Chapter 12 #2
The rest of the journey to the Keep was hampered by a pounding head, a persistent ache in my back, and something gone awry with my left hip. My feet were growing numb, and my sense of direction was faltering.
Fortunately, I broke through the woods before having to admit I was lost, and the lights of the Keep shone across the park. My luck improved further when I met Algernon having a smoke on the back terrace.
“My lord, are you well?” he asked as I half stumbled up the terrace steps. “You aren’t exactly moving with lithesome grace.”
“Slipped on the bridge, banged my brainbox. A bit the worse for wear.”
He took me by the arm. “Your head is bleeding. Come along. This is not your finest day, Caldicott. At this rate, you will post a notice in the Times that Hampshire is hazardous to one’s health.
That damned little bridge is a menace in winter.
Too close to the water. Always has a rime of ice in cold weather. ”
He walked me to the door as he chattered, and I found his stream of words comforting. I could understand him. I could hear him. I was walking under my own power and would soon be warm. Matters could be much worse.
“You’ll take a tray for supper, old man,” Algernon went on.
“That is not a mere scratch, not with that much blood. I’ll send the housekeeper to you, and you will comport yourself in her presence as the meekest of lambs.
She knows what she’s about, does Mrs. MacIntyre.
You slipped on the bridge. Most unfortunate.
I’ll let Papa and Bryson know, and if you don’t come down to breakfast, we’ll alert the watch. Let’s get you up to your room.”
He struck just the right note between solicitude and bossiness, and I was soon in my quarters. Atticus leaped from a chair before the fire, where he’d apparently been reading some pamphlet or other.
“Guv, ye made a bloody mess o’ yerself.”
“Scalp wounds are notorious for bleeding profusely. Algernon, my thanks. I will see you at breakfast. No word of this to the womenfolk biding with Lady Clotilda, if you please. One does not want to cause undue alarm.”
Atticus looked ready to toss Algernon out on his ear, though Algernon took no notice of the boy.
“You are sure you only slipped on that footbridge?” Algernon asked.
“I’d enjoyed some time in Miss West’s company, and the encounter preoccupied me as I rambled back to the Keep.
I wasn’t watching where I was going. The ice on the bridge took me quite by surprise.
” The last part was a falsehood. Had I not been very securely gripping the railing, I might now be lying half submerged in the icy stream, snoring my way to heaven.
“Very well. Prepare to be cosseted and fussed over for the second time in one day. You are under strictest orders to regain enough health in the next twenty-four hours to acquit yourself adequately on the dance floor. Half the spinsters in the shire are hoping to dance with you.”
He scowled at me, shook his head, and left.
Atticus locked the door behind him. “You dint slip. A mountain goat is clumsy compared to yer rubbishing lordship. You was pushed.”
I nodded. “We’ve reached the interesting part of the investigation. Please find me some dry clothing while I try to get myself out of these damned boots.”
“You don’t got another pair.” Atticus pointed to a chair. “I’ll get ’em off ya. Sit, and don’t give me no sass.”
Atticus was unnerved and rightfully so. The day had proven perilous for us both, and going forward, I would need to exercise utmost caution.
I sat. I gave him no sass, and I was as lamblike as my nature allowed in Mrs. MacIntyre’s capable hands.
She was a twin to Maggie MacArthur, though the cook was a bit more substantial than her housekeeper sister.
Mrs. MacIntyre prescribed—of all things—ice for the bruise forming near my temple, and even in that, I obeyed orders.
Then I sat down with pencil and paper and began to make a list of suspects and motives, and I was still at it when the supper tray arrived.
By morning, my hip was aching dully, and an examination of my temple revealed the edges of a nasty bruise mostly covered by my hair. I cocked my hat off to one side, the better to avoid aggravating a mild headache.
“Don’t go anywheres alone,” Atticus said, handing me my spurs. “I mean it, guv.”
I shoved the spurs into the pocket of my riding coat.
“Take your time with my boots.” I was back in my best pair, which Atticus had magically rescued from certain ruin.
The older pair would be less of a challenge, though they would give him an excuse to linger for half the morning in the servants’ hall.
“I know me orders.” Atticus spoke around the last of a buttered croissant. “Take me time. Listen to everything. Watch everybody. Be a cheerful, stupid little lad with a bottomless belly.” He grinned, though his smile struck me as too ruthless for one of his tender years.
“The banquet tonight will have the whole staff running off their feet until all hours. Be helpful where you can, but don’t overtax yourself. Avoid the damned punch, you rascal.”
His grin faded. “I learned that lesson. Ruddy footmen. Getting a wee fellow tipsy when he’s barely out of leading strings. Lee said that was foul play.”
“I agree with Leander.” Though when had Leander made that pronouncement?
As far as I knew, the boys avoided each other.
“If anybody sends you on errands that necessitate a jaunt over to Lady Clotilda’s, be very, very mindful crossing that bridge.
In fact, look for a place to cross safely without using the bridge.
Until further notice, we’re wrapping a hair around the outside of the door latch too. ”
“You’re keeping Miss Hyperia waiting, guv.” He hefted the breakfast tray and made for the door. “I wish Lady Ophelia was here. She orders a lot of trays.”
Meaning Godmama gave Atticus many excuses to visit the kitchen and to fill his belly on leftovers. “Are your rations insufficient?”
“Nah. I just miss Lady Ophelia.”
“Write to her.” The suggestion was not improper so much as it was unusual. Tigers were generally illiterate. Her ladyship was fluent in at least five languages, she was easily five times Atticus’s age, and she had no lack of correspondents. “Report on the investigation.”
Hyperia had already sent one dispatch. Atticus needed the opportunity to work on his penmanship and his spelling.
“I’ll tell her you was dunked twice in one day. She’ll be here hotfoot.”
I opened the door for him. “I’ll tell her you were dunked as well, and she’ll forbid me to take you traveling with me.
And my second time wasn’t much of a dunking.
” Though it could have been. The stream was neither deep nor wide, but a man could drown in two feet of water if he was half unconscious.
Atticus stuck his tongue out at me and marched off.
I followed him after wrapping a discreet hair around the door latch. When Atticus returned to the room, he would know if anybody had entered in his absence. Then he, too, would wrap the latch should he have occasion to quit the apartment.
That simple, discreet measure had aided me in more than one investigation. I was equally fond of the old-fashioned counting locks, though they were becoming rarities.
I collected my horse, settled into the saddle a bit gingerly, and set off for Lady Clotilda’s. I could hear the hounds yipping off to the east—Lady Clo’s wilderness lay in that direction—meaning the hunt had made an early start. The sun was not yet properly up, which favored my objective.
Instead of following the bridle path and using the plank bridge, I steered Atlas along the stream bank. A crusting of snow covered most of the bracken, and I found what I sought fairly easily.
Fifteen yards in the direction of Lady Clotilda’s property, I found a clean impression of a boot print. Either a very sizable lady, say on the dimensions of Mrs. MacArthur, or a man, based on the dimensions of the boot and how deeply the impression cut into the snow and damp ground.
I used my own boot for comparison and found a near match for length.
The print was not much deeper at the heel than elsewhere, suggesting a walking pace rather than a run, but I hadn’t expected any indication of haste.
Running through the woods after nightfall was a difficult undertaking even by moonlight.
The stream banks were close together where I’d found the boot print, close enough for me to easily leap from bank to bank. Sure enough, on the far side—Lady Clotilda’s side—I found deeper impressions.
“Somebody crossed here, waylaid me, and disappeared into the night.”
Atlas twitched an ear and stood like the gentleman he was as I climbed back into the saddle.
“The stream’s babbling beneath the ice would have covered any sounds of retreat, not that I’d been listening for any while thrashing my way to safety. Let’s toddle on, shall we?”
My intrepid steed hopped the stream easily and ambled back to the beaten path, while I kept an eye out for more prints matching the ones I’d found. My vigilance was rewarded when I spotted two prints side by side in the lee of an oak stump much nearer the footbridge.
“Somebody sat here in the cold and dark and waited for me.” Somebody fairly substantial, because the blow to my back had been high, nearly at shoulder height. One might shove powerfully with straight arms, but shoving upward with that much force was difficult.
I was pondering my list of suspects—Lady Clotilda was tall enough—when Peter Carstairs turned onto the path ahead of me. He was mounted on his chestnut gelding and proceeding at a relaxed walk along a trail that led in the direction of the village.
“Good morning, Vicar!”
“My lord, good day. Should you be out in this weather after yesterday’s adventures?”
I noted his use of the plural. “Seals swim in colder water and seem to thrive. I’m off to collect Miss West for a hack. What of yourself?”