Runaway (32 page)

He led us back to the room where we had waited before. There Mr and Mrs Saunders and Bridges were waiting.

‘Henry!’ exclaimed Bridges, as we entered the room. ‘By God, it’s good to see you! Even if you’ve turned into an old man!’

‘What about you, James?’ asked Henry, his voice thick with emotion. ‘What a crop of grey hair you’ve sprouted!’ The two men embraced and then Henry turned to Mr Saunders for a more detailed description of the man who had ridden through the lodge gates this morning. ‘Did he have pale blue eyes or dark? Was he injured?’ he asked.

‘Dark. What do you mean injured?’

‘Did he have his arm in a sling?’

‘No,’ said Saunders definitely. ‘He did not. The man I opened the gates to this morning was unharmed.’

‘It was the real Robert this morning, then!’ Henry said definitely, turning to me.

‘Perhaps the impostor was hurt overpowering Master Robert,’ suggested Mr Saunders.

‘Perhaps they have concealed him nearby, hoping to move him under cover of darkness,’ said Henry. ‘We must pray they’ve kept him alive.’

‘I hope they think he can be useful to them,’ I said with a voice that shook. ‘There must be a great deal they still don’t know about the family.’ I could see that none of the others were so optimistic. They expected to find a body. I swallowed hard and clenched my fists to keep my courage high.

‘Where do we even start to search?’ asked Mr Saunders helplessly.

‘We must think like those nasty, murdering rogues,’ replied his wife. ‘Where would they hide someone quickly nearby, someone who they attacked on the ride down to the house?’

‘The summer-house?’ I suggested.

‘I’ll check there, but it’s in view of the house,’ said Bridges doubtfully.

‘The crypt?’ Mrs Saunders suggested. ‘I’ll walk up there.’

‘The barn at the Home Farm?’ I said. ‘I’ll go there to look.’

‘I’ll go with you,’ said Lawrence.

‘I’ll go with Charlie,’ said Henry protectively.

‘You won’t find him in any of those places,’ said a girl’s voice behind me. I turned to see Miss Judith in the doorway. She looked coolly amused.

‘Good God, Judith, have you left his lordship alone with those scoundrels?’ demanded Lawrence, hurrying from the room.

‘What could
I
do?’ asked Miss Judith with a shrug.

‘Keep him company; be a witness!’ he snapped over his shoulder. I could hear him outside giving orders to the servants who hurried upstairs. No doubt the servants would guard the old lord, though I did not imagine even those rogues dared harm him here in his own home where their guilt would be plain to all.

As Lawrence came back into the room, I turned to Miss Judith.

‘You know something?’ I demanded eagerly. ‘Please tell us!’

‘What possible reason could I have for helping you, stable boy?’ she asked disdainfully. ‘No, really, I think I might almost prefer to have the young man upstairs as grandpapa’s heir than a couple of bumpkin cousins from America. And anyone, absolutely anyone, would be better than dull John as heir.’

‘I understand you still resent me for foiling your elopement recently, Judith,’ said Lawrence. ‘But I was concerned for your safety and acting on your grandfather’s orders. If I did wrong, please don’t revenge yourself on others.’

‘So dull, and so very worthy,’ said Miss Judith with a sigh.

‘Miss Lawrence, you are better than this,’ cried Mrs Saunders. ‘Don’t play these games! What have you seen today?’

Miss Judith looked at her. For a moment it looked as though she would defy her too, but then she shrugged and gave in. ‘Try looking in the icehouse,’ she said.

We didn’t stop to ask how she knew. We all turned and ran out of the house and down through the formal garden behind. I’d never been to the icehouse, but I’d seen the kitchen servants going back and forth. Lawrence and I swiftly drew ahead of our older companions. My heart was hammering with dread and hope. As we approached the trees where the icehouse lay half concealed, I felt sick with fear. Would I find another corpse instead of my living, breathing brother?

Lawrence caught my hand in his and pulled me faster. ‘Courage, Charlie,’ he said. When we reached the icehouse, he pushed open the heavy door, ducked, and entered the building ahead of me. The vast stack of ice that was stored here was mostly gone so late in the summer, so the building lay almost empty, though still cold, half dug into the earth as it was. The light was dim, and I stared about me blindly. I thought I heard a slight noise behind the remaining ice stack, so I followed it. There was nothing there but a pile of sacks. A sickening sense of disappointment flooded me. He was not here! I was about to declare that Miss Judith had been lying or mistaken, when I thought I saw the sacks move.

I ran forward, throwing myself on my knees in the dirt beside them and flung back the sacks. A body in torn underclothes and bound with ropes lay there: face down, pale, and motionless. I whimpered with fright. It was my brother’s soft brown hair, so similar to mine. For a moment, I was too afraid to turn the body, terrified that his throat would have been cut with that evil knife.

Kneeling on the other side of the body, Lawrence bent and lifted it in his arms to turn it. The face was my dear brother’s. A gag was bound cruelly tight across his mouth, but the deep blue eyes that met mine were very much alive.

Lawrence freed the gag and I fought to untie the ropes on my brother’s wrists. ‘Robert! Robert, you’re safe!’ I kept repeating, giddy with relief.

Robert coughed and spluttered as he was freed from the dreadful gag. I flung my arms around him and hugged him tight while Lawrence freed his ankles.

‘I say, Charlie old girl,’ my brother managed to gasp at last. ‘Let a fellow breathe!’

I released him, stroking his grubby face, unable to believe that he was really here, alive and well. Between us, Lawrence and I helped him to his feet and supported him out of the building. Mr and Mrs Saunders, Henry, and Bridges had all reached the icehouse now and greeted us with relief.

Lawrence and Mr Saunders supported Robert back to the house. He was in pain as the blood began to circulate in his hands and feet again after so many hours. He was also dazed from a blow to the head and from lying so long in the dark.

We reached the house just as the constable arrived. Lawrence sent a servant scurrying for some clothes of his for Robert to wear and led us all into a library lined with countless bookcases and furnished with sofas and armchairs with a view out over the gardens. There, Lawrence took the constable aside and spoke earnestly to him. I could see Henry’s suspicious eyes on Lawrence, but for myself, I no longer harboured thoughts that he was guilty of any crime.

I persuaded my brother, who was still horribly pale, to sit down upon a sofa, then I sank wearily down beside him. I had to break the dreadful news to Robert that our father was dead. After his ordeal today, he was no longer surprised, though deeply distressed. He wept, his arms around me, grieving for the father he had loved.

‘What’s happened to you, Charlie?’ he asked when he could speak again. ‘Have you been ill? Is that why your hair is cut short?’

I shook my head. ‘No, I’ve been in danger but quite well.’

‘You've been up to your tricks again, haven't you?’ asked Robert, striving for a more cheerful tone after his tears. He tugged at my shorn hair. ‘Dressing as a boy? What a ragamuffin you are, Charlie.’

‘You sound like Mr Lawrence,’ I said, half laughing and half crying. ‘That’s what he calls me. I had no choice! I needed to hide from those same men who attacked you and father. They were looking for a girl.’

‘Oh, Charlie!’ exclaimed my brother, hugging me tight. ‘What a time you must have had of it! I realized something was terribly wrong when I heard from John Lawrence about my
brother
! Why did you not write to me?’

‘I was so afraid those men were watching the post or had spies to take letters,’ I explained.

‘Then you were wiser than me,’ said Lawrence walking over to us, the constable at his heels. ‘I did precisely what you were careful not to do, and brought your brother here. In my defence, I’d written to him before we went to London. I had no idea you were already in trouble or that I was putting Robert in danger. And I had not the slightest suspicion of who either of you really were.’ He turned to Robert. ‘I was concerned for your sister, who I thought then was your younger brother. She was so clearly well-born and so young to be making her own way as a stable boy.’

‘Is this what you’ve been up to Charlie?’ exclaimed my brother, shocked. ‘A stable boy? I’m relieved you
did
write to me, Lawrence!’ he said, stretching out a hand.

Lawrence shook it with a smile. ‘Please, call me John! I think we must be related, you know.’

‘What?’ exclaimed Robert, brows knit. ‘How can that be?’

‘It’s a long story, Robert,’ I said. ‘But it seems our name isn’t Smith at all. These are our mother’s parents.’ I drew Mr and Mrs Saunders forward. They had been waiting patiently all this time at the side of the room to be introduced to their other grandchild.

Robert was astonished, but delighted, to meet them. While they introduced themselves, Lawrence drew me quietly into an adjoining room. ‘Charlie, I’ve told the constable all I can,’ he said. ‘But you are going to have to explain your story to him yourself, to convince him to arrest those two scoundrels above stairs. Can you do that?’

‘Of course,’ I said.

‘You look weary,’ he said. ‘I wish I could spare you this.’

‘No, it’s important. I’m ready now.’

‘He’s in the room next to this, ready to listen to you. Would you like someone with you? Your brother, your grandmother or your friend Henry, perhaps?’

I hesitated. ‘Would you stay with me?’ I asked. ‘I’d feel safe … with you there.’

Lawrence sighed. He stepped forward, taking one of my hands in his and pressing it. ‘I was afraid you no longer trusted me,’ he said. ‘I tortured myself, when you fled with no word to me, thinking you’d run from me. I was afraid you thought … that my intentions towards you weren’t honourable.’

I shook my head; returning the pressure of his hand. ‘That wasn’t it … it was seeing you with that man! And I’d seen the poster too … it’s true: I
didn’t
trust you.’

‘But you don’t suspect me of plotting for the inheritance now?’

I looked up into his kind, warm hazel eyes. My heart flipped over. ‘I couldn’t think such a thing of you.’

‘But you did.’

‘Most unwillingly, I assure you.’

‘I can’t tell you how relieved I am to hear it. This is scarcely the moment, I know, to speak of love, but, oh, Charlie, it is so good to see you!’

I smiled shyly up at him. With a quick glance at the door to check we were still unobserved, Lawrence drew me into his arms and kissed me. ‘I would have married you, no matter what Lord Rutherford said,’ he whispered to me. ‘When you were a penniless stable girl.’

I put up a hand to touch his cheek and he caught hold of it, pressing my fingertips to his lips. My heart fluttered.

‘I hope you will still wish to do so if it turns out that I am somebody altogether more distinguished?’ I asked.

‘That would depend on whether you would stoop to marry a mere steward, Miss Lawrence,’ he replied seriously. ‘Our positions are quite reversed, you see.’

‘I care nothing for that,’ I assured him. ‘How could I? And please, continue to call me Charlie!’

‘Only if you will call me John.’

‘Very well, John,’ I drew reluctantly back from his embrace. ‘But I don’t think I should keep the constable waiting any longer, should I?’

I thought, as Lawrence accompanied me, that he still looked troubled. Dimly I perceived that there was perhaps a greater gulf between us now than there had been before and it sat uneasily with him; he would prefer to be the one who generously overlooked the difference.

The constable questioned me at length. He then spoke to the others: my brother, the Saunders, Henry, and his brother. It must have made a most bewildering tale for the poor, baffled man. At length he felt he had our story clear, and Lawrence was ready to escort us back to Lord Rutherford.

‘Have you said anything to them?’ I whispered as we all followed him upstairs. ‘To his lordship or to the impostors?’

‘Not a word,’ he replied. ‘I couldn’t speak to Lord Rutherford without alerting the other men and I didn’t wish to set them on their guard just yet. They are at dinner, partaking freely of the wine, and I hope we will take them by surprise.’

Lord Rutherford, Miss Judith, and their two companions were startled when so many of us trooped into the room. My brother, hurriedly dressed in a slightly-too-small shirt and breeches of Lawrence’s, was still badly bruised and dirty after his ordeal. There was not a presentable guest among us for such a grand dining room, save only Lawrence who was as neat and immaculate as ever.

‘What is the meaning of this?’ demanded Lord Rutherford from the head of the table. ‘I ordered those two locked up for the constable!’ he cried, pointing at Henry and me. ‘I don’t wish to be troubled further with them! What are you thinking of, John? And what the devil are my lodge keepers and groom doing in my dining parlour?’