‘I’m guessing the syringe I found in the sack is filled with some combination of muscle relaxant and sedative to help you play dead, making it easy for Doctor Dickie – who I assume is being paid handsomely for his trouble – to make it official on the death certificate, forgoing the need for an unpleasant inquest. One would imagine that a week or so after your death, you’ll be back in France enjoying a nice glass of white wine.’
A couple of maids are carrying slopping buckets of dirty water towards the doors, their gossip coming to an abrupt halt as they notice us. They pass by with uncertain dips, Evelyn steering me further into the corner.
For the first time, I see fear on her face.
‘I admit I didn’t want to marry Ravencourt and I knew I couldn’t keep my family from forcing me into it unless I disappeared, but why would anybody want to kill me?’ she asks, the cigarette still trembling in her hand.
I study her face for a lie, but I might as well be turning a microscope on a patch of fog. This woman has been lying to everybody for days. I wouldn’t recognise the truth even if it did manage to escape her lips.
‘I have certain suspicions but I need proof,’ I say. ‘That’s why I need you to go through with your plan.’
‘Go through with it, are you mad?’ she exclaims, lowering her voice as all eyes turn towards us. ‘Why would I go through with it after what you’ve just told me?’
‘Because you won’t be safe until we draw the conspirators out and for that they need to believe their plan has succeeded.’
‘I’ll be safe when I’m a hundred miles from here.’
‘And how will you get there?’ I ask. ‘What happens if the carriage driver is part of the plot, or a servant? Whispers carry in this house and when the murderers get word you’re trying to leave, they’ll push forward with their plan and kill you. Believe me, running will only delay the inevitable. I can put a stop to it here and now, but only if you go along with it all. Point a gun at your stomach and play dead for half an hour. Who knows, you may even get to stay dead and escape Ravencourt as you planned.’
She has her hand pressed to her forehead, eyes squeezed shut in concentration. When she speaks again, it’s in a quieter voice, somehow emptier.
‘I’m caught between the devil and the deep-blue sea, aren’t I?’ she says. ‘Very well, I’ll go through with it, but there’s something I need to know first. Why are you helping me, Mr Rashton?’
‘I’m a policeman.’
‘Yes, but you’re not a saint and only a saint would put themselves in the middle of all this.’
‘Then consider it a favour to Sebastian Bell,’ I say.
Surprise softens her expression. ‘Bell? What on earth has the dear doctor got to do with this?’
‘I don’t know yet, but he was attacked last night and I doubt it’s a coincidence.’
‘Perhaps, but why is that your concern?’
‘He wants to be a better person,’ I say. ‘That’s a rare thing in this house. I admire it.’
‘As do I,’ she says, pausing to weigh up the man in front of her. ‘Very well, tell me your plan, but first I want your word that I’ll be safe. I’m putting my life in your hands, and that’s not something I submit to without guarantee.’
‘How do you know my word is worth anything?’
‘I’ve been around dishonourable men my entire life,’ she says simply. ‘You’re not one of them. Now, give me your word.’
‘You have it.’
‘And a drink,’ she continues. ‘I’m going to need a little courage to see this through.’
‘More than a little,’ I say. ‘I want you to befriend Jonathan Derby. He has a silver pistol we’ll be needing.’
51
Dinner’s being served, the guests taking their seats at the table, as I crouch in the bushes near the reflecting pool. It’s early, but my plan depends on being the first person to reach Evelyn when she emerges from the house. I can’t risk the past tripping me up.
Rain drips from the leaves, icy cold on my skin.
The wind stirs, my legs cramping.
Shifting my weight, I realise I haven’t eaten or taken a drink all day, which isn’t ideal preparation for the evening ahead. I’m light-headed and without anything to distract me I can feel every one of my hosts pressed up against the inside of my skull. Their memories crowd the edges of my mind, the weight of them almost too much to bear. I want everything they want. I feel their aches and am made timid by their fears. I’m no longer a man, I’m a chorus.
Oblivious to my presence, two servants spill out of the house, their arms laden with wood for the braziers, oil lamps hanging from their belts. One by one they ignite the braziers, drawing a line of fire into the pitch-black evening. The last one is next to the greenhouse, the flames reflecting on the glass panels so that the entire thing seems to be ablaze.
As the wind howls and the trees drip, Blackheath flickers and changes, following the guests as they make their way from the dining hall to their bedrooms and finally into the ballroom, where the band have taken to the stage, and the evening guests await. Servants open the French doors, music exploding outwards, tumbling across the ground and into the forest.
‘Now you see them as I do,’ says the Plague Doctor, in a low voice. ‘Actors in a play, doing the same thing night after night.’
He’s standing behind me, mostly obscured by trees and bushes. In the uncertain light of the brazier, his mask appears to float in the gloom like a soul trying to tug free of its body.
‘Did you tell the footman about Anna?’ I hiss.
It’s taking every ounce of self-control I have not to leap up and throttle him.
‘I have no interest in either of them,’ he says flatly.
‘I saw you outside the gatehouse with Daniel, then again near the lake, and now Anna’s missing,’ I say. ‘Did you tell him where to find her?’
For the first time, the Plague Doctor sounds uncertain.
‘I assure you, I wasn’t at either of those locations, Mr Bishop.’
‘I saw you,’ I growl. ‘You spoke with him.’
‘It wasn’t...’ He trails off, and when he speaks again, it’s with a spark of understanding. ‘So that’s how he’s been doing it. I wondered how he knew so much.’
‘Daniel lied to me from the start, and you kept his secret.’
‘It isn’t my place to interfere. I knew you’d see through him eventually.’
‘So why warn him about Anna?’
‘Because I worried that you wouldn’t.’
The music stops sharply, and, checking my watch, I discover it’s a few minutes before eleven. Michael Hardcastle has silenced the orchestra to ask if anybody’s seen his sister. There’s movement by the side of the house, darkness stirred by darkness as Derby takes his position by the rock, following Anna’s instructions.
‘I wasn’t in that clearing, Mr Bishop, I promise you,’ says the Plague Doctor. ‘I’ll explain everything soon, but for the moment, I have my own investigation to undertake.’
He departs quickly, leaving only questions in his wake. If this were any other host, I’d run after him, but Rashton’s a subtler creature, slow to startle, quick to think. For the moment, Evelyn’s my only concern. I put the Plague Doctor out of my thoughts and creep closer to the reflecting pool. Thankfully, the leaves and twigs are so demoralised by the earlier rain they don’t have the heart to cry out beneath my feet.
Evelyn’s approaching, sobbing, looking for me in the trees. Whatever her involvement in all this, she’s clearly afraid, her entire body shaking. She must have already taken the muscle relaxant because she’s swaying slightly, as though moved by some music only she can hear.
I rustle a nearby bush to let her know I’m here, but the drug’s doing its work, she can barely see, let alone find me in the darkness. Even so, she keeps on walking, the silver pistol glinting in her right hand, and the starting pistol in her left. It’s pressed against her leg, out of sight.
She has courage, I’ll give her that.
Reaching the edge of the reflecting pool, Evelyn hesitates, and, knowing what comes next, I wonder if perhaps the silver pistol is too heavy for her now, the weight of the plan too much.
‘God help us,’ she says quietly, turning the gun towards her stomach and pulling the trigger of the starting pistol by her leg.
The shot is so loud it cracks the world, the starting pistol slipping from Evelyn’s hand into the inky blackness of the reflecting pool as the silver pistol hits the grass.