Murder at Mansfield Park

would supply her sister with the sober
facts of the case as well as she could do. But if she wished to avoid society in general, she most earnestly sought the company of her brother. He alone would understand some thing of what she was
suffering, and he alone would have the words with which to console her; but a search of the house revealed only that his bed was empty, and his horse gone.
    She asked the cook for a dish of tea, and made her way slowly to the privacy of her own room, where she finally gave way to a violent outburst of tears. It was some time before this excess of
suffering had spent itself, and even longer before she could trust herself to appear before the Grants in a tolerable ease of mind, so she sent word that she was indisposed and lying down. And lie
down she did, though with such a head-ache as precluded all hope of sleep. Never had she wanted the bliss of oblivion more, and never had she more need of it; she knew her impending interview with
Charles Maddox would tax all her reserves of watchfulness and caution, and yet she could not quiet her thoughts. Between the horror of Julia Bertram’s senseless and untimely death, and her
own unconscious part in it, and the words she had heard from the girl’s own lips, only hours before she died, she could not tell if her heart were more oppressed by sorrow, guilt, fear, or
foreboding.
    When Maddox arrived shortly after three o’clock, she was sitting in the shrubbery. He saw at once the paleness of her face, and the slight tremor in her hands, and
guessed some thing of what she had been suffering in the hours since dawn. He pitied her, but he could not afford to shew it; she, by contrast, could think of him only in the guise of a man
prepared to resort to torture, to intimidate an innocent servant. He would have taken her hand, had she offered it, but she remained seated, and would not catch his eye. He said nothing
immediately, but took a seat on the bench beside her.
    ‘I see we do not meet as friends, Miss Crawford. I am at a loss to know how I have so far forfeited your good opinion.’
    ‘You have only to search your own conscience, Mr Maddox.’
    ‘Even so, I would prefer to hear it from you.’
    ‘Really, sir,’ she said angrily, turning to face him, ‘do you have no recollection at all of the atrocious way you behaved towards Kitty Jeffries? Setting your brute of an
assistant upon her like a dog?’
    He sat silent for a moment, and it occurred to her that he had supposed her ignorant of the incident, and was even now debating how best to excuse it. She had never seen him frown before, and
she was struck by how much it served to alter his face, as the scar above his eye deepened, and cast shadows along the strong lines of his chin and jaw, sharpening them to an edge. She had known
him to be a formidable adversary; now, for the first time, she saw him without the mask of geniality or politeness. It may, perhaps, have been due to her extreme weariness, but she felt the power
of his presence as she had never done before; she had been used to condemning him as arrogant and domineering, but now, sitting by him in such close proximity, and after such an experience endured
together, she found herself affected in a way that was wholly new to her.
    ‘It was—necessary,’ he said at length. ‘Regrettable, but necessary. The girl will take no lasting harm, and I fancy her mistress is already remembering me in her nightly
prayers.’
    Mary gathered her wits, and called to mind why she had been so displeased with him. ‘Lest you have already forgotten, Mr Maddox, Miss Bertram has this very morning lost her beloved
sister.’
    ‘My apologies, Miss Crawford, I am properly reprimanded. We are both of us, I suspect, somewhat fatigued. I meant merely to say that Miss Bertram is far from sharing your resentment. She
does not approve of the method, any more than you do, but it has been the means of exonerating her from all suspicion, and relieving her mind from an intolerable burden. I see from your expression
that you do not know the story. I will be brief. At a certain point during your pleasant little party to Compton, Maria Bertram told her cousin that she wished her dead. She did not know, then,
that her sister had overheard these words, and when Mrs Crawford’s body was found, Maria was seized with panic, fearing she would be suspected if the story became known. Her fears were all
the greater because she had suffered a