A Wicked Way to Burn

by Margaret Miles

  Charlotte sat very still, while Esther Pennywort sighed at the world’s folly, took another sip of cider, and sat back with a small frown. Then she began to examine the company around them, unaware of the great secret she’d just betrayed.

  So Jack Pennywort had left her henbane, thought Charlotte with a tiny smile … probably for fear of what she might suspect about his dealings with the miller. She’d already guessed that Jack knew more than he’d told. Had he feared, after their interview, that she might soon guess more?

  She had given him tea on Thursday; that might have planted the idea in his mind. And perhaps he had only tried to discredit her, by causing her to act as he often did himself. After that, in the same way that others had always laughed at him, they would laugh at her, whatever she told them. Surely, her death hadn’t been part of his plan. After all, he chewed the seeds himself. And she believed for Jack Pennywort that one murder would have been enough. As for Peter Lynch—how easy it would have been for Jack to offer his powerful “friend” one pinch of tainted snuff … then, another. And in a while, if the miller had begun to worry, or if he had rushed toward the smaller man, threatening—

  She thought it likely Jack had only resorted to murder after he’d witnessed the miller commit one of his own. Poor young Sam must have seen the miller getting rid of the evidence of “Duncan Middleton” in his pond on Tuesday night; the boy had probably agreed to meet Lynch at a later time, when things had calmed down. If Jack had already gone to rest in the dark mill on Tuesday night, and overheard Sam talking with Lynch—and if he had followed later, to see the miller choke the life out of the boy—he might well have thought his own life was in danger. As it probably had been.

  It all fit. So did the many reports of “the Devil’s work” heard during the week. No doubt Jack had enjoyed offering others some of his own medicine in an innocent pinch of snuff. After all, he had been chosen to tell a shocking story to an admiring world, only to discover that it had all been a hoax. The whole thing, his whole life, had been a peculiar sort of amusement for others. Perhaps, thought Charlotte, there were more than a few people in Bracebridge to blame for Jack’s recent sins.

  She drew her mind back to the buzzing room full of farmers. The smells of ripe stew, lunch baskets, tobacco and wood smoke, wet linen and wool, and the pungency of several infants all swirled together over the subtler fumes from mugs and glasses.

  Right now, Jack would be out behind the tavern with a few other men, enjoying tall stories and the cheap comfort of jug liquor, out of view of their women and children who preferred the crowded warmth inside. If he should enter now, what would be his reaction at seeing her sitting beside his wife?

  And what about the man who had started the whole thing by coming to Bracebridge with the red cloak and the gold coins belonging to a dead man—an impostor whose own location no one, as yet, seemed to know? Had the stranger truly been responsible for the real Duncan Middleton’s murder, with perhaps some help from Peter Lynch? Whoever he was, he was probably far away. Or then again, it was possible that he could be about to walk in through the tavern door at any moment.

  Thinking it all over, Charlotte came to one final conclusion. She had very little idea of what would happen next.

  Chapter 29

  ODDLY ENOUGH, THE next person to actually sweep through the front door of the tavern turned out to be Diana Longfellow, who had never been known to visit the Blue Boar, but who seemed to find it worth a brief look now.

  “You’ll wonder,” she said to Charlotte Willett with feigned ennui, “what draws me here, and all alone. It’s a question with two answers, really. First, Richard and Cicero are quite busy on the bridge, debating whether the flow of water would be increased if the millpond were reduced, and whether that would alter the pleasures of some kind of fish. For my part, I wanted to tell you I’ve found my dragon vial. It was just where I’d left it, I’m afraid. But why don’t we all go for our dinner now, if you’re through with your business?”

  “Then it wasn’t Mary—” Charlotte began. Immediately, she thought better of denying what she’d been forced to suspect earlier … that the young woman might be a thief, and worse. It had seemed odd that Mary would be interested in taking such a thing, while her lover’s life was at stake. Diana’s news, then, meant that there must be two identical bottles in Bracebridge. But why had Mary been so quick to hide one of them the night before?

  “Didn’t you tell me that bottle was one of only half a dozen just arrived?” she asked Diana instead.

  “Yes, brought in by Will Harper. If I’d been in Providence to ask him directly, I’m certain I could have gotten it at a much better price. For a song, really,” Diana concluded, her eyes taking on a dreamy expression. “Did I tell you that I met the captain once before, while I was in London?”

  “But then, Mary’s bottle must have been brought from Providence, as well,” Charlotte labored to explain. “So that means Peter Lynch was in Providence, not Worcester, on Monday … and that’s where he intercepted Duncan Middleton! As he may have been told to do—by someone far smaller, who would be able to impersonate the merchant here. Then, both came back to Bracebridge on Tuesday, with the clothes, the horse, and the money. The impostor took the money, put on the clothes, and rode the horse to the inn. I saw him; so did Jonathan, and Lydia … although she tried to hide the fact—unsuccessfully, for the two of them were overheard by Mr. Lee. And then later at the Blue Boar, Gabriel went out first, and Jack followed them both onto the road, just as they knew he would—”

  And at that instant the end of the story came to her, along with the knowledge of where her reasoning had gone wrong before. Stunned by her conclusion, she barely heard the faint clatter of horses’ hooves outside. Then, realizing that delay might be dangerous, Charlotte turned and started to explain to Diana exactly who it was they should be extremely careful to avoid, and why. She had time to utter a name which put a look of astonishment on Diana’s features. But before Mrs. Willett could go further, a commotion rose above the room’s babble. One by one, heads turned to see five horsemen dismounting under the bare trees in front of the tavern.

  Those outside quickly gathered around the newcomers, obscuring the view through the windows. But Charlotte and Diana had seen the vivid finery of Edmund Montagu, surrounded by the lesser uniforms of four others. Two, in loose blue and white, were sailors, while two more in scarlet coats and white breeches were clearly members of the king’s regiments. It was an unusual spectacle this far inland, in time of peace, and more than a little grumbling punctuated the immediate excitement of the men outside.

  Curiously, the sailors followed Montagu into the tavern while the redcoats kept watch over the horses, in the face of an increasingly agitated and demanding crowd.

  Montagu at once spoke in low tones to Phineas Wise, who had seen his arrival and hurried forward. As he spoke, the captain’s eyes caught those of a worried Charlotte Willett. He stared at her with concern of his own, before he was captured by a look from Diana Longfellow. The conference with the tavern’s owner lasted only a moment more. Then, while Wise continued to shake his head, Montagu approached the two ladies whom he’d so often thought about lately, for different reasons.

  “Captain Montagu!” Charlotte exclaimed softly. “I think we have proof our miller killed your merchant in Rhode Island.”

  “Yes, but how the devil—”

  Rapidly, Charlotte began to explain.

  “There was a perfume bottle, given to Mary Frye by Peter Lynch, while he pressed her to marry him. She took the bottle because she was forced to, but was ashamed to show it to anyone. Diana has its twin, one of a very few lately arrived on a ship now at anchor near Providence—” Montagu held up a hand in supplication, and she let her sentence trail off.

  “Peter Lynch was seen along the waterfront, boasting and spending Dutch gold, as you say, Mrs. Willett. But of far more importance now is the man I’ve come for, the imposter in the red cloak you saw on Tuesday afternoon—
”

  Now, Edmund Montagu was forced to halt, when a group of boys burst into the Blue Boar. They soon set the place whirling like a hurricane.

  “We’ve found the Frenchman! The murderer’s in the mill!” They chanted it eagerly, over and over, forcing all other conversation to stop short. “We’ve found him, and he’s gone into the room above!” their leader screeched. Behind him, someone climbed onto a table to shout, “Let’s get the beggar, and finish it!” A rasp of voices sounded an angry chorus.

  “Throw him in the millpond, and see what he says!”

  “Don’t wait to send him to Cambridge, or Worcester, where his friends be! Let’s do it now, and have it done—”

  “Come on!”

  A flurry erupted all around the room, as some tried to get to the door so as not to miss the excitement, while others attempted to pull themselves and their children out of harm’s way, out of view of what promised to be a grisly scene. Charlotte watched Esther Pennywort jump up and join the rest, no doubt going to find Jack—just as Richard Longfellow pushed into the room against the tide.

  “Edmund,” he began as he reached the captain, “what’s to be gained by bringing—”

  “Do your duty,” Montagu quietly ordered his two sailors, who turned and disappeared into the crowd. “You two stay here,” he added to Charlotte and Diana, while he grasped Longfellow’s shoulder. But they weren’t able to leave quite yet.

  “Save him!” Diana implored, pulling on Montagu’s hand with strength enough to turn him back to her. It was a tense look he gave her—one that she would long remember with a thrill, and a certain pride.

  Then the captain and her brother were gone, following the crowd that headed for the mill.

  THE PLACE HAD already been thoroughly searched. A few concerned with trespass had lately avoided it, as did many more who believed rumors that the mill now had its own ghost. All of these ideas made it a likely spot for Gabriel Fortier to hide.

  Somewhat earlier, Mary had imagined herself unobserved as she crept around behind the millpond on the small path. But several boys playing a game of settlers and Indians had seen her going by. They, in turn, had eagerly and carefully crept after, and proved her undoing.

  Like King Philip a century before, leading the Nipmucks, the Narragansetts, and his Wampanoag brothers against the settlers, the boys had been careful to keep out of sight until the moment called for action. They imagined that they, too, wielded guns and tomahawks, and that these tomahawks were much like the hatchet the Frenchman had recently used to destroy the miller, as most of their fathers maintained. And so it was with a mixture of terror and delight that they came to see a young woman in the arms of that very same murderer.

  When they screamed, hoping to make him let go of her, they expected the woman to run behind them to safety. Instead, both had stood with looks of disbelief frozen on their faces. And then she had turned and run up the stairs to the mill’s second floor, where the large post of the grinding stone was held in place; next, the boys had seen the Frenchman go running after her, calling out her name.

  Now, their shouts had created an extremely satisfactory chaos outside the mill, where fifty men debated what to do. Some wanted to smoke the Frenchman out; others urged someone should wait with a rifle, until he showed his face. Most simply wanted to storm the building.

  All of their plans were short-lived. Edmund Montagu, back on his horse now and followed on foot by Richard Longfellow, cleared a way for the two redcoats who carried muskets set with bayonets. At the water’s edge the captain turned to address the enflamed crowd.

  “There is no reason” he shouted over a barrage of threats and suggestions, “to go in after Gabriel Fortier, or to endanger the life of the young woman with him. But there is every reason for all of you to listen to me! The man who was said to catch fire last Tuesday evening was not, as you must know, the merchant, Duncan Middleton. But he was someone who arranged for that man to be killed! Middleton’s body was found washed ashore on Tuesday morning, near Providence. Yet on Tuesday afternoon, after the discovery of that body, someone else walked through Bracebridge wearing Middleton’s clothes, carrying a supply of Dutch coins obtained by the merchant in a recent exchange. That man then caused himself to disappear, to cover up the real murder of Middleton, which he himself could not have committed—but which he had caused to happen by promising payment to your own Peter Lynch!”

  Now a different sort of cry rose from the crowd—one of outrage mingled with disbelief.

  “Who was it killed the miller, then?” one man shouted. Others quickly turned to ask each other the same. In the new commotion, Montagu’s horse tripped and turned with a discomfort that matched its rider’s, while those next to it warily moved back.

  “That is of only secondary importance at the moment,” Montagu argued with consternation.

  “What about my boy?” came a sharp cry from Rachel Dudley, who had followed the crowd hoping to learn more of her son’s death. She finished with a sob that did much to still the violence in those around her, at least for the moment.

  “They’re saying it was no accident that killed Sam,” the bereaved woman continued. “Well, no one cared about this man Middleton—no one knew him! All they really cared about was his gold. No one even minds what happened to Peter Lynch, who surely deserved what he got. But Sam was only an innocent boy! So you tell me, who would want to murder my son?”

  “It’s nearly certain that he, too, was killed by the miller, for something he saw,” Montagu called down to her, “and for that, I’m truly sorry. I believe your boy frightened Lynch, though he might not have known it. But there’s one here who’s responsible for all of this! A man who arranged to have his own brother killed—a man assumed dead by all those who insist on believing what they read in the newspapers—a man thought to be drowned in a shipwreck three years ago! I have brought two of his former shipmates from Boston; they can rely on their own eyes to tell them the truth, and will say if Lionel Middleton is still here, maintaining his masquerade!”

  Montagu pointed, and the crowd turned to see the two sailors in an upper window of the Blue Boar, waving their arms, then shaking their heads violently—while from another window Diana, and Charlotte behind her, leaned out and pointed back. Taking the hint, many turned around again, to see a stream of smoke rising from the base of the mill; it was immediately followed by a sheet of flames that began to climb the outer walls of the old wooden building with a roar, racing into its upper story.

  Suddenly, the crowd was electrified by the knowledge that two innocent young people were trapped inside, and would soon burn before their eyes. Immediately, water pails and a ladder were rushed from the tavern; others ran to nearby homes to bring more buckets. Few noticed a lone figure leading a horse from the stable behind the Blue Boar; few heard the approaching clatter of iron shoes on the road.

  There was a scream from the crowd as Mary and Gabriel appeared in an upper window. Together, they stood on the brink, in the midst of a flow of black smoke that was already filled with bright sparks. Both were choking, trying desperately to fill their lungs with air. Then, still together, hand in hand, the pair leaped out into the air, and fell down into the millpond.

  In a few moments, Mary Frye was pulled out of the pool by several men, to be bundled into a blanket and rushed off by a group of solicitous women. Gabriel still clutched at water weeds and struggled to get his footing on the millpond’s muddy bottom, until the strong arm of Nathan Browne reached out to him, hesitated briefly, then slowly pulled him to the bank and safety.

  By this time, two lines passed to and from the fire; these were manned by most of the able-bodied, while the two old quails, Tinder and Flint, stood back and shouted lustily at the flames, as if together they might somehow blow them out.

  “But where,” cried an elderly farm wife, who had been trying to think of something to do, “is this other man the captain accused? The one who’s responsible for all that’s happened? Is he going to get a
way?”

  As it happened, her question was answered almost immediately. Six redcoats and a third sailor now rode down toward the town bridge from the direction of Boston. Between them, his hands bound and his head low, rode the finally defeated naturalist, Adolphus Lee.

  Chapter 30

  WITHIN THE HOUR, the Blue Boar and the Bracebridge Inn were filled with sooty, happy patrons who gave thanks for an end to the fire, and to their fears of the past week. Warmed by their own efforts, they raised their glasses to the saved mill and to each other, and there were some who said a prayer for their reprieve from any further preaching that day.

  Meanwhile, in Charlotte Willett’s kitchen, Longfellow and Diana, Charlotte and Edmund Montagu feasted on toasted bread dipped into heated cheese, a few bottles of French wine, and a heaping plate of apples. Much had been discussed, but more remained unclear.

  “So Lionel Middleton,” Diana tried again, “arranged for the miller to kill his brother, which each of them did for money … and then the miller, already a murderer, killed the boy when he thought Sam had seen too much … and when Jack saw Lynch kill the boy, he decided to kill the miller?”

  “Actually,” Montagu corrected her, “when I spoke with Pennywort half an hour ago, he assured me he only meant to find out if Lynch had any further plans for him. Then, when he suspected he had, Jack thought he might make the fellow less dangerous with some of his doctored snuff. He hoped it would give him his chance to get clear, and planned to alert the rest of the town so that Lynch would be taken into custody. But when the miller threatened to kill him then and there, Pennywort swears he only did what he had to, as soon as he got the chance. Luckily, the ax was handy. After that, he watched the miller reel into his pond, wrench the thing from his head, and drown.”