The strangled servant, p.17
The Strangled Servant, page 17
“She’d lost her charm?” Henry said.
“Exactly. Became demanding. Kept talking about some Poppy girl and Tom,” Pelling said.
“Poppy? What about her?” Henry sat up.
“Oh, just that she’s a plain old thing. A little country mouse Ida took in hand to improve her. From the sounds of it, the girl needed it. Idolizes Ida, of course, but so good of her to teach the girl some manners.”
Henry had to unclench his fists. “And Tom?”
“Just some bloke Ida mentioned from time to time, one of her many admirers.” He shrugged. “She liked to bring him up when she thought I was tiring of her. She would say such things to keep my interest but frankly, I was bored. I would’ve broken it off soon.”
“Were you her patron?”
“No. It was a little harmless flirtation, nothing more.” He leaned in close, “I am engaged to be married.”
“To who?” Henry asked.
“Julia Roxby, from Broxbourne. Lovely girl. Good family.”
“Congratulations.” Mentally he wracked his brain but couldn’t come up with a face to fit the name.
Seeing his expression, Pelling said, “Oh, they’re not in Debrett’s. A middling sort of family. Her father is a gentleman. Her uncle dabbles in trade.”
“You don’t care about any inferior connections she may have?” Henry asked.
“No. I love her.” It was the simple truth.
“Good luck to you,” Henry said.
“And to you, Constable. Ida’s not a bad girl. I hope nothing bad has happened to her.”
Henry grunted. “If you hear from her or see anything related to her, please let me know.”
“Of course,” Pelling said.
The men bowed to each other, and Henry left, dissatisfied. As he walked down the steps, he was called back by Pelling, waving a note.
“Constable!” he called, his fine shoes clattering on the wide stone steps.
He puffed and huffed and his waistcoat burst a button, but he didn’t notice. Henry turned around. “Pelling?” he said.
“Wait, damn you!” the man huffed. He stopped to catch his breath. “This came in the post. I’ve just seen it. It arrived today.”
Henry took it and examined its contents. It was a letter, wrote in shaky script, with many inkblots and scratches from a quill. It read:
Dearest Pelly, I have some verie important news to tell you. Why did you run away after the show? Did you dislike The Honey Moon? I must see you. I hope you will soon call me wife thereafter once you cast your eyes on the fruit of our love.
Ever yours,
Ida
Henry turned it over. It was postmarked three days ago. The handwriting was unmistakably Mary’s. He asked, “May I keep this?”
“Please. I want no keepsake of hers. May I have the miniature back? I should like to give it to Julia.”
Henry handed it to him.
“Thank you.” Pelling turned to go.
“Do you not wish to see her? The letter suggests she’s carrying your child.”
Pelling smirked. “Do you know how often that happens to fellows like us? Please. If she was that free with her favors with me, no doubt she’s been lying about with any sod dumb enough to fall for a pretty face. No, I’ll not be caught by an actress.”
“Do you happen to know a Neville Conn?”
“No. Why, should I?”
“He may have known Ida.”
Pelling laughed. “That alone should tell you the nature of her character. If she has been dallying with more than one man, I think it is not a matter of if she gets into trouble but when. Good luck in your search. I hope you find her.”
Henry rode back to the inn. He examined the letter again and wished not for the first time that Poppy wasn’t involved in this mess.
He turned over the letter and read its contents thoroughly, looking for a clue. But there was nothing, aside from the poor penmanship and ink blots from the girl’s unstudious writing. She could be writing from anywhere. Where would a girl in her condition go?
Chapter Twenty-Two
At the inn, Henry sat back with a pint of ale and surveyed the letters again. He’d read the correspondence between Mary and Poppy dozens of times and all he felt was a sense of anger and regret at Poppy’s social acquaintances. It was a shame she had no exposure to nicer girls matching her station.
Then he re-read the last letter Mary had written to Sir Pelling. It mentioned a play, The Honey Moon. He spoke with the innkeeper and picked up a copy of The Times, finding an entertainment section in its later pages.
There, he saw it. An advertisement for The Honey Moon, to be performed at Drury Lane. That was easy enough. He had a bite to eat, finished his ale and set out for London.
A day later, Henry drew up his horse a little way outside the theater on Drury Lane. There was nowhere to leave his horse, so he looked at a group of little boys standing around. He paid one of them a coin to watch it with the promise of more when he returned, and went inside.
As it was daytime, the venue was mostly empty, but for a few people walking around inside. It had just opened its doors but wasn’t time for an afternoon matinee yet. He made his way backstage, where he bumped into a roughly dressed man.
“’Ere, watch yerself,” the man said.
“Do you know an Ida?”
“Who?”
“Ida. Pretty face, brown hair. I heard that she worked here.”
The man shrugged and walked off.
Henry was not to be deterred. He walked backstage and accosted the first person he saw. “Excuse me.”
“Show’s not ’til noon,” the young woman said, sitting in a chair. She dangled her legs carelessly over one side of it. “Come back later.”
“Do you know a girl named Ida Dowbry or Mary Pendle?”
She stopped putting white face makeup on her face. “No. Why, do you?” she said insolently.
Henry’s eyebrows knit together. “Ida or Mary. Young, about nineteen years of age. She’s got brown hair.”
“The only Mary ’round here is Mary Evans. Mary!”
A buxom woman came walking over. She was quite large, and her tangled brown hair was stuffed under a stained mob cap. “What you want?”
Henry looked at them both. “Do you know a young woman that works here? Mary?”
Mary and the other woman shook their heads. “There’s a bunch of us actors in the company.”
“Company? What company?”
“The Drury Royal Guild of Actors!” Mary said with a smile.
Henry had an idea that the women were toying with him. “Has one of your girls gone missing recently? Mary?”
“I’m the only Mary around here. But…” she looked at the other young woman. “Ida’s been gone a while.”
“Ida Dowbry?” Henry asked.
“Ida know, do you?” Mary smacked her knee and she and the woman giggled, their light laughter grating on his ears.
He pulled out the sketch of her that Poppy had given him and held it up to see. “Do you recognize this girl?”
Mary’s eyes grew wide. “That’s Ida, all right. What you got a picture of her for? Are you sweethearts?”
“No.” Henry rolled up the picture and tucked it away in his bag.
“Ida’s got a pretty face but she’s not so good at acting. She loves it, though. What’s happened to her? She’s not in a bad way, is she?”
“Can you tell me about her?” he asked.
“Come with me.” Mary indicated with her head and started marching.
Henry followed the round woman through a small corridor that led to dressing rooms, pallets and shelves to sleep on, and more men and women in various states of undress and stage clothes, all of whom eyed him as they went past.
“Got yerself a follower, Mary!” one of them called.
Mary laughed and said, “You jealous, Thom?” as she led Henry further through a myriad of corridors. Finally, she made a left turn and came to an older woman, thin with greying hair, patching up a torn dress that had seen better days.
“Helen,” Mary said.
The woman looked up. “Mary. Who’s this?” She glanced at Henry.
“He’s come asking about Ida.”
The woman fixed Henry with an even gaze. “Who are you?”
“Constable Dyngley. You are Ida’s mother?”
The woman sat up straight on her stool. “What’s this about? She in trouble?”
“She’s missing.”
“What?” The woman shot to her feet. “What’s happened?”
Henry said, “Please ma’am, I just need to ask you a few questions about your daughter.” Seeing her face, he added, “Please, sit down.”
The woman sat, clutching her sewing.
Henry asked gently, “Could you tell me when you last saw Ida?”
The woman shrugged. “She performed in our play last month, then she said she was going off to visit my sister, who’d invited her for a visit. Where is she?”
“She was in an accident—”
“Ooohhh!” Mary exclaimed. “Is she dead?”
“Mary!” snapped Ida’s mother. “Don’t speak ill! She’s not dead.”
“How do you know?”
“I can feel it. She’s alive. Now, what’s gone and happened to her?” she asked Henry.
“As far as I can tell she did visit her cousins—”
“The Potters, that’s my sister’s family,” Helen said.
“In Hertfordshire?”
She nodded in agreement.
“There was a…disagreement at the assembly rooms a week ago and she left town. However, her carriage overturned, and she has gone missing. Do you know where she might have gone?”
“To get rid of her trouble, that’s where.”
“What do you mean?”
“The girl told me she’d got into a bit of bother with a young man.”
“You mean she was with child.”
“Aye.” The thin woman scratched her head. “I told her no man would take her, and to get rid of it. We hardly have enough to eat as is, there’s no chance we could care for a babe. I told her what she had to do.” She looked down at her lap forlornly. “The girl wouldn’t listen.”
“Where did she go?”
“I don’t know. There’s a doctor who… helps women. But she wouldn’t have gone there. She had a plan, she told me. She was going to her lover, the man who did it to her. He’d take her in, she said.”
“When did you last see her?”
“A month ago. Is she…” the woman hesitated. “Is my girl dead?”
“I think she is alive, but missing. I am trying to track her whereabouts. If you know where she might have gone, it would be most helpful.”
“I don’t know nothing, honest. That girl has a mind of her own and don’t go listening to the likes of us. She thinks we’re lower.” She sniffed.
“Lower?”
“You know. She wants to be one of those toffs, and when that man came around she thought she’d landed him sure as anything. I told her not to dally with him, but she would do what she wanted rather than listen to me.” She shrugged.
“What happened?” he asked.
“She took him to her bed is what. Then she comes to me all proud like the cat who’s got the cream and says she’s with child. Well, you know what I said to that.”
Henry nodded. “What did she do?”
“She said she was going to marry him, the father. Then she’d be out of the acting company and be a lady. I laughed at her and bet her sixpence she’d be back here within a week.” She wiped her eyes. “I didn’t mean it. I mean, the girl needs a good kick up the arse, but if she did come back I’d take her in, you know?”
“I know. So she went after him?”
“Yeah. And that was the last I heard of her.” She looked him in the eyes, not caring that he’d seen her cry. “You’ll find her, won’t you? You’ll tell her she can come back here anytime.”
“I will,” Henry said. “May I see her things?”
“Beg your pardon?”
“Her personal items. Her clothes, anything of hers. It might help me find her.”
“All right. But I don’t reckon they’ll be of much good to you.” She set aside her sewing and led him into another room that had a pile of clothes, letters, and old scripts.
He peered at the pile, keenly aware of her eyes on him. He said, “Perhaps you’d give me a bit of privacy. I wouldn’t wish to disturb you from your work.”
She took the hint. “Aye. You’re welcome to her things if they help you find her.”
“Thank you.” He waited until she left him alone before he started to rummage through Mary’s things. There were scripts, a playbill, and a broadsheet she’d collected, which had a pretty likeness of her drawn on the front. She was listed amongst the cast but was not one of the principal actors. He found no coins or jewelry, but did spy a packet of letters she’d tied up with string.
He undid the ribbon holding them together and eyed the stack. They were correspondences, largely from Poppy. A part of him felt like he was intruding on the girls’ privacy by reading, but he wanted to know anything that would lead him to Mary. He opened the first letter and read,
Dear Mary, I hope you are having a good time in London. I miss you dearly, and I know Tom does as well, although he does not say it. Instead, he looks at your sketch and sighs, and I know he misses you in his heart. When will you return? Life in the village is dull without you.
Your most affectionate friend,
Poppy
He read the second, and the third. Each was from Poppy, except for one. It was smaller, shorter and on cheaper paper than the others. The writer was also less educated and made many errors in spelling, with many words crossed out and more than a few ink blots staining the page. This one read:
Mary, Come back to Hertford. I cannot wait until we are wed and I may introduce you as Mrs. Thomas Maddox.
Love
Tom
Henry examined the addresses. Poppy’s were to Ida Dowbry, but Tom’s was to Miss Mary Pendle, Drury Lane, London. He thought, So she told Poppy of her true identity, but not Tom. Interesting.
The last letter was the most intriguing of all. Written on very fine paper, it said:
My dearest Ida, I thank you for your warm affection, which I have held in high regard. Unfortunately, this is to be my last communication, for I am engaged to be married. Please accept this money as a token of my affection and see yourself taken care of, and here is the lock of hair you so kindly bestowed upon me.
In friendship,
E.P.
Henry reeled. So the man had tried to pay her off. He began to trace a timeline of events. Why would Ida hide her true identity? Why would she not use her real name? It made things so much more confusing.
He tied up the letters and put them in his saddlebag. After a moment’s thought, he included Poppy’s too. He couldn’t say why, but something in them made him want to read them again. As he paid his goodbyes to Mary’s mother, he mentally planned his next movement in the hunt for Mary. Minutes later he had his horse saddled and made his way back to the village of Hertfordshire. The answers lay there, he knew.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Poppy sat on her bed, forlorn. The thin coverlet was pleasant, red and white stripes now faded with sunlight and age. The room itself was pleasant. Everything in her life was dashed pleasant, so why had she ruined it all?
Her uncle was right, she had been making a nuisance of herself and now all she had to show for it was the misguided hopes of her aunt and the disapproval of her uncle and the constable and his colleagues. No doubt Constable Dyngley thought he was doing her a kindness when he asked for her help.
She rose from her bed and paced the room, the floorboards creaking beneath her slippered feet. She would prove them all wrong. But she was forbidden from leaving the house. What to do? Should she disobey her uncle’s command and investigate this matter herself, or try to be an obedient, upstanding niece?
There was a knock at her door. It opened, revealing her aunt. “Poppy,” her aunt said.
“Yes?”
“I do not want you to be troubled by what your uncle said. He means well, he’s just afraid.”
“Of what? That I’ll embarrass him more? No chance of that.” Poppy sat back on the bed, tossing some needlework aside.
Her aunt said, “Now don’t be taking a smart attitude with me, girl. I don’t know what you were thinking, going after that woman, but it was no place for a young lady and that’s God’s truth.”
“She was attacked, Aunt Rachel. Tom was supposed to fetch help but—he never came back.”
“He left you there alone, with a dead body?” Her aunt looked a trifle pale. “Mercy. It’s a wonder you didn’t faint. I know I would’ve.”
“Then the deputy came and…”
“I know. Reginald told me. He’s not embarrassed by you, my dear. He’s afraid for you. Now that you’re out, you’re not a child anymore. You’re a young lady with a reputation.”
“A disreputable one,” Poppy said.
“Nonsense. People love a bit of gossip, but the constable declared you were innocent of that crime, there’s no way you could’ve done it. So put that matter out of your head.”
“But Uncle was so angry. He’s furious with me.”
“Well, I’m not saying you didn’t give him a reason. But for what it’s worth, he’s just looking out for you. He’s afraid that you’ll start to keep company with men.”
“But I’ve kept company with Mary and Thomas for years.”
“Aye, but you know it’s not like that. You girls were each other’s chaperones. With you going out in society unaccompanied, with young men, it’s just not seemly. You understand.”
She did.
“We don’t want you to become like Mary,” Aunt Rachel said.
“Mary did nothing wrong.”
“Well, do innocent girls run away? I don’t think so.”
Poppy glared at her. “Maybe she had a good reason.”
