The Winter List, page 10
part #6 of Damian Seeker Series
Madge’s bosom was heaving and she could hardly breathe. ‘Stop now, Madge, stop,’ she said to herself, steadying herself with her hands on the back of a chair. ‘Be no good to babby or the poor mistress if you’re dead of an apoplexy. And who would keep an eye on Jed then?’ She stood and three times took in a deep breath, three times letting the breath out slowly. ‘Now then,’ she said, bending down as she felt better, ‘whatever is wrong with you, my little Prince Hal?’
Prince Hal, seeing that he had her attention, only began to bark the more furiously, jumping up to scrape his claws on the kitchen door. ‘Poor thing,’ said Madge, ‘you’re needing out and all forgotten in the middle of everything.’ Glancing in the direction of the other door, leading to the hallway and stairs up which she had heard Thomas Faithly bound, she unlatched the back kitchen door for the dog to get out. ‘Two minutes, no more,’ she admonished the terrier, ‘or there’ll be no end of it from Sir Thomas if I haven’t all the doors and windows locked!’
Still muttering, ‘no end of it,’ to herself, she shuffled down the hallway to lock the front door. Going back to the kitchen, she realised that Prince Hal, now out in the yard, was barking with even greater vehemence. ‘What in the world can the creature want?’
Out across the yard, white against the snow that continued to fall thickly and was already lying, the terrier was now raising his racket at the back gate. Madge hastily pulled on an extra shawl and went out after him. ‘Hal! Hal! Is she there, is she home?’ Fumbling at the bolt with cold fingers, she pulled it back expectantly. There was nothing except for the empty passageway and not the tiniest of footsteps visible in the snow. As a crestfallen Madge was looking to one end of the lane and then the other, Prince Hal ran out between her skirts and the gatepost and hared off, still barking, up Straker’s Passage. Madge clamped her hand over her mouth, tears almost coming again. ‘Oh, Hal!’ she said, turning and beginning to hurry as quickly back through the gate and across the yard to the house as the ice and slush allowed her, ‘Oh, you clever, clever boy!’
Thomas stood helpless. He’d never seen Manon like this, not even in the earliest days of their friendship, when the mysterious, pale young girl had been escorted from Yorkshire to London in the care of Anne Winter, by those same soldiers who’d been escorting him down to the Tower. He’d tried asking Lawrence, once, about Manon’s history, but had swiftly been told it was not his business. In time, though, he had come to understand the astonishing truth that she was Damian Seeker’s daughter. What might that man not have done had he been here now?
Manon’s eyes were wild as she paced distractedly about her bedchamber, having dismissed the physician and his pleas that she would take a concoction that might calm her to sleep. She had almost lunged at Thomas when he’d come into the room, and it was only his presence and the midwife’s dire warnings about the risk to her unborn child that kept her from going out in the snowstorm in search of her daughter.
She clutched his hand. ‘Oh God, oh God, where is she, Thomas?’
‘Hush,’ he said, passing his hand over her brow, ‘Lawrence will find her.’
‘But what if she has gone down to the wharf, tumbled into the river? What if someone has taken her?’
‘The boatmen would have caught her had she got anywhere near the wharf, or some person crossing the bridge would have seen her. Never fear about that, Manon – she will not have gone into the river.’ He said nothing to her fears that someone might have taken the child. The lie that no one would think such a thing would not force itself over his lips. Instead he held her hand more tightly. If what Marvell said was true, and someone had come to York in order to discover from Lawrence the whereabouts of Damian Seeker, taking the Ingolbys’ child was the only possible way that Lawrence might be forced to talk. It would do Manon Ingolby no good to think her child was in peril because of her husband’s past association with one of Cromwell’s agents – her own father.
Thomas had just persuaded Manon to lie down and assured her that yes, Jed had now gone out to join in the search too, when a shrill shrieking of his name shot up the stairs. ‘Sir Thomas! Sir Thomas! Oh, you must get after Prince Hal!’
‘Damn the woman!’ said Thomas, striding to the door with a view to telling her to keep her voice down. But Manon had sat up and was now very determinedly getting out of bed, her face enlivened with new hope.
‘Of course.’ Going past him to the door and pulling it open she greeted the housekeeper excitedly. ‘Prince Hal! Why did I not think of it?’
‘Who is Prince Hal?’ said Thomas, hastening after her.
The two women looked at him in astonishment. ‘The dog, of course,’ said Madge.
‘Yes,’ said Manon, taking Madge’s hand as the older woman lighted her down the steps. ‘Lizzie loves Hal and Hal Lizzie, and he will not happily be parted from her. We must send out Prince Hal to find her.’
‘But he is already gone, my dear,’ said Madge. ‘That is why I called down Sir Thomas here. He must go after him.’
Manon had turned to him, her eyes alight, ‘Oh yes, Thomas, you must. You will, will you not?’
‘But I cannot leave you women alone here.’
‘Pff.’ Madge was contemptuous. ‘I will lock the doors after you and should anyone attempt to breach them, they will find me ready.’ Thomas saw now that in her left hand she brandished a pistol.
‘Where on earth did you get that?’
‘It’s the master’s. He keeps it in the drawer of his study.’
Thomas looked to Manon who did not appear troubled at this development, then back to Madge. ‘You know how to use it?’
‘Oh, don’t you worry yourself about that. Madge Penmore could take down a Spanish buccaneer at forty yards.’ She laid a protective hand on Manon’s arm. ‘No one will get near my mistress. But you must go, sir. Get you after Hal – he could be at the other side of York by now!’
Thomas was far from convinced but he saw refusal would do Manon’s state of mind more harm than good. Admonishing Madge once more to let nobody into the house and to discharge her pistol if she had to, he went off in the direction she told him the animal had gone. He followed the pawprints of the small dog all the way up Straker’s Passage then onto Black Horse Passage and into the Stonebow where they became lost amongst wheel tracks, hoof and bootprints. He looked distractedly around him. A pair of butcher’s boys had set down the pig carcass they were carrying and begun to hurl snowballs at a passing brewer’s cart.
‘You boys!’ he shouted. ‘Have you seen a terrier come out this way?’
‘Aye,’ said one. ‘Madge Penmore’s tyke came darting out that vennel and went yapping and snapping up Colliergate like its tail were on fire. Must a’ been after a rat or something.’
But Thomas was already running, cursing as he slipped in the slush, from the end of the Stonebow across Pavement and onto Colliergate. The street was busy with people hurrying as much as they could in the swirling snow, trying to get in what they needed then get safely home. Carters with wheels sticking cursed at the red-faced children who were hurling balls of snow their way. The snow grew heavier and heavier and it was becoming difficult to see more than a few feet ahead. Thomas shouldered encumbrances aside without apology as he ran, not caring who or what he might bump into in his pursuit of the terrier. Then suddenly he was brought to a halt by a woman’s surprised cry as she fell into the road beside him. Thomas spun round, apologising, and reached down a hand to help, only to notice a small red apple that had been tipped from her fallen basket roll an inch or two before coming to rest in the snow at his feet.
He stared a moment at the apple then reached again for the woman. ‘Forgive me,’ he said, as he pulled her up somewhat roughly, ‘but I must get after that dog.’ It was only as he’d set her on her feet and was about to run again that he realised, to his horror, that the woman he had knocked over was Anne Winter.
He started to mumble an incoherent apology but was halted by the sardonic voice of the Scotswoman who had evidently been accompanying Lady Anne and who had stooped to pick up more spilled apples. ‘Would it be that wee dog over there?’
Thomas followed her gaze. With a jolt he saw Prince Hal disappear down a very narrow snicket. He apologised again and rushed across the street after the animal. He reached the top of the path only to realise that the Scotswoman was at his back.
‘What’s he after?’ she asked.
‘A missing child,’ he shouted behind him, as he continued in pursuit of the small white dog, who was now barking furiously at the rotting wooden door of a small shack at the far end of the snicket. Thomas was soon at the door, turning the handle, but the door refused to move, a bolt near the top, he now noticed, securing it with a padlock. He reached his dagger up to the padlock in an attempt to prise it off but could not shift it. The terrier was now frantic, and as Thomas looked around for some other implement, the woman behind him exclaimed in exasperation, ‘For ony sake, pit yer shooder til it, man!’
‘What?’ he said.
‘Your shoulder! Put your shoulder to it!’
Thomas lost no more time before hurling himself, shoulder first, at the door. It gave at the second assault and swung inwards, away from them, into a dark and windowless coal store in the corner of which Lizzie Ingolby, sobbing and streaked with dirt, clutched a kitten to her chest.
The dog was through the door in an instant, and the woman after it, Thomas following. The woman had crouched down and reached out a hand to the little girl. ‘My wee pet, my poor wee pet. All will be well. You’re safe now, and all will be well.’
The child’s eyes in her soot-streaked face were huge and terrified. Thomas put a gentle hand on the woman’s shoulder and said, ‘No, let me. She knows me.’
The woman moved aside and Thomas crouched down before the little girl. ‘Lizzie. Lizzie, my sweetheart. You needn’t be frightened any more. Uncle Thomas is here. I’m going to take you home.’
Nine
At the Ingolbys’ House
The reception was tumultuous. As he passed the child over to the exultant housekeeper, Thomas feared for a moment that Lizzie, kitten still in her arms, would be crushed in Madge’s embrace. Manon had almost fainted at the sight of her daughter and Thomas only just managed to catch her and help into her hearthside chair. Throughout all, the dog continued to yap and the hairs of the terrified kitten’s fur stood on end.
‘Thomas.’ Manon clutched his hand and let her tears flow. ‘Thank God, thank God. You have found her.’
He settled her in the chair before taking the child from Madge and passing her to Manon. The Scotswoman, who had again come in behind him, somehow obtained possession of the kitten.
As Madge bustled off to fetch blankets and clean, dry articles of clothing for Lizzie, Manon covered her daughter with kisses. Running a thumb gently over the smear of coal dust and tears on the little girl’s cheek, she looked up at Thomas. ‘We will never forget this, as long as we live. And we can never repay you.’
He touched a finger to the one lank brown curl at the nape of Lizzie’s neck. ‘I did nothing more than any friend would do, Manon. And I was fortunate to have help.’ He turned to indicate the Scotswoman, but she was no longer there. The kitten had been placed on the hearth rug at Manon’s feet. As Madge came hurrying in from upstairs with a bundle of soft woollen items, the stranger emerged through the door from the back yard. She was carrying a large ewer of water, which she proceeded to pour into a pot she had suspended over the fire. Madge stopped, struck dumb to see a stranger make herself so much at home in her domain. The Scotswoman glanced her way. ‘The bairn will need an infusion of ginger and lemons, lest she take cold. Have you lemons?’ Giving no further explanation of herself, she set about rifling the spice drawers in Madge’s kitchen cabinet. Thomas had never before seen the housekeeper rendered speechless, and had it not been for the circumstances, he might have enjoyed the spectacle. ‘I’m sorry, Mistress Penmore,’ he said, indicating the stranger. ‘In all the urgency of finding Lizzie, there was no time for us to be introduced.’
‘Griselda Duncan,’ said the woman, without taking her eyes from the pot into which she had begun to stir various items. ‘Sir Thomas here cowped my mistress ower in the street, and a thing else fell oot fae there.’
The housekeeper continued nonplussed, and from behind Thomas, the voice of Anne Winter, whom he had forgotten about, drifted towards them. ‘You must excuse Grizel, Sir Thomas, Mistress . . . Penmore is it? My maid is prone to slipping into her native tongue, but she is of a very practical bent.’ Then she slipped past him, into the heart of the room. ‘Manon. Oh, my dearest girl. It has been such a very long time.’
It had been almost six years since Damian Seeker had entrusted Anne Winter with the care of his daughter on her journey from York down to London. For all their past encounters, their battles of wits, the mutual enmity of their causes, nothing in her relationship with the Cromwellian captain had affected her as much as that simple but momentous request. He had not told her that Manon was his daughter, of course, but it was clear he knew she’d guessed it. His request had exposed a humanity in him that she thought few could ever have witnessed, and it had evidenced a greater trust in herself than she’d thought to merit from anyone.
She’d heard, some few years later, of Manon’s marriage to Lawrence Ingolby and she’d been pleased. The lawyer had the name of an honest man, and a clever one. Now, as she looked about this trim little house on this prosperous street in York, Lady Anne felt that Seeker’s daughter had chosen well. She wondered whether Damian Seeker knew. She hoped so. She hoped too that, wherever he might be, Seeker knew that she, Anne Winter, had never told a living soul who Manon Ingolby really was.
Manon’s face broke into a smile, lively with disbelief. ‘Lady Anne? Is it you? Really you?’ she laughed, the remnants of tears still in her eyes. ‘Come like the fairy godmother in a children’s tale to bring me back my child!’
Anne laughed a little too, and knelt in front of Manon, resting her hand on her knee. She was careful not to go too close to the child who was regarding her with a look of deep mistrust.
‘It was an accident that brought me here.’ She raised her eyebrows in Thomas Faithly’s direction. ‘A happy accident. And it was Grizel there who noticed the dog, and went off after it with Sir Thomas.’
‘A terrier wouldna run aff lik yon but guid cause.’
‘Grizel,’ chided Anne, ‘English, please. We are in my country now.’ They had found it useful, from time to time, for Grizel to speak in her own Scots tongue. Assumptions were made then about her understanding of English, her intelligence. People were less careful how they spoke in front of her or what they left within her view, when they thought her mind worked in Scots.
The maid breathed in, lips pursed, the very image of affrontedness, but it seemed she had found an unexpected ally in the rotund, frizz-headed housekeeper, who had guessed enough of what she’d said. ‘You’re right there. My Hal doesn’t stir from that yard without my say-so. He knew there was something afoot. Nothing would have kept him from going off after our Lizzie.’
‘But where did you find her?’ asked Manon, having released the child once more to Madge’s care.
And so, with the occasional necessary elaboration from Grizel, Sir Thomas told her.
‘But what on earth was she doing there? How did she get there?’
Anne was watching everyone in the warm, lamplit kitchen very carefully, but both Sir Thomas and the housekeeper looked as curious as did Manon Ingolby.
It was Grizel who spoke. ‘She’d have gone in after that kitten.’
Like everyone else, Anne turned her eyes to the little creature that had somehow got from Manon’s feet to her lap.
‘She was holding that kitten for dear life when we got in there, and she wasn’t for letting it go.’ Grizel addressed Manon. ‘Is it your kitten, Mistress Ingolby?’
Manon shook her head. ‘We have no cat. Prince Hal would not permit it.’
‘Cannot abide cats of any nature, my Hal,’ agreed Madge. ‘Tom, queen, young, old, ginger, tabby or whatever else, he will not have them! And there’s none better than him with a rat or a mouse. No, no need for cats in this house.’
Thomas Faithly cleared his throat. Anne smiled to see him so nervous in the face of the housekeeper. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘it would seem you are in possession of one now.’
Lizzie, freshly dried and dressed, had clambered back up onto her mother’s lap and taken the kitten once more firmly in her embrace. The terrier, as if sensing his hegemony was at an end, had slunk to lie at the far side of the hearth, from where he emitted the occasional perfunctory growl.
Thomas leaned over by Manon’s chair and put out a hand to stroke the kitten. ‘Where did you find the kitten, my pet?’
Lizzie looked from him to Madge then back to him and murmured something in a voice so tiny Anne could not hear it. Neither could Thomas, who leaned a little closer. ‘What was that, Lizzie?’
She was a little louder this time, but still quiet and looked reluctant to speak, fearful, Anne thought, that someone might take the cat from her.
‘Ah.’ Thomas patted her hand and sighed as he straightened up.
‘I could not hear her. What did she say?’ asked Manon as everyone else waited.
Thomas’s look was not hopeful. ‘“Shed.”’
There was a collective, ‘oh,’ of disappointment around the room.
‘She must have followed it in there,’ said Manon. ‘That must be why she wandered off. Lizzie loves animals, and she is so good with them.’
This idea seemed to content the mother and the old housekeeper, but Anne could tell from the expressions on the faces of Grizel and Sir Thomas that the same thought was passing through their minds as had taken root in hers: even if little Lizzie Ingolby had indeed toddled all the way up to the end of the vennel off Colliergate on the trail of a kitten, then some unknown person had closed and locked the door of that small, grimy shed behind her. Anne spoke to the housekeeper. ‘Where is your master, Mistress Penmore?’
