Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
ONE
TWO
THREE
FOUR
FIVE
SIX
SEVEN
EIGHT
NINE
TEN
ELEVEN
TWELVE
THIRTEEN
FOURTEEN
FIFTEEN
SIXTEEN
SEVENTEEN
EIGHTEEN
NINETEEN
TWENTY
TWENTY-ONE
TWENTY-TWO
TWENTY-THREE
TWENTY-FOUR
TWENTY-FIVE
TWENTY-SIX
TWENTY-SEVEN
TWENTY-EIGHT
TWENTY-NINE
THIRTY
THIRTY-ONE
THIRTY-TWO
THIRTY-THREE
THIRTY-FOUR
THIRTY-FIVE
THIRTY-SIX
THIRTY-SEVEN
THIRTY-EIGHT
THIRTY-NINE
FORTY
FORTY-ONE
FORTY-TWO
FORTY-THREE
FORTY-FOUR
FORTY-FIVE
FORTY-SIX
FORTY-SEVEN
BY JAYNE ANN KRENTZ WRITING AS AMANDA QUICK
The Third Circle
The River Knows
Second Sight
Lie by Moonlight
Wait Until Midnight
The Paid Companion
Late for the Wedding
Don’t Look Back
Slightly Shady
Wicked Widow
I Thee Wed
With This Ring
Affair
Mischief
Mystique
Mistress
Deception
Desire
Dangerous
Reckless
Ravished
Rendezvous
Scandal
Surrender
Seduction
BY JAYNE ANN KRENTZ WRITING AS JAYNE CASTLE
Dark Light
Silver Master
Ghost Hunter
After Glow
Harmony
After Dark
Amaryllis
Zinnia
Orchid
OTHER TITLES BY JAYNE ANN KRENTZ
Running Hot
Sizzle and Burn
White Lies
All Night Long
Falling Awake
Truth or Dare
Light in Shadow
Summer in Eclipse Bay
Smoke in Mirrors
Dawn in Eclipse Bay
Lost & Found
Eclipse Bay
Soft Focus
Eye of the Beholder
Flash
Sharp Edges
Deep Waters
Absolutely, Positively
Trust Me
Grand Passion
Hidden Talents
Wildest Hearts
Family Man
Perfect Partners
Sweet Fortune
Silver Linings
The Golden Chance
G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS
Publishers Since 1838
Published by the Penguin Group
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Copyright © 2009 by Jayne Ann Krentz
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Published simultaneously in Canada
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Quick, Amanda.
The perfect poison / Amanda Quick. p. cm.
eISBN : 978-1-101-04445-2
1. Women botanists—England—Fiction. 2. Secret societies—England—Fiction. 3. Psychic ability—Fiction. 4. Murder—Investigation—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3561.R44P’.54—dc22
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, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
While the author has made every effort to provide accurate telephone numbers and Internet addresses at the time of publication, neither the publisher nor the author assumes any responsibility for errors, or for changes that occur after publication. Further, the publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.
http://us.penguingroup.com
This one is for my fantastic sister-in-law, Wendy Born. With love and thanks for the Ameliopteris amazonensis.
And for Barbara Knapp, with my deepest appreciation and thanks for, among other things, introducing me to Mr. Marcus Jones.
I am very grateful to you both for opening a window on the wonderful world of nineteenth-century botany.
ONE
Late in the reign of Queen Victoria . . .
Lucinda stopped a few feet away from the dead man, trying to ignore the fierce undercurrents of tension that raged through the elegant library.
The constable and the members of the grieving family were well aware of who she was. They watched her with a mixture of macabre fascination and barely concealed horror. She could hardly blame them. As the woman the press had once featured in a lurid scandal and a tale of shocking murder, she was not welcome in polite society.
“I do not believe this,” the attractive, newly minted widow exclaimed. “Inspector Spellar, how dare you bring that woman into this household?”
“This will only take a moment,” Spellar said. He inclined his head toward Lucinda. “If you would be so kind as to give me your opinion, Miss Bromley.”
Lucinda was careful to keep her expression cool and composed. Later the family members would no doubt whisper to their friends and associates that she had appeared as cold as ice, just as the newspapers and the penny dreadfuls had portrayed her.
As it happened, the thought of what she was about to do actually did chill her to the bone. She would far rather be home in her conservatory enveloped by the scents, colors and energy of her beloved plants. But for some reason that she could not explain, she found herself drawn to the work that she occasionally did for Spellar.
“Certainly, Inspector,” she said. “That is why I’m here, is it not? I think we can safely say that I was not invited for tea.”
There was a gasp from the widow’s spinster sister, a severe-looking woman who had been introduced as Hannah Rathbone.
“Outrageous,” Hannah snapped. “Have you no sense of the
proprieties, Miss Bromley? A gentleman is dead. The least you can do is behave in a dignified manner and leave this household as quickly as possible.”
Spellar gave Lucinda a veiled look, pleading silently with her to watch her tongue. She sighed and closed her mouth. The last thing she wanted to do was jeopardize his investigation or cause him to think twice about requesting her advice in the future.
At first glance one would be highly unlikely to guess Spellar’s profession. He was a comfortably stout man with a benign, cheerful countenance, a voluminous mustache and a thin ring of graying hair, all of which served to distract others from the sharp, insightful intelligence in his blue-green eyes.
Few who were not well acquainted with him would guess that he possessed a true talent for noticing even the smallest clues at a murder scene. It was a psychical gift. But there were limits to his abilities. He could not detect any but the most obvious cases of poisoning.
Fairburn’s body lay in the middle of the vast floral carpet. Spellar stepped forward and reached down to pull aside the sheet that someone had drawn over the dead man.
Lady Fairburn burst into a fresh cascade of sobs.
“Is this really necessary?” she cried brokenly.
Hannah Rathbone gathered her into her arms.
“There, there, Annie,” she murmured. “You must calm yourself. You know your nerves are very delicate.”
The third family member in the room, Hamilton Fairburn, set his well-modeled jaw in grim lines. A handsome man in his mid-twenties, he was Fairburn’s son by a previous marriage. According to Spellar, it had been Hamilton who insisted on summoning a detective from Scotland Yard. When Fairburn had recognized Lucinda’s name, however, he had been aghast. Nevertheless, although he could have refused to allow her into the mansion, he had not done so. He wanted the investigation to go forward, she thought, even at the cost of having such a notorious female in his house.
She walked toward the body, bracing herself for the disturbing sensations that always accompanied an encounter with the dead. No amount of preparation could entirely dampen the disorienting sense of utter emptiness that swept over her when she looked down at the figure on the floor. Whoever and whatever Fairburn had been while he was alive, that essence was gone.
She knew that traces of evidence that might provide clues to the manner of his death still clung to the scene, however. Spellar would certainly spot most of them. But if there was any indication of poison, it was her mission to detect it. The psychical residue of toxic substances remained not only on the body but on anything the individual had touched in those last moments.
There was often other, very unpleasant and much more obvious evidence, as well. In her experience most people who died after ingesting poison became violently ill before expiring. There were always exceptions, of course. A long, slow, steady diet of arsenic did not usually produce such dramatic results at the end.
But there was no indication that Lord Fairburn had suffered from bouts of nausea before he died. His death could have been attributed to a stroke or a heart attack. Most families who moved in elevated circles, as the Fairburns did, would have preferred to accept such a diagnosis and thereby avoid the publicity that inevitably attended a murder investigation. She wondered what had made Hamilton Fairburn send a message to Scotland Yard. Clearly he had his suspicions.
She concentrated for a moment on visual cues but they told her little. The dead man’s skin had turned a stark, ashen shade. His eyes were open, staring at nothing. His lips were parted in a last gasp. She noticed that he had been older than his wife by at least a couple of decades. That was not an unusual circumstance when a wealthy widower remarried.
Very deliberately, she stripped off her thin leather gloves. It was not always necessary to touch the body but direct physical contact made it easier to pick up nuances and faint traces of energy that she might not notice otherwise.
There was another round of shocked gasps from Lady Fairburn and Hannah Rathbone. Hamilton’s mouth tightened. She knew that they had all seen the ring on her finger, the one the sensation press claimed she had used to conceal the poison that killed her fiancé.
She leaned down and lightly brushed her fingertips across the dead man’s forehead. Simultaneously she opened her senses.
At once the atmosphere of the library altered in subtle ways. The scents that emanated from the large jar of potpourri swept over her in a heavy wave, a combination of dried geraniums, rose petals, cloves, orange peel, allspice and violets.
The colors of the roses in two tall, stately vases intensified dramatically, exhibiting strange hues for which there were no names. While the petals were still bright and velvety, the unmistakable reek of decay was clearly detectable. She had never understood why anyone would want to decorate a room with cut flowers. They might be beautiful for a short time but they were, by definition, in the process of dying. As far as she was concerned, the only suitable place for them was in a graveyard. If one wished to preserve the potency of a plant or bloom or herb, one dried it, she thought, annoyed.
The sad-looking filmy fern trapped behind the glass front of the Wardian case was dying. She doubted the exquisitely delicate little Trichomanes speciosum would last the month. She had to resist the urge to rescue it. There was scarcely a household in the country that did not boast a fern in the drawing room, she reminded herself. One could not save all of them. The fern craze had been going strong for several years now. There was even a name for it, Pteridomania.
With the ease of long practice, she suppressed the distracting energy and colors of the plant life in the room and concentrated on the body. A faint residue of unwholesome energy slithered across her senses. With her talent she could detect almost any type of poison because of the way the energy of toxic substances infused the atmosphere. But her true expertise was in the realm of those poisons that had their origins in the botanical kingdom.
She knew at once that Fairburn had, indeed, drunk poison, just as Spellar had suspected. What stunned her were the faint traces of a certain very rare species of fern. A cold chill of panic trickled through her.
She took a moment or two longer than necessary with the body, pretending to concentrate on her analysis. In reality she used the time to catch her breath and steady her nerves. Stay calm. Do not show any emotion.
When she was certain that she had herself under control she straightened and looked at Spellar.
“You are right to be suspicious, sir,” she said in what she hoped were professional tones. “He ate or drank something quite poisonous shortly before he died.”
Lady Fairburn gave out a shrill cry of ladylike anguish. “It is just as I feared. My beloved husband took his own life. How could he do this to me?”
She collapsed into a graceful faint.
“Annie!” Hannah exclaimed.
She dropped to her knees beside her sister and removed a dainty vial from the decorative chatelaine at her waist. She pulled out the stopper and waved the vinaigrette under Lady Fairburn’s nose. The smelling salts proved effective immediately. The widow’s eyes fluttered.
Hamilton Fairburn’s expression hardened into grim outrage. “Are you saying that my father committed suicide, Miss Bromley?”
She closed down her senses and looked at him across the vast expanse of the carpet. “I never said that he deliberately drank the poison, sir. Whether he took it by accident or design is for the police to determine.”
Hannah fixed her with a seething glare. “Who are you to declare his lordship’s death a case of poison? You are certainly not a doctor, Miss Bromley. Indeed, we all know exactly what you are. How dare you come into this household and hurl accusations about?”
Lucinda felt her temper stir. This was the annoying aspect of her consulting work. The public was consumed with a great fear of poison, thanks to the sensation press, which had developed a morbid infatuation with the subject in recent years.
“I did not come here to make accusations,” Lucinda said, fighting
to keep her voice even. “Inspector Spellar requested my opinion. I have given it. Now, if you will excuse me, I will take my leave.”
Spellar stepped forward. “I will escort you outside to your carriage, Miss Bromley.”
“Thank you, Inspector.”
They left the library and went into the front hall, where they found the housekeeper and butler waiting. Both individuals were steeped in anxiety. The rest of what was no doubt a very large household staff remained discreetly out of sight. Lucinda did not blame them. When there was a question of poison, the servants were often the first to come under suspicion.
The butler hurried to open the door. Lucinda went out onto the steps. Spellar followed. They were met with a wall of gray. It was midafternoon but the fog was so thick that it masked the small park in the center of the square and veiled the fine town houses on the opposite side. Lucinda’s private carriage waited in the street. Shute, her coachman, lounged nearby. He came away from the railing when he saw her and opened the door to the vehicle.
“I do not envy you this case, Inspector Spellar,” she said quietly.
“So it was poison,” Spellar said. “Thought as much.”
“Unfortunately nothing so simple as arsenic, I’m afraid. You will not be able to apply Mr. Marsh’s test to prove your case.”
“I regret to say that arsenic has fallen somewhat out of favor of late now that the general public is aware that there is a test to detect it.”
“Do not despair, sir, it is an old standby and will always be popular if for no other reason than it is widely available and, if administered with patience over a long period of time, produces symptoms that can readily be attributed to any number of fatal diseases. There is a reason, after all, why the French call it inheritance powder.”
“True enough.” Spellar grimaced. “One can only wonder how many elderly parents and inconvenient spouses have been sped on their way to the Other World by that means. Well, if not arsenic, what then? I did not detect the smell of bitter almonds or notice any of the other symptoms of cyanide.”