Free Cheating the Hangman by Judith Cutler

but I for one deem it as necessary to be rid of them as it is to remove the scent of the stables when one dines.’ He looked round, as if challenging us to dispute with him.
    Snowdon nodded his agreement, but said, ‘Forgive me, my friends, if I do not join you in your ablutions, but already my kind hostess will be looking for me. I would thank you for a most enjoyable day, but we all know that the epithet is inaccurate. But it has been most stimulating, and a surprising pleasure to recover skills I so rarely use these days.’
    ‘Another day, then Snowdon—’
    ‘Alas, provided that my relative’s health improves I shall soon be quitting the county. Your servant, Hansard – gentlemen.’ He made an elegant bow, retrieved his horse, and left at a canter.
    Leaving the county – without my having established if he had actually been the young man galloping from Eliza Fowler’s deathbed. I cursed my stupidity. Should I ride after him? Even as I whistled for Titus, I realised that to do so would look very particular. But he had left none of us with means of contacting him again. All I could do was follow the rapidly retreating figure with my eyes, trying to not lose which direction he was following.
    I raised my anxiety with some embarrassment as we headed wearily back to Langley Park.
    ‘I am hardly surprised you felt unable to challenge him,’ Toone said. ‘A well set-up young man may ride where he pleases, Toby.’
    ‘Even if he has seduced and abandoned a maiden who then takes her own life and that of her babe?’
    ‘But you have no evidence of that. Just that a girl has been betrayed by someone. It might be— Dear God, we know what it is like in these remote villages! There is one in Staffordshire where inbreeding is so pronounced that I am surprised that Hansard here has not studied it in connection of those damned pink or blue flowers of his.’
    Hansard flushed. He had long since abandoned his genetic experiments to spend more time with his beloved wife.
    ‘So you think it would have been ungentlemanly to raise the issue?’
    ‘In front of us, tactless in the extreme – which is why Iam sure you did not attempt it. Tell me, Hansard, what did you make of …’
    From then they exchanged medical observations I preferred not to hear. Soon, however, as the three of us operated the Hansards’ pump for each other, we were laughing and joking like overgrown schoolboys and good fellowship was restored.
    Maria had made sure there were blazing fires in our chambers; another was filling the drawing room with warmth when we gathered. The only chill came from Toone, when Burns announced Jem. Jem and Toone did not find it easy to be in one another’s company: for all his protestations of French egalitarianism, Toone was one of the bon ton in drawling accent and indeed behaviour. Jem, however, while still very much aware of the dangers of putting himself forward, enjoyed such social freedom at Langley Park that he was ready to prickle at Toone’s unconsciously patronising attitude.
    Maria treated Jem as she treated me – as the favourite son or nephew she had never had. ‘The very least I could do,’ she declared, summoning Jem to sit beside her, ‘was to invite you to this cadaver party of ours: you will be as interested to hear the results of Toone’s post-mortem examination as I.’
    ‘Indeed I will. And I come with my own contribution, which is a message for Toby from Mead and Tufnell, the churchwardens: they have spoken to every able-bodied man in the village – indeed, they questioned me, most thoroughly – but to no avail. No one has seen or heard anything of the crime; no one has anything unusual or untoward to report.’
    ‘I am heartily glad of it. I would not want any in my flock to have been associated with a crime like this.’
    As Burns entered to pass round sherry or Madeira, the conversation turned to Hansard’s chief business of the day – his visit to Orebury House’s guest.
    ‘Alas, I