One of the men, a hulking brute of a fellow, punched a lightly built woman full in the face. She went flying backwards, passing between the standing Buckingham Joe and Lancer, blood spurting from her mouth and nose.
The fellow came after her, preparing himself to jump on her with both feet when she hit the floor, but Buckingham Joe put out a foot to trip him neatly. As the itinerant was pitching forwards, the highwayman swung his arm to hit him hard on the back of the neck so that his face smashed into a table to the cracking, creaking sounds of bones breaking and gristle giving way.
Raging like an angry bull, the second man launched himself at the highwayman. But Lancer was standing between them. Turning his back on the charging man, Lancer timed it just right to drive his right elbow hard into the itinerant’s midriff. The body blow knocked the man back a few steps, and he made a noise that was a blending of a grunt of pain, a belch, and the beginning of a bout of vomiting. Without turning, working through some kind of sixth sense that had served him well on the battlegrounds of the world, Lancer flung his right arm out behind him to smash the man in the face with a mighty, back-handed blow.
With the two itinerant men lying on the floor of the inn, senseless, both of them bleeding heavily from the face, Buckingham Joe coolly finished his drink, straightened his frock-coat daintily, and commented to Lancer, ‘I told you we could do well together.’
They went towards the door, with Buckingham Joe putting a hand on Lancer’s shoulder to say, ‘I will walk with you to Footehill, Joby. We could go further together were it not for this woman who is so important in your life. Am I right yet again?’
‘You are,’ Lancer answered simply, glad that not even this apparently all-knowing highwayman could see that there were three women playing major roles in his life. Yet the situation had righted itself for Lancer in the past few hours, with everything settling into its proper place. He would never see Nancy Owens again, although his guilt where she was concerned would follow him down through the years. The promiscuous Sarai Adams was there to be used, to provide well-paid work, possibly even allowing him to share her bed, but Sarai was and always would be a stranger to the kind of fidelity that Lancer wanted when he settled down. That just left Arabella Willard, his ideal woman.
They stepped out of the door into a sunlight that was initially blinding. When Lancer’s eyes adjusted he saw two men standing beside his calf. At first thinking he was about to be robbed, he started forwards, expecting his new friend to be there offering support. But Buckingham Joe had gone, either back into the inn or running off round the building.
Lancer was alone, and now realized that the two men were not brigands of some kind, for they were both well dressed. Not speaking to either of them, he reached to the rope, intending to untie the calf and continue on his way. But one of the men grabbed his wrist and held it, preventing his fingers from reaching the tether.
‘Where are you taking this animal?’ one of the men asked. He was tall, broad-shouldered, and had a face that he hadn’t been born with, but had been remodelled by fists at some later date.
‘To Footehill, where I will sell it,’ Lancer replied.
‘It’s not yours to sell,’ the second man barked, of short stature, as broad as he was high, but even the fat he carried was stacked in a way that said he could use it to his advantage in a rough-house.
‘It belongs to Euart Owens,’ the tall man informed Lancer, adding, ‘I am Constable Githam, and this is Constable Price.’
‘You are mistaken, gentlemen,’ Lancer explained calmly, understanding now why Buckingham Joe had deserted him. ‘I worked for Owens and he gave me the calf because he didn’t have the money to pay me.’
‘Are you named Joby Lancer?’ Price asked.
‘That’s right.’
Githam gave a satisfied nod. ‘Mr Owens gave your name when he reported that you had stolen his best calf.’
This staggered Lancer. Not only did he know he was in serious trouble, but also that Owens had got the better of him for being cuckolded. The burly farmer obviously hadn’t fancied his chances using brawn against Lancer, so he had used brain. Lancer had to grudgingly admit that, for a man so intellectually limited as Owens, the farmer’s plan had been a clever one.
‘I am telling you the truth, but I don’t suppose it will end here,’ Lancer said to the constables. ‘What happens now?’
‘We will take you back to the farm,’ Githam replied. ‘If Mr Owens can identify both you and the calf, then the animal will be returned to him and you will be arrested for theft.’
There was no point in arguing, so Lancer went along with the constables. The long trek back was a dismal experience for him. He was retracing as a prisoner the steps he had taken as an entrepreneur leading on a rope a source of capital that would launch him into an ambitious new life.
The constables spoke little to each other, and not at all to Lancer as they walked. When they came over the rise where Owens had halted the cart on that first day to proudly show Lancer his farm, a massive depression descended on Lancer as he looked at the ramshackle buildings. Neither Owens nor Nancy were to be seen anywhere about the place. Only the skinny cur was there, sitting on its haunches, mouth opened and drooling as it howled over and over like some demented wolf that had mistaken the sun for the moon.
The dog’s howling struck Lancer as ominous, disturbing him greatly for a reason that he was unable to fathom.
Not seeming to notice them as they walked up, the cur kept the unearthly wailing going. Githam shouted, ‘Mr Owens?’ thrice without getting a reply, before instructing Price to put the calf in the barn.
Holding Lancer by the arm, Githam took him in through the door of the house. A familiar smell brought everything back to Lancer. As he blinked to get his eyes used to being without the bright sun, he thought of Buckingham Joe’s theory that life moved in circles. This was a tight circle indeed, for it had brought him back to his miserable starting point within just a few hours. His dread was that he would find himself face-to-face with Nancy. That would be a shameful experience that he hated to think about.
But only Euart Owens was there. Half slumped where he sat at the table; his bulging eyes were red-rimmed as he looked up at Githam and Lancer. He moved his heavy jaw and his slit of a mouth opened but no words were uttered. Even before he caught the stench of cider, Lancer was aware that the ugly farmer was drunk to the extent that he was close to being insensible.
‘There’s the man who calls me a thief,’ Lancer said contemptuously to Githam, who nodded an uncomfortable head uncertain what his next move should be in this situation.
Both Githam and Lancer turned as they heard Price coming in the door behind them. His face was white and he wiped a trembling hand over it before he tried to speak. Even then his lips wouldn’t obey him, and all that came out was a mumble.
At last he managed to blurt out a shocking statement. ‘There’s a young woman hanged herself in the barn. I cut her down, but it seems to me she’s been dead for some time.’
Since I walked out of here this morning, Lancer estimated bitterly, feeling sick and sad. His mind couldn’t cope with imagining Nancy lying cold and dead where she had lain with him when she had been full of life and passion. In the grip of a deeply depressing feeling, it was as if his own life had just come to an end.
The small group of mourners had returned to the Willard home after the funeral. As well as being filled with sorrow, Arabella couldn’t free herself of the astonishment that had been caused her by the single cloud that had come across the sky to rain on them just as her mother’s coffin was being lowered into the ground. It had seemed to her like heavenly acknowledgement of the sadness in the life that had just ended. Arabella had never seen her mother truly happy, although she had bravely tried to appear to be so for her daughter’s sake. For most of her life it had been plain to Arabella that her mother had undergone some traumatic experience from which she had never fully recovered. It was either before Arabella had been born
, or when she was too young to understand what was going on around her. Often having tried to summon up the courage to ask, Arabella had found the whole issue held in some kind of black void. Now it was too late to put the question.
Uncomfortable at what now seemed a somehow strangely empty house, Arabella felt Lionel touch her arm and signal with a sideways inclination of his head towards the other room. Glad to escape from a group of mourners eager to convey their sympathy but unable to speak one word, Arabella followed her man. On that day that needed nothing to increase its misery, Lionel gave her more bad news when they were alone, standing in their dark clothes, sipping Josephine Heelan’s weak tea.
‘They’ve arrested Gray Sawtell and Willie Brickell for the murder of John Nichol,’ Lionel solemnly informed her.
Added to Lionel’s upset over the arrest of his friends, it was obvious to Arabella, was the desolation he felt at the grim, soul-destroying truth that he would no longer be earning good money.
‘When one door closes another one always opens, Lionel dear.’ She offered words of consolation that sounded pathetically ridiculous the instant they passed her lips.
Dejected, Lionel countered fantasy with stark reality. ‘With the arrest of Gray Sawtell the only door of opportunity to open for me closed forever, Bella.’
‘Let us wait until this sad day is over, then we can think straight,’ Arabella advised. ‘We can make a new start because this house will be ours to rent.’
Although he gave a half-nod of agreement, the expression on Lionel’s face as he took a sweeping glance around the hovel showed that he was far from impressed by the prospect.
At Owens Farm, Githam and Price had commandeered a cart and a pony that they harnessed to it. They had cut down Nancy’s body and laid it in the bed of the cart. Her lovely face had been contorted into a ghastly grimace by strangulation, and her eyes stared sightlessly at a horrified Lancer. Covering the woman’s body with sacks, they had ordered Lancer to get up on the cart. Then what was a nightmare ride for him began, with every jolt of the cart causing the Nancy’s corpse to move around under the sacking. The worst of the journey ended when the constables stopped in a town that Lancer didn’t know to carry Nancy’s corpse into a small building.
The constables returned to the cart and the journey continued until Dorchester was reached. There he was taken to the Police Office to be examined by a magistrate. He had an hour-long wait until a hard-worked magistrate named Merrifield came, red-faced and sweating, into the building.
‘Stand up,’ shouted Sergeant Foster, who had now taken over as Lancer’s captor.
With the image of Nancy’s dead face filling his mind, Lancer was not really aware of what was happening around him. He heard the magistrate complain that he ‘Didn’t have time to waste’, and then Foster pulled him roughly up on to his feet.
The magistrate solemnly but hurriedly read out the charge that Lancer had stolen a calf the property of one Euart Owens from Owens Farm, Symingham, Devon.
‘Have you any observations to offer on the charge, Lancer?’ Merrifield enquired.
Forcing himself to take an interest, Lancer replied, ‘I did not steal the calf. Owens gave it to me as payment for two months’ labour on his farm.’
‘Mr Owens says differently,’ Merrifield sneered. ‘Mr Owens is a respected member of the community, whereas you apparently are some kind of itinerant. I understand that when you were arrested outside of an establishment known as the Lamb Inn you were wandering without visible means of sustenance. Is that correct?’
Accepting that he was in a no-win situation, Lance made no reply.
‘I will take the absence of a response from you as confirmation,’ Merrifield said smugly. ‘Constables Githam and Price have noted that you left the Lamb Inn in the company of one Joseph Infield alias Thomas Oliver, better known as Buckingham Joe, a highwayman who has previously languished for many days at the prison in which you will reside anon when you leave here.’
‘Someone left the inn soon after me,’ Lancer’s habitual need to oppose authority temporarily defeated his despair over Nancy’s death.
‘It is noted that you were drinking with Buckingham Joe while inside the inn.’
Lancer shrugged. ‘There were several people there. I didn’t ask the name of any of them.’
‘This attitude of yours is doing you no favours,’ the magistrate cautioned.
Lancer responded with another shrug.
‘Get a grip of yourslf, lad, and show respect. Mr Merrifield is a Justice of the Peace,’ Sergeant Foster ordered angrily.
‘Leave it, Sergeant, thank you,’ Merrifield said quietly, then raised his voice to address Lancer. ‘If you have anything to say, now is the time to speak up.’
‘Owens Farm is in Devon, so why have I been brought to Dorchester?’
‘That’s because The Lamb Inn, where you were arrested lies just inside the Dorset border. That presented the arresting officers with a choice – Devon or Dorset, and it was convenient for them to bring you here,’ Sergeant Foster replied.
‘I would imagine that when you are tried in court you will be taken to Exeter Prison,’ Merrifield explained, revealing that he had already found Lancer to be guilty. ‘Take him away, Sergeant.’
Snapping a pair of handcuffs on Lancer’s wrists, Foster grunted. ‘Come on, lad. The sooner I get you out of my sight the happier I will be.’
Resigned to believing that Joby Lancer would never return to Adamslee, Arabella had said yes when Lionel had proposed marriage. It hadn’t been the joyous acceptance of someone madly in love, or in love at all, she had realized. Rather, it had been one of the big compromises that those facing just two options are forced to make in the knowledge that she could either face a bleak life of soul-destroying poverty alone, or face a bleak life of soul destroying destitution with a partner. Her sole asset was the tenancy of the house she had taken over on the death of her mother. Admitting to herself that she was acting out of cowardice, unable to face a dismal future alone, she had agreed to marry Lionel Heelan, who was then in poorly paid work as a fisherman.
No wedding day in an impoverished community is a spectacular event but Arabella’s big day went largely unnoticed. Not one solitary soul stood in the doorway of any of the cottages to see her pass by on her way to the church in the badly fitting white dress Lionel’s mother had made for her. Waiting inside for her at the door of the church was Dr Mawby who had willingly agreed to give her away, and Ruth Heelan, her bridesmaid.
The doctor gave her an encouraging smile as she took his arm and they started slowly down the aisle together. The only people in the church were Josephine Heelan and her two youngest children. The Reverend Worther stood in front of an altar had been sparsely decorated with a few small bunches of wild flowers. Lionel Heelan stood in the front row of pews with his older brother Malcolm at his side, having travelled down from London to act as supporter. Lionel turned to watch Arabella’s approach, the expression of utter desolation on his face too much for her to endure.
Footsteps slowing, Arabella would have turned and run out of church had not Rupert Mawby applied pressure on his arm that linked with hers, and gently kept her moving in the direction of the altar. Once she was there, and his brother had nudged Lionel out into the aisle to stand beside her, the kind Reverend Worther rescued the ceremony from total gloom by conducting it in a vigorous style that made it seem that the church was packed with well-wishers there to ensure that the happy couple are properly launched into a life of wedded bliss.
Finding it easy to join in the illusion created by the clergyman helped Arabella to get through to the finish of what had seemed an interminable wedding ceremony. But when they stepped out of the church into the gloom of the village’s deserted streets, and Lionel abruptly shook his arm free of her hand, the memory of Reverend Worther’s well-meant pretend enthusiasm disappeared. Arabella realized that a happy marriage needs more than a church blessing. Much more.
Neither Arabella nor Lio
nel spoke as they walked back to the house that now held no promise of security. She broke down and wept once inside what was once a home but was now just a crude building in which her sobbing echoed hollowly.
The one saving grace for the prisoners confined within the damp, depressing walls of Dorchester Gaol, was the knowledge that life could get no worse. Joby Lancer was the exception, although his fellow convicts were unaware of this. There was a rule against prisoners talking to each other. As enforcing this rule caused trouble for the warders it was largely ignored. That displeased Lancer, who had no wish to either mix with or speak to the other inmates. The prison wasn’t the cause of his depression: he was haunted by the knowledge that he was the reason for Nancy Owens having taken her own life. His sadness would be just as upsetting had he been free and living in luxury with Sarai Adams in Adamslee House.
Having just finished a frugal meal in the refectory he was about to stand up when he sensed another prisoner standing close, and heard him exclaim, ‘At last, a true gentleman among the riff raff! Joby Lancer, I presume?’
Astonished that someone should know his name, Lancer looked up to see a handsome young man who was wearing a smart smock coat, smiling down at him. Obviously new to Dorchester Gaol, the fellow’s charming persona didn’t fool Lancer. It failed to disguise the ruffian that lay just beneath the surface.
‘Did you learn my name from someone in here?’ Lancer enquired as he stood up.
‘No, no, no. It may help if I introduce myself,’ the prisoner suggested, proffering his right hand to Lancer. ‘I am John Longley.’
Ignoring the invitation to shake hands, Lancer said, ‘That name means nothing to me.’
‘Mmm.’ Longley pursed his lips before trying another name. ‘John French?’
Lancer shook his head.
‘One more try.’ Longley smiled. ‘The Kentish Youth or the Kentish Hero?’
The Toll of the Sea Page 11