‘It’s not cock fighting,’ he said. ‘Unless I miss my guess, that large devil over yonder, strutting about and flexing his muscles, is the local champion, and there is to be a prize fight.’
‘Ah.’ Spence nodded. ‘Which explains why Porter was being so furtive. You can wager he’s running the book, if you’ll pardon the pun, which would not sit well with my father. He wouldn’t want his steward involving himself in unlawful fights.’
‘The law turns a blind eye,’ Dawlish pointed out. ‘It has to, given that royal princes are keen supporters of pugilistic gatherings.’
‘Regardless of its legality and morality, how does it involve our forger?’ Spence asked.
‘We don’t know that it does,’ James replied. ‘We have to assume the person Miss Darcy overheard Porter and Bairstow referring to could be the man responsible for supplying the fighters. Perhaps he has a specific arrangement with Bairstow and was holding him to that arrangement.’
‘Shall we go and watch?’ Dawlish asked.
‘No,’ Marc replied. ‘Until we can be sure what’s going on, it’s better if we don’t. If Porter sees Spence and me he will know his secret is out. No telling what he might do then.’
James gave a thoughtful nod. ‘If anyone to do with the art world is in that barn, they will most likely recognise me,’ he said. ‘Let’s use the crowd as cover to get round the back of the barn where we can’t be spotted so easily.’
With a nod from Spence, all four of them merged into the crowd. No one took any particular notice of them as they headed for the interior of the barn. Spence led the way round to one side of it, where they would have a view of the activity through an open window but the chances of them being seen were slim. Everyone was focused upon the preparations for the fight. An air of expectation fuelled the atmosphere as the crowd gathered in a tight pack around the space cleared for the combatants.
‘There,’ Marc said, pointing to a man standing to one side, taking bets. ‘It’s Porter.’
ᴥᴥᴥ
Susie decided she must have taken leave of her senses, but determination not to be excluded from any discoveries made that night overcame her qualms. She would not be satisfied until she found out for herself just what it was that Tobias had become embroiled in. Marc and Spence were not his greatest fans and might well advise Papa to dismiss him without being in full possession of all the facts.
Susie couldn’t allow that to happen.
They had no guests at Pemberley that evening, and Susie was able to make an early escape to her chamber, claiming fatigue. She dismissed Mary as soon as she reasonably could and put her plan into action before her courage deserted her, pulling on an old pair of Luc’s breeches and the accompanying male attire. She tied her hair on the top of her head and hid it beneath a cap, hardly recognising the creature with glistening eyes and flushed cheeks that stared back at her when she checked her reflection in the long glass.
She had spent the evening pondering upon the best way to get to Denton and had come up with a plan, of sorts. Morris, the gentle old cob that she had learned to ride on, was turned out to pasture day and night now that he was more or less retired. No one would notice if she borrowed him for a few hours. She could trust Morris to take good care of her, just as he always had.
‘Right,’ she said, the sound of her own voice giving her courage. ‘Now to get out of the house.’
That proved to be relatively easy. The family had retired for the night so all the servants were in their quarters. However, the side door to the mews would remain unlocked since Marc and Spence were not at home. The one footman who had been left on duty to lock up after her brothers returned had fallen asleep at his post, just as Susie had hoped would be the case. She slipped past him and through the unlocked door without making a sound. The footman continued to snore, oblivious to her nocturnal wanderings.
Feeling mildly euphoric at having escaped unnoticed, she collected the halter that she had hidden that afternoon behind a shrub, made sure she still had a carrot in her pocket, and headed for Morris’s paddock. Morris could always be relied upon to come for a carrot. Thankfully, the sky was clear and there was a three-quarter moon that would enable her to see where she was going. Even so, being out alone in the dark was unnerving. Every sound seemed exaggerated, and when a fox streaked past her, almost brushing against her legs, she was obliged to stifle a shriek. Susie took a deep breath to steady her oscillating nerves, waited for her palpitating heart to resume a more regular beat and felt fractionally calmer. She reminded herself what was at stake and told herself she could do this.
‘Good lad,’ she said, when Morris lifted his head in response to her soft call and trotted over to the fence.
She patted his neck as he munched on his carrot, slipped the halter behind his ears and secured it in place. She then led the cob from the paddock, making sure to close the gate behind her, positioned him beside the railing and used it as a mounting block. She slid her leg over Morris’s wide back, envying gentlemen the freedom of movement that breeches afforded them. Morris was as comfortable as an armchair and ambled forward when she touched his sides with her heels. Her eyes had become accustomed to the dark and she felt less inclined to jump at every nocturnal sound now that she had Morris to talk to.
Susie knew the area so well that she didn’t need to think about the direction she took. Even so, it was ten miles to Denton, it was full dark and all sorts of hazards awaited the unwary. Fortunately she was riding an unremarkable cob that few would take any notice of and she herself looked like an equally unremarkable farm lad.
Or so she hoped.
She pushed Morris into a steady trot, wondering if she dared to cut across country. It would save her at least a mile. In daylight she wouldn’t hesitate but, given the circumstances, she decided to stick to the road. Even a horse as sturdy as Morris might twist a fetlock on the uneven terrain and that could prove disastrous for more than just her obliging mount. Miss Susanna Darcy of Pemberley would be required to explain why she was stranded in the middle of nowhere at the dead of night, dressed as a boy and riding an old cob with neither saddle nor bridle. She shuddered as she imagined her father’s reaction and almost lost her nerve.
‘There’s no help for it, Morris,’ she told the cob. ‘We shall just have to take the long way, but we have no need to rush so there’s little danger of you running out of energy.’
She hummed to herself as she and Morris made steady progress, the sound of her own voice helping to quell her growing anxiety. Her father’s reaction if he discovered what she had done really didn’t bear thinking about. But her brothers, she knew, would be equally incandescent.
‘It would be less inconvenient if they didn’t find out,’ she told Morris. ‘And they will not since I can be as devious as you please when the situation calls for it.’
The realisation that her brothers would consider her incapable of facing this situation head on served to bolster her courage. She was tired of being treated like a delicate flower, without the wit or wisdom to take responsibility for her own actions. Besides, she was the one who had made the situation more difficult for James by carelessly telling Tobias why he had come to Derbyshire so it was beholden upon her to help resolve matters. She had come prepared for trouble and was armed with her most vicious hat pin. If anyone attempted to challenge her, she wouldn’t hesitate to deploy it in the most vulnerable part of her interlocutor’s anatomy.
The night was warm and, reassured by Morris’s plodding gait, Susie almost began to enjoy her brazen undertaking. It was only as she neared her destination, saw lights and heard a cacophony of male voices that she started to have second thoughts. But she was not about to permit momentary doubts to deter her.
‘We have come this far, Morris,’ she said, patting his neck, ‘so we’d best see matters through.’
Thus resolved, she found a secluded spot and slid from Morris’s back, a little unsteady when her feet touched the ground after riding astride for so long. S
he was not accustomed to it, and resigned herself to aching legs for at least three days. Her fingers shook as she took three attempts to secure Morris’s rope to a sturdy branch. Not an auspicious start. Taking a deep breath, she patted the cob’s neck and told him she would not be long, hoping she spoke the truth and that she would see the obliging creature again in the near future.
She blended in with a few stragglers heading towards the barn, gathering from the snippets of conversations that reached her ears and from the fast pace they set that they were late. Late for what? She dared not look up at them for fear of drawing attention to herself but could tell from their manner of discourse and the indifferent nature of their clothing that they were not gentlemen. That knowledge gave her heart, since it increased the likelihood of this gathering having nothing to do with forged works of art.
She hung back when the motley crew she had tagged along with entered the barn. It was too well lit for her to risk going inside. Besides, the crowd was thick, she would be swallowed up by it and escape would be impossible. She slunk round one side of the barn instead and met a solid brick wall.
She shrieked, drawing the attention of the wall in question, which proved to be no wall at all. Instead it was a mountain of a man—solid muscle and ugly as sin—stripped to the waist and looking ready to murder anyone who looked at him askance. And at that precise moment, she was the sole focus of his displeasure.
‘Where the devil is the guard,’ he demanded to know, grabbing her shoulder in a grip firm enough to make her eyes water and shaking her until her teeth rattled. ‘You shouldn’t be back here.’
Susie swallowed, too frightened to say a word.
‘Come on, Mason, it’s time. What’s got you so distracted?’
Susie almost swooned with relief when she recognised Tobias’s voice. Her wits were restored to her and the true nature of this gathering also struck home.
It was a prize fight.
‘Nice of you to send me this chit.’ The man-mountain’s terrifying expression gave way to a lascivious grin. ‘But now ain’t the time. She’ll keep until later.’
A chit? Susie panicked. How did he…She lifted her hand and realised that long strands of hair had escaped from her cap during her ride and spiralled over her shoulders in a tangle of curls. She had been so preoccupied that she hadn’t thought to check that her disguise was still in place. A fine investigator she would make!
Tobias’s eyes widened with recognition as he fixed her with a disbelieving glower. Susie remained frozen to the spot, too terrified to be able to think coherently or move a muscle, even though the man-mountain had released his hold on her shoulder. Tobias gave curt orders to a man standing behind him, grabbed Susie’s arm none to gently and almost dragged her away from the barn.
‘Let go of me!’ she hissed.
‘What in the devil’s name are you doing here?’ he demanded in a furious tone.
ᴥᴥᴥ
‘I can understand now why they were so suspicious of our presence in the tavern,’ Marc said, watching the steady flow of men gathering in the barn. ‘They won’t want Father to know about this escapade. This is more our uncle Bingley’s neck of the woods but the pater wields authority over the entire district and won’t stand for the law being disregarded in such a blatant fashion.’
‘Or the wagering of blunt this lot probably can’t afford to lose.’ Spence nodded towards two men on the far side of the barn, overwhelmed with the volume of people wanting to part with their hard-earned coin.
‘See anyone you recognise?’ Marc asked, addressing the question to James.
‘Not so far,’ James replied, scanning the constantly moving crowd with his eyes.
‘There’s Porter,’ Spence said curtly.
James followed the direction of his gaze and saw the man in question standing behind the bookmakers, keeping a weather eye on their activities. Then his attention appeared to be diverted by something happening outside of James’s line of vision. Porter issued curt instructions to his underlings and disappeared through a side door, presumably to the area where the pugilists waited to beat the hell out of one another for the entertainment of others.
James and his party were no nearer to figuring out what Porter was up to when the crowd parted rather like an ebb tide and a gentleman and his entourage moved brazenly to a spot close to the makeshift ring.
‘Covington!’ Marc said in a disgusted tone, following James’s lead and lowering his hat over his eyes to avoid recognition. There were so many bodies in that barn that it would be nigh-on impossible to identify anyone who wasn’t actually inside the structure. Even so… ‘And he’s not even trying to hide his involvement.’
James barely heard him. Instead his attention was focused with angry disbelief on the scruffy little man at Covington’s side.
‘That’s Mannering,’ he said, pointing to him with a shaking finger. ‘One of my father’s most promising protégées.’ James was so irate that he could barely speak. ‘And, I thought, one of the most loyal students in his master classes. He is the last person I would have expected to be involved in this ugly business.’ He turned to face the Darcy brothers. ‘Gentlemen, we have located our forger.’
‘Presumably Covington keeps him secluded around here somewhere and uses Bevan to sell the forgeries,’ Spence said, his calm voice going some way towards quelling James’s ire. ‘He doesn’t risk getting too closely involved himself, but he must be the person Susie heard Porter discussing with Bairstow. He’s the important guest who needs to be kept happy with a front row view of the sport.’
‘I was not aware that he enjoyed violence,’ James said scathingly. ‘But then it seems I know little about his true character, other than that he has a sorry way of repaying my father’s generosity.’
‘If he’s a gamester,’ Dawlish said, ‘perhaps he got in above his head with the wrong type of loan sharks and this is his only way of extricating himself from his debts.’
‘I would like to believe that was the case,’ James replied, ‘but I cannot help feeling he’s more likely to be motivated by a combination of greed and the desire for vicarious fame.’
‘He can take no public accolade for the forgeries,’ Spence said, ‘so he takes private pleasure from being accomplished enough to deceive supposedly expert eyes.’
James nodded grimly. ‘Precisely.’
‘What do you wish to do about this, Tyrell?’ Marc asked.
‘I would like to grab hold of Mannering and wring his ungrateful neck, but given our current situation that would be unwise. Did you notice the two burly individuals who came in behind Covington and who are now keeping a weather eye on the throng?’
Marc nodded. ‘The one on the left is Bairstow, Covington’s steward.’
‘If we try to grab Mannering, they will prevent us and a brawl is bound to ensue,’ Spence said. ‘We will be heavily outnumbered, this crowd has been drinking, their blood is up and I don’t fancy our chances of coming through unscathed if we disrupt their sport.’
‘I agree,’ James said, not bothering to lower his voice. The cacophony of sound drifting through the open window of the barn was such that it would be impossible for anyone to overhear him. Indeed, his friends had to lean in close to hear him themselves, despite the fact that they weren’t even inside the barn. ‘Besides, I want to catch everyone involved so stealth is called for. We know Covington and his steward are up to their necks in it—’
‘To say nothing of our own trainee steward,’ Marc added bitterly.
‘Quite so.’ James inclined his head. ‘We had best follow Covington when he leaves here and see where Mannering is holed up. Then we can take the necessary action in the morning.’
‘You have to admire Covington’s nerve,’ Spence remarked. ‘He is aware that you’re in the area, Tyrell, and must suspect why—yet he still risked bringing Mannering out in public.’
‘We are not supposed to know anything about this gathering.’
‘Perhaps not, but w
e were seen in the tavern. You would think that someone would be keeping watch and reporting back to Covington.’
‘He is either very arrogant or very desperate,’ Marc said.
‘We were seen leaving the tavern and riding away,’ Dawlish pointed out. ‘Had we not been, perhaps they wouldn’t have shown themselves.’
‘They must be very anxious to keep Mannering happy,’ Spence mused. ‘Still, he’s their passport to riches and so I suppose it’s in their best interests to protect their investment.’
James watched as one of the bookmakers approached Mannering and took his wager. Everyone else had been obliged to go to them.
‘Porter has been gone for a long time,’ James said, thinking it suspicious.
‘Perhaps he went to organise proceedings,’ Spence replied, nodding towards the cleared space when the challenger entered the arena and a loud cheer went up.
‘Lord have mercy!’ James remarked when the massive champion stepped in—bulging with a combination of hard muscle and overwhelming confidence—to an almighty roar that was in danger of lifting the rafters. ‘The challenger doesn’t stand a chance. You have to admire his courage…or desperation.’
Further conversation was impossible as the fight got under way and the noise became deafening. James watched Mannering waving his arms and shouting encouragement, his bulging eyes never leaving the much smaller challenger. It wasn’t difficult to surmise where he had placed his blunt. The challenger was wily—a small, muscular man who knew how to defend himself and dodge the worst of the champion’s meaty punches. The fight was far from one-sided. The champion had a cut beneath his right eye and the eye in question appeared to be half closed. The challenger had blood pouring from his nose.
‘It’s rigged,’ Marc said when the challenger seemed to gain an advantage. ‘Covington most likely arranged it that way to keep Mannering happy.’
Susie Darcy's Tenacious Nature Page 17