Page 69 of Evidence of Evil
Constance was tired and her feet were sore. She really didn’t want to walk to the village and back. She wanted a comfortable seat and a cup of tea as soon as possible. She seemed to have spent most of the day walking and achieving nothing, and right now, she wasn’t convinced they could learn any more from Dr. Murray.
However, she rarely gave in to weakness.
“Why not?” she said, and turned to see a pony and trap rumbling down the road toward them. One of the Fairfield Grange stable lads drove the shaggy pony, and sitting on the trap with her disdainful nose in the air was Bingham, Frances Niall’s personal maid.
The lad holding the reins touched his cap to them and slowed. “Drop you at The Willows if you like,” he said cheerfully.
“I don’t suppose you’re going as far as the village?” Constance asked hopefully.
“Hop on. Taking Miss Bingham to catch the stagecoach to London.”
Only then did Constance realize the maid had a large bag with her. She seemed stunned when Constance condescended to climb up onto so rustic a vehicle, with Solomon’s polite aid. He climbed after her, and all three of them jolted their way down the road.
“So you’re off to London?” Constance said. “Do you have a new post already?”
“I’m to interview for one, but the agency says if I don’t get it, there are plenty of others to be had.”
“I hope you have somewhere to stay,” Constance said uneasily, for London offered a horde of dangers to a girl not up to snuff. Bingham said she had come from there in the first place, but she was also naïve enough to have got into trouble.
“No,” she said, “but I’m told it’s easy enough.”
Constance delved into her reticule and found a pencil and someone else’s calling card, which she scribbled out. On the back of it, she wrote an address. “Go here, if you need to. It’s respectable, cheap, and safe.”
“Thank you, ma’am,” Bingham said in clear surprise. “Everyone is being so kind. The colonel and Mrs. Haslett both gave me lovely references. And now you give me this. I feel guilty for being so glad to leave.”
“I think your position has been difficult,” Constance said tactfully.
“You’re telling me. Everyone swore Miss Frances was an angel—which she weren’t, not by a long chalk—and then it got even worse when she died. The funny thing is, I’m almost sorry for her now.”
“Why is that?” asked Constance, who shared that inexplicable pity.
Bingham shrugged helplessly. “I don’t know. I just find that house oppressive.” She lowered her voice so the lad wouldn’t hear. “The colonel’s so strict, and I gather the late mistress was so sour faced she’d curdle the milk. Maybe if I was able, I’d have rebelled, too, and taken my temper out on other people.”
“Is that what Miss Frances did?”
“I think so, yes. I told you she weren’t happy.”
“Why was that, do you think?” Constance asked as they passed the turning up to The Willows.
“Crossed in love, I expect. Always trying to make him jealous, if you ask me, only he never was.”
Constance felt a jolt of excitement. Deliberately, she did not look at Solomon. “Who?”
Bingham leaned closer. “Sir Humphrey. I told you before, I reckon it were always him she had a thing for. Not saying he returned her affection, mind. No secret notes ever came from The Willows. But I’m sure that’s why the colonel’s so convinced Lady Maule is the culprit.” Bingham smiled suddenly. “Don’t look so worried, ma’am. I won’t talk about it in London. No one wants a lady’s maid who can’t keep her mouth shut.”
*
“It always comesback to Humphrey,” Constance said discontentedly over her tea and toast at the inn.
“If you believe her,” Solomon said. “She didn’t give him that kind of importance the last time we spoke to her, did she?”
“No, but she’s out of the house now. I got the impression she was being more open and honest.” Constant sighed and picked up her teacup. “Though not necessarily right.”
“It’s possible Frances remained obsessed with him,” Solomon said thoughtfully. “Perhaps because he was the oneman she could not manipulate. That doesn’t make him her murderer.”
“But shecouldmanipulate him. She told him Elizabeth was a whore, and he doesn’t quite disbelieve it, does he?” Constance drank her tea and helped herself to another dainty piece of buttered toast. “There’s something we’re not seeing.”
“Something we’re not meant to see. I can’t even see Dr. Murray.”
