Page 100 of A Modest Independence

“Quite well. He was a dear, dear friend to me when Colonel Anstruther and I were newly married.”

A dear, dear friend.

Jenny briefly wondered if the rumors were true. Had Mrs. Anstruther and Giles really been lovers? The lady didn’t seem at all Giles’s type. She was too frail and flighty. The fragile sort of woman who required a great deal of looking after. Surely Giles wouldn’t have had the patience to indulge her. “When did you see him last?”

“In Poona, sometime before the mutiny began. He often came to dine with me.” Mrs. Anstruther smiled for the first time. “He was a young gallant, Lord Castleton. He knew just how to lift my spirits.”

“Yes,” Jenny said. “His lordship always knew precisely what to say.”

“Indeed, Miss Holloway.” Mrs. Anstruther reached into her sleeve for her handkerchief. “I was ever so grieved to hear of his death. For such a gentleman to be cut down in the prime of his life. It’s one of the great tragedies of the mutiny.” Her eyes filled with tears. “When I think of how he was—”

“My dear,” Colonel Anstruther said from the doorway. “You have entertained our visitors long enough.”

Jenny and Tom rose, but neither of them so fast as Mrs. Anstruther. She was on her feet in seconds, nearly knocking over her chair.

“Have a care, madam,” the colonel said sharply. He was a big fellow, tall and wide, with a heavy, drooping mustache. His skin was baked brown from the sun, his black hair peppered with gray. He looked, Jenny thought, exactly like the sort of man who would take pleasure in hunting a tiger or an elephant. The sort of man with not an ounce of finer feeling within him.

She regarded him with a frown as he unceremoniously ushered his much younger wife from the room. He shut the doors to his study behind her before coming to join them.

Introductions were dispensed with and they returned to their seats, Anstruther taking the chair lately vacated by his wife. “You must excuse my wife. She’s been unwell for some time.”

Tom’s brow furrowed with concern. Whether or not it was genuine, Jenny couldn’t tell. “Nothing serious, I trust?”

“The heat. She’s never adjusted to it. Many wives don’t.” Anstruther crossed one leg over the other. “But you haven’t come to Delhi to discuss my wife. You have questions about Captain Lord Castleton, I understand.”

“We do, sir,” Jenny said.

“Seems dashed strange. I’ve already had a letter on the subject from a fellow called Treadway. It was delivered sometime in late January.”

Jenny stifled an inward groan. In Calcutta, Tom had written to Mr. Thornhill and asked him to discharge Mr. Treadway. Unfortunately, Mr. Treadway’s own letters—written to the upper echelons of the Bengal Army—had been dispatched months ago. As a result, Jenny and Tom were forever tripping over his name.

“We’d hoped to learn something more than Mr. Treadway,” she said. “You must know that yours is the only account of Lord Castleton’s death.”

“I’m aware.”

“Would you—that is—if you could please tell me what it is that you observed that day, I—”

“It will be no different from what I wrote in my report and subsequent letters. One to his sister, if memory serves. Which is precisely what I told this Treadway fellow.”

“Yes, but I’d very much like to hear it from your own lips.”

Anstruther’s brow lowered. “Have you reason to doubt my report?”

“No one doubts your account,” Tom said. “Miss Holloway and Lady Helena are only hoping to discover some minor detail that might have been missed.”

“To what purpose?”

Jenny leaned forward in her seat. “To discover if there is any small chance Lord Castleton might have survived the fall of Jhansi.”

Anstruther’s lip curled. “You may dispense with that notion, ma’am. Castleton is dead. I saw the death blow delivered with my own eyes.”

“You said as much in your condolence letter to Lady Helena,” Jenny said. “But you gave no further details other than that he had been cut down by a rebel sepoy. How can you be certain that the blow he received—”

“My good man,” Anstruther interrupted her to address Tom. “Can you countenance such a discussion in front of a lady? I wouldn’t permit it in the presence of my wife. Too upsetting, you know. Not quite the thing.”

A burst of helpless frustration flared in Jenny’s bosom. It was the same sensation she’d felt in Allahabad when the gentleman at luncheon had demanded they limit the conversation to subjects fit for females. Only this was worse. Far worse. She hadn’t come all this way merely to be excluded at the final hour on account of her sex.

Her mouth opened on a sharp retort.