‘Of course, but I wouldn’t have liked to impose,’ I said. ‘And I think Louis thought it wasn’t safe for me to remain at Tucker’s Grave after what happened.’
‘Hmm.’ Alice propped a dish on the cupboard that served as a drainer and turned to me. ‘That’s one of the things I wanted to talk to you about. There’s been a lot of talk in the village as to who it could have been who did away with your poor father.’
I was silent, and she went on: ‘Most of it comes from Jem Giddings, mind you, so how much attention can be paid to it I wouldn’t like to say.’ She sniffed loudly. ‘You know what Jem Giddings is like.’
I nodded. Jem Giddings was little better than a vagrant who was too fond of strong drink – when he could get it – for his own good.
‘He’d been to your place that night, so he says,’ Alice went on.
Again I nodded. I seemed to remember seeing Jem amongst those in the bar when I had gone in to bid my father goodnight. ‘I think he was, yes.’
‘Well, he’d had a drop too much as usual, and fell in the hedge on his way home to sleep it off. But sometime during the night he was awakened by horses. Going hell for leather they were, he says.’
‘The men who came to the inn.’ My throat had gone dry. ‘He saw them!’
‘Not only that, he reckons he recognized one of the horses.’ Alice had abandoned any pretence at washing the dishes. She wiped her hands on an old piece of cloth, drying them carefully. ‘Now, it was a dark night, I know, but Jem says the moon had come out just then, and he saw a grey with a white flash on the muzzle and one white sock. He reckons he’d seen that horse before – and he’d know it anywhere. And whatever else you might say about him, Jem knows his horses.’
That much was true, I knew. Before he had fallen from grace, Jem had been a groom.
‘So where did he think he’d seen it before?’ I asked.
‘Well, you know he covers a lot of ground on his travels. Has a bit of a round trip like, gone for months, then back again…’ Alice paused, as if unwilling, now that the moment had come, to put into words what was on her mind. ‘Well, he reckons he’s seen that horse over Dartmouth way.’
‘Dartmouth?’ I repeated stupidly.
‘That’s right. And it’s set folks wondering, what with the inn going to that Louis Fletcher, whether maybe he might have had something to do with it. To get his hands on Tucker’s Grave, I mean.’
‘Louis!’ I shook my head vigorously. ‘No! He’d never…’
‘I’m not so sure about that,’ Alice said. Her mouth was set. ‘According to Jem there’s rumours in those parts that he’s killed before. Did away with his wife, so they say. Now, Flora, can you see why it is I’ve been so worried about you?’
Eight
The dark little scullery seemed to close in around me, the heat from the range suddenly overpoweringly hot, the lingering smell of cooking sour in my stomach.
Louis a cold-blooded murderer twice over? No! I could not believe it!
‘Alice,’ I said, ‘this is nothing but gossip and speculation, and all of it hinging on the word of a man who is drunk for most of his waking hours. Louis’ wife is dead, yes, and has been for many years. But she died of a fever.’
Even as I said it, I seemed to hear Bevan’s voice again. Oh well, if that’s what you’ve been told, it’s not for me to tell you different. And Louis’ own: I have no wife. But I closed my ears to them, thrust away the sharp shiver of doubt they raised.
‘As for Tucker’s Grave, it’s just a humble coaching inn, and Louis is a very wealthy man,’ I went on. ‘It couldn’t possibly be worth his while to have my father murdered so as to gain possession of it. Why, it would be just a drop in the ocean to him – a month’s profit would be less than he can make with business deals in a single day. In any case, he’s had it boarded up.’
Alice’s face screwed into an expression of bewilderment.
‘What are you talking about – boarded up?’ she asked.
‘He had men sent over to do the job the very next day after I left,’ I said. ‘He wanted to make sure that it was not broken into by vandals.’
‘Well, it certainly didn’t look boarded up to me when we drove past there last week!’ Alice said shortly. ‘Deserted, maybe, but not boarded up.’
It was my turn to look bewildered. Why should Louis tell me the inn was boarded up if it was not true? Alice must be mistaken. The workmen had done their work so neatly it simply looked shuttered. Before I could say as much, however, the door opened and Antoinette came rushing in, bursting with excitement.
‘Flora, you must come and see the foal! She’s the prettiest thing! And the man who owns her says she’ll soon be up for sale! I want Papa to buy her for me. Oh, come and see, please, so that you can help me to persuade him!’
‘Antoinette, I know nothing about horses…’
And I have other things on my mind…
But Antoinette was not to be put off.
‘Flora, you must! I insist!’ She grabbed my sleeve, a gesture so unlike her I could scarcely believe it, and actually tugged me in the direction of the door.
I glanced back. Alice was watching us and the expression on her rosy face was one of deep concern. But the opportunity for confidences was gone. We would not be alone again today.
* * *
The foal was, indeed, every bit as pretty as Antoinette had said, a little bay who would doubtless grow into an elegant filly – even I, with no real interest in horseflesh, and my mind spinning around quite different matters, could see that.
‘I have to have her!’ Antoinette said. ‘I’ll die if I don’t!’
‘But you already have a horse,’ I pointed out.
‘Perdita, yes. But it would be such fun to have a little foal too! I could help break her – she’d be truly mine, as if she were my own baby. You will help me persuade Papa, won’t you? He will buy her for me, won’t he?’
Certainly Louis seemed to give Antoinette everything she asked for, in material terms, anyway. But it occurred to me suddenly – how much did I really know about Louis?
‘I expect he will, yes.’
By the time George had finished the shoeing it was midafternoon and high time that we started back to Belvedere. But there was something else that I wanted to do, even if it meant we did not arrive home until after dark. When we had bidden George and Alice goodbye – Alice clasped me tightly and bid me ‘be careful, Flora’ – I gave my instructions to Thompson.
‘I’d like to make a short detour. Would you drive past Tucker’s Grave Inn, please?’
He looked a little surprised. Though the inn had been on my original itinerary I suppose he thought that since we had been so long at the forge I would have decided it was now too late. But it was not for him to argue. Thompson had long been in the service of those whose word was law; the fact that I was a humble innkeeper’s daughter of the same class as himself did not enter into it. I was now part of the Belvedere household, I had ordered the carriage and was in charge of the master’s daughter, and my wishes were to be treated with respect.
‘Can we visit the ruined abbey too?’ Antoinette asked as the horses drew the carriage up the long hill out of the village of Monksmoor.
‘I don’t think there will be time,’ I said. ‘We’ll come back another day, perhaps.’
She pouted, and I added: ‘We very likely could have visited the abbey if you had not spent so long with the horses. You must realize that sometimes there are choices to be made in life.’
She was silent, sulking, and I thought again what a difficult girl she could be. She had enjoyed a day full of interest, yet the moment her wishes were thwarted she once more became pettish and miserable.
As the inn came in sight, my heart began to beat unevenly and the dryness increased in my throat. The carriage ground to a halt, and I climbed down, almost afraid, now I was here, to look on my old home.
When I did, my heart leaped again in my throat.
Alice had
not been mistaken when she said she did not think Tucker’s Grave had been boarded up. Though dark, deserted and forlorn, it looked otherwise exactly as it had when I had left it.
* * *
How long I stood there on the forecourt staring at my home, I do not know. My thoughts were whirling, yet a thick fog seemed to have clouded my brain so I could not get hold of any one of them to try to make sense of it. All I knew was that Louis had lied to me, for what reason I could not imagine.
And if he had lied to me about this, what else had he lied about? What secrets was he keeping from me?
‘Miss Flora.’ Thompson’s voice, deferential yet firm, invaded my thoughts. ‘If there’s nothing else, I really think we should be making for home. It’s best not to be out on these lonely roads after nightfall.’
‘Yes. Yes, of course. We’ll go now.’
I felt oddly vulnerable, suddenly, and conscious too that I was responsible not only for my own safety, but Antoinette’s also. I climbed back up into the carriage, though my eyes still lingered on Tucker’s Grave Inn as we drove away.
‘It’s quite small, isn’t it?’ Antoinette remarked disparagingly. ‘A very ordinary-looking place really.’
Ordinary, yes. And yet Louis had wasted no time in coming to claim it as his inheritance, forcing me to leave it and then lying to me about having it boarded up.
Why would he do any of those things? All the questions that had puzzled me in the early days, and which I had put to the back of my mind, rose, clamouring once more like a flock of startled birds. He had no need of it for financial gain. He seemed in no hurry to put in a new landlord to run it. Yet he had refused to allow me to stay there. And he had lied to me about having it boarded up. That was the most vexing question of all.
But by no means the most disturbing one.
I thought again of all Alice had said. I had dismissed out of hand her suggestion that the men who had come in the middle of the night and shot my father might have some connection with Louis. The link was so tenuous, even if Jem Giddings had been a sober and reliable witness – which he was not. But I could no longer avoid making it.
Had Louis wanted Tucker’s Grave for some reason of his own? Wanted it so badly that he had sent a pair of ruffians to despatch my father so that he could get his hands on it? I recoiled from the thought.
But they had not shot him outright, I reminded myself. There had been a heated exchange first. Could it be that they had come with some kind of proposal from Louis for illicit dealings and with orders to finish the argument by force if my father failed to agree? Which of course he would have done. My father would have no truck with anything that was not strictly honest and honourable; he was not that kind of man.
I had not thought Louis to be that kind of man either. Oh, it had crossed my mind he might be involved in a little free trade, and that the records concealed in the locked bureau in his study related to that. But something so serious that an innocent man should be murdered so that it could go on unhindered? No, not in a million years. It was beyond belief in the man I had come to know – and fallen in love with.
But then it seemed I did not know him at all. For if the other allegation Alice had made carried any truth, then he was already a murderer. The murderer of his wife.
I shivered, a chill similar to the one that had pervaded me in the days after my father’s death creeping over my skin. I pulled the rug more closely around my knees and still gained no warmth from it. I felt nauseous too, and the rocking of the carriage exacerbated it.
Dear God, it was a nightmare, all of it. Just when I had thought that I had turned the corner towards a new life, just when spring had seemed to be waking from the cold depths of winter, I was plunged once again into dark confusion, despair – and fear. Was there no one in my new world that I could trust?
I pressed my fingers to my mouth, fighting back the nausea. And all the while the carriage took me further and further away from my old friends, and closer and closer to the dark secrets of Belvedere House.
* * *
When we arrived back, Gavin was there.
‘I thought I’d lost the pair of you!’ he said jokingly. ‘Where in the world have you been?’
I was saved from answering by Antoinette, whose good humour returned at the chance to relive her adventures.
‘Oh, we had lunch in a cottage and there was a forge where I watched a horse being shod, and I’ve seen the most darling foal that Papa absolutely has to buy for me, and we went to Tucker’s Grave Inn and…’
Gavin glanced at me. ‘You went to Tucker’s Grave Inn? I thought you said Louis has the only key.’
‘We didn’t go inside,’ I said. ‘We only stopped on the forecourt for a few moments.’
‘That must have been very upsetting for you, if it’s been boarded up.’ His narrowed eyes were watching me. Did he know, I wondered, that Louis had lied?
Again I was saved from having to reply by Antoinette’s intervention.
‘It’s not boarded up,’ she said. ‘Just locked. I wish we could have gone in, though. I would have liked to explore the passages that lead to the abbey ruins. Not that I think Flora would have come with me. She’s afraid of the spiders. You could take me, Uncle Gavin. You wanted to explore them, too, didn’t you?’
Gavin laughed. ‘When I was a boy.’
‘Oh, say you will! You’d like to, I know.’
‘Perhaps one day I will,’ Gavin said. ‘Provided you behave yourself – and provided your Papa will let me have the key. But I don’t suppose we should get very far. With the abbey end blocked up, the tunnels have no doubt collapsed over the years.’
And for the time being, that was that.
* * *
After we had eaten dinner and Flora had retired to her room, Gavin repaired to the parlour. Since Louis had been away, he had taken to remaining in the house instead of returning to the Lodge – taking advantage of Louis’ absence, I surmised. I had made no objection for I was glad enough of the company and Gavin had not again overstepped the bounds of propriety as he had on the day Louis had brought me my pearl collar, but tonight I was in no mood for social intercourse. Rather I wanted answers to some of the questions that were bombarding me. I had no idea how much Gavin knew, given the bad feeling that existed between the brothers, but I had every intention of finding out.
I had been silent throughout the meal, for any attempt at normal conversation would have been beyond me, and I had been glad that Antoinette was so full of her day that she talked constantly to Gavin about it. But Gavin must have noticed my preoccupation, for when we were alone, and he had poured himself a large glass of Louis’ good cognac, he said idly: ‘You are very quiet tonight, Flora. Did going back to Tucker’s Grave upset you?’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Yes, it did.’
‘Then I shall have to try to cheer you up, shall I not?’ He threw himself down on the chaise beside me, stretching his long legs comfortably and sipping his brandy. ‘Lightening dark moods is my speciality.’
‘Not tonight, Gavin,’ I said.
‘Oh come! You’ll ruin my good opinion of my own qualities!’ He moved a little closer. I moved away. It was now or never.
‘Have you ever seen a horse in these parts with a white flash on its muzzle and a white sock on the left hind leg?’ I asked.
‘I beg your pardon?’ Gavin sounded bewildered, as well he might.
I took a deep breath. ‘A horse like that was seen galloping away from Tucker’s Grave on the night my father was murdered,’ I said.
Gavin froze. I felt the sudden stillness in him, tangible as the bite of frost in the air on a sharp December night. Then: ‘Why do you ask if I know such a horse?’ he asked.
‘The man who saw it is a vagrant,’ I said. ‘Over the months he travels far and wide through the countryside begging food and the price of a jug of ale, though his home, in so far as he has one, is our village, Monksmoor. According to what I heard today, he was sleeping off the effects of his liquor
in the hedge not far from Tucker’s Grave, saw two riders pass, and recognized one of the horses as one he has seen in the vicinity of Dartmouth. I wondered if it meant anything to you.’
For a long moment Gavin remained motionless. Then his breath came out on a short laugh.
‘My dear Flora, have you any idea how many horses there are in the vicinity of Dartmouth?’
‘Yes, of course. But this one is distinctive enough for Jem Giddings to have recognized it,’ I persisted. ‘Are you sure you don’t remember having seen it?’
‘Not that I recall. In any case, the man is a vagrant, you say, and a drunk to boot. Surely no faith can be placed in anything he might say?’
‘That’s true enough,’ I agreed. ‘But he’s also a former groom, who knows his horses.’
‘I’m sorry, but I can’t help you,’ Gavin said. ‘If I should see a horse like the one you describe, I’ll take note of who it belongs to, but I should think such a thing is very unlikely.’
I bit my lip. There was no arguing with what he said – why, it had been exactly my own reaction when Alice had told me of it. And yet… I couldn’t avoid the disturbing certainty that what I had said had meant something to Gavin; that for all his protestations to the contrary he had recognized the description of the horse Jed claimed to have seen. And that could mean only one thing. He was denying any knowledge of it in order to protect Louis.
‘Flora,’ Gavin said, his voice gentle now, ‘it’s no wonder you are so upset if you have been reminded of the terrible thing that happened to your father. All this dwelling upon it will do you no good. Don’t you think you should try to put it out of your mind?’
My hands balled to fists in the folds of my skirt.
‘I saw my father lying dead on the floor of the bar in a pool of his own blood,’ I said harshly. ‘I can never put it out of my mind. And if there is the slightest chance that I can identify the men who did that to him and bring them to justice, then I shall take it.’
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