The Favoured Child (20 page)

John nodded. ‘Well, now I’ve come this far I’ll walk on with you,’ he said agreeably. ‘I gave Mr Megson some money on account to alleviate some of the worst hardship in the village at once. I told him to assess people’s needs and spend it carefully. Is he doing some kind of food distribution?’

I could not help myself. I laughed out loud. ‘No!’ I said. ‘They’re having a party.’

We rounded the bend and John could see the table nearly ready for dinner and the people bringing stools and round logs of wood from the cottages to serve as chairs.

Then I froze, because the Dench cottage door opened and a man came out. He was upon us before I could give a warning cry. He did not even see us. He had a great saucepan of boiling soup in his hands and his eyes were on the steaming liquid and not where he was going.

It was the outlaw John Dench. It was Clary’s uncle, the wounder of Richard’s horse Scheherazade, the Havering groom who had trusted me to ride her. I knew him the second I saw him. But I did not know what to do.

‘Look out, man!’ Uncle John said abruptly, and Dench stopped and looked up from the saucepan in sudden surprise.

He recognized me at once and he took in the fine quality of Uncle John’s clothes and knew he was before the gentry. He shot a look from right to left as if thinking of dropping the saucepan, soup and all, and making a run for it, a dash to the common before the hue and cry was raised. But then he looked at us again and saw that I was alone with Uncle John. His eyes were that of a hunted animal and the colour drained from his face so that he looked grey and dirty.

‘Who are you?’ Uncle John demanded.

Uncle John had heard the story of Scheherazade, in Mama’s letters, and from his son. He would remember the name of the guilty man, would demand his arrest and take him to Chichester for trial at the next quarter sessions. Dench’s eyes flew to my face, and the whole street was silent; every man, woman and child in Acre seemed to be holding their breaths and waiting for the answer. Dench opened his mouth to speak, but he said nothing.

‘This is Dan Tayler,’ I said. My voice was as clear as a bell, confident. ‘Dan used to live here, but he now works on an estate at…at…at…Petersfield.’

Clary was suddenly at his side and she gave her uncle a little push. ‘They’re waiting for the soup,’ she said. She gave me an unsmiling straight glance.

‘And this is Clary Dench,’ I said unwavering. ‘And this is Sonny Green, and Mr and Mrs Miller Green, and Ned Smith with Henry, Jilly, and that is Little ‘Un. This is Matthew Merry, and over there is his grandmother, Mrs Merry, and beside her is Mrs Tyacke, and that is her son, Ted. That is Peter the cobbler and his wife, Sairey, and those are their twins. You know George the carter, and those are his girls, Jane and Emily.’

I named them all. Uncle John nodded and smiled and the women curtsied to him and the men pulled their forelocks. Many of the names were familiar to him, but he smiled at the people who had come to Acre in recent years, or young men who had been little children when he left.

I glanced around. Dench had disappeared.

Ralph came forward. ‘Would you like to share the dinner, Dr MacAndrew?’ he asked politely. ‘You and Miss Lacey would be most welcome.’

‘We’ll not interrupt you,’ Uncle John said equally civil. ‘We came only for Miss Julia’s glove. She dropped it somewhere here.’

One of the little Dench children darted under the table and came out with the glove like a trophy, and brought it to me. ‘Thank you, Sally,’ I said smiling.

John nodded to Ralph. ‘I see you’re settling in,’ he said. ‘I knew you would be glad to be home, but I never guessed you would be greeted as a returning hero.’

Ralph smiled. ‘Acre people never forget their friends,’ he said, and I heard a message to me in that. ‘We’ve long memories in this part of the world.’

‘I’m glad,’ Uncle John said. ‘It will be easier to set the estate to rights if they feel they are working for someone they trust.’ He hesitated. ‘I expected you to organize the distribution of food, not to set in train a village revel.’

Ralph Megson threw back his dark head and laughed. ‘I know
you did, Dr MacAndrew,’ he said jovially. ‘But there are some things you must leave to me. I’ll not tell you how to doctor, don’t you tell me how to bring Acre alive again. It is not money they want. It is not even food. They have been hungering all this time for a little joy in their lives – you’d know that feeling yourself, I dare say. Setting the village to rights is a lifetime’s work which we can start as soon as we have properly understood the problems. Giving them a bit of hope is something which can begin at once.’

Uncle John hesitated, but then he looked at the village street alive with chatter and laughter. ‘It’s not what I had planned,’ he said slowly, ‘but I can see you may be in the right.’

Ralph Megson nodded. ‘You can trust me,’ he said simply. ‘I am serving Acre’s interests, not yours. But while your wishes and Acre’s run in harness, you can trust me.’

Uncle John nodded, and a smile went between the two of them. ‘We’ll leave you now,’ Uncle John said. ‘Perhaps you’ll come to the Dower House after your dinner?’

Ralph nodded and Uncle John turned to leave. He stopped for a word with Miller Green, and Ralph said to me in an undertone, ‘That was well done, Miss Julia. Well done indeed.’

I shot a quick glance at his face and caught a warm smile that made me drop my gaze to my boots, white with drying chalk mud. I should not have told a lie and I should not have been praised for it. So I said nothing and he stood beside me in a silence which was not awkward, but was somehow delightful. I would have stood beside that man, even in silence, all day.

‘Mr Megson,’ I said tentatively.

‘Yes, Miss Julia,’ he said, his voice amused.

‘Why are you a hero to Acre, Mr Megson?’ I risked a quick glance up at his face and found his dark eyes dancing with mischief.

‘Why,’ he said, ‘I would have thought that you would have known. Knowing everyone in Acre as you do – and they say you have the sight as well! Do you not know without my telling you, Miss Julia?’

I shook my head, a wary eye on Uncle John, who was still deep in conversation.

‘I would have thought you would have known at once,’ he said sweetly. ‘I was told you had the sight.’

I shook my head again.

‘Whose voice was it when you first saw me?’ he demanded abruptly.

My eyes flew to his face and I shook my head. ‘I don’t know,’ I said. His eyes narrowed as he noted the lie I was telling, and I flushed scarlet that he should catch me in a deceit. ‘I am sorry, I
do
know,’ I amended lamely. ‘But it sounds so silly…and I did not want to say.’

He gave a crack of laughter which made Uncle John turn and smile at the two of us. Ralph’s broad shoulders were shaking and his eyes danced. ‘No reason in the world why you should answer my question, and no reason why you should tell me the truth if you do not choose to,’ he said fairly. ‘But I’ll answer yours for free and for nothing.’

He looked at me closely, taking my measure, and then he beamed at me as if he were telling me the lightest most inconsequential secret. ‘I was here the night of the fire,’ he said confidingly. ‘I led them up to the hall, to burn it down, and to murder Beatrice. I’m Ralph Megson, her lover from the old days, and her killer. In those days they called me the Culler.’

My eyes flew to his face and I gasped aloud, but Ralph Megson’s confident easy smile never wavered. He turned away from me as if he had told me only the slightest of trivialities and then he went towards the head of the table where they were waiting for him to take his place.

I stood where he had left me, in stunned silence. Uncle John had to speak to me twice and touch my elbow before I came out of my shock and was able to smile absently at him and start to walk home.

Mr Megson watched me go. I could see his glance in our direction, and his casual, friendly wave to Uncle John. But I knew his eyes were on me. And that rueful almost apologetic
smile was for me, and me alone. In the mist, with the weak sun trying to break through, I shuddered as if it were full night and I was caught in the cold rain of a thunderstorm.

I knew that smile. I had seen it before. He smiled like that in the dream, though I had never seen his face. And I knew that the next time I dreamed it I would look up over the great horse’s shoulder and see Ralph Megson bending down to scoop me up to him and to knife me under the ribs as carefully and as tenderly as he might perform an act of love. And, though the girl in the bed in the grip of the nightmare would be screaming with fright, I knew that the woman in the dream was not afraid. I knew she would see Ralph’s smile as he came for her and she would be smiling too.

‘S
o what is he like?’ asked Mama with polite interest. Stride was setting the decanter of port before Uncle John, but Mama and I were lingering with the informality of a happy family, with ratafia to drink and comfits to eat. ‘Your new manager,’ she said, ‘what is he like? Is he going to be of any use to you?’

Uncle John was at the head of the table and he poured himself a glass of the tawny-coloured port. ‘I do indeed think so,’ he said. ‘In a London hotel room he was impressive, but in the Acre street he was magnificent! I think you will like him, Celia. He’s very much his own man. I would trust him entirely with money and with responsibility.’

Mama smiled. ‘Good,’ she said, ‘for I am counting on having all three of you at home a good deal. If we have a proper manager on the land, then you, John, can concentrate on getting well and I can take Julia to Bath with a clear conscience.’

‘He was rude to me,’ Richard said abruptly. His head was turned away from his papa towards the foot of the table, to my mama, who always attended to his needs. ‘He knocked me with a sack of meal off the cart and into the road before all Acre.’

Mama gasped and looked to John.

‘Forget it,’ John advised briefly. He raised his glass and looked at Richard over the rim. Richard turned at once to my mama again. ‘In front of all of Acre,’ he said.

My mama opened her mouth to say something, but she hesitated.

John leaned forward. ‘Forget it,’ he said, his voice stronger. ‘You and Mr Megson had some difference. No one in Acre even
noticed. I have been down there and I asked specifically if there was any trouble. No one even saw.’

I had to dip my head down to look at my hands clasped on my lap at that. No one
ever
saw anything in Acre which looked like trouble.

‘Ralph Megson is a man of the world and his judgement is good,’ Uncle John said gently. ‘He will not refer to whatever took place. I advise you to forget it, Richard. You will need to be on good terms with him.’

Richard shot a swift burning look at his father, then he turned his shoulder towards him and addressed my mama. ‘I don’t like him,’ he said. ‘He insulted me and he should not work here if he cannot be civil.’

Mama looked at Richard and her face was infinitely tender. ‘I know you are thinking of us,’ she said gently. Then her gaze slid away from his young cross face to Uncle John, calm at the head of the table. ‘Richard has had responsibilities beyond his years,’ she said, speaking to him directly. ‘He is only thinking of what would be the best for us.’

John nodded. ‘It is a good sign that Richard is so responsible,’ he said kindly, ‘but I shall be the judge of this.’

Mama nodded and smiled at Richard. He gave her one long level look, and I knew that he felt betrayed. Mama, who had relied so much on him, now had the man she loved at her side, and she would prefer his advice. She sipped at her glass. ‘Does he know enough about farming?’ she asked. ‘What is his background?’

‘He was a tenant farmer in Kent and was bought out by an improving landlord at a considerable loss to himself,’ Uncle John said. He answered her as if the matter of Richard’s opinion was of small moment. ‘Losing his land like that would have made a lesser man bitter. It made him think about the rights of the landlord, and the rights of the tenants and workers. He’s a radical, of course, but I don’t mind that at all! I’m glad to have a manager who thinks of the good of the people, rather than simply the profits of the estate. And I don’t think a grasping man would last long in Acre anyway!’

‘No,’ Mama said. ‘As long as they will do as they’re bid…

Uncle John smiled down the table at me. ‘They were falling over themselves to please him when we left,’ he said. ‘If he remains that popular I should think they’ll plough up their kitchen gardens for Lacey wheat at his request. He seemed an absolute hero, didn’t he, Julia?’

‘Yes,’ I agreed, and I said no more.

‘Odd I never heard of him,’ Mama said. ‘He must have left Acre many years ago, for I never met him. I wonder how he can be so popular since he left when he was just a lad.’

I shifted uneasily in my chair and Richard came out of his brown study and shot a swift hard look at me. The very question I had feared had been raised on this first afternoon of Mr Megson’s return home. I had his life in my hands. All I had to do was to repeat what he had told me and he would be taken to Chichester and hanged. It would hardly matter that the fire had taken place fourteen years ago. Ralph Megson was a fire-raiser roaming free on Wideacre, and only I knew it. It should be me who gave the warning.

He had told me a secret which would hang him, and many of the villagers as well. And he had told it me in utter freedom and in jest and daring, and he had known, he
must
have known, that it would place me in the position I was in now: I had to choose between the claims of my family, my Quality family, and the preferences of Acre.

Before the whole village he had told me that he was an arsonist and a murderer, and I had not cried out against him then. I had not rushed to Uncle John and told him. I had not taken Uncle John to one side before we reached home and told him the appalling news. Mr Megson’s warm smile, his dazzling defiance of the law and the outside world and his matchless confidence had won me into complete complicity. Now I had to decide whether to lie outright to my mama or to betray Mr Megson, a stranger and a murderer.