Bar Sinister

by Sheila Simonson

  "You want to try Tom's plan because it is Tom's plan."

  "Yes."

  Emily cocked her head. "Then let us make doubly sure it succeeds." She gave a single sharp nod of acquiescence. "Yes, very well. When?"

  He turned from the desk and stood for a startled moment looking at her. "You're a remarkable woman, Emily."

  Emily felt her cheeks burn. She did not wish to be called remarkable. Lovable, yes. "On the contrary, I'm a woman with her back to a stone wall. When, sir, and how?"

  He hesitated. "Within the week."

  Emily groaned.

  He frowned, worried.

  "Never mind, I'm just kicking against the prods. Friday, then. How?"

  "I'll hire a carriage as far as Reading. Your eldest brother lives there, doesn't he? It wouldn't be thought odd if you were to seem to visit him."

  "Only to anyone acquainted with Will and me. We fight like cat and dog."

  "Oh."

  Emily sat once more. Brooding, she tapped the arm of the chair with her forefinger. "We'd best take my father's travelling carriage. A hired coach would cause comment. I'll tell Papa we mean to visit my maternal Aunt Collingwood in Devon."

  Richard sat too. "I ought to explain to Sir Henry."

  Emily sighed. "We'll have to take Aunt Fan into our confidence. Papa, however. He must be told."

  "He'll kick up a dust."

  "Yes."

  Emily groaned again. "Well, let us persuade my father, then, and swear him to silence. Now, granted Papa's travelling carriage, why only as far as Reading? Why not all the way?"

  "Tom suggested that you change discreetly to his carriage at some point to confuse the curious."

  "Do you mean to say I'll be followed?"

  "Not at once, but such an exchange, if it were made with care, would confuse questioners later. After all, we don't want anyone to pursue us."

  "Us!"

  "I mean to escort you."

  "Wonderful. The duke's minions have only to ask if a carriage has passed bearing a load of females and squalling brats, escorted by a man with his arm in a sling. You are visible, Richard."

  A gleam of rueful appreciation lit his eyes. "True, and you're a first-rate accomplice."

  Emily said darkly, "Only since I met you. Before that I led a blameless, respectable life entirely without incident." She meant to make a joke, but she saw at once that he had taken her words at face value.

  "I did you no favour bringing you my children, did I? I'm sorry, Emily."

  He looked so beaten, suddenly, that Emily had to restrain herself from embracing him. After a moment she contrived to say lightly, "To tell you the truth, my blameless, respectable existence was also rather dull. Don't grudge me one small adventure. I've never seen Cornwall." And never wanted to, her prosaic self added.

  After the first flurry of protests Aunt Fan proved persuadable, but Sir Henry Mayne was a tougher nut to crack, as Emily had thought he might be. She would have preferred to deceive him, she decided, as wave after wave of paternal fury crashed over her.

  "Outrageous! I won't have it. You'll have to give the brats up." He prowled the carpet of his bookroom like a caged beast.

  "No," Emily said, mildly but firmly.

  "I'll put a stop to this harebrained plot. I'll write the Duke of Newsham."

  Emily went cold. "If you betray Richard, Papa, I'll never see or speak to you again."

  "Fustian!"

  "Try me."

  He stopped pacing and glowered. "'Richard,' is it? Upon my word, have you no shame? You, a lady and respectably widowed, to be gallivanting all over England with a baseborn adventurer."

  "That will do." Emily glared back, temper blazing to life.

  "By God, I've had enough." Sir Henry's hand smashed onto the surface of his desk. A paper fluttered. "He is using you, madam."

  "With my full consent. And Aunt Fan's."

  "Your aunt is a dashed pander," Sir Henry said bitterly.

  "If by that you mean to suggest there will be an irregular liaison, I assure you, you are fair and far out. Colonel Falk does not come with us to Treglyn."

  Sir Henry was not mollified. "It will look as if you've eloped with the man. To Edward's mother, for an instance. To your neighbours, who are already, I may add, impertinently curious about your relations with this...this..."

  "Bastard?" Emily asked, her voice hard.

  Sir Henry turned a deeper shade of purple. "Emma, you are my daughter. A Mayne. No scandal has ever attached to our name."

  "Nonsense. I daresay there were any number of ramshackle Maynes. What of Matilda Mayne-Wilkins? She slept with Charles the Second, didn't she?" When she was a child Emily had heard the legend of Matilda's royal liaison from her father's lips. Embellished.

  She almost made the mistake of pressing her point but she caught herself in time. Sir Henry did not relish having his inconsistencies thrown in his face.

  She drew a careful breath. "Now, Papa, consider. If only you'll cooperate it will seem as if Aunt Fan and I have taken the children to visit Mama's sister. Nothing can be made of that. We'll spend the time quietly at Treglyn. When it's safe we'll return. No one will know the truth unless you peach."

  "Mind your tongue." Sir Henry did not like Emily to use cant terms, but his protest was mechanical. There followed a baffled silence. "Why, Emma?" he asked finally. "Why? You ain't a fool in the general course of things."

  "The children are in danger."

  "So Falk says."

  Emily leaned forward, earnest. "Richard was set upon in London by hired villains, Papa. You've seen his eye. They also damaged his injured arm."

  "Pah, that's London. Could've happened to anyone. The children haven't been harmed, or even threatened."

  Emily sighed. "Papa, Richard believes they are in danger. Perhaps he's wrong, but it's clear the duke means to exile him. I think Richard has earned a right that other Englishmen, my brothers, for example, consider as natural as breathing--the right to live and work and raise his children unmolested in his own country. He may be a bastard, but no one denies he is native-born." She blinked back unwelcome tears.

  Sir Henry's eyes narrowed. "I'll tell you what, Emma, you're in love with the scoundrel."

  Emily sat very still.

  "Well? Eh? Eh?"

  She raised her chin. "I'd marry him in a trice if he asked me."

  "If he's trifled with you--"

  "Oh, Papa, you know better. No one trifles with me." Try as she might she couldn't quite keep the regret from her voice.

  Her father wasn't listening in any case. He sat heavily in his favourite armchair. "I only wish you happy, Emily."

  Emily swallowed. "I know, Papa. But if I cannot be happy then I mean to be useful."

  "He ain't worthy of you." Her father's voice was plaintive.

  Emily smiled. "Dear Papa, so partial. Richard is a distinguished soldier, a writer of merit, and related, however indirectly, to half the peerage. He is a dear if sometimes exasperating man, and I love him very much."

  "Nonsense. You love his brats."

  "So do you." Emily had him at point non plus and they both knew it.

  His shoulders slumped against the chair back. "But my God, to be leaving your home and traipsing all over the country on a wild-goose chase!"

  "At least I shan't be following the drum."

  Aghast, Sir Henry sat upright. "You'd never have done that!"

  "Yes," Emily said slowly, surprising herself at this turnabout. "With backward glances and dragging feet, yes, I'd have followed the army if Richard had asked me to. Fortunately or unfortunately, all I intend now is to pay a little visit to Lord Clanross's Cornwall manor, fully countenanced by my aunt. Very respectable, Papa."

  Sir Henry's eyebrows twitched wrathfully, but he was defeated and he knew it.

  33

  The house leaned drunkenly against its neighbour. Street vendors and urchins with shrill voices converged upon Sir Robert Wilson as he stepped down from his carriage. He held a
scented handkerchief to his nose against the foul air.

  In muffled tones Wilson directed his coachman to exercise the team, and picked his way through refuse to the peeling front door. His knock and question elicited a surly reply from a half clothed slattern. Third floor back.

  He began to climb. The treads, upon which shreds of ancient carpet mouldered, creaked under his weight. He hoped he might not fall through a rotten floorboard. When he found what he assumed was the right door, he knocked again.

  Richard, in shirt-sleeves, his arm in a sling, opened the door. "Ah, Wilson. Good of you to call."

  Wilson lacked breath for a suitably scathing rejoinder. He took the proffered chair, one of two unmatched straight-backed chairs with which the room was furnished, and sat for a moment panting. Fortunately the air smelled rather better at that height.

  He looked round him. A deal table bore the remains of a meal of bread and cheese at one end and writing implements and a neat stack of papers at the other. Against one wall--incongruously, it was freshly limed--a sprung couch leaned. A portmanteau had been shoved into one dark corner, and a washstand and shaving mirror by the lone window suggested that Richard lived in the room as well as writing in it.

  Wilson took a last, puffing breath. "Where the devil have you been this past month? Where are the children? Sarah's frantic."

  Richard watched him warily from the doorway. "The children are in a place of safety. I've been here most of the time."

  "Why?"

  "I'm writing a scurrilous memoir." A brief grin flickered across Richard's drawn features. "I like the neighbourhood."

  Wilson was not amused. "Sarah has run half mad with worry."

  "I'm sorry for it. I've felt a twinge or two of apprehension myself." Richard closed the door and went to the table. He propped himself against the edge. "Do you recall the letter I showed you from Newsham's man of business?"

  "Very clearly." Wilson shifted in his chair. The wood creaked. "For God's sake, Richard, what have you done?"

  "What have I done?" Richard drew a breath and said in a carefully reasonable voice, "Apart from conveying the children and Mrs. Foster out of harm's way, I've been sitting here writing."

  Wilson leaned forward, hands on his knees. "Blast you, tell me what has happened!"

  Richard complied, tersely, with a minimum of detail. There was no emotion in his voice, and Wilson had learned to mistrust that. As the tally of events unfolded Wilson's stomach churned, nor was Richard as cool as he sounded. His hand cramped on the edge of the scabrous table.

  "Why did you not come to me at once?" Wilson burst out. "At once, when Newsham tampered with your publisher. Newsham broke his word to me. I'd have exposed him, I promise you." He stopped, choked with indignation.

  Richard was examining the toes of his boots. He raised his eyes. "There's been a small problem of doubt, has there not, Wilson? You acted for me this summer because it looked as if I'd be unable to act for myself. I was grateful to you. I still am."

  "Richard--"

  "But I could not risk doubts and hesitations. I had to act."

  Silence lay between them.

  "I've had help," Richard continued. "My friend--"

  "Lord Clanross." It was a guess, but Wilson had had weeks to reflect on their last meeting.

  Richard's brows drew together. "Tom had it in his power to provide a hiding place for the children. I'd not like his name to come into this, Wilson, if you please. He's not a well man."

  Wilson nodded. He was hurt by Richard's failure of trust.

  "My first impulse was to take my children abroad at once, without telling anyone, so that Newsham would lose the trace. Tom suggested another course. It was his plan that I compose a thinly disguised memoir which he would have privately printed in Dublin."

  "Dublin!"

  "Tom is convenient to the Irish packet--he's still fixed in Lancashire--and we thought it unlikely Newsham's surveillance of printers extended to Ireland. There was no thought of publishing the memoir." Richard brushed his hair from his forehead.

  "Blackmail."

  Richard's hand dropped. "If you like, though I believe blackmail involves making threats of exposure for gain."

  The room had no hearth and was cold in the frosty October afternoon, but Wilson's face burned. "I beg your pardon."

  Richard shrugged and went over to the window. "That was Tom's plan, to give me the freedom and the means to embarrass Newsham. However, it would have taken a great deal of time. I still write slowly. Even if I writ like lightning, making a book is a tedious business. I could not expect Mrs. Foster to absent herself from Wellfield House for months. She has had to give over the management of her son's estate to her father."

  "What course did you take?"

  Richard regarded the chimney pots and the dark bulk of the next house with grave attention. "Tom still supposes I'm holed up in some village writing my roman à clef in secret."

  Wilson was not stupid. "Instead you've been sitting here like a dashed decoy, waiting for another assault."

  "I thought I might come to Newsham's attention if I hid out in an obvious way." Smiling a little, Richard went to the table and straightened the papers on it. "You know, Wilson, I once earned my bread for a sixmonth by copying documents, and writing letters at tuppence a shot. It's not a lucrative profession. A fortnight ago I hired a copyist. I wasn't sure he was dishonest, but he looked hungry enough to be susceptible to Newsham's bribery." Richard's mouth twisted. "I'm a good judge of character."

  "He betrayed you? Has there been another assault?"

  Richard nodded. "Last evening."

  "You might have been killed!" Wilson burst out. "For the love of God, Richard!"

  "I was prepared for them." A defensive note crept into his voice. "This time I had my man, McGrath, by me. He's been following me home discreetly every evening from that inn down the street. When he saw my attackers McGrath rushed into the fray. He enjoys a brawl." A real smile lit his eyes. "They were the same two Mohawks who jumped me outside Judy Cassidy's lodging house." The smile faded. "Newsham ought to be more careful of his tools."

  "Were you hurt?"

  "A few bruises. Nothing to signify. We, er, detained one of the culprits. The other escaped, unfortunately. I'm less than adept at one-armed wrestling."

  Wilson drank that in. "You're mad, Richard, utterly mad."

  Richard took the other chair. "Do you think so? I had a long talk with my assailant last night. He is now reposing at Newgate and seems inclined to be frank."

  Wilson studied his brother-in-law's thin, composed features. "Surely he cannot identify Newsham."

  "Oh, no. I rather fancy his principal to be Lord George, though no names were uttered. My attacker has made a full confession, and claims he can point out the man who bought his services." Richard was rubbing the smooth silk of the sling with absent fingers. He looked up. "That surprises you."

  "I'd not have expected Newsham to act in his own person, but I confess I thought better of George."

  "He's been stupid, certainly."

  Depressed, Wilson kept his silence. He could believe George's stupidity. It was the malice that surprised him.

  Richard was watching him again from eyes that were shadowed with weariness. The sharp October light made the toll of his ordeal all too plain.

  Wilson rose. "My carriage is below. Will you come with me to Newgate? I'd like to hear the man's story at first hand."

  Not a tactful thing to say. Richard's jaw was set.

  Hastily Wilson added, "I wish to be sure of details before I write Newsham of George's conduct. Shall you drop the charges?"

  "If possible. I thought I might have to bring an action--"

  "If I refused to persuade Newsham to deal with you. I see. You need not have doubted me in the face of such clear evidence of malice."

  To his surprise his brother-in-law flushed and looked away. "I beg your pardon, Wilson. God knows, I have reason to trust you. This past month has been a little diffi
cult."

  It was an apology of sorts. Wilson had come prepared to wrest an apology from Richard. He wondered why there was so little savour in it. "Well, come along, then. We can discuss our strategy in the carriage."

  Richard took his coat from the chair back and shrugged into it. He did not try to put his right arm through the sleeve.

  Watching the struggle, Wilson felt a stab of anger with Lord George that fairly shook him.

  "I must speak with McGrath. Go down to your coachman. I'll meet you in the street directly. The devil, I nearly forgot."

  "What?"

  "My blackmailing screed." He bent over the stack of papers on the table. "This is a fair copy of the first fifty pages. I told you I was slow. You may need it."

  Wilson reached for the sheaf. "I daresay Newsham has his own copy by now."

  "Or Lord George." Richard handed Wilson the manuscript copy. For an unsmiling moment their eyes met.

  "I shall have Newsham's head in a basket," Wilson said tightly. "He broke his word to me."

  Richard's mouth relaxed. "Lead on."

  Wilson returned to his town house before six with the stench of Newgate in his nostrils and wrath stiffening his backbone. It was one thing to contemplate criminality in the abstract and quite another to confront it in the flesh, whining for mercy and babbling betrayals.

  Sarah met him in the foyer.

  "I've seen your brother. He's well and his children are safe," Wilson said, answering the question in her eyes.

  "Oh, thank God. Tell me."

  "Will you await my explanations, my dear? I've been to Newgate Prison and I shan't be fit for decent company until I've had a hot bathe and fresh linen."

  "Richard is not in gaol!"

  "No, but it's a complicated business. Please, Sally."

  "I'll tell Maman you've found them." Sarah's voice trembled. "But do not dally, Robin, I beg you." Sarah and Wilson had been ten days in Town, having failed to trace Richard and the children from Hampshire. The duchess, drawn by Sarah's apprehensive letters, had only arrived two days before.

  Rather more than an hour later Wilson had completed his toilet and written Newsham a blunt note requesting the duke to call next morning. He thought he had revealed enough to ensure Newsham's response. That accomplished, Wilson descended to the withdrawing room in which, according to his man, his wife and mother-in-law awaited him.