The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle

59

Quite what reaction I’d expected from Evelyn I’m not sure, but she surprises me by clapping her hands in delight, jumping up and down as though we’re pets performing a new trick.

‘I knew it would be worth following you two,’ she says, placing her lantern on the ground, stitching its glow to ours. ‘People don’t trek all the way into the darkness without a little knowledge to light the way. Though I must confess, I’m at a loss as to how this is any of your concern.’

She’s shed her French accent and with it any trace of the dutiful maid she was hiding behind. Shoulders that once slouched straighten immediately, her neck stiffening, pushing her chin into the air so that she seems to survey us from atop some lofty cliff.

Her questioning gaze passes between us, but my attention is fixed on the forest. This will all be for nothing if the Plague Doctor isn’t here to hear it, but beyond the puddle of light cast by our two lanterns, it’s pitch-black. He could be standing ten yards away and I’d never know.

Mistaking my silence for obstinacy, Evelyn offers me a wide smile. She’s enjoying us. She’s going to savour us.

We have to keep her entertained until the Plague Doctor arrives.

‘This was what you had planned for Thomas all those years ago, wasn’t it?’ I say, pointing towards Helena’s body in the boathouse. ‘I questioned the stablemaster who told me you’d gone out riding on the morning of his death, but that was just an alibi. You’d arranged to meet Thomas here, so all you had to do was ride past the gatehouse, tie up the horse and cut directly through the forest. I timed it myself. You could have arrived in under half an hour without anybody seeing, giving you plenty of time to murder Thomas quietly in the boathouse, wash in the water, change clothes and be back on your horse before anybody knew he was missing. You’d stolen the murder weapon from the stablemaster, and the blanket you were going to cover the body in. He was supposed to take the blame once Thomas was found, only the plan went wrong, didn’t it?’

‘Everything went wrong,’ she says, clicking her tongue. ‘The boathouse was a backup, in case my first idea went awry. I intended to daze Thomas with a rock and then drown him, leaving him floating in the lake for somebody to find. A tragic accident, and we’d all go about our lives. Sadly, I didn’t get a chance to use either plan. I hit Thomas over the head, but not nearly hard enough. He started screaming and I panicked, stabbing him out here in the open.’

She sounds irritated, though not unduly so. It’s as though she’s describing nothing more serious than a picnic spoiled by bad weather, and I catch myself staring at her. I’d deduced most of the story before coming here, but to hear it relayed so callously, without regret of any sort, is horrifying. She’s soulless, conscienceless. I can barely believe she’s a person.

Noticing me floundering, Anna takes up the conversation.

‘And that’s when Lady Hardcastle and Charlie Carver stumbled upon you.’ She’s considering every word, laying them ahead of her onrushing thoughts. ‘Somehow you managed to convince them Thomas’s death was an accident.’

‘They did most of the work themselves,’ muses Evelyn. ‘I thought it was all over when they appeared on that path. I got halfway through telling them I was trying to get the knife away from Thomas, when Carver filled in the rest for me. Accident, children playing, that sort of thing. He handed me a story gift-wrapped.’

‘Did you know Carver was your father?’ I ask, regaining my composure.

‘No, but I was a child. I simply accepted my good fortune and went riding, as I was told. It wasn’t until I’d been shipped off to Paris that Mother told me the truth. I think she wanted me to be proud of him.’

‘So Carver sees his daughter covered in blood on the lake bank,’ continues Anna, speaking slowly, trying to put everything in order. ‘He realises you’re going to need some clean clothes, and he goes to the house to fetch them while Helena stays with Thomas. That’s what Stanwin saw when he followed Carver to the lake, that’s why he believed Helena killed her own son. It’s why he let his friend take the blame.’

‘That and a great deal of money,’ says Evelyn, her lip curling, revealing the tips of her teeth. Her green eyes are glassy, blank. Utterly without empathy, intolerant of remorse. ‘Mother paid him handsomely over the years.’

‘Charlie Carver didn’t know you’d planned the murder beforehand and already had a change of clothes waiting in the boathouse,’ I say, struggling not to look for the Plague Doctor among the trees. ‘The clothes stayed there, hidden, for eighteen years until your mother found them when she visited Blackheath last year. She knew what they meant immediately. She even told Michael about them, probably to test his reaction.’

‘She must have thought he knew about the murder,’ says Anna pityingly. ‘Can you imagine... she couldn’t trust either of her children.’

A breeze is stirring, rain plinking against our lanterns. There’s a noise from the forest, indistinct and distant but enough to draw Evelyn’s attention for an instant.

‘Stall her,’ I mouth to Anna, as I remove my coat and lay it across her thin shoulders, earning a grateful smile.

‘It must have been terrible for Lady Hardcastle,’ says Anna, drawing the coat tighter. ‘Realising the daughter she let her lover go to the gallows to protect had murdered her own brother in cold blood.’ Her voice drops. ‘How could you do that, Evelyn?’

‘I think the better question is why she did it,’ I say, looking at Anna. ‘Thomas liked to follow people around. He knew he’d get into trouble if he was caught, so he got very good at being quiet. One day he followed Evelyn into the forest, where she met a stable boy. I don’t know why they were meeting, or even if it had been planned. Maybe it was a coincidence, but I think there was an accident. I hope it was an accident,’ I say, shooting a glance at Evelyn, who’s appraising me like a moth that’s landed on her jacket. Our entire future’s written in the creases around her eyes; that pale white face is a crystal ball with only horrors in the fog.

‘Doesn’t matter really,’ I carry on, realising she isn’t going to answer me. ‘Either way, she killed him. Likely, Thomas didn’t understand what he’d seen, or he’d have run back and told his mother, but at some point Evelyn realised he knew. She had two choices: silence Thomas before he told somebody, or confess to what she’d done. She chose the first option, and set about her work methodically.’

‘That’s very good,’ says Evelyn, her face lighting up. ‘Aside from a detail or two, it’s almost as if you were there in the flesh. You’re a delight, Mr Gold, you know that? Far more entertaining than the dull creature I mistook you for last night.’

‘What happened to the stable boy?’ asks Anna. ‘The stablemaster said he was never found.’

Evelyn considers her for a long while. At first I think it’s because she’s deciding whether to answer the question, and then I realise the truth. She’s summoning the memory. She hasn’t thought about it in years.

‘It was the most curious thing,’ says Evelyn distantly. ‘He took me to see some caves he’d found. I knew my parents wouldn’t approve, so we went in secret, but he was very tedious company. We were exploring, and he fell into a deep hole. Nothing too serious, I could easily have fetched help. I told him I was going to, and then it dawned on me. I didn’t have to fetch help. I didn’t have to do anything at all. I could leave him there. Nobody knew where he’d gone, or that I was with him. It seemed like fate.’

‘You just abandoned him,’ says Anna, aghast.

‘And you know, I rather enjoyed it. He was my thrilling little secret until Thomas asked me why I’d gone to the caves that day.’ Keeping her gun trained on us, she lifts her lantern out of the mud. ‘And the rest you know. Pity, really.’

She cocks the hammer, but Anna steps in front of me.

‘Wait!’ she says, stretching out a hand.

‘Please, don’t beg,’ says Evelyn, exasperated. ‘I hold you in such high regard, really you have no idea. Aside from my mother, nobody’s thought twice about Thomas’s death in nearly twenty years, and then, out of the blue, you two appear with almost the entire thing wrapped up in a nice little bow. It must have taken a great deal of determination, and I admire that, but nothing is so unbecoming as a lack of pride.’

‘I’m not going to beg, but the story’s not done,’ says Anna. ‘We deserve to hear the rest of it.’

Evelyn smiles, her expression beautiful and brittle and utterly mad.

‘You think me a fool,’ she says, wiping the rain from her eyes.

‘I think you’re going to kill us,’ says Anna calmly, speaking as one would to a small child. ‘And I think if you do it out in the open, lots of people will hear. You need to move us somewhere quieter, so why not let us talk on the way.’

Evelyn takes a few steps towards her, holding the lantern close to her face so that she might better inspect her. Her head is cocked, lips slightly parted.

‘Clever girl,’ says Evelyn, purring in admiration. ‘Very well, turn around and start walking.’

I listen to this exchange with increasing panic, desperately hoping the Plague Doctor will appear out of the gloom and finally put an end to this. He must surely have enough evidence to support Anna’s freedom by now.

Unless he’s been delayed.

The thought fills me with dread. Anna’s trying to keep us alive, but it will all be for nothing if the Plague Doctor doesn’t know where to find us.

I reach for our lantern, but Evelyn kicks it away, motioning us into the forest with the point of her gun.

We walk side by side with Evelyn a couple of paces behind, humming softly. I risk a look over my shoulder, but she’s far enough back to make snatching the gun an impossible endeavour. Even if I could, it wouldn’t be any use. We’re not here to capture Evelyn, we’re here to prove Anna’s not like her, and the best way of doing that is to be in danger.

Heavy clouds blot out the stars and with only Evelyn’s dim flame to guide us, we’re having to move cautiously to avoid tripping. It’s like trying to navigate through ink, and still there’s no sign of the Plague Doctor.

‘If your mother knew a year ago what you’d done, why didn’t she tell everybody then?’ asks Anna, glancing back at Evelyn. ‘Why arrange this party, why invite all these people?’

There’s genuine curiosity in her tone. If she’s afraid, she’s keeping it in a pocket somewhere I can’t see. Evidently, Evelyn’s not the only actress in the house. I can only hope I’m doing as well. My heart’s thumping hard enough to crack a rib.

‘Greed,’ says Evelyn. ‘My parents needed money more than my mother needed to see me hang. I can only assume the marriage took some time to arrange, because Mother sent me a letter last month telling me that unless I allowed myself to be wedded to that odious Ravencourt, they’d turn me in. The humiliation of today’s party was a parting shot, a slither of justice for Thomas.’

‘So you killed them in revenge?’ asks Anna.

‘Father was a trade. Michael murdered Felicity, and I murdered Father. My brother wanted his inheritance while there still was one. He’s buying Stanwin’s blackmail business with Coleridge.’

‘Then it really was your boot print I saw outside the gatehouse window,’ I say. ‘And you left the note claiming responsibility.’

‘Well, I couldn’t have poor Michael being blamed, that would defeat the point entirely,’ she says. ‘I don’t intend on using my name once I leave here, so why not put it to some use?’

‘And your mother?’ asks Anna. ‘Why kill her?’

‘I was in Paris,’ says Evelyn, anger heating her words for the first time. ‘If she hadn’t bartered me to Ravencourt, she’d never have seen me again. As far as I’m concerned, she committed suicide.’

The trees break suddenly, revealing the gatehouse. We’ve come out around the back of the building, opposite the latched door into the kitchen the fake Evelyn showed Bell that first morning.

‘Where did you find the other Evelyn?’ I ask.

‘Her name was Felicity Maddox. She was some sort of con artist, from what I understand,’ says Evelyn vaguely. ‘Stanwin arranged everything. Michael told him the family wanted Felicity to marry Ravencourt in my place, at which point they’d pay him half of the dowry to keep quiet.’

‘Did Stanwin know what you planned to do?’ asks Anna.

‘Perhaps, but why would he care?’ shrugs Evelyn, gesturing for me to open the door. ‘Felicity was an insect. Some policeman or other tried to help her this afternoon and you know what she did? Instead of admitting everything to him, she ran straight to Michael and asked for more money to keep quiet. Really, a person like that is a stain upon the world. I consider her murder an act of public service.’

‘And Millicent Derby, was her death a public service?’

‘Oh, Millicent,’ says Evelyn, brightening at the memory. ‘You know, back in the day, she was as bad as her son. She just didn’t have the energy for it in her later years.’

We’re passing through the kitchen, into the hallway. The house is silent, all of its occupants dead. Despite that, a lamp burns brightly on the wall, suggesting Evelyn always intended on coming back here.

‘Millicent recognised you, didn’t she?’ I say, dragging my fingertips along the wallpaper. I can feel myself coming unstuck. None of this feels real any more. I need to touch something solid so I know I’m not dreaming. ‘She spotted you in the ballroom alongside Felicity,’ I continue, remembering how the old lady hurried away from Derby. ‘She had watched you grow up and wasn’t going to be fooled by a maid’s outfit and Gold’s new portraits on the wall. Millicent knew immediately who you were.’

‘She came down to the kitchen, demanding to know what I was up to,’ says Evelyn. ‘I told her it was a prank for the ball and the silly old dear believed me.’

I glance around, hoping for some hint of the Plague Doctor’s presence, but my hope is fading. There’s no reason for him to know we’re here, so he will have no idea how courageous Anna’s being, or that she’s solved his riddle. We’re wading towards death with a madwoman, and it’s all for nothing.

‘How did you kill her?’ I ask, desperately trying to keep Evelyn talking while I come up with a new plan.

‘I stole a bottle of veronal from Doctor Dickie’s bag and crushed a few tablets into her tea,’ she says. ‘When she passed out, I held a pillow over her face until she stopped breathing and then fetched Dickie.’

There’s joy in her voice, as if this is some happy old memory being shared among friends at the dinner table. ‘He saw the veronal from his bag on her nightstand and immediately realised he was implicated,’ she says. ‘That’s the beauty of corrupt men, you can always rely on them to be corrupt.’

‘So he took the bottle away and claimed it was a heart attack to cover his own tracks,’ I say, letting out a little sigh.

‘Oh, don’t fret, lover,’ she says, prodding me in the back with the barrel of the gun. ‘Millicent Derby died as she lived, with elegance and calculation. It was a gift, believe me. We should all be so lucky to meet such a meaningful end.’

I worry she’s leading us into the room where Lord Hardcastle sits twisted in his chair, but instead she shepherds us through the door opposite. It’s a small dining room, four chairs and a square table at its centre. Evelyn’s lantern light scatters across the walls, illuminating two canvas bags in the corner, each of them stuffed to bursting with jewellery, clothing and whatever else she could steal from Blackheath.

Her new life will begin where ours ends.

Ever the artist, Gold can at least appreciate the symmetry.

Placing her lantern on the table, Evelyn gestures for us to kneel on the floor. Her eyes are glittering, her face flushed.

A window faces the road, but I can see no sign of the Plague Doctor.

‘I’m afraid you’re out of time,’ she says, raising the gun.

One move left to play.

‘Why did you kill Michael?’ I ask quickly, hurling the accusation at her.

Evelyn tenses, her smile evaporating. ‘What are you talking about?’

‘You poisoned him,’ I say, watching the confusion sketch itself on her face. ‘Every day, all I’ve heard is how close you two were, how much you loved him. He didn’t even know that you’d killed Thomas, or your mother, did he? You didn’t want him thinking ill of you. And yet when the time came, you killed him as easily as the rest of your victims.’

Her gaze is flicking between myself and Anna, the gun wavering in her hand. For the first time, she seems afraid.

‘You’re lying, I’d never hurt Michael,’ she says.

‘I watched him die, Evelyn,’ I say. ‘I stood over him as—’

She strikes me with the gun, blood oozing from my lip.

I’d intended on snatching the gun from her, but she was too fast, and she’s already taken a step away from us.

‘Don’t lie to me,’ she wails, eyes ablaze, rapid breaths escaping her mouth.

‘He’s not,’ protests Anna, wrapping her arms around my shoulders protectively.

Tears roll down Evelyn’s cheeks, her lip trembling. Her love is rabid, pulsing and rotten, but it’s sincere. Somehow that only makes her more monstrous.

‘I didn’t...’ She’s clutching her hair, pulling hard enough to tear it from the roots. ‘He knew I couldn’t marry... he wanted to help.’ She looks at us pleadingly. ‘He killed her for me, so I could be free... he loved me...’

‘You had to be certain though,’ I say. ‘You couldn’t risk him losing his nerve and Felicity waking up again so you gave her a glass of poisoned Scotch before she walked out to the reflecting pool.’

‘But you didn’t tell Michael,’ Anna continues. ‘And he drank what was left while Rashton was questioning him.’

Evelyn’s gun has dipped, and I tense, readying myself to spring for it, but Anna tightens her grip around me.

‘He’s here,’ she whispers into my ear, nodding towards the window.

A single candle burns on the road, illuminating a porcelain beak mask. Hope stirs, but withers immediately. He isn’t moving. He can’t even hear what’s being said.

What’s he waiting for?

‘Oh, no,’ says Anna, sounding sick to her stomach.

She’s staring at the Plague Doctor as well, except instead of my confusion, there’s horror. She’s gone pale, her fingers clutching at my sleeve.

‘We haven’t solved it,’ she says, speaking under her breath. ‘We still don’t know who kills Evelyn Hardcastle, the real Evelyn Hardcastle. And our suspect pool is down to two.’

A cold weight settles on me.

I’d hoped Anna’s unmasking of Evelyn would be enough to earn her freedom, but she’s right. For all the Plague Doctor’s talk of redemption and rehabilitation, he still needs one more life to pay the piper, and he expects one of us to deliver it.

Evelyn’s still pacing, still tearing at her hair, still distracted by Michael’s death, but she’s too far away to ambush. Maybe Anna or I could wrestle the gun from her hand, but not before the other one was shot dead.

We’ve been tricked.

The Plague Doctor stayed away on purpose so he wouldn’t have to hear Anna’s answer and confront the good woman she’s become. He doesn’t know I was wrong about Michael.

Or he doesn’t care.

He’s got what he wanted. If I die, he’ll free me. If she dies, she’s trapped here, just like his superiors wanted. They’re going to keep her forever, no matter what she does.

Unable to hold in my despair in any longer, I run to the window and bang on the glass.

‘It’s not fair!’ I scream at the distant shape of the Plague Doctor.

My fury startles Anna, who jumps away in fright. Evelyn advances on me with her gun raised, mistaking my anger for panic.

Desperation claws at me.

I told the Plague Doctor I wouldn’t abandon Anna, that I’d find a way back into Blackheath if they released me, but I can’t spend another day in this place. I can’t let myself be slaughtered again. I can’t watch Felicity’s suicide, or be betrayed by Daniel Coleridge. I can’t live any of this over, and part of me, a much larger part than I’d ever have believed possible, is ready to rush Evelyn and be done with it all, regardless of what happens to my friend.

Blinded by my misery, I don’t notice Anna come to me. Ignoring Evelyn, who’s watching her the way an owl might a dancing mouse, Anna takes both my hands and stands on her tiptoes, kissing me on the cheek.

‘Don’t you dare come back for me,’ she says, pressing her forehead to mine.

She acts fast, turning on her heel and leaping at Evelyn in one fluid motion.

The gunshot is deafening, and for a few seconds its fading echo is all there is. Crying out, I rush to Anna’s side, even as the gun clatters to the floor, blood seeping through Evelyn’s shirt above her hip.

Her mouth opens and closes as she drops to her knees, a silent plea held in those hollow eyes.

Felicity Maddox is standing in the doorway, a nightmare come to life. She’s still wearing her blue ball gown, now dripping wet and covered in mud, her make-up running down pale cheeks scratched by her hurried flight through the trees. Her lipstick is smeared, her hair wild, the black revolver steady in her hand.

She throws us a quick glance, but I doubt she sees us. Rage has left her half mad. Pointing the revolver at Evelyn’s stomach, she pulls the trigger, the shot so loud I have to cover my ears as blood splashes across the wallpaper. Not satisfied, she fires again, Evelyn collapsing on the floor.

Walking over to her, Felicity empties the last of her bullets into Evelyn’s lifeless body.