Endure My Heart (15 page)

It brought me resoundingly to my senses, to see how his
real
intentions were riveted on Lady Lucy. If I needed such bringing to my senses, that is to say. Truth to tell, I was finding him dangerously attractive since he had removed the wadding from his shoulders and stopped calling me “ye.” I had begun to entertain some hopes his match with Lady Lucy might have foundered on the shoals of a longish separation.

Chapter Eleven

I have mentioned in passing a place called the Eyrie. It sits high on a cliff overlooking the ocean. Much too high, with its sheer rock cliff pitching down to the sea, to be used as a good landing spot. It would take a creature with the leaping ability of a mountain goat and the stamina of an elephant to get the kegs of brandy up that incline, though from the top the tranter’s wagons would have easy enough access along a gently winding path up from the main road. Its isolation made it a tempting spot for me. It was connected by legend with the most renowned smuggler ever to land a barrel in England, Miss Marjoram. But then a whole host of exploits bedazzled that gentleman’s name, at least three quarters of which are imaginary.

With Williams nipping off to London a day before me, I decided to go for a drive up to the Eyrie. It is uninhabited, of course, except for ghosts. These are hangers-on from the days of Miss Marjoram, which inclined me to think he had used the house for smuggling. A ghost was a wonderful incentive for keeping the curious away, especially on a dark night, and more especially in those old days when the world was more simpleminded.

The tale of ghosts had not kept Williams away. He had looked into it earlier on in his visit, but had not returned more than twice. Due to its inaccessibility, I imagine he had decided it was innocent. Busybody that he was, he would not be long in discovering what was afoot if the men used it regularly at all. Unless he could be made to believe any activities there had another motive, and what would any sane person be doing late at night at the Eyrie? No sane person would be doing anything, but a lunatic... I juggled various village simpletons about in my head as I drove along, with Mrs. Kiley in the forefront. But no, she would not do. My accomplice at the Eyrie must have more wits than that about her—or him.

This was no more than woolgathering as I wended my way in the gig up the winding path to the summit, mental meanderings to put from my mind the image of Sir Stamford Wicklow simpering and smirking at Lady Lucy. I was determined not to moon about like a lovesick calf.

It was chilly on the cliff top, plus ensuring me plenty of discomfort as well as the required solitude. I approached the old house with definite misgivings. It was like a fairy castle designed by an astigmatic demon—all minarets and gables, slightly tipping this way and that. The whole structure was held together so precariously a good gale might topple it over. The once brown wooden shingles had dulled to gray, with an occasional darker spot showing beneath where a shingle had fall in off, exposing protected wood. The windows were of irregular shapes, and stuck into the walls at odd places. There was an octagonal window high up at the front, giving the place the air of a misbegotten Cyclops. From that window, one would have a view for miles across the sea. There were other windows, uncommonly long and narrow, set in at uneven heights. All were smudged with several decades of dirt, dust and mementos of seagulls.

Gathering up my courage, I tackled the sagging stairs of the verandah (which was quite simply in peril of falling off) and reached the front door. It was locked. Back down and away to the rear, where a stone stoop was still in good repair. The back door was on the latch. It opened without a key, making me wonder whether it was not inhabited by someone, a traveling tramp or an illegal squatter.

I opened the door and peered in. There were no foot marks on the floor, and it was dusty enough that any traffic the last year would have left traces. I went in, finding myself in a stone-floored kitchen, with an ancient black monster of a stove standing guard over a long table, on which rested some few rusty vessels and utensils. I scuttled quickly through this room to the chambers above. They were nearly empty. Anything worth removing had been taken away; what remained were a few dilapidated pieces of furniture, the stuffing hanging out where animals had been into them for nesting or nesting materials.

The gothic decor was complete with cobwebs and spiders, a mouse scampering across one corner of the room, squeaks and squawks as I trod lightly on the uncovered floorboards—the works. I was thankful it was broad daylight. I took a quick run upstairs to see more of the same squalor—ten bedrooms, not one of them fit for human habitation. I returned below, after just taking a peek through that dusty octagonal window. It was so placed, right at the front of the house, looking straight out to sea, that any lugger approaching for miles, or any official vessel chasing it, would be easily visible. A light in that window would similarly be as clear as a lighthouse beacon to men at sea.

If Miss Marjoram had used the house for anything other than a lookout post, he had more wits than I. As I entered the main saloon belowstairs, I felt a cooler breeze, and looked, thinking to discover a broken window. What I saw was not a broken window, but a raised one that someone had forgotten to lower after leaving by it. I smiled softly to myself to think Williams had gone to the bother of breaking in, when the back door had stood on the latch.

Back to the kitchen for a last look around. There was a rough door, presumably leading to the cellar, but I had not quite the heart to tackle a cellar, despite the torch I had brought with me. I turned to leave, then turned back to that door.

What if the cellar was the answer to the riddle? Where more likely was a cellar in the bowels of the earth, to hold access to the sea? Foolish of me to have wasted time abovestairs. It was here or nowhere. My heart heat faster with combined fear and excitement as I went down the rickety old stairs, holding my torch high, into a deep, dank, dark cellar. I could swear I still smelled brandy clown there.

I peered around in the gloom at incredible blackness. Faint outlines of objects began to swim into view as my eyes adjusted to the dark. Big round things, lined against the wall—barrels. Brandy barrels, each with a bunghole in it. Miss Marjoram had done some decanting here, it seemed, emptied the barrel into smaller containers for retail selling. Miss Marjoram was up to anything. I poked around, no longer afraid, for I felt I was in the presence now of friendly spirits. I mean the late Miss Marjoram and company, not the dregs of brandy.

The doorway was not hard to find once I realized it had to be there. It was off in a nice dark corner, locked, but after coming this far I was not about to be stopped by a locked door, when there was a crowbar beside the barrels. I had the lock off in a minute, and was standing at the top of a steep stairway, hewn out of natural stone, with the unmistakable smell of salt air blowing up on me. The stairway must lead right to the sea.

So it did, I soon discovered. Light was seen at the bottom of the stairs once I got around a sharp bend in them. Water lapped across the bottom steps—black water beyond—the sea was deep here. The steps ended in the mouth of a cave. The cave was not large enough to allow a lugger to enter, but a smaller boat could be anchored in the cave, for the final leg of the transporting. Miss Marjoram’s men must have stood on these very steps, waiting for their load, and carried it up to the cellar.

I was weak with admiration. Here I had been thinking myself well named Sage. I did not hold a candle to Miss Marjoram for ingenuity, but I had at least sense enough to realize I must have this property. Must have easy and legal access to it, without arousing too much interest locally in my own direction. I had plenty to occupy my mind on the way home.

The only time Sir Stamford intruded his greasy smiling face was when I thought how much fun it would be to outwit him. I had been born and reared here on the coast, and had no inkling of this house’s secret. Sir Elwood Ganner had not known it; I doubted a living soul knew it, even including the place’s owner.

I stopped at the Registry Office on my way home, and discovered the property to be in the name of a Mr. Simon, in London. With a visit to London pending, I wondered whether I could not arrange to buy or rent the place there, do it through a London agent, using some other name than my own. Edna was privy to all my news and plans before we sat down to dinner. She was excited, but cast a hundred difficulties in my path.

“How can you possibly buy it or rent it without everyone knowing you have done so? Your name will appear on the records. Besides, it would cost a pretty penny to buy. More than the thousand pounds you speak of giving to charity.”

“I doubt it would cost that much. It’s falling apart. A down payment and a mortgage...”

“Buy a house in some name other than your own? What if you should die? Who would get it?”

“I would prefer to rent, certainly. It would be so much cheaper.”

“I don’t see why you don’t just use it. Who is to stop you? There’s never a soul there from year’s end to year’s end. I never heard of any Simons living in this area at all. I wonder if they would be kin to the Johnsons—Meggie Johnson married a lad named Simon, did she not?”

“What has that to do with anything?” I asked impatiently.

“Why, if the house is Meggie Johnson’s husband’s, there could be no harm in using it.”

“Why, Edna, that would be trespassing!” I replied, laughing.

“Much that would bother you, hussy! The least of your problems.”

“You overlook the main point. When someone is living in a house, he has the right to keep off trespassers. The likes of Williams would be less likely to be creeping down to the cellar to see what he missed the first time around if the place had an occupant.”

“No one in his right mind would live in that ramshackle rabbit warren of a place.”

“I have settled on a lunatic as my tenant,” I said, to shock her. “Oh, an eccentric is all I mean. A fierce-tempered fellow to keep people away.”

“You’d have every youngster in the neighborhood hanging around if that is the sort of tenant you have in mind. They love to provoke folks who give them a strong reaction. The Nortons have every apple on their trees stolen, not because they are any better than anyone else’s, but because old Ned is such a fool he goes hollering and chasing after the lads. Choose a duller tenant.”

“Not a bad idea. An invalid, for instance.”

“I still think you should speak to Meggie Johnson’s mother and see if something can’t be worked out.”

“Don’t be foolish. Edna.”

“It is you who is foolish. I think you’ve run mad. You’ve been acting oddly ever since you found out Mr. Williams is engaged.”

“Mr. Williams may marry his sweetheart today for all I care.”

“I daresay that’s why he went up to London,” Edna answered.

My heart gave a terrible lurch in my breast. I felt suddenly giddy, weak-kneed. It was all the commotion of the trip to the Eyrie, of course, and the plan to rent it. It took quite a toll of my nerves, all the planning and bother.

“I am only joking, my dear,” Edna said at once, being so addlepated as to think my little spasm of nerves was related to Williams’ getting married.

“I couldn’t care less about that,” I said, shaking off her offered help to seat me, as though I were a disabled octogenarian.

If he had married Lucy, we would not have known it till he came to Salford with her hanging on his arm, for we saw not a sign of him all the time we were in London, despite repeated cruises past Belgrave Square in a hired cab. We did not know which mansion belonged to Lord Hadley, of course and had not the least intention of actually hounding Mr. Williams, but I thought we might catch a sight of the wedding party. Edna assured me such a social occasion would be reported in the journals.

“In the usual way it might, but as Wicklow is working under cover, it might be done quietly, secretly.”

“My dear, you worry yourself for nothing. He would not get married in the middle of this job he has undertaken. I’m sure all this Lady Lucy business is a misunderstanding. Wicklow is a gentleman; he would not lead you on so shamelessly. And how could he bring a Lady Lucy to live in Salford?”

“What is wrong with Salford? Lady Ann doesn’t seem to mind it. I hope be
has
married her and gone off to Devonshire, that we might be rid of him once and for all.”

“You could write your aunt another letter.”

“We don’t have a copy of the
Observer,
Edna. Maybe the account of the wedding is in the
Observer.”

She gave me such a pitying look I longed to crown her with my reticule. “I only want to know for business reasons. If I read they are gone off on a honeymoon to France, for instance, I shall have clear smuggling for a spell.”

“I’m sure he’d never do such a thing to you.
I
know when a young fellow is in love.”

“And how do you come to be such an authority on the subject?” I asked sharply, then immediately felt very sorry, for a spinster, as I was coming to learn, was tender on that score. “Well, never mind Wicklow, and never mind the
Observer
either. Is not this a lovely room, Edna? I am happy we changed our lodgings to Stephen’s. And the mail too is much better for traveling than the coach. We are becoming quite the seasoned travelers. One only learns these things by doing them.”

“A pity Andrew would not have come with us. Two ladies  alone cannot do all the things that escorted ladies can do.”

Two unescorted ladies felt it not too fast to attend a Christmas comedy at Drury Lane. I thought we might catch a glimpse of Wicklow there as I had mentioned specifically we meant to attend, but we did not see him. It was a wretchedly stupid play we saw. The children at the school could have done better. I was amazed that sophisticated city people could be so well entertained at that farce.

I had certainly not gone to London to waste my time chasing after Mr. Williams. I had better things to do. First in priority was to attend to acquiring the Eyrie. For the exorbitant sum of a crown, an attendant at Stephen’s Hotel was kind enough to discover for me where to apply for such information. I might just caution you while I am on the subject of tipping that at such a place as Stephen’s Hotel, you are expected to distribute more liberal gratuities than obtained good service for us at Reddelstone’s. It seemed every time we turned around there was a liveried boy with his hand out, and they were none too happy with a shilling either.