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RICHARD REMEMBERED his promise to me, about this name that had cropped up: Thompson. He had said he would tell me the following day and accordingly, he asked for the use of the music room for an hour after breakfast. Martha assumed he wished me to play for him again, so she grudgingly gave her permission. I waited for him there.
Richard came in carrying a plain wooden box, about the size of a tea caddy. The maid stood by the door and curtseyed to him. I waved her out and, after casting one doubtful look in his direction, she obeyed and pulled the door closed behind her. I knew she must have received instructions from Martha not to leave us alone together. I must make matters right with my sister-in-law on the maid’s behalf later.
Richard put the box down on the small table by the window, before he came to take me in his arms and kiss me good morning. “One day closer,” I said, when I could.
“So it is.” He seemed so sanguine about it. I still had doubts, not about my feelings for him, but his for me. I still wondered why he should have fallen in love with me, but I could say nothing. It would have been tantamount to asking him for compliments. Perhaps it was that I couldn’t believe my good fortune.
He led me to a chair by the little table, helped me sit and then took a chair and sat down opposite me. He leaned one elbow on the table and gazed at me. I smiled back at him. “Thompson’s,” he said, with a smile.
“Yes, please. I’ve imagined all kinds of things. Are you a gang leader perhaps?”
He laughed, genuine amusement showing through his naturally serene expression. “With a highwayman’s mask and a musket?”
I smiled too, as I had a ridiculous vision of him in all his court finery with a filthy scarf wrapped around his mouth, holding up a carriage on the road to Exeter.
“No, my love,” he said eventually, “nothing so exciting, I fear. But let me tell it in my own way, and you’ll know it all. There is one thing—”
“Yes?” I lifted my head to meet his gaze.
He caught his breath in an audible gasp. “Sometimes... You look so trusting there, sitting with the sun lighting your hair, and that look in your eyes...” He leaned forward, caught my hand in his, and gazed at me until I became embarrassed by what I saw in his face and looked down, blushing.
“How did you know what I was thinking?” he asked, amused.
“I recognised something in your eyes, and when I’ve seen it before.”
He kissed my hand and released it. “Two weeks,” he reminded me softly, and then took a deep breath and reminded us both, “Thompson’s.”
“Thompson’s.”
He took another breath and smiled at me. “When I was eighteen, Gervase left to go abroad, and the Strang family was in turmoil. Preparations were already under way for Gervase and I to go on the Grand Tour when the scandal broke and he left. My father insisted I go on my own. When I lost Gervase, it was like a betrayal, that Gervase had done this without telling me anything. I felt I could trust no one.” Gervase had eloped with a married man. It had taken a great deal of money from his parents and courage from Richard to live the scandal down. To do Gervase justice, I know he wanted to remain in the country and face the critics himself, but his parents hadn’t allowed it and packed him off abroad. At eighteen, he had little choice.
“We had been together always, and I never imagined it any other way. I hadn’t considered a wife an impediment to that, you see. She was a necessity, a means of continuing the line, because that’s the way my father saw it and at that time he was God to me.” He smiled at me apologetically. “As you can see, I have changed.” I smiled back to reassure him, but I didn’t interrupt.
“This was a scandal of the worst kind, and at all times it was emphasised to me I must hold my head high and face the world proudly, so I did my best. That’s when I started to wear the heavy maquillage, in effect a mask to conceal my face, and the clothes, to make myself something else, something new. Servants were procured for me and to my everlasting gratitude Carier arrived in my life. He’d served generals in the army, but was tired of army life, so he came on the Tour as my valet and bodyguard. I believe the pay was better, too, at least that’s what he always told me when I asked him why he preferred to stay with me.” He smiled reminiscently, but didn’t pause his narrative for long. “I was on my own for the first time in my life. Only Carier saw what that solitude meant to me. I kept my mourning for private moments, but a good valet must always see some of that.”
He stopped. A troubled frown crossed his features when he remembered a time that had tested his character to the full. He was left alone to face a scandal not of his making. I could only imagine how hard that must have been. I reached my hand across the table to take his, and he looked up and smiled, recalled to the present.
“Carier brought his army pension and a small inheritance with him. He’s a resourceful person—he even contrived a meeting between Gervase and me in Rome. My father had set other persons to watch me when I went to Rome, to see that I didn’t come under Gervase’s baleful influence, but Carier helped me to give them the slip one afternoon.” He stopped again. This was so painful for him, I could see that, but I knew I must let him tell it in his own way, and I said nothing. I let my hand rest in his.
“The meeting is not one of my favourite memories. Gervase’s lover had left him, and he had nothing left. But Carier showed his loyalty to me many times during that terrible tour. His discretion then and afterwards has been absolute.
“By the time I returned to England I had formed and honed my new personality. I’d been away two years, and no one expected what they saw, but my older friends still recognised and supported me. You’ve met one of them, Freddy Thwaite.” I nodded. He caressed my hand, rubbing his thumb over the palm. I wasn’t sure he knew he was doing it. “I locked myself away, and gave myself over to hedonism. Cards and gambling I never cared for overmuch, although I tried for a season, until my father cut my allowance. I found myself so destitute then, and the humble apology I had to make to my father so humiliating, I decided to make my own money, independent of the estate.”
He stopped. “Don’t think I did as well as Gervase, because he could buy me ten times over and still have change.”
I released his hand, and crossed the room to the small table where the decanters were kept. I poured two glasses of madeira. He was thirsty, for he accepted his glass with a smile and drained most of it before he continued.
“One of Carier’s inheritances was a building in the City. We went to see it together. I made a business proposal to him, one I’d been considering for some time. At that time, my mother was always looking for a lady’s maid, never able to find one, and her friends seemed to be in the same difficulties. I’m assured that a good lady’s maid is hard to train and hard to find. My mother and her friends were exacting in their requirements, but the pay was good for the right person, and I couldn’t see why they had difficulties until I visited a Registry Office with my mother.
“The records were sparse, and the future employer was expected to take up the references given for herself, which many of them failed to do. They could have been forged. Anyone could inveigle themselves into a place of trust in a wealthy household on the strength of a few pieces of paper. The building was in a small side street, run down and uncomfortable, not at all the kind of place my mother was used to visiting. If she hadn’t been so desperate for a good maid I doubt she would have undertaken the errand herself.
“I observed all this and it sparked an idea. I proposed that Carier and I set up an office for high quality servants, at a price. Our offices would be spacious and comfortable and our servants the best available.” I started to laugh, and he arched a patrician eyebrow. “What can I have said to amuse you?”
“Oh, I’m sorry,” I gurgled through my hands. “So that’s Thompson’s? Oh, you can’t imagine what I’ve been thinking.”
He smiled at that. “Tell me.”
“Well I knew of your—reputation for pursuing beautiful women. I lay in bed at night imagining all kinds of things!”
It was his turn to laugh. “You thought it was a brothel? Now what would a well-brought-up young lady know about that?”
“You’d be surprised,” I managed, still laughing. It was such a relief, when I had imagined all kinds of sinister things, to find it was just a normal business, the laughter was as much a release as genuine amusement.
“You frequently surprise me,” he admitted with a smile. “It’s one of your many charms. No, Thompson’s started as a simple registry office for servants. Nothing else was on offer, I do assure you.”
He waited until I had recovered, and then he went to the decanter and replenished both our glasses, returning to sit down again. “There’s more?” I asked.
“A little. Are you ready, or would you like the rest to wait?”
I remembered I had still not found out what the box was for, and I touched it with one hand.
“Yes,” he said. “The box. There are only two of these. One is kept at the office, in the safe, and Carier and I have the other. It never leaves us. In it are names, directions, and areas of expertise.”
“Expertise?”
“Listen, my love. Who knows all the secrets of the house? Who knows where, who, when?”
At once I saw where he was heading. “Servants.”
“Perfectly correct. We provide lady’s maids, housekeepers, butlers, valets, first and second footmen. Higher servants in positions of trust. Some of our people indicate to us for an extra fee and total discretion they—” he tapped the box, “—will help us if it doesn’t compromise their position, or if we discover illegal activity. Sometimes a husband finds his wife has pawned the family jewels, and he needs to know where they are, to quietly recover them. He can come to Thompson’s and we will do our best to help. Perhaps there’s a mysterious death. They won’t go to the authorities, that would mean far too much scandal and upset, but we can provide them with a solution on which they can then base a decision. Mysterious deaths are not always murder, and above all things my peers rely on discretion and reputation.” He sighed. “I have long advocated a civilian force to administer and regulate the law, but public opinion is against it, although the matter has been brought up time and again in Parliament. If a man wishes to prosecute a burglar, he must instigate the investigation himself and provide the proof to the magistrate. We help with all that. Either we have one of our special people in place, or we seek permission to place one.”
“So at the Abbey—” I began. He’d helped my family with a similar “little problem” there.
“Strangely, no. It was the first time I’d come across a great house without one Thompson’s employee in it. I did that all on my own. With a little help, of course,” he added, grinning.
“So when there’s a problem, you’re asked to stay?”
“Well, actually, it’s not me they want. You see—nobody knows about my involvement except you, Mrs. Thompson, Gervase and Carier.”
“Mrs. Thompson?” I’d wondered where the name had come from.
“Alicia Thompson, the third component of the unholy triumvirate.” I watched him closely for any signs of emotion, but there were none, so I imagined Mrs. Thompson as a comfortable widow of advanced years. It seemed I was right.
“Carier knew her in the army. After her husband died she needed a position, so we gave her one, running the office and the day to day management. After all, Thompson’s is one of the best staff agencies in London these days. We take up all references before anyone is put on the books, and provide comfortable, if not luxurious surroundings where our clients may interview prospective servants if they wish to. Mrs. Thompson knows about all the other activities, and I couldn’t ask for a more efficient manager. However, only these people know of my active involvement. Most people think I have invested in the company to give Carier a pension and that was, after all, how it started out.
“We thought it would be better to keep my involvement quiet.” He paused to take another sip of his wine. “Of course, many people have guessed, but nobody knows for sure. The records of my investment in the business are well tucked away, and when we decide to retire, as I am considering now, the business will still be there for the others.”
“You’re thinking of retiring?” I echoed in surprise.
“My purpose was to make me some private income, so I wasn’t so dependent on my father, but most importantly, to keep me busy, to stop me from becoming too bored. Everything seemed to bore me at one point, and eventually even the women—I’m sorry, my sweet, have I gone too far?” He broke off as he remembered whom he was talking to, but I knew his past, I knew his reputation. He had never tried to hide any of that from me. It had worried me since I had first met him. I still worried. He had proved his attractiveness to other women, how long could I hope to keep him?
When I’d first met him, he was a distant figure who had troubled me. His sardonic humour meant I could never tell when he was laughing at me. As it turned out, he never had, but that hadn’t stopped me imagining it in the early days. His fine clothes were the most astounding I had ever seen, and if it had not been for the accident, he might well have remained that way, distant and unapproachable, but it had happened, I had been there, and now here we were.
I smiled and shook my head. “I know some of that part, and I’m beginning to understand better. It’s the women in your future I worry about, not the ones in your past.”
He took my hand and looked straight into my eyes, warm blue holding me, as always. “There’s only one woman in my future. There’s no reason why I should ever want anyone else,” he said earnestly. “You’re everything I ever looked for in a woman, and I’m so fortunate I can have you to myself for as long as I take care of you and love you. If you believe nothing else, believe that.”
I was taken aback by the sincerity of his reply, and his lack of any kind of flattery or humour. I had to believe he really meant it, and put my trust in him. Today, he’d told me more than he’d told anyone else. I knew it, by the halting way he’d spoken, and by the total sincerity and lack of guile.
I answered in the same way, with sincerity, without flummery. “I’ll love you anyway. I don’t know what happened to me on that road in the dirt, but my world moved into yours then. Even if you had turned me away, married Miss Cartwright, produced your heirs, I would have loved you.”
He stood up from his side of the table then and drew me into his arms. He held me close so I could feel the warmth of his body underneath those fabulous clothes. After a moment he slid his hand up under my hair at the back and kissed me for a long time. I returned it, savouring the warmth, the love I found only with him. “Two weeks.”
“Two weeks,” I repeated, smiling.
It was some time before we sat down, and then we knew we would have to join the world again soon. I was so grateful to him, he had told so much and had been so honest with me, so much so I wished I had a secret to tell him, but my life had always been open and tedious in the extreme. There was one thing I wanted to tackle before we left the room. “Richard, do you really wish to retire?”
“I’d like to devote more time to you than I could if Thompson’s was still running its extra services,” he replied.
“What if I helped?”
He shook his head. “There’s no need.”
But I started to see this as something else, something for me. “Does it make you happy, when you help with these problems, have that sort of power?”
He studied my face, and then sighed. “You know me too well already, love. Yes, it gave me a kind of contentment, a fulfilment.”
“I would hate to take that from you. And it sounds so exciting, I should love to help. Just don’t say you’ll retire immediately, please.”
He smiled. “If you insist, I’ll leave it open, but I’ll not make any promises.”
I would get no more out of him that day. He looked tired, probably from revealing so much of himself, more than he’d done for years. I left him on a sofa by the fire, and went to the harpsichord. I found my music and I played for him, deliberately choosing the pieces I knew best, so he wouldn’t have to come and turn pages for me, or do anything else except sit back with his eyes closed and relax. As I played, I glanced at him. I thought the cloud lifted from him, and I was thankful I could do something for him, that I had a gift to bestow.
Soon the magic took hold of me, and I felt the protective cocoon fold around me, the shield music always gave to me, and yet I still felt his presence. He was inside with me. Just with me.
The door opened once or twice, but people tended to look in and go away again, when they saw us so tranquil. It couldn’t go on forever. I knew it after I heard the doorknocker sound.
Soon, a maid came in to inform us the Terrys had called, and Martha would appreciate it if I came to the drawing room. Richard opened his eyes and smiled when his eyes met mine. I got up, closed the lid and went to him.
Before we left the room he pulled me against him once more for a kiss, not as sweet as last time, an edge of passion to it. I responded, though the need made me ache. Whatever was I turning into?
I turned to leave, but he drew me against him, one arm around my waist. He kissed my neck. “May I come to you tonight?”
“What?” I almost turned to face him, but his arms held me tightly.
“Please?” Did I imagine the edge of desperation to his voice? If so it only echoed mine.
“How can we?”
“Easily. I’m only a few doors away.”
“Won’t someone hear?”
“Not if we’re quiet. Rose, I’ve never needed anyone like I need you. I’d be happy—well, happier—” He gave a derisive laugh. “If I could hold you, be with you.”
“You are, for most of the day.”
He nuzzled my ear and murmured, “Skin to skin, my love. Touching, kissing, holding. Loving.”
What could I say against that, especially when I needed it too? “Yes.”
“Later, sweetheart, later.” It was a promise.
We went together to the drawing room. Richard took the little box and gave it into Carier’s hands in the hall. “Five of us know for sure now, Carier.”
The manservant nodded and bowed. “That is as it should be, my lord,” he said and took the box away. I took this as approval from him, and although this kind of comment would not normally be expected from a servant, I knew Carier was much more than that to Lord Strang.
* * * * *
WE WENT UPSTAIRS TO the drawing room. Richard must have felt my hand stiffen on his arm when I recalled the last time we had seen them. “Miss Terry knows more than she has a right to, and she might well have told her mother, but I don’t think we should repine. What’s done is done. I have nothing to be ashamed of, and if anyone maligns you, they’ll answer to me personally.”
Mrs. Terry faced the door, and she stared at us as we went in, so I thought it highly likely she knew the gist of the conversation her daughter had overheard. Her look was hard, her pale eyes narrowed in speculation.
I was surprised to see that her husband, Mr. Norrice Terry, had decided to accompany her. Perhaps he knew, too. Mr. Terry was a large man, tall and broad. He always reminded me of the later portraits of King Henry VIII, with his small eyes and harsh expression. He could be hard on his servants and his family, and with my new knowledge, I wondered if anyone from Thompson’s was employed there. A maid from London would appeal to Mrs. Terry’s pretentious nature. Upper servants knew everything their employers did, and if they put their knowledge together, they would probably know considerably more. I would have to ask Richard if we had any Thompson’s servants in the Manor.
Richard made an elaborate bow and I curtseyed to our guests. I promised myself, as I always did when confronted with his social graces, to practise mine so he would have no need to be ashamed of me in company. Martha smiled at us, an edge of desperation in her face as we entered the room. Richard and I sat side by side on a small sofa. Richard allowed his hand to rest on mine, an indication of our status he rarely allowed himself even in public, but since we had to assume most of the company knew our devotion to each other, it seemed foolish to deny this small pleasure of contact.
Mrs. Terry’s pointed gaze went straight to our hands, and then up to our faces, where Richard’s expression of tranquil innocence confounded her, and she looked away again.
Her capacious bosom heaved a couple of times. “While it is of course charming to meet you again, my lord, we came to find out what the truth was about these dreadful rumours we have been hearing.” She addressed us rather than spoke to us, as though she was speaking at a public meeting.
“I don’t like rumour,” boomed Mr. Terry from his seat on one of Martha’s best spindle-legged chairs. “It is not a healthy state of affairs.”
“What exactly did you hear, ma’am?” asked Richard.
I noticed Miss Terry then, uncharacteristically subdued, but watching Richard’s hand on mine like a rabbit watches a snake. I felt uncomfortable under her regard, but since Richard had, I thought, noticed but refused to acknowledge it, I let my hand rest under his.
“That on an expedition to the coast—” Mrs. Terry turned to Martha momentarily, “—and why, dear Lady Hareton, people would rush to the sea quite so eagerly, when it is acres of nothing I have never understood—” then back to the company in general. “That on an expedition to the coast, you discovered the body of a poor unfortunate gamekeeper who had been brutally done away with. It is a most distressing thing, and I cannot think it the proper subject for the drawing room, but I felt it my duty to come, so my husband and I can put the minds of our employees at ease. As you know, we employ four gamekeepers on our land, and they are all most distressed by the rumours.”
“You have four gamekeepers?” Richard said in some surprise, for the Terry’s land was not particularly extensive.
“My husband likes to hunt and shoot in the summer,” Mrs. Terry replied haughtily, “I would have thought you, my lord, might sympathise with his preferences.”
Richard smiled. “I find one gamekeeper and several men under him sufficient. My father may employ a few more, but that is not my concern.”
“You have your own establishment, my lord?” asked the lady.
“I have one or two places.” He stiffened, defensive about his fiercely protected private life. “The main estate is in Oxfordshire. I’ve not up to now spent much time there, but I have sent for it to be put in order, for Rose to inspect when we return from the continent.” At least Mrs. Terry had the good sense not to ask about the honeymoon, but she put her eyebrows up at his fond use of my first name, something he rarely did in company.
He pressed my hand, and I smiled. The promise of the night ahead had sharpened my senses. I felt his nearness, smelled the citrus scent he used, mingled with hot, hard man, and my appetite for him sharpened. “Do you intend to open the house, then, my lord?” asked Mrs. Terry, her eagerness open for everybody to see. She was probably thinking of invitations to come.
“It’s entirely up to my future wife.” He looked at me and smiled, an intimate smile saying more than words could do. “If she doesn’t like it, we’ll buy somewhere else.”
“I’m sure it’s charming.” To be honest, I’d never thought of where we would settle when we came home. I was too taken up with preparations for the wedding and what lay immediately beyond it. Greatly daring, I added, “You know where I want to be.”
“Yes,” he replied, accepting it.
Martha cleared her throat. “As to the rumours you’ve heard, you’ll find they’re greatly exaggerated. I was not there myself but I understand only one body was found. While that is tragic enough, it’s not as terrible as the rumours you’ve heard.”
It was a cue meant for Richard and he took it. “No indeed.” His face became graver as he looked away from me, back to Mr. and Mrs. Terry. “We only discovered one body. One too many, but only one. We believe it was put there on purpose for us to find on our return.”
“What makes you think that, my lord?” demanded Mr. Terry.
“We all thought it,” Richard informed him. “It wasn’t there when we took the same route earlier in the day, so someone saw the route we took, and assumed we would return the same way. They placed the unfortunate victim there for us to find. Also, the man had been barbarously used. I don’t intend to go into details when there are ladies present.”
Mrs. and Miss Terry shuddered, and in that moment, the resemblance between them was clearly marked. I saw what Eustacia could become in twenty years’ time, her prettiness absorbed in flesh, her attitude matronly and autocratic.
“Who would do such a thing?” Eustacia’s eyes gleamed with the inner cruelty she had shown me so often in the past. I hoped it was shallowness and not prurience that had caused her frisson of excitement. My dislike of her had sprung from her cruelty to me, but perhaps that masked an essential cruelty born of her inner nature.
“We believe it must have been free traders.” Richard studied her, likely seeing what I had seen when her eyes had gleamed. “The squire doesn’t allow the smugglers to cross his land, and this must be inconvenient for them. He posts sentries, and calls out the land-riders, or so he has told me, so they must be anxious to secure his co-operation. Somehow,” he added with a gleam in his eye, “I don’t think this will stop him. He seems determined on it.”
“I can’t see what he has against it,” Mrs. Terry said. “There’s little we can do about it.”
“I would agree, ma’am,” Richard said smoothly, and Mr. Terry shot him an appraising glance. “I don’t think anything can be done here on the coast. It must be tackled in Parliament.”
“What do you suggest?” Mr. Terry leaned forward. His chair creaked.
Richard leaned back so he could see me and answer Mr. Terry. “Cutting duties. The government would then receive much more revenue from all the goods passing through, as I believe many of the recipients would much prefer to receive their tea, tobacco and liquor honestly, at a fair price.”
Mr. Terry sighed. “That would seem to be a long way off.” He passed his tea-dish to Martha for another helping.
“It would indeed,” Richard replied. “The brutality, however, should not be allowed to flourish unchecked. There was a Sussex gang broken up, was there not?”
“The Hawkhurst gang.” I found it surprising that Mr. Terry should know such things. We were a long way from Sussex.
“Just so. It was when their brutality became too much to stomach that the authorities found a way in to break it up.”
Mr. Terry put a hand to his chin—at least one of them. “You seem well informed, my lord.”
“Not really, but the case was a famous one, and I remember reading about it. I was under the curious misapprehension at the time that these things had a glamour they lack in real life. Pirates and highwaymen close up, are equally reprehensible.”
“Not having met any, I don’t think any of us can say for sure,” said Martha tartly. She created a natural pause by pouring the tea, and then talk turned to the wedding and how far the plans had advanced. Despite the fact that it was my wedding, I took little part in the conversation. Martha and the Countess of Southwood had made most of the plans. They corresponded almost daily now. “The countess writes me she will arrive next week,” Martha said. “I’ve heard so much from her, but I’m looking forward immensely to meeting her.”
“She says the same thing about you,” Richard assured her. “But when my family arrives, I fear I must take my leave.”
“Yes indeed,” agreed Martha. “We’ve enjoyed your visit much, especially one of us—” and she cast a significant look at me, “—but it wouldn’t do for you to be married from this house.”
Richard gave her one of his most charming smiles. “You’ve been an excellent hostess, and I hope you might still receive me from time to time.”
“Every day if you should wish it.” Martha smiled, and I knew then for certain that she approved of his devotion to me, and looked on it with kindness. Not every guardian would have approved of such open displays of affection as Richard had offered me, but Martha loved James, and had done since she had met him, in her case after the marriage was arranged. In fact, there was only ten years between Martha and me, but she had such a motherly way about her, she was so comfortable, that when she had taken the reins of the household we all welcomed it with relief. We were still overcrowded and to a certain extent still chaotic, but the important structures had been put in place; mealtimes, social visits, as a skeleton for us to exist around. Even the ascetic Ian had appreciated the more regular habits we slipped into after Martha had arrived.
This recent incident, so close to home, had upset Martha considerably, and she abruptly returned to the subject. “I do hope they catch the perpetrators.” She looked more anxious than I had seen her for some time. “I don’t like the idea of murderers running free hereabouts.”
“I wouldn’t concern yourself, ma’am,” said Mr. Terry, “you should be quite safe here. The free traders have no interest in crossing your land, although, I believe you plan to expand your property, do you not? But you will be safe enough.”
Richard leaned back, regarding Mr. Terry with an indolent expression. Of the people in the room only I knew Richard was at his most dangerous when he seemed most languorous. “You seem to be sure. Can it be, sir, you know some of these villains?”
“No more than most people hereabouts,” said the gentleman.
Richard pursued the topic. “Most people hereabouts seem to know them. A great deal of the local wealth comes from smuggling, I think.”
“You may be right, sir.” Mr. Terry cleared his throat noisily.
Richard let the matter drop, but he was interested. Unlike the squire, Mr. Terry did let the smugglers run their goods through his land, and I thought he might have even turned his back a few times while his more outlying barns were used overnight to store contraband. He probably knew some of them, and where he could contact them.
James had always taken the view that the less he knew about it all the better, but others were not quite so sanguine. The squire took his position seriously and had always been concerned about the proliferation of smuggling. We received many goods from the Channel Islands, run across from France but I had never seen a run, and I never wanted to. We could make little difference. Richard was right. The matter needed addressing in Parliament.