Copper Kingdom (30 page)

‘You can put your fists where your mouth is,' he said loudly, ‘or admit that you were in on this so-called accident. You're a chemist and would know full well how to set off an explosion.'

‘That's right Mr Richardson,' a voice called out behind him, ‘give the man a pasting. He's been snooping round here for a couple of nights, he can't be up to much good.'

Suddenly Travers lunged forward, catching Sterling off guard. He was on his feet and would have made a run for it but the men closed in around him, hemming him within a tight circle.

‘Fight, you lily-livered coward,' one of the men called and Travers, like a cornered rat, swung out a fist in the direction of Sterling's head.

‘You'll have to do better than that.' Sterling moved back easily, out of harm's way. ‘You're so good with the mouth, let's see how you feel when I close it for you.'

Glanmor Travers staggered back clutching his face. He spat and blood trickled down his chin, he whimpered and moved further away and Sterling suddenly had no heart for the fight.

‘Get off home,' he said shortly, ‘and never let me set eyes on you again if you want to go on breathing.'

There were cries of disappointment from the crowd who had hoped to see a blood bath.

‘Get off my property.' Sterling gave Glanmor a push and the man staggered away towards the gates, pausing for a moment to look back, and his face was a white oval in the light from the lamp above the gatehouse.

‘You'll pay for this one day, Richardson, I'll get you back, I swear it, even if it takes me the rest of my life.'

Sterling stared at him coldly. ‘At the rate you are going, it may just take you that length of time.' There was a roar of laughter from the men as Travers vanished into the darkness and Sterling turned to them.

‘Now go back to your homes and leave it to me to find out what happened here tonight. And another thing, don't let rabble rousers the like of Travers and Cullen influence you, they are nothing but scum, they have no sense of decency. If there's anything you are not sure of that you'd like to ask questions about, just come to me, all right?'

‘Your brother was with them too, Mr Richardson,' a voice from the back of the crowd called. ‘Saw Rickie Richardson large as life, I did, coming out of the sheds just before the explosion.'

Sterling felt himself grow tense. ‘Who is that?' He peered through the darkness as one of the boys from the rolling mill came reluctantly forward. Sterling grasped his shoulder in a fierce grip.

‘Jed, it's you. Now I know you for an honest lad but think hard, you're sure it was Mr Rickie that you saw?'

The boy nodded. ‘Yes, I'm sure Mr Richardson, he came out of the sheds alone and then I saw those other two men come out after him, slipped past the gatehouse in the shadows they did but my Mam had chucked me outside while she had a row with Dad and I had nothing to do but look around me, that's how I saw the three of them.'

‘Good enough.' Sterling felt sick even though he smiled at the boy. ‘As I said, leave it all to me and get off home to your beds. I'll speak with you again in the morning and perhaps we can sort it all out.'

‘Why don't you get the bobbies up here, boss?' Jed pushed back his cap and scratched his head. ‘I've heard they can find clues even in ashes.'

Sterling smiled. ‘You've been listening to too many stories, my boy. Go on, off with you.'

Wearily Sterling walked back to where the Ascot was standing outside Sam Herbert's house. He saw to his dismay that the headlamps had been broken and that there was glass all over the road. He sighed heavily; who could blame the people for being angry when one of their own was dead and two more injured?

He managed to drive the automobile back through the town – he knew it must be past midnight but he could not wait until morning, he had to have it out with his brother right now, tonight. He would wring the truth from Rickie one way or another.

It was bright moonlight as Sterling drove along the roadway leading to Plas Rhianfa. As he drew nearer to the house, he saw that there was a light in one of the upstairs windows though the lower rooms were in darkness. He moved around to the back of the great building, knowing that some of the servants would be still up and about.

‘Master Sterling, you did give me a fright, knocking the door like that and walking in so unexpected.' Carrie was wiping her hands on her apron and she nervously tucked a stray hair behind her ear.

‘Is anything wrong, are you sick or something?'

Sterling forced himself to smile naturally. ‘Sorry to upset you, Carrie. No I'm not ill, I'm just looking for Rickie. Is he here?'

‘Why bless you your brother's been in bed these few hours since, had some sort of sick headache, he did, said he wanted nothing to eat and wasn't to be disturbed until morning.'

‘I see. Well if he should be about, don't tell him I'm here, I'll surprise him.'

Sterling made his way quietly up the stairs. He did not want to awake his mother and have to answer the barrage of questions she would undoubtedly throw at him.

He opened the door of his brother's room and looked inside, sighing heavily as he saw that the bed was empty and had not been slept in. He sat down before the dying embers of the fire, feet stretched out before him, drinking in silence.

His childhood had been a good one, he'd had few problems then and did not realise that, so soon, he would be responsible for the running of the company. He stared into the small flames that rose from the ornate grate and wondered where the closeness that brothers were supposed to share had gone, or had it never existed between himself and Rickie? It was difficult to say.

After about an hour, he lit a lamp and as he blew out the lucifer, he heard a step on the landing, and Rickie came into the bedroom.

‘Good night to you, Rickie. Where have you been until this hour, courting some lovely young girl or planning to blow up more of the furnaces?'

Rickie paled visibly and his hands were trembling as he thrust them into his pockets.

‘I don't know what you're talking about,' he said quickly. ‘What's all this about blowing up the furnaces?'

‘You mean to say you didn't know?'

Sterling's irony was not lost on Rickie, he flushed and looked away. ‘Well I did hear some talk about it in the town but I don't see why you should start accusing me.'

Sterling moved closer to his brother and stared at him as though he had never seen him before. His brother's face was weak, his mouth drawn down at the corners like that of a petulant child, but then perhaps it was not entirely his fault, he had not been allowed to face the world like a man but had been shut away in some namby pamby school all his life.

‘You were seen,' Sterling said coldly. ‘Seen leaving the works shortly before Travers and that ruffian Cullen left, and just before the explosion occurred. What do you expect me to think?'

Suddenly Rickie turned on him. ‘Just leave me alone will you, I don't want to look at you or see you or talk to you. I hate you, don't you understand that? I've always hated you and even if I have done the things you accuse me of, you've got no proof or you'd be here right now with a constable.' He turned his back on Sterling and his voice was low. ‘Just get out of my room, do you understand, leave me alone.'

Sterling had driven halfway to town and was almost at the door of the Mackworth Arms when he suddenly remembered he had left Mali waiting for him in his room, He sighed softly, she would understand when he explained things to her. Such a lot had happened to him in the last few hours, he had learned that Mali loved him and that his own brother hated him. All in all, it had been quite a night.

Dean Sutton sat in the dining room with the warmth of the early morning sun on his face, waiting for his groom to put in an appearance. It seemed that Gray had something urgent to tell him that couldn't wait until Dean had breakfasted.

There was a knock on the door and then Gray entered the room his blond hair sticking up around his head, his eyes alight with self importance.

‘There was an explosion last night at the copper works,' he said breathlessly. ‘Sounded like the clap of doom it did Mr Dean, and sparks shooting high into the air as though the end of the world was coming, terrible it was.

‘My Mary, Big Mary as some calls her, she was like a heroine, ran into the gates of the copper works with no thought for herself, just to see if there was anyone hurt.'

‘And was there?' Dean wished that Gray was less of a raconteur and more of a plain-speaking man for there was no hurrying him and Dean was impatient to know exactly what had occurred.

‘One dead sir, poor old Sam Herbert, too old he was to be working really but he was kept on to make tea and suchlike and be night watchman whenever he felt like it, which was most nights because poor old Sam had the gout and couldn't sleep anyway.'

Gray paused for breath and Dean rose from his chair and moved to the window, staring out into the sunlit gardens. He had spent less time than he should have on the business of the copper works of late because he had been involved in setting up a chain of drapery stores across the country, and very successful they were proving to be. It seemed that however poor, most women had a taste for fripperies and a new bonnet.

‘Two men injured as well, helping to install the new furnaces they were,' Gray continued. ‘One lost a hand and the other will be off his rocker for the rest of his life I spects with half the furnace inside his brain.'

‘What a God awful thing to happen,' Dean muttered, ‘is someone trying to spike our guns, I wonder?' He was thinking out loud more than asking a question but Gray was only too ready to answer him.

‘No doubt of it, sir, those furnaces don't explode, not when there's nothing boiling away inside them they don't. No, some one put a stick of dynamite in there, and the poor sods putting the furnaces together copped it.'

Dean wondered what had been going on up there at the works. Though he was not very keen on the changes Sterling wished to make, and doubted the young man's ability to implement them, he did at least feel that he would recoup the money he had invested in the company.

He had decided to step in only if things went badly wrong and that they seemed about to do now. Perhaps some time he would have to take a look for himself, but not today. This morning he was going to see Bea again, they were going out for the day and he would treat her to some fresh sea air at a small secluded bay a few miles along the coast.

They had planned to take a picnic and Dean glowed when he thought of the way Bea had warmed to him recently. And yet she was still subdued, much of the time, her eyes dull, her laughter noticeably lacking. He'd tried to bring her out of herself and on rare occasions he had succeeded; then she had seemed for a brief instant to be almost the high-spirited Bea he had always known.

‘What's going to happen, Mr Dean?' Gray was still hovering, waiting for some reaction, and Dean turned to look at him, eyebrows raised.

‘Well, I'd say it's all up to the young Mr Richardson to sort out,' he drawled. ‘Though if you can find out any more about the incident, Gray, I should be very pleased to hear it.'

Later, as Dean drove the horse and trap away from the house, he looked down towards the town and saw the familiar main street stretching away like a crooked question mark against the surrounding landscape. Further away, on the other side of the valley, lay the copper works, huddled darkly against the yellow line of the river Swan. It was strange, Dean mused, how he had come to love this place that was as different from his own wide-spread country as a mouse was from an elephant.

He knew that if Bea would marry him, he would be content to settle here for good, build up his own empire, bring up his sons to follow in his path. So some might call him a shopkeeper instead of a man of industry, but he had decided long ago that he would not put all his eggs in one basket.

It was only a short drive from Dean's home to the large old house jutting out of the hillside where Bea Cardigan lived. In the early morning sunshine the bricks were mellow, almost gold, and the turrets on the roof gleamed green, the copper strippings eroded by the rain that fell more in this country of Wales, Dean thought, than anywhere else in the world.

Bea was ready and waiting and the basket of food was being carried out to the cart by the maid who seemed so attached to her mistress.

Dean had deliberately cultivated Bertha, buying her sweets, bringing her ribbons, knowing that she was in her mistress's confidence. It did no harm to keep the servants sweet, they could be very enlightening when it came to the affairs of their betters.

‘Bea, honey, you look very charming today.' His words were an understatement for Bea looked good enough to eat in a soft summer skirt and a blouse that revealed her smooth arms and throat. He resisted the urge to take her in his arms and kiss her, for she would run like a startled filly if he did not move carefully.

‘And you look very handsome, Dean.' Bea smiled with her lips but there was no light in her eyes. She sat demurely beside him while Bertha straightened her mistress's skirts before climbing into the trap herself. Dean made a mental note to speak to the maid for now the time seemed right to start questioning the girl about what was troubling Bea.

Dean knew he had a persuasive tongue when he wanted to turn on the charm and he had softened the maid up very nicely; he felt sure she would trust him now.

‘Isn't it a beautiful day, Bea?' he said as he jerked the reins, startling the horse into movement. Bea smiled up at him but her eyes were hidden by the brim of her hat and he could not see the expression in them.