Taking Liberties (11 page)

The woman's account of their kinship might or might not be true—it very well could be. In either case, it hardly mattered now; since she herself had been an only child, the title had passed to a distant cousin in Surrey and a claim to it could not be resurrected at this late stage.

‘Very interesting, Mrs Nicholls. Now, if you will excuse me . . .' She rose to get away from the eyes that were so at odds with the woman's over-jovial manner.

‘Oh, but you got to meet my son.' Mrs Nicholls gestured frantically at a man over the other side of the room, watching the dancing.

Diana had already noticed him. Amidst all the gaudiness and glitter, the plainness of his uniform stood out, though it was undoubtedly a uniform—like a naval officer's dress coat but lacking its ornamentation. Without the epaulettes, braiding and the silver binding to the buttonholes, its dark blue cloth seemed to take in light and give none back.

So did the man, which was why the Dowager had noticed him. He was thirtyish, regular-featured, not unhandsome, yet there was an extraordinary non-reflectiveness to him, as if the chatter of the people around him and the music were being sucked into a well. He was alone, even in a crowd.

At his mother's signal, he came towards them without changing his expression.

‘Yere, ma dear,' Mrs Nicholls said. ‘This is the Countess of Stacpoole—you know who
she
is, don't ee? Your ladyship, this yere's my son, Captain Walter Nicholls. We gave 'un Walter in memory of Sir Walter Pomeroy, him bein' a descendant.'

Captain Nicholls's response to knowledge of who she was puzzled the Dowager. It might have been that of a hunter who had waited all his life for the sight of one particular quarry—yet there was no excitement in it, merely an added, almost relaxing, quietness. Had he been a master of hounds, his so-ho would have been uttered in a whisper, but both dogs and fox would have known it was doomed.

Most disturbing. Did he resent her? No, it wasn't resentment, it was . . . she didn't know what it was and would spend no further time on it.

‘Your ladyship.'

‘Captain Nicholls.'

The mother prattled on regardless. ‘And a fine son, tew, your ladyship, though it's me as says it as shouldn't. Educated and on his way up, aren't ee, Walter? Board of Customs Comptroller for this area, goin' to root out all the dirty smugglers along the coast. And if he dew, the Lord Lieutenant's promised as King George'll give him a knighthood, idden that right, Walter? So us'll soon be back to greatness, won't us, Walter?'

‘Mother,' Captain Nicholls said, flatly.

Mrs Nicholls clapped her hands over her mouth, but over them her eyes remained fixed on Diana's. ‘An' you'll never guess, Walter, but what her ladyship's thinkin' of returning to T'Gallants, our mootual ancestor's home. Ah,'twill be like Sir Walter Pomeroy come back, like Good Queen Bess's olden times.'

Yes, well. The Dowager bowed and made another move to leave but now it was Captain Nicholls who barred her path.

‘T'Gallants?' he asked abruptly. ‘You're going to live at Babbs Cove?'

The Inquisition would have had better manners. ‘I don't know, Captain Nicholls. Whether I do or not is a matter of concern only to myself.'

‘No, it isn't.' He darted his sentences, each as unornamented as his dress, and stared after them into her face, as if to make sure they arrived at their destination before he began another. Somewhere along the line he had discarded the Devonshire accent but his eyes were his mother's. ‘I must have your permission to search the house before you take possession.'

‘Indeed?' He was mad; they were both mad.

‘Yes. I've tried before. The caretaker refuses to let my men in.'

Was this lunacy or total lack of social grace? Either would hamper his rise in his profession, yet, if his mother were telling the truth, the title of comptroller suggested fairly high authority. She suspected obsessive efficiency.

Then she thought: Caretaker?

He jerked out the next sentence. ‘And the local magistrate refuses me a warrant.'

There was something childlike in his confession to being thwarted; in anyone else it might have been endearing but nobody, ever, would find this man endearing.

She did not like him; she did not like his mother. Most certainly, she did not want him rootling in her house, whether she occupied it or not. ‘If a magistrate refuses his warrant, I fear I must withhold mine,' she said and moved away.

Again he blocked her, presumably to argue, but she was rescued by Admiral Edgcumbe. ‘What's this? What's this? We leave business at the door, Nicholls, along with our swords.'

‘That gentleman appears to want to search my house,' she said as they walked off.

‘He would. Recently been made comptroller for the area. New broom sweepin' clean. Typical blasted Customs. Hard worker, though, always looking for hidden contraband.'

‘Really ? Does he think there is some at T'Gallants?'

‘There probably is,' the Admiral told her.

‘Really?' She was shocked.

‘Oh yes,' the Admiral said, without concern. ‘Smuggling's the local industry round here. Fishing and smuggling, the two are synonymous. ' He patted her hand. ‘No need to worry, Diana, your Devonshire smuggler's a rogue but not a dangerous rogue. And he'll be facing a hard time now that Nicholls has been appointed to catch him. A regular ferret, our Nicholls. And out for glory. If he can sweep the coast of smuggling, he'll be well rewarded.'

He sounded regretful. Diana thought he showed extraordinary laxity to a trade she knew by hearsay to be ugly; the Fortescues in Kent, with whom she'd stayed occasionally, gave blood-chilling accounts of smuggling gangs torturing and killing Revenue men sent to round them up. Not, she remembered, that such murders had prevented Lady Fortescue serving tea on which no duty had been paid.

‘That's
Kent
,' Admiral Edgcumbe said dismissively when she mentioned it. ‘East of England villains. Ugly. Different again from your Devonian or even your Cornish lads. Your West of England smuggler's a fine seaman, d'ye see? Has to sail further to fetch his goods from France.'

The Dowager failed to see how good seamanship necessarily denoted good character, nor how an admiral presently engaged in a war with France could tolerate with such apparent charity fellow-countrymen who traded with the enemy. But Lord Edgcumbe appeared to regard the supply of cheap brandy, Hollands and tobacco as necessary to the country's morale.

That used to be Aymer's attitude, the Dowager remembered— until he'd became a minister in His Majesty's Government and discovered by how much the Treasury was being welched.

His Majesty's Exchequer had estimated that duty, standing at four shillings per pound, was collected annually on 650,000 pounds of tea. Less happily, it also estimated that the nation's annual consumption of tea was at least 1,500,000 pounds and therefore it was losing nearly three million pounds in uncollected revenue. As for brandy, smugglers could provide it at five shillings a gallon (and make a handsome profit for themselves while doing so) which left honest wine merchants and publicans with the choice of staying honest and paying for legal brandy at eight shillings a gallon or going out of business.

From then on Aymer had advocated drawing and quartering for offenders against the Revenue.

At supper—the second of the night;
how
these people ate—she found herself surrounded by a blue and gold coronal of naval officers who, spurred by the story of Nicholls's attempt to search her house, were a-brim with tales of smugglers and smuggling.

She looked covertly towards their wives, who had formed a separate nosegay of their own, to see if they minded. She must be careful; if she was to settle in this area, she must not outrage its female society. Already she had refused all invitations to dance and was emitting no signals saying she wished to flirt, which she did not. Aymer had knocked such playfulness out of her very early on.

Admiral Edgcumbe, she knew, was merely paying her the attention due to an esteemed guest by a kindly host. The others? Well, she was new on stage and, despite her listlessness and the grey dreariness of her dress, still not totally repulsive.

Her main concern was Captain Luscombe who'd proved most eager to bring her an ice from the supper table, which, since he had been introduced to her as the officer in charge of Millbay Prison, she had graciously allowed him to do. But as the good captain was a fat fiftyish bachelor, susceptible, as she'd learned from Lady Edgcumbe, to anything in petticoats, she didn't think the ladies of Plymouth would begrudge her this minor conquest.

The glance reassured her; the women were serene, they saw her as no threat. Perhaps jealousy was an emotion naval wives could not afford, or was reserved for the unknown women their husbands encountered in other ports. The Admiral and his cronies were being allowed to entertain a newcomer with tales the ladies had heard many times before, while Lady Edgcumbe and
her
cronies indulged in more interesting local gossip. Satisfied, the Dowager inclined her ear to stories related with affectionate shakes of the head more usually awarded to naughty children.

It was a relief that Babbs Cove was not the centre of them.

Babbs Cove? Probably did its share but no more than any other village nearby—
that
privilege was reserved for Cawsand along the coast in Cornwall,
what
a smugglin' nest, its fishermen more familiar with brandy and lace than fish, bold, cunnin' ruffians that they were. Courageous, though; bitter work to sail to and fro from Roscoff and Cherbourg in winter, got to hand it to 'em. And its women just as audacious . . .

‘Remember old Granny Gymmer? Crossed the sands regularly carrying bottles of Hollands wrapped in a child's shawl and when the Revenue complimented her on such a nice quiet baby, had the nerve to say: “Ah, but I reckon her do have plenty of spirit in her.” '

Amused, Diana asked: ‘Why then does Captain Nicholls not devote all his searches to Cawsand if it is so notorious, rather than Babbs Cove?'

‘Well, you know these fellows who come from the wrong side of some noble blanket . . .'

Mrs Nicholls, it appeared, had made public property of her son's connection to the Pomeroy name.

‘. . . probably thinks the house would have been his had his great-granny been given her rights. Jealous, like all bastards.'

Obviously, Captain Nicholls was not liked. Her informants' antipathy was compounded by his profession. Diana was surprised by their animosity towards an upholder of the law that they had not displayed to the breakers of it. His Majesty's Royal Navy, it seemed, loathed His Majesty's Board of Customs. Excisemen could get prize money and bonuses for a successful capture without leaving the comparative safety of home waters. They were the night-soil collectors of maritime society—necessary but not to be fraternized with. There were other sins . . .

‘Limpin' home in
Lancaster
after Quiberon Bay, we were,' the Admiral said, spraying vol-au-vent and resentment, ‘just about to enter harbour when up sails a blasted Revenue cutter, flyin' the pennant if you please, and you know and I know that's not allowed 'less they're in pursuit. “Comin' aboard to search for contraband,” the 'ciseman says. “You're damn well not,” I said. I admit we had a few ankers of brandy in the mess, some trinkets for the ladies and God knows what the crew had stowed away, but fightin' for our country we damn well deserved it. Wasn't going to let some ribbon-flutterin' shore-hugger take it for nothin'. “You sheer off,” I told him, “or I'll turn my guns on ye. An' haul that damn pennant down.” '

The anecdote and the applause that greeted it provoked a certain sympathy in the Dowager for that particular exciseman and, had he been more likeable, even for Captain Nicholls himself. Both were pursuing their rightful office, after all. Nevertheless, when she looked around to see if the man had overheard, she was unaccountably relieved to find that he and his mother had gone.

It took some doing on her part, but at long last she was able to steer the conversation so that someone, not her, mentioned the prisoners of war. As she'd hoped, the Admiral's memory was pricked.

‘By the by, Luscombe, I hear that Howard fella's inspectin' prisons in the area. You lettin' him have a look at Millbay?'

‘Thought I might, thought I might,' Captain Luscombe said. ‘Fearfully overcrowded at the moment, of course, but their lordships seem keen on it; show the fella how the navy runs things, eh?'

The Dowager was relieved. The name of John Howard had previously been unknown to her, the fame attached to it having sprung up during her incarceration in her husband's sickroom. Only since being with the Edgcumbes had she learned of the man's marvels in uncovering the filth, disease and corruption of common prisons and exposing them to the light of publicity. ‘Summoned to the bar of the House, my dear,' Lady Edgcumbe had told her. ‘Thanked for his contribution to humanity, written a book and I don't know what-all.'

She'd been amused to see that the Edgcumbes and their set were no less susceptible to Howard's celebrity and the general excitement that he was in the area than anyone else. Let the incarcerators of thieves, murderers and debtors tremble at his name; the Admiralty was assured he'd find nothing wrong with its treatment of prisoners of war.

‘Rather be in Millbay than Newgate any day,' said Lord Edgcumbe, voicing the general opinion. ‘Practically wake 'em up with breakfast in bed, don't ee, Luscombe?'

Captain Luscombe was not prepared to go as far as that. ‘Haven't the funds I'd like, my lord, and the overcrowding's—'