An Execution, an Earl, and Miss Hughes (Regency Murder and Marriage #5)

Chapter One

THOSE UNFAMILIAR WITH Plumpton might assume a meeting of its Ladies’ Society was a genteel affair involving needlework and flower-arranging. Those familiar with Plumpton knew better.

Miss Sarah Hughes pressed a hand to her brow as the town curmudgeon—Mrs Canards—faced off against Lady Emily Delaney. Both were arguing that the profits from the upcoming assembly should be donated to a charitable cause. Neither, however, could agree on what cause.

“Mr Leek’s Botanic Gardens bring distinguished guests from far and wide to Plumpton,” Mrs Canards cried.

“It is only right that we donate the funds to help him expand his collection. He wishes to purchase a night-blooming cereus—they’re quite rare and expensive.

Think of how an acquisition like that might raise the status of Plumpton. ”

“Mr Leek does not allow anyone without a page in Debrett’s to view his collection,” Emily argued in turn, her voice quavering with indignation.

“We cannot ask the parish to donate money to buy plants they may never see. The funds should go to the parish’s benevolent fund to help to feed the poor—it’s only right”

“Fiddles to the poor,” Mrs Canards cried, so forcefully that Sarah decided it was time to step in before the ladies came to blows. This was the parish hall not The Ring’O’Bells at closing time.

“Really Mrs Canards,” Sarah admonished, using her calmest voice. The same voice she had used with her brothers growing up, when they had become over-boisterous. “What a thing to say. We are women of faith, we must never forget that the poor are always with us.”

Mrs Canards balked, glancing sharply around the room as if concerned that some of the aforementioned poor might actually be present.

“We shall put it to a vote,” Sarah decided, before Mrs Canards had a chance to regroup and attack again, like Napoleon from Elba.

“Those in favour of donating the funds to Mr Leek’s gardens, raise your hands,” she continued, noting that only Mrs Canards and her friend Mrs Wickling voted.

“Those in favour of the parish benevolent fund?”

Every other hand in the room—including Sarah’s—shot into the air. Emily’s waving hand was accompanied by a very smug smile. Sarah would not usually have thought that gloating was becoming of a marchioness, but Mrs Canards was truly very grating.

“Benevolent fund it is,” Sarah noted absently in the minutes, before offering a harried smile to the group. “I think that’s it for the month. Thank you ladies—I do hope someone else will volunteer to chair next time.”

The sound of scraping chairs filled the room, as the genteel ladies of Plumpton stood to leave. The three Mifford sisters stayed behind, to assist Sarah with straightening the Parish Hall before locking up.

“If only Mary had been here to take Mrs Canards down a peg or two,” Eudora, the youngest of the sisters, mourned as the door shut behind the last society member.

“I rather think it best she wasn’t here,” Jane, the second eldest sister, remarked with a wink to Sarah. “Sarah had enough to deal with in Emily. If Mary had been added to the mix Mrs Canards might have staged a bloody coup.”

“She would have failed,” Emily stated fiercely, stroking her growing bump. “Freddie says I’m like Bonaparte himself of late—small but terrifying when something upsets me.”

“I was like that too, toward the end,” Jane rubbed her sister’s arm affectionately.

Sarah felt a slight stirring of wistfulness at the exchange, which startled her.

She had never been one to dream of having a family of her own, especially as she had spent her girlhood helping to raise her brothers after her mother’s passing.

Since her youngest brother had wed, however, the idea that she might like a family of her own had become rather insistent.

A fanciful notion, for at five-and-twenty Sarah had accepted that she had been firmly placed on the shelf—and that shelf was located in an antique shop, in marriage-market terms.

“That’s everything tidied away,” Sarah said, glancing with satisfaction around the clean hall. She led the way outside, the three sisters tailing her.

“I’ll drop the key in to father on my way home,” Jane said, as Sarah locked the door of the hall behind them.

Mr Mifford was the local reverend and therefore custodian of the key.

He was not the most pious of vicars but as the residents of Plumpton were not so pious either, he was well-liked by his flock.

Sarah duly passed the key over to Jane though she lingered for a moment on the steps with her three friends.

Being the only daughter in the Hughes family, Sarah always enjoyed briefly basking in their sisterly affection.

Though the squabbles and endless pilfering of stockings she had also witnessed over the years, also reminded her to be happy with her own lot.

Brothers weren’t so bad when one valued one’s stockings.

“Would anyone like to pop in to Primrose Cottage with me?” Jane asked the group.

“Not particularly,” Emily replied, with her usual bluntness. “Mama has it in her head that she wants to marry Charlotte off to Mary’s guest and I don’t have the patience today to listen to her boast of her matchmaking skills.”

Sarah kept a respectful silence as each of the Mifford girls winced in turn.

Mrs Mifford had all the subtlety of a knock from a carriage and four, especially when it came to showing off her—self-perceived—skills.

She could only imagine the ignominy Mrs. Mifford was inviting with her matchmaking campaign.

She had more brass than Wellington but sadly none of his strategy.

“Poor Charlotte,” Eudora rolled her brown eyes. “She’s quite terrified of the earl.”

“Is he very fierce?” Sarah questioned, trying but failing to picture Lord Deverell, Earl of Ashford in her mind’s eye. She had read of his name once or twice in the papers but as it was usually in the context of Parliamentary debates he had not much inspired her imagination.

“Not fierce,” Jane answered, with the tone of one trying very excessively to be delicate. “He’s just a little—”

“High on the instep,” Emily finished, far more comfortable with bluntness than her elder sister.

Sarah hid a smile; despite their new lofty titles, the Mifford sisters would not suffer any snobs in their midst.

“Not arrogant exactly,” Jane argued, ever the peacemaker. “Just slightly impatient. And I don’t think we can blame him his impatience with Mama around—she’d irritate a saint if she got close enough. And, besides, he’s widower.”

This last piece of information was delivered with a definite note of “and that’s that”. Sensing that Emily and Eudora might require a more detailed explanation as to why widowers were exempt from social sufferance, Sarah lightly made her excuses to leave.

“I will see you all tomorrow at dinner,” she said, as she hoisted her basket over her arm. “And your earl.”

She bid them a wave and hurried toward the village, ignoring Emily’s plaintive cry of “he’s not my earl”.

Plumpton village was little more than a row of shops and cottages clustered around a village green. It was quaint, charming and, in the way of most Cotswolds villages, would not have looked out of place in a story book.

Sarah did not have time to appreciate the pastoral village scene, for as she neared The Ring’o’Bells she sighted a group of men gathered around a cart which had lost its wheel.

As was usually the way with men and vehicular issues, there was an undercurrent of excitement, notable head scratching, peacocking from some, and unwanted observations from others.

“It’s definitely the linchpin, has to be the linchpin.”

Mr Marrowbone—the village constable—waved his pint of ale knowingly at the lopsided carriage, his expression conveying satisfaction at his own genius.

As even Sarah knew that the linchpin was what secured the wheel to the axle, she suspected Mr Marrowbone’s advice fell into the unwanted observations category.

“Oh, case closed then—we can all go home,” a man Sarah presumed to be the driver of the vehicle replied. This presumption was based on his accent—decidedly not Plumptonian—his frustrated expression, and the fact that he was the only gentleman present not clutching a pint in his hand.

“No need for that, now,” Mr Marrowbone said, before taking a long sip from his pint, completely nonplussed.

“You’re not the one who needs to get these exotic blooms to Hill House before they dry out,” the driver replied, though his tone had softened.

Perhaps he had realised that Mr Marrowbone and his acquaintances from the pub represented the best help that Plumpton could offer him. Any port in a storm and all that.

“Oh, you wouldn’t want to leave Mrs Fawkes waiting,” Mr Marrowbone agreed, his cheeks rosy.

“A shame that such a beautiful woman is in possession of such a foul temper,” Mr McDowell, the grocer agreed. “I pity Colonel Fawkes.”

“I don’t pity him her temper,” Mr Marrowbone replied saucily. “But I do pity that Silas Hardwick is making a cuckold out of ‘im.”

Sensing that the conversation was about to descend into topics better suited for much later in the day, Sarah interrupted.

“You might find someone to help you with the linchpin in The King’s Arms coaching inn, just down the road,” Sarah called over the heads of the gathered men.

Several pairs of eyes turned to glare at her and, sensing that she had injured male pride, Sarah continued. “You could find no better men to watch over your cargo than these, sir. They’ll keep your plants safe from harm while you’re gone.”

“Indeedin, we will,” Mr Marrowbone puffed out his chest with pride.

Though a spinster gathering dust, Sarah was well aware that most men responded well to praise.

So well, in fact, that she often wondered if most wars might have been averted if only a woman had been close by to inform the warring factions that yes, they were very important and had indeed made their point.