His face twisted into a suspicious scowl. “You are remarkably well informed about the contents of my house.”
The woman showed no signs of fear at his expression or his tone. “I should be, Mr Gavenor. For the past eight years, until a week ago last Wednesday, Rose Cottage has been my home.”
CHAPTER 3
As he trudged through the rain, Bear thought about Miss Neatham’s claim. He couldn’t imagine why she should make up such a story. She must know that he could check with Pelman. She did not seem a stupid woman.
His seller told him that the Hall was uninhabitable, but that a local fellow had been keeping an eye on the place and might know of a suitable cottage. He’d sent a letter to Pelman, asking for something close to the Hall. It had never occurred to him he might be turning a woman and her elderly father out of their home.
His instincts and the evidence said she was telling the truth. He found it hard to believe that a woman would want to live so far from the village.
On the other hand, everything was where she said it would be, down to the basket of ointments and potions for medical care in the pantry, to which he had been sent when he proposed tearing up a sheet to bind her ankle so she would be more comfortable. Sure enough, the basket held rolls of fabric, torn into two-inch strips and neatly rolled.
He’d wrapped the ankle and put the basket away, leaving her with a little jar of ointment to dab on her scratches. And that was another question. How did she come to leave the basket behind? If it was, indeed, hers?
He reached the bottom of the first hill and crossed a little bridge before climbing the next hill. In daylight, before the rain set in, the distance had seemed shorter.
Bear and Pelman had probably done Miss Neatham a favour, pushing her into a cottage within easy reach of the village shop and neighbours. He consoled himself with that thought as the rain poured down in sheets and the puddles joined into streams, running down the road and passing him as he descended a long slope toward a cluster of rooftops around a spire.
The village of Kettlesworth occupied a small plateau halfway down the hill, and spilled across the slope below to the river flats, now drenched in rain. The village boasted rows of tidy cottages as well as some shacks barely worthy of the name, and a number of larger buildings. The inn, where he’d eaten lunch today and left his horse, was centrally placed, where the road from the Mersey met four local roads, one of which led to the road to Chester.
Three other large buildings stood on their own extensive grounds. One, he knew, was occupied by the Pelmans, brother and sister. He’d called there this afternoon to collect the keys to the cottage from Pelman. A second building, beside the church, would almost certainly be the Rectory. The third large house stood slightly uphill from the village and faced the road he walked. Miss Neatham’s directions led him past its gates and on past the first row of cottages. Fair enough. Her evident poverty made a large house unlikely. One of the cottages, then. At the crossroads with the inn, his instructions said to turn into the second road past that building. Ah. The road to the Pelmans’ house. But no, she said to take a turn behind the church.
This lane was narrow and rutted. It wound down a hill too steep for carriages, lined by nothing much beyond rocks, goat shelters and pocket-handkerchief gardens, the last two drooping in the rain.
Soon, he arrived level with the roofs he had seen from the top of the road, and a miserable lot they were—more patch than roof and more hole than either. What idiot had thought it a good idea to build in a hollow? In this weather, the alley between the two-up two-down double row of dwellings was close to a lake, and the disgraceful condition of the cottages suggested they were either deserted or occupied by those who had no resources to do repairs.
Bear shook his head. He’d seen many such warts on the landscape; some landowner’s idea of workers’ housing, tucked into any corner—however unsuitable—that placed them out of sight of the local landowners and those visitors they wished to impress.
Miss Neatham could not possibly live here. Bear looked for a street name but found none. He tried the key she had given him in the door of the third house on the left. It fitted. What the hell was a lady of Miss Neatham’s refinement doing in a slum like this?
Bear pushed the door open and let himself into a narrow hall, where he removed his coat and hat, and looked around a little helplessly for a hook or a rack or even a chair to lay them over. In the end, he draped the coat over the newel post of the staircase, and put the hat on the floor by the door. Puddles began to spread across the bare board beneath both. At least he wasn’t destroying Miss Neatham’s carpet.
Where would he find the father? He called out, “Mr Neatham?”
All he heard was the rain driving viciously against the outside of the house and his coat dripping on the floor.
Bedridden, she had said. Upstairs then. “Mr Neatham?” He repeated the call at the turn of the stairs, and again when he reached the landing.
“Who’s there?” the voice from the room at the end of the short passage above the stairwell shook with fear or age, or perhaps both. “Who’s there? Go away! I am armed. Rosie? Rosie, someone is in the house. Run, Rosie. Get the constable.”
Bear pushed open the door to find an elderly man, not much larger than the rose thief herself, propped up on pillows in his bed, clutching a sheet to his chest, his eyes wide. He flourished a candlestick, his gaunt, wrinkled face showing more terror than aggression.
Bear stopped in the doorway. “Mr Neatham, your Rosie sent me.”
Mr Neatham lifted his chin and sniffed. “I do not know you, sir.” The voice, thready with age, bore the same hallmarks of birth and education that distinguished his daughter’s.
Bear bowed. “Allow me to introduce myself. Hugh Gavenor, at your service.”
The room contained little beside the man and the bed. The corner of the bedside table rested on a stack of broken brick in lieu of a leg. A battered trunk and a few garments hanging on hooks along one wall completed the room’s furnishings. The room was clean, almost painfully so, except the strong smell of fresh urine hinted that another clean—of the frail body before him—was overdue.
Neatham seemed to have forgotten his alarm in his puzzlement. “Gavenor? I know no Gavenors.”
“I purchased Thorne Hall.” Bear stepped toward the bed, stopped, and waited for Neatham to react to his approach.
The man curled his lip. “Rubbish. If you mean to tell me stories, Gavenor, or whatever your name is, you will have to do better than that. Lord Hurley would never sell. He would certainly never sell without telling me. I am his librarian, you know.” He shook his finger at Bear. “Go off with you. My Rosie will be here soon with the constable.”
Bear kept his countenance calm while he rehearsed a rebuke for Miss Neatham. Your father is senile, woman. Why did you not tell me?
“I came from your Rosie,” he explained. How much could the old man understand? “She is at Rose Cottage. I am sorry to inform you she has injured her ankle and will not be able to return tonight. I came on her behalf, to check that you have all you need, Mr Neatham.”
Neatham flapped his hands in agitation, almost hitting himself with the forgotten candlestick. “I don’t believe you. I don’t believe you. My wife Rosie would never stay at the gardener’s cottage. Why should she? Lord Hurley will send some footmen to bring my wife home. I will…”