by Ben Tripp
He also spent hours pacing irritably from one end of the Manse to the other, smoking his churchwarden pipe and looking out of the windows as if expecting someone to visit. But no one ever did. He read books about coach-making and studied maps; he took me out hunting and shot no game, but rode his great black horse over every terrain like a madman with the devil at his back, myself trailing along behind on a gray hunter with similar skill but more care, determined not to break my neck.
Sometimes he would stop at a particular crossroads or other isolated spot and study the lay of the land with infinite care, I knew not why. I had begun to understand that my master, as much as I, felt trapped—myself by idleness, and him by some unknown business that worried him.
But here my musings ended, for my steps had taken me to the Widow’s Arms.
Chapter 2
THE DAY’S SECOND INTERROGATION
I HAD BEEN instructed by Master Rattle to bring back a jug of beer in addition to whatever else I thought fit. He was not much interested in food, except as it accompanied drink; that and cards were my master’s main vices. He was often out all night. I had saved getting the beer for last, because it would spoil if it sat in the cart all afternoon. So it was, with the sun at my back and long shadows stretching out before me, that I stopped in at the tavern.
The Widow’s Arms was a low, dark place on the road outside town, always cool within and smelling of damp. There were a number of people at the tables there, it being market day, and the air was blue with pipe smoke. Molly Figgs tended bar, scouring pewter mugs with a rag as brown as bacon. She was a formidable woman with a red cap on her head, not the widow named on the signboard but her daughter-in-law. She knew me well, my master requiring an above-average quantity of beer.
“Brought your jug, I see, Mr. Bristol,” she boomed. Bristol, being the town in which I was purchased, was my surname. “Same as always?”
“If you please, ma’am,” I said, and placed my coins on the bar. I thought of ordering a dish of tea for myself, but one look at the washing-rag and I decided against it.
Molly arranged the jug beneath a beer-tap in the end of a cask, then aimed a leering wink at me. “Your master’s a rare ’un,” she said. “There’s talk of him from one end o’ town to the next, you know.”
I did know. I felt my face turning red. It was a proud thing to work for a gentleman, but not so proud if the gentleman was prone to strange behavior.
“It’s only gossip,” said I, staunchly. “Master Rattle is restless from inaction, that’s all.”
“Curse of the titled class, boredom,” Molly said, and squinted as if she could squeeze me to death with her eyelids. I was searching for a suitable response when there was a great clatter of boots and hooves in the foreyard, and a few moments later the door flew open and banged against the wall.
The officer late of the fine brown horse strode in, spurs ajingle, and tucked his hat under his arm like a bagpipe. He surveyed the room, examining each face turned toward him. To judge by his scowling demeanor, he found some fault in every one. He might have been correct, but it was unkind to make his opinion so obvious.
Still, thirst must be answered. So he clove through the occupants of the place as a ship cleaves the waves, with a pair of soldiers at his back forming a red wake, and dropped anchor right beside me.
“Whisky,” he barked in a drill-field voice. The soldiers standing behind him gazed lovingly on the tuns of beer that stood behind Molly. While she fetched the bottle, the captain leaned on his elbow and turned to sweep the room with his eyes again, lingering on the roughest characters. I barely rated a blink’s worth of scrutiny.
“I am Captain Sterne,” bellowed he, “of the Earl of Bath’s Regiment, now designated the Tenth. Look on me well. If any crime is perpetrated upon the roads from here to the Irish Sea, or t’other way to Penzance, or thence to the chalky Cliffs of Dover, I shall pursue the perpetrant to the very gates of hell. But every coin has a backside, and so have I.”
At this, several of the customers chuckled, and Captain Sterne fixed them with a glare so ferocious it could have knocked a bird out of the air.
“On the obverse of this coin: If any of you have knowledge of a crime done, or of plans to commit one in the future, I am provided with means of instant reward by courtesy of our practical-minded Majesty. There is nothing so soothing to the conscience as gold. When I’m not fixing the noose about your necks, I’ll balm your tongues with sovereigns. Am I understood?”
There was a smattering of “yerss” and “aye” from those present, sufficient so that the captain felt he’d done his part.
“The age of land-piracy is come to an end,” he said. “And I’m the end of it.”
So saying, he threw the dram of whisky down the back of his throat like a shovel of coals onto a smelting fire, coughed once, and clapped a gold sovereign on the bar. “God save the King,” said he, and spun on his heel so that he was nose to nose with his men. They parted to let him pass, then followed him out of the place, just as thirsty as when they had walked in.
Every eye in the house turned from the door as soon as it was shut, and fell upon the coin that gleamed atop the bar. After she’d gathered her wits back together, Molly Figgs’ red hand leapt out and snatched it up. It vanished into a pocket among her skirts. Then she swept the room with her own eyeballs, no less ferocious than the captain.
“That’s what I gets for keeping an ’onest hestablishment,” said she, defiantly. “And don’t think I’ll fail to turn ’ee in one and all if you ain’t ’onest yerselfs!”
So saying, she commenced polishing the bar with such determination that part of it nearly became clean. The jug was overflowing, and I pointed this out to her. She corked it up and slid it across to me, but didn’t let go. Her brains had been at work, it seemed.
“There’s talk,” Molly said, “that your master rides out of an evening and don’t come back till morning.”
“Most gentlemen do that sort of thing, I’m told,” I said. “Until they have wife and children, of course. Then they don’t come back all week.”
“There’s some what seen him on that great black horse, riding across the moors by moonlight. Wild as an Apache, they say. Clad all in black,” she went on, now leaning over the jug to squint at me more closely.
“I doubt very much that’s my master,” said I, growing irritated. This sort of talk was dangerous. If they thought my master was galloping around in the dark, it wasn’t a far stretch to asking why an honest man would do so. People were seeing highwaymen behind every tree these days—they could mistake him for a brigand. And Captain Sterne might not care who he captured, as long as he captured someone.
I was about to argue the point, but stopped myself, remembering my earlier interview with Lily the acrobat. If I protested too much, Molly might well take it that I was hiding something. I was an open sort of person by nature—little credit for that, as it caused me no end of difficulties—but my years on the road had taught me a great deal about how dishonest minds work. They tend to attach the worst motives to everything.
“My master’s a man of rare habits, I confess,” said I. “But there is no harm in him. We go hunting thrice a week, but he hasn’t any interest in bagging game, as far as I can tell. He once shot a sparrow out of the air by way of a demonstration of marksmanship, and accidentally trampled a marmot while jumping Midnight over a stile, but that’s been the whole of his bag in the two years I’ve known him. Master Rattle loves to ride, that’s all. And Midnight’s the finest horse in England. Anyone would want to ride him day and night.”
Molly nodded, as if this confirmed her worst suspicions. She began to release the jug, lifting one finger at a time in order to prolong the conversation. “He likes his guns, though, even if he don’t shoot rabbits,” she said, and winked so violently her cap tipped sideways.
A couple of ruffians at a nearby table had begun listening to the conversation. Captain Sterne’s eye had lingered upon them earlier. One
had a pink scar that ran from his cleft ear to his nose, like a saber cut.
Their pipes had gone out, and they were staring at me in a most curious manner. I watched them from the tail of my eye, and was again reminded of my conversation with Lily. It might be as well to warn people that the Rattle estate was reasonably well defended.
“He’s a brilliant shot with pistols,” I boasted, raising my voice a little. “And he’s a wizard with a sword. Master’s taught me a great deal so that I might spar with him, but there’s none so quick as he. However, I can play my part.”
“Practicing pistols and swords … it makes a body wonder what on Earth he needs such talents for,” Molly said.
She didn’t elaborate on what she was thinking, and when I finally realized what she was implying, I decided not to say another word, lest I make matters worse. Unless I was much mistaken, she suspected my master was—incredibly enough—a highwayman. And it hadn’t occurred to me until that moment that I could furnish no proof otherwise.
Master Rattle did ride out at all hours of the night, with no word to explain where he’d gone. He was the surest shot and the nimblest sword I knew, and his magnificent horse could scarcely have been swifter if he’d been equipped with wings. What a dreadful thought! But it was nonsense, of course. Highwaymen didn’t have manservants, and here I was.
With that thought to sustain me, I departed the Widow’s Arms. The eyes of the two ruffians followed me to the door.
Chapter 3
RATTLE RIDES OUT
THE SUN was down and the sky a red bowl over the darkening countryside when I drove the cart through the crooked iron gates of the Rattle Manse, and the stars had come out by the time I had put Old Nell away in the stable. Midnight, my master’s fine black hunter horse, was not there, nor his tack. I brought my purchases into the house by way of the kitchen, and there found a note pinned to the long deal table with a paring knife.
Dear Mr. Bristol,
I shall be out all night, and possibly longer. Do not wait up, I pray.
Yrs
J. Rattle
This was a fairly typical communication from Master Rattle, who (despite his station in life) seemed to find it amusing that he had any household staff at all. He’d grown up with many servants in the much finer seat of his family. His father was an influential and wealthy lord, and his elder brothers were celebrated, too: one was an admiral in the navy, the other an importer of tea. James Rattle was himself, as he’d once said to me, nothing more than a spare boy in case one of the other two died prematurely. As a result he’d been given one of the hereditary estates and a trifling income. Although he joked about it, I think he acutely felt his father’s indifference to him. I cannot speak of my own father’s indifference, for no one knew who he was. Neither of us could remember our mothers, who had perished young in the fashion of the times.
The Manse was a big place, to be fair—far too big to maintain, and set in the middle of extensive grounds. Yet among the estates thereabouts, it was the least. The roof was falling in, it was overrun by mice (which Demon the bulldog steadfastly ignored), and the cellar flooded for a month every spring.
* * *
Having been employed by him for two years, I thought I understood my master fairly well (which, as you shall learn, shows I understood little enough). He had two reasons for not employing more servants: one was money, always in short supply—gambling consumed his entire annual stipend in a month or two—and the other was privacy. Most servants employed to mind such a wreckage as the Manse would do nothing but carry tales into town all day. Master Rattle detested wagging tongues.
I made for myself a supper of ham and butter between two slabs of bread, a clever way of taking meals invented by John Montagu, 4th Earl of Sandwich. Then I set some sausage and the jug of beer on the table for my employer—the kitchen door was nearest the stables, and among Master Rattle’s eccentricities was his use of the kitchen door as if it were the main entrance to the house. His father, he once remarked, had never set foot in his own kitchen in sixty years.
This accomplished, I took myself off to bed.
* * *
It was the deepest part of the night, with the moon almost down behind the trees, when I was awakened by the distant sound of breaking crockery. I was quartered in a backstairs room above the kitchen, and the noise seemed to come from directly below. My first thought was burglars. Demon the bulldog had been sleeping on the rug at the foot of my bed. The short fawn fur on his back stood up and he began to screech in the way of barking peculiar to the breed. I bade him be silent.
The two of us went along the passage and crept downstairs, me in my stocking feet. I felt my way along without a candle, not wishing to advertise my presence, and stole to the inner kitchen door. Demon let me lead the way, not being a bold creature. When I looked into the kitchen, my caution was forgotten and I rushed in.
My master was sprawled upon the table, face down, the jug of beer shattered on the floor. By the moonlight coming through the small windows, I saw a dark stain spilling across the boards. It didn’t look like beer.
Once I’d ascertained my master was senseless, I lit a candle from the embers in the hearth. Master Rattle was bleeding profusely from a wound in his body somewhere, his face white as paper ash. That was the first thing I saw.
The second thing was that my master was clad entirely in black from head to foot, except for the bright scarlet turndowns on his boot-tops. There was a black mask across his eyes. I smelled horse sweat and gunpowder.
I went to my master’s side and my foot collided with something under the table. It was a gold-hilted sword, unsheathed, the blade smeared with blood. I struggled to turn him face upward. The unfortunate gentleman was delirious, his eyes fluttering.
“Mr. Bristol,” he croaked. “My apologies.”
“I’ll fetch the doctor, sir,” I said, pressing dishcloths over the wound in his chest. I confess I was more frightened than I had ever been before.
Master Rattle redoubled my alarm by fiercely gripping me upon the arm, as if all his strength was concentrated in that one hand. “No doctor!” he snarled. “Promise me that. Not a soul knows of this but you and I.”
“But Master,” I said. “You—”
“The devil take me!” he interrupted, and fell into a faint.
* * *
I did what I could to stop the flow of blood. I’d had a little experience with such things, acrobatic work being an endless source of injuries. But I’d never seen a bullet wound. It was a terrible sight, and I felt sick in body and soul as I bound it up. Regardless of my master’s entreaty, I fully intended to call the doctor at the first possible opportunity. The poor fellow wasn’t in his right mind, after all.
At length I could do no more. I wanted to get my master up to his bed, but moving him could have been fatal. Instead, I fetched some bedding from the cupboard and tucked it around the patient right there on the kitchen table, with a pillow under his head. Master Rattle appeared to be sleeping, not unconscious, and a little color had returned to his face. I fervently hoped the worst of the danger had passed. I put Demon up on the table for company, and the little dog sniffed the bandages and licked at my master’s face.
I would have rushed out straightaway, but lacking shoes, I hurried up to my bedchamber, the candle-flame stretched almost to the point of extinguishment. Upon catching sight of myself in the small looking glass over the washbasin, I paused to rinse the blood from my hands. It wouldn’t do to ride about in the dark looking as if I’d murdered a man. Just as I was buckling my shoes, there came a great pounding at the front door of the Manse.
In a panic now, I rushed down the stairs, through the library, drawing room, and great hall to the grand foyer. The candle went out entirely. Demon had set to barking again, and sounded like a cat with pneumonia. Just before I reached the front door, a chilling thought occurred to me. Someone had done terrible violence to my master. Who else but the assassin would be at the entrance at this hou
r of the night, come to finish the job? I slowed my steps. The hammering on the door was redoubled, and now I could hear someone calling, “Come out, Jack, d___ your eyes!”
“One minute,” I called, trying to sound calm. I relit the candle, which cost me four lucifer matches to accomplish, so much was I trembling. The phossy* stink of them was awful. I could hear the men—there was more than one voice—arguing outside in muted tones. I began to wish there was a pistol about me. There had been one in my master’s belt, come to think of it.
If only I presented a more imposing figure! With clumsy fingers I retied the ribbon that held the hair at my neck, straightened my weskit†, and took a long breath. Then I threw back my head and squared my shoulders in imitation of Master Rattle, strode to the door, and opened it—none too wide.
Three men stood on the broad granite steps. The mark of habitual villainy was written plainly upon their faces, visible even by candlelight. One wore an immense two-cornered hat with an ostrich plume in it; this ornament made the stranger look half again as tall as he was. The man beside him wore a sailor’s short jacket and Monmouth cap, and had an iron hook in place of his left hand. The third man was the unpleasant character with the scarred face who had observed me at the Widow’s Arms; one of his sleeves was torn and spattered with blood.
“What is the meaning of this?” I demanded, before the men had opportunity to speak. I kept a hand on the door, ready to fling it shut if they rushed me.
“We would have speech with your master,” the man in the enormous hat replied. His voice was as unpleasant as his demeanor.
“The master is unavailable,” I said, as haughtily as I could manage. “Good night to you, sirs.” I moved to close the door, but to my dismay, the second man thrust his hook into the gap.
“Belay that, young squire,” he growled. “We come to see old Jack, and we means to see him.”
“There’s no Jack here.”