Bloodie Bones

by Lucienne Boyce

  Mudge shifted uncomfortably, conscious of the rough treatment he had given Dan on the night of the fire. Dan held out his hand. “No offence taken, Mudge.”

  “And I suppose I should thank you for that sock on the jaw,” Witt said.

  “Saved getting you killed.”

  “How do you do it?” asked Potter. “I could never have stuck it out without giving the game away.”

  Dan shook his head. “Sometimes I’m not sure myself. Now, to business. Captain Ellis and Tickner, you will go for Singleton. Witt, you can take Rawlinson to the farm and pick up Dunnage.”

  Witt sized up Rawlinson and nodded his satisfaction.

  “Potter, you can take Sibbetts and pick up Abe.”

  Potter, eager to avenge Ford’s injuries and his own beating at the hands of Abe and Dunnage, cradled his cudgel in his arms and smirked.

  “Robbins, Jones, Thomas and Mudge, you’re to the Fox and Badger for Buller and Warneford. Be careful of Warneford. I wouldn’t be surprised if he sleeps with a pistol nearby.”

  Mudge looked a bit green at this. Ellis noticed and said, “Robbins and Thomas should do Warneford.”

  That left Jones with Mudge to go after Buller. Dan decided that if Ellis trusted the young man in a situation where he might be as good as single-handed, that was good enough. In any case, he did not think the landlord would put up much of a fight.

  “His Lordship and I will go for Travell. Mudge, have you got the covered wagon ready?”

  “It’s in the farmyard ready to go.”

  “Good. Get the prisoners down there as quickly and quietly as you can. Only use your pistols if you have to. I don’t want to wake the village. I want the prisoners out of Barcombe before anyone realises what’s happening. Sibbetts and Potter, Rawlinson and Witt – you have further to go so you had better set off now. We’ll meet you at the home farm.”

  Lord Oldfield handed around the warrants and the four men jogged off into the darkness. The rest loosened their cutlasses in their belts, muttered “Good luck” to one another, and waited tensely. Good men never took their prowess for granted. True, they were well-armed, experienced, and taking the criminals unawares, but things could always go wrong, and a man could end up injured or dead if he weighed his advantages too much in the balance.

  *

  Dan hustled Travell up to the wagon and pulled the hood off his head. The shopkeeper clambered in and collapsed, whimpering, in the corner. He had been whimpering ever since he and his wife had woken to find Lord Oldfield and Dan standing over their bed. They had got him dressed and down into the shop with a tail of weeping women and boys straggling after: his wife, the serving girl, and three pupils who lodged with him. Here, in a patch of moonlight, Mrs Travell recognised Lord Oldfield and was struck dumb with fright.

  Dan showed her the warrant. “We’re taking him to Shepton Mallet prison. There’s a watch on the house. No one is to leave until morning. Do you understand?”

  It was the girl who gabbled, “No, sir, we won’t, sir, we’ll stay here, sir.”

  If Travell had not been quaking so much, he might have pointed out that they had no right to place the women under house arrest, real or imaginary. As it was, all his legal knowledge had deserted him, and they left the women safely shut indoors. The maid shooed the boys back to their beds and ushered her mistress into the parlour, where they left her plying the stricken woman with Bristol Cream.

  Dan had just got Travell settled when Tickner and Ellis arrived, Singleton’s bulky shape stumbling along between them with Ellis’s pistol in his back. In spite of being cuffed and gagged, he went for Dan. It took the three of them to manhandle him into the wagon, where he bucked and kicked until Ellis knocked him out with the butt of his pistol. Tickner tied his legs.

  “What about Mrs Singleton?” Dan asked. “Not too alarmed, I hope?”

  Ellis laughed. “Alarmed? She held the door open for us when we left. You should have seen his face. We’d got the gag on him by then, but I don’t think he could have said anything if he’d been free to speak…I’ll see if I can rustle up something for the men.” He wandered off to the house, where Lord Oldfield and Mudge stood talking in the patch of light from the open door.

  The party from the Fox and Badger came in with Buller and Warneford. The landlord took his place calmly, Warneford with a swagger and a wink. Buller’s daughter was locked in the cellar. No one would hear her banging and shouting until the morning drinkers turned up.

  Rawlinson and Witt arrived with Dunnage. The farmer had a bloodied head, and Witt looked pleased with himself. Sibbetts, Potter and Abe completed the party. The sullen youth shook off Sibbetts’s steadying hand as he struggled into the wagon. Robbins and Thomas got in with the prisoners and checked that cuffs were tight and gags snug. They sat down near the tailgate with their pistols at half-cock, trained on the prisoners.

  Mrs Mudge appeared with a bottle of brandy and tumblers on a tray. Dan shook his head. “No thanks, but give the men some. And if there’s anything to eat…”

  “Nancy’s bringing some meat and bread fresh out the oven.”

  Ellis came up. “Mudge is saddling a horse for me. What about you?”

  Dan said, “Gamekeeper Potter’s volunteered to drive the wagon. I’ll sit up with him.”

  He followed Mrs Mudge with her tray of used glasses to the house. Lord Oldfield and Mudge had been joined by Witt.

  “A good night’s work, men,” Lord Oldfield was saying as Dan came up. “Come up to the Hall in the morning and I’ll reward you properly for your service. The same goes for you, Foster, and I’ll be writing a letter of commendation for you and your officers.”

  “Thank you, My Lord, but I shan’t be here in the morning. I’m leading the prison escort and I won’t be back until the day after tomorrow.”

  “Garvey will be here by then to hear your full report. You will stay at the Hall.”

  It was a command, not an invitation, but Dan said it would be an honour. Which it was, as the looks on the other men’s faces showed. It was not an honour he wanted, but he could not go back to the forge.

  Chapter Nineteen

  “I’ll kill you for this, Fielding!”

  Singleton flung himself across the cell and scrabbled at Dan’s throat with his manacled hands. One of the prison officers cracked his stick across the back of the blacksmith’s knee and he went down. The two gaolers dragged him back to his chair and held him there.

  “Believe me,” Dan said, “this is the part of my job I like least. But you have broken the law, Singleton.”

  “I’ll kill you. However long I have to wait, I’ll kill you.”

  “So you’ve said. Could you put it aside for a moment? I’ve something to say to you.”

  “I’ve got nothing to say to you. Fucking scum.”

  They had reached Shepton Mallet soon after dawn, roused the gaolers, shown them the warrants, and got the prisoners inside. Dan had commandeered a room for the interrogations and had been given a bare, windowless chamber. When they’d opened the door and shone in a light, beetles and spiders scuttled for cover. The rats were still scratching behind the walls. A drain from a necessary house ran under the cell, the damp stink oozing through the floor. Dan wondered how many men had died of gaol fever in here.

  The prison had two centuries of miserable history behind it. All the rooms were poky and dark, the ceilings too low, and the damp, bulging walls had not seen a lick of whitewash for years. A recently built extension meant that male and female prisoners could be separated at night, which had at least resulted in a drop in the number of children born to live and die in the squalid atmosphere. It was lucky for Singleton and his friends that they could afford better accommodation than the other inmates, who were mostly impoverished petty offenders and one sheep stealer.

  “It’s about Walter.”

  Understand
ing flickered across Singleton’s face. “You and him were very pally, weren’t you? And now the little bastard’s turned us in.”

  “Walter didn’t turn you in. He didn’t have to. I’ve got enough on you without asking him to speak up.”

  “So you’re going to arrest the lad too?”

  “No. I want to keep him out of this. He’s young and – ”

  “Ah, you’ve got a heart of gold. Then I’ll be a rich man when I’ve ripped it out.”

  “ – he’s got a life ahead of him. I want your promise that you won’t mention Walter and that you’ll make sure the others don’t either.”

  “Why should I promise you anything?”

  “It’s not for me. You know he only stole from Lord Oldfield because he was upset about his dog, and he’d given it up before this. What’s the point of ruining him now he’s gone straight?”

  “I won’t mention him and nor will any of the others, without you having to tell us. We’re not the kind who rat on our friends.”

  “There’s one more thing.”

  Dan dragged a rickety chair across the slimy stones and sat down close to the prisoner. The gaolers tightened their grip on his shoulders, but Singleton had gone quiet and was staring moodily at the floor.

  “You know you’ll be up on capital charges. They’ll probably dissect you as well.”

  Singleton flinched, but said nothing.

  “If it was just the offences under the Black Act, I’d say your chances of avoiding the gallows were good. Juries don’t like it. But there’s Castle’s murder as well.”

  “That had nothing to do with me.”

  “The problem is we’ve got no one else to blame. You were all in the wood that night, you all had a reason to want the gamekeeper out of the way. You were in it together, but you needn’t hang together. Lord Oldfield is willing to drop the hanging charges and just bring you up on deer stealing. You’d be facing transportation. All you have to do is tell me who killed Josh Castle.”

  “Is that what this is all about? It is, isn’t it? That’s why you came to Barcombe. That’s why Lord Oldfield sent for you – to find out who killed his precious high-and-mighty Josh Castle. Damn the pair of you. I hope you join the gamekeeper in hell. I wouldn’t tell you if I knew.”

  “Why is that, Singleton? Don’t want to peach on yourself? You’re strong enough for the job. Did you sneak off from the others, smash his skull, and break his bones? Because if it was you, there’s only one decent thing left for you to do now, if you don’t want the lives of your mates on your conscience.”

  “It’s not me who should be worrying about that, Fielding.”

  “Whose idea was it? Who struck him? Did you all have a go? Whether you were in on it or not, your only chance of escaping the rope is to tell me who killed Josh Castle.”

  “Fuck yourself.”

  *

  And that, with small variations, was all Dan got out of them when, one by one, they were brought in for questioning. Travell would have told him if he had known, and if anyone deserved consideration for a lesser sentence it was Travell, who had always hung back when the fighting started. Unluckily for him, he did not know, though Dan saw from the look of desperate cunning on his face that he contemplated accusing one of the others anyway. Dan soon put that idea out of his mind.

  He thought if anyone was going to turn in Walter it would be Abe after their quarrel, but he had underestimated the loyalty bred in villages where every house harbours a poacher. Apart from cursing, Dunnage said very little; he was still dazed from the fight with Witt. As for Buller and Warneford, since the most they faced was a fine or three months in prison for illegal sale of game, they could not be intimidated. Buller was silent and sullen, and Warneford silent and sneering.

  When Dan had finished with the prisoners, he sorted out the paperwork with the prison clerk. The gang would be brought up at the quarter sessions in January and tried at Taunton April Assizes. That done, he hurried over to The Red Lion. The men had wolfed down a hot breakfast and were sitting around a bowl of punch, sharing tales of their exploits of the previous night. Captain Ellis sat alone at a small table.

  “Anything?” the captain asked when Dan joined him.

  “No. I told Lord Oldfield I didn’t think they were responsible for the gamekeeper’s murder, and I still think it.” He signalled to the maid that he would take a plate of the ham and eggs. “Have you sorted out any transport yet?”

  “I’m sending Jones to hire a post-chaise when he’s finished his drink.”

  “I’ll sort out your rewards and expenses when I’m back in London. Just keep a note of everything you spend. Ah, here’s my food. I’ll have a cup of coffee with it, miss.”

  “What about you?”

  “Potter says we’ll have to rest the horses, so I told him to sort out some rooms here for us. I could do with a good night’s sleep.”

  “Do you want one of the lads to go back with you?”

  “No, thanks. I’ve got Potter.”

  “I wasn’t thinking only of the journey back.”

  “I’ll be fine.”

  “If you’re sure. But be careful, Dan.”

  “I intend to.”

  *

  In the morning, Potter tied Ellis’s mount to the back of the wagon. Though he looked a well-mannered beast, Dan preferred to sit up with the gamekeeper again. They made good time now the vehicle was empty. It was early afternoon when they reached Barcombe. They did not see anyone in the road, but Dan knew word of his return would quickly circulate.

  Potter dropped him off at the back of the Hall and ambled on to the farm with the wagon. Dan went to the kitchen, where the cook and her staff were busy preparing dinner, which Lady Oldfield insisted on taking at the unfashionably early hour of three – one of the arrangements he imagined Lady Helen would change as soon as she was in charge.

  While he was drinking a cup of water, a red-eyed girl emerged from the scullery carrying a stack of copper pans. She caught sight of him and let go of the pans. Cook was so startled she dropped a mixing bowl, and the girl at the range almost knocked over a pan of boiling water. As the clash and clang of the heavy pans echoed around the high stone ceiling, the cook bustled over to the stricken girl and gave her a sharp clip around the ear.

  “You’d better not have dented any of those pans, else you’ll be paying for it out of your wages for a very long time! Pick them up and wash them all again. Mary, go and help her.”

  “Is that Sal?” Dan asked as the girls scuttled off with their arms full.

  “Yes, and she’s been useless ever since you took Abe away. Though good riddance to him if you ask me, sly young devil. And if you’re going to set the girls a-screaming, go and do it elsewhere.”

  Ackland came in just then with orders that Dan was to join Lord Oldfield when he was ready. He would find his portmanteau and hot water waiting for him in the room he had previously occupied. Dan bathed quickly this time, washing off the stench of the forge and the gaol. Then he put away Dan Fielding’s rough boots, soiled linen and corduroy trousers.

  Resuming his own clothes was a part of the job he always relished. It was as if he was reliving his rise from the brickfields: the transition from dirt and want to prosperity and comfort. This moment, standing in front of the mirror in his long coat, smart breeches, tall boots and striped waistcoat, all in muted colours but of decent cut and cloth, was a moment of triumph. His disguise had worked – and it had only been a disguise.

  He retrieved the Bloodie Bones notes from their hidden compartment in his bag and put them in his pocketbook. It was safer to keep them with him now the bag was not under lock and key.

  He knocked at the door of the green drawing room and went in. Lord Oldfield sat in an armchair with a glass of wine in his hand, regaling the company with an account of the arrests. Garvey, who had arrived an hour ago a
nd to whom the details were new, listened with quiet, professional attention. Lady Oldfield looked bored and disapproving. To her it was a low tale that did not improve with repeating. The adventure had not lost its charm for Lady Helen, who was a most appreciative audience with her starts, gasps and exclamations. Dan thought Lady Oldfield was nearer the mark.

  “And that was when the captain and Tickner arrived with the blacksmith. I wouldn’t have believed two such ordinary-looking men could have brought the brute in, but he crept along between them like a beaten cur. I tell you, in a fight I’d rather have one Bow Street man with a cutlass than a whole regiment of dragoons with muskets and sabres…And here is the man who deserves our gratitude. Come in, come in, Foster. Have a glass of wine.”

  “Really, Oldfield!” his mother snapped.

  It seemed that Dan was fated to set the girls a-screaming today. Lady Helen uttered a cry, as if she thought, or perhaps hoped, that he was going to rattle his cutlass, which of course he did not have on him.

  Garvey nodded a cool greeting over his sherry. “Whatever congratulations are due for the capture of a gang of village poachers I do indeed accord you, Officer.”

  “Thank you,” Dan answered. “I wish I could tell you how much your congratulations mean to me.”

  Lady Helen listened delightedly to the barbed exchange. “But really, Mr Garvey,” she said with a malicious smile, “don’t you think Mr Foster’s done a splendid job?”

  “Of course, My Lady. It cannot have been easy to defeat such formidable adversaries.”

  She laughed.

  “Well, Foster, tell us how it went at Shepton Mallet,” said Lord Oldfield, oblivious to his betrothed’s mischief-making.

  Dan, who did not think it suitable for the ladies’ ears, did not know how to answer. Luckily Lady Oldfield had the same thought.

  “I believe we have heard enough of this for one day. Come, Lady Helen. We will leave the men to their business.”

  Lady Helen pouted, but having no choice, she followed her future mother-in-law out of the room.