by Mary Nichols
‘Draw up a proper list of what needs doing and how much it will cost,’ Alex told the much-relieved steward. ‘I shall stay at the Five Bells for the next few days until it can be made habitable.’
‘Very well, sir. Shall I consult her ladyship over the interior decoration and the furnishings?’
‘Her ladyship?’ Alex queried.
‘The marchioness, my lord. I believe she is at the Five Bells.’
Alex laughed. ‘There, the gossip has failed you, Mr Boniface. The lady at the Five Bells is my mother, not my wife. There is no marchioness at present.’
‘I beg your pardon, my lord,’ he said hastily. ‘I only meant that the house will undoubtedly benefit from the attention of a mistress.’
‘You are forgiven.’ Alex smiled and the embarrassed man relaxed visibly, before taking his leave to set about the task he had been given. Alex went round the house again and found himself imagining what it might be like when it was restored. There would be new carpets and curtains, new furniture and bed hangings, ornaments and pictures. It could become a comfortable family home, a fine place to bring up children. He chuckled to himself, wondering what his mother would say if he shared that thought with her, probably something like ‘Didn’t I tell you so?’ or ‘About time, too!’
He left Davy inspecting the wainscoting in the dining room for woodworm and went out into the garden, if that tangle of weeds and overgrown shrubs could be called a garden. A gardener was another need, probably more than one. He had a feeling that restoring this house was going to eat up nearly all his savings. He wandered down what had once been a terrace and across a stretch of grass, past a shrubbery and a kitchen garden to the far boundary. From here he could hear and smell the sea. He breathed deeply. Yes, it would do, it would do very well. He turned in the direction of the village to rejoin his mother.
* * *
Almost two weeks passed before Charlotte watched her father set off for Oxfordshire, the carriage piled so high with his luggage, drawings, models, samples of wood, cloth, leather and braid, there was hardly room for him to squeeze in. Then she turned and went back to the office to work until it was time to go home. When all the men had gone, she would have to check the building to make sure there were no naked flames or glowing embers anywhere to constitute a hazard. Fire insurance companies would not cover the premises on account of all the flammable materials kept there; her father had exhorted her to be extra careful.
He had also told her not to walk home alone, but to ask one of the men to escort her. She did not like to do that; the men had all done a long day’s work and would be anxious to go home to their suppers. Only Martin Grosswaite remained and, for some reason she could not explain, she would not ask him to accompany her. ‘If you will not let me escort you,’ he said, ‘permit me to fetch a chair. At least that way you will be safe from molestation.’ She agreed it was the sensible thing to do and while he was gone, had a last look round before locking up. Everything was as it should be.
The chair arrived very quickly so Martin must have found one close at hand. She climbed in and directed the chairmen to take her to Piccadilly. It had been a busy day and what with her father being intent on his journey, she had been left very much to her own devices and that meant walking round the various workshops making sure the men were working as they should, meeting customers who had come to collect their vehicles and keeping her ledgers up to date. She was very tired, but it was a satisfied kind of tiredness and she was looking forward to having a couple of the maids fill a bath in her room so that she could soak the tiredness from her. That it was considered eccentric to bath so frequently did not deter her. Having no company, she might ask Barbara, her maid, to join her for supper afterwards.
It was several minutes before she realised she was not being taken to Piccadilly. The chairmen had turned down a dark alley and were trotting at a pace that was bone-shaking. She put her head outside and commanded them to stop. They ignored her; if anything, their pace increased. She shouted at them again, but it soon became evident that they had no intention of obeying her. Now she was very frightened indeed. Where were they taking her? And why? Captain Carstairs’s warning came to her mind. She was being kidnapped!
After several more minutes, they stopped outside a dilapidated tenement and let down the chair. She hurried to open the door to escape, but they had anticipated that and grabbed her arms and dragged her, protesting loudly, into the building, along a corridor which was dark as pitch and into a candle-lit room, where a woman rose from a chair to face them. ‘You got her, then?’
‘We did, Molly, we did. ‘Twas as easy as winking, though she made a deal of noise.’ He was a big man with a weatherbeaten face, a moulting bag wig and bad teeth. He was also the man who had grabbed her bridle in Hyde Park. Captain Carstairs had been right in saying they might try again. Oh, how she wished she had listened to him. But he had said nothing about not hiring a chair and how was she to know the kidnappers would use that ruse?
‘And I shall continue to do so until you take me home,’ Charlotte snapped at him.
His answer was to push her into a chair. His companion, smaller but no less unprepossessing, produced a rope and they proceeded to tie her down. She struggled ineffectually, and when his hand strayed too close to her mouth bit it as hard as she could. He snatched it away and swore. ‘And for that, you will pay extra,’ he yelled and stuffed a dirty piece of rag into her mouth.
She almost choked and had to force herself to breathe evenly through her nose, but assumed from his words that she had been kidnapped for a ransom. Though the thought of spending a second longer in the company of these three was anathema, it gave her a little hope. Her father, hearing of their demand, would undoubtedly pay to have her safely restored to him. And then she remembered her father was from home. Would Barbara have the good sense to alert someone that she was missing? Or would she be kept here until her kidnappers were able to contact her father? Would he be able to trace her movements through the chair she had taken? Would he think of that? Oh, if only someone would come to her rescue!
* * *
‘Mama, I am summoned back to town,’ Alex said, studying a letter the mail had brought to the Five Bells. It had been marked urgent and the landlord had sent the potboy up to the Manor with it. ‘I am needed to solve another kidnapping. It appears Miss Gilpin has disappeared, most likely abducted.’
‘Oh, how dreadful for her,’ she said. ‘But can no one else be asked to look for her?’
They had left the Five Bells to move into a part of the Manor that had been made habitable and were in the morning room, drinking the tea Davy had made for them. The chimneys had been swept and the house cleaned by an army of women he had hired from the village, supervised by the butler and housekeeper, Mr and Mrs Wharton, who were now back in residence. There was still a great deal to be done. The whole house needed painting, ill-fitting doors needed replacing, rattling windows must be refitted and re-glazed and new carpets, curtains, furniture and kitchen utensils purchased. Apart from one or two good quality items of furniture and some pictures and ornaments, the rest would have to go. When all was done, he must decide how many servants he needed, but that could wait until the work was finished and Mrs Wharton would see to the hiring of them.
‘Lord Leinster has been making preliminary enquiries,’ he answered his mother. ‘but I have done this kind of thing before and James thinks I am the best person to undertake the task’
‘Do they know who has her?’
‘No, that is for me to discover. Mama, do you wish me to leave you here, or shall you go home? I can take you if you do, but you must be ready to leave in an hour.’
‘I shall be ready. I do not want to stay here without you. This is your home, not mine, and I miss my little cat, and the church. But can you leave the refurbishment here unattended?’
‘It is not urgent. Mr Boniface and
Mr and Mrs Wharton will carry the work forward in my absence. I will return as soon as I have Miss Gilpin safely back with her father.’
Mrs Carstairs hurried to tell her maid to pack as quickly as possible and stayed to help her, while Alex sent a man ahead on horseback to bespeak post horses. He had come to Foxlees at a leisurely pace, using the same horses throughout, but he was in too much haste to return the same way. The greys would be sent back to the Manor from their first stop and the new groom would look after them until he returned. After that he went round the house with Mr Wharton, pointing out things that needed to be done in his absence. Within the hour they were on their way.
Alex sat back in the coach, glad that he had purchased a well-built vehicle because Davy was driving at a spanking pace and they were being thrown from side to side over the bumpy roads.
‘Mama, is the jolting too much for you?’ he asked. ‘Shall I have Davy slow down?’
‘No, I know you are in a hurry. Do not mind me.’
‘Betty?’ he queried, addressing the maid.
Betty was looking very white, but she managed a wan smile. ‘I wish only for the journey to be over, my lord, so by all means make haste.’
Alex sank back into his seat, contemplating the task ahead of him. The letter had said nothing about how Miss Gilpin had been kidnapped, nor if there had been a ransom letter. It was usually the ransom letter that furnished the first clue about where a kidnapped victim was being held. Without one the case would be doubly difficult.
He found himself wondering how Miss Gilpin had come to be taken. Had she gone out alone after his warning about the dangers? How he wished he had defied her wishes and told Henry Gilpin what had happened in Hyde Park. He felt a surge of guilt that he had not done so, for if he had, her father would have made sure she was always escorted and she might not now be in the hands of abductors.
He found himself imagining all manner of horrors: Miss Gilpin manhandled, struck perhaps, even molested. He shuddered at the thought of that beautiful, proud, self-assured woman being subjected to that. His heart went out to her and he felt the anger bubble inside him, not only anger for her abductors, but anger at Henry Gilpin. The man had more or less abandoned her at Lady Milgrove’s concert, which both he and Jonathan had thought was strange. She would have come to no harm there, but was it an example of the off-hand way he had of dealing with his daughter? Did he think she could be treated like a son? Alex smiled inwardly at that; Miss Gilpin herself would undoubtedly accept that as her due, even been glad of it. He would wager she was not feeling glad now. She would be frightened, unless, of course she had manufactured the abduction herself, perhaps to meet a lover who did not meet her father’s strict provisos.
Could they have taken themselves off to Gretna Green, where the law requiring three weeks’ notice of a marriage at the churches of both bride and groom did not apply? It would not be the first time he had chased after a kidnap victim to discover she had not been kidnapped, but had run away. Somehow he did not think that would apply to Miss Gilpin. He thought she would always face up to her problems. What did apply? His brain went round and round all the possibilities and he wished the coach could take to the air and fly.
‘You are very worried about her, are you not?’ his mother interrupted his thoughts.
‘Yes. I cannot help feeling guilty. I foresaw what might happen and I did nothing to prevent it.’
‘How could you have prevented it? You were not even there.’
Alex explained what had happened in Hyde Park. ‘I felt sure they would try again and I begged Miss Gilpin not to go out alone any more.’
‘If she did not heed your advice, that is surely not your fault. She is a veritable hoyden by the sound of it.’
‘She is opinionated and independent, that is true, but she is still a young woman and deserving of protection.’
‘Then it behoves her father to provide it.’
He could not argue against that and fell silent as his imagination painted lurid pictures of what Miss Gilpin might be going through and that was interspersed with memories of the warmth of her body against his when he had rescued her before. He had not thought her a hoyden at that moment.
‘You will find her, I am sure,’ his mother said.
‘I sincerely hope so, but kidnappers are not gentlemen, Mama, and I fear for her.’
‘You have told me she is very competent and is in the way of running the Gilpin works. Perhaps she will find a way of effecting her own release?’
‘I hope she may not attempt it,’ he said. ‘The consequences could be fatal.’
‘I think perhaps your heart is ruling your head at the moment, Alex.’
He looked sharply at her. ‘My heart has nothing to do with it.’
‘No?’
‘No.’
‘If you say so.’ It was said with a smile that told him she did not believe him.
Of course his heart was not engaged. He had only met Miss Gilpin four times and two of those had been at the works where their encounter had been strictly businesslike. At Lady Milford’s Jonathan had been with him and the conversation had not been personal at all. Even so, he had learned a little of her character and temperament. She was lovely, far more so than he had at first supposed; she had strong views on many subjects and was not afraid of voicing them, but there was a soft side to her which showed in her sympathy with the children at the Foundling Hospital and her wish to do something for them. And the workers at the Gilpin business clearly respected her, even loved her. Joe Smithson worshipped her. Their only other encounter had been in Hyde Park and that meeting had been so dramatic, it hardly signified. Or did it?
The coach slowed and turned into the yard of an inn for their first change of horses. As soon as the wheels stopped turning Davy jumped down and went in search of the ostler and the fresh horses. Alex got out to stretch his cramped legs.
‘Mama, do you wish to take a turn about the yard while the horses are changed?’
They had not long had luncheon and no one needed refreshment and so she declined, saying perhaps she would do so at their next stop or the one after that. The horses were changed in double quick time and they were off again, rattling through the countryside at a cracking pace, overtaking everything on the road, much to Davy’s delight.
* * *
It was very late and quite dark when they arrived back at Briarcroft. Alex would not stay after he had seen his mother and Betty safely indoors, but continued on into the night. With two passengers and their luggage gone, the coach was lighter and they went even faster. Alex was glad he had arranged for the horses to be changed every twelve miles; it meant they were always fresh, though he dreaded to think how much the journey was costing him.
* * *
He had arrived back in town just as dawn was breaking and gone straight to the Mount Street house to change from country attire to something more befitting the town and hurriedly eaten some breakfast before making his way to the Gilpin works on foot. Early as it was, Henry was already there and hurried forward to meet him. ‘Thank God, you have come,’ he said, forgetting to bow or even shake Alex by the hand. ‘I am at my wits’ end.’ He almost dragged Alex into the office where he fetched out the cognac bottle and glasses. ‘I was away for a few days visiting a new customer in Oxfordshire and left Charlotte in charge. She has done it before without the least trouble. I came back as soon as I received the message she was missing, but the roads are infernally bad and we were held up by heavy rain and post horses were hard to come by. It took me over two days.’
‘Tell me what happened.’
‘I don’t know what happened, that’s the truth of it. The last anyone saw of her was when they bade her goodnight at the end of the day and went home, leaving her to lock up before going home herself.’
‘Alone?’ Alex asked.
�
�I told her to make sure one of the men accompanied her.’
‘And would she have obeyed you?’
‘Naturally she would. She may be outspoken, but she is a dutiful daughter none the less.’
Alex thought of the encounter in the park and doubted it, but kept his thoughts to himself. ‘Which of the men was it?’
‘I cannot be sure, but I think it was Martin Grosswaite.’
‘And what has he to say for himself?’
‘I don’t know. No one has seen him since.’
‘Tell me about him. How long has he been with you? Is he trustworthy?’
By the time Henry had answered, it had become very obvious that Martin Grosswaite had to be found and found quickly. Alex had every employee in the place come to the office one by one and interrogated them about what they knew of Grosswaite, if they had met him before he came to work there, had he said anything about his background, wife, family, where he lived, was he a good craftsman, one that might have been employed in another works—anything to give him a start on his investigation.
He learned very little. The man had once been employed as a servant to an earl, he had boasted, but he had not vouchsafed the earl’s name. His carpentry skills were basic; he was certainly not up to anything intricate and they wondered why he had been taken on. On the other hand he was willing and did not mind spending his time sweeping up wood shavings or fetching them ale and a bite for their mid-day meal. He toadied to Miss Gilpin, too, but in their opinion, the young lady was too fly to take any notice of that. They did not know that he had been asked to escort her home. No, they hadn’t seen him leave the premises with her. She was just as likely to have sent him home and gone off alone. And, yes, the premises were safely locked up when they came in to work next day and they had to send to Joe Smithson for the spare keys to get in. Alex gained the impression they thought Miss Gilpin too independent by far, though none had said it aloud.
