Elinor moistened her lips. ‘Blackmail?’
‘Unless he is stopped.’
‘Are you sure? It’s a grave accusation to lay at a gentleman’s door.’
‘Gentlemen may grow desperate like the rest of us, madam. The papers are in his rooms in New Building. If we can find them and destroy them, then the difficulty is resolved.’
‘You intend to play the housebreaker?’
‘I can see no alternative,’ Holdsworth said. ‘I know where he keeps them. But I cannot break into the room like a burglar. It would be impossible to do so without arousing attention, even when he is absent. Besides, the outer doors of those sets are made of seasoned oak near two inches thick. I would need to take a crowbar to the lock and even that might not be easy. Which is why I had hoped to apply to the Master for help.’
She frowned. ‘Even if he were well, how he could help you? He could not be seen to condone a forced entry into a guest’s rooms.’
‘The only way to come and go unobtrusively is with a key. I understand that Mr Whichcote guards his own keys very carefully – when he goes out, he keeps them on his person. But Mulgrave tells me that the college Treasury contains duplicate keys for every lock in the college.’
She stared at him, scarcely believing her ears. ‘You wish to borrow the duplicates for Mr Whichcote’s rooms?’
‘If Dr Carbury had been well enough, I would have laid the difficulty before him and asked for his assistance.’
‘But the very idea of -’
‘I should not ask you if I could see any other way.’
She did not speak. Her mind worked furiously.
Holdsworth leaned further forward, bringing himself even closer to her. ‘Madam, I must move as soon as possible if I am to move at all. Would you be able to act for Dr Carbury? Would you be able to lay your hands on the Treasury keys?’
She studied him, thinking that he was not plain-featured, after all; there was too much force and expression in his face. Part of her relished the temporary power she held over him, the power to make him wait, the power to grant or withhold a favour.
‘What would you do with these papers?’
‘Burn them, madam. They can do no good, only harm.’
She came to her decision. ‘I know where he keeps the keys, sir. If we are to go into the Treasury unobserved, now is as good a time as any to do it. Susan is out on an errand. The nurse is with Dr Carbury, and Ben will not stir unless rung for.’
Elinor stood up, taking care to turn her face from the window in case her expression betrayed even a hint of what she was thinking, and left the room with more speed than dignity.
She visited her husband’s bedchamber, where the patient was still sleeping, lying on his back and snoring, while the nurse knitted by the window. She found the first key in his dressing-table drawer. Afterwards, she went downstairs and fetched the other key from the book room. She almost expected Dr Carbury to suddenly materialize at her shoulder, his face black with anger, and demand what in heaven’s name she thought she was doing.
Holdsworth followed her downstairs and was waiting for her in the hall of the Master’s Lodge. The door to the Treasury was set back in a deep alcove. The walls were particularly thick here; Dr Carbury had told her that they might once have formed part of the monastic church that had once stood on the site. The door was blackened oak, bound with iron. The locks were new, installed last year and as cunningly constructed as the locksmith could make them.
Elinor handed Holdsworth the keys. He unlocked the upper lock and crouched to insert the key in the lower. She looked down at the back of his neck and the thick, lightly powdered hair. She wondered what it would be like to touch it, whether it would feel like a dog’s hair, say, or more like a cat’s.
The second key turned in the lock. Holdsworth twisted the handle, a heavy iron ring. The door opened inwards. A current of cold and slightly musty air flowed out into the hall. The Treasury was a small, windowless room, perhaps twelve feet square, with a flagged floor like the hall and a barrel-vaulted ceiling. The walls were lined with shelves and cupboards.
Holdsworth looked about him, pursing his lips. ‘What do they keep here?’
‘The Founder’s Cup and the best of the plate. Some of it is very valuable, I believe. There will be the deeds for college properties and probably the leases. I think rents are kept here, too, and other sums of ready money.’
She made a circuit of the room, treading lightly like a thief and with her ears alert for any sounds in the house. She had not expected there to be so much in here. But she fought back the temptation to hurry for she would not give Mr Holdsworth the satisfaction of believing her to be a poor, weak representative of her sex, easily driven to hysteria. There was enough light from the doorway for her to read most of the labels attached to the boxes. It occurred to her that she might be the first woman ever to be in this room, the first woman ever to read these labels.
She came at last to the cupboards. They were not locked. The first of them contained more boxes, but the second, to her great delight, held row upon row of hooks, and from each of these hung a bunch of keys. They were neatly labelled, too, and divided alphabetically into staircases and then numerically into rooms.
She looked back at Mr Holdsworth. ‘Where are Mr Whichcote’s rooms?’
‘G4,’ he said.
She ran her finger along the rows until she found the staircase G. She unhooked the keys for number 4. She closed the door and turned round.
Holdsworth was nearer than she expected, no more than a yard away, and staring intently at her. Automatically she held out the keys and he took them, his hand touching hers as it had at the garden gate. Despite the coolness of the air, she was suddenly far too warm.
‘Madam…’ he said.
He stopped, still staring at her, and leaving whatever he had been about to say hanging in the air, unformed, full of promise and fear. Slowly his head moved nearer hers. Inch by inch, his face drew closer. Plain-featured? Oh no, she thought, quite the reverse.
There was a knock at the hall door.
They sprang apart from one another. She reached the safety of the hall. ‘Quick,’ she hissed. ‘Close the door. Ben will be here directly.’
For a big man, he moved quickly. He was out in a moment and had the door closed. She snatched the keys from him. She would lock up after he had gone. She glanced at her hands and apron, fearing to find tell-tale dirt or dust there. They were clean enough. What about her face, though? Was there some mark there, some clue to the treacherous desires of her heart?
Ben’s footsteps were approaching in the passage.
‘You called to see how the Master was,’ she murmured to Holdsworth. ‘And now you are leaving and I am come down with you to see you to the door.’
Ben arrived in the hall, hesitated when he saw his mistress with Holdsworth, and then, at a nod from her, opened the door.
Mr Richardson was on the threshold. His eyes flicked past the servant to Elinor, and then to Holdsworth standing behind her. He uncovered and bowed.
‘Mrs Carbury, your servant, ma’am. And Mr Holdsworth too. This is indeed convenient – I find I kill two birds with one stone.’
43
There had been rain in the night and the river bank was muddy. Thirty yards ahead, Tom Turdman slouched steadily along the footpath, moving with unexpected speed. He was still wearing his working clothes and a whiff of the man lingered behind him like a bad dream.
Harry Archdale plodded after him. Tom had been waiting at the end of Mill Lane. As soon as he had seen Harry,
