Read Don't Look Back for Free Online

looked at the ring that Jessica wore. "Perhaps there is a way..."
     
    "It certainly does not surprise me that you got involved in the affair," Tobias said dryly. "What did you do?"
    "Jessica wore a very unusual ring. It was gold and set with colored stones and tiny, sparkling diamonds in the shape of a flower. I asked her about it. She told me that it had come down through her family and that she had worn it since she had left the schoolroom. It looked at least somewhat valuable."
    Tobias nodded matter-of-factly. "You urged Jessica to use the ring to finance her new life."
    Lavinia shrugged. "It seemed the obvious course of action. The only other solution to her problem that I could see was that she contrive to poison Oscar Pelling. Something told me that she would falter at the notion of murdering her husband."
    Tobias's mouth edged upward slightly at one corner. "Unlike you?"
    "Only as a last resort," she assured him. "In any event, I thought the ring plan was the best. I knew that if she could get to London with it, she would be able to sell it for a reasonable sum. Not enough to allow her to live in luxury for any length of time, of course, but sufficient to give her a means to survive until she could establish herself in a career."
    "My sweet, you have reinvented yourself so many times that I fear you overlook the fact that not everyone is as resourceful and determined as you are."
    She sighed. "You may be right. I must say that even though I thought my plan was splendid, Jessica looked appalled when I outlined it. She appeared quite daunted by the notion of taking on a new identity and finding a way to support herself. She had always had money, you see. The idea of getting by without her fortune terrified her."
    "Damned unfair, too," Tobias mused. "After all, the money was hers."
    "Well, yes, of course. I sympathized entirely on that point. But in my opinion, it was either turn her back on her fortune and take a new name or start research on the fine art of preparing poison. As I said, I did not believe that she would be enthusiastic about the latter course of action."
    "Sometimes you send a bit of a chill through me, Lavinia."
    "Nonsense. I'm certain that had you been in my shoes, you would have given her the same advice."
    He shrugged and offered no comment.
    She frowned, rethinking her remark. "I take that back. You wouldn't have advised her to go to the trouble of establishing a new identity. You would have arranged for Pelling to meet with a nasty accident."
    "As I was not in your shoes, there is no point speculating."
    "Sometimes you send a bit of a chill through me, sir."
    He smiled at the echo of his own words, no doubt concluding that she was making a small joke. But she was not joking, she thought. Sometimes he did send a small chill through her. There were some shadowy places deep inside Tobias. Occasionally it struck her quite forcibly that there was still a great deal that she did not know about him.
    "What happened to Jessica Pelling?" he asked.
    "I never saw her again," Lavinia whispered. "She committed suicide the following day."
    "How? An overdose of laudanum? Did she drink too much of the milk of the poppy?"
    "No. She chose a more dramatic means. She went out riding in the midst of a violent storm and cast herself into the swollen river. Her horse returned without her. Later a maid found a note in Mrs. Pelling's bedchamber declaring her intention to drown herself."
    "Hmm."
    There was a short silence.
    "They never found her body."
    "Hmm."
    "It happened from time to time." Lavinia clasped her hands very tightly in her lap. The memories of that awful day were so fresh and vivid now that she had to fight to draw air into her lungs. "The river was very deep and treacherous in places. It was not unheard of for some unfortunate soul to fall in when it was in flood and never be seen again."
    "Oscar Pelling blamed you for his wife's death?"
    "Yes. He confronted me in the street immediately after the searchers