“Oh, the one with your crest on the door, I suppose? So that every toll gate keeper between here and the border will say,‘Oh yes, Lord Tarvin passed this way three hours and ten minutes ago.’Do have some sense, Edward. It must be a post chaise, and we must run away in the middle of the night, so that our flight will not be discovered for some hours.”
“And how are we to get a post chaise out here in the middle of the night with no one noticing?”
“It will wait for us on the road, of course. I am afraid we will not be able to take much luggage with us, only what we can carry.”
“It is a pity I cannot take Deakin with me, for he is a strong fellow and could carry quite a bit, but one does not quite like to take one’s valet on an elopement. It does not have the proper romantic sensibility to it, somehow. And you would have to leave Betty and Harold behind, too.”
“With pleasure. How long will it take us to reach Scotland?” she said.
“Two or three days. Do you really think Lady Alice would send Captain Edgerton after us?”
“I do, and he is very likely to catch us up, too. He may not be very good at catching murderers but I think chasing an eloping couple would be something he would do very well.”
“We shall just have to elope when he is not here — as now. Shall I order the post chaise for tomorrow night?”
She only laughed and said, “Silly boy.”
But the next day, the captain returned from Pickering with James Neate and two other men, and were shut away with the earl and Mr Willerton-Forbes for some time. Edward, alerted by Deakin of the event, loitered in the library watching the door to the earl’s study to see the newcomers as soon as they emerged. But when the door opened, it was only the earl to speak to the footman stationed outside. The footman nodded and then pointed across the room to Edward. The earl waved him across.
“Come inside, Tarvin, for I have news that affects you. It affects Tess most of all, but Edgerton has told me— Never mind, just come inside.”
The two newcomers were a goldsmith from London, brought in to value the gold in the safe, and a bailiff who specialised in valuing houses and their contents to defray debts. The gold, it now appeared, was worth a great deal more than they had originally supposed.
“The goldsmith who valued the one bar we had removed assumed we wanted to sell, so he offered us a low price for it,” Edgerton said. “When the whole collection was properly valued, by weighing every bar individually, it was worth a great deal more. And the house… the house is stuffed with precious objects. A whole room in the basement full of silver. Expensive rugs on the floor, fine furnishings, porcelain ornaments, exquisiteglassware, some excellent paintings on the walls… In all, that house and its contents, plus the money in the bank, are worth some hundred thousand pounds.”
“And… how much of that will go to Tess? After allowing for the late Mr Nicholson’s thievery?”
“I cannot account for more than fifty thousand pounds stolen, if that,” Willerton-Forbes said. “Miss Nicholson will inherit a fortune of at least fifty thousand pounds. She is a very wealthy lady.”
Edward slumped into a chair. His dreams were over. Tess would marry Ulric after all, and be free.
22: An Invitation
Tess could hardly take it in.
“Fifty thousand? And it is certain?”
“It is at least fifty thousand pounds,” Mr Willerton-Forbes said. “I cannot be precise about the exact sum yet, but I can assure you it is at least that much. I will know very soon. You will have a very pretty dowry when you marry, Miss Nicholson. I congratulate you.”
“But how is it possible? The gold I understand, it was undervalued initially, but all these valuable items in the house — surely my father did not buy them? I never recall him taking any interest in art.”
It was the earl who answered. “My father bought the house and furnished it many years ago, so most likely it was his doing.”
“Did he use the house himself?” Tess said, but the men exchanged uncomfortable glances. “Why else spend so much money on it?”
Mr Willerton-Forbes said carefully, “We believe there was a lady living there, whom the late earl visited from time to time.”
“His mistress, you mean?” she said.
“Tess!” the earl said. “A girl of your age should know nothing of such matters.”
“Well, I do. Was it Mrs Mayberry?”
The earl sighed. “I never knew her name. She was not mentioned in his will, however, only the house, which was left to your father. No one knew at the time just how valuable a bequest that was. But what became of the lady, I know not.”
Tess at once went looking for Edward. He was not in any of the principal rooms, but a visit below stairs soon ascertained that he had not gone out riding or in the carriage, nor had he asked for his outdoor clothes. He was still in the castle, therefore. She had no compunction about going straight to his room. He was not there, but there was a faint hint of him in the air, a subtle manly scent that she immediately recognised as unique to him. Idly she ran her fingers over his brushes laid out on his dressing table. They were silver-backed, with his crest on the handle, and of an old-fashioned design embossed with his crest, perhaps inherited from a previous holder of the title. Stuffy, as he was.
But he was not there, and she had run out of places to look… no, there was one place he might be. It was her own refuge, but perhaps he needed a place to hide away, too.
