Behind The Horseman (The Underwood Mysteries Book 3) (22 page)

Mrs. Trent met him in the hall, her face full of loving concern, “I’m so sorry, Reverend.  I had no choice but to let them in.”

“Let who in, Mrs. Trent?”

“The Penningtons.  They have been awaiting your return for hours.  I put them in the study.”

Oh, dear God!  Did he not have enough to trouble him, without adding Catherine’s in-laws to the brew?

He heaved a heavy sigh, then purposefully walked down the hall and opened the door.  Their eyes turned towards him, but he could not see one spark of warmth of pity towards him.  Their intention to leave his house with their grandson was writ plainly upon the determined features.  His own chin subconsciously lifted and his shoulders squared as though to assume a heavy burden.

“Good evening,” he said quietly, “I apologise for my tardiness.  Has Mrs. Trent provided you with refreshment?”

“We require nothing, sir,” said Mr. Pennington stiffly.

“Well, I’m afraid I do.  I have been out on the moors and I am chilled to the bone.  You will forgive me if I take tea.”

He rang the bell and presently Mrs. Trent arrived to be given her orders.  Nothing more was said until she returned bearing the tea tray, then the Penningtons watched in curious fascination as Gil went through his usual ritual of tea-making.  Neither had seen such careful preparation since their grandparent’s day.

Gil mixed the different sorts from the locked caddy with seeming indifference to their observation of his every move and presently sank back in his chair to relax and drink the china dish of tea, “I presume,” he began kindly, “that you have come to see Alistair?  I’m sorry to have to disappoint you, but he is presently visiting my sister-in-law and will not be home until tomorrow.”

Mrs. Pennington eyed him warily, not quite sure if he was being sincerely helpful, or merely mocking them, “We did not come here just to see Alistair, sir, but to have words with you.  You must know you have no moral right to keep the boy.  He should be allowed to come home with us.”

Gil gazed calmly at her over the rim of his cup, “Madam, it was never my intention to keep you from the boy, and please believe me when I say that you may visit as often as you desire, but Catherine left Alistair in my charge and that is how it will remain!”

“And what has that to say to anything?  We know nothing about you.  Catherine was a hot-headed, undutiful daughter …”

“I will brook no criticism of my wife, madam!” snapped Gil, with uncharacteristic vigour.

Her husband intervened, “We have no wish to speak ill of the dead, sir, so that subject will be left closed.  Instead, I insist you tell us how you intend to raise the boy.  You obviously know nothing of our faith, but in our care, Alistair will be placed in an excellent Catholic school …”

Gil was rarely rude to anyone, certainly not to guests under his own roof and he always deferred to age, but this was too much.  His harsh comment cut across Mr. Pennington’s tirade, “That is out of the question.  Alistair’s health is far too frail to withstand the rigours of a boy’s school, certainly for the foreseeable future.”

“And how do you intend to educate him?”  The tone was sarcastic, but Gil had a ready answer, “My brother and I will teach him between us.  Underwood spent twenty years tutoring at Cambridge, so I think you will find nothing amiss with his methods.  I myself will take care of his spiritual health.”

This momentarily wrong-footed the Penningtons, so the direction of the discussion veered off at an angle, “You have a moral duty to raise him in the faith of his father.”

“I think I have a moral duty to follow the last request of my late wife.”

Mr. Pennington grew heated in the face of Gil’s composure, “The boy was not hers to give to any stranger.  He is the child of our son!”

“I imagine it was just such evidence of your belief in ‘ownership’ which prompted Catherine to leave Alistair in my care, and not in yours, sir,” said Gil coldly, taking them both by surprise, “This is a child we are discussing, not a dog or a horse.  There will be no further prevarication.  When Alistair has had time to grow used to his loss, I shall speak seriously to him about the future.  Then he will be allowed to make his own decision as to whom he wants as his guardian.  You may be sure I will abide by that choice – I trust you will do the same.”

Mr. Pennington laughed harshly, barely able to believe what he was hearing.

“You are going to let the boy dictate to you?  What figure of authority do you think you will be to him?  You will bear a closer resemblance to a figure of fun.”

“I can think of nothing I should like more.  Alistair is a little boy who has, in the space of a few short years, lost both his parents.  Do you not think that far from imposing authority upon him, it behoves us to see that he does have a little ‘fun’?  God knows he’s endured enough tragedy to last a lifetime.”

This passionate entreaty meant nothing to the Penningtons, who had faced their own tragedy with a stoicism born of the belief that life was only to be lived as a preface to the eternal life to come, “It is easy to see you have no children of your own, Mr. Underwood.  Boys especially need firm handling.  Your way will see the child grow up wilful, dishonest and idle!”

Gil rose suddenly to his feet, “Now I have heard all I want to hear, and more!  You have encroached upon my time for long enough.  Alistair will be brought to visit you tomorrow, at the inn.  I have nothing further to add.  Good night to you both.”

With the study door held open for them to pass through, they could hardly refuse to leave, so they walked past him, heads held high.  Gil could not summon the energy nor the inclination to accompany them to the front door, so he left them to show themselves out and the last sound they heard from him was the slamming of the study door behind them.

*

CHAPTER TWENTY TWO

(“Dum Vita Est Spes Est” – While there’s life, there’s hope)

A sudden sharp pain in his chest brought Underwood half-awake and he struggled to open his eyes against the weight of utter weariness.  He had slept, but only fitfully, haunted by strange dreams, and even stranger aches and pains.  He had found muscles he did not even know he possessed.  He was stiff, but not as cold as he had been the night before.  When he glanced to the side, the reason became evident.  Cara was nestled against him, fast asleep.  The vision made him smile slightly.  She looked very pretty, her golden curls against her pink cheeks, ruddy in the dancing firelight.

It was borne upon him then that he could see her quite clearly – there was light in the cave.  Immediately he was fully awake and looking about him.  Three lanterns had been placed on convenient rock shelves, two more candles had been lit just above their heads, and the fire, far from sinking into embers as it should have been, was roaring and licking furiously against fresh logs.

No one else was there, but clearly there had been a visitor.  It was daunting to know they had been observed whilst they had been asleep – chilling, in fact.

Cara woke as he tried to extract his arm from beneath her body.  She sat up, yawning and stretching, “Hello.  Do you feel better?  You frightened me, I couldn’t wake you.”

“I’m so sorry.  The last thing I recall was having a devil of a headache.”

“Has it gone now?”

“Not really.”

“What about your cough?  You were hacking in the night – well, I suppose it was night.”

“Strangely enough, much better – though God knows why.  I should be dying of pleurisy having spent the night in this place.  Are you hungry?”

“Ravenous – what is there?”

“Plenty.  I have no wish to unnerve you, but we had a visitor whilst we were asleep.”

She shuddered, “Oh, heavens!  I don’t like that notion.”

“Nor do I.  I must endeavour to hold slumber at bay.  I need to find out which way our friend arrives.”

He was taken with a fit of coughing and the pain in his chest sharpened and stabbed.  Perspiration broke out on his forehead and Cara, watching him, realized that he had been exaggerating his recovery.  Concern was etched on her face as she studied him, listening with horror to his agonising spasm.  He sounded very bad and sleeping on a cold, stone floor, miles below ground with an open fire was not going to help him.

She handed him a drink of water when at last the paroxysm finally passed and asked quietly, “What are we going to do, Mr. Underwood?”

“Don’t concern yourself too greatly, my dear.  This cannot go on for much longer.  The man wants us here for some reason and he is sure to come out of hiding soon.”

His words proved startlingly prophetic, for at that moment a voice shouted from the shadows, booming and bouncing off the walls and roof, making it impossible to determine the precise direction from whence it came, “Good day to you, Mr. Underwood, you slept well I trust?  Underground, Underwood!  That’s very funny!  And judging from the state of your health it won’t be long before you are underground permanently.  It wasn’t the cough that carried him off, but the coffin they carried him off in!”  The jeering had a cruel edge to it and Cara shivered, creeping closer to her companion.  She thought he sounded insane, and that frightened her more than anything else.  A sane man might be reasoned with, but a lunatic would have no compunction about torturing or killing them.

Underwood was more alarmed than he cared to show.  It took a moment for him to recover his wits sufficiently to reply.  Making a valiant effort to stifle any further coughing, he called back, “Who are you, and what do you want?”

“Revenge, Mr. Underwood.  Sweet, sweet revenge.  The dish that’s best served cold.  And you are cold, aren’t you?”

“Against myself, I assume?”

“Oh yes!”

“Then kindly take the young lady out of here and restore her to her friends.  She can have no possible connection with myself – and whatever ill service it is you imagine I have perpetrated against you.”

“Imagine?  You are a callous creature, aren’t you, Underwood?  You trample your way through life, pushing aside anyone who gets in your way, not caring for the damage you do and the pain you inflict.”

Underwood, who considered himself the most caring of men, was irritated beyond measure by this cavalier description of his character – especially coming, as it did, from a man who had assaulted and terrified a pregnant woman, and abducted another, causing her a painful injury.  Added to this he was tired, uncomfortable and feeling decidedly unwell.  He was not about to use his words with caution, “You snivelling little coward!  If you were half a man you would show yourself and have this out face to face, instead of lurking in the shadows like some medieval assassin.  If you think I have done you some injustice, then fight me and cease to frighten helpless women with your games!”

“You don’t deserve a fair fight – you deserve the pain caused by my actions, as I have suffered the agony inflicted by yours!  I lost my father and one of my sisters thanks to your meddling.  Another is trapped in a miserable marriage to a man not fit to wipe her boots.  I’m reduced to penury, living on another man’s bounty, with a whore for a mother.  Do you really think that merely smashing your face to a pulp will repay me for all that?”

Underwood racked his brains – who the devil was the man?

Suddenly, with a clarity which stunned him, Underwood knew who his adversary was and the knowledge frightened him deeply. 

He was not dealing with a man, who could see things with a measure of maturity and some of the sense which the years bring; he was facing the anger of a boy, seventeen or eighteen years old and with all the selfishness that youth bestows.  A spoilt, petty, cruel boy, who could only see the world from his own self-centred point of view, who only cared how things affected him, and whose early years had giving him a grounding in maiming and death on the hunting field which had effectively desensitised him to the pain and suffering of others.

He was about to call out the name, but some instinct stopped him.  No, better that the boy thought him ignorant for the moment.

“I have no idea what you are talking about.  I have never wreaked the chaos you describe upon anyone.  I have merely done my duty.  If the crimes I have exposed have rebounded upon their families and friends, then I am of course, sorry, but the sin was not mine, nor the fault, but their own!”

This was digested in silence.  Underwood waited a moment, then continued, in a calmer and kinder tone, “Whoever you are, you cannot wish to hurt Lady Cara.  Do not, pray, compound your error by including her in this.  She has nothing whatever to do with our quarrel.”

“I won’t leave you here alone with that madman,” she whispered fiercely.  He laid a hand on her arm to quieten her, “You will do as you are told, young lady!”

There was no reply.  The man in the shadows was gone.

*

The gossips in the Pump-rooms were being presented with an abundance of information and as a result the whispers were flying.

The joint disappearance of Underwood and Lady Cara Lovell was being viewed as an unprecedented scandal and there was horrified condemnation that a married man of mature years could run off with a pretty young thing, leaving his wife about to give birth to his child.  Those who knew Underwood spoke hotly in his defence, but it made little difference.

It was no help at all to the Underwood reputation that the Penningtons were being vociferous in their bitterness toward the vicar, using the loss of their only grandchild to gain the sympathy of the populace.

The arrival of the earl added fuel to the elopement rumours, particularly when he went about the town with a thunderous frown and snapped viciously at anyone who dared to broach the subject of his daughter.  The various expeditions to the moors were seen as nothing more than a pretext to cover the eventual return of the runaways.  Naturally a man in the earl’s position was not going to admit that his daughter had become the mistress of a married man.

The advent of the very next coach into town provided even more salacious enjoyment for those so inclined.  It seemed Underwood had found a moment, in his last busy day in Hanbury, to write a letter to the Constable of Stockport, asking for the address of the parents of a certain Cassandra Millbanke.  That gentleman, aware, as were half the town, of the searches instigated by those same loving parents, had taken it upon himself to tell them of their daughter’s whereabouts.

When they alighted from the coach outside the White Hart, Cassie was just walking by on her way back to her lodgings.  The ensuing scene was heart-rending, according to several interested onlookers.

The elder Milbankes’ joy could not help but be tempered by the shock of realization that though their child was heavily pregnant, she wore no ring upon her finger.

There were several exchanges, varying between happiness and recrimination.  Cassie’s mother caught sight of her first and her anguished cry of recognition brought the attention not only of the girl, but her husband and several passers-by.

Cassie had the look of a startled deer, then gathering her wits, she began to run, but her father caught her before she reached the street corner, “Not another step, young lady,”  he said, swinging her around to face him, and at the same time causing her grip on her cape to loosen so that the garment fell open.  Mrs. Millbanke gasped at the evidence of her own eyes and cried, “Oh, Cassie!”

The young mother-to-be lifted her chin in a defiant gesture which made her father long to strike her, “Well?  If I am to have a baby, what has it to do with you, pray?  I’m a grown woman and I can take care of myself.  Have I asked for your help?  Have I complained to you of my predicament, or come home and embarrassed you before your friends?  No, I have not.  Get back on the coach and go away!  You hated Godfrey, and if you hated him, then you must hate me too.”

Mr. Millbanke was preparing himself to answer her with equally harsh words, when his wife glanced about them and realized, with barely concealed horror, that they were being closely observed by a rapidly expanding group of curious onlookers.  She plucked nervously at her husband’s sleeve and he glanced down at her with irritation, “What is it?” he demanded.  She cast her eyes towards their audience and he grew red as he began to understand her distress, “We will continue this inside, Cassie,” he said, in a tone which brooked no argument.  They retired to the inn.

The Millbanke family had held everyone’s attention so fully that it was not noticed that another newcomer had also stepped from the coach that day.  He had given the reunited parents and child no more than a cursory glance before picking up his valise and going on his way.  He carefully chose an inn which was down a quiet back street, then, leaving his baggage in his newly acquired room, he made his way across the main square to the Pump-rooms.  There was nothing particularly curious about this behaviour.  The waters were what Hanbury was famous for, and most people found themselves in the Pump-rooms sooner or later.  This gentleman, however, looked to be in the rudest of health, and though he happily paid his fee to enter the spa, he, like Underwood before him, made no attempt to take the water.

When he entered through the ornate doors, many heads turned, as they always did – curiosity was the lifeblood of the pump-rooms – but only one person showed any hint of recognition.

Ophelia Knight, with Elliott on her left and Wyndham-Rogers on her right, watched, ashen-faced, as the strange gentleman made his determined way across the room towards her.  As he neared her, his hand reached out for hers, “Ophelia, my dear, we meet again.”

She opened blue-tinged lips and tried to speak, “Fabian…” The name died on her tongue and both her companions looked askance at her.  Aware that she was going to have to perform some sort of an introduction, she moistened her suddenly dry mouth by swallowing deeply, and said hoarsely, “Mr. Wyndham-Rogers, Captain Thomas Elliott, allow me to present Mr. Fabian Woodward, an old friend of mine…”

Woodward raised a cynical brow, “Friend?  Is that really how you wish to remember our relationship, Ophelia?  I would have said something very different.”

If it were possible, Ophelia grew paler.  Jeremy James, who was well within earshot, turned to Swann, “Sweet Ophelia may be able to see into the future, my friend, but she didn’t see that coming!”

Swann, who did not like Ophelia any more than the other Wablers, and spent most of his time trying to wean his comrade Elliott away from her, sniggered unkindly, “Dashed if she did!”  He made no attempt to lower his voice and Ophelia cast him an anguished glance, before returning her pleading gaze to the newcomer.

“Do you think we might have this conversation elsewhere, Fabian?”

Fabian cast his hat, coat, and stick onto a convenient bench, then seated himself and began to pull off his gloves, one finger at a time, as though he was enjoying making her await his response.  The gloves off, metaphorically as well as actually, he crossed his legs negligently and smiled at her, “My dearest one, why should we do any such thing?  Do not tell me that you have suddenly become ashamed of our association?  That was not the impression you were inclined to give me in the past.  On the contrary, you have always insisted that the subterfuge was on all my part.  How many tedious quarrels have I been forced to endure, whilst you listed my shortcomings, insisting that I was too afraid of convention to break with my wife and live in unmarried bliss with your own sweet self?”