Camp Follower: A Mystery of the American Revolution (19 page)

"Serves
him right, the scum."

"What if
Sims was killed to keep him silent?"
 
From Hannah's stare, Helen had piqued her interest.
 
"Whoever hired Sims suspected your
father had knowledge that could undo him.
 
Perhaps one night when Mr. Chiswell allowed your father to pull the
bottle from his hands and help him to bed, he spoke of someone who'd wronged
him.
 
Charles might have hinted of
confidences."

Hannah's stare
drifted over Helen's shoulder.
 
She
shook her head.
 
"Nothing comes to
mind this moment."

"Of course
not.
 
Knowing your father, any reference
he made would have been subtle.
 
Think
on it.
 
Let it come to you when it's
ready."
 
If Charles had confided in
Hannah, it might take the distraction of travel and adventure to bring it to
the surface.

***

Behind the
closed door of the study, Jonathan shoved the record book back on its
shelf.
 
"I found no discrepancies
in the accounting.
 
There were no
anomalous debt amounts, such as for a series of blackmail payments.
 
You clearly documented the payment for each
debt with its corresponding date."
 
He shook his head.
 
"I see
no evidence of perjury here."

She indicated
the box of letters.
 
"What of his
correspondence?"

"Nothing
there except —"
 
Jonathan's face
pinched with disgust.
 
"— vulgar
reminiscences from his youth not fit for a lady's eyes.
 
I suggest that you burn the whole box."

Admiration for
Jonathan rushed through Helen.
 
David
would have suggested the same.
 
True
gentlemen.
 
"And the letters to
Isaiah Hanley?"

"Nothing
in any other letter gave weight to that peculiar postscript.
 
Helen, if the murders of Charles, Mr.
Layman, and Arthur Sims are somehow related to actions of your late husband, I
don't see clues here.
 
For now, move on
to more pressing matters.
 
What
information did Hannah offer about Charles?"

"None.
 
I followed your suggestion and asked her not
to dwell upon our theory.
 
Perhaps
something will come to her."

"Has Roger
found a second man yet?"

"No."

Arms crossed
over his chest, he walked to the window and stared out.
 
"You won't find him this late.
 
The trip is perilous, demanding an elevated
standard of fitness and intelligence of your attendants that excludes the
majority of candidates.
 
It also
excludes any candidate who is even marginally sympathetic to the rebel
cause."
 
He faced her, arms at his
side, his blue eyes electric.
 
"If
you are to be guaranteed any reasonable level of security and safety, you must
have a second man.
 
I see no option but
to accompany you myself."

She
snickered.
 
"Now, now.
 
December and January can be bitter out of
doors."

"I'm aware
of that."
 
His jaw was set.

Disbelief
speared her.
 
"You're
serious
about this?
 
Wouldn't you rather sit by
your fire?"

"Why ask
me such an absurd question?
 
Do I look
like a doddering old man?"

"Doddering?
 
Surely not."

"It's
settled, then.
 
Peter and I shall ride
home and pack.
 
Meet me at my estate on
the morrow.
 
Plan to spend the first
night there."

"
Nothing
is settled, Jonathan.
 
You mustn't risk
your life on this assignment."

Enid knocked on
the study door.
 
"Mistress, Mr.
Fairfax has just arrived for your noon meeting.
 
I've admitted him to the parlor."

"Yes,
thank you, Enid."
 
Fairfax.
 
Perhaps Jonathan's inclusion in the party
was judicious.
 
Still, for him to
endanger his life — she lowered her voice and met the level gaze of her former
teacher.
 
"I've never disputed your
wisdom."

"Trust me
to guard my own back."

Her shoulders
dropped in acquiescence.
 
"I
presume you won't object to packing away the gentleman's clothing while we
travel through the Santee?"

"Not at
all."

Her lips kinked
with irony.
 
"Care to leave your
chessboard behind?"

Mock-indignation
bit his expression.
 
"Do you fancy
me a coward?
 
Of course I shall bring
it!"

***

From Fairfax's
poise upon receiving news of Jonathan's inclusion in the party, he'd
anticipated it as the move of a well-bred lady and widow.
 
Helen concluded the meeting and sent the
lieutenant on his way, saw Jonathan off by half past twelve and brought Enid to
the merchants' shops, where all her clothing had assumed final shape overnight:
a gentlewoman's winter travel wardrobe that dazzled Enid and drove back Helen's
misgivings.
 
With the gowns bundled away
home between Enid and one of the apprentices, she hurried on to the office of
her attorney, humming despite the overcast.
 
The message he'd sent her earlier that day said he had good news.
 
Never had she the luxury of arriving at a
lawyer's office for good news.

Attorney
Chapman ushered her in, seated her with his blue eyes a-twinkle, and offered
coffee, which she declined.
 
Then he
took a seat across from her and crossed one bony knee over the other.
 
"All is very well, Mrs. Chiswell.
 
Your monthly mortgage payments won't change,
and you've nothing to be alarmed about."

Relief
punctured some of the foreboding she'd acquired that morning, and she expelled
a sigh.
 
"Excellent work, sir.
 
Then you've settled with my new creditor
over my monthly payment?"

He nodded.
 
"Wise of you to hire me to investigate
the matter.
 
Deceit is more common than
you'd imagine, and good folks are often swindled by these creditor
frauds."

Helen frowned
at him.
 
"Creditor frauds?"

"Your
original creditor never sold the mortgage to another party.
 
In fact, he has no idea who this third party
might be and is indignant to have his good name sullied for this operation.
 
We initiated an investigation to discover
who might actually come round to pick up payments delivered to the addressee
indicated on the letter, but thus far, we haven't caught anyone.

"So
congratulate yourself on being shrewd enough to not send money to this third
party.
 
Someone was most definitely
trying to swindle you."

Helen
gulped.
 
The relief she'd experienced
earlier evaporated, leaving her the sensation of having passed beneath a
spillage of rank water.

The attorney
registered the distress in her expression, and his tone grew soothing.
 
"Would you care for some brandy?"

"No, thank
you."

"Perhaps I
should have approached the situation more delicately.
 
Respectable widows on fixed incomes present irresistible targets
for swindlers.
 
Your creditor and I want
to apprehend these scoundrels.
 
Have you
any idea who might be trying to swindle you?"

She regarded
the spines of leather-bound case studies on shelves behind his desk.
 
A pair of cold eyes haunted her memory.
 
"Prescott."

Chapman emitted
an awkward cough.
 
"
M-Maximus
Prescott?"

She met the
fledgling attorney's gaze and read terror in his face.
 
So much for his youthful exuberance at
saving Wilmington's fixed-income widows from swindle schemes.
 
If Prescott were involved, he'd squash any
meddler like a mosquito, fellow attorney or not.

"Never you
mind, Mr. Chapman."
 
She stood, as
did her attorney.
 
"I cannot thank
you enough for preventing my victimization in this scheme.
 
If ever one of my friends or neighbors needs
an attorney, I shall recommend you highly."

He bowed his
head, his expression stamped with the relief of a knight who learns he doesn't
have to vanquish a fire-breathing dragon after all.
 
"You're most welcome, madam."

She shivered
the whole way home, less from weather than the ominous track of her
thoughts.
 
Prescott is up to
something
.
 
Almost a week earlier,
David had declared it, but she'd disregarded his idea.

Oh, the
bottomless hatred in Prescott's eyes two days ago when she'd stood her ground
over the contract.
 
He knew he'd wrung
her estate dry, and all she had left was her home on Second Street.
 
Was he trying to defraud her of the house,
her final material possession?
 
If so,
why?
 
He was one of Wilmington's
wealthiest residents.
 
He didn't need
the house.

Perhaps he'd
leaped in over his own head in some nefarious deal and found himself the debtor
to a man even more ruthless.
 
But she
didn't quite believe it.

If
Prescott had masterminded the scheme, he'd intended to achieve a purpose other
than quick monetary gain.

That moment,
she wished herself on the other side of the world from him.
 
The assignment with the Legion assumed even
more the shape of a blessing.

Chapter Eighteen

AT SIX THURSDAY
morning the twenty-third, Badley's servants arrived with the tarp-covered
wagon, horse team, and additional horses, one of them a lively, saddled
mare.
 
From the window of Silas's
bedroom, Helen watched Roger examine wagon and horses by torchlight and
inventory the wagon's contents.
 
His
proficiency eased her pre-journey jitters.

Badley's
servants were sent on their way.
 
Enid lugged
out personal gear.
 
Flimsy, gray dawn
sieved through the cloud cover.
 
At
seven, Fairfax and nine men on horseback rode up and possessed the street
outside the house.
 
Morning traffic
detoured around them.

Back in her own
bedroom, Helen beckoned Enid to the hidden panel in the wall.
 
"This slides open, see?
 
There's enough money in here to keep you
through March."
 
It was every bit
of her money not required for the trip, and she hoped Enid wouldn't blow
through it like a Clancy son on the eve of his majority.
 
"I expect to return well before then,
by the end of February at the latest."

"Aye,
mistress."
 
The sagacity in the
housekeeper's dark eyes spanned many eons.
 
"By the bye, I had a word with Rhiannon last night.
 
She assures me you'll be back in good
time."

Helen
appreciated her servant's consideration.
 
Danger lay ahead, she knew.

"Rhiannon
thinks you'll do some singing on this quest of yours."

Helen glanced
at David's hat on her bedpost and cocked an eyebrow, curious whether singing
carried the same implication for the Welsh that it did for her people.
 
They embraced.
 
Downstairs, she donned her new cloak, gloves, and hat.
 
Fairfax, who lingered just outside the front
door, offered a civil bow and the courtesy of a lift into the saddle of the
mare without any attempt at glibness.

The overcast
failed to clear during the morning.
 
Along the way, cultivated, flat fields reinforced the monotony of an
autumn-denuded landscape in shades of brown and gray.
 
Mid-day, at the end of a winding drive of rhododendron,
hardwoods, and spruce pines, the impeccable lawn and two-story mansion of
Jonathan Quill came into view and broke the dreariness.
 
Helen watched Fairfax absorb details of
their host's wealth and hoped he formed impressions of her far from the truth
of a commoner purchased as a bride the year after she, as May Queen, had
blessed the county with a fertile Beltane.

Jonathan jogged
from the wide front porch out to greet them.
 
Not the slightest bit winded from his sprint, he kissed Helen's
temple.
 
"Welcome, my
dear."
 
The luxurious, teal-colored
silk of her new gown rustled, and he held her out from him, his gaze a
caress.
 
"Such color in your
cheeks.
 
The open air agrees with
you.
 
I take it your journey from
Wilmington was without incident?"

The hug and
compliments left her a little breathless.
 
She nodded, nonplussed to find him dressed in plum-colored velvet, white
silk, and lace.
 
How handsome he looked.