The bailiff, one of his men and the prisoner left in a closed carriage, the cost of which would also be charged to Mr Whichcote. The other two men remained at Lambourne House to make sure, the fat man explained to Augustus, that nothing untoward happened to its contents in its master’s absence. Their services would also be charged eventually to Mr Whichcote. For another consideration, the fat man had agreed to have a letter conveyed to Mrs Phear in Trumpington Street.
Left alone, the two sheriff’s men took Augustus on another tour of the house. They kept up a running commentary on its contents, casting a critical eye over them and estimating their worth. Much depended, they condescendingly explained to Augustus, on who actually owned the house and on whether there was a mortgage on it. All being well, they assured him, the contents would raise a tidy sum, particularly the wine cellar.
They brought up a couple of bottles of wine and sat down with them at the kitchen table. They were not impressed, however, pronouncing the contents nasty thin stuff. It was a little after nine o’clock in the morning, while they were discussing whether or not they should try another bottle just to make absolutely sure, when there came a rapping on the hall door.
The officers accompanied Augustus when he answered it. The visitor was standing with his back to the door when Augustus opened it. At first the footboy took him for a tradesman, for he was plainly dressed and the dust on his lower half showed he had come a good way by foot. But when the man turned, Augustus recognized him at once.
‘Where’s your master?’ Frank Oldershaw demanded.
37
On the same morning, while the college was in chapel, Dr Milton called at the Master’s Lodge. He was a dried- up little man, well past seventy, with a face like a prune and a snuff-stained waistcoat. His manner was never amiable but today it was worse than usual, partly because he had been forced to hurry his breakfast and partly because he had heard that his patient had had the temerity to call in a second opinion.
‘Well, ma’am,’ he said to Elinor when he had seen Dr Carbury, ordered a few ounces of blood to be taken from him, and prescribed more opium. ‘I do not know why you needed to send for Dr Jermyn. He can have added nothing of value to my diagnosis. The case is as plain as the nose on my face.’
‘Then there is no possible room for doubt, sir?’
‘None. It is a type of cancer that is beyond the reach of any physic.’
‘Perhaps a surgeon -?’
‘No, ma’am, no. As I have already told Dr Carbury, the location of the swelling rules out surgery entirely. The remedy would be as fatal as the disease, only swifter in action. The knife would kill him as it cut out the cancer.’
Elinor turned aside. After a pause, she said quietly, ‘How long?’
‘That is a harder question. It may be days or weeks – even months, though I doubt it. These matters are notoriously hard to calculate. So much depends on the progress of the disease and the constitution of the patient, you apprehend. I will continue to do my best, ma’am, but you should not expect miracles.’
‘No, sir,’ Elinor said. ‘Never that.’
He looked sharply at her, suspecting irony, then took out his watch and said his other patients were awaiting him. When he had gone, Elinor stood by the window looking down over the Master’s Garden and the Long Pond. She had known this day would come but had not expected it so soon. Her future had suddenly become a dark hole in the path before her; and she was sliding inexorably towards it, unable to change direction or even to delay the moment when she would fall into the pit.
There was a knock at the door and Susan came in to say that Dr Carbury was awake and was asking for her. She found her husband in bed, propped up against the pillows. Beside the window sat a hired nurse with her knitting. The illness had aged him still further overnight and also shrivelled his face and body. His eyes, paradoxically, seemed to have grown more youthful. She had never had occasion before to pay much attention to them but now she realized they were large and lustrous, like those of a wolfhound Frank used to have in the country when he was a boy.
Dr Carbury beckoned her towards him, nearer and nearer until her face was only inches from his. ‘Send the woman away,’ he whispered. ‘And have them bring me Soresby.’ His fingers gripped the sleeve of her dress. ‘It is most important, madam.’
She tried to pull herself away, wondering whether Soresby had returned from his illicit excursion the previous evening. ‘It shall be done directly, sir.’
‘Soresby,’ he whispered. ‘Soresby.’
They were interrupted by a knock at the chamber door. Mr Richardson appeared; Ben followed behind him, his face fixed in an expression of mute appeal because Elinor had ordered him not to allow anyone to come up.
‘Mrs Carbury, your servant, ma’am.’ Richardson advanced into the room. ‘My dear Dr Carbury, my gyp told me you had had Dr Milton this morning, and I simply could not keep away. I hope your indisposition is not serious?’
‘Dr Milton does not advise visitors,’ Elinor said. ‘He was most insistent.’
‘But I am hardly some chance acquaintance, ma’am.’ Richardson smiled, as if to take the sting from the words. ‘All of us in the combination room have been anxious for news and of course we are praying that it will be good news. Besides, you may remember that the fellows are due to meet at midday and this business with poor Mr Soresby makes it particularly urgent that we should do so. If the Master is too unwell to attend, I suppose I must do my poor best to take his place for the occasion.’
Carbury, who until this moment had given no sign that he had noticed his visitor, turned his head on the pillow and stared fixedly at the far wall.
‘I regret to say that the Master will probably not be well enough to join you today, sir,’ Elinor said. ‘The doctor has ordered him to rest.’
‘Oh dear.’ Richardson’s face became a picture of sorrow and concern. He neatly sidestepped Elinor so he could address the figure on the bed directly. ‘Goodbye, my dear friend, and you may be sure I shall pray for your speedy restoration to health.’
The tutor bowed again to Elinor. But at the door he stopped. ‘By the way – have you heard the news? Mr Soresby was not in chapel this morning. I sent over to Yarmouth Hall but his room is empty. I regret to say that he appears to have absconded. It’s scarcely the act of an innocent man, is it? But I hope that no harm has come to him.’
Dr Carbury groaned. Elinor turned. Her husband had not moved: he was still staring at the far wall.
‘Damn the man,’ he said. ‘Damn him. Damn, damn, damn.’
The smith, up early to tend his forge, had seen Frank Oldershaw walking south through Whitebeach not long after dawn. He had wished him good morning but Frank had not replied. The sighting confirmed that Frank was almost certainly making for Cambridge.
Holdsworth walked after him. Once he reached Cambridge, he tried Jerusalem first. Mepal, standing by the gates with his little eyes bright with curiosity, told him that he had not seen Mr Oldershaw since they took him to Barnwell all those weeks ago. He advised Holdsworth against calling at the Master’s Lodge at present, explaining that Dr Carbury was indisposed. Mr Richardson was unavailable, for he had just begun a lecture. Holdsworth asked after Mr Archdale, only to learn that the young gentleman was among Mr Richardson’s audience.
He walked back the way he had come and crossed the bridge. In Chesterton Lane, the gates of Lambourne House stood open. Could Frank have been so foolish as to go there? A man in a frayed brown coat was smoking a pipe on the front doorstep. He wore a red-spotted handkerchief round his neck and watched Holdsworth’s approach with a detached, faintly amused air, as a man with time on his hands might watch the antics of a stray dog. The door stood open behind him. Inside the house, someone was whistling ‘The Girl I Left Behind Me’.
Holdsworth had never seen the fellow before but there was no doubt about his identity. There were enough of the breed in London, and Holdsworth had lived in fear of finding a pair of them – they rarely worked alone – outside his own door.
‘If you’re looking for Mr Whichcote, he ain’t here,’ the man said, removing his pipe and peering into the
