3-Book Victorian Crime Collection by Caro Peacock

Author:Caro Peacock [Caro Peacock]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
Published: 2014-02-03T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

There was no riding on Thursday morning because Amos had a horse to deliver to Highgate, so I was at Kennedy’s lodgings soon after it got light. He’d been working late the night before and was still in his dressing gown and slippers, breakfasting on coffee and anchovy toast with a newspaper on the table in front of him. He jumped up when the servant showed me in, setting toast and paper flying.

‘What’s happened now?’

‘Nothing bad,’ I said. ‘Progress, I think.’

We sat down, he found another cup and poured coffee for me and I told him every detail of the meeting with Lady Silverdale.

‘So she’s nearly sure Hardcastle stole the earrings from Columbine,’ he said.

‘It’s a lot more than that. She’s terrified of him facing any questions about Columbine.’

‘We can’t prove that.’

‘I wish you’d stop talking like a lawyer,’ I snapped. ‘Everything I try to do, you pour cold water on.’

He sighed. ‘Liberty, if I’m talking like a lawyer, it’s because I’m having to think like one. I spent an hour or more yesterday speaking to Harmer.’

It took me a moment to remember that was his solicitor friend.

‘What did he say?’

‘He’s worried, Liberty. He says there’s nothing we’ve found so far that Charles Phillips will be prepared to bring out in court on Monday.’

‘What about the earrings? What about Marie disappearing?’

‘He says Phillips is too fly to try to ride wild horses in opposite directions. Either we produce one theory – and I mean one theory – with evidence to support it, or all we can rely on is Phillips’ eloquence in picking holes in the case against Jenny.’

‘And is he hopeful?’

Kennedy shook his head.

‘Have you told Daniel this?’

Another headshake.

I sank down in the chair, feeling bone weary.

‘Couldn’t we have the case delayed?’

‘I asked that. Not much hope there either, unless we can produce a strong argument that delay would bring in fresh evidence.’

‘But it will. For one thing, we might find Marie.’

‘What good would that do? The police have already questioned her and let her go. We don’t have a shred of evidence that they were wrong.’

I stared down at the floor. The newspaper he’d dropped was yesterday’s Chronicle. When I bent to pick it up from simple tidiness, my own surname leapt out at me from the advertisement columns on the front page.

If Mr Lane has information which he wishes to impart, he may meet the gentleman referred to in his advertisement in the same locality at four o’clock on Friday afternoon.

I stood frozen with the newspaper in my hand. If there’d been a reply at all, I’d expected it to come to my home by messenger. It hadn’t occurred to me that it might be by another advertisement.

‘What is it, Libby?’

I showed him.

‘Another wild horse, perhaps the wildest of the lot,’ I said. ‘It’s the man who thinks Pauline killed Columbine.’

‘That’s a wild leap on your wild horse. He might easily have other reasons for trying to strangle the woman. Has it occurred to you that

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