An hour later, Jasper was making his way through one of the ledgers he’d taken from Frumkin’s safe when there was a soft scratching on the door and Paisley entered.
“Your visitor is here, my lord.” He stepped back to allow Mrs. Vogel—as heavily veiled as a woman would be in the first flush of mourning—to enter the room.
“I’m sorry I’m late,” she said before Jasper could even greet her. “I’m afraid I had difficulty getting away.”
“I understand,” Jasper said, because he did. “Would you care for tea?”
“Oh, no thank you.”
Jasper nodded at Paisley, who shut the door soundlessly behind him.
“Please, Mrs. Vogel, have a seat.”
She lifted her veil.
“Bloody hell!” The words slipped out of him before he could stop himself, and he closed the distance between them with three long strides, instinctively reaching for her. When she flinched back, he dropped his hand. “I’m s-s-sorry—I didn’t mean to startle you. I was trained as a m-m-medical doctor. Would you l-let me have a look? Unless you’ve already had it s-s-seen to?”
She shook her head, her chin trembling as tears oozed out of her eyes, both the beautiful blue one and the one that was now black and swollen shut. “I didn’t go to a doctor,” she said in a hoarse voice. “But I went to my old nanny and she—well, she’s helping me.”
“Your f-f-family, can they—”
“They already know what he is like but they can’t do anything to help me. My family are poor, my lord, it’s the reason I married Adolphus.”
“You have n-nobody who would t-t-take you in?”
Her poor battered face twisted into a bitter smile. “I have friends—one in particular—who wants to help. But Adolphus has already said he will destroy my family if I ever try to leave.”
In addition to her blackened eye, her jaw was swollen and discolored on one side, for all that she’d obviously used cosmetics to cover it. Her lower lip, which he’d been admiring only last night, was split and twice its normal size.
He suddenly recalled what Vogel had said. “Good Lord—your baby—did he?”
“No,” she shook her head hard enough to probably make her head spin. “There wasn’t one—it was a lie. I lied to him so that he would stop touching me. But then—somehow—he found out and last night—” A sob broke out of her and she crumpled.
He caught her by the shoulders and held her while she cried, her slender hands like crushing claws on his back as her body shook.
Jasper patted her shoulder and made the cooing noises he’d seen people make with their children, feeling useless and helpless. He wished, unfairly, that Paisley was still in the room to consult for guidance, although the old bachelor was likely as useless as Jasper.
Thankfully, Mrs. Vogel’s violent flood of tears was of short duration. She slowly came back to herself, her posture stiffening as she recalled that Jasper was a stranger.
Jasper hooked the chair behind her with his foot and pulled it close. “Here, sit down,” he murmured, not releasing her until she’d slumped against the high back of the chair.
He took a deep breath and slowly expelled it before dropping to his haunches in front of her, taking her hand. She was that rare person who looked twice as attractive after weeping, even with the horrid damage she’d endured.
“T-Tell me what happened.”
She dabbed her eyes with the lacy, ineffectual handkerchief women always seemed to possess, wincing when she touched her bruised eye. “He was angry and demanded I tell him what we’d been talking about.”
Jasper grimaced; so it had been his fault she’d taken a beating.
No, Jasper, it was her husband’s fault.
He knew that, and still—
Her fingers lightly squeezed his own. “It isn’t your fault, my lord—this is not the first time it has happened. Sometimes he doesn’t even need a reason. I think he is always angry because he knows—”
She didn’t need to finish the thought; Jasper knew what she meant. Vogel would know that she loathed him and it must infuriate him. In his obsession to possess her, he would, ultimately, break or kill her.
She gave him a tremulous smile. “Please, I’m sorry I came undone. I am fine now, I promise.”
She looked far from fine, but Jasper suspected that his own anxiety was only serving to make her more anxious, so he released her hand and stood, pulling a second chair closer.
“T-T-Tell me what happened with Beauchamp—from the beginning.”
“I had a lover.” Her chest rose and fell jerkily. “And somehow he learned about it.”
Jasper thought of the sexually explicit letter he’d found in the dead man’s safe. It had been from H. to M. and the date on the letter had fit the date next to Helen Vogel’s name in Frumkin’s little black book.
Hatred flared in her unusual blue eyes, shrinking the pupil that was still visible.
It was the look of a person who could do murder, and Jasper felt a distinct chill in the sultry summer air.
“Margaret. Her name is Margaret.”
Jasper blinked, confused. “I beg your pardon?”
“My l-lover,” she said, suddenly defiant.
“Ah,” Jasper said, too startled to say more.
“Margaret Peel,” Mrs. Vogel repeated, more softly.
There had been far fewer female names than male in Frumkin’s book, and one of them was Margaret Peel.
“He came to me—only a few months after my marriage to A-Adolphus,” the stammered word was scarcely a whisper and she nervously glanced around his study, as if the source of her terror might be lurking anywhere.
After a long, fraught moment, she continued. “I was to go to him.” Her expression shifted from terror to naked revulsion. “He said he would consider the debt paid after—after six nights.”
Jasper nodded, trying to think of a polite way to frame his next question. But she took care of that little bit of awkwardness for him.
“He wasn’t there that night.”
“December seventeenth?”
Her eyes widened. “My God. How do you know? Who else—”
“Shhh,” he soothed. “It was m-mere speculation,” he said untruthfully. “What about M-Margaret? Did he th-th-threaten her, too?”
“Yes, but he wanted something else from her—a painting.”
“A C-Constable?”
“I don’t understand,” she said, her voice rising to a near-wail. “How do you know these things? You can’t have spoken to Margaret?”
“N-No, I haven’t spoken to her. But I intend to.”
“You shall have to go to Venice to do so,” she said, her expression viciously smug. “She got away from this mess. From him.” She took a deep breath, held it, and then released it slowly.
Jasper gave her a moment to compose herself before he asked, “When did she leave?”
“Not long after he approached her and she handed over the wretched painting.”
“When?”
“In November. It was the twelfth—she went with her grandmother, who is half Venetian.”
Well, that took care of one suspect’s name from the list. “You said Beauchamp w-w-wasn’t there December seventeenth. When was the l-last time you saw him?”
“December tenth,” she said without hesitation. “We didn’t do … well, we didn’t do anything. I had to go to his house—on Sullivan—and bring him—” Her jaw tightened, and she swallowed hard, forcing the next words out, “I had to bring him—I had to bring him a pair of my drawers.”
Jasper realized his own face was hot.
What a prude you’ve become, old thing. Less than a month in the land of the Puritans and already you’re blushing at the mention of female unmentionables. His sly inner companion had a good laugh.
“D-D-Did you s-see him that day?”
“Yes,” she ground out, her face a fetching rosy pink. “He made me take tea with him. And then he scheduled our visits. Once every month, on the seventeenth, for six months.”
“Why the s-seventeenth?”
“It was usually when I met Margaret—it was his way of perverting what we had.” She stared down at her clenched hand. “I told him there was no way I could commit to months of meetings on a particular day. I tried to convince him how difficult that would be if Adolphus wanted me to do something on one of those nights. He was such a—a—pig, he just laughed and told me he knew I was a mistress of persuasion.” She twisted her handkerchief restlessly.
“When I got home from that meeting Adolphus was waiting.” She swallowed and met Jasper’s gaze. “I didn’t look as bad as this by the time he got the truth out of me, but—well, let’s just say it was a less than joyful Christmas.”
“Did he go see Mr. B-Beauchamp?”
She shook her head. “He said he wanted to wait until our arranged meeting. He said when Beauchamp opened the door expecting me, he’d find Adolphus, instead.” Her eyes dropped to her hands again. “Adolphus, as you can see, believes in solving problems with his fists.” She sighed. “I have to admit that I was relieved that he finally knew the truth. He was sickened—he said what Margaret and I had done was an abomination before God and he was just as concerned as I was not to have word of our, er, association become known.”
They sat in silence for a long moment.
It was Mrs. Vogel who broke it. “Margaret was already safe and far away, so I didn’t have to worry about him taking out his anger on her. Although I did get a letter from her. I have any important correspondence delivered to my nanny’s, where I read it but of course never take anything back with me. Anyhow, Margaret said her father had suffered a serious reverse in his investments and that it seemed somebody was singling him out—the attack almost personal.” She shook her head at Jasper. “I couldn’t prove it, but it was too much of a coincidence not to be Adolphus.”
“Do you think your husband k-k-killed Beauchamp?”
“I’ve been thinking about nothing else since you mentioned it.” She chewed her lower lip and then winced before looking up, her expression the same intense loathing as when she’d mentioned Frumkin. “I would not be saddened to see Adolphus in jail, my lord—I would love to never have to look at him or let him—” She broke off, swallowing convulsively. She shook her head. “But, no, I don’t think he killed Beauchamp.”
“Why not?”
“Adolphus likes to make people suffer. That’s why he is slowly crushing Margaret’s family. He doesn’t want anyone dead—not when he can extract his revenge over and over again.”
Jasper thought about Edward Cooper and what he’d intimated about Vogel; the description certainly fit.
Still, Vogel had a motive as surely as any of the names of the people that Frumkin had been extorting.
Not only did Vogel have motive and plenty of opportunity, but evidence of his violent nature and cruelty was sitting right in front of Jasper.
And then there was the fact that he’d once been a butcher.
Yes, Mr. Adolphus Vogel’s name had just shot to the top of Jasper’s list.
“Do you know anything about his first w-w-wife?”
“I know she was so miserable that she threw herself off their roof.”
He sat forward. “How do you know that?”
“Because that’s exactly what I want to do almost every single day since I married him. Even if he had killed Beauchamp, a man like Adolphus is just too rich and powerful to ever have to pay for his crimes.”
“You need to find somepl-place to go, Mrs. Vogel,” Jasper urged. “You need to l-l-leave him.”
She gave Jasper a look of such profound despair it hurt to look at her. “The only way I’ll ever escape Adolphus is if I die.”
Jasper didn’t point out that would be all too likely if she refused to leave him.