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“He left immediately.” The memory of Jonas’s mother clutching his father in one last fearful embrace before he walked out of the door was forever seared in his mind.
“How long before you heard?” Alexander’s voice was low.
Jonas glanced at him and saw empathy in his eyes. It was a look he recognized from his school days, but this time, it was different. Although they’d been brought together by this tragedy in their youth, the pain had been too fresh and the ramifications too unclear to discuss particulars with each other. To his surprise, he realized that this was the first time he’d actually shared these details with Alexander.
“The magistrate arrived the next morning.” Jonas ran his hand across his face. This memory was one of the worst. The crushing pain in his mother’s eyes as she’d faced the man who’d brought her the cruelest possible news was one of the greatest shows of strength he’d ever seen. By then, she must surely have suspected that something had gone terribly wrong, but she had equally surely never, ever wished to hear the words spoken aloud.
“He said that Father’s horse had been discovered wandering the headland and that although a thorough search was ongoing, they believed he must have stumbled over the cliff in the dark.” Jonas squared his shoulders. “His body washed ashore five days later. On the same day that two unidentified bodies from the Alouette were discovered.”
Alexander nodded. “My father tracked down the shipping log in Calais. There were a dozen crewmen onboard. The only additional passengers were my uncle, his wife, and their two children. They’d chosen to take the small merchant ship across the Channel because it would arrive in England a full week before the next passenger ship was scheduled to sail. They had hoped to be at Bloxley Hall in time for my grandmother’s birthday.”
“But rather than a birthday celebration, your family was required to plan a funeral.”
“Multiple funerals,” Alexander said. “First for my uncle, Mr. Frederick Allerton. Then, a week later, there was one for his son, Charles.” He sighed. “My family waited a fortnight before holding a memorial service for his French-born wife, Isabella, and their daughter, Suzanne. Their bodies were never recovered.”
“I had not realized Mrs. Allerton was French.”
Alexander nodded. “They divided their time between a chateau her family owned in the Dordogne region of France and the estate my uncle inherited from his mother in Sussex.” He sighed. “Charles and Suzanne were younger than me, and because they spent so much time abroad, I met them only once or twice, but even I felt the loss when the Alouette went aground. They were the only cousins I had.”
Silence hung between the two men, heavy with regret and lingering grief.
Anxious to get out from under its weight, Jonas cleared his throat. “What did the smugglers gain from the wreckage? Was the cargo listed on the paperwork your father uncovered?”
“Yes.” Alexander walked over to his desk and pulled open the lower left drawer. “I discovered the record a few years ago when I was going through the last of my father’s documents, and for some reason, I could not bring myself to discard it.” He rifled through a pile of papers. “At the time, I berated myself for refusing to relinquish the past.” He glanced at Jonas, his lopsided grin hinting at the discomfort he felt in confessing as much. “But perhaps there was a more significant reason for keeping it after all.”
He withdrew a single sheet of yellowing paper and set it on the desk. Jonas moved to stand beside him, watching as Alexander’s forefinger slowly moved across the neatly drawn columns on the handwritten copy of the shipping log.
“It appears that the hold contained bundles of lace and silk, along with salt, spices, and tobacco.”
Jonas raised his eyebrows. “A fine haul indeed.”
“Undeniably,” Alexander said. He turned the document over and handed it to Jonas. “But nowhere near the worth of the lives lost.”
Jonas glanced down, his grip on the paper tightening as he read the names of those known to be onboard, their ages, and the places of origin beside them. Here was documentation of real people whose lives had been cut short by foul weather and the actions of conspiring men. “I will get to the bottom of this, Alex,” he said.
His friend placed a hand on his shoulder. “You forget, old fellow, you are no longer in this venture alone. And I believe we may soon have two more unforeseen yet extremely powerful allies.”
An unwelcome sense of unease settled in Jonas’s gut. “You know as well as I that the more people we take into our confidence, the more likely it is that those involved will catch wind of what we are about. We have yet to identify the villain in our midst. One wrong step, one whispered word, and he will cease his clandestine activities and leave us without the evidence we need to convict him.”
“It will not be necessary to take the men I am referring to into our confidence.” A spark of excitement now outshone the sorrow in Alexander’s eyes. “Their assistance will be unwittingly offered but promises to be considerable nonetheless.”
“Would you care to elaborate?”
“You will recall that when you first arrived, I told you I had news to share.”
Jonas nodded warily. “You did.”
“I learned of it during a most interesting conversation with Billy last week.”
“Billy?” Jonas said. “As in, Mr. William Pitt, prime minister?”
Alexander chuckled. “It seems that despite our youth, we’ve all assumed rather presumptuous new titles and responsibilities since our days together at Cambridge.”
“Indeed, although I don’t envy Billy his in the slightest.”
“Few of us do,” Alexander said. “But I believe he’s up to the task, and with the king demanding that the government fill the coffers he drained when he took the nation to war on the Continent and the Americas, Billy’s already putting his sharp mind to work to discover a solution.”
Jonas frowned. “Forgive me for not seeing how this relates to our desire to root out the leaders of the Lamhurst Gang.”
