“Arkerley is a pleasant house, and of course you are more than welcome to live there,” Francis said, “but I tried to buy you Combe Manor, the house of your childhood. I do not think it’s possible, though.” He glanced at Virginia and grimaced. “I’m sure Virginia would have sold it to me, if she could, but her late husband requested her to retain it.” Ordered her, more like.
And all the others. But as Virginia opened her mouth to corroborate what he’d said, her ladyship cut in.
“Oh, that would never do!” She gave a slight shudder, her tea dish rattling in its saucer. “It was always cold and drafty, and so close to the sea that it was always damp. My father chose to live there because it was good for nothing else, as he put it.”
She paused, tracing the rim of her tea dish with one polished fingernail. “My childhood was hard, my dear. I’ve never made a secret of my origins, so that should not be a shock to you.”
“You never spoke of it much,” Francis said softly. Virginia watched the way his expression stiffened, as if preparing himself for bad news.
Jamie and Maria occupied the twin sofa to the one Francis and Virginia sat on, bracketing the countess’s chair, so they could comfortably converse. The tea table stood to the right of the countess, and a small table was tucked at each end of the sofas.
Her ladyship looked around the company, taking her time, her shrewd eyes, so much like her son’s, missing nothing. The clock ticked, and birdsong came from the garden.
Having the complete attention of everyone, Lady Wolverley gave a sunny smile. “Why should I speak of it, when I had escaped to this?”
She indicated the room. “My father barely spoke, because he never got out of the habit of working from dawn until dusk. He followed the hours of the sun, going to bed when polite society was only just beginning the night’s entertainments. My mother could not read, and she made sure that I went to the village school every Sunday to learn my letters. But my father was never a humble farmer, and I was never a simple dairymaid. I helped in the dairy, that was all. Not that I would be ashamed of that, but the times I’ve wanted to correct people are without number. It would only have encouraged them, so I held my peace.”
She took a sip of tea. Nobody spoke. “My father was a rich farmer. Not rich by your standards, but rich enough to be on good terms with the local squire. I met my husband when he came to discuss a matter of business with my father. Mutual grazing rights, I think. I was carrying a dish of cream, one of those large, shallow bowls from the dairy, and I was so intent on not spilling a drop that I did not see him until I was upon him. So much for spilling a drop. I tipped the entire contents of the bowl over his fine suit!” She smiled.
“I remember that story, Mama,” Francis said through the laughter.
So did most of society. That story was what had labeled her as a dairymaid, but it sounded as if she was much more than that. And her intelligence had helped to triple the original worth of the earldom.
She had worked with Francis to develop and manage the new opportunities he’d opened up abroad. Dismissing all the well-meaning advisors who had drifted into her sphere, she administered the estate herself. That alone had recommended her to many people who would initially have dismissed her as an upstart, a social climber.
“So, my son, I am delighted that you did not burden me with Combe Manor. I can’t help but think that it will make an appalling orphanage. It is far too close to the sea, for one thing. And the cellars…” She shuddered. “Damp, and they’re like a warren, winding everywhere. My father didn’t approve of smugglers, but I can’t help thinking that the house is far better suited to the trade than it is to shelter small children.”
“You’re right,” Virginia acknowledged, “but it is on the list of establishments my late husband wanted to turn into orphanages. I am—was—bound to do it, but other than building a wall higher than Exeter city walls, or locking the mites up all day, I’m at a loss how to do it safely. I was obliged to house fifteen children at each orphanage.” She sighed.
“And block up the cellars,” her ladyship advised.
“I was forbidden to make major structural changes.” She hesitated, but why should she not reveal the whole? “Ralph did not trust me that far. He said no woman had a sense of space, and I would fill the house with plaster ceilings and French wallpaper. His instructions were specific.”
“Why did I hear none of this before?” her ladyship demanded.
Virginia had turned into a babbling brook. If she told one person, she should tell them all. It was like playing with fire; if any of the trustees, whose names she did not know, got to hear that she had spilled the beans, then they would take the decision away from her.
“I was not allowed to tell anyone,” she said simply, smiling and spreading her hands in a kind of apology. “The penalty for telling someone was severe.” Getting up from her seat, she walked to the window. Restlessness filled her. She folded her arms, her lace ruffles tickling her bare skin. “But it doesn’t matter now.”
But there was something else, something that tickled the edges of her memory. For the life of her Virginia couldn’t imagine what it was.
* * * *
The following day was spent in resting, walking in the garden with Jamie, Francis, and Maria. Francis’s man of business arrived in the early afternoon, and Francis spent some time closeted with him, dealing with the affairs of the estate.
Just before she was due to go upstairs to change for dinner, Virginia went to the library. She had kept the list of orphanages—not that she needed them. She remembered every one. That had given her the feeling that she was missing something.
Armed with the list she already had, plus the ones Henderson had told her about that morning, she crossed to the table and laid them out. The large, rectangular table was set in the middle of the room, writing implements set in a circular silver writing stand. The moderately sized room was lined with glass-fronted bookcases, all satisfactorily full. The smell of furniture polish and the musty smell of paper wove in the air.
Bitterly she scolded herself. She had slipped into following the terms of the will because at the time it had suited her. After Ralph she had not wanted to marry anyone ever again.
But now she did. She had accepted an offer from the most unexpected place, and he made her happier than she had thought she could ever be. Feelings she had no words for, of such profundity she hadn’t considered them possible, coursed through her.
And with the return of the full person, Virginia started to think more clearly. The orphanages were the clue. Everything hinged on them. Ralph’s insistence on her establishing them, his careful plans, down to the last penny. Virginia had put that down to his military history, that he was using a method he was accustomed to, but her assumption had misled her.
She recalled the ones she’d already set up. Every site had something in common—they were near the sea, in small communities. None were in towns. But then, Devonshire was part of a peninsula, and no place was too far from the sea.
It all added up to something else.
She had to explore the bookcases thoroughly before she found the atlases, not least because she kept coming across books that intrigued her, that she would return to later. But for now, she wanted the well-thumbed maps she found on the lower shelf under the window. She carried a couple across to the table and laid them open.
Half an hour later she had her answer. Finally she had unraveled the last conundrum. She felt certain she was right.
That was where Francis found her an hour later. Glancing at the clock, she groaned when she saw the time. “Oh no. I’ll go up and change for dinner straightaway.”
A man stood behind Francis and, at his impatient gesture, moved forward and bowed. “Wait a while, Virginia. My dear, this is Samuel Cocking, a Bow Street Runner.”
Samuel Cocking was a man of moderate height, slender, with alert
gray eyes and a sharp nose. He did not bow so much as nod, which perversely, Virginia liked. He laid a plain leather folder on the table and undid the strings.
“What is your business in Devonshire?” Virginia demanded, puzzled. “I thought you dealt with matters in London only.”
Cocking and Francis exchanged a meaningful glance. Cocking cleared his throat. “When Magistrate Fielding set up the Runners, he always intended us to deal with major crimes like smuggling. We work out of Bow Street, but we may travel to wherever we need to in order to apprehend offenders.”
Cocking drew a paper out of the file. “This is part of the Bow Street records on the smuggling activities in Devonshire and Cornwall. In the last ten years the activity has increased threefold, perhaps more. Before that, Essex was the hotbed for large-scale smuggling activities, but the trade from Devonshire is bigger than it ever was.”
“Before I moved to Devonshire, I had no idea it was such a problem,” she admitted. “Of course I knew it was rife, but not in such an organized way.”
Cocking nodded. “The gangs take control of villages, whole stretches of the coast.”
Next to her, Francis was leaning back in his chair, appearing indolent, but the spark in his eyes showed him as anything but. He was listening, waiting for the story to unfold before he added his comments.
“When the four footmen were murdered, we were alerted to the possibility that the case was not restricted to London.”
Virginia frowned. “Why?”
“Because of their destination. They were not murdered for gain, they had nothing of real worth, and they were strong men, easily able to fight back. They were dispatched quietly and swiftly, and their bodies hidden so they would not be discovered. It was sheer chance that made a stableboy run behind the stables, intent on relieving himself. But he found the bodies crammed there and sounded the alarm.”
Virginia would have screamed like a banshee.
Cocking continued. “We learned the intended destination of the footmen. The day after the murders, we were assured by one of our most trustworthy informants that this outrage had nothing to do with the London gangs. Once we discovered who had hired the coach, we knew you were in danger, and we followed you. We lost track of you, but I knew I would find you at your house.”
Francis nodded. “I have told you what happened at Staines. After that, we decided to travel covertly and quietly. Someone was pursuing us. There were two attempts on my life in London, one warning and one serious attack. Someone wanted to separate me from Virginia. I assumed it was Lord Dulverton, but now we know it was not.”
The Runner nodded gravely. “Indeed. I visited the customs offices at Exeter, where they informed me of the events at Combe Manor. The operation went smoothly, as if the smugglers have been doing it for a long time. The caretakers would leave the premises, close the shutters against prying eyes, but leave the door open. The cellars have internal stairs leading down to the cliffs. There are many caves hereabouts, and in the past they were probably used for storage. They still were, but the storage was illegal contraband. The excise caught most of the gang, but none are talking. But we’re not done yet.” He tapped another paper.
Virginia’s turn. Since the Runner was here, he could see what she had discovered.
“Look at these.” She indicated the books and the series of marks she’d made once she found the red ink.
The men stood and leaned over the book. “What have you been doing?” Francis asked.
“I know what Ralph was up to. Why the orphanages were so important to him. That story he told me about the waifs on the battlefield?” She snorted inelegantly. “He didn’t care. He used it as a useful excuse.”
She pointed at the map. “The red crosses are the orphanages I have already set up. The slashes are in the places where I was expected to establish them.”
Silence followed as the men studied the map.
“Damn,” Francis muttered. “Dear God.”
Cocking grunted.
“I worried I was imagining things, but I’m not, am I?”
Francis traced the lines with his fingers. “Mousehole, Hayle, Padstow, Fowey, Mevagissey…” Straightening, he turned and leaned against the table. “No, you are not imagining anything. Those places are notorious hotbeds for smuggling. And wrecking.”
“My thoughts exactly, sir,” Cocking agreed.
She shuddered. “And I’ve been helping them.”
“Unwittingly.” Francis was too steady, hiding his emotions as he used to. But this time he was not covering them with the insouciant, careless attitude he had used in London.
“It was unwittingly, wasn’t it?” Cocking demanded.
A chill crept down her spine. “What do you mean? You think I knew?”
Francis stood between her and the Runner, who shook his head. “I didn’t mean it like that, I’m sorry. But the pattern is so obvious when it’s plotted out like that. All on the coast or close to it.”
Francis folded his arms and met her gaze with a somber look she was not used to in him. “Your late husband was a soldier. His expertise was organization, the necessary part of war that rarely attracts much notice.”
“Yes. He enjoyed organizing everyone and everything.”
“Including you.”
“Including me. And he found something else to organize, didn’t he?”
Cocking nodded. “He planned to turn the haphazard smuggling that goes on here into a countywide enterprise. Increase the efficiency. Make more profits.”
Turning back to the table, she closed the books. “Nobody else should find these.”
“I’ll dispose of them. Is this the list?” Francis picked up the sheet of paper on which she’d written the places, studied it, and passed it to Cocking.
“Yes. They were jumbled up, in no particular order. That was why I didn’t notice at first. And I don’t know the West Country as well as I should. Of course they are near the sea because we’re on the peninsula. There’s little but coastline here. He never meant me to have the property. He knew that by the time I knew for sure, I would be complicit.”
“As guilty as the others,” he murmured. “Whoever they are.”
Tears stung her eyes. “I thought he was treating me like a child, but he wasn’t. He was pulling me in. Making me guilty. Perhaps he thought that eventually I would join in. I will not. Ever!”
She flung herself to the door, but he caught her from behind, his hands banded around her forearms. Without thought, she turned into him and let him hold her while she shook. “My husband was a smuggler. A criminal. He was doing what he did best. Organizing, making profit. Betraying his country.”
“Not everybody sees it like that,” he murmured against her hair.
Cocking spoke from his station at the table. “Never you mind that, my lady. What is most important is that we have discovered it. Now we have to stop it. Tell the authorities. The trouble is, half the excise men in the county are taking money from the smugglers.”
She drew back. “If there is an organization, there must be more people like Ralph. More people of wealth and power. Don’t you think?”
Francis nodded and guided her back to the table. “Yes, there must. I had thought of that. Sweetheart, do you object to making the celebratory ball even bigger than it was? We can invite friends but also all the local gentry. Someone will know something. And perhaps we will learn more about what this all means. If a man approaches me and asks me about my plans for Combe Manor, for example.”
“I can have men attend the ball, my lord. Dressed as servants. No need for you to get involved. I can handle affairs from here.”
“I wouldn’t hear of it,” Francis said promptly. “We will keep this between us. Only my mother and Lord and Lady Dulverton should know.”
“With your permission, I can be at the ball, my lord. Keeping an eye out. Yo
u’ll have your guests to manage.”
After looking at the Runner for a long time, Francis finally nodded. “Very well.”
He took her elbow. “Meantime, you have to change for dinner.” He nodded to Cocking. “Would you join us?”
“If’n you don’t mind, I’ll be better in the kitchens,” he said. “I’ll tell them I’m a new footman, hired for her ladyship’s personal use. I can see what’s what that way.”
“Very well. I’ll send word. You may confide in Hurst, the footman. He knows as much about this matter as I do. You will also find a man in bed upstairs by the name of Butler. He has given us signal service, and while I want him resting until he is recovered, you may trust him and listen to what he has to say.”
Francis took Virginia upstairs to change for dinner. Outside her room she paused, her hand on the panel. “You won’t do anything too dangerous? I don’t want to lose you, Francis. Not now.” With people trying to kill him, enlarging the guest list would also increase the danger. Although she had sent for one more guest: her solicitor from Exeter, Henderson.
“I promise I will talk and listen, that’s all. I swear.” He kissed her, making it soft and sweet, a kiss that went with his promise.
She eased out of his arms. “Thank you.” She pressed a light kiss to his lips but drew away when he would have caught her close. “I’m glad you know. We have to talk about it, I know, but at least we’ve found the key.”
“You found the key,” he corrected her. “Clever woman. I’ll go to the drawing room while you change.”
Chapter 23
Guests had begun to arrive for the ball. Emilia Dauntry arrived with the remainder of Virginia’s belongings that afternoon.
Emilia came into Virginia’s bedroom while Winston was still getting her ready. She had not bothered with more than a light knock, but what if Virginia had been engaging in something more intimate with Francis?
Virginia greeted Emilia with a kiss on both cheeks, but also with relief. Emilia was at heart a kind woman, but her inability to think matters through, and a regrettable tendency to make instant judgments, occasionally led her to make pronouncements that made Virginia want to slap her. Now Virginia need not entertain those sentiments, although she would have to find someone else to take Emilia.
Virginia And The Wolf Page 26
