Devil Water (44 page)

Charles had dismounted and he walked to the door. “We’re benighted,” he said. “Is there room in the village to lay our heads?”

The woman held the candle higher and peered out. “We might have room,” she said uncertainly. “Though we don’t take in strangers, and besides --” She turned towards Charles, the light fell on his face. “Good God!” cried the woman. The yellow light trembled violently. “It can’t be,” she whispered, and slumped against the doorpost.

Charles took the candlestick from her limp hand and examined her closely. “Saint Mary and the angels,” he said with a rueful laugh. “I believe ‘tis Dorothy Forster! I’m not best pleased to find
you
here, and that’s the truth.”

“Come in,” she said. “Come in out of the rain, your man can take the horses to the stable.”

Alec was already on the cobbles, holding the stallion. He twitched at Charles’s sleeve. “Have a care, sir! Can ye trust her?”

“Needs must--” said Charles. “I’ll not have Jenny soaked and chilled any longer.” Besides, he added to himself, he could manage any woman, and Dorothy had always seemed trustworthy, whatever her despicable brother was.

Dorothy silently led the way down a long passage to a lofty whitewashed taproom where a coal fire was burning. A frowzy little barmaid was playing with some beer mugs. Dorothy dismissed her at once. “You may go, Mab. We won’t need you.”

When they were alone, Dorothy bolted the door. Then she turned to Charles. “What are you doing here?” she said sharply. “Where’ve you come from?”

“Do you run an inn now, Dolly?” said Charles, watching her narrowly. “If so, is’t your custom to question all your guests?”

“This alehouse isn’t mine,” she said. “It belongs to Lord Crewe’s estate, but, as was his dying wish, I live here for a while each summer. What are you doing here?” she repeated. “Have you turned Whig at last, that you dare travel about in England?”

Charles’s eyes glinted, he examined her warily. She had grown much heavier, her cheeks were crimson with tiny broken veins; there was a drift of gray through her chestnut hair, yet there were still signs of her former beauty, and her gaze was direct and fearless as ever. Charles put his hand slowly in his pocket, and drew out a white cockade. He fastened it with a flourish to his hat. “Does this answer you?” he said. “And
you,
Dorothy Forster, there was one member of your family not noted for steadfastness, have you followed his example?”

She opened her mouth, then snapped it shut. Color surged up her full neck. “We’ll not speak of that!” she said. “Tom has suffered for all his blunders. As for your question, though there’s no occasion for it any more, well, I can sing this as heartily as I once did.” And she hummed the Jacobite song, “When Jemmie Has His Own Again!”

“So--” said Charles with relief. He took Dorothy’s hand and clasped it warmly.

She smiled, and released her hand. “Who is this lass?” she said indicating Jenny, who was warming her back at the fire, and watching in some bewilderment the interchange between the woman and her father. “You were ever a gallant, Charles, yet this one seems o’er young to me.”

“She is my daughter,” said Charles curtly. “Jenny, come here and make your curtsey to Miss Forster!”

The girl obeyed. “How do you do, ma’am.”

“Aye,” said Dorothy looking at the fair young face with a pang of envy. “I can see she’s a Radcliffe. Pray take off your wet things, later we’ll sup. Here’s something to warm you.” She poured them each a mug of October, and heating the poker at the fire plunged it into the ale.

Charles thanked her with a bow, then held his mug high. “Long life to James the Third of England, our rightful sovereign!”

“To our king-over-the-water!” Dorothy replied. “Ah, it’s been long since I’ve toasted him.” She sighed.

Jenny did not drink, though the others were unaware of this. It wasn’t right, she thought unhappily. That toast was treason. And this Forster woman -- to Jenny she did not look like a lady -- how unfortunate that Papa should have found her here, to aid and abet his wrong views. How can I make him
see?
Jenny thought.

Charles and Dorothy were talking. He told her something of his life abroad, and she said sadly, “I suppose you never ran across Tom?”

“I took pains to avoid it,” said Charles. “I believe he’s living at Boulogne. I needn’t tell you he’s not welcome at King James’s court.”

She shook her head. “My poor brother. He had never the wits for aught but hunting and drinking, you mustn’t be too hard on him.” She sighed again and turned away. “It was lonely when I no longer had him to care for. Charles -- I’ve not told you -- I’m not Miss Forster any more. I wed an Armstrong, one of the Bamburgh lot.”

“Indeed!” said Charles, astonished. Except for Alec he had known nobody of that name. “I trust you’re happy? Where is your husband now?”

“Sailing in his coble, I suppose,” said Dorothy lifting her chin. “He’s a fisherman. A good one,” she added defiantly. “Aye, I know what you’re thinking, Charles. But he wanted me, and I’d no mind to struggle on alone.”

“Of course not,” said Charles without conviction. He was shocked when he thought of the suitors who used to woo Dorothy Forster, the young Widdringtons, the Swinburnes, Collingwood and Ridley, even a Percy once -- the great names of Northumberland. Yet most of these were dead! he realized with a start. Still a
mésalliance
like this, for a Forster, a niece of Lady Crewe’s! As bad as his own mis-mating, worse -- since Dorothy’s had been voluntary.

“The day will come,” she said watching him with a faint smile, “when
all
classes will be mingled in England, and remember that in the past noble veins have oft been strengthened by a yeoman’s blood. I can see you don’t agree. Radcliffes’ve always been prideful.”

Courtesy forbade Charles’s answer, though Jenny was impressed. High and low blood were in her too, she thought. Even Papa could not make her of one piece, dearly as she’d love to please him.

“Hark!” cried Dorothy suddenly, putting a finger to her lips. “Someone’s outside!” They listened and heard a man’s voice in the passage, then somebody tried to open the taproom door. “Who is’t?” called Dorothy.

The answer came in the whining, ingratiating accents Charles remembered instantly though it had been eight years since he heard them. “ ‘Tis Mr. Patten of Allendale, come to taste your fine ale again. Mistress Dorothy -- d’ye mean you’re locked in!”

Dorothy turned white and looked at Charles, who mouthed soundlessly “Patten, the informer?” She nodded and taking his arm pushed him towards the fireplace. “Inside up to the right. Priest’s hole,” she whispered in his ear. Then she ran to the door. “In a minute, Mr. Patten,” she called. “There’s a young gentlewoman in here who’s swooned, and all disrobed.” She ran to Jenny who had been dazedly watching her father scramble over the coals, up into the fireplace and disappear, while a shower of soot nearly extinguished the fire.

“Swoon!” said Dorothy fiercely in the girl’s ear, and she pushed her down on the floor. The girl gave a gasp and shut her eyes while Dorothy flung a cloak over her. Then Dorothy unbolted the door.

“Come in, Mr. Patten,” she said suavely. “Sorry to keep you waiting, but you see --” she indicated Jenny’s still body, “I had to open her dress and loosen her stays.”

“Dear, dear,” said the vicar, his long nose quivering. He bent with interest over Jenny, whose heart was beating in great frightened thuds. “Her color’s not bad -- perhaps if I bled her -- I’ve a lancet in my pocket --” Patten groped beneath the cloak for Jenny’s arm, and Dorothy said, “I wonder could it be the
smallpox
striking?”

Patten jumped back. “Take her away,” he said shrilly. “Take her out of here, I’ve never had it!”

“I don’t like to disturb her yet,” said Dorothy. “Perhaps ‘twould be better if you left? Where are you bound, by the bye?”

“From Stanhope to Hexham,” he said hurriedly. “On Government business. I can’t go on tonight, the weather’s foul, and my horse weary. Get rid of that girl! I command it, as agent to the Crown!”

Dorothy’s eyes snapped. “Aye, Mr. Patten,” she cried. “You’ve been well rewarded by the Crown for turning your coat, haven’t you! So ‘tis commands you give now to the sister of him who was once your master!”

The vicar wriggled and tugged at his clerical bands, his eyes shifted. “Mebbe I was hasty, just now, but I--” He glanced at Jenny, who had gathered that the intruder was a Whig, and yet disliked him intensely. She uttered a long shuddering moan, and cried, “Oh, oh, I feel so ill ...”

Patten gave her a horrified look and fled out the door. Dorothy followed him into the passage. “They’ll take you in at Pennypie House,” she said pleasantly. “ ‘Tis only a mile. Good luck.” She waited while he shouted to the stable boy for his horse, then she came back to the taproom. “Lie there a bit longer, Jenny,” she said, “until I’m sure he’s off. And if he falls in a bog on the way to Pennypie, the world’ll not be the loser.”

“He changed sides in the Rebellion?” asked Jenny slowly.

“He saved his own neck by selling information. Without that creeping louse’s evidence, the Earl of Derwentwater’d be alive today -- my brother and your father’d likely be free men instead of fugitives under a death sentence.”

Jenny knit her brows. “If he’d seen my father now, you think he’d turn him in?”

“Beyond the shadow of a doubt. For Patten’d be well rewarded -- maybe with an even finer living than the one they saved for him at Allendale.”

“Why were you civil to such a man, Mistress Dorothy?” asked Jenny.

“Ah, my dear,” said Dorothy. “What’s done is done. And as one gets older one gets cynical. There’d be no custom at this alehouse, no market for my husband’s fish, if we were too nice in our acquaintance.”

While Jenny pondered this, they heard a tapping in the plastered wall above and to the right of the fireplace. “What’s that!” she cried.

“Not a ghost,” said Dorothy with a twinkle, “though we’ve ghosts at Blanchland -- plenty of ‘em.” She went out and came back quickly. “He’s really gone. I saw him head for Pennypie. Here, Jenny, help me throw ale on those coals, so your father can get down.”

“Do you mean he’s up in the fireplace yet!” cried Jenny. “I thought there must be a passage to the roof.”

Dorothy shook her head. “There’s a good-sized chamber built in the thickness of the walls; many a man’s been hid there in the old days.”

They doused the fire, and Dorothy called “All clear, Charles” up the chimney.

He appeared feet-foremost, covered with soot, his boots badly singed. “Whoof!” he said coughing and sneezing. “That’s a well-warmed lodging you gave me! Though I’m heartily grateful for it.”

“Could you hear aught?” asked Dorothy.

“Yes. There’s a pinhole behind that picture! So the estimable parson of Allendale’s on the prowl is he! What games I could have with him!”

“Charles, don’t!” cried Dorothy. “Don’t go on to Dilston! You must see now how dangerous it is!”

He smiled and whisked soot off his sleeves. “Dolly, I think I’ve never shown any particular reluctance to face a bit of danger? A tame life bores me. And d’you think I’d give up Dilston when I’m ten miles away, and there’s never been a time these years that I’ve not longed to see it again?”

She shook her head. “Dilston is not the place you once knew, Charles,” she said sadly.

Jenny slept that night in a big bed with Dorothy. The bedroom had been the Abbot’s lodging in the old monastery, her hostess explained, and Jenny had never seen anything like it. The ancient beams were black, there were deep stone cupboards and niches in the walls. The triple lancet windows were of stone too, and had fragments of stained glass in them. They looked out over a garden which had once been the cloister. Little humps marked the graves of the murdered monks.

That night at Blanchland, an eeriness began for Jenny and continued for as long as she remained in Northumberland. It was an awareness of something close and wishful of communicating, a feeling that the veil was here very thin -- more awesome than frightening-- yet there were times when Jenny was frightened. She was during that night at Blanchland. Unable to sleep beside the gently snoring Dorothy, she listened to the crackles in the old woodwork, the scurrying of mice overhead. Again and again her excited brain presented her with pictures of the day just past; of the heather moors, and the cries of curlews -- “whaups” she had called them in Coquetdale; of her father, and the loving teasing way he spoke to her, of the laughter they had shared. These pictures were radiant, then they darkened, as the moorland mists had swallowed the sun. There were such disturbing things about her father. His Catholicism for one. Jenny was embarrassed when he crossed himself. And worse even was his obstinate undeviating belief in the Pretender. A belief she had childishly thought to change. Patten’s visit had exposed her error. The panic, the concealment, and the lies were daunting. She had herself been plunged at once into the momentary whirlpool. To refuse to do so would have injured her father. But it shouldn’t
be
so, Jenny thought. She looked up at the bed’s shadowy canopy, and felt a great weight in her breast. At that moment she heard the frenzied tolling of a deep bell. It seemed to come from far away and yet resounded in her ears. She sat up with a muffled exclamation.

Dorothy stirred and murmured, “What’sa matter?”

“The bell,” said Jenny with a kind of sob. “Who’s ringing that bell?”

“Ah, so you hear it!” said Dorothy awakening. “I don’t, but others have.”

“Where does it come from?” Jenny cried. “You said the church was in ruins.”

“ ‘Tis the monastery bell,” said Dorothy softly. “An echo from the long long ago.”

“They rang the bell for gladness they were saved -- and it was that which killed them,” Jenny whispered. “Oh, it’s horrible.”

Dorothy soothingly touched the girl’s shoulder. “You might say rather that they were punished by their own witless folly. It is often so.”

Jenny put her hands to her ears, then fell back on the pillow. “It’s stopped. Thank God, it’s stopped.”

Dorothy pulled the blankets up, and tucked them around Jenny. Poor pretty child, she thought. She’s a sensitive. The future for her will never be an easy one.