A Dark and Brooding Gentleman

by Margaret McPhee

  The scarlet shawl marked her amidst the dark drabness all around. Something of her stance suggested a woman going to her doom, something of her very stillness was all speaking and the pallor of her face was stark against the brightness of the shawl. Hunter slipped from his hiding place and made his way through the crowd.

  He threaded his way steadily closer, never once losing sight of the red shawl. He had almost reached her when he saw the figure move behind her, a fair-haired man with his cap pulled down low over his eyes—the same man he had last seen outside the Tolbooth in Glasgow.

  He was so close and yet the throng of people between them barred his way, and he knew he would not reach her in time.

  ‘Phoebe!’ he shouted, ‘Do not do it!’ He saw her face turn to him, saw her shock and her anguish.

  ‘Sebastian!’ She began to move towards him just as the man struck, snatching the white handkerchief from her hand.

  Phoebe stared in disbelief and wondered for a moment if Sebastian were real or just a figment of her imagination.

  She had never seen his eyes look so dark or his face so white with fury. He grabbed hold of her, staring down at her and there was such darkness, such danger and intensity about him to raze all else in its path. Phoebe trembled at the promise she saw in his eyes.

  ‘Are you all right?’

  She nodded, not trusting herself to speak.

  ‘Take a carriage home and wait for me there. And do not dare run away from me, Phoebe Allardyce.’ He pressed his purse into her hands and then sped off in pursuit of the Messenger.

  The man knocked people flying as he fled from Hunter, cutting a swathe through the crowd to reach the road where he dodged through the mêlée of carriages and carts. Hunter did not hesitate, running between the carriages, chasing down his quarry. He ran with a cold determination that made his legs pump all the faster. The man glanced back over his shoulder and Hunter knew the villain was tiring. He pressed on harder. Another glance back and this time it cost the man his footing. The bastard slid in a pile of horse dung and almost fell, before catching his balance and running on. A third glance and Hunter caught him as he ducked into the alleyway.

  The man bounced against the brick of the building as Hunter’s punch landed hard against the villain’s jaw.

  ‘You bastard!’ Hunter snarled and made to move in.

  But the man cowered away and as he did so Hunter felt a flash of recognition as if he knew this man from somewhere, but could not place him. ‘Don’t hurt me! Please! Just take it …’ the coward pleaded and threw the small white parcel.

  Hunter felt the hardness of metal as he caught it, but he had to be sure. He ripped through the cotton of Phoebe’s handkerchief and there inside, with its emerald eyes looking up at him, was his father’s wolf’s-head ring.

  He glanced up to see the man sloping away. Their eyes met and the man sprang to action and ran for his life.

  Hunter tucked the ring safely away and then started after him.

  The man sped from the alley, turning left to nip out onto the street just before a procession of carts and a surge in the crowd.

  Hunter cursed, then realised that the villain was heading west towards Bishopsgate and for the first time in a year Hunter was glad of his rakish past, of his misspent nights in the low-life gaming dens of Spitalfields and Whitechapel. He knew the lanes round here like the back of his hand. He slipped into Duke Street and then cut along Artillery Lane, taking a short cut to bring him out on Bishopsgate only twenty yards behind the man who was no longer running, but hurrying. Hunter did not close the distance, just stayed amidst the crowd and followed. And as the market crowd thinned and they entered the banking area of London, Hunter knew the man would lead him to whoever was behind this villainy.

  The man hurried on until he came to a quiet leafy street lined with a few large houses, a street down which Hunter had never travelled. Hunter hung back, knowing that in the emptiness the man would be sure to see him if he followed too close, then used the ancient sycamores that lined the road as cover to close the distance.

  The man hesitated outside the largest of the houses and, with a furtive glance around him, ran up the front steps and disappeared inside the opened door. Upon a black stone plaque on its wall the words Obsidian House had been carved and beneath the words were the same symbols that were carved into the lintels above the front doors of both Blackloch and his town house in Grosvenor Street. And Hunter felt the stirring of something dark.

  Only once the man was inside the house did he follow. The main doors stood open, caught back and secured with a hook. There was a small porch area followed by a set of glass interior doors that led into the hallway. The glass doors were closed, but Hunter was up the stairs and his back pressed flat against the wall at the edge of the outer doors that he might inch his head round and gain a view.

  Inside in the hallway, the man was talking to a gentleman. And now Hunter knew why the fair-haired villain’s face had seemed so vaguely familiar. He was a footman. And the gentleman at his side was his master. A gentleman Hunter knew very well. A gentleman Hunter had considered a friend: James Edingham, Viscount Bullford.

  There were more men appearing in the hallway now. Men that Hunter or his father had counted friends. Rich men, powerful men. A high court judge, an archbishop, a member of the cabinet, even a member of the royal family. A duke clapped his hand against Bullford’s back in a gesture of friendship. And they began filing down a corridor that led straight ahead.

  They were smiling. And they were all of them wearing long black ceremonial robes identical to that of the man in the painting in Hunter’s bedchamber at Blackloch.

  His eyes dropped from the receding black figures to the floor of the porch. Not tiled or wooden, but a mosaic and depicting the same hunting scene from classical antiquity as was carved into the stone fireplace of his study in his town house.

  Hunter saw the footmen that came to close the outer doors. He dodged back out of the way and jumped down behind the bushes that grew in the narrow soil strips on either side of the house. Once the doors were closed he made his way back to Grosvenor Street.

  Phoebe was not in her room.

  He glanced down at the travelling bag that still sat by the bed and the sudden thought struck him that maybe the footman had had an accomplice waiting there to snatch her from Spitalfields. His stomach dipped with the dread of it.

  ‘Did Miss Allardyce return safely from her morning sojourn?’

  Trenton cleared his throat ‘Indeed, sir, but she has gone out again on an errand for Mrs Hunter some fifteen minutes ago.’

  ‘An errand?’ Hunter frowned.

  ‘Mrs Hunter is suffering from a headache. I believe she dispatched Miss Allardyce to purchase a herbal remedy.’

  ‘From where?’

  ‘I do not know, sir.’

  And neither did his mother.

  ‘Inform me immediately that she returns,’ he instructed Trenton, and aside from that there was little that Hunter could do, despite all his unease.

  He went to his study to wait, blaming himself for not guarding her better, chiding himself for not realising that she would steal the ring to save him.

  Phoebe made her purchase of feverfew and betony and had just left the apothecary shop when she was assailed by a familiar voice.

  ‘I say, Miss Allardyce, how nice to see you on this glorious morning.’

  Phoebe felt her heart sink. She was in no fit state for conversation. Her stomach was churning with dread at the thought of what the villains might have done to Hunter. Hunter was tall and strong and fast and she did not doubt that he could best any man, but what chance had he against a pistol or a knife? She would not rest until he had returned, despite all that would ensue. She hid her worries and glanced up to see Lord Bullford’s coach stopped by the side of the road and the gentleman himself emerging to stand before her on the footpath.

  ‘Good morning, Lord Bullford,’ she said politely and forced a smile to her face. />
  ‘You are out and about early this morning, Miss Allardyce …’ he glanced around the street paying special attention to the apothecary shop from which she had just emerged ‘… and without Mrs Hunter?’ His expression held all the kind friendliness that it ever had.

  ‘Indeed, sir. I am afraid Mrs Hunter is much distressed with a headache. It is the reason for my journey; I have come to fetch a prescription to relieve her pain.’

  ‘Oh dear,’ murmured Lord Bullford with his brow creased in concern. ‘Poor Mrs H., how she suffers with her head.’

  ‘Indeed,’ said Phoebe. ‘Which is why, sir, I must beg your leave and return immediately to Grosvenor Street.’

  ‘Of course.’ Lord Bullford nodded. ‘But I have a better idea. Please, Miss Allardyce, allow me to convey you home in my coach.’

  ‘Your offer is very kind, my lord, but I should not.’ She smiled in earnest to soften her refusal.

  ‘By coach the journey will take but a few minutes. On foot, I imagine a great deal longer. And you did say that Mrs H. is quite unwell … I thought only to relieve the lady’s discomfort. But if you would rather walk …’

  Phoebe felt a pang of guilt at Bullford’s gentle reproach. ‘Perhaps you are right, sir.’

  ‘I will have you at Grosvenor Street in no time at all to tend the poor lady.’ He smiled, and Phoebe was reassured. He held out his hand and helped her climb up into his coach, and the door slammed shut behind them.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Hunter stood before the fireplace, thinking of Phoebe. If anything had happened to her. And as he worried, his eye caught the carving on the stone beneath the mantel.

  A hunter with a great black dog pursuing evil-eyed foxes and boars and ferrets. It was a picture that had fascinated Hunter since he was a child. He remembered coming to this house and tracing his fingers against each of the figures of the scenes. He had always thought that lone huntsman astride his horse had been hunting with his dog, but now that he had seen the defined colourful mosaic in Obsidian House he could see that the dog was not a dog at all, but a wolf. And he could see, too, that there was something missing from this carving, a small detail that had been clear in the background of the tiled mosaic version.

  Lurking amidst the trees of the forest, the backdrop against which the hunter rode, were six wolves’ faces—Hunter knew there were six because it had been his habit to count them as a child. In the mosaic there had been seven. Hunter looked where the seventh should have been on the stone carving, and there in its place, clear now that he was looking for it, was a headless wolf.

  And the strangest thought occurred to Hunter. From his pocket he withdrew the wolf’s-head ring, and the wolf seemed to look up at him, its emerald eyes sparkling in the morning sunlight. Hunter pressed the silver wolf’s head into the hollow where the wolf’s head on the carving should have been, and turned, and one of the long wooden panels in the mahogany wall of his study popped open. Behind the hidden door was a room all in darkness. Hunter lit a candle and stepped into the secret room.

  The candlelight showed a long narrow room empty save for four Holland-covered paintings that hung upon the wall and a large chest in the corner. Hunter pulled the holland cover from the closest painting. The cream linen slid silently onto the floor to reveal his father staring out from the canvas at him. In the portrait his father’s hair was as dark as Hunter’s and his face only a little lined. He was dressed in the same long black ceremonial robe that Bullford and the men had worn and on his finger was the wolf’s-head ring. And Hunter suddenly knew that his father was the ‘monk’ in the picture at Blackloch. His gaze dropped to read the plaque fitted to the bottom of the gilt frame—Mr Edward Hunter, Master of the Order of the Wolf.

  The other three paintings showed Hunter’s grandfather, great-grandfather and great-great-grandfather; all three men were garbed in the same black robes and each wore the same wolf’s-head ring upon their fingers.

  Hunter’s heart was thudding as he turned to the chest, and his hands shook as he found the letter addressed to My Son, Sebastian Hunter. The writing was that of his father, the seal that of his father’s signet ring. He broke the seal, unfolded the paper and began to read.

  7th September, 1809

  My dearest son

  If you are reading this letter then I am gone from this world to meet my maker, and you have found yourself on the path to the Order.

  Firstly let me say that I love you and have always loved you and been proud of you as my son, no matter the disagreements that we have had. You are a young man, reckless and wild as young men are wont to be; as I myself once was. It is a father’s duty to prepare his son, to guide and nurture and train him for the path that lies ahead. And if I have been harsh and hard with you, Sebastian, then it has only ever been with this in mind. As a Hunter your path is already mapped and it is not an easy one.

  I am Master of the Order of the Wolf, a secret society founded by your great-great-grandfather in accordance with the instruction of King George II for the good of all Britain, her people and her king, just as my father was master before me, and his father before him … and just as it is your destiny to be. To the Hunters of our line this is the duty to which we are born and must devote our life’s work.

  Your great-great-grandfather foiled a plot being hatched amongst the nobles against the king and was rewarded with a fortune to rival that of the wealthiest in the land and the honour of establishing and leading this society. The Order exists to work secretly in the shadows to safeguard this great country and her line of monarchs, to fight against tyranny and foreign invasion, injustice and dishonour. We are the hunters that seek out the traitors within. We are the wolves that slay the guilty. There is meaning in our name, indeed, my son.

  Forgive me for having deferred bringing you into the Order for so long, but such is the responsibility that I deemed it critical to wait until you had sown your wild oats and calmed your wild ways. And now that I am gone you must find your own way in. But remember always that no man who is not a member may know of the order’s existence and live, and this rule is true for you, too, Sebastian.

  By virtue of the fact you are reading this then I have already given into your keeping the wolf’s-head ring and with this letter I name you my heir and successor. Whosoever wears the ring is Master of the Order, so guard it well.

  All that you need know of the Order is written in the book you will find with this letter.

  May you fulfil the destiny that is given you as a Hunter.

  God bless you, my son.

  Your loving father,

  Edward Hunter

  Hunter wept as he read the words his father had penned only two months before his death. He wept because written in that letter were the words his father had never spoken to him in life—that he loved him, that he was proud of him. He lifted the ancient brown calf-leather-bound book from the chest, and leafed through its pages.

  His father was right, everything he needed to know was there. The history and inception of the society, its rules, its purpose, the methods of its operation, initiation ceremonies and trials for new members and much more. At the back of the book were pages and pages of names of men who had been, and still were, members of the Order. The last name entered on the list, written in his father’s own hand, made his heart skip a beat, for it was Hunter’s own. He took a deep breath, and scanned the list. Linwood was there, marked as an office bearer, which explained his wolf’s-head cane, and the viscount’s father was listed, too. Francis Edingham, the Marquis of Willaston, Bullford’s father, was described as the deputy master. Bullford’s name was not amongst them, but Hunter supposed that no one in the Order had had access to the book to add any new members since his father’s death.

  Hunter knew now why they wanted the ring and he had an inkling why it was Bullford who had been given the task. He took the neatly folded black robes from the chest and then moved back out of the dark chill of the secret room to the sunlit study.

  A kn
ock sounded at the study door. He snuffed the candle and, retrieving the ring, slid it onto his finger. The panel pressed easily back into place, the seam of its outline invisible against the rest of the ornate panelling that surrounded it. Then Hunter opened the study door to find Trenton waiting there, a single letter lying upon the silver salver.

  ‘A letter has just been delivered for you, sir. The boy who brought it said it was for your most urgent attention.’

  Hunter felt his jaw tense as he lifted the letter and saw his name upon it, for it was penned in the same disguised hand that had been used in all of Bullford’s letters to Phoebe. He ripped it open and read the unsigned contents.

  If you wish the safe return of Miss Allardyce, then you will leave your father’s wolf’s-head ring on the gravestone of Abigail Murton in the churchyard of Christ Church, Spitalfields, this afternoon at two o’clock.

  He screwed the paper into a ball and threw it onto the grate in the fireplace. Then he readied his pistols, slipped them into his pockets and rang the bell for Trenton.

  Phoebe woke to find herself lying in a dark room. Her wrists had been tied behind her back and her ankles bound together and there was a gag around her mouth. She could hear nothing and see nothing; she remembered the carriage and Lord Bullford removing a small brown bottle from his pocket to drip some of its foul-smelling liquid onto his handkerchief. The warning bells had been sounding in her head, not so much at what he was doing, but at the strange expression upon his face.

  She heard his words again: I am sorry, Miss Allardyce, if only you had done as we asked. And there had been genuine regret within his eyes.

  And she had known, then, who it was that had organised the break-ins in Mrs Hunter’s Glasgow town house and at Blackloch, and who had sent his Messenger to threaten her papa.

  ‘You!’ she whispered in disbelief and tried to flee, but Bullford was across the carriage and pressing the foul-reeking cloth to her nose and mouth. The vapour of it choked her and burned her throat and lungs, and that terrible suffocating sensation was the last that she remembered.