Jack had been grooming Hercules, but he put down the brushes quickly when Matty arrived back one hour later. She looked tense and all his fear for her gathered inside him like a dark cloud. ‘Whatever’s happened?’ He was coming swiftly towards her. ‘Did something go wrong?’
‘You could say so.’ She was pulling off her awful hat and her brown governess jacket. ‘Your stepfather, Fitz, arrived.’
His face hardened. ‘No.’
‘It’s very much a yes, I’m afraid.’
‘But how...?’ He was shaking his head. ‘It sounds as if Lawrence’s message must have gone astray.’ His tone sharpened. ‘Did Fitz see you?’
‘No. Thanks to Bracewell, he didn’t. Fortunately we had some warning—Fitz had sent a rider on ahead of his carriage and Bracewell helped me to get out of the house the back way.’
‘Matty, I’m sorry! This is why I wanted to go myself. I never wanted to put you in danger—’
Her eyes glinted with determination. ‘I keep telling you that I’ve managed to look after myself for years now—and I still can.’ She met his gaze steadily. ‘I don’t like to fail, Jack.’
He felt the first faint glimmer of hope. ‘Then—Matty...’
‘I don’t like to fail,’ she repeated. ‘So I’ve brought you—this.’
She opened her father’s document case and handed him a sheet of paper. ‘Is this what you wanted, Jack?’
He scanned it swiftly.
Jack had never allowed himself to wholly believe that his scheme was possible. After two years, the chances were incredibly slim that the piece of paper she’d spotted in a dusty drawer was still there, but just as she’d promised, this incredibly resourceful girl had brought him what he could see was a rough draft of the ransom letter Fitz had forged. The French was poor, but the content and intention were clear enough. The letter was supposedly from the governor of the French prison—the Chateau Esperance—asking for five hundred guineas for Jack’s release.
And it was in Fitz’s writing.
‘This is it,’ Jack said. ‘This is exactly what I need. Matty, you’re brilliant.’ He hugged her.
And slowly but surely she eased herself away, as he suddenly realised, with a jagged tearing at his heart, that he wanted to keep her in his arms. He wanted to hold her tight and cover her beautiful face with kisses and...
She was still smiling, but it was as if she’d deliberately drawn an invisible curtain between the two of them. Protecting herself from him. Who could blame her?
You must sort this, Jack. You must.
‘So I’m brilliant, am I?’ She raised her eyebrows a little, teasing him. ‘Maybe so. But I can’t make sense of the ransom, Jack. Fitz really thought he could claim you were worth five hundred guineas?’
‘My mother believed it,’ Jack said wryly. ‘But then, she always was a bit foolish, you know?’
Matty looked more serious. ‘Yes. Of course she would want you back at any price.’ She lifted her eyes to his. ‘So now I suppose you can’t wait to start work on reclaiming your family home?’
A week ago, his answer would have been yes, he couldn’t wait. But now, suddenly, Jack was gripped by the absolute certainty that he didn’t want to leave this girl. Ever.
Careful, he warned himself. Careful.
Because he’d realised she was drawing something else from that serviceable case of hers and was spreading it out in front of them.
‘While I was in the library,’ she said, ‘I also found—this.’ Her voice held a kind of tremulous excitement that he guessed she was trying hard to control. ‘It’s the map I told you about. A very old map that my father found when we went to the house together. It shows the site of the Roman settlement. Do you see? In the same area where my father found the coin.’ She was smoothing the map out almost reverently. ‘It existed, Jack. It really did.’
And his heart sank even further.
She led him along a grassy track not far from the canal just as the sun was starting to set and she pointed to the area of rough pastureland marked on that old, faded map. It was inscribed with the name of the man who’d drawn it with such care—Thomas Dunne—together with the date: 1653. Matty had it in her hand all the time; Jack wondered if in fact she would sleep with it under her pillow tonight. And now she showed it to him again.
As if he didn’t already know every line, every shading of its damnable contents.
Her voice—her sweet, true, believing voice—betrayed her excitement, even though she tried her best to keep it steady. ‘Here is the stand of pine trees.’ She pointed. ‘It wasn’t far from here that my father found the coin. He’d already guessed there was a Roman site in the area, but he was only working on hearsay, together with some vague references in his history books. Finding the coin lifted my father’s hopes, but he couldn’t find any other actual evidence. Then he and I saw this map at Charlwood Manor. My father wanted to come back and examine it more closely, to make certain of the area it pointed to and maybe find out more about Thomas Dunne—but you know what happened next.’
Her face clouded. But then she looked around and her eyes lit up again. ‘My father’s work was all worthwhile. This could be a site of truly great value to historians. Tomorrow I shall begin to explore for myself—I still have my father’s tools on board the boat. Maybe soon I’ll need more expert help, but I can at least make a start...’
Jack’s spirits were as low as they’d ever been in his life. ‘Matty,’ he said. ‘Matty. There’s something you should know.’
As he began to tell her the truth, he saw her beautiful, trusting face grow white and drawn and he felt like the biggest villain on earth. He explained to her that he knew this area well, because as a boy he used to ride his pony out here. He told her that beneath the scrubby bushes and meadow plants lay clay, and over a hundred years ago, all of this area had been dug up for that clay, which was then used to build farmworkers’ cottages in the nearby village of Feldham.
‘All the locals know this was once a clay pit,’ he said. ‘Of course it became filled in over time and plants and trees began to grow. But if ever there had been a Roman settlement here, any treasure would have been discovered by those clay-pit diggers over a century ago.’
‘But what about this map?’
He shook his head. ‘Matty, I’m afraid Thomas Dunne was a local eccentric. Yes, there have always been legends that the Romans once settled around here, but there was never any real proof. Thomas Dunne was a fantasist. As well as drawing your map, he wrote many fabricated tales about times gone by and nobody took him seriously, either in his own lifetime or since. That would be why your father had never heard of him and why no one in authority expected to find any sort of treasure when the clay pit was dug.’
‘But my father’s coin,’ Matty whispered at last.
He hesitated. ‘It could have been dropped by a traveller.’
‘As you suggested before we even started this journey.’
For a few moments after that she stood very still. And as he saw the light, the hope, die out in her eyes, he felt her despair twisting his insides. At last she went on, in a very low voice, ‘You knew this, didn’t you? You knew all along that there couldn’t possibly be any Roman remains here in the place I described—but you didn’t tell me. How could you not have told me, straight away? No—don’t trouble to answer, Jack, because I already know what you’ll say. It’s because you planned all along just to use me. To bring you to Charlwood, to get those letters for you, from the library.’
‘Matty, please...’
‘Listen. Listen to me a moment.’ She drew a deep breath. ‘I’ve always been an outsider, Jack, wherever I go. I’d grown used to not fitting into either the Oxford world of my father’s friends or the world of the canal folk. I thought I’d learned to accept that I was different—to accept for good that I was on my own. But then you came along and, stupid as I am, I was beginning to think that maybe—just maybe—I could trust you. Even when I found out you were using me to reclaim your family home, I thought, why not? Charlwood is a lovely place, so I couldn’t blame you. But now. This.’
She looked around, despair clouding her features. ‘You knew all along that the place I described to you couldn’t hold my father’s treasure—but only now do you tell me. Now, when my hopes have been raised so high. Thanks to you, I’ve been made to feel an absolute fool.’
‘Matty,’ he said. ‘What can I say?’
‘Nothing,’ she said steadily. ‘Absolutely nothing, Jack.’
She was already turning away from him, but he moved to block her way. ‘Look,’ he said. ‘Your father was right—as I told you, there really have always been legends about the Romans in this area and who’s to say they’re not based on the truth? When Charlwood is mine, we’ll search properly. I’ll hire experts to comb the whole area for any signs of genuine remains—’
‘Do you really expect me to trust you again?’ Her voice was bitter now. ‘I’m afraid not. You’ve played games with me several times and I made it rather easy for you, after all. But I cannot forgive you.’ She picked up her map and began walking steadily back to the canal and her boat.
‘Matty,’ he called.
She called back over her shoulder, ‘Don’t bother saying any more. You’re wasting your energy and my time. I’m well aware you still have a few possessions on my boat, so I’ll put them out on the bank for you.’
‘Please wait. Are you heading back to London? How will you manage on your own?’
‘I’ll manage perfectly well, just as I managed before you appeared. And now the best thing you can do for me is to get out of my life right now. Do you understand?’
The minute she arrived back at her boat, she gathered all his things from the cabin. His spare clothes. And those dice, carved for him in the French prison... Suddenly she felt a huge ache at the back of her throat and her eyes misted, but after blinking hard, she climbed back on deck and dumped them on the towpath. Hercules, tethered close by, watched her and looked puzzled.
She rubbed at her eyes with the back of her hand, feeling more like throwing Jack Rutherford’s things in the canal. Stupid man. Stupid her. But, oh, she hurt inside, as if every piece of her was damaged beyond repair. She went back inside her cabin, so she wouldn’t have to see him when he came to collect his things.
Tomorrow, she would set off on her own again. She would do as she’d done before—earn money by carrying light loads, only a little more often now so she’d have enough income to keep living on her boat. That was her priority. But all her dreams had died: both her dream of finding her father’s treasure and her dream of having found someone special.
Time is a healer, she told herself.
What a trite, meaningless phrase. She hurt, she physically hurt—and she didn’t think she would ever recover from this betrayal. Yes, life would carry on, but she wouldn’t be the same, ever. Couldn’t trust anyone with her foolish heart again. She went back to her cabin, listening for his footsteps on the towpath; heard them stop, then go away. She went up a few moments later to find that indeed both Jack and his possessions had disappeared.
Then she noticed a piece of paper pinned to the cabin roof.
Matty,
Please believe that I never meant to hurt you.
J
She nearly cried then. But she didn’t, because Hercules needed feeding, and she had to buy some supplies for her journey south the next day. A journey she would be making on her own.
Jack set off on foot for Aylesbury, from where he intended to travel back to London by stagecoach. Deep in his coat pocket, he had the faked ransom letter that would enable him to force the truth out of Fitz. At last, the dark shadows that had lain over him for two long years were beginning to lift and he could see his future ahead.
But the future wasn’t nearly as bright as it should have been, because he was haunted by the expression on the face of a beautiful and courageous girl when he’d told her just now that he’d always known her father’s dream of finding lost treasure was an impossible one. Yes, it was time to head back to London. It was time to confront Fitz with that fateful sheet of paper he’d so carelessly left at Charlwood and see the fear in his stepfather’s eyes when Jack threatened to expose him for the cheating rogue he was. It was time for Jack to claim back his inheritance. Within his actual grasp were the twin goals of revenge on Fitz and the restoration of his lost home.
But all he could think of was—Matty.