The Valentine Legacy (8 page)

“I am. It's delicious. I'd like another one.”

“Just don't ask me to carry you around anymore.”

“You think I'm fat?”

“For God's sake, Jessie, you're as skinny as that table leg. I'm just jesting with you.”

“Nelda and her husband, Bramen, came to dinner last night. He's fat, James, and he eats like Friar Tuck, who's in stud now and can eat like a pig if he wants to. I don't think Nelda likes him very much.”

“Friar Tuck or her husband?”

Jessie took another bite of her ice cream. “Nelda doesn't
like horses at all, so I guess it's both. Glenda told her about how she was going to marry you by the end of the summer. She said she'd be a beautiful September bride. She said you would be ready by then. Mama agreed with her. She said that you would be over your grieving, if in fact you were still grieving, which she doubted because you were a man and men evidently don't grieve. Grieving about what, James?”

He said in a voice as remote as that faraway desert in Africa, “I was married. My wife died in childbirth. That was three years ago. I told you I wasn't going to marry your sister. Why don't you weave that into your dinner conversation this evening? I don't wish to be rude to her, Jessie, but I have no intention of marrying her.”

“Do you like me?”

“No, not particularly. You're a pest. At least you're a good horsewoman. Don't get that punctured look. All right, I like you sometimes. I see you're finished. Do you want another ice cream?”

“No. If I could gain weight in my bosom, I'd eat another one, but I can't. Glenda is always showing off her bosom. She's very pretty.”

“Who cares?”

 

On the following Tuesday, Jessie was a mite depressed as she went into Compton Fielding's bookstore because James, just as he'd promised, had beaten her at the races the previous Saturday, cajoling Tinpin over the finish line a good two lengths ahead of her and Jigg. She'd had to hear her father grumble, then take a bottle of champagne over to Marathon to toast James until the both of them were as drunk as stoats.

She'd prayed James would have a vicious headache, but he'd been at church Sunday morning, with his mother, Ursula, and Giff, to hear Winsey Yellot exhort everyone
present to exercise more moderation in their daily lives. She'd given James a nasty grin.

She waited inside Mr. Fielding's bookstore until he finished with a customer, then walked toward him, the diary in her hand.

“What did you think of it, Jessie?”

“It was fascinating. He made me think I was there, his descriptions were so vivid. Not all of them to be sure, but enough to hold my interest.”

“You're frowning. Why?”

“Oh, I was just remembering how a couple of times I thought for certain that reading the diary was somehow familiar. That's silly, of course. I'd like to buy it, Mr. Fielding. Perhaps you have another one for me? Well, if you don't have any more novels, that is.”

He did have another diary, and she paid for this one on the spot. It was written by an English sailor who'd tracked and hanged pirates in the early years of the eighteenth century. He followed her from the shop and onto the road, saying, “Give this one some time, Jessie. He isn't a very clever fellow and he tends to repeat himself, but perhaps you'll find him amusing.”

“I hope—” Her voice disappeared in her throat. She heard and saw the oncoming wagon at the same time. The man was driving it right at her at a furious pace, the horses snorting and blowing, pounding the packed earth. There was no time for anything. The man must be mad. He must be drunk. She managed to jerk herself back onto the sidewalk, panting hard, frozen with the worst fear she'd ever felt in her life. Then the wagon was coming right at her, the man yelling at the horses, whipping them up, swinging them toward her.

Compton Fielding grabbed her at the last instant and literally threw her against the door of his bookstore. She hit her head against the door frame and knocked herself out.

“My God, Jessie. Wake up!”

She did in just a few seconds and stared up at Compton Fielding, who looked as pale as the sheets that hung on the rope lines behind Warfield house every Tuesday.

“My head hurts. That man was mad. He tried to kill me.”

“No,” Compton Fielding said slowly. “No, I think he was drunk. It was a stupid accident. Don't worry about it, Jessie.”

“Then why did he drive on?”

“I don't know, but I'll ask around.”

“Maybe he was after you, Mr. Fielding.”

“That's a possibility, I suppose,” Fielding said, and grinned. “Perhaps he wanted me to give him violin lessons and I turned him down.”

She did laugh, a little.

Jessie told her family that evening at the dinner table. Her mother said when she'd finished, “No one in his right mind would want to kill you, Jessie. It was obviously some sort of strange accident. That or Compton Fielding was right. Someone wanted to knacker him.”

Glenda took a bite of blancmange, licked her lips only to purse them, and said, “Mother's right. Who would have enough interest in you to want to kill you? It's really quite absurd. So is your story.”

Her father, who hadn't spoken up to this point, said slowly, “Everything happened just as you said, Jessie? All right, I'll speak to Compton about it. Forget it now, my dear. Eat your stewed pork. That's a good girl.”

Her father never mentioned it again. By the next racing day, when she swore she'd beat James to hell and back, she'd forgotten about it—a good thing, because a jockey from Virginia tried to butt her off her horse with the handle of his riding crop. It was a wild racing day, many jockeys were injured, and neither she nor James did very well.

The ideal thoroughbred is born to run, bred to win, and will literally race to death.

 

B
ALTIMORE
, M
ARYLAND
A
PRIL
1822

W
HEN
J
AMES SAW
her coming out of a small dress shop, he wondered what in blazes Jessie Warfield would be doing there. He waved at her. When he caught up to her, he asked her to Balboney's for some more ice cream. He didn't know why he did it, but he did. Perhaps it was because they'd both lost at the last races.

Yet again, Jessie's delight was alarmingly obvious. They discussed the race and found themselves in the rare situation of commiserating with each other. By the time James ordered her another bowl of ice cream, he still hadn't delivered a single snide comment.

At that moment, Mr. Parvis, a longtime newspaper man from the
Federal Gazette
, burst into the emporium shouting, “Allen Belmonde was just found shot through his mouth!”

“Oh my,” Jessie exclaimed. She called out, “He's dead, then, Mr. Parvis?”

“Oh, Jessie, it's you. Yep, he's deader than a mackerel caught in the Patapsco and lying out on the dock for a week.
The back of his head was blown off. His poor little wife found him in one of the tack rooms.”

“Good God,” James said blankly. “I can't image Allen shooting himself.”

“Oh, he didn't,” Mr. Parvis said, rubbing his hands together. “Someone killed him dead.”
Oh dear
, Jessie thought, her sweet, helpless Alice—frail and weak-spirited, but still Jessie had always liked her, probably because Alice had never had a negative word about her racing horses and wearing men's breeches. It was Alice who'd told her about the cucumber mixture for lightening the freckles. She pictured Allen Belmonde with the back of his head blown off and nearly gagged into the melting ice cream in her Balboney blue bowl.

 

Oslow Penny said, “Jessie, you're depressed about poor Alice Belmonde. You'll see the lady tomorrow, and you can flutter around her all you please. But no more sighs and tearful expressions now. That's right. You just chew on that piece of straw, pull your hat over your face to protect that pretty white skin of yours, and listen to the story of Grimalkin the cat.”

“I'm listening, Oslow.” Jessie pulled the disreputable old leather hat over her eyes, sank back against a hay bale, drew her knees up, and chewed on a fat straw.

“You remember that all thoroughbreds are descended from three and only three stallions.”

“Yes, the Byerley Turk, the Darley Arabian, and the—”

“The Godolphin Arabian. That's right, Jessie. Now be quiet. The Godolphin Arabian was foaled way back in 1724. Now, the Godolphin Arabian's companion wasn't a stable lad or his owner or even a donkey. It was Grimalkin the cat. That damned brindle cat rode on his back, sitting up, all proud and smug, neck stretched out, surveying the world as if he were a bloody proper prince. The cat ate beside him,
clawed through his mane to keep the tangles out, and slept draped around his neck. No one could figure out why that horse and that damned cat were so inseparable, but they were. It came in time that Grimalkin the cat died.

“The horse went wild. He wouldn't eat for days. He wouldn't let anyone near him. He looked to be pining away. Then he appeared to be normal again, but he wasn't. He wouldn't let another cat near him. He tried to kill any cat he even saw. He'd go wild if he even saw a cat in the distance. It's said that when he died, they buried him beneath the stable gateway next to Grimalkin the cat.”

Jessie shoved her head back. “That's too good a story, Oslow. I think you made it up.”

“No, he didn't, actually.”

“James, goodness, whatever are you doing here?”

“Peter told me the two of you were swapping outrageous tales.”

“She's all upset about poor Alice Belmonde. I don't know why since the girl's now quit of a scoundrel of a husband. I wanted to cheer her up. I've succeeded.”

“Good. Now, don't disarrange yourself, Jessie. That's a new hat, isn't it?”

“I found it in a trunk in the attic. It just needed to be cleaned and reshaped a bit. I like it.”

“It does have character. It does keep the sun off your nose. However, I think I smell moth powder. How old is the thing, Jessie?”

“I think it was my grandfather's.”

He looked at that hat a moment longer, shook his head, and said, “Gordon Dickens, the magistrate, is here. He wants to talk about Allen Belmonde. It seems Gordon heard that there was quite a commotion here just a few days before Allen was shot and that Belmonde was so mad he wanted to take Sweet Susie away that night. Jessie, why are you
rubbing your throat? Why have you turned whiter than my stable cat's belly?”

“I did threaten him, James. In front of witnesses. You nearly had to drag me off him. Do you think I'll be hanged?”

“No. Did I really drag you off him? Odd that I don't remember it happening exactly that way. Now, come along, the both of you. Dancy Hoolahan is here—the whole cast of characters, I guess you could say.”

Gordon Dickens had hated tea since his stepmother made him drink it until he'd peed in his pants. An excellent punishment for a smart-mouthed little boy, she'd told him with a good deal of satisfaction when he'd finally lost control. He even hated to see anyone else drinking the foul stuff because it made him want to relieve himself. He could barely contain himself, watching Jessie Warfield drink that dreaded tea, but he knew he had to. He was here to do his duty. He had to be alert. He not only had to listen to everyone's words but also carefully study their expressions. His father had always told him that you could see guilt on a man's or woman's face if you knew what to look for. He wasn't quite sure what that meant, but he always looked carefully. He couldn't think about his luscious bride, even now lying in their bed, all warm and naked and tousled. He swallowed and forced himself back to his duty. He looked from that tea-drinking female, Jessie Warfield, to Dancy Hoolahan to James Wyndham. He cleared his throat.

“Would you like a muffin, Gordon?”

“No, James, thank you. I'd like to hear what happened after Jessie Warfield brought the mare back here. Yes, Thomas, you come in here as well. You were one of the parties present that night.”

“It wasn't really a party, Mr. Dickens,” Thomas said, all austere because he knew this was proper business. “Poor
Miss Jessie was all bloody and Mr. James was holding her up. No, it weren't no party.”

“That's not what I meant. Tell me what happened.”

When all the facts had been wrung out of all of them, Gordon Dickens stroked his whiskers, stared at Jessie, and said, “I understand that you and James Wyndham are rivals. I always wager on James, but you beat him at least half the time, which surely isn't the thing to do. I've seen you try to shove your horse into him. I've seen you kick out at him. I've seen him try to ride you into a ditch. You're enemies. Why would you defend him and threaten Allen Belmonde? Why would you even bother saving that mare? It wasn't your mare.”

“I like Sweet Susie. She's a fine mare. I don't suppose you've found the two men who stole her? Or whoever hired those men to steal her?”

He'd been too busy getting married and learning the awesome joys of the marriage bed to pursue the matter, but Gordon Dickens didn't say that. He thought about how he'd spent the early-morning hours and blushed. He shook a bit. Who cared about a damned horse when Helen was lying there waiting for him, smiling at him, her arms out? “Not yet,” he said, and his voice was as chilly as a Baltimore spring rain. How dare the damned girl question him? “You haven't answered my questions, Miss Warfield.”

“It didn't matter that Sweet Susie belonged to Allen Belmonde, who wasn't a very nice man. I would have tried to save Sweet Susie if she'd belonged to Mortimer Hackey, a truly despicable man. Anyway, Allen Belmonde was annoying everyone, shouting accusations at James—totally unfounded accusations—and I wanted to hit him.”

“Perhaps you shot him instead.”

James, who was leaning his shoulders against the mantel of the fireplace, jerked forward to tower over Gordon Dickens. He pulled him up by his collar out of his chair and
shook him. “That is the most ridiculous thing that's emerged from your mouth. Just look at her—she's perfectly white with fear. Mind your tongue, or else I'll mind it for you.”

“See here, James, I'm just doing my job. She did threaten him, she plays at being a man, just perhaps she also uses a gun like a man, and—”

Wanting only to distract James, who he could see was itching to send his fist into Gordon's jaw, Dr. Hoolahan said quickly, “I don't suppose you know that Allen Belmonde had once wanted to marry Ursula Wyndham, James's sister?”

James whipped around, staring at him as if he'd grown an extra ear. “Well, he didn't marry Ursula, so I had no reason to shoot him. How the devil do you know about that, Dancy?”

“Mr. Belmonde's wife became ill shortly after they were married. She was also depressed, pale, and on the verge of tears the whole time. She told me that he began avoiding her almost immediately after their marriage, that he'd even called her Ursula several times during moments of, er, affection.”

James turned to stare at Dancy Hoolahan. He released Gordon Dickens, absently brushed his coat front, and gently shoved him back down into his chair. “I told Alice not to marry him,” James said. “He married Alice Stoddert out of spite after Ursula married Giff, hoping to make her jealous I suppose, only it didn't. He wouldn't believe she didn't want him, that she preferred Giff Poppleton. And Alice didn't believe me either.” He looked Gordon Dickens straight in the face. “You will contrive to keep all this behind your teeth, Gordon. All of it, do you understand? And you as well, Dancy, and yes, I well understand why you dug it up and spit it out when you did. Well, I'm under control now and I won't throttle Gordon, at least in the next five
minutes. Remember—all of you—that none of this has anything to do with Belmonde's murder.”

Gordon Dickens fiddled with his cravat. “I must do my duty. However, I agree with you, James, that none of this seems to have any bearing on Belmonde's unfortunate death.”

Jessie said, “Who do you think killed Mr. Belmonde, James?”

“I haven't the foggiest idea. As you said, Jessie, he wasn't a particularly nice man. Listen, Gordon, Allen Belmonde had two business partners. There was probably a good deal of strife among the three of them. Have you looked into that?”

“Oh, yes. They all hated one another. They accused one another of villainy, of embezzlement, of cheating.” Gordon Dickens rose, looking gloomy. “This is a proper mess. I was hoping that one of you would be guilty. It would have made things so much simpler.”

“Why, thank you, Gordon,” Dancy Hoolahan said.

“There's the horse racing,” Oslow said. “Mr. Belmonde made bets at the racetracks, big ones, I heard, and he didn't always pay up when he lost. There're also rumors that he was responsible for poisoning Rainbow—a four-year-old thoroughbred whose sire was Bellerton and whose dam was the Medley mare—at last year's Baltimore Plate. The horse he backed won, so he also won, a lot of money. All unproved of course.”

“Everything is unproved,” Gordon Dickens said, and sighed. “The world is unproved.” He sighed again as he rose. He straightened his waistcoat. It was loose. He'd lost weight. It felt good. He knew it was from all the unaccustomed activity he was getting at night and in the early mornings. “Damn Belmonde's eyes,” he said, looking at everyone with gloomy irritation. “Why couldn't he have just ridden off that cliff over at Miller's Jump? That way I
could have called it an accident, and that would have been the end of it.”

 

Mrs. Wilhelmina Wyndham had a firm hold on her son's arm. “Whoever is visiting poor Alice? You will get rid of who it is, James. We are here now and thus the only ones who should be offering sympathy to the poor girl. Some folks have the manners of rodents.”

James had ridden to the Belmonde town house on St. Paul Street, to offer Alice whatever support he could. And here was his mother, just emerging from the landau he'd bought for her three years before. “Ah, my dearest boy,” she'd said, allowed him to assist her to the ground, and took hold of his arm.

“Did you tell Alice you were coming to visit her?”

“Certainly not, but that doesn't matter. Go see to it, James.”

He just smiled down at his mother, knowing nothing short of a hurricane could ever dissuade her from anything. Maybe not even a hurricane.

Her visitors were Glenda and Jessie Warfield.

A thin woman with stooped shoulders ushered them to the large Belmonde parlor. Glenda was prettily arranged on the settee wearing a pale yellow muslin gown. Jessie was standing beside Alice, with her hand on the widow's bowed shoulder. She was wearing another of her sister's castaways, a pale gray wool that made her look like a young nun trying on the mother superior's habit. Like the other gown, this one was too short and too big in the bosom. James heard her say, “Alice, Mrs. Partridge has told me that you've scarcely eaten at all. Come now, here are some fresh scones. Shall I spread some butter and strawberry jam on one for you?”