by Regina Scott
“Well,” he allowed as they reached the blue-lacquered door, “to do my superior credit, he did search elsewhere first.”
“Obviously not hard enough.” She raised her hand to knock.
Mrs. Mance, the vicar’s housekeeper, opened the door, white hair like the seeds of a dandelion about her wrinkled face. “Miss Chance, Mr. Denby, how nice to see you.” She stepped aside to let them in.
Jess had visited the vicarage any number of times over the years. The wood-paneled walls were warm, the lamplight soft. Easy to imagine curling up somewhere with a cup of tea and a good book. Mrs. Mance led them to the withdrawing room, where the vicar was waiting beside a scroll-backed chair with a needlepoint seat. Her mother had stitched the roses herself, before she’d died trying to birth Jess’s little sister when Jess was fifteen. Her father had blamed himself, of course. Maudie had been the one to focus him on his remaining children.
“Do you want the fairies to come for them?” she’d threatened. “That’s what happens to unwanted children. Changelings, all of them.”
“My children,” her father had said, “will never be unwanted.”
She shook off the memory now as the vicar smiled in welcome.
“I was delighted to receive your note, Miss Chance,” he said in his reasoned voice. “You have always been a light of hope in this village. I have been awaiting this day for some time.”
“I’ll get the cider,” Mrs. Mance proclaimed, hurrying out.
Lark glanced to Jess, brow up in obvious confusion, but she wasn’t any surer of the vicar’s purpose.
“Had you expected me to call previously?” she asked, taking the seat opposite him. Lark settled on the chair next to hers.
“Oh, any number of times,” Mr. Wingate assured her as he sat, brown eyes shining. “I had thought perhaps Lord Featherstone might sway you, but I’m glad to see you understood that his attentions were fatherly. And there was that nice Mr. Vincent from London. Whatever became of him?”
Cold rained down on her. “Mr. Vincent returned to his wife and family.”
The vicar’s face crumbled. “Oh, my dear, I am so sorry. We were all deceived.”
Lark was studying her. It hurt to keep her smile. “Yes, we were.”
The vicar rallied. “But not about Mr. Denby here, eh?”
He expected an answer, one she could never give. Indeed, she wasn’t sure she could even speak. As if he saw her struggle, Lark leaned forward and met the minister’s gaze.
“We seem to have given you the wrong impression, Mr. Wingate. Miss Chance and I are not courting. Magistrate Howland asked us to confirm some facts related to a report he’s compiling for the defense of the coast.”
Mrs. Mance bustled back into the room, carrying a silver tray with four crystal glasses filled with amber liquid. “Shall we toast the happy couple?” She glanced from the vicar’s face, which was turning red, to Jess’s, which was likely white.
“Perhaps not,” she said and left, taking the cider with her.
“Defense of the coast, you say?” Mr. Wingate asked, usually firm voice wobbling. “Against invasion?”
Lark cocked his head. “Invasion, smuggling, that sort of thing.”
The minister nodded. “Of course.”
“Then you suspect the area harbors smugglers,” Lark pressed.
She had recovered sufficiently that she wanted to protest the assumption, but she kept her lips shut. She’d suggested they speak to the vicar. She must see this through.
“I could not say I suspect anyone of smuggling,” the vicar replied, leaning back, “but I’m not surprised to hear you mention it. These are difficult times. Any man might be tempted to turn to dishonest means to support a family.”
“The navy is recruiting,” Lark said, voice hardening. “The army is always looking for able-bodied men.”
“Men who must leave hearth and home,” the minister protested. “Men whose pay would mostly go to their own provisioning. Men who would have few reliable ways to send money home to needy families. There are brave souls who have trained and are ready to confront our foes, but I can see why others less brave, less capable turn to smuggling instead.”
Jess blinked. “You almost sound as if smuggling is a common practice. Not in Grace-by-the-Sea.”
“Perhaps not here,” he allowed. “The trade from the spa supports many, if not through direct work than through subsidies. But we cannot forget our brothers and sisters in Upper Grace and along the shore.”
She shot Lark a look. He was still focused on the minister.
“Surely you’re not condoning breaking the law,” he said.
“I cannot condone it, but I understand the need that drives it. Besides, the laws are specious at best. Champagne, lace, silk—the law punishes those who bring them in and refuse to pay tax but not those who gladly accept the so-called free trade goods.”
“And what of those who traffic in more than goods?” Lark challenged. “Information to the enemy, the transport of French spies.”
Jess gasped. “You cannot be serious.”
“No one in Grace-by-the-Sea would betray the king,” Mr. Wingate agreed.
Lark would not let the matter go. “And yet they send no word to the Excise Office,” he accused. “Tubs of brandy, bolts of silk, casks of tea—all have been found not far inland from your village, Mr. Wingate. Whispers of French spies appearing from Dorset. Did no one see them passing through?”
“I have heard nothing,” the minister promised him. “But it doesn’t surprise me that no one alerted the government. Preventers are generally seen as the enemy.”
“And why?” Lark demanded. “Riding Officers are good Englishmen, looking to uphold the law and protect our shores from invasion.”
“Some,” the minister allowed. “Others accept bribes for looking the other way or, worse, blackmail those involved. It is a sad state of affairs. But I must repeat that Grace-by-the-Sea is immune to such things, for which I thank God daily.”
Jess nodded, but the sinking feeling in her stomach told her she was no longer so sure.
~~~
Lark left the vicarage with more questions than when he had arrived. How could a man of the cloth take such a lax view on crime? Were the members of his parish working with the smugglers? Did he know? Was he a willing participant? Or did he simply refuse to see the truth?
And who was this Mr. Vincent whose name had made Jess curl in on herself like a flower withering in the heat?
“Lark, wait.”
He hadn’t realized he was walking so fast. He slowed his steps past the gravestones of the churchyard to allow her to catch up. “Forgive me.”
“No need,” she assured him as they exited the yard. “I could understand why you’d want to distance yourself from that visit. The vicar’s conversation was unsettling at best. I wonder how many others share his views.”
“Too many,” Lark said. When she looked at him askance, he shrugged. “I’ve seen it. The tax on goods from France is high for a reason. We are at war, and taxation is one way to bring an enemy to its knees.”
“Those purchasing the goods as well,” she reminded him. She nodded toward a lane leading up onto the headland behind the church, and Lark fell into step beside her.
“The tea tax hurts us all,” he acknowledged as they started up the hill through bushes clinging to the chalky soil. “But silk and champagne are hardly necessities. The tax is meant to be ultimately borne by those who can afford such luxuries. Smugglers take all the risks; the wealthy enjoy the spoils. It isn’t right.”
She sighed, her skirts swaying with her step as made the first switchback on the path, where a simple stone bench looked out to sea. “No, it isn’t. And your concern about French spies only worsens the matter. Is it true? Are we in danger? Maudie has been claiming spies have infiltrated the area for years, and none of us believed her.”
“Well,” Lark said with a smile, “she has claimed to have seen Napoleon and mermaids too.”
/> The smile she returned was a ghost of its usual self. “There is that.” She looked away from him, toward the blue of the sky at the top of the hill. “Do you suspect Mr. Wingate of being the Lord of the Smugglers, then?”
Lark shrugged. “He is a possibility, and one I would not have considered but for you.”
She pressed a hand to her chest. “I’m not sure that was a compliment.”
“It was,” he told her. “You have a rare gift for understanding people, Jess.”
They had reached the top. The Downs stretched before them, the breeze whispering through the spring grass, setting it to rippling like an inland sea. In the distance to their right, white-faced sheep bent their heads to crop. To the left, the waters of the Channel sparkled silver blue. Closer still, a copse of trees hid the Lodge from sight.
She sighed as if the pastoral scene brought no comfort. “I wish you were right. Sometimes I don’t understand people at all.”
She sounded so weary he had to ask. “The mention of this Mr. Vincent upset you. Who was he?”
She dropped her gaze and turned onto the path that led toward the Lodge, as if the dusty white soil held some secret she was determined to uncover. “He came to the spa just before Father died. He seemed thoughtful, considerate. Several remarked on his attentions to me. It was easy to believe he was smitten. No one but my father and me understood why he left so suddenly. Some said I should have encouraged him, that I’d kept him at a distance, that I was as frigid as the waters of the Channel.”
“Those people obviously cannot know you well,” Lark said.
Her hand fisted at her side. “Neither did he. He pretended to be a bachelor, you see, but Father exchanged letters with his physician, who had advised him to take the waters for a minor ailment. It seems Mr. Vincent had a wife, children. His attentions to me were only a diversion.”
He had never met the fellow, but he had an overwhelming desire to plant him a facer. “Stupid,” he said.
Her gaze snapped up to his, and lightning flashed from those delicate blue eyes. “When you have lived for six and twenty years and are considered a spinster with no hope of changing your circumstances, sir, you may have earned the right to judge me, but not before.”
She started for the Lodge at a fast clip, skirts flapping, and he sprinted to put himself in front of her. She pulled up short, chest heaving.
“You mistake me,” Lark told her. “The stupidity belongs to Mr. Vincent, for even thinking to dally with the kindest, sweetest lady it has been my pleasure to know.”
She glanced up at him again, and this time the blue swam with tears. It was all he could do not to gather her in his arms.
She sucked in a breath, as if pulling in dignity with the air. “Thank you, Lark. Forgive me for assuming the worst. I thought I’d put it all behind me, but Mr. Wingate’s words caught me off guard.” She sniffed bravely. “You too, I think. That was a very spirited defense of the Excise Office.”
He should brush it off, claim he was only defending his vocation. But if she could share her deepest pain, so could he.
“Supporting the Excise Office is a matter of some pride to me. The vicar is right—the officers are often treated as pariahs in their own villages. My father was a Riding Officer. He had a four-mile stretch of coastline in Kent. It was his job to note oddities, arrange for support when he identified smugglers in the area. My mother heard mutterings against her whenever she came into the village. Someone once spit on her.”
She blinked away the last of her tears. “How unkind.”
“Like your minister, there were those who felt smuggling was a just and equitable vocation. When I was twelve, my father ran afoul of smugglers near the village. They captured and beat him and left him for dead. My sisters found him. He didn’t recover.”
Her hand shot out, gripped his. “Oh, Lark, how horrid.”
When he could not find the words to respond to the compassion in her eyes, she put her arms around him and held him.
And he could only marvel.
He was supposed to be brave. He believed in his mission, his duty. He’d been trained to hunt down ne’er-do-wells, bring them to justice, restore order. His job was to safeguard communities like Grace-by-the-Sea from criminals so that no family must endure what his had.
Yet he hadn’t been able to muster the courage to hold her when she needed comfort. Now she defied convention, propriety, to comfort him.
This Vincent fellow truly was stupid. But his betrayal hadn’t stopped Jess from reaching out. She deserved better.
Lark drew back. “Thank you for that. But these are far too dismal thoughts for such a beautiful day.”
She sniffed. “The day may be beautiful, but we have work that must be accomplished.”
“Work?” He raised his brows. “Why can’t we enjoy ourselves as well? When was the last time you felt the wind in your hair?”
She started laughing. “Really, sir, what a question to ask a lady! Why do you think we wear bonnets every time we go outside? To protect our faces and hair from the wind.”
He frowned. “Why? Feeling the wind on your face is one of the ways you know you’re alive.”
Her look was all doubt.
“Here, let me show you.” Before she could protest, he reached under her chin and tugged free the ribbons holding her bonnet in place. The straw bonnet fell back easily, and the breeze immediately reached for her curls. He caught her hand as she reached up as if to cover them.
“Now,” he said. “Run with me.”
He tugged on her hand. She resisted at first, then her eyes lit, and she gathered her skirts with her free hand.
They dashed along the path, sun warm, cool salty air filling their lungs. As they neared the trees, he caught her in his arms and spun her in a circle.
“There!” he proclaimed, swinging to a stop. “How do you feel now?”
Her cheeks were pink, her eyes sparkling. “Much better,” she admitted. “How extraordinary.” Her wonder was so bright, like sunlight on the sea, that his spirit couldn’t help rising to meet it. He was bending closer before he thought better of it.
Her gaze snapped past him toward the trees beyond. “Who is that?”
Lark jerked upright, his purpose slamming into him. Turning, he saw a man through the trees, standing on the drive in front of the Lodge. His movements were slow, cautious, and he kept glancing around as if expecting someone to protest his presence. Lark took Jess’s hand again and pulled her behind a tree.
“Do you recognize him?” he whispered.
She was frowning. “Not at this distance. Lord Peverell generally sends his staff ahead to open the house when he intends to visit. I hadn’t heard he’d hired a caretaker.”
Interesting. Lark chanced a glance around the tree. The fellow had disappeared, at least from their vantage point.
“Wait here,” he told Jess.
She caught his arm. “No. I’m coming with you.”
He opened his mouth to argue, and she held up a finger. “Listen. I know each entrance to the Lodge, and, should we find a way inside, I can lead you through the interior. Father and I visited several times over the years.”
Knowing the layout of the house might give him an advantage. He ought to be thankful, but all he could think about was the possible danger to her.
“All right,” he agreed, “but stay behind me.”
She nodded, and they set out.
Lark crept from tree to tree, always watching the circular gravel drive up ahead. He saw no movement, heard no voices. He stopped at the edge of the trees and gazed out.
Unlike most of the white-washed cottages in the area, the Lodge was made of red brick that could only have been brought in from a distance. The builder must have had as whimsical an outlook as Mrs. Tully, for the three-story house had turrets and bowed windows a-plenty, with short wings sticking out either side and at one corner. All in all, the place didn’t seem to know what it intended to be—fortified castle, rustic hunting lod
ge, or grand manor house.
He edged out of the trees. “I’ll try the door.”
Her boots crunched on the gravel as she followed. “It’s likely padlocked. Try the kitchen door. It’s around the back.”
“Can I help you?”
The rough voice came from the corner of the house. An older man in a wool coat and the striped trousers of a fisherman stood frowning at them. A little shorter and lighter than Lark, he had unruly reddish-brown hair that matched his beard.
“Mr. Bascom.” Jess was graciousness personified as she stepped around Lark to venture closer to the fellow. “I had no idea you were helping at the Lodge. How clever of you to figure out a way to do that without interfering with your fishing.”
He shifted on his feet, as if he wasn’t sure how to take her praise. “Wasn’t too hard. Fish bite in the mornings. Lodge needs watchin’ at night.”
“Quite right,” she agreed with a nod. “I trust there’s been no sign of trouble?”
He wiped his bulbous nose with the back of one hand. “None. Did his lordship send you to check? Is he coming back sooner than expected?”
Odd. Jess might know more about Grace-by-the-Sea than anyone else in the area, but if this Bascom was truly the caretaker, surely Lord Peverell would contact him before Jess. And there was a tone of worry under the fisherman’s words.
“I have not heard he is returning before the Season ends,” she assured him. “I doubt we’ll see him before August, at the earliest. Forgive our intrusion. We were just out for a stroll. We won’t detain you further. Please give my regards to your dear wife.”
He nodded, but he didn’t take his eyes off them as Jess returned to Lark’s side and linked her arm with his. She drew him back into the trees and the path to the village.
“Waste of time, then,” he surmised.
That frown was gathering on her brow again. “No, indeed. I sincerely doubt Lord Peverell would hire Henry Bascom to watch the Lodge. I sincerely doubt his lordship is aware that Henry Bascom even exists.”