Demons of Fenley Marsh

by Bancroft, Blair

  So that was it. If Jason would not marry Alyssa—which was likely her plan, not her brother’s . . . If Jason could not be hanged for murdering his nephew, then a different scheme must be hatched. Jason would die, Nicholas inherit, and Miles be left to snatch Cressida from a man so lacking in intelligence or strength of character as to make the theft child’s play.

  Diabolical indeed. Miles Talmadge, the true demon of Fenley Marsh.

  “Take them,” Talmadge ordered. “Make sure the knots are tight.” Smirking, he turned to Jason and me. “Forgive me for not staying to witness the end, but I must make certain I am well within the sight of others at the moment you die.” With a flick of his hand, he sealed our fate.

  Two men seized Jason, the third grabbed me, propelling us through the damp grass. Small sea creatures crunched beneath our feet as we were marched toward the wreck. At one point we waded through a channel a foot deep before once again emerging onto wet sand. When Jason saw what they planned, he fought, but his pitched battle with three opponents was short-lived. I screamed as one of Jason’s captors raised a club and brought it down hard. Oh dear God, was he dead?

  They wrestled Jason’s limp body into a sitting position on the wet sand, with his back to the ship’s broken side, looped a rope around a jagged board, and tied him tight. His hands and feet as well.

  “Girl could wait a bit,” one of the men offered. “Tide’s a long way from coming in.”

  Not that! Too much, too much, I couldn’t take it in. Jason was dying, perhaps dead. And now rape?

  The leader grunted. “Wallowing in the water ain’t my cup of tea. Nor yours neither. Get on with it! ’N’ besides, I’d like to be paid. Don’t think the nob would like us sampling the mort. Too prissy by half.”

  I almost breathed a sigh of relief when I was plopped down beside Jason and tied in the same manner. After each of our captors cast a final leer in my direction, they left. Jason and I were tied facing toward the Wash, but I heard the soft clip-clop of hooves as the men turned the carriage and headed wherever criminals go after committing murder. To demand their pay, no doubt.

  “Jason . . . Jason?” I called softly.

  No answer.

  Above us, seagulls swirled, their raucous cries punctuating the sudden loneliness. We were on a deserted coastline, miles from habitation. The hulk was on a slight rise, perhaps the remains of the sandbar that had caught the ship fast so many years ago. Only a few feet in front of me I could see pale rivulets of water beginning to lick at the base of the rise. The first sign of an incoming tide that would gradually inch its way across the sand, up the timbers . . .

  In a matter of hours . . .

  I wiggled my hands against the ropes that held them tight behind my back. There had to be some flexibility there. Had to be.

  With dogged determination I set about the task of freeing my hands. If I could not . . .

  No, I would not let my mind go there.

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  I continued my struggle to free my hands while the sea rose around us. Jason’s head remained lolled to one side. Once or twice, I thought I saw his chest rise and fall, but it might have been nothing more than a hopeful fantasy.

  Perhaps the same fantasy that allowed me to tell myself that females make up for a lack of strength by the flexibility of their hands and arms. I tugged and squirmed and twisted, tilting myself to and fro until I could feel blood running down my fingers and palms. If the rope had stretched so much as an eighth of an inch, I could not feel it. I paused for breath. The sun was still fairly high, its warmth helping with the dampness that had now seeped through my clothing into my very bones. Early August and my teeth were threatening to chatter. I cast yet another searching look at Jason, who remained still as death.

  No! We will not die here.

  And yet even after I freed my hands—and I would free my hands—I had to untie my feet as well as the rope that was wound around my body, the knot hidden behind a jagged timber pointing toward the sky.

  And then I had to do the same for Jason. And get him back to the shore.

  I gulped a breath and renewed my efforts.

  We were sitting in several inches of water by the time I felt the rope give. Not much, but enough to feel it above the pain of skin long since rubbed raw. My gasp of triumph was answered by a groan.

  “Jason?” No response, but I was inspired to a flurry of renewed effort . . . until at last, a small gap. Twist, turn, tug. A larger gap . . . and suddenly my right hand slid free. Slowly, painfully, I moved it forward, staring at the bloody mess that had once been a daintily feminine hand and wrist. A dip in the water would cleanse . . . I whimpered as the salt water bit into my wounds. Then forgot my pain as I heard another grown.

  “Jason?”

  “Umm?”

  Oh, thank God! But that was all I got from him—unconsciousness had claimed him once again.

  By the time I freed my feet, I was working blind in water nearly a foot deep. But I was still held fast to the broken timber behind me. I wasn’t going to make it. I could perhaps save myself before the tide covered us up, but Jason . . .

  Unless . . .

  Could I wiggle the ropes to the top of the board? Its broken end had narrowed over the years, gradually decreasing in size and ending in a sharp point at the top. Yes! I ought to be able to manage that.

  But attempting to stand with my torso anchored to a board behind my back—a board attached to the remains of a once-sturdy ship buried in sand was not as easy as I had hoped. And water was now filling my lap, moving inexorably closer to Jason’s hanging head. I gritted my teeth, forced my hands behind my back to grip the rotting board on either side, and heaved. Shimmied. Heaved again.

  The ropes moved! Once more, a shimmy and a heave! Three tries later, I collapsed into the water, panting and breathless as the ropes slid up and over the pointed end of the board and I was free.

  Stupidly, I sat there, waist deep in water, thanking God for deliverance, when I should have been tackling Jason’s bonds.

  But there was time, of course there was time.

  “Miranda? Good God, what’s happening?”

  Even more stupidly, I threw myself on his chest and cried. With water almost to our chins, I cried. Fortunately, an outburst I quickly quelled, for as the old saying echoed in my head: Time and tide wait for no man.

  With Jason’s help, feeble though it was, we made short work of the timber holding him in place. I grabbed it near the top and Jason shoved backwards with all his might, and amazingly it snapped right off. I was able to help him to his feet just before the tide reached his chin. The ropes around his wrists was wet and swollen, resisting my fumbling attempts by hands that were now weak and shaking. Perhaps his feet first? We were, after all, fifty or more yards from shore, and I doubted my ability to drag him that far.

  But Jason’s feet were under nearly two feet of water. I could do this. I’d managed my own feet, I could do his as well. In the end, with Jason half-standing, leaning against the side of the hulk, I plunged my arms underwater, groping for the knots. The water was so much deeper than when I tackled my own feet that I felt I was accomplishing nothing. I dove beneath the surface, wondering if I’d be able to see anything at all in the shadow of the hulk. And then, amazingly, the sun—now much lower in the sky—lit my way. I like to think the sudden sparkling light was my own special miracle, a gift from God. For at last I could see . . . Three trips beneath the surface and the ropes gave. I came up spluttering.

  For a moment I rested my head on Jason’s chest; for a precious moment his chin lowered to the top of my head. No time, no time. We maneuvered around the side of the wreck and headed for shore, Jason with his hands still tied, my arm around his waist. Wading through the erratic footing common to salt marshes we ploughed our way through water that ranged from two or three feet to nearly chest high. We kept going, the blessed shoreline growing closer. And then, suddenly, the ground gave way, and we were floundering in water over our hea
ds. Jason!

  I should have taken the time to untie his hands.

  We went under, were torn apart by the current. I bobbed up, frantically searching for Jason.

  “Here!” A gurgled shout from behind me, and there he was, struggling to float with his hands tied behind his back. A few swift strokes and I dropped my arm through the loop made by his tied arms and towed him across the channel, fortunately a distance of no more than a dozen feet. The sea grass came up to meet us, clinging to our legs as we slogged the last few yards to shore, where we fell face down in the sand, soaking up its warmth and, on my part at least, thanking God for delivering us from evil.

  And for learning to swim in that pond in Kent.

  “Miranda?”

  I managed to find the strength to turn my head, discovered Jason’s dark eyes staring into mine.

  “Do you really not mind my face?”

  Sometimes the male mind is truly not to be believed.

  “You are an idiot,” I breathed, “but for some reason I love you anyway.”

  “Then get these demmed ropes off me so I can kiss you.”

  “You don’t need your hands free to kiss me.” A fact I proved by rolling him onto his back and kissing him soundly. His mouth, his cheeks, his forehead, every inch of that long puckered scar. Which led me back to his mouth—

  With a growl low in his throat, Jason pulled back a fraction of an inch. “Get these ropes off or I shall go mad. Devil it, woman, I need to hold you!”

  I heaved a long-drawn sigh, feeling instantly bereft as I forced myself to sit up. I gasped, my heart going cold as I saw Tom Guthrie standing on the bank above us. Jason, twisting around to follow my gaze, drawled, “You’re a bit late, Guthrie.”

  “Late would be if you were dead.”

  “How did you find us?”

  I was afraid I knew very well how he found us. He was Talmadge’s man, come to make certain we had drowned.

  “We realized something was wrong when Sir Basil sent word you’d never arrived. Found the coachman, who managed to tell us which direction you went. The rest was luck and this.” He held up a spyglass. “The wreck caught my eye, then movement, but the roads are a maze and this demmed nag from the inn can’t leap a ditch. By the time I got here, you’d rescued yourselves.”

  Plausible, I supposed, but I would reserve judgment.

  Mr. Guthrie made short work of Jason’s bonds, and in a short time he had Jason up on his horse, and we were plodding back to civilization. I was once again filled with qualms when Guthrie used a small mirror to flash messages to what he said were the guards, but my fears went for naught when the Lunsford carriage met us at the main road, complete with warm blankets, brandy, and a great deal of fuss.

  All the way back to Lunsford Hall, Jason held me as if he would never let me go.

  Which I minded not in the least.

  Late that night when the house had gone silent at last, I lay awake, the day’s events playing over and over in my head, chasing away all hope of sleep. Mrs. Allard assured me that Jason had inquired after my health, but the doctor, fearing concussion, had confined him to his room with his valet and Stebbins hovering over him.

  Drat!

  I hoped matters were settled between us, but Jason had an odd kick to his gallop, and no matter those precious moments earlier in the day, I suspected he was still convinced no one could love him, just because of a scar, a limp, and two partial fingers. Yet surely after those kisses on the beach he had to realize . . .

  No. I must put speculation aside. I would find out soon enough, and until I did there was comfort enough in his enthusiastic participation in those moments on the sun-warmed sand.

  The matter of Miles Talmadge was also unfinished. Tom Guthrie had promised to take him in charge, but until I knew for certain . . .

  And then there was Chas. I have to admit I minded missing his first glimpse of his grandfather and great-grandfather, but they, natural-born autocrats that they were, had Chas brought to them before they’d been a half hour at Lunsford Hall. Yet what did it matter as long as Jason and I were alive to enjoy the afterglow? And having newfound relations had made Chas so happy his words tumbled over themselves as he described their meeting. Is it true, Mama? Really, really true? Why don’t I have a grandmama? Are you going to marry Mr. Lunsford? I know I’m not supposed to eavesdrop, but I heard Josie tell Peg . . .

  I smiled into the darkness, well content with this wonderfully normal end to a shockingly devastating day. Except . . .

  As if my thoughts were a wish magically granted, I heard the snick of the latch. Moonlight rimed a shadow figure, tall and broad-shouldered, making its way toward the bed with the unsteady gait of a man with a limp. No demon this, though he’d already captured my heart and soul. The silvery light was kind to him, and I sensed he was more comfortable in the dark. That it might be a very long time before Jason truly believed I saw only the man, not the scars.

  Wearing nothing but a banyan, he eased himself down beside me. “I thought you might still be cold,” he offered in that baritone I loved so much.

  “And lonely.”

  “I also thought that before we plunge into anything more permanent, you might wish to be assured that certain vital bits of me remain undamaged.”

  “An excellent idea,” I murmured, my lips curling into a triumphant smile.

  He stood, unbelted his robe, shrugged, and the garment pooled about his feet, leaving me staring at ample evidence that he was more than ready to complete what we had begun earlier in the day. And with his hands now free, there was no denying him.

  As if the thought ever occurred to me.

  Miles Talmadge should have hanged, we all agreed on that. Yet his grievance was great, if unjustified by the honor code that governed gaming. After much discussion, which included the opinion of our two visiting bishops who advised mercy and a duke and a Bow Street Runner who opted for hanging, Jason paid for the Talmadge family’s passage to the Antipodes. The sale of their house and furnishings would give them enough money to start anew on the far side of the world.

  With a collective sigh of good riddance, a position was found for Clover Rooke as a tweeny in a household many miles from Fenley-on-the-Marsh. The Bishop of Peterborough stood in the pulpit in the small stone church at Fenley-on-the-Marsh, flanked by the Bishop of Lichfield and Coventry, the Archdeacon for the Boston area of Lincolnshire, with the sometime village vicar, Mr. Fairclough, hovering in the background, and pronounced against the conjuring of imaginary demons in no uncertain terms. Not a word was said about the Talmadges or the deaths of Francis Pilkington, Eileen Dawes and the rag and bone man, but everyone now knew the truth. Shame-faced villagers, after much cogitation, came to the conclusion that rumors of a demon and demon child had originated with Miles Talmadge, aided by his cousin, Francis Pilkington. Capping the villagers’ capitulation was the discovery of fresh blood on a bear claw in the Talmadge collection.

  As for Eileen Dawes, the powers that be decided to let the matter rest. Very likely she had been lured to her death by a lover, but proving that lover was Miles Talmadge was deemed impossible. The death of the rag and bone man, in spite of the banshee wail, would also forever remain a mystery.

  Were we wrong not to see Miles Talmadge hang? He had killed a man of God, however misguided, and I could only hope God would mete out his punishment in the end.

  Jason accepted Sir Basil’s abject apologies for being duped by Miles Talmadge. He even unbent enough to encourage Cressida’s marriage, promising her easy access to Nicholas when her busy social schedule in London would allow. And during the long holiday after Nicholas went off to school.

  Which brings me to Nicholas, the alleged Demon Child. Jason and I sat him down one afternoon and told him what had happened to Chas in Kent, and finally, bit by agonized bit, Nicholas admitted to abuse at the hands of his tutor. Abuse that ended only when his threat to tell his uncle had precipitated the tutor’s resignation. After this revelation, we gradually began
to see the glimpses of the strong and happy boy Nicholas once was and would be again.

  As for myself . . .

  It is late spring again, the summer solstice rapidly approaching. Jason and I were married last September before the entire congregation by my Papa, garbed in the full regalia of his office, leaving no one in doubt that we were blessed by the full weight and majesty of the Church of England. There was no more talk of demons.

  Chas grows all too rapidly. I fear he will want to go off to school with Nicholas for Michelmas term. And though I will miss him, I will not be alone, for I not only have Jason but sometime in July we will adding another small soul to our household.

  A hand presses on my shoulder, fingers twine in my hair. I drop this hundredth quill I’ve worn to a nub while recording the events of my first months at Lunsford Park and lean back against my husband’s broad chest.

  No demons here. Just love and laughter. And occasionally in the dark of night, a frisson of fear about what might have been.

  ~ * * * ~

  About the Author:

  Believing variety is the spice of life, I also write Romantic Suspense and Mystery (please see the list below.)

  The Golden Beach (GB) books are not a classic series. Some have connected characters; others, only a connected setting, a very real Florida Gulfcoast resort and retirement community whose name has been changed because the residents would like to keep its uniqueness a deep, dark secret.

  I am always delighted to hear from my readers. I can be contacted at blairbancroft@aol.com. My website is http://www.blairbancroft.com/. My blog: http://mosaicmoments.blogspot.com/

  Twitter: @blairbancroft