The lieutenant had ordered him flogged as an example to the others. Jake would have died that day if Captain Harraway hadn’t happened upon the scene and put a stop to it. Put a stop, too, to the ruinous plan to collect water under the enemies’ noses.
Even better, Captain Harraway had taken Jake as his personal soldier-servant. “You’re an insolent fellow, Jake Flynn. But as long as you follow my orders, I don’t care what private opinions you might hold about me or anyone else.”
And he was true to his word. Captain Harraway proved to be a good officer. Also, a good man, who had somehow managed to grow up in England’s upper classes without assuming his birth made him superior to the rest of the universe, bar those few raised with his own privileges.
The captain treated everyone much the same—his men, his fellowofficers, the Spaniards and Austrians they fought with, even French prisoners-of-war. He was always courteous, fair, firm when he needed to be, and scrupulously honest. Before long, Jake would have followed him into Hell. In fact, in the remaining years of the war, he often had.
This expedition could prove to be the entrance to another kind of hell, if it went wrong. Captain Harraway was determined to retrieve the incriminating letters Waterford was using to blackmail the captain’s friend, Captain Matthew Podger. When they had discovered that Waterford’s servant had been given the evening off to see the funeral procession for poor Princess Charlotte and her son, Jake and the Captain had seized the chance for a foray.
As long as nobody comes home, we’ll be all right.
The study was locked, too. Jake knelt before the door. The captain, without further prompting, shone a beam of light on the lock. It was a simple device and succumbed to Jake’s ministrations without protest.
The most probable place for a safe or other hidey hole was behind paintings or bookshelves. Jake began a systematic search, while the captain headed straight for the large ornate desk. Jake could hear him sliding open the drawers.No locks, so probably not there, he mused, but it was keeping Captain Harraway occupied.
Jake was wrong. The captain struck the jackpot in the third drawer he opened.
“Jake, I think this might be it,” he whispered, waving an envelope in the air. “This one has Podgy’s name on it.”
He fished in the drawer again. “There’s more.” Jake checked over his shoulder, as the captain lifted out envelope after envelope, all neatly labeled with a person’s name, their sins, and their likely worth to a blackmailer.
“We’re going to have to take the lot,” the captain decided. “We can then decide whether to get them back to the people involved, or to just burn them.”
Jake didn’t bother to argue. The captain’s tone madeit clear that he’d made up his mind. Jake had hoped that Waterford wouldn’t notice that Captain Podger’s incriminating evidence—whatever it was—had been taken, but the man couldn’t possibly miss the disappearance of the contents of the entire drawer.
The next one down, too, for the captain checked all the drawers before he declared himself satisfied and began stuffing envelopes into the pouch they’d brought with them.
“After all,” said the captain, “I don’t suppose they deserve to be blackmailed any more than old Podgy.”
Which was probably true, but put paid to any chance that Waterford would overlook their visit.
Chapter Three
A village in Oxfordshire
It surprised neitherKat nor Miss Ellen that Miss Miller took offense at the size of Miss Ellen’s purse. Indeed, if the entire household and the solicitor had not been watching, Kat believed Miss Miller would have denied the money to her youngest sister.
As it was, the mean cow told Miss Ellen she had a week to quit the premises. “You have your own money now, so I do not need to provide for you,” she said.
But Miss Ellen didn’t want to wait, and neither did Kat. “Soonest begun, soonest done,” she said. It had been a favorite quotation of the housekeeper who had been at the Millers’ for several years and who had been the nearest thing to a mother Kat had ever known. Mrs. Kirby had been stern, but fair, and she had protected Kat, and later Jacob, from the other servants.
Miss Ellen went up to her chamber to finish her packing, and Kat ran across the fields to Miss Francine’s stables to ask Miss Francine if she could hire a handcart. Miss Francine was glorying in her ownership of her beloved stables, and her benign mood extended further than loaning her sister the handcart. “Tell her she can come and stay with me for a few days if she likes,” she offered. “I don’t mind Ellen, and mycottage has a spare bedroom.”
“I shall let her know,” Kat said. “I think she is anxious to be on her way. We shall come by to tell you her decision.”
Miss Ellen agreed, and they called in at the stables on their way out to the main road. Miss Francine was busy schooling a young colt, but she stopped long enough to shake Miss Ellen’s hand and wished her well.
“Be happy, Ellen,” she said. “I am, but I doubt Clara ever will be. She doesn’t have it in her. Leave the handcart in town at the Crown and Anchor, and I shall retrieve it.”
“I do not need to wish you happy, Francine,” said Miss Ellen. She waved a hand around at the stables and horses. “You have everything you want. So instead, I wish you good health and prosperity. We shall do what you say with the handcart.”
“Thank you. Tell them I’ll pick it up when I come over for the horse fair next week. Send me a note now and then, will you? Letting me know how you get on?”
And that was it. With no further ado, the sisters parted, and Miss Ellen and Kat were on their way.
“I cannot believe that Mother left me one hundred and fifty guineas,” said Miss Ellen to Kat, as they walked. “I am astounded. She must have thought more highly of me than I ever knew.”
Kat nodded. “She must have.” Kat had been astounded, too, at the measly single guinea in the purse with Miss Ellen’s name on it. Just one guinea! A tenth of the largesse for the senior servants, and the same as the minor servants. The value, only twenty-one shillings, was insulting. It was less than the wages of the scullery maid, the lowliest servant in the house, who received her board and keep, and was paid one and a half guineas a quarter, besides.
