“You are planting potatoes, Mamma?”

“Potatoes?” She stared at me incredulously. “What do I care for potatoes, you silly girl, when there is a priceless necklace of rubies to be found? Mr. Thrace was most adamant. The booty of Chandernagar is ours for the taking, Jane! You might assist me, if you can but find another shovel—”

“Pray enlist Cassandra, Mamma,” I said firmly. “I am engaged to walk with Miss Prowting. Her father has hired a maidservant for us — one Sally, who is even now established in the kitchen.”

“That is excellent news!” she cried, brightening. “You might inform her, Jane, that I prefer a simple nuncheon of bread and cheese at eleven o’clock. She may bring it out to the field, so as not to interrupt the excavations. And if she has any ability with a trowel or hoe—”

I delivered the first part of this message to the scullery, my bonnet dangling from my hand.

“Sally,” I said as almost an afterthought, “you are acquainted with Bertie Philmore, I collect?”

“All my life, ma’am.”

“And also his wife — one Rosie Philmore?”

“Rosie’s sister to my elder brother’s Nell.”

“Where in Alton does she reside?”

“The Philmores live in Normandy Street. Rosie takes in washing — you can’t miss the linen and small clothes hanging in the yard.”

“Thank you, Sally.” The girl, I reflected, had already earned her day’s wages.

Catherine waited until we had passed through the village and put the Great House Lodge behind us — the Lodge, where even now Jack Hinton might be gazing out his sittingroom window, and observing our progress — before she undertook to speak.

“You said last evening that the path of duty must always be clear, Miss Austen. And that it is the path of the heart that descends into obscurity.”

“So I have found it.”

“I lay awake some hours in my bed, considering of your advice.”

“It was not intended as such. I could not undertake to advise you, knowing you so little. I merely made an observation, based upon my own experience of life.”

“But that has been considerably greater than my own,” she returned in a low voice, “and as such must command my respect. I have known for some time where my duty lay. It was the urgings of my heart that counselled otherwise.”

“Can you perhaps explain the circumstances?” I suggested.

“I have no right to force a confidence, of course; and if you believe the particulars are better left unsaid, I will certainly understand.”

“No, no—” she cried. “It was to make a full confession that I begged you to accompany me. I feel, Miss Austen, that I have been a reluctant party to a very great injury that has been done to you and your family!”

I had expected some flutterings of the heart over Mr. Hinton; had expected to be consulted in a painful affair of unrequited passion for Julian Thrace; but never had I considered myself as the object of Catherine’s avowal.

“In what manner?” I enquired cautiously.

“As regards the corpse of that poor man discovered in your home.” She came to a halt in the middle of the Alton road, the wide expanse of Robin Hood Butts stretching beyond her. “You see, Miss Austen — I know who placed him there.”

Chapter 15

Damning Evidence

7 July 1809, cont.

“I should explain, Miss Austen, that I have found it difficult to sleep of nights for some weeks past. The heat, perhaps, of July—”

Catherine broke off, and began to walk slowly once more in the direction of Alton. I studied her averted countenance, and recognised the marks of trouble; the girl had not been easy in her mind, I should judge, for too many days together. I had an image of her lying alone in her bedchamber, a picture of stillness beneath a white linen sheet, while a furious tide of thoughts swelled and resurged within her brain.

Resolutely, Catherine began again. “On the evening of Saturday last, I went to my room at ten o’clock, as is my habit. I was not conscious of the passage of the hours as I lay wakeful in my bed, the usual sounds of a summer night drifting through the open window; but I recollect with the sharpest clarity the tolling of the St. Nicholas church bell at midnight. I sat up, and counted the strokes, and told myself that this wretched want of peace must end, or utterly destroy my pleasure in life. I lit my candle and took up the book that sits always near my pillow, and read for a little; and when the heaviness of my eyes suggested I might at last find rest, I first got up, and fetched a drink of water from the washstand. I was returning to the tumbled bedclothes once more — when I heard the most dreadful noises arising from the darkness.”

She glanced at me appealingly, as tho’ wishing to be spared the next few words. “It was the sound of men fighting. I went to the window and lifted the sash so widely that I might lean out into the summer’s night. The moon was almost at the full, and the scene below was as clear to me as daylight. In the distance, well beyond the reach of our sweep and the angle of your cottage, two men were locked in a furious embrace, grappling.”[18]

“Could you distinguish their faces?”

She shook her head in the negative. “I could not. The distance at which they moved prevented me from recognising their features.”

“But I thought you said. ”

“Pray hear me out, Miss Austen,” she demanded. “This is difficult enough.”

I inclined my head, and so she continued.

“They were emitting the most horrid noises imaginable. Or I should say: one of the men was doing so. Grunts, hoarse cries, squeals of pain. The other — the taller of the two — preserved an awful silence, as tho’ so intent upon his object, that he could not spare a thought for his injuries. As I watched, he o’erwhelmed his adversary and drove the man down towards the earth. I heard nothing more. I believe, now, that he had succeeded in thrusting Shafto French’s head — for so I guess the lesser man to have been — beneath the waters of Chawton Pond. After an interval, all grappling ceased; and the victor rose.”

“Good God,” I said. “Why did you not scream? Why did you not sound the alarum, and rouse your father?”

“I was paralysed by the violence and horror I had witnessed,” she returned quietly. “Fear pressed so heavily upon my breast that I do not believe I could have spoken, had I tried; and my trembling arms could barely support my frame as I leaned without the window. It is fortunate I did not swoon entirely away. And there was also this, Miss Austen: the quality of the scene, in its flood of moonlight, was so spectral as to convince me I had witnessed nothing but a dream, a nightmare of my own mind’s fabrication. Altho’ terrified, I could not be convinced in that moment that what I saw was real. ”

I could, in truth, comprehend the disorder of her wits, and the cruel doubt of her mind. “And the rest of the household heard nothing?”

“My sister Ann is a sound sleeper, and her room — like my parents’—is at the rear. We are all so accustomed to the noise of coaches passing along the Winchester Road of nights, that little can disturb our slumbers. I believe I overheard the scene by the pond solely because I was already awake.”

“I understand. And what did you then?”

She shook her head furiously, as if she might shake off the hideous memory. “I could not move. I remained by the window, staring out in an agony of indecision and disbelief. The man rose — the man whom I now comprehend was French’s murderer — and moved into the shadows of the trees bordering the pond. He must have untethered a horse at that point, for the only sound I subsequently heard was that of hoofbeats, as his mount made its way down the road.”