Without a sound, without knowing what had happened to him, the tall man slumped forward and Billy looked with surprise at his own clenched hands. He knelt and said in the same sort of coaxing voice that Tom had only seconds before been using to him, ‘Poor Tom, poor Tom’ but the huddled form lay completely still. With a shrug of indifference the huge young man stepped over the body and ran out into the darkness. Despite his bulk it was uncanny how the shadows swallowed him up as if he was a wraith.
When he was clear of the sideshows, he paused like an animal to sniff the air. Then stealthily and silently he made his way towards the most thickly wooded part of the field. Simple as he was, he knew that he must keep clear of people if he was to enjoy his new-won freedom so when anyone came near, Billy veered away. In quiet, hidden places, lovers were lying together and Billy dodged them indifferently. Once, stumbling upon an oblivious pair, he jumped clean over them in an enormous vaulting leap. The girl opened her eyes and screamed as his shadow darkened the star-filled sky above her but the man on top only grunted, thinking that she was effusively grateful, and kept on at his work. She later told him she must have been completely transported to have imagined such a thing as a jumping devil.
At last Billy found himself a solitary hiding place on the highest elevation above the gypsy camp and hunkered down to gaze around. The Fair with all its lights and noise was spread out at his feet like a world in miniature. In the middle, and most brightly lit, was the circus tent where people were flocking in for the last show. As strains of music went drifting up to him, he smiled, beating his hands in time gently on his knees. Greedily his eyes ranged around the panorama. He did not know where he was, he could not remember the name of the town at which he was looking but it represented freedom, though he was not aware of that as a concept. All he knew was that like an escaped animal, he must avoid recapture.
Lauriston entranced him. Pinpoints of illumination sparkled all over its dark mass. Candles shone in windows and blazing lamps drove away the shadows at street corners. Along the parapet of the Rennie Bridge, tall braziers cast their reflections down on to the smooth waters of the Tweed. The most gloriously lit building in the town was Havanah Court, illuminated by Canny in honour of his daughter’s coming betrothal which, he hoped, would be officially announced the following day although most of the townspeople had heard about it already. Billy’s eyes ranged over the town, up the snaking length of Roxburgh Street towards Sloebank Castle, which also glittered with hundreds of lights in the middle of its black, tree-filled park. He smiled silently to himself, relishing his first taste of freedom.
Chapter 12
The layout of the Elliot home was obviously familiar to Mrs Archer, Adam noticed when they arrived at Viewhill House. He and Jockie were all in favour of storming the door in order to rescue Grace, but the older woman counselled caution. ‘Wait,’ she said holding them back. ‘I must work this out. The stable’s empty and the horse is away so that means her father is not at home. If I can get inside I could free Grace before he gets back. Believe me, that’s the only way we’ll get Grace out of his clutches because Hester will never open the door to us. Then I’ll wait in there for him to return. I want to surprise him.’
‘But you’ll never manage to get in, it’s like a prison,’ groaned Adam, looking at the immense iron-studded door and barred windows.
In the moonlight he saw that she was smiling at him, however, ‘Oh yes I will,’ she said. ‘That’s one of the things I learned during a misspent youth. I know a way. Mary can come and help me. You stay here and warn us if Elliot comes back.’
She took Adam’s sister by the arm and led her towards the kitchen area where, in the semi-basement, she clambered up on to the sill of a low window. Hanging on to the pitted and corroded bars she scrutinised them carefully and then whispered to herself, ‘Good, they’ve not been replaced. What matters now is whether I’ve changed too much. I wonder if I can still get through.’
Bending her head she looked in at the glass and saw that the frame behind the bars was half-lowered and there was a marble shelf running beneath the window with a few brown earthenware bowls full of milk and cream standing on it.
‘I’ll have to step carefully or I’ll get a milk bath,’ Alice said to Mary and then started trying to squeeze sideways between the bars. ‘Oh dear, I used to be able to get through so easily,’ she groaned to the watching girl. Then she tried again but the gap was just too narrow and she said dispiritedly, ‘I was afraid of this. I’m fatter than I used to be. There’s nothing for it – I’ll have to take my clothes off. Don’t let the men come round the corner Mary, but stay and help me. Hold my clothes and when I get inside slip them to me through the bars – and be careful, there’s something in my skirt pocket that I don’t want to lose. I’ll probably need it in there.’
The moonlight shone brightly while Alice slipped out of her long skirt and cotton blouse. Then she bundled up her shawl and laid her shoes neatly side by side. Like Mary herself she wore no underclothes, not even a shift. They were unnecessary luxuries for poor women. After a few seconds she stood naked in the half-darkness, narrow-waisted and full-breasted, still lithe and beautiful, like an ageing nymph. Once more she climbed on to the sill and with a huge effort that made it seem she was in danger of breaking her ribs, she finally succeeded in squeezing her white body between the bars. She paused for a moment on the other side to catch her breath, then stuck an arm out for her clothes and whispered, ‘I’ve done it! Now tell the boys to wait and not to worry. Grace will be out very shortly.’
Mary passed in Alice’s clothes, noting how heavy was the weight of the bulky shape in the skirt pocket. She watched through the dim glass till Alice’s shape could be seen slipping ghostlike out of the kitchen and everything returned to silence and waiting.
Inside the house it was very still and dark. Though it was years since she’d been there, Alice was surprised at how much she remembered. With one hand reaching out she felt her way around the kitchen and her fingers told her that the paint was still peeling from the walls. Elliot, she thought, was as loath as ever to spend money where the expense would not show and a rush of anger rose in her as she thought that Grace had been doomed by an unloving father to spend her life in those dingy surroundings.
Very quietly she opened the kitchen door and crept up the uncarpeted stairs to the main hall where the decoration was more ambitious. Huge gilt-framed pictures hung on the walls, the floor was white marble and a bust of a Roman emperor perched on a tall plinth in one corner. The effect was so intimidating and chilly that the hall looked like the interior of an ancient temple.
The light of the moon coming through the glass panes of a semi-circular fanlight above the front door showed Alice the way up the stairs and she tiptoed stealthily, pausing to listen intently every time she took a step. When she reached the first-floor landing, she headed unerringly for the door of the principal bedroom and turned its handle very softly. As she had hoped, there was only one figure lying in the middle of the big bed. Hester, her hair flowing out over the pillow, was snoring loudly and Alice stepped silently across the carpet to pause by the bed, looking down reflectively for a few seconds before she put out a hand and shook the sleeping woman by her hunched-up shoulder.
Hester shrugged off the hand and murmured, ‘What time is it? Have they taken her away?’
Alice did not speak but shook the shoulder again till Hester opened her eyes, half-turned her head and brushed back the tangles of hair with one hand. When she saw that the intruder was a woman she gasped, ‘Who the devil are you? What do you want?’
‘You’ve not changed much, Hester. You’re still a slugabed,’ said Alice in a cold voice.
‘Who are you?’ asked Hester in a voice that trembled slightly.
‘Look harder. Don’t you know me?’ Alice’s voice was bleak.
Hester clutched the sheet up to her face and made a gobbling noise. ‘You’re not a ghost, are you? He said you were dead…’
&nb
sp; ‘He hoped I was dead. Bigamy’s still a crime, isn’t it? Where’s my daughter?’
Hester pointed above her head with a trembling hand. ‘She’s up there. I’ll give you the key. Just go away, Lucy, go away.’
‘Get up,’ said Alice grimly. ‘I don’t trust you. Come upstairs and let my girl out of there. You’ve been wickedly cruel as well as a liar and a perjurer. You should be made to suffer but I haven’t the time now. Just get up and don’t force me into anything.’ Her voice was cold and Hester saw that she was drawing a long-barrelled pistol out of her skirt pocket as she spoke. Any thoughts the red-haired woman had of attacking the intruder disappeared and she swiftly rose from the bed, running ahead of Alice into the hall and up a narrow flight of stairs to the attic. In her imprisonment Grace heard the approaching thud of feet and started hammering on the door with her fists, shouting, ‘Let me out, let me out!’
While Alice jabbed her in the back with the barrel of the gun, Hester unlocked the door, flinging it wide and Grace came charging through, hair wild and fists flying, no longer her meek and mild self. She looked like a raging fury as she knocked Hester back against the wall and was about to attack Alice too when she realised who it was standing behind her step-mother.
‘Mrs Archer! What are you doing here?’ she gasped.
Alice had no time to waste on explanations. ‘Get out of here at once. Adam’s in the garden waiting for you. Just get away as fast as you can. I’ll wait till your father comes back and then I’ll join you at Mudie’s tent.’ While she spoke she was pushing the girl towards the stairs. Grace did as she was told. Without a backward glance she flew down both flights and disappeared through the front door. When it slammed behind her Alice let out a long sigh of pent-up breath. Part of her mission had been accomplished.
Silence took over the house again and she brandished the pistol at Hester, smiling and saying, ‘Now we wait for our husband! Go back to bed, Hester.’
Their vigil was not protracted for soon the door slammed and a voice called out, ‘Hester, where are you?’
Alice nodded to the terrified woman in the bedroom who croaked out, ‘Up here. In bed.’
His footsteps could be heard hurrying upstairs and as he opened the door he was saying, ‘Get up, get yourself dressed. That damned Rutherford’s bringing Thompson here to look at Grace. They didn’t believe me – that daughter of his stuck her meddling nose in.’
On the threshold he stared across at the bed and said, ‘Don’t you ever get tired of lying there? Where’s the candle, where’s the tinder?’
There were sounds of him searching round in the darkness but he stopped when a voice came from a distant corner. ‘There’s no need of candles,’ it said.
Elliot whipped round and stared at a dark figure sitting half-hidden in a chair by the chest of drawers. ‘Who are you?’ he demanded.
‘It’s Lucy. It’s your wife,’ croaked Hester from the bed.
He did not seem surprised. ‘I heard a rumour you’d been seen in the town. Burns the grocer was talking about it. What a fool you are, Lucy. When they catch you, they’ll hang you.’
The half-hidden woman stood up and walked slowly towards him with a silver filigreed pistol hanging from her hand. When she was close to him she levelled the gun and he heard a click as she pulled back the trigger. ‘It’s loaded,’ she said.
He felt beads of sweat break out on his brow and held out both hands towards her. ‘Come, come, Lucy. Don’t be silly. I won’t give you away. I’d be happy if you just vanished, after all…’
‘After all you’re a bigamist and you knew I was still alive when you married her.’ Alice waved the gun at the terrified Hester.
‘No, I didn’t,’ he protested.
‘You did because I wrote to you asking you to send my daughter to me. But you didn’t, did you, because my father was dead by that time and you were helping yourself to Grace’s property. You committed bigamy as well as theft and you knew it.’
Elliot backed away with his eyes fixed on the gun and said soothingly, ‘You’re not going to shoot me, Lucy. That would only make things more difficult for you.’
‘Why shouldn’t I shoot you? You as good as murdered me. Lucy Allen’s dead right enough and it was you who killed her. You deserve to die for that and for what you’ve done to our daughter. Even if they hang me it doesn’t really matter providing I get revenge.’
His tone changed to pleading. ‘I’ll do anything you want, anything. Go away and I promise not to say you’ve been here.’
‘She made me let the girl out,’ squeaked Hester from behind him but they both ignored her as they gazed at each other over the menacing pistol.
Alice indicated the chair she had vacated and said to Elliot, ‘Sit there! I want to ask you some questions. First, who killed my baby? Was it you or was it her?’
‘It was her,’ he said, quickly nodding at Hester who gave a cry of protest.
‘But it was your idea, wasn’t it?’ Hester nodded vigorously at this. ‘You worked it all out so that I’d be judged mad or wicked – and either way you’d get rid of me. You must have been very disappointed when I didn’t hang but I suppose banishment was almost as good. It took me away forever and it let you get your thieving hands on my property.’
‘Yes,’ he agreed, recovering some of his nerve. ‘Banishment from Scotland for the whole of your natural life – and a hanging if you ever came back.’
Alice sighed. ‘And you haven’t a scrap of remorse because I was banished for something I didn’t do.’
He snapped back, ‘You’d been unfaithful! You’d taken a lover and become pregnant by him. That child who died wasn’t mine.’
Her voice rose in anger. ‘How dare you! You’d not been in my bed for three years before I took a lover. You were in her bed – and in the beds of others too if my suspicions are right. You treated me cruelly. You made it obvious that you’d only married me for my property.’ ‘So then you fell in love… But he didn’t stand by you, did he? He soon disappeared when the scandal broke. You’ve not been much good at choosing men, Lucy,’ he sneered.
She shook her head, ‘Lucy wasn’t, but I’m better, much better. But that’s all past. What did you do with my father’s property? Have you still got a copy of his will, the one you took from Mr Anstruther’s office?’
‘Do you think I’d show it to you if I had?’ he sneered.
‘Then it’s a good thing that old Mr Anstruther privately kept a copy. His widow gave it to me yesterday. You didn’t know that, did you? Not everyone was entirely convinced by you. When you told my father I was dead he left everything to Grace and she inherits on the day she marries or when she reaches the age of twenty-five. What were you planning to do – poison her, perhaps?’
The guilty man was silent as he stared at her and she gestured to him to rise to his feet as she said, ‘Now we’ll go and look for the deeds of my father’s properties. I’m sure you still keep them in the same hiding place. You come too, Hester.’
For a moment it was obvious that Elliot considered refusing to accompany her but the set look on her face changed his mind. He knew she would shoot him as soon as look at him if he did not do as he was told.
She ushered them downstairs in front of her and into the library where she ordered Hester, ‘Lift the carpet by the window – there’s a loose board beneath it. Take it up and you’ll see a metal box. Bring it to me.’
When this was done, Alice told Elliot, ‘Now give me your watch keys. I’ll open it.’
He handed them over very reluctantly but before the box was opened a great thundering came at the front door and Canny Rutherford’s voice could be heard shouting, ‘Let us in, Elliot!’
Alice told Hester, ‘Let them in. I’d like them to see this.’
When the new arrivals Canny and Professor Thompson, appeared in the doorway, she was tucking a bundle of papers into the neck of her dress. She smiled and told them, ‘You’re just in time. We’ve been having a discussion about the p
ast and my husband’s confessed his sins… perhaps he’ll tell you, too.’
She brushed past the astonished men and said, ‘He’ll feed you a pack of lies when I’ve gone but don’t believe a word he says.’ Still clutching the pistol, she strode through the bleak hall like a queen and out through the front door which she left swinging open behind her. The darkness swallowed her up.
* * *
The first Jem knew of Billy’s disappearance was when he announced his act to an expectant crowd… ‘Billy, the Strongest Man in the World, will terrify you all with his strength; this young giant has the strength of a team of six horses! Give a cheer for him, ladies and gentlemen!’ With a flourish, he threw a hand out towards the painted backcloth draped behind him but nothing happened. A sinister silence hung over the empty stage.
Jem stepped forward and lifted the corner of the cloth. His face registered surprise when he saw that there was no one to be seen in the area behind him.
Damn! he thought and then muttered, ‘Where’s Billy?’ A sickening feeling of panic rose in him as the next words that came into his mind were, ‘And worse, where’s Alice?’
Flustered, he turned to his audience and roared, ‘Billy’s not able to appear tonight, folks, but don’t worry, I’ll give you your money back.’
The dwarf called Hans was standing at the side of the stage and Jem thrust the leather money bag at him. ‘Pay them,’ he ordered and jumping off the stage, ran to his own caravan. It was forbiddingly dark and empty. One look was enough to tell him that Alice was not there. In a panic he headed for Billy’s waggon. It was dark there too but Long Tom’s daughter was sitting on the steps with her chin in her hands staring at nothing.
‘Where’s your father?’ asked Jem.
‘Dunno. He took Billy for a walk and he’s not come back yet. I’m waiting to give the big one his supper when he’s finished his act.’
St James' Fair Page 33
