“At the same time I would not wish my son to be a coward,” Verena admitted quickly.
“I think that is extremely unlikely for one who was your son,” the Duke replied.
She looked up at him and he saw her eyes shine.
“That is the nicest compliment anyone has ever paid me, Thank you, Major Royd! And now here we are at The Priory.”
As she spoke, she turned to Assaye who was still behind them and said commandingly,
“Hide, Assaye!”
The horse hesitated and then trotted off towards a clump of trees beyond the house.
“Will he really hide?” the Duke asked in amazement.
“Indeed he will,” Verena answered. “We used to hide together when I wished to escape my Governess and then I taught him ‘hide and seek’. I swear it would be almost impossible for you, as a stranger, to find him!”
“It is really incredible!” the Duke exclaimed.
He saw that The Priory had once been a very beautiful Elizabethan building. Of the two top floors there were only a few blackened walls standing and the roof had completely gone.
The garden was a wilderness and a lake at the back of the house, where the monks had once caught fish, was almost hidden by shrubs.
“I will take you down to the cellar,” Verena suggested. “But do walk carefully as some of the stairs have worn with age and it is easy to slip and land at the bottom on your back.”
“I will certainly be careful,” the Duke replied drily.
The ground floor of the house consisted of brick walls with empty windows, of burnt and blackened ceilings with the plaster now crumbling onto the floor.
A miscellaneous amount of rubbish had accumulated in what must have once been an elegant hallway with a carved oak staircase curving upwards.
Verena preceded him across the hall under the staircase and down a passage that led to what had once been the servants’ quarters.
The place was festooned with cobwebs and dust lay thickly on the floor. The Duke could see that tracks had been made fairly recently, which might have been caused by nothing more sinister than the feet of village children exploring the ruins or by Verena herself when she came to search of contraband.
The Duke did not believe her story of the highwaymen. At the same time at the back of his mind he had the strange feeling that these were pointers to something important.
Verena stopped at the cellar steps.
The door which once shut them off from the main passage had been torn away from its hinges. As they descended, they had some light from long narrow windows at ground level, which were still secured by rusty iron bars.
The cellars, piled with all sorts of debris, appeared to run the whole length of the house. As the Duke and Verena went from room to room they were conscious of damp and chill. Besides the main cellars, divided neatly with rough stone walls, each had an inner cavern secreted behind an oak door furnished with iron bolts and an impressive lock. These now stood open to reveal only an eerie darkness.
As the Duke followed Verena, he noted a large number of rusting bottle racks and ancient barrels of great size that had once contained ale.
“Your ancestors certainly enjoyed their liquor,” the Duke remarked and heard his voice echo round the empty caverns.
“My great-grandfather was a four-bottle man!” Verena smiled.
“So was mine!” the Duke added.
They went into another cellar where there were dozens more empty barrels, but the door of the inner cave was closed and barred.
Verena stopped suddenly.
“When I was last here,” she exclaimed in a low voice, “that door was open.”
“Are you sure?” the Duke asked her.
“I am quite certain.”
“Well, let’s open the door now and see if there is anything inside.”
He walked towards it as he spoke and saw that the lock had been turned but there was no key.
“It is locked!”
“I know where the keys are,” Verena told him.
“Where is that?”
“It will take me a minute or two because it is at the far end.”
She sped away from him leaving the Duke staring at the door. He inspected the lock carefully.
It was quite obvious that someone had oiled it recently. It was very large, the type of lock that the monks had used in the old days on Church doors and apparently in the cellars of their Priories.
There were also two bolts and these moved surprisingly easily as the Duke pulled them back. Then he inspected the keyhole again.
He was wondering now whether Verena would find the key where she had expected it to be.
If anyone was using this particular cellar for illicit purposes, he was not likely to restore the key to its normal place and so it was extremely unlikely, in view of the craftsmanship of the monks, that the locks in any of these cellars would be identical.
He was just wondering if it would be possible to force an entrance but, doubting that even with the right tools it would be possible, when he heard a step behind him.
‘Have you found the key?’ he intended to ask, thinking that it was Verena.
But, as he opened his lips to speak, he felt a blinding crash on his head followed immediately by another.
He found himself falling –
Then he knew no more.
CHAPTER FOUR
Verona walked to the far end of the cellar where in an alcove there was a concealed cache that the monks had made centuries ago to hold their keys.
Even if the Duke had wished to accompany her, she would not have let him into the secret that her grandfather had shown her all those years ago, telling her that it was known only to the Winchcombe family and had been handed down from father to son.
“No, I have no son,” he said sadly, “I must show it to you because, child, you are the last direct descendant of a line that has existed for five centuries.”
This had all seemed very impressive to a little girl of ten and, when the General had pulled a lever hidden behind a pillar and slowly a huge stone had moved to disclose a small opening, she had been thrilled.
The hole was just large enough for a man to put his hand into. In a hollow space inside the pillar there was a huge book and on it was hung, attached to a circular piece of wire, the great keys of the cellar.
Verena used to wonder why the monks had taken such precautions about their wine, for there was no doubt at all that it would have been impossible for anyone not knowing the secret of the keys to find them. What was more she had always believed that it would be impossible for anyone to force open the cellar doors.
Now, when she reached the alcove where the secret cache lay, she looked back to make quite certain that the Duke had not followed her.
Then, still with a little thrill of excitement which had never left her all down the years, she pulled the iron lever and slowly the stone moved.
She slipped her small hand inside only to find that there was nothing attached to the iron hook. She thought that the keys must have fallen off, but the cache was not very deep and there was nothing at the bottom of it except dust and a few pieces of stone.
Verena stood there looking at the age-old hiding place with a frown between her eyes.
‘Just who could have learnt that the keys were hidden here for all those years?’ she wondered.
It could not have been someone who had discovered the secret by mistake, for if so, it was unlikely that he would have closed the stone again and thrust back the lever.
Slowly, puzzled and worried, she walked back towards the Duke.
She did not intend to let him know of the secret place. Instead, she thought, she would just say that the keys had been stolen.
But someone knew of the keys and their whereabouts. Someone had taken them and locked the cellar door. And that person, whoever it might be, had come to The Priory since her visit last week.
Verena was so deep in her thoughts that she did not even real
ise that she had now reached the cellar where she had left the Duke.
Then, as she walked into it, she saw as if in a flash of a second, a man hit the Duke with a large knotted cudgel.
The first blow spun his high hat off from his head and made him stagger and, then at a second blow, he fell.
For a long moment Verena was too paralysed with horror to cry out.
Then, as the Duke hit the floor with a dull thud, she heard footsteps coming down the stone stairs.
Swiftly and without even consciously thinking about it, she slipped behind the great empty barrels that lay between her and the man with the cudgel.
It was the instinct of self-preservation that made her crouch down low on the dusty floor. Her heart was thumping so loudly with fear that she thought that it must betray her. She could hear the footsteps coming nearer and nearer until they entered the cellar where she was hiding.
It was then she heard the man with the cudgel speaking –
“I found a stranger here, sir. He be down for the count, but do you think he was seekin’ for evidence against us?”
The man did not speak with an educated voice, yet at the same time he was not illiterate and had no particular accent. It was rather the tone, Verena thought, of a superior servant.
There was no doubt that the man who replied to him spoke with the cultured drawl of a gentleman,
“A man! The Devil take it! He is not a Bow Street Runner?”
“Not in those boots, sir.”
Verena thought that the gentleman was inspecting the fallen Duke.
“No, you are right. He is certainly not a Runner.”
“Shall I turn him over so that you can see his visage, sir?”
“To what purpose? Maybe he is just a traveller seeking refuge from the inclemency of the weather. It is raining hard.”
“Shall I blow a piece of lead in him, sir?” the man with the cudgel asked.
“You damned fool!” the gentleman expostulated. “Dead men cause questions to be asked and are tales carried to the Magistrates. Let’s get on with our task. It’s a cursed nuisance that he has come here because it means we dare not use this place again not at any rate for a month or two. Have you got the key?”
“Here it is, sir,” the man with the cudgel replied.
“Then get that door opened and be quick about it,” the gentleman commanded.
Peeping through the barrels Verena could now see the man with the cudgel inserting a key in the lock. He had his back to her, but she could see the profile of the gentleman quite clearly.
Sharp-featured with a pointed nose over a thin tight-lipped mouth, he was dressed with exceeding elegance. His expensively cut coat fitted tightly to his body, his cravat was tied in the most intricate folds and the points of his collar were high above his chin.
He wore his high hat at an angle and he had, she thought, the look of a dandy or at least a Gentleman of Fashion.
The man with the cudgel had opened the cellar door and he plunged into the darkness to return carrying what appeared to be a heavy wooden box, heavily corded and sealed.
“How many?” the gentleman enquired.
“Four, sir. The coach was bound for York and I think that we can definitely have an exceptional haul this time.”
There was a crash as the man with the cudgel set the box on the floor and, as he straightened himself, seeking in his pocket for a knife to cut the cords with, Verena could see his face quite clearly.
She had expected someone evil-looking, a desperado or a ruffian with perhaps sword cuts on his face and definitely coarse-featured. But instead the man had almost a sanctimonious air about him.
His hair was grey and long and, turning white at the temples, he had unremarkable features, but sharp shrewd eyes beneath thick eyebrows. He might have been a tradesman or a butler, she thought, and was not in the least like her idea of a highwayman.
He bent down and a moment later she heard the gentleman exclaim with a note of triumph in his voice,
“God! What a prize! Gold! Thousands of sovereigns!”
“It was what I suspicioned, sir. If you’ll start puttin’ the coins into the sack I’ll bring out the rest.”
Under cover of loud clinking of coins, very, very cautiously Verena edged her way a little further behind the barrels until she could see round them and perceive the face of the gentleman.
He was taking handfuls of gold coins from the box and placing them into a long narrow sack such as grocers sometimes used to hold rice and other such commodities.
He had, as she suspected, a well bred countenance, but there was something far more unpleasant about him than the man with the cudgel. His face was thin and dissipated while the expression in his eyes as he transferred the gold from the sack was one of such outrageous greed as to be repulsive.
The man with the cudgel came from the cavern carrying four more boxes. He opened them and Verena heard him exclaim,
“Bank of England notes in this one, sir.”
“Used or unused?” the gentleman enquired.
“The majority, sir, appear to be used.”
“Good, then they will be safe. Have you another sack for them?”
“Yes, sir. I brought four with me.”
“That should be enough,” the gentleman drawled. “Open the other boxes.”
There was a noise of the lids of the boxes being pressed back.
“More sovereigns!” she heard the gentleman drawl.
Then the man with the cudgel remarked,
“Bonds in this one! Do we dare keep ’em, sir?”
“No, too dangerous,” the gentleman replied. “Chuck them into the water with the other boxes, but cord it first, they might float.”
“I had thought of that, sir,” the man with the cudgel said with just a hint of rebuke in his voice.
There was no answer and he continued,
“I’ll be takin’ this sack up to the curricle, sir. I’m only hopin’ there will be room for the lot in the hidey-hole.”
“You will just have to pack it tight,” the gentleman replied. “I said when the hiding place was being made that it was not big enough.”
“’Tis the first time there’s been a squeeze,” the man with the cudgel replied. “If we’d had it any bigger, sir, it might have appeared suspicious. As it is, it would take a sharp eye to notice the difference from any other gentleman’s vehicle!”
“Hurry up, you fool, and stop nattering,” the gentleman suddenly said testily. “Get it all aboard and let’s clear out. It gives me the creeps to be here with that man lying on the floor!”
“He’ll not be hearin’ anythin’ we’re sayin’, sir,” the man with the cudgel said with a snigger. “But if you are worried, let me make sure he won’t blab. There’s no point in takin’ risks!”
“There will be much more risk if we leave any more dead bodies lying about,” the gentleman snarled.
“Very good, sir,” the man with the cudgel replied.
Putting the sack of gold under one arm and one of the boxes under the other, he went from the cellar and up the steps.
Verena kept absolutely motionless. She knew that it was dangerous to stare too fixedly at the gentleman now that he was alone. She was well aware how easy it was for someone to feel instinctively that he was being watched.
Because she was so afraid of being discovered, she closed her eyes, listening to the clink of coins as the gentleman filled the sack.
The man with the cudgel then returned. Again he carried a sack and a box up the cellar stairs. And now there was only the soft rustle of bank notes as the gentleman transferred them from the third wooden box.
“Fifteen thousand pounds at least,” he muttered once to himself.
The fourth box, which contained the bonds, was re-corded when the man with the cudgel returned. Now the whole operation was finished.
The gentleman then straightened himself and Verena saw him look towards the fallen Duke.
“I just wonder if he wa
s really suspicious?” he asked.
“No, just a traveller, Hickson. I am certain of it. Perhaps thirsty and in search of a drink. Well, let’s make sure that those who find him will be convinced that he wandered in here by a drunken mistake!”
“How are you going to do that, sir?” Hickson asked.
“Quite simple,” the gentleman replied with an unpleasant smile on his lips.
As he spoke, he unscrewed the gold top of the elegant Malacca cane that he had been carrying when he came into the cellar. He drew from the stick a long, thin glass phial, which Verena knew contained brandy. She had seen such a stick before, in fact her father had owned one.
As the gentleman opened the phial and poured the contents over the Duke’s neck, she heard him say,
“Waste of good brandy, but it is doubtful if anyone will believe him if he blabbers of locked doors when they find him smelling strongly of the grape.”
“You are clever, sir, that’s what you are!” Hickson said. “I’ve never known a gentleman with such a mind for detail.”
“That is why we are successful, Hickson,” the gentleman replied with satisfaction. “Always remember that in operations like ours it is the details that most count, every one of them. That reminds me, you had no trouble this morning?”
“None at all, sir, it happened exactly as you planned it. That bit of marshland near the river was that misty you couldn’t see a hand in front of your face. The guards were dead before they knew what had hit them. the coachmen were unconscious and were tied up and inside the coach before they could utter an oath!”
“They did not see any of you?”
“No, sir, and anyway we all had our faces covered.”
“Good man, I congratulate you, Hickson.”
“I was only carryin’ out your orders, sir,” Hickson said with a note of servility.
“And mind you always do,” the gentleman admonished him. “That is a hundred guineas in your pockets, Hickson, and fifty for each of your men. Not bad for a morning’s work!”
“Not bad at all, sir,” Hickson replied. “But I did hope you would see your way, sir, to increasing the remuneration. I’ve my expenses, sir, as you well know, and I’ve to make certain that the men I employ on your behalf are trustworthy. ’Tis not always easy.”
The Odious Duke Page 7