Abbeyford Inheritance (20 page)

It was wild and lonely near the crumbling, desolate ruins. The wind whipped through the broken-down building, howling mournfully. It was eerie and forbidding. Adelina shuddered.

“Stay here, Adelina. I'll take a look.” Wallis dismounted and stood a moment to load his shotgun. He did not go inside the ruins but climbed up on to a low wall. Then she noticed that he was beckoning her to join him. Swallowing the fear which rose in her throat at being so close once more to the ruins which evoked such horrific memories, Adelina dismounted and moved towards him. Without speaking, he gave her his hand to help her climb the low wall to stand beside him. Clinging to his arm she stood on the precarious, crumbling stonework and looked into the ruins. Wallis pointed and in the farthest, darkest corner she saw something move. She narrowed her eyes and gasped as, all at once, she realised there were two mangy, wild-eyed dogs in the corner – though to Adelina they looked more like wolves.

“They are
tethered
!” Wallis said in a low voice. “Can you see the rope tying them to that ring in the wall?”

“
Tethered
!” Adelina repeated in a shocked whisper. Then, as she realised the full implication, horror-struck, she added, “You mean – someone had them and – and – let them loose on your sheep?”

Wallis nodded grimly. “It looks very much like it. It's what I expected. Stand down now, Adelina.”

“What are you going to do?”

“Shoot them,” he replied bluntly.

Adelina climbed down from the wall and stood watching him as he raised the shotgun to his shoulder. There was a loud report which echoed through the ruins and one of the dogs fell dead. The other immediately began barking frenziedly, straining at its leash in wild terror. Seconds later, Wallis steadied his gun again. A second shot rang out and the dog ceased its barking, swayed and fell.

Slowly Wallis lowered his gun. Then he stood looking at the dogs for a moment. He turned and jumped down from the wall. Together they walked into the ruins. They stood over the dogs. They were indeed the ones which had savaged the sheep, for their rough hair coats were matted with blood and scraps of sheep's wool clung to their jaws. There were also a few tell-tale bones scattered nearby as if they had carried off a lamb or two to their hiding-place.

Adelina turned away, sick at heart, and went back to their horses. She watched Wallis anxiously as he walked towards her. His face was twisted with fury. His shoulders were rigid and his hands clenched. “The dogs were obviously unleashed amongst my sheep on purpose.” He spat out the words. “It was planned – all planned!”

“Unless someone has caught them since and tied them up here for safety,” Adelina suggested, clinging desperately to the hope that it had not been a deliberate act of vengeance.

He shook his head. “ No, it was deliberate.”

Adelina was forced to agree that he was right.

The slaughter of the sheep was the beginning of a campaign of hatred against Wallis Trent. His enemies were unseen and unknown. Whoever they were they came stealthily in the dead of night. There was a tense atmosphere of distrust throughout the village. Each villager suspected his neighbour, whilst Wallis believed that the whole village was involved in this war against him as an employer, but, above all, as a member of the hated Trent family, for no hand was laid against Abbeyford Grange and Lord Royston. The trouble was confined to Abbeyford; there was no sign of unrest at Amberly or at any of the other adjoining estates.

The vendetta went on for weeks and then months, right through the summer, and the tension mounted. Abbeyford was a village of unhappy, frightened people. Adelina mentally listed the damage caused and felt helpless to do anything. Fences were smashed and hedges torn up so that cattle escaped and wandered away. Wheels would come off farm-wagons without reason, causing a deal of damage to Wallis's vehicles. Jupiter went suddenly lame. And poaching reached frightening proportions.

One afternoon in early September, Adelina was riding Zeus through the wood behind the Manor when she heard a horse's thudding hooves behind her. Startled, she turned to see Squire Trent galloping towards her through the trees. He pulled hard on the reins and his horse halted abruptly beside her. It tossed its head and stamped angrily at its rider's rough treatment of it. Zeus, too, became restive.

“Whoa there, boy,” Guy shouted and grinned broadly at Adelina.

Adelina smiled warmly at him. “ Shall we ride a little way together?” she offered.

“I'd be honoured, my dear. If you'll permit me, I'll show you something worth your while. You like a bit of sport, eh?” His eyes were feverishly bright. Adelina hesitated.

“Come on,” he said and spurred his horse forward. Adelina followed, a little reluctantly.

As they reached the edge of the wood, Guy Trent said, “ We'd best leave the horses here, Adelina.”

“Why?”

“It's all right. You're safe with me. But we must go quietly, we don't want to be seen.”

“I don't understand you. Where are you taking me?”

“To the abbey ruins.”

“No!” Adelina cried out. “ I won't come.”

“It's all right, my dear,” he said again. “I just want you to see a sport the village menfolk enjoy.” He pointed. “Look, several are making their way there now. Only we mustn't be seen. We must stay here in the trees until all the men are inside and then we'll creep up and watch from a place I know where they can't see us. Don't worry – I often come, but I always take care they don't know I'm there.”

“But what is it?”

“You'll see. I want it to be a surprise.”

They waited some time, watching from the shelter of the trees as men from the village arrived in twos and threes and slipped into the abbey ruins.

“There – I can't see anyone else coming. Come on. Follow me and don't make a noise whatever you do.”

Adelina, still wary, followed Squire Trent. He skirted the ruins and went round to the opposite side from that overlooking the valley. They climbed a small bank at the top of which were some bushes growing against a wall which was not so badly broken down as some of the others. Guy pushed his way through, holding the branches aside for Adelina. They came up against the wall.

“Here, over here,” he whispered, and Adelina saw him crouching down to peer through a peephole in the wall. Curiosity overcame her doubts and she crouched down beside him. Below them in the abbey, in what had once been one of the larger rooms, about twenty-five to thirty men were gathered. The rubble had been cleared away from the ground and they were all standing in a circle with a clear space in the centre.

At first Adelina could not think what it was they were going to do. Then on either side of the ring she saw two men each holding a fine cockerel. On the cocks' feet were fitted metal spurs. The birds were struggling to free themselves, but the men held them fast, whilst a third man went round the others taking money from them.

Adelina put her mouth close to the squire's ear and whispered, “What are they doing?”

In turn he whispered to her. “ Cock-fighting. The man in the middle taking money is taking bets on which will be the victor. I fancy the one on the left. Look at those legs! He'll tear the other one to pieces.”

Adelina was not quite sure what he meant or exactly what was going to happen until she saw the fight begin. The man in the centre of the ring completed his bet-collecting and then the two cockerels were released. In a wild flurry of beating wings, necks outstretched, the cocks flew at each other. Their sharp, pointed beaks pecked viciously at each other's head and neck. Then, one backed off a little and then surged forward. His wings flapping and both feet clear of the ground, he aimed the metal spurs straight at his opponent's chest. The wounded cock staggered. Adelina clapped her hand to her mouth to still a horrified scream which threatened to escape her lips. It was not that she was squeamish, but the bloodthirsty attack was so unexpected.

“Come on, come on,” Guy urged in a whisper, for the wounded cock was the one which he had thought would win. Adelina glanced at him. His eyes were bright with excitement. He ran his tongue over his dry lips.

The noise from the watching men below was deafening. They were shouting or cursing whichever cock they had backed. Again the first cock made another lunge towards the already bleeding one, but he dodged away at the last moment, so that the assailant fell on to the ground instead, momentarily losing his balance. Taking swift advantage, the other cock flew at him from behind and mounted his back, digging in his spurs. The shouts increased as the fight swung this way and that, with first one bird seeming the strongest, then the other. All the time the watchers – all except the two hidden in the bushes – shouted encouragement.

At last the fight was over when one of the cocks lay, a bleeding mass of feathers, upon the ground. The other could hardly be said to strut proudly, for it staggered around hardly able to stand either.

Squire Trent nodded with satisfaction. “ There, I told you that one would win. Wish I'd had a sovereign on it. Good fight, wasn't it?”

Adelina shuddered. “I suppose so, if you like that sort of thing.”

He looked at her in surprise. “I thought you liked a bit of sport. You joined the Hunt.”

She grimaced. “I joined the Hunt for the riding and the social gathering. I can't say I relish the kill very much.”

“Oh, well, I'm sorry I brought you then,” he said huffily.

“I'm glad to have seen it,” Adelina tried to placate him. “Thank you for bringing me. I heard tell George Washington used to enjoy the sport.”

“Really?” the squire said, somewhat mollified.

“What do we do now?”

“Wait until they've all gone before we leave or we'll risk being seen.”

But the village men showed no sign of dispersing. In fact, the atmosphere became quieter, more serious, as if, the sport over for the day, they now had business to discuss. They talked amongst themselves for some five minutes whilst Squire Trent grumbled. “Whatever are they playing at? Why don't they get off home? They don't usually dally once the fight's done. Can't understand it …”

At that moment his whispered mutterings were cut short by the arrival through the broken, stone archway of another man. Squire Trent's mouth dropped open and his eyes bulged in surprise. Adelina, tired of watching through the peephole, was now sitting with her back against the wall just waiting until her companion should give the word that all was clear for them to leave. She saw the strange expression upon his face and sat upright again.

“What is it?” she hissed.

He put his forefinger to his lips and Adelina was surprised to see that his hand trembled. Mystified and intrigued she twisted round to see the cause. She almost cried out as she recognised the man who had just come into the ruins and now stood on a low wall some three feet high so that he could address the other men and be clearly seen and heard by them.

“Evan,” Adelina whispered hoarsely. “It's Evan Smithson!”

Squire Trent nodded soberly. “I wonder where the devil he's sprung from again?”

A shadowy incident, just out of reach of her conscious mind, seemed to flicker across Adelina's memory, as if she ought to know and yet she could just not remember …

Evan was speaking now. Squire Trent and Adelina bent forward, their faces close together, to listen. There was something ominous about this meeting of the village men, and both were anxious to learn what it was.

“My friends,” Evan was shouting, spreading his arms wide in a gesture of grand eloquence. “ I have come here today to show you that I am alive. I left Abbeyford – vowing never to return. But, my friends, I kept thinking of you all under the whip of that tyrant, Wallis Trent. So I came back.” He grinned. “ I have been back several months!” And Adelina knew instinctively that Evan Smithson had been behind the mysterious happenings against the Trents. “You all know I have reason enough to hate him and his kind,” he was saying. “And so have you, if you think on't.”

He prodded his forefinger towards the men. A low murmuring ran amongst them. “He doesn't care if you work yourselves into an early grave, or if you've a roof over your head or enough food in your bellies, or whether your children run barefoot and shiver in winter and die of starvation.”

The murmurings grew louder.

“Does he put more money in your pocket, my friends? He's lining his own whilst you starve. Does
his
family live on a diet of rye bread, potatoes and skim-milk? No, his son will eat meat every day, if he wants. When did your children last eat
meat?
”

“We share a pig now and again,” someone muttered, but Evan, if he heard, ignored the remark.

“And so, my fellow peasants, I say it is time for revolution. It is time we stood up for our rights as human beings instead of being slaves to the gentry. The whole country wants Parliamentary reform. We want the Corn Law abolished.”

The cries of assent rang through the crumbling walls, and Adelina and Guy Trent exchanged a look of deep anxiety. Only one voice tried to bring a note of sanity. “Aye, but Trents is cattle-farmers. This 'ere Corn Law won't mek no difference to us.” But he was quickly silenced.

Evan's tirade was relentless. “ Last week I went to a meeting near Manchester – at Peterloo – only about twenty miles from here. A peaceful meeting it was, of farm labourers from hereabouts and men from the cotton mills too. It wasn't intended to be a riot or a rebellion. Men took their families, their wives and little children – even babes in arms. But what did the magistrates do? They called out the yeomanry, who charged amongst the people, killin' and maiming. I tell you, my friends, if you could 'ave seen the sight afterwards – the field was littered like a battlefield. Men wounded and dying, women trampled by the horses, children orphaned in the space of a few seconds, crying pitifully. It was a massacre, a bloody massacre!”