The Secrets of Wiscombe Chase

by Christine Merrill

‘If you wish to give me one,’ he said, cautiously.

  She stood and put her arms around him, delivering a kiss that left him dazed. Several days had given his sweet and innocent wife a surprising amount of skill. Then she released him, staring up with a strange half-smile. ‘Good luck to you, my captain. Share none of it with the earl. And if you care for me at all, do not let him shoot that stag.’

  ‘I had no idea that you cared about the poor beast,’ he said, in surprise.

  ‘My only wish it that Greywall returns to his home empty handed and unsatisfied. Do that for me and I will be the most grateful of wives.’ She batted her lashes again.

  ‘Very well, my lady.’ He smiled back at her.

  Chapter Twenty

  ‘I have never gone so far from the house, when hunting with Ronald,’ the earl said, glancing around him at the thinning trees. Gerry had led their little party nearly three miles already, until they approached the tor that marked the little strip of moor at the back of the property.

  ‘That might explain your lack of success,’ Gerry said, urging Satan up a narrow path through the rocks. ‘If Rex has been hiding from you, this is the place he would choose.’ He offered up a silent apology to the beast for sharing that knowledge at all.

  Though he had no intention of disappointing Lily, the challenge of hunting without finding anything was more difficult than he’d thought. Especially since Rex seemed as interested in stalking them as the earl was in shooting him.

  The stag was keeping pace with them, walking silently at their flank and awarding Gerry an occasional glimpse of hoof or tail before disappearing into the trees again. Gerry pretended to ignore him and made no move to alert the other hunters. Eventually, Rex would bore with the game and go back to his home on the moor. Since Greywall was either too drunk or too foolish to notice what was not directly in front of him, he would likely never realise how close he came to success.

  ‘I told you that the presence of the captain would make a difference,’ North called from the rear. ‘Magnificent country,’ he added, directing this to Gerry.

  Gerry grunted in return. As far as he could tell, it was magnificently useless. Beautiful, of course. But not the sort of place they wanted to be caught in after dark. Without a clear view of the terrain and a stout stick to test the ground, the risk of ending up knee deep in a bog far outweighed the pleasure of a moonlit walk.

  ‘Is this still your property?’ They were as far away from the Greywall lands as it was possible to be. It was plain that, without a guide, the earl might never find his way home.

  And what a tempting idea that was. But not necessary. One more day and the man would be gone for good, even if Gerry had to pack the bags and carry them himself. ‘Do you doubt my knowledge of the property lines?’

  At this, the earl laughed and Gerry could hear the rattling and sloshing of the flask as the man took a drink. ‘You sound very like your father. He had an obsession with borders and boundaries, as I remember.’

  It was not a reminder he welcomed. Today, his father was already uncomfortably close. Gerry had had no desire to soil his new hacking jacket, so he’d had Mrs Fitz hunt up some leather breeches and an old poacher’s coat. Both still stank of the old man’s tobacco. ‘You should be grateful that I know the land as well as he did.’ He reined in his horse and held a hand up to call for silence. Then he pointed towards the last stand of trees before the moor. There was a flash of russet, just out of rifle range before Rex disappeared deeper into the wood.

  ‘I’ll be damned,’ said the earl, fumbling for his gun.

  ‘Quite possibly,’ North agreed. ‘But you might have your stag before then.’

  The voice behind him raised the hairs on the back of Gerry’s neck. If North was an enemy, he had made the worst mistake of his life by allowing the man to follow him. Best to change the order of things. Gerry dismounted. ‘From here, we go on foot. Keep your gun at the ready, Greywall. I will circle and try to flush him towards you.’

  He made a wide circuit of the trees, going halfway up into the granite boulders before stopping to check the wind. From here, the breeze would carry his scent straight to the stag. That alone would be enough to urge a younger and less intelligent animal towards North and the earl. But Rex would know better. He had been both smart and lucky enough to outlast Gerry’s father. It was hard to believe that, even with help, the earl could succeed in taking him.

  Or perhaps Rex’s reign had finally come to an end. Gerry had not even reached the back of the copse before he heard the crack of a rifle and the triumphant shout of the earl. He turned and picked his way back to where he’d left his two companions.

  ‘I hit him,’ the earl exclaimed when he came into sight. ‘And on the first shot. He is mine for sure.’

  ‘An excellent shot,’ North announced. ‘The animal broke cover and, even uphill and into the sun, Greywall got him.’

  Gerry glanced around him, relieved when he could not find so much as a drop of blood to indicate the bullet had found its target. ‘Then where is the body?’

  ‘It was not a clean death,’ the earl said. ‘But a killing shot, certainly. Let us run him down.’ He turned to get back on his horse.

  ‘Which direction did he turn?’

  The earl pointed towards the moor.

  Gerry held up a hand to stay him. ‘The ground on the moor is too unstable to take the horses. One will turn an ankle for certain and we will be walking back.’

  ‘Then we must track the deer on foot,’ the earl announced, dismounting unsteadily and heading towards the bog.

  The last thing Gerry wanted was to lead a drunkard on a jaunt across unstable ground. ‘It is dangerous to stray too far from the forest, if you do not know the territory,’ he said.

  ‘There is nothing to fear,’ the earl announced. ‘We will only go as far as the body of the stag.

  ‘He got off a good shot,’ North agreed, then added to the earl, ‘The poor fellow will be bleeding. He will not make it far and will leave a clear trail for you to follow.’

  ‘All the same, it is better to be prepared.’ Gerry turned back to his saddle to get his stick, a knife and a stout length of rope. They would be necessary in the event that he needed to drag the animal back. But more likely, the slight delay in equipping himself would give the quarry a fighting chance to run for his life.

  ‘You are taking too long,’ the earl opined. ‘We must get to him while there is still light.’

  ‘If the shot was as good as you say, we do not need to rush.’

  ‘You selfish bastard. My last hunt and you expect me to be frightened of a bit of wet grass. I will go ahead. Follow when you are ready.’

  ‘That is most unwise, my lord.’ There were a hundred things he might have said about the differing weight of man and deer, and the superior knowledge that even a frightened animal had of the dangerous terrain of the moor. The whole area was full of featherbeds and shifters. Patches of moss or gorse that looked solid might drag an unsuspecting hunter to a watery death. But he barely had time for the brief phrase he’d shouted at Greywall’s retreating back. The earl was so eager for his stag that he was already up the tor and disappearing over it.

  ‘Be careful,’ North called cheerfully, getting down off his horse. ‘I am certain the earl will take care,’ North said, to reassure him.

  ‘He is just as likely to get himself killed,’ Gerry replied, cursing quietly as he dug in his saddle bag.

  ‘We all must go some time.’ The words were accompanied by the chick of a cocked pistol. ‘May I see your empty hands, Captain Wiscombe?’

  Gerry cursed himself for being distracted and for not bringing the pistol that would have been in this very bag had he been in Portugal and not his own back garden. He turned to display his empty hands to his father-in-law.

  ‘Very good.’ Nort
h was as cheerful as ever. He gestured with the gun. ‘Could you step away from your rifle as well? Take a seat on that rock.’

  ‘Do you mean to shoot me sitting down?’ Gerry asked. ‘It would be just as easy to do it standing.’

  ‘Shoot you?’ for a moment, North seemed puzzled. ‘I merely wish a few moments of uninterrupted conversation.’

  ‘You can get that just as easily without pointing a pistol at me,’ Gerry suggested, then walked slowly towards the indicated seat. In his mind, he calculated the steps to his gun and the cover of the woods. He did not want to shoot both of his wife’s family in the same day. But neither did he want to die with a ball in him, when success was so close.

  From the moor, there was an echoing cry for help.

  Without thinking, Gerry turned and took a step in the direction of the tor.

  ‘Stop!’

  He froze again, remembering the gun. ‘The earl is hurt. We must go to him. You have my word that we will settle what is between us once he is safely off the moor.’

  ‘Sit down, Wiscombe. There is nothing between us that needs settling,’ North said, still smiling. ‘The only problem I have with you is your predictable desire for heroic action.’

  ‘Some of the bogs are deep,’ Gerry reminded him. ‘This is not one of your little games that hurts no one. He may be drowning.’ When North made no move to put away the pistol, he added, ‘We must help him before it is too late.’

  To add weight to his logic, there was another call for help, followed by a man’s scream of terror.

  Instead of being moved to action, North leaned against the nearest tree. ‘If we are lucky, it is too late already.’

  ‘Damn it, man. Let me go to him.’ He did not like the earl, but neither did he want to drag the man’s body back from what should have been his final hunt.

  ‘A little while longer, I think,’ North said. ‘I feared we would have to wait through the night to do this properly. But things are progressing nicely.’

  ‘I should never have let him go ahead.’

  ‘And he should never have raped my daughter,’ North said, with no change in his demeanour.

  ‘He...’ Now that the truth was before him, it made perfect sense. Lily’s silence at dinner and the headaches after the meal. She’d been trying to be a perfect hostess while sharing a table with her attacker. ‘She said he was dead.’

  ‘She lied,’ North said. ‘I suspect she was worried about what would happen if you learned the truth. One cannot just shoot a peer, Captain Wiscombe.’

  But he would have done it. He would not have been able to help himself. ‘She should not be the one trying to protect me,’ Gerry said, his guilt returning.

  ‘But she is trying, all the same. She does not want to risk losing you,’ North said. ‘She loves you.’

  ‘She loves the hero of Salamanca,’ Gerry corrected.

  ‘She deserves a hero,’ her father agreed. ‘She’s seen damn few of them in her life. The North men have been chronic disappointments. As her father...’ He shook his head. ‘If I’d only known, the matter would have been settled long before you got here. But I swear to God, I thought the child was yours. And that our estrangement...’ And now, his voice broke. ‘I gave the earl the master bedroom. I thought to flatter him. All this time she has been thinking I was a pandering villain and not just a trusting fool.’

  ‘I told her that it could not have been intentional,’ Gerry said.

  North nodded. ‘I am nowhere near the perfect father, but I would never allow anyone to hurt her. Since that has already happened, something needed to be done.’

  ‘And the gun?’ Gerry pointed at the pistol the man still held.

  ‘There was going to be a hunting accident of some sort,’ North said. ‘But a habitual inebriate drowning in a bog will be much easier to explain at an inquest than a bullet in the back. If need be, you can swear that you were held at gunpoint and prevented from aiding the man until it was too late. In the eyes of the law, you are an innocent victim.’

  ‘And the earl?’ There had been no sound from the moors since that last unearthly scream.

  ‘He got what he deserved,’ North said, putting the gun aside. ‘Time will tell if the Lord blesses you with a daughter, Wiscombe. If he does, you will find there are no limits to what you would do to keep her safe. And if you fail?’ He shook his head. ‘For your sake, I hope you do not.’

  ‘But we cannot just let him drown,’ Gerry said, knowing that they most certainly could. Hadn’t he just told his wife that a convenient hunting accident would be easy to arrange?

  ‘You’ve already made an effort to keep him from harm.’ North’s smile had returned. ‘I distinctly heard you tell him that it was dangerous. Yet he went on ahead because he wanted that damned deer.’

  That was true enough.

  ‘It is a shame I could not be there to watch him suffer,’ North said, with a sigh. ‘But as my daughter pointed out at breakfast, we cannot always have what we want. I think it has been long enough now. Let us go and see what we can find of him.’

  Gerry put the supplies he’d collected back in the saddle bag and led the way, walking a skittish Satan over the tor and out on to the moor itself. There they found the blood trail from the stag, just as the earl had expected. But the red drops were sparse and the tracks gave no indication that the stag was weak on his feet. The even hoofprints were mirrored by the boot prints of a man.

  They followed the marks barely a quarter mile before they discovered the earl. The clear trail ended suddenly, devolving into a muddy mess of hoofmarks and the claw-like troughs of a man’s hands searching for purchase. Gerry tapped at the ground in front of him and found the place where it gave way to bog, watching the carpet of moss that covered the muck sway and ripple as he poked at it.

  Then he took out his rope and tied one end of it to the saddle before slowly lowering himself into the hidden water. A few minutes searching beneath the surface and he was able to grasp a coat sleeve and tie the other end of the rope around the corpse. Then he climbed back on to the path and urged his horse back to drag the earl to the surface.

  They stared down at the dead man.

  ‘As I told you before, people who I invite here deserve what they get,’ North said.

  The late Earl of Greywall stared up at the sky with a blank look of surprise, his forehead marked by the bloody print of a single cloven hoof.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  It was taking too long.

  Lily had never been interested in the hunts that were held almost daily at her home. But she could not help but be aware of the pattern they followed. Even the longest of them was over before dusk. It gave the participants time to wash, or more often to drink before dinner.

  But tonight, the sun was almost fully set before she heard the sound of the men returning. She’d been waiting in the sitting room for some word of their progress and rushed towards the hall in time to hear the unusual request that a footman locate my lord’s valet immediately.

  ‘There has been an accident.’

  The words sent a chill through her. It was some comfort that her husband had been the one speaking.

  And now her father said, ‘He would not listen to reason. He was following that damn stag and he would not stop, even when the animal ran on to the moor.’

  From the third member of the party, she heard nothing. If he were really hurt, she’d have expected swearing or complaints, or at least a demand for strong drink. The total silence was ominous.

  She pushed her way through the knot of servants gathering in the doorway to see a body wrapped in oilcloth slung over the saddle of the earl’s horse.

  A hunting accident.

  But Gerry did not know. He would have had no reason to take action against the earl.

  At the moment,
she could not enquire even if she wanted to. Gerry was in a quiet conversation with the white-faced valet, who was then stuffed into a coach to make the short ride to Greywall to get others who would come back to take the earl home. Until they arrived, Wiscombe servants were gathering to find a properly respectful place for the body of a peer.

  Lily turned to Mrs Fitz to request a cold supper be laid for family and any servants of the earl that might be coming, and tried to decide if her current calm was an accurate reflection of her mood, or merely the shock that accompanied sudden death. In either case, it was more ladylike than joy.

  She started forward, trying to get a better look at the body.

  ‘Lillian.’ Her father took her arm to lead her away.

  ‘I need to know,’ she whispered.

  ‘He is dead. There is no question of that. Come away.’ She tried to pretend that she had not seen the nod that passed between him and her husband that seemed to confirm her fears. ‘Let us go back to the sitting room. There is nothing that can be done for him.’

  She shut the sitting-room doors behind him, her calm disappearing. ‘That is not what matters to me. I need to know which of you shot him.’

  Her father let one inappropriate laugh escape before he regained his own composure. ‘What you mean to ask is, What happened?’

  ‘Tell me,’ she said, clutching his hand. ‘Tell me that Gerald did not do something foolish on my account. Because I could not bear it.’

  ‘The earl tracked a wounded stag on to the moors. We were not there to see his death. It appears the beast attacked him, either before or after he fell into a bog. The combination of the attack and the water...’ Her father shook his head.

  It really had been an accident. She sat, rather too quickly, on the sofa. But since the sudden bout of weakness was not followed by fainting, headaches or shortness of breath, it was likely a perfectly normal reaction.

  ‘And what of the deer?’

  ‘The deer?’

  ‘Rex,’ she said. ‘The stag. I assume that was the animal he was chasing. What became of him?’