The Elsingham Portrait

Fourteen


Mr. Randall Towne was kicking his elegantly-shod heels in Lord Elsingham’s library one evening when the door opened to admit the owner and Lord Peter Masterson.

“What ho!” said Randy, searching their faces. “News?”

“None,” said Lord John. “You?”

“No sign of her at any of the Channel ports; no rumor in Paris. And you know, old fellow, that if she were there—”

“Yes,” agreed John morosely. “The salons and boutiques would be buzzing.”

“No luck at all in Ireland?”

“ ‘Devil a bit,’ ” quoted Peter grimly. “I’ll swear she never got as far as Liverpool.”

“The dresser?”

“We heard that Donner had been back to Brionny, but she wasn’t there when we arrived,” John said heavily.

Randy was too shocked by the expression on his friend’s face to continue the discussion. He did have one slender clue, but before he shared it with this troubled man, he wanted to discuss the situation with Peter. Sound man, Peter. For all his great size he had plenty in his bone-box. Randy fidgeted nervously until Lord John sighed wearily. “We’re all too tired to think straight. I’m going to bed. I’ll see you both tomorrow. And about the help you’ve given me—you know how I feel—”

“Don’t say it!” begged Randy, who had a horror of being thanked especially when he was concealing a clue which might wipe the desolate look off his friend’s face.

As Peter and Randy went down the steps to Randy’s waiting carriage, Peter said abruptly, “He hasn’t slept a wink since we left London. Nor has he eaten enough to keep a bird alive. This is bad business, Randy.”

“It’s worse than that,” said Randy gloomily.

“Why do you say that? And what in Heaven’s name possessed you just now? You were as nervous as a nun in a crib.”

“Don’t be vulgar,” said Randy. “The thing is, I think I know where she is.”

“You think you know—!” began Peter incredulously. Then with a roar that startled an approaching pedestrian, “And you didn’t believe it important enough to mention? Why, you miserable little cockerel—”

“Oh, be quiet,” said Randy. “And use the brain you’re supposed to have. If I’m right, and we find the lady, then what?”

Lord Peter gaped at him, then slowly closed his mouth. “Yes. I begin to see the dilemma. Has she run off with another man?” He enunciated a vicious oath. They had not been easy nor pleasant, these days spent with his friend in the fruitless search. “How the devil can we protect him from this bitch? Who is the man, by the way? Do I know him?”

Randy colored. “I don’t know that there’s a man involved, exactly . . . well, at least . . . there’s got to be, wouldn’t you say? I told you I got back from Paris yesterday. I came at once to John’s house to discover if you two had returned from Dublin. Old Burl wasn’t much help, so I waited for an hour or so, on the chance of news. While I was strolling around, I noticed that damned great portrait of Nadine was gone from the landing. I asked Burl what had happened to the portrait, and he said his lordship had sent it to the Manor. Well, I caught a flash of an expression on the face of one of the footmen, so when old Burl had gone back to his pantry, leaving me to await a non-existent message from you two,” he interjected sternly, “I bribed the footman to tell me why he’d got that silly conspiratorial look when Burl was talking to me. He said his lordship had sent the picture to the attic the night before you left for Ireland, and then, not ten minutes after you left, Bennet had told Burl his lordship wanted it sent to the Manor. The footman said he’d been in the hall all the time, and no such order had been given.”

Peter was staring at his friend with annoyance and pity fairly evenly mixed. “Have you any idea what you are trying to say, or are these the ramblings of a mind overset by too much fine French brandy?”

“The portrait, idiot! Don’t you remember John telling us he caught his wife and Bennet playing some jiggery-pokery in front of the portrait? That’s why he had it sent to the attic.”

“So?”

“So he surely wouldn’t change his mind and have it sent to the Manor between the time we left him and the time he picked you up.”

“Why not?” argued Peter.

“Because, for one thing, he hadn’t time, and for another, he’d be more likely to want to forget the damnable, seductive thing than to parade it through every one of his houses! I should think that would be clear to the meanest intellect!” shouted Randy, exasperated.

“Not so much righteous indignation, young Jaw-me-dead,” advised Lord Peter calmly. “You’re attracting the attention of the hoi polloi.”

Randall’s coachman was indeed staring down at them with interest, and a passing nursemaid was casting amused glances at the elegant young bucks quarreling on the street. Lord Peter boosted Randall into the carriage and got in after him.

“You are right, little man,” he admitted. “This does call for some thought. One of the less attractive things we learned about Donner in Brionny Village is that she is believed, by everyone who knows her, to be a practicing witch. They cross themselves when her name is mentioned.”

“Superstitious lot, Irish peasants,” offered Randall, not much struck by this.

But Peter persisted. “Not all of them were peasants, my lad. The parish priest told me she’d have been burned at the stake fifty years ago. ‘And I’d light the faggots,’ he told me. ‘She’s a creature of pure evil. We all breathed easier when she left. She is a child of the Devil’ ”

“D’you think she’s got her claws into Nadine?”

Peter shrugged. “I think it likely she’s after her. I’m just not sure it might not be a good idea to let her succeed in her quest.”

Randall considered that soberly enough. Finally, “I cannot agree, old man,” he said. “She’s been the evil genius behind all that’s happened, if you can believe what you hear. It stands to reason she’ll cook up more of the same, or worse, if she gets hold of Nadine again. And the girl is Lady Elsingham.”

Lord Peter was frowning. “What I can’t understand is dear old Bennet mixed up in this hell-brew. She was such a tower of strength and rectitude in our youth.”

“Maybe Nadine or Donner has bewitched her, too,” offered Randy. “Had we better tell John what we fear before something else happens?”

“If he doesn’t get some rest soon, I won’t answer for his health,” Lord Peter said. “We’ll wait and tell him first thing in the morning.”

As the two friends entered Elsingham House the following morning, they encountered another visitor in the hall. Burl led them into the library, under the jealous gaze of the stranger.

“It’s Mr. Manton, of Mr. Edmund Burke’s staff. Most anxious to see his lordship. Says his mission is one of the most utmost urgency,” whispered Burl. In common with all Lord John’s staff, Burl knew that matters were not well for his lordship. Burl was happy to place responsibility in the hands of his master’s best friends.

“Is Lord John awake?” asked Randall.

“He is just coming down, Mr. Towne—or so Paget informs me.”

“Then let’s get out into the hall,” decided Lord Peter, suiting action to word. As they came into the hall, Mr. Manton arose and fixed a reproachful gaze upon them. ‘I was first in the field,’ his expression said.

And then Lord John came down the stairs. He caught sight of his friends, and moved toward them, smiling. Mr. Manton fairly erupted into the group. Ignoring everyone but Lord John, he cried out, “Milord! I must see her ladyship at once! It is a matter of great urgency—involving national security!”

Lord John looked down into the angry, worried face. “My wife is not here at present, Mr. Manton. May I help you?”

“She must be brought here at once!” shrilled Manton.

“You forget yourself, Manton,” said Lord John sternly.

The little man pulled himself together with an effort. “My apologies, milord. The matter is—of the most utmost urgency. When I had the privilege of meeting her ladyship several weeks ago, she informed me—in your presence, sir!—of an encounter at Lexington. April 19, she said, milord!”

“I believe I recall something of the sort,” Lord John answered, suddenly very interested indeed.

“It has happened! His Majesty’s ministers have just received word of an action taken by the defiant citizens of Massachusetts, in which a detachment of General Gage’s soldiers suffered heavy losses. I need not give details—” the little man glanced warily at the other men in the hallway, “but you can see that I must see her ladyship at once . . . and . . . you can understand why, can you not, milord?” He ended almost in a wail.

“By God!” said John Elsingham, “she was right!” and a smile spread over his face. He grinned at the astonishment on the faces of Lord Peter and Randall, then turned courteously to Wilmot Manton.

“I truly regret that I cannot give you a conference with her ladyship, but she has been ill and is in the country, recuperating. You recall she had just broken her arm when you saw her—”

“Yes, yes, but that must not be allowed to stand in the way. As a loyal Englishwoman, it must be her first responsibility to serve her country—”

Still smiling, Lord John interrupted him. “My wife is not an Englishwoman, and her responsibility—that is, she might feel—” He laughed, joyously.

Lord Peter moved in smoothly to soothe and divert the affronted Mr. Manton. Lady Nadine is Irish, Manton, but what is more important, she’s very ill. His lordship will agree to notify you when his lady is able to confer with you. And now I’m sure you will excuse us?” and he turned Manton over to the hovering butler.

When the little man had taken a reluctant departure, Peter herded John and Randy into the library and closed the door.

There was an expression on Lord John’s face which his friends had never seen before. “She was telling the truth,” he said softly.

Randy opened his mouth to object, but Lord Peter ruthlessly forestalled him.

“This little cockerel has used his head for once in his life. Randy, tell him about the portrait.”

Randy repeated his discussion with the footman, who was promptly called into the library and interrogated. They got no more from him than Randy had already learned, but John, riding a wave of euphoria, decided it was enough. He sent the footman for Paget, and ordered that worthy to have the big traveling carriage around within twenty minutes.

“I suppose,” he regarded his two friends with twinkling eyes, “you two will want to accompany me to Elsinghurst and offer your apologies to Kathryn,” he said.

“I shall insist upon coming,” retorted Lord Peter, “if only to prevent you from making a fool of yourself. What is this about Lexington?”

“That’s right, you weren’t present when—when Kathryn announced that the first skirmish in the War of Independence would occur at Lexington on April 19. Since the day of her announcement was April 18, Mr. Manton, perhaps understandably, felt he was being hoaxed. It takes military intelligence from three to four weeks to reach us from the Colonies,” he explained kindly.

Lord Peter was not amused. “You were fortunate he decided it was a hoax. A more imaginative man might have suspected—witchcraft.”

“I will admit to a certain sense of urgency, in Manton’s felicitous phrase,” confessed Lord John. “My poor Kathryn down among the peasants. I hope she will have sense enough to keep her mouth shut.”

Randall regarded his friend with anxious eyes. “Johnny, my good child, if your wife tells the villagers about coming back from the future, she’s apt to be burned as a witch.”

Lord Peter glared at him, but he insisted, “You know what English peasants are like, Peter. They’re still living in the Middle Ages. Don’t even know Queen Anne’s dead! And the Scots burned a woman as a witch less than fifty years ago, on far less evidence than this. M’father told me about it.”

“That’s the dandy! Just keep reassuring us,” gritted Peter, watching the smile fade from Lord John’s face. “Johnny’s beside himself already with worry—”

“No,” Lord John said quietly, and stood up. “I’m clear in my mind at last. I believe her story. She’s Kathryn Hendrix. I don’t know how it happened, but I’m convinced Kathryn is telling the truth.”

His two friends watched him in a troubled silence as he paced the room, deep in thought. Finally, “What are we going to do about it, when we get down there?” Randy ventured.

“We’re going to tell Bennet to produce Kathryn,” said John with a return of the joyous smile. “I’ve a suspicion that more went to Elsinghurst than the portrait of milady.”