The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle

‘So Carver sees his daughter covered in blood on the lake bank,’ continues Anna, speaking slowly, trying to put everything in order. ‘He realises you’re going to need some clean clothes, and he goes to the house to fetch them while Helena stays with Thomas. That’s what Stanwin saw when he followed Carver to the lake, that’s why he believed Helena killed her own son. It’s why he let his friend take the blame.’

‘That and a great deal of money,’ says Evelyn, her lip curling, revealing the tips of her teeth. Her green eyes are glassy, blank. Utterly without empathy, intolerant of remorse. ‘Mother paid him handsomely over the years.’

‘Charlie Carver didn’t know you’d planned the murder beforehand and already had a change of clothes waiting in the boathouse,’ I say, struggling not to look for the Plague Doctor among the trees. ‘The clothes stayed there, hidden, for eighteen years until your mother found them when she visited Blackheath last year. She knew what they meant immediately. She even told Michael about them, probably to test his reaction.’

‘She must have thought he knew about the murder,’ says Anna pityingly. ‘Can you imagine... she couldn’t trust either of her children.’

A breeze is stirring, rain plinking against our lanterns. There’s a noise from the forest, indistinct and distant but enough to draw Evelyn’s attention for an instant.

‘Stall her,’ I mouth to Anna, as I remove my coat and lay it across her thin shoulders, earning a grateful smile.

‘It must have been terrible for Lady Hardcastle,’ says Anna, drawing the coat tighter. ‘Realising the daughter she let her lover go to the gallows to protect had murdered her own brother in cold blood.’ Her voice drops. ‘How could you do that, Evelyn?’

‘I think the better question is why she did it,’ I say, looking at Anna. ‘Thomas liked to follow people around. He knew he’d get into trouble if he was caught, so he got very good at being quiet. One day he followed Evelyn into the forest, where she met a stable boy. I don’t know why they were meeting, or even if it had been planned. Maybe it was a coincidence, but I think there was an accident. I hope it was an accident,’ I say, shooting a glance at Evelyn, who’s appraising me like a moth that’s landed on her jacket. Our entire future’s written in the creases around her eyes; that pale white face is a crystal ball with only horrors in the fog.

‘Doesn’t matter really,’ I carry on, realising she isn’t going to answer me. ‘Either way, she killed him. Likely, Thomas didn’t understand what he’d seen, or he’d have run back and told his mother, but at some point Evelyn realised he knew. She had two choices: silence Thomas before he told somebody, or confess to what she’d done. She chose the first option, and set about her work methodically.’

‘That’s very good,’ says Evelyn, her face lighting up. ‘Aside from a detail or two, it’s almost as if you were there in the flesh. You’re a delight, Mr Gold, you know that? Far more entertaining than the dull creature I mistook you for last night.’

‘What happened to the stable boy?’ asks Anna. ‘The stablemaster said he was never found.’

Evelyn considers her for a long while. At first I think it’s because she’s deciding whether to answer the question, and then I realise the truth. She’s summoning the memory. She hasn’t thought about it in years.

‘It was the most curious thing,’ says Evelyn distantly. ‘He took me to see some caves he’d found. I knew my parents wouldn’t approve, so we went in secret, but he was very tedious company. We were exploring, and he fell into a deep hole. Nothing too serious, I could easily have fetched help. I told him I was going to, and then it dawned on me. I didn’t have to fetch help. I didn’t have to do anything at all. I could leave him there. Nobody knew where he’d gone, or that I was with him. It seemed like fate.’

‘You just abandoned him,’ says Anna, aghast.

‘And you know, I rather enjoyed it. He was my thrilling little secret until Thomas asked me why I’d gone to the caves that day.’ Keeping her gun trained on us, she lifts her lantern out of the mud. ‘And the rest you know. Pity, really.’

She cocks the hammer, but Anna steps in front of me.

‘Wait!’ she says, stretching out a hand.

‘Please, don’t beg,’ says Evelyn, exasperated. ‘I hold you in such high regard, really you have no idea. Aside from my mother, nobody’s thought twice about Thomas’s death in nearly twenty years, and then, out of the blue, you two appear with almost the entire thing wrapped up in a nice little bow. It must have taken a great deal of determination, and I admire that, but nothing is so unbecoming as a lack of pride.’

‘I’m not going to beg, but the story’s not done,’ says Anna. ‘We deserve to hear the rest of it.’

Evelyn smiles, her expression beautiful and brittle and utterly mad.

‘You think me a fool,’ she says, wiping the rain from her eyes.