Death Devil's Bridge

by Robin Paige

  “It’s on your account, if you must know,” Thornton said grimly. “I’m looking out for your interests.”

  “For my interests?” Bradford asked in surprise. “And how are my interests at stake in a village assembly?”

  “I’ll tell you,” Thornton said. “Or better yet—” He turned, speaking to a man who stood in the shadows. “Come out here, Whipple, and tell his lordship what is troubling you and your friends.”

  “As ye say, Squire.” Clutching his hat in his hands, Whipple came into the light. He was a sturdy, thickset man, with a wide face the color of brick dust, fringed with red whiskers. His eyes were red-rimmed and angry. “I’ll tell yer lordship wot ‘tis, since I’m bid,” he growled. “ ’Tis that balloon. An’ the motorcars, too.”

  “Oh, it is, is it?” Bradford snapped. This had the look of trouble and he knew he should speak softly. But the evening had been long, and he was coming to the end of his patience. “And what is it about the balloon and the motorcars that distresses you? To my certain knowledge, many of your friends are planning to come tomorrow. There will be fine entertainment.”

  “Fine entertainment it may be to see a balloon go up,” Whipple said with scorn, “but comin’ down is another matter. We’ve seen balloons come down, the drag ropes wreckin’ fences an’ tearin’ ‘oles in ’edges.” He paused, and added, in a meaningful tone, “We’ve also seen motorcars racin’ in the lanes, sir, an’ we’ve seen old men kilt. I speak fer all when I say we don’t like it, m’lord. Not one whit.”

  Bradford drew himself up. “I trust you are not accusing me,” he said stiffly.

  Whipple’s face grew darker, his tone more scornful. “I don’t accuse nobody, sir. All I’m sayin’ is we don’t like it. An’ ‘ere’s wot we done about it, sir. Every farmer an’ ’ouse‘older wot wants one of these kin git it.” He held up a printed proclamation. “Wi’ all due respect, m’lord,” he added, touching his forelock with a mocking gesture.

  Bradford took the proclamation and held it to the light that came through the window of The Sun. In stern black letter were printed the words “Balloons and Motorcars Strictly Prohibited,” with the accompanying terse directive: “Aeronauts, motorcar drivers, and all such trespassing on this land will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of Her Majesty’s Law.”

  “That means,” Whipple interpreted, “that any leaseholder’s got the right to summon the constable if yer balloon er any o’ them motor cars comes on ’is land.”

  Bradford handed back the proclamation without comment. He glanced gravely at Thornton. “How are you involved in this business, Squire?”

  “Some of those in attendance tonight are my tenants at Thornton Grange. I happen to share their concerns. I fear for the horses, as do other owners and breeders in the area.” Thornton lowered his voice. “I shall say to you what your father would say, were he here, Bradford. The horseless carriage is a threat to the horse, and to the horse trade: stud stables, harness and carriage manufacture, even farming itself. You are bringing catastrophe on our heads.”

  “Oh, come now, Roger,” Bradford said with a dismissive wave of his hand. “You cannot seriously argue that—”

  “I can certainly so argue,” Thornton said fiercely, “and others agree. I tell you, Bradford, every leaseholder in the district intends to post one of those proclamations. What’s more, they plan to gather at the launch site tomorrow morning. There’s going to be serious trouble.”

  Bradford controlled the expression on his face, but he could not keep the anger out of his voice. “You are collaborating with these men!” he exclaimed. “You are encouraging them in their lunacy!”

  Thomton’s stern face was dark, his frown fixed. “And just who is the lunatic here? What will your father say when he returns home and learns how you have betrayed his beliefs? What will your mother say when she discovers that you have encouraged your sister in her foolish flirtation with—” His eyes began to blaze with the flame of the Thornton squires. “I warn you, Marsden. You and your heedless friends and your motorcars and balloons are wreaking havoc. I won’t stand for it.”

  “Excuse me, gentlemen,” said a quiet, firm voice. “Is there anything wrong?”

  Bradford turned and squinted into the darkness. “Oh, good evening, Constable Laken,” he said. He laughed uncomfortably. “No, nothing wrong. A lively exchange of views on a controversial subject, that’s all.”

  “That’s fine, sir,” Laken said evenly. “But perhaps, in view of the lateness of the evening and the proximity of residences, you would not object to exchanging your views in a lower tone.”

  “Agreed,” Bradford said with a careless laugh, “although I think we have had our say.”

  “Marsden?” called Charlie Rolls, coming around The Marlborough Head with his horse. The young man sounded a bit sozzled, not surprising, since he had done more than his share of the drinking. “I say, Marsden, old chap, are we ready to leave?”

  “I’m ready,” Bradford said to Rolls. “Good night, Constable.” He turned to Thornton. “I wish you a good night, Squire—and better company.”

  “You’d best mind what I said,” Thornton snapped, “or you’ll be sorry.”

  Bradford leaned over his horse. “I hear you, Squire,” he said. “But it is much too late to change anything, even if I wanted to.”

  “Then I pity you, Bradford,” Thornton said bitterly, “for you have called up the very devil, and you shall have the devil to pay.”

  10

  “But I always want to know the things one shouldn’t do.”

  “So as to do them?” asked her aunt.

  “So as to choose,” said Isabel.

  —The Portrait of a Lady

  HENRY JAMES

  When the idea came to her, Bess knew immediately that she should not act on it. If she were caught, it would go hard with her, for there was no possible explanation she could make. But having reflected on the matter while she was milking her cow and feeding the chickens and gathering willows for her baskets, she discovered that the idea was now firmly lodged in her head, and she could not choose not to do it.

  So on Friday night, after it had grown dark, she gathered what she needed, tucked the bundles into the pocket of her skirt, and wrapped her black shawl around her. Then she set off in the direction of Bishop’s Keep.

  It was unlikely that motorcars would be out and about at this late hour, but Bess still throbbed with angry resentment at Lord Bradford and she did not care to be knocked into any more watery ditches. So instead of following the road, she took the footpath into the Bishop’s Keep Park. The land lay in darkness, but the moon was bright enough to see the cars lined up near the road under a large banner that proclaimed GRAND MOTOR CAR EXHIBITION AND RACE! She shuddered when she saw them, swift, steel-clad monsters, out to devour quiet lanes and destroy sleepy villages and run down pedestrians. If what she read in the newspaper was true, soon every county family would have its horseless carriage, steam tractors would replace wagons, and even the vicar’s bicycle would be motorized. The way of life she loved would soon be gone forever.

  Beyond the exhibition area, illuminated by a gaslight so bright that it turned the night to day, was the balloon’s launch site, whence Bess was bound. The night was still, and so quiet that she could hear the low voices of the two men tending the balloon well before she reached it. Bending low, clutching her shawl around her, she kept to the shadows of the trees.

  The balloon was a pale ghost that quivered, half-filled with gas, within its net of confining ropes. In just a few hours, it would rise from the earth and go soaring, sailing away through the bright air, to land who knew where. If she could go with it—but that was a vain hope. No, her only expectation of flying lay in the secret formula in the leather book tucked into its secret cache before the fireplace, where Gammer Gurton had hidden it after her successful flight.

  The balloon, moored to the ground, its gondola attached, was secured to a canvas hose, through which gas passed with a
slight hissing sound. The fragile gondola was draped with hempen lines and ballast bags, and a five-pronged metal anchor hung from its side. Bess crept forward through the darkness, one eye on the two men. After a few moments, the pair turned their backs and walked away, sharing quick nips from a brown bottle.

  Sure now that she was unobserved, Bess darted to the gondola and swiftly did what she had come to do. Then she slipped into the shadows, and hurried back along the wood toward the exhibition area. Here, there was only moonlight, flickering like a candle as thin clouds moved across the face of the moon, and she was less fearful of being seen. Scanning the line of mechanical monsters, she easily singled out the one that belonged to Lord Bradford. Going to it, she knelt down in the shadows and spent several moments completing her mission. Then she stood and brushed herself off, feeling strong and powerful and vindicated. A moment later, confident of having achieved success without detection, she stepped out boldly into the lane. She had tripped along only a few paces, however, when she was suddenly brought up short by the sight of a stout figure on the road in front of her, and a familiar voice.

  “Bess Gurton!” Sarah Pratt demanded, hands on hips. “Why in ’eaven’s name are ye skulkin’ through the dark?” Sarah’s voice became suspicious. “Wot’re ye doin’ that ye shudn’t?”

  The day of the balloon’s arrival had been a long one, and the night dragged on longer still. By dawn, Lawrence Quibbley was fagged. Understandably so, since Mr. Rolls had put him in charge of inflating the balloon and Sir Charles had made him responsible for the plant that was producing the gas—two not-inconsiderable tasks.

  Since yesterday, Lawrence and Thompson, the gardener, had tended the gas plant’s three retorts, fueling them in rotation. Every nine hours, they opened the iron door of one of the ten-foot-long brick chambers, stepping back from the flash of flame and the pop! of the remaining hydrogen and methane igniting in the air. The intense heat of the furnace had reduced the coal to a bright orange-red layer of coke, which they scooped with long-handled shovels into the combustion-chamber below. They reloaded the retort with fresh coal and closed the door, retreating to a cooler spot to wipe the sweat from their faces, Thompson complaining mightily that he had hired on to tend roses in the sunshine, not to stoke a gas-plant by moonlight. It had taken a half bottle of whisky to soothe the man’s ruffled spirit.

  Thompson hadn’t been Lawrence’s only problem. There had been one or two difficulties with the Daimler, which he’d been required to attend to. Then the balloon—that unfamiliar and rather unwieldy object—had caused him some concern when one of its seams had sprung a leak.

  But for all his bone-weariness, Lawrence was exhilarated. Looking up into the misty predawn sky, he could see that the balloon was already tugging at its mooring lines. By ten A.M., the scheduled time of ascent, the fog would have burned away, the balloon would have reached its functional capacity, fully capable of lifting its team of aeronauts into the heavens.

  On the other matter under his consideration, Lawrence was not quite so pleased. He had thought of several possible ways of persuading Lord Bradford to abandon his motorcar project, so that he would no longer require Lawrence’s services as a mechanic. The difficulty was, however, that each scheme Lawrence had come up with involved some sort of damage to the Daimler. This would not be difficult for him to execute, knowing every nut and bolt of the motorcar as he did. But if any mischance befell it, Lawrence himself would be the first to be blamed. More importantly, he was reluctant to damage the motorcar, for he had come to care for it in almost the same way that his father had cared for the family draft horse.

  But after hours of deliberation, a glimmer of an idea—not yet a full-blown scheme—had come to him. It did not solve the basic problem, of course, but it would get him past it, and allow him to fulfill both Amelia’s desires and meet his own obligation.

  As the dawn broke, Lawrence’s plan began to take a clearer and brighter form.

  Lady Marsden’s letter arrived by the Saturday morning post. Kate, opening it, read the following:

  Nice, France, September 20, 1896

  My dear Lady Kathryn,

  I take up my pen as a concerned mother, to appeal to you. It has come to the attention of Lord Christopher and myself that Patsy has become unwisely involved in a dangerous liaison with a young man, a guest of my son’s at Marsden Manor, and that this reckless relationship has been supported, indeed, even furthered by you. I believe I need not say that my son has acted injudiciously in the extreme to bring such a person into close acquaintance with his sister, and that it was quite irresponsible of my husband’s aunt to allow the young man into my daughter’s company. I must ask you to withdraw your support of this foolish intimacy and persuade Patsy (who is, for all her cleverness, an inexperienced and headstrong young girl who can do much damage to herself and her family through unwise associations) to abandon her injurious friendship with this person. I am confident that now that you have been informed of the facts, you will do as I bid, and withdraw your unwise sponsorship of this association.

  Yrs.,

  Henrietta Marsden

  Kate sat with the letter in her hand for some time. Lady Henrietta’s imperious voice spoke clearly and offensively, but she could see the mother’s predicament. It was true that Patsy was a headstrong, impulsive young woman, unlike her more compliant sister, Eleanor, who had married at her parents’ wish. (Never mind that Eleanor was already quite wretched.) And it was true that Patsy’s relationship with Charlie Rolls was probably a dangerous one, at least in the sense that it would lead to her eventual unhappiness.

  But unhappiness, in Kate’s opinion, was relative, and might even be balanced out by moments of great happiness. She also felt very strongly that marriage was a matter of the heart, and that daughters should not be the victims of their mothers’ matchmaking. Lady Henrietta obviously feared that Patsy’s friendship with Rolls threatened the family’s plan to marry Patsy to Squire Thornton and link the Marsden estates to Thornton Grange. After thinking about it for a time, Kate decided that she would say nothing of the mother’s letter to the daughter, although she would do what she could to encourage the girl to think carefully about what she was doing. A little later that morning, she had her chance.

  “You can preach all you like,” Patsy Marsden remarked loftily, in response to Kate’s question, “but I shan’t change my mind. I intend to marry Charlie Rolls.”

  “You have changed your mind, you know,” Kate replied, and poured her guest another cup of tea. Outside the window of the drawing room, she could hear the noise of the crowd gathering for the fete—the cries of children, the thwacking of the coconut shies, the shouts of a vendor hawking hot pies. “Only a fortnight ago, you said you didn’t intend to marry Charlie Rolls, or fall in love with him either, for that matter. You had set your heart on becoming England’s premier female photographer. What has happened to that ambition? I thought it a fine one, for which you have a great talent.”

  Patsy pouted. “You don’t like him.”

  “My liking or disliking the young man has nothing to do with it.”

  Patsy’s pout deepened. “You think I should be a dutiful daughter and marry Roger Thornton.”

  Kate picked up her cup, drank, and set it down again. “I think,” she said deliberately, “that you should stop allowing your mother to push you into doing things you know you will regret.”

  Patsy’s cornflower-blue eyes, the same shade as her elegant silk dress, opened wide. “Then you are saying I should marry Charlie! Goodness, Kate—why can’t you make up your mind?”

  “I am saying, Patsy, that you should neither marry to please your mother, nor marry to spite her.”

  “To spite her?”

  “Yes. Either will make you dreadfully unhappy, and inflict a world of harm not only on yourself, but on the man, as well.” Kate leaned forward and put her hand on Patsy’s arm, speaking with all the earnestness she could summon. “Marry no one unless your heart—not the heart
of a daughter nor that of a rebel, but your true woman’s heart—leads you to it, Patsy.”

  Patsy was silent for a moment, and Kate wondered whether her words had struck so deeply that they offended, or whether they had merely glanced off an impenetrable surface. But at last the girl sighed and spoke. “No one but you will talk honestly about such things, Kate. I fear you understand me too well.”

  “I have learned to understand myself,” Kate said with a small smile, “and we are rather alike, you and I.”

  “I think we are,” Patsy said, “in spite of your being—” She stopped and bit her lip, coloring.

  “Being an American, and Irish? Perhaps, Patsy, that is what makes us alike, you and I. We do not always think or feel or behave as those around us expect. It is hard for us not to do as we choose, even though we might not know exactly what that is.”

  “And yet you married.” Patsy spoke almost accusingly.

  “I married when I knew that my heart had chosen well. And I have not regretted it.” To herself, but not aloud, she added, in spite of the difficulties.

  For there were difficulties. She and Charles were enjoying a temporary reprieve just now from the burdens of his family. But when his brother was dead, and Charles should become the Baron of Somersworth, those burdens would have to be shouldered. There would be a move to Somersworth, so he could manage the family estates; and months in London, when Parliament was sitting; and social obligations in a society that would be forever foreign to her. She had known all of this when she married Charles, of course, but that did not make it any easier to bear.