‘Gone?’
‘Disappeared. They ran outside. Elizabeth was standing by the well, an angry expression on her face. They were afraid to approach her, but Sabine asked her what had happened. Elizabeth wouldn’t reply and, sir, she has not spoken since. Sabine said they looked down the well, but it’s deep. They couldn’t see to the bottom.’
‘Is the well in use?’
‘No, the groundwater down at Walbrook’s been foul with sewage for years. Edwin got a founder to make a pipe to carry water underground from the conduit to the house not long after he bought it. The year the king married Nan Bullen.’
‘That would have been expensive.’
‘Edwin is rich. But they should have capped off that well.’ He shook his head again. ‘They should have capped it.’
I had a sudden picture of a fall into darkness, a scream echoing off dank brick walls. I shivered despite the heat of the day.
‘What did the girls say happened next?’
‘Avice ran for the house steward, Needler. He got a rope and climbed down. Ralph was at the bottom with his neck broken, his poor little body still warm. Needler brought him out.’
‘Did the steward give evidence at the inquest?’
‘Oh, yes. David Needler was there.’ Joseph frowned. I looked at him sharply.
‘You don’t like him?’
‘He’s an impertinent fellow. Used to give me sneering looks when I visited from the country.’
‘So, according to their testimony, neither girl actually saw what happened?’
‘No, they only looked up when they heard the shout. Elizabeth often sat out in the garden alone. Her - well, her relations with the rest of the family were - difficult. She seemed to have taken a particular dislike to Ralph.’
‘I see.’ I looked him in the eye. ‘And what is Elizabeth like?’
He leaned back, laying the crumpled handkerchief in his lap. ‘She was like Ralph in some ways. They both had the dark hair and eyes of our side of the family. She was another that liked her own way. Her poor parents indulged her, being their only one. She could be malapert, coming forward with opinions in an unmaidenly way, and she preferred book-learning to ladies’ concerns. But she played the virginal well, and enjoyed embroidering. She’s young, sir, young. And she has a kind nature - she was always rescuing cats and dogs from the street.’
‘I see.’
‘But she changed after Peter died, I have to admit that. Not surprising, her mother gone, then her father and then their house sold. She withdrew into herself, sir, stopped being the eager, talkative girl I knew. I remember after Peter’s funeral, when I said it would be better for her future to go to Edwin rather than back to the country with me, she gave me such a look, such anger in it, then turned away without a word.’ I saw tears come to the corner of his eyes at the memory. He blinked them away.
‘And things did not go well when she moved to Sir Edwin’s?’
‘No. After her father died I visited them several times. I was concerned for Elizabeth. Each time Edwin and my mother said she was becoming more difficult, impossible.’
‘In what ways?’
‘Refusing to talk to the family, keeping to her room, missing meals. Not even taking proper care of her clothes. If anyone tried to chide her she’d either say nothing or else fly into a screaming rage, calling on them all to leave her alone.’
‘And she was on bad terms with all three of her cousins?’
‘I think Sabine and Avice were confused by her. They told the coroner they had tried to interest her in womanly things but Elizabeth just told them to go away. She is eighteen, a little older than them, but they should have been all girls together. And Edwin’s children moved in higher social circles, they could have taught Elizabeth much.’ He bit his lip again. ‘I had hoped for her advancement. And it has led to this.’
‘And why do you think she disliked Ralph so much?’
‘That I understood least of all. Edwin told me that lately, if Ralph came near Elizabeth, she would give him such looks of hate it was frightening to see. I saw it myself one evening in February. I was at dinner with the family, all of them were there. It was an uneasy meal, sir. We were eating beefsteak, my brother enjoys it very rare and I do not think Elizabeth liked it - she sat toying with her food. My mother chid her but she wouldn’t reply. Then Ralph asked her, quite politely, if she was enjoying her nice red meat. She went quite pale, put down her knife and gave him such a savage look I wondered—’
‘Yes.’
He whispered, ‘I wondered if she were ill in her mind.’
‘Elizabeth has no cause to hate the family that you know of?’