Page 74 of Corpse in the Canal

Was that a hint of amusement or even appreciation in her eyes? Whatever, Constance had no chance to study it, for Clarence came bouncing in with several pictures flapping in his hand.

“Look, Mrs. Grey, here’s my sea monster. Mama says he’s the scariest thing she’s ever seen, and David said any ship would flee from it.”

“I should think they would,” Constance agreed. “Is he bigger than a ship?”

Clarence considered. “Bigger than a little ship. These are David’s funny fish. I don’t think his whale is as frightening as my monster.”

Constance took the other pictures from him. “No, but that one comes close.”

Clarence laughed. “It’s a…octopus, but I don’t believe its eyes are really like that.”

“I expect you’re right.” She looked at the next picture—a sketch of Adelaide and Clarence with the canal behind them. In contrast to the water and the countryside, the figures held little detail, yet David had managed to capture something of Clarence’s energy and curiosity, and something indefinable in the woman that was purely Adelaide. Even her dress was somehow recognizable as the one she had worn on their first meeting.

Interesting. She wasn’t sure how she felt about it. David had come a long way, but he was vulnerable, and Adelaide… Even if she had not killed Percy—and Constance was not convinced—surely any kind of relationship with his brother’s former lover was unhealthy for all of them. But particularly for David.

“Can I draw you and Mama?” Clarence asked her.

“Of course.”

Rather to her surprise, he sped off to the desk, some distance away.

“You must have good eyesight,” Constance remarked.

Clarence grinned. “I’m not good at faces yet. From here I don’t have to be.”

Startled, Constance looked at his mother. “He’s very quick. Another budding artist?” She spoke lightly, and yet perhaps she hadn’t quite hidden the old suspicion that surged up, for Adelaide met her gaze and held it.

“He isn’t Solomon’s,” she said. “He was not conceived until after my marriage, by which time Solomon had been gone for almost a year.”

Heat burned into Constance’s face, from as much shame as embarrassment. To have her suspicions and foolish jealousies read so easily… Yet Adelaide had had no need to say these things.

“Why do you tell me this?” Constance asked.

Adelaide’s lips quirked. “Because I loved Solomon, and because I have to admire the woman brave enough to accept him.”

“It didn’t take bravery,” Constance said. Well, it had, just not the kind Adelaide meant.

“Not for you,” Adelaide said. She drew in a breath. “Do you know what happened to David when he disappeared?”

“Some of it,” Constance said. “Very little. He, too, is a lesson in courage.”

“Yet you protect him. You and Solomon. Is he so fragile?”

“He is stronger every day.”

Again, the smile flickered on Adelaide’s lips. “And that is all you will say.”

“That is all I will say.”

“Yet you want everyone else’s truth?”

“A man was murdered. His family needs justice.”

“Did the man you stabbed get justice?” Adelaide asked, sounding more philosophical than accusing.

“I believed so at the time.”

“Then self-defense is a form of justice to you?”