Edward glared at her, raised his gun and shot, the noise cracking through the damp, still air. ‘Like that!’ he exclaimed as pieces flew from the fence post.
They both turned to Francis. He seemed frozen, as if the shot had done something to him.
Instinctively, Dorothea moved forward to comfort him, as she always did when he flinched at loud noises—doors slamming in the wind, his father’s raised voice. Once, at a fireworks display, he bolted, and it had taken half an hour to find him and coax him out from beneath a hollow in the hedge. His mother had been the same. Dorothea had come to know the quirks of Adeline Fitzhenry well. A dropped glass, a car backfiring; Adeline had been a nervous butterfly. What was she so afraid of? Dorothea had always wondered back then. Now, as she looked at the brutish, impatient figure of the man leaning over Francis, she knew.
‘Hold it up!’
The boy startled. He tried to raise the shotgun but it dropped to the ground. He was shaking. Dorothea crossed to him and placed her hands on his shoulders. She tipped his face to hers. ‘Francis, you’re all right. Nothing is wrong.’
‘For god’s sake!’ Edward gripped his son’s arm. ‘Pull yourself together, boy.’ He pushed Dorothea away. ‘Pick up the shotgun and sort yourself out. I’m sick of this bloody play-acting. You arenota girl, so stop acting like one.’
‘Edward, please. I don’t think he’s cut out for this. Go gently.’
‘Don’t bloody well tell me how to raise my son!’ The words thundered across the silent field, spittle hitting Dorothea on her temple. ‘You willnottell me what to do. You’re not fit to even be here, you little slut!’
Face ugly with rage, Edward pulled Francis’s arm upward, pushing the shotgun into alignment with the post. ‘Hold it!’
But Francis couldn’t. Tears ran down his face. Edward spun him towards the post, lifted the gun once again. Francis’s arm wavered mid-air, but then a sob, the shotgun fell and a roar erupted. A torrent of Edward’s abuse.
‘Edward, please.Please!’ Dorothea’s hand was on Edward’s, pulling at it to release Francis from his brutal grip.
He turned on her, a sudden, unexpected grab and his hand was around her throat. ‘Don’t bloody well interfere where you have no place! You’re unfit to raise any son of mine!’ He was throttling her, and she was shocked that his huge hands were on her like this, surprised at the pain, the urge to cough, to move air through her windpipe but with no way to do it. The colours around her became electrified, the sounds diminished, until at last, her frantic instinct for survival kicked in. She pulled, scrabbled, nails into flesh. She clawed and hit at him as dizziness spread, a sluggish bubble of unreality as she heard the wordsleave her alone,as if they were distant, her vision narrowing to his Adam’s apple, a spot on his throbbing neck.
‘Stop! Stop it!’A female voice.
Dorothea fell, crumpling onto the grass, heaving. She sucked violently at the air. Eventually, she pushed herself onto all fours. A terrible rasping noise was interspersed with her guttural coughing. She had an urge to throw up, but then, a voice, a harsh laugh. She looked up, not sure if she was hallucinating, because the scene was not real. Francis had the butt of the shotgun to his shoulder, firmly now, body rigid. A distant part of her thought,Clever boy, that’s right,but he was pointing it quite near her, she noticed now. A few feet to her right, to where Edward stood, his hands raised like stop signs. ‘Put it down, Francis,’ he said, in a way that didn’t sound like Edward. A slow, hesitant voice. She turned and saw Cricket was standing nearby, terror written on her face.
Dorothea crawled backward and stood. She edged towards the boy. ‘Francis,’ she whispered, a jagged pain ripping at her throat. ‘No.’
But Francis didn’t look at her. His sight was firmly on his father, the gun steady against his shoulder, aimed exactly at Edward’s chest. And then she heard it. The return of Edward’s confidence, his callous arrogance that nobody would deny his commands. ‘Don’t be ridiculous, boy. Give me the gun.’ He took a step forward.
Dorothea’s fingernails dug trenches into her palms. She saw Cricket had moved so that she now stood opposite Dorothea, the two of them poised on each side of Francis, who kept the gun trained on his father. ‘I’ll shoot you if you come closer.’ His voiced wobbled.
‘No, Francis,’ whispered Dorothea. Francis glanced at her, then back at his father, who kept moving in. Dorothea raisedher fingertips towards the boy’s hand, his outstretched arm, tried to urge the barrel downward. But there was resistance.
Slowly, slowly, Dorothea, she thought. He was quivering like a trapped animal.Step away so he feels safe.She must calm him. ‘Dearest,’ she whispered. She took her hand away. ‘Please, now. Put it down.’
But from the corner of her eye she saw Edward looming closer, and again, her hoarse, urgent entreaty: ‘Put it down, Francis.’
A shadow, a shout.
She hissed a final desperate demand: ‘Francis, no!’ just as Cricket screamed, ‘Do it!’
A moment, a flicker.
An explosion of sound.
53
RODDY
NOW, CAMBRIDGESHIRE, ENGLAND
Roddy navigates his hire car through the muddy carpark, trying to shrug away his heavy mood. His stop for coffee in the neighbouring village should have been a delightful interlude, except he had made the mistake of flagging his intention to visit Bleddesley House.
‘Do you know the history of the manor house?’ the woman behind the counter had asked as he paid for his coffee and muffin. He nodded.
‘Gruesome, that murder of Lord Fitzhenry was. Still unsolved, fifty years on.’
