“Mr Wentworth—I mean, the new Lord Cavanaugh as he are now—were payin’ ‘is fortnightly visit an’ after the dinner plates was cleared away, he an’ Lady Cavanaugh left me master ter do what they usually did.”
“And what was that?” the magistrate asked.
The manservant cleared his throat. He looked embarrassed. “They went to me lady’s bedchamber, sir.”
A titter ran through the courtroom, and Hugh fixed his stony gaze on Phoebe. Dear God, she and Wentworth? But of course, that was all he’d ever heard about Lady Cavanaugh. That she’d despised her husband whom she’d cuckolded with the odious Wentworth, the seducer of Hugh’s own sister. And she went willingly with him every fortnight?
His eyes bored into her as he tried to see in her the sweet, ingenuous creature he’d once believed her to be; as he willed her to see him. But her expression remained implacable through every damning statement, as if her perfect features were carved out of alabaster.
Let her deny it, he found himself wishing urgently.
But when the magistrate asked her if everything the manservant claimed was true, she merely nodded.
“And was there any indication of impropriety, Mr Duckworth?” The magistrate asked. “The implication merely in visiting a lady’s bedchamber suggests there is, but do you have any evidence? We cannot rely on hearsay or merely your belief that my lady was cuckolding her husband.”
“There were always a lot of noise when them two were at it.” The coarse-featured retainer looked embarrassed, but when his audience laughed, he straightened in his chair with a grin and elaborated further, warming to the details which were encouraged by his interrogator.
“And how long do you estimate this affair between Lady Cavanaugh and Lord Wentworth had been going on?”
“’Bout six months, m’lord,” Duckworth replied. “Lady Cavanaugh used ter wait at the drawin’ room window each fortnight fer sign of ‘is carriage an’ then she’d meet ‘im on the portico. No, she showed little such affection fer ‘er ’usband,” he answered when quizzed.
A fornicating, cuckolding, husband-hating woman charged with the murder of a respected peer of the realm. Long-familiar with the description he’d heard from around the village and in the local tavern, Hugh had accepted her guilt, almost as unquestioningly as the rest of them. He’d been mildly impressed that Phoebe had defended Lady Cavanaugh with such loyalty.
Now hearing the description as if with fresh ears, Hugh could not reconcile the Phoebe he knew as the one described by Duckworth, and later by a string of other servants; and finally by Sir Roderick and his mealy-mouthed daughter who all testified against her. The Phoebe Hugh knew was honest and direct, not a conniving liar with clearly murderous tendencies. Yes, in the space of half an hour, he’d at least made that turnaround.
Despairingly, he wondered what would happen to her. Not a single person was prepared to offer a different version of the woman he’d loved. As the evidence of her poor character mounted, and no one spoke in her defense, he realized she was going to die. She admitted she was a faithless wife who disliked her husband; admitted to everything that gave her a motive for killing the late Lord Cavanaugh.
More damning than all else, though, was the account of the maids who ran into the drawing room at the sounds of screaming, to find her holding the paper knife, wet with blood, that sh
e’d just plunged into her husband’s heart.
Hugh remembered the night she’d thrown herself from Wentworth’s carriage and fled from him into the woods. She’d been covered in blood. Terrified by the shocking events that had just occurred. She’d told him she was Lady Cavanaugh’s maid; that the crime was wrongly attributed to Lady Cavanaugh. Could there be another explanation? One that, despite her having every desire to wish her husband dead—with her lover waiting in the wings—exonerated her?
Now it was her turn to speak about the events of that particular night. The courtroom became hushed following riotous comments following the unflattering testimony of one of the chambermaids who went into even greater detail than Duckworth about her mistress’s bedroom exploits as she “were the one wot ‘ad to clean up after them an’ they did like a good romp.”
“Where were you when you heard about the death of your husband’s heir, Lady Cavanaugh?” asked the magistrate.
“In my bedchamber.” She held her head regally, no doubt in anticipation of the inevitable rejoinder.
“With your father’s cousin, Lord Wentworth?”
She gave a small nod, and Hugh’s lip curled in disgust. She’d claimed to be so many things he knew she was not—but he never would have believed she was capable of murder, or of consorting with men for financial gain. Not just any man, but Wentworth.
A series of fleeting memories of the two of them, Hugh and Phoebe, entwined as they enjoyed each other’s bodies, now took on a far less rosy hue.
Finally came the questions regarding the murder itself. At this point, Lady Cavanaugh became far more vociferous in her responses, declaring that she had neither murder nor intent to harm in her mind when the knife was plunged into her husband’s heart.
“But you admit that it was your hand which held the weapon that was the cause of death?”
For a moment she looked helpless, and Hugh prayed that in the final moment she would declare that to be a fabrication, just as she’d declared—when he thought her as sweet Phoebe—that Lady Cavanaugh was innocent.
But she did not. Raising her voice and looking at Wentworth who sat nearby, she said clearly, “I have served you well, haven’t I, Wentworth? You used your superior strength to plunge the paper knife, such an innocent implement in my hands but so lethal when controlled by you, to do what you would not, could not, do yourself.” Her voice wavered a moment before gaining strength. “The moment you heard that both of your two brothers who stood between you and my husband’s estate, which you’d never thought you’d inherit, had died, you had to find a way to eliminate the only other obstacle in your way after Wentworth—me!”
The court erupted into uproar, and when calm had been established, the magistrate scoffed into the vacuum of silence, “Come now, Lady Cavanaugh, that’s going too far. He did not eliminate you. Why, you eliminated your husband.”
“Mr Wentworth had good reason to fear me standing in the way of his inheriting.”
“Pray what motive could he have? You were only his cousin’s wife.”