ThePerfectPoison
FORTY-FIVE
“YOU ARE THE ONE WHO STOLE THE FIRST PLANT FROM my conservatory,” Lucinda said. “Why did you take it?”
“You will recall that immediately after you and the others returned from that last expedition, your father and Woodhall showed me the specimens that had been collected. With my talent, I comprehended the true potential of one of them. But I also knew that Bromley and Woodhall would never allow me to grow it for the purpose I intended.”
“You made some poison from it?”
“I made a most interesting drug from it, Miss Bromley. It puts an individual into an extremely suggestible hypnotic state. While in that state he will do whatever he is told to do without question. When the effects of the drug wear off, the victim does not recall what happened while under the influence. As you can well imagine, there are those who would pay dearly to have such power over others.”
“You sold this drug?”
“It wasn’t that simple,” Ellerbeck whispered. He was starting to slur his words. “I realized I had an astonishingly valuable product but I did not know how to go about finding buyers for it. I’m a gentleman, after all, not a shopkeeper. I discovered Mrs. Daykin one afternoon when I went to her establishment. I sensed the poisons she kept behind the counter and knew she might be open to a business arrangement.”
“She found your customers for you?”
“She found one customer in particular,” Ellerbeck corrected. “An underworld lord who was willing to pay the very high price I charged for the drug. In exchange, he agreed to acquire all that I could supply. It was a very profitable association for all concerned while it lasted.”
“When did it end?”
“Six months ago, when I joined the Seventh Circle.”
“I would have thought this criminal lord would have objected quite strongly when he discovered that you no longer intended to supply him with the drug.”
“Allister took care of Jasper Vine for me.” Ellerbeck’s mouth twisted. “Caused quite a sensation in the press. The villain’s associates and Scotland Yard were all convinced that he succumbed to a heart attack. I did society a favor, I assure you.”
“How did you get involved with the Order of the Emerald Tablet?”
“Lord Thaxter came to see me. He was a member of the Order and he had been authorized to recruit botanical talents for a new Circle of Power.”
“The Order wanted you to work on the founder’s formula, I assume.”
“It had become clear that the version created from John Stilwell’s notes was deeply flawed,” Ellerbeck said. “The members of the First Circle are quite anxious to make it more stable.”
“So the Order is conducting research to improve the drug?”
“Yes. I was eager to take on the project. I was certain that with my heightened talents I would soon find the answers. But when my son and I began experiencing side effects, the work took on a new urgency.”
“You gave the formula to your own son? How could you do that? It is one thing to experiment on yourself. Why would you put him at risk, too?”
“You know nothing about my son,” Ellerbeck whispered. “The formula was his only hope.”
“What do you mean?”
“As I said, he was quite insane, Miss Bromley. I was forced to put him into a private asylum when he was only twelve years of age. I did that the day after he murdered his own mother and sister with a carving knife.”
“Dear heaven.”
“I told the police that Allister died at the hands of the unknown intruder who had killed my wife and my daughter. I changed his last name when I put him into the asylum. As far as the world is concerned, Allister Ellerbeck has been dead for years. Now, thanks to you and Caleb Jones, he truly has been taken from me.”
“What made you think that the formula would cure his insanity?”
“I was certain that his mental illness was linked to his unstable psychical senses. I thought that if they could be strengthened, he might become sane. For a short time it appeared to work. I was able to take him out of the asylum and bring him here to live with me. I introduced him to my friends and associates as my nephew since I could hardly claim that he had come back from the dead.”
“But soon the toxic side effects of the drug began to show, didn’t they?” Lucinda said.
“He was plunging back into insanity before my very eyes but this time he was so much more dangerous because the formula had heightened his senses to a level that allowed him to kill with his talent. I knew we were both doomed unless the drug could be stabilized and made less toxic.”
“You weren’t making any progress improving the drug, though, were you? Was that when you discovered that the penalty for failure within the Order is death?”
“Yes, Miss Bromley.”
“That was when you and Thaxter went looking for a modern-day alchemist to assist you, wasn’t it?”
“Believe it or not, I considered inviting you to join the Order, Miss Bromley. But Thaxter wouldn’t hear of taking a woman into the Circle. In any event, I feared that if you ever learned the truth about the death of your father and Woodhall, you might go to the police or to the Council.”
“I would never have agreed to help you work on the formula,” she said tightly.
“You are so like your father,” Ellerbeck said wearily. “All that bloody self-righteousness is very tiresome. In desperation I turned to Mrs. Daykin for advice. I knew she was aware of other botanical talents in London who might abide by a somewhat different set of ethical standards. She suggested I discuss the matter with a certain Dr. Basil Hulsey, who, as it happened, was looking for a new patron.”
“Why did you send Hulsey to my conservatory to steal my Ameliopteris ?”
“I did not send him to steal that damned fern,” Ellerbeck hissed. “He wanted it for his own, private experiments. Daykin had told him about it. Nothing would do but that he had to have it.”
“But he was supposed to be working on the founder’s formula.”
“In order to get him to help us, we had to strike a bargain with him.” Ellerbeck slumped against a workbench and blotted his brow again. “We agreed to finance his private research as long as he made progress on stabilizing the formula.”
“But he wasn’t successful, was he?”
“I have no notion, Miss Bromley, and I never will now because I will soon be dead. Everything has gone wrong because you brought Caleb Jones into this affair.”
The hand holding the gun was shaking.
“One more question,” she said softly. “Why did you kill my fiancé?”
“I had no choice.” Ellerbeck snorted. “Glasson was nothing if not a consummate opportunist. He suspected that I was the one who killed your father and Woodhall. He followed me to Daykin’s shop and realized that I was dealing in poison. He tried to blackmail me. I had to get rid of him. That little scuffle between the two of you in the Carstairs Botanical Society gardens set the stage very nicely.”
“You are responsible for the deaths of a number of people, Mr. Ellerbeck, but it ends now. You will not kill me.”
“You are wrong, Miss Bromley.” The gun wavered precariously in Ellerbeck’s hand. “I will have my vengeance if it is the last thing I do.”
“You are no longer capable of aiming that gun at me, let alone of pulling the trigger. You are quite exhausted and you will soon collapse into a deep sleep.”
“Wh . . . what are you talking about?”
“I put a drug into your tea,” she said gently. “It works very rapidly.”
Ellerbeck trembled, as though in the grip of a raging fever. He blinked, trying to clear his vision. The gun slipped from his hand. He stared at her, uncomprehending.
“You poisoned me?” he whispered.
“The moment I walked into your house today I sensed the terrible energy emanating from this conservatory. I knew something was very wrong. When your housekeeper went to inform you that I had arrived, I took a sleeping powder from my satchel. It is odorless and tasteless. I had no difficulty slipping it into your tea. You have drunk two full cups of it.”
“Impossible,” he gasped. “I watched you pour the tea. I saw no bottles or packets that could have contained poison.”
Glass splintered and shattered. Caleb walked into the conservatory. The gun in his hand was leveled at Ellerbeck.
“Are you all right?” he said to Lucinda without taking his eyes off Ellerbeck.
“Yes,” she said.
Ellerbeck crumpled to his knees. “How did you do it?” he demanded. “How did you poison my tea?”
She held up her ungloved hand so that he could see her lapis-and-amber ring. Very deliberately she opened the tiny, hinged lid to reveal the hidden chamber.
“Some of the stories about me are true, Mr. Ellerbeck.”
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