An Unsuitable Heir Read online

  Desmond’s mouth worked, the corners pulling down in a way that reminded Pen dreadfully of a sad clown’s face paint. Tim cleared his throat. “Well said, Pen. I entirely agree.”

  “We’ll never know the ins and outs,” Mark said, that seeming to be the biggest concession he could manage. “Conyers got himself in with Phineas, whatever way, and got himself sent up to investigate Pen’s claim with Mr. Hapgood. Then what, Justin?”

  “It was pretty clear how things were going by the time we left Chepping Wycombe,” Lazarus began.

  Mr. Hapgood nodded. “Even before we proceeded to Norfolk, I must admit that the evidence seemed conclusive.”

  “Conyers started complaining of a stomach upset on the train,” Lazarus said. “He said he was going off to stay with a lady friend and we didn’t see him from the evening of the Wednesday to the afternoon of the Saturday. He wrote up a lot of notes, brief unspecific ones, and got his woman to send a couple a day. And meanwhile he came down here to kill Pen betting that nobody would look twice at him as a candidate because to all intents and purposes he was in Norfolk. I checked the times of the milk trains before I came down here, and he’d have had to cover a lot of ground, but it would be possible. And he was convincing. It didn’t even occur to me he was shining us on at the time, and I’m suspicious. A clever man, Conyers.”

  “But he chose an unreliable accomplice,” Mr. Hapgood said. “If she betrayed his plan—”

  Lazarus rubbed his chin. “Ah, yes. That.”

  “Your friend in Norfolk doesn’t exist, does he?” Mark said, sounding more resigned than surprised.

  “I didn’t meet anyone there I’d rely on to tell me the time,” Lazarus said. “I don’t even think they have the telegraph. They barely have the wheel.”

  “Excuse me,” Greta said. “We’re from Norfolk.”

  “Don’t mind him. He shouldn’t be allowed out of London,” Mark said.

  Lazarus raised a brow. “Did I ask to go? Yes, I did, in fact, lie about that, but it worked, so—”

  “Worked?” Tim yelped.

  “Yes, dear, it worked,” Greta said. “Go on.”

  “Conyers got in on New Year’s Day, and made his attempts on Pen, trying to make it look like an accident at first, then just trying to get it done,” Mark said. They’d all seen the fading bruises on the corpse’s wrists. “Whether anyone in the house had knowledge of his presence or helped him—”

  “We’re unlikely to find out,” Pen said, with a warning look. “But he knew the house, I’m sure he could have done it alone.”

  “Right,” Mark said obediently. “Then after the smothering failed, he cycled off to the station, got the milk train up to London—”

  “Thence to Norfolk, and staged his recovery on Saturday afternoon,” Lazarus completed. “We finished up and came down to London on Monday, and Mr. Hapgood came on here with Conyers.”

  “In company with a murderer.” Mr. Hapgood pulled out a handkerchief and mopped his brow. “Dear heaven.”

  “Meanwhile, I was in London, catching up with events,” Lazarus said. “Nathaniel made up a list of all the relevant dates—he’s terribly orderly—and it finally dawned on me that Conyers’s invisibility on the crucial days might have meant he wasn’t there. That was late last night; I got the first train this morning.”

  “Too late,” Desmond said harshly. “Too late for my son.”

  “It was already too late,” Mark said. “Nobody saw Phineas after he was closeted with Conyers. He didn’t bid you good night last night, did he, sir? I think they fought, or at least that Conyers hit him—he was a powerful, violent man, and Justin’s lad Frankie was killed by a throat injury too. The blow may not have been intended to be fatal, but it was.”

  “Why?” Desmond demanded. “Why would they fight?”

  “Over the fee,” Lazarus said.

  “Because Mr. Conyers told Phineas what he’d been up to, and Phineas threatened to report him to the police,” Pen said loudly. “I’m sure that’s why.”

  Desmond’s old hands clenched tight. “Conyers had already attempted murder in this house. On whose behalf if not my son’s?”

  “We won’t ever know,” Mark said. “It’s possible that Conyers gave no hint of his intentions, that he promised to deal with Pen, without saying how.”

  “How else?” Desmond demanded. “What else could he have offered to do, except—except—?”

  Pen cast an urgent look at Lazarus, as the most fluent liar in the room. He gave a tiny eye roll, unseen by Desmond, but suggested, “Destroy the documents supporting Pen’s claim. He could have persuaded Mr. Phineas that that would be—What is it, Mr. Hapgood?”

  “I gave Mr. Phineas the dossier yesterday.” Mr. Hapgood pushed himself to his feet. “He wanted to go over it. I left it with him. I didn’t consider—a gentleman’s conduct—Where is it?”

  “You gave it to him,” Lazarus repeated. “You gave Phineas the original documents. Good, good. Perhaps we might go and find them.”

  “Would you mind showing him, Tim?” Pen asked. “Mr. Hapgood looks a bit tired.”

  “Thank you,” Mr. Hapgood said as Lazarus and Tim left together. “I am tired.” He dabbed his forehead again. “I am an old man and I am shocked, profoundly shocked, by all I have seen and heard. I have served this family faithfully all my life. I find myself asking why.”

  Desmond’s face crumpled. Pen looked between the two old men, cursing Phineas and Conyers and his father with all his heart. “But Uncle, it’s clear that whatever Phineas may have ever thought, or been trapped into, he didn’t agree with Conyers in the end. Because Conyers killed him.”

  “No question,” Mark said. “Killed him, dumped the body in your practice area, and set on a last risk-all strategy of trying to put the blame on you.”

  “Would that have worked?” Greta asked.

  “Might have, yeah,” Mark said. “Depends on the investigating officer, but Pen had plenty of reason to dislike Phineas, and the world would think he was the gainer from all this. It would have been circumstantial, of course, but men have hanged on less. Or it might have just distracted attention for a few days, while Conyers slipped away. Pen had made it clear he wasn’t bowing to blackmail. Conyers would have wanted to cut his losses.”

  “His losses,” Desmond said. “His.”

  “Manner of speaking, sir.”

  Desmond didn’t seem to hear. “We’ve lost it all. Our family’s honour, our name, our decency. My son, my son, my Phineas, involved in this foul, sordid—”

  “You don’t know that, sir.” Pen shoved himself out of his chair to grasp the old man’s hand. “Don’t believe the worst of him, please. Conyers was the evil man. He lied, he fooled everyone.”

  “Phineas didn’t want you to be earl,” Desmond said flatly. “We all know that. He wanted me to have it, and he would have taken any action—”

  “He did,” Lazarus said from the doorway. “Or someone did, anyway.” He held out a leather document case, empty. “There’s no sign of any of the papers.”

  “What was in it?” Tim demanded.

  “The page from the register,” Mr. Hapgood said dully. “The statements, Emmeline Godfrey’s papers, the proof of your identity. Lord Moreton, I can only apologise.”

  “The picture?” Pen asked. “The one we gave her?”

  “Just a fireplace full of ashes,” Lazarus said. “I’m sorry.”

  “This is all my fault,” Mr. Hapgood said. “If I had thought, if I had imagined I could not trust a gentleman and a Taillefer—”

  Tim came over and took Greta’s hand. “It doesn’t matter, surely. We all accept Pen is the earl. Surely if the family support his claim, there is no more to be said, and I don’t think any of us will object, will we? Uncle Desmond?”

  “I…” Desmond shut his eyes. His lips were trembling. “No. Let him take the place. I make no objection.”

  Pen took a deep breath. “Well, I do.”

  “What?” asked Mr. Ha
pgood.

  “Oh my God,” Lazarus muttered, not entirely under his breath.

  “I object,” Pen said again. The thought had burst on him like the sun blasting through fog, burning away its wet grey clutch on his soul. He felt exhilaration coursing through him as he spoke, the joy of the trapeze and the leap into nothing. “I don’t want to be the earl. I’m not bred to it or fit to it. There’s so much responsibility I don’t know how to take, and don’t want, and it would be madness to give me all this just because our ghastly father married our mother in order to sleep with her. That wasn’t a real marriage and I shan’t pretend it was.”

  “In law it was entirely real,” Mr. Hapgood said.

  Pen pulled himself to his full height, and set his shoulders wide. “Prove it.”

  “Pen,” Greta said.

  “Prove it,” Pen repeated. “Prove our parents were actually, legally married, with no marriage certificate, no register, no record at Somerset House, no physical evidence. I say they weren’t, and I’ll engage a lawyer if I have to. I’ll see you in court.”

  “To argue yourself a bastard?” Mr. Hapgood said incredulously.

  Pen folded his arms. “Yes. If you try to assert Edmund Taillefer was my father, I’ll sue.”

  “For defamation, I hope.” Lazarus had a look of unholy awe in his grey eyes.

  “But…”

  “I want to go back to work,” Pen said. “I think everything should go on as it would have without me. Uncle Desmond should be confirmed as Lord Moreton, and then Tim will be next in line, won’t he? And Tim and Greta are getting married, so if you really think it’s important that Edmund’s child inherits, well, she’ll be the countess and any son of hers will be the next earl. And that’s only fair, when you think about it,” he added, warming to his theme. “She’s older than me. Everyone puts my name first, but Greta’s the firstborn.”

  “She isn’t an heir male,” Mr. Hapgood said.

  “Nor am I,” Pen said. “That’s my decision, Mr. Hapgood.”

  “But—but—I simply cannot countenance this. In the interests of, of—”

  “Of whom?” Pen asked. “The family? Everyone must see I’m not right for the title and it’s not right for me. Natural justice? I think we passed that point a long time back. I don’t want this title, Mr. Hapgood, and Uncle Desmond does, and Greta would be such a countess. Such a countess. She’ll be the best thing that ever happened to Crowmarsh, you’ll see. And I’m very good on the trapeze.”

  “Don’t be stupid.” Greta’s eyes were shining. “How can you fly without me?”

  “I’ll just have to learn,” Pen said. “You want this, and I want you to have this, and we’ve been each other’s partner for a long time. New routines are important. We don’t want to get stale.”

  There were huge, unrestrained tears running down Greta’s face. “Oh, Pen.”

  “No repentance, no regret.” He knelt by her for a bone-crushing hug.

  “No repentance, no regret,” she echoed in his ear, then sat up and sniffed hard. “Goodness. Look at me, blubbering. Right—No, wait. Tim, does this suit you?”

  “Yes?” Tim said faintly. “That is, I have no desire to deprive Pen of his inheritance—”

  “You aren’t,” Greta said. “Our parents weren’t married, and we defy anyone to prove they were, and I’ll say that in court next to Pen, so there. But if you’re going to be the earl after Desmond, you could marry anyone you like, and—and not an illegitimate trapeze artist, and you should think about that. Of course I won’t hold you to anything.”

  “That’s good news,” Tim said. “Marvellous news. Anyone I like? I’ll take an illegitimate trapeze artist, please.”

  “Tim—”

  “No,” he said firmly. “In fact, it is a condition of my support for Pen’s abdication that you marry me, and I shan’t brook any argument on the subject. Er, unless you don’t actually want to,” he added, rather spoiling the effect.

  Greta gave a damp and inelegant snort, nestling against him. “Well then.”

  “You cannot do this!” Mr. Hapgood almost wailed. “We all know the truth. You saw the papers,” he appealed to Lazarus. “You had them in your hands, spoke to the Potters and the true countess. You can provide eyewitness testimony.”

  “And I’d be delighted to do so, but unfortunately I have what they call a Past,” Lazarus said. “As Conyers said. Utter disgrace. Nathaniel Roy says any competent counsel would take me apart in the witness-box, and he should know.”

  Mr. Hapgood’s mouth fell open. Lazarus smiled at him. It was not a smile that said reliable witness. “Reformed character, needless to say, but give a dog a bad name and all that. No, I fear you can’t depend on me.”

  “You’re all right, Martha,” Mark said. “Mr. Hapgood, Pen’s told us all what he wants from the start, and he’s spot on about the family interests. If you want to serve those, let this slide. You can’t prove the marriage now, certainly not with Pen and Greta denying it, and this won’t be the first time a line of succession had a dog-leg in it. And meanwhile, the police are on their way.”

  “God, I’d actually forgotten that,” Greta said. “What are we going to say?”

  “We can tell them everything,” Mark said. “All the family business laid out, murder and implication and blackmail and a story of lost heirs without a shred of proof to it, and see what that does to the Taillefer name.” He paused, and Pen could see the full horror of that sinking in on the faces around him. “Or we tell them that Mr. Conyers killed Phineas and attempted to abduct Miss Greta Starling, and leave it at that.”

  “Oh,” Tim said.

  “I mean, tell the truth and nothing but the truth,” Mark said. “Don’t misunderstand me. But the whole truth—that’d blacken the name of a fair few people, including the dead. And I wouldn’t let that stop me for a second if Conyers was alive to hang, but he’s not. He’s had all the justice he’s getting in this world, and there’s so much harm already been done. Let’s not do more.”

  Pen met the old lawyer’s eyes. “Sir, you’ve served the family all your life. You said so. We’re trying to do the right things here, for the family line, for the estate, for everyone’s good.” Mr. Hapgood shook his head silently. Pen appealed to Desmond. “Uncle Desmond, you haven’t spoken. What do you want?”

  Desmond looked up at him. His eyes were rheumy with grief and strain, but they met Pen’s and held for a long, silent second.

  “I wish to speak to Hapgood,” Desmond said at last. “Alone.”

  —

  Greta and Tim peeled off together, to nobody’s surprise. Lazarus expressed his intent of taking a walk around the house for some fresh air, and Mark and Pen were left alone. They went up to the Little Drawing Room, the one room in this house Pen had begun to feel was his own. He looked around at it with new eyes: the panelled walls and lead-paned windows, the furniture collected by his forefathers, the fading pictures of a grandmother he’d never imagined.

  “Second thoughts?” Mark asked.

  “God, no. I can’t wait to leave.”

  Mark put his arm around Pen’s waist. “You were marvellous out there. Think it’ll work?”

  “I can’t see why not. It depends what Desmond says now. The poor old man. I mean, he’s dreadful and so was Phineas but this has destroyed him.”

  “Marvellous,” Mark repeated, and brushed Pen’s ear with his lips. “God, I love you. You’re sure he won’t get married and father a child on his deathbed to spite Tim?”

  Pen snorted. “That would be typical but I doubt he’s up to it. To lose his son like that. It’s unspeakable.”

  “Conyers has a hell of a lot to answer for. All of them do. How many generations was it, the sins of the fathers?”

  “ ‘Visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, and upon the children’s children, unto the third and to the fourth generation,’ ” Pen said. “I’m the third generation, if you start with Clem and Edmund’s father, but then, maybe his fa
ther was dreadful too. And anyway, ‘The fathers shall not be put to death for the children, neither shall the children be put to death for the fathers: every man shall be put to death for his own sin.’ ”

  “You’ve got a lot of Scripture knowledge there.”

  “I can do it all day.”

  “Talking of death,” Mark said. “When Greta gave that funny scream, it was one of your signals, right? I recognised it from the Grand Cirque.”

  “A three-second count to jump,” Pen said. “So I jumped.”

  “At a maniac with a gun.”

  Pen shrugged. “If we didn’t trust each other’s signals we’d be dead.”

  “I know, I know. It put the heart across me, though.”

  “Me too,” Pen admitted. “God, that was frightening. If Greta hadn’t kept her head I don’t know what I’d have done.”

  “She did keep her head, yeah. Which is to say, uh, I’m sure Justin’s right and the gun went off accidentally.”

  “Mmm,” Pen said, given he knew exactly what he’d seen.

  “Justin’s got a way of telling people what to remember. And it’s what I reckon they’ll want to remember, come to that. Think she’ll be all right?”

  “Of course. Especially with Tim. Goodness, I’ve never known her like this with anyone.”

  “Yeah,” Mark said thoughtfully. “Tim. He’s a nice enough chap….”

  “You don’t know what she sees in him?”

  “Can’t say I do.”

  “Nor do I. Not at all. He’s ordinary and plain and not—not enormously interesting, if you were to ask me, and Greta looks at him and sees fireworks. It’s glorious when you think about it, isn’t it?” Mark shot him a questioning look. Pen waved a hand in an effort to bring out his meaning. “Oh, you know. You look at people and you see a boring clerk, just another man in a suit. Or you see someone with one arm, and the one arm is all you see. Or even”—he indicated himself—“you see a man. And it looks like it’s real because it’s what we see, but there’s so much wonder on the inside. As if you had a plain packing crate and it was filled with silks and Persian rugs and things that would spill out and make everything beautiful, if only you took the trouble to open it. Do you know what I mean?”