Page 16 of A Moveable Feast
“Yes, it can alleviate pain, but too much is quite deadly. Mixing it with alcohol or something like laudanum will speed up its effects, but one can die in a few minutes from having even a small dose.”
Cold flashed through me. “A mercy I only had a swallow, then.”
His eyes widened. “You drank some? Good heavens, yes, it is a mercy. Also, the tea diluted it a good bit, according to my friend. I am happy to see you alive and well, Mrs. Holloway.”
My knees were shaky, and I put my hand on the wall to steady myself. “Thank you for finding out, Mr. Thanos.”
“Not at all. Are you well?” He regarded me with concern in his kindly dark eyes.
“Yes, I will be.” I hadn’t drunk more of the tea, and I was quite fine, after all. No need to break down.
The question remained, who had dosed the tea for Mrs. Morgan and why? Had her initial illness been true, or also caused by a dollop of morphine?
I drew a breath, remembering my errand. “Come downstairs with me. Lady Cynthia is there, and I know you haven’t had enough to eat.”
Mr. Thanos gave me another concerned glance but followed me to the backstairs door, reaching to open it for me before I could. He could not help always being the gentleman, even to a cook.
By the time we reached the kitchen, Tess had returned. “I told him,” she whispered to me as I began to fix Mr. Thanos a plate. “He sent me back here and hurried off.”
I nodded at her in thanks and carried Mr. Thanos’s meal to him.
He rubbed his hands. “Seems callous to want food at a time like this, but thank you, Mrs. Holloway.”
“I said the same thing,” Cynthia stated. She and Mr. Thanos shared a tiny smile of camaraderie, which pleased me beneath my bewilderment.
I agreed with Jane that a tramp swarming into a fine home on Portman Square and stabbing the young master to death as he happened to cross the hall was an unlikely occurrence. Constables walked their beats in these parts, even on Easter Sunday, and one would be certain to notice a vagrant looking for unlocked doors.
The idea came to me that perhaps the open door was a blind, and someone already in the house had decided to do away with the young master. One of the guests enraged with him? A servant, such as Armitage, who might strike out in a drunken stupor if Lord Alfred argued with him?
I would more believe it the work of an intruder, if it weren’t for Mrs. Morgan. She’d been afraid for some reason, and the tea intended for her had been laced with poison. Had Lady Babcock wanted Mrs. Morgan sunk into a long stupor or perhaps out of the way entirely?
Mrs. Seabrook had mentioned that Mrs. Morgan and Lady Babcock had been quarreling “something fierce,” speculating it was over the menus. But Lord Alfred’s death cast a more sinister shadow on the arguments. Had Mrs. Morgan realized that Lady Babcock meant to do away with her stepson? Tried to persuade her against it? Therefore, Mrs. Morgan had to be taken out of the way?
Then again, I reasoned, Lady Babcock might not have tampered with Mrs. Morgan’s tea at all. If she’d set the cup down somewhere between wherever she’d brewed it and the cook’s bedchamber, anyone could have slipped the poison into it.
Anyone in the house at the time, I amended. Which meant the servants and the rest of the family.
I had no idea how difficult it was to get hold of morphine. Was it something only a doctor could dispense, or did one walk into the nearest chemist’s shop and request it? Mrs. Seabrook had mentioned that a doctor did give Lady Babcock medicine, but she hadn’t specified what.
These were questions the police would have to ask, as it was not my place, but the two events narrowed down the list of suspects.
Then again, the incidents might be entirely unconnected. Lady Babcock, in her rather dim way, might have been trying to nurse Mrs. Morgan back to health, and had nothing to do with whoever had killed Lord Alfred.
Watch out for her, Mrs. Morgan had urged me.
Because she thought the woman might kill her stepson?
I needed to know who had been in or outside of the dining room when Lord Alfred had died.
Under the pretense of packing up the food, I moved to the table near Cynthia and Mr. Thanos so I could have a low-voiced conversation with them.
“Who were the guests today?” I asked Cynthia.
Her light blue eyes went wide. “Good Lord, are you thinking one of them killed Alfie while we were enjoying our soup?”
“It is one possibility,” I said cautiously.
“Well, let me see.” Cynthia’s eyes narrowed in thought. “There’s Margaret, of course, Alfie’s sister. Another member of the family turned up—Desmond Charlton. Third cousin, I believe. Margaret is batty about him. Wants to marry the fellow, though Lady Babcock doesn’t approve of the match. Desmond and his brother haven’t much money, at least, not enough for Desmond to marry Margaret and keep her in the manner to which she is accustomed. Then there was a bishop, whose name I can’t remember?—”
