Chapter 9
The great oak lay across the path like an enemy brought down at last—the thick trunk pinned into the earth, branches splayed in tangled ruin, leaves flattened and soaked.
It had not merely blocked the lane to the town; it had severed Belair House and the Admiral’s cottage from everything below.
No cart could pass, only humans who came on foot and climbed like goats.
Edmund had spent the first daylight hours ordering what could be ordered.
The Admiral’s roof had been covered with a tarpaulin for the moment—ingenuity with canvas and rope had prevented the worst, but Edmund knew very well how temporary such measures were.
A tarpaulin would keep out the rain only as long as the wind permitted it.
In a coastal winter, that was to say not long at all.
The roof had to be repaired first; the interior could be mended afterward.
He had found a carpenter at dawn, offered coin without haggling, and secured a promise that men and timber would be sent up that morning.
Then he had come back to the fallen tree.
Soon, two labourers worked beside him—Tom Headley, square-shouldered and steady, and a younger fellow named Prowse who possessed more enthusiasm than skill but made up for it by refusing to be discouraged.
Between them they had procured a saw the length of Edmund’s arm, a wedge, a mallet, and stubborn patience.
“You be ’aving the arms for it, Mr. Leigh,” Headley observed, as they set the saw to the trunk and began the slow, punishing rhythm. “Not like some gentlemen. Most would look at that tree and send for six more men to do it whilst they watched from a window.”
Edmund kept his expression mild and his breathing even. “Perhaps I am not most gentlemen.”
Prowse gave a breathless laugh. “No, sir. That’s plain enough. You ’ave a soldier’s back.”
Edmund felt the faint prickle on his neck that always came with such easy recognition. He had spent years learning how to become unseen. Yet in a town like this, it was difficult to vanish entirely.
“A soldier,” he said lightly, keeping the saw’s teeth biting into the wood. “Many men were soldiers. These days it is hardly distinguishing.”
“Aye, but you ’ave a different look,” Headley replied.
“What look is that?” Edmund asked, though he suspected he knew.
“The look of a man who keeps listening even when there be nothing to hear,” Headley said, and for the first time his voice held something less casual. Then he cleared his throat as if he had said too much and added briskly, “Mind your fingers, Prowse. You be about to take the end of one off.”
They worked in silence for a few minutes, the saw rasping, the smell of resin rising as the fresh cut opened the tree’s heart. The damp, cold air made Edmund’s lungs sting; the exertion warmed him nevertheless. His hands ached in a way he welcomed—an honest ache.
It struck him, with faint surprise, that he enjoyed the company.
This was not the polished banter of St. James’s Square, with Manners’ elegance and Baines’ bluster; not even Stuart’s comfortable cheer.
This was different. Here was camaraderie without history, obligation without expectation.
He was merely Mr. Leigh, a gentleman with his sleeves rolled up, sharing labour in a field of mud.
No one spoke of Singleton. No one watched his face for fractures.
And that, he realized grimly, was the very danger of it. Comfort could make one careless.
Prowse spat into the mud and wiped his brow with his forearm. “Storm did more’n drop trees,” he said, as if the thought had occurred to him only now. “Shook loose a deal of old trouble too, I reckon.”
Headley shot him a look. “Mind your tongue.”
“What?” Prowse insisted, eyes bright with the pleasure of half-forbidden gossip. “’Tis not as if I said it weren’t true. Folks ’a been talking since Holt came back.”
Edmund lifted his gaze slightly, keeping his tone mild. “Talking of what?”
Prowse looked briefly pleased to be invited and then wary of Headley. “Oh, nothing, sir. Just… old stories.”
“Old stories are the sort writers come for,” Edmund said, and let the faintest amusement touch his voice. “So I am told.”
Headley snorted. “You’ll be putting him in a book, will you? The lad’ll charge admission to speak to you after.”
Prowse grinned, encouraged. “’Tis about Captain Larkin, sir.”
The name landed like a stone dropped into still water. Edmund kept his hands on the saw. “What about him?”
Prowse lowered his voice, though there was no one near enough to overhear except the wind. “Well, folks say when he died, it were nay just a storm what took him.”
Headley swore under his breath. “Prowse—”
“It be only talk,” Prowse said quickly. “But talk’s all we ’ave, sometimes. His ship went down, they said, out at sea. But there were men in the tavern who swore they saw strange lights that night. Signal lights—and a boat that did nay belong.”
Edmund’s pulse did a quiet, disconcerting thing: it steadied. He felt suddenly awake in the old way, the way he had felt on the Continent when a rumour became a thread and a thread became a rope leading to a hidden door.
“Strange lights,” he repeated, “from where?”
“Off the Sound,” Prowse said. “And nearer in than a ship ought to be if she’s honest. Wasn’t smugglers. Wasn’t Revenue men. Might ’ave been nobody. But—”
Headley cut in, his voice gruff. “Captain Larkin was a fine officer. Mrs. Larkin’s a fine lady. Leave it be.”
Prowse coloured. “I mean no ill. Just… when things go wrong, folk look for reasons. And when a man dies sudden, folk think there must be a hand behind it.”
Edmund nodded as if indulging idle town speculation, but his mind shifted, aligning itself around the new detail. “A brother of mine died in an accident. It is hard not to look for reasons why.”
The other men gave a sympathetic nod as they continued to saw and axe at the tree.
“It must have been hard on Mrs. Larkin,” he remarked carefully.
Headley’s jaw clenched. “She don’t speak of her husband’s death, sir. She keeps a school; she looks after girls who already ’ave fathers in the ground or in the sea.”
“’Tis admirable of her to help others.” Edmund felt the faintest prick of shame, but it was necessary to discover all that stood between this woman and whomever had the cipher now.
They worked on until the cut finally deepened enough to allow the wedge. Edmund drove it in with the axe, each blow ringing up his arm. The trunk groaned—wood complaining like an injured thing.
Headley leaned his weight. “There. She be a-going now.”
With a final crack, the section they had been cutting gave way. A thick limb shifted aside and the lane opened by a foot.
Prowse whooped. “Another hour and we shall have it passable!”
Edmund wiped his brow and looked up. Mrs. Larkin stood at the edge of the lawn.
She had come quietly, without the fuss of an announcement. Her cloak was pinned neatly at the throat; her bonnet was plain and practical. A basket hung upon her arm as naturally as a part of her. She surveyed the work with an expression of composed appraisal, as if she were reviewing soldiers.
When her eyes met Edmund’s, something like relief flickered—and swiftly vanished, smoothed away before it could become gratitude too plainly shown.
“Mr. Leigh,” she called, her voice carrying without strain.
He went to her, careful to wipe his hands upon a cloth before he came close and offered a polite bow. “Mrs. Larkin.”
“You have done a great deal,” she said. “I feared I would need to climb over the tree.”
“It will be cleared enough for a cart soon,” he replied. “By afternoon, if the men keep their strength.”
Prowse, overhearing, swelled with pride. “We shall do it, ma’am. Mr. Leigh works like he’s bein’ paid double.”
Mrs. Larkin inclined her head to the men. “Then I am grateful to you all. Cook will give you bread and stew when you break from your labours.”
Prowse looked as if he would like to break from them immediately.
Mrs. Larkin’s gaze returned to Edmund. “I am going down to the town.” Her lips pursed faintly. “We require—supplies.”
He nodded. “Of course.”
She hesitated a fraction—just long enough that he felt it rather than saw it. “You need not trouble yourself further with the tree,” she added, as if offering permission to withdraw. “You have done more than enough already.”
He heard what she did not say: You have done enough to make yourself welcome. You need not press further… but his whole purpose was to press further.
“I shall help to finish opening the lane,” he said, keeping his tone easy. “It would be impractical to abandon a half-cleared road.”
Her eyes held his. “Practicality is rarely the reason gentlemen do things,” she said, and moved away before he could answer.
Edmund stood for a heartbeat, watching her retreat—the steady line of her shoulders, the sure steps that did not hesitate even on muddy ground.
Then his instincts spoke, swift and urgent. She was going to Blake. He could not allow her to go unwatched—not if Blake was indeed the key to the cipher’s use, not if someone was asking questions, not if the Revenue men were hovering near.
He turned back to Headley and Prowse with the air of a man making a simple decision. He needed an excuse. A gentleman did not follow a widow into the town without reason unless he wished to be noticed for it.
“Headley—your arm is steady. Keep the saw going. Prowse, fetch the rope and pull the smaller branches off to the side. I am off to fetch more help.”
“Aye, sir,” Headley said, readily now, as if Edmund had already earned the right to command.
Edmund wiped his hands, drew his coat on, and forced himself to walk—not hurry—toward the town.
He left, keeping his pace measured until he reached the bend in the lane where the path dipped and the harbour came into view.
Mrs. Larkin was ahead of him, walking with that same purposeful grace. She did not look back. She had not expected him to follow her.