Miss Wonderful (50 page)

Caleb
turned his scowl upon Jackson. "I been listening to that the
livelong day. You going to give him some medicine or let him turn us
both into drooling bedlamites, like him?"

Jackson
poured a glass of wine and added a stingy dose of laudanum to it. He
set it down on the table in front of the prisoner. "Best drink
it down, sir," Jackson said. "We're going to be traveling,
and it'll make you more comfortable."

"Very
well," said Mr. Oldridge. "We shall be dining soon, I
trust?"

"Yes,
sir. I've ordered a hamper for the carriage."

"A
hamper." Caleb rolled his eyes. "And gold plates for him to
eat off of, I suppose."

Mr.
Oldridge raised the glass and mumbled something about old friends and
sons-in-law, and drank it down.

When
the glass was empty, Jackson turned a narrow look on Caleb. "Don't
be making those martyr faces at me," the agent said in a low
voice. "You've caused enough trouble, with not waiting for
orders, and rushing everything. I said you were too hasty, didn't I?
Do you know they're already looking for him?"

"She
started out for London straight after the meeting, you told me,"
Caleb said. "They couldn't've got word to her so quick. Not to
mention that no one there'd sneeze without she said so."

It
was almost a hundred fifty miles to London, a fifteen-hour journey at
least—and that was mail coach style: pushing the horses, and
quick changes en route, and hardly a stop to drink or eat or empty
your bladder. A private carriage bearing ladies—and them with a
train of servants and baggage—would need days. By the time the
household took alarm, Miss Hussy would be in Town. Caleb had worked
it all out beforehand.

"Mr.
Oldridge is like clockwork, I'm told," Jackson said. "When
he missed his dinner, the butler took fright and straightaway sent
for the mistress."

The
messenger caught up with her before dawn at the inn where she stopped
for the night, Jackson went on. Meanwhile, the whole neighborhood
started searching for Mr. Oldridge at daybreak.

"If
you'd waited, the way master wanted, until she reached London, we'd
have time," Jackson said. "But you didn't wait, and now
we've barely half a day's start of them. Thanks to you, half of
Derbyshire knows he's gone. We'll have to set out right away and
travel this fiendish mountain in the dead of night—and pray
they're too cautious to try the same. And if we end up in pieces at
the bottom of a ravine, we'll have you to thank for it."

Caleb
pretended to look chastened. The truth was, Longledge Hill didn't
frighten him, even though this was the steepest and rockiest part of
it. He'd grown up in the Peak and wasn't afraid of its hills and
dales, summer or winter, day or night. There'd be an accident, all
right, he thought. But he wasn't the one who'd end up in pieces.

MIRABEL
told Alistair about her experience with Caleb Finch as they slowly
made their way to the far end of Longledge Hill, toward Lord
Gordmor's coal mines.

Their
destination was the result of conjecture, which in turn was based
largely on rumors—one article the dry limestone hills produced
in abundance. One of the women who'd helped carry provisions from
Oldridge Hall said she'd seen a tall scarecrowlike fellow, who looked
like Caleb Finch, skulking near her neighbor's milk shed early
Wednesday morning.

There
were other rumors: Finch spotted at church in Ledgemore one Sunday
and someone who looked like him at the posting inn in Stoney
Middleton a week or more ago.

Because
Alistair was Gordy's representative, he was also told an apparently
unrelated story about his lordship's mine foreman losing his place
suddenly, because Lord Gordmor's bailiff took a dislike to him. The
foreman was muttering about going to the law, the miners weren't
happy, and the grumbling had traveled from cottage to public house to
posting inn, to reach Longledge this week.

Alistair,
who'd visited the mines less than a fortnight earlier and found all
in order, was beginning to develop a theory. He said nothing of his
suspicions to his informants but promised to look into the matter.

All
this had happened while Mirabel rested.

Now
she knew that Caleb Finch and Lord Gordmor's bailiff were one and the
same man—a man who might have been nursing a grudge against the
Oldridges for eleven years.

SINCE
no carriage could negotiate the narrow, rutted trails hereabouts,
Oldridge had to travel in the coal cart. While Jackson was outside,
laying down blankets so the great philosopher's tender bottom
wouldn't be bruised, Caleb emptied a sizable dose of laudanum into
the wine bottle and pushed it in front of the old man. "Drink
all you like," he said. "It'll make the journey more
peaceful-like."

Oldridge
frowned at the bottle. "I hope Cook does not take offence and
give notice," he said. "How many dinners have I missed? I
lose count. One must take care with artists. Their feelings are so
easily wounded." He looked up at Caleb. "Perhaps someone
would send Cook a note? Merely to tell her I've been unavoidably
detained."

"Whatever
you wish, sir," Caleb said, humoring him. "A very good
idea. A business engagement, eh? Called away sudden-like. Business in
the north."

"I
have not attended much to business," the old man said sadly. "It
was remiss of me. The great Dr. Johnson suffered from melancholia,
you know. A strange ailment, indeed. How ironic that one should read
about it in order to understand a young man, only to discover it in
oneself."

"I'm
sure it is strange," said Caleb, to whom the words were
gibberish. "Do have another glass, sir. Won't get an-other
chance until we get to the carriage. A precious rough ride until
then. But this'll settle you nicely."

IT
was long after midnight when Alistair and Mirabel reached the
colliery. They'd hurried up the packhorse trail as fast as they dared
and were now far ahead of the others, who continued systematically
scouring the rugged hillside, looking for Papa under bushes, between
rocks, in caves and crevices.

The
colliery was deserted. Not so much as a watchman.

No
witnesses, Mirabel thought. With the foreman dismissed and the men
given a holiday, Finch would be free to do whatever he liked.

She
would not let herself imagine what might have happened.

"I
want to check the foreman's cottage first," Alistair said. "A
while ago, I thought I saw smoke coming from this direction."

She
followed him to the cottage, half a mile away. It looked deserted.
They dismounted, and Alistair cautiously tried the door. It opened
easily.

The
structure was only a slight improvement over a miner's hut. The
candle Alistair lit revealed a single room containing a small,
thickly blackened fireplace. The room still smelled of smoke, which
meant its occupants must have left fairly recently. The single cot
had been stripped bare. A few pieces of crockery stood on the one
narrow shelf above the fire, an empty wine bottle on the scarred
table.

"Do
you see anything?" Alistair asked. "Anything of his, any
sign he was here?"

Mirabel
moved slowly through the small, dirty room, searching for a sign. If
Papa had not been here, he might have been thrown into a mine. He'd
be sick, hungry, hurt, and cold. How long could a man approaching
sixty, accustomed to ample meals and every material comfort, survive
in such circumstances?

If,
that is, he'd been left there alive.

She
should have had Finch prosecuted when she had the chance. She should
not have let her romantic trials cloud her judgment. She should have
had more backbone.

She
told herself to stop fretting about the past. It accomplished
nothing. The present was what mattered. Yet her anxiety must have
shown in her face, because Alistair spoke sharply.

"I
beg you will not entertain morbid fancies," he said. "You
have described Finch as a greedy, dishonest creature. What would he
gain by injuring your father?"

"Revenge,"
she said. "On me."

"Revenge
won't line his pockets," Alistair said. "I'm sure whatever
he does is done for gain." He lifted an empty wine bottle and
sniffed it. "He drinks good wine. Stolen from Gordy, I shouldn't
wonder." He started to set it down again, then paused, the
bottle in midair, his gaze on a spot on the table.

Mirabel
joined him. Something gleamed in one of the table's many cracks.
Alistair took out his penknife and worked the object out of the
crack.

A
gold toothpick.

He
handed it to Mirabel. "Your father's, do you think?"

She
studied it. "It could be Papa's. I cannot imagine Caleb using a
gold toothpick, though it is possible. It cannot belong to the mine
foreman. Perhaps—" She broke off as Alistair bent to peer
more closely at the table.

"Something
is scratched here," he said. "N. T. Is that an H?"

She
squinted at the marks, tiny ones, running vertically. One might
easily mistake the faint line of letters for scratches. "Or an
N," she said.

"N.
T. H or N. Then an M, an L, and a rectangle that could signify an O
or a D."

He
studied it for a long time, while Mirabel tried out various words and
word combinations. "Perhaps it's a code?"

Alistair
shook his head. "Why leave a message in code? If your father
left this…" He trailed off, and his gaze became remote.

"What
is it?" she said.

"Northumberland,"
he said. "Finch is Gordy's bailiff, recollect. The ancestral
home is closed up, most of the staff let go. Finch must have
handpicked the few remaining. Gordy hasn't been there in years.
Depresses his mind, he says."

She
could easily imagine how Lord Gordmor felt. Finch must have run his
estate into the ground, the way he'd almost done her father's.

"We
must have the mines searched," Alistair said, "but I think
you and I should continue northward. I feel certain your father left
this message. The table is freshly scratched, so it was done quite
recently."

"Unless
it is a trick."

"Do
you think Finch so clever?"

Mirabel
considered. "I don't know. I haven't seen Finch since I
dismissed him. I was young, and half my attention was elsewhere.
Perhaps he is clever. On the other hand, if he is so brilliant a
deceiver, how is it he couldn't deceive a twenty-year-old girl
preoccupied with losing the love of her life?"

"If
you believed Poynton to be the love of your life, any half-wit could
pull the wool over your eyes," Alistair said.

She
smiled, in spite of her worry. "Yes, of course. How good of you
to point that out. Clearly I'm overestimating Finch's intelligence."

SINCE
Caleb considered himself a deep and knowing man, he hated admitting
he'd made a mistake. But there was no avoiding the fact: He'd
misjudged the effects of a large dose of laudanum.

Instead
of falling unconscious—or dead—the vexatious old man set
to puking.

And
Jackson, tenderhearted blockhead, stopped the cart, "because the
motion upsets him, don't you see?"

These
fine gentlemen had delicate digestions, Jackson said. Mr. Oldridge
probably couldn't stomach the plain, peasant fare he'd had for
breakfast, or the steak and kidney pudding he'd had at noonday, or
the fried slices of leftover suet pudding he ate at tea. It was all
coming back to haunt him, like the ghost at the feast in Hamlet.
Jackson had seen the play on the stage in London not long ago and now
fancied himself a scholar.

They
wasted an hour waiting for the old man to empty his gut, and after
that they crawled along, Jackson walking alongside the cart,
promising a good, hot cup of tea the instant they reached Ledgemore,
where the carriage waited.

A
snail could have beat them, easy.

They
crept along for hours in the wooded part of the hill, with the
weather getting ready to turn foul again, and Caleb's temper turning
uglier by the minute, while the old man lay curled up in the cart,
sleeping like a baby, with Jackson hovering nearby, like he was a
nursemaid.

But
when Jackson stepped away to answer nature's call, Oldridge jumped up
out of the cart and bolted for the woods.