Twenty-three

“How do I look?” asked Rosalind, turning once around. When she faced them again, two of her servants were trying not to laugh at her, and the other was glaring disapprovingly, arms crossed on her thin chest. “Do you think I’ll be recognized?”

“No, my lady,” Alice choked out. Mrs. MacCrory’s eyes twinkled almost maniacally.

Rosalind wore the cook’s second-best black dress, an old-fashioned gown with long sleeves and a high neck trimmed with black velvet. The fit was poor, but not disastrous, as Mrs. MacCrory had gained in girth since the dress was made and Rosalind was increasing. With it she wore a black hat that even the cook had put aside. Its straw was disintegrating, and the black feathers on the crown were dusty and shedding. But it boasted a veil that hid Rosalind’s features and bright hair, and she was not interested tonight in looking smart.

Mrs. MacCrory spoke, and Alice giggled before she translated. “She says we won’t introduce you at all. Everyone will think you’re the very spirit of death and disaster standing at her shoulder.” She giggled again.

Rosalind smiled behind her veil. “A splendid idea. Shall we go?”

“No good will come of this blasphemous masquerade,” declared Jane Jenkins. “My lady, it’s not my place to say so, but you should be ashamed. Dressed like a…”

“Just make it appear that all is as usual here,” said Rosalind. “We will be back before long.” And gathering Alice and the cook with a gesture, she led them out the kitchen door and into the stableyard. The pony trap was awaiting them there, harnessed at Rosalind’s orders before she changed.

“Where are we going?” asked Rosalind when they had all squeezed in. She took up the reins and got the vehicle moving.

“They’ll be at the alehouse,” said Alice. “Most of them, anyway. We’d best hurry. They’ll be leaving for…they’ll be going soon.”

Rosalind urged the horse to a trot. As they drove, she thought of something. “Alice.”

“Yes, my lady?”

She wasn’t sure how to ask her question. “Will everyone be able to…will they know what Mrs. MacCrory is saying?”

Both the other women laughed. “Most of us here have a little Gaelic, my lady,” responded Alice. “We have relatives in Scotland, and all. It’s only the southerners who can’t understand.”

“Then the ringleaders won’t know what you’re saying,” concluded Rosalind happily.

Alice shrugged. “Someone’ll tell them. But it won’t matter. They think countrymen are all fools.” She sniffed.

“Which is the alehouse?” They were approaching the village, a huddle of dark shapes against the curve of the moor.

“Turn there. We’d better hide the trap first.”

Alice guided her into a narrow lane between two houses, and Rosalind took her direction gratefully. She wouldn’t have thought of hiding the carriage, she realized.

“If someone saw us, I’ll tell them I ordered the trap myself, on account of the emergency,” added Alice as they climbed down. “They might have watchers out, though I expect they’d be nearer the…the sea.” She helped Mrs. MacCrory down, and the three of them set off along the village street.

There was a dim light filtering through thin curtains outside the house that served as tavern and meeting place. A murmur of voices could be heard through the wooden door, but this did not prepare Rosalind for the smoke and noise when Alice swung it open. The small room was filled with village men and a few outsiders, lit by smoky lamps and a sullen fire. In the ruddy light, the men’s faces gleamed, and the tankards they held shone copper bright. When the door opened, they fell silent and stared in a way that made Rosalind want to step back. Tonight, at least, there was not a woman in the place.

“Alice!” said a young man not much older than the kitchenmaid. As he strode forward, Rosalind saw that they looked very much alike. “What are you doing here, girl?”

“I had to speak to you, Tom.” Alice stepped quickly inside, drawing the others with her. She took Tom’s arm and pulled him into a corner.

“Not now,” he hissed. “Alice, you know tonight’s…” He broke off, glancing sidelong at her companions.

“That’s why I had to come. You remember Mrs. MacCrory.” Alice looked at Cook. “My brother Tom, ma’am.”

Both of them nodded, Tom impatiently. Rosalind noticed that several of the men nearby were listening without seeming to. She bent her head in the dim corner and left things to Alice.

“This is no time…” Tom was beginning, when his sister interrupted him.

“Mrs. MacCrory has had a vision,” she said, in a voice that seemed a whisper but carried well beyond their little circle. “About tonight!”

Tom fell silent. He looked doubtful but uneasy. Other men were giving up the pretense of not listening and leaning forward.

“She saw,” added Alice portentously. “I had to come and warn you.”

Mrs. MacCrory nodded, her expression serious, her blue eyes bright. They had decided it would be more effective if Alice told their tale while she looked on.

“Saw?” echoed Tom. Other men exchanged glances.

“Something terrible is going to happen tonight,” Alice intoned. “An awful disaster.” She shook her head, and Rosalind had to hide a smile. Alice should have gone on the stage. “Death,” Alice added. “She smells death in the air.”

A hush fell over their corner of the room.

“Death and destruction,” continued Alice. “Homes without their fathers and brothers. Weeping and wailing.” She clutched Tom’s sleeve again. “Oh, Tom. I had to come and tell you.”

Her brother looked bewildered, and uneasy. “But what’s it about? What’s going to happen?”

Mrs. MacCrory spoke at last, briefly.

“Of course the Sight’s not like that,” Alice agreed. “It doesn’t show you everything. If it did, Cook would win all the pools.”

This drew a few smiles.

“But it does give warning,” Alice went on. “You can’t go out tonight, Tom. Stay home!” She clung to his arm, gazing up into his face with real fear and pleading.

The latter impressed Tom as much as the story, but he shook her off and stepped back. “I can’t do that, Alice,” he whispered fiercely. “You know what they’d do.”

“But, Tom, something’s going to go awfully wrong.” The raw emotion in her voice caused a stir. Men exchanged worried looks and moved from foot to foot. And then the group parted to let a larger man through.

“What’s this, then?” He shoved the last of the group aside and stood before Alice. “The little girl from the abbey, eh? The baron’s little kitchen drudge. What’re you doing here, girl? You and the two crows. The magpie and her crows, eh?” He laughed, and a few of the others joined him.

“I had to speak to my brother,” replied Alice, standing very straight, her cheeks burning.

“Did you now? About what, then?”

Alice was silent. Tom moved to stand beside her. “The old lady had a vision, Jem,” said a short, squint-eyed man in the crowd. “Says there’s going to be a disaster tonight.”

“Eh?” Jem leaned forward and peered at them. “Which old lady?” he asked. “Which old crow?”

Rosalind longed to throw back her veil and command him to hold his tongue. But she knew that impulse was both foolish and, perhaps, dangerous. She shrank back a little.

Mrs. MacCrory stiffened as his liquor-soaked breath engulfed her. She raised her chin, fixed him with a piercing blue eye, and began to speak.

Her voice was compelling and musical. It rose and fell so liltingly Rosalind found her head nodding with the cadence. Though she couldn’t understand a word, she got emotions—warning, sadness, fear, hope. Watching the faces around her, she saw the village men, and Alice too, enthralled. Those men from outside the village were silenced, but uncomprehending. Rosalind caught a movement in the corner of her eye, and saw two village men slip out of the house and into the night.

“Enough!” roared Jem at last. “Enough of this gabble. What the hell is she saying? Is she some kind of frenchie or eyetalian?”

“Scots,” said the squint-eyed man, who looked much less smug than before. Indeed, he had gone quite pale, as had many of the villagers.

Jem glared at him. “Scotsmen speak our lingo as well as you rabble. Had a Scot in my regiment. Is this some kind of trick?” He gazed around the room, and men quailed before him· No one dared answer. “Well?”

The silence was broken by the entrance of another Londoner. “What’s up?” he said. “It’s time to get moving.”

The tension stretched a moment longer, then broke as Jem growled and pushed his way toward the door. “Get back to your kitchens,” he said to Alice over his shoulder. “And stay out of things that ain’t your business.”

There was a collective sigh when he went out. A few others followed, but most of the men milled about nervously, talking in whispers together.

“You won’t go, Tom,” murmured Alice. “Please.”

Her brother’s face was creased in thought. “I have to go,” he concluded finally. “They’ll be after any as doesn’t. But I can hang back, ready to run for it.” He looked at Mrs. MacCrory, then at Alice. “We can all of us stay back.”

There were nods all about the room, and relieved expressions.

“Be careful,” said Alice. “And will you…tell Eddie, too?”

Tom grinned. “Aye. I’ll tell him. If he shows up.” Tom looked at another man. “Maybe there’s a reason Eddie and George took sick just tonight.” The other nodded.

Rosalind leaned forward and whispered in Alice’s ear.

“Oh, Tom,” she said as he started out. “Have you seen the young lady from the abbey? Her ladyship’s sister? She’s gone missing.”

Rosalind watched the men’s faces from behind her veil. They all looked simply startled, and perhaps a little concerned. There were no guilty glances or triumphant grins.

Tom shook his head, looked around for confirmation, and shook it again. “Missing is she?” he repeated.

“What about…what about Mrs. MacCrory’s cousin? The one who came to the wedding? Have you seen him?”

Tom eyed her. “We still haven’t settled that little puzzle, my girl.”

“He gone missing, too?” asked a man behind Tom. “Mebbe they’ve run off together.”

This raised a laugh. Another added, “Eddie Forbes’ll be glad to hear it,” and got a chuckle. Tom frowned. But a low call from outside put a stop to conversation, and one by one the men filed silently out, grins gone from their faces. In five minutes, the women were alone in an empty room.

Alice let out a huge sigh and sank into a chair. Mrs. MacCrory took another. She looked tired.

“Do you think we convinced them?” Rosalind asked quietly.

“Some of them,” replied Alice. “Did you see Nat Wetherall and Sam Green go out? They won’t be on the beach tonight.”

Mrs. MacCrory said something.

“Maybe,” answered Alice. “I hope so. But how can all the village men stay off the beach? Jem and his dirty friends will make them go down.” She shook her head.

The cook spoke again, and Alice brightened. “That’s true.”

“What?” asked Rosalind.

“Cook says that our men know how to hide on the moor, my lady,” Alice said. “Better than any Londoner or any soldier, either. If they’re on their guard, which they will be, no doubt of that, they may get away.”

“I hope so,” said Rosalind. Having seen the group, and its leaders, she was convinced that the village men were not chiefly at fault. Mistaken, yes, but not deserving of prison, as Jem and his friends certainly were. “I suppose we should be getting back,” she added.

The others rose, and they walked together back to the trap. The first part of the short journey passed in silence, then Alice said, “I’m sorry we couldn’t find out about Miss Miranda, my lady. Maybe she’ll be back at the abbey by this time.”

Rosalind nodded, but she didn’t think it likely. Her fears, which had been pushed back by action, rushed up again. Somewhere in the darkness around them was Miranda. Rosalind couldn’t even imagine her position. But she had the sense suddenly that the night was full of moving shapes and tense whispers. The smugglers, the men poised to attack them, Philip and Alan. All of the people she loved were out there; anything might happen to them. Rosalind shivered.

“Are you cold, my lady?” asked Alice. “We’re nearly there.”

Mrs. MacCrory added something.

“Cook says she’ll make a nice pot of tea, and that you must have some supper, even though the chicken will probably taste like old leather by now.”

Rosalind laughed a little despite her fears. “We’ll all have some, unless Jane has eaten it. And then we will try to think if there is anything else we can do.”

“Yes, my lady.” Alice didn’t sound hopeful, and Rosalind didn’t blame her. She was afraid herself that there was nothing they could do now but wait.