Chapter 17 #2
What followed was far more fuss than Kit had anticipated.
For a start, the vicarage butler, Henley, had been standing in the shadows of the front hall and had heard their story; he, in turn, informed his wife, the housekeeper, who came sailing into the hall to reassure herself that all her charges—in which category she plainly included Sylvia—were coping with the shock and, Kit suspected, to cast her eyes over the gentleman-lord her chick had brought home.
From Mrs. Henley’s slowly evolving but ultimately approving smile, Kit surmised he’d passed inspection, but reassuring the redoubtable housekeeper that Reverend Buckleberry and his daughter were truly bearing up required the good reverend’s focused attention.
Sylvia tugged Kit’s sleeve. As he moved with her down the hall, she called to her father, “We’ll harness the gig and wait for you in the stable.”
They reached the stable to find that a similar chaos had taken hold there, courtesy of the boys’ colorful retelling of their tale.
Apparently, several ostlers from the local inn had been visiting the old stableman, and they were all avidly drinking in the drama.
Thinking of poor Gibson waiting alone in the gathering dark—and who knew what reaction Nunsworth might provoke from a man he’d left nursing an aching head—Kit quickly put the ostlers to good use, setting them to help Smiggs reharness the bays to the curricle and Egbert to put a neat chestnut between the shafts of the reverend’s gig.
Kit hadn’t intended for the boys to return to the mill, but they rebelled and insisted, and Sylvia pointed out that it would be better for them to tell of their parts in her rescue—and the facts about Nunsworth that they had ferreted out—to the magistrate and sergeant now, rather than having to remain in Saltford overnight.
She glanced at Jack and Ned. “Your mother,” she said, looking at Jack, “and your aunt and father,” she said to Ned, “will be wondering where you are.”
Kit saw both boys’ faces fill with sudden consternation and not a little guilt and took pity on them.
“After we return from the mill, Smiggs can drive the three of you home in the curricle.” Smiggs could return with the carriage for Kit and Sylvia tomorrow.
Given they were at the vicarage, given the events of the past hours and their outcome—the impact of Nunsworth’s scheme on Sylvia and him—Kit saw no reason not to take advantage of where Fate had landed them.
Then Reverend Buckleberry came hurrying from the house, and they sorted themselves into the two carriages. Jack and Ned squeezed in beside Sylvia’s father, and with the others following in the curricle, the reverend led the way back to the mill.
They drew up in the clearing outside the mill, with the magistrate and the sergeant in the magistrate’s gig on their heels. After securing the horses and exchanging greetings and introductions, they walked in a group to the mill’s open door.
Gibson, the foreman, had lit several lanterns inside the mill. They entered to find Nunsworth exactly where they’d left him, the pail still on his head; at the sound of footsteps, he started to thrash and call for help.
Seated on a narrow bench along the inside wall, Gibson had recovered some of his color. He snorted. “He’s been silent until now. Not a peep, even when I asked him what he’d planned for me.”
When Reverend Buckleberry inquired as to Gibson’s state, Gibson gave a gap-toothed grin. “I’m on the mend. Can’t wait to tell the wife that there’s benefits to having the hard head she’s always bemoaning.”
The reverend smiled and patted Gibson’s shoulder, then turned to where the magistrate and sergeant had halted on either side of Nunsworth. Reverend Buckleberry sobered.
Nunsworth, accepting that whoever had come in was not going to help him, had fallen silent, although his arms still tensed and shifted as he strained at his bonds.
The following minutes were an exercise in futility. At a sign from Quigley, the magistrate, the sergeant cut the rope connecting Nunsworth’s bound hands to his feet, then hauled the miscreant up to sit, at the last, removing the pail from his head.
The boys, peering around Kit, Sylvia, and Smiggs, sniggered at the sight of Nunsworth, with his expression enraged, his color high, and ashes in his hair and in streaks down his face and dusting his shoulders and chest.
The boyish sound drew Nunsworth’s attention.
He glared at the boys, then noticed Smiggs.
Nunsworth looked at the magistrate. “I want to lay charges against those boys and, I believe, that man there.” He nodded toward Smiggs.
“They attacked me and tied me up and subjected me to a humiliating experience. I’m a man of the cloth! ”
Quigley, an older gentleman Kit judged to be the sort frequently referred to as the backbone of a county, studied Nunsworth, then succinctly replied, “No, you’re not.
If you recall, it was I who allowed myself to be persuaded by the good reverend here and his bishop to allow you to be defrocked and run out of the parish rather than send you for deportation as your stealing from our villagers warranted.
It seems I have lived to regret that decision. ”
With his hands still tied behind him and his feet, also tied, before him, Nunsworth scowled, uttered a sound very like “Pshaw!” then stared straight ahead at the floor.
After regarding him for several seconds, Quigley raised his gaze and surveyed those gathered inside the door. “Very well. Now, which of you would like to start telling me what this is all about? Just the facts, if you please.”
“It started,” Kit said, “when Miss Buckleberry sensed that someone was watching her.”
Quigley took the cue and looked inquiringly at Sylvia. In a clear, steady voice, she recounted the various incidents and what she’d thought at the time—that the person was watching her with malevolent intent.
“But you never saw who the watcher was?” Quigley asked.
“No,” Sylvia admitted.
Kit then explained that he’d mentioned those incidents to his business partner, and that Jack had overheard. He glanced at the boys. “That led to Jack, Ned, and Ollie deciding to spend their spare time trailing after Sylvia, trying to spot who it was that was watching and unnerving her.”
Quigley demonstrated his sound sense in the way he drew the boys’ information from them.
In short order and with surprisingly little extraneous detail, they’d related all they’d learned about the man others living near his lodgings knew as Nunsworth—the same man who had accosted Sylvia, calling himself Mr. Hillary.
The magistrate paused and looked at Nunsworth. “Well, Hillary Nunsworth, do you deny anything these boys have said?”
Nunsworth didn’t look up. “It’s all lies—every last word,” he spat. “I deny everything!”
Quigley was unimpressed. He moved on, drawing out all that Smiggs, Kit, and Sylvia had to report.
Nunsworth’s only contribution was to loudly and frequently proclaim his innocence, insisting that he knew nothing of the events the others described.
Several times, Sergeant Jenkins was moved to cuff Nunsworth over the head to silence him.
Kit, Sylvia, Smiggs, and the boys told all to the point of them tying up Nunsworth.
Quigley nodded sagely, then asked, “Does anyone have anything more to add?”
To everyone’s surprise, Gibson called, “Aye—I have.”
They all turned to where the watchman still sat on the bench along the wall.
“Seems to me that having a local’s word on it won’t hurt.
That blackguard”—Gibson nodded at Nunsworth—“knocked me out when he arrived, right enough, but like I said, I’ve a hard head.
I came to m’senses—enough to hear and see—as he finished tying Miss Buckleberry to the railings.
I couldn’t lift me head to save meself, mind, but I heard and saw everything that followed, and it was exactly like these people have told you.
” Gibson’s gaze rested heavily on Nunsworth, who made no attempt to meet it.
“If it hadn’t been for Miss Buckleberry getting one hand free, enough to avoid Nunsworth’s first blow, and if the gentleman hadn’t arrived and flung himself in front of her…
Well, Nunsworth would have had his way and left nothing but tragedy behind. ”
That, Kit felt, was an excellent summation and final word.
Quigley seemed to think so, too. He nodded to the watchman. “Thank you, Jake.”
Then Quigley looked down on Nunsworth—at the top of his head as Nunsworth was still belligerently staring at the floor.
“Hillary Nunsworth, currently of Bristol, I’m binding you over to the next assizes where, without a shadow of a doubt, you will be judged guilty of kidnapping and attempted murder.
” Quigley paused, then gestured to Sergeant Jenkins to haul up his prisoner.
“Take him to the cells. We can keep him there until the judges arrive—the assizes is only a few weeks away.”
The sergeant bent and cut the rope tying Nunsworth’s feet.
Quigley waved the others to precede him back into the open air. Gibson waited until the sergeant passed, dragging his uncooperative prisoner along by main force. Then Gibson doused the lanterns, pulled the door closed, and joined the small crowd outside.
Reverend Buckleberry had arranged for Jack and Ned to squeeze into Kit’s curricle; he turned as Gibson came up. “Come along, Jake—I’ll drive you home. Your wife will be glad to see you.”
Gibson grinned. He directed a bow at Sylvia, Kit, and the others, then addressed the reverend. “Aye, I’m thinking to make the most of the lump on me head. Just as well if you come along and vouch for how I got it.”
With smiles and chuckles, everyone dispersed. While Jack and Ollie squeezed onto the box seat with Smiggs, Sylvia shooed Ned into the curricle. Then Kit helped her up and, reins in hand, followed.