Dangerous Diana (Brambridge Novel 3) (21 page)

As she read, the familiarity of the book came flooding back, the half remembered images and text dancing on the page. She had read them a thousand times, at first to help her through her father’s death, and in the later stages to help her study and further her passion for plants.

But there was nothing there.

Not in the first book, nor the second book, or even the third.

There was nothing there apart from that which she expected to see. In the early hours of the morning as the embers of the fire died, she tried turning the books upside down and reading them backwards, hoping to see something she had missed. She took off her glasses and squinted at the pages, hoping that something would jump out. She looked at the page numbers to see if there was a code buried in them, even read each plant description again to see if they matched now that she had her own extensive plant knowledge.

There was nothing. Nothing, apart from a small exclamation mark on a page that highlighted the attributes of the
saxifraga longifolia
. Tiredly Melissa rubbed her eyes. She was not surprised about the exclamation mark. It was the Corona del Rey plant that her father had been exploring for when he died. Blinking she traced a finger over the beautifully drawn leaves. Only then did her tired eyes catch on the note written in the most minute of writing below the hand drawn rendition of the alpine plant. She gasped and moved closer to the fire. The words leapt out of the page. ‘
See diary’
was written in her father’s hand.

She had no diary. She had never seen a diary, nor heard of one that her father had written. He was more inclined to make small notes in books that he used.

Melisa scrabbled at the books on the desk, flipping through the pages. There were no more small notes, however, in any one of the books. They were as useless to her as the ones that she had used to weigh down her old press.

She swallowed, her throat dry, and a cold sweat broke out on her brow. There were three more books that completed the entire collection. The books she had used to weigh down her press. Books on animals that she had barely opened before, that her father had only kept because they had been authored by his colleagues.

Opening the bottom drawer again, Melissa knelt and pushed her head inside. She could easily see the rough wooden back of the drawer. There were no hidden depths.

It was the same with the rest of the drawers in the desk. Had Hades missed the books when he had collected them for reasons known only to himself? Had he already found the book that the Viper so readily wanted?

Please no.

That book was her only key to overthrowing the Viper.

CHAPTER 23

It was all a complete washout. Hades stared glumly out of the panes of glass that covered the small orangery to the side of Berale House. The rain fell in stair rods rat-a-tat tatting against the windows. The noise was thunderous. It suited his mood.

Nothing had gone to plan. He had re-entered the house to find Melissa had gone, and no one could find her. Once again she had run away. His feet itched to run after her but he had stayed, his mood somber. Not even Victoria and her bosom bow Agatha could raise a smile from him with their efforts to trip him up into revealing more about how he knew Miss Sumner.

Even the damn Dutch spy hadn’t showed. Bill had received a message from Renard to say that the man had disappeared from the boat as soon as it had rounded the point into Longman’s Cove. One of the crew hands had gone to rouse him from his cabin and found the small space empty.

Renard described the Dutch man as short, with a large red nose, and sandy-blond hair. He also hadn’t revealed much during the ship’s passage, nor seemed to be carrying any money with him.

Hades cursed. Renard didn’t normally lose people on his crossings. He was more famed for saving them, ferrying French émigrés across the channel for a new life in England. Hades picked up a pebble from the floor and threw it into one of the many flowerpots. It clanged as it fell to the bottom. He supposed Renard wouldn’t have been able to watch the man fully as he needed to keep up the pretense that he was working for France.

He picked up another stone and launched it at the pot. It hit the side with a crack and fell to the floor. Even his horse hadn’t been removed yet from the stables. He expected the knacker men that morning. They had sent word that they didn’t work on the weekend, and that they would arrive at Berale House on the Monday, today. The other horses in the stable were very unsettled. They didn’t like the smell of death, and even the stable hands were saying that the odor was becoming very pungent.

“Earl Harding?” Smythe, the Anglethorpe’s butler, peered his head around the door to the orangery.

Hades glanced up at him and scuffed his foot on the floor. “Yes Smythe?”

“There are some men at the door, sir.” Smythe’s face was more inscrutable than his own butler, Carter, but Hades could tell that something had created a bad smell under Smythe’s nose. “They are rather excited, sir, and ask that you join them.”

“And they are…?”

“Ah, sorry my lord. They say they are from William Knackers and sons.”

Hades nodded. So they had arrived. Good, then perhaps one of his tasks could be completed and he would return to London—when the rain had stopped.

Standing, he followed the butler to the front entrance hall of the house. Two men, their hats clasped in two hands in front of them, stood dripping on the oak floor.

“You be Earl Harding?” the elder man said, his face lined from exposure to sun, wind and rain. Hades nodded. “We’ve got something you should see.”

Hades sniffed. Suddenly his nose received a pungent whiff of what could only be described as glue. He coughed. Smythe gave him a sympathetic look. Now he knew what had caused the butler’s expression.

“It’s our work clothes,” the younger man said suddenly. “We can’t get the smell out. It ain’t worth trying to change clothes either. In one day they just get as smelly. The only way to get rid of the smell is to burn ’em.”

Hades nodded. The knacker’s job was a hard one, dealing with death, tanning and glue. All of these were long, hard, smelly, and thankless jobs.

“Now that we’ve addressed that, we’ve got something you should see, my lord.” The young man pushed his hat back on his head. The older man followed suit.

“I shall need…” Hades turned to address Smythe, but Smythe had already pulled a greatcoat out from under the stairs, as well as a large hat.

“I believe it is still raining, sir,” Smythe said dryly.

Hades nodded and took the proffered coat and hat. The coat smelled of wax and wet socks. It wasn’t any worse than the smell from the men, though. He jammed the hat on his head for good measure and turned back to the front door. “After you gentlemen.”

The rain was insidious. It was a relief to reach the stables. The horses were noticeably more quiet now that poor Acorn had been lifted onto a cart which stood near the front gates to the Berale House Estate.

“I was just driving the cart out to go to Ottery, see,” the older man said. “At a slow pace, mind so John could catch up.” Ah. William Knacker and
son.

Hades nodded. A small drop of rain slithered down and under the hat, causing him to shiver as it found a chink in his neck.

“He came running after me shouting to stop. I barely heard above the pounding of the rain.”

“What did you find?” Hades turned to John who waited silently.

“I think you had better come and see.” John led the way into the stables where Acorn had fallen. The floor was still covered in hay, and the smell from the dead horse was stronger.

“I’m not sure what I’m meant to observe?” Hades ducked down deeper into his coat, hoping that the wax and wet socks would overpower the stench of death.

Old William pushed open the stable door to allow the dull day’s light in. “Light the lamp, son,” he said, leaning against the door jamb.

John swiftly lit a small lamp that stood on the floor just at the entrance. He held it up with an outstretched arm and pointed into the hay. “You can go closer. We don’t think there is any danger now.”

Danger?
Hades stepped further into the stable, taking care to make his shadow stay off the hay. His eyes searched carefully through the hay as William and John waited patiently.

It was a flicker of the lamp that allowed him to see what John was referring to. Coiled in the hay was a snake, grey in color with dark brown markings down its back. Its broad, triangular shaped head and upturned snout lay to one side, the jaws open, and tongue lying partially out.

“It was underneath the horse. It probably didn’t survive being lain on,” John said dryly.

“Could it have killed the horse?” Hades moved closer, and with one toe prodded at the tail of the snake. He estimated it to be around twenty-five inches long.

“Dunno.” John closed his mouth with a snap.

“I’ve seen horses bitten by snakes before,” William said, straightening from his leaning position and rubbing his back. “They rarely die.”

Hades stood back from the snake in disappointment. But William wasn’t finished.

“I tell you one thing though,” he paused. Hades gritted his teeth and waited. “That snake ain’t from around here.”

Hades jumped as the snake uncoiled slightly in the hay, causing a rustling sound. Both William and John laughed.

“It’s still dead, my lord. Your prodding it with your toe probably undid the balance. What do you want doing with it?”

Hades pondered. Did the snake have anything to do with the unnatural death of his horse? It was better to be safe than sorry. He still had to interview the elusive Trump on the other side of Ottery St Mary who had entered the bet into the White’s betting book. If he was a member of the Royal Society and had an interest in animals as the meeting on Ibex suggested, then perhaps he might be able to identify the snake too. That was, if he wasn’t the Viper himself.

Hades’ head suddenly started hurting very badly. “There is an empty basket in the coach,” he said quietly. “I think you will find that the snake fits in it quite well.”

John left the stable unhurriedly and returned shortly with the small basket that the unfortunate Jeffries had left in the coach. Using a large stick, he pushed the dead snake into the basket, coiling the body this way and that until it was all in. The wicker lid fit nicely on top.

“Could a been made for a snake,” William remarked. He opened a pouch from his pocket and stuffed a wad of tobacco in his gums.

Hades nodded. With hands that trembled only slightly, he took the basket from John who handed it to him with a grin.

“Perhaps get yourself some gloves,” William remarked with a cackle. “Come on, John. It’s time we’re off.”

Hades winced and walked out with the two men to where the cart stood at the gates to Berale House. Mercifully there was a break in the clouds, and the rain had stopped for a few minutes. A small stoic, bedraggled pony stood in front of the cart looking neither left nor right.

Putting the basket gingerly on the floor, he pulled a sovereign from his pocket and handed it to John. Without these two men, he wouldn’t have found the snake. It would have been swept up with the stable hands and put out with the rest of the dirty straw.

John and William beamed him identical smiles and climbed up on their trap. “Pleasure doin’ business with you, sir,” William called as John shook the reins to wake up the pony.

Hades inclined his head and looked down at the basket on the floor. He needed to get that into the dry, fast, and work out just how he was going to approach Mr. Trump.

Henry greeted him at the door as he ducked under the porch out of the rain. “Smythe said that the knacker’s lads seemed to want you rather urgently. Is everything alright?”

“I think another piece to the puzzle might have fallen into place.” Hades opened the top to the basket. Henry looked in and blinked. “It’s a snake,” Hades explained. “It was underneath my horse Acorn when the knackers lifted the body onto the cart.”

|Henry frowned. “Snakes don’t often enter our stables, even though they are warm and dry.”

Hades shook his head. “Neither do your guests turn up with baskets donated by highwaymen that seem just right to accommodate a snake of such size.”

Henry raised an eyebrow. “You think the snake was put in your coach deliberately?”

Hades swallowed. If it had been and it was venomous enough to kill a horse, he and Freddie had had a very lucky escape. It didn’t bear thinking about too closely.

“It is a very elaborate way to attempt to kill someone,” Henry said, scratching his chin.

Hades tapped his boot against the hall table. Snakes, snakes, snakes. All he had thought about for the past few weeks had been snake strategies and the Viper. It couldn’t be coincidental that someone had left a snake for him. He stilled his foot. Had he met the Viper himself? Had the Viper been the highwayman that had escaped so easily up the banks of the road?

He cursed loudly and at some length. The Viper
had
followed him as he had suspected he might. To have been so near, and now yet so far. He wouldn’t recognize the man again. The mask had covered most of his face, and his hat was pulled down low over his head. There was something he had noticed though. The man had had incredibly hairy ears.

Hades rubbed his face hard. So what did he have left? Still no description of the man. He could be anywhere by now. That just left the lead of the Dutch spy and Trump. He had a description for the Dutch spy, but no idea where he had gone.

“Anglethorpe, can you put out a message to all your contacts and the local coaching inns to look for a man?”

Henry nodded. “Description?” he asked.

“He is short, has a red nose, and sandy blond hair. He may speak with a slight Flemish accent, although it is unlikely.”

“Is this your Dutch spy?”

“Yes. I have one more favor to ask. I believe I may need the services of Bill Standish again.”

“That’s easy enough to request. The man has been flittering round my sister like a bee around a honey pot. I believe he is already here in the morning room.”