Don Diego left Madrid a day ahead of his mother and cousin. Dominica heard of his plans without change of countenance, but his mother drawled: “You do not ride with us?”
He answered very easily that he would go before to have all in readiness against their coming to Vasconosa. He could not but think that the Carvalho guards would be protection enough for their equipage.
Doña Beatrice looked at him with narrowed eyes, seemed to consider him, but said only: “You are not very gallant, my son.”
His departure was watched by one of whom he knew nothing. Joshua, anxious to get speech with Dominica, haunted the vicinity of the Casa Carvalho, and saw Don Diego set forward that Friday with his valet and two lackeys with led sumpters. Joshua’s sharp nose smelled mischief. He lounged against the sunbaked wall and picked his teeth, but his ears were on the prick and his eyes sharp beneath the slouching brim of his hat. A chance word let fall by one of the lackeys strapping a pack to the sumpter disclosed their destination. There was little need of it; Joshua had been in small doubt. He watched Don Diego mount and gather up the reins; heard him admonish the lackeys to press forward at speed; and saw him ride off. Joshua drew his own conclusions.
“Ay, go swiftly, villain!” he apostrophised Don Diego. “Waste no time, for you will have Mad Nick behind you, never doubt it! Cullion and coystrill! Oh, an eater of broken meats, a very pungent rascal! It would do one’s heart good to slit the villain’s nose. I shall suggest it to my master in due course.” He heaved a sigh. “Master, as I see it, you would do well to break out of ward swiftly. Here’s roguery afoot. If I can but get speech with my lady, and know what they will be about! A plague on all women!”
An hour of patient loitering rewarded him. Dominica at last appeared, accompanied by her maid, and bound, as Joshua had hoped she might be, to hear Mass at a neighbouring Church. She cast a passing look at him where he lounged, but it was unrecognising. As well it might be, for there was little trace of swaggering Joshua in the sober, clean-shaved personage she saw. He wore a buffin gown as might some needy clerk; gone were the ambitious mustachios, gone the beard that Sir Nicholas was wont to call his pique de vent, gone, too, the strutting carriage. A meek individual followed my lady at a discreet distance to Church.
She chose an unoccupied bench at the back of the Church. Joshua waited until old Carmelita was bowed over her rosary, devout and unseeing, then slid on to the bench and edged gradually closer to my lady.
Her eyes were open, looking straight before her. She became aware of Joshua and turned her head. She was inclined to be angry at his encroachment: that he saw by the spark in her eyes. He looked fully at her, laid a finger to his lips and beckoned her surreptitiously nearer.
She did not know him; she stiffened; her look should have abashed him. He was at a loss; he dared not move nearer to her lest the maid should be roused from her devotions, or the lady withdraw. He looked imploringly, and she turned her shoulder. A hasty glance round him showed him only a few people busy at their prayers. He bent his head and whispered: “Lady, Reck Not
!”
His quick eyes peeped up at her; she had heard; she was looking keenly at him now. Again he made that little beckoning movement. She let fall her missal, bent to pick it up, and in the doing of it shifted her position till she was close beside him.
He pretended to mumble prayers, telling over the beads of a rosary. “Lady, you do not know me. I am Joshua Dimmock. My beard is off. What of that? Caution! Caution!”
She stole a glance at him, met the upward flash of his shrewd grey eyes. Recognition sprang into her own. She bent her head and put her clasped hands up to hide her face. “You! Oh, what do you know?”
“He is in ward. Courage, señorita! I am here to discover what plans are laid for you. Does Tuesday hold good yet?”
“Saturday,” she whispered back. “Tomorrow. He sent you? You have contrived to get speech with him?”
“Nay. Be of good heart, lady, and keep faith. He will break free yet.”
She gave a long sigh. “I have led him to his death.”
Privately Joshua was in complete agreement with her. “It was noticeable,” he said later, “that she seemed to have little idea of having led me thitherwards. But I let that pass.”
For all his secret convictions, vicarious dignity would not permit him to let the lady think that she had had any hand in this escapade. His answering whisper contained some austerity. “I have yet to learn, señorita, that my master is led by aught save his own inclination. Let it go. I am avised of your movements; it but remains for me to get speech with Sir Nicholas.”
Her eyes flickered to his face. “Is it so easy? Can you do it?”
“It will not be easy,” said Joshua severely, “but certainly I shall do it. Be of good cheer; trust me, and trust my master. No more of this. Dangerous dealing!” He edged away along the bench, and she was left to her seeming prayers.
She was oddly comforted by this talk with Joshua. He spoke with an assurance he was far from feeling, but she was not to know that. She might doubt still, but she now had hope, for if Joshua, who knew Beauvallet
