The Glass House

Chapter Fourteen

I hastened back to Mayfair, taking Bartholomew with me. Lord Barbury's home was in Mount Street, in a large house typical of the neighborhood. Pomeroy was there, along with another Runner from the Queen's Square house, asking the neighbors what they'd heard. Nothing, Pomeroy told me in disgust.

Lord Barbury had been laid out on his bed, pale and cold. A dark red hole marred the black locks of his hair just behind his right ear. As I looked at him, my anger soared.

The fact that the pistol had been in his hand might convince the Runners that it was suicide-over grief for his dead mistress, they'd say-but I was not convinced.

His coachman, who had been the last to see him alive, replied readily to Pomeroy's questions. Upon leaving Grenville's, Lord Barbury had asked his coachman to set him down in Berkeley Square, saying that he'd walk home from there. He'd wanted to think, he'd said. Why he could not have thought in the carriage, the coachman couldn't say, but that was not a coachman's business. The man set his master down as requested and returned home. Later, one of Barbury's footmen had heard a noise outside, opened the door, and found Lord Barbury lying dead on the front doorstep.

The servants were shocked and grieved. Barbury had been a good master and a kind man. I was in a boiling fury. I had Bartholomew fetch another hackney, and I rode to Middle Temple.

I ought to have consulted Sir Montague or Thompson or even Pomeroy first, but I was tired of waiting for them to uncover evidence through slow investigation. Whatever my thoughts were, they were not clear; I only knew that I wanted to find the killer and drag him to justice. In the affair of Hanover Square, I'd sympathized with those wanting to murder the odious Horne. In the regimental affair, I'd understood the motives behind the deaths; but Peaches and Lord Barbury, though a misguided in some respects, were hardly in the same standing.

I turned to the most obvious suspect, the jealous husband.

Chapman's chambers lay in the Brick Court of Middle Temple. The house and those around it bore the same formal architecture of gray brick and white windows. The Middle Temple coat of arms, the Agnus Dei, reposed over the door.

Mr. Chapman sent down first his clerk, then his pupil, to try to put me off. Very busy, the clerk said. The red-haired Mr. Gower made a face and said, "He's been closeted all morning by himself, pouring over mucky books. Why, I do not know. I'm only thankful he hasn't made me help him."

"It's important," I said, and Bartholomew loomed behind me to put in, "There's been a murder."

Mr. Gower looked somewhat more interested. "Really? And you want to prosecute? Mr. Chapman works through a chap called Sandringham, in Fetter Lane. I'll give you his direction."

"No, Mr. Gower," I said in a hard voice. "I want to talk to Mr. Chapman about the murder of his wife's lover."

Gower's freckles spread as he raised his brows. "Good lord." He looked at Bartholomew as though asking the large lad whether this were a joke, then he looked back at me. "Well, well. Did Chapman do him in?"

"Maybe," I said.

"Good lord."

"May we go up?" I asked pointedly.

Gower blinked at me, then nodded. "Yes, yes, follow me."

He led us up a flight of polished stairs, his gait agitated. He rapped briefly at a door at the top of the stairs, then pushed it open and fled before Chapman could say a word.

Chapman looked up from behind a stack of books, his graying hair awry. "I told you I did not want-"

He broke off when he saw me, his mouth remaining open. I walked inside. Bartholomew stayed in the hall but closed the door, shutting me in alone with Chapman.

"What do you want?" Chapman bristled. "I am a busy man, sir. What did my clerk mean by admitting you?"

"I am afraid I rather insisted." I dragged a chair from the wall and sat facing Chapman. The chair was hard, the upholstery frayed. "Your wife's lover is dead."

He flushed. "I know that. What of it?"

"You have heard the news, then?"

"I do read newspapers."

"Yes, you make much of your living from the sordid crime that is reported there. Where were you last night?"

He stared, puzzled. "Last night? At home, of course."

"You have witnesses to place you there?"

"Witnesses?" He rose. "See here, Captain Lacey. What are you on about?"

"Do you?" I asked.

"My housekeeper made me supper. I ate it and retired."

"What time was this supper?"

"Eleven o'clock. I am certain of that, because I arrived home at half-past ten."

"Why so late? Were you out?"

"No, I was here. I have much practice, much work to do. Not that my good-for-nothing pupil helps me. He whined that he wanted to waste time at his club with his friends, so I told him to go."

"At what time?"

"Why are you obsessed with the hours of the day, Captain?"

"Tell me, please."

Chapman came around the desk, but I remained seated. "Leave at once, sir. I do not have time for this foolishness. I have a difficult case for which I must prepare."

"Involving murder?" I asked. "Perhaps you are researching how a man might get out of hanging for a crime of passion? How to prove it was not premeditated?"

His flush deepened. "Just what are you suggesting?"

"Did you leave these chambers last night, meet Lord Barbury, and shoot him dead?"

His brow clouded. "Lord who?"

"Barbury. You saw him yesterday at your wife's funeral."

"Did I?" He looked confused.

"The tall man with the dark hair. That was Lord Barbury. Your wife's lover."

Chapman stared at me a moment longer then his face drained of all color. He crossed back to his desk and sat, his eyes fixed in frozen horror.

" He was her lover?"

"Yes. The Thames River policeman told the court all about him at Mrs. Chapman's inquest. He wasn't there himself."

But Chapman had left the room, I now remembered, before Thompson had revealed Lord Barbury's name. Lord Barbury had managed to keep his name out of any newspaper reports of Peaches' death and inquest, probably by giving healthy bribes to the right people.

I could swear that Chapman's astonishment now was genuine. Not only astonishment, shock. He had known that his wife had taken a lover but had not realized that the name of the man was Lord Barbury. I wondered just who he'd thought the lover was.

Then it struck me. "Oh, my God," I said. "You thought it was Simon Inglethorpe."

Chapman looked at me, his face blotched red, his lips white.

"You must have heard she had been going to his house in Curzon Street," I said. "You so concluded that Inglethorpe was her lover."

Chapman's breathing was ragged. "It was an accident. The man ran at me, and the sword went right through him."

I let him sit there while I envisioned the incident. I imagined Mr. Chapman approaching number 21, Curzon Street, filled with indignation, ready to dress down Inglethorpe for his improper relations with his wife. Chapman might have thought to threaten Inglethorpe with a lawsuit or perhaps he'd merely wanted to vent his feelings. Inglethorpe might have laughed at him, provoked Chapman to anger. And my swordstick was to hand…

I paused. How Inglethorpe had suddenly produced my swordstick, I still could not fathom, nor did I yet understand why he'd removed half his clothing.

"Tell me what happened," I said.

"No, I should say nothing." Chapman's hands shook.

I rose and opened the door. Bartholomew was sitting on a wooden chair, resting his muscled shoulders against the wall. I knew he'd heard every word. "Run to Bow Street," I told him. "Fetch Pomeroy if he is back from Lord Barbury's. Tell someone to send word to Sir Montague Harris in Whitechapel. Tell them both it is urgent that they come here."

Bartholomew nodded once, sprang to his feet, and dashed off.

I stayed with Chapman, who sat listlessly, forgetting about his books and everything else around him. Gower came to offer coffee, looking puzzled and very interested.

Pomeroy arrived in a remarkably short time, followed soon after by Sir Montague Harris and Thompson.

Chapman, looking defeated, told his story. Yes, he had learned from one of his maids that Mrs. Chapman was in the habit of going to a certain house in Curzon Street, owned by a wealthy gentleman called Inglethorpe, for regular visits. Mrs. Chapman would never allow the maid to follow her in, and in fact she would dismiss the maid at the door, saying she would return home alone later.

After Peaches' death, Chapman had wanted to see for himself who was this wealthy gentleman of Curzon Street. When he'd reached the house, he found the door wide open and Inglethorpe in the reception room, shirtless, for heaven's sake, and looking annoyed.

Inglethorpe had not even had the decency to pick up his coat and put it on. He'd demanded to know what Chapman wanted, very high and mighty. Chapman had accused him of being Mrs. Chapman's lover, and Inglethorpe had laughed at him.

He'd not denied that Peaches had come there regularly; she always had a marvelous time, Inglethorpe said.

A sword from a walking stick had been lying on a chair next to the door. Chapman had picked it up, uncertain why, he said. He did not really remember, but suddenly, the sword was in his hand. He'd looked down the blade at Inglethorpe, angrier than he had ever been. Inglethorpe, alarmed, had lunged for him. Chapman had held the sword steady, and the blade had pierced Inglethorpe's chest.

Inglethorpe had dropped to the floor. Chapman had let go of the sword and fled.

Chapman's voice was hollow when he finished. Thompson and Sir Montague exchanged glances. Pomeroy said, "A nice story. Now then, sir, what about your wife?"

Chapman looked puzzled. "What do you mean?"

"Your wife, who was cuckolding you with a Mayfair gent. Did you kill her first, vowing you would kill her lover as well?"

"No, no. I did nothing to Amelia. I told you, I never saw her after the time she left my house to begin her journey to Sussex."

"Well, the jury will decide whether that's true," Pomeroy said cheerfully. "Who knows? Perhaps the gent what prosecutes you will be one of your acquaintance from Middle Temple." He chuckled.

Chapman went white. The man who had aspired to take silk would now have a King's Counsel staring at him across the courtroom at the Old Bailey, questioning his stammered explanation of how Inglethorpe had run into the swordstick.

I rather believed Chapman had stabbed Inglethorpe in fury then had come up with the story of Inglethorpe skewering himself, while sitting in this room "researching" his case. The sword had been thrust all the way through Inglethorpe's chest and into the carpet. I could imagine Chapman stabbing, Inglethorpe crumpling, dying, Chapman keeping the sword hard in him until he'd pinned Inglethorpe to the floor.

As Pomeroy had said, the jury would decide what was true.

Before Pomeroy dragged Chapman off, I said to him, "What is the name of your wife's man of business? I wish to speak with him."

Chapman stared at me in bewilderment. "My wife did not have a man of business. All of our affairs were handled by mine."

"Oh, but she did," Sir Montague Harris broke in, a smile on his broad face. "He sent the coroner a letter on hearing of her death, asking for the death certificate."

Chapman continued to look surprised.

I was surprised as well. "So the man of business does exist?" I asked.

"Indeed," Sir Montague said. "I think I ought to pay him a visit. Care to join me, Captain?"

"This is most irregular," the thin man on the other side of the table said to us. He had sandy, almost colorless hair, narrow dark eyes, and pale skin stretched tightly over his bones. He kept a tiny room in a court off Chancery Lane, not far from the Temples, had a clerk as thin as he was, and an office of painful neatness.

His name was Ichabod Harper, and he'd been Peaches' man of business for six years, ever since she'd inherited property in a trust.

"Murder is most irregular," Sir Montague replied.

"Indeed," Mr. Harper said.

Sir Montague beamed at him. "Now then, tell us, sir, what was this property, how did Mrs. Chapman come to inherit it, and to whom does it pass on occasion of her death?"

Mr. Harper cleared his throat, a dry sound. "To answer that, sir, I must go back some years. Mrs. Chapman's parents were a rather low form of actors-strolling players, I believe they are called. Mrs. Chapman's grandmother had married one of these players, running away and disgracing her family, who then disowned her. The grandmother's sister-Mrs. Chapman's great aunt-took it upon herself to see that her foolish sister's offspring would not be completely destitute. Mrs. Chapman's parents died of a fever eight years ago, leaving Mrs. Chapman-then Miss Amelia Leary-alone. The great aunt offered to have her grandniece live with her, but Mrs. Chapman ignored the invitation and continued to live on her own with the strolling players."

He looked disapproving, but I understood Peaches' reasoning. A young girl, full of life, would rather stay with the people and the freedom she'd known her entire life than return to be a poor relation to family connections who did not approve of her.

"Two years after that," Mr. Harper continued, "the great aunt, who had never married herself, died. She had named her sister's children and grandchildren as inheritors of a trust, of which I am the trustee. Mrs. Chapman's mother was the only offspring of the original ill-advised marriage, and because she and her husband had already died, Miss Amelia Leary was the only one left to inherit the trust. And so, upon learning she had inherited the property, Miss Leary decided to come to London. She looked me up, and I explained it all to her."

"Did not the property go to Chapman when she married him?" I asked. That was usual, unless the trust protected the property very tightly. Most men inherited what their wives had absolutely, and a gentleman could sell a wife's property and squander the money however he wished.

"This trust was quite specific," Mr. Harper said. "The property belonged solely to Miss Amelia Leary and the heirs she named, and the trust ensured that her husband could not touch it. The great aunt had no liking for men and feared the property going to, as she called them, 'lowly actors.' Now, as Mrs. Chapman had no offspring before she died, the trust reverts to the original estate, and we trace the inheritance from there. So far, I have had no luck."

"What was this property?" Sir Montague asked him.

"A house in London," Mr. Harper replied in his thin voice. "Number 12, St. Charles Row."

"Well, this is a turn up," Thompson said.

The three of us had adjourned to a coffeehouse, where Sir Montague partook of beefsteak, and Thompson and I sipped rather over-boiled coffee.

We were all a bit startled by the revelation. But the fact that Peaches owned The Glass House herself explained why she'd not needed Lord Barbury to supply her with one. It also explained why she'd kept a room there after her marriage. It was a place of her own, a retreat from her unhappy life with Chapman.

A trust meant that although Peaches had technically inherited number 12, St. Charles Row, she could not sell it. But she could certainly hire it out and enjoy the income from it. The house had indeed been hired, Mr. Harper had gone on to tell us, to-no surprise to any of us-Kensington.

There was no doubt that the house made much money, and Peaches would have reaped some of the profit. The riches she'd looked for upon first journeying to London had come to her, although perhaps not as she'd anticipated.

"Well, her husband wouldn't have killed her for the house," Thompson said. He took a sip of coffee. "He doesn't get it. Think he's telling the truth about Inglethorpe?"

"Possibly," Sir Montague said. "Or at least what he's convinced himself is the truth."

"He still cannot explain why Inglethorpe had taken off half his clothes," I mentioned. "Nor why he had mud on his shoes."

Both men looked at me without much enthusiasm. They had found and arrested a murderer; they did not much care about the victim's eccentricities.

"What about poor Lord Barbury?" I continued. "Have you any idea who might have killed him?"

"Himself," Thompson said. "You say that his health had deteriorated greatly after Mrs. Chapman's death. Due to either excessive grief or excessive remorse, perhaps."

I studied my coffee. "I do not think he did it himself. I saw the wound that killed him. It was too far to the back of his head." I lifted my hand and tapped myself behind the ear. "It is more usual for a man to shoot himself through the temple, or through the mouth."

I had seen more than one corpse of a suicide in the Army; once, of a man in my own company. Most of us in the Army had been very stoic about the fact that every time we rode into battle, we would likely not return. We agreed that death fighting the pesky French was more honorable than death by the infections that regularly swept through the camps. We even joked about it.

But there were those for whom the horrors of war had come as a shock. Some men could not face shooting and killing others and were terrified by the thought of death by bayonet or musket ball. In the quiet hours of dawn, these gentlemen would creep away by themselves and end their lives quickly with a bullet in the head, as I described.

No one stopped them. A man had to find honor where he could. We simply buried them, sent their effects back to their families, and marched on.

I'd always thought it a waste of life that these good officers and men were not put to use elsewhere than the front. But the pigheaded fear of cowardice, drummed into us since birth, made men prefer death at their own hands to being made a headquarters aide because they could not face bullets.

The head wounds I had seen on these men were usually in the temple, above the ear, or through the back of the throat. None had been behind the ear, where the man would have to pull his arm back at a slightly uncomfortable angle.

"Perhaps," Sir Montague agreed. "What we need is a witness or more evidence. Pomeroy continues to tramp through the neighborhood, but so far, no one admits they saw him die."

"I don't think Chapman killed him," I continued. "He was astonished when I told him Lord Barbury had been his wife's lover. He'd been fixed on Inglethorpe."

"Why would someone other than Chapman kill Lord Barbury, in any case?" Thompson asked. "Unless Lord Barbury knew something about Mrs. Chapman's death that he hadn't revealed?"

I turned my cup around on the table. "I have toyed with the idea that Lord Barbury might have been blackmailing the killer, and the killer grew fearful or tired of it. But I do not think so. I would swear Barbury knew nothing of how Mrs. Chapman died."

"Unless he killed her himself," Sir Montague suggested. "Then remorse built up so much that he took a quick way out. Or perhaps after speaking with you and Mr. Grenville, he realized that he could not hide his guilt forever."

"Lord Barbury was a man of volatile passions," I said. "I saw that in him, and in those letters he wrote to Mrs. Chapman. I agree that he could have quarreled with Mrs. Chapman and killed her, perhaps even accidentally. Both of the bedrooms I saw had heavy brass fenders at the fireplaces. If she'd fallen and hit her head, the blow could have killed her. I did check both fenders and found no evidence of blood on either, but they could have been cleaned afterward. The one in the attic was certainly shiny."

"Well, I shall ask Mr. Kensington about those fenders, when I have him up before me," Sir Montague said, sounding happy. "I intend to arrest him before the week is out. I will need your testimony and that of the little girl, Lacey, but I will get him."

"What of Lady Jane?" I asked. I had explained about her, and what Denis had told me, on our way to see Mr. Harper.

"I've heard of her," Sir Montague said. "So far, no one has been able to fasten anything illegal to her, but that is because she's slippery, not innocent." He thought a moment. "Can Mr. Denis set us an appointment with this Lady Jane?"

"He and Lady Jane are fierce rivals," I said. "I doubt she'd let him pin her down."

"Mr. Denis might find it in his best interest to keep a magistrate happy," Sir Montague said, smiling.

"Unfortunately, that may not sway him."

"No harm in asking," Sir Montague said with good cheer. "Or we can get to her through her subordinate, although I have the feeling that when we arrest Kensington, she, the larger fish, will slip the net. I would like to do this the easy way, Captain. I do not have the manpower to scour the city for her."

I gave him a nod and promised to send word to Denis, though I was not optimistic.

Sir Montague grunted as he climbed to his feet. "I will have Mr. Harper keep me informed of who will inherit the house. I hope this person, whoever it might be, is horrified to learn it is being used as a bawdy house and closes it. And if he is of mercenary disposition and wishes the income from it, I will have a little talk with him."

Sir Montague looked buoyed. He had realized today that The Glass House's lifespan would be even shorter than he'd hoped.

"Lady Jane can simply open another house," I pointed out.

"Not if I have anything to say about it." Sir Montague stuck out his hand. "You have been of great help, Captain."

"I have done very little," I said, as we shook on it.

"Nonsense. You got yourself into The Glass House where my patrollers could not go, you found the connection between Mrs. Chapman, Lord Barbury, and The Glass House, you got Chapman to confess to the murder of Inglethorpe. Impressive work to this plodding magistrate."

"It comes from poking my nose where it does not belong."

"Yes, indeed." Sir Montague clapped me on the shoulder. "Keep it up, there's a good fellow."