“Next time, there will be two of us,” Weiss promised, as he paused in the doorway, “and we will feast off you together. Enjoy the anticipation and terror until we return. I will.”
Weiss moved the lorry down the drive until it was out of sight of the house, and left. Schmidt could take it back to the farm when he returned.
He ran back up to the stable and stretched out on Schmidt’s bed.
That way he’d know immediately when he returned.
It would be fun working the creature over together. Fear made blood so much sweeter.
Chapter Thirty
The milkman first noticed the parked lorry blocking the drive up to Wharton Lacey. Since his horse was placidly inclined, he maneuvered past and up to the house. With the household still asleep, he left the milk, and the papers he always brought as a service to the Whartons, then took his horse and cart back down the drive, repeating the tricky maneuver. Muttering that some mothers did have ’em, he went on to the cluster of cottages at the bottom of the hill and then into Brytewood village.
Frank Woolgar, the manager of the Home Farm, was the first to notice the farm lorry missing. Cussing under his breath at the laziness of some people, he sent Gracie, one of the land girls, off to Jim Proudfoot’s cottage. If Jim hadn’t left yet, he told her, he was to drive the lorry back himself, as he should have last night. If he’d already left, that gave him two whole days to rehearse what he’d say when tearing Jim off a strip. Having the weekend off to help out his wife’s sister, who’d been bombed out in Croydon, was one thing. Neglecting to return the lorry was another matter entirely. For one hideous moment, he wondered if the Proudfoots had taken the lorry with them. If so, that was a firing matter.
The lorry was nowhere in sight. Gracie thumped on the door for several minutes, and only succeeded in rousing the two little evacuees who lived next door.
“You’re making too much noise,” the taller boy said. “You’ll wake the baby and he’s been up half the night.”
“Sorry,” Gracie said. “I was looking for the Proudfoots.”
“They’re gone.”
“Left yesterday,” the younger one added. “Right after lunch. They took the bus into Dorking to go to the station.”
“The bus? You’re sure? They didn’t drive a lorry?”
They both shook their heads.
At least the lorry wasn’t in Croydon, by the sound of things.
“They went to help Mrs. Proudfoot’s sister,” the elder one said. Gracie searched her brains for their names but with no luck. “She got bombed out.”
“Think they’ll be back?” the other one asked. “Mum went off to help Gran after her house got hit and then got bombed herself.”
Poor little blighters. Gracie remembered the talk a month or so ago. “Sorry about your mum.” What else could she say? “You two had best get indoors before you catch your death of cold.”
Mr. Woolgar was none too happy at the news. “Where the hell’s the damn lorry then? Sure it wasn’t there?”
In the Proudfoots’ tiny garden there wasn’t space to hide a wheelbarrow, much less a farm lorry. “Not a sign, and the boys were quite certain they left on the bus. I asked particularly if they’d taken the lorry.”
“If he left after lunch, what the blazes happened to the flowers Sir James wanted delivered? Did they get where they were going, I’d like to know? And where’s the dratted lorry?”
Lady Gregory answered that one. Returning from her morning ride across the fields, she took a detour around by the cottages and up the lane toward home. The sight of a farm lorry parked askew in the drive struck her as odd.
Back in the house and settled over her toast and coffee, she asked her spouse, “What’s a farm lorry doing parked in the drive? I know we’re not expecting company this weekend, but if anyone does try to come up, they’ll never get past it.”
“Eh?” Sir James looked up from the Times. “In the drive you say? What’s it doing there?”
“That was what I was asking, dear. It ought to be moved.”
“Proudfoot had it last. I sent him down to the village with camellias for that Nurse Prewitt. She’s getting married today to the chap from over at the munitions plant.”
Interesting, but since the district nurse wasn’t a tenant or employee, a wedding present wasn’t called for. “It still needs to be moved. Won’t they need it today?”
“I’ll have Smith, the new gardener, drive it over. Can’t think what got into Proudfoot.”
“One more thing!” Edith Aubin muttered at the latest request from the dining room. And, of course, Smith hadn’t yet put in an appearance in the kitchen. No doubt waiting to want toast after they’d finished with both breakfasts.
“What’s the matter?” Molly asked, hands in the sink as she washed up.
“Seems someone left a farm lorry down in the drive. Sir James wants Smith to move it and of course, is he anywhere to be seen? Still lolling in bed, I’ll be bound.”
“If he’s not over here by the time I get these done, I’ll go and give him a yell,” Molly offered.
Fifteen minutes later, Molly pulled on her coat to nip across to the stable yard. She wasn’t in the best of moods. She’d been up since 6:30 and here was this layabout still snoozing. It was a less-than-friendly voice that called up the stairs. “Mr. Smith? Sir James needs you, so look sharp!”
Getting no response didn’t improve her mood. If he was still snoring away while she’d been up working for hours, she was going to tear him off a strip, even if it wasn’t her place to.
She climbed the open steps that led up above the stables. She wouldn’t normally venture into a man’s room, but she was cross enough not to care. His room was the second one along and the door was closed. She gave it a sharp rap and called out, “Wakey wakey, Sir James needs you, better get going.” When he didn’t respond she rapped harder and longer, and called his name.
Having no luck there, she opened the door a few inches and peered in. She had a straight line view of the bed, and saw at once the bedspread was crushed, as if someone had slept on it, but not bothered to get inside. She opened the door wider and surveyed the empty room.
Where the blazes was he?
She closed the door, and it was her especial good fortune that she’d not been curious enough to look behind it. Weiss clung to the wall, ready to pounce if she’d seen him. As she left, he looked for alternative exits. The window was the only one possible.
Outside, Molly hesitated, wondering if Smith were in one of the other rooms. She walked down, calling his name and peering in the unfurnished rooms. In the last room she heard a noise, like a groan or gasp. She pushed open the door, and at the sight of a half-naked man chained to the bare springs of the bedstead, screamed.
Weiss snatched the moment and leapt through the window, hoping her screams would mask the sounds of splintering wood and breaking glass.
He was bleeding; time would heal that. Not hesitating a second, he headed across the parkland and toward the fields, racing in the direction of his previous resting place in the ruins of the rectory tennis court.
Poor Molly gasped, took a deep breath, and crossed the room.
“My God! It’s Mr. Whorleigh! What happened?”
He gave a weak gurgle as if it hurt to speak and rasped out, “Get this off me. Please.”
It took all her strength to shift the chunk of cement and she wondered how on earth anyone had got it up here. Once free, he struggled to sit up and stand.
He grabbed her shoulder for support. “Thank you,” he croaked. “Where am I?”
He didn’t smell of drink and seemed more weak than intoxicated. “Where am I?” he repeated. “And where are they? He said they’d come back.”
“You’re over the stables at Wharton Lacey, and who put you here?”
“They…” he began, but broke off, shuddering. “Help me.” He grabbed at her coat, digging his fingernails into the cloth.
“I am helping you.” Reali
zing she’d snapped, she lowered her voice. “Look, Mr. Whorleigh. I’ve got to get help. I can’t get you down on my own.”
He clung to her even more tightly. “Please. Don’t leave me!”
“Alright, listen. I’ll help you to the top of the stairs, then you wait there while I get Miss Aubin to help. If she tried by herself, she’d end up breaking her leg and then bang would go her day off.
He wasn’t happy about it, but waited at the top, crawling into a corner and shaking while she climbed down as fast as she could and ran across the yard to the kitchen door to call out for help.
“What’s going on?” Miss Aubin said. “What’s the fuss? And where is that Paul Smith? I’m about give him a piece of my mind.”
“He’s not there, but Mr. Whorleigh is. He was tied to one of the beds.”
It took Edith Aubin all of thirty seconds to decide Molly had to be telling the truth. It was too impossible to make up. “Where is he now?”
“At the top of the steps. He can hardly stand, and I didn’t think I could get him down without help.”
“I’ll help.”
Together they got the shivering man down and safely into the kitchen and wrapped him in a blanket. While Molly made him a cup of sweet tea, Miss Aubin went to relay the news to the dining room.
Molly poured the tea, thinking the poor blighter needed a shot of brandy as well as extra sugar, but it wasn’t her place to help herself to spirits, even if they hadn’t been locked up. “Here you are, Mr. Whorleigh,” she said, pulling up a straight-backed chair beside his. “A nice cup of tea. Just what you need. Do you the world of good, it will.” Looked as though she’d be late leaving, but would she have a tale to tell when she did get home!
“Really, Miss Aubin, what on earth is going on out there?”
“As to that, sir, I can’t rightly tell you. I haven’t searched the stables myself, but Molly found no trace of Smith, but she did find Mr. Whorleigh, the grocer from Brytewood. He was chained to one of the spare beds, wearing nothing but his torn-up trousers and minus one shoe.” Now she came to say it aloud, it did sound preposterous. “I’m thinking we should call the doctor for Mr. Whorleigh. He’s not in a good way.”
“Call Dr. Watson,” Lady Gregory said. “And I think the police too. If that man was chained up in the stable loft without any blanket or covers, he’d have died if Molly hadn’t had the foresight to look.”
Miss Aubin called, but half an hour earlier, Alice Watson had redirected her calls to the locum in Leatherhead. She was not missing Gloria’s wedding for anything short of pestilence or air raid.
The locum agreed to come out as soon as he could get there.
She then called down to the police and disturbed Sergeant Jones enjoying a late breakfast with his family. He agreed to come up right away.
Once he heard the ring on the line indicating she’d finished, Sir James Gregory called the office in Whitehall he’d spoken to yesterday. “Parish,” he said, when the line picked up the other end. “I need to speak to Parish. It’s James Gregory. It’s urgent.”
“Just a minute, please, Sir James,” the young man at the other end said. “He’s home right now, I’ll connect you through.” He waited while the line clicked and buzzed.
“Hello,” Peter Parish said. “What’s happened?”
“Seems the bird has flown but left an injured cuckoo behind.”
“This line’s secure, or as secure as any of them are. Tell me what’s happened.”
Sir James Gregory told him.
“We’ll be there in two hours, and whatever you do, keep that grocer person there. He must be caught up in this somehow.”
Chapter Thirty-One
The men had gone ahead on the bus. Alice and Gran picked up Mary and Gloria, a definitely beautiful bride, complete with bouquet. (A couple of the camellias had been squashed in the melee last night but who was complaining?) As they headed out of the village, the crowd outside Whorleigh’s caught Alice’s eye.
“What’s going on there?” she asked. “Looks like a queue for the London sales.”
“Stop a minute, my love,” Gran said, “and I’ll have a word with someone.”
“Please, Gran. Whatever it is can wait, surely?”
“I suppose so, my love. I just think if something is going on, we need to know about it.”
Having learned the hard way to trust Gran’s hunches, Alice pulled up in front of the shop and wound down her window. “What’s the matter?”
“Hello, Doctor. Shop’s not open,” someone said, “and Marion here don’t have the key.”
“That’s right,” Marion, one of Whorleigh’s numerous assistants, said. “He always has it open by the time I get here.”
“Rum do, if you ask me,” a voice in the crowd muttered.
Alice’s conscience twinged. She should see if anyone was hurt, but it would delay them all. Then Constable Parlett emerged from the newsagent and post office next door, and announced he was cycling over to Whorleigh’s house to see what was happening.
He could take care of things.
Alice thanked him and drove on.
Even Gran seemed relieved they hadn’t stopped, but she said very quietly, “Something’s wrong, my love. He always opens on time.” And came in early to boot, something Alice once had reason to be profoundly grateful for. “Still, there’s not much we can do, I think,” Gran went on. “Not now. This is Gloria’s day.” It was indeed, and they’d taken care of one of the Vampires yesterday.
The wedding was brief and businesslike but no amount of bureaucratic briskness could quell the joy and happiness in the little room, or the glorious look of love on Gloria’s face. Mary pushed aside a pang of envy at the sight of Gloria and Andrew walking hand in hand down the street toward the Spread Eagle where they were all lunching.
She didn’t doubt she loved Gryffyth. She knew why she hesitated and, darn it, she was taking care of that tonight. She’d have the cottage to herself. She’d even made up her bed with clean sheets that very morning. Was that being presumptuous?
No, she decided. Optimistic.
“You’ve gone very quiet,” Gryffyth said, walking in step beside her.
“Just happy for Gloria, and a little worried on her account. Who knows when Andrew will get the word to go?”
“It’s hard on them,” he agreed, “but I doubt either is worrying about that right now. I envy him,” Gryffyth went on. “The woman he loves, didn’t turn him down.”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake! I haven’t turned you down.”
“No, even worse. You’re keeping me dangling.”
If he wasn’t careful, she’d give him a firm answer and it wouldn’t be the one he hoped for. “I’m making up my mind. If you want to try convincing me, come over to our house this evening. I’ll be all alone.”
That left him speechless for several seconds. But only seconds. “What do you mean?”
As if he didn’t know! And if he really didn’t, she was darn well not spelling it out in words of one syllable. “Seven-thirty, and bring your own beer, we don’t have any.” His face was a picture to behold. Time to toss her last match on the possible conflagration. “You can make it later, if you like. I was thinking of going up to the hammerpond and it sometimes takes me a little while to get back.”
“You’re not going up to the pond on Longhurst’s land.”
Oh, no? “Where else can I go? Gryffyth, you have to understand, I need to be in deep water. Salt water for preference, but that hammerpond is the best I can do in Surrey. You shift and breathe fire. I need to feel water flowing over my skin. All my skin,” she added. Just for the sake of making her point.
She succeeded.
“You’re not swimming naked in Tom Longhurst’s pond!” She’d never heard that exact tone of voice in her life and it sent a little shiver of excitement down her spine. She’d certainly piqued his interest. Maybe a wee bit too much. “If you go, I’m coming with you!”
Mary didn’t bother to r
espond, since they were about to cross the road. Didn’t need to. Her heart raced behind her ribs. Tonight was the night.
She so hoped.
They had a big, round table in a small, private room and in the place of honor was Mrs. Burrows’s cake, which had ridden down with them, hidden under a blanket in the back of the shooting brake. How it miraculously appeared from there to sit on the silver cake stand was a mystery, but weren’t more than half the company Other? Only Peter and Andrew were full human. Must have been a bit of Pixie magic. Or perhaps Dragon magic?
No, she hoped all the Dragon magic was waiting for her tonight.
They were between courses and had the room to themselves (thank heaven) when Mrs. Burrows said, “Thank you, Howell, my love, for getting everyone here on time.”
“Doubted me, didn’t you, Helen? Thought we’d all be too hung over to get here.”
“I did not. Not really. I just know how enticing Fred Wise’s beer can be.”
“We got here, Helen, all safe and sound, and with clear heads.”
“And what were you women doing? Didn’t go over to the Stepping Stones in Westhumble, did you?” Andrew asked.
“We spent the evening at Gloria’s,” Alice said. “Nice quiet evening it was, until Mary staked the Vampire.”
“You did what?” Gryffyth all but shrieked. Mary had never realized eyebrows really could disappear into the hairline like that.
“I staked a Vampire: the one Alice remembered finding hurt, weeks back. She recognized him.” Mary held back the grin. Surprising your man was one thing. Infuriating him beyond measure was a bit much.
“Christ almighty!” Peter announced.
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