Tucker's Inn

by Tucker's Inn (retail) (epub)

  Who were these men who had come in the dead of night, and what had brought them here? What had they quarrelled with my father about, and why had it come to this? I did not know, and could not speculate. I knew only that my beloved father was dead, and even that was too much, as yet, for my befuddled brain to take in.

  My trembling legs refused to support me for another moment, I flopped heavily into the chair and remained there, my arms folded round myself, my gaze fixed on the body of my father. I was still there when the coachman returned with the constable and the doctor.

  A doctor! As if there was anything he could do! The sight of him, carrying his medical bag, was enough to bring me to hysterical laughter. But perhaps the coachman had brought him, not for my father, but for me, for he attempted to persuade me to take a dose of laudanum and go to bed.

  I refused. Nothing could take away my pain, only dull it for a little while, and I did not want to sleep. I somehow needed to be aware – as aware as I could be – of what was going on. To lose myself in a fog of drugs would, it seemed to me, be a final betrayal of my father. And I might somehow be able to help piece together the evidence that would pinpoint his killers and bring them to justice.

  Nothing I could tell the constable was of any use, of course. I had not seen the men, nor even heard them clearly. Their horses had been – well, just two horses. I couldn’t even be sure what colour they were, for in the fitful moonlight they had simply been dark shapes.

  The constable was unable to find the smallest clue; the identity of my father’s murderers seemed likely to remain an unsolved mystery.

  And so, as I watched his coffin lowered into the ground, the question still haunted me.

  Why?

  As the first clods of earth thudded on to the oak lid, the tears ran once again unchecked down my cheeks and I reached out and dropped the small bunch of snowdrops I had gathered this morning to fall amongst them.

  ‘Goodnight, Father,’ I whispered, and, echoing the words he had spoken to me each night since I was a little girl: ‘Sleep well.’

  Then I turned, head bent against the driving wind and rain, and began to walk away from the grave.

  * * *

  A touch on my arm arrested me. I stopped and looked up to see the tall figure of a man beside me.

  For a moment I could not think who he was. Certainly I had not noticed him at the grave side, but then, in my grief I had not looked at any of the mourners who had gathered to pay their last respects. Their faces were nothing but a blur to me.

  I stared, puzzled, into the strong dark face beneath the black beaver hat, and the man smiled faintly.

  ‘Louis Fletcher. I don’t suppose you recognize me.’

  Then, of course, I knew. Louis Fletcher, a second cousin of my father.

  My first reaction was surprise that he had travelled the fifteen or more miles from their home for the funeral. We had never had much contact with the Fletchers – ‘the rich relations’, my father had laughingly called them, for that is what they were.

  ‘They don’t want to lower themselves associating with the likes of us,’ he had used to say, good-naturedly enough – but then, that was my father all over, and I could not help but suspect there was some kind of feud, or difference, at least, between the two branches of the family, for it seemed strange they should live within such easy distance and yet see so little of one another.

  Peter Fletcher, my father’s cousin, was a well-to-do merchant, though what he dealt in I was never entirely sure – and as such was certainly much higher in the social scale than my father, a humble innkeeper. And since jealousy was not in my father’s nature, I could only think that it was Peter who kept his distance from my father rather than the other way around. Certainly their way of life was very different to ours.

  Once, when I was very small, and being taken to visit relatives of my mother’s in Cockington, my father had stopped the carriage and pointed across the valley to a grand house set in its own grounds and overlooking the River Dart.

  ‘See there, Flora? See that fine place? Who do you think lives there?’

  I remember staring in awe at the balustrades and parapets; to me it looked like nothing so much as a fairy-tale palace.

  ‘A princess!’ I said.

  My father smiled. ‘Try again.’

  I screwed up my small face, thinking hard. ‘A prince?’

  He laughed aloud this time. ‘No, Miss, you’re wrong there, though it’s an easy mistake to make. No, it’s your very own cousin twice removed.’

  ‘My cousin!’ I could scarcely believe it; he was teasing me, I thought. ‘But I don’t have a cousin!’

  ‘Twice removed, like I said. He’s my cousin, my mother’s brother’s son, and that makes him your cousin too. Now, what do you think of that?’

  I didn’t know what to think. I was overwhelmed, as well as still being confused.

  ‘Are we going to visit him?’ I asked at last.

  ‘Oh no, we can’t go calling on folk like that without an invitation,’ my father said, jovially enough. ‘You’ll have to make do with the fisherman’s cottage down Cockington, and your Granny Livesay, I’m afraid.’

  ‘I don’t mind,’ I said loyally. I loved Granny Livesay and the dear little cottage with the doorway so low that Father had to bend his head and hunch his shoulders to go in, and the tiny garden at the rear full of hollyhocks and sweet briar roses and a blackberry bush that I could feast on when the fruit was ripe, as I hoped it would be today.

  But as we drove away I cast a longing glance towards the great house on the hillside overlooking the River Dart just the same. It looked so impossibly romantic, and I couldn’t help wishing that perhaps one day we would go to visit Father’s cousin who lived in a house fit for a fairy-tale prince.

  We never did. Once, some time later, a portly man in fashionable attire and wearing a tricorne hat and woolly hedgehog wig had called at the inn on his way to Devonport, he said, and I learned that this was Cousin Peter. He had with him two boys, his sons, Louis and Gavin, but they were much older than me, almost grown up really, and so they had no time for a little girl like me, and I was too shy to make any overtures of my own.

  The younger boy, Gavin, did ask me if it was true that there were secret passages beneath the inn, running from the cellars to the crypt of the old ruined monastery down the road, and when I told him eagerly that there were, and that they had once been used by priests escaping from the soldiers who had come to sack the monastery, the two boys had become very excited and asked if they might explore them. Their father soon put a damper on that idea, however, saying he had no intention of turning up in Devonport with the pair of them looking like chimney sweeps, and after that I don’t think either of them spoke more than a dozen words to me, though the family stayed long enough to take refreshment with us.

  ‘Proper little gentlemen, aren’t they?’ my father remarked after they had left. ‘I suppose that’s what comes of being sent away to school.’

  ‘Sent away to school?’ I was puzzled. For me, school meant the gathering of pupils of all ages at the home of Dame Hibbert in the village, and not all the children I knew kept regular attendance there, even.

  ‘Boarding school,’ my father explained. ‘It’s where the gentry go to learn their lessons – and how to behave themselves in polite company,’ he added darkly.

  ‘Boarding school? You mean they have to stay there all night?’ I asked, amazed.

  ‘All night, and weekends too,’ my father said.

  ‘Oh!’ I said. ‘I shouldn’t like that! Not to be able to come home…!’

  ‘And you’re not likely to have to,’ my father said. ‘Girls don’t go to boarding school.’

  ‘Then I am very glad I’m not a boy!’ I said, feeling some sympathy for my distant cousins.

  My father laughed. ‘You wouldn’t go to boarding school even if you were,’ he told me. ‘I couldn’t afford the fees.’

  ‘But Cousin Peter can?’

&nb
sp; ‘Certainly he can! And he wants his sons to know all it will take for them to succeed him in his business, I expect,’ my father said.

  And that was that. I don’t recall ever having met Cousin Peter, or Louis, or Gavin again, though when Cousin Peter died I did hear that the boys had indeed taken on the running of the family business.

  Yet now here was Louis, attending my father’s funeral.

  I looked more closely at him, trying to see the young man who had once come to the inn with his brother, and begged to be allowed to explore the underground passages, but I could not. Hardly surprising, since it must have been at least fifteen years ago, and probably more. The smooth boyish face I remembered had developed the planes and angles of manhood, and a faint shadow of shaven beard darkened a strong jawline. Louis seemed taller than I remembered him, too, and perhaps he was, for boys often continue to put on the inches long after girls have ceased to grow, I believe, and though he was still quite slim, his shoulders were powerful and his chest broad beneath his heavy dark woollen redingote.

  He had, I thought, all the stature of a man who had not only inherited wealth, but added to it by his own efforts, for there was nothing of the fop about him, rather he exuded a slightly disconcerting presence.

  Somehow I gained control of myself and found the power of speech.

  ‘It is very kind of you to have come,’ I said. ‘My father would have been touched.’

  Louis inclined his head slightly. ‘We were sorry indeed to hear he had met with such an untimely and violent end.’

  The tears constricted my throat once more; I did not feel capable of continuing a conversation.

  ‘Thank you again,’ I murmured thickly, and made to turn away, but Louis’ voice arrested me.

  ‘Flora – we need to talk.’

  I turned back, puzzled.

  ‘Are you going direct back to the inn?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes, but… I’m not holding a wake,’ I said. ‘I’m afraid I couldn’t face that.’

  ‘All the better,’ he said. ‘We can have our discussion in private.’

  And still I did not understand. All I could think was that I wanted to get home and be alone with my grief.

  ‘You must forgive me if I seem inhospitable,’ I said, ‘but I have just lost my father in the most distressing circumstances and I don’t feel up to entertaining.’

  The dark eyes narrowed beneath the brim of the beaver hat.

  ‘Flora, this is not a social call. Surely you must realize that?’

  His tone was hard, his expression serious. The first glimmer of comprehension pierced my bewilderment – and with it a feeling of panic. I stared at him, wanting desperately to turn and run, anything to avoid hearing what I knew in a blinding flash he was going to say.

  ‘Surely you know, Flora, that I am your father’s closest male relative, and as such the beneficiary of his estate? Tucker’s Grave Inn belongs to me now. I thought you would be aware of that.’

  Two

  For a moment I thought I would faint. The blood drummed in my ears so loudly it drowned out the patter of the rain and the roar of the wind; the mist thickened before my eyes and the world seemed to be going away from me.

  If I had thought about it, of course, I did know. I was a woman, and under the cruel laws of the land, women could not inherit. But I had not thought. My mind had been too numbed, I had lived through these last days in a daze of shock and grief, barely able to think about the immediate tasks that had to be carried out, certainly giving no thought whatever to the future.

  This new blow stunned me. I reeled beneath it.

  Louis must have noticed me sway, for his hand went beneath my elbow, steadying me.

  George Doughty, the blacksmith from the village, must have noticed too. George and his wife Alice had been very kind to me during these last dreadful days, and they had brought me to the funeral in their trap. Whilst I had been talking to Louis they had maintained a respectful distance, presumably not wishing to intrude; now they were at my side, fussing anxiously.

  ‘Flora, it’s time we got you home,’ George said to me. And to Louis: ‘This has been a terrible ordeal for her, more than flesh and blood can stand. If you’ll excuse us…’

  Louis made no move to relinquish his hold on my arm.

  ‘I am family,’ he said in a tone that made Alice take a step backward. ‘I am sure you mean well, but I will see Flora safely back to the inn.’

  George was made of sterner stuff. ‘And we are friends. It’s folk who love her the maid needs at a time like this.’ His ruddy face was indignant on my behalf.

  I felt a rush of gratitude towards him. But I knew there was nothing he could do to help me. Little as I wanted this interview, now or ever, it could not be avoided. Better to get it over with and learn the worst. At least then I would know exactly where I stood.

  ‘It is quite all right, George,’ I said, straightening myself and trying to shrug off the unwelcome grip of Louis’ hand on my elbow. ‘This gentleman is indeed my father’s cousin, and we have some business to attend to.’

  Perhaps George understood the import of what I had said, for he looked very sad suddenly. ‘Well, if you are sure, m’dear…’

  I nodded, my head jerking like a stringed marionette.

  ‘I am sure. And thank you for all your kindness.’

  ‘You know where we are if you need us, Flora. Any time of the day or night, remember.’ He glowered at Louis, seemingly unimpressed by the fact that Louis was a gentleman whilst he was only a humble blacksmith. ‘Don’t you go upsetting her, mind, or you’ll have me to answer to.’

  Louis ignored him. ‘Shall we go, Flora?’

  I nodded again. Then, with my head erect, I started across the wet grass to the path and thence to the road and the waiting carriage.

  * * *

  It was a far grander carriage than the one in which I had travelled to the burial, drawn by a fine matching pair. But I was far less comfortable in it. I was very aware of Louis sitting beside me, and though there was plenty of room for us to sit side by side without touching, I moved as far as I could into the corner so there was no risk of the slightest contact.

  Louis Fletcher might be my cousin, but I did not know him from Adam, and besides, he felt like an enemy, and a very disturbing one at that, the man who was cruel enough to intrude upon my grief and tell me he was now the owner of the only home I had ever known.

  If I had not been so numb I would have hated him, this arrogant stranger in his heavy dark redingote and leather boots; as it was I felt nothing but abject misery.

  ‘I’m sorry if this has come as a shock to you,’ he said as the coachman shook the reins and the carriage rolled off along the lane between the bare and dripping hedges.

  The regret in his tone, which I assumed to be false, struck a discord on my shattered nerves.

  ‘Why did you have to come today?’ I demanded. ‘Why couldn’t you at least let me bury my father in peace?’

  Heavy brows drew together. ‘I thought it best that the matter should be settled as soon as possible,’ he said.

  ‘Settled?’ I echoed sharply. ‘What do you mean, settled?’

  He glanced at me. ‘Don’t you think it would be better if we waited until we are at the inn before we have this conversation?’ he said, and it was not a request, but an order, a decision made.

  ‘I have to say I wish we did not have to have it at all!’ I returned defiantly.

  He smiled faintly. ‘I am sure you do. However, unfortunate as the circumstances might be, there is no changing them. And at least I’ve come myself. I could have had my lawyer sort things out with your father’s representative – always assuming he has one. But I have little time for the members of the legal profession. There are occasions, of course, when employing them is unavoidable, but more often than not they charge exorbitant fees for what one can handle far better oneself.’

  I tightened my lips. So, for all his obvious wealth, Louis Fletcher was a skinflint
. But I was glad, all the same, that he had not asked for a meeting with my father’s solicitor. It would have been highly embarrassing to have to admit that I had not the slightest idea whether he had one or not. On balance, I doubted it. Our simple way of life had never, to my knowledge, given cause to need legal representation.

  Nothing more was said until the coachman pulled into the courtyard, Louis opened the door without waiting for it to be done for him, got out and handed me down. Then he stood for a moment looking speculatively at the old grey-stone building.

  ‘Yes, it is as I remember it,’ he said. ‘We came here once, my brother and I, with our father. You may have forgotten.’

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘I remember it well. Your brother asked if it were true there were underground passages and when I told him there were he wanted to explore them.’

  ‘Yes, that would be Gavin,’ Louis said, as if he himself had forgotten the details of the incident. ‘Always the adventurer. He hasn’t changed, I’m afraid. He may be older, but he’s no wiser.’

  Well at least he is not here gloating over my misfortune, I thought bitterly, but I merely enquired: ‘Where is he today?’

  ‘In France. On business. It often takes him there.’

  ‘But not you?’ I asked.

  ‘Occasionally.’ His tone was short. ‘Shall we go inside out of the rain? I assume the door is locked.’

  ‘Oh no.’ I turned the heavy iron handle and pushed the door open. ‘We seldom lock the doors in daytime.’

  I stepped inside and Louis followed me.

  ‘A casual attitude,’ he remarked. ‘Especially given what befell your father.’

  Colour tinged my cheeks. ‘That was different! They came at night, when the door was bolted, and it didn’t stop them, anyway! But in the hours of light… people round here trust one another. And we’ve very little worth stealing – except the ale of course.’ A small hysterical laugh gurgled in my throat suddenly as an incongruous picture rose in my mind’s eye of some intruder, helplessly drunk, on the bar floor.