Authors: Tania Anne Crosse
He gazed at Harry again, his brow drawn low over his eyes. ‘And you’m certain?’
Harry’s lips curled in a satisfied smirk. ‘Would I have walked all this way from Tavistock if ’tweren’t? We cas’n all afford that there train, you knows. Not like your wife. Taking the train every week to make a cuckold out o’ you.’
Cuckold
. The word sliced at Barney’s heart. His pride. The overwhelming love and trust he had always held for his beloved Ling. All this time, she had been deceiving him. His brain became enshrouded in swirling, blinding fury, and Harry’s voice reached him as if from the depths of hell.
‘I could do summat ’bout it for you,’ Harry whispered in Barney’s ear. ‘Warn ’en off, like.’ And then his mouth twisted into a sneer as he added under his breath, ‘For a small fee.’
Barney’s senses reeled away and his fists grabbed at the air. Ling. His darling Ling. It couldn’t be her fault. The bastard had seduced her with his highfalutin talk. Lured her into his bed. Oh, yes, he could forgive Ling, but she must come back to him. And the only way to make sure she did was to teach that bloody Elliott Franfield a lesson he’d never forget. ‘What d’you mean, warn ’en off?’
‘Just knock ’en ’bout a bit. A warning, like. Tell ’en if he don’t stay away from Ling there’ll be worse to come.’
Barney sucked in his cheeks to consider. He must be quick in his decision before anyone saw him talking with the beggar. ‘All right,’ he murmured. ‘But just a warning. Nort more.’
‘You won’t regret it,’ Harry answered, his sly eyes gleaming dangerously. ‘But money up front. I doesn’t want to come all the way up yere again.’
‘Wait here.’
Barney’s heart was thudding as he hurried the few yards to the cottage. He knew where Ling had hidden what little remained of their wedding nest-egg from the Warringtons. You never knew when it might be needed, Ling had always told him thriftily. Well, it was needed now. Two pounds he would take. He might be able to persuade Ling she had miscounted if he took no more, and, besides, it was a great deal more than Harry had seen in a long time, he was sure.
He passed the two notes reluctantly into Harry’s greedy hand.
‘Be that all? I thought—’
‘Then you thought wrong. ’Tis all I have. You just make sure he don’t come near Ling again. And if you gets caught, I know nort about it.’
Harry gave a livid sneer and doffed his cap mockingly before turning and walking jauntily away. Barney watched him, revulsion bringing bile into his throat. He felt sickened, so stunned that he couldn’t remember why he had been going to fetch Mr Warren from the manager’s house. Ling. Unfaithful. He still couldn’t believe it. Didn’t
want
to believe it. But, when he thought about the woman he had always loved so deeply, she had changed over the years. She was no longer the happy, carefree spirit who had been in her element working for the Warringtons. The death of her parents, and the loss of the children she had never been able to carry to term, had broken her. And yet all through the summer, until just a few weeks ago, she had seemed to come alive again. And now he knew why.
Barney sat down abruptly on a boulder and felt it vibrate beneath him. Ah, yes, the train was passing at the end of the track, lumbering uphill to the prison settlement. Were there convicts on board? He felt as trapped as they were. And that damned, bloody train was the cause of it all. Without it, Elliott Franfield would never have come into their lives.
Barney sprang up as another thought struck him, as if right between the eyes. The train marooned in the blizzard. He almost ran to Sam’s cottage and had to pause to calm himself ahead of knocking brusquely and opening the door before Fanny had a chance to answer it.
Fanny looked up, putting a finger to her lips. ‘Shh! Laura’s having her nap. So, what can I do for you, Barney? Shouldn’t you be at work?’
‘Oh, I cas’n find Sam,’ he lied. ‘I just wondered if he wasn’t yere. So . . . so Laura’s asleep,’ he faltered, searching for the right words. ‘Lovely cheel. You must be so proud. And to think you might’ve lost her, it being such a difficult birth. Must’ve been an excellent doctor what delivered her.’
Fanny smiled at him in wide-eyed innocence. ‘Oh, yes. Dr Franfield were wonderful. ’Twas so lucky he were on the train.’
Barney felt as if he had been shot by a bullet. It was crystal clear now. Ling didn’t love him. She loved Elliott Franfield.
He dragged himself back to the manager’s house and gave Mr Warren the garbled message. He returned to his work in the quarry but his vision was blurred with the image of Ling and Elliott Franfield together, holding hands. In bed. Just as it probably would have been all along if he hadn’t destroyed the letter the handsome stranger had entrusted to him all those years ago. He had been living under a delusion ever since, and he only had himself to blame. Ling was far above him. He had always denied it but hadn’t he always struggled to draw himself up to her level? Never reaching it, if he was honest with himself, and riddled with jealousy when she seemed so fulfilled when living at Fencott Place among people whose intellect she was on a par with? She could have had a far better life if he hadn’t interfered.
He had to summon the courage to open the cottage door at the end of the day. Ling was sitting at the table and she smiled at him, her hair loose and falling about her face in a profusion of chestnut curls. She looked so beautiful and he felt his heart lurch.
‘Barney, I’ve got something to tell you,’ she said softly. ‘I’m pregnant again. And I’m past the three-month danger period. I think . . . I somehow think I’m going to keep this one.’
Her eyes were glistening, great pools of past hurt and present hope. A child. What they had both longed for over so many years.
‘Oh, my darling,’ Barney couldn’t help but mutter as he took her in his arms. ‘You really must look after this one.’
‘Yes, I intend to. I shall go into Tavistock on Saturday. But it’ll be for the very last time, I promise.’
Barney understood what she meant, though he would never let on, and he felt the balm soothe his wounded soul. The child might be his, or it might be Elliott Franfield’s. He didn’t care either way. Ling was coming back to him. She was shaking against him, and he knew why. She was giving up her true love to return to her proper place. His heart danced with elation. There was no need for Harry Spence to . . .
Oh, Jesus Christ, what had he done? Harry had left hours ago and would be back in Tavistock by now, planning his move. Perhaps he would carry it out that very night! Barney’s blood ran cold. He had to stop him.
He let go of Ling, astounding her as he bolted out of the door. He ran, flying past those who watched him in amazement, faster, faster, must go faster! He must catch the train, the last train, find Harry before it was too late, though where, or how, he had no idea. And then the green engine was rumbling towards him, a wisp of grey smoke puffing rhythmically from the chimney. Barney waved his arms frantically, praying it would make an unscheduled stop along the line. But the giant monster trundled past him, leaving him to sink on his knees in despair.
Elliott gently closed behind him the door of the Fitzford Cottage alongside the canal. Another healthy little human being delivered safely into the world. The new addition was an obvious delight to the happy family and was rubbing salt into the already raw wound.
Was Ling’s child his? It was certainly possible, although it was far more likely to be Barney’s. Either way, he had lost Ling, he knew it. Her place was by Barney’s side, not his. Much as she loved him, her loyalty was quite rightly to her husband. He had entreated her so often to come away with him, but her high morals, the very same that he loved and admired her for, had prevented it. And now they had taken her, and what was possibly his child, away from him for ever.
He paused for a moment, staring up at the clear night sky. It was almost dark and stars were beginning to twinkle up there, somewhere miles beyond human experience. The air held that familiar autumn tang of dampness, especially here beside the canal. Elliott wondered how many years he would witness the dying season pass him by. Without Ling, it would all seem so pointless. Would he ever love again? He doubted it. She had been,
was
, so special to him, his one and only love. It hadn’t been a lie when he said he had thought about her during all those years studying in London. And now she had been whipped away from him by what should have been the most joyous event life could offer.
He walked on, unable to blank out the grief. Five minutes would see him home. To the empty house that had once rung with Ling’s voice. The fire in the range would long have gone out with no one there to see to it. There would be no hot meal, not even a hot beverage. How different things might have been if Ling had been free to marry him.
He shivered. It promised to be the first chilly night since the spring, and he felt cold inside. As if there was ice in his veins.
It was as he reached the remains of Fitzford Gate that he heard the hurried footfall of someone running along the path at the far side of the canal. He turned round as the figure of a man, no more than a black outline in the near darkness, charged across the bridge, waving frenetically at him.
‘The bag,’ the stranger wheezed, jabbing his head towards Elliott’s medical bag. ‘You a doctor?’
Elliott straightened his shoulders and nodded. ‘Yes. Dr Franfield.’
‘Oh, thank God,’ the man spluttered. ‘My mate’s fallen down the aqueduct. Broked his leg, I reckons.’
‘Right, well, we’d better raise some help. We’ll need some assistance if we’re to carry him all that way.’
‘Oh, no. I’d best take you to ’en first. In proper agony, he be. You’d never find ’en in the dark on your own. I can show you.
Then
I’ll fetch help.’
‘All right. But we must take care not to fall ourselves in the dark. And
you
need to catch your breath.’
‘Yes, you’m right,’ the fellow panted. And, keeping his head low, he hurried back across the bridge.
Elliott followed him, and they set out at a brisk pace along the old towpath of the disused canal. Faint lights glimmered from the windows in the Fitzford Cottages on the opposite side, but once they had passed the end of the little dwellings they were plunged into deep shadow. Moonlight shimmered on the silver ribbon of water, but even that became lost as they entered the trees that had grown up beside the once busy canal.
Elliott concentrated on what was thankfully a relatively even surface. He reckoned it was a good mile to where the canal was carried over the steep Lumburn Valley on a vast embankment possibly a hundred feet high. If someone had fallen down the precipitous bank he would be lucky to have broken his leg rather than his neck! Elliott hoped he himself could get down to the chap safely to administer some pain relief while his companion summoned the manpower that would surely be needed to carry out the rescue.
‘Hurry!’ the man called urgently, almost dancing in front of him.
Elliott took a breath in through his teeth. The fellow was understandably agitated, but Elliott wondered what on earth these two individuals had been doing out here as dusk had gathered into nightfall. Though he had not glimpsed the face of the man who had summoned him, he had caught the distinct odour of alcohol on his breath, but it wasn’t his role to ask questions. And so he hurried along, in the wake of the burly silhouette, for the first time in his life wishing vehemently he was not a doctor whose duty it was to help people at any hour of the day or night. All he wanted was to be home, to be warm, to satisfy his empty stomach and to sink into the bliss of sleep where, if he was lucky, he might be able to escape from the tormenting belief that Ling was lost to him for ever.
They had been scurrying along for ten minutes or so, half running and breathing in the chill, damp air, when the stranger turned round so unexpectedly that Elliott had to pull himself up short to avoid colliding with the fellow. In that instant, he saw the whites of the man’s eyes glint in the darkness, and, for a split second, recognition flashed across the deepest recess of his mind. He had seen those cunning, shifty eyes somewhere before. But the warning came too late.
Harry Spence drove his iron fist upwards underneath Elliott’s ribcage. The blow was so powerful it completely knocked the wind out of him. He couldn’t move, began to choke, struggling for the breath that wouldn’t come. He stood, transfixed, air gurgling and trapped in his throat. He had no strength, every muscle rigid, and the heavy bag slipped from his fingers, landing on the ground with a dull thud. He must . . . breathe. With a massive effort of will, he forced his chest to expand.
The pain of it seemed to scream through his body as he stared at the snarling face before him. He must defend himself. But, even as he gathered his stunned wits about him, a second blow smashed across his jaw, and he staggered backwards. The blackguard was standing there, arms akimbo, gloating at his handiwork, waiting to strike again. But Elliott wouldn’t give in so easily. He wasn’t afraid, just furious at allowing himself to be tricked. Agony tore through his ribs as he launched himself forward, but he had never fought in his life, not even a schoolyard scrap. What did this devil want? The drugs in his bag? The morphine? Then why didn’t he take the bag and run? It was obvious Elliott was in no fit state to give chase.
He wasn’t quite sure where he was aiming, but his knuckles met with solid muscle that racked his own fist. He heard the evil laugh as the wretch grabbed him by the collar, half choking him, and swung him round to receive the full force of the next punch, which landed deep in his stomach. A sickening fire ripped through his entire body, and he collapsed on to his knees as Harry’s next blow slammed into his face. Panic rather than agony seared into his head as he saw stars and then blackness, and then Harry’s fists were raining down on him until he rolled helplessly on to his side.
A deep, hollow stillness. Thank God it was over. But then torture; his hair was being torn from his scalp as his head was wrenched upwards by it.
‘Look at me, you varmint!’