On Her Wedding Night, the Widowed Woman Was Accused of Murder by Her Husband’s Brother, and Then a Strange Fear Appeared on His Face

On my wedding night, my husband’s body lay upstairs, while I stood at the foot of the stairs and heard the servants already counting out my future.

Doctor Prentice closed his pocket watch and said loudly enough for everyone to hear:

“Lord Wexford’s heart has stopped. Unfortunately, we could do nothing.”

The candle flames swayed in the silver candlesticks. The newly made wedding ring on my finger was so cold, as though I were holding someone else’s hand. I had only one thing left from that day—the ivory wedding glove, with a small silver sewing needle stuck near the wrist. It had belonged to my mother, and before the wedding she told me to leave the needle there to fasten fate.

I was twenty-two years old and had been Lady Wexford for barely nine hours. I had known Robert for only eleven weeks. My father owed him a large sum, and my marriage resembled a transaction entered in a book of debts.

“Do you want to see him?” the doctor asked me.

“He was my husband.”

“I do not advise it, madam.”

“I am going up anyway.”

I went up the stairs. The heavy silk of my dress dragged along the floor, and every step made a sound as though the house were testifying against me. In the bedroom Robert lay dressed. His hand was still warm.

That was what frightened me most.

“I am sorry, Robert,” I whispered. “I should have been a good wife. I really intended to be.”

As I was closing the door, housekeeper Beckett met me in the corridor.

“Madam, shall I write to your brother-in-law in London?”

Adrien Wexford. Robert’s younger brother. The new earl, to whom the house, the lands, the money, and even the right to decide my future now belonged.

“Immediately,” I said.

That night I could not cry. I had become the widow of a strange man, and more humiliating than that was only the fact that I had not yet loved him.

On the third day, in the afternoon, Adrien arrived. Tall, thin, with a stern face. He had green eyes, but there was no warmth in them.

I waited in the green room. The glove lay on my lap, while the silver needle lightly trembled with every movement.

“Lady Wexford,” he said. “It is unfortunate to meet you under such circumstances.”

“I think so too.”

He did not remove his hat.

“My brother married you eleven weeks after meeting you. He died on the wedding night. You will agree, that is a strange sequence of events.”

The blood drained from my face, but I did not lower my head.

“You are not asking about my grief, my lord. You are looking for my guilt.”

“I look at the facts.”

“No. You arrange them so that there is no place left for me.”

Adrien went to the fireplace. He placed his fingers on the marble edge.

“Tell me, madam, where were you before Robert’s death?”

“In my room.”

“Who will confirm it?”

“My maid.”

“And what if she is frightened?”

“Then you must learn that fear is not the truth.”

For the first time I noticed that a crack had appeared in his calm. He took a small folded sheet of paper from his pocket, but immediately hid it again.

“You do not know what my brother thought of you,” he said.

“Nor do you know what he thought of me.”

Beckett’s footsteps sounded in the corridor. She held a dark leather folder in her hands.

“My lord,” she said, “I found this in your brother’s study. He instructed me to hand it over only after your arrival.”

Adrien looked at the folder. Then he looked at me.

His hand slowly reached toward the clasp…

When the folder’s clasp opened, it seemed that even the ticking of the clock in the room stopped.

“Is this my brother’s handwriting?” Adrien asked.

Beckett nodded.

“Yes, my lord. He told me that if anything happened to him, it had to reach you.”

Adrien took out the first sheet. He read it. His face changed, but he immediately folded the sheet again.

“There is nothing here,” he said.

“Then why did your face turn pale?” I asked.

He looked sharply at me.

“You became interested in my face very quickly.”

“For three days you have been accusing me of murder. I have the right to know why.”

Beckett locked the door.

“Madam, that night the lord asked me to call the doctor only if a bell sounded from the bedroom. There was no bell.”

“What does that mean?” I asked.

“I do not know. But in the morning, before you came down, I saw this on his desk.”

She took a small brass key from the folder. The head of the key was shaped like a horseshoe.

Adrien quickly covered it with his hand.

“Enough.”

“No,” I said. “It is no longer enough.”

For the first time he lost his calm.

“You do not know whom you are opposing.”

“Perhaps. But you also do not know whose widow you left me.”

The sound of horses’ hooves came from outside. Beckett looked toward the window.

“Another man has arrived.”

Adrien put the key in his pocket. The door handle moved and an unfamiliar voice sounded beyond the threshold:

“Lord Wexford, I am a police officer. I have urgent business concerning your brother…”

The door opened and Captain Haley entered the room. In his hand was a folded warrant, and the whole room filled with the smell of wet leather and horse sweat.

“My lord, Doctor Prentice has made a new statement,” he said. “The death was not natural.”

Adrien froze.

“What are you saying?”

“After examining the body again, he found traces of plant poison in the stomach.”

I gripped the back of the chair. The ivory glove fell from my lap to the floor, and the silver needle rolled across the wooden floor with a ringing sound.

“You told me it was the heart,” I said to the doctor, who stood behind the captain.

Prentice lowered his eyes.

“Then I was mistaken.”

“Or you were forced to be mistaken,” Adrien said.

The captain placed a small glass vessel on the table.

“This is from Robert’s room. They found residue at the bottom of the glass. But this still does not prove who gave him the drink.”

Adrien opened the folder.

“Now you will understand,” he said.

He took a letter from inside. Round wax marks could be seen on the corners of the paper. The letter was written in Robert’s hand.

“Adrien, if you are reading this, I was unable to complete what I began. Do not trust Mariana only because she is my wife, but do not condemn her either when you do not yet know the truth. Her father, Edward Belmont, stole money from my house accounts. Marriage to his daughter was not only a transaction. I needed to protect her, and she needed my protection too.”

Blood throbbed in my ears.

“Robert knew this?” I asked.

“He knew everything,” Adrien answered. “Including that Belmont was in the house that night.”

“My father was here?” I could barely pronounce the words.

Beckett covered her mouth with her hand.

Adrien took out a second sheet.

“This is not only a letter. It is a medical record that Robert secretly requested from the doctor. He suspected that his brother was being slowly poisoned. On the wedding night, poison was put into his drink.”

The captain looked toward me.

“Madam, where were you when this happened?”

“In my room. I was writing a letter to my father.”

“Where is the letter?”

My heart contracted strangely.

“I do not know.”

Adrien understood immediately.

“The letter is gone,” he said.

At that very moment a horse neighed outside. Beckett ran to the window.

My father’s carriage stood in the courtyard.

But Edward Belmont had not come alone. Beside him stood the house steward Hargreaves, the man whose name never appeared in Robert’s letter, although his handwriting appeared on every page of the accounts.

The captain looked toward the window and said quietly:

“They are already here. And apparently they know that you found the letter…”