A Marked Man

wasn’t your business, what becomes of the children of a woman whom you’ve known since you were Marcie’s age I daresay? This”—she scooped up a handful of the heavy silver coins—“will vastly help matters, if it comes to that. But as you say,” she added shrewdly, “’tis a great deal of money for a man to give a slave-woman when there are others who can be bought for less . . . If that’s what he was buying.”

Lucy frowned, puzzled. “What else would he have wanted to buy from a woman?”

“Silence.”

“About what?”

“About whatever was worth twenty-three pounds to him—maybe. And twenty-three pounds may not be the whole sum of what he gave her, if she took some with her when she left.”

Lucy knelt beside the bed and ran the coins through her fingers, listening to their heavy, musical clink. “Why would she leave any?”

“We can’t know that until we know why she left.”

“Could that be what she meant, when she said to Margaret, Something terrible has happened, and I don’t know what to do? Could she have been pregnant?”

“I’ve been told a woman can become pregnant while she’s still nursing,” said Abigail, “but I’ve never known it to happen. And I’ve never known a white man who considered impregnating some other man’s servant-girl—by seduction or by force—sufficiently shameful to pay twenty-three pence to the girl to keep quiet about it, much less twenty-three pounds. Something terrible has happened,” she repeated slowly, “and I don’t know what to do.” She replaced the lid on the teapot, folded the silver together in the apron again, and tied its bands into a loose bundle. “And this on the Friday, after Sir Jonathan had departed but nine days before his death. May I keep these?” she asked, rising to her feet. “I’m sorry,” she added, as Lucy preceded her out the door into the main attic. “I didn’t mean it to sound—”

“No, it’s all right.” The girl laughed. “I know what you mean, and yes. I mean, if I left them here, or even in my room . . . I know at least one of the footmen steals. Mama’s like Margaret and says all servants always steal, but your girl doesn’t, does she? Neither does Sheba, nor Philomela, nor Mr. Barnaby, though I actually wouldn’t put anything past Mr. Barnaby if he was protecting his wife. He dotes on her. I think it’s sweet, really,” she added, as they crossed through the upper hall toward the main stair. “Let me get you something to carry those in, so if Papa comes home for his dinner early, he won’t accuse you of stealing a teapot.” She dodged into her room, emerging a moment later with a hatbox, into which teapot, apron, and coins were tucked and tied. “Will you stay for some tea?” she asked, when they were in the downstairs drawing room again.

“Thank you,” said Abigail, “but I honestly can’t. With John away there’s always more to be done. Really, Miss Fluckner, if you don’t stop beating and starving this poor dog”—she stooped to scratch Hercules behind the ears as the obese pug waddled up to her, its curled tail wagging so that his whole backside threshed—“your reputation will never recover. I’m sorry, sirrah, my hands are empty. No food. See? There is nothing edible in that hatbox, either—” She turned her head at the sound of the outer door opening, and a moment later, Hannah Fluckner’s rich, slightly overloud tones.

“Good Heavens, Barnaby, company before noon? What on Earth was the girl thinking?”

“Just in time,” Lucy whispered.

“My dear Hannah,” laughed Mrs. Sandhayes, “they all go to bed at sundown here! Of course they’re all up and doing at the crack of dawn—”

“Should I tell Margaret about this?” Lucy nodded toward the hatbox. “She blithers like a perfect nincompoop, but she’s really very clever. You should see the list she’s putting together, of people who were in the ballroom that I didn’t even remember, and when people came and went out of the cardroom.”

“Caroline Hartnell?” Mrs. Sandhayes’s voice lifted in reply to some remark of her hostess. “Dear m’am, there’s no sense expecting her to contribute a penny. She lost five hundred guineas at silver-loo Wednesday night . . .”

“Great Heavens!”

“I almost fancied myself in London again. And playing so badly! I wanted to go around the table and shake her, except that I was winning at the time—”

“I don’t think so,” murmured Abigail. “And she complains of servants gossiping!” She stroked Hercules’s little round head, and though she did not approve of lapdogs, smiled as her fingers were thoroughly licked. “As we’re going on the assumption that Harry didn’t murder Sir Jonathan, it follows that someone else did . . . and that someone might just as easily be a member of the Governor’s circle of friends, as some poor disgruntled ruffian from Maine.”

“—La, my dearest Hannah, surely you know about her and that dashing Major Usselby . . . such a name, Usselby . . . ! The one who always seems to win, when she plays across from him . . .”

“Until we know more about who might have done it and where they were just after full dark fell on Saturday night, I had rather we keep whatever we might learn between ourselves. My dear Mrs. Sandhayes,” she smiled, turning from Lucy’s protesting headshake to greet the chaperone as she appeared in the doorway.

Lucy sprang to her feet: “How went your shopping, Margaret?”

“Astonishing—I positively made your mother purchase the most exquisite yellow silk for you—”

In the hall beyond Mr. Barnaby’s shoulder, Abigail could see a parade of footmen bearing parcels and hatboxes up the stairs, sufficient to have furnished an expedition to China.

“I’ll take oath it was French, for all that pirate who was selling it claimed it was Indian and perfectly within the regulations of the Board of Trade. It should make up divinely into one of the new polonaise gowns—le dernier cri, my dear: nobody but dowdies like me are wearing panniers anymore. Has Mrs. Adams seen young Mr. Knox again?” she asked more softly, drawing close. “Is he well? They’re not really going to be such imbeciles as to ship him off to Halifax . . .”

“Well, they’ll need a ship to do it on, first,” said Abigail, shaking hands. “And given the weather, I doubt that will appear any time soon. The fact is, I came to ask about Mr. Fluckner’s plans regarding that poor girl Bathsheba’s children, if their mother does not return.”

“Poor little mites,” sighed Mrs. Sandhayes. “Worse of course that the older one’s a girl, because one can sell boys as young as five for pages, if they’re pretty enough.” She shook her head. “I cannot even imagine what sort of despair a woman would have to be in, to walk away from them like that . . .”

“Do you think it was what she intended to do?” asked Abigail, as a footman—the same young African who had brought Lucy’s letter earlier that morning—relieved the Englishwoman of her half-dozen shawls and scarves, and of her faded cloak with its elaborate whaleboned hood.

“I wish I could say yes or no. But honestly, Mrs. Adams, I don’t know.” She drew off her gloves, resettled the Medusa cameo on its ribbon at her throat, tucked and patted and twitched the powdered mass of hair—genuine and false—into order again. “She loved her children, and I know she would never have gone away from them in her right mind . . . But had you seen her, weeping, and shivering, and . . . and turning about as she did, at any noise or movement nearby . . . I should have spoken to her then. I should have taken her aside . . .” She limped to the nearest chair, sank carefully down into it, and propped her canes against its arms. “I should have done something. But I did not.”

Lucy walked Abigail to the door, carrying the hatbox for her carefully, so that the coin inside neither jingled nor shifted its weight. Mr. Barnaby brought Abigail’s wraps to the hall, and as she donned them one by one, Abigail asked quietly, “Mr. Barnaby, the last time I was here you spoke of the chance that I might see Mr. Fenton, at the Governor’s house. Can that still be arranged?”

“I’ll ask my sister about it,” said the butler. “But I can’t see why not. I can’t imagine His Excellency would deny the poor man a little company in his illness. He’s barely able to eat, Mattie says—my Emma’s sister—and weak as a babe.”

“Then I shall make him a blancmange,” said Abigail.

By which form of bribery, she reflected, she might very well be able to find out whether Sir Jonathan Cottrell