Page 56 of House of Furies
“Shall we convene in my offices?” Mr. Morningside came dressed in his usual sleek suit, a tailcoat with a square cut away and well-fitted tawny trousers. His ivory cravat matched his shirt. It made me feel shabby but honest. I wouldn’t know what to do with myself if offered a silk dress and slippers.
“I would rather not,” I said. “Your birds are... I don’t want to be around them.”
“Ah. Yes. I heard you sat in on a ferrying. Incredible, isn’t it?”
“That’s one word for it.” I dropped my apron and stepped out into the daylight, narrowly avoiding the pup that tore around the yard, nimbly avoiding his owner with a piece of yam flapping against his jaws. “A walk would suit me better.”
“A compromise, then—the west salon. There are no birds there, to my knowledge.”
I had barely stepped foot into the grand room on the first floor of the house. The guests took meals and tea there sometimes, but it was not a place the servants congregated. We crossed back through the kitchen and foyer and into the tall, overcrowded salon with its myriad green velvet couches and walls heaped with dusty paintings. It felt huge and small at once, a large space stuffed with far too many antiques and furnishings, the aged wallpaper almost unseen behind so many paintings.
Mr. Morningside shuttered the massive doors behind us while I floated listlessly in the middle of the room. I had no idea where to sit, faced with so many couches and chairs and settees. But he walked confidently to a dark wood table with curlicue legs near the side window. Two chairs were positioned at a jaunty angle and he took one, sliding into it elegantly and sitting with his legs stretched out in front of him. His feet, fortunately, were facing forward.
I took the chair opposite him, feeling awkward and out of place, like a dandelion stuck into a bouquet of roses.
“To business,” he said with a clearing of his throat. “Mary tells me there was a bit of nastiness last night in Derridon. First Dr. Merriman and then a woman murdered in some cottage up the hill.”
“I was nearly killed, and a woman was torn to pieces and her skeleton was strung up over the hearth,” I corrected him hotly. “So, yes, a bit of nastiness did indeed occur.”
“There’s no need for sarcasm, Louisa, although I do apologize for the doctor. He was not your responsibility. Quite honestly I underestimated the fellow, never thought he would be so sloppy.” He sighed and flicked his brows up. “You’re recovering?”
“I will, yes.” I didn’t want to talk about Merriman. He was dead and the world was better for it, though I didn’t want Mr. Morningside to have the satisfaction of knowing I thought as much. “There was something strange about the woman,”I said, taking the little scrap of paper out of my apron pocket and pushing it across the table. “George Bremerton says it was Lee’s mother. We saw him going up to the cottages and followed, but there is no way he had time to do... I believe it would take a very long time to completely remove someone’s flesh and disperse it all through a house.”
“You would be surprised,” he said thoughtfully, taking the paper and studying it closely. Sniffing it.Lickingit.
“That... was in a fireplace.”
“Obviously.” He brought it away from his face and twirled it between his fingers. “But you saw Bremerton there?”
“Yes, but only after we discovered the body. He didn’t have much of a lead on us, perhaps five or ten minutes.” I searched the room for a moment, finding a writing desk with quill and ink on the other side of the many carpets. Quickly, I retrieved the writing implements, then took the paper back from him, flipping it to the blank side. “There was a symbol in blood behind her. I made certain to memorize it.”
“Enterprising of you,” he said with a chuckle. “I knew I was right to send you.”
“After what I saw, I wish you hadn’t,” I replied, finishing the drawing and returning the paper. “A sort of lamb or sheep devouring itself with a sun behind it.”
The smile fled from his face.
“You recognize it?”
Mr. Morningside shook his head, though he wouldn’t tearhis eyes away from the rudimentary drawing. “A lamb,” he whispered, tapping his teeth with the nail of one thumb. “What does a lamb symbolize.... Youth or naïveté, though for the God-fearing it can be purity and peace, even the son of God himself. One only ever sees an Ouroboros of the serpent. A snake eating its own tail. But to exchange that for a lamb... What could it mean?”
“And the sunburst?” I asked. “A lamb and a sun seem awfully cheerful for a message written in blood.”
“I told you, Louisa, beauty can be deceptive.”
“What do you make of that writing? It looks like a masculine hand to me. Only the headmaster at Pitney had penmanship that bold.” Poppy and Bartholomew passed by the window, the pup still leading her on a winding chase.
“There we agree, certainly a man’s pen,” he said, flipping over the paper. “Bremerton’s?”
“It’s possible,” I conceded, “but unlikely. I took him to be genuinely horrified when he realized Lee had found his mother murdered and displayed so. And in the carriage, too, he expressed regret.”
He studied me over the tiny scrap of paper, squinting his golden eyes and cocking his head. “The widow. Merriman. You know now these people are here for a reason. George Bremerton is a known thief and has killed over money and debts before. Do not be blinded to his faults because of his nephew.”
“You didn’t see her, sir. You... I cannot believe he would dosuch a thing to Lee’s mother and then turn around and embrace the boy. And besides, whoever did the killing would be covered head to foot in blood, and he had not a speck upon him.”
“That is a sensible conclusion,” he admitted. Sighing, he let the paper float back to the table and pushed both hands through his wavy black hair. “This is vexing. We have far more questions than answers. This symbol, the writing you found, Bremerton, the woman... All of it must be related.”
I was not so sure. Lee’s uncle had indeed found us in that cottage, but his story made sense. Hiding Lee’s mother’s questionable choices seemed like the loving thing to do. Her interest in the occult, in dark things, might have gotten her mixed up with the wrong sorts of people.
