A quiet, somewhat sulky youth, he was six years my junior, and I think he found my company marginally less repressive than Father’s. Edward’s first cousin and heir also gave me little trouble. Simon was sickly and bedridden, afflicted with the same heart complaint that had taken all of his kinsmen. Like Edward he would not make old bones, but it was my lot to care for him until he passed.
The last of my new houseguests was the Ghoul, who had arrived with the expected trunks and a lady’s maid half as old as God. Aquinas had installed them in the China Room, which elicited a flurry of complaints. The room was too cold, the exposure too bright—the litany went on and on. I waved my hand, leaving Aquinas to manage, which he did with his customary efficiency. A small heater was installed, the heavy draperies were drawn, and a fresh bottle of gin was placed on the dressing table, sherry having apparently been given up in favor of something more potent. Since then, I had heard nothing from her whatsoever, and I made a note to instruct Aquinas to add a weekly bottle to the household expenses.
But as much as I complained about them, I was glad to have my family around me as I moved through that awful day. I felt like a sleepwalker, being shifted and guided and turned this way and that, but feeling nothing. They told me later that the sermon was lovely. I was glad of that. I had not listened, and I much suspected that the vicar could not possibly have anything comforting to say. He probably quoted Job, that absurd passage about flowers being cut down. They always quote that. And he probably made some innocuous observations about Edward, observations from a man who had not known him. Edward had not been a great believer, nor was I for that matter. We had been brought up to attend when absolutely necessary, and to observe the conventions, but my family was populated with free-thinking Radicals and Edward’s was simply lazy.
The end result was, I was certain, a eulogy that could have been spoken over the body of any rich, youngish dead man. I did not like to think of that. I did not like to know that Edward, the boy I had loved and married, was already being lost. He was anonymous to the vicar, to the grave digger, to anyone who passed his grave. No one would remember his charm, his beautiful gilt hair, his sweetly serious smile, his ability to tell jokes, his utter incompetence with wine. I would be the only one to remember him as he truly was, and I did not want to remember him at all.
I tried to imagine, as I stood over his open grave, what I would have carved onto the stone. Nothing seemed appropriate. I ran Bible verses and bits of poetry through my mind as the vicar droned on about ashes and death, but nothing fit. I had a few months yet before they would put the stone in place. They would wait until the ground settled before they brought it. I knew that I had to think of something, some brief commentary on his life, some scrap of wit to sum him up, but that was impossible. Words are simple, Edward had not been.
As I struggled to remember a snippet of Coleridge, a cloud passed over, obscuring the sun and throwing the graveyard into chill shadow. A few of the mourners shivered and Father put his arm about my shoulders. The vicar quickened his pace, cracking through the last prayer. The others bowed their heads, but I looked up, studying the graveyard through the thick black web of my veil. Beyond the grave, where the Circle of Lebanon sheltered its dead, there was a figure, or an impression of one, for all I saw was the dead white of a shirtfront against a tall black form.
I dropped my eyes, telling myself it was a trick of the light, of the veil, that I had seen no one. But of course I had. When I raised my eyes again I saw the figure slipping away through the marble gravestones. No one else had seen him, and he had vanished, silent as a wraith. I might have imagined him, except for the question that burned in my mind.
What had brought Nicholas Brisbane to Highgate Cemetery?
Somehow, I knew I should not like the answer at all.
THE THIRD CHAPTER
And then again, I have been told Love wounds with heat, as Death with cold.
—Ben Jonson
“Though I Am Young and Cannot Tell”
After the funeral, everyone repaired to March House where Aunt Hermia had conspired with Father’s butler, Hoots, to provide an impressive cold buffet and quite a lot of liquor. My relations seemed very pleased with both. And so was I. The more they ate and drank, the less they spoke to me, although I still found myself repeatedly cornered by well-meaning aunts and faintly lecherous cousins. The former doled out advice over shrimp-paste sandwiches while the latter made me dubious proposals of marriage. I thanked the aunts and rebuffed the cousins, but gently. They were an intemperate lot, especially with the amount of spirits Aunt Hermia had offered, and if I offered one of them an insult I had little doubt there would be a duel in the garden by sunrise.
It was a relief when Father finally fetched me to his study.
“Time for the will,” he said tersely. “You haven’t accepted your cousin Ferdinand, have you?”
He glanced over my shoulder to where Ferdinand was still tipsily proposing marriage to a marble statue of Artemis and her stag, completely unaware of the fact that I had excused myself.
“No, I don’t think so.”
“I am glad to hear it. He is a famous imbecile. They all are. Marry one of them and I will cut off your allowance.”
“I shouldn’t marry one of them if you doubled it.”
He nodded. “Good girl. I never understood why we Marches always married our cousins in the first place. Bad breeding principle, if you ask me. Concentrates the blood, and God knows we don’t need that.”
That much was true. Father had been the first to marry out of the March bloodlines and had ten healthy children to show for it, all only mildly eccentric. Most of our relations who had married each other had children who were barking mad. He had strongly encouraged us to marry outside the family, with the result that his grandchildren were the most conventional Marches for three hundred years.
In the study, the solicitor, Mr. Teasdale, was busy perusing a sheaf of papers while my eldest brother, Lord Bellmont, viscount, MP and heir to the family earldom, browsed the bookshelves. He was fingering a particularly fine edition of Plutarch when Father spied him.
“It isn’t a lending library,” Father snapped. “Buy your own.”
Bellmont bowed from the neck to acknowledge he heard Father, nodded once at me, then took a chair near the fire. His manners were usually impeccable, but he hated being barked at by Father. Mr. Teasdale put aside his papers and rose. I offered him my hand.
“My lady, please accept my condolences on your bereavement. I have asked Lord March, as head of the family, and Lord Bellmont, as his heir, to be present while I explain the terms of Sir Edward’s will.”
I took a seat next to Bellmont and Father took the sofa. He snapped his fingers for his mastiff, Crab, who came lumbering over to lie at his feet, her head on his knee. Mr. Teasdale opened a morocco portfolio and extracted a fresh set of papers, these bound with tape.
“I have here the last will and testament of your late husband, Sir Edward Grey,” he began pompously.
My eyes flickered to Father, who gave an impatient sigh.
“English, man, plain English. We want none of your lawyering here.”
Mr. Teasdale bowed and cleared his throat. “Of course, your lordship. The disposition of Sir Edward’s estate is as follows: the
