by Mira Stables
Mr. Longden clapped a hand to his head. “Jewels!” he exclaimed in sharp dismay. “I had clean forgot! I was to have seen Gregson — the fellow from Rundell and Bridge — this evening, and in all the excitement it went quite out of my head. Dear me! How extremely remiss. Especially as the poor man has had that wearisome journey for nothing. How would it be if we carried him to York with us Piers? It would save him a fully day’s travelling, for he could take the London Mail from there. That would make some small amends. But he must be at Ash Croft betimes, for I will not stay for him!”
Piers offered to have a message of explanation and apology carried to the jeweller, and the company were able to address themselves to the excellent dinner to which they had been so unceremoniously bidden, Mr. Longden emerging from one of his fits of abstraction to request his hostess to compliment her cook on the fricassee of game.
“It is one of my favourite dishes,” he explained, innocently unaware that the remark had reduced his two younger daughters to suppressed giggles, while the third, with heightened colour and a brilliant sparkle in her eye, devoted herself to a helping of roast duck with pensive dignity. Lady Eleanor, aware of some undercurrent, looked slightly puzzled, but was too well bred to enquire into what was clearly a private joke, and returned her attention to Mr. Longden, pleasing him very much by telling him how grateful she was to Clemency for helping her these past weeks, and paying a graceful tribute to the girl by commending her capabilities in just such moderate and sensible terms as carried far more conviction than fulsome praise.
Mr. Longden beamed delightedly and said what a comfort the child would be to her Mama, and Clemency felt herself to be quite the horridest creature in all Nature because she could not welcome the prospect with wholehearted delight. Piers, setting down her subdued mien to embarrassment at the public praise, turned the subject by saying that he hoped she would still be able to spare a little time to help him with his letters, declaring that although his hand was now practically as good as new, he had discovered the luxury of having the tedious task performed for him, and would not lightly forego it.
The party broke up early, since the travellers meant to be up at crack of dawn, and Lady Eleanor said that Faith too, should go early to bed. Nor were her sisters reluctant to retire after their exhausting day, though one of them lay long awake, wondering how it was that a world in which all one’s long cherished hopes seemed about to come true at last should seem so utterly devoid of zest and enchantment.
Chapter Fourteen
“THERE’S something wrong with the whole set-up,” complained Pelly sourly. “There was no word of this last night, or my pretty Peg would have told me of it.”
“Well ’er telling me come about quite natural like,” placated Harry. “I woke up uncommon dry — must have been the pigs’ fry we ’ad for supper — so I went down to the tap room for a sup of ale to wet me gullet. And Peg just ’appens to say as ’ow the bloke ’ad loped off an hour gone. But all’s bowman,” he added hurriedly, seeing the lowering scowl on Pelly’s face, “’cos it was this ’ere Ash Croft place that ’e was going to.”
Pelly grunted but his brow cleared slightly. “Maybe they’re just playing it clever,” he brooded, and fell silent.
Harry knew better than to interrupt this reverie with any ideas of his own about Gregson’s unexpected move. He did not see how the fellow could have got wind of their plans. They had kept well out of his ken during his stay at the inn, though this precaution had not been necessary, the poor gentleman having gone immediately to his bedchamber and remained there, suffering, said Peg, from some kind of sickness brought on by the swaying of the coach. Harry had set eyes on him only once, and a puny undersized little fellow he was. He would present no problem in a hold up. A good hearty sneeze would just about blow him away, and one could no more imagine him carrying a pistol or a knife than one could picture him, Harry, figged out in silk stockings and satin breeches at a Court ball.
The amiable grin with which he welcomed this exotic flight of fancy was wiped clean away by Pelly’s brusque, “And what cause have you to grin, gapeseed? Seems to me there’s little cause for grinning in the prospect of losing a fortune.”
Harry mumbled something apologetic as how he’d only been thinking that there Mr. Gregson wouldn’t show to much advantage if it came to fisticuffs.
“It’s not like to do so unless we can guess what he plans to do next,” said Pelly. “If he’s not coming back here, where does he plan to board the London Mail? For we must nobble him before then. It takes four at least to stop the Mail, and likely lads at that” — with a disparaging glance at Harry.
Further discussion revealed the depressing fact that there were no less than three different points at which the intending traveller might choose to board the coach, and it was clearly impossible for two men and a ‘half wit’ as Pelly described Will Overing, to cover all of them.
“There’s only the one thing to be done,” decided Pelly at last. “The one road that he’s bound to use is the lane that runs easterly from Ash Croft to the turnpike.”
“The one that passes that stud farm? The Manor ’ouse?” asked Harry helpfully.
Pelly nodded impatiently. “Yes. Though we take him before he gets that far. About half a mile from Ash Croft the lane goes up a steepish hill with a sharp bend at the top, and there’s a spinney on the left where we can lie close till he comes. If my memory serves me, we can cover the gates of Ash Croft from the hill top and make sure of our man. This is one time when we don’t want to be stopping any chance-come chaise.
“We’ll maybe have a long wait,” said Harry dubiously.
“So I suppose we should sit here by the parlour fire and send a message to Mr. Gregson to kindly let us know when he’s ready to leave,” snapped Pelly. “If we’ve to keep watch all day and all night, I’m having those sparklers.” And then, in rare condescension, “Don’t you see, Harry, they’re just the right stamp for men of our calling? Good class stuff, but commonplace. What’s the good of taking the Norton diamonds or the Eversley black pearls — even if so be as you could come nigh either? You can’t sell them. They’ve to go to a fence and be broken up — and away goes the profit. Now this little lot — why, Barney’ll place every piece with some of these new-come-up mushrooms that made a fortune in the war. No questions asked and everybody happy. That’s the way to make easy money, Harry boy.”
Harry regarded him with admiration, and then, encouraged by his unusual affability, ventured a question. “You seem uncommon well acquainted with these ’ere sparklers, Dan’l?”
Pelly grinned. “So I am, Harry, so I am. I near as nothing had a touch at them once before, but it came to naught through one of those mischances that happen to the best of us.” For a moment his mind went back to that Surrey hillside where he had slain the mistress and despoiled the maid. The grin widened over that last memory. He wondered where the wench was now, and whether she still went in fear of his vengeance. A pity he had never come up with her again. She had been his first virgin. It might have been amusing to make her dance to his piping. Then he dismissed the thought as idle folly when there was business to be done.
“I’ll settle our reckoning, Harry. Do you get out to the Wyke barn and bring Overing and Lucifer to the spinney. Best let the lad ride the stallion — he’ll go quietly for him. I’ll join you as soon as I’ve set all straight here.”
At much the same time that this conference was taking place, the Longden twins were also discussing their plans for the immediate future, with Clemency curled up on the end of Pru’s bed while her sister folded and put away her clean linen. Pru had a good deal to tell, for though Giles had not yet spoken to her father and their affairs must now wait upon his return, they had agreed matters to their own entire satisfaction and neither of them really doubted that parental approval would be forthcoming. Clemency wished her sister happy and tried to take what comfort she could from the thought that at least Pru would be living no further away than the M
anor. This put her in mind of the fact that Giles was only his cousin’s steward, and she enquired with sisterly candour whether he was in a position to support a wife.
Thereupon Pru poured out the whole tale of Captain Kennedy’s generosity, and how Giles was to step into his cousin’s shoes. For her own part she could not understand a man choosing to resign such a comfortable heritage as the Manor in favour of adventuring in strange and distant lands, which must, by all accounts, be very dangerous, as well as horridly uncomfortable. But it seemed that Captain Kennedy was so constituted, and — she blushed — had heartily approved his cousin’s decision to marry, and even his choice of bride. Matters were already in train for the transfer of the estate to its new owner. Perhaps — shyly — they might be married in the spring, if Mama was well enough for all the excitement of a wedding.
Clemency listened and exclaimed and sympathised, saying all that was proper, with a lonely little ache in her heart as of a child shut out from a party yet compelled to watch the glowing happiness within. Presently, when Pru had come to an end of her plans, she said casually, “Will Captain Kennedy not return to England, then? Does he intend to reside wholly in Australia?”
Pru explained the arrangement about the Dower House but said that certainly he seemed to regard Australia as his home. Then, sensitive as always to her twin’s mood, said thoughtfully, “It is a pity that you should have taken him in such dislike at your first meeting. I would have thought the pair of you well suited, for you have always yearned for travel and adventure. Strange how our looks belie us.” She studied their two reflections in the mirror. “You, so dainty and feminine, as though you should sit for ever on a cushion and sew a fine seam, with courtiers attending your every whim, while I look the complete Amazon, and all I want is Giles and” — her voice dropped to a shy tenderness — “his children.”
Clemency didn’t answer. She was envisaging a busy and useful future as a comfort to Mama and spinster aunt to those same children, and finding the prospect little to her taste. Children had not come much in her way until the advent of the Gordons, but of late she, too, had sometimes dreamed of a child, a dark haired lad with laughing blue eyes, an upstanding scamp, mischievous perhaps, but gallant and gay and loving.
Pru cut sharply across the little silence. “What did go wrong? That day you went to ask Piers to help us? You never told me the whole story. Was he unkind to you? Too high and mighty?”
“No, indeed,” said Clemency promptly, for fair was fair and he had been neither. Too attentive would be nearer the mark, but that was a secret she would keep to herself. “He behaved as if I were too young and silly to be out without my nurse,” she said at last.
Pru looked puzzled. “I suppose you would dislike being condescended to,” she said doubtfully. “But surely you do not still hold it against him?”
Clemency tilted her chin. “I cannot see why you are refining so much on such a trivial matter. Captain Kennedy and I are perfectly good friends. Must you try your hand at match making, just because you are happily in love? I think I am not yet at my last prayers, and may yet hope to find a partner to my liking.” And then, swiftly penitent, “I’m sorry, Pru, love. Set my ill humour down to too much excitement yesterday — for indeed I feel horridly flat and dull today. And though I am truly happy for you and Giles you cannot expect me to give you up to him without a little selfish moan. I’ll smile and dance at your wedding, I promise!” And a quick loving hug dispelled any soreness that the snub might have left behind.
By tacit consent the subject of Piers Kennedy was dropped and the sisters spent the rest of the day in looking over Mrs. Longden’s furs and hanging them in the fresh air to sweeten, and then in pressing out and furbishing up their own gowns, so that Mama should not find her daughters too dreadfully shabby.
“You will not mind being left alone tonight?” asked Clemency, as Betsy came in to draw the curtains and shut out the fading daylight. “Giles was to collect the letters from the receiving office on his way home, and I promised Captain Kennedy that I would deal with any that required an answer. But I can come back after I have finished the letters if you will be nervous on your own.”
“Goose!” smiled Pru. “What should I be afraid of? With Betsy and Elspeth and Lady Eleanor’s two girls, it seems to me I have guardian angels a-plenty! There’s Giles now.” She got up to bring Clemency’s cloak, fastening the strings at the throat and settling the hood snugly with gentle fingers that expressed her deep affection better than any words, and even stooped to brush a light kiss on her sister’s cheek, a rare caress in an undemonstrative family. She watched the gig out of sight, shivered in the raw November air, and turned back to the comfort of the hearth.
In the spinney at the top of the hill, Harry pulled his coat collar higher and stamped his feet in an effort to bring some warmth to those frozen members.
“Quiet, man!” hissed Pelly. “Listen!”
Carried on the frosty air came clear enough the sound of hoofs and wheels. Straining his eyes through the gathering dusk he could just make out the shape of a vehicle drawing out of the gates of Ash Croft. And yes! there were two occupants, a big husky looking fellow driving, and a smaller one beside him.
“At last!” he breathed exultantly. “That’ll be them. And about time, too. The little’un’ll be Gregson. Do you tend to him, Harry, while I take the driver, and you, lad,” to the pallid faced Will, “go to the horse’s head as soon as I’ve stopped ’em.”
Harry was across the lane in a swift silent dash that contrasted sharply with his earlier noisy demonstration, crouching in the frozen ditch and melting out of sight among a clump of low growing bushes. Pelly swung into the saddle and held his pistol ready, hoping for once that he would not need to fire, since the sound, so close to human habitation, might summon help to his victims.
The gig came on at a gentle pace. The rise was steep and Giles was ever careful of his horses. Fully engaged in watching for hazards in the ill-surfaced lane and never dreaming of danger so close to home, the surprise when it came was complete. At one moment the hill was bare and peaceful, at the next a great black stallion leapt out of the hedge as though it must crash into the gig, to be pulled up, rearing up above his head while a loud voice yelled at him to stop and a pistol was levelled at his head. As, instinctively, he swerved to his left, another figure leapt up from the nearside ditch and sprang catlike towards Clemency, while yet a third appeared to catch at Chevalier’s head. Outmanoeuvred and outnumbered, Giles cut furiously at the mounted man with his whip. The fellow evaded the onslaught, wrenched the black aside, and rose in his stirrups, reversing the gun to bring it down in a heavy blow aimed at Giles’s head. It was fortunate for Giles that in the instant of its descent Clemency pulled him back with all her strength, so that the weapon struck him only a glancing blow on the side of his head and expended its full force on his shoulder. Clemency saw him sway and topple awkwardly from his seat almost beneath the hoofs of the frantic stallion, but at that moment Harry succeeded in getting a foothold on the hub of the wheel and dragged her roughly to the ground.
It was Harry’s sharp exclamation of disbelieving fury that drew Pelly’s attention from Giles and brought him round to Harry’s side of the vehicle before the stallion could vent its fury on the limp body so perilously close.
Harry was shaking the helpless girl like a rag doll, pouring out the while a stream of blasphemous vituperation that his captive was not the little jeweller but a useless wench. Pelly stared — for a moment unable to believe that his plan had so miscarried; that the elaborate trap had caught only a pair of silly country lovers, for so he deemed them. Then his attention was caught by something familiar about the frightened white face framed in the loose goldbrown hair, for the hood had fallen back in Harry’s rough handling. Perhaps — the idea came to him — it was just possible that all was not yet lost. “Let her be, Harry,” he said, quietly enough, though his fingers bit into Harry’s shoulder with bruising force. The girl reeled away,
sick and dizzy, to clutch at the side of the gig for support. Pelly studied her curiously. Yes — despite shabby cloak and simple gown, there was definitely an air of quality.
“Who is she?” he snapped. “Either of you know her?”
It was Will Overing who answered. Will had played his part as bidden. He had seen the blow that had struck down Master Giles — as decent a chap as ever stepped, allowing for him being one of the swells — and his heart had turned to water within him. He longed only to be free of his new associates. But he dare not go against them.
“’Tis Miss Longden,” he muttered sullenly, “Miss Clemency,” and turned his face away from her, though she had not so much as glanced his way.
Pelly nodded. So his half guess at the girl’s identity had been right. “Then maybe we’re not done for yet,” he said thoughtfully. “Search that fellow I laid out, Harry, and make sure there’s naught hid in the gig.”
It did not take Harry long to report that there was nothing of value save a few coins in the young fellow’s pocket and a gold watch, which trophies he handed over with a deeply disgruntled mien. He then asked if he should search the wench, who had managed to stumble to Giles’s side and was feeling for a pulse beat with shaking fingers. Pelly shook his head. “No need,” he said. “We’ll take her along with us. The old man can have her back when he hands over the jewels — or the money if he’s already sold ’em. I reckon they were worth a cool ten thousand. That shall be the lady’s price — and I’ll warrant he’ll pay up willingly enough to have his dainty ewe lamb restored to him unharmed.”
Harry heartily approved. Never at a loss, wasn’t Dan. Trust him to snatch victory out of defeat. But he was anxious about their exposed position on the open hillside. Could they not withdraw to some more sheltered spot to settle the final details?