‘I’m bound to say I don’t, ma’am,’ said the Exciseman bluntly. ‘What for would the young lady want to run away from her cousin?’
‘Because he would have forced me to marry him!’ said Eustacie recklessly.
The Exciseman cast a glance of considerable respect at Sir Tristram, and said: ‘Well, but surely to goodness, miss –’
‘My grandfather is dead, and I am quite in my cousin’s power,’ announced Eustacie. ‘And when I was on my way here I met the smugglers. And I was naturally very much afraid, and they were too, because they fired at my groom, and wounded him, and he fell off his horse with both my bandboxes.’
Sir Tristram continued to preserve a grim silence, but at mention of the groom a slight frown knit his brows, and he looked intently at Eustacie.
‘Indeed, miss?’ said the Exciseman. ‘Then it queers me how there come to be only the tracks of one horse down the road!’
‘The other horse bolted, of course,’ said Eustacie. ‘It went back to its stable.’
‘Maddened by fright,’ murmured Miss Thane, and encountered a glance from Shield which spoke volumes.
‘And may I inquire, miss, how you come to know that the horse went back to its stable?’
Miss Thane held Sir Tristram’s eyes with her own. ‘Why, Sir Tristram here has just been telling us!’ she said with calm audacity. ‘When the riderless horse arrived at the Court he at once feared some mishap had overtaken his cousin, and set out to ride – ventre à terre – to the rescue. Is that not so, dear sir?’
Aware of one compelling pair of humorous grey eyes upon him, and one imploring pair of black ones, Sir Tristram said: ‘Just so, ma’am.’
The look he received from his cousin should have rewarded him. Eustacie said: ‘And then I must tell you that I took my poor groom up behind me on my own horse, but I did not know the way very well, and he was too faint to direct me, and so I was lost a long time in the Forest.’
The Exciseman scratched his chin. ‘I’ll take a look at this groom of yours, miss, if it’s all the same to you. I’m not saying I don’t believe your story, but what I do say is that ladies take queer notions into their heads when it comes to wounded men, and the late lord – begging your pardon, sir, and miss – was never one to help us officers against them pesky smugglers, any more than what most of the gentry hereabouts are!’
‘Help a smuggler!’ said Miss Thane in shocked accents. ‘My good man, do you know that you are addressing the sister of a Justice of the Peace? Let me tell you that my brother, who is in the house at this moment, holds the strongest views on smugglers and smuggled goods!’ This, after all, she reflected, was quite true, and ought to impress the Exciseman – provided, of course, that Sir Hugh did not take it into his head to appear suddenly and explain the nature of his views.
The Exciseman certainly seemed rather shaken. He looked uncertainly from Miss Thane to Eustacie, and said in a sulky voice that his orders were to search the house.
‘Oh, they are, are they?’ said Nye. ‘P’raps you’d like to go and tell Sir Hugh Thane yourself that you’re wishful to search his bedchamber? And him a Justice, like miss has told you! You get out of this before I lose my temper, that’s my advice to you!’
‘You lay a hand on me and you’ll suffer for it, Mr Nye!’ said the Exciseman, keeping a wary eye on the landlord’s massive form.
‘Just a moment!’ said Sir Tristram. ‘There is no need for all this to-do. If you suspect my cousin’s groom of being a smuggler –’
‘Well, sir, we fired on one last night, and I’m ready to swear we hit him. And it can’t be denied that females is notably soft-hearted when it comes to a wounded man!’
‘Possibly,’ said Shield, ‘but I am not soft-hearted, nor am I in the habit of assisting smugglers, or any other kind of law breaker.’
‘No, sir,’ said the Exciseman, abashed by Sir Tristram’s blighting tone. ‘I’m sure I didn’t mean –’
‘If the wounded man is indeed a groom from the Court I shall recognize him,’ continued Shield. ‘The affair can quite easily be settled by taking me to his room.’
There was one moment’s frozen silence. Sir Tristram was looking not at the Exciseman, but at Eustacie, who had turned as white as her fichu, and was staring at him in patent horror.
Nye’s voice broke the silence. ‘And there’s a mighty sound notion, sir!’ he said deliberately. ‘I’ll lay your honour knows the lad as well as I do myself.’
Sir Tristram’s eyes narrowed. ‘Do I?’ he said.
Eustacie said breathlessly: ‘You cannot see him! He is in a fever!’
‘Never you fret, miss,’ said Nye. ‘Sir Tristram’s not one to go blaming the lad for doing what you ordered him to, nor he won’t do anything to upset him. If you’ll come upstairs, sir, I’ll take you to him right away.’
‘Begging your pardon, but I’d as lief come too,’ said the Exciseman firmly.
‘That’s it, Nosy, you come!’ replied Nye. ‘No one ain’t stopping you.’
Eustacie moved swiftly to the foot of the stairs, as though she would bar the way, but before she could speak Miss Thane was at her side, and had swept her forward, up the stairs, with an arm round her waist. ‘Yes, my love, by all means let us go too, in case the lad should be alarmed at having to face Sir Tristram.’
‘He must not see him! He must not!’ whispered Eustacie, anguished.
‘In my back bedchamber, sir,’ said Nye loudly. ‘I always house smugglers there to be handy for the riding-officers.’
This withering piece of sarcasm made the Exciseman say, defensively, that he was only trying to do his duty. Nye ignored him, and threw open the door of the back bedchamber, saying: ‘Step in, Sir Tristram: I know I needn’t warn you not to go for to startle a sick lad.’
A small, insistent hand grasped Sir Tristram’s coat-sleeve. He glanced down into Eustacie’s white face, saw in it entreaty and alarm, and shaking off her hand strode into the room.
Ludovic raised himself on his elbow. Across the room his strained blue eyes met Shield’s hard grey ones. Shield checked for an instant on the threshold, while Miss Thane gave Eustacie’s hand a reassuring squeeze, and the Exciseman said hopefully: ‘Do you know him, sir?’
‘Very well indeed,’ replied Shield coolly. He went forward to the bed, and laid a hand on Ludovic’s shoulder. ‘Well, my lad, you have got yourself into trouble through this piece of folly. Lie down now: I’ll talk to you later.’ He turned, addressing the Exciseman: ‘I can vouch for this fellow. He does not look very like a smuggler, do you think?’
‘No, sir, I’m bound to say he don’t,’ said the Exciseman slowly, staring at Ludovic. ‘I’d say he looked uncommon like the old lord – from what I remember. It’s the nose. It ain’t a nose one forgets, somehow.’
‘It is a nose often seen in these parts,’ said Sir Tristram with dry significance.
The Exciseman blinked at him for a moment, and then, as light broke in on him, said hurriedly: ‘Oh, that’s the way it is! I beg pardon, I’m sure! No offence meant! If you can vouch for the young fellow of course I ain’t got no more to say, sir.’
‘Then if you ain’t got no more to say you can take yourself off !’ said Nye, thrusting him out of the room. ‘It don’t do the house any good having your kind in it. Next you’ll be telling me I’ve got smuggled liquor in my cellar!’
‘And so you have!’ rejoined the Exciseman immediately.
The door closed behind them; those in the little chamber could hear the altercation gradually growing fainter as Nye shepherded his unwelcome guest down the stairs.
No one moved or spoke until the voices had died away. Then Eustacie caught Sir Tristram’s hand, and pressed it to her cheek, saying simply: ‘I will do anything you wish. I will even marry you!’
‘Oh no, you will not!’ exp
loded Ludovic, struggling to sit up. ‘If this last don’t beat all! What the devil did you mean by telling that long-nosed tidesman that I’m one of Sylvester’s by-blows?’
‘But no, Ludovic, no! I find that was very clever of him!’ protested Eustacie. ‘Did you not think so, Sarah?’
Miss Thane said gravely: ‘I’m lost in admiration of so quick a wit. You never told me he was such an excellent conspirator.’
‘Well, truly I did not think that he would be,’ confessed Eustacie.
Sir Tristram, ignoring this interchange, said: ‘In God’s name, Ludovic, what are you doing here?’
‘Free-trading,’ replied Ludovic, with complete sang-froid.
Shield’s face darkened. ‘Are you jesting?’
‘No, no, he really is a smuggler, Cousin Tristram!’ said Eustacie earnestly. ‘It is very romantic, I think. Do not you?’
‘No, I do not!’ said Shield. ‘Hasn’t your name been smirched enough, you young fool? Smuggling! And you can lie there and blandly tell me of it!’
‘You see!’ Eustacie made a disgusted face at Miss Thane.
‘Yes, he seems to have no feeling for romance at all,’ agreed Sarah.
Ludovic said savagely: ‘You may be thankful I can do nothing but lie here! Do you think I care whether I’m hanged for a free-trader or a murderer? I’m ruined, aren’t I? Then, damn it, I’ll go to the devil my own way!’
‘I don’t want to interrupt you,’ said Miss Thane, ‘but you’ll find yourself with the devil sooner than you think if that wound of yours starts bleeding again.’
‘Ah, let be!’ Ludovic said, his right hand clenching on the coverlet.
Sir Tristram was looking at that hand. He bent, and grasped Ludovic’s wrist, and lifted it, staring at the bare fingers. ‘Show me your other hand!’ he said harshly.
Ludovic’s lips twisted into a bitter smile. He wrenched his wrist out of Shield’s hold, and put back the bedclothes to show his left arm in a sling. The fingers were as bare as those of his right hand.
Sir Tristram raised his eyes to that haggard young face. ‘If you had it it would never leave your finger!’ he said. ‘Ludovic, where is the ring?’
‘Famous!’ mocked Ludovic. ‘Brazen it out, Tristram! Where is the ring indeed? You do not know, of course!’
‘What the devil do you mean by that?’ demanded Shield, in a voice that made Eustacie jump.
Ludovic flung off Miss Thane’s restraining hand, and sat up as though moved by a spring. ‘You know what I mean!’ he said, quick and panting. ‘You laid your plans very skillfully, my clever cousin, and you took care to ship me out of England before I’d time to think who, besides myself, could want the ring more than anything on earth! Does it grace your collection now? Tell me, does it give you satisfaction when you look at it?’
‘If you were not a wounded man I’d give you the thrashing of your life, Ludovic!’ said Shield, very white about the mouth. ‘I have stood veiled hints from Basil, but not even he dares to say to my face what you have said!’
‘Basil – Basil believed in me!’ Ludovic gasped. ‘It was you – you!’
Miss Thane caught him as he fell back, and lowered him on to his pillows. ‘Now see what you have done!’ she said severely. ‘Hartshorn, Eustacie!’
‘I would like very much to kill you!’ Eustacie told her cousin fiercely, and bent over the bed, holding the hartshorn under Ludovic’s nose.
He came round in a minute or two, and opened his eyes. ‘Tristram!’ he muttered. ‘My ring, Tristram!’
Shield brought a glass of water to the bed, and, raising Ludovic, held it to his lips. ‘Drink this, and don’t be a fool!’
‘Damn you, take your hands off me!’ Ludovic whispered.
Sir Tristram paid no heed to this, but obliged him to drink some of the water. He laid him down again, and handed the glass to Miss Thane. ‘Listen to me!’ he said, standing over Ludovic. ‘I never had your ring in my hands in my life. Until this moment I would have sworn it was in your possession.’
Ludovic had averted his face, but he turned his head at that. ‘If you have not got it who has?’ he said wearily.
‘I don’t know, but I’ll do my best to find out,’ replied Shield.
Eustacie drew a deep breath. ‘I see that I have misjudged you, Cousin Tristram,’ she said handsomely. ‘One must make reparation, enfin. I will marry you.’
‘Thank you,’ said Sir Tristram, ‘but the matter does not call for such a sacrifice as that, I assure you.’ He saw a certain raptness steal into her eyes, and added: ‘Don’t waste time picturing yourself in the rôle of a martyred bride, I beg of you! I haven’t the smallest desire to marry you.’
Eustacie frowned. ‘But you must have an –’
‘Yes, we won’t go into that again,’ he said hastily.
‘And I think,’ continued Eustacie, visibly attracted by the vision of herself as a martyred bride, ‘that perhaps it is my duty to marry you.’
Ludovic raised his head from the pillows. ‘Well, you can’t marry him. I’m the head of the family now, and I forbid it.’
‘Oh, very well!’ submitted Eustacie. ‘I dare say I should not like always to be a sacrifice, after all.’
‘Am I to understand,’ inquired Miss Thane, ‘that Sir Tristram is to become one of us? If you are satisfied he is not the villain it is not for me to raise objections, of course, but I must say I am disappointed. We shall have to remake our plans.’
‘Yes, we shall,’ agreed Eustacie. ‘And that reminds me that if Tristram truly did not steal Ludovic’s ring, there is not any need for me to marry him. I had forgotten.’
Sir Tristram looked rather startled, observing which, Miss Thane said kindly: ‘You must know that we had it all fixed that Eustacie was to marry you so as to be able to search in your collection for the missing ring.’
‘What a splendid notion, to be sure!’ said Sir Tristram sardonically.
‘Yes, it was, wasn’t it?’ said Eustacie. ‘But now we do not know who is the villain, so it is of no use.’
Ludovic was watching Shield intently. ‘Tristram, you know something!’
Shield glanced down at him. ‘No. But Plunkett was shot by someone who wanted the talisman ring and only that. If you were not the man I know of only one other who could have done it.’
Ludovic raised himself slightly, staring at his cousin with knit brows. ‘My God, but he believed me! He was the only one who believed me!’
‘So implicitly,’ said Shield, ‘that he advised you to face your trial – with evidence enough against you to hang you twice over! Have you never wondered why he did that?’
Ludovic made a gesture as though brushing it aside. ‘Oh, I guessed he would be glad to step into my shoes, but damme, he would not run the risk of committing murder – he of all men!’
Eustacie gave a joyful shriek. ‘Basil!’ she exclaimed, clapping her hands together. ‘Yes, yes, of a certainty it was he! Why did I not think of that before? Miss Thane, it is my cousin Basil who is the villain, and although you do not know him I assure you it is much, much better, because he wears a silly hat, and I do not at all like him!’
‘Oh well, in that case I am perfectly willing to have him for the villain in Sir Tristram’s place,’ said Sarah. ‘I did not like to seem to criticize your choice, but to tell you the truth, Sir Tristram is not sinister enough for my taste.’
Sir Tristram looked a little amused. Ludovic said: ‘Wait, Eustacie, wait! This is not certain! Let me think!’
‘But there is not any need to think, mon cousin. It is clear to me that Basil is the man, because he wants very much to be Lord Lavenham, and besides, there is no one else.’
‘I can’t believe he’d put his neck in such jeopardy!’ Ludovic said. ‘When did the Beau ever court a risk?’
; ‘Whoever did it, Ludovic, was able to obtain a handkerchief of yours to leave beside the body,’ Shield reminded him. ‘He must also have known that Plunkett was dining at Slaugham that evening, and guessed at least that he would return by the path through the Longshaw Spinney.’
‘Yes, but to plan a cold-blooded murder just to dispose of me, and then pretend belief in my story – No, surely he could not do it!’
‘Hush!’ said Miss Thane impressively. ‘The whole affair is becoming as clear as daylight to me. He did not plan it; I dare say he never went beyond wishing that some accident would befall Ludovic – oh, I beg your pardon! – befall Lord Lavenham –’
‘“Ludovic” will do,’ interposed his lordship, grinning up at her. ‘I count you as quite one of the family.’
‘I wish you may, for I assure you I regard myself as irrevocably bound to this adventure. Do not interrupt me! Let us say that he thought quite idly how fortunate it would be if Ludovic met with an accident. He would not dare to contrive one, for being the next in succession suspicion might fall on him. Well, then, Ludovic lost his talisman ring, and Basil saw – No, I am wrong! At first he saw nothing. But Ludovic began to play into his hands – really, Ludovic, I believe it was all your fault: you tempted Basil beyond what he could resist.’
‘I did not!’ said Ludovic indignantly.
‘You know nothing of the matter, my dear boy. You and Chance between you showed Basil how he could be rid of you. You became enraged with the man whose name Eustacie cannot remember (or I, for that matter), and I dare say you were drinking heavily, and –’
‘He was,’ said Sir Tristram.
‘Of course. He was in a mood for violence. I’ve no doubt he talked very wildly, and swore he would be avenged. Now you must think, Ludovic, if you please! Did not Basil know that you meant to waylay that man upon – upon the fatal night?’
‘I don’t know. I think I made no secret of it. Basil knew the whole story.’
The Talisman Ring Page 10