Death at Blenheim Palace (31 page)

Ned was a town boy, and although he knew the lanes and hedgerows around Oxford by daylight, he had little experience of the countryside at night, for his mother insisted that all of her boys be at home before darkness fell. Now, it was dark, very dark, frighteningly dark, and Ned wished that he was safely back in Oxford, in his bedroom, surrounded by his books and rubbings and collections of medieval artifacts. But he loathed that wishing part of himself, that anxious, spineless, cowardly part, and he subdued it as well as he could, focusing his attention on the flickering circle of light cast by the candle-lantern, counting his footsteps to distract himself from the shifting shadows and whispering dark. One, two . . . fifty-six, fifty-seven, fifty-eight . . .

And then he was at the Well, and the sweet innocence of the burbling, bubbling spring was added to the cunning cacaphony of night sounds. Ned held up the lantern, peering through the blackness around him.

“Is anyone here?” he whispered, and then, having barely heard his own voice, raised it, trying to make it strong, make it casual and cool. “Anyone here?”

There was no reply. No human reply, that is. From the hillside behind the Well came a quavering
Whooo?
Fright loosened Ned’s knees, and he suddenly regretted his shabby trickery, regretted his agreement to Lord Sheridan’s beguiling proposal, regretted the whole rotten, damned day, from bloody start to bloody finish.

There was a great rush of wings in the darkness, and after a moment of strained listening, Ned gave a short laugh of scornful bravado.
It’s only an owl, you bloody coward,
he told himself. Next thing, he’d be blubbering like a baby. He set the candle-lantern on the ground. What sort of idiot was frightened by an owl? But there was no quieting the rapid trip-hammer pounding of his heart, which throbbed so loudly in his ears that it smothered the other night sounds.

But not all. Behind him, a branch snapped and he whirled. “Who’s there?” he demanded, his voice cracking.

“Who d’ye think?” came a low, wary growl out of the blackness.

Apprehensive, Ned sucked in his breath. “Bulls-eye?” he said tentatively.

There was a longish pause. Then the fierce demand: “Who the hell are you?”

Silently, Ned cursed himself. Instead of counting his steps, he should have been inventing an explanation for his appearance at the Well, some sort of fabrication that would win Bulls-eye’s confidence and extract the information Lord Sheridan wanted. Aloud, and almost desperately, he said, “I’m . . . Foxy.”

Another pause, then a chuckle, its bonhomie even fiercer than the demand. “Foxy, eh? That’s a good ’un, that is. Well, then, Foxy—if that’s yer name—what’s yer game?”

Ned’s apprehension grew, for while the voice coming out of the darkness was rather more genial now, it was also rather nearer, although he could not tell from which direction it came.

But he steadied himself and made a breezy reply. “Same as your game, Bulls-eye. Same as the game at Welbeck, and here, with the King’s visit.” He paused, listening. Hearing nothing, no snap of twig, no rustle of leaf, he went on. “Alfred’s on late duty t’night and couldn’t get away, so he sent me. Said to tell you he wants to know if there’s any news of Kitty. And he wants to know the plan, too—what you said in your note.”

“Oh, ’e does, does ’e?”

The voice, even more menacing, was even nearer. A great, sinister hush seemed to have fallen over the woods, although the lake seemed to lap even more greedily, licking up the shore. The candle-lantern flickering at Ned’s feet cast wicked, twining shadows, like black ropes.

“That’s right,” Ned said, with a studied carelessness. “Alfred showed me your note. He said to tell you that he wants to know what—”

And then suddenly there was an arm around his neck, an iron arm in a rough woolen sleeve that smelt of tobacco and garlic and stale beer. The crushing grip flattened his larynx and cut off his air, at the same time that he felt a sharp, painful jab in the small of his back.

“Alfred wants t’know, does Alfred?” the gravelly voice demanded. “Well, I got somethin’ I wants t’know, Foxy. Wot’s the gull?” The evil mouth came close to Ned’s ear. “Wot’s the gull, I say!”

Ned’s hands came up and he struggled to break the choking hold. But the knife—for it was a knife, he knew—was rammed more sharply into his back, and he forced himself to stop struggling. “Wot’s the gull?” the voice said again, harsher now. “Who’re you?”

“I . . . can’t breathe,” Ned managed. It felt as if his neck were being crushed. “Loosen up, will you?”

But Bulls-eye, himself in the grip of a fiery rage, didn’t feel like loosening up. He felt like choking the kid until he was blue, if only because he wasn’t Alfred. And because Alfred had been so stupid—or perhaps so tricky—as to give up the lay. What did he have up his sleeve, anyway, sending this boy—Foxy, by damn!—to do a grown man’s business? Some sort of bloody gull, of course. But what sort of gull? And why? Had Alfred twigged to his scheme? Suspected that he was game for Bulls-eye’s knife and sent the boy as bait?

Bait. Bulls-eye tightened his grip around the boy’s neck. What lurked out there in the darkness, beyond the fluttering light? He hadn’t thought that Alfred was smart enough to come up with a plan, but—

“Where is ’e?” he growled. “Where’s Alfred?”

“He’s . . . back at the palace,” the boy choked out. “Couldn’t come. Sent me to—”

“Aw, hell,” Bulls-eye said disgustedly. He put his knife between his teeth, yanked the boy’s hands behind his back, and pulling a length of stout twine out of his pocket, bound his wrists. Then he shoved him to the ground, hard, face-down, and lashed the long tails of twine around his ankles, pulling ankles to wrists, and taking another twist and a hard knot. Then he rolled his captive to one side and put a heavy foot on him.

“Cough it up,” he commanded brusquely. “I want the tale, all of it, by damn. I want it fast. And straight. Lie and I’ll kill ye.”

Pinned down and lashed, the boy writhed. “I . . . can’t talk,” he gasped. “Can’t . . . breathe.”

Bulls-eye shifted his weight, but as he did so, he heard it: the muffled sound of an oar breaking the water. Alfred! It could only be Alfred.

He tensed, listening for the next stroke. Then he felt rather than heard the boy’s sudden deep intake of breath, and faster than thought fell forward, clapping his hand over the mouth that had been open, ready to cry out. He whipped off his neckerchief and gagged the boy.

“Warn ’im, will ye?” he snarled. “I’ll teach the both o’ ye to try yer schoolboy tricks on old Bulls-eye. Aimed t’ use ye fer bait, did ’e? Well, ye’re bait, now, by damn.”

And Bulls-eye stepped back out of the circle of dancing light, leaving the boy on the ground, trussed like a fat fowl for the roasting spit and ready for the knife.

Out on the lake, laying strongly to the oars and not caring who heard, Alfred glanced over his shoulder and saw the shadows writhing about the pin-prick of light. He steered toward them. Ned had to have taken a lantern when he went to meet Bulls-eye. And that must be his lantern, that flickering point of light, and the reeling, struggling shadows could only be Ned and Bulls-eye. Drops of water splashed his face as he dug in with his oars.

The night around him was damp and cool, chill, almost, but although Alfred was lightly clad in breeches and cotton shirt, he did not feel the cold. Within, he was a furnace, seething, burning, ablaze with rage, mad with grief and fury and fear, grief and fury for Kitty and the unspeakable death that Bulls-eye had done to her, and fear for young Ned and what Bulls-eye might do to him. No,
would
do to him, without a doubt, just as he had done to Kitty.

For in spite of Ned’s duplicity and double-dealing, in spite of the fact that he had been well and truly deceived by the boy, Alfred felt responsible for him. More, he felt a warm liking for him—and for the first time in his life, fired by fury and fear, Alfred was moved to violence. Half-sobbing, he pulled with a strength past his own on the oars, and in a moment or two, felt the bow of the rowboat grate on the shore.

He leapt out, and heedless of the cold lake lapping around his calves and spoiling his satin breeches and patent leather shoes, dragged the boat onto the shore. Above him, close to Rosamund’s Well, the light of Ned’s lantern glimmered like a hostage firefly, and on the ground beside it—

He stopped. On the ground beside the lantern lay Ned, unmoving, and while Alfred could not be sure from this distance, he seemed to be bound, hand and foot. Bound? Or already slaughtered, his throat slashed ear to ear, his life bleeding into the dirt. With no more thought than he had given to the cold water, he scrambled up the bank.

“Ned!” he cried. “Ned!”

Reaching the boy, he knelt down and began to fumble at his lashings. No, Ned wasn’t dead. He was shaking his head violently, as if to warn Alfred off, his eyes wide-staring and terrified.

Alfred stopped. Of course. Lord Sheridan had said as much, and in his furious rage, he had forgotten. Bulls-eye might try to use Ned as a decoy, to lure—

And then he felt the hand clamped powerfully on his shoulder, the arm pulling him to his feet, the knife-point thrust like a hot pocker into his back. He heard Bulls-eye’s harsh, rasping voice.

“Trick me, will ye, Alfred? Dare t’ diddle me, do ye? Well, I’ll—”

Alfred whirled, breaking Bulls-eye’s hold, stepping backward out of reach of the long-bladed knife that glinted wickedly in the light.

“I dare,” he cried, with a flinty hatred. “You killed Kitty, you bloody murderer! You slit her throat and dumped her in the lake. And now I’ll kill you!”

With a roar, Bulls-eye lunged at him. At the same instant, Alfred’s heel caught on the raised edge of the paving around the square pool and he went down flat on his back. Bulls-eye was on top of him in an instant, knife-hand up-raised to strike, the blade catching the candlelight with an awful gleam, the same blade that had carved all the life from Kitty. Alfred’s thoughts whirled with monstrous, unforgettable images—Kitty’s gaping throat and annihilated face, hands gnawed to the wrists—and he felt a cold, sick sweat breaking out on his brow as he waited helplessly for the blade to fall.

And then Bulls-eye was grinning down at him, a gap-toothed evil grin, and lowering the knife.

“Naw,” he said. “That’s too easy. Too quick. Some things I got t’ know first.” He stood, gathered Alfred’s shirt in his fist, and yanked, pulling Alfred to his feet. “Why’d you blow the bloody lay, Alfred?” His face darkening, he gestured with his head at the trussed boy on the ground. “Who’s yer friend ’ere? Why’d ye tell ’im the plan? And ’oo else ’ve ye told?”

“I . . . I didn’t,” Alfred gasped, pushed to defend himself. “Didn’t tell him nothin’. And he’s not my friend.” He pulled in his breath on the lie, wishing he could call it back and hoping Ned hadn’t heard. He covered it with a blustering question: “Why’d you kill Kitty, Bulls-eye? What’d she do to you?”

“Didn’t tell ’im, eh?” Bulls-eye’s growl was mocking, and he ignored Alfred’s question. “Then ’ow’d ’e come t’ know ’bout Welbeck, tell me that, Alfred!” And he gave Alfred a rough shove that sent him stumbling.

Alfred flailed his arms, gaining his balance. Welbeck? How had Ned—He pulled in his breath. But that wasn’t the point. He went stubbornly back to his refrain.

“Why’d you kill Kitty, Bulls-eye? What’d she do to you?”

“Shut yer mouth!” Bulls-eye bellowed fiercely. He reached down and pulled a second knife out of his boot, a knife with a shorter but no less vicious blade. He held it up, his voice derisive.

“If ye told ’im nothin’ and ’e’s no friend o’ yers, ye won’t mind slittin’ the boy’s pretty throat, now, will ye, Alfred?” And with a swift, easy grace, he tossed the knife at Alfred, who, without willing it, reached up and caught it in mid flight.

“There, now,” Bulls-eye said, his grin wider still, and more evil, as Alfred stared speechlessly at the knife in his hand. “It’s yer turn, me fine-feathered friend. Ye want t’ share in the winnings, ye’ll ’ave t’ share in the killings.”

“No!” Alfred cried, hearing the raw edge of panic in his own voice. He turned to Ned, whose eyes were open and staring, following the two of them. “I can’t. I
won’t!
”

“Ye can an’ ye will,” Bulls-eye growled, advancing on him. A beefy hand seized his arm and shoved him forward, toward the bound boy. “Once ’tis done, ye’ll ’ave blood on yer ’ands, Alfred. Ye’ll ’ave earned the right t’ be one of us.” He put his face close to Alfred’s. “And if it ain’t done, yer dead, and then ’e’s dead, and wot’s the sense of that, I asks ye? Better ’im dead than you, ain’t that right?”

Alfred sucked in his breath, grasping the knife, steadying himself, remembering why he was there. “He’s no friend of mine,” he said, very low. “I’ll kill him, if that’s what you want me to do.” He raised his voice. “But first you have to tell me why you killed Kitty.”

Bulls-eye’s laugh was harsh and grating. “That’s easy. I killed the drab ’cause she knew Mr. N’s real name and threatened t’ spill it.”

“Mr. N?” Alfred felt his mouth drop open. “Kitty knew
that
?” he asked uncomprehendingly. Mr. N’s real name was the most closely kept secret in the Empire. Not even the man’s trusted aides knew who he was, and nobody even dared to wonder. That was the only way a gang like this one could work, Kitty had told him. Utter secrecy. And yet she had known, and kept the secret from
him.
For the first time, Alfred wondered about Kitty, and whether they could have—

Bulls-eye laughed again, bitingly. “Stupid dolly-mop. Thought she was goin’ t’ get ’er a great pot o’ money, di’n’t she?” He pushed Alfred forward. “Now, get to ’t. Sooner it’s done, the better fer both of us.”

Holding the knife, Alfred knelt beside Ned, whose terrified eyes flashed at him. He raised his hand as if to strike, then lowered it.

“I . . . can’t,” he said brokenly. “Ned, I never meant to. I just had to hear him say he’d killed her, that’s all.”