A Regimental Murder

Chapter Eleven

Breckenridge's eyes were open to nothing, unseeing and glassy, pupils fixed. His mouth was open as well, as though he'd been drawing a breath to shout. His face had been slashed by the dozens of branches he'd crashed through, not to mention bruised where I'd hit him the day before. His knee-high boots and buckskin breeches were likewise scarred by his descent. My coat and his gloves were in ribbons.

Bartholomew slid his huge hand beneath Breckenridge's head. "Neck's broken," he informed us.

Grenville cupped his hands around his mouth. "Can you bring him up here?"

Bartholomew stooped beneath the branches. Breckenridge was a large man, but Bartholomew was larger. He rolled the older man onto his shoulder. With his brother's help, Bartholomew began climbing back toward the road, brush crackling and breaking under his onslaught. I followed slowly.

Bartholomew laid Breckenridge out at Grenville's feet. "Must have fallen from his horse, sir," he said, dusting off his hands. "Broke his neck tumbling down the hill."

Questions spilled through my mind. Had Breckenridge truly fallen or had someone broken his neck for him and tossed him down the hill? What had Breckenridge been doing up here at all? And why dressed in my coat?

I also wondered why Brandon had suddenly turned up at Astley Close, and why he'd just happened to have been taking a walk this morning in Linden Hill Lane. I thought I knew the answer, and beneath my stunned surprise at Breckenridge's death, anger seethed.

Something caught my eye and I moved away from the others. The soft earth at the side of the lane showed two shallow furrows. They began about ten yards from where Bartholomew had dropped the body and led straight to the edge of the road where Breckenridge had gone over. The tracks were intermittent, sometimes disappearing altogether, sometimes appearing for only an inch or so.

I followed the trail back. "Look at his boots," I instructed.

They stared at me collectively. Impatiently, I bent over Breckenridge and turned the sole of his boot upward. The edge of the heel was crusted in earth. The other was the same.

I straightened. "He was dragged here, and thrown over the side. He did not fall from a horse."

"But there's a horse gone," the stable lad said. He removed his cap, wiped his forehead, and replaced it. "And the tack. Someone rode out." He looked at me. "Thought it was you."

"Which horse is gone?" I asked.

"Chestnut gelding."

"I rode a bay," I said. "I put him away when I returned. Was the chestnut Breckenridge's own horse?"

"He was that."

I mused. "Even if he did ride up here in the first place, someone dragged him from there to here." I pointed. "Here, the brush is not as heavy. Easier to throw him down the side. He would slide most of the way."

Grenville frowned. "But why, if he'd broken his neck falling, would someone push him from the road? Why not lay the poor man over the horse and bring him home?"

"Because I think the person deliberately killed him and wished it to look as though he'd had a bad fall."

Brandon snorted. "Who would do such a thing?"

"A very strong man," I said. "Or a very angry one. Or perhaps it was an accident. Perhaps they quarreled, Breckenridge slipped and fell and broke his neck, and the second man panicked."

"Seems unlikely they'd come all the way up here for a quarrel," the stable lad pointed out.

I considered. "An appointment, perhaps."

"Or a footpad," Grenville said. "Tried to rob him, broke his neck, and pushed him over."

I closed my mouth. I sensed strongly that this had been murder with a purpose, but Grenville's suggestion was logical, and arguing with it at present might look strange to the others. It might have been simple robbery, but I did not think so.

We all did agree about the need to search for the horse. The stable lad and Matthias easily found the chestnut gelding not a mile down the road, in a pasture of the farm that the lane skirted. Whether he had wandered through an open gate on his own, or someone had retrieved him and led him there, we could not tell.

The horse seemed displeased at being found, having had its pleasant meal of lush grass interrupted, but once caught he was docile enough. He was about sixteen hands high, fine-boned, and expensive. The head stall and saddle he wore were the very ones I had ridden out with and left behind to be cleaned.

Bartholomew and Matthias agreed to stay with the body while the rest of us returned to Astley Close. The magistrate would need to be informed and a cart sent to retrieve Breckenridge. There would be an inquiry, and an inquest. I imagined the coroner and jury would happily let the horse be the culprit, but I was not so certain he had been.

We followed the lad into the stable yard. I looked into the tack room, which was simply a horse box on the end of the row used for the purpose. Saddles on pegs lined one wall, and bridles and halters hung opposite. A wooden shelf filled with curry combs, brushes, hoof picks, and cloths occupied the wall opposite the door.

"Why would he use the saddle I had left to be cleaned?" I asked as the lad unfastened the cinch and dragged the saddle from the horse.

The stable lad shrugged. "It was nearby."

"It was dirty. In the middle of the floor, where I left it. Why not use a bridle with a clean bit? Besides, Breckenridge had his own saddle, a French cavalry saddle. He boasted of it."

I pointed. The saddle rested on a peg at the end of the row. Both pommel and cantle curved high, making the seat, covered with a quilted leather pad, deep. The English saddles had been similar. On campaign, we had strapped sheepskin to the saddle for more comfort, the cinch wrapping across the top of the sheepskin and fastening beneath the horse.

Breckenridge's stolen French saddle was a fine thing, obviously the property of a high-ranking officer. I knew in my heart that if he'd saddled his own horse and gone off riding early, he would have used the cavalry saddle, not the one I'd left, damp and dirty, on the stone floor.

The stable lad shrugged again, and moved off to care for the horse. Grenville was watching me curiously, Brandon impatiently. I sensed I would learn no more here, and the three of us left the stable and trudged toward the house.

"I will inform Lady Mary," Grenville said as we walked. "And tell her to send for the magistrate." He slanted me a glance. "I think for now you should keep your murder theory to yourself, Lacey. You would have difficulty convincing a magistrate without more proof."

"We have proof," I said. "He would not have used that saddle, and he was dragged down the road to a convenient place to be tossed over the hill."

"What about my idea of the robber?" Grenville asked.

I shook my head. "He still had his watch. I saw it in his waistcoat. A robber would have taken the watch, not to mention the horse."

Grenville deflated. "That is true."

"For God's sake, Lacey," Brandon broke in. He had been striding along Grenville's other side in silent anger. "A man has just died, and his wife waits in the house to learn of it. She will not want to hear you going on about murder. Leave it be."

I stopped. We stood halfway between the house and the stables. The stable and yard lay beneath the curve of a hill, the roof just visible from our position. The house sat a good fifty yards ahead of us, rising like a sphinx from the green lawns, arms extended.

"If he were murdered," I said doggedly, "it was not done up on that road. He was killed in such a place as this, where they would not be heard from house or stable. The killer fetched the horse, saddling it with the tack I'd left, and led it back to Breckenridge. He laid Breckenridge across the saddle and led him up to the woods until he found a likely spot to dispose of him. Then he slapped the horse on the rump and sent it on its way. When the horse was found, the assumption would be that Breckenridge had fallen from it."

"He did fall," Brandon said. "Why make things complicated? If a man could know which horse was Breckenridge's, why would he not know which saddle belonged to him?"

"Perhaps the murderer was not staying at the house. Breckenridge rode out at an early hour every morning by habit. Anyone staying at the village would have grown used to seeing him on the chestnut, and assume the horse was his, or at least the one he liked always to ride. But they might not have noted the saddle."

Brandon still looked annoyed, but Grenville nodded. "You may be right. I admit, if Westin were not dead, I would not be as quick to agree with you. But two of the four gentlemen involved in the incident on the Peninsula are dead, seemingly by accident. Strange, is it not?"

He was closer to the truth than he knew. Brandon did not stop scowling, but a worried light entered his eyes.

Grenville nodded to us. "I will go break the news to Lady Mary."

"Do you want me to come with you?" I offered.

Grenville considered. "No. Best I do this alone. I dislike Lady Mary, but Breckenridge was her friend. She will doubtless take it hard."

He pivoted on his heel and marched away, shoulders squared.

When he was out of earshot, I turned on Brandon, other questions troubling me. Brandon had mistaken the fallen Breckenridge for me; Breckenridge was dead. I feared, I very much feared, that the idiot had done something irreversible.

"What brings you to Kent?" I asked him sharply.

He met my gaze, his eyes chilling. "I like the country."

My anger rose. "Balls. You followed me down here. It was you skulking about the inn and the gardens, watching me, and then again this morning, was it not?"

He did not answer, but his ice blue stare told me I'd guessed right.

"Good God," I exploded. "Why?"

"Why the devil do you think?"

I balled my hands. To think I'd fretted about the tracker, wondering if it were Westin's killer. All this time it had been Brandon. It fit. He knew better than most how to follow someone about without being seen. Hell, he had taught me.

My hands tightened. "You thought I knew where Louisa was. You thought I'd come down here to see her."

"Can you blame me? Why else would you gallivant down to the country? You do not even know these people."

"They were at Badajoz," I said. "Did it not occur to you that I was still poking into the question of Captain Spencer's death?"

"Of course it occurred to me. You can never let well enough alone. But one conclusion does not preclude the other."

I stared at him. "Did you think I'd brought her with me? How damned stupid do you think I am?"

We faced each other, fists clenched. The sun shone down on us, the bright, soft morning belying the storm that ever roiled between us.

Brandon was speaking again, rapidly. "I would have thought you'd had enough of scandal. If you have her hidden somewhere, I swear I will have you arrested."

"You are an idiot. I do not know where she is."

"Damn it, Gabriel, do not lie to me. I am surprised it is not all over the scandal sheets along with all your other adventures."

I leaned to him. "It will be if you do not stop making such a pig's breakfast of it. You can follow me all over England and make scenes and look overjoyed when you think me dead, but I still do not know where your wife is."

I watched him lose strength. A warm breeze stirred his hair, brushed a loose brown lock across his cheek. "Then where did she go? If she did not go to you, then tell me where she went."

That question still troubled me as well. Lady Aline's letter had only told me she was safe, and I trusted Lady Aline to know that. But I wanted to know myself. I wanted to see her, to hold her hand, to reassure myself that all was well.

"Louisa's note said she needed time alone," I reminded him.

"Alone, where? Do you think she has gone to the continent?" He paused and would not look at me. "Or to a lover?"

"She would not disgrace you like that. If she wanted to abandon you for another, no doubt she would look you in the face and tell you so."

He did not appear convinced. But I knew that Louisa had no slyness in her, no deceit. She would rather face her husband with the truth than resort to trickery. She had left him for some other reason, a reason he could not see beyond his fear and jealousy.

A dart of pain laced my heart. On the Peninsula, when Brandon had cast her out, Louisa had come to me. I had been dreaming of that hot night when I'd walked down to the bridge in the night I'd saved Lydia Westin. Louisa had come to me, ill with weeping, and had thrown her arms about me. Her golden hair had tangled on my shoulder, and for the first time since I'd met her, I dared furrow it with my fingers.

This time, she had not turned to me. Whatever Louisa had needed or wanted, she had known I could not give it to her. This time, she had left me as well.

I ended the futile quarrel by turning from him and walking back to the house in silence.

The inquest of Viscount Breckenridge was held the next day at the public house, the Crow and Cross, in the village. The local magistrate had called in a magistrate from London, Sir Montague Harris, a rotund man obviously fond of his beefsteak and port, but one with a shrewd eye.

Colonel Brandon stood up and described how he had found the body. He had been staying in the village, he said, in fact, here at the Crow and Cross. He had decided the morning in question to walk along Linden Hill Lane. He had wanted a brisk walk and thought it would be just the thing.

This caused the coroner to ask why he was in their corner of Kent at all? To take the country air after the hot closeness of London, he replied. The Londoners in the crowd nodded in commiseration.

Had he attended the exhibition of the pugilist, Jack Sharp? No, Brandon replied. He did not like blood sports. This caused a murmur of disapproval from all those who had flocked down for their fill of the blood sport.

So far Brandon had delivered his answers in a strong, matter-of-fact voice. But when he began to describe how he had found the body and what he had done, his hands clenched into hard fists, and he kept his eyes firmly fixed two feet to the right of the coroner.

He had gone walking, as he'd said, about nine o'clock that morning. Upon reaching the crest of the hill, he'd notice that branches to the right of him had been snapped and broken, as though someone had tried to force a path through the undergrowth. Upon investigating, he had spotted the body of Lord Breckenridge lying facedown in the brush. The man had been dressed for riding, but no horse was about.

Had he gone down to the body? No? Why not? Because, Brandon said, he could see at once that the man was dead and Brandon would likely need help to lift him back to the road. Thought it more sensible to go at once for help.

The coroner shrugged, but Sir Montague Harris leaned forward. Why had Brandon made for the manor house rather than the village, which was closer? Brandon, reddening, answered that he had been acquainted with members of the house party there and naturally turned to people he knew.

Sir Montague sat back, satisfied. Then Brandon, as if suddenly remembering, said that of course he had sought out Astley Close because Lord Breckenridge had been a guest there and of course his friends would want to know if he'd been hurt.

The coroner, looking uninterested, nodded. Prompted, Brandon continued that he'd entered the stables where the grooms and stable hands had been readying horses for exercise. Brandon had reported the death and asked to be taken to the main house. Upon reaching the house, he'd found the only guest awake had been Mr. Grenville, to whom he had repeated the account of the accident.

The coroner carefully noted all this and dismissed him. Brandon visibly relaxed as he walked back to his chair. He hated to lie, and was bad at it, just as I was. And he was certainly lying about how he'd found the body. Not about all of it, but about a good part, if I were any judge.

Grenville and the stable lad and I all concurred with Brandon's story of his first going to the stables and then to the main house. We each related how we'd gone up the hill with Brandon and found Breckenridge together. Neither Brandon nor Grenville mentioned Brandon's certainty that the dead man had been me, and I did not volunteer the information.

I did mention the saddle. I explained my reasoning, that Breckenridge would have used his own cavalry saddle, which he'd said he preferred, when it was so close to hand. Sir Montague listened, his eyes fastened on me, taking in every word. I used the opportunity to mention the marks I'd found on the road, and concluded that, in my opinion, the death warranted further investigation.

The coroner eyed me in dislike. He was sitting on the body of a viscount-a peer, not an unfortunate farmhand. He wanted a simple accident, and here I was trying to complicate things.

Once all statements were made, a doctor was consulted who agreed that Lord Breckenridge had died when his neck was severed early on the morning of his death. The coroner finished his note-taking, and then instructed the jury.

Notwithstanding Captain Lacey's remarks, he said, they must decide whether they thought this a clear enough accident. There was nothing to stop a man from changing his mind and using a different saddle if the whim took him. The marks on the road could have been made at any time. The horse was found, Lord Breckenridge had been dressed for riding, and for what other purpose could he have gone up the hill?

The jury did not deliberate long. To the coroner's obvious relief, they returned with the verdict I expected-Lord Breckenridge had died while accidentally falling from his horse.

Everyone in the hot room, from the coroner to Eggleston to Brandon to the stable lads, looked pleased with the conclusion.

I kept my feelings to myself.

When we returned to Astley Close, Lady Mary closeted herself with her brother, whom she had summoned home, and left her guests to fend for themselves. The house party over, Grenville ordered his carriage made ready to take us back to London.

I encountered Lady Breckenridge in the downstairs drawing room-entirely by accident; I had been looking for Grenville. I had not seen her since finding her in my bed two nights before. But much as I hadn’t gotten on with her, Breckenridge's death had been sudden and shocking. I paused.

"Please accept my condolences on your husband's death," I said. "I am sorry."

She studied me with glittering eyes that masked emotion. "My son is now Viscount Breckenridge," she said. "Why be sorry about that?"

While I searched for a way to respond, she went on, "Tell your friend, Mr. Grenville, that his company was most pleasing."

I supposed this meant mine had not been.

"I will." I bowed. "Good afternoon."