He returned the pressure of her hand, fear and love for her drenching him like a hopeless tide. ‘It does not trouble me. I think I must learn to swallow my pride a little and accept the care I am given.’
‘That would be much more sensible of you. You ask Jonathan and me to accept all you do for us without thanks. It is unfair of you not to do the same.’
He lifted her small hand to his lips and kissed it. She shuffled into his side and laid her head on his shoulder.
‘You are growing, little woman.’
Rachel returned. She carried baby Anne sleeping on her shoulder, and led Stephen, white- Stepand confused, by the hand.
‘Graves, Stephen wishes to bring his model of the
Splendour
with him. I said we should enquire if there is room enough.’
‘Papa likes it.’
Graves got to his feet. ‘Yes, of course you must bring it then.’ He crossed to the little boy and picked him up in his arms. ‘Susan, will you fetch it and bring it down?’ She nodded and scudded out towards the nursery. Graves felt Stephen’s arms link behind his neck and he began to carry him down to the waiting carriage.
‘Did the spies attack Father, Mr Graves?’
‘They did, Stephen. Now Mr Crowther and his friends will hunt them down.’
‘Tell Jonathan I am sorry not to be there when he wakes. Sometimes he has bad dreams.’
‘I did not know that, Stephen. Thank you. I will see he does not wake alone.’
Once Rachel and the children were comfortable and the model safe he stood back and looked at his coachman.
‘Are you armed, Slater?’
‘Yes, sir.’ He shifted his seat to show the pistol at his side. ‘As is Gregory.’ The footman on the carriage with him touched his hat as he was named.
‘Good,’ said Graves. ‘If any footpad tries to delay you, shoot him.’
Mrs Service met him in the hallway. ‘Do go in, Mr Graves. Mr Palmer, who seems to be the man behind it all, is in the library with the rest. Mr Crowther has told us what has passed, and now I feel my duties must return to the domestic. It seems there will be a quantity of people coming and going today, and very few of them through the front door. I must speak to Mrs Martin and the servants. How is Susan?’
Graves leaned against the wooden panelling of the hall as he replied, his hand shielding his eyes from the lamplight. ‘I have told her to send for Verity Chase as soon as she may.’
‘Good,’ said the little woman and began to move away.
‘Mrs Service?’ She turned back towards him. ‘You are very calm.’
She let a smile hover over her lips. ‘I save my vapours up, like Molloy saves his favours. Go in, sir. We all of us have work to do this day.’
Harriet knew quickly that there was no hope that Trevelyan could offer. Having seen her husband made more comfortable with laudanum and cold presses, she dismissed the doctor to see to his other guests, disturbed by the noise and hurrying. Clode did not leave the room, but retired to a chair by the fire and angled his face he nois>
James’s eyes fluttered open. ‘Harry?’
‘Here, my darling.’
‘I fear I am leaving you again.’
She could not reply to this, only wrap her warm fingers round his palm. It seemed colder to her now than a few minutes before. ‘Harriet, I know I am not what I was . . .’
‘That is not important, James.’
He breathed a little raggedly, then closed his fingers tightly around her own. ‘But Harriet, tell me . . . before . . . It was a good marriage, was it not? I always thought of it so. I remember loving you . . .’
Harriet’s voice struggled up through the darkness in her throat. ‘It was a good marriage, James. Very. You made me happy.’
‘I am so glad.’ His eyes fluttered closed again, and Harriet watched his chest rise and fall, listening for a carriage on the gravel.
‘Then we are decided?’ said Mr Palmer. There were nods around the room. ‘I thank you for your hospitality, Graves. I must, however, appear at the office if we are not to frighten away our birds, and I must meet quietly with Lord Sandwich. Mr Crowther will coordinate our activities during the day. I shall take control in the evening. There are four messengers I trust to be discreet. Graves, how far can you trust your people?’
‘I recommend them without question.’
‘Very well. I shall summon my people.’
He stood up and there was a general stir in the room. Palmer put his hand to Crowther’s shoulder and leaned into him. ‘Sir, it would be a great boon to the Crown, and the prosecution of these traitors, if Johannes was brought into my custody alive. I believe Molloy and Mrs Bligh have certain . . . forces to draw on. I wish to question the man myself.’
Crowther looked at him down his long nose. ‘I am aware of that.’
Palmer chewed his lip. ‘I am glad. Johannes will not move from whatever hiding-place he has found in daylight. No doubt his fear and need will drive him back into Town this evening as we close on Lord Carmichael and these creatures of Mrs Bligh’s discovering.’
Crowther looked over his shoulder at Jocasta, Molloy and the little boy. ‘That is the consensus.’
Palmer turned towards the door, saying, ‘But I note you make me no promise.’
Crowther did not reply, and Palmer met the fate of any man who had tried to stare him down and left the room, shaking his head.
Rachel knocked lightly on the door, and on hearing Harriet’s quiet, ‘Come in’, ushered Stephen in, in front of her. Clode came immediately towards them, and Daniel had just enough time to take the model from the little boy before he charged across the room and into the arms of his mother. She held him for a second, then seeing that James’s eyes were opening again, addressed her boy.
‘Stephen! Stephen, my love, look at your papa.’
The boy struggled to hold his head against his mother, his eyes tightly shut.
James managed to open his lips. ‘Stephen,’ he coughed fiercely.
The boy flinched but feeling the gentle pressure of his mother’s hand managed to turn his body a little and open his eyes. James smiled at him, and without apparently knowing he did so, Stephen loosed his grip on his mother’s waist and smiled shyly back.
Harriet could not quite bear to look at her husband. She knew how great his pain must be, she could see it in the fine lines around his eyes, the furrows of his forehead. She wondered what part of his mind was serving him now, causing him to try and shield their son from that pain. It spoke a finer understanding than any he had shown since the accident.
‘Thank you for coming to see me, my boy.’
Stephen forgot his fear enough to move away from Harriet entirely, and put his small hand on his father’s massive wrist.
‘I brought the model for you, Papa.’
‘Thank you.’ James’s eyes travelled the young boy’s face with a sort of curious wonder. ‘Let it be put where I can see it.’ Clode dragged one of the side-tables to the opposite side of the bed and set the
Splendour
on it. If James noticed or recognised Clode himself, he gave no sign. Only, when the boat came close enough for him to see, he gave a great sigh. Stephen seemed to feel the lack of his attention.
‘I found out the name of the song, Papa,’ he said, and sang a line or two in a quavering falsetto. ‘It is called “
Sia fatta la pace
”. Manzerotti sings it.’
James kept his eyes on the ship, but opened his fingers to take his son’s hand in his own. ‘Manzerotti. Yes, of course. Thank you, Stephen. It does not seem as important now.’
Jocasta was back on the sofa dealing the cards by the time the first of the King’s Messengers returned. ‘It seems you were right, sir,’ he said, shifting his weight from one shoe to the other as he spoke to Crowther. ‘Fred Mitchell came out to take the air at lunch, and I saw him meet with Mr Palmer’s secretary at Whitehall. Then he high-tailed it back to his place in Salisbury Street. I’d swear his jacket pocket sat smoother when he came out again.’
‘Very good,’ Crowther replied, without looking up from his writing. ‘But yourormation came from that lady,’ his quill pointed out to Jocasta, ‘not myself.’ The Messenger cleared his throat and looked uncomfortable.
‘Yes, sir.’
‘What further?’
‘There was a boat taken from a pitch at the bottom of One Tun Alley on Thursday night. Or at least, something queer went on. Fella who owns it came to it in the morning and found the ropes done up wrong and a hearthrug shoved under the bench.’
Crowther lifted his eyes. ‘What became of the rug?’
‘The man took it home to his woman, and she weren’t too pleased to let it go again.’
‘And now?’
‘The thin lady in the kitchen, Mrs Service, took it from me, sir. Before she showed me up.’
‘Excellent.’ The man did not leave. Crowther waited.
‘Thing is, sir, seems like there’s a funny mood abroad – down by the river and over the streets. Can’t put my finger on it, but people are on edge. As if they’re watching and waiting. There’s something going on. I haven’t seen so many people with that look on them . . . I’ve never seen it, sir.’
Crowther looked at him impassively. ‘I understand you, sir. You have done very well. What are your further duties?’
‘I am to wait near Lord Carmichael’s, sir. Discreet like, till I am called for.’
‘Then do so.’
The man backed out of the room. As the door shut behind him, Jocasta stopped laying her cards and studied Crowther from under her brows. The ceasing of the regular beat of her cards disturbed him and he glanced towards her.
‘Wasn’t sure of it last night, but now the daylight’s on you, I know you.’
‘Do you, madam?’
‘Ask me where I was born and when.’
Crowther laid down his pen and sat back in his chair. ‘Where were you born and when, Mrs Bligh?’
‘Keswick. Seventeen thirty-seven.’
‘I see.’
‘I don’t hold as a rule with waking up what’s been left resting a long while, my Lord. But should you ever wonder about the days of my youth, and what I remember of it, you may find me and ask me.’
Crowther felt his throat tighten. ‘I would prefer you called me simply Mr Crowther. Or as we are acquaintances from childhood, you may call me Crowther.’
Jocasta did not reply and the cards began to slap down again. Some moments passed before she said, ‘Sam has returned with the lad that saw my Kate done for.’
‘Where are they now?’
Jocasta nodded upwards. ‘Making friends with Lady Susan and her little uncle and that grey-eyed beauty, Miss Chase. That young girl’s a smart one. You could throw her on a dung-hill or into a palace and she’d prosper. If they feed my boy macaroons he’ll be sick on their carpet. He’s not used to it.’ Crowther was unsure if she meant the dog or Sam. ‘It’s a queer household this, Mr Crowther. I turn my cards here, I see blood and harmony all woven together. Strange rope to swing from.’
Crowther’s pen made small scratching movements on the paper. ‘As good as any. Did you make your arrangements?’
‘I did. And Molloy continues with his own.’
Crowther looked across at her. ‘I will be there?’
‘Don’t fash yersel’. You’ll be there, and you’ll be fetched when needed. I wouldn’t walk the rookeries as a general habit, gentleman like you. But tonight you’ll pass in and out again.’
‘Thank you.’
Jocasta said nothing but continued at the cards.
The world was becoming simpler again. The strange aching fog that had been battering at his mind, the whistling headaches . . . his stumbling senses were beginning to clear. He opened his eyes a little. The ship, his other darling, was there waiting for him, trim and thirsting to be away. He saw old comrades on the deck; men he’d thought drowned or shattered were there whole and urging him towards them. And on the quarter-deck, with the baby in her arms and Stephen at her side, was Harriet. She was wearing the green riding-habit she had been dressed in the first time they met. It matched her eyes. And she was laughing, trying to stop the wind driving her red curls across her face and waving to him, telling him to hurry because all was ready and the ship was straining for the off. The smell of the sea flooded his nostrils, the wind stung his cheeks and he began to run down the slope to the bay where the jolly-boat was waiting to take him onboard; he could already hear the bosun’s whistle, feel the shift of the timbers on the deck as the wind caught her sails, feel his wife’s hand cool and loving in his own as they made their way out into open water.
She held on to his hands as if she could pull him back from the flood, as if by fastening her fingers where his pulse now threaded away to nothingness, she could hold him back from the wastes beyond.
‘James?’ she said in a whisper, as his breath emptied from him. ‘James? No, please stay, James! Stay! Stay, my love!’ He was gone. She fell forward over his body and promised any God who might listen her and bones, offered every sacrifice, every love, she tried to offer them her life, her children, and taking him by the shoulders, buried her mouth in his neck.