The Captain's Daughter (30 page)

For over
an hour, Amy sat in the library dazed by the
information she had to adsorb. She must get the information to Ben, but how?
She had no transportation, because the coach had taken the others to Vauxhall
Gardens. She had no way of sending a letter until tomorrow. She felt both
excited and frustrated, practically bursting to tell him the news.

At dinner she ate little while she
anxiously awaited her confidant, Emma to come home. She was surprised they were
not back yet considering the delicate condition of Emma’s health. The cook had
prepared food for everyone, but she was the only one to dine, and she definitely
didn’t eat her share. She ate at seven, the usual time at the Ramsey house.
That was about sunset, but in sooty old London, a person would be lucky to see
the sun at this time of day. Now it was 7:30 and completely dark, yet the
others still had not returned.

They arrived back quite late. This
made it impossible to talk to Emma because they all went to bed and since the
three girls were sharing the same room in the Ramsey house that meant that
Mattie would be in the room with Amy and Emma. While Mattie was kind, sweet,
caring, and sympathetic, Amy just could not have the same frank talk with Emma
that she could have if Mattie was not present.

Amy tried to sleep as she lay
awaiting the new day.

When she went to breakfast Thursday
morning she should have been dead tired, but the excitement of all that she had
learned yesterday afternoon made her wide awake in a hazy sort of way. She
nibbled at her food, waiting for Leo to come to breakfast.
Where was he
?

Well over an hour after Amy had
left the breakfast table he came hurrying into the living room announcing he
had to run an errand and wouldn’t be home until later in the day.

“Leo, I don’t want to be a nuisance
or impose on you,” said Amy, “but can you take me to Ben’s today.”

“I don’t know,” replied Leo, “it
all depends on how long my business takes.”

“I would really be eternally
grateful if you could. It is really, really, really important.”

Leo gave her a puzzled look, and
then replied: “I will try my best.”

Impassioned pleas do help, as he
returned just after two.

Amy was awaiting his return already
dressed with her outside clothes, much to her mother’s curiosity and concern.
Everything, of course, worried and concerned her mother, who knew little of
what was going on, as was almost always true.

This time Ben was there at his
tawdry lodgings. While Leo and Mattie watched from the street outside where
they could not see the entire courtyard, Amy was admitted by the little
clerk-like man who routinely picked up Ben’s letters. The man was in his shirt
sleeves and his white shirt appeared to be smudged with dirt and dark
brownish-red smears.

She rushed into the dull and musty
little room. Where was Ben? Then she saw him. He was propped up in a chair and
had bandages wrapped around his chest.

“Oh Ben,” she cried in anguish,
“what has happened to you?”

Ben started to reply, but the
little man interrupted.

“Ben was seriously wounded by
highwaymen when he was riding as a decoy for a Frenchman escaping the reign of
terror.”

Amy flung herself to her knees in
front of Ben.

“Please, how can I help you? I have
taken care of wounds of children in Stokely-on-Arne. I can bandage your
wounds...”

Ben could hear the worry,
approaching panic, in her voice.

“I am all right, Amy. Allan is
taking good care of me. All we need to do is wait until the wound heals
naturally in the course of time.”

“We are most fortunate,” Allan
broke in, “that Ben has not come down with a fever. The bullet was removed six
days ago. That it has not become infected is a good sign.”

Ben’s condition so worried her that
for the time being her momentous news was forgotten. But when the little clerk
left Ben in “her hands” to go for victuals and to get medicine from the
apothecary, and she was left alone with Ben, it soon came rushing back.

As the information poured forth
from her, Ben did not seem as surprised as she had anticipated. He never liked
Eskman and was suspicious because Eskman always seemed as if he was prying and
up to something.

“Up to what?” she asked.

“I don’t quite know. I thought he was
trying to find an heiress to marry, but if he is already married then there
must be some other motive behind his machinations”.

“Now do you see that those men who
attacked me were not trying to use me to entice you into a trap? I must have
been their target. Lady Eskman had painted Eskman as a coward and timid, but I
was attacked. As Lady Eskman said, Caroline Anselan never once called herself
Lady Eskman, but that is who she must be, Lord Eskman has evil acquaintances.
He doesn’t do his own dirty work but uses others.”

“That is not unlike many men,” said
Ben. “Many who are known as great men, do their evil through the hands of
others. Judges have others hang men for them. And kings and princes have others
kill for them and die for them. So Eskman is like so many other cowards and
scoundrels in fine clothes and high places. But now we have a clear motive. You
are right, Amy Sebbridge, or is it Agnes Buchanan, you are their target. You
are a threat to him as long as you are alive. But there is a deep puzzle in
that.”

“What is it Ben?”

“Why?”

“What do you mean, why?

“You have told me that Christine
Anselan said he squandered all his own money, all the estate he inherited from
his father, as we have heard from other sources. Don’t you see the question
that raises?”

For a few moments Amy was puzzled
and then it struck her.

“If I am a threat to Eskman it
would seem to be as a threat to his inheritance since my father was made Sir
Hugh Anselan’s heir. But Ishmael Anselan, who is now Lord Eskman, squandered
all the inheritance. There would seem to be no threat if there is nothing to
inherit, so why does he want me out of the way so badly?”

“That is the quandary,” said Ben
looking puzzled. “Whatever his motive, you clearly need protection. You must be
guarded.”

“But we can’t do anything obvious,
because we would have to tell my mother what was going on and in her fragile
state she wouldn’t be able to tolerate it.”

Ben thought a little. “I’ll guard
you in a way she won’t know.”

Glad to have been able to share
what she now knew with Ben she returned to Leo and Mattie in the carriage and
they took her home. Mattie enjoyed these little trips because it gave her time
alone with Leo. On the way home, Amy told them of Ben’s wound.

Just after breakfast the next day,
which was Friday, both Leo and Mattie were most amenable to Amy’s request to go
to Ben’s and see how he was doing. As they left the Ramsey’s street, she
noticed a cart with two men who seemed to be engaged in some sort of activity
on the street. She hoped these were the guards that Ben posted and not Eskman’s
henchmen.

At the entrance to Ben’s courtyard,
a cart was stopped and the carter was working on a wheel, so they parked behind
the cart ignoring the carter’s curiosity as to why a coach with fine people
would be stopping on such a street and in such a place as this.

When she entered the courtyard she
immediately saw two men standing at Ben’s door. They appeared to be talking to
someone inside. Curious she stood near the stack of crates and other materials
near the courtyard’s entrance. She was fearful that they might be enemies of
Ben and that they had done something bad to him. They had a familiar look. She
then remembered the Frenchman who had visited their home and his two men, one
of whom had followed her. They resembled these two men, although she could not
be sure they were the same.

Soon they turned to leave, coming
down the steps and walking in her direction. They walked right past where she
was hiding without spotting her. They were speaking French and she quickly
recognized they were the two men she had seen hiding the casket in the old mill
at home. She drew in her breath in fear not just for herself, but mostly in
fear of what they might have done to Ben. As they left the courtyard, she
slipped out of her hiding place and hurried up the stairs, fearing what they
had done to Ben.

Before she could knock, Ben’s door
opened. She froze. There was no way she could hide from whoever was about to
come out through the door. Ben stepped out onto the landing. Except for the
impairment of his wound, he seemed to be fine. Her mind swam in confusion and
she turned and ran out to the waiting coach.

“Please hurry and leave she
implored,” and they did.

She asked about the two Frenchmen.
Neither Mattie nor Leo had noticed them. Later the coachman told Amy the
Frenchmen had gone in the other direction when they exited the courtyard. They
apparently had not noticed the coach because it was parked behind a cart piled
high with boxes.

As they returned to the house,
Amy’s thoughts were a raging storm of confusion, and then she remembered. Ben
was shot six days ago! No it was seven days ago now. A chill ran down Amy’s
spine. She could not help but recall the fearful account that Lady Ramsey had
fretted about. One of the murderers of the Frenchman fleeing the Reign of
Terror was wounded, and escaped. Ben received his gunshot wound at the very
same time. A cold fear crept over Amy and filled her to the deepest parts of
her soul.

When they
returned to the
Ramsey’s house it was still early. Emma had remained in the bedroom all
morning, because despite her improvement the trip to Vauxhall Gardens the
previous day and the long day they had spent there, had tired her out.

It was not long
before Leo and Mattie along with their mother set out to see the town. Amy
declined their invitation and remained at the house. With Emma upstairs and the
house quiet, Amy once more found her mind in turmoil. Who was her enemy and who
was her friend?

She sat at the
desk in the library, and took out a sheet of paper and pen and ink, and decided
to examine everything logically.

Lord Eskman has
a motive to get her out of the way it would seem, but he is a craven coward.
Would he have enough manhood in him to kill her? Both Ben and Christine seem to
believe he would. But Ben really knows nothing about him and Christine has a
motive to think the worst of him.

Ben is, was, or
seemed to be her friend. He had worked hard to help her, but that was not the
question. The question was what was Ben up to. Was he helping the victims of
the Reign of Terror escape France and the French assassins, or was he in
cahoots with them? In the end she has only his word. She has seen no evidence
supporting his claims. He could be doing the very same thing he claims to be
fighting. Rich French seeking refuge are being targeted by someone who seems to
know their itinerary. How do the highwaymen know whom to attack, or when? Just
clever scouting or do they have inside information? And if they do, who are
they getting it from? Who better than Ben? Who better to gain the confidence of
the French exile community than the man who claims to be aiding them?

These are
bitter thoughts. Once she was ashamed to think ill of Ben, but now in the face
of undeniable evidence what else could she think regardless of how much it
troubled her. He had helped her but that did not mean he was not guilty of
being associated with the gang of robbers—the gang of murderous robbers. She
shivered at the thought.

But would he
have tried to do her harm? Perhaps the attack where he intervened was just a
way of throwing her off the trail—of convincing her he was innocent. And it had
worked, but now she faced overwhelming evidence. She had been told of the
attack and the killing of the Frenchman. She had also been told that a casket
of valuables had been taken in the robbery. She had seen with her own eyes, two
Frenchmen hide a casket at the old mill, and then she had seen the same two
Frenchman paying a friendly visit with Ben.

Yes, with the
injured Ben. One of the killers of the Frenchman had been shot. Ben had been
shot and had not told her anything about the details other than claiming he was
running decoy to protect a French exile, obviously the same man who had been
murdered. If he had been running decoy, and the Frenchman had been killed, why
had Ben been shot? Other than the murder victim, the Ramseys had mentioned no
other person being shot except one of the killers.

She crumpled up
the papers and threw them into the wastebasket. She must talk to Emma.

She poured out
all her worries to Emma, but Emma did not quite understand. The ever-logical
Emma, ever more reasoned than her age, urged Amy not to rush to judgment.

“Things are not
always what they seem.”

“Emma,” said
Amy, “the evidence is overwhelming and irrefutable. I don’t know what to do. I
must do something, I just don’t know what.”

Amy went back
downstairs. She looked in the study. There was no one in the room. She went in
and gathered her papers out of the wastebasket. No one must see them. She took
them back up to the bedroom and put them with her personal items. She wasn’t
quite ready to discard her ruminations just yet.

“I have to go
out,” she told Emma.

“Where are you
going? asked Emma.

“To find some
answers.

“How can you go
out, Leo, Emma, and Mother took the coach?”

But Amy had
already left the room. She was determined to bring an end to the turmoil and
confusion in her mind. She knew where Eskman lived. She must go to him and
confront him.

She was about
to hurry out of the front door when she remembered the two workmen. Whoever had
sent them, they would undoubtedly be in the street out front. She rushed past
the startled cook and scullery maid and out the Ramsey’s back door into the
lane behind the house. The lane led to the adjoining street.

Eskman’s
residence was only about ten or fifteen minutes away if she walked fast, and
the way she felt right now, she
would
walk fast. She would go and
confront him. Maybe his henchmen were dangerous but he was timid and no danger
and she would have the element of surprise. He would not be able to summon
them. All she would encounter would be the cowardly Eskman and his poor mother
who was practically his prisoner.

Maybe Eskman
was no danger. Perhaps he didn’t have any henchmen. All she had was the accusations
of an abandoned wife and Ben who seemed to be covering up his own nefarious
activities. She would find out. Eskman did have some motive, whatever that
might be, to be concerned about Amy and her inheritance but that didn’t mean he
would be willing to have her killed.

She burned up
the streets all the way to the Eskman house, which she found unexpectedly dingy
and humble. In fact when she came out of the fog of her anger and determination
she discovered he was in a very marginal neighborhood. She felt a bit
uncomfortable as she looked around, but it was broad daylight and she supposed
she should be safe even though she clearly wasn’t dressed in a manner
appropriate to where she now found herself.

She hesitated
for a moment, and then went up and pounded the large brass knocker against the
front door.

An old woman,
thin as a rake and bent to one side, came to the front door.

“I need to talk
to Lord Eskman,” she demanded.

The old woman
stared at her suspiciously and looked over her fine clothes. The woman’s eyes
darted to the left and to the right searching for the coach this finely dressed
young lady must have arrived in.

“Who are you?”

“I must talk to
Lord Eskman,” Amy said emphatically.

“He is not
here.” Her voice sounded harsh.

“Then I need to
speak to Lord Eskman’s mother. Tell her Amaryllis Sibbridge wants to speak with
her. Lord Eskman may have told her who I am.”

“I am Lord
Eskman’s mother.”

Taken aback,
Amy paused and looked at the woman whom she took to be a poor household
servant. But isn’t that exactly what Christine’s account should have led her to
expect. Eskman hobnobs with the cream of society while he keeps his poor mother
in virtual poverty.

“May I come in
and speak with you?”

“I suppose,”
was the cold reply.

Lavinia Eskman
invited her into the house.

Inside, the
house was dark, dingy, and dirty. Amy cannot imagine how the niftily attired
Eskman could live here. She is led into what might once have been a respectable
room, and in response to the old woman’s invitation, nay command, she finds the
least dusty place to sit.

How should Amy
begin? Even with the shabby, even cruel treatment, the old woman has obviously
received from Eskman, she is his mother and will likely be defensive of her
son. Mothers can take bad treatment from their sons and still make excuses for
them.

“Lady Eskman, I
know you love your son, but there is something I must tell you that you may not
know.”

“My name is not
Lady Eskman, I am Lavinia Anselan, and I know most of my son’s affairs. My son
inherited the title of Lord Eskman from my brother when he died.”

“How could that
be?”

“It is a title
tied to land, not primogenitor. There are some such titles, you know. The owner
of the land has the right to the title.”

Amy decided she
would have to ask someone about that later, but she continued, “I’m Amy
Sibbridge.”

“You already
told me that. Why are you here?

Lavinia Anselan
did not sound friendly.

Amy briefly
explained about the will and said she needed to have a personal talk to
Lavinia’s son about a number of matters concerning it and some accusations
people had made against him. She wanted to seek the truth and find out what he
had to say. She made no mention of Christine or who had made the accusations.

“He will be
home shortly,” Lavinia told her coldly. “Wait here.”

It was not long
before she heard the sound of someone entering the front door. Lavinia hurried
out, once more commanding Amy to wait. There was a muffled conversation that
Amy could not make out and then Eskman strode in with his mother following a
few paces behind.

“Well, well,
young Amy Sibbridge. This is a surprise.”

Amy
aggressively confronted him. She told him what she knew and asked him directly:
“Did you try to kill me?”

“Madame, that
is an outrageous accusation. If you were a man you would be facing a duel right
now.”

She doubted if
he would have had the courage to fight a duel.

“I did not
accuse you of trying to kill me. I asked you a question. Did you try to kill
me? Just give me an honest answer.”

“Certainly not.
The very suggestion that I would even contemplate such a thing is an
effrontery.”

But when she
described her assailants, a grave look came over his face and he turned and
looked at his mother.”

“I had to do
it, you fool,” she said. “She was going to steal your inheritance that we have
fought all these years to get. I couldn’t let her, when we are so close to
success.”

A cold feeling
of shock swept over Amy, followed by fear when she realized the situation she
was in. She must flee.

With Eskman and
his mother involved in verbal combat, she took the opportunity to run towards
the Eskman front door.

“Stop her you
fool,” Lavinia yelled at her son.

The old woman
rushed after Amy and threw herself in her path to the front door. As Amy tried
to reach for the door handle, Lavinia grabbed Amy’s clothes.

“Help me you
idiot,” she screamed at her son.

Belatedly, he
joined his mother, and between the two of them they were able to prevent Amy’s
escape. Amy struggled mightily. Lavinia grabbed a dusty vase from a hall table
and smashed Amy on the head.

Amy dropped to
the floor stunned but not unconscious. Lavinia tore decorative strips from
Amy’s dress and began to tie Amy hand and foot while her son held her down at
Lavinia’s urging.

“Hester,
Hester,” Lavinia yelled.

A ragged
servant girl emerged from where the kitchen should be.

“Go get Jack.
Tell him he better be here quick if he knows what’s good for him.”

 As the
girl hurried out the front door, Lavinia opened a drawer in the table and
extracted a pistol, which she pointed at Amy.

“Stand!” she
commanded.

Amy, still
dazed, struggled to her feet.

“Now walk.”

Eskman went
ahead of his mother around a bend in the hall and opened a door.

“March!”

Lavinia forced
Amy to shuffle to the door and then pushed her through it. Amy tumbled down a
flight of stairs and the door was slammed shut. Lying on a damp dirt floor she
heard them lock the door. It was pitch black in the cellar.

Amy, hurting
badly from her fall, forced herself to her feet and felt for the rail at the
side of the steps, which she had caught sight of before the door was slammed.
Sore and bruised, her hands bound and her feet tied at the ankles, she
laboriously dragged herself up the wooden steps feeling her way to the top.
When she could see a faint light through the keyhole, she knew she had reached
the door.

She was about
to pound on it when she heard Eskman and his mother quarrelling. They were a
short distance from the door but she was able to just barely make out what they
were saying.

“Mother, why
did you try to kill her, I could have taken care of this problem in a much
better way.”

“How? Marry
her? In case you have forgotten you already have a wife.”

During the
quarrel, Amy learned much that she did not know since they seemed intent to
hurl their entire history at one another. Amy came to realize that Lavinia was
the schemer going all the way back to the tragic day Amy’s father and mother
drowned in the River Avon.

“What will we
do about her?” he asked.

“What do
you
think? Jack will take care of her.”

“Mother, you
can’t.”

“What else is
there to do? Do you want to hang, you fool?”

“But mother
she’s a nice girl. Please let’s find another way.”

“You’ve done it
to enough others, one more won’t make a difference.”

“That was
different. They were Frenchmen and had been cruel to their own people.”

“How can I possibly
have had a weakling son like you?”

“Mother, you
had her parents killed, please don’t kill her.”

More and more
dread flowed over Amy as she listened as long as she could until the voices
become too faint and muffled as Eskman and his mother moved out of earshot.

Amy sat down on
the top step. She was trapped in a damp, dank totally dark cellar save for a
pencil of light coming through the keyhole of the door. She was bound hand and
foot. Her head was throbbing and she was dizzy. She was trapped and she knew
she was going to die. The only question was how soon. It seemed it would be
when Jack arrived and that did not seem to be long. There was no way out and no
one knew or would even be able to guess where she was. It was totally against
her nature and spirit but Amy found tears running down her cheeks. This was the
end.