A Gentleman of Fortune (16 page)

He pushed a jumbled collection of letters into the centre of the table and the others of his party bent over them. He was, perhaps, unfortunate in his companions, for it seemed that most of the sharper minds were busy with riddles at the other end of the room. Miss Neville and Miss Prentice applied themselves eagerly to the task of solving his puzzle, but could make nothing of it. It was Miss Bevan, who was seated opposite him, who found an answer. She studied the letters a little while, frowned at them as if, for some reason, they troubled her; hesitated a while, then leant forward:

‘Pardon me, Miss Neville, Miss Prentice, may I try?’

‘By all means my dear – it is much too hard for me,’ said Miss Prentice cheerfully, ‘I never am very clever at these sorts of things. It is so very… Ah! You have found it out!’

While she had been talking Mary Bevan had rearranged the eight letters into a very neat little line.

‘Relative
! Of course, yes. How very clever of you!’ cried Miss Prentice.

Mary kept her finger for a moment on the word and turned her fine dark eyes upon the gentleman’s face. ‘That I think is what you meant, is it not, Mr Lansdale?’

He smiled and gave a small bow. ‘You are too clever for me, Miss Bevan,’ he said gallantly.

‘Then perhaps,’ she said, ‘you will allow me to answer you with a puzzle of my own.’ She cleared the word away with a sweep of her hand, made another selection of letters and slid them into the centre of the table.

They all, including Dido – who was beginning to be intrigued by the game – leant forward to study them. She and Mr Lansdale seemed to discover the answer at the same moment, for just as she saw the word hidden in the letters, he reached forward his hand.

Dido smiled. This was indeed a very interesting game indeed – a much deeper game than it appeared to be.

Henry Lansdale’s hand, instead of instantly rearranging the letters, hovered for several moments above them as he studied them thoughtfully. Then he smiled and formed the letters into a word, tapping them into a neat line in an exact imitation of Miss Bevan’s actions.

License.

‘That is the word you meant, is it not, Miss Bevan?’

Miss Bevan raised her brows and began to speak but unfortunately her words were lost in a much louder appeal from the other party.

‘Margery,’ called out Mrs Midgely, ‘can you not remember that charming conundrum which used to amuse the colonel so well? It began “Kitty a fair but frozen maid…” but I cannot remember how it went on at all.’

Miss Prentice frowned thoughtfully, but was given little time to recall anything of fair Kitty, because just then the whole party began to be on the move.

The move originated with Lady Carrisbrook who seemed all of a sudden to be quite determined on walking out. She had noticed a little clouding of the sun and thought that, ‘it must surely be a little cooler now’. And Sir Joshua remarked that if they did not take their walk soon, ‘it would be dinner time before they knew it’. And Flora – always the most obliging of guests – was on her feet and declaring herself well rested and ready for exercise.

It would be rude to resist further.

Mary Bevan also rose, stepped to the window and noticed that there were quite a number of clouds gathering. Miss Prentice and Mrs Midgely began to move. However, Dido lingered a moment longer studying the letters before her. Then she picked out six more and pushed them across the table. ‘Maybe,’ she said very quietly, ‘maybe you will apply yourself to that, Mr Lansdale.’

He looked from the letters to her. Very still in all the movement that surrounded him. There was recognition in his eyes, but he did not hurry to arrange the letters. ‘Yes,’ he said pleasantly, ‘I see the word. And I don’t doubt, Miss Kent, that it describes you very well.’

Dido coloured and looked confused for a moment.

Again the gentleman set the alphabets into a neat line.

Solver
.

He stood up and made a gallant bow. ‘I am sure, madam, that you are a very fine solver of mysteries.’

Dido was rather pleased with herself as the party prepared to leave the house: sure that she now understood one part at least of the mystery. The word play had told her a great deal. She now knew the cause of Mr Lansdale’s strange anxiety and agitation. She understood why he had expressed some doubt about retaining their good opinion.

To be sure she could not quite determine whether her new knowledge brought her nearer to thinking him a murderer, or whether it overturned that possibility altogether.

But she was more determined than ever to find out the whole truth and, if he was innocent, save him. And, just at the moment, she felt that she could accomplish almost anything. It was impossible not to have a rather good opinion of her own abilities just now; for not only had she discovered Mr Lansdale’s secret, she had also succeeded in convincing Mr Lomax that her suspicions were well-founded – and overthrown his notion that she was fanciful. With so much achieved, she could not believe that the difficulties before her would prove insurmountable.

She was longing to tell Mr Lomax about her latest discovery; but, in the confusion of the dark hall, she lost him. She was detained first by Miss Prentice who exclaimed over the elegance of the luncheon and was taken with a desire to tell over all the dishes, like a child reciting a lesson she is afraid she will forget. And then, when she had escaped from Miss Prentice, Lady Carrisbrook delayed her by pressing upon her the loan of a parasol. And finally, as everyone else trooped out into the sunshine, she found that the catch was stuck on the parasol and she must struggle with it several minutes before she could open it.

By the time she stepped out onto the terrace, the rest of the party were all dispersed about the gardens and she could not see Mr Lomax.

She hesitated for a moment and looked about her. In front of her, old uneven steps led down to a pretty flower garden edged with box and beyond that there were more steps and a wall through which a stone archway led to a bowling green and a wide lawn with a sundial set amid lavender bushes. From the terrace it was possible to look clear across the lawns, where the others were sauntering about, to the meandering stream and the meadow that bordered it – just ripe for cutting now and bright with buttercups and poppies.

The day had lost some of its brilliance, but none of its heat, and clouds of small black insects hung in the air with the warm scents of box and lavender. As Dido started down the steps she discerned, in the distance, the very faintest rumbling of thunder.

She had thought the whole company well ahead of her, but as she came to the bottom of the second flight she heard a voice talking just beyond the wall. She stopped. There was something about its low, earnest tone which prevented her going on.

‘Yes, of course.’ It was Mr Lansdale’s voice. ‘Of course I have it safe. I am not a fool, Jem.’

‘You had much better destroy it.’

‘No. No I won’t. I cannot do that.’

Dido stepped quickly into the shadow of the wall and was instantly ashamed of herself for doing so. But now it was too late to reveal her presence and, besides, Mr Morgan had begun to urge his friend in
very
interesting terms.

‘Henry, do you not see that if that document was found – if it was known that you had procured it – and kept it hidden – it could hang you.’

‘Hang me? My dear Jem, you make me laugh! You pay a great deal too much attention to gossiping old women.’

‘I think you had better start paying them a little more attention,’ began Mr Morgan. But they were interrupted. Gentlemen were too scarce in the party for them to be left long alone and now there were several voices calling out to them.

Dido waited a moment or two and then strolled slowly out onto the lawn, her mind very busy with all she had heard.

The party was dispersed about the garden.

Unfortunately, Mr Lomax was closely engaged in conversation with Sir Joshua. Mr Morgan was walking with Lady Carrisbrook, and regaling her with an account of the emeralds’ discovery, in which it appeared that it was his own extreme dexterity and penetration which had brought the jewels to light; but the story was rather marred by his being so overwhelmed by the smiling attention of the lovely Maria that he could scarcely keep from falling over his own feet. His friend, meanwhile, was attending Miss Neville and Miss Prentice, his face open and laughing and looking very unlike a man who had, only moments before, been threatened with the gallows. And Mr Hewit was, Dido noticed with interest, speaking rather earnestly to a very sour-looking Mrs Midgely. Flora was talking to Mary Bevan beside the sundial and Dido moved in their direction meaning to join them. But as she drew near, she saw that Mary was too distressed and her companion too deep in commiserating conversation for either of them to welcome an interruption.

‘I knew it was to happen,’ Miss Bevan was saying in a low, wretched voice. ‘I knew that I must be a governess. But I confess I have been trying not to think of it. And now I find it takes me quite by surprise.’

Dido only nodded and passed on to where a shaded walk led between yew hedges higher than her head, towards the stream. In its cool seclusion she allowed her mind to wander over all the strange possibilities which the overheard conversation presented to her.

What could the document be that was so dangerous to Mr Lansdale? And why was he unwilling to destroy it?

The idea which slipped most readily into her mind was that the document must be a will. A new will of his aunt’s which disinherited him – as Mr Vane had heard her threaten.

The notion brought to mind the overblown dramas which her brothers had loved to perform on their makeshift stage in the barn when they were boys. Wills – destroyed by villains in black side-whiskers, or hidden by faithful family retainers, or miraculously recovered by heroes – had, as Dido remembered, played a large part in the plot of those plays.

But was it so fanciful an idea? After all, wills – and the arguments they occasioned – filled the pages of newspapers as well as fiction. They were a common part of the real, modern world…

And then there was the burglary. She recalled Mrs Midgely’s description of the drawing room and the suspicion which had immediately started into her own mind of the intruders being intent on finding some particular object. Could it have been a will which they had been searching for – and failed to find because Mr Lansdale ‘had it safe’?

But if he did indeed have in his possession a document which could deprive him of his fortune, why did he hesitate over throwing it into the fire – in the accepted style of literary usurpers?

She was seated on a stone bench in the yew walk, deeply immersed in these speculations, when she heard a faltering step behind her. She turned.

The stooping figure of Mr Hewit was just retreating into the shadow of the bushes. ‘I am sorry, dear lady. Please accept my profound apologies.’ He bowed deeply. ‘I did not intend to intrude upon your solitary musings.’

Dido quickly reassured him. ‘I shall be very glad if you will walk a little way with me,’ she said, jumping up. He stepped forward politely and they started together down the walk which led between the high dark banks of yew to the sparkling stream and sunny meadows beyond, bright with the red, blue and yellow of wild flowers.

‘I understand that we are to have the pleasure of hearing you preach only once more Mr Hewit?’

‘Well, I will say nothing at all about the pleasure, Miss Kent, but it is true, I preach only once more at St Mary’s.’

‘And will you satisfy the congregation by railing against the French this time?’

He smiled and shook his head. ‘No, I think not, dear lady. Though perhaps I may use their example to remind my congregation of the outrages that inevitably follow when we abandon our sense of duty and obligation, as the poor misguided French have done.’

‘I think that will be very acceptable to your listeners,’ said Dido, stealing a glance at his lined face, ‘for it will prove you to be no Jacobin, which, you know, you must be a little suspected of since you have lived some time in France.’

He looked very solemn. ‘No,’ he said. ‘I am no revolutionary, not now. I have seen too much…’ He stopped, shook his head as if it were full of memories he would be rid of. ‘At least,’ he finished sadly, ‘I advocate now only that revolution which our saviour preached – a revolution of the heart.’

He seemed oppressed by thoughts upon which Dido did not like to intrude and they walked in silence for a while. She found herself liking the man more and more: found herself hoping that Flora’s guesses were correct and that – since his mind now seemed free of radical ideas – he and Miss Prentice might yet find happiness together.

They came to the end of the yew walk where the rest of the party were now gathered at the side of the stream. Mr Hewit began to take leave of her – she suspected he was anxious to join Miss Prentice. But she delayed him a moment. There was one more question which she
must
ask.

‘Where precisely is this living which you are to take, Mr Hewit?’ she said.

‘In Westmorland.’

‘Westmorland!’

‘Yes. Why should you be so surprised?’

‘Oh, I am sorry, it is nothing,’ she said hastily. ‘It is just such a remarkable coincidence. For that is the county in which Mr Lansdale’s estate is situated.’

But Mr Hewit shook his head. ‘It is no great coincidence, dear lady,’ he said calmly. ‘For it was Mr Lansdale’s aunt who gave the living to me. The business was settled just a few days before the poor lady died.’ And then with a smile and a bow he left her, strolling out quite unconcernedly to join their companions in the sunshine.

But Dido was in no mood for company; she had a great deal too much upon her mind.

She walked past the company upon the river-bank and found her way to a little rustic summer house – a simple, open construction of stone walls and wooden benches that smelt very pleasantly of fresh timber and heather thatch. And here, as clouds gathered across the bright afternoon sky, she fell to thinking very carefully indeed about the reverend Mr John Hewit. She liked him; she could not help but warm to him; she certainly did not wish to suspect him. And yet…