Like Chaff in the Wind (The Graham Saga)

by Belfrage, Anna

  There were flickering lights in the window of Fairfax’s office, the main door stood ajar, and they walked on silent feet down the passage, halting before the entrance to the study. Alex stepped inside and fell back, hard enough to crash into James.

  “Oh God! What have you done, you stupid man?”

  Fairfax was sitting in his chair, head lolling to reveal he was – or had been – somewhat remiss about washing his neck. The sumptuous coat he’d been wearing earlier in the evening hung on the back of his chair, and the wide gathered sleeves of his French linen shirt had been pushed back, a quill on the floor under his open hand. Ink spattered the front of his breeches, and round the dirk buried in his chest, there bloomed a stain of blood.

  “He was sitting like this when I came,” Matthew said, appearing from the relative darkness of a corner. “And look, you can see he’s been dead for quite a while.” He spat to the side. “I wish it had been me, it should have been me plunging the steel into him, making him squeal in terror and pain. But it wasn’t.”

  Now that he pointed it out, Alex could see that he was right. The blood looked dry as did the ink, and when Alex touched the hanging hand it was an icy cold.

  “And,” Matthew added, “that isn’t my dirk.” No, because his still hung from his belt, although Alex was doubtful as to how much that would help.

  “We have to get out of here,” she said. “We have to leave before someone comes.”

  “Too late for that, I’m afraid,” Jones interrupted, blocking the doorway. “Well, well, Graham. Now what have you done? At any rate you’ll hang for this. I dare say it will smite your brother hard.” He smirked, his fingers coming together in a money rubbing gesture.

  “I haven’t touched him!” Matthew flared. Two constables pushed their way into the room, eyeing Matthew with suspicion.

  “No? And then why are you here at this ungodly hour?” the elder of them said, letting his eyes travel over Matthew, Fairfax and Alex.

  “I had business to conduct with him,” Matthew said.

  Jones laughed loudly. “Of course you did; business relating to Fairfax and your wife.”

  Matthew’s face went a dark red. “What business I had with Fairfax is none of your concern,” he said through gritted teeth.

  “Now it is,” the elder constable said, “but maybe you should save it for the trial.”

  Matthew backed away from them and in his eyes Alex could see a flash of panic at the thought of ending up yet again fettered and incarcerated.

  “Oh for God’s sake, you incompetent morons!” Alex exploded. “That man’s been dead for hours. Since well before midnight! Anyone with half a brain can see that.” She saw a shadow cross Jones’ face, and narrowed her eyes at him. “You did it!”

  The elder constable gave her an irritated look. “Jones is – or was – a trusted employee. He has worked for Mr Fairfax for over ten years. And even allowing for the fact that we are but simpleminded fools, your husband seems a far more likely candidate.” He walked over to where Fairfax was sitting and touched the bluish skin. “You are right in that he has been dead for a long time, but that in itself does not preclude your husband from killing him, does it?”

  “He wasn’t here! He was with me, in bed.”

  The younger officer gave a mild snort. “My pardon ma’am, but you would say that.”

  Alex stepped between Matthew and the officers, heaving herself up to balance on the balls of her feet.

  “He didn’t do it. You’re just looking for the easy way out. I’m telling you he did, Jones did, and I can bet why as well.” She half crouched, ready to spring, and before her the officers halted, throwing her wary looks. Smart move; she’d kick their teeth out before she’d let them get close to her Matthew.

  “Oh really?” Jones drawled. “And why would that be?”

  Alex gave him a cold look, hands busy bunching her skirts out of the way.

  “Let’s bring your wife in, shall we?” She knew she’d hit bull’s eye from the way Jones’ mouth tightened, but before she could capitalise on that, the younger constable lunged. Alex whirled, a kick sending the young man staggering back.

  “Alex!” Matthew said. “What are you doing?”

  “I can’t…” She began to cry. “I can’t let them take you away for something you haven’t done. Not again, Matthew.”

  “But you can’t kick an innocent man like that!” Matthew sounded scandalised. “He was just doing his duty.”

  “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to hurt him, but I just can’t.”

  The constable straightened up and studied her with grudging respect. “Where did you learn that?”

  “In Sweden,” Alex replied, mentally apologising to the Japanese while deciding this was not the time to give him a breakdown of Budo history. She was still standing poised in front of Matthew, but his hand was on her waist, trying to move her out of the way.

  She shook her head. “They’re not taking you. Not unless they kill me first.”

  *

  James had been watching the proceedings in silence. There was no way Matthew would save himself from this, the constables had already made their minds up, and wee Alex’s impassioned defence had not helped, rather the reverse. He threw a thoughtful look in the direction of Jones. He’d seen the flashing expression of guilt when Alex had confronted him, but to insist he’d done it would not help. In this part of the world, Jones was a known quantity while Matthew Graham was but flotsam, an inconsequential nuisance. No, there was but one thing to do, however much it made his bowels cramp. He straightened his back and stepped into the centre of the room.

  “I did it, I killed yon fat bastard.” James spat in the direction of the dead man, feeling a blinding surge of rage. He fervently wished he had killed him, in revenge of the life he’d stolen from Matthew and hundreds like him, and he was glad the fat maggot was dead. “For years, decades, he’s been stealing innocent men off the street to work them to their death.” He narrowed his eye at the elder constable; a hastily averted face. “And you knew. You heard too many men protest their innocence and yet you did nothing.” He spat again, sinking his eyes into Matthew to warn him to shut up. “So, now he’s dead. And I hope he burns in hell.”

  “You?” Jones couldn’t keep the ridicule out of his voice. “You couldn’t kill a fly – look at you, a walking bag of bones.”

  “Oh, aye I can. And I have. I did it, I took the dirk and ran it through his heart.” Once again, he glanced in the direction of Alex and Matthew, willing both of them to remain silent. He could see Alex was about to protest, but Matthew’s hand closed around her arm and she subsided, eyes never leaving James.

  “You can’t seriously believe this preposterous tale,” Jones blustered as the constables moved over to tie James’ hands together. “Not only the accusations he levied at poor dead Mr Fairfax, which are of course nothing but fancies, Mr Fairfax being a most Christian and upright character, but also all this nonsense about him killing Mr Fairfax.” He waved a hand to indicate Fairfax’s bulk and turned to stab a finger at Matthew. “He did it! I swear he did!”

  “That’s not what you said when you came to fetch us,” the elder constable said, “then you told us you’d found your employer dead and had no idea who the perpetrator was.” He frowned at his own comment, glancing at Jones. “Strange, isn’t it? To kill, slip away unnoticed and then return to the scene of his crime.”

  “And now you get it,” Alex muttered. She seemed on the point of saying something more, but Matthew’s hand twisted into her arm and she snapped her mouth shut.

  James sighed theatrically. “I have confessed. So why are we still here?” He threw his head in Jones’ direction. “He’s just out to grind his own axe, on account of him not knowing if the bairn in his wife’s belly is his or Matthew’s.” James smiled maliciously at the look on Jones’ face, and raised a brow to the constables. “See? A jealous man.”

  Jones broke out in one last voluble protest. How could the constable thin
k this teetering wreck of a man would have the strength to overcome a florid man like Fairfax? Did they perchance think that Fairfax had sat still, perhaps even using his own digits to indicate where to run the knife in? The constables gave him irritated looks; one dead man, one self-confessed killer – why make matters any more complicated? Besides, as the elder pointed out, unless Jones had actually seen Graham kill Fairfax there was no proof, was there? He cut any further discussions short with an angry gesture, bowed in the direction of Alex, and led James outside.

  *

  Matthew dragged Alex from the room in their wake. Only once they were outside, did his hold relax. James was boosted onto a horse, and when the company of three rode off, Matthew raised his hand in a silent salute. Alex wanted to cry. Matthew took her by the hand, grabbed the mule’s reins with his free hand and began the long walk home.

  Now that Matthew’s death by hanging was no longer imminent, Alex found herself prey to a varied assortment of emotions, foremost amongst them anger.

  “How could you do this to me?” she said, trying to disengage her hand from his. “What in the world possessed you go there in the middle of the night?”

  “I had to, I had to somehow make him pay. But I wasn’t planning on killing him.”

  Alex gave an incredulous snort. “No, just some GBH, right?” At his puzzled expression she sighed. “Grave bodily harm; GBH.”

  “Aye, that fits.”

  “Sometimes you’re incredibly stupid. What do you think Fairfax would have done had you assaulted him? Never told anyone? He’d have had you dragged from our bed in revenge, either by the constables or by Jones and his likes, and they would have left you more dead than alive.” She saw that he had never considered that, and exhaled loudly through her nose. “Vengeance is mine saith the Lord, remember?”

  They walked without speaking, stopping now and then to rest by the verge. Alex sat back against a slender sapling, having first ensured there were no snakes in the vicinity.

  “If I hadn’t woken up, it would have been you, not James, on the constable’s horse. And no matter how innocent, they would have tried you and found you guilty.” He nodded his grudging agreement. “And now James will die instead.”

  “Aye,” Matthew groaned, “he has condemned himself for me.”

  Chapter 29

  “Somehow we have to find a way to prove that Jones did it.” Alex tagged after Matthew on their way to the temporary jail. In her basket she carried food, stone bottles of beer, candles and a few sheets of paper, as well as a clean shirt and the worn Bible Matthew had fetched from James’ little bundle.

  Matthew didn’t reply; this had been the constant theme in everything she’d said since they got back, and he had to quell an urge to turn on her and yell that there was no proof. In fact, it might not be Jones at all, even if both Alex and he were convinced it was. He was battling huge coils of guilt that twisted in a writhing heap inside of him. If only he hadn’t gone, or if at least James and Alex hadn’t come. But if they hadn’t, it would be him sitting under lock and key, watching as the gibbet was constructed outside his window. That was the worst of it; the sense of acute relief at having avoided death by the noose. He had no illusions whatsoever about James’ fate – the court would condemn him to hang.

  “I want to see him as well,” Alex said, but the guard shook his head.

  “He has requested that only Mr Graham be allowed in.”

  “Why would he do that?” she grumbled to Matthew, handing over her basket.

  “He’s my friend, and it’s my life he’s saving.”

  Matthew followed the guard to the makeshift cell. Once he was inside, the door swung shut, leaving him blinking at the sudden disappearance of light.

  “James?”

  “Over here,” came the reply, and Matthew dropped to sit beside him in the straw.

  “How are you?”

  James shrugged; he hadn’t been mistreated, and the guards had brought him water and bread. The bedding was as comfortable as any he had had lately, and he’d even been given a blanket.

  “That’s good then,” Matthew said.

  “Aye, that’s good.” James explored the basked and smiled with evident pleasure at the candles and the paper. “Will you carry my letters back with you? I wish to write to my wife and my son.”

  Matthew nodded and cleared his throat. “Why are you doing this? Why are you throwing your life away?”

  “Throwing my life away? Don’t you want to live?” James leaned forward. “Don’t you?”

  “Aye,” Matthew admitted weakly. “I do.”

  “Then I’m not throwing it away, am I? I’m giving it that you may live.”

  Matthew moaned, crushed by shame, and hid his face in his hands. James patted him on the head.

  “I’m an old man and I’m dying anyway. You know that, and so do I. It’s no great matter.”

  “But you’ll hang,” Matthew said, “you’ll die branded a murderer.”

  James uncorked the beer bottle and drank before handing it to Matthew.

  “You and I both know I’m not a murderer, and so does the good Lord. And as for the hanging…” He swallowed, he swallowed again, and even in the weak light Matthew could see how his face paled, how a hand came up to rub at the scraggly neck. Guilt burnt like red-hot coals down Matthew’s gullet, landing to hiss recriminations in his gut.

  James shook himself, gave Matthew a small smile. “Every day I die, lad. Look at me, you can see me wasting away.” James pinched at his thin arms. “He was right about that, yon Jones; I couldn’t have run a dirk through that fat man, not unless he held himself very still and had the patience of an angel.” He drank some more and pushed the cork back into the bottle. “It’s right painful. Do you know the story of the Spartan boy, the lad who hid a fox cub under his cloak?”

  Matthew nodded that he did.

  “Well, I have a fox cub eating at me all the time, eating through my innards in slow, agonising bites. The Spartan laddie he didn’t cry out, he just fell down dead when the fox bit into his heart. I fear that I won’t be that brave, that instead I’ll cry and scream like a lassie.” James clapped a surprisingly strong hand on Matthew’s shoulder. “‘Tis better to die quickly. I’m dying already, lad, I’ve just chosen the way to do it.”

  Matthew came out of the jail feeling relieved, the guilt shrinking to more manageable proportions. James had explained several times that the constables would never have looked further than the man already there, present at the scene.

  “Except that I wasn’t, not when he died,” Matthew had said.

  “Nay, the only one there at the time was Jones,” James had replied.

  Matthew seethed inside, his hands clenching into fists.

  “No, Matthew, you must not. You must promise me that you won’t.”

  Matthew attempted to twist away from those brown eyes, his mind swimming with the urge to revenge himself on Jones for everything.

  “You mustn’t,” James had repeated urgently. “You’ll never win against him here. He’s the establishment, you’re but a disgruntled former slave.”

  Matthew had promised, seeing James sink together with relief.

  Once outside, he stood in the uncomfortable heat and regarded his wife, sitting on the bench where he had left her. Her wide-brimmed hat hid most of her face from view, one rebellious strand of hair having escaped to shimmer in the sunlight.

  “You look like a demure maiden,” Matthew said, sitting down beside her.

  Alex made an irritated noise and returned her work to her pouch. “Appearances can deceive.”

  Halfway home she hurried over to stand in the shade of some trees, complaining loudly about this infernal heat.

  “This is nothing, you wait until August, then you can talk about heat.” He stood relaxed beside her, studying the few people who had dared the humid midday heat of this Sunday late in June. “The guards were talking about you.”

  “Me? Why?”

  “On acc
ount of what you did earlier today.”

  “Earlier? Oh, you mean when I sent the constable flying.” She hitched her shoulders. “I didn’t hurt him, you know I can do far worse.”

  “It isn’t seemly.”

  She stuck her tongue out at him. “See if I care.”

  “Alex,” Matthew sighed, “they could have put you in the pillory.” He nodded at the look on her face. “Aye, you don’t want to experience that, do you?”

  “What was I supposed to do? Have them drag you away?”

  “I don’t need you to fight for me!” He softened his tone at her hurt look. “You’re my wife; it is I that should do the defending.”

  “This is a tough world,” she said, “and I must be able to defend myself and mine.” He agreed but extracted a promise that she would do no more fighting until the child was born, before asking her how she retained her skills.

  She shrugged. “I practice.” Twice a week at minimum, she told him.

  *

  After a couple of minutes in the shade, they resumed their walk, Matthew with his hands clasped behind his back and a severe look on his face. He looked haggard – no wonder, given that he hadn’t slept all night, and on top of that he was probably wallowing in a quagmire of recriminations. Alex’s eyes drifted to his neck, her hand strayed to her throat.

  “Is he scared?”

  “Nay. He seemed…at peace.” He gave her a brief summary of the conversation he’d had with James.

  “Not my choice of euthanasia,” Alex said, vividly imagining the burning sensation as the rope closed around the tender skin of her neck.

  “The drop will kill him, and we’ll give him the means to get royally drunk beforehand.”

  She just nodded, sick to her stomach. Poor James to die in front of so many people and not one to hold his hand.

  A shout behind them startled them, and they turned to see the stout figure of the harbourmaster waving something at them.