by Mary Nichols
‘You have discovered who might have been responsible?’ Harriet asked him.
‘One of Mr Macdonald’s associates, I think. It might have been the man, Billings, but as he is dead…’ He shrugged without finishing the sentence. Could it have been Smith or Randle who murdered Amy’s husband?
‘The only thing that came to me,’ Amy went on, ‘was a voice, which I think must have been Duncan’s, saying, “Go to Blackfen Manor. I will join you there. Tell no one.”’
‘Ah, that is how you came to be on that coach,’ Harriet said.
‘Yes, so you see, he was very likely alive when I left and most of the mystery is solved. I have decided not to worry about the rest. I can remember being here afterwards and the Captain coming and that is enough.’
‘Are you going to stay here with us, then?’ Matilda wanted to know.
‘Oh, yes. And the Captain is going to stay, too. He says Highbeck suits him.’
‘If you would be so good as to allow me to remain at the Lodge until I find some where to buy in the vicinity,’ he put in.
‘Stay as long as you like,’ Harriet said. ‘Which reminds me, did you deliver those documents to Mr Smithson?’
‘I did indeed. He said he would write to you as soon as he has had time to study them, but he is sure you have nothing to worry about.’
‘I am glad to hear that,’ Harriet said. ‘Not that I ever doubted it, but Gerald was here again yesterday, being as objectionable as ever. He insisted on going round the house making an inventory. He said there were repairs that needed doing and we were not up to seeing to them, which made me very angry. I followed him round to see what he was writing down, but he did not seem to make many notes at all. I think he was simply prying. What I cannot understand is why, after years of silence, he has suddenly taken an interest again.’
‘Oh, it is the presence of the Captain,’ Matilda said, almost smugly. ‘He is afraid Amy will marry him and deprive him of all hope of getting his hands on the Manor.’
Amy’s face went scarlet and even James was taken aback.
‘Tilly!’ Harriet remonstrated. ‘You are putting Amy to the blush and embarrassing the Captain.’
James felt something from him was called for, but he was unsure what that should be. Should he deny he had ever thought of Amy in that way, which would be a terrible set down for her? On the other hand he did not want to be pushed into proposing. He was not ready for that. ‘Until a week ago, we all believed Mrs Macdonald was married,’ he said evenly. ‘I am sure she is not yet ready to consider another suit.’
Amy was mortified. Not until that moment had she realised her growing regard for James was more than that. She loved him and nothing would have pleased her more than he should love her, too. But he did not and was letting her down as gently as he could. But could she blame him? She might have said she was content not to push at her memory, but there were still matters unresolved and even if she had not been the one to put the knife into her husband, she must have seen it happen and knew the men who did it and that made her an accessory. He had to uphold the law, that was the kind of man he was; he would not marry a woman like her. The happiness she felt in returning to Highbeck seeped away, leaving her as troubled as she had been before.
‘Aunts, what have you been doing while we have been away?’ she asked, falsely bright. ‘Apart from entertaining Cousin Gerald, I mean.’
‘Busying our selves about the estate,’ Harriet said. ‘Overseeing the hay making and clearing the barn for the harvest. And we had two more callers. Why the house should suddenly interest visitors, I do not know. We are so out of the way here.’
‘Visitors?’ James queried. ‘What manner of visitors?’
‘A Mr Miller and a Mr Wade. London gentlemen, they said. Studying architecture. They asked to be shown round the house.’
This was not good news. James wondered whether to put the ladies on their guard or say nothing. There must be a reason why the house was attracting visitors. Most recently, those two, whom he did not doubt were Smith and Randle, and also Gotobed, seen whispering with the dying Duncan Macdonald; and even Sir Gerald Hardwick, whose interest in the place had suddenly been revived. And there was the voice Amy had remembered. ‘Go to Blackfen Manor. I will join you there. Tell no one.’ What was she not to tell? Had she remembered that and decided not to en lighten him?
‘Did you show the two London gentlemen round?’ he asked the aunts.
‘No, but they came into the hall and started asking questions about the house and how many rooms there were. I did not like them and when they started to become too inquisitive, almost as if they were interrogating me, I asked them to leave.’
‘Good.’ He paused. ‘Perhaps it would be wise to be a little less hospitable in future.’
Amy, who had begun to understand how his mind worked, looked sharply at him. Was he simply being cautious or did he think there was more to the visitors than appeared on the surface? Did it have anything to do with her? If she had brought danger to her aunts, she would never forgive herself. He saw her looking at him and smiled to reassure her. ‘Just a precaution.’
They talked for a few more minutes, then he took his leave, setting off to walk swiftly through the copse to the Lodge.
Sam had seen to the horses and put the carriage away and was busy in James’s bedchamber unpacking. He turned as James entered. ‘Is all well at the Manor, Captain?’
‘I am not sure. Sir Gerald Hardwick has called again and two other men came wanting to be shown round the house. It looks like we have found Smith and Randle.’ He gave a grunt of a laugh. ‘Or they have found us.’
‘You saw them, too, did you?’ Sam said. ‘I wondered if you might have.’
‘It occurred to me they might be the two who held up the coach when we first came to Highbeck. The masks and cloaks made it impossible to identify them.’
‘Then they are connected with Mrs Macdonald…’
‘It looks like it. Mrs Macdonald has remembered her husband telling her to come to Highbeck, that he would meet her here. Presumably they knew it. And that fellow Billings did, too. They were all on the way to Blackfen Manor.’
‘Then undoubtedly there is something there, something they want and it has to be something valuable. Gold and jewels, mayhap.’
‘What made you say that?’ James asked sharply. One of Amy’s dreams had featured something of the sort, though he did not think Sam knew that.
‘No reason, but ain’t that what thieves are usually after?’ He gave a sudden chuckle. ‘You never know, it might be the Arkaig treasure.’
James laughed, too, but it set him thinking and thinking hard. Knowledge of the whereabouts of that, or anything like it, could be a threat, not only from criminals who coveted it, but from the government who had been trying to locate it for years without success. Having it amounted to treason. Surely his beautiful Amy could know nothing of it? He wanted to rush back and warn her, to instigate a search for whatever it was, hand it over and free Amy of any stigma of involvement. He sat down heavily on the bed while Sam continued to tidy away his clothes and put out a fresh coat and breeches for him to change into.
His thief taking had taken on a whole new meaning. Fielding had sent him here—did Fielding know more than he had told him? Was he being used? It made him angry and, for a second—and it was only a second—he thought of abandoning the whole project and returning to London to confront the magistrate. But he knew at once he could not do that. Amy was here and, wherever Amy was, there he must stay. ‘I think we would be wise to search the grounds and out buildings,’ he said.
‘For the treasure?’ Sam gasped.
‘No, man, for those two murdering thieves. We must find out where they are staying and keep a watch on them. Gotobed, too.’
‘He was at the King’s Arms when we left four days ago. Mayhap they are there, too.’
‘Then tonight you and I will go and enjoy the hospitality of mine host.’
Amy lay awake.
In spite of telling James she would wait until God chose to restore her memory, she found herself going over and over what she had learned about her husband, her mother’s statement about the unsavoury characters with whom he associated and the two men she had seen following her in the grounds. James had not said so, but she knew him well enough now to know that he considered they had been her aunts’ visitors and that boded no good. His gentle warnings hid a deep concern.
Dear James! How she loved him! He embodied all that was good, whereas the others represented evil. She needed to know there was none of that evil in her, and to do that she must remember everything. She lay listening to the rising wind soughing round the old house and deliberately made herself visualise the house in Henrietta Street, trying to see it as it had been before someone had fought a battle in it.
She had no idea what her married life with Duncan had been like, except from what her mother had told her, nor what had caused the fight in the house. Nor was she sure there had ever been any gold or jewels except in her dreams. But there had been a struggle. It was coming back to her now; mentally she reached out to grasp it, something she had been shying away from until now, too afraid to face it. Four men. Anger. Everyone shouting. Crockery and furniture being thrown. A knife being produced and a great deal of blood. Screaming. Her screaming as she watched. And Duncan’s voice, weak from his injuries, telling her to go to Highbeck. How much of that was real memory and how much suggested to her by dreams and what people had told her? Was she dreaming now? And then she remembered being out in the street, running, running as if the hounds of hell were at her heels…
She began to tremble. It was very close now, the revelation she wanted so badly and yet feared so much. Knowing she would not sleep until it came to her, she left her bed and drew back the curtains. It was dawn, but still very early, too soon to dress and go down to break fast. She slipped into a dressing gown and sat at the escritoire and taking quill, ink and paper from a drawer began to write down all she could remember and had been told in the order in which she thought it had occurred. Slowly more was revealed on the pages in front of her. It was as if her memory were communicating itself direct from her pen to the paper.
She had helped the wounded Duncan to bed, trailing blood all the way, and tended his wounds, while the other three caroused and argued in the kitchen. Duncan had wanted her to leave him. ‘Go while you can,’ he had said. ‘You know what will happen to you if you do not. They will have no mercy. Go to Highbeck. Tell no one where you are going.’
‘But I cannot leave you like this!’ she had exclaimed.
‘I shall recover, never fear, and join you there.’
‘What will they do to you?’
‘Nothing. I have something they want very badly. They will not harm me further while I tantalise them with it.’
She would never have left him if she had known he would die or if she had felt an ounce of sympathy for him, but all she could remember feeling was anger that his own disreputable behaviour had brought this trouble on them. The sound of drunken laughter coming from the kitchen finally persuaded her to go. She had flung a cloak about her, crept from the house and run down the street, dodging this way and that, not knowing what to do or where to go. Even as angry with him as she was, she could not do as Duncan asked and go to Highbeck, not while he lay wounded and at the mercy of those men. She ought to find a constable or a watchman, but if she did that, Duncan would be in trouble along with those dreadful men. A doctor, then.
She was standing in the street, too confused to go on, when Gus Billings—she remembered him—had caught up with her and given her the choice of allowing him to accompany her to Highbeck, which indicated he had overheard Duncan talking to her, or taking her back to the house and handing her over to the other two. ‘And they will not deal so gently with you, my dear,’ he had said with a leer, his hand gripping her arm painfully. ‘All I want to do is help you, as Duncan wishes me to.’
As she wrote, the journey in the coach came back to her. James and Sam Roker and a parson had all boarded it in London, as she and Billings had done. James had shown some concern for her and had given her his coat for a pillow. He had spoken kindly and at the inn where they stopped had paid for a tisane for her, but he had also seemed impatient, as if anxious to be at his destination. Or had she simply surmised that because he had since told her about his wife? Why was it all such a muddle?
They had been held up by high way men; she remembered that now. The robbers had worn masks, hats and cloaks, so she could not positively identify them, but they had been known to her unwelcome escort. They had conferred together while James stood with his arm protectively about her. Even then, even in the first days of their acquaintance ship, he had been looking after her, protecting her, as he had been doing ever since. The robbers had let them continue their journey and she remembered feeling exhausted and trying to sleep and then being severely jolted and James grabbing her as the coach rolled over. He had pulled her from the wreckage and tended to her. She saw again the mangled coach, the frightened horse careering up the road and Billings lying dead. And she had a bump on the back of her head that hurt when she touched it.
That was the beginning of her loss of memory, that was when her poor brain gave up on her, but it was also the beginning of the rest of her life in which James figured largely. He had brought her safely to the King’s Arms, nestling like an injured bird inside his coat against his shirt. She remembered that ride in fits and starts, the warmth of him, his gentle voice soothing her, arriving at the inn and being put to bed. Everything after that was clear as day; her aunts’ efforts to make her remember; James’s arrival in the village, her growing dependence on him, her burgeoning love for him which now could not be denied, but must be denied until all taint of wickedness had been washed away.
She heard a cock crowing in the yard and then the clatter of milk pails and then Susan going past her door to go down stairs. Another day had begun. Without waiting for the maid to come with her hot chocolate, she dressed and went down stairs to eat her break fast with the servants in the kitchen, which she often did. Her aunts were still in bed and she did not want to put the servants to the trouble of serving her in the dining room. Besides, she liked their company, had always enjoyed listening to their gossip and hearing news of the doings of the villagers.
After break fast, she fetched out her sketching materials and took them into the back parlour where the light was good and set about illustrating her memories, trying to capture the likeness of those two men. It was sombre work and made her feel low in spirits. She could be doing something more useful, she told herself, something to make her feel better. Looking at her drawing, she knew she would recognise those men if she saw them again. Did she know their names? Had she ever known them? Her aunts’ visitors had called them selves Miller and Wade, but they could easily have invented those along with their claim to be architects. They held the key and she had to face up to them. James seemed to think they were some where in the village. Could she find them?
Hearing the door knocker, she thought it was James and was unprepared when a footman came and told her Mr Gotobed desired a few minutes of her time.
She was inclined to say she was not at home, but was curious about what Duncan had said when he lay dying. She bade the footman to show him into the drawing room and, in the absence of her aunts, who were making calls in the village, told him to send Susan down to her.
She had settled herself on a sofa with her hands in her lap, when Martin Gotobed came striding in, swept off his tricorne hat and executed a flourishing bow. He was wearing yellow breeches, a green coat and a yellow-and-brown striped waist coat. She thought he looked like some strange beetle. ‘Madam, your obedient.’
‘Mr Gotobed.’ She rose but did not curtsy, waiting for him to state his errand, giving him no prompting by asking how he did. Susan slipped into the room and took up a station just inside the door. He seemed unaware of her.
‘Madam, I hope yo
u are well,’ he began.
‘Very well, sir, I thank you.’ She did not ask him to be seated and, as she remained standing herself, he could do nothing but stand facing her. He was no taller than she was, which put him at a disadvantage.
‘And your journey to the capital? I hope it proved beneficial,’ he enquired.
‘How did you know I have been to London?’
‘Why, madam, this is a small village, everyone knows everyone’s business. Captain Drymore was enquiring about carriages and horses, so…’ He shrugged.
She allowed herself a twitch of a smile. ‘To be sure. In answer to your question, yes, it was of some use.’
‘Ahh.’ He paused. ‘Then you will have learned of Mr Macdonald’s demise.’
‘Yes.’ She was angry now and did not bother to hide it. ‘I also learned you were with him when he died. You could have had the civility to tell me that when you first came here.’
‘I was not with him at the moment of his death, but he was certainly beyond recovery when I left him. I would have told you, dear lady, but I could hardly get near you for your body guard.’
‘My body guard? Do you mean my aunts?’ she asked.
‘No, I meant that thief taking mariner who seems to have attached himself to you like a leech. I did try to warn you…’
‘So you did, but as you see, he did not arrest me,’ she said tartly.
‘Heaven forfend!’
‘Mr Gotobed, why have you come?’
‘Why, to convey your husband’s dying words to you, and to ask you a question,’ he said.
‘Go on. I am listening.’
‘His last words were of you. He asked me to tell you that. He said he had sent you to Blackfen Manor where he hoped to join you…’ He heaved an in sincere sigh. ‘Alas, it was not to be. When he realised he would not live to keep his word, he asked me to come to you in his stead. He desired me to look after you.’
