“No, what happened?”
“Tom Bowles bought it.”
At Warren House next afternoon the Tidemills riot was being discussed, too. George Warren had ordered out a horse with the intention of riding the bounds of the sadly diminished estate he had inherited under the entail. An arduous morning spent with Mr. Futherby and his documents had left him with a pretty good idea of his boundaries and a passionate desire for fresh air. But the groom who brought out the horse he had selected from the Warren House stables looked anxious.
“You won’t go down into the valley, sir?”
“I don’t mean to. But why not?”
“There’s trouble there, bad trouble One of the girls was down to visit her ma and came back in tears.”
“Oh?” Warren paused in the act of throwing his leg over the horse’s back. “What happened? And why was I not told?”
“I don’t rightly know what happened, sir. As to telling … well … I suppose Chilver … The old master didn’t reckon much to what happened to us.”
“Well, I do. Walk the horse for me, will you? I shan’t be long.” He was getting used to having the front door of his house swing open as he approached. “Send me Chilver,” he told the footman who held it. “To the study.” And, when Chilver appeared: “What’s this about one of the girls coming back from the Tidemills in tears?”
“It was Lucy, sir. Lucy Penfold. Her mother lives down in the village. Father’s dead, younger brother works in the mills. The old lady’s—quite old. Mrs. Warrender gave permission, sir, when Lucy came here to work, for her to go home once a week and make sure all was well with her ma. I’m sorry, sir, I should have asked.”
“Nonsense,” said George Warren. “Of course the girl should go. What I want to know is why she came back in tears.”
Chilver looked unhappy. “I don’t rightly know, sir.”
“If you don’t know, you should, and if you don’t want to tell, you’re a fool. Send the girl to me, Chilver, if she’s feeling up to it.”
“Oh, as to that. She’s only an under housemaid.”
“So has no feelings? She’s a woman, isn’t she?” He sighed. “I see I must look about me for a housekeeper. And in the meantime, Chilver, everything that goes on in the house is my affair.”
“Yes, sir. I’ll fetch Lucy, sir.”
Lucy was a surprise. Hardly more than a child, she was rapidly growing into a beautiful woman, would have been one already, Warren thought, if recent tears had not blotched the peaches-and-cream complexion. A golden curl escaped from under a hastily donned mob-cap, and she clutched her neckerchief round her shoulders with a desperate, dirty little hand.
“You’re Lucy Penfold.”
She had bobbed her curtsy and was casting a frightened glance round the study.
“Yes, sir.” Another curtsy.
“No need to be afraid. I merely wanted to know what happened to you down in the village.”
“Ooh, it was dreadful, sir.” The strong local accent was a disappointment coming from her delicately shaped mouth. “But I mustn’t tell, surely. He said if I told, things would be much worse for ma. And they’re that bad already, sir, with two mouths to feed on a boy’s wages. I … I wish now I’d let him, sir. Anything. He’s good to them as does. Everyone knows that. I meant to, honest I did, sir, but then, when he got me in the back room of the shop, all among the flour sacks, I couldn’t, sir. I scratched his face and ran for it. And he came after me, down the back lane, saying such things! I don’t know what he won’t do to ma, sir. And if my brother Johnny hears of it, he’ll try and fight him and get killed, most like. Or transported. Oh, sir,” she put her hands to her mouth, “now I’ve told you. Oh what will become of us!”
George Warren stared at her, hardly able to believe what her incoherent speech seemed to suggest. “You mean, the shop keeper, down at the Tidemills—he attacked you?”
“Yes, sir. Tom Bowles. But not to say attacked, sir, not really. See, it’s a known thing. He invites you into the back room, you go: vittles is better for the family. Only, I didn’t seem able, sir, not when it came to the point And now what’ll happen to ma and Johnny?”
“Did you tell your mother what had happened?”
“Oh, no, sir. I couldn’t. I was late already, see. I run all the way back here. If I lost this job we’d be in the basket and no mistake. Ooh …” She had suddenly remembered to whom she was talking.
“Never mind,” he said soothingly, suspecting that his American accent had made her forget his position as her employer. “You’d surely not have lost your job just for being late?”
“Ooh, wouldn’t I just! Chilver’s powerful strict, sir.”
“I shall most certainly have to get a housekeeper.” Warren picked up his beaver hat and whip. “Now, quit fretting, child. I’ll ride down to Tidemills and have a word with Mr. Bowles. And your mother, if you like.”
“Ooh, sir. Would you really?”
“Yes, I really would. Now, off you go, wash your face and stop worrying.”
Chilver was hovering in the hall. “I’m riding down to Tidemills.” Warren could not quite keep a hint of definance out of his voice.
“I wish you wouldn’t, sir. Or wait till Mr. Futherby can accompany you.”
“No. But I’ll take a groom if it makes you happier.”
“Yes, indeed, sir. Barnes would be best, sir. He was born at Tidemills.”
“And got away as soon as he could, eh?”
“That’s about the size of it Sir?”
“Yes.”
“You’ll … you’ll watch yourself? There was bad trouble down there yesterday. God knows what things are like today. And I hear Lord Hawth’s back.”
“What’s that to the purpose?”
“They’re his mills, sir.”
“As if I’d forget that!” But it was with some slight, strange feeling of crossing a Rubicon that he jumped his horse over the hedge at the bottom of the long meadow that marked the boundary between his land and the fields Charles Warrender had lost to Lord Hawth along with the village of Tidemills itself.
At the village, everything seemed normal enough, with the splash and swish of the huge mill wheels speaking of work in progress, and women and small children here and there in the sandy street But the shop, when they reached it, was closed, with a padlock on the door and a note in huge capitals: BACK WHEN I PLEASE.
“He’ll be out collecting bad debts,” explained Barnes.
“Then we had better hurry to Mrs. Penfold’s house.”
“It’s at the far end, sir. By the mill yard.”
That explained why Lucy had not even paused to warn her mother of trouble to come. Riding on down the narrow street, Warren began to fear that it had come already. There was too much noise at this end of the village. “What’s going on?” he turned to ask Barnes over his shoulder.
“It’ll be the day shift, sir, just out. Mill works twenty hours a day, see. They hold back the tide, so’s to turn the wheels long as they can. So: two ten hours’ shifts. Depending on the tide.”
“Long shifts.”
“Yessir. Oh, blimey, a mill!” They had turned the corner into the yard where a rough circle of men had formed round a central space.
“A mill? Oh!” he recognized the unfamiliar term. “A fight, you mean?”
“Looks more like murder to me,” said Barnes. “Young Johnny Penfold and Tom Bowles as can whip any two men in the village, and does, if they so much as breathe a complaint. He’ll slaughter him, sir. He enjoys it, does Tom Bowles.”
“Does he so? Keep close to me.” George Warren pushed his horse through the crowd, which opened readily enough, assuming that the gentry had come to watch the fun. From their comments as he urged his horse forward, Warren, gathered that several rounds of the uneven contest had already been fought, and the betting was now on how many more young Johnny Penfold would, survive. Reaching the edge of the circle, Warren drew a horrified breath. At one end of the improvised ring, a hug
e man was sluicing his bare, muscular back from a bucket held for him by willing hands. At the other, a fair-haired boy was crouched in the dust, blood pouring from above his right eye, trying vainly to wipe it from his face with his own floury shirt.
Tom Bowles wiped his face with a towel handed by another pair of eager hands. “Ready!” He moved forward into the ring, with the delicate, assured movements of a professional fighter.
“Ready it is,” said a man at the far side of the ring whose clothes, less floury than everyone else’s, suggested he did not work in the mill. “Come on out of there, young Johnny, if you’re coming.”
“I’m coming.” The boy flung down the bloodstained shirt and rose shakily to his feet.
“Foul!” George Warren rode forward into the ring. And then, as Bowles and the referee gazed at him in open-mouthed astonishment; “What kind of British fair play is this? Who seconds the boy?”
“No one would, sir,” explained the referee. “Not no how. Not against Tom Bowles.”
“Well, he’s got seconds now. Hold my horse, Barnes.” He dismounted and crossed the ring to where Johnny stood, weaving on his feet, helplessly brushing blood from his eyes. After one look, “He’s not fit to go on,” he said. “Is there a doctor in the village?”
“Lord, no,” said the referee. “You’ll be Mr. Warren from the house.” A glance somewhere between servility and scorn took in the ill-fitting buckskins that were the best Mr. Snipe, the Brighton tailor, had yet managed to produce. “You wouldn’t understand, sir. My wife does the doctoring here in the village—when she feels like it.”
“Then she had better feel like it now. Which house is yours?”
“Why, the inn, sir, The Ship.” He was amazed at such ignorance.
“Fetch her, Barnes,” he began, but was shouted down by the crowd.
“Fight’s not finished!” “Betting’s still open!” “Out of the way, Yankee!” “No spoiling sport!”
“Sport!” exclaimed Warren. “Do you call it sport to see a boy half-killed?” Once again his voice was drowned by the increasingly angry shouting of the crowd. He took off his tall beaver hat and threw it into the centre of the ring. “If it’s sport you want, I’ll take on your bruiser, and back myself to have him crying for mercy in five rounds.”
“But, sir,” protested Barnes, as the crowd began loudly discussing this new proposition. “There’s not a man in the village can stand up to him. He’ll kill you.”
“I doubt it. He’s been cock of the walk here so long, he’s forgotten what a real fight’s like.” He laughed, stripped off his drab coat and handed it to Barnes. “Don’t look so anxious, man, I’ll not disgrace you! I learnt to fight the hard way, before the mast.” His shirt was off now, revealing a thin, wiry body whose deep tan had faded to a dull saffron colour. “But I’ll need you for a second. And one other. I’m not fighting by your foul Tidemills rules.”
“Let me!” Johnny Penfold was steadier on his feet now “My wound can keep. And thank you, sir!”
“Thank him for nothing.” Bowles swaggered forward from his comer. “Maybe you’d better send your man for a surgeon before we start. Two of the men will second you, won’t you boys?”
“No, thanks.” Warren cut short a sycophantic murmur of agreement, stepped out of his buckled shoes and spat on his hands. “Just tell me your rules, if you have any, and let’s go!”
“For God’s sake, be careful, sir.” Barnes was in an agony of apprehension. “He reckons to kill you.”
“Doesn’t he just!” He moved forward as the publican gave the word, and spent a first round of delicate feinting, getting the feel of his opponent and his style of fighting. The crowd, excited by blood, booed its disapproval at this slow start, but Tom Bowles was beginning to look puzzled. None of his formidable blows seemed to connect with the opponent who danced around him like a gadfly. When time was called for the first round and Warren withdrew to his comer of the ring he recognized a change in the tone of the crowd. Bets were beginning to be taken both ways. He also saw that though he did his gallant best to conceal it, Johnny Penfold was half dead on his feet.
“We must get you to a doctor,” Warren said, and went in for the second round. So far, he had been boxing right handed, like his opponent, now, suddenly, he switched to lead with his left, caught Bowles unawares, once on the right cheek, and then, as he staggered and recovered himself, hard on the right temple. “So much for that” He retired composedly to his comer as Bowles went down without even a groan, and the crowd burst into a great roar of applause. “Someone had better fetch the woman who doctors the village. He may be in need of her services. As for you—” to the publican, who had just finished counting Tom Bowles out— “You doubtless have a waggon of some kind?”
“Yes, sir?” Jewkes, the publican, though an old friend and associate of Tom Bowles, had recognized the change in the mood of the crowd. He left his friend lying senseless and gave a quick order to one of the bystanders. “At your service, sir.”
“Good. I want young Johnny here and his mother taken up to Warren House without delay.”
“And her bits and pieces, sir?”
“Bits?”
“Bowles had seized them for debt, sir. That’s what this was all about.”
“I see. Johnny.”
“Yes, sir?” John Penfold pulled himself together with an effort.
“Does your mother care about her things?”
“Care?” The boy was beyond comprehension, and merely gazed at him dully.
“Oh, sir!” The crowd, openly delighted at the sudden fall of its tyrant, had helped the little old woman in black to push her way forward, and now she merged in front of Warren as if shot from a gun. Tiny and erect and bright eyed, she swept him a surprising curtsy. “I don’t know how to thank you, sir. You saved my Johnny’s life. Do you really mean to take him to the house?”
“And you, too, if you care to come. I was just asking about your things.”
“Let them lie in the dirt where he threw them.” A savage shrug dismissed Tom Bowles. “You’ll let me serve you, sir? And Johnny?”
He had been coming to one of his quick decisions. “There’s an empty cottage up on the home farm,” he said.
Chapter Six
“Pack of spiritless curs.” Lord Hawth had surprised Kate by riding down to Tidemills to give his answer in person to his recalcitrant millhands. “Not a bit of fight left in them. Well, they’d had a busy day! That cousin of yours had been there, interfering in my affairs.”
“Cousin?” Mrs. Warrender looked in puzzlement from him to Kate, demurely garbed now in governess’s grey.
“The American heir. George Warren. Seems you were right in what you told me of Tom Bowles. Young Warren got wind of some of his doings—tampering with one of the girls from Warren House—went down there cool as be damned and found him in a fair way to slaughter her brother.”
“Not Johnny Penfold!” exclaimed Mrs. Warrender.
“Got a pretty sister and an old mother that’s seen better days?”
“That’s the one. Oh, I knew I should have done something for old Mrs. Penfold.”
“No need to fret, ma’am. Young Warren has. The village was buzzing with it. Walks into the ring where Bowles was having his fun with young Johnny, knocks him out cold as mutton and carries off the whole Penfold family to the house. A beauty, I take it, the sister?”
“Without two wits to rub together.” Kate regretted the sharp comment the moment it was uttered.
“Oh, Kate,” said her mother. “You know she always did her best.”
“It sounds as if her best was good enough for George Warren.” Hawth caught a flashing look from Kate and changed the subject. “Anyway, with Tom Bowles out cold and the stranger from town mysteriously vanished, I reckon I could have halved the men’s wages and they’d have touched their caps and thanked me. Oh, well,” tolerantly, “no doubt they threw a fright yesterday into that other young cousin of yours. He’s only a boy after all,
” and again aware of the furious glance from. Kate, “a game one, mind you, but I don’t just see him knocking out Tom Bowles with a left-hander.” He laughed his harsh laugh. “I can’t decide whether I should call to thank George Warren for punishing my troublemaker, or complain of his stealing my hands. Seems he’s to let the old lady help out at Warren House.”
“Mrs. Penfold,” said Mrs. Warrender. “What a good Idea. She will manage admirably for him. It was a sad comedown, that marriage of hers, and I was always afraid not much good would come of it. She’s not old, you know, not really: It was life with Job Penfold changed her so. I never did understand what possessed her to marry him. Or at least—” she coloured scarlet and was silent
“Really, mamma!” Kate had followed her mother upstairs to her bedroom. “What with the things you let Lord Hawth say to you, and the things you say to him, you positively put me to the blush!”
“Shocking, isn’t it?” Her mother smiled at her ruefully. “It’s the strangest thing, Kate. He uses the most scandalous language, and glowers at one like a thunderstorm, and it doesn’t trouble me in the least. I suppose it must be the advantage of being his paid servant. It makes everything so much simpler.”
“I’m glad you find it so,” Kate cast a furious glance at her reflection in the glass. “I confess I am getting a little tired of being the invisible governess.”
Her mother laughed. “Just as well he doesn’t notice you much. You should, just have seen your expression when he said you weren’t capable of knocking out Tom Bowles.”
“ ‘Only a boy’!” quoted Kate angrily. “It’ll be a long day before I meddle in his affairs again.”
“Well, that’s a comfort,” said her mother. “I think young Kit Warrender had better emigrate to Australia or something, don’t you?”
“Oh, nothing quite so drastic as that,” said Kate. “I should miss it so. But maybe a trip to town … Besides, I have the most lowering suspicion that Sue has imagined herself into a tendre for young Kit!”
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