Fever Quest: A Clean Historical Mystery set in England and India (The Isabella Rockwell Trilogy Book 2) (15 page)

Isabella was mute.

“And she liked you. You became more to her than just a
ticket to freedom.” Rose paused, the next words dredged up as if from the
bottom of her soul. “And that was the part I couldn’t bear.”

Inside her, Isabella felt a shifting and a loosening.

“But Livia loves you.”

“Livia loves me in the same way she loves a pair of old
slippers or a faithful dog. She
admires
you.”

“That was worth killing for?”

“I couldn’t bear for her to leave. I didn’t know how I
would cope without her.” Isabella rolled her eyes. Rose grasped her arm
tightly. “She’s been my family all my life in a way my own family never were. I
couldn’t handle life without her to tell me what to do, or how to do it.”

“How do you know if you’ve never tried?”

Rose’s red-rimmed eyes finally rested on Isabella’s face.

“At least let me know my own limitations.”

“What do you want me to say?”

“I want to ask your forgiveness.” There was a pause. “Not
now, not today, but maybe one day – one day in the future you might feel less
bad about me, and that would help me sleep at night.”

Rose ran out of breath. Then she pulled her sari’s extra
fold over her head.

“Are you going somewhere?” Isabella asked.

Rose nodded.

“If you’ll lend me the money, I will take the overland
coach to Bombay. I’ll pay you and Midge back. I’ll leave the money at the
British Residency. I’m sure you’ll pass through there eventually.”

Isabella nodded.

Rose walked back down the steps. She turned once to
Isabella.

“I’m sorry.”

Then she was lost in the shifting kaleidoscope of the
crowd.

There was a long silent moment in which time stretched out
in front of Isabella and behind her like a glittering, winding ribbon, and she
had a sense, just for a second, that there might be more to the actions she
took now than she could ever know. But it was only brief and then she lost it.
Rat pulled on the hem of her sari.

“What?”

Rat ran a few strides and looked back at her with his ear
pricked. The crowd below surged down towards the port. Her head nodded, almost
as if it was independent of her bidding, and Rat flew down the steps, his
narrow brown body scissoring through people’s calves until Isabella couldn’t
see him. She took a few hesitant paces after him, then a few more which were a
little surer. Finally she plunged into the torrent of sellers and passengers,
holding her head high above the others, calling for Rat. And for Rose.

It didn’t take long for her to spot Rose’s filthy maroon
sari hovering at the edge of the crowd. Isabella fought her way towards her.
Rose was trying to pull away but Rat had a firm hold of the bottom of her sari
and was nudging her with his body towards the wall that enclosed the alley,
hemming in the throng of people.

After using her elbows, Isabella finally reached them.

“Don’t be so bloody stupid.”

Rose blinked.

“What?”

“You don’t have to go.” Rose’s expression was hesitant, as
if she hadn’t quite understood what Isabella had said. “You can stay with us.”

“Why would you let me do that?” Rose’s voice was a
whisper, tears springing into her eyes.

Isabella took a deep breath.

“I know what it’s like to have a death on your conscience.
It’s the loneliest place in the world … And Abhaya used to say everyone
deserves a second chance.”

Rose’s face transformed as the colour and life flooded
back into it, and she pulled Isabella tightly against her ribby chest, so
Isabella could feel her heart fluttering like a trapped bird.

The sun was climbing in a hot, white arc. Isabella
pulled her white cotton scarf over her nose and mouth and squinted hard. Her
horse, who she’d bought in Bombay shifted beneath her, his long mane rippling
white in the breeze. They stood on a rocky cliff which looked over the plain
ahead of them. Far away, she could see the minarets of a city through the haze
on the horizon. She turned the horse around.

“I think it’s only a day’s ride, or thereabouts.”

“That’s what you said yesterday,” said Livia with a smile.

“And the day before,” said Rose.

“In fact, let’s face it, you’ve actually got no idea, Iz,
have you?”

Isabella laughed.

“We are going the right way, that is all I’m prepared to
say.” She’d attempted to keep her nervousness hidden from the others, but she
hadn’t slept properly since they’d been on the road, convinced at any minute
Stone or his soldiers would creep up on them. Thank heavens Rat didn’t seem to
need any sleep either. She’d often fallen asleep safe in the knowledge he was
awake. He would lie with his eyes closed, but the slightest whisper of wind or rustle
of leaves would cause them to open.

“He’s hearing things,” Rose would say with a smile.

More and more often, Isabella found Rose sitting up with
her and Rat. “It’s all right. You get some rest. I’ll keep watch.” At first
Isabella kept waking up, not entirely sure she trusted Rose not to fall asleep,
but each time Rose was still awake, stroking Rat or brushing his tail with an
old comb she’d found on the road. Soon she and Isabella were taking it in turns
to keep watch. Midge didn’t seem impressed.

“Why are you so worried? Stone couldn’t possibly catch us
before we get there. Don’t you think sailing from Masulipatam saved us time?”

Isabella was poking at the ground with a stick. It was
just before dawn and they had stopped to sleep under the roof of an old goat
shed set back from the road. Judging by the leftover food and the ash spread
around, they were not the only travellers with the idea.

Isabella looked east at the sunrise. The closer they got
to Lucknow, the more familiar to her the land became. It was drier and rockier
with crabbed, spiky bushes that grew close to the ground. They would find the
occasional stream in which they would bathe, but whose temperature made them
gasp as it still held the chill of the mountains in the north. It was very different
from the flat, green, humid soup of the south.

“I do,” she said finally. “But Stone won’t give up and I
would like to get to Lucknow as soon as possible. It’s easier hiding in a city
than it is on the road. Even if I do deliver the seeds, I am worried about
what’s going to happen to you afterwards. I just want to put as much distance
between him and us as I can.”

“I thought our disguise was quite good,” said Midge with a
smile.

Isabella looked at him. Both he and Livia had dyed their
hair so black it was almost blue. Their skin was burnished chestnut and they
were both lean and muscled from their hours on the road. Grey shadows under
Livia’s eyes hinted at a past illness, but otherwise she was well. Every time
Isabella became faint-hearted about the journey ahead, she had only to look at
Livia. Isabella had never seen a recovery like it, and it kept her heart and
feet steady.

“Well, I’m not sure you look native, but at least you
don’t stand out like a sore thumb.”

Midge pulled a face.

That had been three days ago. Yesterday the hills of the
north appeared and she’d known they were firmly on the right road. She felt a
fierce surge of pleasure on hearing the familiar dialect on the lips of other
travellers. How she had missed it.

“Come on.” She reined her horse away from the edge of the
rocky outcrop.

Rose was next to her. She’d taken to wearing men’s clothes
whilst they travelled and looked like one of the small, wiry post boys who
galloped helter-skelter through the region, a heavy box of mail balanced on
their shoulders. Her horse was brown and tough, like a leather shoestring, and
he suited her.

“Wait.” Rose urged her horse perilously close to the cliff
top. “What’s that?”

Her tone was sharp and Isabella’s head snapped around. It
must have been only nine in the morning, but the sun already sat in yellow
layers in the valley beneath them. A heat shimmer rose from the ground making
it hard to see anything distinctly, but far off, barely noticeable, Isabella
could see a small cloud of dust.

“Is it a dust storm?”

“No.” Rose hadn’t moved. “It’s riders.”

Isabella held her hand up to shield her eyes.

“Come on, Rose, it’s nothing to worry about,” called
Livia, turning her horse away.

Isabella, too, moved away, but then she stopped.

She could see them now, or, at least, she could see
something. This wasn’t an early-morning partridge hunt; they were riding as if
the gates of hell had opened behind them. And the lead horse was white. The
horse he’d ridden from the ship, the horse his servant had held for him at the dock.
The Arab with a coat like milk and an eye as glacial as Stone’s own. Arab so
she could travel long distances with no water.

“Did you ever see Stone’s horse?” asked Isabella in a dead
voice.

“Yes,” said Midge. “White. Horrible beast bit me.”

Isabella reined her horse away from the others so tightly
he nearly fell. She jammed her heels into his side and he leapt forward.

“Come on,” she shouted. “It’s Stone.”

They rode all of that burning day, their eyes grim over
their face scarves. The ground was hard and rocky and there was no shade. Twice
they stopped to water the horses in a stream that ran parallel to the road, but
by dusk the animals were stumbling with exhaustion.

“We can’t go any further.” Livia’s voice was firm. We must
rest. Stone will have had to stop too.” Isabella nodded too tired to speak.
“Look up there.”

Livia had undone her scarf, which left the bottom of her
face looking pale against her burnt and dusty nose and forehead. Isabella
wondered why she had worried so much about disguising Rose and Livia – no one
would recognise them now. Or her, for that matter.

She looked up to where Livia pointed. Against a deepening
blue sky a giant grey stone mosque crouched on a hill above them. It was a ruin
left over from the Middle Ages when Muslims had ruled this part of India. Two of the domed minarets had collapsed and some of the stonework had come away,
leaving toothy gaps in its turrets. The giant wooden door had long rotted away
from the black door arch, and tumbleweed blew against the marble columns
supporting the door arch.

Without speaking, Isabella turned her horse up the hill
and the others followed. They unsaddled and the horses rolled, groaning, before
folding their legs and resting their heads on the hard ground. There was no
food for them, but they had drunk their fill from the stream.

“I’ll keep watch,” offered Rose.

Isabella shook her head.

“No, let me. You sleep. We can only rest for a couple of
hours.”

“I could sleep for ever,” said Midge, rolling
himself in a square of fabric from the market. Within seconds his eyes were
closed, and Livia and Rose followed suit. Isabella wrapped herself in Abhaya’s
sari and leaned back against the stone of the mosque wall. It still held the
warmth of the sun, which seeped through her sari and relaxed her tight
shoulders. If they could get to Lucknow, they might finally be safe, though how
far that was, she couldn’t tell. She would make straight for the British High
Commission they’d take care of them all. Then Stone would have some explaining
to do. With a small smile she closed her eyes.

Rat’s growl was long and menacing. Isabella woke with
a start. The sky was pink and the morning star was setting in the west. She
rubbed her eyes and blinked. What time was it? Surely she hadn’t slept all
night? She was on her feet in a trice, but it was too late. The sound of hooves
on shingle was quite clear and it wasn’t their horses. They were tied up next
to the wall.

Rose woke and stood up. “Hurry, inside.”

As quickly as she dared, Isabella led the horses in
through the giant doorway. Midge and Livia scrabbled to their feet and followed
behind her. The mosque had been built facing the rising sun, and a soft shaft
of yellow light came through the door with them and fell on the black-and-white
mosaic floor. Isabella had hoped there would be a door on the far side from
which they could exit, but there was nothing except the wall, patterned with
turquoise and go

They were trapped.

A row of narrow windows lined another wall. Isabella let
the horses go, then took out the rifle she’d bought at Masulipatam. She aimed
it through one of the slits, fairly certain she could not be seen from outside.
Not unless anyone was looking for the tiny grey nose of a gun barrel.

“Get down,” she hissed.

Midge and Livia had pushed themselves up against the wall
next to her, but Rose had crouched down beside Rat and held a knife between her
teeth. Isabella gestured with her head and Rose tiptoed over to her. Isabella
stopped her breath, so all she could hear was her heart. Her arm would be steadier
that way.

Over the brow of the hill came Stone, his horse wide-eyed
with fear, her flanks heaving and dark grey with sweat. Isabella breathed and
then held it again. Up behind him rode four soldiers in scarlet, the brass ends
of their lances catching the morning light. Isabella took another breath, both
in and out, then steadied her arm. Her sights remained firmly trained on Stone.
If it looked for one second as though he might come inside the mosque, she
would shoot him.

From the corner of her eye she could see two more riders,
one clearly less comfortable in the saddle than his companions. She flicked her
eyes to him. It was Vritra. He was filthy, his loincloth was stained and he
looked far older than the last time they had seen him, with heavy trenches down
either side of his nose and mouth.

“That backstabbing liar,” Rose hissed under her breath.

Isabella nudged her to be quiet, and trained her sights
back on Stone.

“Who’s the other one?”

“I don’t know. He looks Indian,” replied Rose.

Stone had pulled up his horse and dismounted and was
leading it back down to the stream, his vicious spurs clanking as he walked.
For just a moment, Isabella risked a glance away from him to the other man,
whose face was partially covered by a dirty white scarf. He wore his light
rifle in a military fashion, though his clothes were mufti - a cream-and-grey
linen tunic and dhoti. On his feet he wore riding sandals, laced Afghan style.
But it was the way he sat on his horse that caught Isabella’s attention. He was
fluid and balanced and he dismounted by lifting one leg in front of him,
instead of behind. Once on the ground, he stroked his horse’s nose and rubbed
its ears with a gentle hand. Then he took off his scarf.

Isabella’s world dissolved around her.

I have to keep looking at him, because if I
don’t he might vanish.

He is my father and yet not my father. A person
everyone feared dead. Even I, though I hate to admit it, had my moments when I
thought they were right. To believe him dead seemed easier.

And yet here he is.

He’s taken Stone’s reins and Vritra’s too and he’s
unsaddling both horses. The horses shift and turn towards him, ears forward, as
he speaks to them. He’s always had a way with them. I loved how they all used
to barge each other in the corral so they could get a chance to stand beside
him, nipping each other if any one of them was there for too long.

He looks different, but then a year and a half is a
long time. He is thinner and his skin is even darker, as if he’s been living
outside. He has a beard now, as well as a moustache, but I can see the tiny
touch of red in the hair beneath each corner of his mouth. The last remains of
the Ireland he’d left so far behind.

Except for that, he appears native. Even to me. In
the same way I suppose I do to others. We could live as Indians, he and I,
disappear into this vast country and never be found. It is tempting. I could
just walk out now. Leave everyone. We could get on those horses and he and I
would be gone. No one can outride my father. Stone wouldn’t follow. He’d have
Midge, so why would he bother? We could just leave them all to it.

My father and I.

“Iz? Iz?” Midge’s increasingly worried voice. “Iz,
don’t fall apart on me now. What is it?”

“My father.” She thought she’d spoken, but no words had
left her lips. She tried again. Her tongue peeled off the roof of her mouth and
her heart resumed its beat. She was surprised it had not stopped altogether.

“Oh, Midge.” Tears filled her eyes in a moment. “The other
rider.” Her hands clawed at her mouth. “It’s my father.”

Midge’s face reflected all the horror and fear inside her.