The Silent Woman

Chapter Eleven

Alexander Marwood had suspended all belief in the notion of divine intervention. After a lifelong study of the phenomenon, he concluded that there was no such thing as a benevolent deity who watched over the affairs of men with a caring love and plucked those in danger from beneath the wheels of fate. Marwood spent most of his existence beneath those wheels and they had left deep ruts across mind, body and soul. If there really was any pity in heaven, it would surely have been shown to someone in his predicament yet none came to relieve the unrelenting misery of his lot. His plight should make angels weep and archangels wring their hands in sorrow but compassion was always on holiday. He became ungodly.

Work, wife and Westfield’s Men. Those were the triple causes of his ruin. A man of his temperament should never have become an innkeeper. He hated beer, he hated people and he hated noise yet he chose a profession which tied him forever to them. His introspective nature was ill-suited to the extrovert banter of the taproom. It was a crime to make him serve out his sentence at the Queen’s Head. Marriage had compounded the felony. Sybil Marwood bound him to the inn and fettered him to her purpose. One year of muted happiness in her arms had produced a daughter who was miraculously free from the spectacular ugliness of both parents. It had also turned a tepid marital couch into a cold one and so much ice had now formed around its inner regions that Marwood felt he lay beside a polar bear. Westfield’s Men completed his nightmare.

Separately, each of his tribulations was enough to break the heart of man and the back of beast. Together, they were unendurable. The fire at the Queen’s Head had somehow welded all three of them together and the combined weight of his afflictions was now pressing the last glimmer of life out of him.

‘Have you come to a decision yet, Alexander?’

‘Not yet, my love.’

‘Move swiftly or we lose the advantage.’

‘There is no advantage in a theatre company.’

‘Then why does this other innkeeper woo them?’

‘Madness.’

‘Profit.’

‘Suicide.’

‘Respect.’

‘Ignominy.’

‘Fame!’ cried Sybil. ‘Do not lose that, Alexander, or we perish. Be wise, be proud, be famous!’

The polar bear roared at her husband every day now.

Marwood left his wife in the taproom and scurried out to the yard, bracing himself for the sight of devastation and vowing that Westfield’s Men would never again be given the chance to set fire to his premises. A surprise greeted him. The restoration work had advanced much faster than expected. Diligent carpenters had now completely removed all the charred timbers and replaced them with sound ones. Behind the wooden scaffolding, the gaping hole was slowly being filled. The galleries no longer sagged in the corner. Fresh supports had lifted them back up to something like their former shape. There was still much to do but the yard of the Queen’s Head was recognisably his again.

A less agreeable surprise awaited him. Though busy hammers still banged away and busy ostlers brought horses in and out of the stables, the yard was curiously quiet. There was no crowd of spectators jostling each other, no packed galleries setting up a further buzz, no servingmen calling out for customers as they carried trays of beer amid the throng. Above all there were no players strutting about the stage, flinging their speeches and leaving them embedded like so many spears in the minds of the audience. There was no Lawrence Firethorn to hurl his verbal thunderbolts, no Barnaby Gill to make the boards echo with his jig, no Owen Elias to put the rage of a whole nation into his voice. And there was no applause. Alexander Marwood missed them. It made him feel sick.

‘Good morning, sir.’

‘You have work to do, Leonard.’

‘I’ll about it straight when I have done my duty.’

‘What duty, man?’

‘Give me time, sir, give me time.’

Leonard wiped the back of a massive hand across his mouth then motioned two figures across. Anne Hendrik had been shopping at the market in Gracechurch Street and brought Preben van Loew with her so that they could move on to the cloth market and buy fresh supplies of material. Since they were so close to the Queen’s Head, they slipped in to see how the repairs were progressing. Anne had another reason for the visit. Primed by Margery Firethorn, she was ready to lend her weight to the campaign to bring Westfield’s Men back to the inn. Though still unsure about one member of the company, she wanted the others to regain a home.

Marwood viewed the pair with cautious respect. Anne was patently a lady but the sober garb and austere manner of Preben van Loew suggested that he had never been inside a taproom. Leonard had no social graces but he managed a few clumsy introductions. As he moved off to work, he threw in a last tactless piece of information.

‘Mistress Hendrik is a friend of Master Bracewell.’

Marwood glowered. ‘He burnt my yard down.’

‘That is not what I hear,’ said Anne, coming to the defence of the book holder. ‘Report has it that he saved your inn from total destruction.’

‘He starts a fire, he puts it out. That is to say, he gives me a disease then helps to cure it. But I had rather the disease did not come in the first place.’

‘The carpenters work well,’ noted Preben van Loew.

‘When I keep them to their task.’

‘Your galleries will be stouter than ever,’ said the Dutchman, peering around. ‘I was here once before to see a play and I noticed the rot in some of your beams. It was worst in the corner where the fire struck which is why the flames got a hold so quickly. Rotten wood burns best. Had you replaced those old timbers yourself, they might have withstood the blaze much better.’

‘Do not lecture me on my inn, sir,’ said Marwood.

‘I make one simple point. You now have sound timbers where you had rotten. Such neglect was dangerous. Those pillars would have snapped under the weight in time.’

‘Preben is right,’ said Anne. ‘In a strange way, the fire may have done you a favour.’

‘It did, mistress. It showed me my folly.’

‘About not replacing bad timber?’ said the Dutchman.

‘About suffering the deadwood of a theatre company.’

‘Westfield’s Men gave you a name,’ said Anne.

‘It is one I disown entirely.’

‘That is a poor reward for their patron,’ she observed. ‘Lord Westfield has brought half the Court to the Queen’s Head. Was that not an honour?’

‘Indeed, it was.’

‘Then why discard it?’

‘Wisdom comes with age.’

‘Then you must be immensely wise,’ said Preben van Loew with a wry grin. ‘Please excuse me.’

He went off to view the renovations at close quarters. Anne Hendrik was left with the daunting task of improving the status of Westfield’s Men in the eyes of the innkeeper.

‘They are feted wherever they go,’ she said.

‘Who?’

‘Westfield’s Men.’

‘God keep them far away!’

‘They prosper in the provinces.’

‘Let that prosperity hold them there.’

‘They will return in triumph to their new home.’

Marwood was interested at last. ‘You know where it is?’

‘In Southwark or in Shoreditch.’

‘Which? The two are separated by the Thames.’

‘What does it matter, sir?’ she asked. ‘You have thrown them out of here. They may go wherever they wish.’

‘On what terms, though?’ he wondered.

‘Better than they enjoyed here.’

‘That cannot be.’

‘I speak only what I have been told on good authority.’ Anne did not mention that the good authority was Margery Firethorn. Having gained his ear, she now pretended to walk away from it. ‘I grow tedious, sir. I will go.’

‘Wait, wait.’

‘Westfield’s Men are dead here. This is a tomb now. I will have to send them somewhere else.’

‘Send who?’

‘I tax your patience here.’

‘No, no. You talked of custom.’

‘In a small way, Master Marwood,’ she said. ‘My name is Dutch but I am English, as you see. I speak both languages and that makes me useful in our community.’

‘We have a lot of Dutchmen here.’

‘And most of them resented like any other foreigner. But a man like you turns nobody away. That is why your inn will always flourish.’

‘I do not serve many Hollanders,’ he said, glancing across at Preben van Loew. ‘They are not ale-drinkers.’

‘They are if they are taught to be. And playgoers, too. That is my argument.’ She indicated her employee. ‘Preben works for me and frowns on all pleasure. Yet when I brought him to a play in this yard, he enjoyed it so much he sent a dozen of his friends back. Each one of that dozen sent a handful more and so on. You stay with me here?’

‘Why, yes,’ said Marwood thoughtfully.

Anne was into her stride. ‘Visitors come from Holland all the time. When they seek entertainment, I send them here because Westfield’s Men never disappoint. All this trade will be lost if the company goes.’

‘It has to go. They burnt my premises down.’

‘They are helping to build it up again.’

‘How so?’

‘Take a closer look at these workmen,’ she suggested. ‘That man on the ladder is Nathan Curtis, master-carpenter with Westfield’s Men. I know him as a neighbour of mine in Bankside. With him is his assistant, David Leeke. When they sent their fellows away on tour, they stayed to rebuild the company’s home.’

‘At my expense! These repairs are costly!’

‘Defray the amount, Master Marwood.’

‘If only I knew how!’

‘It is not for me to say, sir,’ she remarked. ‘I am in business myself but employ only a handful of men. Preben there is one. This I do know, however. If I ran this inn, I would seek to spread the cost of restoration.’

‘I have tried, I have tried.’

‘Everywhere but the easiest place.’

‘And where is that?’

‘Westfield’s Men.’

‘They are almost penniless.’

‘Not when they fill your yard every afternoon. Think on this. Suppose they agreed to pay half of all the bills that you incur from the fire. Would that not cut your grief in two?’

‘How could they afford it?’

‘You levy a surcharge on each performance.’

‘Explain, I pray.’

Anne was persuasive. ‘Westfield’s Men pay a rent for the use of your yard, do they not? Add a fire tax to that rent. Some small amount, it may be, and spread over a whole year. At the end of that time, you would have earned back the half of all you spent.’ She saw a smile almost peeping out at her. ‘And that will be on top of all the extra revenue the company will bring in. London has missed them sorely. When they return, this yard will fill in minutes.’

Alexander Marwood could hear the sense in her argument but he still had grave reservations. Anne Hendrik left him with one more idea over which he could mull.

‘Their first performance would be the best of all.’

‘Why?’

‘Because all its proceeds would go to you.’

‘They will play for nothing!’

‘As a gesture of faith,’ she said, ‘they will donate the takings of an afternoon to the repair fund. If that is not generosity, then I do not know what is.’ She waved to Preben van Loew to indicate an imminent departure. ‘We must leave you now, sir, but I tell you this in private. I would not have Westfield’s Men go to this other inn to play.’

‘Why not?’

‘It has a most villainous innkeeper. Farewell.’

It was dark when Nicholas Bracewell left the house in Crock Street and there was no question of his riding out to visit his father that night. The confrontation, in any case, needed a degree of forethought. What he had done after his talk with Mary Whetcombe was to walk back to the quay and take a proper look at a place which had meant so much to him at one time. It was empty now but still redolent with activity. He could almost smell the cargoes being unloaded and hear the deals being struck by astute merchants. When his father had first taken him there, Nicholas had loved the cheery commotion of Barnstaple quay. A few small ships floated at their moorings but it was the vessel which lay at anchor in the middle of the river which had captured his interest. The Mary was a fine craft, still riding on its reputation as a privateer. Even in the moonlight, he could judge its character. To own such a ship was to own the town. No wonder Gideon Livermore was ready to kill for it.

When the curfew bell sounded, he had gone back in through West Gate and headed for the Dolphin Inn. Sleep came with merciful swiftness. Rain tapped on the window to wake him in the morning but it had cleared by the time he went down to the taproom for his breakfast. Over toast and ale, he read the letter which Barnard Sweete had left for him with the innkeeper. Nicholas was invited to visit the lawyer in his chambers. The subject of discussion was not stated but he could guess at it. Mary had told him enough about Sweete to alert him to the man’s cleverness and Nicholas already had a clear impression of the sort of man the lawyer might be. Before taking him on, however, he needed more evidence and that could only come from his father. It was ironic. The man who had torn him away from Mary Parr might now be in a position to offer a kind of restitution.

Nicholas hired a horse and rode northwards out of the town in the direction of Pilton. Two men followed him this time but at a comfortable distance. They were there to watch and not to attack. Nicholas smiled when he came to an old signpost that pointed his way. The village of Marwood was one of three listed and he knew it from his boyhood. Its namesake at the Queen’s Head had none of its rural charm and still less of its abiding warmth.

The cottage was not far from Pilton and his first sight of it shocked him. It was a small, low, half-timbered building with a thatched roof. Standing in a couple of acres, it had a neglected and world-weary air. When he got closer, he saw that birds were nesting under the eaves. One of the trees in the garden had been blown over in a gale and was now propped up with a length of timber. Panes of glass were missing from an upper window. The garden gate was broken. A goat chewed unconcernedly outside the front door.

He felt curiously offended. When Nicholas was a boy, his father had been a successful merchant with a wife, two sons and three daughters, all of whom lived in a large town-house in Boutport Street. They had respectability and position. Robert Bracewell had no social standing now. He was a virtual outcast from Barnstaple. A man who had once rubbed shoulders with Matthew Whetcombe and the other leading merchants was now banished to the oblivion of a country cottage. It was a poor reflection on the family name but Robert Bracewell deserved no sympathy. Nicholas reminded himself of that as his knees nudged his horse forward.

Dismounting at the gate, he tethered the animal and went up the path to the front door. The goat did not even look up from its meal of grass and nettles. Nicholas did not need to knock. The door swung open and the suspicious face of an old woman emerged. She was short, stout and wearing a plain dress. Grey hair poked out from beneath her mob-cap. Her hands were a network of dark blue veins. After staring at him for a moment, she seemed to half-recognise him and it made her shrink back. She called to someone inside the cottage then disappeared from view. Nicholas waited. A small dog came scampering out and barked amiably at him. The goat aimed a kick at it then resumed its browsing.

The front door opened wider and an old man in a faded suit glared out at him. Nicholas at first took him for a servant, like the woman, but it slowly dawned on him that this was his father. The years had eaten right into the man. The tall figure had shrunk and the powerful frame had gone. Hair and beard were grey and the face was etched with lines. It shook his son. Robert Bracewell was a wreck of the man he had once been. He seemed too small and insignificant to bear the weight of all that hatred of him that his son carried.

A touch of his old belligerence still clung to him.

‘What do you want?’ he growled.

‘I’ve come to see you.’

‘We want no visitors. Who are you?’

‘Nicholas.’

‘Who?’

‘Your son.’

Robert Bracewell glared at him with more intensity then waved his hand. ‘I have no son called Nicholas,’ he said. ‘He sailed with Drake and was lost at sea. Nicholas is dead. Do not mock me, sir. Go your way and leave me alone.’

He stepped back and tried to close the door but his son was too quick for him. Nicholas got a shoulder to the timber and held it open. Their faces were now only inches away. The belligerence turned to an almost childlike curiosity.

‘Nicholas? Is it really you?’

‘We must speak, Father.’

Robert Bracewell became suddenly embarrassed and began to apologise for his humble circumstances. He led Nicholas into the long, dank room which occupied almost the whole of the ground floor of the house. The old woman lurked at the far end. When she saw them coming, she sneaked off into the scullery and shut the door after her. The furniture was better than such a dwelling could have expected and Nicholas recognised several pieces from the old house in Boutport Street. A cane-backed chair kindled special memories. His mother had nursed him in it. Robert Bracewell now dropped into it with the heaviness of a man who did not mean to stir from it for a very long time. Nicholas had already caught the aroma of drink. He now saw that his father’s hands had a permanent shake to them.

‘Sit down, sit down, Nick,’ said his father.

‘Thank you.’ He found an upright chair.

‘Why have you come to Barnstaple?’

‘I was sent for, Father.’

‘Mary Whetcombe?’

‘I called on her yesterday.’

Robert Bracewell nodded and appraised his elder son with mingled pride and fear. They had parted in anger. There was still a sharp enmity hanging between them.

‘Where do you live now?’

‘London.’

‘What do you do?’

‘I work for a theatre company.’

‘Theatre?’ His nose wrinkled in disgust. ‘You belong to one of those troupes of strolling players? Like those we used to see in Barnstaple in the summer?’

‘Westfield’s Men are a licensed company.’

‘What does that mean?’

‘It would take too long to explain,’ said Nicholas.

‘Actors? No. That’s no fit way for a man to live.’

‘Nor is this, father.’

The rejoinder slipped out before Nicholas could stop it and it clearly hurt Robert Bracewell. He drew himself up in his chair and his jaw tightened. He waved a trembling hand.

‘This is my home, lad,’ he warned. ‘Do not insult it.’

‘I am sorry.’

‘Had you stayed, I might not now be in this state.’

‘You drove me away.’

‘That’s a lie, Nick!’

‘You drove Peter away as well.’

‘Your brother was different.’

‘We were ashamed of you.’

‘Stop!’

Robert Bracewell slapped the flat of both hands down on the arms of the chair. Anger brought him to life. His back straightened and his head was held erect. The resemblance to his son was suddenly quite strong and it disturbed Nicholas to be reminded of it. The old man’s yell made the door to the scullery open for the woman to peer in before withdrawing again with a hurt expression. His father was shaking with quiet fury now and that would not further Nicholas’s purpose. He tried to placate the old man with a softer tone.

‘We need your help,’ he said.

‘We?’

‘Mary Whetcombe and I.’

A note of disbelief. ‘You came back for her?’

‘A messenger summoned me from London.’

‘Mary would never even look at you now.’

‘Yes, she would.’

‘After the way you let her down …’

‘We talked for a long while at her house.’

‘She despises you!’

Robert Bracewell had always been forthright and it was a habit that made him few real friends. Nicholas and his brother had an abrasive upbringing. Their father loved them after his own fashion, but he was blunt about what he considered to be their faults. Nicholas wondered how his mother had put up with her husband for so long. Robert Bracewell had not spared his wife. She had suffered the worst of his cruel candour. She had also endured his other vices until their combined weight had crushed the life out of her. Nicholas thought about her lying in the churchyard and resolved to get through the business of his visit before riding away from his father for ever.

‘What brought you, Nick?’

‘Matthew Whetcombe’s will.’

‘That is no concern of yours.’

‘I have made it so.’

‘Why?’

‘Because the messenger who came to London was murdered before the message was delivered to me. They tried to stop me from getting to Barnstaple. I was attacked by the same man.’ Nicholas paused. ‘He now lies dead in Bristol.’

‘You killed him?’ The old man was shocked.

‘Defending myself.’

‘Who was the rogue?’

‘His name was Lamparde.’

‘Adam Lamparde?’

‘You know the man?’

‘I did at one time,’ recalled his father. ‘Lamparde was a sailor. A Tiverton man by birth. A good seaman, too, who could have looked to have his own vessel one day. But he was too fond of a brawl. A man was killed in a tavern one night. Lamparde disappeared. They say he made for London.’

‘Which ship did he sail in?’

‘The Endeavour. She was only twenty tons, but she flew between Barnstaple and Brittany like a bird on the wing.’

‘Who owned the vessel?’

‘Two or three. Gideon Livermore among them.’

‘His name guided me here.’

The old man snarled. ‘Livermore is offal!’

‘He stands to inherit the bulk of Whetcombe’s estate.’

‘Let him. What care I?’

‘You were a witness to the man’s will.’

‘Yes,’ said the other with a sigh of regret. ‘I could speak to Matthew in those days, visit his house, discuss all manner of business, mix with his friends.’

‘You saw that will, Father.’

‘I would not have signed it else.’

‘What did it say?’

‘That is a private matter.’

‘You may save Mary, if you can tell us. She is cut out by the new will. Gideon Livermore seizes all. I do not believe that that was Matthew Whetcombe’s true wish.’

‘He was a deep man, Matthew. A very deep man.’

‘What was in the first will?’

‘Ask the lawyer!’

‘You read it, Father!’ shouted Nicholas. ‘For God’s sake, tell us what was in it! Did he leave the ship to Gideon Livermore? Did he leave the house in Crock Street? Did he all but disinherit his wife and child? Tell us.’

Robert Bracewell pulled himself forward in the chair as if to strike his son, but the blow never came. Nicholas was instead hit by a peal of derisive laughter that made his own fists bunch in anger.

‘So that’s your game, my lad,’ said his father with weary cynicism. ‘That’s why you came back here. For her. You wanted Mary Parr then and you want her even more now that she is Mary Whetcombe and a wealthy widow. That’s what my son has turned into, is it? A privateer! Drake has taught you well. Hoist your flag and set sail. Seize the richest prize on the seas. No wonder you want her. Mary Whetcombe is a treasure trove.’ The laughter darkened. ‘But she’ll never want you. She’d sooner look at a rogue like Livermore!’

Nicholas was so incensed that it was an effort to hold himself back from attacking his father and beating him to the ground. The speech had opened up old wounds with the ease of a sharp knife ripping through the soft underbelly of a fish. Nicholas closed his eyes and waited for the pounding in his temples to cease.

Robert Bracewell was typical of the merchant class. He was a practical man, toughened by a harsh upbringing and by the struggle to survive in a competitive world. Marriage was essentially a business proposition to him. Merchants’ sons married merchants’ daughters. A prudent choice of wife brought in a widening circle of friends and relations who could improve a man’s prospects considerably. The dowry, too, was important. It could save many a poor credit balance. That was a factor that weighed heavily with Robert Bracewell, and he had selected a bride for his elder son partly on that basis.

Fathers struck bargains. Katherine Hurrell was selected for Nicholas Bracewell in the same way as Mary Parr was the designated wife of Matthew Whetcombe. Love and happiness were a matter of chance. The commercial implications of the match were far more important. Paternal pressure on all sides was immense, but Nicholas and Mary resisted it. They rejected their chosen partners. They wanted each other, no matter what their fathers decreed. Robert Bracewell had been adamant that his son should marry Katherine Hurrell. His preference for her family had become an obsession.

Nicholas remembered why and his loathing intensified.

‘You stopped us!’ he accused.

‘I had to, Nick. You must see that.’

‘You killed our hopes.’

‘I had no choice.’

‘Mary was waiting for me,’ said Nicholas. ‘She would have run away with me sooner than marry him. She hated Matthew Whetcombe. He had nothing to offer her.’

‘Yes, he did,’ said his father. ‘He offered something that nobody else could match. There was more to Matthew than you might think. A deep man, believe me. Hidden virtues.’

‘Mary had no time for him.’

‘That is not true.’

‘She couldn’t bear the fellow near her!’

‘Yet she married him.’

It was offered as a simple statement of fact, but it had the impact of a punch. Nicholas recoiled. Matthew Whetcombe had indeed married Mary Parr, but only because Nicholas had deserted her. His one impulsive action all those years ago had committed a woman he wanted to a loveless relationship with a man whose death she could not even mourn. By extension, it had also thrust her into the humiliating situation that now faced her. Guilt pummelled away at Nicholas again but the real culprit was sitting calmly in front of him. His father was enjoying his son’s discomfort.

It had been a mistake to come. Robert Bracewell would not help a son who ran away from him or a woman who ruined his marriage plans for that son. The old man would take a perverse delight in obstructing them. Nicholas got up abruptly and moved to the door. His father’s voice halted him.

‘I witnessed that will,’ he said, ‘but I am not able to tell you its contents. They are confidential. If you insist on seeing it, apply to Barnard Sweete. He should have a copy of the first will.’

‘He has destroyed it.’

‘Matthew had a copy drafted.’

‘That, too, has disappeared.’

‘Find it, Nick.’

‘The house has been searched from top to bottom.’

‘Search again.’

‘Was Livermore the main beneficiary of the first will?’

‘Find it and you will know the truth.’

‘Will you give us no help at all, Father!’

‘What have you done to deserve it?’ said the other with scorn. ‘Get out of my house! Get out of my life!’

‘A crime is being committed here!’ urged Nicholas. ‘You can prevent it. We need you!’

But Robert Bracewell had said all that he was going to on the subject. The interview, which had been a torment for his son, had been an ordeal for him as well. All the strength had drained out of him and the pouched skin quivered. The woman came in from the scullery to stand behind him in case she was needed. They looked once again like two old servants in a farmer’s cottage. Nicholas was saddened.

He went quickly out but paused a few yards down the path, turning to call a question through the open door.

‘Why did you go so often to Matthew Whetcombe’s house?’

Robert Bracewell got up and lumbered towards him. One hand on the door, he stared at his visitor with a mixture of nostalgia and dismay.

‘Why did you go?’ repeated Nicholas.

‘To see my granddaughter.’

He slammed the door shut with echoing finality.

His mind was an inferno as he rode away from the cottage. Past and present seemed so inextricably linked that they had become one. Mary Whetcombe had reminded him of the young man he once was and Robert Bracewell had warned him of the old man he could become. Both experiences had torn at his very entrails. He rode at a steady canter and vowed never to return to the house. Seeing his father again had laid some ghosts to rest but awakened too many others. The picture of two aged people side by side in a run-down cottage stayed in his mind. Robert Bracewell had once lived with a handsome woman of good family who loved him devotedly and who bore him two children. That wife was sent to an early grave with a broken heart. All that the merchant had left now was a shuffling servant to fetch and carry for him.

So much had happened since he had come back to Barnstaple that he could not absorb it all. Nicholas Bracewell tried to pick out the salient facts. Mary Whetcombe was in serious danger of losing her inheritance through a conspiracy. Gideon Livermore was dispossessing her in order to bring her within his reach. As a rich widow, she would never deign to look at a man like him, but she might change her mind if marriage restored to her all that she had lost. Mary was an essential part of the property, and Livermore would not part with her. She had been forced to marry one man she hated. Why not another?

If she took Gideon Livermore, however, she would be sharing her life with a murderer. Lamparde had killed Susan Deakin and attempted to send Nicholas after her but the orders had come from Livermore. He stood to gain most and had just as much blood on his hands as Lamparde himself. Barnard Sweete was an accomplice. Against two men of such guile, a distraught widow would have little chance. They had even enlisted the aid of the vicar on their side to render Mary Whetcombe completely powerless.

Another consideration scalded its way into Nicholas’s brain. Mary was the mother of his child. The feeling that Nicholas had when he first saw Lucy had been strengthened. In spite of her mother’s denial, he sensed that the girl was his, and his father had confirmed it. The forlorn creature who was locked away with her dolls in a silent universe was Nicholas’s daughter. She deserved special protection.

Robert Bracewell’s regular visits to the house were now explained, but questions were raised about Matthew Whetcombe. Did he know that the child was his? Had his revulsion been based on the girl’s afflictions or on her true parentage? Nicholas’s father had called the merchant a deep man. In what sense? Would such a proud merchant accept a cuckoo in the nest? Was he aware of Mary’s pregnancy when he married her? The house in Crock Street was full of phantoms.

Nicholas had gone to such lengths to exorcise the demons from his mind that he could not be certain about dates and times. The specifics of Lucy’s birth did not matter. His own instinct was more reliable, especially as it now had his father’s endorsement. What hurt him most was that Mary had lied to him about the girl. Their daughter was conceived in love even if she had grown up with very little of it around her. Nicholas was sorrowful as he thought about the thin little body and the pinched face, but he also felt a strange joy. He knew the truth at last.

He passed the signpost to Marwood again and his thoughts turned once more to the company. With all its problems and pressures, life with Westfield’s Men was far preferable to this. He had a recognised position there and was able to impose some order. Barnstaple was chaos. Nicholas no longer had a place in the community and his feelings about it were ambivalent. Mary had hardly given him an ecstatic welcome and his own father had treated him like an intruder. Instead of being in control, he was being swept along by events.

Nicholas had to affirm his purpose. Action was needed. His immediate priority was to find the first will. Gideon Livermore was the architect of the villainy but his guilt would still have to be proved. Possession of that first will would be a major piece of evidence against him. If it was not in the house, where else could it possibly be?

He was still asking the question as he rode through a patch of woodland. The horse cantered along and its rider let it find its own way along the trail. It proved fatal. The forelegs of the animal suddenly made contact with the stout cord that had been stretched across its path between two trees. Down went the horse in a writhing heap and Nicholas was thrown clear. He knew at once that it was an ambush. After rolling over on the damp ground, he looked for cover and dived swiftly behind the nearest tree. He was just in time. There was a loud twanging noise and something thudded into the trunk only inches away from his face.

He drew his sword to defend himself and leapt to his feet, but his unseen attacker was already spurring his own horse away. Nicholas examined the short steel arrow which was embedded in the tree. It was the bolt from a crossbow.

They had found a new Lamparde.

Barnard Sweete was livid. As he paced the room, his coolness and poise were cracking audibly around the edges.

‘You should have consulted me first, Gideon!’

‘And given you the chance to stop me?’

‘I warned you not to lay hands upon him.’

‘Who are you to give orders?’ said Livermore.

‘They are not orders!’ protested the lawyer. ‘I simply want to stay alive. You cannot attack a man like Nicholas Bracewell. It is one thing to kill off a mere servant hundreds of miles from here but we do not want a corpse like this on our doorstep.’

‘It is not on our doorstep,’ assured the other with a complacent grin. ‘My man will have buried it in the wood by now. Nobody will ever find Nicholas Bracewell or know why he came to Barnstaple.’

‘Questions will be asked.’

‘By whom? Mary? His father?’ He shrugged. ‘We tell them that he has fled the town. He walked out on both of them before now and he has done so again. They will never know the truth. Trust me, Barnard. My way is best.’

‘It incriminates us.’

‘Lamparde has already done that.’

‘Far away in London — not here!’

Gideon Livermore chuckled. ‘You are too squeamish, man. Be grateful to me for having rid us of the problem. I was only taking your advice, after all.’

‘My advice?’

‘You said that I could not have him killed off like a poacher who has been found on my land. But that’s exactly what I have done. I own this town and Nicholas Bracewell has trespassed on it. I merely enforced the law.’

Barnard Sweete came to rest in front of the table. He sat against it and his foot tapped anxiously as he feared repercussions. If Livermore disposed of his enemies so ruthlessly, what would happen to the lawyer if the two of them ever fell out?

‘I still do not like it, Gideon,’ he said.

‘You will learn to live with it.’

‘Think of the risk that you were taking.’

‘I am a merchant,’ said Livermore. ‘Risk is the essence of my business. Every time I send a ship across the sea, I risk its loss. Every time I strike a bargain, I risk a high cost. But these are calculated risks and they have always paid off in the past. Put trust in my merchant’s instinct now. This is the most profitable deal I have ever made.’

Barnard Sweete calmed down. Horrified when told about the ambush in the wood, he was now coming to see its positive advantages. Nicholas Bracewell was a threat to the whole enterprise and had to be removed. This way was dramatic and worrying, but it did eliminate the one last obstacle. When he looked down at his hands, they were white and spotless. He might feel the blood on them but there was no visible sign of it.

Gideon Livermore wanted progress. Having disposed — as he thought — of a major problem, he was impatient to take possession of his prize. He had been down to the wharf to see the Mary again that morning and had watched her for an hour as she lay at anchor in the middle of the River Taw. She dwarfed all the craft around her. Livermore would soon occupy that position in Barnstaple. In every sense, his tonnage would be the heaviest in north Devon and all would make way for him for fear of being caught in his wash.

He was still preening himself when a knock on the door brought an anxious clerk into the room. When he told them who had arrived at the chambers, both men blanched. Barnard Sweete recovered first. He told his clerk to send in the visitor after two minutes. Alone once more with Gideon Livermore, he treated him to a burst of vituperation. The merchant had boasted of the death of Nicholas Bracewell yet that same man was now calling on the lawyer. Another of the merchant’s schemes had miscarried.

After a bitter exchange with his colleague, Sweete showed him into an adjoining room and left the door slightly ajar so that the latter could overhear everything. The lawyer took a deep breath to compose himself before sitting behind his desk. Nicholas Bracewell was conducted in. Brief introductions were made then the clerk withdrew again.

‘Pray take a seat, sir,’ invited the lawyer.

‘I will not be staying,’ said Nicholas. ‘Why did you wish to see me?’

‘On a matter of mutual concern.’ He attempted a smile. ‘It is a great pleasure to meet another member of the Bracewell family. I acted for your brother, Peter, and I know your father well.’

‘I have not long returned from him.’

Nicholas was standing defiantly in front of the table. His jerkin was scuffed and there were traces of mud on his face but he was plainly unhurt. Equally plainly, he was in no mood for polite conversation. The lawyer plunged straight into business.

‘I believe that you may have been misled, sir.’

‘In what way?’

‘Last evening,’ said Sweete, ‘you were seen leaving the Whetcombe house in Crock Street, though my informant was not quite sure how you gained entry.’

‘You need a more vigilant informant. But warn him that he will get more than a crack on the head if I chance to meet up with him again.’

The lawyer swallowed hard. ‘Evidently, you spoke with Mistress Whetcombe,’ he said. ‘She may have raised the question of her husband’s will. It may appear uncharitable to her on the surface but there is much comfort for her between the lines.’ After pausing for a response that did not come, he went on. ‘I am also in a position to offer certain emendations.’

‘You are empowered to change the will?’

‘By no means, sir,’ said Sweete fussily. ‘It has been signed and witnessed, so its terms must hold. But a number of concessions can still be made.’

‘How?’

‘By deed of gift.’

‘You have lost me, Mr Sweete.’

‘I am not quite sure how much you know of the will.’

‘Enough to distrust you.’

The lawyer stiffened. ‘Do you question my integrity?’

‘I do not believe there is any to question.’

‘Really, sir!’

‘You mention deeds of gift.’

‘We are a respected firm of lawyers, Master Bracewell. I will not have you coming here to insult me like this. Do you not understand? I am trying to help you here.’

‘How do I benefit from the will?’

‘We may put your mind at rest.’

‘About what?’

‘Matthew Whetcombe’s widow.’

‘Nobody could do that,’ murmured Nicholas. ‘Speak your mind, Mr Sweete. I am needed elsewhere.’

The lawyer felt intimidated by the solid presence and the uncompromising manner. He stood up to give himself more authority, but Nicholas was still an imposing visitor.

Sweete became glib. ‘The main beneficiary of the will is Gideon Livermore, a name that is not unknown to you, I suspect. He is a generous man and wishes to modify the apparent harshness of the will by ceding certain items to the widow by deed of gift. This will be a personal matter between them and separate from the execution of the will itself. The gifts are lavish.’

‘Good,’ said Nicholas. ‘Mary Whetcombe will accept all of her husband’s properties, all of his capital and the ship that bears her name.’

‘Leave off this folly, sir.’

‘Then leave off yours. These are no deeds of gift. They are trifles to soften the blow. They are a device to entrap a helpless woman. Gideon Livermore will give nothing away that he does not expect to reclaim when he forces himself on this lady in marriage.’

Barnard Sweete resorted to a string of protests but Nicholas quelled them with a raised hand. Seeing the strategy that was being used, he cut straight through it.

‘There was an earlier will,’ he said.

‘Now invalid.’

‘With the estate more honestly distributed.’

‘Its terms were that of the later document.’

‘Then why draw it up?’

‘Because it contained some minor alterations.’

‘Yes,’ said Nicholas, ‘the crossing out of Mary Whetcombe’s name and the insertion of that of Gideon Livermore. Because of a minor alteration, a grieving widow faces complete ruin.’

‘Only if she remains stubborn.’

‘The first will left everything to her.’

‘I dispute that and so will the other witnesses. Your father among them.’ He saw Nicholas wince and pressed home his advantage. ‘I note that Robert Bracewell was unable to help. Your visit to his cottage was a waste of time. Even if he had been ready to lie on behalf of Mary Whetcombe, it would have been no use. What is the word of a drunken and disgraced old man against that of three respectable figures in the community? You have no case, sir.’

‘But I do. It is supported by the first will.’

‘Show me the document.’

‘I do not have it as yet,’ said Nicholas, deciding to bluff. ‘But I know where to find it.’

Barnard Sweete whitened. When Nicholas headed for the door, the lawyer rushed to intercept him. He gabbled his offer once again and insisted that the deeds of gift would take all the sting out of the nuncupative will.

‘Gideon Livermore is a most generous man,’ he insisted.

‘I know,’ said Nicholas, taking out the crossbow bolt from inside his jerkin and thrusting it into the lawyer’s hand. ‘He sent me this. By deed of gift.’

Lucy Whetcombe did not need to keep her dolls hidden away in Susan Deakin’s room any more. Her mother encouraged her to bring them out and play with them. The girl sat on the floor of the fore-chamber and unwrapped the binding in which they were kept. Her mother watched her with wan affection. Mary Whetcombe had been stunned when Nicholas Bracewell had come into the house unannounced, and she was still dazed by it all, but his visit had one important result. It unlocked her feelings for Lucy. Since her husband’s death, she had been unable to give the girl the love and reassurance that she so desperately needed.

The news of Susan Deakin’s murder was a devastating blow and Mary did not know how to cope with it. Matthew Whetcombe had died peacefully in his bed with his family close to him, but the servant had been struck down miles away from home while she was doing no more than summoning help for a beleaguered widow. Mary looked down at her daughter and sighed. The girl’s handicap kept her in a childlike state. Susan had not been much older, but she was infinitely more worldly and mature. She had been the real mother to Lucy. It was a role that Mary now had to take on again herself.

Lucy found the little replica of her father and tucked it out of sight beneath the material. He no longer had any place in her game. Mary saw her opportunity. Kneeling beside the child, she picked up the doll that had Susan’s plain features dropped onto it by a paintbrush. Lucy tried at first to stop her and clutched at the image of her friend, but Mary was firm. Gently detaching her daughter’s hand, she placed the doll beneath the cloth. Lucy gazed up at her and understanding slowly filled her eyes with tears. Her beloved friend would never come back. Mary took the girl in her arms and they wept a long requiem for Susan Deakin. They were still entwined when Nicholas Bracewell was shown in by the maidservant.

Mary got up and the girl rallied slightly. Nicholas soon realised the cause of their distress. He hugged the girl and let her tears soak into his shoulder, then he comforted Mary. For those few minutes, he felt as if he were part of a little family, and it reinforced his conviction that Lucy was his daughter. But he said nothing on the subject. That discussion needed to take place in a very different atmosphere. The rescue of Mary Whetcombe from the designs of Gideon Livermore was the main objective now, and that could only be achieved with a legal document.

‘Did you see your father?’ she asked.

‘Yes, Mary. I fear that it was a mistake.’

‘Was he not able to help?’

‘Able, perhaps. But very unwilling.’

‘Why?’

Even as she asked the question, Mary could supply the answer. The past was too great an encumbrance for father and son. There was so much accumulated bitterness between them that it was impossible for them to communicate with each other. Mary herself was hopelessly bound up in those distant events, and they had left her with her own share of acrimony.

‘So you learnt nothing from your father?’ she said.

‘No,’ he confessed, ‘but the visit yielded further proof of Livermore’s villainy.’

‘In what way?’

‘He set an ambush for me.’

Mary gasped in alarm. ‘You were attacked?’

‘Without success. Some hireling with a crossbow.’

‘Nick!’

She put an involuntary hand on his arm and her love was rekindled for an instant. The moment soon passed. He was risking his life to help her and she was eternally grateful, but that did not obliterate the memory of the pain he had once inflicted on her. Nicholas was trying to extricate her from a situation for which he was to some degree indirectly responsible. Mary withdrew her hand but listened attentively as he gave her details of the ambush in the wood.

‘I have frightened them, Mary,’ he said. ‘If Livermore had nothing to hide, he would not need to attack me. They will be even more unsettled now.’

‘Why?’

‘I told the lawyer that I know where to find the will.’

‘And do you?’

‘Not yet, but it is vital that they believe me. The more I can draw them into the open, the more chance I have of catching them out.’

‘Be careful, Nick. They are dangerous men.’

‘Dangerous and corrupt. That is why I must stop them.’

‘Not if it costs you your life.’

Her involuntary hand again brushed his arm. Lucy was looking up at him with a hopeful affection. Nicholas could not let the two of them down now. He turned to Mary.

‘Where did Matthew deal with his business affairs?’

‘In the counting-house.’

‘May I see it?’

‘They have already searched the room.’

‘A fresh pair of eyes may see something that was missed.’

‘Barnard Sweete was most thorough.’

‘I have to start somewhere — and immediately.’

Mary was pessimistic. ‘Follow me.’

She took him to the counting-house and showed him the table at which her husband worked. Satchels of documents and trading agreements lay everywhere and more were stuffed away into chests and drawers. It would take an age to sort through them all, and Nicholas did not have unlimited time. He had deliberately offered a lure to Barnard Sweete by telling him that he knew the whereabouts of the first will. That threat would force Livermore’s hand. Nicholas had to be ready for him but his position would be immensely strengthened if he really did locate the document.

When Mary left him, he sifted quickly through the papers on the table then opened one of the drawers to take out a sheaf of correspondence. Though he was searching for a will, he paused for a moment to take a look into the life of the man who had taken his appointed place at the altar. Matthew Whetcombe was not just a thriving merchant. He commanded enormous respect. The letters were from local and county dignitaries, all thanking him for benefactions and all praising his character for its goodness. Here was a very different portrait of his rival, and Nicholas was chastened.

He chided himself for prying and stopped at once. He was about to put away the correspondence when he noticed a letter from Gideon Livermore. Brief and explicit, it thanked Matthew Whetcombe for a dinner that he had given at Crock Street. Nicholas was not interested in the contents of the missive. He was intrigued by the hand of the man who wrote it. Inside his jerkin was the letter that he had found on Lamparde in the derelict warehouse. It had shown its value already, for it had convinced the authorities in Bristol that Lamparde was indeed a hired assassin and that Nicholas had killed him in self-defence. The letter had double value. The writing was identical with that in the other missive. The pen that was thanking a friend for a dinner could also set murder in motion. Here was firm evidence of Livermore’s guilt.

Putting both letters away, Nicholas sat back and looked around the counting-house. It was the centre of Matthew Whetcombe’s commercial empire. It positively exuded power and significance. If Nicholas had remained a merchant, he would have owned such a place with such a feel to it. This was the world on which he had turned his back, and it caused him a pang of regret. There was safety here and meaning. At the same time, however, there was a narrowing of the mind and the spirit. Nicholas did not want his life to be measured in piles of trading agreements and letters of commendation. To own such a house and to share it with a wife like Mary was a seductive notion, but he decided that he was better off as a mere lodger with Anne Hendrik.

As his eye roved the walls, it fell on a painting that hung in a gilt frame. Every time Matthew Whetcombe looked up from his work, he would have seen and drawn strength from it. The artist had skill. His brush had even caught the shifting colours of the River Taw. A seaman himself, Nicholas admired craft of all sizes, but the sight of the Mary, ploughing her way through the water with full sail, was quite inspiring. The merchant’s pride was understandable but his priorities shocked Nicholas. The painting of the ship was hung in a far more prominent position than the portrait of the woman after whom it was named.

He continued his search with renewed vigour. An hour or more slipped by before an anxious Mary returned.

‘They are still watching the house,’ she said. ‘I think that they are biding their time until you come out.’

‘They will not attack me in the street,’ he said. ‘I will be safe once I get back to the Dolphin.’

‘You would be safer still if you stayed here.’

‘Here?’

‘Lucy and I would feel safer as well.’

Nicholas was grateful for the offer. He was quietly thrilled at the idea of spending a night under the same roof as a woman who might have been his wife and a girl who might be his child. He was also glad to be able to offer the two of them a more immediate safeguard. Nicholas crossed to the window and looked down at the two men who kept the house under surveillance. She stood beside him.

‘The enemies are not only outside the house, Mary.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘You have one inside as well.’

‘Mr Calmady?’

‘He is Livermore’s creature, certainly, but there is another foe to beware. One of your servants.’

‘That is not possible!’ she protested.

‘Then how did they know that Susan Deakin had taken a horse and ridden to London? Someone has been spying on you. He or she is being paid to tell Livermore and Sweete exactly what is going on inside this house.’

‘One of our own servants?’ Mary was shaken.

‘Who chose them?’

‘My husband.’

‘Then their first loyalty was to him.’

‘But I treated them well and earned their respect.’

‘Respect is not enough,’ said Nicholas. ‘If someone fears that he will lose his place here, he may be only too ready to betray you to a new master.’

‘Who could it be?’ said Mary, looking around in alarm. ‘I have trusted them all. Who could it be?’

‘We will find out in time. My guess is that Livermore may have planted someone here a long time ago to keep him abreast of everything that happened. He was able to watch your husband die and choose his moment to move in.’ He drew her away from the window. ‘Say nothing at this stage and do not show any suspicion. We will use spy against master.’

‘How?’

‘You will see.’

Mary nodded. ‘I will have a bed made up for you.’

‘Thank you. I appreciate the invitation.’

‘It is only to ensure your safety.’

‘I did not think it was for any other reason.’

She gave him a pale smile then went quickly out.

Lawrence Firethorn came out into the yard of the Jolly Sailor and took his horse from the ostler. After a highly productive stay, Westfield’s Men would now ride on to Bath, where they were due to give two performances at the home of Sir Roger Hordley, younger brother of their patron. They had not just distinguished themselves on stage. With the assistance of Owen Elias, their leader had brought off the signal feat of capturing Israel Gunby, a highwayman whose reputation stretched from Bristol to London. Money stolen from the company at High Wycombe was now restored. A substantial reward for the arrest of Gunby was also in Firethorn’s capcase. What pleased the actor most, however, was not the way that he had outwitted the two confederates but the fact that it had been immortalised in song. ‘The Ballad of Israel Gunby’ was being hawked all around the city. Firethorn could sing it in his sleep.

The company was happy. Bath was a guaranteed welcome. Harder times might lie on the open road ahead, but they looked no farther than the next couple of days. As they mounted their horses or climbed up onto the waggon, they were brimming with contentment. Even George Dart was smiling. At the performance of Hector of Troy on the previous afternoon, the makeshift book holder had survived without any real disasters. Firethorn had actually paid him a compliment. Dart was overjoyed. He was liked.

Last in the saddle were Barnaby Gill and Edmund Hoode. Gill had personal reasons for wanting to quit the city of Bristol, but he had shaken off the effects of the assault by Lamparde, and his old brio had returned on stage. Edmund Hoode was so thoroughly pleased with himself that he made Firethorn stare at him in alarm. The last time the resident playwright had looked that happy was when he was in love.

‘Who is she, Edmund?’ said Firethorn.

‘Clio.’

‘A pretty name for a tavern wench. Which one was she? The drab with the filthy hair or that great, fat creature with the cast in her eye?’

‘Do not try to drag me down to your level, Lawrence.’

‘Ah, I see. You set your sights higher.’

‘On the very pinnacle.’

‘Then this Clio is some juicy whore in red taffeta.’

‘She is the Muse of History,’ said Hoode with dignity. ‘And she has inspired me in my history of Calais.’

‘Your play?’

‘Finished at last!’

‘God bless you, Edmund!’

‘Save your kisses for Clio.’

‘Kisses, embraces, pizzle and all, if she wishes,’ said the delighted Firethorn. ‘This deserves a celebration, man. When may we play the piece?’

‘As soon as you have read and approved it. Then it is but a question of hiring some tidy scrivener to copy out the sides and we may put The Merchant of Calais into rehearsal.’

‘This news gladdens my heart, Edmund.’

‘I never thought to complete it.’

‘Left to yourself, you’d still be playing with the baubles of your mistress in London. Women are wonderful creatures but the finest plays in creation may be crushed to powder between the millstones of their thighs. Think on that, Edmund. Write first and take your pleasure afterwards.’

‘I have learnt that lesson,’ said Hoode with a laugh. ‘I never thought I’d be grateful to a husband who caught me in bed with his wife.’

Firethorn was tactful. ‘No, dear heart. I have cause to thank that fine fellow as well. He gave me both playwright and play.’

‘Nick Bracewell was my guide.’

‘As always, when we need him.’

‘The Merchant of Calais owes much to Nick.’

‘We’ll give him a rare welcome when he returns.’

‘Where is he now, do you think?’

‘Penning a drama of his own, Edmund.’

‘Nick, a playwright? What is the piece called?’

‘The Merchant of Barnstaple.’

After several futile hours in the counting-house, Nicholas Bracewell widened his search to other parts of the building, but the will could not be found. He was still opening cupboards and peering into nooks and crannies when light faded. With the aid of a candle, he continued to look for secret panels and hidden cavities in every room. It was almost midnight when he finally abandoned his search. The rest of the house had already retired and Nicholas made his way wearily to his own bedchamber. Removing his jerkin, he lay on the bed with his hands behind his head. Convinced that the will was in the house somewhere, he racked his brain to work out where Matthew Whetcombe could possibly have put it.

Fatigue almost claimed him and he struggled to his feet to undress properly. It was then that he heard the banging on the front door below. He ignored it at first but it continued unabated. Nicholas heard someone descend the stair and unbolt the door. The next moment, feet came scampering up towards him and a fist banged on his own door. Nicholas opened it to reveal a panting servant in night attire.

‘You have a visitor,’ said the man.

‘At this hour?’

‘He waits below and is in some need.’

‘Who is it?’

‘Your father.’

Nicholas told him to calm the rest of the household then he went quickly downstairs with a candle to guide him. Robert Bracewell waited in the dark hallway, leaning against a wall for support. As the flame illumined the old man’s face, Nicholas saw the blood and the bruises. He reached out to support his father and helped him into the nearest room, closing the door behind them and lowering his visitor into a chair. He held the candle closer to examine the injuries more closely.

‘Who did this to you?’ he said.

‘Who do you think?’

‘Gideon Livermore?’

‘Two of his men came to see me this evening,’ said his father. ‘They asked me what I had said to you earlier today. When I told them it was none of their business, they set about me. This was a gentle warning, they said. If I even spoke to you again, they would deal more harshly with me.’

‘Stay here,’ said Nicholas.

He went to the kitchen to fetch a cloth and water. He then bathed his father’s face, wiping away most of the dried blood and exposing the bruises on temples and jaw. One eye was black and shining. Robert Bracewell’s faded apparel had been torn in the scuffle. Nicholas was touched. His father had shown bravery in defying the threat of his assailants. He had ridden through the night to report the attack and to give his son a weapon with which to strike back.

‘I was a witness to Matthew Whetcombe’s first will,’ he said. ‘It left everything to his wife.’

‘Are you quite sure?’

‘I’ve not made all this effort in order to tell lies.’

‘Was Livermore named in the will?’

‘Only as a minor beneficiary.’

‘The ship was left to Mary?’

‘Ship, house and the bulk of his estate.’

‘Would you swear to that in court, Father?’

‘If they let me live long enough to do so.’

On impulse, Nicholas hugged him with gratitude, but the old man pushed him away. Exhausted as he was, Robert Bracewell still had enough strength to shake with anger.

‘Keep away!’ he snarled. ‘This is all your doing!’

‘I am only trying to help.’

‘And what has your help brought me? The sight of a son I had hoped was dead and a fearsome beating. I did not want either. Go away and leave me alone.’

‘But I can protect you from Livermore.’

Pride flared. ‘I can look after myself.’

‘Of course, of course. Thank you for coming.’

‘I am not here for your benefit, Nick. I came only to help Mary — and to hit back at Gideon Livermore. No man can tell me what I can and cannot say. They may have driven me out of Barnstaple but I am still the master of my house.’

‘You must stay the night here,’ said Nicholas.

‘Never!’

‘But you are in no condition to travel.’

‘If I can ride all the way here, I can make the return journey just as well.’ He got to his feet. ‘It is an effort for me to stay under this roof. Matthew Whetcombe once drove me out of this house. Its doors are barred against me. I would sooner sleep in the street than lay my head here.’

‘Father — wait!’

‘Stand aside.’

‘One word before you go. That first will …’

‘I have vouched for its contents.’

‘The document itself would be stronger testimony.’

‘Then find it. Matthew surely held on to a copy.’

‘I have searched everywhere in vain.’

‘You have looked in the wrong places.’

‘Which is the right one?’

‘The heart of Matthew Whetcombe.’

‘I do not follow.’

‘He was a merchant,’ said the old man. ‘He thought and felt like a merchant. Put yourself in his position and ask where you would hide a precious document.’ He tried to move to the door. ‘Now, out of my way.’

‘Let me come with you.’

‘No!’

‘But there may be danger.’

‘It is an old acquaintance and I have learnt to face it alone. I would never turn to you. My elder son is no longer alive. He died at sea. You are a poor counterfeit who merely bears his name.’ He walked past Nicholas. ‘I have done my duty to this house and I am free to go.’

‘All that way in the dead of night?’

‘I am needed there.’

‘That is no way for a man to live.’

‘It is my home.’

‘You and that old servant-’

‘Be silent!’

Robert Bracewell’s eyes blazed in the candlelight. Years of hatred and resentment on both sides were suddenly ignited. Father and son faced each other across a chasm of lost kinship and love. There was no hope of reconciliation. They had chosen an appropriate venue for the last time they were ever to see each other. Lying upstairs in the fore-chamber was the woman who had once come between them, and Robert Bracewell could never forgive her for that. But for her, he felt, his son would have married Katherine Hurrell and everything would have worked out much more satisfactorily. Nicholas took a different view of the Hurrell family. They had turned a father whom he respected into a man he loathed.

‘Let me show you out,’ said Nicholas.

‘I know my own way!’

‘We are very grateful to you for coming.’

The old man looked upwards. ‘I did it for others in this house. They deserved help. You do not.’

He opened the door and lurched out into the hallway. Nicholas went after him with the candle, but his father was already lifting the latch on the front door. Without a backward glance, Robert Bracewell let himself out into the street and tottered away. Nicholas had the feeling that something he had said inflicted a more serious wound on the old man than any collected in the attack.

After bolting the front door, Nicholas went up to the counting-house. He was fully awake now and ready to resume the search for the will. His father had given him a clue that had to be followed up at once, and it took Nicholas back to the chair in which Matthew Whetcombe had transacted his business. Nicholas gazed around the room once more and wondered where he would hide something of great value. Robert Bracewell told him to look into the heart of the merchant, but the cold and unyielding Matthew Whetcombe had never seemed to possess one. He did not love the wife and child with whom he shared his life. He did not love his family and friends with anything approaching real passion. Could anybody or anything make its way into the heart of such a man?

Nicholas doubted it until his gaze drifted across to the painting. The Mary was the merchant’s true pride and joy. It was the summit of his achievement, the hallmark of its excellence. The Mary was a symbol of all that Matthew Whetcombe valued most in life. Nicholas got to his feet in excitement. His first thought was that the merchant had kept the document hidden away in a cabin aboard the ship, but that would expose it to all kinds of hazards. Even Matthew Whetcombe would not take such a risk as that. The Mary would guard his secret but not when she was afloat. He wanted a safer mooring for his will. It hung on the wall.

Lifting the painting off its hook, Nicholas laid it gently on the table with its face downwards. Strips of thin wood had been nailed across the back of the frame to hold the canvas in place. Additional laths had been tacked into position at the bottom of the frame and he soon saw why. Tucked neatly inside the wooden pouch was a parchment. As he began to tease it out with his fingers, Nicholas heard the door behind him open. Mary Whetcombe was standing there in her nightdress with a lighted candle in her hand.

‘What are you doing in here, Nick?’ she asked.

‘Searching for your salvation.’

‘I heard noises. Someone banging at the door.’

‘All will be explained in a moment.’

Nicholas tugged harder and the document came out of its hiding place. Unfolding it quickly, he held it up to the light before breaking into a quiet laugh of triumph. As his father had told him, the legitimate will of Matthew Whetcombe was a far cry from its putative successor. He passed it to Mary, who put her candle aside so that she could hold the document with both hands. She read it with gathering excitement. When she realised its full import, she let out a cry of utter relief and all but fainted. Nicholas steadied her and helped her into a chair.

‘How on earth did you find it?’ she asked.

‘With great patience.’

‘I cannot thank you enough. This changes everything.’

‘Not necessarily.’

‘But this represents Matthew’s true wishes.’

‘That may well be, Mary,’ he said, ‘but we would have to prove that in court. The second will would make this invalid if it were to be upheld. What we have is absolute proof that Gideon Livermore and Barnard Sweete lied to us. This will bears no resemblance at all to the nuncupative version. We must use it wisely to expose them.’

‘How do we do that?’

‘I will show you.’

Early that morning, Nicholas Bracewell rowed out to the Mary. Its cargo had now been unloaded and it was awaiting a refit before embarking on another long voyage. A lone sailor had been left on board to keep watch. He was very suspicious when Nicholas tied up his boat and clambered aboard, but the sailor’s manner became deferential when his visitor showed him written proof that he had come on behalf of Matthew Whetcombe. Nicholas had also brought keys to the private cabin, which was reserved for the owner of the vessel.

Envy fluttered as he stood on deck and took a closer look at the Mary. It was very like the ship in which he had served his apprenticeship, though that had been smaller and wholly confined to legitimate trade. It also reminded him of the Golden Hind on which he had sailed with Drake. That had been somewhat bigger but shared many of the features of the Mary. Both had two sheathings on the hull to strengthen it. They were built in the French style, well fitted out and furnished with good masts, tackle and double sails.

Like the Golden Hind, this vessel also had top-gallant sails for the main and fore masts, an unusual addition to the standard rig in a middling craft but one that gave them vital extra speed. The Mary had eighteen cast pieces, most of them demi-culverins, long-range nine-pound cannon. Nicholas suspected that the crew would also have arquebuses, calivers, pistols and fire-bombs to support their heavy guns, as well as an array of pikes, swords, bows and arrows. Sir Francis Drake would have been proud to command the Mary. She was a floating arsenal and ideal for privateering.

He took direction from the sailor then went below to find the cabin. When he let himself in, he found it small but well appointed. It had a low berth against the wall, a table and chair secured to the floor and some cupboards for storage. A lantern swung gently overhead. Nicholas felt another surge of envy. Like the merchant, he, too, would have kept a private cabin aboard and sailed in the Mary whenever he could. A love of the sea infused them both.

A porthole looked out on the river and showed him the looming shadow of the Long Bridge. The plash of oars made him look in the other direction and he saw exactly what he had hoped. Gideon Livermore was being rowed out towards the ship by a brawny figure. He had stayed overnight in the town and been roused early by the servant whom he paid to keep an eye on activities in the Whetcombe household. Nicholas had told Mary to let it be known that they had found out that the document they sought was on board the Mary. The news spread quickly through the house and reached its intended destination. Livermore was closing in for the kill.

Nicholas used one of the keys he had brought to unlock a cupboard and take out a sheaf of papers. He waited until he heard the two men come aboard then he pretended to study the papers with great interest. It was not long before the door was flung open. Gideon Livermore regarded him with open hostility. His companion was a thickset man with a broken nose. Nicholas suspected that the latter might well have fired the crossbow bolt at him.

‘Where is it?’ demanded Livermore.

‘What?’

‘The will.’

‘You have it, sir. It is lodged with the lawyer.’

‘I speak of the first will. There in your hand.’

‘This is no longer valid.’

‘I wish to see it.’

‘No,’ said Nicholas, thrusting the papers inside his jerkin. ‘You merely wish to destroy it.’

Gideon Livermore wasted no more time. He stood aside and his companion came charging in with a raised club in his hand. His brute strength was no match for the other’s agility. As the man rushed at him, Nicholas dodged the blow, caught the thick wrist and swung the man against the oak bulwark with a terrifying thud. He collapsed in a heap on the floor and would take no further part in the proceedings.

Nicholas pulled Livermore into the cabin.

‘I have the message you sent to Adam Lamparde,’ he said. ‘Murder a girl, you told him. He obeyed. Now he lies dead himself. Your letter will send you to the gallows.’

Gideon Livermore went puce with fury. He would not let this intruder ruin all his well-laid plans. A knife came out from his belt and he jabbed it at Nicholas. The book holder moved swiftly but the blade sliced open his hand and blood spurted. He closed with Livermore and they grappled in the confined space, banging against the walls and tripping over the inert body on the floor.

Hearing the commotion, the watch on deck came running down to the cabin, but Nicholas ordered him to stand clear. The sailor would be a valuable witness to a fight between a crazed merchant and an unarmed man. Livermore was powerful and the thought of what he stood to lose gave him even greater energy. Nicholas was finding him hard to master. He needed more room to manoeuvre. Twisting Livermore off balance, he released his hold and pushed. The merchant stumbled back and gave Nicholas a precious moment to rush back up on deck.

Gideon Livermore came panting after him. They were in view of the quay now and there were other witnesses on the bridge, but that did not stop the merchant. All his plans could founder on this one man. As long as Nicholas Bracewell was alive, Livermore would never inherit the estate and seize Mary Whetcombe as an agreeable part of the booty. Most of all, he would never take over the Mary herself. That was his dream. Gideon Livermore was a pirate trying to lay hold of a pirate ship. It was a fitting place in which to decide his fate.

Open space gave Nicholas more options and his own dagger was now out. The two men circled each other warily. Nicholas was bleeding profusely but he did not dare to look down at the flesh wound on his hand. Livermore could not be underestimated. Though he paid others to kill for him, he was more than capable of doing his own work. The merchant feinted then lunged but Nicholas evaded him. A second attack forced the book holder back and he fell over some coiled rope that lay on the deck. Livermore pounced and his weight took the breath out of his adversary. Nicholas had a grip on the man’s wrist but his own weapon had been knocked away.

They grappled, they rolled, they punched and gouged. Livermore even tried to bite him. With sudden power, Nicholas threw him off and got to his feet, but Livermore was after him at once. The advantage had swung back to the merchant now and he was taunting his prey, forcing him back towards the gunwale. Nicholas ran out of space. He was cornered.

‘Give me the will,’ demanded Livermore.

‘The Mary will never be yours.’

‘Give me the will!’

Nicholas patted his jerkin. ‘Come and take it.’

The merchant needed no more invitation. Aiming the point of his blade at Nicholas’s face, he charged forward. The book holder was too fast for him. He ducked, grabbed then heaved upwards with all his might, and the body of Gideon Livermore went over the side and into the river. The people on the bridge were so impressed that they gave a cheer. Other boats were now being rowed out from the quay.

Nicholas leant over the side of the gunwale as the merchant surfaced. The man coughed and spluttered. Though he had learnt to swim in the river, he had never done so in heavy clothing when he was exhausted from a fight. Livermore began to flail wildly and call out for help. He was drowning. Nicholas peeled off his jerkin and kicked off his shoes before diving over the side of the ship. He hit the water cleanly and explored its murky depths for a few seconds before coming up again. He was just in time to see Livermore starting to sink. Grabbing the man from behind, he lay on his back and swam towards the ship with Livermore’s head supported above the water.

The sailor on watch was waiting to help them aboard, and the other rowing boats were closing in. Spectators on the bridge and quay were applauding Nicholas’s heroism in saving the drowning man. But Gideon Livermore himself had second thoughts. He would never inherit the estate and marry the woman he coveted. He would never own the Mary. All that awaited him was a humiliating trial and a long rope. He would never submit to that.

When Nicholas finally pulled him to the side of the ship, Livermore waited for his moment and then broke clear to plunge headfirst again into the dark water. Nicholas went after him and a few other men from the boats jumped in to assist, but they could not find the merchant anywhere. It was several minutes before the River Taw yielded up its sacrificial victim. When Gideon Livermore bobbed to the surface with his face still submerged, he was way beyond any processes of law.

In one transaction, many debts had been paid off.

It was a windy afternoon, but that did not deter him. He took a long, meandering, valedictory walk through the town to reacquaint himself with a youth that now seemed a century away. He went down streets where he had once played and across a field where he and his brother had first learnt to ride a horse. He left flowers on his mother’s grave at the nearby churchyard then walked slowly back towards his old family house in Boutport Street. It looked much as it had done when his parents raised their children in the dwelling. Compared to the cottage where his father now lived, it was a small mansion. A deep sorrow made him turn away.

Nicholas Bracewell went through the gate and left the town, feeling an immediate sense of release. Barnstaple had once been his entire world but it now had the whiff of a prison about it. The pleasure of seeing familiar places was offset by the pain of old memories. He walked briskly on in the stiff breeze until he came to a walled garden. Nicholas halted in alarm. His feet had taken him insensibly to the one house in the area which he had vowed he would never visit again. When he tried to turn back, his legs betrayed him again and impelled him forward to the gate. One look up at the half-timbered dwelling brought it all back.

The home of the Hurrell family had once been filled with noise and laughter, but it now seemed curiously empty. The garden was overgrown and there were no signs of life in the house itself. He pushed the gate back on a grinding hinge and went in. Swept by the wind, the thatched roof was parting with a few of its reeds and somewhere in the property a window was banging. Nicholas followed the sound as it led him to the rear of the house. A rectangular lawn was fringed with flowerbeds that were badly neglected. The grass was ankle high. It was in this same garden that Nicholas had been obliged to court Katherine Hurrell. He shuddered as he recalled how he had allowed himself to become betrothed to her to please their respective families.

The noise took his eye upwards. It was a long, low house with eaves that jutted right down over the top of the walls. The open window was in a bedchamber that he identified at once, and the rhythmical banging was a hammer that nailed a spike into his skull. Nicholas was mesmerised. This house and that window had altered the whole course of his life. Many people had suffered as a result, and there were some things for which he could never forgive himself. Katherine Hurrell had recovered from the shock of his departure to marry another man and to leave the area. Mary Parr had not been so fortunate, nor had her daughter.

Nicholas stared up at the window as it flapped away like the wing of a trapped butterfly. He had no wish to see inside that room again. It was a tomb for so many of his hopes and ambitions. The house was sad and uncared for, but it still held its old menace for him. As Nicholas stood there and looked up, the whole building seemed to tense up in readiness, as if it was about to hurl itself at him. He could bear it no more. The Hurrell house had already struck him down once. Before it could assault him again, he took to his heels and ran all the way back to Crock Street.

It was time to liberate himself from Barnstaple.

‘When will you leave?’ asked Mary Whetcombe.

‘Tomorrow at dawn.’

‘So soon?’

‘The company is waiting for me to join them.’

‘Can nothing detain you here?’

‘No, Mary. I fear not.’

They were in the hall of the house, which she had now rightfully inherited from her husband. Lucy was playing with her dolls at the table. Nicholas had done all that he had come to do. Susan Deakin’s death had been avenged and Mary Whetcombe had been rescued from her plight. Gideon Livermore was dead and Barnard Sweete — along with other accomplices — was under lock and key. The spy in the Whetcombe household had been revealed and dismissed. A question still hovered over Arthur Calmady, and his sermons were now tentative and apologetic. His visits to Crock Street had been abruptly terminated. Nicholas wore heavy bandaging on his wounded hand, but it would not prevent him from taking ship to Bristol.

Mary Whetcombe was hampering his departure. Reluctant to see him at first, she now wished to keep him in Barnstaple, and Lucy added a smile to hold him there. When the three of them were alone together, there was happiness in the house for the first time. Nicholas was only briefly tempted. Some memories had been obliterated but others were overpowering. Robert Bracewell still stalked the streets of Barnstaple.

‘At least I will know why this time,’ said Mary.

‘I could not reach you before I left.’

‘You did not wish to, Nick.’

‘I was too ashamed.’

‘But I loved you.’

‘It was not enough. I could not saddle you with that burden. It would have been unfair to you. I had to get away from him. You must understand that.’

‘What did your father do?’

It was a question she had a right to ask and he could not hold out on her any longer. Mary Whetcombe had suffered the consequences of a secret he dared not tell her, and she deserved to know the truth. At the same time, he wanted confirmation that Lucy was his daughter. Mary threw a glance at the girl and looked back at him. In the household of a merchant, his widow was offering a bargain before a mute witness. If Nicholas told her about the last night they had spent together, she would confide in him.

‘I wanted you, Mary,’ he said. ‘I wanted you more than anything in the world, but my father chose Katherine Hurrell for me. It was all arranged with her family. The dowry was large and my father needed a share of it to steady his own business. You were my choice but your dowry was smaller and your father was set on a marriage into the Whetcombe family. It was an impossible situation.’

‘There was only one way to break out of it.’

‘I tried hard to persuade my father.’

‘I know,’ she recalled. ‘You went home that night to make a final plea to him. If it failed, we were to run away sooner than be parted. But you never came back for me.’ Her eyes accused him. ‘What happened when you went home?’

‘I did not go home, Mary.’

‘Then where did you go?’

‘To Katherine Hurrell’s house.’

‘But why?’ she said, indignantly. ‘You had no cause.’

‘We were betrothed. She had a right to be told. I loved you but I could not walk away from Katherine without at least a word of explanation.’

‘You gave me no word of explanation.’

‘There was no time.’

‘You found time enough for Katherine Hurrell!’

‘Mary, please — listen!’ Nicholas tried to remain calm. ‘This is difficult enough for me. Be patient.’

‘All right. So you went to her …’

‘Yes.’

‘And stayed the night there, is that what I am to hear?’

‘No.’

‘Tell me the truth,’ said Mary, trembling with a jealousy that had had many years to build. ‘Tell me, Nick!’

‘Katherine was not at the house,’ he said. ‘Nor was her father. The place was almost empty.’ Nicholas shivered as he relived the memory. ‘I picked my way around to the garden at the rear. The window of Katherine’s bedchamber was at the end. I hoped to attract her attention and draw her out so that we could speak in private. There was no answer to my whistle. I did not wish to throw stones up at her window in case the noise woke anyone else who might be in the house.’

‘So what did you do?’

‘I climbed up the ivy to look into her room.’

‘And?’

‘She was not there.’

‘Well?’ pressed Mary. ‘What, then?’

‘I saw them in bed together.’

‘Who?’

‘Katherine’s mother and …’

‘Go on.’

‘My father,’ said Nicholas. ‘Robert Bracewell. He was making love to Margaret Hurrell.’ Nicholas looked up at her with his bitterness refreshed. ‘That was why I was to marry Katherine — to enable my father the more easily to carry on his adultery with her mother. I was not a son being sent off happily to the altar. I was just a factor in a corrupt bargain. It destroyed me.’ He winced visibly. ‘My mother knew, Mary. That’s what killed her. She knew all the time but had no power to stop him. My mother knew but said nothing. She simply curled up in horror and died.’

‘What did you do when you saw them together?’

‘I ran away,’ he said, simply. ‘All I could think about was getting away from that place and those two people. I looked up to my father. He was a difficult man to love but I had always admired the way he overcame his setbacks. But that night I lost all respect for him and for his values. I wanted nothing to do with Barnstaple and its merchants. My one urge was to take to my heels.’

‘Did you not spare a thought for me?’

‘Of course, Mary. I did not want to drag you into it. After what I had seen, I felt tainted and did not wish to pass on that taint to you. I believed that if I ran away, I might be able to save you.’

‘Save me!’ she said with irony. ‘From what?’

‘From taking on the name of Bracewell. From suffering the same sense of shame. From enduring our disgrace.’ He heaved a sigh. ‘I was young, Mary. I felt such things deeply. I could not ask you to come into such a family.’

‘So what did you think would happen to me?’

‘That you would find someone else and forget me.’

‘Oh, I found somebody else,’ she said. ‘And I was lucky to do so in the circumstances. But I did not forget you. How could I? We were lovers.’

Nicholas glanced down at Lucy then back at Mary.

‘Is she my daughter?’ he asked.

‘No, Nick.’

‘My father said that she was.’

‘He could not have done so.’

‘But he did, Mary. In so many words.’

‘What exactly did he say?’

‘I asked him why he visited your house so often.’

‘And he told you it was to visit his granddaughter.’

‘Yes — Lucy.’

‘No,’ said Mary. ‘Susan Deakin.’

‘The servant girl?’

‘She was our daughter, Nick.’

He was completely dumbfounded. The plain girl with the features that enabled her to pass for a boy had been his daughter. He could not believe it at first and yet he now saw, in his heart, that he must have had a faint glimmer of recognition. Susan Deakin had prompted such a compelling sense of revenge in him, a personal commitment such as a man could never feel for a stranger from a distant household. That was what had driven him on. It was not just the desire to get to Barnstaple to help the woman he thought had sent for him. Nicholas had also been seeking atonement for the murder of his own daughter.

He looked across to Mary for enlightenment.

‘The last night we met,’ she explained, ‘I had been carrying your child for some months.’

‘Why did you not tell me?’

‘I tried, Nick, but I could not find the words. I hoped that your father would relent and that we could marry with his blessing. All would be well then. But you left and I was stranded.’ She bristled like a hunted animal. ‘I had nowhere to go and no chance of hiding my condition for long. What life would I have as an unmarried mother with a bastard child? You had one kind of shame, I would have carried another.’ She shook her head in despair. ‘I did the only thing that was left to me. I turned to Matthew Whetcombe.’

‘You told him the truth?’

‘Yes, Nick. Matthew was a hard man but he knew what he wanted. I was to be his wife on any terms. We struck a bargain and I accepted it gratefully. I was confined and everyone was told that I was visiting friends in Crediton.’ She shuddered. ‘Susan came into the world too soon and almost died. She needed constant attention. Joan Deakin had been my own nurse. She took Susan for her own. That is the name you will find in the church register. Susan Deakin.’

‘Then you got married?’

‘As soon as I was strong enough.’

‘And Lucy?’

‘She came along very quickly.’ A defensive note came in. ‘I had to give Matthew that. He was prepared to let my brat live under his roof but only if he could have children of his own. That was the contract and he enforced it. But Lucy was the first and last.’

‘Why?’

‘There were complications. I could bear no more. My husband could never forgive me for that. He had accepted Susan and all I could give him in return was this wounded little creature here. Matthew felt cheated. Your child was fit and healthy while his was a deaf-mute.’

Nicholas began to comprehend. Lucy had been brought up as the daughter of the house. Susan Deakin — Mary’s child by him — had been reared as a servant girl. The strong bond between the two of them was now explained. They were stepsisters. Mary provided further clarification.

‘When Joan was dying,’ she said, ‘she told Susan the truth. The girl knew that you were her father. That’s why she came to you in London, Nick. We were in trouble and the one person who could help us was you. Susan idolised you. She stole clothing, took the fastest horse and set out to find you. Can you imagine the risks she must have run? She would only have done such a thing to reach her father.’

Nicholas was sobered. He had fled from Barnstaple but others had stayed to bear the burdens that he had left behind. There was no way that his action could be fully justified, but at least he had been given the opportunity to redeem himself. He did not save Mary from marriage to Matthew Whetcombe, but he had fought off another predatory merchant and rescued her inheritance. To reach Barnstaple, he had put his life at risk: to help Mary, he had even forced himself to confront the father whom he loathed.

He looked down at Lucy as she played with her dolls and he leant over to place a gentle kiss on her head. But his real sympathy was reserved for Susan Deakin. His daughter had been relegated to an inferior position all her life. When she was told the name of her real father, she was given dignity and status for the first time. Susan showed the bravery of a true Bracewell in trying to contact him, but she had died before they could even speak. He felt her loss like a stone in his heart. The girl had been the hapless child of a doomed love. His only consolation lay in the fact that he had been able to avenge her death.

Nicholas did not wish to spend another night in the house where she had lived. His daughter’s spirit hovered there to haunt his conscience. He rose from his seat and began to take his leave, but the others reacted with alarm. Lucy clutched at his arm and Mary made a heartfelt plea.

‘Stay here with us, Nick!’

‘I may not do that.’

‘What is to stop you?’

‘There is no place for me in this house.’

‘We are making a place for you,’ she said, putting an arm around Lucy’s shoulders. ‘But for you, we would have been driven out of here. But for you, everything that was rightly ours would have been stripped away from us. You gave it all back to us and have a right to share in our good fortune.’ Lucy nodded eagerly, as if she had heard every word. ‘Make a new life here with us. It is what Susan would have wanted.’

‘Is it what you want, Mary?’

‘I think so.’

‘After all that has happened between us?’

‘That is dead and buried,’ she said. ‘Now that you have explained it to me, I can understand why you behaved as you did. And I forgive you. In a way, I am as much to blame. If I had told you that night that I was carrying a child, you would have acted very differently.’

‘That is true.’

‘Stay here, Nick,’ she said, softly. ‘We were neither of us able to be real parents to poor Susan. You did not even know that she existed and I had to pretend that I did not care for the child. Let us make amends with Lucy. She can be our daughter now. You will be a real father to her.’

The girl nodded again and held up two dolls. Nicholas recognised himself and Mary, side by side in miniature. It was a powerful image and he was deeply touched. His resolve wavered for a second then he shook his head.

‘It is out of the question, Mary,’ he said, with a glance around. ‘I am not able to support you in this fashion.’

‘You would not need to, Nick. We have money enough to keep us in style for the rest of our days.’

‘I could never live off Matthew Whetcombe’s wealth.’

‘Then use it to produce an income of your own. You are from merchant stock. Buy and sell as Matthew did. There is a ship and a crew at your disposal. Would you not like to have control of the Mary?’

It was a great temptation and Nicholas wavered again. To own such a ship would be to fulfil a lifelong ambition, and he could use it to restore some respect in trading circles to the name of Bracewell. Mary Whetcombe was showing true forgiveness in making such a generous offer. Yet he could never accept it. To secure the Mary, he had to take charge of the woman after whom it was named, and she brought a troublesome cargo in her hold. As long as he remained in the house, he would be locked in with too many ghosts.

‘Thank you, Mary,’ he said. ‘You show a kindness and a forbearance that I do not deserve. I love you for that. But I cannot stay here with you and Lucy. It is impossible for me to make a new life in a place with so many old memories. For my own peace of mind, I must get away from Barnstaple.’

‘And from me.’

‘From my father, mainly. Everything that occurred in the past stemmed from him. I find it hard to forgive.’

‘Do not be too harsh on him.’

‘His lust for another woman killed my mother,’ he said. ‘He drove her into her grave. He was so obsessed with his own needs that he tried to marry his son into the Hurrell family to give him a legitimate excuse to call more often at the house. He would never have consented to our betrothal. My father put his own lascivious urges first.’

‘He paid for them in time, Nick.’

‘So did we all.’

‘Do you know what happened to him?’

‘That is evident. He fell from grace.’

‘But do you know how — and when?’

‘I would rather not dwell on it.’

‘But you should,’ she insisted. ‘You cannot judge him until you know the full picture. I had no idea that his relationship with Margaret Hurrell went back for so many years. It did not come to light until after you had fled from Barnstaple. Your father was very discreet. Nobody suspected for a moment that any impropriety had taken place.’

‘Not even Katherine herself?’

‘She was a good match and soon married someone else. They live in Exeter with a large family. They were well clear of Barnstaple when the scandal eventually broke.’

‘And when was that?’

‘Not until a few years ago.’

‘They kept it secret for all that while?’

‘Your father was a clever man,’ she said. ‘He knew how to hide things beneath that bluff manner. And he could be charming when he wanted to be. Matthew liked him enough to do business with him and to invite him here as a friend. They did, after all, have something in common.’

‘Susan?’

‘Nobody told him. Your father guessed for himself. As soon as he saw the girl, he knew that she was yours. He never said anything even when Matthew forbade him to come to the house. He never betrayed us.’ She brushed back a lock of hair. ‘He was very kind to Susan. He loved her and brought her presents. In his own quiet way, he tried to do right by her. Susan was very hurt when he no longer called here.’

‘And when was that?’

‘When the truth about him and Margaret Hurrell finally emerged. They were caught together by her husband. You can imagine the way that the scandal spread. Robert Bracewell and the wife of a man with whom he did business. It was the end of your father. Barnstaple turned its back on him. Matthew refused even to speak to him. The whole community treated him like a leper.’

‘So he had to leave the town?’

‘In complete disgrace.’

Nicholas found a granule of sympathy for his father. He understood what it must have been like to be ostracised by the world in which a man had spent his whole life. Barnstaple was a narrow-minded and inward-looking community. It conferred great respect on its members, but it was merciless with those who forfeited that respect. Robert Bracewell had been hounded out of a town he had honoured. Nicholas’s sympathy was soon crushed beneath his hatred. By pursuing one woman so relentlessly, his father had broken the heart of another. Having sacrificed a wife to his lust, he was even ready to sacrifice his eldest son.

‘What happened to Margaret Hurrell?’ he asked.

‘Her husband divorced her.’

‘So she was cast out into the wilderness as well.’

‘In a sense, Nick.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘She married your father. They lived together.’

Nicholas was stunned. The old woman at the cottage had not been a servant at all. She had been the wife of a successful merchant and had enjoyed all the trappings of that success. But she had also risked them to be with the man for whom she really cared. Margaret Hurrell had loved Robert Bracewell so much that she was even prepared to share his disgrace and his straitened circumstances. Nicholas now realised why his father had been so hurt by the reference to his mean cottage and his old servant. It was an insult.

Mary Whetcombe became philosophical.

‘We have all been punished,’ she said.

‘Punished?’

‘For illicit love. You and I came together outside marriage and we paid the price for it. What we did was wrong, Nick. We were betrothed to other people.’

‘Only in name.’

‘God punished us in the same way that he punished your father and Margaret Hurrell.’

‘There is no comparison,’ he said, hotly.

‘But there is, Nick. Their case is not so very different from our own. They loved where they had no right to love. Yes, you may call it lust but it must have been more than that. Lust would have burnt itself out long ago. What they have has bonded them together for life.’

It was a chastening thought. The stern father who had tried to bully Nicholas into a marriage for commercial reasons had himself taken a second bride solely in the name of love. It was a crowning paradox. Robert Bracewell had betrayed the values of the mercantile community in which he had made his name. Notwithstanding the enormous cost, he was now ending his days with a woman he had loved for so many years.

Here was a salutary lesson for Nicholas. He had to choose a wife by following his heart and not by seeking any pecuniary advantage. Marriage to Mary Whetcombe would open up a whole new world for him, but it was not one that he had earned. Nor could they ever recapture the infatuation of their youth. He was delighted that they were reconciled and moved by her plea but he could not make a commitment to her.

‘Stay with us, Nick,’ she said. ‘We need you.’

‘I have to leave tomorrow.’

‘But we can make a fresh start together. You, me, and Lucy.’ He lowered his head in apology and she understood. ‘There is someone else.’

‘Yes, Mary.’

‘Is she waiting for you?’

‘I hope so.’

There was no more to be said. Nicholas felt that it would be unwise to spend another night in a house that echoed with so many cruel whispers from the past. He would stay at the Dolphin Inn and sail at dawn on the morrow. Mary Whetcombe threw herself impulsively into his arms and he hugged his farewell. Lucy joined in the embrace and they both kissed her warmly. The girl then broke away and rolled back the piece of material in which she kept her dolls. She sensed that she would never see Nicholas again and she wanted him to have an important souvenir. After stroking one of her dolls with great reverence, she handed it over to him.

Nicholas looked down at the flimsy object on his palm.

It was Susan Deakin. His daughter.