was walking on the green. Because that was where he died. He was between your house and the palace.”

“That might just be coincidence.”

“But it might not.”

“But even then, there are so many possibilities,” insisted Jane. She started ticking off possibilities on her fingertips. “Princess Sophia, the Duke of Sussex, if he thought it might save Princess Sophia. And then there’s Father—”

“This is going to sound odd coming from me, but I don’t believe it was your father.”

Jane stared at her. Victoria felt herself smiling.

“I know. But when I was falling sick, I accused him of having poisoned Dr. Maton.” And of trying to poison me.

“What he said . . . He said he knew about the blackmail scheme. He said that one of Dr. Maton’s victims might have turned to poison, but it was not him. ”

“And you believe that?” asked Jane.

“Oddly enough, I do,” said Victoria. “But that does leave your brother as a possibility, I’m afraid.”

“And your mother,” said Jane.

Victoria bowed her head. Do I believe that? Victoria found she did not know, but it was fair that Jane should say it.

“There’s Dr. Maton’s own family, as well,” said Victoria. “His oldest son, at least.”

Jane frowned. “Why them?”

“To save themselves.” Victoria remembered Gerald Maton and all the anger in his demeanor when he spoke of his father. “Debts can be repaid, but what happens to the family if their father’s scheming destroys their reputations? And a doctor would know how to handle poison.”

Jane nodded. “Mr. Rea already said he would not trust any of the sons, because of their father.” She rubbed her eyes.

“But that’s not even a full list. It could be any of a hundred people in the palace.

For all we know, Lady Flora has some dreadful secret.

Or Lady Charlotte. Or someone whose name we don’t even know. ”

“It would have to be someone Dr. Maton would sit with,” said Victoria slowly.

“Someone with whom he might share a drink or something to eat.” She paused.

“Someone who he could reasonably expect to be able to call on in the middle of the day. Someone he trusted and yet had a secret he could make use of.”

She waited for Jane to argue, but she did not. Victoria closed her eyes.

Think , she ordered herself. He walked during the day. Otherwise the groundskeepers would not have seen him. He walked regularly. So, whoever he was visiting, he expected them to be there during the day....

If it’s not all a coincidence. If it wasn’t really his heart. If . . . if . . . if . . . Victoria ground her teeth together. Frustration rose in her, and she suddenly wanted to break something.

Break something. The words repeated themselves inside her. Break something.

Victoria’s eyes flew open.

“Jane,” she said. “Tell me again how Susan was dismissed.”

Confusion filled Jane’s eyes. “My mother said she broke the best tea set . . .” Her words trailed off. “You can’t suspect Susan!”

“Not Susan,” said Victoria.

Jane blanched. “Mother?”

“She had a secret she very much wanted to keep. She was home during midday, which was when Dr. Maton was out walking. She would be expected to serve tea to any guest. And as hostess, she would be the one to fix his cup.”

Jane sat stupefied. Slowly, her mouth began to move. She wiped her hand across it, as if seeking to wipe some stain away.

“What day was it?” Jane asked suddenly.

“I don’t understand.”

“The day, what day of the week was it when we found Dr. Maton?”

“It was Thursday afternoon,” said Lehzen. Lehzen, of course, had been listening. She had heard everything and had said nothing. Until now.

Jane’s face twisted up tight. Her mouth moved again, but it was a long moment before any sound emerged.

“The card luncheon,” Jane said.

“I don’t—”

“My mother attends a weekly card luncheon. The ladies there play very deep, and Mother wins a great deal. So, on Thursday afternoons she always has money, and she is alone in the house. Dr. Maton could walk over then and receive his payment.”

“And she would serve tea,” said Victoria.

“But . . . she had no secret,” stammered Jane. “I mean, the one she did have, it wasn’t real, and it seems that everybody knew that, anyway.”

Victoria shook her head. “No. Don’t you see? The real secret was that she was not my father’s natural daughter. She was not related to my family. That was what she needed to keep from your father.”

Because Sir John valued his status and his consequence. Sir John would not forgive anyone who took that away from him.

And he most certainly would not forgive anyone who had spent years successfully deceiving him.

“But we can’t know,” Jane whispered urgently. “We’ve said all this time we have to know . We have to have proof! What proof is there? No one saw! Liza was paying calls, and Susan said she wasn’t even there.”

“Someone saw,” said Victoria. “It is not possible your mother was truly alone. There was someone there—” She stopped. She blinked. She shifted herself so that she faced Jane fully.

“Jane,” she said. “Where’s Betty?”