‘How was Arabella?’ she asked when we were driving back to St James’s Square, leaving Adrien behind.
‘Strange,’ I said. ‘Do you mind if I tell you and Luc together? I need to think about my impressions a little more.’
* * *
We found that Luc had come home and that Garrick and Carola, his wife, had returned from Greenwich. Luc had told them the news and we all gathered in the drawing room. Carola had her feet up on a stool because Garrick was fussing, but otherwise it was barely possible to tell that she was pregnant. There were months to go yet, as she kept telling her husband.
‘How was Miss Jordan?’ Luc asked.
‘I found her very confusing,’ I admitted. ‘When told only that Lord Tillingham was dead, she immediately asked who had killed him. When we confirmed that he had, in fact, been murdered she again asked who did it. It was only then that she collapsed and began weeping. I wasn’t –’ I broke off, reluctant to be bitchy about a young woman I didn’t know.
‘Go on,’ Garrick urged.
‘I wondered whether the tears were entirely genuine. I couldn’t see her face and she cast herself into Adrien’s arms.’
‘Shock takes many forms,’ Carola said. She was a herbalist and had far more experience with disease and distress than I had.
‘Yes,’ I agreed. ‘I thought that too. But she didn’t ask how he died, or whether he lingered or suffered. Or when it happened, who found him – not any of the things you would expect.’
‘I suppose that she knew him well, if they were betrothed,’ Carola said. ‘He may have mentioned enemies –’
‘Or she may have thought him the kind of man likely to be murdered,’ James said. He had been sitting quietly to one side with Kit Lyle, who was looking a touch taken aback by three women discussing murder.
‘He was almost twice her age and Adrien said it was not a love match. Just
how well did she know him, do you think?’ I retorted.
Something about Arabella’s responses was troubling me. It was not what she had said, exactly… I couldn’t put my finger on it. ‘What we need are the boards to begin to get all the evidence and speculation organised.’
‘I must go and see the boys,’ Luc said, getting up. ‘I’ll be down in an hour.’
‘I have the boards we used last time. I’ll get them if you can give me a hand, James,’ Garrick said, standing up, and the three of them went out.
‘It is the way we deal with all the elements of an investigation,’ I explained to Kit. ‘If you can help me move the ornaments off that console table, we can prop them up there.’ Then I remembered that we weren’t in Luc’s old rooms in Albany and looked across to Lady Radcliffe. ‘If that is all right? We can move them into the study before dinner, but there is more room in here.’
‘Yes, of course. I am not certain there is a great deal I can contribute at the moment, so I will go and speak to the staff and discover what they know about Lord Tillingham’s household.’
She went out leaving Kit, who was still regarding me in a somewhat bemused manner. I went and moved a pair of silver candelabra and he pulled himself together and came to shift the marble statue of a lion from the middle of the narrow table set against the wall.
‘James said you come from America,’ he remarked, making it half a question.
‘Yes, Boston, although I have been over here for some time. The evidence boards are an idea I read about over there.’
‘And he said that you and Lord Radcliffe have solved several murders.’
‘One kidnapping, three murders, yes. With assistance from Garrick and James, of course.’
‘You do not find it distressing?’
‘Of course I do. But it is even more distressing to leave a murderer at large. Besides, I enjoy working with Luc.’
I could see that he knew we were lovers but was struggling with how not to show he knew. I expected that James had also told him that I was aware that the two of them were together. My lack of reaction to that would have gone against everything he expected from a lady.
‘I will go and find some paper from the study,’ I said, leaving him to come to terms with things.
As well as paper, some tacks and writing implements, I brought the Peerage and plonked it down with a thump on the table. ‘I need to sort out the Prescott clan,’ I told him. ‘There seem to be a great number of adult males involved and several who would have a motive.’
‘I’ll do that,’ Carola offered as Garrick came in with his arms full of boards.