by Jean Stubbs
For a couple of weeks, an uneasy stalemate prevailed. Then the long silence between Ambrose and Naomi was broken by her calling on him at the office. Since that fateful Friday afternoon, she had taken care that Mary should deliver Page Seven, so for a moment he was torn between confusion and joy. Her first sentence dispelled both sensations.
‘Ambrose, I think someone is trying to frighten me!’
They had succeeded. Her face was sallow and heavy, her eyes deep-sunk as though she had not slept.
‘Sit down and tell me,’ Ambrose said, and felt cold.
As she talked, head bent, she peeled off her gloves, finger by finger, and then smoothed them on again.
‘I feel I am being watched, followed. Mostly after dark. Once, I saw a face at the window. Sometimes I think there are figures in the shadows. Of course, we have Joseph in the house. The doors and shutters are bolted at night. No one has actually tried to break in. But I know you are all in danger, because of what you wrote about George Howarth in The Correspondent, and from what Mr Pickering says in The Herald. These are ugly days. And I am afraid, Ambrose, in case these people are going to punish me for lending you money. I have this feeling — and I cannot help it — that something terrible will happen. Do I sound foolish? Am I imagining things?’
He knew the answer, but not what he should say to her.
‘Of course, the George Howarth affair was bound to upset you,’ Ambrose began diplomatically, ‘and when we know such things are possible, we tend to think the worst. But Millbridge has always had its share of rogues and footpads — you may well have glimpsed one of them. Certainly, you should continue to take all the usual precautions — and if you go out in the evening, use your carriage and arm your manservant. The new station-house is not far from you, at the end of the High Street. I can ask one of the constables to keep a regular watch on Thornton House for a while, if you wish — just until this general unpleasantness has blown over. Otherwise I should advise you to enjoy sound nights and peaceful days, and forget about it.’
Naomi stared anxiously at him, trying to read his expression, but Ambrose was a master of concealment. After a moment or two she sighed, smiled and sat back in her chair.
‘Of course, you are right. My nerves are shaken. I am sorry to have troubled you, but I had no one else to turn to.’
‘Had you not?’ Ambrose enquired, astonished at his unexpected eminence in her life.
‘Why, no. Who should I ask? My poor Mary? She also lives alone — at least for most of the time. Your uncle? He is cool towards me these days — and with some cause, I must agree! My acquaintances in the High Street? The old ladies over the tea-tables? My servants?’
Then she became aware that her tone was high, that she was perhaps expecting too much of him.
‘You are always busy, and I must go,’ said Naomi, rising. ‘Ah! Once more I forget. I came to bring you our copy.’
He took Page Seven and set it down on his desk without a glance.
‘Like me,’ he said, ‘you appear to have everything you want. But what we call our solitude is often loneliness, and then the much we have seems very little.’
‘What little?’ she cried, firing up in defence of her solitude. ‘I need nothing. I need no one.’
‘Well, you needed me — or at least,’ correcting himself hastily as he read her expression, ‘my advice.’
‘We are good business friends,’ said Naomi, very firmly indeed, ‘and now I leave you to your work!’
She did not wait for him to open the door. With amusement and chagrin, he watched it close behind her. He walked over to the window, hands in pockets, to glimpse her sweeping out into Middleton Street. He saw her stop and look questioningly at a shabby fellow lounging on the street corner, shake her head as if to chide her fears, seat herself gracefully in the carriage, and order Joseph to drive away.
Ambrose scrutinised the fellow too, but no one could have said whether he meant any harm by being there. After a while, the man detached himself from the wall and walked off whistling, in the opposite direction to that of Naomi’s carriage.
FIFTEEN: HELP! MURDER! THIEVES!
A sound as of quiet footsteps on the stairs. The wind grumbling in the chimney. The shutters talking back. The creak of a door bolt, straining against its bonds. All these are nothing to those who sleep fearlessly, but when violence has been done and promised to be done, then sleepers tend to start awake and fill the void with fears.
So Ambrose told himself at four o’clock of a cold March morning, but what impelled him to walk up Millbridge High Street alone and unarmed, at an hour when any sane man stayed safe abed at home, was difficult to imagine. Did the cherished melancholy of all lovers draw him to watch and sigh beneath his lady’s window? By no means. Ambrose had not the slightest idea in which room Naomi slept. The whole affair seemed nonsensical, and yet as urgent as stop-press news.
He was, in fact, driven by something which is generally regarded as a woman’s prerogative: intuition. Charged by this strange feeling which causes a mother to rise unsummoned in the night, knowing that something is amiss with her children, he dressed and came out into Middleton Street.
The moon was high and acted as a lantern for him. The air was cold and gusts of wind hunted up papers and straw in the gutter. His boots sounded hollowly on the cobbles. No one was about. There were no coaches. The Scarborough Diligence had departed at midnight. The Carlisle Flyer would not arrive until a half after six. He hurried on, obsessed by the idea of arriving in the nick of time.
The Old Town lay in a silver hush. The stately steps of Thornton House came into view, donkey-stoned to a creamy white, unsullied and at peace. He walked more slowly now, keeping close to the area railings, somewhat shamefaced. A sense of proportion, a sense of humour, and above all a sense of the ridiculous, returned. Even supposing that Naomi and her property were attacked by a gang of robbers, who was he to confront them? Had he ever been a boxer, a swordsman or a fine shot with a pistol? Not a bit of it. The first blow would fell him. A sword would be more of a hazard to him than to his opponent. He did not even possess a pistol.
He found the condition of love wholly exasperating.
Still he marched doggedly on, and presently heard the lonely sound of hooves and wheels behind him in the distance, whereupon he stepped prudently into a doorway and waited.
The carriage bowled rapidly up the High Street. He recognised Naomi’s manservant, Joseph, on the box, glimpsed the lady inside, and wondered what on earth they were doing out at this hour of morning.
The carriage stopped. The manservant jumped down, pistol in hand, and looked carefully all about him. Nothing. No one. A dog trotted by. An empty bottle rolled drunkenly in the wind.
Joseph was off guard only for the moments in which he opened the carriage door. Naomi’s hand was on his arm, her foot touched the pavement. And in those moments, four men were running soundlessly out of the shadows on the other side of the street.
They moved with incredible speed, and yet to Ambrose it seemed that the event unfolded like the petals of a flower, silently and with graceful deliberation. A hand floated over Joseph’s mouth, another detached the pistol from his fingers. Two men pinioned Naomi’s arms and rendered her as voiceless and helpless as her servant. The last man held and soothed the horses.
Ambrose’s pulse quickened. His heartbeats hammered in his head, throbbed through his body. He paused on the edge of the scene for what seemed a long while but was only seconds. Then, without thought or plan or hope, he charged into the noiseless tableau.
His boots pounded on the narrow pavement. His voice rang again and again in the silent street. He threw himself heedlessly into their midst, crying, ‘Help! Murder! Thieves!’
Everything became much too sudden, close, and indistinct.
‘So this is what battle is like!’ he thought.
He hit out wildly at one of the men holding Naomi. The other kicked him savagely in the jaw and he fell backwards. Undaunted, he sc
rambled up again, shaking his head to clear it. His intervention had broken the spell. Naomi was struggling fiercely. The fellow who was holding Joseph hit the servant with his own pistol and joined the fray, leaving the manservant lying unconscious on the pavement.
Remembering his school-days, Ambrose ducked his head well down and ran full tilt at the man’s belly, temporarily winding him. Now one of Naomi’s captors slapped her hard on both cheeks and, as she hung dazed with shock, left his comrade to hold her.
Ambrose was aware of fists punching his head and chest, of boots kicking him in the kidneys and groin. Down he went for a longer count, and this time he could only struggle up onto all fours. So he crawled the few paces towards Naomi’s captor, wrapped both arms round his legs, and held on obstinately, croaking, ‘Help!’ until they hit him over the head. Naomi sank her teeth into the hand that gagged her, and screamed the instant it was snatched away. The horses began to whinny and plunge. Unnoticed, the manservant stirred and stared.
Windows were thrown up and shutters unbolted. Faces in nightcaps bobbed over the sills. Three aged spinsters flung up withered arms and shrieked, ‘Rape!’ A retired army major discharged the entire contents of his musket into the air without sighting a single target. And two top-hatted policemen pelted up the High Street, flourishing their truncheons and shouting, ‘Stop, thief!’
Now Naomi strove to hold rather than to escape her captor, while his fellows ran away. Guessing her intent, Joseph crawled forward and fetched him down by the legs just as he freed himself.
Ambrose, recovering consciousness for a moment, wound his arms round a lamp-post, and whispered, ‘This is one of them, constable!’
‘You were so brave!’ Naomi said, weeping, trembling, kneeling by him on the hall tiles. ‘And so foolish! It was very brave and foolish of you, Ambrose, and you might have been killed.’
He sat up and felt his jaw.
‘I think he knocked a tooth out,’ he said.
Naomi held a cold compress to Ambrose’s forehead, which felt extremely pleasant. To his amazement, a great deal of time had evidently passed. Here was Jamie Standish with his nightshirt tucked into his trousers, no cravat, and an overcoat covering the rest of his deficiencies. There was Joseph, sitting on a hall chair with his face buried in his hands and a bandage round his head. Outside, the sky turned a lighter shade of plum; the world was beginning to stir.
‘Yes, you’ve lost a tooth in the lower jaw at the side, Ambrose,’ Jamie said, grinning, ‘and you’re going to ache all over for a while yet. But nothing seems to be broken. You’ll fight another day!’
‘Oh, good,’ said Ambrose and tried to get to his feet.
‘You must not!’ said Naomi. ‘He must not, Dr Standish!’
‘Oh, yes, I must,’ said Ambrose firmly. ‘I have an important appointment to keep. Help me up, Jamie.’
Naomi wrung her hands, crying, ‘No, no. Do not let him.’
‘Naomi, do hush! Would someone be kind enough to order me a very quiet horse from the Royal George?’ Ambrose asked.
‘No!’ said Jamie Standish, supporting him. ‘You’re not fit to ride, and your appointments must wait — but I’ve no objection to your being driven home, and going straight to bed.’
‘Very well,’ said Ambrose, resolved to humour them all rather than be diverted from his purpose. ‘Order me a hackney-coach!’
The manservant stood up resolutely, if rather unsteadily. He looked very white and sick, but pulled himself together and endeavoured to dust and straighten his livery.
‘I can drive you home, sir.’
Naomi cried, turning from one man to the other, ‘But you are not well, Joseph! You are not well, Ambrose!’
‘I’m quite fit to drive, madam,’ said the manservant. ‘I shall take care.’
‘And if you start arguing about it, I shall walk back, Naomi!’ warned Ambrose.
She saw that his mind was made up. She gave a resigned shrug.
‘Then you must both drink tea before you go!’ she said, having her own way in this at least.
‘There was something puzzling me, Naomi,’ Ambrose went on. He passed one hand across his forehead, but could not recall the question. ‘Ah, well, it will come back.’
‘The police tell me you took a crack on the head with a pistol before they could reach you,’ said Jamie, watching him, ‘so we shall have to keep an eye on you for the next twenty-four hours or so. If you feel a wee bit dizzy, or find yourself dozing off when you least expect to, send for your regular physician. Who is your doctor?’
‘I don’t think I have one,’ Ambrose replied vaguely. ‘I am never ill, you see.’ He endeavoured to be helpful. ‘Your Uncle Hamish used to be our family doctor…’
Naomi made a sound of exasperation.
‘Aye, well. Send for me, then!’ said Jamie, amused.
Ambrose nodded. He was conserving energy for what must be done.
‘And, as your physician, I must insist that you delegate your work today, and that you go to bed immediately. Is that understood?’
Ambrose nodded again.
‘He will not do what you say, Dr Standish!’ Naomi cried, suspicious of this unwonted obedience. ‘Does he think I forget that The Correspondent is printed this evening?’ She plucked her copy from where it lay by her muff on the hall table. ‘Here! Here is your Page Seven!’ Thrusting it into Ambrose’s fumbling hands. ‘I tell you, Dr Standish, he will go home and work all day and all night, and disobey all your orders. I know him!’
‘Well, if he’s daft, he’s daft,’ Jamie replied philosophically, ‘and I must be away to my breakfast.’
‘On my honour, I promise you that I will go to bed immediately when I get home,’ said Ambrose, telling part of the truth. ‘Now, are you satisfied, Naomi?’
She was not, but there was nothing she could do about it. Ambrose begged leave to wash. Dollie, the parlour-maid, escorted him to one of the guest rooms and fetched up a copper jug of hot water and clean towels. The looking glass showed him a face that was either white or bruised, and a head with a plaster on it. Dollie brushed his suit, but it had been elderly in the first place and was now past revival. With shaking hands, he re-tied his cravat so that the bloodstains hardly showed. He borrowed a comb.
Somewhat refreshed, he drank tea in the parlour, avoiding Naomi’s reproachful eyes. Then he and Joseph walked out to the carriage together, making light of the fact that the boot-boy had to help one of them onto the box and the other into his seat. Joseph raised his whip in salute, and Ambrose waved goodbye cheerfully, though the action hurt. He waited until Thornton House was out of sight. He lowered the window, put out his head very carefully and called to the manservant.
‘Kingswood Hall, if you please, Joseph!’
The ironmaster needed very little sleep and had been an early riser from childhood. His wife Zelah, accustomed to the management of a vast household and a large family, still left her bed at six o’clock each morning even though all her children were grown and gone. So husband and wife were breakfasting when Ambrose was announced.
‘Show Mr Longe into the library and say I shall be with him presently,’ said William, waving Zelah back into her seat.
For she would be ordering another place to be laid and making the fellow welcome, if he were not careful!
‘Shall he not join us, love?’ Zelah asked.
‘No, no. It is a matter of business, and will not take long. He has come a little too soon, that is all.’
She smiled assent, but did not believe him.
‘You shall see the damned idiot before he goes, if you wish,’ said William magnanimously.
Yet when he entered the library, such a sorry gallant met the ironmaster’s eyes that he did growl, ‘Should you like some coffee?’
He was answered, ‘If it is not too much trouble, sir. I might fail else. And would you be so kind as to offer Miss Bloom’s coachman similar hospitality in your kitchen? He is in like shape.’
‘Sit down, sir!’ s
aid William curtly, ringing the bell. And, as Ambrose lowered himself with infinite care, ‘Have you both been in some sort of scuffle, then?’
‘Did you not arrange it, sir?’ Sarcastically.
The ironmaster replied, very short and sharp.
‘My views on public violence have been made quite clear in The Herald. But perhaps you read no newspaper other than your own?’
‘Oh, I know your public views, sir, but what you say and what you mean so often differ.’
William surveyed his nephew gloomily.
‘Well, speak up. What have you come for?’
Drumming his fingers on the arm of his chair.
‘Naomi Bloom was attacked by four ruffians in Millbridge High Street in the early hours of this morning. Fortunately, I happened to be there at the time and was able to summon help.’
The ironmaster’s exclamation of horror did not stop him. He spoke on sturdily, though his head jingled at every consonant.
‘There are several points to be cleared up as yet, but the number of these villains, the speed and skill with which they acted, and their presence in the street at that hour, indicates a deliberate and premeditated assault on her.’
The ironmaster held up his hand.
‘Was Naomi hurt?’
‘Not hurt. Shocked and frightened, yes, but not hurt.’
‘I am relieved to hear it. Pray continue!’
‘Whether they planned to abduct her, rob her, or simply to terrify her, we don’t know. The police are holding one of them, but he is a hardened rogue and I doubt he will tell them anything.’
William nodded slowly, as though he were answering himself.
Ambrose said bitterly, ‘You know, of course, that this is all of a piece with that cowardly attack on George Howarth? You realise that when they knew The Correspondent was ready for them, they had to look for a victim elsewhere?’