Vice and Virtue

by Veronica Bennett

  Aurora bridled at this, though she made no protest aloud.

  “We walked together as far as the piazza, here in Covent Garden,” continued Edward. “Then we parted, Richard for the Black Swan, I for these lodgings. But before I had gone ten yards I heard a scuffle and a scream, and ran back. Richard lay upon the cobbles. He had been struck on the head.”

  “Who would do such a thing?” gasped Aurora incredulously, her brain immediately busy with questions. “Did they mistake him for you? Were they trying to kill him?”

  Edward gave a sigh. “They did not mistake him, neither did they mean to leave him for dead. I am convinced they intended to render him unconscious, and for me to find him. They must have followed us, seen us part, and pounced while I was still close enough to hear Richard’s cry. It was staged, without doubt.”

  “But to what end?”

  “They left this in Richard’s waistcoat pocket. Here, read it.”

  Aurora took the piece of paper he offered. In a haphazard style, probably disguised, were written the words, I know who you are.

  “Do you understand the import of this?” asked Edward.

  “Your identity is discovered,” she replied, raising her eyes to his face, “by someone who would harm you. Beyond that I have no explanation.”

  He nodded. “Do you see anything else on the page?”

  She looked again. In the corner of the paper was a scribble she could not make out. “What does it say here?” she asked, pointing.

  Edward’s voice was still soft, but steady, and full of implication. “It is a crude representation of the family crest of the Deedes.”

  Aurora met his eyes. “So … the person or persons who attacked you did so on behalf of Josiah Deede? ”

  “Aye,” said Edward with sorrow. “It seems his hatred of me is unabated, despite his successful theft of my inheritance.”

  Silence fell between them. Aurora held out the paper; she wanted rid of it, and Edward took it, recognizing her revulsion. “Someone must have been following us,” he said. “How much Josiah Deede knows – whether ‘Miss Drayton’ has been discovered too – we can only conjecture.”

  “And he wanted…” Aurora’s throat had contracted. She could barely speak. “He wanted to give you a warning. A threat.”

  Edward nodded wearily. “We are all in danger.”

  Aurora knelt there on the floor, her hands in her lap, her heartbeat unsteady. The return of the letter was now no longer necessary, as Edward had said. Josiah Deede had found the key, and discovered the theft. Afraid that Edward knew the secret, and would continue the blackmail, he had resorted to paying ruffians to follow Edward, attack Richard and leave the threatening note. In huntsman’s terms, he was trying to flush Edward out and force him into the path of danger. If Edward showed himself, Deede would be waiting.

  She swallowed. Tears had crept into her eyes, though she did not know why. Did she weep for Edward, disinherited, defeated, and now threatened, seeking a fruitless revenge on a powerful man with ruthless associates? Or for Joe, whose father’s conduct had now ensured that his courtship of the amiable Miss Drayton was irredeemably, irretrievably over?

  “I must go to Richard,” said Edward, rousing himself. He put on his wig and stood up. “I came only to collect the key and the letter, which we cannot leave hidden in this room, and to warn you to lock the door and admit no one.”

  Aurora rose too, so shakily that she had to place her hand on the open lid of the trunk. “When will you return?”

  “When I can leave him,” said Edward. He looked at her intently. “Fare thee well, my dear Aurora.”

  He walked to the outer door and she followed him, intending to lock it after he had gone. But then he stopped unexpectedly and whirled round, his hand going to his coat pocket. “I almost forgot this!”

  He handed her a letter. It was addressed to Hartford House in familiar handwriting and sealed with a familiar seal. “Richard brought it, but I have not had the opportunity to give it to you until now,” said Edward.

  And before she realized he had done it, he had kissed her brow and quitted the room.

  Dacre Street, Westminster

  May 3rd, 1700

  My dearest, dearest Aurora,

  Mrs Edward Francis! Have you been practising your new signature? Hester says if I finish this note before eight o’clock she will take it to the Bell, and put it in the coach that passes through Islington. Please send one of your servants to do the same with your reply, or if Mr Allcott should be in town he is always welcome to deliver a letter in person.

  I miss you already, my dear sister, though you were married but four days ago. That night, we were so late home from Hartford House, and the bedchamber was so lonely without you, that Eleanora came and slept in your place. I confess we wept, but only tears of happiness. I have many questions about what happened to you that night, but I will not ask any of them, of course.

  Please, please write and tell me you are in good health and happy. I await your reply with great impatience. And now Hester is waiting, so I must break off.

  With fondest love, and the same from Eleanora,

  Flora Mary Eversedge

  That evening, in the dancing room, Aurora held her sister’s letter close to the candle and read it for the fourth time. It interested Aurora to think that it was now five days since Flora had sat down at the little writing desk in the drawing room and taken up her pen. During that period, the letter had gone by coach to Islington, where it had been picked up by Richard’s servant and taken to Hartford House. Richard had brought it with him to London when he arrived yesterday. She added the days together – four days between the wedding and the writing of the letter and five days for it to get to her. Was her marriage truly only nine days old? It seemed astonishing that everything she had believed before it took place had vanished, as instantly and irrevocably as any of Flora’s more far-fetched fancies.

  Edward had still not returned. She had locked the door as he had instructed, and had spent a lonely and fearful day. She was now sitting cross-legged on her bed in her nightdress, every muscle in her body tense, unable to sleep until she heard his familiar footsteps.

  She guessed it must be near to eleven o’clock at night. She could hear the servants moving around, and there was still traffic in the street. She put down Flora’s letter and was about to snuff the candle when she heard a sound that was not Mary shutting up the house. She tiptoed to the outer door and listened. Below, the sounds of booted footsteps, a raised masculine voice and the grumble of Mary’s remonstrations got louder as the footsteps mounted the stairs.

  She tried not to panic. It must be someone known to Mr Marshall. But the door handle rattled, then a deafening knocking began. “I demand that you open this door!” The voice belonged to Joe Deede.

  Aurora’s heart thudded. Joe was still knocking on the door. When she did not answer, he began to kick it. It creaked and strained under his assault. It was an old door with an ordinary iron latch and lock. If Aurora did not open it, it would soon succumb.

  She heard an inarticulate shout and the sound of scuffling feet. She backed away from the door just before it banged against the wall and Joe crashed into the room. He staggered against the table, uttered an oath, grasped the back of a chair and regarded Aurora furiously. His breath came hoarsely. “So this is how Miss Drayton repays our hospitality, is it?”

  Aurora’s body tingled with shock. She hardly recognized Joe’s features, distorted as they were with indignation and rage. His face was flushed with exertion, his eyes pink-rimmed. But she tried to preserve her wits and think. It was no use trying to keep up her pretence; Miss Drayton’s consumptive brother who never went out was clearly absent. But it would not do to confess everything either, at least until she was certain how much Joe knew, and how he had found it out.

  She kept her expression passive, though beneath her nightgown her heart was galloping. “And is this,” she asked calmly, “how a gentleman pays a call on a lady, b
reaking down her door in the middle of the night, when she is not dressed?” She had left the inner door open and began to make her way towards her room. “I beg you, give me leave to make myself presentable.”

  “Do not walk away from me!” he roared.

  Aurora stopped, but she regarded him with disdain and gestured to a chair. “Please sit down.”

  “I will not sit down,” he said petulantly. “I insist that you tell me who you really are, and what your business is with Edward Francis!”

  Fear gripped her. Edward’s suspicions had been well founded. After she had left Mill Street on Friday, Joe must have found the skeleton key in the lock of the cabinet, wondered what it was and alerted his father. Discovering that the letter was gone, Josiah must have left the key there to trap her, knowing she would remove it when she returned to the house on Saturday evening. As, of course, she did. Evidently, Josiah had told his son she was an impostor. But had he told Joe about the contents of the letter?

  “I am Aurora Drayton,” she said blankly, “as well you know.”

  He crossed the room swiftly and seized her left arm. “Do not deny that you live here with Edward Francis! Edward Drayton does not exist, and whoever you are, you are not Aurora Drayton!”

  Aurora’s mind raced. Josiah’s henchmen must have been following her since the discovery of the key. Edward and Richard’s late departure from Spring Gardens made it easy for the villains to follow them, attack Richard and leave the threatening note. Earlier, Josiah’s men had seen her return to the lodgings alone, and this morning they had watched Edward leave for the Black Swan, and not yet return.

  Evidently, if they had reported this to Josiah, he had then reported it to his son. Joe Deede had chosen very carefully the moment to make his assault.

  He shook her arm, his grip tightening. “If you will not confess it, then be in no doubt that I will beat it out of you!”

  A boorish bully, accustomed to violence. So Henry Francis had been correct about Joe Deede after all.

  “I am not afraid of you,” she told him. She tried to keep her voice steady, but a constriction in her chest prevented her from drawing sufficient breath. The house was silent. She wondered whether Mary had gone to tell Mr Marshall of the angry young visitor. With his gouty foot, Mr Marshall could not climb the attic stairs, and William would be long gone at this hour.

  “Indeed? Alas, you should be!” His face, a mask of frustration, was very close to Aurora’s. His breath smelled sourly of gin. “And you will tell me what his intention is, if you wish to preserve your beauty.”

  This was such a cowardly threat that Aurora’s fear became scorn. “Only a man who is not a man will threaten a woman,” she said coldly. “I pray you, leave me be.”

  His eyes hardened, and he began to twist her arm. Pain shot through her elbow. She gasped, but locked her jaw, refusing to scream. Her teeth ground against one another as he pushed her arm behind her back and applied such pressure to it she thought it must burst from its socket. All the while, he demanded that she tell him what Edward Francis had instructed her to do. “He wants to ruin my father, does he not? He thinks my father has stolen his inheritance.” He twisted her arm higher. “Though he has not, has he? Tell me you know he has not!”

  Aurora’s determination not to show her pain was making her faint. Silver motes floated before her eyes. But her arm felt on the point of breaking, and to her shame, she blurted, “He has not!”

  The pressure on her arm did not diminish. “Henry Francis was a blackmailer, was he not? Say it!”

  “Henry Francis was…”

  She could speak no more. Unconsciously, she had begun to cry. It was not the sustained weeping she remembered from her father’s funeral, or the girlish tears a quarrel with Flora would produce. It was an anguished, shuddering, sobbing onslaught that soaked her face and burned her lungs. “Please, please…” came out in a whisper. She had no breath. She closed her eyes.

  And then she heard a voice that was not Joe Deede’s. “Leave hold of her, or I will have your head off!”

  Her tormentor loosened, but did not relinquish, his grip. Aurora blinked frantically, trying to clear her vision. Edward stood in the doorway, his sword drawn, his eyes like gemstones in the pale mask of his face.

  “Leave her be, I say, and conduct yourself like a man!” he taunted.

  Aurora found herself released. She sank to the floor. Her tears were subsiding, but she was not yet mistress of herself, and trembled as if possessed by a fever.

  Joe had not drawn his own sword, but when he spoke to Edward his voice was hostile and impatient. “Miss Drayton, as she calls herself, is a thief.”

  Aurora’s eyes were closed, but she heard the squeak of a loose floorboard as Edward crossed the room to kneel beside her. She felt the touch of his hand upon her cheek. “Where are you hurt?” he asked.

  “My arm, my shoulder.” She opened her eyes. Though her sight was tear-washed, she could see the depth of Edward’s rage. His face was pinched, and whiter than plaster.

  He stood up and re-sheathed his sword. “I insist you leave my chambers immediately,” he told Joe Deede. “This lady must be attended to.”

  “This lady, if that is what she is” – Aurora heard the thump of Joe’s fist on the table – “has been employed for a sizeable fee, I presume – to pose as your sister. Her instructions, no doubt, were to make the acquaintance of my family, and, acting as your spy, accuse my father of wrongdoing. You could not be satisfied with the judge’s verdict on the contesting of your father’s will, could you? Well, sir, your clever little accomplice lost no time in finding proof, but, alas, not the proof you expected. Her theft of a letter in my father’s possession has shown that Henry Francis was a blackmailer!”

  “Do not say that, sir…”

  Joe ignored Edward’s interruption. “Your father changed his will to repay my father because he feared God’s punishment. You see? Your fortune was made by illegal means – I will not scruple to say again, by blackmail. And now, by God’s will, it is back in the right hands.” He laughed humourlessly. “I see by the squalor of this room that you are already becoming used to doing without it!”

  There was silence. Aurora wondered what Edward could do to protect her, or himself. Joe Deede seemed to have outwitted them.

  “Very well, I deny it no longer.” Edward did not sound outwitted. He said the words stoutly, as a statement of fact. “My wife showed me the letter, and—”

  Colour flooded Joe’s cheeks. “Your wife!”

  “And I told her of my father’s grave affliction, as I will now tell you,” continued Edward. “For the last ten years of his life, my father was so crippled with rheumatism that he had to use an amanuensis.”

  Joe made a sound like “Hrrmph!” He looked at Edward with contempt. “Such as you yourself?”

  Edward did not fall into the trap. “I am aware that anyone, myself included, could have written that letter,” he told Joe frostily. “But if I were privy to whatever it is that your father will pay to keep secret, why have I not continued to blackmail him when my father died five months ago?”

  Joe did not reply.

  “Furthermore,” said Edward, “you persist in believing that my father altered his will because he was overcome with remorse about blackmailing your father. You say that he must have dictated that blackmail letter, and heaven knows how many others, to another person. Well, let me give you another version of the story. My father did know your father’s secret, but he took it with him to the grave, never considering using it to his advantage, though it was in his power to do so. Your father was tricked by the unspeakable villainy of the writer of those letters, and Henry Francis was never the blackmailer at all!”

  Joe struck a frustrated blow to the mantelpiece, near where he stood. He could not refute the logic of Edward’s conclusion. “Henry Francis was a poor apology for a man!” he bellowed. Another blow. “A coward!” Another blow. “A man who made an enemy out of a friend, then stole his
money! He was not a man, but a monstrous, godless beast!”

  “Then what is your father?” Edward had been driven too far. “A man who murders his former friend in order to forge his will? It is not my father that is the godless beast, but yours!”

  All the colour had gone from Joe Deede’s face. “Do you dare to accuse my father of murder?” he asked incredulously.

  “Indeed I do. And of forgery and gross deception.” Edward’s words were followed by the sound of metal on metal. Aurora scrambled painfully to her feet. Swaying, she gripped the edge of the table. Edward had drawn his sword and was holding it upright before him, its blade six inches from his face. “I will fight to the death for my father’s honour,” he said stoutly.

  Joe drew his own sword and, like Edward, held it upright “And so will I, for my father’s honour.”

  Grimacing at the pain in her left arm, Aurora lunged with her other arm for Edward’s sword hand, like an anxious mother trying to remove a sharp stick from her son. “No! No!” she implored. “I beg you, do not do this. He will kill you. Please, do not allow him to incense you!”

  “Peace!” Edward’s eyes had lost their glitter. They looked at her grimly. “I will deal with this.”

  “No, Edward, I cannot stand aside and watch you place yourself in death’s way,” persisted Aurora. “This man is a swordsman, in constant practice. It is an unfair match.”

  “Indeed it is,” said Joe Deede, tilting his chin. “Sir, you know not what awaits you.”

  “It is a question of honour,” Edward told Aurora. “I cannot allow my father to stand accused of blackmail without demanding satisfaction on the matter.”

  Aurora knew this. She also understood that Joe must defend his own father’s honour, and accept the challenge. She released Edward’s wrist and looked at Joe. Only last night she had wished she were truly Miss Drayton, free and ready to marry a man to whom she was attracted, and who was attracted to her. Now, as she looked at him standing before Edward in the mean little room, his raised sword glinting in the moonlight, his face full of the certainty of victory, she knew Joe Deede had duped her far more successfully than she had duped him.