“So she turned to him?”
Peter Higgins nodded. “It was Dagonet as found her crying in the stable and offered to help her. She wouldn’t tell him what her trouble was, though. He figured it was still with Master George, I reckon. Anyway, he offered to meet her by the lake, so he could get her story out of her, most like, and figure out a solution. He sent her a note. She showed it to me.”
Catherine felt a rush of satisfaction. So that was exactly as she had surmised. Dagonet had not been involved with Milly, at all, except to try to help her.
“So why did he not meet her as he had offered, Mr. Higgins? Nothing else has mattered as much all these years, except what really happened at the lake.”
“Well, he set off to meet her, right enough. I’d followed her, do you see? I was still right sweet on Milly. I’d have taken her to wife, bastard child and all, if she’d have had me. But I was just a lad. No doubt she knew I didn’t know what I was saying. I hid up on the ridge above the spinney and watched her. She was already waiting by the lake, fretting and wringing her hands. I figured she was crying, though I wasn’t in earshot. I had some thought that after she talked with Master Charles, I could go down and offer myself, and Dagonet would back me up, and she’d marry me.”
“But Dagonet never arrived?”
Peter Higgins shook his head and sighed. “A gentleman came up Rye Water from the direction of the high road. He was afoot, but he wore riding clothes, and he was carrying a package. He must have hidden his horse down in the woods. When Milly saw him, she ran across and threw her arms around him, like her savior had arrived.”
“You think she knew he was coming?”
“Aye, she was expecting him, right enough. He pushed her off, though, and began to open up the parcel he was carrying. I could see he had presents in there for her. Thought he could buy her off, most like. She had no fear, our Milly. She would’ve been waiting for Master Dagonet to arrive and take her part, you see.”
The sailor hesitated and bit his lip, staring into the fire.
“As he had promised in the note,” Catherine said softly. “So what happened then?”
“It seemed that she spurned the stuff and they began to argue. I could see him waving his arms about. Then he seized her by the neck and started to shake her. They were right on the edge of the lake. I saw her fall back into the water. It’s the hardest thing I ever did, ma’am, not to run down there right then. I know I stood up and shouted like a madman, but the wind carried off my words, and there was no way I could reach her in time to save her.”
“I’m so sorry,” Catherine said. “There was nothing you could have done.”
“Besides, I saw Devil Dagonet coming down the path from the house. He could swim like an otter. If anyone could save her, he would. I was rooted to my perch, ma’am, with my tongue clove in my mouth. Dagonet came striding down through the birch spinney without a care in the world, but Milly must have already told the other fellow that she was expecting him, because the man in the riding boots picked up the package and dodged behind a tree and was waiting. Dagonet was a formidable fellow with his fists and quick as a hawk to react, but the fellow struck him from behind with the butt of a pistol, and he dropped like a felled lamb. It was treacherously done, ma’am. I saw the whole thing like a play laid out before me, and then I ran down as fast as my legs would carry me.”
“But it was too late?”
“Worse than too late. I reached Dagonet first. The gentleman had taken a brandy bottle, from the parcel he’d brought for Milly, most like, and was pouring the liquor over Dagonet’s mouth and chin. Then he sopped some into his clothes so he would smell like he’d been drinking, and left the bottle by Dagonet’s hand where he might seem to have dropped it. He took off after that into the woods like the hounds of hell was on his heels, taking the rest of the stuff with him. I heard his horse’s hooves thundering away. You’ll understand, though, that all my thoughts were for Milly.”
And Catherine did understand. Peter Higgins’ sweetheart had fallen into the lake, and could maybe still be saved. No wonder the lad had left Dagonet where he lay.
“But you could not save her, could you?”
The sailor’s face crumpled. “She was drowned, ma’am. I doubt that the fellow had really meant to kill her. He probably just meant to frighten her and make her keep her mouth closed, but she was dead all right. Milly couldn’t swim. She’d have sunk like a stone. I pulled her from the water into the reeds and wept over her, but it was all to no good. Poor Milly! She wasn’t the first girl to be blinded by a fine gentleman’s sweet words and she won’t be the last.”
“Why didn’t you tell anyone what you had seen?”
“I was only a gardener’s boy, ma’am. Who’d have believed me? Sir Henry Montagu might even have thought I’d done it, for jealousy. They all knew what Milly meant to me, though I wouldn’t have harmed a hair on her pretty head. Besides, I was that upset I couldn’t think straight. When I heard someone coming, I ran off and hid. It was John Catchpole, and I was afraid of him. He was a tough customer and hard on us lads. He’d been stealing from the stables, too, and selling off feed on the side. I couldn’t have him find me there. It would have been made to look black for me. No, all my thoughts were for Milly.”
Catherine waited quietly, her heart thumping beneath her bodice.
Peter Higgins took another sip of ale. “I can see it was wrong now, of course,” he said at last, “but I didn’t even get my things together. I ran off for Bristol, and soon enough I was taken on as a cabin boy in the East India fleet and I put Lion Court behind me. The sea’s my life now. I think about Milly sometimes, and how things might have turned out if Master George had never cast his eye on her, but you can’t change the past, they say. When my Ma told me, though, when I was between ships this time, that someone had inquired in the newspaper about John Catchpole, I couldn’t stay silent. Ma heard that Devil Dagonet had taken the blame. It’s time things were put right.”
“Past time, Mr. Higgins.”
Yet how could she blame him? He was very possibly younger than herself, and had seen his sweetheart murdered before his eyes. No wonder he had run away!
“And the gentleman that betrayed Milly and let her fall into the lake. Did you not want justice?”
“The good Lord took his own justice, ma’am. The fellow died within a few months, of the smallpox, I heard.”
“And he was someone that you knew?”
“Well, of course,” Peter Higgins replied. “I can tell you his name.”
Percival Blythe, Marquis of Somerdale, was feeling very old. The pain from his gouty leg was making him roar more than usual at the servants. How could his favorite grandson have become such a profligate? When the servant girl at Lion Court had been found drowned and Dagonet brought up to the house passed out from drink, he still wouldn’t have believed the lad guilty if Sir Henry Montagu had not told him that he knew it was Dagonet who had seduced her.
He had thought his heart would break then. Lion Court ought to have been passed to Charles de Dagonet. George neither cared nor was competent to run the place, yet there was no one else left.
When he heard that Dagonet was returned from the Peninsula, he had almost hoped that the lad could somehow redeem himself, until he had learned about Miss Hunter, the story fully embellished by Charlotte’s vivid tongue. Something had snapped inside him. The world would be better off without such a renegade. The clever, fine daughter of the Reverend Hunter! Dagonet had seduced her. He couldn’t bear to have such a man associated any more with the family. In a moment of passion he had made the arrangement with the young viscount.
He set his stubby jaw. He would not rescind it.
Let Dagonet die on the dueling field or the gallows, and Miss Hunter would be free to make a good match.
He would see to it.
The pain shot up to his knee again and he roared aloud.
“May I fetch you anything, Grandfather?” Charlotte sat primly across the room. “You know, it was most unwise to have port after dinner. Mr. Clay was always most abstemious when it came to port. He believed it inflamed the blood.”
“Be damned to Mr. Clay, madam! I’ll drink what I like.”
“Don’t prose on so, Charlotte,” George said. “Can’t you let a fellow have what he wants, without prosing on?”
“You might be better had you not indulged so deep yourself, George. I never recall you so abusing the bottle as you have recently. Mr. Clay never drank to excess. He was moderate in all things.” She sniffed audibly.
“There is a lady below to see you, my lord.” It was the footman, in his powdered wig and livery.
“So late? The marquis is too ill to see anyone,” Charlotte announced.
“I’m not in my grave yet, madam. I still make the decisions in this house. Who is it, Larson?”
Larson bowed and presented a card on a silver tray.
Lord Somerdale picked it up and peered at it in the firelight. “Miss Hunter? Send her up!”
“There is a person with her, my lord.”
“I don’t care if the Archbishop of Canterbury is with her. Send her up!”
Within moments Catherine and Peter Higgins had entered the room.
Charlotte rose instantly to confront them. “Who is this person, ma’am?” she said, indicating the sailor. “Could he not wait in the kitchens? Mr. Clay always made sure that no one from the street ever entered our drawing room.”
“I believe Lord Somerdale would wish to hear what this man has to say, Mrs. Clay. By all means retire. I’m sure you would be more comfortable.”
“What’s this? What’s this?” The marquis waved Catherine over. “Glad to see your pretty face, my dear. Who is this fellow?”
The sailor bowed. “Peter Higgins, at your service, my lord. As was gardener’s boy at Lion Court seven years ago. I was there when poor Milly Trumble drowned. I saw it happen, my lord. The lady thought as how you might be of a mind to hear me out.”
“It concerns no one but you, Lord Somerdale,” Catherine added quietly. “I did not know that Sir George Montagu and Mrs. Clay were with you.”
Catherine sincerely hoped that George and Charlotte would leave the room, but they both insisted on staying. George had gone green around the gills, yet he sat as if planted in his chair. Mrs. Clay would not miss some new piece of gossip for the world. Lady Pander would be all ears to hear the latest about Devil Dagonet and his checkered past.
Charlotte settled herself firmly, spreading her skirts, and gave a self-satisfied smile.
“I trust that since we are
en famille
, nothing need be kept from any of us,” she announced. “Pray Mr. Higgins, let us hear the tale!”
With a bashful nod of the head, the sailor began to repeat the story he had earlier told Catherine. They heard him in a dead silence until, with an embarrassed look at George, Peter Higgins was forced to explain the role that George had played.
The marquis turned on his grandson. “What’s this, sir? Was it
you
seduced the girl? Be damned to you! Why did you not own up like a man? You let your cousin take the blame. Why did Dagonet not tell me at the time?”
George’s face was damp with sweat. “Because he swore an oath to me that he would not,” he mumbled. “We made a bargain. If he was fool enough to keep his side of it, even after he thought I’d broken mine, more loss to him.” Sudden red color flooded back into his cheeks and his voice rose to a bellow. “Why shouldn’t he have suffered? He always had everything. He could ride better, shoot better, fence better than anyone else. He never studied at his books when we were boys, yet he could do all the lessons and argue rings around me in class. Everything was his. Everything! All the girls were in love with him, even Milly! She came to my bed, but it was Dagonet she was in love with. And you always loved him more than me, Grandfather. Always! He was the apple of your eye. You never noticed anything I did. It was Dagonet with you, always Dagonet! You even gave him that stallion.”
“Because your father had provided you a stable full of hunters and Dagonet had no horse of his own, sir.”
“But the stallion was better than any of them.”
“And you could not have handled him. Your behavior is vile, sir. Vile! To have allowed your cousin to take the blame for your irresponsibility! To have stood aside and relied on the strength of his honor, at the sacrifice of your own! How could you have lived with yourself all these years?”
But George’s large body crumpled like the collapse of a hot-air balloon. Burying his face in his hands, he began, in great audible sobs, to weep.
The sound echoed into an appalled silence.
It was broken by Mrs. Clay.
“I fail to see that this changes anything.” She sniffed. “The girl was murdered. Dagonet was there and George was not. If George had fallen prey to her wiles in a moment of weakness, who can say that it was not Dagonet who corrupted her to start with? No one has ever laid the charge of the girl’s death at George’s door. He was in Fernbridge at the time with Mama. Dagonet was found drunk in the woods. He was at the scene.”
Charlotte turned to Peter Higgins, who stood awkwardly twisting his hat in his hands. “How do you explain that, my man?”
“There was another man, ma’am,” the sailor replied.
As George stopped his weeping and dried his eyes, the erstwhile gardener’s boy continued the tale. He was listened to in a hushed quiet.
Catherine could not take her eyes from the old marquis. His face was beginning to look different, as if years of pain were slowly peeling away. His beloved favorite grandson had never betrayed his word, had behaved with nothing but the highest honor, in the face of all their misplaced wrath and discord. How could he have ever believed otherwise?
“And this other gentleman?” the marquis asked at last in an unsteady voice. “The man who attacked Dagonet and left Millicent Trumble to drown. Did you recognize him?”
“Why, yes, indeed, my lord. I knew him well.”
“So who was the mystery stranger?” Charlotte queried impatiently. “Really, this is all too sordid. Let us have some plain speaking on this at last! Mr. Clay always recommended plain speaking.”