The Unknown Ajax

by Georgette Heyer

  ‘If your brother was shot, sir, the reason was that he was mistaken for Mr Richmond Darracott!’

  Claud, listening to this with dropped jaw, said, in a dazed voice: ‘I was shot, because I was– Dash it, I don’t look like Richmond!’

  ‘You are of much the same height and build, sir, and I had good reason to believe that he was abroad tonight.’

  ‘But you can’t shoot at everyone who’s the same height and build as my cousin! Besides, what’s it got to do with you if he was abroad? Never heard anything to equal it in my life! You must be mad!’ said Claud, stunned.

  ‘He’s got it firmly fixed in his head that our Richmond is mixed up with the free-traders,’ explained Hugo.

  ‘Well, that proves he’s mad. If my head weren’t swimming so– What I mean is – nothing to do with me, if he was mixed up with them! Silly notion, anyway. And then I think –’ He put up a hand to his shoulder, cautiously feeling it, and wincing. ‘I don’t know what you’ve done to me,’ he said fretfully, to his valet. ‘It’s too tight. Devilish uncomfortable!’

  ‘Pray do not touch it, sir! I implore you, sir, do not try to shift those bandages!’

  ‘Something sticking into me,’ muttered Claud, closing his eyes again.

  ‘Yes, sir, but it was necessary to bind a thick pad over the wound,’ said Polyphant soothingly. ‘We fear that the bullet may be deeply lodged, so you must not –’

  ‘What!’ Claud’s eyes flew open. ‘You mean to tell me I’ve got a bullet in me?’

  ‘It’ll be dug out, never fear!’ Hugo consoled him.

  ‘Oh, no!’ moaned Claud.

  ‘Mr Darracott, I have two questions which I shall be obliged if you will answer! That will not, I trust, exhaust you! Why were you wearing a mask, and why did you run away when commanded to halt, in the King’s name?’

  ‘Take this fellow away!’ begged Claud feebly. ‘A bullet lodged in me! It may be fatal! And all the fellow can do is to stand there, asking me questions! How was I to know what they were shouting? Next you’ll say I should have begged pardon and asked them to speak more clear – Polyphant, where is the bullet lodged? I am feeling very low.’

  ‘And the mask, sir?’ demanded Ottershaw inexorably.

  ‘Very low indeed! Shouldn’t wonder if I fainted away again. Dashed if I’ll answer you! No concern of yours!’

  ‘Were you wearing a mask, Claud?’ said Vincent, looking amused. ‘Now, I wonder if I could hazard a guess? Rather a late hour for a ramble in the wood, was it not? Unless you wished for some reason to go by the shortest way to the village – or to meet someone, not far from – perhaps – the smithy?’

  ‘You go to the devil!’ said Claud sulkily. ‘And you can take that nosy tidewatcher with you!’

  ‘I wonder if any of my cattle want shoeing? I feel sure they do. I have a positively burning curiosity to see that game-pullet of yours, Claud. But I shan’t wear a mask, however savage her brother may be. What Hugo can do, I can!’

  ‘Leave the poor lad alone!’ said Hugo reprovingly, but with a grin. He laid his fingers on Claud’s limp wrist for a minute. ‘Yes, I think the sooner we get him to bed the better it will be.’

  ‘If I may say so, I am entirely of your mind, sir!’ said Polyphant. ‘Knowing Mr Claud’s constitution as I do, I shall make bold to say that he will be in a high fever if we do not procure for him a little quiet!’

  Hugo nodded, and looked at Ottershaw. ‘Well, lad, you’ve had your wish, and kicked up a rare scrow-row into the bargain, but happen it’s time you took your leave now,’ he said, not unkindly, but with a certain authority in his deep voice.

  The Lieutenant stared up into his face, his eyes hard and searching, his lips tightly compressed. For several moments he did not speak: to the Darracotts the moments seemed hours. The Sergeant cleared his throat, and moved towards the door, but Ottershaw paid no heed. He could read nothing in Hugo’s calm face but slight amusement, nor did those very blue eyes waver. Could any man appear so totally unconcerned unless he was as innocent as the Major looked? Some, perhaps, but this enormous, simple creature – ? Nothing could have been clumsier than his efforts to keep Richmond’s mother and grandfather in ignorance of his condition; his naïve attempts at deception had been the blunderings of the big, good-natured, stupid man he appeared to be. But was he? There was no subtlety in his face, as there was in Vincent Darracott’s; his eyes were sometimes grave, and sometimes twinkling, but they were the eyes of a child: they gazed innocently upon the world, there was no thought behind them.

  The Lieutenant glanced at Richmond. It struck him that Richmond was too pale; paler, surely, than he had been a few minutes earlier? His eyes narrowed, intently watching the boy. It was useless to question him: if he was drunk his answers would be valueless; if he was pretending to be drunk he could make them so. He was leaning forward, both his arms on the table, foolishly trying to stand the stopper of the decanter on end, using both hands impartially. It was incredible that he could sit like that, vacantly smiling, if he had a bullet lodged in him; it was incredible that he should be sitting in that chair at all under such circumstances: surely he must have swooned from sheer weakness? But he was certainly growing paler.

  ‘Vincent!’

  The Major’s voice was lowered. Ottershaw’s suspicious eyes went instantly to his face, but Hugo was no longer looking at him, he was looking at Richmond, a rather rueful smile on his lips. He glanced towards Vincent, and significantly directed his attention to Richmond, saying, in an undervoice: ‘From the looks of it, he’ll be casting up his accounts before he’s much older. Better get him to bed.’

  ‘Damn the brat!’ said Vincent. ‘Inevitable, of course! He will in all probability cast ’em up as soon as he gets to his feet. What a singularly disagreeable evening this has been, to be sure!’

  He went up to the table as he spoke, and grasped Richmond’s left arm, just above the elbow, as though to pull him to his feet. ‘Come along, bantam!’ he said. ‘Bedtime!’

  Richmond hiccupped. ‘I don’t want to go to bed.’

  ‘One moment!’ Ottershaw said suddenly, obedient to an insistent, inner prompting. ‘Before you retire, Mr Richmond, oblige me, please, by removing your coat!’

  Twenty-one

  Well, upon my word!’ cried Anthea, as though she could no longer restrain herself. ‘Mr Ottershaw, are you indeed mad, or merely determined to insult us! I never heard of anything so outrageous in my life! Who are you to throw orders about in this house? Pray how many people have been fired on tonight?’

  Uncertainty, chagrin, the intangible feeling that he was being fooled to the top of his bent, were making the Lieutenant lose his temper. He snapped back accusingly: ‘Only one, Miss Darracott!’

  She stared at him, her eyes blazing. ‘Only– Why, you – you impertinent idiot! Do you know what you are saying? Do you seriously imagine that I – my grandfather – my cousins – all of us, in fact: every member of the household! – are engaged in the smuggling trade?’

  ‘No! But that you are engaged in protecting Mr Richmond Darracott, yes!’ he said recklessly.

  ‘Don’t be so daft, Ottershaw!’ said Hugo quietly.

  Anthea paid no heed, but gave a scornful, angry laugh, and said: ‘Well, I hope you know how my brother has contrived to become a smuggler without anyone’s being the wiser, for I can assure you I don’t! When I think of the way every single soul at Darracott Place fusses and cossets him– Oh, what is the use of talking to you? You are out of your senses!’ She swung round towards Lord Darracott, demanding impetuously: ‘Grandpapa, how much more of this do you mean to endure?’

  ‘Let him go to his length, my girl!’ he replied. ‘The farther the better! Do you think I mean to stop him tieing the noose round his own neck? I don’t, pea-goose!’

  Sergeant Hoole stepped forward, laying a hand on the Lieutenant’s arm. ‘Sir!’ he utte
red imploringly. ‘Begging your pardon, but –’

  Ottershaw shook him off. He had gone too far to draw back, and the voice within his brain that urged him not to let these Darracotts outjockey him was growing every second more insistent. Rather pale, but with his jaw out-thrust, he said: ‘If Mr Richmond Darracott is unhurt, why should he hesitate to remove his coat, so that I may be convinced by the evidence of my own eyes that it is so?’

  Hugo, who had bent over Claud, adjusting the sling that supported his left arm, straightened himself, saying: ‘Oh, for God’s sake, take your coat off, Richmond, and your waistcoat too! Let’s be done with this business!’

  Richmond might be pale, but his eyes, tremendously alive, gave the lie to the drawn look on his face, not a trace of fear in them. He gave a gleeful chuckle, and pointed a derisive finger at the Major. ‘Who said I couldn’t bamboozle the Exciseman? Who said he was too fly to the time of day to be hoaxed by a silly schoolboy? I’ve done it! Vincent, do you know what Hugo –’

  ‘I’m going to say something more, when you’re sober enough to attend to me,’ said Hugo, somewhat grimly. ‘Happen you won’t find that so amusing! In the meantime, we’ve had more than enough of your hoax, so take your coat off, and let me have no argument about it!’

  Richmond’s laughter was quenched. He looked resentfully at his large cousin, saying sulkily: ‘I don’t know why I need do as you say. I don’t care for what you think. Nothing to do with you!’

  ‘Help him off with it, Vincent!’ said Hugo curtly.

  At this point Claud, who had opened his eyes some few minutes previously, demanded, in bewildered accents: ‘What the devil does that fellow want with Richmond’s coat? Dash it, he is mad!’

  ‘Don’t fatch!’ said Hugo. ‘He thinks it’s Richmond that was shot, and not you at all, so the easiest way to prove him wrong –’

  ‘Thinks – thinks I wasn’t shot?’ gasped Claud, galvanized into struggling up on to his right elbow. ‘Oh, so that’s what you think, is it, you murderous lunatic? Then let me tell you –’

  ‘You young fool, keep still! Claud – !’ exclaimed Hugo, taking two hasty strides to the head of the sofa, as Claud, with every sign of one exerting a superhuman effort, dragged himself up from the cushions, panting, and making unavailing attempts to speak. ‘Nay then, lad! Gently now!’ he begged, his arms round Claud. ‘You’ll do yourself an injury, you silly lad! You mustn’t –’

  ‘Don’t you talk to me!’ raged Claud, between laboured breaths. ‘If you think– Ow – !’

  The anguish throbbing in this sharp cry was so real that even Vincent was startled, while Anthea could almost have exclaimed Bravo! Ottershaw, who had been paying no heed to him, but keeping his eyes fixed on Richmond, just about to let Vincent pull off his coat, turned involuntarily.

  ‘Hugo, you – you – !’

  ‘Nay, lad, it’s your own fault!’ protested Hugo. ‘Stop wriggling about like –’

  ‘You put your great, clumsy hand right on– Oh – ah – ugh – !’ moaned Claud, reduced again to extremis.

  ‘Brandy, Polyphant!’ Hugo said, his anxious gaze on Claud’s face. He shifted him slightly, and stretched out an imperative hand. ‘Or the salts! Anything, only give it to me quickly!’

  A tiny, perfectly spontaneous shriek escaped Anthea. ‘Hugo – ! Your hand!’ she stammered, her dilating eyes riveted to it.

  ‘Good God!’ ejaculated Vincent involuntarily.

  Hugo looked round, surprised, at Anthea, and then at his own bloodstained palm. ‘Oh, my God!’ he uttered, swiftly glancing down at Claud’s back, which only he was in a position to see.

  ‘Sir – !’ exclaimed Polyphant reproachfully, and darting forward to snatch up some lint from the pile on the floor. ‘No, no, let me, sir! I beg pardon, but pray don’t– Just hold him, if you please! Oh, dear, oh, dear! Miss Anthea, the longest strip of linen you can find – or knot two together – anything! Don’t move, Mr Claud! I implore you, sir, don’t move!’

  Since no one in the room had seen the Major pick up several of the blood-soaked swabs from the bowl still standing on the chair beside the sofa, and close his hand on them, it was hardly surprising that the sight of his horridly reddened palm should have come as a shock to the rest of his family. Had Lieutenant Ottershaw not been far too much shocked himself to think of studying the expressions on the faces of his companions, one glance must have satisfied him that the Darracotts were honestly horrified.

  Anthea was the first to recover her wits, and to rush to the sofa, scolding distractedly; Vincent was swift to follow suit. Both blamed Hugo for having handled the drooping Claud with abominable clumsiness; my lord joined in, directing his menaces, however, towards Lieutenant Ottershaw, for being the real cause of this fresh disaster; and the Sergeant, prompted by real dismay, and a very lively dread of the consequences, seized the opportunity provided by all this commotion to represent to Ottershaw, with all the eloquence at his command, that any more attempts to exacerbate the Darracotts would only bring them both to ruin.

  It was at this moment that Lady Aurelia entered the room, and, halting on the threshold, demanded, in a voice which, without being raised to any vulgar pitch, easily penetrated the hubbub: ‘What, may I ask, is the meaning of this extraordinary scene?’

  Such was the effect of her commanding eye, and air of supreme assurance, that Lieutenant Ottershaw found himself, to his subsequent fury, adding his voice to those of Anthea and Vincent, in an attempt to present her ladyship with the explanation she desired.

  She seemed to grasp the gist of what was told her with all the rapidity of a powerful intelligence; and, considerably before the various accounts had been brought to their conclusions, paralysed the company by uttering, in icy yet ominous accents: ‘Be silent, if you please! I have heard enough!’

  She then swept forward to the sofa, Anthea, Vincent, and the Major giving way instinctively before her, and bent over Claud, feeling his brow, and his wrist. Magnificently ignoring everyone else, she exchanged a few words with Polyphant, who had remained devotedly at the head of the sofa; and, upon Claud’s venturing to open his eyes sufficiently to cast a doubtful, slightly nervous glance up at her, said with calm kindness: ‘You will keep perfectly still, my son: do you understand me? You have no need to trouble yourself about anything, for Mama is here, and will make you better directly.’

  She then turned, and looked round the room, with all the lofty contempt natural to the descendant of eleven Earls, all of whom, if not otherwise distinguished, had been remarkable for the high-handed and very successful way with which they had dealt with inferior persons, and overridden all opposition to their domestic decrees. No one saw these august personages range themselves at Lady Aurelia’s back, but (as her appreciative elder son afterwards asserted) no one could doubt that they had all of them hurried to the support of so worthy a daughter.

  ‘I do not know,’ she stated, in a tone of dispassionate censure, ‘why I have been obliged to come downstairs to discover for myself the precise nature of Claud’s injury, but I do not attempt to conceal from you that I am excessively displeased. Your conduct, Vincent, I consider particularly reprehensible, for it was on the understanding that you would instantly apprise me of it, if you found your brother’s injury to be of a serious character, that I allowed myself to be persuaded to remain upstairs. Neither you nor Anthea, whom I must deem to have been gravely at fault, are so stupid as to have supposed that the accident was of a trifling nature. I shall say no more to you, Hugo, than that I trust you will in future refrain from making well-meaning but foolish attempts to conceal from some other female in my position the very dangerous state in which one of her children may be lying. Pray do not answer me! I have neither the time nor the desire to listen to excuses or apologies. You will all of you, with the exception of Polyphant, be so good as to leave this room immediately. Vincent, since I apprehend that Richmond is disgracefully i
nebriated, you will please assist him to his bedchamber. I do not presume to dictate to you, my lord, but since there is nothing for you to do here I am persuaded you will be very much more comfortable in your library.’ Her eyes next fell on Lieutenant Ottershaw, and after considering him for a moment or two in a way that made the Sergeant feel profoundly thankful that her gaze had swept past him, said, without the slightest change of intonation: ‘You, I believe, are the author of this outrage. I collect that you are in the services of the Board of Customs. I shall be obliged to you if you will furnish me with your name, and style.’

  The Lieutenant’s colour was considerably heightened, but he replied with commendable readiness: ‘My name is Ottershaw, ma’am – Thomas Ottershaw, and I am a Riding-officer of the Customs’ Land-Guard. Allow me to assure your ladyship that, while I do not seek to disclaim responsibility for whatever injury Mr Darracott has suffered, my explicit order was that no shot was to be fired, other than a warning shot over the head of any person failing to obey a summons to halt in the King’s name. I regret very much that an accident should have occurred, but I must take leave to inform your ladyship of the circumstances which led –’

  ‘Pray say no more!’ she interrupted. ‘I am neither deaf nor slow of understanding, and since I was present when you made known to his lordship the precise nature of your errand any further explanation would be superfluous. Let me make it plain to you that whatever may be my opinion of the accusation you then made, I am not concerned with my nephew’s affairs, but with the attack upon my son. I have nothing further to add, except that I shall immediately lay the matter before my husband. No doubt he will know what action to take. As a mere female, I cannot consider myself competent to deal with such an affair. I will not detain you any longer. If you have anything further to do in this house, pray desire Major Darracott to conduct you to some other room!’

  With these measured words, she turned to Polyphant, and began to question him on the exact nature of Claud’s injury, wholly ignoring her stunned audience.