The Swordmaster's Mistress: Dangerous Deceptions Book Two(49)

‘I promise. But why? What do you expect to happen?’ Her expression was tense but her voice was quite even.

‘I have no idea,’ Jared said grimly on his way through the door. He found the back stairs and went down to the half-basement, following the sound of voices.

‘And you get your sticky fingers off those lemon tarts, Thomas Bainton.’

‘I like ’em.’

‘Aye, you and Master Frank both and it was like having a plague of blackbirds down here when the two of you smelled my baking – and both old enough to know better.’

‘You used to work here as a young man, Thomas?’

They all swung round at the sound of his voice. Thomas got up from the chair by the scrubbed pine table where he had just been reaching for one of the tarts cooling on a rack. Mrs Mountjoy looked up from a rocking chair by the range and a stout woman who must be the cook paused in her pastry-work, the glass rolling pin poised in mid-air. A scullery maid stopped in her scrubbing of the breakfast pots and pans and stared.

‘Aye, sir. I was the boot boy.’ Thomas made surreptitious flicking movements, trying to get the crumbs off his livery. ‘Then when the family moved away to Cross Holme towards Whitby I went with them as under-footman but they couldn’t afford to keep me on. I got a position in Whitby but I came back when his lordship took up residence and wanted staff.’

So the Quentens lived near Whitby now? That was too close to familiar ground for comfort, although he did not recognise the name.

‘I am going out for an hour or so. Please find Faith and send her to Lady Northam immediately.’

‘Aye, sir, Mr Hunt.’ He went out in a shower of crumbs.

‘Is there a riding horse in the stables, Mrs Mountjoy?’

‘There is, sir. Lord Northam’s hunter and a mare for her ladyship. They left them here for when they visit.’

‘Very well, thank you.’ He paused by the back door. ‘And her ladyship is not at home to anyone unless I am with her, is that clear? I do not care whether it is the vicar or the Prince Regent.’

‘Yes, sir.’ Mrs Mountjoy was tight-lipped and he could tell she was itching to know on what grounds he was giving the orders, but he thought she would obey nonetheless.

The Northam coachman and groom had taken over the stables and reduced the resident stable lad to very junior status. He scurried to ready the sturdy black hunter and knuckled his forelock when Jared took the reins and swung up into the saddle, his eyes riveted on the rapier Jared wore at his side.

‘Which way to the village?’

‘Over yonder, sir. You can see the top of the church tower on the left side of the big oak, sir. Gi’ower, you lummock,’ he added to the horse as it slobbered down the back of his neck.

Jared felt the accent washing over him like a tide of memory. He’d played with the local boys growing up, had many a good skelping – beating, he corrected himself – for using a strong Yorkshire accent at home for fun. He was not sure now that he was pleased to be hearing it again, it would make keeping it out of his own voice that much harder. He nodded to the lad and turned the big horse towards the yard entrance. ‘What’s his name?’ he called back.

‘’ero.’

The horse went willingly enough, then took exception to the stable cat slinking across his path, a baby rat in its mouth. ‘Stop that, there’s nowt to nark you there, you gurt ninny, Hero,’ Jared scolded him, for the simple pleasure of letting the words roll off his tongue. Yes, he most definitely must resist the temptation to talk Yorkshire.

The village was compact, with lanes running off from a central green towards the farms and holdings that dotted the rolling hills. Jared passed the Red Griffin and made for the church, uncertain what he was looking for but obeying the instincts that had served him well in the past. Guinevere believed he was wasting time and thought on Francis Willoughby but he was prepared to accept that there was something he had seen or heard which was buried deep in his mind. It had not yet linked to other fragments of information, but it was niggling at him.

Hero was content to stand lipping at the long grass beside the lych gate as Jared worked his way between the irregular ranks of graves and tilting headstones. Most he could dismiss as old, their inscriptions almost lost to time and lichen. Then he found a group of three that were clearly recent. One, the earth still raw and freshly turned, had a simple wooden cross, the mound of the second had sunk a little and grass was growing over it, but the headstone, sharp and clean, read Agnes Millar departed this life aged 86 years…

Beyond it was another. He almost turned away because it had a fine stone, deeply carved and with a design of angels, their wings making the point at the top. Jared stepped over Agnes Millar’s grave and read the inscription anyway, for the sake of thoroughness.

Here lies Francis Arnold Willoughby

Only son of the late Henry Willoughby and his wife Jane

Beloved brother of Elizabeth

Born January 7th 1784 Killed August 15th 1810

Aged 26 years

“The voice of my brother’s blood crieth unto me from the ground.”

‘I’ll be damned.’ Jared dug in his pocket for his notebook.

‘We will all be damned, my son, if we do not seek salvation through our Lord,’ a gentle, elderly voice said behind him.

Jared turned, unsure which was more galling, being reprimanded, however gently, for blaspheming in a churchyard or being taken by surprise despite the ancient clergyman’s unsteady approach. ‘I beg your pardon, sir.’