Amanda Scott - [Dangerous 03] (48 page)

A tremendous crack of thunder echoed through the cave, and the horses seemed to go wild. Melissa’s scream was drowned by Victor’s as the huge gelding reared in terror, frightening the others. Crowded as they were into the alcove, it was a moment before Victor broke free and plunged toward the fire.

The men had leapt instantly to their feet, and several rushed to calm the frightened horses. Nicca was closest to Victor and reached toward him to catch his bridle, but the huge gelding reared again and one hoof caught the man on the shoulder, spinning him and sending him crashing to the cave floor at Daintry’s feet, where he lay winded and gasping.

Quick as a flash Daintry snatched the pistol from his belt and said, “Move away with me, girls. Keep clear of Victor and watch those men with the horses.” Once she was far enough along the wall to be sure Nicca could not simply snatch the pistol back, she waited for his eyes to open before she said in a calm, clear voice, “Do not move or I will shoot you.”

The others had control of the horses now, including Victor, and her words echoed oddly through the cavern, causing the men to turn toward her as one. Dewy Warleggan took a step toward her.

“Stop where you are. If you think I won’t kill him, you are very much mistaken. In fact, you ought to put another log on that fire before it burns too low, for I would hate to shoot the wrong man merely because I cannot see the right one.”

Nicca sat up, rubbing his shoulder. “Do as the lass says.” Then, watching her narrowly while Dewy obeyed, he began to get to his feet. “You won’t blow a hole in a cove just for seeing if his bones are broke, will you, mum?” Once upright, he looked at her more speculatively. “Doubt you be a murderous mort when all’s said and done.” He took a single step toward her.

Dewy said sharply, “Don’t do it, Nicca She don’t like men, so she’s as like to kill you as look at you!”

“Nay, lad, not her. I knows gentry-morts, ye see, and this one ain’t gonna loose off no popgun at an unarmed man.”

Had he leapt at her, Daintry knew she could very well have shot him, but if he simply kept walking toward her, she was just as sure that she could never fire the pistol.

“Shoot him,” Charley cried. “Oh, shoot him!”

Daintry could see amusement in Nicca’s eyes when he held out his hand and said, “You’ll not do it, lass.”

“She might not,” Deverill said from the cave opening, “but I certainly will, and you won’t really care who pulled the trigger when all is said and done.” He held a pistol in his hand, and behind him, Penthorpe held another. “Now, back away from the ladies, and the rest of you lads step away from the horses and over by that wall so we can have a look at you.”

Daintry said quickly, “The thunder, sir. Someone must hold Victor, or he will panic again.”

“Clemons,” Deverill said sharply, but Charley was already on her feet and had run to the gelding’s head.

“I can steady him if only the others don’t spook him again.”

Deverill looked at Daintry, who nodded in reply to the unspoken question. He said, “Clemons, Ned, see to the others.”

“My lord,” Dewy Warleggan said, standing his ground when the two passed him, “we would not have harmed them, I swear it.”

“As we saw,” Deverill said grimly.

“He’s cutting no whids, your lordship,” another man said, and Daintry saw he was the one who had been so vocal earlier. “Happen we seen there was a damber in the ruffmans, and since we’d no yen t’ deck the chates, we’d ha’ binged a wast but for the rhino we was promised. A cuffin can’t buy peck nor poplars without rhino in his drawers, m’lord, and times is hard.”

Penthorpe said indignantly, “What’s the fellow talking about? Dashed if I can understand a word of it!”

Deverill looked at Dewy Warleggan, but it was Nicca who answered, “He says it warn’t altogether pound dealing, m’lord, which is fact, since the cove what hired us would ha’ seen us swing had we’d done all he wanted us to do, and we’d ha’ given him the bag but for the gelt he flung about so generous.”

Daintry, still bewildered, looked quizzically at Deverill, who smiled at her and said, “Their principal is something of a scoundrel and since they don’t wish to be hanged, they would have abandoned him altogether if he had not paid them regularly.”

There was another sharp crack of thunder, and Victor reared, catching Charley off her guard. Nicca leapt to help her hold the gelding, and Deverill lowered his pistol. He looked from one to another of the would-be villains, then said, “What was the plan for today? In plain English, if you please.”

Dewy Warleggan said, “We was told the bit lass there”—he pointed at Melissa—“had run off, and we was to find her but not to bring her straight back, only to keep her safe hid. One of the stable lads had been made to say where she was likely to be, and if Miss Charley was with her, we was to keep her, too, and to keep an eye out for Lady Daintry to show.” He licked his lips. “We’d never have harmed her ladyship, my lord, not for nothing, but like Nicca says, times is real hard and money right scarce.”

“A cove prefers to be rhinocerical,” the vocal man muttered.

Nicca nodded, stroking Victor. The gelding’s eyes were wide, but it stood quietly despite recurrent rumbling outside.

Dewy said pensively, “Doubt you’ll credit it, sir, when I tell you who it was, but—”

“Not now,” Deverill said curtly. “Just tell me this. Are you lot responsible for firing upon Lady Daintry’s coach, inciting the riots at Mulberry mine, and shooting at me?”

Dewy grimaced. “I’d as lief not discuss the mine, sir. That were a separate matter and had naught to do with… with the cove I spoke of. Nicca did fire at you, but never to do harm, and he told him you was too quick for him both times. As to the rest, he never said the old griffin would be in the coach that day, nor Lady Daintry neither, just that we’d find easy pickings if we robbed it and he wouldn’t cry none if them inside was killed. Think he meant them to be,” Dewy added, “but he never said as much, and we lobbed off soon as we seen who it was inside. The cove’s summat of a basket scrambler, your lordship, if you take my meaning.”

Deverill nodded and Daintry, who had followed the conversation without much difficulty said suddenly, “Are you the same men who attacked Lord Deverill in London, then?”

Dewy shook his head. “Ain’t never been to London, nor Nicca neither, but Sir—” He broke off, caught Deverill’s eye, and went on, “That is, the cove I was amentioning might ha’ hired someone else to do it. He’s no friend of yours, sir,” he added, “but we’ve no grief with you, none at all. Fact is, you, my Lord Jervaulx, and Lord St. Merryn are the only gentry we know who be trying to get the mines opened again. We don’t bite off our own feet, so to speak, but we do what we can to earn a bit here and there without we commit murder.”

“So you are willing to do what the man tells you, but only when it does not offend your conscience, is that it?”

Nicca grinned at him. “That’s it. We work for the sheep-biter when it’s to our good, m’lord, but we ain’t scoundrels nor we ain’t madmen, and that be the truth of it.”

Penthorpe said suddenly, “What are we going to do with them, Gideon? We’ve got to get young Melissa home to her mother.”

“No!” Charley cried. “You can’t take her back!”

Melissa stood pressed against the wall beside Daintry, her eyes wide, her lips parted as she took in the scene before her.

Deverill looked at Daintry and said quietly, “We would do better to discuss this matter without so great an audience, I think, but I leave it to you to decide what must be done with these fellows, my dear. You were their victim, after all.”

Penthorpe said angrily, “I’m for hanging the lot of them. Surely, you don’t mean to let them go, Gideon!”

Deverill said, “Well, Daintry?”

Daintry, seeing that all the men were watching her, some of them most anxiously, said, “They did not hurt us, sir, and I do not believe they can be very villainous at heart, but to be sure, if they are the ones who fired upon our coach—”

“But missed, mum, by a mile,” Nicca pointed out quickly, “and Cub there, he couldn’t move his dexter wing for a sennight after. Old griffin plugged him neat as wax.”

“That is perfectly true,” she said. She looked at Deverill, expecting him to decide, but when he waited, the picture of patience, she knew he truly meant to abide by her decision. “Let them go, sir. I am sure they will mend their ways.”

“We will,” Dewy said, adding more hesitantly, “I say, mum, will you … that is, you won’t say nothing to Feok, will you? What I meant is … well, Feok is …” He spread his hands.

“I will engage to say nothing if you will promise to help your brother on his farm—cheerfully, mind you—until the mine opens again or until you find some quite legal occupation that you like better. Is that a bargain, Dewy?”

“Aye, mum, it is.” He glanced sheepishly at Nicca, who only grinned at him. A few minutes later the men and their horses had gone, and Daintry realized she had not heard thunder for some time. The light outside the cave opening was brighter, too.

Penthorpe snorted in disgust. “Well, they’re gone,” he said, “but I still say we ought to have hanged the lot for scaring poor Susan clean out of her mind, as I have no doubt they have done. Since they are gone, however, at least we can be getting Miss Melissa back to her straightaway.”

“No,” Charley said, “you don’t understand!”

“Not another word,” Deverill said sternly. “Ned, Clemons, take the other horses outside, and be sure those villains have departed. We’ll be with you in a moment. And now, Charley,” he added when they had gone, “you have ventured very near the edge of what I will tolerate, so I advise you to tread with care, but if there is something you believe you must say, say it now.”

Charley looked at him, her mouth open, men closed it and looked down at the ground, nibbling her lower lip.

Daintry kept silent.

No one else spoke.

Finally, Charley said quietly, “We left a note for Aunt Susan, sir, so she won’t be scared. W-we thought it would help her if Melissa ran away, because then she could run away too. If Melissa goes back now …” She could not finish, and Daintry saw that there were tears in her eyes.

Penthorpe started to speak, but Deverill silenced him with a gesture and said, “We are going to ride to Seacourt Head with you, Charley, and we will see to it that matters are properly explained so no one gets hurt. Will you trust us to do that?”

She nodded, but Daintry could see her reluctance and hoped Deverill could keep his word. Knowing he would find it easier to do so if he understood exactly what sorts of things Seacourt was capable of doing, she knew she had to make a clean breast of it at last, but when he commanded the others to ride ahead and drew Shadow alongside Cloud, she found she had no idea how to begin. Even if she did, she was by no means certain she could tell him the things that would matter the most. The storm had passed, and although there were still dark clouds drifting overhead, the sky behind them was blue again, and the thunder had stopped.

“Are you all right?” Gideon asked quietly.

“Yes, of course, though I suppose you mean to scold me for riding after them without getting someone else to come with me.”

“I have no right to chide you, but I’d advise you to take care what you say to Penthorpe. He does have that right.”

She swallowed, looking ahead to where the others were riding. “I didn’t know he was in Cornwall,” she said.

Gideon chuckled. “He hadn’t quite got around to riding to Tuscombe Park, you see. It seems he put off turning across the moor until he suddenly found himself at Deverill Court.”

She nodded, turned to him impulsively, then turned back and stared straight ahead.

Gideon watched her for a few minutes. Then, gently, he said, “What is it, my dear? I’ve seen that look on too many young soldiers’ faces, when they have something they are burning to say but are afraid of the consequences. I have already said you have nothing to fear from me.”

She looked at him, saw the warmth in his eyes, and said suddenly, “I’m not afraid of you, only of what you will think of me, but that’s foolishness, for there are other, much more important matters at stake.”

“Then suppose you tell me. I promise you, nothing you can say will alter what I think of you.”

The warm note in his voice brought heat to her cheeks, but suddenly she found that she could talk to him as to herself, and the words flowed from her. She told him everything that Geoffrey had done to Susan. Then she told him about the night of the storm, and when she finished, and saw his lips pressed tightly together, she feared for a single, brief moment that he would blame her. Then he looked at her, and the fear melted away.

“Is that why you pulled away from me that one night?”

She nodded. “I-I couldn’t help it. The memory came before I knew such terrors were lying in wait for me.”

“We have some talking to do, some things to straighten out,” he said, “but first I want a chat with Sir Geoffrey Seacourt.”

They had reached the drive, and it was only minutes before they let themselves into the house. Daintry was surprised that there were no servants to greet them, but glad, too, knowing it would be best if the day’s events did not become food for gossip.

She led the way to the drawing room, certain that at that hour they must find Susan there, but the others were close behind her. As she drew near the doors, she saw that they were slightly ajar, and she heard angry voices. Motioning for the others to be silent, she crept nearer in time to hear her sister say, “I don’t believe you, Geoffrey, and if you do not instantly tell me where you have hidden Melissa, I will kill Catherine.”

S
EACOURT SAID ANGRILY, “DAMN
it, Susan, put that pistol down at once. You don’t know what you’re doing, and it could very well go off by accident! I tell you, Melissa ran away. I found a note from her and didn’t tell you, because I had hoped to have her back before you realized she had gone.”

“I don’t believe you,” Susan snapped. “You would not be sitting quietly here if you did not know where she was, Geoffrey. I know you have taken her to torture me because I asked you to send Catherine away, and if you do not instantly bring her back, I promise you, I will shoot Catherine.”