‘Yes.’ Jack found himself backed into a corner – there was no way of retreating now. If he did, Lord Heston would very likely question Mrs Bartlett and she would regale him with their entire conversation, word for word, no doubt.
‘Leave us, Kit,’ said Lord Heston.
Bidding Jack goodbye, Kit rode ahead with the look of a prisoner who had been granted an unexpected pardon. Jack glanced after him. He would have to find some way to help the young man – perhaps invite him to Lampton more often. It would also give Kit and Alethea a chance to get to know each other better, which would stand them in good stead if the betrothal went ahead in accordance with the earl’s and Lord Heston’s wishes.
He turned back to face Lord Heston, who was regarding him with an impenetrable expression.
‘Well?’
‘The matter I wished to speak to you about concerns a young maid by the name of Sarah Duval, who was in your employ at the time of your first wife’s, well …’
‘Our family tragedy. Yes, thank you, Halliford, I don’t need reminding, but if you have any news of that thieving wench, I’d be much obliged if you’d be good enough to share it with me.’
Jack cleared his throat. ‘I have it on good authority that the maid is dead.’
‘Whose authority?’
‘I saw her grave, in the woods south of the mill, with my own eyes,’ said Jack.
‘In the woods?’ Lord Heston arched his eyebrows, then he laughed, and it wasn’t a pleasant sound. ‘My, my. The search went far and wide for that strumpet, all that time she was right under our noses. So she’s truly dead?’
‘Yes.’
‘Good. Now if you’ll excuse me, Halliford, I have important estate matters to attend to.’
Jack watched Lord Heston ride away, but stayed for a moment staring out over the fields in contemplation. His hunt for Cora had turned into a need to help her, as well as a curiosity about her history, and so far his findings were intriguing.
Chapter Eleven
Cora ran until her lungs were bursting, and when she stopped at last she heard no sounds of pursuit. It would seem that Jack had decided not to follow her this time, thank goodness. He’d called himself Jack, which suited him somehow. She allowed herself a little smile, but then returned to reality. She should never have gone out there in the first place, but she missed her mother and baby brother and had wanted to say goodbye to them one last time. From now on she’d stay at Mrs Wilton’s cottage until it was time to leave the area. Fear and shame needled her stomach at the thought of holding up another carriage, but it was the only way for her to find the money she needed to get Ned to safety.
She made her way back to the cottage, deep in thought. Lord Halliford’s claim that she was the illegitimate child of a noble captain was extraordinary. She didn’t take Jack for a stupid man; he’d managed to find her and Ned’s home in the forest, and not many people knew precisely where it was. That was why she couldn’t dismiss his words outright. Her mother had been a maid once, and a nobleman taking advantage of a woman belonging to the lower orders was, however despicable, quite commonplace.
The more she thought of it, the more her mother’s last words began to make sense.
Remember, you’re a lady.
Strictly speaking, being the illegitimate child of a nobleman made her nothing of the sort, but to her mother, at the point of death it probably made a sort of sense.
But why would Jack tell her this at all? What did he stand to gain by introducing an illegitimate relative to the family, unless it was for the purposes of vexing his father. If, and it was undoubtedly a big ‘if’, Cora had any claim at all on an inheritance from the late captain, helping her would only deplete the funds of the estate, and, from rumours abounding in town, the earl could ill afford it.
She didn’t trust him; didn’t believe he wouldn’t give her to the authorities when he had finished whatever game he was playing. And he clearly had designs on her – his eyes had told her that as surely as if he’d said the words. Tempting as she found it to spend more time with him and get to know him better, who was to say he wouldn’t just use her and then hand her over to the magistrate?
And she had to consider the safety of her heart. Much to her dismay, she’d already discovered that she couldn’t trust herself around him, and what if the worst happened, and she succumbed to her desires only to find it was then too late for herself and Ned to get away? She shuddered at the thought. She had come very close already and felt the danger as if it burned her.
When she arrived at Mrs Wilton’s cottage, her head was swimming with the possibility that she might not be who she thought she was. She plucked up the courage to ask her father something she’d never for a moment thought was in doubt. She had to know.
‘Where have you been, girl?’ Ned’s hand clamped down hard on her wrist as soon as she entered the cottage, his strength unmistakable despite his illness. ‘I’ve been worried sick about you, wandering about like that.’
As if to punctuate his words, his body was suddenly beset by a hacking cough.
‘Sorry, Father. Here, let me get you something to drink.’
‘Just … answer the … question.’
Her father waved her away, but she ignored him and poured him a tankard of ale, which he accepted with a querulous expression. He watched Cora in silence as she sat down on a stool beside him.
‘First of all, I need to tell you something,’ she said. ‘The man who rumbled me was Lord Halliford.’
Ned frowned. ‘I know who he is, but I don’t see what difference it makes. He spends most of his time up in London carousing, but he’s nobody’s fool. If he’s uncovered your identity, the sooner we can be out of the county the better. I wouldn’t trust the likes of him further than I can spit.’
‘Actually, he let me go,’ said Cora. She decided not to mention her second run-in with him just now in the woods.
‘He let you go? Why?’
‘He made an extraordinary claim about my parentage.’
‘Did he, now? And, pray, what’s it to him?’
Cora looked at her father. From the wary expression in his eyes she wondered if he knew what she was going to ask him. The realisation cut through her. ‘It’s true, then?’ she said, more to herself than to him.
‘What’s true, my heart?’
‘Lord Halliford claims I’m the illegitimate daughter of his father’s cousin, Captain Blythe. Apparently the resemblance is striking; we have the same eyes.’
‘Pah! Resemblances mean nothing. We’re all created in His image after all.’ Ned dismissed Cora with a wave of his hand, but failed to meet her eyes. Cora’s stomach tightened.
‘Please, tell me the truth. He says my eyes are unusual, and perhaps he’s right. I didn’t get them by accident, did I? Are you my …’ She hesitated, unable to finish the question. ‘Did the captain get my mother into trouble?’
Ned set the tankard on the table and put his hands on her shoulders, reassuring her with his infinitely gentle eyes and an expression which spoke only of a father’s true love for his daughter.
‘Whatever your blood line, Cora, you’ll always be my child.’
‘So it is true,’ she whispered.
‘Aye, it is. But there’s more.’
Ned let go of her and Cora waited to hear what else he had to say, this man whom she had always thought to be her father. Her mind was in turmoil.
‘The good captain,’ Ned began, ‘did not beget you by your mother, Sarah. If the resemblance is as striking as Halliford claims, the captain probably fathered you, but by a different woman altogether.’
Cora blanched. This she had not anticipated. She had expected to hear the age-old tale of a maid seduced by the master of the house. She had even been prepared for the possibility that she was the result of a rape, but the notion that Sarah might not have been her mother at all had never entered her mind.
Tears stung her eyes. Her beautiful mother, so gentle and frail, whose only ambition in life was to have
a family, had carried one child to term in her womb, and that child wasn’t Cora. It shouldn’t matter, but it did. Not wanting to give vent to her hurt and anger, she clenched her fists in her lap.
Ned waited in silence while she battled with her rage and frustration, then he said, ‘Your natural mother was Lady Heston.’
‘Lady Heston?’ Cora looked up. ‘The woman who ran away and was found dead in a coach?’ The story was well-known.
‘The very same.’
Ned dug inside his shirt and pulled out a small bundle. ‘Here. This is the only proof I have of your identity. It has preyed on my conscience for many years, and I have often debated whether I should give it to you, but I was afraid that I might lose you if I did. Whenever I tried to tell you, it never seemed to be quite the right moment. Forgive me.’
Cora stared at the bundle in her hand, and then back at her father. Well, he was her father, wasn’t he? He had fed her, clothed her, taught her to walk, talk, picked her up when she fell over, scolded her, comforted her and gone without when there was little to eat. Only a real father did those things.
‘Oh, Father,’ she said and sent him an affectionate look, ‘of course I forgive you. It must have been a dreadful burden for you. I never knew how troubled you were.’
Ned smiled. ‘Open it,’ he said.
She pulled back the corners of the cloth to reveal a pendant and a ring. The pendant was a miniature painting depicting an elegant lady in watercolour on ivory, and the ring was a plain band of gold with an inscription inside it. Cora held it up in the sunlight to read: ‘To My Lady Heart. C’.
‘C?’ she said, raising her eyebrows.
Ned shrugged. ‘I can’t be certain, but I think it must have been a gift from her husband. Lord Heston’s Christian name is Charles.’
‘I see,’ Cora said. This was hardly proof, though; one could argue that Ned might have come by these items at any time. ‘And how did these items end up in your possession?’ she asked.
‘Sarah, your … mother, gave them to me after Lady Heston died.’
‘Did she steal them?’
‘No.’ Ned had a fierce look in his eyes. ‘She took them to give to Lady Heston’s child one day.’
Cora shook her head. ‘I still don’t understand. Lady Heston died with her child in her arms. How can these things be proof of my identity?’
Ned rose and paced the room, but then stopped and looked at her as if there was something important on his mind. He shook his head and turned away.
‘Father?’
Cora got up and stood behind him, her hand on his shoulder, beseeching him to look at her. Finally he turned and sent her a wry smile.
‘I once made my living as a highwayman,’ Ned said. ‘Just as you support us now, much to my horror. Although it has to be said, George taught you well. Anyhow, I was the one who held up the lady’s coach.’
Cora stared at him, unable to comprehend what he’d just told her. Her law-abiding father, a highwayman?
‘Not only that,’ he said, ‘but I switched the babies.’
‘You switched … in God’s name, why?’
‘Because Lady Heston implored me to. She feared for your life, feared what her husband would do to you when he discovered that you couldn’t possibly be his daughter.’ Smiling wistfully, Ned gave her arm a squeeze. ‘I always suspected that she must have been unfaithful to her husband. Why else would she have launched herself so desperately into the night? I just never knew who her lover was. Now I do. And so do you.’
‘Tell me everything from the beginning, please. I need to understand,’ Cora begged.
Cora listened in amazement as Ned told her exactly what had happened that night. Desperate for a few shillings so he could feed himself, he had held up a coach amid a dreadful storm. But a pitiful sight had greeted him when he opened the door, a woman close to death, her newborn baby tucked into a basket beside her. He hadn’t been able to deny the woman’s dying wishes to save her baby from her husband.
Cora smiled when he described her mother, Sarah, sitting in his horse’s saddle with as much dignity as a queen, making Ned almost dizzy from her presence.
‘And so it was I found myself with an infant in my arms and a hoity-toity lady’s maid straddling my horse. I had a curious feeling that I’d been hood-winked,’ he told her.
They’d travelled through the woods to the Ewers’ place, where just that morning Ben Ewer’s wife had given birth to stillborn girl. After switching the babies, Ned and Sarah had taken Cora home.
‘Of all the possessions I have acquired robbing from the rich,’ Ned said, ‘I have never held anything quite so precious in my arms.’
Chapter Twelve
‘And then what happened? You and Mo— I mean Sarah, fell in love?’ Cora stared at Ned, still shaken by all these revelations.
Ned smiled and shook his head. ‘Not right away, no, although I won’t deny I was smitten. She’d had a shock, so I gave her time and …’ He shrugged. ‘Yes, we fell in love. We moved away from this area, so no one ever knew you weren’t really our child.’
‘And Lady Heston’s … remains? Who discovered them?’
‘I’ve no idea. Before we left, I unleashed the horses and shooed them off across the heath. I’m guessing the coach was found in the morning or soon after, but I didn’t stay to find out. I had to get you and Sarah away from there, and fast.’
‘So where did you go?’ Cora needed to know every last detail.
‘Well, back to my humble cottage first.’ Ned smiled. ‘That was when you stole my heart too.’
‘Me?’ Cora laughed. ‘But I was just a baby.’
‘Aye, but when we got there, you were wide awake. You seemed to be studying me as if I were the strangest thing you’d ever laid eyes on. I was probably just being fanciful; I’ve heard newborn babies can’t see that well. But your tiny fists were waving furiously and when I slipped my little finger inside your hand, your tiny perfect fingers closed around it, and that was it. You had me.’
Cora smiled. ‘You’re too soft-hearted for your own good,’ she murmured. ‘Was it your idea to call me Cora or did I already have a name?’
‘No, Lady Heston never said. But you had that birthmark on your cheek and very distinctive it was too, shaped like a heart. It gave me an idea – I said to myself, I’ll call you Cora, short for corazon, the Spanish word for “heart”. I’d learned a handful of words, probably none fit for a lady’s ears, from a travelling Spaniard I’d once shared a jug of ale with. It seemed fitting, and Sarah agreed.’ He sighed and sent her a tired smile. ‘You’re my heart and always will be, child.’
Cora stared at him, not quite able to take in what she’d just heard. When the impact of Ned’s words finally hit home, she felt as if her innards had been ripped out. ‘So … so …’ she said, struggling against the hard lump in her throat, ‘all this time, we’ve been living a lie?’
‘I assure you, my heart, Sarah and I were your mother and father in every sense of the word except through blood. No one loved you as she did. You were the first thing on her mind when she woke in the mornings, and her last thought before bed. Just as you occupy my thoughts now.’
And you mine, Cora wanted to add, but her tongue seemed stuck. She knew one thing, though: she had to get the money they needed to leave this place. She had to protect him as he had once protected her. Get him away from Jack so he couldn’t threaten them anymore. It was too dangerous to stay.
‘Are we done, m’lord?’ The groom called down from the box.
He and Jack had driven from the outskirts of Hounslow to The Black Dog and back three times now. The groom could hardly disguise the impatience in his voice and Jack heartily agreed with the man. The constant dips in the bumpy road were beginning to grate on his nerves, and every time they passed the gibbets he felt the small hairs rise on the back of his neck.
Instead of his own carriage, Jack had chosen one without the family crest; it had been taken out of commission a while back a
nd mice had chewed and nested in the leather seats till practically all the stuffing spilled out.
‘Another turn, if you please, Benning,’ he called back, and then cursed as the wretched carriage dipped into a hole in the road, and he knocked his head against the carriage window.
And after that another turn, he added to himself. I intend to do this all damn night if that’s what it takes to find her.
For a moment, assailed by doubt that he would ever see Cora again, he regretted his decision not to pursue her, but he knew it would have been futile. This was better. It had to be. He suspected she would leave the county altogether and settle somewhere else, now he knew her identity. He would if he were her, and for that she would need travel money, he’d bet his last penny on it. For an experienced highwaywoman there was an easy solution to that problem. And she didn’t seem like the type of woman who would wait once she’d decided on a course of action. She would do it tonight. He was even making it easy for her, travelling along the most deserted part of the Heath in a carriage with lanterns blazing and only one unarmed man on the box.
When they reached the ten-mile stone, Benning turned the carriage around, and with much cussing of the horses, they were heading back to The Black Dog.
A shot rang out, and the carriage came to an abrupt stop. At last! Tensing, Jack cocked the pistol in his right hand and peeked out of the window. In the glare from the many lanterns he and Benning had strapped on he could see a dark figure on horseback pointing a pistol, but he couldn’t be sure it was Cora.
Through the walls of the carriage he heard the muffled order for Benning to step down and lie by the side of the road. It was a young voice – not unlike a woman’s – and his confidence was restored. It seemed Cora had walked right into his trap.
‘You in there! Step out of the carriage!’ Cora yelled at the closed door.
Jack had to hand it to her; she was good and took no chances. Cora knew the dangers, that if she pulled open the door, there was a good chance she would find herself staring down the barrel of a pistol. Jack needed to lure her closer.
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