Page 12 of What Cannot Be Said

Sebastian shook his head. “The earlier victims were Julia and Madeline Lovejoy—Sir Henry’s wife and daughter.”

Gibson’s eyes widened. “I don’t like the sound of that.”

“Hero thinks the killer could be someone deliberately echoing the first killings to torment Sir Henry.”

“Now, there’s a chilling thought. Magistrates must rack up an ungodly number of enemies. How long has Lovejoy been a magistrate?”

“Ever since his family was killed—fourteen years.”

“In other words, your pool of suspects might as well be infinite.”

Sebastian met his friend’s worried gaze. “Exactly.”

Chapter 9

The sprawling redbrick complex known as the Foundling Hospital lay in Bloomsbury, just north of Guilford Street. Dating back some seventy years to the mid-eighteenth century, it was a hospital only in the word’s original sense of a charitable institution offering “hospitality.” It owed its existence to the efforts of a retired sea captain named Thomas Coram, who had been so horrified on his return to England by the number of dead and dying infants he saw abandoned in the streets of London that he decided to do something about it.

It hadn’t been easy, for the stern moralists of Coram’s day argued that saving the lives of illegitimate children would serve to encourage the sin and debauchery against which they railed endlessly. But he persisted, and in the end managed to secure a royal charter. A number of aristocratic ladies convinced their lords to lend their respectability to the scheme, while artists and musicians such as Hogarth and Handel helped raise the necessary funds.

Yet despite its name, the institution no longer actually took in foundlings. In the first years of its existence it had been so inundated with babies—fifteen thousand in four years—that it now received only infants surrendered by known mothers who could successfully prove they had been of “good character” before their fall. And there were still so many of those applicants that the few babies lucky enough to be taken in had to be selected by a lottery system.

The children who made it past those hurdles lived in a three-story brick building that included two dormitory wings fronted by long arcades, a large chapel in which Handel had once staged yearly performances of his Messiah, and an impressive art gallery that helped fund the hospital by attracting patrons who then made donations. Hero had visited the institution before, in the course of research for a different article, and the impressive financial gift she’d given at that time brought the Foundling Hospital’s chaplain, the Reverend Reginald Kay, bustling out to meet her when she arrived there that morning.

They exchanged the usual polite pleasantries and then, at Hero’s suggestion, turned to stroll along the institution’s famous art gallery. “I fear you find us all at sixes and sevens today,” said the Reverend with a sigh. A small white-haired man with pale blue eyes and a pink, unlined face, he was visibly shaken, and kept bringing up one plump white hand to swipe down over his nose and mouth. “You’ve heard the dreadful news about Lady McInnis?”

“I have, yes. It’s beyond horrid.” Hero made a show of pausing before a canvas depicting the story of Moses brought before the Pharaoh’s daughter and tried to make her next question sound as casual as possible. “When was the last time you saw her?”

The Reverend Kay looked thoughtful. “Let’s see... It must have been last Tuesday, I believe. Yes, Tuesday. She is—or I suppose I should say was—organizing a benefit concert for the foundlings and had come to look at some details of the layout of the chapel.”

“Did she say anything while she was here to suggest that she felt in any kind of danger?”

“Danger? Good heavens, no. She was quite cheerful—you know what she was like.”

“Yes,” said Hero, surprised to find herself suddenly blinking away the sting of threatening tears. She had to swallow hard before she could go on. “Tell me about this benefit concert she was organizing.”

“It’s scheduled for next month, although I don’t suppose it will happen now. She organized a concert of operatic selections last year, but she wanted something different this time. I understand she was putting together a collection of popular stage songs—pieces from Shield and Dibdin and the like—along with some Scottish and Irish airs arranged by Haydn and Beethoven... that sort of thing. She hoped it might attract some new, younger audience members. Her thinking was that we need fresh blood if we’re to keep the donations coming...” His voice trailed away, his face blanching as if he’d suddenly remembered the circumstances of her death and feared his use of the word “blood” might be considered inappropriate.

Hero said, “Was anyone working on the concert with her?”

“Yes, Mrs.Veronica Goodlakes. You know her?”

“I do, yes.” Veronica Goodlakes was a wealthy widow in her late thirties who, unlike Laura, was not especially known for her devotion to philanthropy and benevolent works. “Is Mrs.Goodlakes an active supporter of the Foundling Hospital, as well?”

“Not exactly,” said the Reverend hesitantly. “But she has been quite keen to help Lady McInnis with this year’s benefit concert.”

“Perhaps she’ll be able to keep it going.”

“Perhaps,” said the Reverend, although he didn’t sound convinced.

“What about Lady McInnis’s efforts to convince Parliament to improve the current laws regulating apprenticeships? Do you know if she’d made any enemies in her work on that?”

“Enemies? I don’t know if I’d go so far as to use that word, but there’s no denying she definitely ruffled a few feathers.” He paused, his face looking pinched. “You can’t think that’s why she was killed?”

“No, of course not,” said Hero mendaciously. She moved on to the next painting, this one a pastoral scene with a young shepherd holding a lamb. “When you say she ruffled a few feathers, precisely whose feathers are we talking about?”

The Reverend’s watery blue eyes drifted sideways. “Well... I believe she tangled with the director of more than one of the workhouses. The Foundling Hospital learned long ago the importance of screening the tradespeople who take our children. But I fear the workhouses bind their children out to virtually anyone who will have them, and I understand Lady McInnis didn’t hesitate to voice her disapproval to some of the directors.”

Of course, the reason the Foundling Hospital had learned long ago the importance of screening the tradespeople who took their children was because they’d once apprenticed a young girl to a midwife who was ultimately hanged for torturing the poor child to death. But all Hero said was, “Do you know precisely which workhouse directors?”

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