The House at the End of the Moor

by Michelle Griep

  Reaching into an inside pocket, the barrister retrieved a rolled parchment and offered it to him. Oliver’s breath hitched. An official stamp marked the top edge in blue ink. Either this was the written documentation of the complete term of years he was to serve or… Dare he hope?

  His fingers shook as he grasped the thing and unrolled the paper, then the whole world trembled as he read, the words blurring together.

  Sentence revoked.

  Full release.

  Effective immediately.

  He crushed the paper to his chest. “Am I to understand that I am free?”

  The barrister’s throat bobbed, yet he didn’t speak—and when he finally did, the voice was foreign. Only once had Oliver heard such thick emotion, such raw brokenness from the man… the day his mother died.

  “Would to God, my son, that I had been at your trial to begin with and this had never happened in the first place. But yes, you are free.” Reaching out, he squeezed Oliver’s shoulder. “You are well and truly free.”

  Oliver closed his eyes, cherishing the words, allowing them to sink low and begin to heal all the wounds he’d suffered. Well and truly free. He was well and truly free! He drank the phrase deeply.

  “Thank God,” he breathed out.

  Then he blinked his eyes open and stared at the man he’d so long resented. The man who’d secured his release, despite his disappearance, despite the rift still between them. “And thank you, Father. All these years, I…” He swallowed against the lump in his throat. “Well, I was wrong to dishonor you in my thoughts, in my words. But no more. Let us both leave our transgressions here. All of them. Shackled. Forgotten.”

  “And forgiven?”

  A smile stretched his lips wide. “Yes, forgiven. It is high time we start over.” His breath hitched as a new thought struck him. Just because he was ready to make amends didn’t mean his father was. “That is… if you’re willing?”

  “Willing?” His father’s voice broke. His face contorted. Several breaths later, he lowered the lantern to the floor, then lifted his arms and held them out strong and steady.

  Eyes stinging, throat impossibly tight, Oliver flung himself into his father’s embrace. His chains rattled and the shackles bit into his wrists, but he didn’t care. God love them both, the iron bindings just didn’t matter anymore. His father on earth and in heaven had set him completely free.

  How long they stood there, father and son at long last one, Oliver couldn’t say. He’d stand there a hundred years more, so right did it feel.

  But then Barrow banged on the door, his gruff voice rumbling from outside. “I’ve not got all night. I’m to take you both to the warden’s office. Let’s move.”

  After a final clap on the back, his father released him and scooped up the lantern. “Are you ready to leave?”

  Oliver laughed. “Since the day I arrived. But what of Corbin? And Groat? Are they—”

  “A tale to be told at another time. For now, let us shake the prison dust from our feet, hmm?”

  As curious as he was, the urge to leave behind this place of torment welled even stronger. Allowing his father to lead the way, he followed the barrister to the door, and after a rap and a “Ready!” Barrow let them out. Oliver ignored the man’s sneer as they passed. Barrow’s imposing hulk was hardly worth thinking about, not when freedom was mere steps away.

  But so was a barking cough. Oliver stopped dead in his tracks in front of Jarney’s door. “Father, wait.”

  The barrister turned, one eyebrow arched high—and no wonder. Who in their right mind would wish to tarry in the bowels of a prison?

  Oliver gestured towards his friend’s door. “I cannot leave here without seeing to Jarney. Not only is he as innocent as I, but he’s sick, nearly unto death. Is there nothing you can do for him?”

  His father frowned.

  So did Barrow, truncheon at the ready. “My directions are to bring you to the warden’s office, Ward. No one else. Now move.”

  It was a risk but one worth taking. Maybe this was even the very reason God had brought him back here. Oliver turned away from Barrow and spread his hands wide, chains grating in a high-pitched cadence. “Father, please!”

  He held his breath. So did the ten-year-old boy inside him. All the years between then and now folded into nothingness. Would his father come to his friend’s aid this time? And if he didn’t, despite his own words of forgiveness, would some hidden remnant of old bitterness rage up stronger than before?

  Something moved behind his father’s eyes, shadowy, indistinct, then dawned into a burst of brilliant compassion. He reached out and clamped a hand onto Oliver’s shoulder. “I can do nothing for him now, Son, but I promise I shall look into his case.”

  Oliver nodded, relieved more than he could account for. It wasn’t instant help for Jarney, but it was a beginning—more than his friend had hope of before.

  But another bout of coughing once again leached out Jarney’s door. Time was a commodity his friend just didn’t own. Oliver speared his father with a determined stare. “While I appreciate your offer, can you not at least get him into the infirmary until you look into his case?”

  “Now that I think I can manage.” He looked past Oliver to Barrow. “Open the door, guard, if you please.”

  Barrow planted his feet wider, slapping his truncheon against his open palm. “I don’t answer to you.”

  A muscle on his father’s jaw twitched. Not a good sign. Neither was the steely tone of his voice. “Officer Barrow, you will answer to the master at the workhouse when I see you stripped of your position if you do not open that door. Now!”

  “As obstinate as your son, are you?” His bushy brows drew into a sullen line. “Fine. I’ll open the door, but I am not to blame if the likes of you catch his fever.”

  Barrow swooped over and made short work of the door, then stood aside, glowering.

  Oliver rushed in, but he didn’t have far to go. Jarney lay curled in the fetal position near the threshold. Sweet mercy! Were they too late?

  “Jarney!” He dropped to his knees beside him, praying, hoping, straining to hear a response—any response.

  A slight moan wheezed out.

  Carefully, Oliver eased him up to sit, while behind them both, the barrister bellowed at Officer Barrow. “Get some water for the man. Can you not see he is in need?”

  Jarney’s eyes gleamed abnormally bright in the dim light. His skin burned, and the stench of him nearly choked Oliver. But oh, how sweet the moment when his friend’s gaze finally fixated on Oliver’s face. “Ward? How did you… Is this a dream?”

  “No, friend.” Biting back a sob, he brushed the man’s stringy hair from his brow. “I am here. Just like you said, it looks like God’s watching out for you. You’re finally going to get the medical attention you need.”

  Feet clipped a few steps behind them, and then the barrister crouched with a cup of water in hand. “Here is some—”

  His father sucked a sharp breath and the cup clattered to the floor. “Henri? Can it be?”

  Jarney’s yellowed eyes drifted to Oliver’s father, then widened. “Cassius?”

  Oliver looked from one to the other, completely taken off guard. “Father, you know this man? You know Jarney?”

  “Know him?” The barrister gaped, then lowered his voice. “He is the missing Marquis of Lambesc, Henri J’Arney. Help me get him to his feet.”

  Oliver stumbled, as wobbly as his friend as he helped his father hoist the man upward. Once standing, he stared at Jarney—no, J’Arney, if he were to believe it. “Is it true, my friend? You are a marquis? Why did you not tell me?”

  Leaning heavily on the barrister, J’Arney looked past them both to where Barrow hulked outside the door, then issued a raspy whisper, “The walls have ears… and I have many enemies. For my safety and yours… it was best to be an English Jarney instead of a French J’Arney.”

  But it was too much. The speaking. The standing. J’Arney’s eyes rolled back in
to his head and he collapsed fully against the barrister.

  “Guard!” his father roared. “Help me get this man to the infirmary.”

  Oliver shook his head. “Father, I am well able to—”

  “No.” Securing his hold beneath J’Arney’s arms, his father lifted his face to Oliver’s. “I’ll see Henri to the doctor. You report to the warden’s office.”

  “But Father—”

  “Oliver, trust me in this. I will not let you down. Now go!”

  He hesitated, debating, then wheeled about. His father wanted to help—was helping. The miracle of it all left him breathless. And God was not done working wonders, for Oliver was also striding past Barrow for the last time.

  But two steps past the man, Barrow’s hand clamped on his shoulder and hot breath hit the back of his neck. “If you’re not in the warden’s office when I get there, Ward, I promise I’ll hunt you down like the rat you are.”

  Waiting alone in a warden’s office is a peculiar sentence in and of itself. I dare not wander out the door to inquire how much longer I need wait. Just the thought of asking the turnkey at the front desk raises gooseflesh on my arms. His nose and ears look as if he’s been punched too many times, and his left eye has a perpetual squint. How often has he leapt off his stool to scrap with anyone who chances by?

  Unease prickles down my spine. I assume the warden, the barrister, and Oliver will appear shortly, but I don’t know—and not knowing raises all sorts of uglier questions that I don’t want answered.

  What if a convict straggles in here while I’m alone?

  What if a new prisoner arrives before the warden returns?

  What if there’s been a mistake and Oliver will not be released after all?

  I pace the small room, trying to outrun my fears and angst and deep, deep yearning to press my cheek against Oliver’s chest and hear him rumble, “All is well.” But it’s not. Not yet. And I cannot keep my gaze from straying to the rack of rifles behind the warden’s desk or the shelf of wooden clubs lined up and at the ready next to them. How awful it must’ve been for Oliver on the day he first arrived, knowing those weapons could be used against him for no fault of his own.

  A knock raps at the door. I press my hands against my stomach. The warden wouldn’t submit to such a formality to enter his own office. What if it’s that horrid, hairy guard Mr. Barrow? The voice I’ve depended upon for the past ten years packs its bags and moves away, leaving nothing but a squeak to pass my lips.

  Another knock, this time followed by a deep tone. “Warden Cawsey?” The doorknob turns. The wood inches open. “Your pardon, sir, but—?”

  Oliver stands on the threshold, mouth dropping. He takes a step. Then two. Then rasps, “Maggie?”

  Chains jingle from the shackles on his wrists. His left eye swells at the center of an ugly purple bruise. There is a cut on his jaw and his forehead, and his right cheek is scraped as if his face has been slammed against a wall.

  My heart breaks. Despite the brutality he’s suffered, I’ve never seen such a handsome man in all my life. I rush to him and tenderly cup his uninjured cheek with my hand. “You’re hurt.”

  He smirks. “Not as badly as the first time we met, remember?”

  “I will never forget.” My voice breaks, bent beneath thick emotion. He’d have died that day had Nora and I not taken him in. He looks half-dead now.

  “What are you doing here?” He frowns.

  Biting my lip, I lower my hand. There is no possible way I can tell him how frantic I was to see him, touch him, drink him in without sounding like a desperate woman. No doubt he’d rather hear of the intricacies of his release than endure the nonsensical pledges of a woman in love.

  Deciding on a safer route, I peer up at him. “How much has your father told you?”

  “Only that I am free. And as such, I assume Groat and Corbin now wear beauties such as these.” He holds up his wrists, and for the first time, I see the raw skin where the metal has chafed.

  I bite back a wince and will my words to come out even and unaffected. “Mr. Corbin yet awaits trial, but yes, your father assures me there is no way he will escape justice this time. The false witnesses he hired to accuse you revealed the full truth in a formal deposition, as did the judge whom he’d bribed to put you away. Ambrose himself even signed a statement bearing responsibility for the unlawful way he schemed to collect insurance money and sales profit by selling his wife’s ruby necklace.”

  Oliver sucks in a breath. “Why on earth would any of them do that?”

  “Apparently the Hawk of Crown Court is every bit as persuasive as you once told me.”

  His brows rise. “Indeed. And Groat? What of him?”

  It’s my turn to shrug. “That is for God to decide.”

  Oliver’s face visibly pales beneath the dark stubble of a sprouting beard. “Don’t tell me he’s still at large.”

  “No. He was found the morning after your abduction, his neck broken from a fall.”

  “I see.” Oliver blows out a breath and turns from me, wandering across the room and back again. I don’t blame him. It is a lot to take in.

  Finally he faces me. “And Mrs. Corbin? How is she faring through all this?”

  “She’s holding up well. I know it’s hard on her, but she’s not as gaunt as she was, and I even spied a bit of colour in her cheeks the day she saw your father and me off.”

  “I am happy to hear it.” He nods, and a hank of his dark hair falls forward, hiding his purpled eye. He flicks it back with a jerk of his head. “I suppose this whole sordid affair is at a close then, eh?”

  “Not quite.”

  “What else?”

  I pad closer to him, then stop a breath away. I cannot begin to predict what his reaction will be nor if I’ll even have the courage to expose my heart in such a vulnerable fashion, but I do know this: if I do not tell him what I came here to say, I will regret it the rest of my life.

  “There is still a piece of unfinished business, one for which I finally have an answer.” I lift my face to his and meet his gaze. “Yes.”

  A small smile ghosts his lips. “I like the sound of that, but to what are you agreeing?”

  “You once inquired if, when you were free, you might call upon me.”

  He goes suddenly still. The green flecks in his eyes darken to moss. I cannot read what he thinks, how he feels, if he is repulsed or deeply moved. Nor does he say anything. I am left alone at the edge of this cliff.

  “That is, if your offer still stands.” My resolution falters, and I retreat a step. “Perhaps I presume too much.”

  “You presume too little, but you are correct. I do not wish to court you anymore.”

  My world tips, until he lifts his arms and encircles me, chains and all, in his embrace. “I wish for more, Maggie. So much more.”

  His husky words hardly register before his mouth comes down warm and soft on mine. Many a time men have stolen kisses from me, but this is different. This I welcome, cherish, need. I grasp handfuls of his shirt and press against him. All the years of fearing men, shying from them and closing myself off ends now. Here. With this man. This brave, justice-loving convict who smells of dirt and filth and musky promise.

  Oliver pulls back, not far, just enough for his eyes to ask permission for more. Bruises or not, I reach up and guide his lips back to mine. The next kiss surpasses the first, but I cannot tell if it is he or I who searches and seeks with such hunger. It doesn’t matter. My heart is his. He is mine. There is nothing more I want than to be one with him.

  “What’s this?”

  Startled, we pull away from each other, but with Oliver’s chains wrapped around me, we both stumble.

  Near the now-open door, the barrister glances at the warden and snorts. “I’ve seen restraints used in many ways, Warden, but I think this is a first.”

  First lugging Jarney to the infirmary. Then getting stuck helping Hoff with a jammed cell door and pinching his thumb in the process. Now this. Ba
rrow pulled out his gun and sighted down the barrel at the beat-up pile of rags between the lady and the barrister, all of whom were steps away from the front door, walking out as if they owned the place. Did the barrister and that woman really think this little ruse would work? That he wouldn’t notice them making off with a prisoner who rightly belonged in a cell?

  “Stop right there, Ward.”

  All three halted. Ahh, but this would be good. Not only would he lock up Ward once again but his father as well for trying to help the man escape right in front of his eyes. As for the woman, well, he supposed she could go ahead and leave. Everyone knew women were easily deceived through no fault of their own.

  “Stand down, Mr. Barrow.” The command came from behind him.

  He ignored it and clicked open the hammer.

  “I said stand down, man!”

  He frowned. Why would the warden order such a heinous breach of justice? Even so, he lowered the gun. Authority must be respected, or the world would be chaos.

  A few clipped steps later and the warden drew up beside him, speaking to the three shapes yet frozen. “My apologies, Miss Lee, Barrister, Mr. Ward. You are free to leave.” Then he turned to Sebastian. “A word, Mr. Barrow. In my office. Now.”

  What was this? Though it provoked him in every possible way, he reholstered his gun and followed the warden into the office.

  The warden sank into his seat and lifted his face. “The case of Mr. Oliver Ward is no longer your concern or mine. It turns out he was wrongfully accused.”

  Sebastian jiggled his finger in his ear. The words might as well have been gibberish, so little sense did they make. “Come again?”

  Warden Cawsey leaned forward, chair creaking, and folded his hands on his desk. “The truth is, Mr. Barrow, that Mr. Ward is as innocent as Adam before he bit the apple.”

  Preposterous! Could the warden speak nothing but garbled nonsense? Sebastian narrowed his eyes. “How can that be?”

  “Men make mistakes. Only God’s justice is infallible.”

  God’s justice? What of his justice? What of weeks spent traipsing across the country with a hole in his boot and hardly enough coins to spare for his cigarillos? He was doing his job. His duty! But then a horrible thought hit him sideways.