I did not look at Nicholas and went on busily with my packing, which was accomplished in my usual helter-skelter fashion.
“She ... told me she had wished to kill me. I think it must have been she who followed me from the Hag’s Head to the Hall that day, and then I saw her again that night when the dogs were disturbed.” I was tremendously relieved when Nicholas agreed without showing any signs of emotional involvement. “I knew there was someone playing off rather unsavory tricks. But I thought it was Megan’s husband—her widower. I meant to catch him out. Apparently, I was unfair to the fellow.”
“No,” said Elspeth quietly. “I do not think you were unfair. I know I thought those tracks upon the carpeting in your house belonged to Patrick. And all the while—poor Aunt Megan.”
“Don’t!” said Nicholas curtly. He came across the room to where I had my portmanteau laid out and began to repack my things, neatly and with the skill of long practice.
These army officers! I thought. They are forever hearkening back to their precious “neatness”!
Elspeth and the little Bow Street runner stepped into the bed-sitting-room across the hall, and I heard them discussing the crimes. As I watched Nicholas pack for me, feeling inadequate and yet oddly cross about it, my thoughts reverted to the times I had ventured into the Hag’s Head, the shadowy face, the sounds, the sight that had caused prowling Macrae to fall and crack his skull, the dreadful trek of Mrs. Sedley from the Hall to the inn, pursuing this monstrous apparition which she must have recognized as her unfortunate daughter. Small wonder the wretched woman had died of it!
“I must hurry,” I said, trying to change the direction of my thoughts. “Papa will be fetching me onto the York Mail as it passes, and there will be only a very short wait.”
“It is waiting now, with your Papa,” said Nicholas, with one dark eyebrow raised. “You are the most careless child imaginable. Don’t you know you will ruin your things if you treat them so?”
His indifference to my departure was so dreadful that I felt the first tickling of my nose, which meant that I was about to cry. I sniffed mightily and shrugged off his warning. “I do not in the least care, I assure you. In Cornwall we have less trivial thoughts.”
He did not argue with me but took up my portmanteau and my beribboned band box, upsetting Timothy.
Elspeth and I embraced briefly. I picked up Timothy, repeated my invitation to Elspeth, then shook hands with Meg Markham and gave her a friendly message for Mrs. Famblechook. There was time for no more, for Sir Nicholas had already gone ahead of me and was striding down the street with my luggage in one hand. I hurried after him. He reached for my fingers. I felt blissfully content with my hand in his while I hugged Timmy’s soft body to me during the walk to the bottom of the hill. There the York Mail Coach waited while the coachman and several male passengers drank their fill in the Owl of York.
Waiting at the foot of the hill was Father, and as I caught sight of him, massive and heavily wrapped against the sharp northern climate, Sir Nicholas let me go. I ran to Father and asked him why he had not come to Sedley House so I could see him sooner.
He looked over my head at Sir Nicholas and, surprisingly enough, smiled at him. “Ay, lass, but why would I be doing that when a great gentlemen like His Worship asked me to wait. Said he had somewhat to say to you.”
“Yes, but when did you meet him?”
“I assure you, Kathleen,” said Sir Nicholas, “the York Mail takes all manner of passengers, even magistrates. I simply ascended the York Mail in Heatherton and rode to Maidenmoor. Paying my sixpence-ha’penny, of course.”
I looked from one to the other of the men. They seemed to have a complete understanding.
“That he did, Kate,” said Father. “And what’s more, we’ve his luggage atop the coach, safe as may be. He goes to London Town and on to Cornwall with us!”
“Certainly,” Sir Nicholas went on in that infuriatingly calm, businesslike voice. “I tell you here and now, I do not intend to carry you off to marry you at Gretna Green like any bumpkin. I must make the acquaintance of your mother. For aught I know, she may be a wrecker’s child!”
“No, no,” I assured him hastily. “That was Grandmother Kathleen that was the wrecker’s daughter!”
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