Jane and His Lordship's Legacy Read Online Free PDF Page A

influence my future, however little of it he might hope to share.
    The elderly solicitor reached for his walking-stick and, with one hand braced on my mother’s table, thrust himself to his feet. I was struck of a sudden by the devotion that had kept him sedulously in pursuit of his duty, when another man of his advanced years should have been already nodding by the fire.
    “Mr. Chizzlewit, you have my deepest gratitude,” I said soberly.
    “No thanks are necessary.” He stared at me as though I had uttered an impertinence. “I was honoured by his lordship’s confidence. We are all of us diminished by his foul murder.”
    And pressing a heavy lead key into my palm, he wordlessly bowed.
    The interview, I perceived, was at an end.

Chapter 4
    Of Knights and Villains
    4 July 1809, cont.

~
    “L ETTERS! ” MY MOTHER EXCLAIMED IN HORROR UPON HER return, unmindful of Mr. Prowting at her elbow. “What kind of a man leaves his paramour
letters
? A cottage perhaps, in a good situation—an annuity of a thousand pounds for the remainder of your days—but a bundle of papers not worth the ink smeared over them? Was the Rogue
mad,
Jane?”
    “Never more so,” I replied. “Have you enjoyed your walk, Mamma?”
    “Fiddle my walk!” She rounded on Mr. Prowting. “You will have heard, I am sure, of Lord Harold Trowbridge—a Whig and an adventurer, for all he was the son of a duke; not content with having his fingers in every Government pie, and spoiling them all, but he must break my poor girl’s heart! I can only say, Mr. Prowting, that murder is too good for him. He was born to be hanged!”
    “So I apprehend, ma’am, from the London papers,” the magistrate said stiffly. “I had not understood that you were on terms of acquaintance with the gentleman— For so we must call him, in deference to his birth. That
at least
remains unimpeachable.”
    “And a good deal of money the old Duke must have laid down to make it so,” my mother retorted shrewdly.
    I chose to ignore this impertinence, in deference to the heaviness of her disappointment, and turned instead to the magistrate. “His lordship’s Bengal chest is of considerable size, Mr. Prowting. Would you be so kind as to assist me in securing it?”
    Mr. Chizzlewit’s warning had not been lost upon me. Lord Harold’s enemies were numerous and determined; death alone should not quiet their fears. I had weighed the merits of henhouse and privy as unlikely objects of a thief’s interest, but settled instead upon the depths of the cottage as being more convenient to hand. Our present abode having once served as an alehouse, it must be assumed that the cellars were commodious and in good repair. A double-doored hatch protruded from nether region to yard, undoubtedly for the purpose of rolling barrels of ale within; but this could be secured from below by a stout bar. I might sit upon Lord Harold’s papers like a hen upon an egg, a priest upon a crypt, alive to every threat of violation.
    “I am entirely at your service,” Mr. Prowting said with a bow.
    A foetid air rose from the damp and musty space as I descended the narrow stairs, a tallow candle held aloft.
    “You will require a manservant,” the magistrate declared. He was puffing from exertion, the wooden casket clutched precariously in his arms. “I shall take upon myself the task of securing a likely fellow from Alton.”
    “He must be called William or John, mind. I depend upon that.” A scuttling of feet greeted my flame, and for an instant I hesitated on the bottom step. “Does the history of our former alehouse encompass smuggling, Mr. Prowting?”
    “Every alehouse in the country must. Your brandy will not serve, unless it comes by stealth from France. But that is no Gentleman of the Night, Miss Austen. You will also be wanting a dog, I think—a stout little terrier to clear your cupboards for you.”
    In the glow of the tallow I observed several dark and stealthy forms stealing from a heap of