Black Hearts in Battersea (20 page)

"I'd best dose you all while I'm at it," Dr. Field said. "Quinsy is highly infectious. I'll have to get my medicines."

One of the men accompanied Dr. Field, the other assisted Mrs. Buckle to carry eggs, goat's milk, and spirits of rhubarb to the dinghy. Presently it pulled away with its cargo and the two boys stole back to Mrs. Buckle's hut and settled down for the night, Justin to sleep peacefully, Simon to toss and turn in wakeful misery, thinking of Sophie and Dido.

Early next morning he rose and looked out. A thin snow was falling and beginning to lie on heather and rocks.
Dark Dimity
was still anchored in the bay, and a dinghy was pulling toward the shore. Unsurprised, he saw that its sole occupant was Dr. Field. Simon woke Justin and the two boys ran to the jetty.

"Doped the lot of 'em," said Dr. Field, grinning cheerfully as he shipped his oars and indicated two men sprawled on the bottom boards. "They're all sleeping like babies. Help me get these beauties ashore and then we'll go back for some more."

"How did you do it?" Simon asked.

"A species of seaweed that's common on the rocks here is a powerful soporific. I ate some myself one month, when Dark was a bit slow bringing the groceries; put me into a deep sleep for two days; Mrs. Buckle thought I'd stuck my
spoon in the wall. Woke up feeling fit as a fiddle, though. So I dried and powdered a lot; thought it would come in useful if ever I got back into practice. Yes, that's right, drag them into the hut."

"Won't they be surprised to wake up and find we've gone off and left 'em!" giggled Justin, delighted at the neatness and simplicity of the plan. He helped Simon ferry over the rest
of Dark Dimity's
crew, two by two, with a few supplies. ("We must be humane, after all," Dr. Field said. "We'll tell the Preventives about them when we land, and they can come and fetch 'em to jail.")

Mrs. Buckle meanwhile, scandalized at the disreputable condition of the ship, had been scrubbing decks and polishing brasswork; she would even have attempted to wash and mend the dirty, ragged sails, had there been any soap, and had not Dr. Field dissuaded her.

"There'll be work enough sailing the ship to land," he warned her. "I've kept the two men with quinsy; they're still too weak to give trouble. They can take it in turns steering while the boys and I handle the sails, if you'll keep guard over them with a gun, Mrs. Buckle."

"What, me touch one o' them nasty things? I'd as lief blow me head off!"

But when she found it was not loaded and was to be used merely as a threat, Mrs. Buckle agreed. The
Dark Dimity,
being on the return journey from Hanover, was loaded down to her marks with pistols, Pictclobbers, gunpowder, and bullets.

The two sufferers from quinsy quailed at the sight of
Mrs. Buckle nervously waving a blunderbuss, and were only too anxious to obey Dr. Field's orders, the more so when he told them they should go free if the
Dark Dimity
arrived safely at the port of Chipping Fishbury.

Shortly after noon the
Dark Dimity
weighed anchor, with one of the two invalids steering while Dr. Field and the boys worked the capstan. As the brig left the shelter of the island her sails slowly filled with wind. They had all been too busy to notice the weather, but now Simon realized that it was snowing fast; the flakes streamed past him in ribbons of white, blown by a knife-edged wind from the northeast; when he looked back, presently, from his perch in the rigging (for they had already found it necessary to reef some sails) he saw that Inchmore was no more than a white bump amid the threatening waves.

"It's a good thing we built up the fire before we left," Dr. Field said. "Those men are going to be feeling cold by the time they wake up. This wind is exactly what we need; we can run before it all the way to Chipping Fishbury."

He rubbed his hands in satisfaction, stamping his feet on the snow-covered deck to warm them. "Mrs. Buckle! I don't think those two men will give any trouble now. How about putting your blunderbuss away and going to the galley to make us all some of your excellent hot beef-tea?"

A huge fire blazed cheerfully in the nobly proportioned fireplace of Chippings Castle great hall. Beside it the Duchess dozed in an oak settle, surrounded by her embroidery. Occasionally she woke and put a stitch or two into the tapestry.

Upstairs, in an attic leading onto the castle battlements, the Du e was happily occupied with one of his experiments, something to do with air balloons. After the last few weeks of excitement, rescues by land and water, perils of fire, drowning, and wolves, not to mention the loss of a nephew and the discovery of an unexpected niece, his Grace was badly in need of peace and solitude.

Sophie, seated at the fireside opposite the Duchess, also appeared to be peacefully engaged—in mending the Duke's socks but—her thoughts were not peaceful. She was anxious and miserable, longing to be back in London. The party had now been at Chippings for three weeks, but still Justin had not turned up. Every body here was kind and faithful, she was sure, and the Duke and Duchess were
safe, but Sophie felt dreadfully isolated. She wanted to know what had happened in Rose Alley. What had become of Simon, Justin, and Dido?

It had been snowing now for two days, there were reports that the wolves on the wolds were becoming very bold, and Sophie feared greatly that the castle might be cut off from all news for weeks and weeks—perhaps until spring.

As if to give emphasis to her thoughts, a baleful howling arose outside, and the stabled horses neighed and stamped in fear. Sophie shivered, threw a log on the fire, and went to look out of the window, but although it was hardly more than midafternoon the day was so dim with whirling snow that she could see nothing.

The Duchess nodded, yawned, and opened her eyes. "What was that noise, Sophie dear?"

"I'm afraid it was wolves, ma'am."

"Oh dear me, wolves so early? I suppose that means we shall not be getting the evening paper from York," her Grace said dolefully. But just then they heard a fusillade of shots, a tremendous jingling of sleigh bells, and, almost immediately, an urgent tattoo of knocks upon the great door of the castle.

Sophie ran to the door, but old Mogg the steward was before her.

"All right, all right," he grumbled, letting down the massive bars. "Leave a bit of t'door standing, cansta? We doesn't want t'wolves taborin' in and setting by her Grace's fire—"

"And we don't want the wolves biting off our breeches pockets while you fiddle with the bolt!" shouted an impatient voice.

"Naay that's nivver t'paper boy?" muttered Mogg, scratching his head. "Happen t'wolves got him and yon's t'replacement? Or could it be woon o' they doddy travelin' salesmen? Ye can coom in, but coom in slow and careful, for if ye're a highwayman I'll shoot ye full o' gravel chips," he warned, and pulled an ancient pistol out of his green baize apron pocket. He stepped back from the door, which burst open, allowing four people and a wolf to surge into the hall. The wolf was chased out again, with kicks and curses; Sophie gave a joyful shriek.

"
Simon!
You're
safe!
Oh, how glad I am to see you. And Justin too!—their Graces will be so relieved. Ma'am, ma'am, see who's here!"

"What about the evening paper?" grumbled Mogg, but nobody heeded him amid the cries of wonder, relief, and joy. Sophie was hugging Simon, the Duchess was simultaneously patting Justin's head and shaking hands with Dr. Field, though rather puzzled as to how he came to be with the party.

"Why, if that beant Dolly Buckle!" old Mogg suddenly ejaculated. "Eh, Dolly, my lass, 'tis a rare long year since we've seen thee here! Wheer's 'a bin, lass?" Then his jaw dropped and he gaped at Simon, whom he had only just noticed. "And who's
thon?
Why, t'lad's the dead spit of Mester Henry as died in Hanover!"

"Who is he?" shrilled Mrs. Buckle. "Who is he? Why, use your wits, Matthew Mogg, who should he be but his young lordship?"

"Nay," said Mogg obstinately "
yon's
his young lordship, Mester Justin there, nobbut skin and gristle, granted, but he's bahn to be lordship for all that."

"Him? He's my Justin that I never thought I'd rear, aren't you, my lovey?"

Justin looked slightly embarrassed and sidled away from his mother's embrace. "But as for Master Simon," she went on, "he's family, not a doubt of it, for he's got the Battersea tuft."

"Tuft, sitha? Let's see, then, lad. Kneel down on't' flagstones, tha be's such a beanpole." Rather puzzled, Simon submitted to the old man's parting the thick black locks on the back of his head, where Mogg evidently found what he expected, for he cried, "Eh, tha's reet, Dolly my woman! To think that I should see the day! Eh, your Grace, tak' a look at this!"

"Why, what a curious thing!" the Duchess remarked. "A little tuft of white hair among the black, precisely like the one my husband had before all his hair turned white. Is that the Battersea tuft?"

"Indeed it is, ma'am," Mrs. Buckle cried. "All the Battersea babies have had it."

"Then Sophie must have it too—Sophie, child, kneel down!"

Sophie, laughing, allowed Mrs. Buckle to uncoil the
curls of her long dark hair and discover the little white tuft on the back of her head. "I never knew it was there myself!" she said.

The Duchess was looking from Simon to Sophie and back, declaring in wonder, "I do not believe I have any eyes at all! Why did I never notice the likeness before? Of course they are brother and sister! Why, they are as like as one guinea to another. We must tell his Grace the news at once!"

"He's in the attic," Sophie said, and she ran from the room. As she darted up the winding stairs she wondered what troubles Simon had been through, to make him look so pale and haggard. She had asked where Dido was, and he had answered, "I can't tell you here," in an undertone, and with a look that went to her heart. Poor Simon! Poor Dido! What could have become of her?

Sophie knocked on the attic door and ran into his Grace's workroom, which was full of a general mess of scientific apparatus lying strewn over several large tables. The Duke was not there, but the outer door onto the battlements was open and gusts of snow were blowing in.

"Your Grace? Uncle William?" Sophie called. "Are you there?" She peered through the open door into the snowy dark. A lighted lantern stood on the leads, and there were footprints in the snow but she did not see the Duke until she looked up.

"Mercy!" she exclaimed.

A pair of legs was dangling just above her. Peering past them through the flutter of snowflakes, Sophie could just
see the outline of an extremely large air balloon above her head; it was rising and tugging his Grace upward as he clung to it with one hand, while with the other he held on to the guttering of the attic roof.

"
Your Grace!
Oh, pray take care!" Sophie gasped. She pulled at his legs with all her strength, and then, discovering a dangling rope, ran it through a staple evidently intended for mooring, and dragged the balloon and its passenger back to safety.

"Ah, thank you, Sophie, my child," said the Duke, wiping off the snowflakes which had settled on his hair and eyebrows. "I was just wondering how much longer I could hang on. The mooring rope slipped out of my fingers after I had pumped in the gas. Have you made it fast? Capital. Is it not an excellent balloon? I am delighted with my work; quite delighted. It surpasses all my expectations as to buoyancy."

"Yes indeed, it's beautiful," Sophie said, dragging his Grace indoors as if she feared that he, too, might take off into the night air. "Only think, Uncle William, Simon is here!—and Justin, and Dr. Field, and Mrs. Buckle—Simon has the Battersea tuft, which proves he is my brother and your nephew, and Justin is Mrs. Buckle's son—oh, it is all most complicated. And I am sure they have had
such
adventures, do, pray, come and hear all about it!"

The Duke looked quite bewildered by this stream of news, all delivered at top speed, but he permitted Sophie to pull him down the winding stairs and into the great hall.

In no time the whole party was sitting down to crimped
fish, pickled cockles, venison, and whortleberry pies, and a huge platter of spiced parkin. While they ate, Sophie and the Duchess bombarded Simon and Dr. Field with questions, and each told his tale; Mrs. Buckle put in explanations until the whole story of Buckle's plot and the Hanoverian conspiracy was made plain. Sophie then recounted how she had heard Buckle disclose his intentions to poison the Duke as soon as Justin returned.

Justin, who had been looking more and more miserable and apprehensive as the tales were told, revealing him as the unwitting tool of all this villainy, now broke down altogether and fairly boohooed.

"None of it's my fault," he howled. "I never asked to be swapped as a babby, and prosed and preached at and made into a Duke! Oh, boohoo, n-nobody likes me and I shall be t-turned out into the snow to starve! I wish I was back on Inchmore with my ma, I do!"

The Duchess exclaimed warmly, "
Nonsense,
Justin dear, nobody thinks of putting you out in the snow. Nobody blames you for what you didn't know about—I am sure we all pity you for having such a thoroughly unpleasant father. You can go back to Inchmore if you wish, next summer—in winter I am sure it must be most disagreeable and you had best stay here at Chippings with your mother, who has kindly agreed to help Mrs. Gossidge with the housekeeping. Now stop crying and do not be such a great gaby! Mrs. Buckle, perhaps he is overtired and should be put to bed."

"Indeed he should, your Grace, I declare I'm ashamed
of him," exclaimed his mother, and whisked him away, crying, "Come along, my ducky, do, and don't make such a show of yourself, my precious lambkin, or Ma will be obliged to give you two Gregory's powders and a spoonful of calomel. Look at Simon.
He's
not crying!"

Simon looked pale and heavy-eyed, however, as the Duchess noticed with kindly concern. Dr. Field quickly finished the tale of their adventures: they had turned
Dark Dimity
over to the Preventives at Chipping Fishbury, the two recovered sufferers from quinsy had been allowed to ship as deck hands on a collier going south, and, learning that the Duke was at Chippings, the rest of the party had come straight there in a hired sleigh, only slightly hindered by wolves on the way.