Page 45 of The Hollow of Fear
“She had always been a devoted mother. But in a divorce she would lose the children. What would she do if she had to choose between her children and the man she loved?
“Then a third, far more terrifying possibility occurred to me. What if she did not intend to give up either? What if she intended to run away with the man, my children in tow, so that she never needed to worry about being parted from them?
“With that in mind, I studied the cipher with which they communicated, and sent her a note in the same cipher, telling her that the night of her birthday ball would be a good time to take the children and leave, given that I would be distracted by my duties as the host.
“A little before one o’clock that night, she opened the door to the nursery, only to find it empty of all occupants, except me. I confronted her about her plan to make off with the children. And she, who had too long been accustomed to dealing with me without pretenses, was again bluntly truthful. I told her to go and not come back. She understood then that the children were now beyond her reach, that even if she stayed I would never trust her to see them again. And she must have decided that the only thing she could salvage from this misadventure was her lover and that she might as well leave with him since he had already cost her dearly.
“My primary concern had been to keep my children from being taken—to prevent that from ever happening. To that end, Lady Ingram’s departure appeared a highly favorable development. It wasn’t until I’d calmed down somewhat I realized the difficulty I was now in.
“Lady Ingram was a prominent member of Society. She had friends, acquaintances, and, however distant, a family. She had dozens of servants from whom her absence could not be concealed for any length of time. Not to mention, a ball in her honor was still in full swing.
“I had to brazen it out, but etiquette was on my side. Guests are supposed to slip out discreetly, without say good-bye to the hosts, if they leave before the end of a ball. Those who stayed until carriages knew better than to inquire ofme, at least, as to the whereabouts of Lady Ingram. They would have assumed either she was seeing to other guests or that the strain of the long night was more than her bad back could take—the same assumption the servants would have made. And she had dismissed her maid for the night at the beginning of the ball, rather than making the latter wait until the small hours of the morning.
“Given all that, I didn’t need to announce her departure until the next day. And then, only to the senior servants. I told them that her health had taken a catastrophic turn in the later part of the ball and that she’d needed to leave immediately. And then I asked them to carry on as usual, except that we would depart from London as soon as possible.
“To her maid, Simmons, I spoke separately. I told her that Lady Ingram had decided to leave her behind, as Simmons is not fond of either overseas travel or cold climates. Simmons once worked for my mother and was well-positioned to retire. She was distressed to be let go unceremoniously, after six years of service. But she is a kind-natured person and was more concerned for Lady Ingram than for herself.
“To the children I gave the same story. They were saddened but believed me when I said that she would return when she was well. I took them to the seaside to distract them—and to be somewhere my wife could not readily guess at, for I still feared that she would come for them.
“But there had been no sign of her in all the months since. Until yesterday, when I was told that her body had been discovered in the icehouse.”
It was the same account he had given Sergeant Ellerby, only in greater, unhappier detail.
Fowler considered Lord Ingram for close to a minute, then extracted something from his pocket. “We discovered this in Lady Ingram’s stocking. If you don’t mind taking a look, my lord.”
Charlotte Holmes leaped up, took the folded-up piece of paper from Fowler, and delivered it to Lord Ingram, still at the window. Lord Ingram smoothed out the paper and stared at it, his expression odd, as if unable to believe his own eyes. Miss Holmes gave him a few more seconds before retrieving the evidence and returning it to Fowler.
Treadles’s eyes were on Miss Holmes the entire time, but could not detect on her face anything other than an eagerness to be of service.
“That is a sheet of my handwriting practice,” said Lord Ingram.
Fowler leaned forward. “All these different hands, they are all done by you?”
“It’s a hobby.”
Treadles’s heart sank. A man who could write as if from many different people? This was not a helpful skill for the police to discover, especially when they already suspected him of murder.
“And this... pangram”—Fowler turned to Mr. Holmes—“is that the correct word?”
“Quite so, Chief Inspector.”
“My lord, why did you choose this pangram to write repeatedly?”
“I didn’t. Miss Holmes came up with a number of pangrams.Don Quixote jokes flippantly at windmill, vexing Bach and Mozart.Volcano erupts liquidly, spewing marzipan,pâte à choux, and breakfast jam. So on and so forth. I used them all at some point.”
“Nevertheless, this is the one Lady Ingram kept. Do you think she resented that you wrote another woman’s name two dozen times on a single page?”
“Lady Ingram would have had to feel a sense of possessiveness toward me in order to harbor any twinges of jealousy. No, I don’t believe she had ever viewed Miss Holmes as a romantic rival.”
“And yet according to Mr. Holmes here, Miss Holmes was not a friend to both yourself and Lady Ingram, only to you.”
“A woman can dislike another for reasons having nothing to do with a man. I daresay Lady Ingram’s antipathy toward Miss Holmes stemmed not from her friendship with me but her ability to resist the pressure to accept a proposal of marriage.”
Fowler’s eyes narrowed. “I am not sure I understand.”
“Miss Holmes’s background isn’t all that different from Lady Ingram’s, a penurious respectability. But whereas Lady Ingram buckled under and married after her first Season, Miss Holmes long held firm on her disinclination to marry and turned down any number of proposals.
“Lady Ingram prized strength above all else. From the beginning, she sensed in Miss Holmes a strength greater than her own, both of mind and of character. That was what she was jealous of. That was what prevented any possibility of friendship: Simply by existing, Miss Holmes made her feel inferior—and angry at herself.”
