and his bonds. He turned away from the clerk's stuttering thanks to do the same for Thoday.
'Your arrival was timely, sir,' Thoday said. 'This is evidently the place to which one should take recourse if one wishes to lose one's head.'
Leese came up to the group. 'Sorry, sir,' he said. 'Two of the wretches got clear away. I'll 'ave summat to say to my people when we're back aboard, that I will. Eight smart sailormen an' all that preparation, just for four no- good rascals. Not to speak of losin' them antic folk what opened the show. I'll 'ave their 'eads.'
Shaking his own head, Leese took the three extinguished torches, lit them from the one Spurrier had rekindled, and jabbed them into the ground. In the light they cast, Leese inspected them with mingled disgust and respect.
'Looks like great big pricks,' he said. 'Beg pardon, ma'am.'
'We got the only man we needed, Leese,' Hoare said. 'Perhaps it's for the better that the others got away.'
'You speak no less than the truth,' Selene Prettyman said. Her voice was low but heartfelt.
'Well, sir!' came Abel Dunaway's voice from the dark outside the Stones Circle. 'I think my lads 'ave bagged ye some pretty little coneys! Come along, lads, and show the Captain what ye found!'
'Oh, my God,' Hoare whispered. They had managed to see Cumberland off unscathed. Had the smuggler, thinking to help, brought him back?
One at a time, hustled along by Dunaway's men, fugitive celebrants began to appear. The smugglers' bag numbered five of the women, three of the men. The captives' ecstasy had worn off; the women clutched themselves from modesty or cold, or both, while the men simply looked hangdog. The two Frobishers, the rest of the men, and the four faun-urchins had evidently eluded the new arrivals.
So, Hoare saw with relief, had Ernest, Duke of Cumberland.
'If your men will take over our bag now, sir,' Mr. Dunaway said, 'we'll be. off. It's as well your men don't get too good a look at mine.'
'Of course, Captain,' Hoare replied. 'Where the Navy failed, your people succeeded. Well done, and my thanks to you all.'
He swept his eyes over as many of Dunaway's men as would meet his glance before they all drifted away into the night. Dunaway waved cheerfully as he disappeared.
'It's just as well, Hoare,' said Selene Prettyman, 'that the Frobishers got away and took our noble friend with them. They were off before the real mischief started, after all. And while Sir Thomas may be objectionable and more than a little mad, he is still a power in the region and in parliament. He is better disarmed than destroyed.
'And in case of need, both you and I-and your crew, of course-saw his son and daughter taking part in that silly performance. No, with a tale like that hanging over his head, we have no more need to disturb ourselves with Sir Thomas.
'Mr. Spurrier's other master now, whoever he is… that's another thing. We must interrogate the good Captain-intensively, if need be. For that, best we take him to Dorchester.'
Hoare felt an unaccountable reluctance, first, to do Selene Prettyman's bidding and, second, to relinquish Spurrier to her.
'To Royal Duke, I think, ma'am,' he said.
'Why?'
'Because you were among this evening's celebrants. I do not trust you with our captives.'
'You forget, sir, I am 'friend of the Crown.' You yourself have said it, and it's greatly to your credit. It was I who gave you the warning and I who was responsible for his capture, Captain Hoare,' she said.
Hoare preferred to divert her from that issue.
'Nonetheless, I must not habituate myself to having a lady preventing the escape of my adversary, leaving him for me to capture,' Hoare said.
'What do you mean?'
'Mrs. Graves crippled the skiff in which my last villain was rowing to safety…Just now, you enabled me to catch Spurrier when you tripped him.'
Hearing his name, Spurrier sat up and groaned. The side of his head was bleeding slightly where Selene Prettyman had swatted it.
'Ah, yes, Mrs. Graves,' Selene Prettyman said. 'And how, pray, did she 'cripple' the skiff?'
'She slung a stone. It broke one of its thole pins. He capsized in the surf. I went on from there.'
'I must remember to keep out of slinging range of Eleanor Graves, then, must I not?'
Mrs. Prettyman put a slim, strong hand on Hoare's arm.
'But surely, Captain Hoare, you can do better for yourself than a globular widow. Why, she…'
Upon seeing Hoare's expression, Selene Prettyman stopped in midsentence.
'That was inexcusable of me, Captain Hoare,' she said.
'Yes, madam, it was. I thank you for your intervention with Mr. Spurrier, and I wish you a good evening.'
With that, Hoare left Selene Prettyman standing. He summoned the landing party, and departed for Dorchester with the captives. Mrs. Selene Prettyman could find her own damned way.
On the way to Dorchester, Hoare instructed Leese to let all the participants in the ceremony escape, except Spurrier and the hard henchmen who had brought Rabbett and Thoday to the altar in the Nine Stones Circle. In the first place, Hoare reasoned, the folk who had been present at the pagan rite could at the most be no more than Spurrier's deluded devotees-harmless, eccentric perhaps, and now very frightened. In the second place, Royal Duke, while a brig herself, had no accommodations for prisoners-no brig, so to speak, he told himself half-hysterically. He put the horrid jest in that mental commonplace book of his, against possible future need.
So he merely had Rabbett take down their particulars before releasing them in the town. As Hoare had expected, the clerk already knew most of them. One, for example, was the wife of the town grocer, another a ne'er-do-well ditcher.
'Remind me, Rabbett,' Hoare said, 'to give their names to the vicar at the Church of All Angels. They committed their sins in his parish, I think. He can do as he will with them.'
'Yes, sir,' Rabbett said. 'If you wish, I'll give 'em to Vicar myself as soon as possible.'
'I think not, Rabbett. Tomorrow, you must be aboard Royal Duke. I need you there.'
He heard the clerk's gasp. Was it with pleasure or fear?
'If I may, then, sir, I would like to bid my old mam and da farewell. And pick up my other shoes. For 'tis a long walk to Weymouth.'
'Do you ride, Rabbett?'
Rabbett could not, nor, as Hoare found when he inquired, did the otherwise omnicompetent Thoday. So Hoare silenced his conscience and ordered Rabbett to roust out a chaise for himself, Hoare, Thoday, and their prisoner and a wagon to carry Leese, the landing party, and the other prisoners. Spurrier he would keep to himself and interrogate him in the chaise as they rolled south to Weymouth.
While weary, Thoday could still summon up advice for his Commander.
'We might, sir, visit Mr. Spurrier's place of business while en route to Weymouth,' he said. 'A more leisurely inspection than I had time to conduct during my clandestine intrusion could produce interesting results.'
Spurrier must have overheard, for he started. 'You will find nothing of interest, Hoare, I assure you,' he said.
'Pipe down, you,' Leese said.
Hoare followed Thoday's advice. Joined eventually by the weary Rabbett, they searched Spurrier's quarters by candlelight, from stem to gudgeon, not neglecting his bedroom. Thoday set out to test every panel and every floorboard for secret hiding places.
He found one at last and crawled into it, carrying a dark lantern. On emerging, he shook his head.
'Nothing except this old missal,' he said disgustedly, holding out the dusty book. 'The place is merely an old priest's hole.'
It was past dawn when they were through with the turning out of Spurrier's quarters. Thoday sighed.
'I think we have it all here, sir,' he said, displaying a small heap of papers. 'I fear there is nothing of interest beyond what I found on my last visit, but we can put our discoveries before the-your crew and see what they make of them.'
