The Doublet Affair (Ursula Blanchard Mysteries) (29 page)

I opened my mouth, couldn’t think of anything to say, and shut it again. I couldn’t look at Ann.

Tilly stared at me with hatred. “You can see what sort she is! She’s had a husband and a child, so I hear. If I’d been that blessed, I’d be grateful all my life and down on my knees giving thanks to God. Not grabbing at every man that came my way like a greedy baby that’s never satisfied.”

“Tilly!”
Ann burst out, and even Leonard and Redman looked slightly bemused.

“I see,” I said. “Jealousy plays a part in this, too. I ought to be sorry for you, Tilly, but you make it too
difficult.” I turned back to Leonard Mason. “I don’t expect you to believe me, as a matter of fact, but nevertheless, I am innocent. I suppose you will want me to leave Lockhill, and I shall be only too happy to go, I assure you!” Matthew would be coming back for me and I must make sure he could find me, but all that lay on the other side of Windsor and my quest for Brockley.

“I trust,” I said, “that I may have time to pack and to move Dale to the village? She is not yet well enough for a long ride, but I will leave her at the vicarage. My man Brockley is away on an errand for me. When—” I must not say
if—
“he returns, perhaps someone would direct him there. I would like to say goodbye to the girls.”

“You will not set eyes on my daughters again. I will not allow you to contaminate them,” said Mason. “However, I shall not,” he added, “send you off unescorted. I know my duty. One of the undergrooms will accompany you wherever you choose to go—to the court or Thamesbank, I suppose. I will permit you to make your own explanations when you get there.”

This was too much. First I was hindered from setting out after Brockley, and now I was to be encumbered with a Lockhill groom. I had had proof enough last night that danger lurked in Lockhill itself, and not merely outside, in ambush along the road.

“I can do without an escort, thank you,” I said. “I will remove myself and Dale at once. Ann, I really am innocent, you know. I think you know it by instinct, and your instincts are right. Good day to you all.”

I turned on my heel to leave the room, but Leonard
said, “Redman!” in a sharp voice and the butler barred my way.

“I said,” said Leonard Mason, “that I wouldn’t send you off alone. A gentlewoman, even one as benighted as yourself, must not be galloping about the countryside on her own. While I arrange for a groom to escort you, I can’t have you wandering about at your own will. You might yet encounter one of my girls, and that I will not allow. Redman, show Mrs. Blanchard to her room and lock her in. You can have half an hour to put your things together, Mrs. Blanchard, while the groom who is to go with you prepares his own. Then I will fetch you myself and take you to the courtyard, where your horse and escort will be waiting.”

Rage is quite an interesting physical sensation. I examined it with clinical care while Redman, with a painful grip on my left elbow, marched me to my room. It was as though a fire were ablaze in the pit of my stomach and sending waves of rippling air up into my brain. Redman pushed me through my door. As he did so, he whispered that he’d dearly love to come in with me, but the master might object.

“I’d object still more, believe me,” I said as he shut the door on me.

I heard him turn the key and remove it. I smiled grimly. A lock without a key, I could deal with. A bolt would have been a serious problem. I waited until his footsteps had retreated downstairs, then I fished out my lock-picks and set to work. Five minutes later, I was out on the landing, heart thudding and ears stretched.

Which way? Main stairs? Back stairs? I reconnoitred,
listening at both stairwells. From the top of the main staircase, I could hear Ann’s voice, speaking on a note of protest, and Leonard answering her, irritably. They were in the hall, but moving away from me. I tiptoed to the back stairs, but someone was talking near the foot of it—the Logans and Joan, by the sound of it. I tried the main stairs again, cocking my head. I could still hear Ann’s voice but it was further off now. I took a deep breath, and started noiselessly down.

The staircase descended into a space where the partition between the hall and the long room stopped short and the two rooms opened into each other through a wide archway. Creeping forward, I peered into the hall. It was empty. The Masons’ voices came from the parlour, which opened off the other end. The parlour door was open, but only a little and with luck, the Masons wouldn’t see me cross the hall. The door to the porch was halfway along the opposite wall. On tiptoe, I ran.

I was out on the porch, down the steps, out in the courtyard. The mastiff stood up, but recognising me, lay down again without barking. I noted that, as usual, the outer gate stood wide. I turned left and sped past the kitchens, stooping to avoid notice through the windows, and darted through the archway to the stables. No one was about, but Bay Star was there, ready saddled and tied by the mounting block. Thanking providence that I had thought of ordering her to be saddled before I went indoors, I ran towards her. Dale appeared, hovering doubtfully at the top of the stairs from Brockley’s rooms. I signalled to her to come down, which she did, all in an anxious flurry.

“Ma’am, what’s happening? You’ve been so long and you’re all put about!”

“Explanations later,” I said breathlessly, tightening Bar Star’s girth. “Quick!” I whisked off the halter which was on over the mare’s bridle, bunched my skirts and scrambling up the steps of the mounting block to put myself into the saddle. “Come on, Dale!”

Obediently, Dale also clambered on to the block and on to Bay Star’s back behind me, hitching her own skirts up and sitting down astride.

“Oooh, it’s awful without a pillion saddle! It’s all slippery!”

“Don’t you dare fall off! Hold on to me! Oh
God!
”

I had been lucky so far, but good fortune rarely lasts. There were shouts from the kitchen and Redman burst out of the door, loudly demanding that I should stop. Mason, Crichton and a distressed-looking Pen ran out after him, followed by Ann, who snatched Pen back. Meanwhile, Thomas had erupted from the stable, and another groom from the harness room. I wrenched Bay Star’s head round, pointed her at the gate, and drove my heel into her. She went like a loosed arrow. Redman actually tried to block the way, arms outstretched, but I swore at Bay Star and threw her forward, straight at him, and he jumped aside.

We hurtled through the arch into the courtyard. Edwin Logan was crossing it, and Redman, running after me, bellowed at him to shut the outer gate. He tried to obey, but Bay Star was past him before he came within yards of it, and we were through the gatehouse and out in the lane. The shouts faded behind us as we
thundered down the lane, with Dale’s arms wrapped round me like ivy round an oak.

“Dale, please!” I gasped. “I can hardly breathe.”

It was only a quarter of a mile to the village, and at the speed we were going, it took us hardly any time to get there. I slowed down as we reached the houses, for there were children playing in the road, not to mention fowls pecking and a dog nosing at the gutter. The place was busy, the day’s work well under way. The cottage chimneys gave off hearthsmoke and a darker smoke came from the forge. Women were chatting by the well or sweeping dust out of open cottage doors. We attracted stares, even when we slowed to a trot: possibly because Dale looked odd, bumping behind me; possibly because Bay Star was champing with excitement and foam was flying from her bit; possibly because we gave off urgency and desperation like a smell.

“There’s the vicarage!” said Dale. “And the church.”

She mentioned the vicarage first because it was so much the bigger of the two, standing beside its church like a mare beside a foal. I pulled up outside. “All right, Dale. Slip down now.” I felt in my pocket for the note and also for my purse. I counted out some coins, and as Dale descended to the ground, I handed them to her. “Two weeks’ wages. You may need some money and—well, it’s just in case I don’t get a chance to pay you later.”

“But, ma’am!”

“And here’s the note. Here comes Dr. Forrest. Give it to him. I hope he’ll do as it asks. Plead with him if necessary! I’m off! I’ve got to do my best. The
innkeeper could disguise a bit of beefsteak with a sharp sauce and maybe glue a piece of straight oxhorn on a white pony’s forehead and get away with it, but I can’t cheat. I’ve got to serve up genuine gryphon and saddle that bloody unicorn.”

Dale, understandably, gaped.

“Never mind, Dale. I haven’t lost my wits, don’t worry. Goodbye.”

I applied my heel to Bay Star again and was away, leaving Dale in the road outside the vicarage, with the job of convincing Dr. Forrest that I was not demented or drunk and that my note must be taken seriously.

I could only hope that she was equal to it.

• • •

I was still aflame with rage and excitement, but after a mile or two I slowed the pace, because it was over half a day’s ride from Lockhill to Windsor and I must take thought for my horse. I must also, I said to myself, think carefully about Brockley. His failure to return
might
be just a matter of a lame horse or the need for a rest. In that case, he would surely have gone to an inn. A lone female making enquiries at inns after a missing manservant would have an odd appearance, but I would have to do it.

I had an odd appearance anyway. The weather was mild and clear and the main track to Henley was busy, with people driving carts or riding on horseback, or trudging along on foot. Many of them glanced at me with puzzled interest. A young woman riding alone, and with an air of purpose such as mine, was an unusual sight. People, in the main, are civil, however, and mind their own business. No one troubled me.

If I found no trace of Brockley along the road, then I would in due course arrive at Windsor. What then? Did I ride straight to Mew’s door and demand news of Brockley?

If Mew was a conspirator, or even simply a criminal, I would be walking into a trap. What could I hope to achieve, alone?

The grim truth was that, far from stopping to rest or meeting with any accidental mishap, Brockley had probably walked into the trap ahead of me. He had known the risk beforehand, but forewarned wasn’t always forearmed, as I had discovered for myself. Brockley’s body might already be rolling along in the depths of the Thames, on its way to the sea. He might never be seen or heard of again. Dawson and Fenn had been found only by chance.

In that case, all my haste was a pointless response to panic with no common sense behind it.

As I left Henley after a fruitless enquiry or two, I decided that I might as well let Bay Star go at her ease. It would be no use at all to enter Barnabas Mew’s premises until darkness had fallen.

Enter Mew’s premises? At night? The thought had taken shape in my mind without warning, and I came up against it as though it were a wall. Was I considering
that?
But Brockley had been going to search Mew’s basement for evidence of conspiracy, and it was in the basement that I must look for him. If he were not to be found, then I should myself seek the evidence we needed. To do that, I must get in after dark and go down into the cellar myself. It was the only way. It was a horrible prospect, but obvious. If
Brockley had come to harm there, then it was because he constituted a threat. If the only thing I could do for him now was to find the secret which had killed him, then I must try.

I had summoned help, but I dared not wait for it, because I did not know for sure if it would come. Unless and until I knew for sure that Brockley was dead, I could not give up hope that he was alive, perhaps a prisoner, and if I could rescue him in time, I must.

I rode on, grimly thinking this over. At Maidenhead, I stopped at the Sign of the Greyhound, where the landlord recognised me. He was obviously surprised to see me travelling alone, but I forestalled any questions by asking my own. Did he remember my man Brockley, and had Brockley lately passed that way? “He went on an errand for me and hasn’t come back. I’m worried about him.”

Brockley, it seemed, had indeed called at the Greyhound late the previous evening. He had stopped for half an hour, taken a meat pie and a beaker of ale, and given his horse a nosebag. “I don’t know which way he was bound, but he was all right then,” the landlord said.

I bought some food to take with me, and set off again, going briskly once again, because it had occurred to me that perhaps I would be wise after all to make the best speed I could, in case I were pursued from Lockhill.

I was still thinking. I had deliberately given Barnabas Mew a chance to send a man to kill me, or else to contact Lockhill and get someone there to do it. He had
taken the chance. In the last twenty-four hours, my life had been attempted, albeit unsuccessfully, twice over.

Was Mason responsible for these attempts? It would be a bitter thing for his family if so, but it was all too likely. Crichton was probably in it too. He had certainly consented to the lie about the tapestries. But Crichton took Mason’s orders. When Dawson listened at a door in Lockhill, had he been listening to Mason giving the tutor instructions oddly unrelated to education? What orders had Mason given about me, I wondered, and to whom?

Redman and Tilly, with their silly accusations, I thought, must have come in very useful, the triumphant fruit of the seed which had been planted so carefully before my arrival. I wondered if Mason had really believed Mew’s lies on the subject of my reputation or if
I heard it from Mew
was merely an excuse, a façade of innocence. Mason and Mew could well have concocted the slander together. Not that it mattered. Mason was certainly making use of it now. He was in a position to order me out of his house with every appearance of righteousness. I could then be disposed of somewhere else, where suspicion wouldn’t point to him.

How had he meant to do it? He had tried to send an undergroom with me. The two Lockhill undergrooms were young lads, open-faced and friendly, not at all like potential assassins. But I could be wrong about that. Mason might have meant to send me off with my killer. Or else to send me into another ambush. He could have other accomplices—men in the village, perhaps.