Footfalls shuffled closer to the door. It opened a crack and a lady with graying brown hair peered out. She looked them up and down, her eyes widening.
“Mrs. Smythe?” Ballantine ventured.
Dressed in a faded gown of indeterminate color, the woman opened the door a fraction wider. “What do ye want?”
“We need to speak to your son, Joseph, madam.”
Her cloudy, hazel eyes narrowed. “What do ye want with Joe?”
“Does he live here?”
“He’s not here now.”
“Where is he, Mrs. Smythe? It is very important that we speak to him,” Diana said, finding her voice. “He may be able to help us.”
The woman’s hazel eyes looked widened. “I told ’em no good would come of it.”
Ballantine leaned closer. “Come of what? Mrs. Smythe?”
She shuffled backward. “I won’t say no more. You’ll have to speak to ’em.”
“Who are they?”
“I had nothing to do with it.”
“Then if you’ll kindly give us his direction, we shall leave you in peace.”
“Joe works at the farm down the road apace.”
She began to close the door, but Ballantine put up his hand to hold it open. “How far is it?”
“Five miles. Just past the woods. Tell Joe I warned ’im this would not go well for him.” She huffed. “But he thinks he’s smarter than his ma.”
Ballantine let go of the door, and it slammed shut.
Diana was grateful for Ballantine’s support as they retreated down the path. Her legs shook and her heart galloped. Were theyclose to the truth? Close to finding out what had happened to Anne?
She barely noticed the view beyond the carriage window: cows in the green meadows, fields planted with spring crops and some lying fallow. They entered the small woodland and then emerged into sunlight.
Half a mile down the road, a gate in a stone wall stood open. On a rise above the trees, they could see the roof of a building.
Diana swallowed, fighting to remain calm. “That must be the farmhouse Smythe’s mother spoke of, where Joe works.” She searched Ballantine’s uneasy eyes.
He nodded. “Let’s find out.”
They left the carriage on the road and walked through the gate and along a gravel drive through the well-kept grounds, the bushes pruned, the garden beds in full flower perfuming the air in the warm sun.A woman’s touch, Diana thought. Well-tended farmland stretched out on either side, and to the rear was a large barn and some sheds. Would Joe speak to them? Tell them the truth? If it proved a dead end, Ballantine would take her back to Bath. She wasn’t sure she could bear it.
They rounded the copse of trees, and a farmhouse came into view: a long, brick, two-story dwelling with a wide verandah along the front, smoke rising into the sky from a chimney in the slate roof.
Would these people know anything about the kidnapping? It seemed unlikely. Her knees threatened to buckle, and she clung desperately to Ballantine’s arm.
He ushered her up onto the verandah, where there was a rocking chair with a basket of wool and knitting needles beside it. Someone’s comfortable home.
Ballantine rapped on the door.
Somewhere inside, a dog barked sharply. A maid in an apron and mobcap opened the door, and a slight, gray dog slipped out and danced around Diana’s skirts.
“Toby?” Diana croaked. Surely, she must be mistaken. She bent down to pat the whippet’s smooth head. Anne’s dog had disappeared the same day as she had.
