Lord Somerton's Heir (31 page)

‘You cut the girth?’ Isabel looked across at Freddy.

‘You’re such a fool, Fan.’ Freddy rolled his eyes. ‘Of course I meant to kill him. He was about to throw us out on to the street, expose us as blackmailers and imposters. It’s your fault.’ He rounded on Isabel. ‘You made him fall in love with you. It all changed after that.’

Isabel frowned. ‘What do you mean, I made him fall in love with me?’

Freddy snorted. ‘I haven’t got the time to explain. We need to get out of here. Fanny, pack a bag.’

‘But I was supposed to marry Sebastian. I was going to be Lady Somerton,’ Fanny protested. ‘You always spoil everything.’

Freddy moved to the window and said with a grunt of satisfaction, ‘The stables are well alight. He’ll be dead by now and his brother with him. Your precious Sebastian is probably charcoal by now, Isabel.’

Nausea rose in her throat as a golden glow lit the dark sky, casting the room into moving shadows.

‘No,’ she murmured in disbelief.

‘Take a look, Lady Somerton. I left dear Sebastian and his comrades trussed up like pigs on market day.’

Isabel stared at the golden-red blaze rising above the tree line. Sebastian…dead? She took the thought and pushed it to the back of her mind. Later, she would rail against the unnecessary death, but now she had her own foe to face and she needed to keep her wits about her.

She looked back at Freddy. ‘What are you going to do?’

‘Sadly, I think the first thing is to depart this place and find somewhere a little more conducive to my health,’ Freddy said.

‘Where?’ Isabel asked.

‘Oh, probably the continent,’ Freddy said thoughtfully. ‘But, make no mistake, Lady Somerton, you’re coming with us. Fanny, be so good as to assist her ladyship to pack for the journey.’

‘What do you mean?’ Fanny asked. ‘What about Sally?’

‘I mean, dear sister, that Isabel may have her uses and I don’t have room for another person, so Sally is not coming with us. Now get dressed, Lady Somerton. I have the coach downstairs. Oh, and do make sure you bring your jewels, Isabel — all of them.’

Isabel looked into Freddy’s eyes. There would be no reprieve, no mercy. He had killed once, twice, if what he said about Sebastian was true, and he would so again. The thought of Sebastian dead numbed her. He’d been in her life so short a time and yet now she couldn’t even begin to comprehend a world without him.

Freddy watched as she stuffed the contents of her jewel box into a soft bag, which he took from her. She pulled on the gown, cloak and bonnet Fanny proffered and, with Freddy’s pistol in her back, they made their way silently down the stairs. Fanny carried a bandbox that clinked with a metallic ring as if filled with metal objects.

In the dark, Isabel nearly fell over Peter Thompson who had been seated on the lower step, tied by his hands to the banisters with a dirty piece of cloth twisted around his mouth as a gag.

She knelt down beside the boy who turned a tear-stained face to her as she undid the cloth.

‘Has he hurt you?’ Isabel asked.

The boy shook his head. ‘No, but he’s killed his lordship. Shut him in the chaff room and then set fire to a pile of straw by the door. It’s all my fault, my lady. I should never have kept that saddle,’ he wailed.

‘Nonsense, Peter —’ Isabel began but, before she could say anything more, Freddy hauled her up by the arm.

‘What about the boy?’ Fanny asked.

Freddy shook his head. ‘He’s served his purpose. Lady Somerton is a far more valuable hostage.’

Pausing only to replace Peter’s gag, Freddy hustled the women out of the house. The carriage, with Jenkins on the driving box, stood waiting by the front door. Without gentleness, Freddy pushed Isabel inside and the coach began to move off before the door had been shut.

Chapter 25

Beyond the door, Sebastian could hear the crackling of flames. Acrid smoke had begun seeping into the room.

He coughed and swore. Beside him, Harry groaned as he flexed, trying to loosen his bonds.

‘How did we get ourselves into this, Alder? Been in some tight spots before, but I think this takes the prize. We must be losing our touch.’

‘Roll over with your back to me,’ Sebastian ordered.

His friend complied and, with his fingers, Sebastian worked the knots on Harry’s wrists. They had been well tied by an expert hand but he gradually got purchase and, as the ropes began to loosen, Harry freed himself. He shook off the ropes and began on Sebastian’s bonds. When he had been freed, Sebastian turned to his brother who sat slumped against the wall, like a broken toy.

‘Matt!’

Matt didn’t move and Sebastian bent over him. Even in the dark, he knew from long experience that Matt had probably lost a good deal of blood and needed to have the wound tended, but first they had to get out of this room.

Flames were now licking around the doorframe and the room had filled with smoke. In a moment the chaff room would be ablaze. From beyond the door and outside in the stable yard he could hear screaming horses and the shouts of men and women.

He heard Bennet’s voice. ‘Cap’n Alder!’

‘The window,’ Harry coughed.

The only exit from the room was a small window set some five feet off the floor.

‘Pull the table over,’ Sebastian said.

As Harry manoeuvred the table over to the window, Sebastian searched the room for a club. He found a wooden spade and, being the taller of the two men, climbed on the table. Swinging the spade at the window, he knocked out the glass.

He heard Bennet again. ‘There he is. Praise be… Quick, you, fetch a ladder.’

Sebastian carefully knocked all the glass from the frame. He jumped down from the table and crossed back to his brother.

‘Matt!’ He slapped Matt’s pale cheeks.

Matt groaned but didn’t open his eyes.

‘Matt, look at me.’

Matt coughed and his eyes half opened. Harry was on the younger man’s other side and, between the two of them, they hauled his brother’s dead weight over to the table. Bennet’s face appeared in the window.

‘Rope!’ Sebastian choked.

Bennet disappeared. A stout end of rope coiled through the window.

‘Here, my lord!’ Bennet said.

Sebastian tied it under his brother’s arms and pulled him to his feet.

‘Matt, I need you to wake up.’

Matt moaned and his eyes fluttered open.

‘I’m going to help you up. Bennet?’

‘I’m here, sir!’

Sebastian shouted instructions at his corporal and, between Harry and he pushing and Bennet, Thompson and the men below pulling, they managed to haul the semiconscious man up and across the lintel. Sebastian gave one final shove and Matt’s legs disappeared out of the window.

Flames had eaten the door and were now creeping with long fingers along the ceiling beams.

‘You go,’ Harry ordered.

Sebastian didn’t have time to argue and Harry outranked him. With a monumental effort, he hauled himself up and over the sill. His hand scraped on a piece of broken glass but there were strong hands on the other side ready to pull him out and he tumbled to the ground.

‘Thank god! We had no idea you were in there. Are ye hurt, my lord?’ Thompson, the groom, bent over him.

Sebastian looked back at the stable that was now well alight, the flames licking up into the rooms occupied by Thompson and his family.

‘Your wife… We must get her out.’

Thompson nodded. ‘Already done, my lord. She’s safe. Can’t find my boy though.’

‘Where’s Freddy Lynch?’ Sebastian hissed, his lungs screaming for air as Harry fell to the cobbles with an audible thump.

Bennet, his face streaked with soot, looked down at him and shook his head. ‘Lynch? I’ve not seen him.’

Sebastian grimaced. Freddy must have slipped away in the dark with his hostage as the alarm was being raised. He looked around the courtyard, now filled with people and horses.

‘Where’s my brother?’

‘They’ve carried him to the house,’ Bennet said.

Harry held out his hand. ‘Going to lie there all night, Alder?’

He took Harry’s hand and rose to his feet. He shook his head. ‘I’m a fool, Dempster. How could I have underestimated Lynch so badly?’

Harry put a hand on his shoulder. ‘You had no way of knowing quite what a villain the man was.’

Sebastian raised his voice and addressed the throng. ‘Did anyone here see Lynch or his man?’

The men gathered around him shook their heads.

Sebastian put out a hand to Thompson. ‘He’s got your boy.’

Thompson’s eyes widened, starkly white in his sooty face. ‘Peter?’

‘Lynch would have gone for his sister,’ Harry said.

Sebastian stared at his friend. Fanny was at the dower house… Isabel was in mortal danger. He turned and set off at a run with Harry and Thompson behind him.

His heart jerked as he found the front door to the dower house wide open. Inside, he stopped and stood for a moment in the front hall, trying to adjust his eyes to the darkness. He heard a moaning sound and fixed on a huddled figure on the stairs.

For a brief moment he thought it was Isabel, but the boy, Peter, looked up at him over a gag with large frightened eyes. Sebastian unbound him and Peter flung himself at his father who had followed Sebastian into the building.

‘He took Lady Somerton!’ The boy’s voice was muffled by his father’s coat.

‘How long ago?’

The boy shook his head and turned to look at him. ‘Not long. My lord, the stables! He set the straw on fire. I thought you were dead. The horses…’

Before Sebastian could respond, the boy took to his heels, running back toward the burning building with Sebastian behind him. Sebastian’s only thought was to find Pharaoh and take off after the coach with Freddy and his hostage aboard.

By the time he got back to the stables, flames licked high into the night sky from the roof. The whole household had been turned out and a bucket line ran from the wells, but the buckets of water barely impacted the inferno. The noise of crashing timbers was almost deafening.

‘How many of the horses have they got out?’ Sebastian shouted at one of the grooms.

‘All of them except Lady Somerton’s mare,’ the man yelled back.

Peter looked up at him, his face anguished.

‘My Lord, we’ve got to get her out.’

The fire had not yet reached the far end of the stables where Millie and her foal were stalled. It would break Isabel’s heart if her gentle mare were to die in such a horrible manner.

The boy turned and sprinted toward the burning building.

‘Peter! Stop him, Bas.’ At the sound of Connie’s voice, Sebastian turned to see his sister running towards him.

‘He’s gone inside!’ Connie screamed as she reached him.

Sebastian snatched up a blanket from the pile being used to beat at the flames.

Thompson caught his sleeve.

‘My Lord, you can’t go in there! He’s my son, I’ll go after him.’

‘Stay here!’ Sebastian commanded and ran toward the building, pausing for a moment in the doorway to wrap the blanket around his head and shoulders.

The smoke that billowed out towards him was so thick that Sebastian could hardly see. Above him, wood cracked and the roaring of the flames almost sent him back. Drawing the blanket around his mouth, with his eyes watering, he groped his way along the stalls until he could make out the shadowy figures of the boys and the horses in the furthest stall.

Peter wrestled with the terrified horse. The mare, docile as she was, plunged around her stall in panic as the boy tried to secure a lead rope to her.

Coughing, Sebastian grabbed the scruff of the boy’s neck and hauled him out of the stall. The boy had managed to get a rope around the mare’s neck but the mare’s eyes rolled and she pulled against the rope as he tried to lead her out. Her foal leaned against her, nickering in terror.

Sebastian slackened his hold and held the mare’s nose, looking into her eyes, making soothing noises.

‘Come on, old girl. Only one way out of here. Trust me.’

Grunting, he picked up the foal, knowing Millie would follow her foal to hell and back. The mare’s eyes rolled white and terrified in her head, but as he moved towards the door to the stall, she followed. Peter sat on the ground outside the stall, coughing.

Sebastian set the trembling foal down and hauled the boy up, flinging him bodily across the mare.

‘Keep low and hang on for your life,’ he said hoarsely.

He collected the foal again and pushed on towards the exit.

As they neared the stable door, the roof above him cracked and a burning beam crashed to the ground behind him. The rope in his hand jerked out of his grasp. The mare screamed and Sebastian turned, seeing the beam had come down between him and the mare. The little horse had reared, depositing Peter on the floor, and now she backed away from the flames that separated her from her baby, screaming.

Sebastian bolted for the door, pausing only to thrust the foal at the nearest person he could find, before turning back into the inferno. He pulled the blanket from his shoulders and began beating at the flames and kicking at the burning timber, clearing enough to get through to the small corner where the semi conscious boy and terrified horse cowered against the wall.

Tearing a strip from the tail of his shirt, he tied it around the mare’s eyes. Her nostrils flared but, no longer seeing the licking flames, she seemed calmer. Sebastian threw the boy across her back again. Giving a quick tug of the leading rope, he pulled the singed blanket over himself and, holding his breath, he ran for his life as the roof timbers buckled and collapsed around him.

Dimly, he heard the sound of cheering as he emerged into the stable yard with horse and boy. He fell to his knees, gasping for breath, and the world went black.

Chapter 26

Wedged in a corner of the rocking coach, her hands and feet securely bound with cords from the coach’s curtains, Isabel looked into Freddy’s pale blue eyes.

Seeing her looking at him, he smiled. ‘You look uncomfortable, my dear Isabel.’

‘I am. Where are you taking me?’

Freddy appeared to consider this question a moment before answering. ‘A little jaunt to the seaside. We can pick up a fishing boat or coastal trader that will take us to France for the price of one of your earrings.’