A Christmas Visitor

by Anne Perry

  “He made these charges before Judah’s death?” he asked. The truth was a poor refuge, but it was all he had.

  She looked up at him.

  “Yes. He came out of prison in Carlisle, straight back here.” Suddenly anger took hold of her. “Why couldn’t he have gone somewhere else, and started a new life where he wasn’t known? If he’d gone to Liverpool or Newcastle, no one would have known he’d been in prison, and he could have begun again! I’ve never seen anyone so filled with anger. I’ve seen him in the street, and he frightens me.” She looked terrified. Her magnificent eyes were wide and hollow, her face almost bloodless.

  “Surely you don’t think he would hurt you?” he exclaimed. The lights were exactly as before, and the coals were still hot, but it was as if the room were darker. “Antonia?”

  She turned away from him. “No,” she said quietly. “You’re really asking if he hurt Judah, aren’t you?” She drew in a long breath. “We’d been into the village for a violin recital. It was a wonderful evening. We took Joshua, even though it was late, because we knew he’d love it. He is going to be one of the world’s great musicians. He has already composed simple pieces, but beautiful, full of unusual cadences. He took one of them, and the violinist played it. He asked if he could keep the copy.” Her face filled with pride at the memory.

  “Perhaps he will be England’s Mozart,” he answered.

  She said nothing for a few moments, struggling to regain her composure.

  “Perhaps,” she agreed at last. “When we came home it was after ten o’clock. I saw Joshua to bed. He was so excited he wanted to stay up all night. Judah said he wanted to walk. He had been sitting all evening. He … never came back.” Again she took a few moments before she could continue. “A while after, I woke Mrs. Hardcastle, and we sent for Wiggins. He and the butler and the footman went out with lanterns to look for Judah. It was the longest night of my life. It was after three when they came back and said they had found him in the stream. He had apparently tried to cross in the dark over the stepping stones and slipped. They are very smooth there, and could be icy. There is a slight fall a few yards down where they are jagged. They believe he slipped and struck his head, and the water carried him.”

  “Where to? It’s not very deep.” Was he thinking of the right place, remembering accurately?

  “No, but it doesn’t have to be to drown. If he had been conscious he would naturally have climbed out. He might have caught pneumonia from the cold, but he would be alive.” She took a deep breath. “Now I must fight the slander for him.” She lifted her eyes to meet his. “It is hard enough to lose him, but to hear Ashton Gower say such evil things of him, and fear that anyone at all could believe it, is more than I can bear. Please help me prove that it is absolutely and terribly wrong. For Judah’s sake, and for Joshua.”

  “Of course,” he said without hesitation. “How can you doubt that I would?”

  She smiled at him. “I didn’t. Thank you.”

  Supper was early, and there were only the three of them at the table. Henry did not sit at the head, in Judah’s place. It seemed an insensitive thing to do, not only for Antonia, but for the grave, pale-faced Joshua, who had not yet reached his tenth birthday, and was so suddenly bereft of his father.

  Henry did not know him well. Last time he had been here Joshua had been only five, and spent more time in the nursery. Already he had played the piano and had been too fascinated by it to pay much attention to a middle-aged gentleman here for a week in the summer, and more interested in hill walking than music lessons.

  Now he sat solemn-eyed, eating his food because he had been told to, and staring at the space on the wall opposite his seat, somewhere between the Dutch painting of cows in a quiet field, and an equally flat seascape of the Romney Marshes with light glistening on the water as if it were polished pewter.

  The servants came and went with each dish, soundless and discreet.

  Henry tried speaking to Joshua once or twice, and received a considered answer each time. Henry had a son, but Oliver was a grown man, one of London’s most distinguished barristers, well known for his brilliance in the criminal court. Henry could hardly remember now what Oliver had been like at nine years old. He too had been intelligent, certainly, precocious in his ability to read, and as far as Henry could remember, in his taste in books. He had been inquisitive, and profoundly argumentative. He could recall that clearly enough! But that was nearly thirty years ago, and the rest was hazy.

  He wanted to speak to Joshua, so as not to appear to ignore him.

  “Your mother says you composed a piece of music that the violinist at the recital played,” he observed. “That is very fine.”

  Joshua regarded him soberly. He was a handsome child with wide, dark eyes like Antonia’s, but his father’s brow and balance of head.

  “It did not sound exactly how I meant it to,” he replied. “I shall have to work harder at it. I think it ends a little soon … and it’s too quick.”

  “I see. Well, knowing what is wrong with a thing is at least halfway toward putting it right,” Henry replied.

  “Do you like music?” Joshua asked.

  “Yes, very much. I can play the piano a little.” Actually, he was being quite modest. He had a certain flair for it. “But I cannot write for it.”

  “What can you do?”

  “Joshua!” Antonia remonstrated.

  “It’s quite all right,” Henry said quickly. “It is a fair question.” He turned to the boy. “I am good at mathematics, and I like to invent things.”

  “You mean arithmetic?”

  “Yes. And algebra and geometry.”

  Joshua frowned. “Do you like it, or is it that you have to do it?”

  “I like it,” Henry replied. “It makes a very beautiful kind of sense.”

  “Like music?”

  “Yes, very much.”

  “I see.”

  And then the conversation rested, apparently to Joshua’s satisfaction.

  After a postprandial half hour by the fire, Henry excused himself, saying that he wanted to take a walk and stretch his legs. He did not ask Antonia where Judah had died, but when he had his coat and boots on, and a hat and scarf as well, he inquired from Wiggins, and was given directions to the stream nearly a mile away.

  It was nearly half past eight, and outside the night was dense black, apart from the lantern he was holding, and the few lights he could see from the village a couple of miles away. The sound of his feet on the gravel was loud in the cloaking silence.

  He moved very slowly, uncertain of his way, wary of tripping over the edge of the lawn, or even of bumping into the drive gates. It took a few minutes for his eyes to become sufficiently accustomed to see ahead of him by starlight, and make out the black tracery of bare branches against the sky. Even then it was more by the blocking of the pinpricks of light than the line of a tree. A sickle moon made little difference, just a silver curve like a horn.

  Why on earth had Judah Dreghorn walked so far late on a night like this? The cold stung the skin. The wind was from the north, off the snows of Blencathra. Here in the valley the ground was frozen like rock, but there was no gleaming whiteness to reflect back the faint light. He wound his scarf more tightly around his neck and a trifle higher about his ears, and moved forward on what he hoped was the way Wiggins had told him.

  Judah had not simply gone for a walk. Henry felt it was stupid to persist in believing that. The recital had been splendid, a triumph for Joshua. Why would a man leave his wife and son after such an event, and go feeling each footstep over the frozen ground in the pitch dark?

  Except, of course, it was more than a week ago now, so the moon would have been almost half full and there would have been more light. Still, it was a strange thing to go out at all, even with a full moon, and why so far?

  Judah had gone to the stream, and tried to cross over it. So he had intended going even farther. To where? Henry should have asked Antonia where the Viking s
ite was. But why would Judah go there at night? To meet someone urgently, or with whom he did not wish to be seen.

  Henry was following some sort of path. If he kept the lantern out in front of him, he could walk at about normal speed. It was bitterly cold. He was glad for gloves, but even with them his fingers were stiff.

  Who would Judah meet secretly, beyond the stream, at that time of night? The answer that leaped to the mind was Ashton Gower. If it had been any other man, Henry might have thought he was looking for some accommodation, a bargain regarding the trial and the deeds, and Gower’s subsequent accusation, but Judah had never equivocated with the truth.

  If, on the other hand, he had taken pity on Gower in any way, he would have done it openly, before lawyers and notaries. If he made any threat, that too would have been plain and open.

  Perhaps it had not been Gower, but someone else. Who? And why? No believable answer came to his mind.

  The land was rising and he leaned forward into the wind. Its coldness stung his skin. He could hear the stream rattling over the stones, and somewhere in the distance a dog fox barked, an eerie sound that startled him so he nearly dropped the light.

  He moved slowly now, lifting the lantern so it shed its glow farther. Even so, he nearly missed the path to the stones. The water was running quite rapidly, oily black breaking pale where the surface was cut by jagged lumps poking through, sharp-edged. Then he realized it was the fall he was looking at. The stepping stones were upstream about thirty yards, smooth, almost flat.

  But when he reached them and looked more closely, he saw the rime of ice where the bitter air had frozen them moments after the current had washed over. What on earth had Judah been thinking of to try standing on them? What had absorbed his mind so intently that he had taken such a risk?

  Puzzled and weighed down by sadness, he turned and made his way back toward the house.

  In the morning he was woken by the housekeeper, Mrs. Hardcastle. She was smiling and carrying a tray of tea. He sat up, startled to see daylight outside. That must mean it was nearer nine o’clock than eight.

  “And why not?” she asked reasonably when he protested that she should not have let him lie in. “It was a long way you came yesterday. All the way up from London!” She set the tray down, poured the tea for him, then went and drew open the curtains. “Not so nice today,” she said briskly. “You’ll be wanting all your woolies on, likely. Wind’s off the water, and there’s snow on it for sure. Take the skin off your face, it will, if it blows up proper.” She turned back to him. “Mrs. Dreghorn said to tell you as Mr. Benjamin’s coming today. Telegraph says he’ll be in Penrith by noon, so we’ll be going to fetch him, as long as the weather holds off. If not, he’ll be having to stay at the inn there, which would be a shame, since he’s come a fair distance, too.”

  Mrs. Hardcastle could have little idea of the reality if she could liken a train journey from London to rail and ship and whatever else it had taken for Benjamin Dreghorn to come from Palestine to the Lakes in the middle of winter. But Henry forbore from saying so, since very probably she did little more than read and write. Geography may not have been among her needs.

  “Indeed,” he said, sipping his tea. “Let us hope the weather favors us.”

  But it did not. By half past ten when Henry set out in the trap with Wiggins, clouds were piling up in the north and west over the Blencathra Mountains, shadowing the land and promising more snow. Wiggins shook his head and pursed his lips, and added more blankets for his passengers.

  They were at least halfway to Penrith before the sky darkened and the wind rose with a knife-edge to it, and the first white flurries came. Henry had not seen Benjamin Dreghorn for several years and normally would have looked forward to meeting him again, but this time it would be very hard. He had offered to go, in order to save Antonia having to be the one to break the news. Naturally, when Benjamin had set out from Palestine several weeks ago, there had been nothing but happiness in view. The bitterness of his arrival would be totally unexpected.

  Henry huddled with the blanket around him and the driving snow at his back as they went the last few miles. He hoped the train had not been delayed. If the snow was bad over Shap Fell, it could hold them up. They would simply have to wait for it. He twisted around in his seat, staring behind him, but all he could see was gray-white, whirling snow; even the closer hills and slopes were obliterated.

  Wiggins hunched his shoulders, his hat over his ears. The pony trudged patiently onward. Henry tried to arrange his thoughts so he could tell Benjamin as gently as possible.

  The train was no more than twenty minutes after the hour. The snow was beginning to drift in places, but the wind had driven it on the lee side at Shap, and the line was not badly affected.

  Henry stood on the platform and watched the carriage doors open and searched for Benjamin’s tall figure among the dozen or so people who got off. He was the last to come, carrying two largish cases and smiling broadly.

  Henry felt his chest tighten as he forced himself to walk toward Judah’s brother.

  “Henry Rathbone!” Benjamin said with unaffected delight. He put the cases down carefully on the snowy platform and held out his hand.

  Henry took it, wrung it, then reached for one of the cases to help.

  “It’s good to see you!” Benjamin said enthusiastically. “Are you staying for Christmas?” He picked up the other case. “What filthy weather! But by heaven, it’s beautiful, isn’t it? I’d forgotten how incredibly clean it is, after the desert. And water everywhere.” He strode forward and Henry had to make an effort to keep up with him. “I used to hate the rain,” Benjamin went on. “Now I appreciate that water is life. You get to value it in Palestine. I can’t begin to tell you how exciting it is to walk where Christ walked.”

  A blast of icy wind struck them as they turned the corner into the street, and took a few minutes to exchange greetings with Wiggins, load the luggage, and make their way out of the town and onto the road west again.

  Benjamin resumed his tale. “You wouldn’t believe the places I’ve been to, Henry. I’ve stood by the shores of Galilee, probably the very hill on which Christ preached the Sermon on the Mount. Can you imagine that? I’ve been to Capernaum, Caesarea, Bethlehem, Tarsus, Damascus, but above all, I’ve walked the streets of Jerusalem and out toward Golgotha. I’ve stood in the Garden of Gethsemane!” His voice rang with the wonder of it. Even muffled against the wind and snow his sunburned face glowed.

  “You are very fortunate,” Henry replied, meaning it, in spite of how irrelevant it seemed now. “Not only to see it, but to be so aware of its meaning.”

  “I’ve brought something very special as a Christmas present for Joshua,” Benjamin went on. “I’m not sure if he’ll like it, yet, but he will in time. I’ve got it in the brown case, that’s why I’ve been so careful with it. Antonia will keep it for him, if necessary. But he must be nine by now. I think he’ll understand.”

  “What is it?”

  Benjamin smiled broadly. He was a handsome man, strong-boned, and he had excellent teeth. “A piece of manuscript—an original of half a dozen verses from the New Testament, just a page, but can you imagine how the man who wrote it must have felt?” His voice rang with enthusiasm. “It’s in a carved, wooden box. Beautiful work. And it smells marvelous. They told me it was the odor of frankincense.”

  “I am sure he will like it,” Henry responded. “If not just yet, then in a year or two.”

  “Wait until Judah sees it,” Benjamin said eagerly.

  Henry could leave it no longer. Not to speak now would amount to a lie. He turned sideways, the wind making his eyes water.

  “Benjamin,” he began. “I came to meet you personally, not only because I am pleased to see you, but because I have some very hard news which I wanted to spare Antonia from having to tell you herself …”

  The light and the joy drained out of Benjamin’s face. Suddenly his blue eyes were bleak and the biting cold of the snow
and the wild, color-bleached landscape seemed hostile, the chill of it getting into the bones.

  Henry did not wait. “Judah died in an accident eight days ago. He went out at night and slipped on the ice of the stepping stones crossing the stream.”

  Benjamin stared at him. “Died! He couldn’t have—it’s only a couple of feet deep at the most, if that!” he protested.

  “He must have hit his head on the stones.” Henry did not go into any more detail. The explanation made no difference to the truth of it.

  “What was he doing there at night?” Benjamin demanded. “There’s nothing there!”

  “No one knows,” Henry replied. “He just said he wanted to stretch his legs before going to bed. He had taken Antonia and Joshua to a recital in the village.”

  “It doesn’t make sense!”

  Henry did not argue. He knew better than to say that such unexpected tragedy seldom did.

  Benjamin turned forward and stared into the snowstorm, his face immobile, marked with uncomprehending grief. How could the whole world change in an instant, and with no warning?

  They rode for at least another mile without speaking again, and were rounding the last curve in the road when the snow eased and a blue patch appeared in the sky. A bar of light like silver shone on the flat surface of the lake, so brilliant it dazzled the eyes. The village itself was almost invisible with its white-blanketed roofs.

  If Henry were to tell Benjamin about the accusation, and save Antonia from having to do it, then he had little time left.

  “Benjamin, that is not all I have to tell you before we reach the house,” he said aloud. “I would prefer that Antonia, who told me, did not have to go through it all again.”

  Benjamin turned slowly. “Judah’s dead. What else can there be?” His face was full of pain. He had loved his brother profoundly, and his admiration for him had been intense. The only thing worse than having to tell him of Gower’s accusation would be having him find out from someone else.