As the morning turned into afternoon she began to panic. Christabel had expected a reply to her letter by now and perhaps, even a visit. All her plans hinged on Ruth delivering the letter. Maybe she had been rash and not thought things through properly; what if Ruth had forgotten or had been delayed by Mrs. Hudson? Or even worse, what if Ruth had given the letter to the housekeeper; what then?
And even if the letter was delivered, there was no guarantee that it would be read immediately or if the recipient would be at home. She would have to think of another plan; get out of the house as soon as possible. It was already getting dark and she couldn't wait until morning. Her life was in danger and she would have to leave the house that very night!
Christabel listened carefully for the sleeping noises of the nurse and before long she heard the peculiar drone of the woman, confirming that she was asleep next door. Slipping out of the sheets, she dressed by candlelight. There was no time to pack any clothing-she could think about that later; her safety was paramount. Her plan was to call at Mr. Crawley's and, failing that, she could seek out the comparative safety of Mr. Williams.
Wrapping her warmest cloak around her shoulders, she tiptoed silently out of the room; the candle lighting her path. Pausing at the top of the stairs, she listened carefully to the sounds of the house. All was still except for her own breathing. Peering into the shadowy gloom below she slowly made her way down the stairs; pausing halfway down to listen again.
Soon, she stood in the hallway and was making her way to the front door. Stephens would probably have locked it by now, but she knew where he kept the key. Walking slowly over the polished wooden floor she was about to reach for the door when a voice bellowed low across the hallway.
"Christabel!"
The deep voice cut through the darkness and sent a shiver through her body. Turning around, the candle flickered in her hand, setting the flame dancing and scattering the light on the walls around her, as if she were standing on the very brink of hell.
"Edward!" His face looked ghoulish in the glowing light.
"What are you doing down here my dear and all dressed too? It's late and you should be in bed.” Smiling, he walked towards her.
"I thought I heard someone at the door and knowing Stephens would have already retired, I thought it best to come down to see who it was?"
"My dear Christabel, I think you have been imagining things, or at the very best dreaming. You forget that you have been quite ill and you shouldn't fret about such things. I was just leaving myself, but thought I would get myself a drink before I left. I was just on my way to the kitchen to see what I could find, why don't you join me, you look like you could do with a drink?"
Christabel had no other option as he led her by the arm and down towards the kitchen stairway. Edward seemed to be kind, but she did not trust him. She could see that the lights were already on in the kitchen and could hear voices in the room below.
As she walked downstairs a figure came into view; it was Mrs. Hudson but she was sitting all alone; perhaps the woman had been snoozing and talking in her sleep?
At the approach of footsteps, she turned and stood, her initial look of alarm turning to one of surprise. “Mr. Montgomery! We didn’t expect to see you here.”
She looked Christabel up and down without acknowledging her and sat quickly down at the table again, her eyes never leaving the pair, eyebrows raised as if awaiting an explanation.
“I bumped into Lady Montgomery in the hallway Mrs. Hudson. I told her she would catch her death going out on a chilly night like this. Besides its late, and who knows what might happen to a lady out without a chaperone in London these days? I thought that we might get a hot drink; maybe even a tumbler of brandy?”
Something in his tone set Christabel on edge. There was a distinct harshness to his voice that she had not noticed before that unnerved her, and Mrs. Hudson seemed to smile wryly as she settled herself at the table. “Well, there’s no hot water, dearie. So if you want a drink you would have to put the kettle on the stove. And as for a nip of brandy...well...?” She indicated the empty bottle on the table.
Mrs. Hudson was drunk; Christabel could plainly see that now. Her face was red with the alcohol and heat from the stove, and the woman could barely stand. No wonder she chose to sit.
Edward stood and held Christabel’s arm. He didn’t seem to mind that Mrs. Hudson was speaking out of turn, but she certainly did. Feeling the anger rise in her throat she pulled free of Edwards grip. “Mrs. Hudson. Might I remind you to whom you are speaking?”
Mrs. Hudson looked taken a back for a brief second before bursting out into a fit of raucous laughter. “Ha, I know who I’m talking too alright, dearie.”
Christabel couldn’t see the humor. “Edward. Tell this woman to stop her cackling and to make us some tea. How dare she treat us like this?” Her voice shook with rage as the color rose in her cheeks.
Sliding back her chair, Mrs. Hudson stood shakily with her hands upon the table and with an unsteady gait took a few steps towards Christabel. “How dare she treat us like this!” the older woman mimicked the younger. “And who do you think that you are except for a jumped up fliberty-gibert; a young chit of a girl? You know nothing, my dear and I would advise that you keep your mouth shut or you might end up like that dear friend of yours.”
Christabel stood, open mouthed as the words sank in. “What do you mean Mrs. Hudson? What about Hannah? Edward what is she saying?”
His hand was on her arm again, but this time it was gripping her tightly. “I’m afraid Pearl is speaking the truth, my dear. We had no choice with Hannah. She knew too much you see and I’m sorry my dear, but you do, too. You already know far too much for your own good, so what are we supposed to do now? We can’t just let you wander about freely now can we, not with all of that knowledge in your head? I was hoping that we could keep you sedated; maybe transfer you to a mental institution for the rest of your life. I have the ear of a few physicians who would be open to suggestion and a few pounds. It would be only natural; a young girl losing first her dear husband and then her maid. Why it’s enough to make anyone go mad. But now I don’t think we can take the risk. I think we have to think of a more ‘permanent’ solution.”
His words chilled her to the bone and any strength she had soon fled. As her knees buckled beneath her, Edward sat her roughly in a chair.
“Now Pearl, what shall we do with her?”
There was a noise from the pantry. Someone was in the small back room attached to the kitchen and all eyes watched as the pantry door slowly opened.
Christabel almost cried with relief. Mr. Crawley stood in the open doorway; he must have received her letter after all! Somehow he had known and had been hiding all this time. He had answered her letter and come to save her.
“Andrew!” With some difficulty she rose to her feet and ran towards him. He looked gaunt and pale and she wondered if he were quite well. It did not matter; she felt safe with him and ran to his arms.
“Did you hear them Andrew? Did you hear what Mrs. Hudson was saying about Hannah? They killed her and would have done the same to me if you had not arrived in time? What are we going to do?”
Running into his arms. she felt his hands roughly upon her. He too smelt of stale alcohol and his clothes looked rougher than she had remembered. Looking into his eyes she sensed that something was wrong, his gaze was cold and impenetrable and her heart beat faster, but only in fear.
Edward smiled. “I’m afraid even Mr. Crawley can’t save you now, can you son?”
The young man laughed as his arm twisted toward her throat. Something wasn’t right. “What’s happening Andrew, I don’t understand?”
The strong arms pushed her back towards the chair and as she turned towards him, she could see that he was grinning, too. The face that she had thought so beautiful looked evil and menacing. He remained silent; his steely gaze upon her.
“You see my dear –your knight in shining armor here is not all that he seems to be. You appear to have put all of your eggs into the wrong basket; so to speak.”
She could hardly breathe. It was like a nightmare that she couldn’t wake up from and her heart pounded as she tried to think. “I…I don’t understand...” she faltered.
“Well, I suppose we could give you an explanation. There would be no harm in it now I think.” Edward smiled as if enjoying the moment.
“You see my dear, Mrs. Hudson and I have known each other for a long time; before you were born in fact. You could say we knew each other quite well.”
Pearl Hudson let out a raucous peal of drunken laughter. “You could say that Edward.”
“Pearl was a good looking woman in those days when I first laid eyes on her in a pub down in Soho. We had a bit of fun, nothing serious – it was never love with me and Pearl, but one thing led to another and she found herself pregnant. I wanted to do right by the woman, so I found her a position in my father’s house. Both Charles and I were still at home at that point. It was back then that we hatched our plan. Charles was a serious sort, a bit of a bookworm, not like me for parties and such like. We thought it might be interesting if Pearl here seduced my dear brother and convinced him that the pregnancy was all his doing. Pearl didn’t show and no one knew about our fling – that is except Arthur Critchley. We were drinking buddies in those days and one drunken night I stupidly told him all about it. At least money has silenced the idiot. I should have done away with him like that fool Charles long ago.
“Either way, Pearl had the child and he was looked after by her sister. Charles continued to believe that the child was his and paid for the upkeep. He was due to inherit on Charles’s death, but when he reached eighteen he got involved with a rough lot and ended up in prison for theft and involvement in murder. It was only with my intervention that he did not hang and I managed to get him released after five years of imprisonment. When Charles found out, he disinherited the boy and any hope of inheritance was dashed. It was then that we got the idea to blackmail poor Charles. Having a convicted murderer and thief for a son wouldn’t have looked good for him, so we started to exhort money from the man. It worked for a while but on his release from prison, Charles refused to hand over any more money. It was then that we knew he had to die.”
Edward stopped to draw breath, pleased with his scheme and the telling of it.
Christabel struggled to take in all that she was hearing. Poor Charles. To have been fooled and lied to by his brother for the past twenty-five years and then killed for gain; it did not bear thinking of.
“But Mr. Crawley was not disinherited from the will; I heard it from Mr. Lewis’s lips for myself. The whole estate has been left to him.” The words had barely left her lips when the door to the stairway burst open. Christabel looked on in alarm and almost fainted as she looked eye to eye with Mr. Andrew Crawley! He was holding a gun and pointing it at Edward.
Surely she was dreaming, or perhaps she really was ill? Her gaze drifted from the young man that had so roughly held her, to the young man that had so recently stepped through the door. They were identical, their features exact, although there was a difference. She could see that now. Where one was cold and mean, the other was warm and kind.
“I think we had better make the introductions. Albert Adams please let me introduce your brother, Mr. Andrew Crawley.”
The two men looked at each other in awe as if glancing at their own reflection; both not quite believing what each other where seeing. The gun dropped from Andrew’s hand, the unexpected turn of events knocking all the former conviction from him.
Christabel gasped. She had known immediately which one was ’her’ Mr. Crawley, she had felt it in her heart almost straight away.
“You see. I forgot to mention that when Pearl gave birth it was to twins. Whilst her sister could cope with one boy, she didn’t want the two and so they were split at birth and have never known of each other’s existence until this moment. Andrew seemed to have all of the goodness that was in me, and Albert all of the badness. Where Albert got in with the wrong crowd, Andrew was sent away to school and did well. It’s unfortunate that no one else knows about the two. You see our little plan means that we can substitute Albert for Andrew and no one will ever know but for Pearl and myself.”
“And what about Andrew, he is your own son?” Christabel spoke where the poor young man could not.
“I’m afraid that he will meet the same sticky end as you, my dear. They say that blood is thicker than water, but not money I’m afraid, in my case. Besides, what would dear Anne say? She knows nothing of this. Why did you think I had to put on such an act at the solicitor’s office? I thought I was most convincing, don’t you?”
“But I thought that you were contesting the will?”
“Only as a red herring. I was only reacting as other people thought I might in such circumstances! Who would ever suspect me?”
Andrew came to his senses, realizing that he had dropped his gun and that it was now lying at his feet, yet before he could react, Albert pounced forward and wrestled his brother to the ground. The two men fought for the weapon and as Edward tried to grab hold of Christabel there was a loud bang as the gun was fired and a smell of sulphur filled the air.
The two men stopped fighting and all seemed still for a moment. Mrs. Hudson who had been on the edge of a drunken sleep came suddenly to life and clutched at her bosom with the shock.
At first Christabel feared that Andrew had been shot. Edward had just reached her and his arm was wrapped around her shoulder. Suddenly, she felt his hold slacken; a surprised glaze blinding his vision as he fell back against the table and onto the floor. Edward was dead.
Pearl Hudson let out a scream as both men looked on in horror.
“Why didn’t you tell me I had a brother?” The young man walked accusingly over to the housekeeper, his eyes full of hate. “Why didn’t you tell me mother?”
Their eyes locked for a second as Pearl stepped forward towards her son. “Kill them both Albert, and then we can have the money for ourselves.”
Albert shook his head, his face white. “Why didn’t you tell me mother?”
His finger pulled the trigger and Mrs. Hudson staggered towards them, her red eyes bulging as a dribble of blood appeared in the corner of her mouth and she fell forward onto the floor to join Edward.
Another noise penetrated the air. This time it was the shrill and piercing tone of a police whistle. Standing in fear, Albert stood paralyzed for a second; the gun wavering in his hands.
Christabel edged towards Andrew as all three stood in silence.
Footsteps clattered on the stairs as three policemen burst into the room. Stepping forward towards his brother, Andrew Crawley held out his hand for the gun. Albert reached across with his empty hand to touch his brother for a brief second before turning the gun and shooting himself dead.