Page 54 of Death at Fournier Downs
There was something in that confession, something about Annie being Andrea that tugged at Hugh, but he couldn’t determine what.
“Bainbury wasn’t the father in either case. You were,” he pressed, even though he was not as confident in that supposition as he had been when he’d first entered the doctor’s home.
“No, I wasn’t! I swear it. Mary did not confide in me, but Charlotte did. It was Renfry, I tell you—heseduced her. And I’m almost certain he seduced Mary as well.”
Hugh narrowed his eyes on the doctor as he recalled the glances Bainbury’s heir kept throwing the sheeted body belonging to his stepmother in the icehouse. He felt ill as he commanded Millbury to divulge what he knew.
“Lady Bainbury—Charlotte—she confided in me…perhaps she’d taken too many drops of laudanum at the time…but she spoke about Lord Renfry and his relentless pursuit, and how lonely she had been. The earl was not as attentive, you see, and well…she gave in. But then, after he’d succeeded, the cad laughed at the conquest, boasting about how proud he was to have denigrated his father’s newest wife.”
Hugh clenched his jaw. Instinct told him that the doctor was not lying. Still, he asked, “Why should I believe you?”
“Because he is a profligate, a true blackguard. I know my own weaknesses, but that lout…” The doctor’s expression twisted with anger now instead of fear. He held Hugh’s stare and seemed to be weighing a decision. Finally, he said, “It goes against my strict code of privacy, but I do not think it can be helped. You must speak to Lady Cassandra Sinclair. She will tell you.”
Stunned, Hugh stepped back. “Tell me what?”
But the doctor shook his head. “I am on my way to meet her now. A message arrived in the letter box earlier this morning. She said it was an emergency. You may come with me, and I will explain to her the importance of coming forward with the truth.”
Hugh sent him a contemptuous glare, and Millbury was at least aware enough to recognize his own hypocrisy. “I will also admit my own secrets. I will…I will try to right everything.”
“Why does the duke’s sister wish to meet with you?” Hugh asked, ignoring the man’s promise. If he came out with the truth, he would be run out of Low Heath. In London, he might have disappeared into the lower-class masses, but here…there would be no escaping the scandal.
His sister Annie—or Andrea—would certainly not be happy about that.
Hugh barely latched onto the thought when the doctor replied, “She, too, has an understanding of Renfry’s wicked appetite.” The significant look he pressed into Hugh made the Bow Street officer’s blood simmer. The doctor’s insinuation was unmistakable.
“How do you know this?”
“I recognized some of her symptoms earlier in the summer, while I was treating the duke. When I inquired, she broke down and told me what had occurred. The man is abominable.”
Hugh did not doubt that Renfry was exactly what Millbury purported him to be. But Cassandra…why seduce the duke’s sister? She was pretty. Young. Impressionable. It might have been one last conquest before wedding his betrothed.
“Where are you meeting her?”
The doctor pulled a folded piece of parchment from his coat pocket. “She has requested the citrine quarry. She was adamant I not come to the main house. There is an old road, direct from town to the quarry.”
Hugh nodded, recalling the young woman mentioning her collection of the amber stones when they, and the duke and duchess, had been riding to the quarry. If she wanted privacy, it would certainly be a secluded spot, but it was an odd choice for Cassandra, especially when the body of Lady Bainbury had been found there less than a week before. Something felt off about the meeting, but Hugh joined the doctor as he went to the small barn behind the house, where his hired boy-of-all-work had readied Millbury’s phaeton.
As Millbury directed the horse through a pair of stone pillars, onto a narrow dirt path that bisected a field, Hugh signaled his horse to slow.
“I will meet you at the quarry,” he called to the doctor. “I have a stop to make first.”
The doctor nodded and continued along the old quarry road. Hugh directed his horse onward, out of the village and toward Fournier House. If Cassandra had found herself in trouble with Renfry’s child, meeting with the doctor and a Bow Street officer to confess her sins would be as unpleasant for her as it would be for Hugh. It would be better to bring someone she trusted.
The choice for a meeting spot continued to nag at him as he rode fast toward the estate. Why the quarry? Cassandra had been shaken quite badly after finding Ida Smith. Selecting the site of another murder seemed entirely irrational.
At last, he turned up the long drive toward the main house. As he reached the top of the knoll, where the drive circled around the lily pond, he tugged on the reins. His horse shuddered to a stop. Cassandra had been seated on the stone edge of the pond, trailing a finger through the water, until she saw Hugh approaching. Now she stood and swiped at her cheeks. She’d been weeping.
“Why are you here?” he asked, alarm stringing his muscles tight.
Taken aback by the gruff question, Cassandra blinked and parted her lips. “I… How do you mean?”
“You summoned Dr. Ryder to the quarry, did you not?”
She grimaced and shook her head. “No. Why would I have done so?”
Hugh dismounted and lowered his voice as he neared her, trying to calm his mounting trepidation. “He told me about your…predicament.”
She jolted back a step and blood rushed to her cheeks. Before she could stammer a reply, he continued, “Did you not leave a missive in his letter box this morning? Or direct someone from Fournier House do so?”
