“The day will come,” she said watching him with a faint smile, “when all classes will be mingled in England, and remember that in the past noble veins have oft been strengthened by a yeoman’s blood. I can see you don’t agree. Radcliffes’ve always been prideful.”
Courtesy forbade Charles’s answer, though Jenny was impressed. High and low blood were in her too, she thought. Even Papa could not make her of one piece, dearly as she’d love to please him.
“Hark!” cried Dorothy suddenly, putting a finger to her lips. “Someone’s outside!” They listened and heard a man’s voice in the passage, then somebody tried to open the taproom door. “Who is’t?” called Dorothy.
The answer came in the whining, ingratiating accents Charles remembered instantly though it had been eight years since he heard them. “ ‘Tis Mr. Patten of Allendale, come to taste your fine ale again. Mistress Dorothy -- d’ye mean you’re locked in!”
Dorothy turned white and looked at Charles, who mouthed soundlessly “Patten, the informer?” She nodded and taking his arm pushed him towards the fireplace. “Inside up to the right. Priest’s hole,” she whispered in his ear. Then she ran to the door. “In a minute, Mr. Patten,” she called. “There’s a young gentlewoman in here who’s swooned, and all disrobed.” She ran to Jenny who had been dazedly watching her father scramble over the coals, up into the fireplace and disappear, while a shower of soot nearly extinguished the fire.
“Swoon!” said Dorothy fiercely in the girl’s ear, and she pushed her down on the floor. The girl gave a gasp and shut her eyes while Dorothy flung a cloak over her. Then Dorothy unbolted the door.
“Come in, Mr. Patten,” she said suavely. “Sorry to keep you waiting, but you see --” she indicated Jenny’s still body, “I had to open her dress and loosen her stays.”
“Dear, dear,” said the vicar, his long nose quivering. He bent with interest over Jenny, whose heart was beating in great frightened thuds. “Her color’s not bad -- perhaps if I bled her -- I’ve a lancet in my pocket --” Patten groped beneath the cloak for Jenny’s arm, and Dorothy said, “I wonder could it be the smallpox striking?”
Patten jumped back. “Take her away,” he said shrilly. “Take her out of here, I’ve never had it!”
“I don’t like to disturb her yet,” said Dorothy. “Perhaps ‘twould be better if you left? Where are you bound, by the bye?”
“From Stanhope to Hexham,” he said hurriedly. “On Government business. I can’t go on tonight, the weather’s foul, and my horse weary. Get rid of that girl! I command it, as agent to the Crown!”
Dorothy’s eyes snapped. “Aye, Mr. Patten,” she cried. “You’ve been well rewarded by the Crown for turning your coat, haven’t you! So ‘tis commands you give now to the sister of him who was once your master!”
The vicar wriggled and tugged at his clerical bands, his eyes shifted. “Mebbe I was hasty, just now, but I--” He glanced at Jenny, who had gathered that the intruder was a Whig, and yet disliked him intensely. She uttered a long shuddering moan, and cried, “Oh, oh, I feel so ill ...”
Patten gave her a horrified look and fled out the door. Dorothy followed him into the passage. “They’ll take you in at Pennypie House,” she said pleasantly. “ ‘Tis only a mile. Good luck.” She waited while he shouted to the stable boy for his horse, then she came back to the taproom. “Lie there a bit longer, Jenny,” she said, “until I’m sure he’s off. And if he falls in a bog on the way to Pennypie, the world’ll not be the loser.”
“He changed sides in the Rebellion?” asked Jenny slowly.
“He saved his own neck by selling information. Without that creeping louse’s evidence, the Earl of Derwentwater’d be alive today -- my brother and your father’d likely be free men instead of fugitives under a death sentence.”
Jenny knit her brows. “If he’d seen my father now, you think he’d turn him in?”
“Beyond the shadow of a doubt. For Patten’d be well rewarded -- maybe with an even finer living than the one they saved for him at Allendale.”
“Why were you civil to such a man, Mistress Dorothy?” asked Jenny.
“Ah, my dear,” said Dorothy. “What’s done is done. And as one gets older one gets cynical. There’d be no custom at this alehouse, no market for my husband’s fish, if we were too nice in our acquaintance.”
While Jenny pondered this, they heard a tapping in the plastered wall above and to the right of the fireplace. “What’s that!” she cried.
“Not a ghost,” said Dorothy with a twinkle, “though we’ve ghosts at Blanchland -- plenty of ‘em.” She went out and came back quickly. “He’s really gone. I saw him head for Pennypie. Here, Jenny, help me throw ale on those coals, so your father can get down.”
“Do you mean he’s up in the fireplace yet!” cried Jenny. “I thought there must be a passage to the roof.”
Dorothy shook her head. “There’s a good-sized chamber built in the thickness of the walls; many a man’s been hid there in the old days.”
They doused the fire, and Dorothy called “All clear, Charles” up the chimney.
He appeared feet-foremost, covered with soot, his boots badly singed. “Whoof!” he said coughing and sneezing. “That’s a well-warmed lodging you gave me! Though I’m heartily grateful for it.”
“Could you hear aught?” asked Dorothy.
“Yes. There’s a pinhole behind that picture! So the estimable parson of Allendale’s on the prowl is he! What games I could have with him!”
“Charles, don’t!” cried Dorothy. “Don’t go on to Dilston! You must see now how dangerous it is!”
He smiled and whisked soot off his sleeves. “Dolly, I think I’ve never shown any particular reluctance to face a bit of danger? A tame life bores me. And d’you think I’d give up Dilston when I’m ten miles away, and there’s never been a time these years that I’ve not longed to see it again?”
She shook her head. “Dilston is not the place you once knew, Charles,” she said sadly.
Jenny slept that night in a big bed with Dorothy. The bedroom had been the Abbot’s lodging in the old monastery, her hostess explained, and Jenny had never seen anything like it. The ancient beams were black, there were deep stone cupboards and niches in the walls. The triple lancet windows were of stone too, and had fragments of stained glass in them. They looked out over a garden which had once been the cloister. Little humps marked the graves of the murdered monks.
That night at Blanchland, an eeriness began for Jenny and continued for as long as she remained in Northumberland. It was an awareness of something close and wishful of communicating, a feeling that the veil was here very thin -- more awesome than frightening-- yet there were times when Jenny was frightened. She was during that night at Blanchland. Unable to sleep beside the gently snoring Dorothy, she listened to the crackles in the old woodwork, the scurrying of mice overhead. Again and again her excited brain presented her with pictures of the day just past; of the heather moors, and the cries of curlews -- “whaups” she had called them in Coquetdale; of her father, and the loving teasing way he spoke to her, of the laughter they had shared. These pictures were radiant, then they darkened, as the moorland mists had swallowed the sun. There were such disturbing things about her father. His Catholicism for one. Jenny was embarrassed when he crossed himself. And worse even was his obstinate undeviating belief in the Pretender. A belief she had childishly thought to change. Patten’s visit had exposed her error. The panic, the concealment, and the lies were daunting. She had herself been plunged at once into the momentary whirlpool. To refuse to do so would have injured her father. But it shouldn’t be so, Jenny thought. She looked up at the bed’s shadowy canopy, and felt a great weight in her breast. At that moment she heard the frenzied tolling of a deep bell. It seemed to come from far away and yet resounded in her ears. She sat up with a muffled exclamation.
Dorothy stirred and murmured, “What’sa matter?”
“The bell,” said Jenny with a kind of sob.
“Who’s ringing that bell?”
“Ah, so you hear it!” said Dorothy awakening. “I don’t, but others have.”
“Where does it come from?” Jenny cried. “You said the church was in ruins.”
“ ‘Tis the monastery bell,” said Dorothy softly. “An echo from the long long ago.”
“They rang the bell for gladness they were saved -- and it was that which killed them,” Jenny whispered. “Oh, it’s horrible.”
Dorothy soothingly touched the girl’s shoulder. “You might say rather that they were punished by their own witless folly. It is often so.”
Jenny put her hands to her ears, then fell back on the pillow. “It’s stopped. Thank God, it’s stopped.”
Dorothy pulled the blankets up, and tucked them around Jenny. Poor pretty child, she thought. She’s a sensitive. The future for her will never be an easy one.
The next morning Charles, Jenny, and Alec quitted Blanchland. They avoided the main road through Slaley, and struck out across Blanchland’s high moor. Even Charles, upon reflection, admitted that it would be unwise to court the risk of meeting Patten, or any other unsympathetic wayfarer.
By ten they reached the brink of the Devil Water, and turning north followed the bank of that cascading turbulent stream. Now every foot of the way was familiar to Charles, and every place poignant with memory. Here was Newbiggin Cottage, where James had hid when the bailiffs were after him in 1715, and here the clump of giant hollies where Jacobite messages had been secreted; here was the Linnels Bridge, which James crossed with Charles before joining Tom Forster on that brave October morning. Here was the Dipton Wood and Swallowship, where the brothers had so often hunted the red deer together. And all along the way the burn tumbled and foamed in tiny cataracts between the fringes of silver birch, or the darkness of pines against the mossy rocks. There were glimpses now and then of the rowan ash’s flame-colored berries.
Charles pointed out the landmarks to Jenny; she acquiesced quietly when he asked her if she did not think the Devil Water charming, then she added a strange remark, “ ‘Tis a good thing the rowan grows here, Papa, for that’s a charm against evil, as everyone knows.”
“Oh, nonsense, child!” said Charles. “Don’t be superstitious! And what evil could there be by this beautiful burn!”
“I know,” she said, and added in half explanation, “yet it has such a peculiar name.”
Charles set himself to explaining the name. Jenny listened politely and was silent, as she had been all morning. There was no accounting for the melancholy which gripped her as they came upon the burn and it deepened as they rode along -- not like the fear she had felt last night upon hearing the ghostly bells, but an impression of anguish. It was as though the waters sobbed. She felt thus perhaps because she had slept so little, Jenny thought, and rallied herself with the hope that soon, soon, she would see Robbie.
They clung to the shelter of the woods, until through the trees there loomed the huge gray-white shape of Dilston Hall, with its rows of tall windows, its balustrade and square built-in pillars -- the great Palladian mansion James had built onto the old castle of his ancestors.
“ ‘Tis very big,” said Jenny softly. “I’ve never seen a house so big!” She looked up at her father and saw that his mouth was twisted, his eyes filled with moisture. She looked again at the mansion and discovered that many of the windows had no glass, that brown streaks ran down the marble facing, that what must have been the lawn was waist-high in weeds. The place had a forlorn air of neglect and desertion.
“Best stay here, sir,” said Alec behind them. “Under cover. I’ll go see how the land lies.”
Charles nodded without speaking. They waited. Jenny let Coquet browse, Charles’s horse stamped and twitched. Charles paid no attention, his fixed gaze never left Dilston Hall.
In twenty minutes Alec returned. “It’s all right, sir. I saw old Busby, he’s been expecting you -- and Mr. Brown’s here!”
Charles started. “Father Brown, the priest? Why, he was in France!”
“Well, he’s here now, sir. Has been for a month. He says to come to his quarters in the gatehouse. Nobody’ll see you, the villagers are all at work.”
“Is Rob Wilson here too?” asked Jenny in a small voice.
“Why no, miss. Though I believe there’s some message.”
Jenny sighed and clenched the bridle tight. They hurried from the wood, across the abandoned pleasure gardens, past the dilapidated summerhouse and the chapel until they came to the gate. The priest’s quarters were next, and Father Brown in a black cassock was waiting in the doorway, his hands outstretched, his thin furrowed face beaming welcome. “My son, my son,” he said hoarsely. “Benedicite,” and he blessed Charles, who fell to his knees and kissed the Jesuit’s hand, while they both thought of their last meeting -- in the Newgate cell on the day of James’s death.
The priest led them into his austere whitewashed parlor. There was no furniture but stools, a table, and a large ebony crucifix on the wall. “So this is your daughter?” said Father Brown, smiling at Jenny. “Sit down, my child. Have a singing-hinny. Mrs. Busby just made them.” He handed her a platterful of cakes, and Jenny took one, trying not to stare at the priest. She had never seen a priest before, but according to Miss Crowe they were all wicked wily men with serpent eyes who worshiped heathenish statues and took their orders from a scarlet monster in Rome. This Mr. Brown didn’t look wicked; he looked kind and tired as he explained himself to her father.
“I’ve been worrying about my little Dilston flock -- bereft of any spiritual comfort. I got permission from the Society to return here, until I can find myself a replacement. I had thirty at Mass last Sunday,” he added smiling.
“I’m glad,” said Charles, “that something is as it used to be. Almost I regret coming back, but I wanted to see --” He gestured towards the chapel next door, where was James’s tomb. “I’ve brought an offering from my Lady Derwentwater she wants put there--” He broke off, and turned away.
“I understand,” said the priest gently. “It will lighten your heart to know that the chapel has become quite a shrine to Catholics for miles around. I’ve had to forbid actual worship of the tomb of course; they had canonized him on their own, not but what it may come someday.”
Charles and the priest both crossed themselves. Then Charles said, “I expected Robert Wilson waiting here with a document of great importance to me. Did Errington explain?”
“Yes. Wilson hasn’t come, but there’s a letter from him. A Rothbury lad brought it yesterday.”
Jenny, who had been puzzled, faintly dismayed by the men’s earlier conversation, jumped from her stool. “Oh Papa! What does Robbie say?”
Charles looked at the piece of folded paper, which was addressed in a firm, quite literate hand, “C. R. Jones esq. c/o Mr. Busby, Dilston.” He frowned as he broke the seal and read the four lines inside. Beneath the disappointment of the message, he was startled that the young lout wrote so well and annoyed at the references to Jenny without the deferential “Miss.” “This is damnably awkward,” said Charles. “Damnably.”
Jenny put her hand on his arm. “Please Papa, let me see what Rob says!”
Charles made an impatient sound. “Take it then!” Jenny grabbed the letter and devoured the message.
Sir -- They wilnot give me what you want.
Only Jenny might get it. Send her here.
Not you. They’d shoot you on sight.
I’ll wait for Jenny.
Resptfly R. Wilson.
Jenny drew a happy breath, and held the letter close between her palms. “So I shall go to Coquetdale,” she said.
“Certainly not!” cried Charles. “I’ll go myself, I’m not afraid of a pack of crazy ruffians, I’ll force them to behave! This is ridiculous.” He was not aware that his sudden fury came as much from the way Jenny looked at the letter as from the bad news it contained. “I’ll not let you go back to that miserable hole!”
Father Brown
cocked his head, and surveyed Charles’s angry face, then he reached out his hand to Jenny. “Give me this disturbing letter, my child.” She yielded it with reluctance. He read it and said, “I think you had better leave me alone with your father. Alec is outside, he’ll show you around.”
Jenny sent her father a beseeching look. She had never before seen him angry. She went out with dragging feet.
“Now, my son,” said the priest, “we will discuss this matter dispassionately.”
Father Brown, who had known Charles since boyhood, exerted the calm authority which had always subdued the lad. He congratulated Charles on the prospects of an excellent Catholic marriage, and emphasized the need for written proof of the first wife’s death. To Charles’s sullen response that he knew all that but Jenny should not be involved, the priest replied with incontestable logic that Jenny was apparently the only one likely to be successful with the mission. And that it was natural the child should wish to see her birthplace once again, seemly too that she should pay some respect to her mother’s memory; while it would be not only reckless but stupid for Charles to antagonize the Snowdons -- let alone run the risk of getting himself shot.
“You’re in enough danger here, as it is,” said the priest. “Busby and I’ve decided that you’ll stay in the steward’s room in the old tower, and go forth only at night. I trust most of my own flock, yet even amongst them the temptation of a large reward might be too much. You’ll be safe in the tower, because nobody dares go near it. Do you remember Mrs. Selby, the blacksmith’s wife, mother of the simple-minded lad?”
Charles said grumpily that he did.
“I think she’s gone a bit soft in the head herself,” continued the priest. “She broods on the Earl’s martyrdom -- can’t blame her for that, but she’s taken to seeing things. Now it’s a white shape on top of the tower, holding a torch. She saw it first last week on August thirtieth, then last night too, and has convinced the whole village.”
“Hokery-pokery,” said Charles in disgust. “So I’m to be protected by a ghost!”