Deceit (7 page)

The coach from Gravesend is already two hours late and I have been waiting in fear the whole while. “Suppose by some terrible stroke of ill fortune Nicholas is on the coach? What shall we do then?” I am pacing up and down, up and down in the street. My jaw is clenching so tight that the ache spreads up behind my eyes and causes my temples to throb in pain. I clutch at the ring on its braid… does it feel hot?

Christophe tries to calm me, but I cannot bear to stand still even for a moment. Then we hear it: the rumble of wheels over the cobbles, the rhythmic clopping of hooves and the jingle of harness. The coach rattles into view and comes to a stop outside the Feathers Inn.

Christophe pulls me back into the shadows so that we can observe the coach passengers unseen. The coach door opens and I glimpse someone dressed all in black and wearing a hat trimmed with beaver fur and for a minute I am sure that it is
him
. The colour drains from the world and
I know I will faint. But then the man descends onto the street and turns towards us, and he is nothing like Nicholas, being small and round as plum pudding and ancient, with a face as wrinkled as a walnut.

I smile with relief. Christophe pulls his hat down low over his face and, gesturing for me to stay where I am, moves close to the coach and looks in. My eyes are fixed on him the whole time, alert for any sign that we may be in trouble. But Christophe straightens up and his shoulders drop in relief; he turns to the coachman and money changes hands and then he beckons to me. “We are lucky to get places on the coach,” he says, “for overnight in Gravesend there have been deaths from the plague. People are already fleeing the town.”

In a very short while I am squeezed inside the coach. To save money Christophe says he will travel outside and he will not listen to my protestations. But the weather is kind at least and so I know he will not get cold or wet. Soon we are out on the open road and heading towards Dover.

We travel all day, only stopping to change horses
at Faversham. By nightfall we are at Canterbury. We pass through the high but narrow city gates and into the streets beyond, which are wide and lined with neat, brick-built houses. The coach stops at the Fountain Inn.

Christophe has been in Canterbury once before. He says the city is home to many Huguenots who are employed in the weaving of silk. A Frenchman will provoke no special interest here, so we decide it is safe to spend the night at the inn; a risk worth taking in exchange for a good night’s sleep. Which it proves to be, for our room is clean and there are fresh sheets on the bed and sweet-smelling herbs strewn on the floor. We have food, wine and hot water brought up to the room as before, only this time the food is hot and savoury and the wine strong.

Then, when we lie down and sink into the warmth of the feather bed, we are a little tipsy from the wine and happy that we have travelled safely this far and will soon be at Dover. When my hand reaches out for Christophe in the night, he pulls me in and, for a little while at least, the world outside with all its dangers does not exist.

We leave Canterbury the next morning after a good breakfast and travel on to Dover. The road is uphill and down. I start to feel a little queasy and have to take a little sip of laudanum. But this does not quell the sickness, and I ask to sit by the carriage window so that I can lean out. The fresh air on my face makes me feel better and I pass the journey imagining how Christophe and I might live safe and happy in one of the pretty houses dotted among the hills that rise up all around. And for a while all is peaceful and I am content.

Then, in the distance, five miles at least, is a castle set up on a steep hill and beyond that a great expanse of slate-blue water, glittering in the sunlight and reaching as far as the horizon. My first glimpse ever of the sea!

A fellow traveller, an olive-skinned man with sleepy dark-brown eyes and a kind mouth, seems amused at my excitement. He leans forward and points out of the carriage window. “From the castle tower,” he says, “on a clear day, you can see as far as France and Calais.”

“Have you been there yourself, sir?” I ask eagerly. He says that he has. I say we hope to travel there, but when I ask if he has business in Calais,
he just smiles, folds his arms and I think he pretends to be asleep!

As soon as we arrive in Dover – a little place where the houses look cobbled together and the sea only comes in far enough for small boats to moor up – he quickly jumps down from the coach and is gone.

Dover is the furthest from London I have ever been in my life. But Christophe has travelled far in the world and so I have never once thought to ask him how easy it will be to cross to France. And because Nicholas also travels freely abroad and even Ralf… I imagine it is a simple thing to do.

But when I say so later to Christophe, he sighs and says that Nicholas is well known at Court and trusted. He will have a safe conduct document, signed by the Secretary of State. “
Ce n’est pas difficile pour lui
, he will be able to obtain the appropriate documentation. Likewise Ralf, if he is offered work in France.” And I look at him in bewilderment.

“But do we need such a document? And if we do, where might we obtain one?”

“We cannot,” he says and he takes my hand as
if he hopes to still my panic, which he can see is rising with every word he speaks. “
Mais calme-toi
, do not worry… for there are smugglers who cross between England and France. They are always willing, for a price, to take passengers too. That is how I travelled to England – on a ship smuggling wines and spirits.”

I am silent at the thought of it. Crossing the sea in a small boat, and like as not under cover of darkness, when I thought we might travel in some comfort at last. How stupid I was to imagine that! And how will we find someone willing to take us?

An inn is as good a place as any to start such a search and there are several in the town. Christophe says we cannot boldly ask if there are any smugglers travelling to France. We must be subtle and watch and listen in to every conversation. So we drink at each inn in turn, but have not yet heard a whisper of anything useful. Then, when we enter the very last inn – The Ship – we decide we will spend the night here if we can, even though it is dark and unwelcoming, with few candles lit and a fire that draws badly. I find it difficult to catch my breath for all the smoke billowing out from the chimney.

I pull urgently at Christophe’s arm, “Let us get a room and sleep now and worry about it in the morning. I am as tired as a turnspit dog.” All I can think of is a bed… any bed where I can lay down and ease my aching body. I think the baby must feel the same, for it turns inside me and kicks furiously. And I am up and on the point of asking the innkeeper if he has a room to spare for us when I spy the brown-eyed man from the coach; the one who has travelled to Calais.

He is huddled in a corner, deep in conversation with a rough-looking fellow whose hair is tied back in the sort of pig’s tail I have seen sailors wear. His forearms are bulging with muscle and roped with blue veins.

I inch closer and see money exchange hands. The ‘sailor’ nods and seems pleased. When he leaves, I decide I will take a chance… and without saying a word to Christophe, though I feel his eyes on me every step of the way, I cross the room and sit down next to my brown-eyed friend.

I ask him straight, “We are looking for a way to cross to France, but have no papers.” I speak low and quick, reaching up for the ring and turning it round and round on its braid. “Do you know how
we might do that? For you said that you made the journey yourself and often… seeing you with that sailor, I thought perhaps…?”

He looks at me, his face in shadow, but his eyes reflecting back the firelight. His hand rubs slowly across his mouth as if he is deep in thought, but his eyes do not leave mine.

“There is a way, but it is not without danger for you and for…” His hand reaches out as if he would touch me and I shrink back from the familiarity of it. “I lost my wife and my unborn child in just such a crossing.” He speaks wistfully, taking his eyes from mine and staring into the distance as he continues. “She was on her way to France, on her father’s boat; they had wool to sell. It was a crossing she had made many times, and it was to be her last before the baby was born. Alas, a storm blew up and she was swept overboard.”

Steeling myself against the intimacy, I take his hand. “I am sorry for your loss… but will you help us, sir, and save
this
child’s life?” I hold his hand against my belly and he feels the baby kick. He nods.

“I will…”

T
he police had never found out that Claire had been up on the crane with Zac and Jacalyn that night two years ago. The press had called Zac’s death a ‘freak accident’, but only those who were there knew the full story. That the Emerald Casket had finally opened, and swept Zac from the platform in a tornado of blue dust. That Robert had been there too and he’d fallen from the crane in a struggle for the casket. That Robert had failed to take possession of the 21st spell the casket contained.

As far as the police knew, Robert was still on the run, having escaped custody. He’d been arrested after attacking Claire at Darke House and at first the police had attempted to trace his movements… to find bank accounts, credit cards, a national insurance number in his name.
To follow the myriad trails that ordinary people leave as they go about their everyday lives. But they couldn’t even find a birth certificate for Robert.
At least
, thought Claire,
not in the name of Robert Benoit and not in this century
. Claire hadn’t suggested they might look at a Nicholas Robert
Benedict
and check out a birth recorded in 1637. Or said, “I know that, because he’s my grandfather ten times removed and he’s been alive for nearly four hundred years.”

All they’d found were business cards and letterheads in the study at Darke House. Did he have any living relatives? None had come forward. The police investigation had finally gone cold. And all that while Darke House stood empty.

So now here Claire was, late on Tuesday morning when she should have been at school, standing in Ivybridge Lane, looking up at Darke House. The shutters were closed and the house certainly looked empty. There was litter outside the front door. The windows were covered in grime and the paintwork had started to peel. Robert was a clever man. He wouldn’t be holding Matthew here. But she had to make sure. And maybe there would be
some clue as to where Robert was holding Matthew. An address, a phone number, a painting, a photo,
something
.

There was a lane, just an alleyway really, leading down the side of the house and to the river. A high wall enclosing the garden and a wrought iron garden gate. She could see the box hedging, overgrown now, and the gravel paths littered with leaves. Roses were still blooming, but it had been two years since anyone had pruned them and they’d grown straggly and wild. The gate was padlocked, but she thought she could climb over. The swirls of wrought iron would give her good hand and footholds.

But she hesitated. She felt spooked. It was as if the house had been waiting for her to come. She looked around. She could see people hurrying past the end of the alleyway. Hear the noise of river traffic; the slap and slop of waves against the riverbank. Smell the unmistakable tang of river mud, oil and diesel. But
that
was the world outside. Here it felt different. Silent. Watchful.

She climbed over the gate as quickly as she could, only stopping when the lace of her left trainer got caught on a curl of iron. Then, safely
down on the path, she ran towards the back of the house. The gravel scrunched loudly underfoot and she couldn’t help looking up at the windows, half expecting to see someone standing there. But they were still shuttered. It would be dark inside wouldn’t it? The electricity disconnected and any alarm disabled. She could open the shutters a little at the back of the house, but opening any at the front would be risky. Lucky she’d thought to bring a torch and a chisel, in case she needed to force open a window.

At the back of the house was a bay with sash windows. The shutters inside were closed and locked. No easy way into the house there, but further around to the side of the house, high up – she would have to find something to climb onto – was a small window just big enough to squeeze through, as long as she was brave enough to go in head first.
Don’t worry about that
, she thought.
Concentrate. Be practical. Stay calm
.

She looked around… there was a wooden garden chair. She dragged it under the window and climbed up, balancing one foot on each arm of the chair. Standing on tiptoe she could just reach the window. There was no lock that she could see
and the catch looked old and fragile. Using the handle end of her chisel, she pushed hard on the window frame. To her amazement, the rusted metal catch gave way and the window creaked open.

She pulled herself up, pushing off with a foot on the back of the chair. It was a tight squeeze, but she managed to get the top half of her body through. There was no going back now and so she wiggled until she reached the tipping point and the weight of her body did the rest. She slithered through and fell, right shoulder first, onto the tiled floor below. It hurt a lot and she couldn’t stop the whooshing sound as the air was knocked out of her lungs.

For a split second she couldn’t catch her breath and felt light-headed. Then, once she could breathe again, she noticed the silence. There was no sound of an alarm, or footsteps running, or anyone calling out. She picked herself up and winced as she tentatively rotated her shoulder. It felt sore, but nothing worse.

She was in some sort of storeroom or larder and the door was open just a crack. She pulled it open wider. The door led out into a passageway
with other doors leading off it. She opened the first one to her left and found stone steps descending to the cellars. The damp musty smell rose up on the cool air and there was a brief scratching noise and the sound of scuttering feet. A faint, high-pitched chuntering sound. Rats?

She took the torch from her backpack and steeled herself to walk down into the darkness. Her back was rigid with apprehension. Fear that someone or something would slam the door shut behind her and lock it and she would be trapped. But she had to make sure Matthew wasn’t
anywhere
in the house, and that meant searching the cellars too.

They went on a long way. Dust lay thick everywhere and cobwebs crossed her path. She called out Matthew’s name as she searched, but there was no sign anyone had been here.

Back up the stairs in the passageway, she breathed a huge sigh of relief. It felt safer and less threatening up here. She checked all the other doors, but they just led to more cupboards, a downstairs loo and then the kitchen, which clearly hadn’t been used since that young policewoman, Emma, had made tea for her and Zac.

Claire shuddered as she thought back over the events of that night. Mum and Micky had been rushed to hospital – and treated for poisoning! Robert had been responsible for that, of course.

She remembered his hands around
her
neck that same night. Had he really tried to murder her too? It didn’t make sense, somehow; why would he want to kill her? Didn’t he need her and her ring to open the casket? To free the 21st spell that he believed would give him everlasting life?

Zacharie had saved her that night, and she’d thought him wonderful – the only one who was on her side. It had been her fourteenth birthday. A birthday she would never,
ever
forget. It seemed like an eternity ago; a lot longer than two years, anyway.

She steeled herself to open one last door… a much grander one at the far end of the passageway. She guessed it might lead into the hallway. She was right. Now she knew where she was and if she left the passageway door open, there was just enough light to see by. There was the fireplace and the stairs leading up to Robert’s study.

Her legs trembled and felt weak at the thought
of it. But she had to go up – because there might be something inside… some clue as to where he was hiding Matthew. She took each broad oak tread slowly, used the bannister rail to help pull herself up. Feeling its smoothness under her hand she thought how Margrat – her grandmother ten times removed – must once have done the same. And since she had read Margrat’s manuscript she had felt a strong connection with her and a kinship with Margrat’s maid, Martha, too. Martha, who had been loyal to Margrat even though she knew what her master, Nicholas Benedict, was capable of.

The study door was closed, but even standing outside she could smell the herbs and spices, the cinnamon and flowers. Potent still, as if Robert had burned his incense only that morning. She hesitated… maybe the door would be locked? But no, she was able to turn the handle and walk straight in. The shutters were closed and since the window overlooked the street she knew she couldn’t open them.

She switched on her torch. Flashed it around the room. It glinted off the glass bottles and cast shadows on the walls. The room felt unused.
Abandoned. Running her finger along the shelves left a trail in the dust.

She put the torch base down on the desk, so that there was a pool of light reflected off the ceiling. Then she sat down and methodically opened every desk drawer. Took sheaves of paper out and sifted through them. Looking for something…a clue to where Robert might be hiding Matthew. But if Robert owned other houses in London, there was no sign of where they might be.

Searching around the room, she noticed how meticulous his record keeping was; the walls
not
lined with bottles and jars held row upon row of account books, leather bound and detailing what seemed to be the sale and purchase of herbs and spices from a warehouse off Swan Alley. Records dating from the seventeenth century, when Margrat was alive. Swan Alley. She checked out the name using her phone’s street-view function. The warehouse was long gone… replaced by luxury flats. But she’d go and look, just to be sure.

Her torch beam flashed over some pictures hanging on the wall. Engravings of a grand house… she looked closer… La Maison Benoit,
Rue de Montmorency, Paris. A date… 1664.
Paris
, where Jacalyn lived. Could Robert have taken Matthew there? No, it was too far away. Too complicated. She would have to look it up though.

Now, what else was there of interest in the room? Loads more files and some recent accounts that listed the sale and purchase of antiques. But if he had a shop anywhere in London, Claire couldn’t find any mention of it. And there was no sign that he’d used a computer… no internet connection cable… nothing. Weird. How could you do business these days without a computer?

She was just about to leave, the torch dangling from her hand, when the torch beam caught something glinting on the carpet. She hunched down and picked it up. An earring. A diamond stud. It looked familiar somehow, but it wasn’t hers, or her mum’s, and Micky didn’t have pierced ears. Probably lots of people had studs just like it, though the diamond did have an unusual,
old-fashioned
setting. She pocketed it and went out closing the door behind her. Now she would check out the downstairs rooms. And she was feeling
much less scared. Less jumpy. It was clear Robert hadn’t been here for a long time.

Claire opened the shutters in the library enough to let in a little light. Nefertaru’s mummy case was still standing propped upright against the far wall, where it had been for over four hundred years. Claire couldn’t stop herself from going across and lifting the lid of the case and looking inside… at Nefertaru’s bony hand, with the third finger missing. She remembered how Robert had spooked her and Micky by telling them Nefertaru had been murdered for a ring just like Claire’s. He’d told them that Nefertaru – as a red-haired girl of just fourteen – had been charged with taking the casket and the 21 spells from Ancient Egypt into the afterlife.

Claire felt for her ring. She knew now that it had been stolen from Nefertaru. She looked at the mummy’s face. The skin was yellow and parched and stretched tight over the skull. She reached out to touch the dry tufts of red hair.

“You poor thing,” she whispered. “Were you happy to sacrifice yourself for the honour of taking the spells into the afterlife? Or did they murder you, after you fought it every step of the way?”
And as she spoke the words, a faint sparkle of silvery blue dust atomised on her breath and Nefertaru’s hair seemed suddenly lustrous and supple and springy under Claire’s fingers. And in her mind’s eye Claire saw Nefertaru’s skin grow soft and downy as an apricot.

In horror, Claire clamped her mouth shut and slammed the lid back on the mummy case. Robert hadn’t told her the full story of Nefertaru; she’d discovered that from Margrat’s manuscript. The poor girl had never made it to the afterlife with the casket, because of the most ridiculous mistake: the name on her case had been misspelled. And now it suddenly occurred to Claire. Supposing, just supposing she had enough power still inside her to bring Nefertaru back to life… What if she could correct the spelling? Could Nefertaru still take all the spells to the afterlife, where they would be safe for eternity?
But I don’t have Robert’s spells yet
, Claire thought.
And I have to save Matthew first
.

As she walked back along the Strand a plan started to form in her head. As she went down the steps into the tube station and onto the tube, as the train
rattled on through the dark tunnel, it began to take shape. By the time she was walking back up the hill towards Grandma’s house, it was almost fully formed. And it was really very simple. She would meet Robert on Thursday as he had planned. She would arrange to meet Joe there too, but tell him nothing until it was too late for him to try and stop her doing what she had to.

She would take the casket with her. And then once she had seen Matthew and made sure he was safe, there would be an exchange. Matthew for the casket. She could see it in her mind’s eye. But she knew that Robert would want
her
too. The casket was no use to him without her, because only she could open it. So at the point of exchange, she would have to be ready. It was risky.

She really did not want to go back to Grandma’s house. Mum wanted her to think of it as their home now, but to Claire it would always be Grandma’s. She dreaded stepping through the door, because every time she did, the atmosphere was so intense it wrapped itself around her like a heavy wet blanket, dragging her down. Making her feel weary to the bone. But there wasn’t a choice was there?