by Simon Clarke
‘Relatively?’ William’s blue eyes widened. ‘You suspect that I’m next on the assassin’s list?’ He sighed. ‘I don’t wish to appear flippant, but do you really believe that my brothers have been systematically murdered?’
‘Inspector Abberline believes there is evidence to suggest that is so.’
‘The inspector is the most respected of detectives. However, I find it hard to accept that an assassin has spent the last two decades stalking my brothers, and slaying them every five years or so.’
‘Thaddeus was shot: clearly a case of murder.’
‘Does it mean the others were murdered also? I took over this house and its land three years ago when my brother, Joshua, died of illness. A congestion of the blood, or so the doctor recorded on the death certificate.’
‘Admittedly, it’s a mystifying case,’ admitted Thomas. ‘However, if Inspector Abberline was here he’d do his utmost to impress on you this fact: your life is in danger. A sniper could be hiding in those woods with the express intention of shooting you dead.’
‘You speak very frankly, Thomas. Vividly, too.’
‘It is necessary, believe me.’
‘Then I should also warn my wife and daughter, though it pains me to frighten them.’ He sighed. ‘I’ve already told Colonel Brampton that there might be a plot to kill the Denby menfolk. He has, therefore, doubled the guard, and sends out soldiers on horseback to patrol the grounds.’
‘Then you will remain indoors?’
‘Absolutely not.’
‘If you go outside the house, even deploying a hundred soldiers here, or a thousand, cannot guarantee your safety.’
‘Thank you for your concern, Thomas.’ The man was sincere in his gratitude. ‘We have, however, reached a critical stage of our research. Balloon flights must continue, and I must oversee every launch. Though, after what you’ve just told me, I should disguise my appearance. Perhaps I’ll borrow a soldier’s tunic – that’ll thrown the assassin off my scent, won’t it?’
‘Perhaps.’ Thomas spoke doubtfully.
‘I’ll test my disguise this afternoon.’ He rubbed his hands together, and Thomas realized that William Denby’s enthusiastic nature wouldn’t easily be suppressed by talk of lurking gunmen. ‘I’ll give you a tour of the estate. That way you can view my domain. Right.’ He clapped his hands together. ‘I am due to oversee the production of a thousand cubic feet of hydrogen gas.’ Heading for the door, he added cheerfully, ‘I’ll meet you by the stable block at two. Wrap up warmly. Let’s make an adventure of it!’
At precisely two o’clock that afternoon William Denby drove a pony and trap to where Thomas stood near the stable block. The brown and white pony was a small, yet powerful looking animal that was decidedly eager. William repeatedly had to call out ‘Whoa, lad’, as the pony succeeded in pulling the little cart forward, even though its driver had engaged the brake.
‘Climb aboard, Thomas,’ sang out William. ‘We have a veritable Pegasus here. I think he would fly rather than trot. Whoa, lad.’
Thomas climbed onto the bench beside William. He noted with surprise that William had made an attempt to disguise himself. Instead of wearing the soldier’s uniform as he said he would, he’d donned the long, green coat of a coachman, complete with an ancient tricorn hat that appeared to have been nibbled ragged by mice.
‘My own wife won’t recognize me now, will she?’ Laughing, he adopted a rustic accent. ‘Hang on tight, sir, while your loyal coachman takes thee on a gallop over yonder hills.’
Thomas opened his mouth to enquire whether the man had brought a revolver for protection, but the pony trotted away so sharply that Thomas was thrown back against the board that formed the seat back.
‘You’d best hang on tightly, Thomas, old chap. I wasn’t jesting about this animal believing he’s mighty Pegasus.’
The pony sped along at something between a trot and a gallop. Thomas gripped the iron framework of the cart’s sides. ‘We have a fine afternoon,’ he said. ‘And this is an extraordinary landscape.’
‘I’ve lived in Wales for three years, and every day these mountains amaze me. Such beauty! Do you see Snowdon?’ He pointed at the mountain that soared skyward. ‘They say you can see five kingdoms from its summit: the kingdom of Ireland, the kingdom of England, the kingdom of the Isle of Man, the kingdom of Wales and, moreover, the kingdom of Heaven.’
‘You’ve flown so high in your airships I daresay you’ve been closer to the kingdom of Heaven than any mortal man.’
‘Ha! So I have, Thomas, so I have!’ He pulled the reins back to slow the pony. ‘Thrusting little beast, isn’t he? His father was a pit pony that spent all his days underground. This one must know that he’ll spend all of his in the God-given outdoors. Can’t you sense his sheer exuberance?’ William Denby seemed to share the animal’s lust for life. His speech and movements crackled with energy.
Thomas nodded at the pony. ‘He’s what my mother would call “a force of nature”.’
‘Ha! Hold on tight. The road here gets a wee bit bumpy.’
The shaking of the cart became so violent that neither could speak more than two words in a row. They passed through dense woodland. Thomas cast his gaze this way and that, expecting to see the dramatic appearance of a sinister figure with a gun. However, he saw only squirrels, sheep and roe deer. Though the road ran uphill the steepness of the incline did nothing to dampen the pony’s enthusiasm. In fact, it showed no sign of tiring as it charged upward to an ancient-looking church.
‘If you turn your head back,’ William said, ‘you’ll have a grand view of the house. Can you see the big sheds – the ones with the while walls? That’s where we build our ships.’ His tone mingled satisfaction and pride. ‘We are at the forefront of aviation. One day we will succeed in fixing paddles, driven by an engine, to a balloon … that will allow us to fly anywhere in the world. We won’t be slaves to air currents and wind direction. We shall be masters of the skies.’
‘When did your father buy the house?’
‘Twenty years ago. As you’ve already heard, he made vast sums turning Britain into a grid iron with his railways lines. Regrettably, he wasn’t so astute when he bought his country estates. Notice how rocky this land is – the hills, the steepness of the valley sides, the marshes down by the river. Barely anything can be grown apart from trees. They are so crooked and twisted that their timber is almost worthless. The land we occupy hereabouts is reasonable for grazing sheep, not much else.’ His blue eyes twinkled as he grinned at Thomas. ‘Not much good, that is, apart from building and flying my balloons. Whoa, lad.’ He coaxed the pony to a dead stop. That done, he sprang down from the cart and quickly tied the reins to a post.
Thomas gazed at the huge mansion. ‘Whoever built that must have been astonishingly wealthy.’
‘It was built by a cousin of George the Third. He looted half of China to pay for it. He’d be amazed to see the place now … if we had the power to conjure him from his tomb, that is. The ground floor comprises offices for my staff. Colonel Brampton has his lair there, too.’ He shrugged. ‘You might have guessed that I don’t always see eye-to-eye with the man. The soldiers under his command are good fellows … salt of the earth, but he runs them ragged.’
‘You portray the man as a tyrant.’
‘He’s overly harsh with his men. Needlessly so, in my estimation.’ William shook his head. ‘If we saw things from the colonel’s point of view I dare say we’d understand his annoyance. Brampton is a senior army officer. What he desires more than anything else, is to lead men into battle, with cannon roaring and regimental flag unfurled. Instead, he is deployed to a country house where dreamers, such as I, try to solve the problems of flight.’
‘It is work of national importance.’
‘Alas, the colonel will never win a medal in our battle to defeat gravity. And medals are what committed military men like Brampton yearn for with all their soldierly hearts.’
‘I see. So, frustrated a
mbition makes him short-tempered?’
‘Indeed, and patience is a valuable commodity in our research. We cannot rush, otherwise there will be more accidents of the kind that claimed poor Captain Sefton.’ William pointed at the house. ‘See the third floor? That is home to my family; it’s comfortable and more than adequate for our needs. Step this way, Thomas.’
Thomas entered the graveyard. The headstones were oblongs of black slate set upright in the ground. The words engraved there were in Welsh. All Thomas could make out were the names of those lying in the earth.
Thomas Lloyd crouched down to read DYLAN LLOYD etched beneath a carved skull. ‘Some of my ancestors might well be buried here.’
‘Perhaps so. Listen to the sound the trees make.’
Thomas heard a whisper in the trees – voices, it seemed, from fleshless mouths.
‘Quite uncanny,’ Thomas said. ‘Like dozens of people whispering.’
William nodded. ‘Locals call the trees that surround this graveyard The Singing Trees. They’re supposed to sing the names of the dead who are buried here, and tell stories of what all these people did in life.’
They listened as the breeze blew harder. The whispering rose in volume. There was almost a sense that the trees had noticed the two men standing amid the tombs and were commenting on their visitors. Even the pony twitched its ears and turned to stare at the trees as they sighed as if in agreement.
Thomas said, ‘I am already half-believing that the legend of the Singing Trees is true.’
‘Ha, there are parts of this landscape that can make you believe in magic. Come on, I wish to show you one grave in particular.’
They walked toward the foot of the church tower where there was a box-shaped tomb in pale stone. This was markedly different from the tablets of liquorice-black slate. What’s more, this one bore its inscription in English rather than Welsh.
Thomas read the words aloud, ‘Here lies the mortal body of Joshua Gordon Denby. Died 8 December, 1887.’
‘My brother: the previous tenant of Newydd Hall. He’d fallen ill six months before he died, which suggests quite powerfully that he wasn’t murdered.’
‘But the deaths of your other brothers might be a result of foul play.’ He didn’t mention that Inspector Abberline had discovered that Sir Alfred Denby had triggered a deadly explosion. Nor did he mention the pagan shrine hidden behind the workshop panelling. True, William’s brother, Victor, may have told him about those matters in a letter, but Thomas decided he should give Abberline the opportunity to broach those delicate subjects with William.
William turned up his collar against the chill wind. ‘We’ll ride back along the lane that follows the boundary of my family’s property. I find it difficult to say “my property” because I feel as if I’m just the caretaker here.’
Thomas suddenly asked, ‘What do you know of the Gods of Rome?’ He hoped such a direct question might provoke a candid answer.
William shrugged as he headed back to the cart. ‘I don’t know much. Other than there was some story about golden statues being found in Italy over twenty years ago. Rumours circulated, suggesting that my brother, Alfred, was somehow involved.’
‘Do you believe the rumours?’
‘It all happened when I was a very young man. I wasn’t much interested. All my time and energy were taken up with balloons.’
‘You’ll be aware of the curse that’s linked to the statues?’
‘Of course. After my brother was killed in the explosion two months ago there was a flurry of speculation amongst the servants about the curse.’
‘Do you believe there is a curse?’
‘The curse is simply a curious myth, just like the story about these trees singing the names of dead people. No, Thomas, I do not believe in curses having the power to destroy human lives.’
The eager pony soon pulled the cart at exhilarating speed into the valley, where a waterfall thundered loudly enough to drown out the rattle of the cart’s wheels. Thomas enjoyed the ride. The air refreshed him, making his face tingle pleasantly.
He was gazing up at squirrels, darting along branches, when an object flew from the shadows. That object was a man who bounded onto the cart. The stranger shouted at them in strange accents. Thomas tried to push the man off their vehicle. Instantly, the man shoved Thomas, slamming him back into his seat. Then the attacker launched himself at William Denby.
The pony reacted to the attack by breaking into a gallop, sending the cart bucking along the lane that ran beside the river. Meanwhile, Thomas grimaced in pain. The powerful stranger had thrown him back into his seat with enough force to wind him. Now the man roared with fury at William Denby. This sounded like a foreign tongue, and Thomas couldn’t understand a single word. So far, the man hadn’t struck William; instead, he’d seized him by the shoulders and bellowed. William not only had to contend with the yelling man, he also struggled to rein back the pony, which hauled the cart at a furious pace.
What happened next happened with astonishing speed. Horses suddenly appeared alongside the cart. Each carried a soldier: one brandished a sabre, another a rifle, the third seized the pony’s bridle and brought the animal to a stop. The other two soldiers leapt from the backs of the horses directly onto the cart. Swiftly, they seized the shouting man and hurled him from the cart to the ground. One of the soldiers raised his rifle, ready to smash the man’s skull.
William saw that the soldier intended to deliver what would probably be a fatal blow. ‘Wait! Don’t hit him! Stay your hand!’
‘He was attacking you,’ the soldier shouted. ‘This is your brother’s murderer.’
‘No, it is not. The man was remonstrating with me. He did not strike me.’
The soldiers hauled the interloper to his feet – the one with the sabre held its point at the man’s throat, just in case he renewed his attack.
Thomas saw that the stranger, who’d leapt onto the cart, was no more than eighteen or nineteen years of age. He had a head of unruly, black curls. His eyes were black as coal, too. He spat words that Thomas couldn’t understand.
‘You will have to speak English, young man,’ William told him. ‘None of us here understands Welsh.’
The dark-eyed man shook with anger. ‘You let her go, see? What you’re doing to that poor girl, isn’t right, Mr Denby.’
‘You recognized me?’
‘That I did, you dog. Now you set Laura Morgan free, do you hear?’
The soldier placed the sabre’s point against the man’s throat: a clear enough warning to take heed. ‘You say “sir” when addressing Mr Denby.’
‘Not while he keeps a poor girl prisoner, I won’t.’
William explained to the soldiers, ‘This is a friend of one of my maidservants.’ He turned to the man. ‘Or, more accurately, she’s your sweetheart, isn’t she?’
‘Laura is my girl. One day, as God is my witness, I shall marry her.’
‘Your name’s Jake, isn’t it? And you live in the village nearby?’
The man nodded. ‘Jake Tregarth is my name. You give that name to the police, if you wish.’ He lifted his chin – a gesture of defiance. ‘I am not afraid, see? Not afraid of you, or your men, even though they beat me to the ground when I came to the house.’
William turned to the soldiers. ‘Is this true?’
‘He trespassed, sir,’ said one of the soldiers, ‘demanding to see the girl. He threatened your staff.’
Jake didn’t fear the sabre at his throat. ‘It isn’t right that you keep Laura prisoner. She is a good girl, see, a kind girl.’
‘My housekeeper speaks most highly of Laura.’
‘Then let her go, sir. It breaks my heart, it does, to picture what your men do to her in that house.’
‘Jake, hasn’t a member of my staff explained to you about what happened to Laura?’
‘No, sir, they haven’t said one word, other than ordering me off your land.’
‘Jake, may we speak man-to-man without shouting?’<
br />
Jake nodded. ‘As long as this brute takes the sword from my throat.’
‘Very well. Harrison, please put away the sabre. I’m sure Jake will speak civilly from now on.’
‘Thank you, sir.’ Jake took a deep breath and appeared much calmer when the soldier withdrew the sword. ‘What has befallen my Laura?’
‘Quite simply she is ill. I’ll tell you as plainly and honestly as I can about her condition.’
‘Go on, sir.’ Jake’s eyes glistened.
Thomas realized that although the young man had no fear of the soldiers, he was evidently frightened for his girl.
‘Earlier this week, Laura fell sick, something to do with her nerves. She became acutely distressed, and she fainted in the wood. One of my employees brought her back to the house.’
‘Her nerves?’ Jake visibly gulped. ‘You’re saying my Laura has become a lunatic?’
‘No, Jake. I’m sure it’s nothing so serious. Perhaps she’s become overwrought in some way. My own doctor has given her medicine that will help her rest.’
‘Laura shouted from a window – she told me that she’d been locked in her room.’
‘A precaution for her well-being, that’s all. Perhaps it was a result of her nervous condition but Laura ran away into the forest. Fortunately, she was found and brought safely back to the house.’
‘Then you are not keeping her prisoner?’
Thomas spoke up, ‘Mr Denby is a kind and honourable man.’
‘Thank you, Thomas.’ William smiled at Jake. ‘Won’t you give Laura a day or two to rest? Then I’d like you to come up to the house so you can see how she is for herself.’
‘Bless you, sir.’ Jake sounded genuinely grateful. ‘I am sorry if I startled you and your companion. I did what I did because I was desperate, see? I had to find out why Laura had been locked away.’
‘’I understand, Jake.’ William held out his hand. This took Jake by surprise. It’s highly unlikely that he’d ever been offered a handshake before by a gentleman of William’s class. Nevertheless, he clasped William’s hand and thanked him again.
Within moments, Jake vanished back into the shadows, the soldiers mounted their horses, and William took up the reins of the little cart. They soon resumed their progress through the wood.
