Dangerous in Diamonds (28 page)

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Authors: Madeline Hunter

Tags: #Historical romance, #Fiction

BOOK: Dangerous in Diamonds
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“I am under no obligation to share any explanation with you. It was not
your
coach and servant that I stole. In fact, I think that I am the one due some courtesy regarding explanations. What are
you
doing here?”
“I followed you. Did you think I would not?”
“Of course I thought you would not. There was no reason in the world for you to do so.”
“That is not true.”
“Oh, forgive me. That is right, how stupid I am being. The infamous wicked rogue had not completed his seduction. Well, I hardly expected you to travel all over the realm to have your way. I had no idea you were so spoiled that you would go to the ends of the earth to have a woman who had caught your eye, if she dared slip out of your grasp.”
“I do not have to have my way with every woman who catches my eye, Daphne. Just you.”
Her indignation drained away when he said that. A deep ache grew among the confusion of emotions that replaced it, however.
Oh, Your Grace, we neither of us truly know what we have in the other
.
“How did you even find me?” She struggled not to reveal the poignant reactions making her melt. She had made a terrible muddle of this and would pay dearly now, with her heart if not her privacy.
“I asked Miss Johnson where you had gone. When she gave me the name of the village, I guessed the rest.”
She dared not respond. She would not assume what he meant by “the rest.”
His dark eyes let her wonder for a while or perhaps waited for her to explain the rest herself.
He extracted some papers from his coat pocket and handed them to her. She looked down at four pages from a pocket map, marked and noted and well creased from careless handling. She saw the one that had brought him to The Rarest Blooms and also the one with this cottage’s location explained.
“I guessed that the tenant of one of those spots of land I inherited had gone to visit the tenant on another of them,” he said. “You had shown some interest in the others. I thought that perhaps you had come to investigate, but I know now that you lived here, after you left Becksbridge’s household, during those years when you told the world you had been married and following the drum.”
“Then you know enough already, it appears.”
He took the pages from her and put them back in his pocket. “Not why you came here now, at such a dangerous time. You are not a stupid woman.”
“Perhaps I came because I thought it was a place where you would not find me.”
She felt cruel as soon as she said it, even though he did not appear insulted. She decided to add enough so that perhaps enough would indeed be enough. “I worried for my old friend. Because of the danger. Also, I thought she might be concerned, as I was, after Becksbridge died, that perhaps her future was too uncertain. I came to reassure her and to bring her back with me if I could not.”
He took that in thoughtfully.
“Is your inquisition finished?” she asked.
He looked at her, and in his eyes she saw more honesty and more kindness than she had ever seen.
“I would say that is enough, Daphne. For now.”
 
M
argaret politely invited Castleford to join them for their midday meal. To Daphne’s dismay, he accepted.
They ate in her tidy dining room off mismatched china plates. Being the daughter of a gentleman had mattered, Daphne had realized. Mrs. Joyes had lived better than Mrs. Rolland these last years. Becksbridge had given none of them more than he thought their birth deserved.
Castleford made conversation. He did not pry, but he managed to learn enough of Margaret’s history to confirm that she had been a servant in Becksbridge’s household.
“So the two of you became friends there,” he said.
Margaret’s smile froze.
“Yes,” Daphne said. If one of them had to lie, she would be the one to do it. Margaret had not asked for any of this trouble. Nor did she feel guilty for her response. If the duke wanted to pry still, they owed him no explanations.
“Mrs. Rolland, do you have any idea how many people went to Manchester today?” he asked, changing the subject.
Margaret regarded him skeptically. “Are you asking as a member of the government?”
“I am asking as a man who finds himself in a village all but emptied of men and even women. If all the villages are like this, that would mean there is a very large crowd in the city.”
“Many thousands,” she said. “There will be no cotton woven today.”
“Such a crowd can be perilous in itself. Why would the women go?”
“They work in the mills, don’t they? They go for themselves and their men and their children’s futures.”
Daphne recognized the little fires in Margaret’s eyes. They had been burning ever since she arrived. Margaret had a good heart and sympathized with her neighbors’ plight.
“You should know, Your Grace, that I support the principles behind this demonstration. I do not work in a mill, but I know many women who do. I am very good friends with some of them,” Margaret said.
“Do you know any of the ones who formed friendly societies?” he asked.
“Some. Those are only social groups, however. They have nothing to do with—”
“Mrs. Rolland, everyone in the government knows that the friendly societies are frauds, created to get around the restrictions of the Combination Acts that prevent workers organizing themselves. That is true for the ones formed by men, and presumably for those formed by women too.”
“I’ll not be agreeing with you in words, if that is what you want, Your Grace.”
“I do not expect you to betray your friends. I am just curious about how many there are. I know of the ones in Royton and Blackburn.”
“There are others. You must be very curious, if you know some of the towns with such women’s societies.”
“It is unusual. The unusual often piques my interest.” He glanced at Daphne. “Mrs. Joyes can tell you how that happens with me.”
“Mrs. Joyes thinks that a better conversation might be your inheritance from Becksbridge, Your Grace,” Daphne said. “Just as you are curious about these societies, Mrs. Rolland is very curious about her place on this property. Or should she wait for Tuesday to ask you about it?”
Castleford appeared not to hear her. His attention had been distracted. His awareness shifted away, totally and rudely, halfway through her little speech.
He realized he had done it and forced his concentration on her again. Mostly.
“Becksbridge’s legacy,” she prompted. “Mrs. Rolland is very interested in your intentions. Since you are here now, perhaps you will reassure her—”
She lost him again. Thoroughly. This time he rose and went to the window. It was ajar, but he opened it fully and went very still.
Margaret looked at her and shrugged. Daphne waited to learn the reason for this strange behavior.
“Excuse me, please.” He strode from the chamber.
Daphne hesitated briefly, then hurried after him. Margaret followed. They found him outside in the front garden, looking west.
“Listen,” he said. “Can you hear it?”
She and Margaret exchanged bewildered glances. Then she tried to hear whatever it was he spoke of.
It took a while. At first she thought she imagined it and heard only because she wanted to hear something. It seemed an almost inaudible rumble came to her on the breeze. Or perhaps through the ground.
It sounded a little like London. A chaos of people and noise. It seemed to grow while she concentrated.
They stood there, the three of them, motionless, until there could be no denying that noise because it no longer was far away but pouring down the lane.
“Damnation.” Castleford glared toward the empty road. “Get inside, both of you.”
Daphne hesitated.
“Go,”
he commanded. “Bar the door and let no one in. I will be back soon.”
He strode to his horse and swung up. Daphne returned to the cottage and joined Margaret at a window.
Castleford had not ridden away yet. Instead he reached into a bag and removed a pistol. He fished out powder and a ball and loaded the gun while his horse waited for a command.
It came soon enough, and the duke galloped away.
 
 
C
astleford rode toward the noise, shamefully glad to have something important to do that kept him from ruminating on Daphne’s history and all the questions now demanding answers. Since the only answers his mind was producing were unpleasant, it had been hell to sit there being polite when he wanted to drag her to privacy and find out the truth for certain.
With each minute the chaos grew louder until its parts finally became distinct. Shouts. Cries. Voices. And beneath it all, the low thunder of feet on the move.
Soon he faced the first of them, the ones still running even though they were miles from the city.
A young man stopped to catch his breath. He noticed Castleford and his eyes widened with alarm.
Castleford trotted his horse over. “You have nothing to fear from me. What has happened?”
“Army and yeomanry,” the young man gasped, bending, hands on his knees while he caught his breath. “There’s people dead and more wounded, and they are arresting who they can. Was calm enough, for all the size of it. Then the army came, and—” He shook his head. “Was terrible to see and desperate to be in. There was no place to go, there were so many. I thought we’d all trample each other before we got out.”
He moved on, walking now, as if in speaking of it he realized he had reached safety. Castleford moved his horse forward.
More people now. Some angry and looking to fight, others terrified, others so dejected they wept. He kept to the side of the road and watched them file past, filling the road, aiming for their towns and villages and homes.
There were wounded among them. A woman with blood on her skirt limped amid the stream, aided by a man. The crowd jostled her and the man lost hold and she went down. The feet kept coming. Some stepped over her, but more did not.
Castleford pushed his horse into the river of bodies. “Give her to me,” he said to the man.
The fellow looked up the horse’s mass and at its rider and hesitated.
“Give her to me, you fool. I will get her to safety.”
The man picked her up, lifted her, and helped her sit behind the saddle.
“You can follow,” Castleford said.
“She ain’t mine. I’ve no idea who she is.” With that, the man joined the exodus.
“Is your husband here?” Castleford asked over his shoulder.
The woman’s head lolled against his back. “He be back there in the city. On the ground. Dead, maybe. He told me to run.”
“We will learn what became of him later. Hold tight now.” He turned his horse and joined the fleeing workers going east.
It took longer to return to the cottage than to come from it. Eventually he turned up the little lane. He noted that the low wall surrounding the front garden did not deter people. Some just swung over and trod through the plantings, trying to avoid the thick crowd now filling the road. Others came in and paused, looking at the cottage.
That was the danger with a crowd on the run, he thought. It turned into a reckless force with no regard for property and sometimes little for life itself. It made some feel that they could do things they would not normally do, and it broke down social restraints.
He deliberately used his horse to crowd the men who dallied and hooked the side of his coat back so the pistol showed.
He cleared the garden, but there would be more. No one would really be safe for several hours at least.
He got off the horse and helped the woman down. Daphne had been watching, and the door opened as he carried the woman to it.
He entered the cottage and saw at once that he had been disobeyed. That door had opened at least once while he was gone, and perhaps several times. Three new faces looked up at his arrival. Worried faces. Terrified eyes.

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