‘I am coming with you,’ Sarah repeated. ‘Don’t you realise who Axminster is?’
‘No, I do not,’ Nicholas said.
‘Wilton—my father’s business manager. Don’t you see? Wilton and Axminster, the two great carpet-making towns.’
‘Coincidence,’ he said.
‘Really? Two crooked ship owners with those names? The Glass-Eyed Man? Wilton wears thick-lensed spectacles and he looks as meek and precise as any office clerk.’
‘That is one coincidence too many,’ Nicholas said thoughtfully. ‘But you are most certainly not coming with me.’
‘Why not?’ Sarah demanded. ‘I am the only person who can identify him. And besides, I want to see him brought down, brought to justice. The man ruined us, as near as killed my father.’
‘Yes, I can understand how you feel. But it would be scandalous, you travelling with a party of men and only a maid as chaperone, and besides, it would be dangerous.’
‘Might I remind you that I have been travelling with a party of men, as you put it, for days now? If your sister is able to salvage my reputation now, then why not in a week’s time? We are hardly likely to be flaunting ourselves at society functions, are we? And as for danger,’ she said quickly, seeing he was on the point of speaking, ‘just what do you envisage as being more dangerous than the situations I have been in this last week?’
‘Miss Parrish—Sarah—please be reasonable about this—’
She almost smiled. This was not a man who was used to people contradicting him, refusing to obey his orders or disagreeing in any particular. ‘If you put me in a post-chaise I will instruct the postilions to go to Blakeney as soon as you are out of sight. And do not think that paying them a large sum to ignore me will work, because I will tell them that you are abducting me for evil purposes.’
For a long moment he stared at her and she stared right back into those dark eyes until she felt she was swaying towards him, mesmerised, her heart thudding, although why, when she was not frightened, she could not tell.
And then Nicholas laughed, a genuine burst of laughter that had everyone else in the room turning to stare at them. ‘You will be the death of me, Sarah Parrish. Why couldn’t I have found myself on a ship with a meek little spinster.’
‘I am a meek little spinster,’ she retorted, then realised how ridiculous it was to say that when she was standing in the middle of a room full of respectable gentlemen brazenly defying a duke. ‘Well, a spinster anyway.’
Nicholas sank onto the nearest chair, put his head in his hands and laughed until his shoulders shook. He looked up and wiped tears from his eyes with the back of his hand. ‘Come, then. I am undoubtedly all about in the head to even contemplate it, but I have no faith whatsoever in you not arriving at Blakeney—probably in the middle of a gun battle—having begged rides in farm carts right across Norfolk.’
‘You are amused?’
‘I am probably hysterical at the turn my well-ordered existence is taking,’ Nicholas retorted, getting to his feet. He bowed towards the group of magistrates and officers who were studiously pretending to ignore them. ‘Excuse me, gentlemen. An ill-timed jest, I fear. I will keep in touch with news as it arises.’
Nicholas swept her down the steps. ‘Now where the devil have Pendell and Millie got to?’
‘And Charlie.’ Sarah looked around her, anxious. What if he had run off, frightened by the magistrates and the nearness of members of Lockhart’s gang? ‘I will look this way.’
Without waiting for Nicholas’s agreement she gathered up her skirts and ran along the right-hand front of the house, through a gateway in the flanking wall, found herself in a garden and stopped, enchanted.
High walls sheltered the plot from the sea winds and it was full of roses, with grass paths dividing the symmetrical beds and mounds of lavender and Russian sage spilling out in wanton abandon. Her nostrils full of the heady perfume, Sarah followed the sound of trickling water and found a stone basin in the centre with a fountain running over mossy rocks. Charlie was perched on the rim, gazing about him with his mouth half open.
‘Are you all right?’ she asked, sitting down beside him. ‘We thought we had lost you.’
He blinked up at her. ‘Wot is this, miss?’
‘It’s a garden, Charlie. Haven’t you ever seen one before?’
‘No, miss. Nuffin grows in the docklands. Is it ’eaven?’
‘Heaven? No, although in some countries they think gardens are like heaven come to earth.’
‘Who looks after it, miss?’
‘Gardeners, Charlie. They start as apprentices and learn the skills. They grow fruit and vegetables as well as flowers. Look, there’s one now.’
A middle-aged man in a leather jerkin, breeches and gaiters came out from one of the paths and touched a finger to his hat brim. ‘Good day to you, miss.’
‘Good day. My young friend and I were admiring this lovely garden.’
‘Thank you, miss. Like flowers, do you, lad? What kind do you like best?’ He spoke kindly and Sarah guessed he might have children of his own.
‘Don’t know any names,’ Charlie admitted. ‘I like those.’ He pointed at a deep crimson rose.
‘Now that’s a rose. She’s a beauty, isn’t she? Here you are, lad, have one for your buttonhole.’ He broke off a half-open bud and handed it to Charlie. ‘And one for the lady, of course. You need to make sure you take off the thorns first so she doesn’t prick her fingers. See?’
Ten minutes later Sarah finally managed to drag Charlie out of the garden, stunned into speechlessness. Millie was looking out of the coach window and Pendell and Nicholas stood on the gravel, both with hands on hips, the perfect models of exasperated menfolk waiting for a woman.
‘Where did you find him?’ Nicholas demanded. He picked Charlie up bodily and dumped him into the vehicle, then gave Sarah a hand to mount the step.
‘There is an enchanting walled garden. Charlie has never seen one before and we were talking to the gardener.’ She looked at the boy, who was peering down at the rose attached to his jacket and touching it tentatively with one finger. ‘Here, Charlie, look at the one he gave me. It is more open and you can see inside.’ She raised an eyebrow at Nicholas. ‘You don’t happen to have a vacancy in your gardening staff for a boy, have you?’
‘I expect one could be found.’ Nicholas regarded the absorbed child. ‘Charlie.’
‘Cap’n? I mean...sir?’
‘Would you like to work in a garden?’
‘Me? Wot, like that one?’
‘Bigger,’ Nicholas said, with a glance out of the window. ‘Much, much bigger.’
‘Oh, yes, sir. Please, sir.’
‘We’ll see if you still think the same once all this is over. If you do, I’ll take you to see my head gardener, see what you make of each other.’
That rendered the boy utterly silent. All he could do was nod.
‘That was kind,’ Sarah said when Charlie’s attention was back on a minute study of the rose.
Nicholas shrugged. ‘He may change his mind or he may not suit, but he deserves a chance.’
They took luncheon at the King’s Arms in North Walsham where the landlord had the charming conceit of filling half-barrels with a mass of cottage garden plants. Pendell had to march Charlie inside past them and, as soon as he had finished wolfing down his pie, eating as though he might be back on crusts and slops at any moment, he escaped outside to stare at them. Sarah followed him and through the open window of the private parlour Nick could hear her identifying them.
‘That’s a marigold and those are larkspur and that is a dandelion, but that’s a weed. What is a weed? Well...’
He leant back in his chair, closed his eyes and let the voices wash over him.
Pendell cleared his throat and Nick came to himself with a jerk. ‘Good Lord, I was dropping off to sleep there.’
‘I don’t think so, sir. You were humming.’
‘Humming? Don’t be ridiculous. I do not hum, Pendell.’
‘You were, sir,’ his valet persisted. ‘“Early One Morning,” it was. You know, the one about the maiden singing and the sun rising and her picking roses for her lover. I expect that’s what put you in mind of it.’
Nick got to his feet and tugged his coat into order. ‘Ridiculous. I do not hum folksongs in public houses. You were dreaming.’
‘Yes, of course, Your Grace. I’m sorry, Your Grace.’
‘Here, take this and go and pay the reckoning.’
Outside he found Sarah and Charlie were still exploring the flower tubs. ‘And this one is Sweet Cecily and that’s a daisy.’
‘Cor... I knew a Daisy once. And a Cecily, only they called her Ceccy. Why are flowers called girl’s names?’
‘I think it is the other way around,’ Sarah said.
‘I disagree,’ Nick drawled. ‘It is because ladies are beautiful and so flowers are named after them.’
‘Daisy weren’t beautiful,’ Charlie objected. ‘Her teef stuck out and she had a squint.’
Nick met Sarah’s amused glance. ‘All ladies are beautiful, Charlie. It is important for a man to remember that.’
‘Well, Millie’s pretty,’ Charlie agreed. ‘And Miss Sarah’s beautiful. But Daisy weren’t, honest she weren’t.’
‘His Grace is teasing you, Charlie,’ Sarah said composedly. ‘The girls are named for the flowers. And beauty is not important, although it is not polite to comment on people’s appearance.’
‘So ’is Grace is wrong?’
‘His Grace is a duke, Charlie, and they are a law unto themselves and may be as rude as they like. You and I, we must mind our manners.’
Behind him Nick heard a choking sound and turned to find Pendell pink about the ears and attempting to stifle his sniggers with his hand.
‘You heard Miss Parrish, Pendell: you must mind your manners.’
‘Yes, sir.’ Pendell emerged from behind his hand, biting his lip, but otherwise managing to keep an admirably straight face.
‘Right. Time we were going. The others should have finished by now.’ They should be on their way and he should be thinking about bringing Lockhart and his crew to justice, not lounging around in inns humming—humming, for heaven’s sake!—and talking inanities with a cabin boy and a paid companion.
In the stable yard he found Fawcett and his six men waiting and both teams harnessed.
‘Where to tonight, sir?’ Fawcett had the road map in his hand. ‘It’s another twenty-five miles or so to Blakeney.’
Nick studied the map. ‘I don’t want to arrive in two carriages without scouting the area first. Holt is just inland and looks large enough to have a decent inn or two.’ He opened the route book. ‘Yes, the King’s Head and the Feathers. We’ll split up, go to one each and then ask about Blakeney—is it a good port to take a coastal vessel to London? Can they recommend a skipper? Anyone to avoid? You know the sort of thing, Matt.’
‘That’s a good idea. I’ll send some of the lads out to the ale houses, ask the same questions.’
‘Then tomorrow we’ll go to Blakeney early, before sunrise. Leave the coaches a way out and walk in. I’ll leave Pendell with the women and the boy.’
‘What about the local Justices, sir?’
‘I think we’ll leave them out of this until we have a clearer picture. This is smuggling country and it isn’t always clear where loyalties lie. This Axminster fellow may have established himself as a local gentleman, for all we know.’
‘Right, sir. We’ll follow you twenty minutes or so back: no point in advertising that we’re all together.’
Nick strolled back to his carriage, whistling under his breath, caught himself doing so and stopped mid-verse. What the devil was the matter with him? Anyone would think he had been drinking heavily when all that had passed his lips had been a pint of ale with the meal.
It was not until the carriage was moving off that he finally realised what was happening. He was enjoying himself. This adventure—there was no point in pretending it was anything else—was a total novelty and couldn’t be further from his normal routine. And that routine had begun to pall, he had to admit. The business of the dukedom was considerable and, however many excellent staff one employed, there was a great deal to keep on top of. His social life was, of course, lavish and, he realised, utterly predictable.
His friends and acquaintances would think he had taken leave of his senses if he told them that he was relishing the discomfort and the danger, to say nothing of the company of one urchin, one pert Cockney maid and one young woman who appeared to think it her mission in life to depress the pretentions of top-lofty aristocrats.
There were dangers, of course. He made himself think seriously about the situation. This was not some storybook adventure. He had people depending on him for their lives if this went wrong, and Sarah Parrish was relying on him to keep her reputation intact, which should be achievable with his sister’s help.
But there was more than reputation at stake here, he acknowledged frankly, shifting on the seat and wedging his shoulders against the angle of coach back and window so he could stretch his legs out more easily.
Sarah, he could see clearly now he had shifted his position, had curled up in the other corner and was looking past him out of the window.
He found her attractive and he must not let that show, must not alarm her or make her feel uncomfortable. She had insisted on accompanying him, true, but that was, surely, because of her own innocence. Presumably she was confident that he would behave like a gentleman and, of course, he would. But it might be rather more difficult not to let the effort show...
Goodness knows why he was finding her presence disturbing. She was attractive enough, but his world was full of far more lovely women. She used no wiles to beguile, she did not flirt, she was given to saying just what she thought in flattening detail and she looked absolutely nothing like Marietta, whom he had always assumed was the perfect example of the kind of looks that most attracted him.
Surely it was not because she made him laugh, or because she used her brain in ways that no young lady was encouraged to do? And she had courage and that was attractive. But she was patently respectable and he was not going to offer her a carte blanche as his mistress: ruining innocents was not something he would contemplate for a moment. It would be sensible to be careful what he said.
‘What is it?’ the innocent in question demanded, jerking Nick out of his abstraction. ‘You have been staring at me for quite ten minutes.’
‘I apologise.’ The truth was clearly inadmissible, but insult would always distract. ‘I was lost in contemplation of that quite awful bonnet.’
‘Oh, yes, isn’t it dowdy?’ she agreed earnestly, giving the ribbons an irritable tug. ‘My last employer bought it for me as a present and I cannot afford to simply discard it. I wondered about new ribbons, or a spray of artificial flowers, but I do not think that would answer.’
‘I will buy you a new one. Holt, surely, has a milliner.’
And there, within a minute, goes my resolution to be careful.
‘I cannot accept gifts of clothing from a gentleman,’ Sarah said stiffly.
‘And my reputation will never survive being seen with a female in that bonnet,’ Nick said, finding his balance again.
‘Very well, thank you. But as a loan only.’
‘And what am I supposed to do with a lightly used bonnet?’
‘Give it to your housekeeper to present to a deserving housemaid.’
Nick made a gesture of defeat. If he bought her a pretty enough hat, then she would keep it, he was sure. He had never yet found a woman who would not. He met Sarah’s speculative gaze and wondered if here was the exception.
‘Who are we?’ she asked suddenly.
‘Theologically, philosophically or biologically?’ Nick asked.
‘No, actually,’ Sarah said. ‘We can’t arrive in a little market town announcing that you are the Duke of Severton. Not without creating a stir anyway. And no one will believe you are Mr Smith—I certainly didn’t. And who am I supposed to be?’
Nick pondered the question which was, he acknowledged, something he should have considered. ‘I have it. I am Lord Wendover and you are my sister Sarah. George, the third Baron Wendover, was at university with me; he has a sister Sarah and is very much wedded to his country estate in Buckinghamshire. If anyone should look in the Peerage I am the right age, and the chances of anyone we might encounter in Norfolk ever having met George are remote in the extreme.’
Sarah nodded. ‘That would be perfect, although you do not look like a George.’ She appeared to find this worrying and frowned at him while her lips shaped the name. ‘Charlie, we will be pretending that the Duke is actually Lord Wendover. Can you remember that? You must call him my lord.’
Charlie nodded. ‘Who am I?’
‘That’s a very good point, Charlie. How would it be if you are the new gardener’s boy? You had best stay with the coachman and groom tonight.’
The boy went very still and Nick recalled his fear at being left alone with his valet that first night. He seemed to trust Pendell now, so he said, ‘On second thoughts, you are the new gardener’s boy, but you are also Pendell’s young brother, so you stay with him. Is that better? His name is James.’
‘Jimmy,’ Charlie said with a cheeky grin, caught sight of Nick’s expression and added, ‘My lord.’
Nick, who had been suppressing a smile, and had clearly produced a scowl, merely nodded and tried to avoid catching Sarah’s eye. She appeared to find his new name amusing.