Jane and the Prisoner of Wool House jam-6

by Stephanie Barron

She endeavoured to make it plain she did not like the Baronet's attentions. I wondered at her energy in expressing so personal a sentiment, to a relative stranger; and thought the hint of design was in her words.

  “How unfortunate, then, that you were obliged to quit the place after the first act,” observed Frank engagingly. “We had intended to force acquaintance on Sir Francis at the interval, and were denied the privilege.”

  Mrs. Carruthers's nostrils flared. “I found that I was unequal to the effort of appearing in public. It is a strain, you understand, to parade as though one is insensible to grief — as though every word and look must not inspire the most painful recollections! I begged to be quit of the crowd at the first opportunity, and Sir Francis obliged me in this.”

  “How unfortunate! And so you fled one frying pan, only to end in the fire!”

  Her delicate brows curled in perplexity. “I do not understand you, Miss Austen.”

  I cast a look of amusement at my brother. “To bid Sir Francis adieu, only to find Tom Seagrave at the door!”

  “I did not know the Captain was in Bugle Street,” she replied steadily. “He left no card. It is as well we failed to meet; I have not seen him since Simon's death, and might have uttered reproaches I should regret. Though Captain Seagrave may carry Simon on his conscience until he dies, I should not wish to carry him on mine.

  “And one might expect the two men to come to blows,” I added sympathetically. “Thank Heaven you were spared such a scene.”

  For the first time, her complexion lost some of its colour. “To blows? Sir Francis and Captain Seagrave? What could you possibly suggest, Miss Austen?”

  “From something Sir Francis said last night, I gathered that he holds the Captain in low regard.”

  “That is hardly singular. All of Southampton might say the same.”

  “But Sir Francis is not of Southampton, Mrs. Carruthers. Has he any cause for so pronounced a dislike? Some professional discourtesy, perhaps, on Seagrave's part?”

  “None that I know of.”

  “Then perhaps he merely thinks to support your grief, and your sentiments.”

  For the length of several heartbeats, Phoebe Carruthers said nothing. Her green gaze held my own. Then she set down her cup. “Sir Francis is not always the perfect master of his temper, Miss Austen, as you have reason to know. He is often betrayed into speech he may regret. He is a man of great passions and considerable jealousies, and may imperfectly understand the circumstances of those around him.”

  “You have been acquainted with the Baronet for some time, I see.”

  “Nearly twenty years. I was governess to his little sisters when I was but eighteen, and spent nearly a year in the bosom of the Farnham family. When one has observed the formation of a man's character, one may forgive a great deal.”

  “Certainly one may respect the enduring nature of his regard,” I observed. “Twenty years is a period! And yet Sir Francis's admiration for you is unflagging.” What had Frank said? That Phoebe Carruthers had been involved in scandal while a governess … something to do with the family's eldest son … and her marriage to her cousin had followed hard upon the business. Sir Francis — jealous Sir Francis — had married and acceded to his title; but he had not forgot the golden beauty. He had waited, and bided his time — and plotted to remove his rivals….

  “Always his father's child,” I murmured. “It is remarkable how blood will out, Mrs. Carruthers.”

  Her green eyes widened suddenly with alarm. She reached for her gloves.

  “I must beg your pardon for trying your patience so long,” Phoebe Carruthers said, rising. “It has been delightful to make your acquaintance, Miss Austen.”

  • • •

  MY BROTHER SHOWED THE LADY TO THE DOOR, WITH many a fine flourish regarding his hopes of seeing her in future, and all the assurances of his wife's regret in having lost such an opportunity to form Mrs. Carruthers's acquaintance; and when she had dwindled down the street, he rounded upon me in indignation.

  “Jane, you were exceedingly rude just now. Poor Mrs. Carruthers is the picture of grief — and you must interrogate her regarding Sir Francis Farnham! It is obvious she doesn't like the fellow's company, and only suffers his attentions because she is too well-bred to send him packing! You might have shown some consideration!”

  “She is altogether too picture-perfect for my liking, Fly,” I said abruptly. “She displays her grief at the slightest urging; desires us to believe that she has no designs upon a baronet; adopts the general tone of disapprobation towards Captain Seagrave, and denies all knowledge of him in Southampton on Wednesday evening. It was a performance intended to distance her from murder, and that alone must make it suspect.”

  My brother's countenance hardened. “You think her afraid, Jane? You believe her bent upon deceit?”

  “I think that Sir Francis determined to destroy his rival for Mrs. Carruthers's attentions. That he plotted Seagrave's disgrace by offering advancement to his lieutenant, in return for betrayal. That he used the signal line to despatch a set of orders the Admiralty never contemplated — and that when Chessyre despaired of his guilt and dishonour, Sir Francis determined to be rid of him. I believe that Phoebe Carruthers went in search of Chessyre in the Baronet's coach on Wednesday night, and carried the man away to meet with Farnham. I do not need to inform you of the result.”

  Frank took a turn about the room in considerable agitation. It is hard for such a man — trained up in the ways of gallantry — to credit a beautiful woman with evil.

  “I could accept all this, provided Phoebe Carruthers had no notion of what she did. The wife of Hugh Carruthers should never collude to murder a man.”

  “Very well. Call her merely a handmaiden — too stupid to know her purpose — and she will thank you for it from the bottom of her heart.”

  “She don't even like that fellow Farnham!”

  “Perhaps not,” I agreed, “but she may feel herself in some wise bound to his purpose. How did she phrase things just now? 'Not all our obligations are matters of choice.' How soon after her marriage to her cousin was Simon Carruthers born?”

  Frank stared. “I have not the slightest notion!”

  “You should do well to enquire. Phoebe Carruthers might do much for the father of her dead child, however little she has cause to love him — particularly when Sir Francis's quarrel is with the man she blames for her son's death.”

  Chapter 20

  An Episode with Rockets

  28 February 1807, cont.

  “GOOD LORD, JANE — IF YOU WOULD HAVE SEAGRAVE the victim of a plot constructed well before the Stella sailed, then you must admit Mrs. Carruthers is out of it!” Frank cried. “Her boy was yet alive when Seagrave left the Channel. She could have no cause to hate poor Tom. Indeed, she vows she loved him as a brother.”

  “But after she received the intelligence of young Simon's death, and learned that Seagrave was accused, moreover, of murder, her sentiments may have undergone a change. Sir Francis had only to appeal to Mrs. Carruthers's grief and sense of outrage, to secure her as accomplice.”

  My brother pursed his lips. “We cannot prove that either of them had anything to do with Seagrave's debacle, you know. I should look an absolute fool, did I suggest to the Admiralty that Sir Francis Farnham was Chessyre's murderer.”

  “We cannot risk an injury to your career, Frank— even in such a cause,” I said with decision. “The Admiralty shall be left in ignorance until such time as guilt is irrefutable. We must provide our friend Mr. Pethering with evidence of so compelling a nature, that he cannot do otherwise than arrest Sir Francis and Mrs. Carruthers both.”

  “But how?”

  “By catching them in their last desperate act.”

  Frank's eyes narrowed. “Have not they done enough?”

  “Etienne LaForge,” I said urgently to my brother. “He is in the gravest danger. Mrs. Carruthers meant to learn from us what the French canvassed, in their talk at Wool House.
The appeal to her son's death was but a subterfuge: she was sent to test what we know. Sir Francis fears and suspects every sort of betrayal — this is why LaForge was poisoned after giving evidence in Seagrave's trial. And that is why the sick men have been removed to the prison hulk.”

  “Farnham need only exchange the French to France to be secure in their silence,” Frank objected.

  “But LaForge requested the right to remain in England as payment for his honesty. Does Farnham know as much?”

  Frank looked all his discomfort. “The subject was generally discussed. Mr. Hill certainly knew of LaForge's plea, and I conveyed it myself to Admiral Bertie, who assured me he would try his influence at the Admiralty. As a prisoner, LaForge and his situation must fall under the authority of the Transport Board….”

  “Which is governed by Sir Francis Farnham. Good God, we have contrived between us to deliver the man to the very Devil!”

  Frank ran his hand through his hair. “Then we must endeavour to save him, Jane. I believe I know a way.”

  WE FOUND THAT IT WAS NEARLY FOUR O'CLOCK, AND ordered dinner to be sent to my mother's room — left a note of apology and very little of explanation for Mary and Martha — and set out for Wool House thereafter.

  “You said, I think, that you are a little acquainted with Captain Smallwood — the officer in command of the prison hulk?” I enquired as we hurried down the High towards Southampton Water. I spoke in part to defray anxiety; I could not help but feel we should have been hours beforehand in our apprehension of danger.

  “An excellent fellow! Though quite enslaved to cards,” Frank returned distractedly. “There is no one like Smallwood for playing at faro. I met with him some once or twice in Malta, and later in the West Indies; I have seen Hamlet in his company, too, while ashore in Gibraltar. He once put me in the way of a bang-up prize-agent.”[24]

  “But is Smallwood likely to oblige you in so serious a matter, without the requirement of greater authority— or at the very least, a full explanation?”

  “I cannot say,” Frank admitted. “The Navy is rather ticklish about—”

  “—niceties and farms,” I supplied. “Not to mention the conduct of prisoners of war. Smallwood should not like to risk the disapprobation of the Admiralty, in the person of Sir Francis Farnham.”

  “Nor should anyone, I expect — but Farnham need not come into it. We shall have Hill at our side, and a man of science may convince a fellow of anything. We must try Smallwood's character, and hope for the best. Mind the loose cobble, Jane!”

  What my brother intended was fairly simple: he thought to secure Mr. Hill's support in urging the release of Etienne LaForge into Frank's care, so that the Frenchman might be removed from the hulk and placed in a room at Mrs. Davies's lodging house. The fact that LaForge was a surgeon — rather higher in his berth than a common seaman — should be strenuously represented, as well as the gravity of the man's condition. Nothing of our murderous suspicions need be disclosed to Captain Smallwood; nothing but charity and goodwill on the part of ourselves should be displayed; and with a minimum of fuss or anxiety, we might all sleep soundly in our beds this evening.

  Such was the plan, and it might have gone off to perfection — but for the small difficulty of our discovering, at the moment of arriving at Wool House, that the place was locked and deserted. Even the Marines who usually stood guard before the great oak doors were fled.

  “I suppose Mr. Hill can have no reason for remaining in attendance,” said Frank thoughtfully, “the prisoners being taken off to the hulk. I shall have to seek him at his lodgings. He resides in St. Michael's Square, I believe — no very great distance. You might remain on the Quay, Jane, and await our return.”

  “I shall stare at the hulk until my eyes fail me,” I promised him.

  • • •

  I MADE MY WAY TO THE OPPOSITE SIDE OF THE PAVING and hastened past the wharves towards Water Gate Quay. The heavy stone expanse thrust out into the sea had no power to cheer me, this darkening day; the distance between Quay's end and anchored prison hulk was too great to admit of comfort. I stood near a piling and felt the wind tug at my pelisse; sea birds wheeled and cried overhead like unquiet souls. As always, the activity on Southampton Water was very great, despite the late hour and lengthening shadows. Boats of every description plied their oars between mainland and moorings.

  The hulk was easy to discern, dismasted and stripped of its sails, against the backdrop of the New Forest. Only this ship, out of all the others at anchor, must exhibit no purposeful movement on its upper deck; here the activity was entirely below, behind the closed portals that had once housed guns, and now sheltered the abandoned wretches tethered in chains. What sin had Etienne LaForge committed, that he must suffer so fearful a purgatory?

  The Water was all chop and white-curling wave, the stiffening breeze driving the current hard against the shore. I could feel its shuddering force slap at the stones of the Quay on which I stood. The hulk would be heaving in its depths, the misery heightened for those in delirium. I narrowed my eyes, attempting to pick out even one figure against the dusk — and saw a rocket soar up near the prison ship's hull. It exploded overhead in a red arc of light.

  “Young fools,” muttered a voice at my feet.

  I glanced around, but could discover no one.

  The harsh clearing of an old man's throat assailed my ears; I peered down die steps that led from quay to water, and eventually discerned a figure familiar in its outline — a seafaring man, with a neat white queue hanging down his back and a silver whistle around his neck. He was crouched in the stern of a small skiff, smoking his pipe. A quantity of fish was neatly stowed in a basket at his feet, and his line and tackle laid by.

  “Mr. Hawkins,” I said.

  The Bosun's Mate pulled his pipe from his lips and nodded. “Miss Austen, ma'am. Nell said as you were very kind to her. I thank you, I do, for your attention to my poor girl.”

  A second rocket fired out of the Water and exploded with a great report over our heads: Despite myself, I started.

  Jeb Hawkins pointed toward the prison hulk with his pipe stem. “That's a sorry sight, if 1 may be so bold. It burns my heart to see the Marguerite in such a state — cut down to a stump and disgraced. The times we had in her — aye, and the battles, too!”

  “You were posted once in that ship?” I enquired curiously.

  “That I were, ma'am — four year and more,?? d many a sharp brush the Marguerite saw. She took fifteen French prizes in her day, and seven Spanish, make no mistake. She were a barky ship, the Marguerite; but it's donkey's years since she were fit for sailing.”

  “What cause could the crew, find for signal rockets?” I asked him.

  “Why, that's never the crew, ma'am! That's a few of Southampton's best, in Martin Whitsun's cockle of a boat, chivvying the Frenchies with the sound of the guns! The young lads're forever plaguing the prisoners with a fight; they think it drives the French half-mad, to have the sound of shells whizzing overhead and be prevented from offering a reply.”

  I strained my gaze towards the hulk's waterline, and discerned the very small craft Hawkins had described, hard in the lee of the ship and almost indistinguishable in the darkness. A sudden misapprehension seized me. What if the rockets were a diversion — a cover for greater malice about to operate on board?

  I turned to stare at the Quay's end, and Winkle Lane; no sign of Frank or Mr. Hill. And at every moment the dusk grew heavier! Surely if murder were done, it would strike under cover of night! I rounded on Mr. Hawkins in his skiff.

  “You say that you are familiar with the Marguerite. Would you be so kind as to convey me to her?”

  Hawkins eyed me dubiously; between drabs and prison hulks, he no doubt thought, I possessed curious tastes for a lady.

  I opened my reticule and retrieved my purse: four shillings, five pence. The sum would have to do. I held out the coins.

  “You're never thinking of clambering aboard yourself,” he prote
sted. “It's right difficult for a lady, without a chair; but happen the Captain could find one—”[25]

  “We shall deal with that difficulty when we come to it.” I clinked the money enticingly.

  He shrugged, rose into a half-crouch, and extended-his palm. I dropped the shilling pieces into it.

  “Have a care, ma'am, to step into the middle of the boat I'm not so young as I was, but strong enough for all that to make the Marguerite in under ten minutes.”

  Ten minutes! It seemed ten hours, rather, as the Bosun's Mate heaved and grunted at his oars. I sat in the bow, facing the hulk, and he amidships, with his back turned to his object; I was privileged, therefore, to experience every agony of apprehension while the distant outline of the Marguerite loomed and grew no nearer. Eventually, however, as the darkness of late winter descended and the shouts of men flew across the Water, the hulk ceased to recede” I thought it came a litde nearer — a little nearer — and a little nearer; the Bosun's Mate showed sweat on his brow, and at last we approached so swiftly that the dark and glistening hull of the ship filled all our sight, a mountainous wall, with the waves slapping against its anchor-chains in petulant bursts of foam. A few lanterns had been lit against the turning of the day; their warm yellow light pooled in places on the upper deck, but shed no glow in the dark under-regions, the successive rings of hell, that comprised the lower decks. From die closed gun ports came the piteous sounds of suffering men — groans, cries of delirium, the harsh cut of laughter.

  Another skiff, larger than the Mate's and filled with at least eight young bucks of seafaring aspect, rowed around the Marguerite's bow and roared with delight at die sight of us. One — who must be their leader — held aloft a bottle in salute.

  “Old Hawkins, ahoy there! Have you come to join the merriment? And brought a fishwife, too! Are you after selling your girl, Mate?”

  “She's too dear for your purse, Martin Whitsun,” Hawkins retorted, “and well you know it”