A Virtuous Death Read online

  THE LADY OF ASHES MYSTERIES

  Lady of Ashes

  Stolen Remains

  A Virtuous Death

  ALSO BY CHRISTINE TRENT

  By the King’s Design

  A Royal Likeness

  The Queen’s Dollmaker

  Published by Kensington Publishing Corporation

  A VIRTUOUS DEATH

  A Lady of Ashes Mystery

  CHRISTINE TRENT

  KENSINGTON BOOKS

  www.kensingtonbooks.com

  All copyrighted material within is Attributor Protected.

  Table of Contents

  THE LADY OF ASHES MYSTERIES

  Title Page

  Dedication

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  CAST OF CHARACTERS

  Epigraph

  Prologue

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  13

  14

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY

  LADY OF ASHES

  STOLEN REMAINS

  BY THE KING’S DESIGN

  A ROYAL LIKENESS

  THE QUEEN’S DOLLMAKER

  Copyright Page

  For Anthony Papadakis

  Brother, Confidant, Friend

  Our conversations are like fine wine:

  They improve as we age.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  All of the usual suspects helped me bring this book to fruition, from plotting to editing: my mother, Georgia Carpenter; my brother, Tony Papadakis; my friend Diane Townsend; and, of course, my beloved husband, Jon.

  My sister-in-law, Marian Wheeler, provided valuable input to the manuscript and is a constant source of spiritual comfort and support.

  Mary Russell has been my best friend for over twenty-five years and provides me with much-needed writing breaks of shopping and dining.

  Dr. D. P. Lyle, M.D., quickly—and graciously—answered my questions concerning the manner of death for my victims. He is an amazing resource for mystery writers. I have no idea how he gets anything done beyond responding to badgering authors.

  I am appreciative for the grace and expertise of my new editor at Kensington Books, Martin Biro, whose love for mysteries shows in his careful editing of this book.

  My thanks to Regency romance novelist and mystery enthusiast Emily Hendrickson, for encouraging my career and being such a lovely correspondent.

  Beth Rockwell at Turn the Page Books in Boonsboro, Maryland, is the best of booksellers, and I am grateful for her enthusiasm and promotion of my books.

  Gloria in excelsis.

  CAST OF CHARACTERS

  VIOLET HARPER’S FAMILY AND FRIENDS

  Violet Harper—undertaker

  Samuel Harper—Violet’s husband

  Mary Cooke—mourning dressmaker and Violet’s friend

  Harry Blundell—fellow undertaker

  Will Swift—co-owner, with Harry Blundell, of Morgan Undertaking

  THE ROYAL FAMILY

  Queen Victoria—Queen of England

  Albert Edward (Bertie)—Prince of Wales and the eldest of nine children

  Alix of Denmark—Princess of Wales

  Princess Helena—Victoria’s fifth child, dowdy and double chinned

  Prince Christian of Schleswig-Holstein—Helena’s indolent husband

  Princess Louise—Victoria’s sixth child, outspoken and unsentimental

  Prince Leopold—Victoria’s eighth child, sickly and weak

  Princess Beatrice—Victoria’s youngest child, shy and serious

  SERVANTS AND STAFF

  John Brown—the queen’s ghillie, or outdoor servant

  Owen Caradoc—Beatrice’s art tutor

  Reverend Robinson Duckworth—Prince Leopold’s tutor

  Reese Meredith—footman to Lord Christie, the Earl of Baverstock

  ARISTOCRATIC FRIENDS AND ENEMIES

  Sir Charles Mordaunt—cuckolded member of the House of Commons

  Lady Maud Winter—friend of Louise’s

  Charlotte Tate, Lady Marcheford—friend of Louise’s

  Ripley Tate, Lord Marcheford—Charlotte’s husband

  Lady Hazel Campden—friend of Louise’s

  THE MORALISTS

  Josephine Butler—moralist dedicated to women’s causes

  Lillian Cortland—an associate of Mrs. Butler’s

  THE DETECTIVES

  Magnus Pompey Hurst—detective chief inspector at Scotland Yard

  Langley Pratt—second-class inspector at Scotland Yard

  If thou art rich, thou art poor,

  For like an ass, whose back with ingots bows,

  Thou bear’st thy heavy riches but a journey,

  And death unloads thee.

  —from Measure for Measure, 1604

  William Shakespeare, 1564–1616

  You colliers lift your hearts on high,

  To God, Who rules the earth and sky.

  He only can defend your head,

  While toiling for your daily bread.

  —from an old English coal-mining song

  Prologue

  Leeswood Green Colliery, Flintshire, Wales

  June 2, 1869

  “What’s wrong with that little urchin over there?” Samuel Harper asked from his elevated viewpoint atop his mount. He pointed to a spot near one of the coal mine’s many tunnel entries.

  Eustace ap Llewelyn, Samuel’s guide he’d hired in Cardiff, looked in the direction where Samuel indicated.

  “Ooh mean that girl there with the bald patch on ’er head?” he said in his thick Welsh.

  “That’s a girl? Impossible. She’s just a mite, couldn’t be more than eight years old.” Bald patch? The child looked as though her hair had been snatched out in great clumps before a hawk had begun clawing at the top of her head, so scabbed and misshapen was it.

  “Nooo, I’d say she’s round twelve. Children aren’t as big and lusty ’ere as I hear they are in America.”

  The girl reached out her hand to a boy—presumably a boy—and led him away from the entrance toward an area where other children sat in a circle, slurping a stew from tin plates. The boy wore a chain around his waist, the tail of which dangled behind him along the ground. He resembled the girl—less the bald patch—so Samuel assumed they were siblings.

  All of the children were scrawny and vacant eyed, eating in silence as though talking might require too much energy.

  “You don’t mean to tell me it’s legal for young girls to work in coal mines?”

  “Nooo, it’s been against the law since ’42.” Eustace shrugged. “But they need work. They’er families need money, else they’ll all starve to death, so mooost folks turn a blind eye to the law.”

  Samuel shifted the reins of his horse from one hand to the other as he considered this. Working in a coal mine was probably better than being in a workhouse, as his Susanna had been many years ago.

  “Why is her head so mangled?”

  Another shrug. “She’s probably a hurrier. The boy sitting next to ’er with the chain—he’s ’er partner. On ’ands and knees he’s attached to the front of a cartload of coal and he crawls up the tunnel, pulling it behind ’im. She gets behind the cart and pushes, mooostly with ’er ’ead. Once they get the cart to the surface and see it emptied, it’s back down to the bottom of the mine for another load.”

  “Why don’t they use ponies or donkeys for the work?” Samuel said.

  “Children are cheaper. And smaller. Those tunnels are less than three feet high. Can’t get an animal in there.”

  “Why don’t they
make the tunnels larger?”

  “Och, man, are youer not listening? It costs money and time to make a tunnel big enough for a beast of burden to get through. Child-sized tunnels are moooch easier to dig.”

  Sam nodded from his vantage point as he watched the children finish off their scant meals, give the tin plates to a man wearing an apron, and return to their duties. The bald girl took the chain-wearing boy’s hand again in a protective way, leading him back to the tunnel’s entrance. She attached the trailing end of his chain to an iron clasp on an ore cart and patted him on the shoulder.

  With the cart behind the boy, he dropped to his hands and knees and crawled back into the tin entrance, the cart squealing in protest. When the cart was almost entirely inside the tunnel, the girl also dropped to her knees, grabbing the top edge of the conveyance with her hands and pressing her head against the metal.

  In seconds, the bizarre little chain of children and cart disappeared into the bowels of the mine.

  How far would they travel on their scabbed knees for their next load? A mile? Perhaps more?

  Sam urged his horse away from the colliery. “I’ve seen enough here. If we don’t get to Mold soon, we’ll miss our train to Pembrey.”

  “But I thought youer wanted to see ’ow they planned to open up the new shaft.”

  “I’ve seen enough to know it won’t be as effective as dynamite. Let’s go.” He turned without checking to see if Eustace was following him.

  Having turned in their hired horses, Sam and Eustace sat in The Three Pits, a tavern a couple of blocks from the Mold train station. Remains of sausages, mash, and peas lay on their plates like swirled bits of ash left behind from a dampened coal fire.

  Sam spoke little during their meal, planning in his mind his upcoming meeting with Mr. Nobel. He’d originally met Alfred Nobel at his home in Sweden several weeks ago and was enthralled with the man’s demonstration of dynamite, immediately realizing the impact it could have on the opening of the many gold and silver mines springing up in the American West, places such as Nevada, California, and his home state of Colorado.

  Nobel, however, was having a difficult time selling his brilliant invention in Europe, particularly in Great Britain. Most governments feared the destructive power of dynamite, despite Nobel’s assurances that it was, in fact, much safer than other methods of removing rock.

  Buoyed by Sam’s enthusiasm, Nobel had asked the American’s help in persuading the Welsh government to let him start a dynamite factory in Wales. Samuel had been a member of a diplomatic corps in London during the American Civil War and had distinguished himself there.

  Samuel might not be Welsh or even British, but he had a few connections left—he hoped—and could perhaps help the heavily accented Swede achieve some acceptance for his invention.

  Sam’s head swirled with the potential of it all. Start a dynamite factory in Colorado? Start one in Great Britain, supplying it out not only to Welsh mines, but to those in the States? Labor was certainly cheaper here in the queen’s realm.

  He paused as the specter of the young hurrier rose in his mind.

  Sam put that thought aside as he took a final swallow of his ale. He wondered how Violet was faring. He missed his wife terribly, but it wouldn’t be much longer before—

  “Mr. ’arper, I think we ’ave some troooble.” Eustace nodded at the window, an ancient piece of glass, pitted and wavy and rendered nearly opaque by years of cigar smoke and neglect.

  Near the entrance to the train station, it looked as though several police officers were escorting two men in iron manacles.

  “Why should there be trouble? They look well secured.”

  Eustace shook his head and said nothing.

  A grimy boy burst into the inn, his eyes wild as he spewed out an urgent concern in Welsh, so rapidly that Sam couldn’t catch a word of it. Eustace, though, nodded grimly, and other patrons abandoned their glasses and plates and headed for the door.

  “What I figured. Come on, then.” Eustace stood and Sam followed him as the guide explained.

  “There’s been bad doings ’ere as of late. The new pit manager, an Englishman named Young, ’as been a hound from hell on the miners. First he prevented them from speaking Welsh while underground. Then he began impooorting English miners and giving them the best jobs. Even wooorse, he announced a cut in wages. Stupid whelp. Green behind the ears and black as coal between them.

  “A grooop of miners held a meeting and decided to show Young the error of ’is ways. Swatted ’im about a little, frog-marched him to the police station, then went back to ’is house and hauled all of his furniture back here to the rail station, in hooopes of sending ’im off for good.”

  Outside, a crowd was gathering around the police and their captives, stalling their progress.

  Someone shouted, “’Tisn’t fair. Should be that black’art Young in chains!”

  Others murmured in agreement. Most of the crowd appeared to be miners, from the smallest boy to the largest man. Their eyes were bleak beneath layers of black dust settled into the lines and crevices that adorned their faces, and they all bore expressions of fury.

  A few women were among their number, as well. Women who were not working in the mines, like the children supposedly were not? The group must have been exceedingly angry to have abandoned their work for the day, which at the least would result in docked pay, but more than likely a firing.

  “Several men were arrested for attacking Young, and ooordered to stand trial today,” Eustace continued. “Those two, Ismael and John Jones, were just sentenced to a month’s ’ard labor at Flint Castle.”

  “Brothers?”

  Eustace stopped and eyed Sam pityingly. “Don’t know moooch about the Welsh, do ooh? Every other man’s name is Jones.” Eustace looked beyond Sam. “More townsfolk coming. Best to get to our platform a bit early, if you see my meaning, Mr. ’arper.”

  Sam turned and saw an indistinguishable mass of dirt-streaked faces, all scowling and muttering.

  By this time, the entry into the train station was blocked by several miners. One shouted at the police, “Ooh’ll not be putting our friends on the train to the castle. They done nothing wrong!”

  Sam and Eustace would have to wait until the disturbance was over to leave. “Let’s head back to The Three Pits while this blows over,” Sam said.

  “Won’t be that easy,” Eustace said, pointing.

  To Sam’s dismay, a group of soldiers, as determined looking as the miners, approached, their rifles ready to inflict damage.

  Far from intimidating the crowd, the soldiers’ presence served only to infuriate them more. There was a simmering blend of miner hatred and supervisory indifference here that reminded Sam of a Civil War skirmish he’d been in, involving a cocky young factory owner’s son who’d bought himself a commission and thought that soldiers were the equivalent of factory workers—who were no better cared for than Southern slaves.

  The situation before him would go no better than what happened that day in ’64, when three other soldiers lagged behind their commander and shot him in the back in unison in the heat of battle. The three had gone on to meet their ends that day at the tips of enemy bayonets, so there was never a need to report it, but Sam never forgot the treachery, nor how easily it was inspired.

  His military instincts took over now and he surveyed the land around them.

  Tapping Eustace’s arm, Sam said, “Look over there. A patch of high ground. Let’s see if we can make it over there to wait until some kind of order is restored.”

  The two men waded through the morass of rough, blackened fists waving in the air and the shouts of people who were feeding off one another’s frustrations and weariness.

  Several other townspeople had the same idea of seeking safety on the little rise of terrain not far away. It was just high enough that nothing was built on it.

  Sam’s old leg injury throbbed by the time he and Eustace—and dozens of others—had reached the hill. He despise
d the reminder that he wasn’t as vigorous as he’d been before his time in the Civil War.

  He stood next to a young woman whom he would have guessed to be about fifteen, but based on his earlier inability to guess, perhaps she was as old as twenty.

  Dressed in a prim gray uniform that told him she was not attached to the mine, the girl turned fearful eyes to Sam and let out a barrage of Welsh.

  As near as Sam could tell, the girl was simply on an errand in town for her mistress and had stumbled into this mob, just as Sam and Eustace had. Concluding her unintelligible tale, she hugged herself, shaking her head as she watched events unfold.

  More miners and townspeople were filling the area. Sam estimated there to be hundreds of people witnessing the two convicted men being escorted to the train for their sentence at Flint Castle jail.

  The scene violently escalated as a couple of bystanders flung stones at the police and soldiers. One missile struck an officer on the forehead, drawing a bright trail of blood down the side of his face and eliciting a cheer from the crowd. Even one of the manacled prisoners smiled at the policeman’s injury, although it may have been combined with relief that the stone had missed the prisoner’s own head.

  The successful hit inspired others in the street to pick up small, sharp stones from the road and add them to their taunts.

  Sam was more concerned by the expression of the soldiers’ faces, visible even where he stood. Their narrowed eyes and compressed lips were indicators of how badly this might go.

  The mob, enchanted with its own temporary victory, was oblivious to the men with guns.

  “I think we need to move farther—” Sam started, but was cut off by the precision firing of rifles. With fluid repetition, the soldiers lifted their weapons to their shoulders, shooting upward with little aim in an effort to frighten the crowd.