From Ruin to Riches

by Louise Allen

  ‘The poor dying man deceived by the wicked murderess?’ Will’s mouth twisted into an ugly smile. ‘And when I returned you were terrified that I might seek an annulment. Of course—that would have made a scandal indeed and it was not my good name you were worried about. How you must have quaked until I consummated the marriage and you were safe. And to think that the worst I considered was that I had been cuckolded in my absence.’

  ‘Yes, I was fearful of a scandal. I will not lie to you. I knew I could not tell you.’ His face darkened. ‘Will, if I had not married you then you would be dead now. Henry, with no guidance, would be ruining King’s Acre.’

  ‘So dragging my name and honour in the gutter was actually a favour to me?’ He looked down at his clasped hands. ‘Finding that the woman I was becoming…attached to had killed and lied and deceived me was not supposed to hurt?’

  ‘You never truly trusted me, did you? Julia said. He had become attached to her. ‘Thank God you never grew to love me.’

  ‘Thank God, indeed.’ He stood up and went to the door. ‘You will stay here.’

  She would not beg him to save her. How could he, even if he wanted to? And besides, she had deceived him and, perhaps, brought him to ruin. ‘I did not think it would come to this. I thought that if I was discovered it would be by the authorities and I would have some warning to be able to vanish before they could catch me and hurt you. What are you going to do?’

  Will looked back at her and suddenly she saw him as he had been when she first met him, when she had thought him an old man. The skin was tight over those strong bones, the colour had left his face, his eyes were stark and full of anger. ‘I have no idea. Think, I suppose. I have promised those bloodsucking relatives of yours that I will write to them by the end of tomorrow with my decision.’

  This time he closed the door slowly, quietly, behind him. The key turned. He thought he had imprisoned her.

  Think. She must think, too, and not give way to the tears or the paralysis of fear. Jonathan was dead. Nothing she could do would bring him back. He had no family in need to whom she could make some restitution. She would be hanged, of course, but the person who would have to live with this was Will.

  The only question that mattered was how to inflict the least damage and pain on Will. Once she put it like that, then the answer seemed clear: not to drag his name through a public trial, an even more public hanging. She must vanish. But to do that she must silence the Priors and the only way she could think of was to hold over them the threat that they, too, would appear as accessories.

  She would tell them that, rather than let Will pay blackmail money for the rest of his days she would surrender herself and then she would have killed their golden goose for them. If they did not believe her, called her bluff, then she would have to decide what to do—give up and surrender or run and try to hide. But she would deal with that if she had to.

  Will would go to the authorities himself, of course, but then he would be seen as someone deceived, someone doing the right thing as soon as he found out the truth. His pride would be hurt, but that was better than the alternatives.

  But she needed time to compose herself and think this through, to make certain Will did not try to find her. There was one certain way of doing that, she supposed. If she could make Will believe that she had taken her own life he would not search for her. But she would not lie to him. Never again, even in this.

  Julia went to the desk, pulled a sheet of paper towards her and dipped the pen in the inkwell. She wrote:

  Dearest Will,

  When you read this I will be beyond the reach of the law and beyond the capacity to cause you any more pain or scandal. I am too much of a coward to take poison. I have heard that the river is the last resort for many of London’s despairing souls.

  There is nothing to say except that I am sorry and that I never meant to hurt you. You will go to the authorities with this letter—I know that you are too honourable to break the law over such a matter. I will not write anything to embarrass you more, except that I love you. Believe that if you believe nothing else.

  Julia.

  There was a small portmanteau that she had pushed into the bottom of a larger one, anticipating having to pack more clothing on their return than she had when they arrived. He would not notice that it had gone. Julia changed from the smart morning gown into a plain walking dress, put on strong half-boots and packed a change of undergarments that hopefully Nancy would not notice were missing. A handkerchief, a comb, her reticule. She must take nothing that would be missed or, if it was, be unlikely that a woman going to drown herself might take out of habit.

  Money she would need. She doubted Will had counted the notes he had given her the day before, or, after all that had passed, even recalled doing so. Julia unfolded it: twenty-five pounds, a year’s wages for many people. She put it in the reticule, then checked every pocket, all her other bags, and found another two pounds in small coin and a crumpled five-pound note. She had enough to get a long way away.

  ‘I love you,’ she murmured, one hand flat on the door panels, as close to him as she would ever be again. ‘Goodbye, Will.’ Halfway to the service door she turned back and took another two handkerchiefs from the drawer. She would need them.

  Then, feeling as shocked and desperate as she had when she had stepped out from behind the screen in that inn room, she slipped into the dressing room, went behind the screen in the corner, eased the door open and tiptoed down the back stairs.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Will splashed brandy into a glass and tossed it back in one swallow, poured another and stood gripping the glass as he stared down into the busy street below.

  His mind could not seem to get past the fact that Julia had killed her lover. It seemed utterly out of character—everything about her spoke of the need to nurture. He had obviously not understood her at all and it was no wonder he had sensed that she was keeping something from him: any other secret he could conceive of paled into insignificance beside this horror.

  Nancy came in and he snarled at her so that she fled, white-faced. He could not bring himself to explain. Not yet. Outside the traffic built as the morning progressed and his mind became as tangled as the mass of hackney carriages and carts, pedestrians and riders down below.

  His name would be ruined. King’s Acre would always carry the stain of this scandal. And his heart… Well, thank heavens his heart was not engaged, that was the only mercy in all this. What if he had loved his wife as she, the deceitful witch, had said she loved him? The pain in his chest was anger and betrayal, nothing more.

  The glass was empty. He filled it. And again. It did not help, all it did was to fire his memory. The pale ghost on the bridge over the lake who had run to his aid. The desperate, grieving mother who had been so afraid he would evict that pathetic little coffin from the vaults. The intelligent farmer arguing for some improvement to the farm, the mistress that the staff, indoor and out, loved and supported with devotion.

  Julia in those scandalous divided skirts riding the stallion with such skill and teasing him about his manhood as she did so. Julia, passionate and sensual in his arms.

  Julia. And all he had been thinking about was how this was going to affect him. The empty glass dropped from his hand and he stared at it as it rolled on the carpet, wondering at his own selfishness. He believed her when she said she had not meant to kill. You could not live with a woman as closely as he had with her and not know whether she had a capacity for violence or not. He dragged me by the wrist. He had seen the bruises, savagely black and blue, that first evening. He meant to rape me. He knew from her responses in bed that the man had been a selfish lout. Of course she had tried to fight back.

  And the story of her escape was probable. He could imagine the scene, the chaos, the gawping crowd avid for sensation. The body would have been the focus of all attention. Julia, almost sleepwalking with shock, could well have dressed in that simple grey cloak and plain bonnet and merged int
o the crowd until she vanished.

  He believed everything she said, he realised. And that meant he must believe her when she said she loved him. The knife that was carving its way through his chest gave a sharp stab.

  Julia had been abused, ravished and then threatened with more violence by the man she thought loved her. What had happened to him had been an accident and, if anyone was to blame it was Jonathan Dalfield. And now, with every excuse never to trust a man again, never to allow herself to love, she had given him, Will Hadfield, her heart.

  And in return he had accepted the worst of her without question, verbally attacked her, locked her in her room, left her in fear of the worst kind of justice. Will was across the room, unlocked the door, flung it open, all before the thought was even finished.

  The bedchamber was empty. He found the service door and then the note lying on the pillow. Dearest Will. His hand was shaking so much he had to sit on the edge of the bed and steady himself before he could read on.

  He was halfway down the stairs before any kind of rational thought hit him. He sent the hall porter sprawling as he barrelled his way through the crowded lobby, down the steps and into the road under the nose of a startled cab horse.

  ‘Westminster Bridge, at the gallop and there’s five pounds in it for you,’ he yelled at the cab driver, who shut his mouth on the stream of invective and whipped the horse up before Will could get the door closed.

  He clung by on instinct as the cab swayed and swerved across Piccadilly, down St James’s Street, across Pall Mall and into St James’s Park. Westminster was the closest bridge and she would need a bridge to be certain of falling into the deep, lethal water. The banks were too uncertain, the water slower, there were too many people to stop her, to pull her out again.

  Will was not conscious of any plan at all in that wild ride, only the knowledge that he must be in time, that if he lost her he would not be able to bear it. The cab pulled up in the middle of the bridge and he leapt out, stared along the length of it. And saw nothing. No hubbub as there surely would have been if a woman had jumped off in broad daylight. No sign of anyone resembling Julia.

  ‘Well, guv’nor? What about my fare, then?’

  Will pulled out his pocket book and handed up a note without looking at the driver, his eyes scanning the northern approaches of the bridge. ‘Wait.’

  ‘For that money, guv’nor, I’ll sit here all day.’

  Will gripped the parapet and tried to assess what was best to do when all he wanted was to rush on to Blackfriars Bridge. She did not know London, but she had read the guidebooks, would know that Westminster was the nearest bridge to Mayfair. And she could expect to get here before he found the note. But she should have arrived by now, even at the normal pace of a cab horse.

  He would have to risk leaving his post here. ‘Blackfriars. As fast as you can make it.’

  Up Whitehall, along Strand, down the hill to the foot of Ludgate Hill and then down to the river and the bridge. Again, only the bustle of everyday life greeted him. Will stood looking down at the dark water rushing beneath and thought about his first sight of Julia, a pale grey ghost in the moonlight, leaning on the bridge over the lake. And he had feared she would jump and drown herself, of all the ironies.

  It was as though he could hear the nightingale again, feel her arms around him, holding him against her warm body. And as if she spoke in his ear he heard her voice.

  I cannot imagine ever being desperate enough to do that, she had replied when he told her he had thought she was about to jump. Drowning must be such terror. Besides, there is always some hope.

  Will dragged the note from his pocket and smoothed it flat on the worn Portland stone. The threat to kill herself was a feint, a clever bluff, all implication. And no lies. And he had fallen for it. The hope that surged back into him made him dizzy for a moment until he realised he still had no idea where to find Julia.

  ‘You all right, guv’nor?’ When Will looked up at him the driver scratched his stubbled chin and frowned back. ‘Not choosing the best bridge to jump off, are you?’

  ‘No. I have lost someone,’ Will said. He needed help. Rushing about like a headless chicken was not going to answer in a city the size of London. ‘Take me to the Bow Street offices.’

  *

  A busy coaching inn was the ideal hiding place, Julia realised as she closed the door of the cramped chamber and listened to the bustle and racket from the yard below. It was the one place where a woman alone was not conspicuous, for it was full of them, some modestly bonneted and cloaked, clutching their battered portmanteaux—servants and governesses, she supposed. Some were fine ladybirds, dressed to the nines and out to attract attention, others were harassed wives and mothers with a baby in their arms or fractious children at their heels.

  The coaches came and went, the tide of passengers ebbed and flowed and she felt safe from detection for the first time in hours. Desolate, lonely, heartbroken and frightened. But at least no one would find her here.

  What was Will thinking now? How was he feeling? Betrayed, of course. He believed she had deceived him and she had. He believed she had lied about loving him and that, Julia realised, hurt more than anything. And he loved King’s Acre and he was having to face the fact that the woman he had thought would help him save it would smear it with the stain of blood and disgrace.

  She wanted to write to him, to justify herself, to try to convince him that she truly loved him. But that would not help him, all it would be was a small, selfish, balm to her smarting conscience. Now she had to plan for where she would go to if she could silence Arthur and Jane and what she should do if she could not.

  *

  Bow Street was home to the Runners, and they would be a danger, but it also attracted a motley crowd of thief-takers and informants who hung around in the hope of commissions, legal and semi-legal. They would think nothing of being sent to every coaching inn in search of a carefully described woman who had bought a ticket and left town that day.

  Will had paid twenty of them better than they asked and promised more for results, then went to the hotel to wait. The inaction was hellish. Worse was the nagging fear that he might be wrong, that Julia might even now be floating in the muddy waters of the Thames.

  No, he told himself for the tenth time. She would not give up, she was a fighter. But man after man came to him and reported nothing. Women answering her description had been seen, but not buying stage or mail-coach tickets. Nor had any of the carriers sold places on their slow, heavy wagons. She was still in London and that, he was all too aware, would make her far harder to track.

  Will paid them, then sent them back out to check again in the morning, pushed his dinner around the plate, left it away uneaten and tried to rest. He could not let her hang, he knew. Whatever the cost, whatever the consequences, he would find her and get her out of the country.

  Why? he wondered, suddenly shaken out of his circle of dark thoughts. Why risk everything, his good name, King’s Acre? The answer came with shocking clarity. Because I love her and nothing else matters.

  He needed to rest because Julia needed him. Will took off his boots and his coat, lay down on the bed, tried to come to terms with that shattering piece of self-knowledge and attempted to sleep through nightmares of Newgate and the gallows, the look of stunned misery on Julia’s face as he had hurled those bitter words at her that morning, the smug, blackmailing faces of her cousins.

  There was something there, something his mind fretted at and yet could not quite grasp. In the floating state somewhere between sleep and waking Will lay still and let his thoughts chase the puzzle. Something had not been right, something had been out of kilter. But when? The answer flicked out of sight whenever he seemed close, like a shadow vanishing from the corner of his eye when he turned to confront it.

  Surprise. It had something to do with surprise. Shock. No, that was not quite right, he was missing the point somehow. Frustrated, Will thumped the pillow, turned over and, somehow, mana
ged to sleep.

  *

  The sun was bright on the gilded cross atop St Paul’s as the Mail clattered on to the yard of the General Receiving Office. Julia joined the crowd of travellers emerging from the numerous inns all around making their way towards the Receiving Office to take the morning coaches out, or to continue their journey by hackney carriage or on foot. A restless night had left her aching and weary, but Julia set off towards the great dome, thankful at least for a landmark. Once she found the cathedral then she only had to go down Ludgate Hill and turn into the Old Bailey and there would be the inn where she had seen her cousins watching the execution.

  Her tired brain went over and over the arguments she had worked out during the long night. Firstly she would appeal to their good nature, then to the threat of scandal to themselves, tarred by association with her. If neither of those worked, well, then she would threaten to hand herself in at Bow Street and to implicate them as accessories.

  And if that failed? She still did not know whether, if that happened she would have the courage to surrender herself and trust to a jury to believe she had acted in self-defence. But if she did not, could she spend her whole life running?

  Whatever happened, she thought as she trod across the cobbled path through St Paul’s churchyard, Will could not be implicated. It was bad enough that he would be seen as a man deceived, but she would not allow him to become implicated as the scandalous baron who knew of his wife’s crime, but who did nothing.

  There were the shops she had stared into so light-heartedly only a few days ago. There, busy now with the passage of lawyers, servants with their marketing baskets, bankers and tradesmen, was the opening into the Old Bailey. There were no hangings today and if it were not for the ominous bulk of the prison at the end of the street, and the stench in the air when the wind changed to blow from that direction, she would think it a pleasant enough district.