Death in the West Wind (19 page)

“They may not have left the Baltic like that. Though they could have been carelessly retted.”

“What does that mean?”

“The soaking of the plants after harvesting is called retting. Retted flax makes linen, retted hemp makes rope.”

“What will happen to the cargo if it has been damaged?”

“Presumably whoever ordered it in the first place will still take delivery of it.”

“And the ship?”

“No doubt the owners will be written to to send over another crew to sail her back. They’re not going to let a good craft like that go to waste.”

Emilia shivered. “But it will always be haunted. I would hate to set foot on it.”

“Well, you’ll never have to.”

“Thank God for that.”

John turned to the constable. “Have all the crew been accounted for?”

“No, only three’s been washed up. God knows where the rest will come ashore.”

“Were there any signs of violence on the other two bodies?”

“No, they were like the man who died in your arms, not a mark on ’em. It would seem that they both simply drowned.”

“I just wonder,” said Joe slowly, “whether Juliana’s murderers came aboard and they jumped into the sea in fear.” He paused for a long moment to think, then Mr. Fielding’s clerk ran his light eyes over the assembled company. “Gentlemen, it’s time we three, together with the Runners, held a meeting to pool what information we’ve gained so far.” He bowed to Emilia. “That is if you have no objection, Mrs. Rawlings.”

She sighed. “What can I say?”

John felt an enormous rush of tenderness for her. “Sweetheart, I won’t do a thing that you don’t wish me to.”

Emilia shook her head, her bright curls swinging beneath her hat. “I’ve already told you, I knew that you worked for Mr. Fielding when I married you. It’s simply that I didn’t think that you would have to do after our marriage.”

“Then if you agree, Mrs. Rawlings, might I call the gentlemen into one of the snugs this evening?”

“You leave me no option but to say yes,” Emilia answered with a touch of asperity, and turned away to find her coachman.

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They had a very relaxing day and she was calm again by the time the shadows lengthened over Sidmouth’s beautiful bay. Slowly the couple walked back to The Ship, where the coach had been stabled, and set off for Topsham in a mood of great tranquility. But this was not to last for they had not proceeded more than a mile across that strange heathland which housed Wildtor Grange when, with a crunching sound, the coach tipped slightly to one side. With a great many curses, Irish Tom reined the horses in and jumped down from the box just as John opened the carriage door and stepped out. They both stared in dismay at a wheel which had finally objected to the condition of the Devon tracks and worked loose.

“Now what?” said the Apothecary.

“I could do a running repair, Sir, but I wouldn’t trust it to get us home. I think I’d best walk back to Sidmouth and fetch the wheelwright. He may only be used to carts but he’ll mend it sturdily enough till I can take it to the coachmakers in Exeter.”

“What choice have we?” asked Emilia from the window.

“None really, Ma’am. We can’t get marooned here overnight.”

She shivered. “No, we most certainly can’t.” John got back into the coach beside her.

“Don’t worry, darling. I’ll stay here with you.”

“But you’d be no match for the ghostly Thornes. Nobody would.”

“The ghostly Thornes don’t exist.”

“Then what was it we saw the other night?”

“Some people playing a prank.”

“What about the headless coachman? Was he a prank?”

John was silent, unable to find a ready answer. It had certainly been a horrific sight, yet surely there had to be a logical explanation. He wondered then if these pranksters, whoever they might be, could somehow be connected with the vigilante horsewoman, she of the mighty scar and powerful body.

“You’re very quiet,” said his wife.

“Just thinking.”

“Are you frightened?”

“No,” John answered, but for all that he felt in the pocket of his coat for his pistol and experienced a thrill of alarm as he realised that he had left it behind in their room.

It began to grow darker and the sun dipped behind the hills, throwing the landscape into inky shadow. The first star appeared and a faint glimmer of moonshine.

“Dear God, what was that?” said Emilia, gripping the Apothecary’s arm.

He strained his ears and, very distantly, identified the sound of wheels coming towards them. His bride turned a stricken face in his direction.

“It’s the Thornes.”

“Rubbish,” John answered, more vehemently than he had intended, and thrust his head out of the window to get a better look. Then he laughed. “It’s two very solid looking ghosts. Tom is here with the wheelwright.” Emilia had the good grace to look apologetic. “I’m being foolish, aren’t I?”

“No. We did see something most peculiar that evening. But I will find out what it was before we go home. I promise you that.”

“And what about the woman who hides out in the Grange? Will you find her as well?”

“Yes. I’d be on her trail this very night if I hadn’t been called to the meeting.”

“There’s always something,” Emilia replied with feeling.

In order to mend the wheel, not only did the horses have to be unhitched but the back of the carriage raised in the air and placed on a special support. With a great deal of sweating and heaving, the coachman managed to lift the carriage while the wheelwright eased it onto the prop. John, meanwhile, held the horses, who were acting in a most uneasy manner, rolling their eyes and pricking their ears and sweating very slightly. Aware that they could probably hear something that he could not, the Apothecary found himself glancing round warily, wondering what it was that was frightening them.

Emilia had wandered off towards a clump of trees into which she had vanished, presumably about business of her own, so it was her shriek that first alerted the three men that something was wrong. John, still holding the reins, started to run in the direction of the sound but as he did so his wife appeared from the thicket, scurrying towards him.

“It’s the Thornes,” she was gasping, looking over her shoulder, her face pale.

“Where?” said John, but the answer had already come. Hurling into his line of vision came the phantom coach, its occupants still in their spectral white, the coachman, with his jagged neck and his head lying beside him, turning his body in the direction of the four people gaping at him. He raised his whip and shook it menacingly before crashing forward in the direction of Wildtor Grange. With a groan, the wheelwright fell unconscious at the Apothecary’s feet, while Emilia let out a long and anguished cry. John, however, lost his temper in the most spectacular manner. Scrambling onto one of the horses, unsaddled as it was, he wrapped its long coaching rein round his arm and set off in pursuit, the other horse, joined by the same harness, following close behind.

“Damn you,” the Apothecary shouted at the top of his voice.

There was no reply but the headless coachman stood up and turned his neck, just as if he were looking over his shoulder, then thrashed his horses to greater speed.

“How dare you frighten people like this,” John yelled into the wind.

Again there was no answer but now there was the sound of another pair of hooves coming from the direction of the Grange. John watched as a horseman firing a pistol appeared, galloping at full speed towards the phantom coach. It was the woman with the scar, the Apothecary felt certain of it. Slowing his own pace slightly, he observed as she took aim straight at the headless driver. There was the crack of a travelling bullet and the coachman slumped, a patch of red appearing at his shoulder.

“You’re no bloody ghost,” John bellowed furiously. Then his own horse, tired of the rough treatment he had been meting out to it, reared in the air in anger and threw him headlong into a small and extremely cold stream.

“‘Zounds’ and ‘zoonters!’” shouted the Apothecary, and with that momentarily lost consciousness.

*
 
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He woke to find Irish Tom heaving him out of the water, uttering oaths that would have made a Topsham docker blush.

“Did the bastards shoot you, Sir?”

“Not they. That mettlesome brute with the rolling eye threw me.”

“I heard shots and thought they’d got you.”

“No, it was the woman who fired.”

“What woman?”

“The vigilante who lives in Wildtor Grange. I’ll explain about her later. How are Emilia and the wheelwright?”

“She’s tending him, great fool that he is. He thought they were phantoms.”

“So did I the first time I saw them,” John admitted reluctantly. “But the woman hit the coachman good and proper and there was a patch of real blood to prove it. Now, I’ve never heard of a ghost that bled, have you?”

“Well, actually, I have Sorrh,” Tom answered, becoming very Irish.

“Not like this, though. The coachman and his passengers are as real as you and I.”

“If that is the case, what are they doing driving round like that, terrorising half the countryside.”

“That is what I’ve got to find out,” answered John, then added, “As if I haven’t enough to do already.”

As he walked back to the coach, the two horses having bolted off ahead of him, he found his thoughts turning yet again to the vigilante. First thing in the morning, he determined, he would ride over alone and somehow track her down. There was a great deal he had to ask her and, if luck was on his side, there could well be considerable information she might have for him.

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*

He was late for Joe Jago’s meeting, naturally. In fact Mr. Fielding’s clerk was in the midst of questioning Nick Raven about his progress in Exeter when John walked in, apologising profusely both for his tardiness and his dishevelled appearance.

“Gracious Mr. Rawlings, you look as if you’ve been in the wars.”

“I’ve been having an argument with a coachload of ghosts. But please carry on. I’ll explain later.”

Nick Raven, having run his dark jewel eyes over the latecomer, continued his tale.

“Juliana and Richard were both seen getting off the coach on the day they travelled into the city together. She was particularly remembered because she was met by a black servant and helped with her baggage.”

“Did anybody see where she went?” the Apothecary asked with interest.

“Into the maze of streets by the three conduits. Apparently there are a lot of lodging houses there. After that she was lost to sight. But one interesting feature emerged. Someone who I encountered in an hostelry who knows the man well and has no reason to like him, saw our redoubtable quay master, Thomas Northmore, going into a house in Milk Street in the very area into which Juliana and the negro vanished.”

“What about this negro?” asked Dick Ham. “Did anybody know who he was? There can’t be too many like him around Exeter surely.” Raven looked pleased with himself. “I struck lucky yet again. He is servant to Lord Hood and was once Lady Hood’s little black boy. They kept him on when he grew up and now he is often seen strutting round the city in his scarlet livery.”

“What in heaven’s name was he doing with Juliana van Guylder?” asked John.

“Clearly he had been sent to assist her, but by whom?”

“Lord Hood?”

“Or one of his sons.”

Joe Jago looked like a fox with a whiff of fat gosling. “Gentlemen, this is a knotty problem indeed. So we must go to our duties. You can leave the quay master to my interrogation. I believe he has a certain respect for me … “

“Terrified of you, more like,” put in John.

“ … so I am liable to deal with him better,” Joe ended severely.

The Apothecary had a sudden thought. “What’s happened to Tobias Wills? He’s not still asleep, is he?”

“No, but I have confined him to The Salutation. He woke up late this afternoon and is now nursing a vast headache. I thought perhaps you might attend him, Mr. Rawlings, and sift him for information at the same time.”

“Gladly. What else did you have in mind for me?”

“I wondered if you and Mrs. Rawlings might call on Sir Clovelly Lovell and infiltrate Lord Hood’s circle if you possibly can. Further, there’s the matter of Gerald Fitz. I think he was lying about not knowing the van Guylders. Somehow, he must be made to confide in you.”

“A tall order indeed.”

“There has to be a chink in his armour.”

“I can’t imagine what,” answered John, and immediately thought of Coralie and frowned.

“What’s happening about Miss van Guylder’s funeral?” asked Dick.

“The coroner has released the body for burial. I believe the ceremony is to be held very shortly.”

“I hope Jan is up to it,” said John.

“Ah yes, Jan,” Joe answered. “You know, despite all I still have not dismissed him as a possible killer. Runner Ham related to me the conversation you had with Dr. Shaw. It seems the girl was a wild uncontrollable creature.”