Carola Dunn (19 page)

“He won’t be able to travel for a while, I daresay?”

“Course I will, sir, if you need me!” said Eustace stoutly.

“Certainly not. You wanted to take him with us?”

“No, I was thinking of sending him and Alfred by the Mail to Ipswich and Winchester to investigate Fenimore and Jeffries, to save time if we draw a blank with the other two. The groom will have to go instead, and I’ll take turns with Ted Coachman on the box.”

“Danny can drive,” Mrs. Potts told him proudly. “He used to drive a haywain at harvest-time when he was naught but a boy.”

“Excellent.”

“Begging your pardon, sir,” said Twitchell, “but a seat on the Mail costs a pretty penny, and changing a team of horses is downright ruinous. It’s not my place to ask, sir, but have you got the blunt?”

Mr. Daviot groaned and clutched his head. “Nowhere near enough.”

“I have several pounds,” Miranda said, “and the key to Lady Wiston’s cashbox. I shall not scruple to use what is there for her own sake, but it is not a great deal.”

“I’ve got a bit put by,” Twitchell said gruffly. “Far as I’m concerned, her ladyship can have the lot and welcome.”

With a shaky hand, Eustace pulled a few shillings from his pocket. “Here, sir.”

Mrs. Lowenstein had a few pounds squirreled away. Baxter, returning with a neat parcel of clean linen for Miranda and a second for Mr. Daviot (“You’ll excuse the liberty, sir,” she said primly), produced another twenty-two guineas. Alfred reappeared and willingly handed over two bright, shiny half-crowns, his tip from Lord Snell for running errands to the cousins, as he announced with a grin. Tilly gave a threepenny bit, two pennies, and a ha’penny. Miranda saw Mr. Daviot open his mouth as these carefully hoarded coins appeared. She shook her head at him. The little maid would be heartbroken to have her offering refused.

The door-knocker sounded. The landau awaited.

Cook’s hastily filled hamper was tied on behind, the medicine chest and other packages stowed under the seats. Meanwhile Mr. Daviot dashed up to his chamber to throw off his morning clothes and don something more suitable for driving in the country. He left Miranda to give Alfred and the groom their instructions for spying on Mr. Fenimore and the Reverend Mr. Jeffries.

At last all was ready. The whole household, even one-legged Twitchell and ashen-faced Eustace, came out to wish the rescuers God-speed.

“We’ll have her ladyship home in no time,” said Mr. Daviot heartily, and turned to assist Miranda up into the high carriage.

Mudge scampered between them and scrabbled up the steps. As he made a final spring to the floor of the landau, Miranda grabbed for his collar. She missed.

Fortunately his sideways slash also missed. He crossed to the far side and turned, teeth bared in a snarl.

“We cannot take Mudge!” Miranda exclaimed.

“Too bad,” Mr. Daviot sighed, “but let’s not waste time over him. With a bit of luck we’ll contrive to lose him on the way. Up you go, Miss Carmichael.”

Careful to keep her ankles out of the pug’s way, she settled on the forward-facing seat, shaded by the raised rear hood. Mr. Daviot sat beside her. The carriage rocked as Daylight Danny clambered up and subsided on the opposite seat. Ted Coachman raised the steps, closed the door, and mounted to the box.

Just as the carriage began to move, Tilly flung in the dog’s leash and a twist of paper. Her aim was excellent. The leash landed on the floor, the paper on Miranda’s lap. The paper split and a shower of aniseed comfits slid to the floor.

No one disputed ownership with Mudge. He gobbled up a dozen bonbons and promptly fell asleep, his head on Miranda’s foot, snoring.

Peter leant down to pick up the few remaining comfits. “Here, better save these for future need,” he said, handing them to Miranda.

Nodding, she dropped them into her reticule. From it she took a small memorandum-book and a pencil, and, consulting Peter, wrote down the exact amount each servant had donated for the cause.

She put the note-book away. Now that the need for decisions and action was over, she was wan and listless. Leaning her head, still in that hideous bonnet, back against the blue velvet squabs, she closed her eyes. Yet her hands in their darned cotton gloves were tightly clasped in her lap, every line of her body revealed by the dowdy dress was tense, and two white teeth chewed on her rosy lower lip.

Hastily dragging his mind from that delectable body, those enchanting lips, Peter assumed she was brooding over her supposed responsibility for his aunt’s abduction. He must put a stop to that.

“Miss Carmichael, you haven’t yet told me how you discovered Snell’s villainy,” he said.

She turned her head to give him a fragile smile, as if she guessed he was trying to distract her from unpleasant thoughts. “I didn’t credit what you told me,” she admitted, “but it made me notice little things, start wondering, questioning his sincerity. Then the carrion crows—”

“The what?”

“Those dreadful doctors he called in...Oh, you never saw them, did you?” She shuddered. “They were like vultures circling about an animal in its death throes. But it was their shabbiness which really aroused my suspicions. They were not at all the sort of well-respected physicians one would expect a nobleman to consult. I believe they would say anything for a large enough bribe. They would have certified Lady Wiston as mad however normally she had behaved.”

“But of course she gave them plenty of ammunition.”

“Yoga, the usual unusual guests.” She threw an apologetic glance at Daylight Danny, who returned a grave nod. “Little enough, yet quite enough. I should have acted then, but I was sure there would be an opportunity for her friends to testify in her favour. I even wrote letters to everyone I could think of, but I did not send them. I was waiting for notification of a court appearance.”

“So was I,” Peter said in bitter self-accusation. “I should have known the sneaksby would set the whole thing up behind my back.”

“No, how could you?” Miranda cried. “You are too open and above board to imagine such underhanded conniving!”

Though glad of her praise, Peter shook his head. “He had revealed himself to me as a wolf in sheep’s clothing. At least I ought to have kept an eye on him instead of retiring to the club to lick my wounds.”

“Which were my doing, not his,” she said remorsefully. “I ought to have had enough faith in you at least to listen properly. I thought Lord Snell was the one to be relied upon, when all the time it was you.”

The glow in her beautiful eyes caught and held Peter for a long moment.

Daylight Danny coughed. “If you was to ask me,” he put in, “I reckon, his lordship being a lord and all, he’d’ve been and gone and done it somehow no matter what. It’s no good crying over spilt milk, like my Mary allus says. What we got to do is mop it up.”

“Very true, Danny.” Peter reached over and squeezed Miranda’s hand. “We have had the argument I promised you. Now tell me how you found out matters had come to a head.”

As she explained, the carriage sped down Whitehall, deserted in high summer and peacetime, and across Westminster Bridge. The river, shining in the sun, reminded Peter of Bassett’s outing and how irritated he had been by Miranda’s pleasure in the officer’s company on the way to Greenwich. Mere irritation was not what he felt when she passed the picnic and the return journey at Snell’s side. He had been infuriated, blue-devilled, and, he had to admit, downright jealous.

Snell had been most particular in his attentions, the dastard! No wonder the poor girl’s hopes had flourished. The only question was whether he had also aroused her affections.

“I’m more sorry than I can say that Snell has disappointed you,” Peter lied when she finished her tale.

“Me? I blush to think I ever supposed him partial! But whatever his faults toward me, it is his aunt he has most grossly deceived, and she alone is suffering for it.”

With that he had to be satisfied, especially as Mudge chose the moment to raise his head and utter a heartrending howl.

“It’s like he understood you, miss,” said Daylight Danny.

“Perhaps he did,” Miranda agreed. “He knows his mistress is in difficulties, and I believe he knows we are going to the rescue. Why else should he insist on coming, when usually he refuses to go near the carriage?”

“Sheer perversity,” suggested Peter, happy to see her lips twitch.

Mudge keened again.

“Perhaps, but how sad he sounds. He is quite devoted to her.”

“Cupboard love. Or rather, pocket-love.”

At that Miranda laughed. “Well, yes, but comfits have never earned me his devotion.”

“You only hand them out when you want to distract him, or bribe him. Aunt Artemis is Lady Bountiful.”

“That she is,” Danny affirmed, his battered face doleful. “There’s many and many’d lay down their life for her la’ship, give ‘em half a chance.”

“Let us hope it won’t come to raising a private army!” said Peter. “We must make plans for when we reach Redpath Manor. Before taking Aunt Artemis there they had first to make preparations to confine her, which cannot have been kept secret. I wish I knew the place.”

“Ted Coachman must be familiar with it,” Miranda pointed out. “He used to drive Lady Wiston and the Admiral there.”

“True. We’re nearly at Croydon—I saw a milestone a hundred yards back. When we stop to change teams, Ted shall join us and you take over the driving for the next stage, Danny. Take it easy at first. I’d wager a high-perch landau handles rather differently from a haywain, and carriage horses from carthorses.”

“Reckon they does!” said Danny, grinning. Then he sobered. “I won’t be overturning you, miss, don’t you fret. Not when it’d hold us up, and her la’ship in the hands o’ them rum custermers. Her own nevvies turning agin her! What she’s going through, it don’t bear thinking on.”

Miranda was desperately trying not to think about it. She did her best to take an interest in the flowers in the hedgerows and the traffic they met.

The Brighton road was busy, for the Prince Regent’s oriental Pavilion attracted many members of the fashionable world to the seaside town every summer. One result was that the innkeepers along the way kept a good supply of post-horses available. The change at Croydon was quickly accomplished. Danny cautiously tooled his team down the village street with Ted kneeling on the seat to provide anxious instruction.

Miranda hung onto the strap as the carriage swayed around a corner. Mudge yipped a protest.

“I hope it will not prove a mistake to trust Danny with the reins,” said Mr. Daviot with a grimace.

“He’ll do.” There was more hope than certainty in Ted’s voice but he turned and sat down. “Now just what was it you was wanting to know, sir?”

“How we are to find out whether Lady Wiston is at Redpath Manor without throwing the household into a commotion if she is not.”

Ted scratched his stubbled chin. “Well, sir, ‘tisn’t likely they c’d hold her ladyship there wi’out the servants catching wind o’ summat, were it nobbut Cook wi’ an extry mouth to feed. And so happens me and Cook was used to be thick as thieves back when the Admiral and her ladyship goes a-visiting down there often. Ah, ‘twould break the Admiral’s heart to see what his nevvies is up to!”

“No doubt he’s turning in his grave. So if we can get you into the house, you’ll be able to find out what’s going on?”

“Sure as eggs is eggs, sir. Proper sweet on me, Cook were, and no cause for hard feelings being as it weren’t my fault we didn’t go to the Hall no more after Mr. Redpath up and tied the knot.”

“Then we must think of a way to smuggle you into the kitchen,” Mr. Daviot said thoughtfully.

“Why?” Miranda was too impatient to find Lady Wiston to put up with subtle methods. “Why not just drive up to the front door and ask if she is there? Should they deny it, surely we will be able to tell whether they are lying.”

“We might, unless we only saw the butler. All butlers are practised at convincing callers that the residents are not at home whether they are or not.”

“Then we must contrive to gain admittance and speak to the family. Besides, if we are in the house, Ted has every excuse to go round to the stables and drop into the kitchen, so even if we discover nothing he will have his chance with Cook.”

“You have a point there, but how do you propose to persuade the butler to let us in? If Aunt Artemis is there, he may well have instructions to look out for us and keep us out.”

Miranda frowned. “So if he does admit us, there is a good chance she is not there.”

“Provided we have a story to tell him which one might normally expect to induce a country squire to receive two absolute strangers in his house!”

“Oh.” Downcast, Miranda reflected on the irritating tendency of even the most imaginative of gentlemen to value logic above feelings. She still had a strong feeling they were wasting their time driving into Sussex. Lord Snell would not give Lady Wiston into the hands of a man he disliked and despised. He would want to keep her under his own control, under treatment by doctors he controlled.

She must not think about that or she would break down and be unable to help when the moment for action came. On enemy ground, Lady Wiston had no one to count on but her nephew, her companion....

“But we are not absolute strangers!” she exclaimed. “At least, we may not know the Redpaths personally, but you are Mr. Redpath’s uncle’s wife’s nephew and I am Lady Wiston’s companion, as Mrs. Redpath once was. There must be a way to take advantage of what connections we have!”

Mr. Daviot gave her an approving look. “A good point. As a matter of fact, I did meet Redpath more than once at the Admiral’s, before I went to America. Wait a minute, I have an idea.”

His abstracted expression was so familiar to her she could see it with her eyes closed. For the first time in hours Miranda allowed herself to relax a little. She had perfect confidence in Peter Daviot’s ability to come up with a credible, effective story once he set his mind to it.

How could she ever have doubted him?

Chapter 16

The sunset was fading over the South Downs as the high-perch landau rolled up the avenue of oaks. Though the raised leather hoods protected against the stiff breeze blowing off the Channel, Miranda was glad of the cloak Baxter had provided.