by Louise Allen
That was a depressing turn of thought, but of course Cris would leave, she accepted that. Whoever he was, whatever his life at home and in London, he was a man who moved in circles far removed from her rustic, unsophisticated world. Even if he had wanted her in any other way than for this brief, amorous, encounter, then he would not when he knew the truth about her. All men wanted heirs. She realised her hand was resting over her stomach and snatched it away, angry with herself for still yearning, still grieving for what she had lost and could never have.
She had never had illusions about men. Jory had loved her in the only way he knew, as a familiar part of himself. They had married out of desire and because she had loved him in so many ways, although none of them was the romantic love she had always dreamed of. He had wanted to keep her safe because he was fond of her and she was one of his possession. And she had wanted to feel safe, a ridiculous illusion with Jory, who did not know the meaning of the word when it applied to himself.
She propped her chin on her cupped palm and stared out of the window overlooking the garden, trying to shake the mood, and saw the men were pacing back and forth along the long seawall at the end of the lawn. Then they broke apart, faced each other. Gabriel Stone drew the sword from the scabbard that seemed to be permanently at his side and she was half out of her seat before she realised that he was demonstrating something. He parried, Cris moved fluidly to one side, then in a blur of movement was behind him, reaching for his sword arm. Stone disengaged, moved out of trouble. They faced each other again, armed against unarmed. Then Cris shifted again, she saw Gabriel’s head turn, he recovered, just too late and the sword went spinning out of his grasp and speared point-down, quivering in the grass.
He flourished an elaborate bow, retrieved the weapon, wiped the point carefully and sheathed it. Cris draped one arm around his shoulder and they began to walk up and down again.
Tamsyn sat down with a thump, closed her mouth, which was inelegantly open, and frowned at the two men. That had been disgracefully arousing and it had also been a demonstration of speed and skill and of complete trust. There would have been no fencing button on the point of that sword. One slip and Cris could have been badly hurt. Or if he had been less accurate, his friend might have been wounded in the disarm. They obviously knew each other very, very well.
She wondered why Gabriel Stone was armed with a sword. Gentlemen carried pistols with them in saddle holsters, or in their carriages when they travelled, but usually these days only military officers wore a sword at their hip. It suited him, she decided, went with the slightly sinister presence, the dark, mocking eyes. If Cris trusted him, then she must, but he unnerved her.
Whereas Cris confused and delighted and confounded her. She indulged herself by watching the tall figure sauntering along, silhouetted against the sea, then made herself look down and wrestle with the columns of figures once more.
*
The picnic expedition set off at eleven o’clock. Aunt Rosie was helped carefully into the chair, the men stepped between the carrying handles, ducked their heads under the leather straps, took a firm grip and lifted. Tamsyn mounted Foxy, Aunt Izzy was helped on to her placid hack, Bumble, and Jason loaded the pack pony with the rugs and hampers.
As Gabriel Stone mounted his own horse, Tamsyn looked down at Cris. ‘You are going to have a long walk, I’m afraid.’
‘Collins is saddling my horse. Didn’t you realise he’s been in your stables eating his head off ever since Collins brought the carriage over?’
‘No one mentioned it and I’ve been too busy to visit the stable yard.’ Which just went to show how distracted she had been by Cris’s presence. Normally nothing stopped her from doing the complete rounds of the house and outbuildings daily.
A raking hunter emerged from the gate further up the lane. There was no one at its head, but when Cris whistled and walked out on to the track it trotted down and butted him in the chest with its big head. ‘This is Jackdaw.’
‘Because he is black?’
‘And wicked and thieving,’ Cris said, as he swung up into the saddle. ‘Stop that.’ The black tossed its head as though in denial that it had even thought about taking a chunk out of Gabriel Stone’s bay. ‘You are old enough to know better.’
‘But not very old.’ Tamsyn edged Foxy closer and Jackdaw snorted and rolled his eye.
‘He’s just four.’
‘And not English, I think.’ There was something about the powerful rump and the set of the animal’s head that seemed different.
‘Danish,’ Cris said shortly and moved off after the sedan chair.
‘Denmark?’ Tamsyn said out loud. She had never encountered anything Danish before.
‘He shipped him back.’ Gabriel Stone brought his bay alongside Foxy. ‘It’s a nice beast and worth the effort and the cost.’
‘You mean Cris…Mr Defoe, has been to Denmark?’
‘Oh, yes, last mission he was on.’ Gabriel said it vaguely, as though he was not creating even more mysteries. She had a very strong suspicion he knew exactly what he was doing. Stirring the pot, Mr Stone? Cris reined in and joined them again, presumably wary of what his friend was saying about him.
‘Mission?’ she asked, obediently playing Gabriel’s game.
‘Diplomatic.’ Cris’s expression did not change, but Jackdaw sidled across the lane uneasily. ‘I occasionally help out.’ He managed to make it sound as though he handed the drinks round at embassy parties.
‘Help who out? The government, you mean?’ She dropped her hands without meaning to and Foxy broke into a trot, jolting her inelegantly for half-a-dozen strides until she got control.
‘The Foreign Office. When they want someone who isn’t, shall we say, a fixture in the diplomatic circles I drop in on…situations. Help out.’
Do you indeed? She was beginning to wonder just who this man was. The government used him as a part-time diplomat, and, she suspected, in tricky circumstances. He was tough, fit and capable of disarming the dangerous-looking Mr Stone, he could afford to import horses from the Continent and he had time to spend on a little local difficulty in a remote Devon hamlet.
Tamsyn tried to think of a question that did not sound like the bare-faced curiosity that it was. The trouble was, she found the mystery only added to the attraction, which was a dangerous state to be in.
Infatuated, she told herself severely. That’s what you are. You should settle for a nice, ordinary man, like Dr Tregarth. He is pleasant-looking, intelligent, hard-working, respectable, stands up for himself…
He might even be willing to accept her the way she was. At least he would understand it was not her fault.
She lectured herself all the way up to Stibworthy and had just reached the conclusion that she did not fall for men like the doctor because they obviously did not find her attractive enough to show any interest, when the little procession met him striding down the street.
‘Why are you blushing like a rose?’ Cris enquired, his voice carrying to Gabriel Stone, who twisted in the saddle, grinned at her and only made things worse.
‘Shh! Good day, Dr Tregarth.’ She waved, but he was by the sedan chair, smiling and nodding approval to Aunt Rosie while the chairmen set down their burden and stretched.
‘Good chap, but too staid for you.’ Cris moderated his voice, just a little, but he was still speaking loudly enough for Mr Stone to hear, judging by his expression. ‘If he doesn’t notice that you blush when you catch sight of him, well, one despairs of the fellow.’
‘I am not blushing over Doc…over anyone. I am just a little windblown, that is all. I should have worn a veil.’
‘Do you own one?’ Cris enquired, all innocence.
Tamsyn brought Foxy tight up against Jackdaw and muttered, ‘Do stop teasing me, you provoking man.’
‘But I like it when you blush. It makes me wonder what I must do to provoke that pretty colour when we are alone.’ His voice had dropped to an intimate murmur. ‘Ah, so that’s the trick
of it,’ he said, his eyes laughing at her as the heat flooded her cheeks.
She was saved from having to reply by the chairmen lifting their burden again and the party setting off once more.
‘Where are we going?’ Gabriel Stone reined back to ask.
‘Up through the village and then we turn north on to the headland above Barbary Combe House. There’s a wonderful view from up there.’
It was not her aunt’s favourite, that had always been the prospect from Black Edge Head to the south, but Tamsyn knew she was far too tactful to take them to the scene of Jory’s final confrontation with the militia.
‘Mrs Perowne.’ Dr Tregarth stepped out into the street as they passed him. ‘A word in your ear, if I may. I did not want to worry your aunts.’ He cast a rapid glance at the retreating sedan chair party.
‘We will ride on,’ Cris said with a nod to Gabriel.
‘No.’ Tregarth held up a restraining hand. ‘I think it would be a good thing if you heard this, too, Mr Defoe. There is word going around that Jory Perowne’s gang is active again. They say the sign of the silver hand has been chalked up on walls, even on the door of the Revenue’s building in Barnstaple.’
‘That’s impossible.’ Tamsyn bit back the rest of the words that sprang to her lips and made herself think calmly. ‘I suppose someone could be using the old name, the sign. This is what that objectionable Mr Ritchie was hinting at the other day, I suppose.’
‘There is more.’ Tregarth looked up at her, his face serious under the brim of his low-crowned hat. ‘There are not only rumours, there is speculation as well. People are asking if the Silver Hand is operating again, and who is leading it?’
‘I have no idea. Jory had no lieutenant. A second in command, yes, but no one who could take control of a gang like that.’ Then Cris’s intake of breath, the earnest expression on the doctor’s face, made her realise what Tregarth was worried about. ‘They think it is something to do with me? That is preposterous. Smugglers would not take orders from a woman.’
‘They might from Jory Perowne’s woman.’
‘No.’ She jerked Foxy’s head round, used her heel and sent him cantering up the street towards the vanishing picnic party. The Silver Hand gang working again? It was impossible. Surely she would know if someone with Jory’s skills and deviousness and leadership had set up the network again anywhere near here. But all she could be certain of was that it was not her leading even one rowing boat, let alone a gang. Yet if someone who knew her as well as Dr Tregarth could look at her with that question in his eyes, then others might think it, too. People who were far more dangerous than a friendly village doctor.
Pounding hooves caught up with Foxy before she reached the others. Cris and Gabriel fell in, one on either side of her, and she reined in to a walk. She did not want to talk about this within earshot of the aunts.
‘Silver Hand gang?’ Cris asked.
‘Jory had inherited a silver charm. A hand, about two inches long, broken off a religious statue by the look of it. The story was that it was a relic from the Armada shipwrecks, found by an ancestor who had a ring fixed to it and who wore it round his neck on a chain. When Jory inherited it he wore it, too.’ She remembered it hanging against his chest, the silver chain glinting through the curling dark hair. When he had been feeling defiant—which was often—he would wear it outside his shirt, answering questions about it with the bland assurance that it was simply an heirloom and it wasn’t his fault if people used it as a symbol.
‘It became part of the mythology around him,’ she continued. Trust Jory to have to be dramatic. ‘The men would chalk a hand on casks when they left them on doorsteps, so people knew who to thank for the gifts the gang left in return for silence. Not that anyone would have betrayed Jory and the others. When the Revenue put up posters advertising a reward, someone would always scrawl the hand over it.’
‘And where is it now?’ Gabriel’s question jerked her out of her memories.
‘He was wearing it when… It was round his neck that day.’ She had seen it in that moment when he had turned to face her, the moment she realised now was when he had made up his mind to jump and save them both the horror of a trial and an execution. If only she’d had his courage, could have stayed strong and defiant, not collapsed with shock and lost the only thing she had left of him.
‘You wouldn’t need the actual object,’ Cris said thoughtfully, jerking her out of her memories. ‘Not with something so well known. I suppose there isn’t another, it would be unique.’
It was a question. ‘There is another,’ she admitted. ‘Jory had a replica made for me as a wedding gift.’ Other women get earrings, a pretty gown, flowers from their lover. I get a smuggler’s talisman. ‘But it isn’t the same as his. He had our names engraved on mine, with a heart and an anchor.’
‘Where is it?’
‘Locked up in the strongbox with the legal papers and our bits of jewellery. I am not wearing it next to my heart, if that is what you want to know.’
‘I know you are not.’ Cris’s whisper made the blush come back like the flooding tide. ‘But it might be a good idea to get it hidden away somewhere a search party couldn’t find it. The Riding Officer might see it as a sign of guilt, not as a love token.’
‘Yes, I suppose you are right, but I cannot believe they would take it as far as searching the house.’ But they had when Jory was alive. It had become almost a routine, tidying up after a party of Revenue men, or the militia, had rummaged in the cellars, the attics, under the beds, through the haystacks.
The ground beneath the horses’ hooves began to level out. They were through the trees and at the edge of the clifftop pasture now and off to the left was the head of the path that she and Cris had climbed the night before.
‘We are right above the house, surely?’ Gabriel stood in his stirrups to look down.
‘It is the only way up unless you are on foot. There are few rabbit holes up here—too many buzzards keeping them down—so we can gallop.’ She turned Foxy off the track and gave him his head. Behind her she heard the sound of the other two horses in pursuit. Foxy, excited by the competition, stretched out his head and she laughed aloud with the thrill of it as they thundered across the clifftop.
They were neck and neck, the three of them, as she reined in. ‘Take care now, it dips down to the next stream, we’d best turn back.’
They trotted behind Gabriel, who spurred his bay into a gallop again. ‘Are we climbing our cliff path tonight?’ Cris asked.
‘Or…’ She blushed saying it, it seemed so forward. ‘I could come to you. I was thinking about it this morning.’ More blushes when he sent her a swift, smiling look. ‘Your room is so isolated, no one would know.’
‘And the bed is softer,’ Cris agreed, his face perfectly composed. Ahead across the clifftop they could see the picnic party flapping out rugs, setting up the folding chair that had been strapped on the pack pony. Cris leaned across, caught her round the waist one-handed, and dropped a rapid, searing kiss on her lips. ‘And I am not. Softer, that is.’
‘Cris!’ She was still laughing, and still flushed, when they reached the others.
‘Oh, it is so good to hear you laughing out loud again, my dear.’ Aunt Rosie smiled up from her chair set amongst the scattered picnic things. ‘And I could laugh like a girl, too. Thank you so much, Mr Defoe, Mr Stone, for this wonderful gift. And to my two stalwart bearers.’ She beamed at the chairmen who were lifting tankards to their mouths. ‘Just look at this view—you can see Lundy in the distance, see, gentlemen? And—’ She broke off. ‘Who is this coming?’
A procession was wending its way along the track they had just used. Three men on horseback, three militiamen on foot, the white cross-belts stark against their scarlet coats, muskets at the slope on their shoulders.
Cris nudged Jackdaw closer to Foxy’s side. Gabriel moved his big bay until it stood between the advancing party and Aunt Rosie’s chair.
‘Squire Penwith,’ Ta
msyn said as the party approached closer. She found her voice was not quite steady. She sat up straighter in the saddle and got it under control. ‘And the coroner, Sir James Trelawney. And someone from the Revenue by the look of his uniform.’
The group halted at the edge of the spread rugs.
‘Sir James, Squire Penwith. Good day to you.’
‘Mrs Perowne. Ladies.’ Sir James lifted his hat. ‘I apologise for interrupting your picnic.’
‘I have no doubt it is a matter of urgency, Sir James.’ She managed to sound just a trifle haughty, she was glad to hear.
‘It is, Mrs Perowne. I very much regret to say that the Riding Officer, Lieutenant Ritchie, has been murdered.’
Chapter Thirteen
‘Murdered?’ Foxy backed as Tamsyn’s hands clenched on the reins. ‘How? When?’
‘Last night, in Cat’s Nose Bay. He was shot in the back,’ the rider in uniform said harshly. ‘I am Captain Sutherland of His Majesty’s Revenue Service.’
‘That is appalling news indeed,’ Cris said before she could do more than gasp. ‘But might I ask why you accost these ladies here with such a tale, told so brutally?’
‘I will be holding the inquest on the body of Lieutenant Ritchie. I require the attendance of Mrs Perowne to give evidence and to answer questions.’ Sir James narrowed his eyes at the two men so protectively close to the women. ‘I do not believe I have had the pleasure of your acquaintance, gentlemen. Sir James Trelawney, Coroner for this district, at your service.’
‘Crispin Defoe, of London and Kent. My friend, Gabriel Stone, of London. Your servants, sir.’ Cris, his voice perfectly civil, managed to make the polite introduction sound like a declaration of war, without one word out of place.
