Secrets of Midnight

by Miriam Minger

  Chapter 3

  “Estelle, no feeden that mongrel under the table now! I won’t have it, I tell ‘ee—Linette, have ‘ee a notion to eat your eggs while they’re nice an’ hot or is it your plan to just push them round your plate? An’ where’s Marguerite? Marguerite!”

  “She’s still sitting in front of the mirror, Frances. Where else would she be?” Corisande answered as she hurried down the stairs and into the cozily warm kitchen where the Eastons’ long-suffering housekeeper stood shaking her head, her hands fisted at her thick waist.

  “Front of the mirror, is she?” came the disapproving reply in a rustic Cornish accent as thick as clotted cream. Frances’s wrinkled face creased into a frown. “I’ve never seen a young girl, comely as that one or no, spend so much time fixen herself up for the day. ‘Tes wicked, I say, an’ her being the good parson’s daughter!”

  “Well, if not wicked, at the very least it’s a sorry waste of time.” Thinking of how she’d bolted from bed upon waking and thrown on her clothes, barely taking a moment to run her fingers through her disheveled hair and wind it into a bun at her nape, Corisande added over her shoulder—good and loud enough for her fifteen-year-old sister to hear upstairs— “I imagine Marguerite will find herself scrubbing the breakfast dishes if she doesn’t come down soon, won’t she, Frances?”

  “Ais, so she will, an’ this evening’s too,” the housekeeper agreed heartily as Corisande reached across the table for a piece of barley toast. In too much of a rush to sit down, she shot a warning look at her youngest sister as the impish nine-year-old tossed a bit of fried bacon to her panting mutt, Luther, then tried to cover her action with an all too engaging grin.

  “Estelle …”

  The grin faded, big hazel eyes pleading. “But he’s hungry, Corie. Just look at him, poor dog. All ribs and whiskers.”

  Luther was a sight, Corisande agreed, a small wiry-haired creature of indeterminate breed who peered expectantly at her toast through a spiky fringe of gray hair. “Maybe so, but you heard Frances. You’re to listen to what she says—and Linette, since you’ve obviously no interest in your eggs, why don’t you fetch Marguerite?”

  “You know she won’t come,” Linette answered with a matter-of-fact shrug. A thin, gangly child just turned twelve with the delicate features of their mother and the auburn hair all the Easton girls shared—well, except for Marguerite, whose locks bore a deeper hint of red—Linette pushed away her plate in disinterest. “Not until she’s brushed her hair two hundred strokes.”

  “Well, she’ll find her hair’s soon to fall out of her head if she keeps on.” Frances shoved Linette’s plate right back in front of her. “An’ you eat now! Your papa will think I’m not feeden ‘ee proper—”

  “Corie, I miss Lindsay.”

  Linette’s soft statement couldn’t have brought the clamor in the kitchen to a more sudden halt. As Frances sighed and turned back to the hearth while Estelle’s expression fell, her whining hound momentarily forgotten, Corisande gazed thoughtfully at her younger sister.

  “We all miss Lindsay, sweet. I can’t believe she’s been gone three days. It feels like forever.”

  “Well, she’d be here right now, having breakfast with us and laughing and telling us wonderful stories, if only she hadn’t gone to London.” Linette raised her small pointed chin, her eyes filled with angry hurt. “Things will never be the same, you know. She might never come back—”

  “And if she doesn’t, then it will be because she’s found something that makes her very, very happy. I can’t believe that wouldn’t please you, Linette—and you know what else I think would please you?”

  Linette shook her head, her gloomy countenance clearly saying that she doubted anything would make her feel better.

  “We’ll read her letters together, you and I—”

  “And me!” chirped Estelle.

  “Yes, and Marguerite, too, if she wants to join us. Lindsay said she’d write as often as she could—so it will be almost like she’s here with us, don’t you think?”

  Linette’s nod was slow in coming, a grudging smile even slower, but Corisande could tell when she gave her a hug that Linette was somewhat mollified. Yet Linette’s face broke into a full-fledged grin when Marguerite suddenly swept down the stairs, only to stop dead in her tracks beside the kitchen table when she realized everyone was staring at her.

  “What are you looking at, Linette Easton?” she demanded of the sister with whom she’d once spent so much time and who now seemed more a pest than anything else since Marguerite had turned the ripe old age of fifteen. Linette merely began to giggle, pointing at Marguerite’s head.

  “I said what—”

  ” ‘Tes your hair, girl,” Frances interrupted, looking quite pleased with herself as if to say “I told you so.” “You’ve brushed it so much that it’s standen on end an’ flying round your head! Any more an’ I swear you’d have found yourself gone bald altogether!”

  Her pretty face reddening at the laughter bursting around her, Marguerite’s hands flew to her hair as she sought to smooth it down.

  “Ais, there ‘ee go, now take a seat with your sisters an’ be quick! You’ve only got a few moments to eat before you’re due at the church school.”

  Marguerite did as she was told, but not before yanking upon Linette’s braid as she passed her sister’s chair and deliberately stepping on Luther’s bony tail, which set the little dog to yelping and Estelle scrambling so fast to comfort him that she knocked her plate to the floor with a crash. As the kitchen erupted in squabbling and confusion, Frances’s voice rising once more above the unholy din, Corisande took a last bite of toast, downed half a cup of weak tepid tea, and fled down the hall.

  Not surprisingly, the door to her father’s study remained closed, Joseph Easton so far removed from the daily workings of his daughters’ lives that such commotion rarely made him stir from his reading and sermon preparation. Corisande rapped on the door as she always did each morning, and had done since her mother died.

  As always, there was no welcoming call for her to enter, which hurt, even if she should have long ago gotten used to her father’s unintentional neglect.

  Everything had changed during those wretched few days eight years ago when the fever had struck the vicarage like a heavy gale, Corisande suddenly thrust by necessity into the role of virtual head of the household at the tender age of eleven which had given her cares and responsibilities far beyond her years. Thank God Frances Hodge, a widow who’d lost her husband to a mine accident many years before, had agreed to come and help, working as their housekeeper more out of the goodness of her heart than for the paltry sum Corisande could afford to pay her.

  And she’d stayed, bless her, Corisande thought as she opened the study door, Frances’s stern command for Marguerite and Linette to cease their quarreling rivaling any general’s as it carried down the hall. But the debacle in the kitchen was forgotten as Corisande’s attention once more flew to the sole occupant of the small shuttered room, her father seated at his desk with head bent and a book spread out before him, the flickering light of a candle falling like gilt mist upon his silvery hair.

  Joseph Easton’s hair had turned white as Christmas snow shortly after his beloved wife’s death, his once broad shoulders long since sagging under an invisible burden, and his step the slow, uncertain shuffle of a man twice his age of forty-two. But his mind had remained unclouded, at least in matters of books and the Bible, and the pulpit still rang on Sundays with the power of the Word.

  If not for that, he would surely have lost his parish, for along with his white hair had come an eccentric streak that had emptied the pews as if the devil himself stood grinning at the altar with his tail twitching and fork in hand—at least until the superstitious parishioners grew accustomed to their parson’s unintelligible mutterings, moonlit stints at gardening, and late-night visits to the graveyard, and other quirks of character.

  Another was that Joseph Easton preferred his s
tudy to remain shuttered like a cave, Corisande forever longing to throw open the windows to fresh air and sunlight. But she never did, respecting the strange, remote existence that her father’s life had become.

  “Papa?”

  He started, as always, her soft query jarring him out of his private world as surely as if she had shouted. For a moment, he seemed bewildered, then a fond smile came over his still handsome face.

  “Ah, Corisande. Are you on your way?”

  The same question, repeated too many times to remember, but even so the words warmed her heart. He uttered them so full of trust, for even in his unfortunate state did he know that Corisande had done everything she could to save his parish for him and keep a roof over their heads—paying visits to his flock as her mother had once done so selflessly, seeing that the church school and the parish poorhouse ran smoothly, attending to details of christenings, burials, and weddings and ensuring that the church register and parish accounts were properly kept.

  Only within the last three years had Corisande begun to do more, involving herself in the dangerous smuggling of contraband goods for the benefit of the entire parish, and if her father had guessed her involvement, he’d given it no voice. But whenever there was boiled beef on the table, or fragrant quality tea in the pot, or a bit of brandy for him to enjoy by the fire, he’d look at her with silent knowing in his eyes and a hint of concern mixed with pride. It was all she needed to keep her going, more resolute than ever to continue doing what she believed was right.

  “Yes, Papa, I’m leaving now. I’ve much to do today.”

  “Godspeed, then.”

  Two familiar words, and he turned away, absorbed once more in his book before Corisande had closed the door. But she, too, was already preoccupied with her own affairs, her step determined as she grabbed her cloak and left the house, Luther’s high-pitched yapping and her sisters’ hilarious giggling following her outside into a glorious sunlit morning.

  At least they were in a better mood, she was glad to hear, wondering what silly antic Estelle had performed to make Linette and Marguerite cease their incessant warring—maybe balancing a spoon on Luther’s nose or some mischievous prank concocted to torment Frances. The latest had been a big hairy brown spider in the mixing bowl, plopped right on top of a yeasty-smelling mound of rising dough. How Frances had screamed …

  “Just as I’ll be screaming if I can’t find that scoundrel Jack Pascoe,” Corisande muttered, walking into the small stable that flanked the Easton parsonage. A loud nickering greeted her; Biscuit, their hardy piebald pony, bobbed his head eagerly as if he knew he was soon to be forging across the heath to Arundale’s Kitchen.

  And why shouldn’t he think they were heading to the mine? Corisande thought irritably, hoisting the worn leather saddle onto the pony’s swayed back. She’d only gone there three mornings in a row, looking for that damned mine captain so she could give him a fair-sized piece of her mind. But each time he’d been nowhere to be found, probably gone down one of the shafts to purposely avoid her, the despicable bastard, and no doubt smug as a snake at his cleverness.

  Nor had she been able to find the Arundale family’s agent, Henry Gilbert, when she’d gone to that Tudor monstrosity of a house where he resided. The sullen housemaid who answered the door had said only that Gilbert wasn’t there—hiding from her, Corisande was certain, the ferret-faced agent as spineless as Jack Pascoe was cunning. Henry Gilbert was the one, after all, who’d given Pascoe free rein to run the mine as he saw fit, and his orders, being the family agent, no doubt had come straight from the Duke of Arundale.

  “Yes, Biscuit, maybe we’re wasting our time going to the mine after Pascoe,” Corisande contemplated aloud as she scratched the pony’s whiskered chin, his breath blowing warm on her hand. “Maybe we should find Henry Gilbert—before he gets a chance to hide in a wardrobe or under the bed, and brighten his day with a show of Cornish temper. It may not help matters much, but at least I won’t feel as if I’m going to explode. What do you say?”

  Biscuit’s obliging snort made her smile, but it faded as she mounted and kicked the animal into a trot, the pony’s bumpy gait—ensuring a jarring ride at best—only adding fuel to the fire.

  Chapter 4

  “Is there anything else you’d like to see this morning, my lord? The rest of the grounds, perhaps? The village of Porch—”

  “That bloody mine wasn’t enough entertainment for one day?” Scowling, Donovan dismounted from his steel-gray stallion while Henry Gilbert slid from his sweaty mount, the rail-thin Arundale family agent nervously shifting his feet, looking as if he wanted to flee the stable at first opportunity.

  And right now Donovan wholeheartedly wanted the loathsome fellow out of his sight. Ignoring Gilbert for the moment, he led the snorting animals into their stalls, the cavernous stable empty but for these two horses and a big ill-kempt gelding whose dull brown coat looked sorely in need of a good grooming. But that would have to wait as Donovan eyed again the anemic, long-nosed scarecrow who’d been attending to his family’s business affairs in Cornwall.

  In truth, he couldn’t fully blame Gilbert for what smacked of his late father’s doing; the man had been paid to follow orders after all. But for the agent to have granted such power to a mean-spirited tyrant of a mine captain because he was too lazy to attend to the day-to-day workings of the mine himself—good God, it sickened him!

  “Get yourself something to eat at the house and then ride back and see to it that a new mine captain is hired by noon,” Donovan grated, Henry Gilbert bobbing his head in acquiescence. “I’m giving you a chance to set things right, Gilbert, or believe me, you’ll be close behind Jack Pascoe in finding yourself without a job.”

  “I understand, my lord. Implicitly.”

  “Good. Choose a man from among the miners, someone they respect. Be sure I don’t see Pascoe on Arundale property again.”

  “Yes, yes, of course, my lord.”

  “And restore the miners’ pay to its previous level until I’ve a chance to go over the books thoroughly—then we’ll talk about raising it further.”

  “But—but, Lord Donovan, shouldn’t His Grace be consulted—”

  “If this damned mine is half as rich as my brother said it was, Gilbert, surely there’s enough coin to properly pay the men whose blood and sweat have made it so profitable, is there not?”

  This time the cowed agent bobbed his head in time with his prominent Adam’s apple. “Anything else, my lord?”

  “Yes. Is there grain to be found in this parish?”

  “Only at famine prices—but of course there’s flour aplenty at the house if that concerns you—”

  “Not for me, man! The miners can’t work if they have no bread, and from the looks of some of them, I’d swear they haven’t eaten a sound meal in days.” Donovan’s hard gaze bored into the agent. “No thanks to the pittance they’ve been paid of late.”

  “And which will be righted at once, my lord, just as you’ve ordered!” Henry Gilbert began walking backward to the entrance of the stable, giving no heed to the steaming piles of horse dung squishing under his feet. “You wish the miners to have grain, then?”

  “Buy enough bushels so that every man has a decent share to take home to his family.”

  “It will cost, my lord—”

  Gilbert didn’t finish, his eyes growing round as serving platters as Donovan tugged off his coat and threw it over a post, then grabbed a shovel from against the wall and advanced toward him. With a sharp intake of breath, the man turned on his spindly legs and fled while Donovan sank the shovel into a pile of dung and musty straw, muttering under his breath, “Blasted fool.”

  It appeared that the stable was as much in need of attention as everything else around this dismal place, he thought mutinously, heaving his ripe-smelling burden into an empty stall.

  It might have been dusk last night when he’d arrived at his Cornwall estate, but there had still been enough light for him to see that the hu
ge house his father had bequeathed to him was in a sorry state of disrepair. Crumbling chimneys, cracked windows, a vast overgrown lawn—and inside, enough dust to choke a man, faded furnishings fit for no more than firewood, and two slovenly housemaids who had been hired in Weymouth by Henry Gilbert before he’d taken up his employment in Cornwall. One woman was as plump as a sausage and the other was passing pretty but had a hard, calculating look and reeked of cheap cologne.

  It had been disheartening and maddening, especially since Donovan had seen his welcome as a smug otherworldly message from his father—marry fast, and the quicker he’d have the funds to improve his miserable surroundings. But he didn’t give a damn about the house or the surrounding estate, and he thought he’d feel the same about Arundale’s Kitchen, too, as he’d been told the place was called, until he’d ridden out there with Gilbert just after sunrise, wanting to see the rest of the trap that his father had contrived for him.

  Until he’d seen the careworn, expressionless faces of the tin miners as they hiked to work, some from as far as six or seven miles away, and more than he cared to remember with pallid cheeks gone hollow from sparsity of food.

  When he had questioned some of the men, he’d been met with stoic tight-lipped silence, until at last a brave few came forth with the wretched truth about their mine cap’en, as they called Jack Pascoe, a pock-faced, red-haired fellow as wiry as a bantam rooster who’d cut their wages by half—only the latest of his transgressions, apparently—and who cared nothing about the wives and children starving at home. Equal parts ambitious and cruel, Pascoe had long ruled his domain by threatening life and livelihood, the miners with no choice but to shoulder their lot or face utter destitution.

  So Donovan had quietly taken the bastard aside and told him to be off the property by noon, promising a full month’s wage if he left the mine without saying a word. Jack Pascoe’s watery blue eyes had filled with rage, but he’d nodded and stalked back into the countinghouse.