She shook her head sadly. ‘I should never have followed them. I have ruined your plan.’
He put out a comforting hand and she took it. ‘All is not lost. If I move swiftly, I should be able to catch them up. But I don’t wish to leave you here alone—you are wet and cold and should find shelter immediately.’
He reached down for the small lamp he had been carrying and held it aloft. ‘Dear God, is that a nightdress you are wearing beneath your cloak?!’
‘There is no time to explain,’ she said hastily. ‘You must go and go now. I can perfectly well find my own way back.’
‘No one’s goin’ anywhere, me laddies.’ The voice had come from behind them and together they spun round to face this new threat. Their whispers must have carried across the marsh, Lizzie thought, and one of the smugglers had heard and come to find them.
The man cleared his throat and spat into the dyke. ‘Whatever yer game, it ain’t goin’ no further. You be comin’ with me’, and very deliberately he pointed a large pistol at them. There was a loud click as the trigger engaged.
Justin’s hand closed on hers and he nudged her leg. She was alert to every hint from him, but was he really wanting them to flee and with a pistol pointing at their heads? The man began to move to their rear, keeping them covered on the march to join his companions, but as he drew level, Justin lunged forwards and caught him unawares. He dived at the smuggler’s legs and upended him. The man hit the ground with a thud and before he could get to his feet, Justin had grabbed him by the jerkin and lifted him off the ground. The smuggler fell backwards with a loud splash—he had landed into the water from which Lizzie had so recently been rescued. As he fell, the pistol went off, the bullet travelling harmlessly above their heads and into the air.
‘Quick, run!’ Justin instructed. ‘The shot will have alerted the others.’
They could hear the man wallowing in the water, his arms carving a passage to firmer ground. In no time he would be on them again. Justin threw the lamp into the dyke and once more they were plunged into darkness. Hand in hand they ran, he a little ahead, leading the way along the path she had just traversed. She followed him blindly into the night, hoping that he had more idea of the marshes than she.
* * *
They had run at least a mile when she was forced to stop, unable to continue. Her legs were reduced to jelly, a searing pain swept through her lungs and her breath was coming short and jagged.
‘I can’t... You...go on... He will not find me now.’
‘You are quite mad, Lizzie Ingram. You cannot think for a minute that I would abandon you here.’
‘But...’
He scooped her up in his arms as though she were no more than a child and walked swiftly onwards. They were soon at the bridge and making their way along the narrow path which edged the outskirts of the town, then swinging left again and back on to the coastal path she knew so well. At her insistence, he set her on her feet and together they made their way down the slope to the cove below Brede House and finally up the wooden staircase to the safety of its garden.
‘Let us rest here.’ Justin opened the door to the stone folly and together they collapsed exhausted on the cushioned seat, their hands momentarily entwined. In the turmoil of escape, they had forgotten their estrangement, but slowly remembrance came to rest between them. Justin rose and walked towards an old chest which squatted toad-like in one corner. Several neatly folded blankets lay on its top.
‘Here, take off that waterlogged cloak and let me wrap you in these.’
She felt his hands tucking the warm wool around her, skimming her body, sending it into tingling alertness. The instant she regained her strength, she thought, she must make her way back to the house.
They sat in silence for some time. ‘Why did you not answer my note?’ he asked at length. She tensed, aware that she could not tell him the true reason.
‘I have been a little busy,’ she hedged, and then scolded herself for such a feeble response. ‘Mrs Croft has lately needed my full attendance,’ she tried again. That was hardly an improvement and he swooped on her words.
‘How long would it have taken to pen a simple yes or no, I wonder?’ His voice was harsh and she felt close to tears. Tonight she had felt herself part of him, sharing the adventure, sharing the peril, neglectful of the fact that he did not know the worst about her.
‘I’m sorry,’ she whispered brokenly.
‘Lizzie!’ He turned to face her, holding her by the shoulders and forcing her to look into his eyes. ‘All I want is the truth. If you find my attentions distasteful, you must say so.’
The tears began to fall in earnest then and she could do nothing to stop them. ‘No,’ she sobbed, ‘no, I don’t.’
‘Then what is going on?’
With a struggle she regained sufficient mastery to say in a quiet voice, ‘It was discourteous not to have replied to your note and I am sorry, Justin, but it would not have been right to come to Chelwood. It isn’t right.’
He shook his head, baffled. ‘Why this sudden qualm? You have not minded visiting me in the past.’
‘That was before...when we were just playing...but now.... you should not know me.’
‘What nonsense is this?’
‘I wish it were nonsense. If you knew...’
‘But I don’t know. That is the problem.’
She must put an end to this painful conversation. ‘You must believe me when I say that if you knew the truth, you would not wish to be with me.’
He moved closer and before she could stop him had put his arms around her. ‘Nothing you could tell me would make me wish that.’ He gave her a little shake. ‘Now, what exactly is keeping you from my door?’
She fixed her gaze on the sodden edges of her nightgown, but did not disentangle herself. ‘I have done a very bad thing.’
‘Why don’t you let me be the judge of that?’
‘It was bad. You see, I was most anxious to find my father.’
‘And you joined the circus.’
‘No. Yes. I did, but this was later.’
His eyebrows were raised in question and she found the sentences tumbling out, staccato and unstoppable. ‘It was when I was fifteen. I met this man. He was a soldier, too.’
‘Aren’t they all,’ he groaned.
‘I met him at a dance in Bath.’
‘I take it that Miss Bates was not your chaperon.’
‘I had no chaperon. None of the girls was allowed to attend dances—the teachers said we were far too young. But we all knew that there was a ball at the Assembly Rooms that night and that the 11th Foot were on furlough in the town. There would be soldiers aplenty to partner and everyone was desperate to attend. But it was impossible. Then Sophie Weston bet me that I couldn’t get there—so I did.’
‘Of course you did,’ he sighed. ‘That was inevitable. Dare I ask how you got there?’
‘I climbed out of the landing window. It’s on the first floor and the porch roof is directly beneath. I managed to jump down without harming my best frock or making a noise—and then I simply walked to the Assembly Rooms.’
‘That could not have been easy.’
‘I wore my boots and carried my evening slippers. It took me an age to get there—the Seminary is on the outskirts of Bath—but I like walking.’ She saw him smile at this naivety and wished it were possible that he would go on smiling, but her revelations would change everything.
For a moment her breath caught in her throat. ‘The return was much easier. Victor—he was the man I met—brought me back to the Seminary in a carriage he’d hired.’
‘You should never trust a man called Victor.’
She knew he was joking, but said seriously, ‘No, I should not have. But he looked so splendid in his uniform and spoke so convincingly. If I’d
had one sensible thought in my mind, I would have known that a serving soldier could not simply disappear for weeks. But I was desperate to find my father and Victor said he would take care of me, keep me safe from harm if I went with him.’
‘You most definitely should not have trusted him.’
‘To be honest, he should not have trusted me either. I told him the most terrible untruths. That my father was very wealthy but lived abroad and that I wanted to go to him.’
‘That was not so untrue,’ he said soothingly.
‘The wealthy bit was. I made him believe I was a great heiress and that if he helped me travel to Spain, he would be well rewarded.’
‘As you never got to Spain, I take it he did not help you.’
‘No.’ She shook her head miserably.
‘So what happened?’
‘I don’t wish to tell you, after all. It was too terrible.’ Her voice had sunk to a whisper again.
He grasped her hands. ‘Tell me, Lizzie! At the very least, I am your friend.’
There was a long silence, then she swallowed hard and began in a wavering voice. ‘We stayed at an inn—he said that Dover was a very long journey and that we would need to rest. I expected him to ask for two rooms, but he said we would have to share the same room as he did not have sufficient funds. I couldn’t argue with him. I had no money myself and all I could think of was how much I wanted to get to Spain.’
Her voice grew smaller. ‘He said he would be the perfect gentleman. I was not to worry. There was a sofa in the room and he would sleep on that. I was greatly fatigued from the dance and from the journey and I fell asleep almost instantly. But then—I don’t know how long afterwards—all of a sudden I was awake and he was beside me in the bed.’
‘My God, Lizzie. Did he not know how old you were?’
She studied the hem of her nightgown intently. ‘To be fair to Victor,’ she said in the quietest of voices, ‘he thought me eighteen.’ And when her companion said nothing, she added unnecessarily, ‘I lied to him.’
Even in the fragmented light of partial moon and cloud, she saw Justin’s expression was severe. When he spoke, his voice was equally so. ‘You need tell me no more. I have understood perfectly.’
‘No, no!’ she exclaimed, desperate that he did not think the very worst of her. ‘You haven’t understood. When I found him beside me, I screamed. He tried to hush me, then he put his hand over my mouth to keep me quiet. But the more he tried to silence me, the more I struggled and the louder I screamed. It brought the landlady to the room. I remember that she stood in the doorway with a candle and just stared at us.’
Lizzie’s eyes were wide with frightened memory, but she forced herself to go on. ‘I thought I was saved then but she turned to go—she assumed that we were newly-weds and I was simply a scared bride. But when I called after her that I was fifteen and a schoolgirl, she stormed back into the room and wanted to throw us both out of the inn. It was only the fact that her husband interceded for me that I was allowed to stay the night.’
‘And Victor—what happened to him?’
‘He was thrown out and as he’d spent all his money on the coach and his shot at the inn, he had to walk back to Bath.’
‘I am gratified to hear it. And did you have to walk back to Bath too?’
‘No, indeed. The landlord sent a message to Miss Bates and she travelled to fetch me. I was in the most terrible disgrace. She said she did not know what she was to do with a girl who had no morals and was bold beyond belief. She was so disturbed that she sent a message to my father and demanded that he come home to discipline me.’
‘I imagine he did just that.’
‘Yes,’ she said unhappily. ‘He was furious. He never stopped berating me—though I think it was more because he had been called from his regiment than because I had run away. He never really knew what had happened, for Miss Bates could not bring herself to speak of Victor. But what I had done was bad enough for him to come close to washing his hands of me for good. All the girls in school were told to ignore me and nobody spoke to me for months. I was a pariah.’
‘That seems very harsh.’
‘Perhaps, but I think my punishment was just. It was a very bad thing I did.’
Justin looked into her eyes and she could see sympathy. ‘And your father—did you manage to part friends when he returned to Spain?’
Her eyes shadowed at the remembrance of their leave taking. ‘He bought me a dress,’ she said sadly.
‘And that was it?’
‘He said that he never again wanted to be called back to England in such a fashion and that I must obey Miss Bates in all things, even after I finished my schooling.’
‘So that is why you are in Rye—Miss Bates decreed it your fate.’
‘She gave me a choice, although not much of one,’ Lizzie said, sucking in her cheeks. ‘Piers—Piers Silchester was the alternative. He is the beau Miss Bates would like me to marry.’
‘You had the chance of marriage and yet you preferred to be companion to an eighty year old?!’
‘Why should I jump at being wed?’ she demanded. ‘A husband would be the dullest thing.’
‘You judge men severely.’
‘You haven’t met Piers.’
‘I now have a lively interest in meeting him. Is he so bad?’
‘No,’ she wailed, ‘he’s so good—that’s the trouble. He is most soulful. He teaches music at the school and has unimpeachable morals.’
Justin burst out laughing and she slipped from his side and rounded on him. ‘It is all very well for you to laugh, but can you imagine being married to someone who never says a bad thing about anyone, ever. Someone who is always fussing around you, someone who thinks you a goddess.’
‘I doubt that I would ever marry anyone who thought me a goddess—’ he grinned ‘—or even a god. But don’t you want to be worshipped, Lizzie?’
Her response was fierce. ‘Only if I can worship equally!’
She was shivering and his arms were back again where she liked them most. She felt their strong clasp through the thin nightgown and shivered again, not from the cold this time, but from the sheer delight of feeling him so very close to her.
‘And is the Victor story the only reason you refused to accept my invitation to Chelwood?’
‘It was a very bad scandal—Miss Bates said that I had ruined myself and the best I could hope for was to meet a man who lived retired from the world and knew nothing of such doings. That’s why she champions Piers so strongly.’ There was a pause before she continued in a voice that wobbled very slightly, ‘I think she spoke truly. I didn’t think—I don’t think—that your friends, your neighbours, would judge me a suitable person for you to know.’
‘Yet somehow, I have got to know you. You were little more than a child when this happened and you were blameless.’
She shook her head vigorously. ‘Not blameless, Justin. I behaved abominably. I used Victor and deceived him. He spent all his money on me and I left him penniless.’
‘It was only what he deserved. Indeed, he got off lightly. He could have been dismissed from the army and put into prison for abducting a girl of your age. He should think himself lucky that his only punishment was to walk back to Bath with his pockets to let.’
She nestled up to him. ‘Does it really not bother you that I have been a wicked girl?’
‘Dear Lizzie, you have no notion of real wickedness. What you have is a very small skeleton in a very young cupboard.’ His lips brushed against her hair and came to rest on her cheek.
‘I thought if I told you, you would never wish to speak to me again.’
‘How could you misjudge me so badly?’
‘For a long time I did not think you even liked me,’ she said shyly. ‘Not until that evening at Chelwood. Bef
ore then you seemed so cold and indifferent.’
‘I was a fool. I liked you too much. But I couldn’t cope with the way you disturbed my peace of mind—and much else besides! You’re not the only one to have skeletons.’
She had an inkling where those skeletons might lie, but her question was tentative. ‘Did your mother’s friends perhaps cause you distress?’
‘One of her friends certainly. I hated her crowd, Lizzie. Hated them with a passion. I loathed the way they descended on Chelwood, even after my parents’ marriage had ended, polluting everything they touched, everything that was dear to me.’
‘You feel very strongly,’ she remarked gently.
‘I have good reason. I was little more than a stripling the last time she visited the estate. She brought with her a group of so-called society women and their husbands. One woman—she shall remain nameless—arrived with her cuckold of a husband and decided that I would make for pleasing entertainment. She came to my room. I imagine I need say no more. But bear in mind that I was not yet eighteen and that her husband was doubtless snoring in the next room. Some young men, no doubt, would be gratified by the attention. But I was not one of them. I was an innocent and deeply shocked. I would know how to deal with her now, but not then. I agonised for days over whether it had been my fault, whether I had perhaps inadvertently suggested to her that I was attracted. At one point I was even going to confess to her husband! Instead I went to my mother.’
‘And what did she say?’ The wretchedness in his face drove her to ask.
‘She told me that I should be grateful for what I could get.’
Lizzie felt quite sick. ‘Now do you see why I do not want her here? She and her cronies are manipulative and immoral. That woman was happy—delighted—to pick on a vulnerable boy for her own base ends. She enjoyed the seduction. So did her husband. So did the whole company who she lost no time in telling.’
‘How very, very dreadful,’ she said in a half-whisper and meant it with all her heart.
For a long time he was silent and when he spoke his voice was filled with regret. ‘I’m sorry, Lizzie, I should not have told you such a thing. That was selfish of me. I have kept it to myself all these years and should have continued in that way.’
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