Sword and Song Read online

  The sun was high across the floor of the room, shining through gaps in the curtains. I staggered up, suddenly feeling ravenous. The mirror showed me a wild-eyed apparition. The bandage had been inexpertly applied; blood darkened the left side of my face. My shirt was crumpled from being slept in and my new breeches were streaked with mud.

  I heard a scratch on the door a second before it opened. Fowler, Heron’s manservant, came in bearing shaving gear, grinning as he took me in. “Getting yourself in trouble again, Patterson? And leaving the rest of us to pick up the pieces?” He stepped back to admire my clothes. “They’ll need a good bit of cleaning. Sit down and let me have a look at that cut. One of these days you’ll be calling on me to get you out of trouble again.”

  He pushed me down into one of the cane chairs and started to unwind the bandage around my head. Fowler is not one of those servants who believes in being deferential, except to his employer. Or perhaps he regards me as a servant too. He certainly seems to think I’ve been severely restricted in my experience of the world and in urgent need of education. He’s helped me before; not so long ago, he was sniping at murderers on rooftops in my company – and a fine shot he is too. I’d not want to get in front of him. Heron picked him up years ago in London, rescued him from transportation and made him respectable.

  Allegedly. I never saw anyone less respectable in my life. A lean, deceptively strong man, with no loyalty to anyone but himself and Heron.

  He grinned at me in the mirror. I winced as his fingers brushed the wound on the back of my head; he set about washing it and unmatting the hair with capable hands. “Nothing much,” he said dismissively. “Hardly worth a headache, even.”

  “You’ve had much worse?”

  “Of course. I told his Lordship as much but he would insist I take a look at it. He’s gone down to the village to enquire after poachers. Want to hear what I think happened?”

  “No.”

  “It was Mr Alyson.”

  “Alyson?” I started, and gasped as my hair pulled in his grasp. “Why the devil should he attack me?”

  “Flat broke.” Fowler leant forward to whisper in my ear. “Spends what he doesn’t have. Always did.”

  I sat up straighter. He dipped the cloth he was using into my washing water, leaving it alarmingly pink. “Always did? You know him?”

  “Not know, exactly,” Fowler said, giving me a meaningful look in the mirror. “Not in the biblical sense.”

  I sighed. “I didn’t mean that way!” Fowler’s tastes have apparently never run to women, a fact that I consider none of my business, and a secret I rather wish had never come my way. A dangerous secret for Fowler. “Did you come across him in London?”

  “Five or six years back, before I was lucky enough to take a potshot at Heron. A baby sheep ready for fleecing.”

  “Six years ago he’d have been seventeen.”

  “And looked younger. He couldn’t game for love nor money but thought it was just a matter of time until his luck turned.”

  “Where did he get his money?”

  Fowler finished his minstrations, combed my hair down and regarded me critically in the mirror. “It’ll do. Sit back so I can shave you. He kept disappearing – he’d lose a fortune he didn’t have, get out of town, come back a month or two later with his pockets full, pay off his creditors and start the whole process again. Trustees, he said.”

  “Trustees gave him money?” I echoed. “Then they’re not like any trustees I’ve ever known.”

  “Well,” Fowler said, draping a cloth round my shoulders. “Doesn’t matter now, does it? Now he has his hands on this estate. He can indulge his tastes in cards and wine and women.”

  “He was probably borrowing from moneylenders,” I said, “against the expectation of his inheritance. And talking of women...”

  “No,” Fowler said firmly. “They’re not. I’d stake my life on it. Not married.”

  “I thought not,” I said. “But she’s not a typical mistress – I’d lay odds she was respectably reared.”

  “She’ll want what women always want – money.”

  I sighed and changed the subject. “Did someone arrive late last night?”

  “Old man, young wife. Just back from their bridal trip.”

  “Do these people have names?”

  “It’s your friend,” Fowler said, with a devilish gleam in his eye. “Ord.”

  He was about to lather my cheeks; I stared at him. “Philip Ord? Good Lord.” Ord and I had crossed paths several times in the past, most notably just before his marriage; he did not regard me with any favour. “I used to teach his wife, Lizzie Saint as was. Daughter of the printer in Newcastle.”

  “Married into trade, did he? Must have been hard up.”

  I closed my eyes, submitted to Fowler’s swift and competent work – it was strangely soothing. Well, at least there’d be one person who’d listen to my playing; Lizzie was a keen harpsichordist herself. I wondered how she and Philip Ord were dealing together; she’d been head over heels in love with him, like the innocent girl she was, and he’d had a great desire for her father’s dowry, like the ruthless businessman he was. And twenty years difference in age between them...

  “There was something else,” Fowler said, pausing in drawing the razor down my left cheek.

  Dozy again and trying to keep at bay that nagging ache that kept prodding at the back of my head, I said lazily, “What?”

  His eyes met mine in the mirror; light winked off the razor’s edge. “Don’t get Heron involved in anything dangerous.”

  Yes, I thought, staring into his reflected gaze, there was still a considerable portion of the ruffian lurking beneath Fowler’s bland exterior. “I can’t govern what Heron does,” I pointed out.

  His mouth twisted wryly. “No one can. I know that better than anyone. But you don’t need to encourage him.”

  I knew that wasn’t a request. It was a warning.

  8

  There is no culture here. They have a fetish for some composer of German origin, who writes Italian operas. I long to introduce them to true opera, the French operas of M. Rameau.

  [Letter from Retif de Vincennes, to his brother, Georges, 6 May 1736]

  On my way down to breakfast, I heard low furious voices coming from one of the bedrooms. It took me a moment to work out that the room in question was the Alysons’. Husband and wife, if that was what they truly were, were having a bitter argument. I couldn’t quite hear what was being said; I hurried on, before I could be tempted to eavesdrop.

  The breakfast room was a small chamber in the corner of one of the turrets; a long table and a longer sideboard loaded with serving dishes were pretty much the only furniture. I couldn’t understand why anyone should have a room especially for breakfast when they already had a perfectly good dining room.

  There were only two occupants. The severe gentleman who had been eying Esther yesterday was reading one of the London newspapers over a massive plate of eggs and devilled kidneys; on the other side of the table, Casper Fischer was just rising from his chair. He looked far too alert for a man who’d not been long out of his bed.

  “My dear sir, are you well?” He greeted me with enthusiasm. “I hear one of the local villains had a go at you last night.”

  I gave him an abbreviated version of what had happened; Fischer sympathised wholeheartedly. His tone was just right, conveying sufficient sympathy to make me feel he was genuinely concerned for my well-being, but not lingering on the matter so long as to embarrass me.

  “You need some fresh air,” he said at last. “Marvellous for clearing a bruised head. I was just about to go for a walk. Nothing too long – only four or five miles. Why don’t you come with me?”

  “I’ll probably have to play for one of the ladies,” I said, trying to sound regretful.

  “Of course,” he said immediately, without rancour. “Work must always come first.”

  Now that was a sentiment I’d never expected to hear in a g
entleman’s house.

  The severe gentleman cleared his throat, obviously annoyed at our talking; Fischer went off for his walk and I helped myself to coffee and a plate of bread and cheese. Sitting under that fierce glare would probably curdle the milk, so I retired to the library. But it was already occupied by Heron, writing letters at the large table in the middle of the room. He had a dish of coffee and a slice of toast to one side, and was dressed in sombre brown, clothes more suitable for a day’s work on his estates than for a houseparty. He glanced up as I came in, finished his sentence and put down his pen.

  “I’ve been to the village,” he said.

  “Fowler said you had,” I admitted. “My thanks for lending me his assistance, sir.”

  He waved away my gratitude. “I have spoken to the local justice. There are no poachers in this area.”

  I laughed, and took the chair he nodded to. “Don’t all countrymen say that?”

  “In this case it appears to be true,” he said dryly. “The local justice was annoyed by half his deer disappearing and undertook to wage war on the villains. Three weeks ago, he sentenced seven men to transportation and cleared the country of poachers at one fell swoop. They are all now in Newcastle, awaiting a ship.”

  “Can we be sure he caught them all?”

  “Naturally not, but the strong possibility is that he did. The matter is more complicated than that, however.” Heron broke his dry toast into two pieces. “Six of the men left families that are of course now destitute, and at least two of those families have male children of an age to take to poaching themselves. They may have to,” he added, “if they don’t want their siblings to starve.”

  “And you think one of these boys was out on a poaching expedition, saw me and thought I was an easy target.”

  Heron broke the toast into smaller pieces. “Possibly.”

  “Forgive me, sir,” I said, “but you don’t sound convinced.”

  He sighed. “It is plain you were hit by someone much the same height as yourself. The oldest boy is twelve years old. He may of course be unnaturally tall but it seems unlikely.”

  I contemplated the view from the window; Fischer was striding down the formal gardens, two spaniels bounding joyously at his heels. Heron put down the fragments of toast uneaten, and sipped at his coffee.

  “If I was not the victim of a poacher,” I said, “then there’s an inevitable conclusion to be drawn.”

  “Indeed,” Heron said.

  “Either it was one of the servants trying to rob me...”

  Heron shook his head. “Why risk attacking you in person when they could slip into your room when you were not there and take what they want?”

  “... or it was one of our fellow guests.”

  Heron set the coffee dish down very precisely. “Interesting, do you not think?”

  “No,” I retorted. “Believe me, sir, I have offended no one here, disadvantaged no one, cheated no one. Indeed, until yesterday, I knew no one, except for yourself and Mrs Jerdoun.”

  “I suggest you think a little more deeply,” Heron recommended. He went on, “Did you see Mr and Mrs Ord have arrived, fresh from their wedding trip?”

  Heron has a low opinion of marriage; his own was apparently merely tolerable, and its end, with the death of his wife, a great relief. His cynicism showed in his voice. I recognised he’d drawn a line under the previous part of the conversation.

  I nodded. “I heard their carriage. They arrived remarkably late.”

  “A broken wheel, I understand.” He picked up his pen again. “Do you think Mrs Ord looks well?”

  “I haven’t seen her yet.”

  “I fancy Ord did not much like your influence with her before the marriage.”

  “Lizzie Saint was my pupil,” I said, “and a keen musician. Nothing more.”

  “I never thought otherwise.” He picked up his pen again, returned his attention to his letter. “I will let you know if I hear anything more about the poachers, Patterson.”

  Unmistakeably dismissed, I picked up my breakfast and went into the hall. Unlike Heron, I knew Ord’s objection to me was nothing to do with his wife. I’d recovered some letters that would almost certainly have ruined any chance of his marriage taking place; worse, I knew exactly what the letters contained.

  But the thought of Philip Ord riding over in darkness on the off-chance of having an opportunity to dispose of me? Preposterous.

  I was hesitating in the hall when the breakfast room door opened and the plump gentleman – what was his name? Ridley, William Ridley – came out, followed closely by a scarlet-and-gold-clad servant.

  “My lawyer? At long last, what the devil’s kept the fellow? Where have you put him? Very well, I’ll go and talk to him. Tell your master he’s here.”

  The servant bowed and they took themselves off in different directions. It looked, I thought, as if Alyson was about to discover the legal complications of running a large estate. And I thought of Esther and her estates in Norfolk and Northumberland – the estates that must inevitably pass, if she married, to her husband. That was yet another reason – if one more was needed – why I could not marry her. What experience did I have in such matters? I’d probably ruin her inheritance in months.

  I heard my name called and looked up the stairs to see the two lively middle-aged ladies of the previous evening waving down at me.

  “Mr Patterson!” one called. “We were saying how delightful it would be to have a few songs. Will you play for us?”

  I said I would. The ladies disappeared upstairs to ‘fetch the music’; I suspected this would occupy half an hour at least and took my bread and cheese out to the terrace to the steps where I had been attacked.

  There was little to see. The gravel path at the foot of the steps was scuffed; a faint trace of blood on the bottom step was dried to a dull brown. I looked up at the windows of the house above. One must be Heron’s. I’d been lucky; if he’d been given one of the rooms at the back, it might be all over for me.

  One thing was clear – the attack could not have been premeditated. No one could have guessed I’d decide to walk in the gardens. Someone must have seen me from the house, seized a weapon, come out to attack me –

  But why?

  I heard voices from the rose garden to my right. At least one of the musical ladies was there; they’d probably already forgotten the idea of singing. And a glimpse of part of the drive showed me Alyson riding off on a spirited black horse, accompanied by Ridley and a cheerful young man in sombre clothing – the visiting lawyer, perhaps. It appeared that the various members of the party were entertaining themselves very well without my help. This could be the easiest – if most tedious – fifteen guineas I’d ever earnt. Although it allowed me much too much time to think about Nell and Bedwalters.

  I went to my room for the key to tune the harpsichord. A couple of disgruntled servants helped me move the instrument into a better light and I set to with some considerable pleasure. It was an hour or more later before one of the musical ladies came hurrying into the room, her arms full of music.

  “Oh, pray, do forgive us, Mr Patterson!” The second lady came in behind her. “But you know how it is. You see someone you haven’t seen for years and find you have six cousins in common you never knew about – ”

  “And then,” said the older lady with a mischievous smile,“they insist upon telling you all about them from cradle to grave, in the utmost detail.”

  “Particularly their illnesses,” said the first lady with a groan. “And they won’t listen when you say you have an appointment – Oh!”

  She broke off in surprise as movement in the doorway caught her attention. It was Esther, in the palest of yellow gowns, a book in her hand. She looked at me for a moment, with her coolest gaze.

  “Dear Mrs Jerdoun,” said the younger lady. “Do join us. We are about to sing a few airs.”

  Esther shook her head. The lappets on her cap rippled against her neck. Why was she wearing so ridiculous
a thing? She’d never cared for such conventional trifles. And it didn’t suit her.

  I reddened as her cool, ironic gaze lingered on me.

  “No, thank you,” she said. “I was merely looking for a place to read – I thought the room was empty.” And she withdrew, the long fall of her gown swishing against the open door.

  The ladies surprised me, both by their excellent voices and the serious manner in which they approached the Art. They were critical of their own performances where appropriate and insisted on rehearsing several parts to get them just right. Even more surprisingly, they complimented me on my playing. An hour or more passed very pleasantly.

  We attracted some attention. One or two other ladies wandered in and out, then Mrs Alyson came in alone. She was a remarkably beautiful woman, still with the freshness of youth but with an edge of weariness. Her dress was of the finest material, with intricate embroidery and lace that must have been worth a fortune. Jewels glittered in her ears and round her throat.

  She was restless, sitting down, standing up again, picking up a book, glancing inside, putting it down again, careful to line it up with the edge of the table. She walked to the fireplace, glanced down at the huge bowl of flowers set in the grate, bent to finger one of them. She seemed tense, unapproachable. I thought that the position of mistress must be damnably insecure – she must know how the ladies and gentlemen would react if they knew her real relationship with Alyson.

  But he seemed so in love with her – why the devil did he not just marry her? Of course, Hugh often said the same of myself and Esther. How could I know the imperatives that governed their lives? I felt a surge of sympathy.

  It lasted only a moment. “Mr Patterson,” Mrs Alyson said loudly.

  I’d been about to play the first chord of a new song, and caught myself just in time. “Madam?”

  “I heard there was an unpleasant incident last night.”

  I had of course risen to address her; I bowed. “Indeed.”

  “I trust such a thing will not happen again.”

  This seemed in the nature of an order, as if I was to blame for the whole affair. She was staring at the huge portrait that hung over the fireplace, a picture of a slightly amused elderly gentleman. “I am aware you have ‘low’ connections, Mr Patterson. Perhaps that is hardly surprising. I made it perfectly clear to Alyson that I wanted no tradesmen here but he chose otherwise. Very well, I submit to his judgement. But you will oblige me by not bringing your cronies or their affairs into this house. Do you understand me, sir?”