A Bouquet of Thorns (15 page)

She remained motionless, as if his words could not penetrate her grief, and he was about to turn away when she mumbled something under her breath.

‘Pardon, my dear?' he prompted her at once, seeing as it was the first word she had spoken that day.

‘I said, her name was Alice. Our daughter's name was Alice.' Her voice was empty, devoid of expression, as if coming from some other, ethereal being, and Charles felt not the least reprimanded.

‘Of course it was,' he replied tentatively, anxious to seize any shred of communication. ‘And we will always remember her. But there will be others. This time next year, there will be another little Chadwick, I promise you. And over the years, we will fill the nursery with our children. So the sooner we start, the better.'

He just caught the thin sound that gurgled at the back of her throat, but chose to ignore it. Instead, he bent to kiss the bare milky skin at her neck, and his hand found its way beneath the yoke of her nightdress to the warm, soft mound of her breast.

She flinched. Her shoulders instantly stiffened and she jerked up her head so that she narrowly missed butting him in the mouth. ‘Charles, I really don't think . . .' she croaked hoarsely.

‘And why not, my dear?' he purred, his voice oily. ‘Dr Seaton pronounced you fit and well a week ago. And the sooner we conceive another child, the better.'

‘But not when we've only just laid Alice in her grave.' Her tone was stronger now, a blend of sadness and resentment that was beginning to try Charles's patience. But anger was not the way to get what he wanted, and he was determined that he would.

He withdrew his hand and instead began to stroke her hair. ‘I understand how you feel, my darling,' he said persuasively. ‘But surely you must see it would be for the best? Another child would give you something else to think about. Help you to get over Alice more quickly.'

He saw in the mirror that she lowered her eyes, and a glow of satisfaction warmed his blood. He was winning her over and, turning her about on the stool, he knelt down before her and with one hand on the back of her head, placed his lips forcefully on hers and used his tongue to probe into her mouth.

She pulled away. ‘Charles . . . please . . .' she moaned. ‘Not now . . .'

‘Oh, but you know I'm right,' he murmured into her ear now as his hands began to fumble between her thighs. ‘Another child . . .'

The sensation of disgust shot up to her stomach, and her muscles cramped. She instinctively pushed him away, and the words were out of her mouth before she had time to think what she was saying.

‘But I'm not certain I
want
another . . .'

They both froze, two statues glaring at each other from eyes stretched wide with horror. Rose wanted to swallow, but it seemed a stone had lodged in her gullet. The buried truth had wormed its own way to the surface without her having consciously considered it. Charles's slack-jawed mouth gradually closed into a hateful knot, and his eyes narrowed as he raised his hand which shook with the effort it was taking not to slam it across her face.

‘Don't want any more children!' he spat venomously. ‘You little bitch! It's your duty as my wife to give me as many children as you can!
Sons
, to carry on my work! I know you dislike the act of love-making—'

‘
Love-making!
' Rose reared up her head. ‘There's nothing
loving
in it, the way
you
do it. You're like an animal!'

Charles jerked as if he'd been shot by a bullet, and then his eyes bulged with unleashed rage. ‘And how would you know any different, madam? It was that bloody convict, wasn't it? You made love to him, but you refuse to make love to your own husband! Well, I'll show you, you bloody little—'

‘No! How dare you! There was nothing like that—'

But the rest of her incensed words were lost as he grasped a hank of her flowing locks and dragged her across the room by it. She couldn't even scream for the pain as her hair was almost torn from her scalp, and as he hurled her on to the bed, the breath was entirely knocked out of her so that she struggled for some moments to remain conscious. She almost wished she hadn't, for a few seconds later, he plunged himself into her. She cried out, transfixed with the sudden pain of it, and at that precise instant, she truly wished herself dead. She turned her head away, gasping for breath, and praying that Charles would hurry up with the business. He was right, of course. She was his wife, and it was her duty. And, in time, she probably
would
want more children. Thousands of mothers lost their infants each year, and went on to find solace in further offspring. But it didn't help her just now, and her spirit heaved with a powerless contempt.

When Charles had finished, he was full of remorse, kissing her, telling how much he loved her. She remained silent, tight-lipped, finally turning her back on him in the bed until his heavy, even breathing told her he was asleep. She let her tears come then, quiet tears of despair that soaked into the pillow and washed away the grief-numbed sterility of her mind. There was nothing she could do for herself. The laws of both God and man said so. She was Charles's wife, as her bruised and stinging flesh reminded her. And she would be so until one or the other of them died – which could be twenty, thirty years – and she would have to live in that knowledge for the rest of her days. She could bring back neither her father nor her daughter. Perhaps other children, the son that Charles craved, would bring her contentment in the future. But that time seemed a long way off, in some distant haze that her present pain could not begin to envisage.

Her own soul was eternally lost. But there was something she could perhaps do to save someone else's. At least she could try . . .

It was still dark when she rose, sleep having eluded her all night. She slipped quietly into the dressing room, managed to light the lamp and dug out her riding habit from the back of her wardrobe. It fitted her regained figure perfectly. She crept silently down the stairs, carrying her cleaned and polished boots, and let herself out of the back door with the stealth of a cat.

A dank drizzle somewhat akin to a heavy mist fell steadily from the sky. Dawn would rise late that foggy August morning. The house still slept, but not so the horses in the field. Though moist, the atmosphere was warm, and Tansy was delighted to see the gentle mistress who was always so kind to her. Rose fetched just a handful of oats and while the mare munched happily, she stole into the tack room. She must be careful as Ned – Ned whom she now hated – slept above it with only the floorboards between them. She could hear him snoring soundly, and though Tansy's bridle jangled on her shoulder as she heaved the saddle from its bracket, the rhythmical droning above her was not interrupted.

It felt so good when she finally mounted Tansy's back. She hadn't ridden for months and it was wonderful to be astride an animal again. If only it had been Gospel! She would have felt him quivering with excitement, his muscles bunched beneath her, but she must put such morose thoughts aside. She had another mission, and though the loss of her beloved horse would tear at her for ever, surely the life of a human being must be more important.

Within minutes they were off at a trot, keeping to the grass beside the gravelled driveway to deaden the sound of Tansy's hooves, and evaporating into the swirling mist like some mythical spectre. They were gone. Free. As if Charles and her life at Fencott Place no longer existed.

Even so, Rose was cautious. She wasn't nervous, but rather fired with humiliation and deranged bitterness, and the desire to lash out in revenge. But she knew that the shadowy gloom of the gauzy mist as morning broke could confuse and disorientate, and so she kept Tansy at a steady trot so that they didn't lose the track in the half light. When they came into Princetown, the village was still deserted. What time was it? Half past five? Six o'clock? Back home, Cook and Patsy and Daisy would be up, building up the heat in the kitchen range, kneading the day's bread. Florrie would not be far behind, wondering what she would do now her darling little Alice was dead and buried. Ned would doubtless still be snoring his head off, and though it would not be long before he awoke, Charles would remain in blissful ignorance of his wife's disappearance.

Nobody saw them slide through the vapour-enshrouded prison village. She could scarcely distinguish the massive buildings of the gaol, but could just about make out the flickering lights at what she knew were row upon row of small, high-up, barred windows. After a long night locked away in their lonely cells, and sleeping on hard wooden beds, with a thin straw mattress if they had behaved themselves, the inmates would already be up, slopping out, eating their dry bread and watery porridge, going to morning prayers to ask God's blessing on the gruelling day of punishment ahead. And tomorrow. And the next day.

Rose paused for an instant near the gates. Somewhere inside those soulless walls, in an unforgiving, damp cell, Seth would be preparing for another long day of back-breaking labour when not even a word of companionship was permitted to ease one's misery. The Silent Rule. Just another cross to bear.

Rose gritted her teeth as she urged Tansy onwards. The injustice of it erupted inside her yet again. She wanted to rebel, to hit out. At Charles, for his possessiveness, his lack of understanding, his jealousy. His betrayal. Most of all, at Fate, or whatever force it was had taken her darling, innocent Alice. And somehow doing whatever she could to help Seth was a way of cleansing her soul of its black anger. Of allowing herself to find some peace.

They trotted on to the small settlement at Rundlestone, then turned left along the old toll road across the moor. Rose knew it like the back of her hand. Though there had been no visible sunrise at her back, daylight was penetrating the mantle of fog. They passed on their left the track that led off to the massive quarries of Foggintor, King's Tor and Swell Tor, reminding Rose of happier times when she had accompanied her father on many a visit to the busy, hard-working community there. She wondered vaguely if they still used gunpowder rather than the new dynamite that was available now. She was sure they would. The men at the quarries were experts with explosives and didn't welcome change, and with the powder mills being so close . . . Ah, but those halcyon days at Cherrybrook seemed an eternity away.

The bank of mist suddenly rolled away as they descended the hill to Merrivale and the new Tor Quarry just beyond the inn. The world seemed to explode into life as men were arriving for work, astounded to see the beautiful young woman of obvious class out so early on the lonely moor – and
alone
. But perhaps the heavenly vision was no more real than the devilish pixies and other sprites that some believed roamed the moor.

Now that they could see clearly, Rose urged Tansy into a sedate canter. Had she been riding Gospel, he would have catapulted forward, neck arched, fine legs stretched as they ate up the ground. Oh, she must stop grieving for him and concentrate instead on breathing in the freedom of the moor that she had not experienced for so long. The joy of the rugged landscape began to lift her heart, allowing her to leave her sorrow behind, if only for a short while. As they reached the top of Pork Hill, the familiar, magnificent view down over the Tamar River to Plymouth was stunning, and Rose slowed Tansy's pace to negotiate the steep downhill incline. And then, at long last, they turned right down the lane that would eventually lead to Peter Tavy.

T
he village was just as Rose remembered it from her visit with her father several years before. People were up and about their business, mainly farmers, one or two of whose farms were actually within the village centre, which once again struck her as unusual. She noticed a straggling group of men heading down towards a lane beside the inn. They looked like miners, and she recalled driving down the lane with Henry in the dog cart. It led down to the River Tavy and they had crossed by the ford rather than the sturdy wooden bridge, since the water in the river had been low. On the far side lay Wheal Friendship, once the most extensive copper mine on the moor, but now, like many that hadn't been forced to close altogether, turned over to arsenic production. Whether or not the mine still used gunpowder, she didn't know. And with Henry and her life at Cherrybrook gone for good, it was no longer her concern.

What
was
her concern was to try to find the man Seth had told her he had befriended during his brief spell in the police cells in Tavistock nearly three years previously. Since Charles had broken his promise to listen to Seth's story and see if he could do anything to help, Rose would have to seek out this Richard Pencarrow instead. His farm was not
in
but
near
Peter Tavy, so she would have to ask. But while she had stopped to remember her trip to the mine with Henry, the people she had seen earlier had disappeared, so for a few minutes, she ambled around the village wondering what to do next. She discovered there was a grassy square in front of the church, wide enough for a funeral carriage to turn, she considered grimly. And coming across it was a likely looking couple, middle-aged and, by their attire, quite respectable.

‘Excuse me, sir, ma'am,' she said politely, bringing Tansy to a standstill. ‘I'm looking for a Mr Richard Pencarrow. I believe he has a farm somewhere near.'

The man raised his eyebrows at being addressed so respectfully. ‘Up at the Hall, miss. He be the maister. Though what a pretty cheel like thee wants with 'en, I cas'n imagine.'

A shadow of doubt clouded Rose's heart at the man's words. In her headlong haste, she hadn't considered that she knew nothing about the stranger she was seeking. Seth himself had known precious little. The friendship that had developed between them was limited, even though Seth seemed to trust the other fellow entirely. From what the man before her had just said, this Richard Pencarrow must indeed have been released, but what if he really was a violent criminal – a murderer as it had involved the Coroner's Court – and she would be putting herself in danger? But to be quite honest, at that particular moment, she didn't really care.