Peril by Post

by Sheri Cobb South

“An excellent notion,” seconded Pickett.

  “I’ll see a builder about it as soon as I get back into town,” Jem resolved, and lapsed into thoughtful silence. Pickett assumed his mind was filled with plans for the Hart and Hound, until he said suddenly, “It’s an odd thing, Da falling off the cliff like that.”

  “Oh?” Pickett asked noncommittally.

  “He’s warned me against standing too close to the edge for as long as I can remember. It’s almost as if—” He broke off, shaking his head as if to banish a thought too absurd—or too horrendous—to contemplate.

  Pickett decided he would never have a better opportunity. “Jem,” he ventured, “do you know of anyone who might have had reason to do your father an injury?”

  “Who might have pushed him off, you mean,” deduced Jem, who was clearly no fool. “I’ll admit, I’ve wondered about that myself. But it don’t make sense. Oh, him and Tyson have quarreled back and forth for years, but it’s not the sort of thing that would end with either one of them murdering the other. And I suppose mean-spirited folk might say Ben Wilson had cause for complaint, what with Da not sending that poet fellow to the rightabout as soon as he started sniffing around Lizzie, what with him and Lizzie being as good as betrothed, but Da can’t afford to offend paying customers—specially one that might take it into his head to write no end of nonsense about him! Besides that, Ben’s a good sort, and I’d be proud to call him my brother,” he added stoutly.

  “But no one else?” Pickett asked, careful not to sound too interested in the affairs of a relative stranger.

  Jem shook his head. “Nothing beyond the sort of squabbles that come up from time to time in any village small enough that everybody knows a bit too much about everybody else’s business, if you know what I mean. And now,” he added, drawing his horses to a halt, “here’s where you’ll need to get down, Mr. Pickett. If you’ll follow the lane there”—he pointed his whip toward a dirt track winding through open meadow on both sides—“you’ll come to the Wilson place. It’s naught but half a mile or so. Oh, and Mr. Pickett—”

  “Yes?” Pickett prompted, when he seemed disinclined to continue.

  “About—what I was saying—I beg you won’t mention it to my stepmother.”

  Pickett assured him that burdening Mrs. Hawkins with this suggestion was the very last thing he would want to do, and having put the younger man’s mind at ease, set off on his walk. A short time later, he arrived at the Wilson residence, a stout, square farmhouse made of the ubiquitous gray stone, roofed with slate tiles and flanked by chimneys on each end. A curl of smoke rose from one of these, and Pickett was encouraged to hope that the young farmer was still at home, having not yet begun the day’s chores. He stepped up to a door so low he would no doubt have to duck his head, should he be invited to come inside, and knocked. A cacophony of barking hailed from inside, and a moment later the door opened. A tiny gray-haired woman stood there, accompanied by two large, growling dogs who regarded Pickett as if gauging the amount and quality of meat to be had from his calf muscles—and finding the result of their speculations very much to their liking.

  “Mrs. Wilson?” hazarded Pickett, giving the dogs a wary eye.

  “Aye, what of it?” she asked.

  “John Pickett, visiting from London,” he said, stooping still lower in a approximation of a bow. “I should like to have a word with Ben, if I may.”

  “He’s been gone to the fields these three hours and more,” she said. “You want to talk to him, you’ll have to go find him.”

  “Very well,” conceded Pickett, not at all looking forward to the prospect of finding one lone sheep farmer in an unspecified expanse of open field. “Er, if you could point me in the right direction, I would be much obliged.”

  “I’ll have Jack and Davy take you to him.”

  “Thank you—” Pickett began, but when the woman spoke again, it was not to him, nor to any other human.

  “Jack! Davy!” she addressed the dogs milling about her skirts. “Go find Ben! Go on, now!”

  The dogs needed no further urging. They raced through the door, all but knocking Pickett down as they pelted past him in their enthusiasm to carry out this command.

  The woman muttered something under her breath, the only intelligible part being “town’s full of strangers these days,” and disappeared back into the house.

  Pickett’s canine escorts showed no inclination to wait for him to follow, but he had no objection to being left behind; besides having no great desire for companions who seemed far too interested in sizing him up for their next meal, he would account himself a very poor Bow Street Runner if he could not follow the trail of two very loud dogs.

  His canine guides soon disappeared over a ridge, and very shortly thereafter the bleating of a flock of agitated sheep offered evidence of their presence, along with, presumably, their master. Pickett trudged to the top of the ridge and found the flock milling about in the valley spread out below, the white of their fleece a brilliant contrast to the green of the grass on which they had been grazing before the interruption. In the midst of them stood Ben Wilson, calling the dogs to heel. His finery of the previous night had given place to a serviceable smock, breeches, and sturdy brogues. His blond head was bare, and across his shoulders he carried a lamb in much the same way as a lady might wear a tippet, its legs draped over his chest.

  “Hallo, Wilson!” Pickett called as he descended the ridge. “Hallo, there!”

  Ben Wilson turned and looked up, releasing the lamb’s hind legs in order to raise a hand to shield his eyes. “Mr.—Pickett, is it? What brings you here?”

  “I’ve come to ask a favor.” Pickett launched into the excuse Julia had provided. “When Mrs. Pickett and I returned from the assembly, Lizzie told us all about your lambs, and now nothing will suit my wife but that she must see them for herself.”

  “Liked that, did she?” asked Wilson, obviously pleased. Having finished his business, whatever it was, with the sheep, he turned and started back up the ridge.

  “Oh, yes,” said Pickett, falling into step beside him. “She’s in the family way, so I suppose it’s only natural that she should be interested in babies, regardless of species—”

  The farmer’s reaction astounded him. “The devil she is!” he ground out between clenched teeth, as his sun-bronzed face turned an alarming shade of purple. “By God, I’ll kill the fellow who’s debauched her—and I’m thinking I won’t have to look far to find him,” he added darkly.

  Revelation dawned. “No, no!” Pickett said hastily. “I meant my wife, not Lizzie.” Once he could be sure young Wilson had assimilated this information, he continued. “No matter what Hartsong’s intentions toward Lizzie, I believe she has too much good sense to let herself be seduced by pretty words unless he first puts a ring on her finger.” He only hoped he was correct in this assessment, for Lizzie’s sake as well as Wilson’s. “Still, I expect you’ll be glad to see the back of him.”

  “Aye, I will at that.” Wilson gave a huff of frustration. “We were all set to marry until he came to town.”

  “I don’t suppose you’ve considered, er, speeding his departure?” Pickett asked blandly.

  Wilson frowned. “What do you mean?”

  “A rock was thrown through my window two nights ago,” Pickett explained. “A rock with a threatening note attached. It occurred to me that, well, if you’d thought to frighten him off, and chose the wrong window, I’m sure no one could blame you.”

  Far from being gratified by this show of sympathy, the young farmer set his jaw and drew himself up straight and very tall. “It’s a right coward who won’t look his foe in the face,” he said. “If I thought that fellow had given Lizzie a slip on the shoulder, I’d give him such a beating that his own mother wouldn’t recognize him. As things stand now, he knows what I think of him without me stooping to such tricks.”

  Looking into that stern, set face, Pickett had no doubt Wilson would make good on his threat should the ne
ed arise. The two young men walked side by side in silence for some time, until Wilson said abruptly, “So Lizzie liked hearing about the lambs?”

  “She did. She was much impressed that you should have left the assembly after paying half a guinea for admission, and come instead to keep her company.” Pickett gave him a sidelong look. “If I may say so, it showed a level of thoughtfulness that she’s unlikely to encounter from Percival Hartsong. My wife says he’s the most self-absorbed person of her acquaintance—and if you knew anything of her first husband’s family, you would know that’s saying something.”

  Wilson gave a short bark of laughter, but when he spoke, it was once again on the subject of Lizzie and his visit on the night of the assembly.

  “Did she say I’d offered to give her this little fellow?” A jerk of the farmer’s head indicated the lamb he carried across his shoulders. “His mother rejected him shortly after he was born.”

  Pickett reached out to scratch the animal behind the ears, and the tips of his fingers sank into soft and slightly oily white fleece. “I know how he feels,” he said cryptically.

  “Eh, what’s that?”

  Pickett shook his head. “Never mind. But yes, Lizzie told us you’d offered to let her have a lamb of her own. Mrs. Hawkins wasn’t entirely keen on the notion, but she didn’t reject it out of hand—just wondered what they would do with it once it was a full-grown sheep.”

  Wilson considered this obstacle in silence for a moment. “Could always take it back once it was weaned,” he said at last. “Don’t want to cause no trouble between Lizzie and her Ma. Thing is, been feeding it milk through a hole cut in the finger of a glove. Has to be done four times a day, though. Don’t have time. Be obliged if she could help me out.”

  “And,” Pickett deduced, “having raised the lamb herself, Lizzie would likely want to come visit it from time to time.”

  The farmer looked as sheepish as any of his livestock. “Aye, I won’t deny the thought occurred to me.”

  “Why don’t you come to the Hart and Hound and ask Mrs. Hawkins yourself?” Pickett suggested. “If you put it to her in those terms, I daresay she’ll agree readily enough, for she much prefers you to the poet as a prospective son-in-law. If you need some pretext, you can always say you came to invite my wife to see the lambs, and to arrange a time that might be mutually agreeable.”

  “Aye,” the farmer said again, brightening. “I’ll do that this very afternoon.”

  Too late, Pickett remembered that he’d promised to row Julia out on the lake. “Best wait until tomorrow. In the meantime—” He broke off, unsure how to frame the question he knew he must ask in a way that would not give offense. He was well aware of the tendency of his wife’s class to sprinkle vails about in exchange for any small service they received, and yet he was still not entirely comfortable with his new prosperity, “In the meantime, granting my wife’s request must take you away from your work. How much do I owe you?”

  They were once again in view of the house by this time, and Wilson stopped to stare blindly in its direction as he considered this question. Pickett couldn’t help wondering if he were imagining Lizzie living there as its mistress, just as he himself had tried (not entirely successfully) to picture Julia in his own two-room flat in Drury Lane long before such an eventuality seemed even remotely possible.

  “It seems to me,” Wilson said at last, “that we’ll be doing each other a favor. If you’re agreeable, let’s call it even.”

  Not being accustomed to buying his way through life, Pickett found this suggestion very agreeable indeed. They shook hands on the bargain, then Pickett set out on the long walk back to the Hart and Hound, looking forward with mixed emotions to the pleasure cruise that awaited him.

  JULIA, FOR HER PART, had lost no time after his departure in undertaking a mission of her own. She rummaged through Pickett’s clothing and selected one of his cravats, then knotted both ends together to make a large loop. She slipped this over her head and slid her right arm inside, resting her forearm experimentally in the fold of starched white linen. Satisfied, she removed her arm long enough to gather up paper, quill, and ink, then returned her arm to its sling and, carrying her writing materials awkwardly in her free hand, descended the stairs to the public room.

  It was surprisingly full for so early in the day: tourists, she supposed, as well as a few farmers and laborers fortifying themselves for the day’s work with a hearty breakfast cooked by Mrs. Hawkins and served by her stepdaughter. Julia dismissed the basest of this lot as very likely illiterate, and therefore impracticable for her purposes, but chose one of the more prosperous-looking of the farmers (as evidenced by the content and quantity of his morning meal) and approached him with pretty hesitation.

  “I wonder if I may ask a favor of you,” she said apologetically, setting her burden on the table with perhaps a bit more clumsiness than was strictly necessary, “I need to write a letter, but it is the stupidest thing! I have fallen and sprained my wrist. If I tell you what I want to say, would you be so good as it write it down? Oh, thank you!” she exclaimed brightly upon receiving an affirmative answer. Once her mark had arranged the paper before him and dipped the quill into the ink, she began her dictation. “Are you ready? ‘Dearest Mama and Papa . . .’ ”

  Professing her unwillingness to impose on her de facto secretary, she recited only a sentence or two before gathering up her writing materials (coyly turning aside his insistence that it was really no trouble, no trouble at all), and looking about for another likely candidate. She had no difficulty in this endeavor, for by this time those sitting near enough to hear were fully aware of her dilemma, and were quick to offer their services. When at last she returned to her room with what was surely the most tedious correspondence ever committed to paper, she had collected more than a dozen handwriting samples for her husband’s inspection.

  PICKETT, RETURNING to the inn some time later, was dismayed to enter the room he shared with his wife and discover her with her arm in a sling.

  “What’s this?” he asked in some consternation, gesturing toward her incapacitated limb. “Sweetheart, what happened?”

  “Nothing.” She withdrew her arm from its sling and reached for the sheaf of papers on the writing table. “That is, my arm is uninjured. I did help myself to one of your cravats, though. I hope you don’t mind.”

  He grabbed the loop of starched (albeit sadly crumpled) linen that hung from her neck and gave it a tug, pulling her closer in the process. “Making free with my clothes, are you?” he growled with mock severity.

  “Yes, but never mind. I shall let you borrow my best bonnet in retaliation.”

  “Thank you, but I’ll pass. I don’t doubt it would look better on you.”

  “And you would very likely burn it,” she put in, giving him a reproachful look.

  “Julia—” he began apologetically.

  “Never mind that now, for I have something to show you.” She handed him the papers and explained as he inspected them. “Handwriting samples. I tried to concentrate on the locals, but when a couple of tourists offered, well, I could hardly refuse them after professing to need help, could I?”

  “Can you identify all these people?” Pickett asked, looking up at her. “Which handwriting goes with which person, I mean?”

  “I think so,” she said. “I might not know their names, but I’m reasonably certain I could recognize them if I saw them again.”

  “My lady,” Pickett said, falling back, as he sometimes did, on her former courtesy title, “you are a wonder! Let’s see if any one of them is a match.”

  But the results of this experiment proved to be a disappointment. When Julia’s letter was laid beside the one Pickett had removed from Ned Hawkins’s body, it soon became clear that none of them matched.

  “Well, I suppose that’s that,” Julia said, regarding the evidence before her with some disappointment. “I hope you had better results.”

  He shook his head. “Not really.”


  “At least this afternoon will be better,” she remarked, brightening.

  “Will it?”

  “Of course! Don’t you remember? You promised to row me out on the lake.”

  “I’m trying to forget,” muttered Pickett, succumbing nevertheless to his fate.

  13

  Adventures on Land and Sea

  PICKETT’S HOPES FOR the outing were not high, his one foray onto the water being an outing on a fishing boat off the coast of Scotland—an experience that had left him shaky, nauseated, and (he recalled fondly) tucked tenderly into Lady Fieldhurst’s bed to recover, although her ladyship had been regrettably absent from it at the time. Still, there were difficulties here that had not been present on that earlier occasion, the first and foremost of these being the need to plant one foot in the long, narrow boat to hold it steady while he handed his wife aboard. At least, he hoped it would remain steady; a pretty fool he would look, spread-eagled over the water with one foot in and one foot out while the boat drifted farther and farther from the pier.

  Nevertheless, having paid a shilling and sixpence for the privilege, he took a deep breath and stepped over the gunwale, maintaining his balance with an effort until the rocking craft adjusted to its burden. Having accomplished this feat, he held out his hand to Julia and assisted her to board. She stepped lightly into the boat (setting it into fitful motion once more) and seated herself at one end, then unfurled her parasol and settled it on her shoulder. Having done his duty by his wife, it remained only for Pickett to shift his weight to the foot on the boat and bring his other foot onboard—an exercise that sounded simple enough in theory, but in practice ended with him sprawled across the center thwart in an ungainly heap.

  But at least he was dry. He scrambled over the thwart to his own seat opposite Julia.

  “You’ve done this before,” he observed, his tone faintly accusing.

  She nodded. “When I was a child, Lord Buckleigh—not that Lord Buckleigh, but his father—kept a little rowboat for the children of the local gentry to take out onto his ornamental lake. When I was about seven years old, Jamie rowed Claudia and me out to the middle of the lake, and then quite deliberately rocked the boat back and forth until he tipped us over. Claudia was furious—she was thirteen years old at the time, and very much on her dignity—and wouldn’t speak to him for a week.”