‘I don’t see the house had anything to do with it.’
‘The occupants, then?’ came with the faintest hint of exasperation, which led Saoirse to conclude he was asking a question to which he already knew the answer. Equivocation thus would not serve.
‘There was a rumour doing the rounds − and to be sure there is ever one or more − hinting Captain Brazier was acting as a spy on behalf of the Excise and William Pitt. If you ask about, you’ll find Pitt’s not popular in these parts for his past actions. It’s a name likely to unleash high passions in those who make a living on Deal Beach.’
‘Do you say they are responsible?’
‘Mr Cottin, I have no idea. I was not party to what took place, so I have no knowledge of who or what set the disturbance in motion.’
‘You say “rumour”. It was not, then, established fact?’
‘I have no awareness it was.’
‘I took the liberty of passing the shell of your house, which I would suggest represents a grievous material loss. Odd you don’t seem able to see a connection to do with my purpose here.’
‘Which is?’
‘To find out who is responsible for what was plain murder.’
‘The house was torched by a mob and it’s not the first time this has happened in Deal.’
‘Such disturbances are often set in motion to serve the purpose of one or more individuals. If, as you say, the name of William Pitt was invoked, then I would scarce be surprised to find a number of folk locally, if it was true, had a great deal to lose.’
‘Have I not already said enough to convince you? I don’t know what you suggest is fact.’
‘Indeed, Miss Riorden. My task now is to find Captain Brazier and ascertain from him the identity of the victim.’ The tone of voice changed to one of deliberate irony. ‘I cannot but believe he knew the name of someone in occupation of a house in which he was also resident. If you have any contact with him, please request he calls on me at the Three Kings.’
Cottin stood, his attitude now lacking warmth, nor was there humour. ‘I shall bid you good day. For now.’
Saoirse sat for a good two minutes after Cottin left, as much to ensure he was out of the door as to deliberate on what had just taken place. But sitting thinking was not going to get her anywhere and there was the other matter to attend to. So she went back downstairs to the Card Room, demanding on entry to be told what in the name of the Holy Virgin was going on.
As before, it was left to Dutchy to do the talking.
John Hawker had gone back to brooding, now on the meeting with Henry Tulkington, nurturing even more the feeling matters were not as they should be. Ever since he’d taken over from his sire, with the very rare but not serious glitch, operations had run smoothly; if their relationship had never been one of mutual affection, it had endured. Tulkington was too cold a fish for friendship and Hawker was disinclined to intimacy, which left it as one of mutual dependence: both had their roles to play and it worried Hawker to admit grit had entered the connection and he could nail the cause.
It would be a blind man who’d fail to see the arrival of that sod Brazier as the source of some of the recent troubles. Usually steady and calm in his deliberations, Tulkington had been knocked off balance by a man seeking to marry his sister, making strenuous efforts to discourage him, none of which seemed to have worked. Hawker wanted to visit upon Brazier a more drastic fate than the beating he’d been asked to arrange, having, after that, been physically humiliated by him and his men. The blow to stun him, delivered in the dark in the grounds of Cottington Court, had been bad enough, but worse followed.
Still not recovered, Hawker had been taken as a sort of hostage, dragged halfway back to Deal by a rope attached between his wrists and a horse’s saddle. This had caused him to repeatedly stumble and fall, afforded no mercy when he did. Endlessly mocked, he was finally dumped in a ditch, his clothing torn and filthy, forced to sneak back to the very place in which he now sat so as not to be seen in such a disordered state.
To a man with his degree of pride, and the memory was fresh, it was too demeaning to be borne. He’d determined to make Brazier and his crew pay, even going so far as to contravene instructions from Henry Tulkington so he could get his revenge. If his plan had worked, there would have been a whole heap of bodies in the remains of Quebec House, not just the one. But it had not so it was still, to him, unfinished business.
He needed to put it to the back of his mind. It was a coincidence and certainly nothing to do with the difficulties which had arisen with Dan Spafford. What had he and Tulkington been gabbing about when they met, and why wasn’t he told? Informed, he might have been able to nip the problems which arose in the bud. Keeping him in the dark had caused real trouble, with the added embarrassment of deliberate and blatant impudence.
It was bound to come out eventually, the fact Spafford had managed to filch part of a cargo Hawker had been tasked to see landed, going on to catch in transit a cartload of tea, everything stolen having disappeared without trace. Such a story would spread quickly if the half-dozen men now locked up in the slaughterhouse were let loose to talk. Clapping a stopper on the gossip would be even more trouble and bloodier than what had just been agreed. More tellingly it would affect the way he was seen, tempting others to copy the act.
John Hawker was proud of his reputation. He saw himself as respected by all − most would have said feared. This applied even to those whose station in life was more elevated than his own, which could not have been predicted from his early upbringing. In a town having more than its fair quota of street urchins, with paid-off sailors coming and going from the busiest anchorage on the East Coast, the pickings for ragamuffins could be constant. This might have been his destiny had good fortune not put him in the path of Henry’s father.
Acton Tulkington had singled him out on first acquaintance, not that it looked auspicious at the time. As one of the most generous patrons of the Blue Coat Charity School, he’d been visiting on the day a pupil had seen it as necessary to put a man seeking to teach him, or to Hawker’s mind humiliate him, on his back, which he did with a single blow. In the commotion which followed, the miscreant had found himself before the principal as well as a distinguished visitor, where the case to examine him and no doubt chuck him out was to be heard.
Oddly, this patron had actually laughed when he heard what had occurred, which did not please the cleric who ran the place, though he dare not say so for fear of causing offence.
The well-dressed benefactor then asked Hawker to give his side of the story. In a halting way, young John had insisted he was not to be practised upon in such a manner. The class had been set a question regarding a quite complex money sum and, after a few quick scrapes on his slate, Hawker had answered quickly and correctly, only to be accused of cheating.
When he protested, the teacher had lifted his stick to beat him, the boy’s blow delivered to forestall the act. Questioned, the principal reluctantly admitted the boy did show a facility in numbers, but set against this was a bad attitude and a bullying nature, one just demonstrated. What followed from this visiting worthy was nothing short of astonishing.
‘My brothers and I were never seen as saints when we attended here, quite the opposite. We gave the divine who then ran the place no end of grief and would have been chucked out had our pa not made a sizeable donation.’
‘But you have prospered despite bad behaviour, sir,’ simpered the present occupant. ‘No doubt aided by natural abilities; God has seen fit to endow you with much good fortune.’
‘I rather think it was my father who did that, sir, not the Almighty, though it scarce matters. Now, boy, tell me who you are and from where you come.’
There was little to tell; born at the dilapidated North End of the town, which edged the marshes, and raised in a hovel, his father had been a body for hire. The son declined to name him as a useless drunk hardly ever present, who could never hold down anything lasting in the way of employmen
t, being ever willing to argue with those prepared to give him a day’s work. A further enquiry regarding his mother elicited no more than a shrug; John was not going to describe a woman who, for the price of a flask of gin, was willing to sell him, even in his very tender years, to men coming off the visiting ships in search of young boys on which to gratify their lust.
The interrogator, whose name he didn’t know, pressed for no more information than the youngster was prepared to volunteer, probably because it was too common a tale.
‘What would you say if you were offered a place aboard ship?’ he’d been asked. ‘With a head for figures you could prosper. There are any number of visiting captains who would take you aboard.’
The vehemence of his objection brought surprise, but his reasons were again his own. The sailors he had been sold to as a nipper were not of a type he ever wanted to encounter again.
‘Well,’ came with a meaningful look at the principal. ‘I doubt it would serve for you to be expelled. If you show a talent for numbers, then it should be encouraged.’
‘He struck his tutor, sir.’
‘How I wish I’d done so in my time.’ There was a long pause before the visitor added, ‘I want this young fellow to be kept on, though he will be required to apologise and contain his temper. Let him have extra instruction in mathematics, for which I will provide the means.’
‘Say thank you, boy,’ was a bitter response from the cleric, who clearly didn’t agree.
‘If you gain enough by it, perhaps I will have for you a place in the future.’
And it had come so to pass, with both his known attributes honed till he’d become an increasingly important cog in the Tulkington undertakings and not just in numbers. As the family increased its grip on the town, John Hawker had become the face of the enterprise, trusted to collect taxes and bills for goods supplied, as well as to collect payments from the local tradespeople of the more common kind, regular sums to guarantee they could operate in peace. Failure to cough up was met with a visit from the men John Hawker led, with predictable consequences.
Acton Tulkington was not one to leave everything of this nature to an underling, being quite capable of exacting retribution himself. Extreme reckoning would be visited on anyone threatening the smuggling operations, a task not always delegated: he wanted those who suffered to know the name of their nemesis. This did not apply to Henry, who talked as if he was the same, but was, in truth, living in a land of make-believe.
‘Not a tenth the man your pa was,’ Hawker growled out loud.
He raised himself to go about the necessary business of the day. While he was going about his tasks the rumour must be spread, to let folk know Dan Spafford was close to going off on a crossing, no need to name the purpose. When he and his crew failed to return, the assumption of malign fate, aided by more rumour spreading, would gain currency over mere misfortune: losses at sea were far from rare in a coastal community.
CHAPTER FIVE
The sole escape for Elisabeth lay in early morning walks, taken when her brother had either left the house or she could be sure he was locked away in his study: on this occasion his coach had left quite early. As for Harry Spafford and the danger he represented, he had never shown the least sign of being a pre-midday riser, so she could be fairly certain not to meet him. Even if she did, it would be in the public parts of the house, in which he could scarcely act out his threats.
Grady was waiting in the hall when she emerged, which led her, not for the first time, to wonder at his acute ear. He knew when his presence was required even, it seemed, merely from the sound of her unlocking the bedroom door. Having been in service at Cottington Court from his first youth as an under footman, he’d known her both as growing child and young woman, one of the many servants present on the sunny day she had married her childhood sweetheart.
He was required to be very careful in his behaviour towards her, but she knew he was no enemy in this sense: while overt aid was risky, he could and had turned a blind eye wherever possible. He would need to be doubly careful now after the departure of Lionel Upton, given the suspicious nature of his master. Upton had been very active in trying to help her escape, only for his attempts to be discovered, which led to immediate dismissal. The risk of exposure as well as the consequence had been known and, given she could do nothing to provide material aid, Elisabeth advised him, if trouble ensued, to search out Edward Brazier who would, for her sake she was sure, see to his welfare. For now, and assuming he had done as advised, it seemed only fitting to invoke his name in her prayers.
‘As you know, Miss Elisabeth,’ Grady said, his tone very correct. ‘I am obliged to inform your aunt on your being out of the house.’
‘It is a duty I know you must perform.’
The servant’s voice dropped to a near whisper, possible because, when helping her into her cloak, he was very close. ‘Can I say it would be as well to attempt nothing untoward? Your movements are being closely watched.’
The reply was equally soft. ‘Something to which I have become accustomed.’
His voice returned to normal as he moved backwards. ‘No, Miss Elisabeth, Mr Spafford is not in his room. In fact, he did not return to the house last night.’
She had to admire the way this was delivered, in a servile disinterested monotone, answering a question she’d not asked, but one he knew would be of much interest. Knowing it would be unwise to ask for more, this formed her thoughts as she walked out into the crisp fresh air, to cross the parterre and exit through the gate which led to the kitchen garden. This would take her down to and round the lake.
Grady had to show great care to avoid being overheard by anyone, Henry most of all, but also her Aunt Sarah. What of the others, the footmen, maids and kitchen staff, who must surely wonder what on earth was going on? It had been possible to assume the servants were well disposed, but this was all it could be for their respective positions mitigated against direct enquiry. That too would have changed with Upton’s abrupt departure: she didn’t employ, feed and house them, Henry did, and he had shown how he reacted to his wishes being challenged.
The evidence of Grady’s warning was not long in showing itself. First was the gardener Creevy, seemingly working away, but in a location which could not be considered normal. As she progressed there was a feeling, and sometimes a fleeting glimpse of humanity, which underlined Creevy was not alone in carrying out discreet observation. Walking slowly took her mind back over the years in which she’d lived here, to wonder if it had always been thus with some of the servants, even in her father’s day, something to which she’d never given much thought. Growing up with domestic staff, as with everything else, you took them for granted, even to the point of rendering them invisible, which applied especially to those who toiled outdoors.
She blushed to recall how many times, as a girl, she’d thrown precocious tantrums, which those who served the household indoors had to accept with a meek apology or studied indifference. Was she worse than others of her station? It was shaming she had no idea. It had taken life in the West Indies to even contemplate the needs of those who saw to her every whim, brought on by the fact of their being her husband’s slaves. It was the excess of power which had focused her mind: the knowledge that, if disapproval in England must be stoically borne, dismissal for a sugar plantation household slave was not the same: it would be a sentence to back-breaking toil in the cane fields.
Now it was she who was the equivalent of a slave, unable to leave what had been her family home without permission from Henry. No means of transport would be provided without his approval of the destination and this would include, as chaperone and informer, her aunt. A horse was out of the question, while even walking had been rendered impossible since the rickety old and secret gate by which she’d met with Edward Brazier had been sealed up with battens.
For a multitude of times since coming home, she’d wondered how he had become the man he now was: cruel, despotic and prepared to go to any lengths to
get his own way. Not that he’d ever been cheerful company, quite the reverse: even as a boy Henry seemed to find jollity alien, which was why, added to a substantial difference in age, they’d never been close. How different Cottington Court had been in the past, a house those who lived locally were eager to visit, for her father enjoyed entertaining and was lavish and generous with it. The high point had been, as she recalled it now, even if her father had not been there to see it, her wedding day. The sun had shone, the guests were delighted at such an engaging couple, with Stephen Langridge, her childhood sweetheart, looking so handsome.
Even Henry, who’d given her away, if not cheerful throughout, had managed a smile when they kissed, albeit in a wan fashion. For once, the Reverend Doctor Joshua Moyle, Vicar of Cottington, had been sober, at least for the actual ceremony. This didn’t last very long; by the time of the wedding feast he could barely speak, while walking was beyond him, just another day when his long-suffering wife had to see him carried home.
But nothing could mar her own joy. She was joined in holy matrimony to the man with whom she desired to spend the rest of her life, which would be away from the likes of Henry and Moyle in Jamaica. How cruel was the fate, or was it the endemic sicknesses, which cursed the Caribbean, which took him from her so soon, smiling and robust one day, near a skeleton within weeks?
She came back to find Henry had turned Cottington into a sort of morgue; there was no laughter or gaiety at all, something she’d determined to change by organising a fete, with games, good food and a flowing rum punch. Added to her intention to cheer things up had been the vague hope Henry, extremely eligible in terms of affluence, might catch the eye of a suitable bride-to-be. Every eligible maid for miles around had been invited, along with mothers eager to push them forward. It was something to produce an ironic laugh now: God forbid any poor creature should be saddled with her brother as a spouse.
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