The Charmer

by CJ Archer

  ***

  Orlando didn't mind being relegated to the back of the cart with Hendricks while Susanna and Bessie rode on the seat. He'd offered to drive and, to his surprise, Hendricks had been an ally and agreed to the arrangement since he thought women not strong enough and his own eyesight was poor. Susanna had declined Orlando's offer and brooked no opposing argument.

  It was market day and Sutton Grange was busy. Orlando remained vigilant for Lynden or Monk but neither seemed to be in the vicinity of the Green. That didn't mean they weren't there, blending into the crowds purchasing goods from carts and makeshift stalls set up in rows across the Green. Or perhaps they were in one of the permanent shops, waiting for Susanna to arrive, or The Plough inn.

  He would not let her out of his sight while so much uncertainty surrounded Monk, and certainly not when so many people occupied the village.

  "It's late and some have packed up and already left," Bessie said as the cart pulled to the side of the road. "But we should be able to get what Cook needs. Oh look, there's William Frate the grocer. Why don't you speak to him today, m'lady?"

  "I'll give the London merchants more time to respond," Susanna said, setting the reins down. "I don't think Mr. Frate will know what to do with orange marmalade any more than Mr. Goody, our regular village grocer," she added for Orlando's benefit.

  He was about to ask her which merchants she'd sent enquiries to but remembered he wasn't supposed to be from London let alone know any merchants so kept his mouth shut. He jumped down and helped Bessie then Susanna to climb off. He offered his hand to Hendricks but the old servant declined with a brusque flick of his hand. He stepped cautiously from the back of the cart onto the slippery, muddy road.

  "There still seems like many sellers here to me," Orlando said. The Green was a hive of enterprise. Farmers tried to out-do each other, announcing their wares in their loudest voices. Since it was already afternoon, many had lowered their prices and the competition to attract customers was fierce. Added to the din was the cluck of hens, the snorting of pigs, and the honks of geese. Women walked from cart to cart, baskets over their arms, and men stood in clusters discussing events. Everyone seemed to be ignoring the children who no doubt liked that arrangement very much. Younger ones played in the dirt and fallen leaves while older ones skipped or threw a ball. A group of about seven youngsters ran past, two of them holding a stick topped with a sticky ball covered in seeds and nuts. Their squeals of laughter lingered long after they disappeared around the corner.

  "Market day is always busy," Susanna said, her gaze on a small child sitting by herself, intent on the rag doll in her lap. Susanna's eyes shone and a wistful smile slowly appeared, but it remained small, distant. Forlorn.

  "Draws the farmers from all around here," Bessie said. "See there, that's Farmer Cowdrey's men tending to his carts. He always has the most to sell. He doesn't come himself anymore. Doesn't like crowds much."

  "Doesn't like people much," Hendricks muttered. "A word of advice, Holt," he said. "Don't try to get a drink in The Plough today, Milner will be run off his feet. Course it won't stop his mouth. Might just make it go faster, actually, what with all the extra ears to hear him."

  Orlando laughed again. "You're witty when you want to be."

  Hendricks glared at him. "I'm not trying to be witty, Mr. Holt."

  "So what will you do while we visit my friend and do some marketing?" Susanna asked Orlando.

  "I'm coming with you," he said.

  Her lips formed a perfect O. It would seem she didn't understand the extent of the danger she could be in. "Then we'd better go. If you're coming along, you might as well put those big arms to use and carry the basket."

  Away from the market, the village was a quiet collection of crooked houses pushed up against each other, rather like in London. Unlike London, most of the houses were only two stories high with attic windows peeping from beneath the steeply pitched roofs. The village itself was small and the short, narrow streets radiating off the High Street disappeared into the countryside or simply ended. Susanna's friend lived in a wooden house with a dangerous lean to it. If it hadn't been propped up by the house next door, it probably would have fallen over.

  "Joan's a widow," Susanna said, "with four children to care for. She recently became ill and I need to make sure she's not lacking anything."

  Orlando lifted the cloth covering the basket and peeked inside. Susanna was a generous friend since she could ill afford to give much away. The basket was packed with jars. Some of them he knew contained her orange marmalade, plus brown bread, dried fruits, vegetables, and a pie.

  "Bessie, would you mind visiting Widow Dawson for some cure-all." Susanna untied the pouch from her girdle—she'd changed into women's clothes for the journey into the village—and handed it to her maid. Coin jangled.

  "Widow Dawson is the wise woman?" Orlando couldn't believe his luck. The wise woman had studied Phillip's body and had been the one to call for the coroner. With the coroner dead, she was the best person to tell Orlando what the body looked like after death. "Is her house nearby?"

  "Just across the road." She nodded at a thin building opposite.

  Perfect. He could keep watch on Susanna's friend's house from the front window and speak to the wise woman at the same time without raising suspicions.

  "I'll buy the cure-all," he said, holding out his hand for the pouch.

  Bessie glanced at Susanna who shrugged and the maid passed him the pouch.

  Hendricks snatched it away. "We can't give him money! What if he runs off with it all?"

  "Mr. Hendricks," Susanna said on a sigh, "if Mr. Holt wanted to steal from us, he would have done so already. Besides, there's hardly enough in there for a hearty meal. Give him the pouch."

  Grumbling, Hendricks reluctantly handed it over. "Why are you so eager to go see Widow Dawson anyway? Got an ailment you're not telling us about?"

  "Hendricks!" Bessie and Susanna cried.

  "That's none of our business," Bessie said.

  "Course it's our business," he said. "What if we catch it?"

  "I don't have anything contagious," Orlando said, tying the coin pouch to his belt.

  "Are you sure?"

  "Quite sure. My ailment is..." He glanced at Susanna. She looked beautiful dressed in women's clothes. Hell, she looked beautiful all the time. "My ailment is of a personal nature. It's not something you'll catch." Although it was debilitating. Utterly. Perhaps Widow Dawson could give him something to expel it. He didn’t like feeling this way about one woman. Nor could he afford to.

  He crossed the road and knocked on the door. The leather and cloth pouches filled with sweet smelling herbs nailed to the wood shook. Above the door was a sprig of rosemary for warding off evil spirits, illness, or perhaps both. Orlando didn't have much faith in most of the concoctions sold by apothecaries and used by wise woman and physician alike. What was sold in the shops wasn't always what they'd bought from his brother's imported stock. Unicorn's horn, a valuable ingredient in many medicines, was more likely to be the teeth of a cow and although the snake skin might be genuine, he'd never seen any benefit come from consuming it, wearing it, or smoking it.

  The door opened and the pouches jiggled as it swung. A young girl of about ten stared up at him, eyes wide with alarm. She shrank back behind the door.

  "Is Widow Dawson at home?" he asked, employing a smile he knew would soften the girl's fear of his size. "I've been sent on an errand by Lady Lynden to fetch a cure-all."

  The girl stepped away from the door but it was Susanna's name that had done the trick, not his smile. "Come in, sir. Ma's in the kitchen."

  He followed her through the parlor and into the kitchen beyond. It was small compared to the one at Stoneleigh and cramped. The large central table left little room for anything else and the herbs hanging from the beams made the ceiling seem lower. Orlando had already removed his hat but he still needed to stoop or the dried leaves would comb his hair. A mix of stro
ng smells filled the room, their scents difficult to distinguish although he detected rue above all else.

  An attractive woman of middling age with golden eyes and brown hair sat on a stool at the table, grinding something with a pestle. She glanced up at him and continued grinding as her gaze lingered on Orlando.

  "You must be one of the handsome strangers I keep hearin' 'bout," she said, eyes bright with amusement. "So question is, are you the one workin' for Lord Lynden or the one helpin' out Lady Lynden?"

  "The latter. My name's Orlando Holt. I'm her gardener, but I'm running an errand today. She needs a cure-all for her friend across the way." He glanced back through the open kitchen door, through the parlor's window to the street beyond. Joan's house was clearly visible. He stayed there where he could see anyone coming or going.

  "Aye, I can see the dimples now that you smile. They said you had dimples a woman could lose herself in." Her laugh was throaty and rich.

  "They?"

  "Aye, and don't play the innocent with me. Men like you know all the women have eyes for you." She half-turned. "Bel, keep stirrin' or it'll burn."

  The girl, Bel, obediently sat on the stool near the hearth and swept her skirts aside to keep them clear of the coals. She picked up the stick lying across the cauldron that was suspended from the rod above the fire and began to stir slowly.

  "A cure-all, you say." Widow Dawson shook her head. "She needs somethin' more spific to her ailment. Too phlegmatic, Joan is. I been waitin' for someone to come to me and buy her a medicine. She's a friend, but I can't give my cures away for nothin', can I?" As she spoke, she rose and walked into an adjoining room. She emerged carrying a lidded jug. "Course I knew Lady Lynden would come round soon enough. She's a good friend and most would agree with that."

  "Most?"

  She set the jug on the table, removed the lid and sniffed the contents. "There's some say she needs to get herself another husband, or she'll grow too headstrong. Looks like it's too late for that if you ask me." She laughed her throaty laugh again. "She runs Stoneleigh now that Mr. Farley's health's gone and does all right for a chit of a thing. Course, she's not been able to sell her orange stuffs yet, but she will. She's got a good head on her, not just a pretty one." She returned to the storage room and came out cradling several small earthen jars to her chest. "There's those in this village that think only men should do the thinkin', and not all of them that say it are the men neither." She shook her head. "Those silly fools are the ones who won't know what to do when their menfolk die. They're the ones who'll need charity from the likes of Lady Lynden. We're a different kind of woman, she and I. We've got heads for trade and that'll see us by in the lean times."

  "So you don't think she should wed again?"

  "What do I care if she does or doesn't? Means nothin' to me. Course, she prob'ly won't."

  "Why not?"

  "Well, she's barren ain't she? She lost a babe once, and it must have ruined her. She hasn't carried another since. What man'd want a barren wife?" She paused, still holding some of the jars, the rest she'd set on the table. "Less he's already got brats of his own from a first wife and don't need more. That'll be her best chance, if she wants it."

  A strange sensation crept into Orlando's chest, like a clawing of his vitals. Susanna knew she would never bear children and the knowledge ached deep within her. He'd suspected it, but hearing the wise woman confirm it made it seem more real, and explained so much about Susanna. The wistfulness in her eyes when she watched children playing, the hitching of her voice when she told him there was "no need" to waste his seed.

  The clawing became a squeezing.

  "And are there any men like that in Sutton Grange?" he asked. "Any men worthy of the daughter of Mr. Farley and the widow of Lord Phillip Lynden, I mean?"

  "Not one that's already got his own children. Farmer Cowdrey thinks he's worthy, but he's just a farmer, no matter how rich he is now. Course, she may not get too many other offers. Don't get many newcomers to Sutton Grange, 'specially not of her class. That gentleman what was here yesterday was the best that's come through in an age, but he left." She chuckled. "A bit too foppish for our Susanna Lynden anyway. He didn't look like he'd want to get dirt under his fingernails, and Lady Lynden likes to be out in the garden. Course that might make the perfect marriage, eh? They wouldn't have to see each other 'cept in the marital bed." Her raucous laughter echoed around the kitchen. The girl, Bel, grinned as she stirred.

  Orlando laughed too, but hopefully Widow Dawson couldn't hear the strain. If Susanna knew that Hughe cared not a whit whether his hands were dirty, she might be interested. Yet Hughe would not. She wasn't high enough to earn his mother's approval and her barrenness would be a problem for Hughe. The earldom of Oxley would end with him if he had no legitimate children and Orlando knew he didn't want that.

  "How did Lord Lynden die? Phillip, that is," he asked, trying to set aside his dark thoughts. He was here to find out one thing and that was whether Susanna killed her husband. Everything else was unnecessary to his work and his reason for getting close to Susanna in the first place.

  "Natural causes, so the coroner said. They called me up to the Hall first, didn't they, Bel, and it was me that told 'em to send for the coroner."

  The girl nodded. "Ma went in the morning and I got to go too," she said, proudly. "I'm her 'sistant, see. Well, he was cold as ice, weren't he, Ma? Stiff as a plank too." She sounded amazed, not horrified. Perhaps she'd seen many gruesome things as her Ma's "sistant".

  "Aye, that's death for you. Bein' a gen'leman don't change nothin'."

  "So you agree with the coroner's findings?" Orlando asked.

  "Course I agree. Who am I not to?"

  "What did the body look like when you saw it?"

  "Stiff," Bel said. "I told you that."

  "Hush, foolish child, Mr. Holt wants a profesh'nal 'pinion." Widow Dawson folded her arms and furrowed her brow. "Well, let's see now. It was some time ago, but I remember him all right." She paused. "Why do you want to know, anyway? What's it to do with you?"

  He shrugged. "I have an interest in health and medicine. I probably would have become a barber surgeon if my father had let me make my own decisions."

  Although he'd never wanted to be barber surgeon, Orlando hadn't lied about his father. Decisions, both great and small, had rarely been his to make. The only choice he'd had was whether to count the goods as they entered and exited the warehouse, or cultivate more customers and tend to existing ones. He chose the customers, but that decision was retracted when his brother took control. It was the warehouse and paperwork for Orlando with boredom, disaster, and banishment soon following. The first choice he'd made after leaving London was to get into a fight in a Southwark inn where he'd come to the notice of Hughe. His choices had been getting better ever since.

  "Well then, I s'pose it's no odder an interest than any other," Widow Dawson said. "So let's see." She frowned hard. "Oh yes, there was no blood on the body, no cuts that I could see, and no markings or colorings on his skin or fingernails. I only sent for the coroner because Lord Phillip was in his prime. I'd seen old men dead from heart failure but not a young one." She shrugged. "Anyway, that's what it was, so the coroner said."

  He wasn't poisoned then, or stabbed. Indeed, the signs, or lack of them, seemed perfectly consistent with a man whose heart simply stopped. Even more telling, the wise woman had not once suggested Susanna or anyone else might have killed Phillip. Clearly the coroner's verdict satisfied her.

  Any lingering doubts Orlando had over Susanna being a murderer were finally quashed. He rubbed a hand over his face in an effort to hide his relief. He knew it would clearly show on his face because he felt it through to his core.

  Susanna was innocent. He didn't need Hughe and Cole to return from Harveston to confirm it.

  But the question remained: who hated Susanna enough to want her dead but didn't want to perform the act themselves?

  "Thank you," he said and turned to go.r />
  "Wait," she said. "The medicine." Widow Dawson surveyed her collection of jars. With a small shake of her head, she picked up the lidded jug and handed it to Orlando. "Take it all. Tell Joan I'll check on her in three days and if she's better, I'll take the unused amount back. It'll rebalance her humors and loosen the phlegm. She's to swallow one mouthful every time she feels it build up on her chest." She held out her palm. "Tuppence."

  He handed over the coin and bowed to the little girl, Bel. She giggled beneath her hand and for some reason, Orlando found that funny. He grinned back.

  "Thank you, ladies. Widow Dawson, you are the wisest wise woman I have ever had the pleasure of meeting."

  "And you, sir, are a terrible flirt. Be off with you."

  Bel's giggle and her mother's laughter followed him all the way to the front door and out to the street. It wasn't until they were all in the cart some time later, their marketing done, that he realized he'd forgotten to ask Widow Dawson for a remedy to dampen his desire for Susanna.

  Ah well, he could always return another day.