The Meaning of Night (51 page)

‘You’d speak out against him, of course,’ I said to Pettingale.

‘Speak out? What do you mean?’

‘Publicly declare what you have just told me.’

‘Now hang on a moment.’ Pettingale made to get up out of his chair, but I pushed

him back.

‘Something wrong Mr Pettingale?’

‘Look here,’ he said, ‘I can’t, you know. Implicated myself, and all that. And my

life wouldn’t be worth a sniff.’

‘Don’t take on so,’ I said soothingly. ‘I might only need you to testify privately to

Lord Tansor. No repercussions. Just a quiet conversation with his Lordship. You could do

that all right, couldn’t you?’

He thought for a moment. To aid reflection, I picked up my pistol from the table.

At length, looking whiter and pastier than ever, he said he supposed he could, if

matters were so arranged that his identity was concealed from Lord Tansor.

‘We’ll need some evidence,’ I said. ‘Something unequivocal, in writing. Could

you lay your hands on such a thing?’

He nodded, and placed his head in his hands.

‘Bravo, Pettingale,’ I said with a smile, patting him on the shoulders. ‘But

remember this: if you tell your former associates of our conversation, or if you

subsequently take it into your head to be unco-operative, you may be assured of paying a

very high price. I hope we understand each other?’

I was now leaning over him, the barrel of my pistol pressed against his temple.

He did not reply, so I repeated my question. He looked up at me, with such a

weary and resigned look.

‘Yes, Mr Glapthorn,’ he said, closing his eyes and giving a great sigh. ‘I

understand you perfectly.’?

31:

Flamma fumo est proxima ?

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I left Field Court in the highest of spirits. At last I had the means to destroy

Daunt’s reputation, as he had once destroyed mine; and in doing so, I could also fatally

undermine Lord Tansor’s faith in his nominated heir! It was exhilarating to feel my

power over my enemy, and to know that he was even now going about his business in

ignorance of the Damoclean sword hanging over him. But still there was the question of

when to draw on Pettingale’s testimony, and on the evidence he claimed he could provide

concerning Daunt’s criminous activities. To do so before I could prove to Lord Tansor

that I was his son would be an incomplete revenge. How infinitely more tormenting it

would be for Daunt if, at the very moment of his destruction, I could stand revealed as the

true heir!

My thoughts now returned to Mr Carteret’s murder, and to the question of his

‘discovery’. He had said to me, during our meeting in Stamford, that the matter he had

wished to lay before Mr Tredgold had a critical bearing on Daunt’s prospects. I was now

convinced that Mr Carteret had been in possession of information relating to the Tansor

succession that would have helped me establish my identity – it might even have

provided the unassailable proof I had been seeking. It therefore followed, if my

assumption was correct that Mr Carteret had been attacked in order to obtain the

documents he had been carrying in his bag, that what was of the utmost value to me had

also been of value to someone else.

Suspicions and hypotheses filled my head, but I could come to no clear

conclusion. The truth was, I needed an ally; a subtle, informed mind; an associate whose

knowledge and experience complemented and extended my own to help throw a light

into the dark places through which I was wandering.

No sooner had I acknowledged the need to confide in someone than I thought of

Mr Tredgold. He had shown me such warm consideration, along with ample

demonstrations of his regard, and I had not the least doubt that I could trust his discretion

absolutely. Surely I could find no one better to offer counsel and guidance, and help me

find a way through the labyrinth of supposition and speculation? And so I resolved then

and there that I would confess everything to my employer and ask for his assistance in

my quest to prove my identity. Fired by this decision, I walked briskly to Paternoster-row

and knocked on the Senior Partner’s door.

There was no reply. I knocked again. Then Rebecca appeared, coming down the

internal stairs that led up to Mr Tredgold’s private apartment.

‘’E’s not there,’ she said. ‘’E left for Canterbury yesterday, to see his brother.’

‘When will he be back?’ I asked.

‘Monday,’ she said.

Three days. I simply could not wait.

I walked along to my office. On my desk was an envelope containing a

black-edged card, with the following communication printed in black-letter type:

The family and friends of the late Mr Paul Carteret, M.A., F.R.S.A., request the

favour of Mr Edward Glapthorn’s company on Friday next, the 4th of November, 1854,

to unite with them in paying the last tribute of respect to the deceased. Mourners are

asked to assemble at 11 o’clock, at the Dower House, Evenwood, Northamptonshire, and

then to proceed in the coaches provided to the Church of St Michael and All Angels,

Evenwood. An early reply to the undertaker, Mr P. Gutteridge, Baxter’s Yard, Easton,

Northamptonshire, will oblige.

I duly sat down to write a formal note of acceptance to Mr Gutteridge, and a

personal note to Miss Carteret, which I called for one of the clerks to take to the

Post-office.

This business done, I determined at once to go down to Canterbury, to see my

employer. I dashed off a note to Bella, whom I had been engaged to meet that evening,

and then consulted my Bradshaw.

I arrived in Canterbury at last to find myself standing before a tall, rather

forbidding three-storey residence close by the Westgate. Marden House stood a little

back from the road, separated from it by a narrow paved area and a low brick wall topped

with railings.

I was admitted, and then shown into a downstairs room. A few moments later, Dr

Jonathan Tredgold entered.

He was shorter and a little heavier than his brother, with the same feathery hair,

though darker and in somewhat shorter supply. He held my card in his hand.

‘Mr Edward Glapthorn, I believe?’

I gave a slight bow and begged to be forgiven for intruding on him at such a time.

‘I beg you to excuse this intrusion, Dr Tredgold,’ I began, ‘but I was hoping it might be

possible to speak with your brother.’

He pulled his shoulders back and looked at me as if I had said something

insulting.

‘My brother has been taken ill,’ he said. ‘Seriously ill.’

He saw the shock his words had produced and gestured to me to sit down.

‘This is sad news, Dr Tredgold,’ I began. ‘Very sad. Is he —’

‘A paralytic seizure, I am afraid. Completely unexpected.’

Dr Tredgold could not give me a categorical assurance, as things then stood, that

his brother’s paralysis would pass quickly, or that, even if it did abate, there would not be

severe and permanent debilitation of his powers.

‘I believe my brother has spoken of you,’ he said after a short space of silence.

Then he suddenly slapped his knee and cried, ‘I have it! You were amanuensis, secretary,

or what not, to the son of the authoress.’

I struggled to conceal the effect of this wholly unexpected and astonishing

reference to my foster-mother, but evidently without success.

‘You are surprised at my powers of recall, no doubt. But I only have to be told

something once, you see, and it can be brought to mind in perpetuity. My dear brother

calls it a phenomenon. It was a matter of much amusement between us – a little game we

would play whenever he came here. Christopher would always try to catch me out, but he

never would, you know. He mentioned to me, some years ago now, I believe, that you

had such a connection with Mrs Glyver, whose works of fiction he and I – and our sister

– used greatly to admire; and of course I have never forgotten it. It is a gift I have; and, in

addition to the harmless amusement it affords my brother and me whenever we meet, it

has had some practical use in my medical career.’

His words were delivered with a succession of deep sighs. It was apparent that a

close bond united the two brothers, and I divined also that the doctor’s expert knowledge

made him less sanguine, with regard to the Senior Partner’s prognosis, than he might

otherwise have been without it.

‘Dr Tredgold,’ I ventured, ‘I have come to regard your brother as more than an

employer. Since I first came into his service he has become, I might almost say, a kind of

father to me; and his generosity towards me has been out of all proportion to my deserts.

We have also shared many interests – of a specialist character. In short, he is a person I

esteem highly, and it pains me greatly to hear this terrible news. I wonder, would it be at

all presumptuous if —’

‘You would like to see him?’ Dr Tredgold broke in, anticipating my request. ‘And

then, perhaps, we might take a little supper together.’

I accompanied Dr Tredgold upstairs, to a bedchamber at the rear of the house. A

nurse was sitting by the bed, whilst in a chair by the window sat a lady in black, reading.

She looked up as we entered.

‘Mr Edward Glapthorn, may I present my sister, Miss Rowena Tredgold. Mr

Glapthorn is come from the office, my dear, on his own account, to ask after

Christopher.’

I judged her to be some fifty years of age, and, with her prematurely silvered hair

and blue eyes, she bore a most remarkable resemblance to her afflicted brother, who lay

on the bed, deathly still, eyes closed, his mouth drawn down unnaturally to one side.

The introductions over, she returned to her book, though out of the tail of my eye

I caught her looking at me intently as I stood, with Dr Tredgold, by the bedside.

The sight of my employer in such distress of body and mind was most painful to

me. Dr Tredgold whispered that the paralysis had affected his left side, that his vision

was seriously impaired, and that it was presently almost impossible for him to speak. I

asked him again if there was a chance of recuperation.

‘He may recover. I have known it before. The swelling in the brain is still in the

acute phase. We must watch him closely for any deterioration. If he begins to wake soon,

then we may hope that, in time, he may regain motivity, and perhaps also some operative

residue of his communicative faculties.’

‘Was there any immediate cause?’ I enquired. ‘Some extreme excitation of

feeling, or other catastrophe, that might have precipitated the attack?’

‘Nothing discernible,’ he replied. ‘He arrived here last night in the best of spirits.

When he did not come down at his usual hour this morning, my sister said I should go up

to see if all was well. He was in the grip of the seizure when I found him.’

I took supper with Dr Tredgold and his sister in a cold high-ceilinged room,

sparsely furnished except for a monstrous faux-Elizabethan buffet that took up nearly a

whole wall. Miss Tredgold said little during the meal, which was as sparse as the

furniture; but I felt her eye upon me more than once. Her look was one of strained

concentration, as though she was attempting, unsuccessfully, to recall something from the

depths of memory.

Suddenly there was a loud knocking at the front-door, and a moment or two later

a servant came in to announce that Dr Tredgold was wanted urgently at the house of a

neighbour who had been taken ill. I used the opportunity to take my leave of the doctor

and his sister. They pressed me to stay the night, but I preferred instead to take a room at

the Royal Fountain Hotel.

I secured my accommodation with little trouble. Having a headache, I took a few

drops of laudanum? and closed my eyes. But my sleep was troubled by a strange

recurrent dream, in which I appeared to be standing in a darkened place of great size. At

first I am alone, but then, as if a light is slowly being let in from some unseen source, I

discern the figure of Mr Tredgold. He is sitting in a chair with a book in his hands, slowly

turning over the pages, and lingering every now and again on some point of interest. He

looks up and sees me. His mouth is drawn down to one side and he appears to be

mouthing words and sentences, but no sound comes out. He beckons me over and points

to the book. I look down to see what he wishes to show me. It is a portrait of a lady in

black. I look closer. It is the portrait of Laura, Lady Tansor, which I had seen hanging in

Mr Carteret’s work-room at Evenwood. Then more light floods in, and behind Mr

Carteret I make out a figure on a black-draped dais, sitting behind a tall desk and writing

in a great ledger. This person, too, is dressed in black, and seems to be wearing a grey

full-bottomed wig, like a judge; but then I see that it is in fact Miss Rowena Tredgold,

with her hair let loose around her shoulders. She stops writing and addresses me.

‘Prisoner at the bar. You will give the court your name.’

I open my mouth to speak, but cannot. I am as dumb as Mr Tredgold. She asks me

for my name again, but still I am unable to speak. Somewhere a bell tolls.

‘Very well,’ she says, ‘since you will not tell the court who you are, the verdict of