Death at Dartmoor Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  AUTHORS’NOTE

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  AUTHORS’ NOTE

  REFERENCES

  More praise for Robin Paige’s Victorian Mysteries:

  “I read it with enjoyment ... I found myself burning for the injustices of it, and caring what happened to the people.”

  —Anne Perry

  “Wonderfully gothic.... A bright and lively re-creation of late-Victorian society.”—Sharan Newman

  “Good stories with a nice feel for the period. Intriguing and intelligent.” —Mysterious Women

  “An original and intelligent sleuth ... a vivid re-creation of Victorian England.”—Jean Hager, author of Blooming Murder

  “Absolutely riveting.... An extremely articulate, genuine mystery, with well-drawn, compelling characters.”

  —Meritorious Mysteries

  “An adventure worth reading.” —Romantic Times

  “Robin Paige provides readers with an excellent historical mystery that will have genre fans searching for the previous novels in this special, one-of-a-kind series.”

  —Midwest Book Review

  Praise for

  Death at Epsom Downs

  “Enough danger and intrigue to keep readers turning the pages, which are filled with vivid historical detail.”

  —Booklist

  “Even-tempered prose, period conversation, historical characters, dialect, and culture will make this a solid addition to the series.” —Library Journal

  “Readers who like their historical mysteries on the lighter side will find much to enjoy here.” —Publishers Weekly

  “The cleverly arranged mystery absorbs the audience, but takes a back seat to the human drama at the tail end of the nineteenth century. Robin Paige provides a page-turning novel that will entice historical fiction buffs and Victorian mystery readers to seek her previous works in a strong series.” —Midwest Book Review

  “If you like mysteries with real characters and historical settings, you will enjoy this series.”—The Stuart (FL) News

  The Victorian Mystery Series by ROBIN PAIGE

  Death at Bishop’s Keep

  ... in which our detectives Kate Ardleigh and Sir Charles Sheridan meet for the first time as they are drawn into a lurid conspiracy ...

  Death at Gallows Green

  ... in which two mysterious deaths bring Kate and Sir Charles together once more to solve the secrets of Gallows Green ...

  Death at Daisy’s Folly

  ... in which Charles and Kate discover that even the highest levels of society are no refuge from the lowest of deeds—such as murder ...

  Death at Devil’s Bridge

  ... in which newlyweds Charles and Kate Sheridan begin their lives at Bishop’s Keep—only to find a new mystery right in their own backyard ...

  Death at Rottingdean

  ... in which a seaside holiday for Charles and Kate becomes a working vacation when the body of a coast guard is discovered on the beach of Smuggler’s Village ...

  Death at Whitechapel

  ... in which a friend of the Sheridans’ is blackmailed—by someone who claims to have proof that her son’s father was none other than the notorious Jack the Ripper ...

  Death at Epsom Downs

  ... in which a jockey is murdered on Derby day, leaving Charles and Kate to embark on a race for justice that stands to be a photo finish ...

  The Victorian Mysteries by Robin Paige

  DEATH AT BISHOP’S KEEP DEATH AT GALLOWS GREEN DEATH AT DAISY’S FOLLY DEATH AT DEVIL’S BRIDGE DEATH AT ROTTINGDEAN DEATH AT WHITECHAPEL DEATH AT EPSOM DOWNS DEATH AT DARTMOOR DEATH AT GLAMIS CASTLE DEATH IN HYDE PARK DEATH AT BLENHEIM PALACE DEATH ON THE LIZARD

  China Bayles Mysteries by Susan Wittig Albert

  THYME OF DEATH

  WITCHES’ BANE

  HANGMAN’S ROOT

  ROSEMARY REMEMBERED

  RUEFUL DEATH

  LOVE LIES BLEEDING

  CHILE DEATH

  LAVENDER LIES

  MISTLETOE MAN

  BLOODROOT

  INDIGO DYING

  AN UNTHYMELY DEATH

  A DILLY OF A DEATH

  DEAD MAN’S BONES

  BLEEDING HEARTS

  SPANISH DAGGER

  CHINA BAYLES’ BOOK OF DAYS

  Beatrix Potter Mysteries by Susan Wittig Albert

  THE TALE OF HILL TOP FARM

  THE TALE OF HOLLY HOW

  THE TALE OF CUCKOO BROW WOOD

  THE TALE OF HAWTHORN HOUSE

  Nonfiction books by Susan Wittig Albert

  WRITING FROM LIFE

  WORK OF HER OWN

  THE BERKLEY PUBLISHING GROUP

  Published by the Penguin Group

  Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA

  Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario M4P 2Y3, Canada

  (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.)

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  Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R ORL, England

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

  DEATH AT DARTMOOR

  A Berkley Prime Crime Book / published by arrangement with the authors

  Copyright © 2002 by Susan Wittig Albert and William J. Albert.

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form

  without permission. Pleas
e do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in

  violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

  For information, address: The Berkley Publishing Group,

  a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

  eISBN : 978-1-440-67293-4

  BERKLEY® PRIME CRIME

  Berkley Prime Crime Books are published by The Berkley Publishing Group,

  a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

  The name BERKLEY PRIME CRIME and the BERKLEY PRIME CRIME design

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  http://us.penguingroup.com

  Version_2

  AUTHORS’NOTE

  Four of the characters in this novel are “real,” and our representation of them is as faithful to life as we can make it. Arthur Conan Doyle and Fletcher Robinson visited Dartmoor during March and April of 1901, when this novel takes place, with the purpose of jointly authoring The Hound of the Baskervilles. We don’t know for certain that Jean Leckie joined Conan Doyle at the Duchy Hotel, but the two frequently arranged such meetings, and it is not impossible that she would have visited him there. William Crossing’s pioneering work as a topographical expert and as a folklorist has made it possible for tens of thousands of visitors to enjoy the beauties of Dartmoor and to appreciate the legends that Doyle used as the basis of his famous story.

  ROBIN PAIGE

  BILL AND SUSAN ALBERT

  BERTRAM, TEXAS

  CAST OF CHARACTERS

  *Indicates historical persons

  Lord Charles Sheridan, Baron Somersworth and amateur forensic detective

  Lady Kathryn Ardleigh Sheridan, Baroness Somersworth and author, under the pen name of Beryl Bardwell

  Miss Patsy Marsden, photographer and world traveler

  *Arthur Conan Doyle (later, Sir Arthur), author

  *Miss Jean Leckie, intimate friend of Conan Doyle, later Lady Conan Doyle

  *Bertram (Bertie) Fletcher Robinson, journalist and self-styled “joint author” of The Hound of the Baskervilles

  Sir Edgar Duncan, master of Thornworthy, Chagford, Dartmoor

  Lady Rosalind Duncan, wife of Sir Edgar and mistress of Thornworthy

  Avis Cartwright, upstairs maid, Thomworthy

  Mr. Nigel Westcott, medium

  Mr. Jack Delany, Stapleton House, Chagford, Dartmoor, Sir Edgar’s cousin

  Mrs. Daisy Bernard, Hornaby Farm, Hexworthy, Dartmoor, Sir Edgar’s friend

  Major Oliver Cranford, Governor, Dartmoor Prison

  Dr. Samuel Spencer, former physician, sentenced in 1900 to Dartmoor Prison for the murder of his wife Elizabeth

  Miss Mattie Jenkyns, archaeologist

  Miss Charlotte Lucas, of the Salvation Army Prison Gate Mission

  Miss Evelyn Spencer, prison reformer

  *William Crossing, author of Guide to Dartmoor and expert interpreter of the moor and its people

  Vicar Thomas Garrett, of Saint Michael and All Angels, Princetown, Dartmoor

  James Lorrimer, M.R.C.S., medical officer for the parishes of Grimpen, Thorsley, and High Barrow, Dartmoor

  Constable Daniel Chapman, Mid-Devon Constabulary

  CHAPTER ONE

  Princetown, Dartmoor

  March 30, 1901

  The chances are that you will either love Princetown or hate it.... There are those who view the mist-enshrouded town with its high rainfall, its gray buildings and grim prison as the end of creation.... There are others, though, who believe that its air is healthy and invigorating and that It is set in a landscape of unparalleled beauty.

  Princetown of Yesteryear

  Chips Barber

  Constable Daniel Chapman of the Mid-Devon Constabulary loved his work with a passion that perplexed his wife and, truth be told, puzzled even him. It was not that he was well paid, for the eighteen shillings he brought in each week was not much above the rate paid to a common laborer, and, like a laborer, he was required to be out in all weathers. It was not that the work was easy, either, in spite of the fact that Princetown was a small town and that, for the most part, the moor dwellers of Mid-Devon were a peaceable lot. Since the prison—ill-famed Dartmoor Prison, which loomed like a gray granite ghost out of the lowering Dartmoor mist—required quite a number of guards and since the guards were not always of the highest moral character, Constable Chapman often found his work cut out for him, especially when Saturday and payday arrived, and the hard-drinking, short-tempered fellows crowded into Princetown’s two pubs to spend their money on ale.

  But in spite of these things, Daniel Chapman felt profoundly proud when he buttoned the gold buttons of his navy blue uniform coat, put on his tall, blue helmet, and bade his wife and children good-bye at the front door of their small stone cottage at the top of the High Street. He felt even prouder when he walked around to the back of the cottage and unlocked the door of the tiny constable’s office (for Princetown’s constable, as was often the case, lived and worked in the same place). Stepping inside, the first thing he saw was the Ordnance map fixed to one wall, and on the other a board pinned full of official notices from the Devonshire Constabulary, signed with Superintendent Weaver’s official flourish. The sight of the map and the notices reminded him once again that he, Constable Daniel Dickson Chapman, was the only representative of the King’s law across all the west moor, from Okehampton down to Plymouth. (The constable did not count the governor of the Dartmoor Prison, of course, who was only a custodial agent for the men incarcerated there and had nothing to do with enforcing the law. That was Daniel Chapman’s business, and only his.)

  The office was as cold as the outdoors. Constable Chapman went to the small iron stove in the corner of the room, scooped the ashes from the grate into a bucket, and carried them out to the ash heap in the rear. Back inside, he lit a fire of small faggots and added pieces of peat. There was enough water in the bucket to fill the kettle, and while he waited for it to heat, he sat down at a wooden table and attacked the mound of reports and papers that always seemed to be lying in wait for him, keeping him off the streets and away from the people whom he was committed to serve.

  The constable was just getting well started when the door opened, letting in a whoosh of cold air. A small, ruddy-faced man stamped in, puffed out his breath, and in his musical Devonshire speech, announced, “Us’ve got dogs o‘er Chagford way, Constable. Two sheep dead an’ two down. There wud’ve bin more, only young Jemmy come up on ’um on his way to school and chased ‘um off. Knowin’ that ye be so partic’lar ’bout keepin’ informed as to goin’s-on here’bouts, I thought ye’d like t’ know.”

  “Thank‘ee, Rafe.” The constable matched the man’s soft speech as best he could, although his Bristol tongue was harsher and more clipped. “ ’Tis the third such report i’ the last fortnight. I’ll let folks know t’keep they eyes open.”

  “Us’ll be shootin’ on sight,” Rafe said darkly.

  “Well, then, be certain t’ shoot dogs, not folks,” the constable said mildly.

  “Aye, fay,” Rafe said, agreeing, and stamped out.

  The kettle began to hiss, and Constable Chapman got up to make a cup of tea. Sheep-killing dogs, a lost child, a drunken prison guard locked up for breaking a window in the Black Dog—that would be the sum of his reporting for the entire fortnight. Cup in hand, he turned to gaze out the window, which opened onto wide fields and stone fences, with Beardown Hill in the distance, and beyond, Beardown Tor, its granite knobs black against the winter-brown moor. In spite of the occasional problems created by the prison, it was far easier to keep the peace on Dartmoor than to police the dirty streets of Bristol. And the land was lovelier and infinitely more fascinating than any city vista, the uplands rising and falling and rising again, their shoulders constantly swept by the fresh, clean wind, their soft flanks granite studded, their gray heads topped with s
tone tors that reared up like monsters out of antiquity.

  The constable smiled to himself. Yes, the land, always the fresh, clean, vast land, beyond the reach of any man to sully it. That was the real reason he loved his work.

  Vicar Thomas Garrett, of Saint Michael and All Angels, on the other hand, did not love his work—a fact that he freely acknowledged as he lit his pipe, stirred one small teaspoonful of sugar into his tea, and settled himself at his desk in the vicarage to work on his Sunday sermon. Oh, it was not that he disliked his Princetown parishioners or the moor dwellers, most of whom lived in a handful of unfortunate hamlets flung like rough stones, randomly coming to rest between the hills and along the dales. It was not that he disliked his clerical duties, either, for Thomas Garrett’s father and grandfather and great-grandfather had been clergymen, and when he donned surplice and stole and stepped up to the pulpit to speak to his flock, he felt that he was not only carrying out the work of the Lord but carrying on a noble family tradition as well. And of course there was no disliking Saint Michael’s, which for all its stony austerity was an impressive example of Devonshire granite work, its tall, square tower offering a splendid view northward across the valley of the West Dart and into the very heart of the moor.