Praise for award-winning author Carla Kelly:

‘A powerful and wonderfully perceptive author.’

—New York Times bestselling author Mary Jo Putney

‘It is always a joy to read a Carla Kelly love story. Always original, always superb. Ms Kelly’s body of work is a timeless delight for discerning readers.’

—RT Book Reviews

‘Kelly has the rare ability to create realistic yet sympathetic characters that linger in the mind. One of the most respected Regency writers.’

—Library Journal

MARRYING THE ROYAL MARINE

‘These two have seen each other at their best and at their worst. Have been tried and tested in the flames yet come out stronger for it.

I certainly enjoyed the trip …’

—Dear Author

BEAU CRUSOE

‘Taking her impetus from Robinson Crusoe and the film Castaway, Kelly crafts the story of a shipwreck survivor readjusting to civilisation … Kelly presents a clear portrait of the mores and prejudices of the era, and demonstrates how to navigate through society’s labyrinth with intelligent, sharp repartee. This alone is worth the price of the book.’

—RT Book Reviews

About the Author

CARLA KELLY has been writing award-winning novels for years—stories set in the British Isles, Spain, and army garrisons during the Indian Wars. Her speciality in the Regency genre is writing about ordinary people, not just lords and ladies. Carla has worked as a university professor, a ranger in the National Park Service, and recently as a staff writer and columnist for a small daily newspaper in Valley City, North Dakota. Her husband is director of theatre at Valley City State University. She has five interesting children, a fondness for cowboy songs, and too many box elder beetles in the autumn.

Novels by the same author:

BEAU CRUSOE

CHRISTMAS PROMISE

(part of Regency Christmas Gifts anthology)

MARRYING THE CAPTAIN

THE SURGEON’S LADY

MARRYING THE ROYAL MARINE

Did you know that some of these novels are also available as eBooks? Visit www.millsandboon.co.uk

Marriage
of Mercy
Carla Kelly

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Prologue

Robert Inman, sailing master, had a cheery temperament. He had always been inclined to take the bitter with the sweet and chalk everything else up to experience. Still, it was a hard slog to reconcile himself to another year of captivity in Dartmoor, a prison newly built but scarcely humane.

Recently, among the Orontes survivors, he had noticed a change in conversational topics. A year ago in 1813, conversation had been almost exclusively of their capture off Land’s End, where they had been toying with British merchant shipping.

With a monumental sigh, Captain Daniel Duncan had handed over his letter of marque and reprisal to the victor. The captain of the Royal Navy’s sloop of war was a mere ensign, but regrettably had had the weather gauge, so capture had come as a matter of course. Rob had felt a serious pang to see the triumphant crew haul down the Stars and Stripes and fly British colours from the elegant, slanted mast of the privateer Orontes.

When the humiliation of capture turned to resignation, tongues loosened up. The powder monkey boasted there wasn’t a jail in England that could hold him long. Duncan’s first and only mate declared that war would end soon and their discomfort would be a mere annoyance.

Both the powder monkey and the mate had been wise beyond their years, apparently. No jail held the monkey long. He claimed the distinction of being the first to die, courtesy of an infected tooth that the prison governor felt deserved little attention, since it resided in an American mouth.

The first mate’s discomfort—indeed, his final one—had proved to be a serious annoyance after rampant scurvy opened up an old wound inflicted by Tripolitan pirates. The scar in his thigh had separated, gaped wider until blood poisoning accepted the invitation and waltzed in, a most unwelcome guest.

As for the war ending soon, no one’s expectations were high. The carpenter keeping the calendar had to be reminded to cross off yet another day on the wall, one very much like the day before, with thin gruel for breakfast, and gruel and a crust of bread for supper, and nothing in between.

Earlier conversations had revolved around food and women, as in what each seaman would eat, upon liberation, and just how many women he would sport with at the first opportunity. Food was too tantalising to discuss any more, and women not even a distraction, not to starving men. Rob had spent one fruitless hour trying to remember the pleasures of the flesh, only to realise he had not enough energy for what would follow, even in his generally fertile imagination.

For the most part, everyone sat in silence all the day. Evenings were reserved for night terrors ranging from rats on the prowl to memories of battle, near drownings to other incarcerations during this pesky war brought on by Napoleon. Those were the good dreams. Worse was the reality of scarecrow prisoners crawling among the men, preying on the more feeble.

The eternal optimist, considering his origins, Rob knew things could be worse. He had to say one thing about Dartmoor: the place was built solid, one cold stone on top of another. The wind found its way inside, though, through iron bars that no warden thought should be covered in winter, because that would be too great a comfort for prisoners.

And that was the problem for Robert Inman, sailing master. More than food and women’s bodies, he craved the feel of wind on his face, but not the wailing wind that filtered into the prison over high walls. He knew what the right wind could do to a sail. He knew he could stand in one spot on any slanting deck and know precisely what to do with wind. In Dartmoor, he could only dream about wind on his face—the fair winds of summer, the fitful puffs of the dog latitudes, the humid offerings of southeast Asia.

All he wanted was the right wind.

Chapter One

If Grace Curtis, formerly known as the Honourable Miss Grace Curtis, had decided to waste her life in fruitless self-pity, she knew several genteelly poor persons to use as her character models.

Agatha Ralls lived in rented rooms over the Hare and Hound, a steep decline from her childhood in Ralls Manor, a structure built during the reign of one Edward or the other, which now housed bats. Family fortunes had taken a dismal turn when a now-distant earl had backed the wrong horse in the era of Cavaliers and Roundheads. That the family’s resounding crash had taken some 150 years was some testament to earlier wealth. Now Miss Ralls lived on very little and everyone knew it.

Or Grace could have looked to the ludicrous spectacle of Sir George Armisted, who maintained a precarious existence on the family estate, when it would have been much wiser to sell it to a merchant with more money than class. Instead, Sir George sat in threadbare splendour in a leaking parlour.

Grace had watched her own father shake his head over Sir George, asking out loud how such a fool justified the expensive snuff he dipped and wine he decanted. That Sir Henry Curtis was doing the same thing never seemed to have occurred to him, even when he lay dying and advised Grace, his only child, to ‘make a good match in London during the next Season’.

Grace had been too kind to point out to her father that there were no funds left to finance anything as ambitious as a Season in London, much less induce any gentleman of her social sphere to ally himself with a cheerful face and nothing else. It wouldn’t have been sporting to point out her father’s deficiencies as he was forced to pay attention to death, as he had never paid much attention to anything of consequence before.

Grace had closed his eyes, covered his face and left his bedroom, resolved to learn something from misfortune and build a life for herself, rather than gently glide into discreet poverty and reduced circumstances. Poor she would be, but it did not follow that she couldn’t be happy.

Dressed in black and wearing a jet brooch, Grace had endured the reading of the will. Papa had had nothing to leave except debts. In the weeks before his death, his solicitor had made discreet enquiries throughout the district in an attempt to smoke out potential buyers from among the merchant class who hankered after property far removed from the High Street. He had found one, so Grace had had to suffer his presence as the solicitor read the will.

There had been paltry gifts for the few servants—all of them superannuated and with no hope of other employment—who had hung on until the bitter end, because their next place of residence would surely be the poorhouse. When the old dears turned sad eyes on her, Grace could only shake her head in sorrow, as she writhed inside.

What followed was precisely what she had expected, particularly since the solicitor had told her the night before that the manor and its contents were all going to the new landlord, an enterprising fellow who had made a fortune importing naval stores from the Baltic. With that knowledge, Grace had deposited her amethyst brooch, her only keepsake, in her pocket for safety.

And that was that. Grace had signed a document forfeiting any interest in her home, then had led the new owners through the threadbare rooms.

It was almost too much when the wife demanded to know how quickly Grace could quit the place, but Grace had always been pragmatic.

‘I can be gone tomorrow morning,’ Grace had said, and so she was.

That she might have nowhere to go never occurred to the new owners, so intent were they to take possession. Her two bags packed, Grace had lain awake all night in her room, teasing herself with the one plan in her mind. She discarded it, reclaimed it, discarded it again, then shouldered it for the final time after breakfast. She straightened her shoulders, picked up her valise and walked away from her home of eighteen years.

Grace had had only one egg in her basket. That it proved to be the right one had given her considerable comfort through the next ten years. It had been but a short walk from her former home to Quimby, a village close to Exeter. The day was pleasantly cool for August, with only the slightest breeze swaying the sign of Adam Wilson’s bakery.

She had hoped the bakery would be empty, and it was, except for the owner and his wife. Grace set down her valise and came to the counter. Adam Wilson wiped his floury hands on his apron and gave her the same kindly look he had been giving her for years, even when she suffered inside to beg for credit.

‘Yes, my dear?’ Mrs Wilson asked, coming to stand beside her husband.

Grace took a deep breath. ‘We owe you a large sum, I know,’ she said calmly. ‘I have a proposal.’

Both Wilsons looked at her, and she saw nothing in their gaze except interest. They had all the time in the world to listen.

‘I will work off that debt,’ Grace said, ‘if you can provide me with a place to live. When I have paid the debt, and if my work has been satisfactory, I’ll work for you for wages. I know you have recently lost your all-around girl to marriage with a carter in Exeter.’

To her relief, nothing in Mr Wilson’s face exhibited either surprise or scepticism. ‘What do you know about baking?’ he asked.

‘Very little,’ Grace replied honestly. ‘What I am is loyal and a hard worker.’

The Wilsons looked at each other, while Grace stared straight ahead at a sign advertising buns six for a penny.

‘My dear, you have a pretty face. Suppose a member of your class decides to offer for you, and then we are out all of our training?’ Mrs Wilson was the shrewder of the two.

‘No one will offer for me, Mrs Wilson,’ Grace said. ‘I have no dowry to tempt anyone among the gentry. By the same token, no man among the labouring class will want a wife who he fears would take on airs and give him grief, because she is elevated in station above him and can’t—or won’t—forget. I am completely marriage-proof and therefore the ideal employee.’

So she had proved to be. The Wilsons lived above the bakery on the High Street, but had gladly cleared out a small storeroom behind the ovens for her use, a fragrant spot smelling of yeast and herbs. She had cried her last tear, walking to Quimby. Once that was done, she became an all-around girl and never looked back.

The first time one of her acquaintances from her former days had come into the shop, Grace had realised she could never afford to look back. She knew the moment would happen sooner or later; blessedly, it was sooner. The morning that one of her dearest friends had come into the shop with her mama and ignored Grace completely, she knew the wind blew differently. Discreetly put, Grace Curtis had slid.

The matter bothered her less than she had thought it might, considering that she had debated long and hard about throwing herself on the mercy of that particular family. Grace’s decision had been confirmed most forcefully a year later. She overheard Lady Astley say to an acquaintance that they had taken in a poor cousin. And there she was, middle-aged and obsequious, always nervously alert in public to do her cousin’s bidding, for fear of being turned off to an unkind world. No, Grace knew she had been wise in casting her lot with the Wilsons.

When two years had passed, Mr Wilson declared the family debt eliminated. He seemed surprised when she took a deep breath and asked, ‘Will you keep me on still?’

‘I thought that was the term,’ he told her, as he set yeast to soften by the mixing bowls.

‘I hoped it was,’ she replied, reaching for the salt, afraid to look at him.

‘Then it is, Gracie. Let us shake on it.’ He smiled at her. ‘You’re the best worker I ever hired.’

The years had passed easily enough. After a brief peace, the war set in again. The Wilsons’ two sons sailed with the Channel Fleet, one dying at Trafalgar and the other rising to carpenter’s mate. Their daughters all married Navy men and lived in Portsmouth. Grace found herself assuming more and more responsibility, particularly in keeping the books.

She had never minded that part of her job because she was meticulous. Her real pleasure, though, came in making biscuits: macaroons, pretty little Savoy cakes, lemon biscuits, all pale brown and crisp, and creamy biscuits with almond icing.

It was these last biscuits—she named them Quimby Crèmes—that had attracted the attention of Lord Thomson, Marquis of Quarle. Mr Wilson always thought he was aptly named, because the old man always seemed to be picking one. Colonel of a regiment of foot serving in New York City during the American War, Lord Thomson suffered no fools gladly, be they titled like himself, merchants with more pretension than the Pope, or the smelly knacker man, who regularly cleared the roads of dead animals. Lord Thomson was equally disposed to resent everyone.

Grace was the only person in Quimby who had a knack for managing the marquis and she did it through his stomach. She had noticed his marked preference for her Quimby Crèmes when he visited the bakery, something he did regularly.

His bakery visits puzzled Mrs Wilson. ‘My cousin is an upstairs maid in his employ and I know for a fact he has any number of footmen to fetch biscuits on a whim. Why does he do it?’

Grace knew. She remembered her own treks to the bakery for the pleasure of the fragrance inside the glass door, and the fun of choosing three of these and a half-dozen of those. Invariably, after Lord Thomson made his selection, Grace watched him open his parcel outside the shop and sit in the sun, eating one biscuit after another. She understood.

She probably never would have realised her eventual fondness for Lord Thomson if he had not come up short in her eyes. One morning—perhaps his washing water had been cold—he elbowed his way into the shop, snarling at a little boy who took too long to make his selection at the counter. He poked the lad with his umbrella. The boy’s eyes welled with tears.

‘That’s enough, Lord Thomson,’ Grace declared.

‘What did you say?’ the marquis demanded.

‘You heard me, my lord,’ she said serenely, adding an extra lemon biscuit to the boy’s choice. ‘Tommy was here first. Everyone gets a chance to choose.’

After a filthy look at her, the marquis turned on his heel and left the bakery, slamming the door so hard that the cat in the window woke up.

‘I fear I may have cost you a customer,’ Grace told Mr Wilson, who had watched the whole scene.

‘I can be philosophical,’ Mr Wilson said, patting Tommy on the head. ‘He’s a grouchy old bird.’

She worried, though, acutely aware that Lord Thomson didn’t come near the shop for weeks. Easter came and went, and so did everyone except the marquis. Quimby was a small village. Even those who had not witnessed the initial outburst knew what had happened. When he eventually returned, even those in line stepped out of the way, not willing to incur any wrath that might reflect poorly on Grace.

With a studied smile, Lord Thomson waited his turn. As he approached the front of the line eventually, an amazing number of patrons had decided not to leave until they knew the outcome. Grace felt her cheeks grow rosy as he stood before her and placed his order.

She chose to take the bull by the horns. ‘Lord Thomson, I’ve been faithfully making Quimby Crèmes, hoping you would return.’

‘Here I am,’ he said quietly. ‘I’ll take all you have, if you’ll join me in the square to help me eat them.’

She had not expected that. One look at his triumphant face told her that he had known she would be surprised and it tickled him. She smiled again. ‘You have me, sir,’ she said simply. She looked at Mr Wilson, who nodded, as interested in the conversation as his customers.

To her relief, they ate Crèmes and parted as friends.

Year in and year out he visited the bakery, even when the decade started to weigh on him. When an apologetic footman told her one morning that Lord Thomson was bedridden now, and asked if she would please bring the crèmes to Quarle, she made her deliveries in person.

Standing in the foyer at Quarle, Grace had some inkling of the marquis’s actual worth, something he had never flaunted. The estate was magnificent and lovingly maintained. She felt a twinge of something close to sadness, that her own father had been unable to maintain their more modest estate to the same standard. Quarle was obviously in far better hands.

She brought biscuits to Lord Thomson all winter, sitting with him while he ate, and later dipping them in milk and feeding them to him when he became too feeble to perform even that simple task. Each visit seemed to reveal another distant relative—he had no children of his own—all with the marquis’s commanding air, but none with his flair for stories of his years on the American continent, fighting those Yankee upstarts, or even his interest in the United States.

His relatives barely tolerated Grace’s visits. Her cheeks had burned with their scorn, but in the end, she decided it was no worse than the slights that came her way now and then. She found herself feeling strangely protective of the old man against his own relatives, who obviously would never have come around, had they not been summoned by Lord Thomson’s new solicitor.

At least, he introduced himself to her one afternoon as the new solicitor, although he was not young. ‘I’m Philip Selway,’ he said. ‘And you are Miss Grace Curtis?’

‘Just Gracie Curtis,’ she told him. ‘Lord Thomson likes my Quimby Crèmes.’

‘So do I,’ he assured her.

She returned her attention to Lord Thomson. She squeezed his hand gently and he opened his eyes.

‘Lean closer,’ he said, with just a touch of his former air of command.

She did as he said.

‘I’m dying, you know,’ he told her.

‘I was afraid of that,’ she whispered. ‘I’ll bring you Quimby Crèmes tomorrow.’

‘That’ll keep death away?’ he asked, amused.

‘No, but I’ll feel better,’ she said, which made him chuckle.

She thought he had stopped, but he surprised her. ‘Do you trust me?’ he asked.

‘I believe I do,’ she replied, after a moment.

‘Good. What’s to come will try you. Have faith in me,’ he told her, then closed his eyes.

She left the room quietly, wondering what he meant. The solicitor stood in the hall. He nodded to her.

‘Coming back tomorrow?’ he asked.

‘Yes, indeed.’

Lord Thomson’s relatives were returning from the breakfast room, arguing with each other. They darted angry glances at the solicitor as they brushed past him and ignored Grace.

‘You’ll be back tomorrow?’

‘I said I would, sir.’

‘Grace, I believe you’ll do.’

‘Sir?’

He followed the relatives, but not before giving her a long look.

As she considered the matter later, she wondered if she should have stayed away. But who was wise on short notice?

Chapter Two

Mr Selway knocked on the door of the bakery the next morning before they opened for business. Apron in hand, Grace unlocked the door, wondering if he had been waiting long.

He didn’t have to say anything; she knew. ‘He’s gone, isn’t he? Mr Selway, I’m going to miss him,’ she said, swallowing hard.

‘We are the only ones,’ he said. ‘I wanted you to know.’ He put his hand on her arm. ‘Please attend the reading of his will, which will follow his funeral on Tuesday.’

Surely she hadn’t heard him right. ‘I beg your pardon, sir?’

He increased the pressure on her arm. ‘I cannot say more, since the company is not assembled for the reading. Be there, Grace.’

And there she was, four days later. The foyer was deserted, but Mr Selway had told her they would all be in the library. She opened the door quietly, cringing inside when it squeaked and all those heads swivelled in her direction, then turned back just as quickly. The family servants stood along the back wall and she joined them. Mr Selway looked at her over the top of his spectacles, then continued reading.

This reading was different from her father’s paltry will. Mr Selway covered a wide-ranging roster of properties, even including a Jamaican plantation, part-interest in a Brazilian forest, a brewery in Boston and a tea farm in Ceylon.

‘T’auld scarecrow had his bony fingers in a lot of pies,’ the gardener standing next to her whispered.

She nodded, thinking about Lord Thomson’s generally shabby air. She tried to imagine him as a young army officer, adventuring about the world. Her attention wandered. Before his relatives had descended on him, Lord Thomson had had no objection to her borrowing a book now and then. She thought of two books in her room behind the ovens and hoped she could sneak them back before the new Lord Thomson missed them. Not that he would, but she did not wish to cross him. Grace was a shrewd enough judge of character to suspect that the new Lord Thomson would begrudge even the widow her tiny mite, if he thought it should be his. Books probably fell in that category.

Mr Selway finished his reading of the properties devolving on the sole heir, who sat in the front row, practically preening himself with his own importance. The solicitor picked up another sheet and started on a much smaller inventory of items of interest to other family members, ranging this time from items of jewellery to pieces of furniture. She listened with half an ear.

The servants were given their due next, some of them turned off with a small sum and thanks. Others were allowed to keep their jobs, probably, Grace reasoned, no longer than it would take for the new Lord Thomson to decide them superfluous. Still, a pound here and a pound there could mean the world to people on the level she now inhabited.

Mr Selway put down that document and picked up the last one remaining in front of him. He cleared his throat, looking uncertain for the first time, as if unsure how this final term would be received.

Without a look or a word, Grace knew instinctively that whatever the term was, it would fall on her. She looked around the room in sudden panic. Everyone had been accounted for and Mr Selway had explicitly insisted on her presence. She started to ease toward the door, afraid for the attention soon to be thrust upon her and wanting only to return to the bakery. She stopped moving when Mr Selway looked directly at her.

‘There are two final items in the will, recently added, but no less attested to,’ he said. ‘One is a small matter, the other a large one. Let me mention the small one first. I will read what the late Lord Thomson dictated to me, only one month ago.’ He cleared his throat and took a firm grip on the document. ‘For the last five years at least, I have been kindly treated by Mr and Mrs Wilson’s assistant, Grace Louisa Curtis. She has never failed to bake precisely the biscuits I craved, and—’

The new Lord Thomson groaned. ‘Good Lord, next you’ll tell me that my uncle is bequeathing her a brewery on the Great Barrier Reef that we have no knowledge of! Let her have it and be damned.’

Now dependent on this new marquis for whatever thin charity he chose to dispense, his relatives laughed. Grace cringed inside and started sidling toward the door again. It looked so far away.

Mr Selway stared down the new marquis and continued. “Knowing of her kindness to me, when none of my relatives cared whether I lived or died, I have arranged for Miss Curtis to take possession of this estate’s dower house and its contents for her lifetime.”

‘Good God!’ Lord Thomson was on his feet, his face beet red.

Mr Selway looked at him and then down at the page. ‘… for her lifetime. In addition, she will receive thirty pounds per annum.’

‘This is outrageous!’ the marquis shouted.

‘It is a mere thirty pounds each year and a small house you would never occupy,’ Mr Selway said mildly. ‘Do sit down, Lord Thomson, I am not quite finished.’ He glared him down into his chair again. ‘As I said, this was the easy part.’

Grace stared at the solicitor. The colour must have drained from her face, because the gardener standing next to her guided her towards a stool that a footman had vacated.

‘I don’t want this,’ she murmured to the gardener, who shrugged.

‘Since when has what we wanted made a difference?’ the man whispered back.

‘Go on, tell me the rest,’ Lord Thomson exclaimed. ‘Lord, this is a nuisance!’

Mr Selway put down the document and folded his hands over it. ‘Lord Thomson, it will probably come as a surprise to you that your predecessor had a son.’

‘I’ll be damned,’ the new marquis said. ‘A bastard, no doubt.’

‘Takes one to know one,’ the gardener whispered, but not in a soft voice. The back row of relatives turned around, some to glare, others to titter.

‘Yes, my lord, a bastard, so you needn’t fear you will lose a penny of your inheritance,’ Mr Selway said. ‘While his regiment was quartered in New York City during much of the American War, your uncle dallied with one Mollie Duncan, the daughter of a Royalist draper. The result was a son.’ He looked at the document again. ‘Daniel Duncan.’

‘How could this possibly concern any of us?’ Lord Thomson snapped.

‘Ordinarily, it would not. Through various means, your uncle managed to keep track of Daniel Duncan’s career. When this current American war began, Duncan commanded a privateer called the Orontes, out of Nantucket.’

‘So Uncle’s bastard is making life difficult for British merchant shipping,’ the marquis said, smirking. ‘Why do you think I even care about this?’

Mr Selway picked up the document again, and pulled a thicker packet from a drawer in the desk. ‘Because before his death, your uncle arranged for Captain Duncan, currently a prisoner of war in Dartmoor, to be paroled to Quarle’s dower house.’ He glanced at Grace, his eyes kind. ‘He specifically requests that Grace Curtis provide his food and care during his parole here. When the war ends, he’ll go free. That is all the connection you will have with him.’

Lord Thomson laughed. ‘You can’t seriously honour this. The old devil was crazy.’

He had gone too far. Grace could see that in the way the other relatives whispered to each other. The new Lord Thomson seemed to sense their disgust of him. He folded his arms and sat silent, his lips in a tight line. ‘Well, he was,’ he muttered.

Mr Selway spoke directly to him, leaning forwards across the small desk. ‘Lord Thomson, your predecessor would have done this sooner, had he not had this sudden decline that led to his death. Everything has been approved for such a transaction. I tell you that the deceased had friends in high places, whom it would be wise not to cross. You are in no way rendered uncomfortable at an estate you seldom visit, anyway.’

Apparently Mr Selway was not above a little personal pride. He smiled at Lord Thomson, even though Grace saw no humour there. ‘I build only airtight wills, Lord Thomson.’ He looked down at the document before him. ‘Any attempt on your part to alter or in any way hinder the carrying out of this stipulation would be folly. I repeat: Lord Thomson had friends in high places.’ Mr Selway folded the will and left the room.

Lord Thomson sat slumped in his seat. After a disparaging glance at her husband, the new Lady Thomson rose and gestured his relatives toward the dining room, where refreshments waited. Grace sidled out of the door ahead of everyone, eager to leave the building by the closest exit. If I hurry, I can be out of here and pretend none of this has happened, she thought.

But there was Mr Selway, obviously waiting for her. She sighed.

‘Mr Selway, please don’t think I need any of the provisions mentioned in Lord Thomson’s will,’ she told him, even as he guided her into the bookroom. ‘I want to go back to the bakery.’ She tried to get out of his grasp ‘Mr Selway, please!’

‘Sit down, my dear,’ he said, his expression kindly. ‘There is no stipulation that you must remain in the dower house, if you don’t wish to. The thirty pounds is yours annually for life, though.’

Grace nodded. ‘I want to save money to buy the bakery some day, when the Wilsons are too old to run it.’

‘Then this is your opportunity.’ The solicitor said nothing else for a long while. When he spoke, his words were carefully chosen. ‘Grace, I have observed in life that most of us place our expectations abnormally high and we are disappointed when they remain unfulfilled. Have you placed yours too low?’

She shook her head. ‘I have not,’ she told him quietly. ‘You know as well as I do that thirty a year will not maintain me in any style approaching my former status. It will not induce anyone to marry me. Heavens, sir, I am twenty-eight! I have no illusions.’

‘Indeed you do not,’ Mr Selway replied. ‘You may be right, too.’ He leaned towards her. ‘Think about this, Gracie: it is 1814. This war with America cannot last for ever. Dartmoor is a fearsomely terrible place. You would be doing a great favour to our Lord Thomson to succor his only child, no matter how boisterously he was conceived.’

‘I suppose I would,’ she said, feeling that the words were pulled from her mouth by tweezers. ‘Could I discuss this with the Wilsons? If I have to live in the dower house with a paroled prisoner, I’d like to keep working at the bakery.’

‘I see no harm in that, as long as the parolee is with you.’

Grace stood up, relieved. ‘Then I will ask them directly and send you a note.’

‘I ask no more of you, my dear,’ Mr Selway said.

The Wilsons had no objections to any of the details of Lord Thomson’s will, so amazed were they that a marquis would consider doing so much for their Gracie, a woman others of her class seemed content to ignore in perpetuity.

‘What’s a year or less?’ Mr Wilson asked. ‘You can live in a nice place, take care of a paroled prisoner, then return to us and all’s well. Or keep working here, if you wish. Maybe he’d be useful to us.’

‘Maybe he would be.’ She hesitated. ‘And… and might I some day buy your bakery?’ Grace asked timidly. ‘I’d like nothing better.’

Both Wilsons nodded. ‘The war will end soon, Gracie,’ Mr Wilson assured her. ‘You’ll be doing a favour for old Lord Thomson. How hard can this be?’

Grace had sent a note to Mr Selway and was greeted by him the next morning as she opened the shop.

‘We’ll go at once,’ Mr Selway told her. ‘I’ve heard tales of Dartmoor and how fearsomely bad it is. Let’s spring the man while we can.’

‘Must I be there, too?’

He nodded. ‘I fear so. Lord Thomson stipulated there would be three signatures on the parole document. Yours and mine, signed and notarised in the presence of the prison’s governor—a man called Captain Shortland, I believe.’

‘Three?’

Wordlessly, he took the parole document from a folder and opened it to show her the first signature. Grace gasped. ‘The Duke of Clarence?’

‘Sailor Billy, himself.’ Mr Selway put away the parole. ‘Let’s go get a man out of prison, Gracie.’

And they would have, the very next day, if news had not circulated through all of England—glorious news, news so spectacular that all of Quimby, at any rate, had trouble absorbing it. After nearly a generation of war, it was suddenly over. Cornered, trapped, his army slipping away, the allies moving ever closer, Napoleon had been forced to abdicate.

Mr Selway told Grace he must return to London, muttering something about ‘details’ that he did not explain.

‘If the war is over, will the American return home?’ she asked, as he came by the bakery in mid-March. She didn’t want to sound too hopeful, but as each day had passed, Grace realised how little she wanted to honour Lord Thomson’s will, not if it meant the continuing animosity of the new marquis, who still remained in residence.

‘Alas, no. That is a separate conflict. We still have a parolee on our hands, or at least, I think we do,’ he told her. He nodded his thanks as she put a generous handful of Quimby Crèmes in a paper for him. ‘Our recent peace could be worse for the Americans, if better for us.’

‘How?’ she asked, embarrassed at her ignorance of war.

‘Now we can focus all our British might on the pesky American war.’ He nodded to her. ‘I expect I will be back soon, though. War seems to grind on.’

He was back in less than a week, knocking on the bakery door after they had closed for the night and she was sweeping up. She let him in and he gave her a tired smile.

‘I am weary of post-chaises!’ he told her, shaking his head when she tried to help him off with his overcoat. ‘I just dropped by to tell you that we are going to Dartmoor tomorrow.’ He sighed. ‘Captain Daniel Duncan is still ours.’

She could not say she was pleased, and she knew her discomfort showed on her face. Mr Selway put his arm around her. ‘Buck up, my dear. At least we needn’t stay in Dartmoor.’ He gave her shoulder a squeeze. ‘Let’s make old Lord Thomson proud of us Englishmen.’

Chapter Three

Grace knew she had a fertile imagination. After only a brief hour in Dartmoor, she knew not even the cleverest person on earth could imagine such a place.

Her mood had not been sanguine, but she credited their first stop of the morning to the lowering of her spirits. Mr Selway had had the key to the dower house and said they would visit her new home first, as he handed her into the post-chaise.

When they had arrived, the solicitor had unlocked the door and they found themselves in an empty house.

‘I thought the will mentioned house and contents,’ Grace said, as she looked around the bare sitting room, where even the curtains had been removed.

A muscle began to work in Mr Selway’s jaw. ‘Wait here,’ he said. He turned on his heel and left the dower house.

Grace wandered from room to room, admiring the pleasant view from uncurtained windows, even as she shook her head over Lord Thomson’s petty nature.

Mr Selway had returned in no better humour. He walked in the door and threw up his hands. ‘Such drama! Such wounded pride! Lord Thomson can’t imagine what happened to the furniture in the dower house and heartily resents my accusation that he emptied it out like a fishmonger’s offal basket.’ He shook his head. ‘He says all will be restored to its proper place.’

‘I won’t hold my breath,’ Grace said.

‘Wise of you. There might be furniture here, but I think Lord Thomson will send his minions to the attics to find the dregs.’

‘We don’t need much.’

‘What a relief. I doubt you’ll get much!’

It’s good you did not ask me if I am afraid, Grace thought, as they left Quimby by mid-morning and began a steady climb onto the moors. This spares me a lie of monumental proportions.

The higher they climbed, the colder the air blew, until she had wrapped herself tight in an all-too-inadequate shawl. Shivering, she looked on the granite outcroppings and the few trees. ‘Is it April here, or only April in the rest of England?’ she asked.

‘Many have remarked that even nature conspires against this place,’ Mr Selway commented. ‘I have heard complaints about the change in atmospherics around Dartmoor.’ He glanced out the window. ‘Could England have chosen a more unaccommodating place for a prison? I doubt it, perhaps that is the point.’

They were both silent as the post-chaise wound its way along a dirt track of considerable width, as though armies had marched abreast. Or prisoners, Grace thought. Poor men.

When she thought they would wind no higher, the fog yielded to cold rain. She peered out of the window as the chaise entered a bowl-shaped valley. And there was Dartmoor Prison, an isolated pile of granite with walls surrounding it like a cartwheel. She looked at Mr Selway. ‘Perhaps it’s a good thing old Lord Thomson never got here,’ she said. ‘It would have broken his heart.’ It’s breaking mine, Grace told herself.

‘There must be thousands of prisoners inside,’ she said, touching the small carton of biscuits she had brought along as a gift, suddenly wishing it were loaves and fishes and greatly magnified.

‘The prison’s first inmates were Frenchmen, acquired during the war,’ Mr Selway told her, his eyes on the tall grey walls as the carriage drew nearer. ‘I don’t know when Americans started arriving, but I can surmise it was after 1812.’

‘I don’t want to go in there,’ Grace whispered as the chaise stopped and a squad of Royal Marines approached at port arms.

‘Who can blame you?’ the solicitor murmured. ‘Here we go, Gracie.’

He rolled down the glass and handed over the papers. The corporal took them inside a small stone building by the gate. He was gone long enough for Grace to feel even more uneasy. ‘There is nothing about this process to put someone at ease, is there?’ she commented to Mr Selway.

‘No, indeed, child,’ he replied. ‘I’ve been in Newgate—just as a solicitor, mind!—and it’s the same there. I don’t know why it is that everyone seeking entrance, even by legal means, is made to feel so small.’

The marine returned their papers and hitched himself up next to the coachman. The chaise rolled through the first gate, which led to another gate. There appeared to be three gates and then an interior wall that bisected the circle, with a still-smaller gate yielding to what must be the prison blocks beyond.

Mr Selway eyed the grey government buildings. ‘It takes a lot of paper-pushing to run a prison, I suppose. Even misery must be documented.’

‘You sound like a radical,’ Grace whispered, her eyes widening at her first sight of prisoners, dressed in yellow smocks and unloading supplies into a warehouse.

‘Do I?’ he asked. ‘Fancy that.’ He tightened his grip on her hand as the chaise slowed and stopped, and the coachman set the brake. ‘End of the line. We walk from here.’

The marine jumped down from his perch and opened the door, holding out his gloved hand for Grace. She took a deep breath and regretted it immediately. A foul stench rose from the very stones of the prison. Grace put her hand over her nose, but it did little good.

They were led immediately into an office on the second floor of a building that looked out on to the prison yards, as though the caretakers of misery felt they would be somehow beyond the noisome odours, sights and sounds below. She looked out of the window in horrified fascination. The prison appeared to be divided into pie-shaped wedges with high walls around each three-storey building.

After a long wait, she and Mr Selway were ushered into the prison governor’s office, a comfortable haven with sweet-smelling fragrances in bowls on every table. The governor introduced himself, holding a scented handkerchief to his nose, then took their papers. He spent a long time looking at the signature that had surprised Grace yesterday.

‘Imagine,’ he said at last, flicking his handkerchief at them, as if they smelled bad, too. ‘What possible interest his Grace has in this one, I can’t understand.’ He waved his handkerchief again. ‘Go on. Take him. Take them all! What an argumentative, carping lot.’ He looked at the letter again, then at the clerk hovering at his elbow. ‘Daniel Duncan, captain of the Orontes. Building Four. Keep an eye on him, for God’s sake.’

He turned back to the paperwork in front of him. They were dismissed. Mr Selway lingered a moment. ‘Captain? Could Miss Curtis remain here while I fetch the prisoner?’

Shortland frowned at Grace. ‘No. This damned document specifically states she is to accompany you to retrieve the prisoner.’ He looked at the corporal at attention in the open door. ‘Send a squad. She’ll be safe enough.’

‘Safe enough doesn’t thrill my bones,’ Mr Selway muttered as they followed the marine downstairs. ‘Still… Chin up, Gracie. This shouldn’t take long.’

Surrounded by a squad of marines, they entered the prison courtyard. ‘Don’t look at anyone. Eyes ahead,’ Mr Selway murmured, keeping a tight grip on her hand.

She did as he said, taking shallow breaths as the stench grew the closer they came to a single prison block. Two men in plain uniforms stood at the entrance, blocking it with their muskets. As the squad advanced, one of them stepped forwards.

‘We’re here for Daniel Duncan of the Orontes,’ the corporal said. ‘Produce him at once.’

One of the warders shook his head. ‘Can’t. He’s ill. You’ll have to fetch him out.’ His eyes stopped on Grace and she felt her face begin to burn. ‘Good Lord deliver us! He’s halfway back. Stall Fourteen, I think.’

The squad of marines pressed closer to Grace and Mr Selway as they entered Block Four. Even above the odour of too many unwashed bodies, Grace could smell mould and damp. As dark as it was, the walls seemed to shine and drip. Dear God, how could anyone survive a day in this place? she thought, trying not to look at the misery around her: men lying on the rankest straw, others huddled together, one man muttering to himself and then shrieking, someone else coughing and coughing and then gasping to breathe.

‘We’ve passed into hell,’ she whispered to Mr Selway, who clung tighter to her hand.

Guarded by the marines, they walked half the length of the building, which appeared to be comprised of open compartments that reminded her forcibly of the stalls in her father’s stable. Ten or more men appeared to be crammed into each stall, sitting or standing cheek by jowl.

‘‘Twas built for far fewer,’ the marine next to her said.

Grace’s feet crunched over what felt like eggshells. It might have been glass; she was too terrified to look down. She walked on what she fervently hoped was nothing worse than slime and mould. The straw underfoot was slippery with it.

‘Here,’ the corporal said, and there was no denying the relief in his voice. ‘Daniel Duncan? Captain Duncan?’

Grace screwed up her courage and peered into the enclosure. A man lay on the odourous straw, his head in someone’s lap. All around him were men equally ragged, some barely upright.

‘There he be,’ said one of the scarecrows, gesturing to the man on the filthy floor. ‘What can thee possibly do more to him that hasn’t already been done?’

His voice was stringent and burred with an accent she was unfamiliar with. Grace looked at him and saw nothing in his expression to fear. She looked at Daniel Duncan and her heart went out to him. She came closer, the marines right with her, which forced some of the prisoners to leave the enclosure. She knelt by the still form.

‘Captain Duncan?’ she said. ‘Can you hear me?’

After a long moment, the man nodded. Even that bare effort seemed to exhaust him.

‘Mr Selway and I are here to parole you to Quarle, the estate of the late Lord Thomson, Marquis of Quarle. Do you know that he was your father?’

Another long pause, as her words seemed to seep into his tired brain, and then another nod. ‘I know,’ he whispered. She had to lean close to hear him. ‘I’m dying, though. Best you leave me alone to do that.’

‘You can’t die!’ she exclaimed and the prisoners close around her chuckled.

‘Like to see you stop him,’ a Yankee said. ‘It’s the only right we have left and, by God, we’re good at it.’

‘But we’re here to parole him,’ Grace said. ‘Mr Selway, do something!’

Oddly, Mr Selway backed away, as though he hadn’t the stomach for such desperation. She hadn’t expected that of him, but then, he was a gentleman, and not the baker’s assistant she had become, used to throwing slops on middens.

‘I don’t know what I can do,’ he said.

She shivered, then knelt in the straw. ‘Maybe we can help you,’ she said.

Duncan shook his head. ‘Too late, miss.’ He turned his head slightly. ‘Choose another.’

‘But …’

She stopped, listening to another commotion near the entrance to the prison block. The prisoners started to hiss in unison, which made her jump in terror. She looked at the enclosure entrance to see a warden carrying a cudgel. He spoke to Mr Selway, who looked at her.

‘I am to go with him and sign yet another infernal paper.’

‘Don’t leave me here!’ Grace said, her hand at her throat.

‘I’ll be right back, Gracie,’ Mr Selway said uncertainly. ‘You’re safe with the marines.’ He hurried after the warden. ‘I’ll bring a stretcher,’ he shouted over his shoulder, as the hissing started again.

‘Thee is safe with us, miss,’ said the first prisoner who had spoken to her. ‘We mean thee no harm.’ He chuckled. ‘Besides, thee has marines and we don’t.’

She jumped again as Daniel Duncan reached out slowly to touch her arm. One of the marines moved closer, but she waved him back. ‘Please, miss,’ Duncan whispered, ‘I have an idea.’

He looked into her eyes, then up at the marines. He did it twice, and she thought she understood. Grace stood up. ‘Would you mind giving this dying man some room?’ she asked the corporal. ‘I’d feel a great deal braver if you would guard the entrance to this enclosure. You can face out. It might be safer for all of us. I don’t trust the ones roving in the corridor.’

‘Nor I,’ the corporal said. He glared at the prisoners in the enclosure. ‘No trouble, mind, or you’ll be taken to the cachot and left there to rot!’

Can there be a worse place than this? Grace thought. With an effort, she turned her attention back to the dying man. ‘Captain Duncan, what can I do?’ She knelt again, taking his hand. His bones felt as hollow as a bird’s.

‘Take someone in my place,’ he said again. He coughed and Grace wanted to put her hands over her ears at the harshness of the sound. ‘Now! Choose!’

He closed his eyes in exhaustion, coughed again, took a gasping breath that went on and on, and died. His hand went slack in hers.

Horrified, Grace sat back on her heels. She looked around her, but all the prisoners were looking at their captain, the man who must have led them well, because they were in tears. Two men—mere boys—sobbed in earnest.

She glanced at the marines, who were facing out, concentrating on the prisoners milling in the passageway. Lord Thomson would want me to honour his son’s dying wish, she thought.

‘Quickly now, who should it be?’ she whispered, as one of the men rolled his captain to the side of the enclosure and shrouded him with a scrap of burlap. No one came forwards to be chosen. They were stalwart men—that she knew without knowing more. Choose, Grace, she ordered herself. Just choose.

She knew then who it would be. He was sitting on the foul floor, leaning his head against the rough wood of the enclosure, eyes half-open. He looked as starved as the others, no healthier or sicker than his mates. What she saw in him, she could not tell, except that he was the man who would take his captain’s place.

Grace touched his arm. His eyes opened wider; they were blue as the ocean.

‘Who are you?’

‘Rob Inman,’ he said. His mates quickly moved him forwards to lie down where his captain had died.

‘I choose you, Rob Inman.’

Chapter Four

The whole business was deceptive in its ease. In less than a minute, Grace received an education in how desperation can grease the wheels. The only one who seemed to harbour any misgivings was the chosen man.

‘Don’t do this,’ he said, not opening his eyes. ‘Surely someone else is sicker.’

‘Nope. Thee is our ideal candidate,’ said the sailor who had spoken to Grace first.

He did something then that touched Grace’s heart and assured her she had nothing to fear from these rough, stinking men: he kissed Robert Inman on the forehead. ‘Thee is a sailing master fit to fight another day.’

‘No. No.’

‘Aye, lad. No argument now. We’ll see thee again in Nantucket.’ The man—he must have been a Quaker—transferred his gaze to Grace. ‘Keep him safe, miss.’

‘I will. I promise,’ she whispered.

She rocked back on her heels, ready to stand, when she heard the prisoners in the passageway hissing again. The warden with the cudgel reappeared, followed by a very concerned-looking Mr Selway and other marines carrying a stretcher.

Mr Selway sighed with relief to see her safe and looked at Rob Inman. Grace held her breath. In the gloom of the stall and his obvious eagerness to be gone, would he notice?

He didn’t. Mr Selway motioned to the stretcher bearers, who were none too gentle as they picked up the sailing master and plopped him on a stretcher marked with yellowish stains. Inman groaned and opened his eyes, reaching out for his mates, who gave him three feeble cheers and sent him on his way. Grace looked at the Quaker. ‘Thank you for doing that,’ she whispered. ‘I could not have thought so fast.’

‘Nothing to it,’ he whispered back. ‘Dartmoor sharpens the intellect.’

She had to smile at that. And England thinks to defeat these men, she told herself. Think again, Johnny Bull. ‘I wish I could help you,’ she whispered.

He indicated Rob Inman with his eyes. ‘Thee has.’

There was nothing more to say, not with Mr Selway looking at her with such a worried expression, and the prisoners starting to shift about, as though wishing her gone, and with her, their sailing master. I’m sorry we were too late to save your son, Lord Thomson, she thought, near tears. ‘Let us leave this place now, Mr Selway,’ she said.

She experienced momentary terror when the warden made them stop at Captain Shortland’s office again. ‘Can’t we just leave?’ she asked Mr Selway.

‘You have to sign the document releasing Captain Duncan,’ the solicitor said. ‘I signed when I was in here earlier.’

Anything, anything to get away, she thought, glancing at Rob Inman on the stretcher. He had shielded his eyes against the glare of the sun. She looked around quickly; everyone looked alike: thin, yellow-smocked, with hollow cheeks. She doubted the governor of the prison could tell any of them apart. Still…

She willed herself calm. ‘Mr Selway, do get… Captain Duncan in the chaise. The light is bothering his eyes.’

She held her breath. Surely no one would have any need to examine Rob Inman closely. To her relief, the solicitor indicated the post-chaise and addressed the marines. ‘Lads, help the captain into the chaise.’

Grace hurried up the stairs to the governor’s office. Handkerchief still to his nostrils, Captain Shortland stood at the window, watching the marines deposit Inman in the chaise. He returned to his desk, his lips tight together with every evidence of displeasure.

He pointed to where she should sign. ‘He’ll be nothing but trouble to you, I warrant, although he looks harmless enough now. Damned Americans.’

Grace signed her name, wondering if she would end up in a place like Dartmoor if anyone got wind of her deception. She signed more documents, the last of which the governor folded into a pouch. ‘This is the parole,’ he told her. ‘You are to keep your eyes on this man at all times. If he escapes or leaves Quarle without you, he will be shot on sight.’ The governor breathed deeply of the handkerchief. ‘One less rascal for me.’

He handed her the parole with a short laugh. ‘One less, but now we can turn our full attention to the United States. What with Boney soon to be exiled, this prison may harbour more of those damned Americans!’

Please, God, no, Grace thought, alarmed. They are already so mistreated. She opened her mouth to tell the prison governor precisely that, but closed it. He didn’t seem like someone concerned with the death of Americans.

He turned to a clerk, handing him the documents she had falsified by carrying out Captain Duncan’s death wish. What will come of this? Grace asked herself, as the clerk took the papers to his own high desk in the next room. Thank the Almighty no one knows Rob Inman from a watering can.

It wasn’t until they dropped off the marine at the final stone gate that Grace drew a regular breath. She could not help the sigh that escaped her.

‘I’m sorry you had to be there, Grace,’ Mr Selway said. ‘Well, the worst is over. Captain Duncan, lean forwards and I’ll cut those bonds.’

‘No need, sir,’ the man said, as he worked the knot with an expert’s skill and slipped his thin wrists out of the rope. ‘Marines may sail on ships, but no one said they can tie a sailor’s knot.’

Grace couldn’t help smiling. Rob Inman watched them, alert, his blue eyes sunken, but glowing with fever.

Impulsively, Grace leaned forwards and touched the back of her hand to his dirty forehead. ‘You’re burning,’ she said. She looked at the solicitor. ‘Mr Selway, perhaps we should stop here in Princetown and get some—’

‘No!’ Inman interrupted, his voice weak but emphatic. ‘Drive on. I want out of this damned cold valley more than I want fever powders, miss. Just drive on. Please.’

Mr Selway nodded. ‘Good enough, lad,’ he murmured.

With a sigh of his own, Inman leaned back. He wrapped his arms around himself, shivering despite his fever. Without a word, Grace took her lap robe and covered him. Eyes serious, he nodded his thanks. In a moment, he slept.

‘I’ll summon the physician as soon as we have the captain in bed in the dower house,’ Mr Selway whispered to her. ‘That is, if Lord Thomson—bless his tiny, atrophied heart—has thought to return the beds and linens.’

Leaning against the side of the chaise, Inman had slept. He opened his eyes now and then, looking around in surprise each time. Grace had watched his hands. For a good hour, he kept them balled into tight fists. After one time when he opened his eyes, his startled expression unmistakable, Grace covered one fist briefly with her hand. He looked into her eyes as an abused pup would, wondering what she would do to him. When he closed his eyes this time, she noticed that his hands opened and he relaxed.

‘We mean you no harm, Captain,’ Grace murmured.

As soon as they had left the bowl-like valley cupping Dartmoor Prison, the sun shone again. The grass even seemed greener and hawthorn hedges sprouted white blossoms all along the highway. This place is so evil even spring stays away, Grace thought, with a shudder.

The coachman stopped by a river, shady and overhung with branches already leafing out. ‘Time to water t’horses,’ he called down to the occupants of the chaise.

Inman opened his eyes no more than part way, as if even that much exertion was nearly beyond him. As Grace watched him, he gazed with growing interest at the stream. In mere seconds, the parolee shrugged off the lap rug and threw open the door. He was a tall man and did not need the step to be lowered to hurtle himself from the chaise.

‘I say there!’ Mr Selway called after him.

He didn’t even look back. With a stagger, he righted himself and plunged into the stream as Grace stared, then leaped to her feet, too, ahead of Mr Selway.

‘Please don’t run away!’ she shouted after him as she jumped from the chaise.

Ignoring her, he waded into the water. Grace stood on the bank, ready to leap in after the parolee. She raised her skirt and petticoat—she could see that the stream came barely above the tall man’s knees—then lowered them as she watched the sailing master, her mouth open.

He had stopped by a bright clump of greenery growing in the water. With an audible sob, Inman grabbed a handful of the greens and stuffed them in his mouth. He chewed and swallowed, then snatched another handful, and then another.

‘My God, what is he doing?’ Mr Selway said, standing beside Grace on the bank.

Grace felt her heart go out to the thin prisoner. ‘I believe it’s watercress,’ she whispered, her eyes still on the man she had chosen. ‘Mr Selway, he’s starving.’

They watched him as he moved to another clump of watercress. Bits of greenery clustered in his beard as he picked one more handful and walked back to the bank. Mr Selway gave him a hand up and he stood there, watercress in hand, like a man with springtime posies.

‘Do you want to take them with you?’ Grace asked. ‘You needn’t, really. There is lots of food at the dower house—or at least there will be—and those will only wilt.’

She tried to take the watercress from him, but he shook his head and stepped away from her.

‘Let him be, Gracie,’ Mr Selway murmured. ‘Let him be.’ He took the parolee by the elbow and guided him back to the chaise. ‘Let me help you in, Captain. There’s a good lad.’

They resumed the journey. Grace’s eyes filled with tears as she watched Inman admire the watercress he clutched to his chest, unmindful of the damp. Several times before he slept again, he raised the little handful of greenery to his nose, just to smell its peppery fragrance.

He grew alarmed when they stopped in Exeter near a group of red-coated militiamen, laughing and joking with each other. ‘Easy, lad,’ Mr Selway said, a hand on his arm. ‘I’ll send Gracie into the public house here for some broth and maybe a pasty. Nothing too rich, mind,’ he warned her as he handed over some coins.

As she waited for the food, Grace stood by the window, watching Rob Inman in the chaise. His eyes never left the militiamen. He looked solemn anyway—his mouth was slightly downturned by nature—but there was no disguising the fear on his face. And what was Dartmoor prison like for you, Rob Inman, turned Duncan? she asked herself, unable to help the shiver that travelled her spine like a bird on a wire.

Inman wanted to gulp down the broth, but Mr Selway was firm on insisting that he sip instead. The solicitor thought to limit him to half a pasty, until the parolee fixed him with a glare that would have cut through lead, something surprising in one so weak.

‘On the other hand, maybe you know what’s best,’ Mr Selway said smoothly, as the parolee refused to relinquish the remainder of the pasty.

Grace couldn’t help a smile. ‘Mr Selway, the governor of the prison did say he would be a lot of trouble.’ It was only the mildest tease, but Rob stopped chewing and looked at her.

‘I’m no trouble to anyone, miss,’ he said around the pasty in his mouth. ‘Well, maybe just to those who get between me and a good wind.’ He was so serious. ‘Aye, that would sum it up.’

Listening to him, Grace realised she had never heard an American accent before, if that’s what this was. There was just the faintest sound of vaguely familiar diction, and then the careful, clipped words originating from a distant shore. She liked the stringent sound.

Then he was asleep again, the food barely swallowed, crumbs lodged in his beard to keep the watercress company. That will all come off tomorrow, Grace decided. And from the way you’re scratching your head, I’ll get a servant to shave you bald. And if not a willing servant, then I will do it.

They arrived at the dower house after dark, with only the moon to show the way. There were so few lights burning in the manor house that she wondered if Lord Thomson was still in residence. Mr Selway had his own opinion about that. ‘What a miser he is,’ he said, making no effort to hide his disdain. ‘I just can’t bring myself to trust people who sit in the gloom to save a groat.’

‘Do you think he intends to remain long?’ Grace asked. ‘He could be a trial.’

‘I am certain he will be, Gracie. No, I think Lord Thomson will stay long enough to make himself thoroughly unpleasant, then return to London. He will probably pop back unexpectedly every now and then, yearning to catch us in some misdeed.’

Grace shivered. ‘I wish him gone now.’

‘So he will be soon! Patience, my dear.’

She couldn’t help her audible sigh of relief to see furniture in the dower house. On closer inspection, it was much as Mr Selway had feared: Lord Thomson had emptied out the manor’s attics. As she gazed at the mismatched chairs in the breakfast room and the rump-sprung sofa in the sitting room, Grace couldn’t say she was surprised.

While Rob Inman swayed at the foot of the stairs, holding on to the railing, Grace hurried upstairs. Beds had been returned to all four bedchambers, complemented by bureaus with drawers missing and a leg gone and propped nearly level with a chunk of wood.

She glanced in the smallest chamber she had designated for herself, surprised to see a small fire in the grate and shabby curtains returned to the window. She heard a noise across the narrow hall and peeked into the chamber she had thought to reserve for Captain Duncan.

She didn’t recognise the man, but he must have been one of the old retainers who did odd jobs around the manor. Dressed in a nondescript pair of trousers and a smock, he shook out a patched coverlet for the bed.

Grace cleared her throat. ‘And you are …?’

‘Emery’s my name,’ he told her, as though she should have known. ‘You don’t remember me? I rake the ground after the sheep have grazed.’

‘Emery?’ she said. ‘I don’t recall …’ She blushed and stopped herself. ‘And now I am being foolish. You must remember, I’ve only been coming to Quarle for the last few months, when Lord Thomson could no longer walk to Quimby.’

‘Aye, miss, and I work on the grounds. That explains it.’ He indicated the partly made bed. ‘I thought to have this all ready, Miss Curtis.’ He peered beyond her into the hall. ‘Did the prison release Captain Duncan?’

‘Yes, indeed. He’s downstairs and he’s so tired. I thought I would have to hurry up here and make the beds. It appears you have beat me to the effort.’

Emery bowed, which made Grace smile. ‘Gracie, I think I am destined to be your butler.’

‘Emery, Lord Thomson would never allow us a butler, even if you are just a gardener,’ she said quietly.

Emery spread out the coverlet. ‘True. He turned me off the estate. Considering that I have no place to go, I thought I would appoint myself butler.’ He tucked in a neat corner. ‘It’s about t’only job I haven’t held here, so why not, says I?’

He seemed to be imperturbably ignoring her, which amused her. ‘Emery, there can’t possibly be any provisions for a butler in Lord Thomson’s will,’ she told him.

‘Then I will fit right in, Miss Curtis. I have very few needs and I’ve always wanted to buttle. How about I lend you a hand with Captain Duncan?’

Grace nodded, relieved to find so willing an ally, where she had expected none. ‘Yes, by all means, lend a hand.’

Rob Inman seemed determined to make his own way up the stairs, pausing once or twice with Emery hovering by his elbow, and Mr Selway watching his progress from behind, ready to catch him if he stumbled.

With an exasperated groan, he stopped at the top of the stairs. ‘Honestly,’ was all he said and his gaze seemed to take them all in. He did not object, though, when Emery took him by the arm and steered him slowly into his chamber. He looked back at her, a quizzical expression on his face. ‘Miss, I’m being abducted. Granted, it’s happening at glacial speed,’ he declared, which struck her as the funniest thing she had heard in weeks.

Grace laughed out loud, which brought a fleeting smile to his face. ‘Thank the Almighty,’ he said. ‘Glad to know you have a sense of humour. We might need it.’

Emery seemed determined to be of service, which touched Grace. He helped Inman off with his shoes, shaking his head. ‘Lad, it’s been a rough time, eh? No stockings and no shoelaces, and not much leather.’

‘I think the rats were as hungry as we were,’ Inman said. He yawned and looked at Grace. ‘Pardon me, miss, but I’m lousy and fleabitten and not worth an “Ave”. Just give me a sheet and I’ll sleep on the floor.’

Grace shook her head. ‘You’ll sleep on the bed, Captain. Tomorrow’s soon enough for delousing. You won’t object if I cut your hair?’

‘Shorter the better,’ he said after another yawn. He lay down and turned toward the wall, as Emery hitched the coverlet higher and rested his hand briefly on the parolee’s shoulder. ‘Goodnight, all you nursemaids.’

The three of them left the room. Mr Selway spoke first on the landing. ‘Our Captain Duncan seems not to mind taking charge. I think we’ve been told what to do.’

They went down and sat belowstairs while Emery took some food from a basket. ‘Mrs Clyde had me bring over this basket. She said it’s no trouble to prepare a little more for the dower house.’

‘It won’t be until Lord Thomson gets wind of his staff’s philanthropy,’ the solicitor said. He bit into a beef sandwich. ‘Grace. Emery. I do have some modest discretionary funds for the maintenance of Captain Duncan here in the dower house. I was going to hire a cook, but if you will do the honours, Grace, then we can stretch the budget to include our new friend Emery.’

‘I certainly can cook,’ she replied, on firm ground now. ‘And bake. I think that must be why Lord Thomson wanted me here in the first place. I can think of no other reason.’

Mr Selway smiled. ‘Actually, Grace, before he died, he told me he hoped you and the captain would fall in love and marry.’

Grace laughed and then sobered as she remembered the scene in the prison, the one Mr Selway had not witnessed. The captain is dead, she thought with a sudden pang, as the two men chuckled and then conversed with each other. And here is Rob Inman. She had to smile again, thinking of Lord Thomson with real fondness. ‘He was a funny old stick, to get such a notion,’ she told her companions. ‘Pigs will probably fly first, wouldn’t you agree?’

Chapter Five

‘I suppose stranger things have happened, Grace,’ Mr Selway teased. He took another sandwich out of the basket and wrapped it in a napkin. ‘I’m going to that closet off the sitting room that I have dubbed the dower-house bookroom—my, aren’t I grandiose?—to make a careful scrutiny of Captain Duncan’s parole and Lord Thomson’s whimsical will.’ He stood up, nodding to Emery. ‘If Grace agrees, I believe you will be a welcome addition to our staff.’

She nodded. ‘Our staff? What an exaggeration! Mind, Emery, this position only lasts until the war ends and the captain returns to America.’

Emery winked elaborately. ‘If you’re man and wife by then, I can be your butler in the United States. I don’t much fancy the workhouse.’

Mr Selway laughed and left the kitchen. Her eyes merry, Grace finished her sandwich while the old man swept up the crumbs from the table and carefully deposited them in the basket.

‘Mrs Clyde said she’ll give us a pot of porridge with lots of sugar and cream,’ Emery told her.

‘After the captain has been deloused and shaved, I’ll go to the greengrocer’s in Quimby,’ Grace said. ‘He is so thin. I can certainly feed him back to health.’ She shook her head. ‘As for the other matter, we’ll let Captain Duncan decide whom he marries.’

‘Aye, Gracie.’ Emery yawned elaborately. ‘Now, if we can’t think of anything else to rescue, I’ll find my bed.’ He stood up and stretched, then walked to the door off the servants’ dining room.

‘I only wish we could pay you more than the barest pittance.’

‘‘Tis enough. This will be interesting.’

I don’t doubt that for a moment, Grace thought as she climbed the stairs. She opened the door quietly to Rob Inman’s room, listening to his even breathing. She closed the door softly behind her.

A lengthy bath won’t come a moment too soon, she thought, as she went to her own room. He smells worse than a kitchen midden in August. She would probably have to burn everything he was wearing and his bedding, too. The least I can do is return him to America in better shape than Captain Shortland gave him to me, she thought.

She stood in front of the fire in her room, hands outstretched, wondering why she had ever agreed to any condition in Lord Thomson’s will.

‘Emery is right. It will be interesting,’ she murmured, as she folded her clothing on the battered bureau, with its mirror in dire need of re-silvering. ‘Thank God for Emery.’

Grace burrowed under her covers, pulling her knees close to her chest for warmth, missing the yeasty fragrance that permeated the bakery. Grace, at least you are not incarcerated in Dartmoor Prison, she reminded herself. ‘Maybe it’s best not to think about such things,’ she murmured into her pillow.

Her sleep had been troubled. She kept seeing the real Captain Duncan, his eyes closed in death, his silent, stinking men grouped about him. Over and over in her dream, she looked at Rob Inman, then chose him. Why him and no other? She had no idea, but there he was in her mind’s eye as she tossed and turned, waiting patiently as he had probably waited since the Orontes was captured. What else is there to do in prison but wait?

She wasn’t sure what woke her hours later. She wasn’t perfectly convinced that she had even been asleep, not with her mind still filled with the horror that was Dartmoor, contrasted with the unexpected kindness in the eyes of Rob Inman’s shipmates, as she knelt in the odourous straw by their dead leader.

She sat up, listening. There was no mistaking it. Someone was moving down the narrow hallway to the stairs.

Her heart hammering in her breast, Grace threw back her covers and reached for her shawl. She opened her door to see Rob Inman walking quietly down the stairs.

‘Rob Inman, you had better not be planning an escape. You’re taller than I am, but I think I could stop you.’

He stopped and looked around, startled at first, then amused. ‘You probably could,’ he told her, then sank down on the step. ‘I tried to wrestle a rat last week and ended up losing my shoelaces.’

She sat beside him, but not too close. ‘Are you hungry?’ she whispered.

He nodded. ‘If my left leg didn’t smell so bad, I’d probably gnaw on it. D’ye think there’s anything edible in the kitchen besides that old man who thinks he’s a butler?’

Grace put her hand to her mouth to stop her laugh. ‘I think there’s another sandwich or two in the basket. Shall we find out?’

He nodded and tried to rise, then shook his head. ‘Best you go on and save yourself, miss. I think I’m done for.’

‘Spare me the drama,’ she teased as she started down the stairs. ‘Promise you won’t jump parole, and I’ll find you a sandwich.’

‘I can’t make a promise like that,’ he said quickly.

‘You must, on your word as a gentleman,’ she replied just as quickly. ‘You will be shot dead if you break parole. I’m not quizzing you.’

He gave her a long look, as if weighing the very marrow of her bones. ‘If I must, I will. But know this—Captain Duncan may have been a gentleman, for all that he was a bastard. Rob Inman is no gentleman and never was.’

‘I suppose that will have to do,’ she said dubiously, puzzled about this man old Lord Thomson had foisted on her. No, that she had foisted on herself in Dartmoor. ‘But I have questions.’

‘I imagine you do.’ He grinned. ‘And I’m still hungry.’

She found the basket easily enough in the dark kitchen and tiptoed with it upstairs, after pausing a moment to smile at the sound of Emery’s snoring. She handed the captain the remaining sandwich; he waited not a moment to demolish it and look around for more. She followed it with one of her own Quimby Crèmes. The cook at the manor house had obviously visited the Wilsons’ bakery a few days ago. Grace had made these just before the visit to Dartmoor.

‘I could eat more of these,’ he said, his mouth full.

‘You will. I made them,’ she said proudly. ‘My own recipe.’

He looked at her, a question in his eyes.

‘I’m a baker for the Wilsons in Quimby,’ she told him. ‘Well, I was, and I will be again once you are sorted out.’

‘You’re going to sort me out?’ the parolee asked, humour in his voice. He might have been hungry and weak, but he wasn’t slow. ‘How on earth did you end up as Captain Duncan’s keeper?’ He popped the rest of the biscuit into his mouth. ‘If that’s what you are.’

‘I suppose I am, in a way. Your keeper now,’ she mused. ‘The old Lord Thomson—I wouldn’t give you a penny for the new one—used to visit the bakery shop regularly and he liked my Crèmes. He was full of crochets, but I never paid his ill humour any mind.’ She couldn’t help the tears that welled in her eyes and hoped they didn’t show. ‘I think I was almost his only friend.’ She also couldn’t help the way her voice hardened. ‘His own relatives were just waiting for him to die. Shame on them.’

‘I don’t see the connection, Miss … Grace.’

‘Nor do I. For some reason, Lord Thomson provided me with the dower house to live in and thirty pounds a year. I suppose that will last until the new Lord Thomson works out some way to stop it.’

‘I gather you could use the money,’ he commented.

‘I could, indeed. I intend to buy the bakery some day.’

‘But you don’t sound confident Lord Thomson’s kindness will continue.’

‘I’m certain it won’t,’ she replied, with no qualms. ‘People like that generally get their way, or haven’t you noticed?’

‘Aye, lass, I’ve noticed.’ He lowered his voice. ‘Why did the old man parole Captain Duncan? I know his origins. Dan was never shy about them. Was it a case of the old rascal wanting to help his bastard son from America?’

‘I suppose that was it,’ she replied. ‘You’ll find this amusing, but Mr Selway told me that Lord Thomson had some vision of Captain Duncan and me falling in love and marrying.’

‘Then you would have had to reckon with the captain’s wife and two children on Nantucket!’ He sighed heavily then. ‘Wish I could get word to them about what has befallen as good a man as I ever knew.’

‘I suppose it will have to wait until the war is over and you go home,’ she said. To lighten the moment, she added, ‘And I suppose you have similar entanglements to prevent my falling in love with you!’

‘Well, no,’ he said quietly. ‘I did have a wife, but she died. A Nantucket girl, like Captain Duncan’s Bess. She understood the sea. They do, on Nantucket.’

‘I’m sorry for your loss,’ Grace said. ‘I didn’t mean to make light of it.’

‘How were you to know? It’s been almost four years, but I am sorry, too,’ he told her. He turned reflective then, leaning on his elbow on the stairs. ‘What with the sea and then the war, I reckon I spent more time on the Orontes than in my own bed on Orange Street. Oh, and let’s not forget the attractions of Dartmoor.’

She thought about the seafarers Rob Inman had left behind. Something about the man beside her seemed to loosen her tongue. It couldn’t have been an air of capability, not with him so weak he had to prop himself up on the stairs. Still, she wanted to talk to him.

‘Tell me. The sailor in that dreadful stall. He said “thee” and “thou”.’

The expression in Rob’s eyes seemed to soften. ‘You have to know Nantucket. It’s an island of seafarers, many of them Quakers.’

‘Are you …?’

‘Not I. Most of my neighbours back home are.’

He was silent, probably thinking of his island. She touched his arm lightly. ‘I’ve never quite been able to understand why things happen the way they do. Maybe people have to be really old to understand.’

They were both silent. She reached for his hand. ‘Let me give you a hand up, Captain Duncan,’ she said. ‘Remember, you are Captain Duncan, you must be. Maybe you can sleep, now that you’ve had something to eat. Tomorrow comes early and we have quite a morning planned for you.’

‘Eh?’ He was shaky on his feet, so she held his hand until he regained his balance.

‘It involves a bath and pine-tar soap and short hair again and no beard. Even if you’re truly attached to prison yellow, your clothes are going in the burn pit.’

‘You can have them and gladly, too, but I don’t have anything else to wear,’ he reminded her. ‘Prisoners don’t come with wardrobes.’

‘Mr Selway is two steps ahead of you,’ she assured him, as they slowly walked up the stairs and to his room. ‘Whether you like it or not, he’s acquired shirts and trousers from Royal Navy stores in the Plymouth navy yard.’

‘The Royal Navy? Oh, foul!’

‘It’s no more than checkered shirts and dark trousers. Probably what you wore on the Orontes.’

He smiled. ‘Very much like. Will I fit them?’

‘Eventually.’

He went in his room and she stood at the door. ‘I have to ask, do all Americans sound like you?’

‘Nay, lass,’ he replied and put his finger to his lips. ‘I know this should also be our little secret, I was born and at least partly raised in a very poor part of London. I’ll tell you more tomorrow, if you’re interested.’

‘You’re English?’ she asked, surprised.

‘Not any more,’ he assured her. ‘That’s what you British don’t understand, once an Englishman doesn’t mean always an Englishman.’

‘I could never be anything but English,’ Grace declared.

‘You’re so certain?’ He sat down on his bed then, as if too tired to stand. ‘You speak good English for a baker’s assistant. You seem a bit refined. What has England done for you lately? For me, nothing. Goodnight now.’

Chapter Six

Grace hated to admit it, but Rob Inman was right: England hadn’t done much for her lately. She thought about his words long after she should have been asleep.

It was one thing to be suddenly poor. It was quite another to be treated by former friends as though she did not exist. She lay in bed, feeling her cheeks burn as she remembered the smarts and slights that came her way in the bakery, as former friends looked right through her.

And here was Rob Inman, an unwilling parolee who was making her ask questions of herself. He’s a challenge. Maybe I shouldn’t have chosen him, she thought, punching her pillow a few times in the hope of finding a comfortable spot.

But the fact remained that she had chosen Robert Inman and old Lord Thomson had chosen her to watch him. Her eyes grew heavy, but she had to smile at the absurdity of it all. Lord Thomson, I fear your good intentions are going to be a lot of trouble to me, was her last thought before she slept.

Emery was as good as his word. In the morning, he brought breakfast from the manor house and a daunting-looking cake of pine-tar soap.

‘If this doesn’t scare away fleas and lice, then we haven’t a prayer,’ he told her as they carried hot water to the tin tub he had set up outside in the overgrown garden. ‘While he’s soaking, I’ll strip off the bed clothes and burn sulphur in that room, same’s as if it was the hold of a ship after a long voyage.’

The parolee required no coaxing to adjourn to the garden for the cure. With some dignity, he wrapped a sheet around himself after Emery commanded him to drop his pathetic clothing by the rose arbour. Rob frowned to see Grace standing by the tub, testing the water.

‘I don’t require your services,’ he protested. He wrapped the sheet tighter around his thin body.

‘My thoughts precisely!’ she said. ‘I’m just making sure the water isn’t too hot. My assignments in this endeavour are to bag your sheets and burn your prison clothes.’

Trying not to laugh, she left Rob in the garden at the mercy of Emery and his pine tar.

Mr Selway found her in the upstairs hall with the sheets and blankets bagged in a canvas sack. He followed her as she deposited the bedclothes by the garden path, next to the captain’s discarded prison yellow.

They sat on a bench by the kitchen door. The solicitor opened a folder. ‘Here it is, Grace, all of our restrictions dealing with a paroled prisoner of war.’

She scanned the document. ‘The upshot appears to be that Captain Duncan must never be out of our sight.’ She looked up. ‘He can leave the estate with one of us?’

Mr Selway nodded. ‘Apparently, yes, but we must sufficiently impress upon him that he is not to escape. If he does, under penalty of our own incarceration, we must immediately notify the justice of the peace and he will be shot on sight.’

‘Where would he go?’

‘Down to the sea. I imagine Captain Duncan could easily blend in with the seagoing crowd in Plymouth and ship out on any merchant vessel in the harbour. The fleet’s always hungry for crew.’

Grace thought about that as she listened to the captain’s protests at having his hair washed yet again, from the other side of the shrubbery. ‘Surely Lord Thomson didn’t want his only son to use a parole to escape?’

‘I don’t know what he intended. Indeed, he never knew his son, did he?’ Mr Selway said, his voice troubled. ‘The burden of this falls on you, Grace, I fear. I will check in with you now and then, but I have business elsewhere.’

‘I understand, Mr Selway,’ she said, feeling alone in the venture. ‘At least there is Emery to help me.’

‘True. We’re fortunate there.’ He handed her the papers. ‘Here is the parole for Captain Daniel Duncan, age thirty-six.’ He stopped and looked in the direction of the garden. ‘I must admit, the captain looks younger than I would have thought …’ His voice trailed off; he shook his head. ‘Who would have supposed that incarceration in Dartmoor would render a man younger looking?’

Grace held her breath. Mr Selway was right; Rob Inman was younger than his captain. ‘May… maybe it’s all that good sea air,’ she said, trying not to stammer.

Mr Selway shook his head. ‘Gracie, sea air usually makes a man older.’ He gave her a generous smile. ‘Maybe it is all that healthy American air! My dear, I’ve arranged carte blanche for you with Quimby’s merchants. You can order anything—within reason, of course—and I will get the bills in Exeter. Send them to this postalbox number.’ He handed her a note. ‘Cheer up, Gracie. What can go wrong with so prosaic an arrangement?’

It was on the tip of her tongue to blurt out that Captain Duncan was dead, but she stopped. Why, she wasn’t sure, except that she had made a promise to the real Daniel Duncan, and felt honour-bound, even if he was an American and a prisoner. Besides that, how well did she even know Mr Selway? This had better be her secret with Rob Inman.

Emery called to her to fetch the new clothes that Mr Selway had left in the bookroom. She took them to the kitchen garden, where the captain sat in the tin tub with his bony knees close to his chin, as tight as a whelk in a basket. His back was turned to her; she gaped at the lash marks on his back. They were fading, but the harsh Stockholm pine tar brought them out in raw relief.

Grace stared at his back another moment, then retreated to the house. Her mind on the man in the tub, she stirred a pot of thick porridge, lacing it liberally with sugar. She pronounced it a success after the addition of a touch of cinnamon and set it to the back of the range to cool slightly.

As Grace stood there, a maid from Quarle tiptoed down the stairs, holding a wicked-looking pair of shears. Gingerly, she held them out to Grace. ‘Emery said I was to give you these for serious work.’

‘Oh, he did?’ she asked, amused. Smiling to herself, she went upstairs. ‘The maid said you need me,’ she told Emery, holding out the shears.

‘I need you,’ Rob Inman said. ‘Please.’ He grinned at the old man. ‘Emery is a dab hand at scouring my skin raw, but we both agree that a steady hand close to the scalp and face fall in your territory.’

‘Aye, aye, Captain,’ she said, stepping closer for a good look at the task.

The captain was dressed now in canvas trousers and a checked shirt, looking much like the seamen she had seen in and around Devon’s seaports. Emery had already draped a towel around the man’s shoulders. Clean now, his hair was a handsome reddish-gold, long on his shoulders and mingling with his beard, which Emery must have dragged a comb through, because it flowed in waves to his chest.

Grace walked around him several times. ‘This is daunting,’ she murmured under her breath. ‘Do I tackle your head first, or your face?’

‘It’s all the same to me, just as long as your hands don’t shake,’ he said cheerfully. ‘I suggest whacking off my hair first. Get as close to my scalp as you can. I like to wear it short.’

She stepped in closer, tongue between her teeth, frown on her face, and pulled up a handful of still-damp hair. ‘No sudden moves, now.’

She hacked at his hair. ‘I had no idea it was this colour,’ she commented, as she worked her way around his head. Emery had vanished and the maid watched—her eyes wide—from the security of the shrubbery.

‘It hadn’t been washed in a year,’ Rob said, ‘Cut it closer. Don’t be afraid.’

Grace concentrated on the task, then glanced at the maid. ‘What do you think?’

‘I think ‘e’s ‘andsome.’

Rob laughed out loud, which sent her running up the steps and into the house, her apron clutched to her face.

‘You’ve embarrassed her, Captain Duncan,’ Grace said severely. ‘And no, you’re not handsome.’

Maybe he could be. Grace cut closer to his scalp, flicking her fingers against his head when he moved. ‘Stop that, unless you want me to inflict a serious injury.’

As soon as she said that, Grace thought of the marks of the lash on his back, covered now with a respectable shirt. ‘I doubt anything I do would trouble you much,’ she amended. ‘Still, behave yourself. Mr Selway is gone and you must mind me.’

‘Mr Selway spoke to me earlier. I’ll tell you what I told him, I cannot promise good behaviour,’ he replied, serious now. ‘What’s to prevent me, once I get my strength back, from just walking away from here? You don’t appear intimidating. I could knock over Emery with a mere backhand.’ He chuckled. ‘That maid is usually at Quarle, but she thinks I’m ‘andsome, so she’ll give me no grief.’

‘Mr Selway said you will be shot on sight,’ Grace protested.

‘An irate husband said that to me once,’ he mused.

Grace flicked her fingers against his scalp, harder this time.

‘Ow!’ He put his hand to his head. ‘D’ye have steel splinters for fingernails?’ He turned serious then. ‘They’d have to find me to shoot me.’ He shrugged and shook the hair from the towel. ‘Careful around my ears.’

Swallowing the irritation she felt, Grace did as she was bid, admiring his hair. It seemed a shame to cut it so short.

The captain fell silent then. She hummed as she worked, looking at him objectively. The maid might be right. When Rob was allowed to eat in peace, the bony lines of his face would certainly fill out. His nose was straight and his lips full enough for all general purposes.

She stood back a moment, looking at him, before she started on his face. ‘I’ll trim your beard with the shears, then you can get close to it with a razor.’

Rob Inman did look better, despite his emaciation. She could hardly avoid noticing how blue his eyes were, maybe almost as blue as Plymouth Sound on a good day with no overcast. Intent upon her business, she trimmed close to his high cheekbones. He did have long lashes, the kind a woman would envy. She would, at any rate, if she bothered to invest much thought in the matter.

When his face was trimmed to within shaving distance of a straight razor, she crouched a little to tackle his neck. He turned his head to oblige her. After a few snips, she stopped and stared.

‘My God,’ she whispered.

Rob frowned, then must have realised what she was staring at. ‘It’s not that bad, Grace. It didn’t hurt for long.’

She couldn’t help her tears, but wiped them away with her apron, even as she knelt in the grass by the stool. ‘Why would anyone do that?’ she asked, when she could speak.

Her question seemed to embarrass him. His finger went to the black imprint of the letter R in his neck just below the hinge of his jaw. ‘I don’t think the British penal system has much fondness for runaways, Gracie. At least that’s what we figured it stood for. Or maybe rascal, or wretch, except I think that’s spelled with a w. Think what a permanent memory I’ll have of your island.’

Chapter Seven

‘They did that to you in Dartmoor?’ Grace asked. She just held the scissors. Her hands shook, and she didn’t trust herself to continue.

‘Who can blame them?’ he asked. ‘I did a runner, and had the misfortune to be caught and hauled back. When Captain Shortland grew bored of his goon lashing my back, he brought out the iron. Grace, it was seven or eight months ago. Now I just have a souvenir.’

‘That doesn’t make it right,’ she said, wondering why she wanted to argue this kind of logic with a prisoner, someone who had done her country harm.

He tried to smile, but she saw how tired he was. ‘Grace, there’s no accounting for war. It’s a nasty business, better not engaged in, but once you’re caught in its grip, you realise how small a cog in the great wheel you truly are. Admiral or powder monkey, it hardly matters. Just cut me close,’ he told her; now there was no mistaking the exhaustion in his voice. ‘I’ll shave myself, if you trust me with a razor.’

‘Of course I do. And while you’re doing that, I’ll bring out some breakfast.’

‘Music to my ears,’ he said with a conscious effort.

She hurried as fast as she could, because he seemed to wilt before her eyes. She wished she had brought him breakfast even before the bath; it was all he could do to sit upright. ‘I’ll send Emery out with a razor, soap and hot water.’

Rob shook his head. ‘Food first.’ He could barely keep his eyes opened. ‘Anything.’

‘I’ll hurry back,’ she said, irritated with herself for not noticing how weak he was.

When she returned with a tray of well-sugared porridge and two hard rolls stuffed with butter and marmalade, her charge lay asleep on the ground. He had pillowed his head on his arms and his breath came slow and peaceful.

‘Drat!’ Grace said under her breath, guilty she had not thought to bring him food sooner. She set the tray beside him in the grass and sat cross-legged next to him under a hawthorn tree, which was shedding its white blossoms.

Perhaps he had smelled the food. Rob opened his eyes and reached for a roll, almost in one motion. He moved onto his back, chewing and swallowing with the same singleness of mind she had seen yesterday, when he had devoured the watercress. The other roll went down faster than the first.

‘Can you help me sit up? It’s a pain to be so useless.’

She did as he asked. In another moment, the bowl of porridge was just a memory. He looked around for more.

‘Emery is afraid you will vomit if you eat any more right now,’ Grace told him.

‘Emery can take a flying leap off a quay,’ Rob said. ‘You’re a baker’s assistant? At some point in your life, maybe you knew what it’s like to be hungry.’

‘I’ve been lucky,’ she said, too shy to tell him of her plummet from her station in life and her rescue from a worse fate by the Wilsons.

By the time Rob had finished shaving—he took his time, stopping to rest—Grace had to agree with the maid who had brought the food from the manor. The man was at least a little handsome, discounting the high relief of his facial bones, a defect that time and food would soften.

‘I don’t think you’ll scare horses,’ Grace said, handing him a warm towel, which he draped over his face with an audible sigh.

‘I hope to heaven not,’ he replied and swabbed the warm towel across his face and neck, where the prison brand stood out in stark relief.

Shaved and shorn, the captain looked so different. She wished she had not cut his hair so close, because it was a beautiful shade of reddish-gold. His eyes were as nicely blue as she had noticed earlier and his nose was straight, even if it did appear etched into his face, because of his total lack of body fat. There was something about him—she had noticed it last night on the stairs: an air of capability she did not expect to see from a man who was a prisoner and weak from hunger and ill use.

She wondered if that was an American trait. Even with a brand on his neck and too few pounds on his body, her parolee did not look like a man who knew his place.

How do Americans do that, I wonder? Her next thought: Can I possibly keep him on this estate, if he chooses not to be here? Lord Thomson, what have you wished on me?

‘Will I do?’ the captain asked, catching the eye of the little maid who still stood there.

The child nodded. Grace doubted anyone in recent memory—maybe ever—had asked her opinion, much less with a smile.

Grace touched her shoulder. ‘He’s teasing you.’

‘I think you’ll do,’ the maid said, then ducked behind Grace, overcome with shyness.

‘I think so, too,’ she told her. ‘If we do our duty—as Lord Nelson admonished all Englishmen—and fulfil our charge from old Lord Thomson, we’ll send him back to … to…’

‘Nantucket.’

‘… to Nantucket healthy.’

‘Your country is counting on you,’ he said gently.

The appeal to patriotism brought the maid out from behind Grace. Still unable to speak, she bobbed a curtsy and dashed for the manor.

The captain watched her go. ‘You realise, of course, that I will be able to inveigle anything I want from the big house, if she is my go-between.’ He handed back the empty porridge bowl. ‘Now, if you will help me upstairs, I hear my bed calling me.’

Grace did as he asked, uneasy at his exhaustion and the way he had to literally pull himself up the stairs. He stood at the top of the landing for a long moment, teetering there until he had his balance. She wondered what he was thinking, unable to really know if his startling change of circumstance had even registered completely.

He headed towards his chamber, but Grace put her hand against the small of his back and steered him to the next room. ‘Emery is fumigating the chamber where you slept last night,’ she told him as she opened the door. ‘This is where you will be staying.’

He stood in the doorway, just looking at the simple but pleasant room. ‘Believe me when I tell you it is humiliating to be full of lice and fleas. I haven’t been so uncomfortable since my childhood.’

Her curiosity piqued, Grace had to know more. ‘Fleas and lice on Nantucket?’ she teased in turn.

The amusement in his voice was evident. He laughed softly, even as he sat down heavily on the bed. ‘Nantucket? Comes with sand fleas, too. But I told you last night I was born in England. I’m one of those Americans that England insists can only be English, because I was born here. This is what you get for choosing Rob Inman, officially branded a troublemaker. You may wish to surrender my parole to someone else.’

‘How could I possibly collect my thirty pounds a year, if I did?’

‘Only thirty pounds to watch me?’ The captain’s eyes were closing. ‘I fear you are not being paid well enough for the aggravation I will be.’

It was a disquieting thought. She watched him as he drifted to sleep, wondering just how much trouble one parolee could be.

She left him then, sound asleep. It troubled her to watch a man wilt so fast and so she told Emery belowstairs, as he continued to unpack the shabby goods Lord Thomson thought should furnish the dower house, now that a prisoner of war lived there, along with a baker’s assistant awarded the princely sum, per annum, of thirty pounds.

‘Why is Lord Thomson so intent upon punishing me for a mere thirty pounds?’ she asked Emery.

The old retainer only shrugged and folded another tattered dishcloth into a drawer.

She toyed with the idea of telling Emery of the switch in Dartmoor Prison, then decided against it. It would serve no purpose to tell anyone who ‘Captain Duncan’ really was. She wouldn’t tell the Wilsons, either, she decided, as she walked to Quimby, knowing Rob would sleep through the afternoon.

‘He is rail thin and weak,’ she told them both as she stood at the familiar kneading table again.

‘Worms, more like,’ Mrs Wilson said. ‘I have a dose of black draught that will shift ‘im.’

Grace smiled, her equilibrium restored by the mere act of stirring a recipe she knew so well. ‘I’d rather wish the black draught on Lord Thomson! He took everything out of the dower house before Mr Selway and I returned from Dartmoor and replaced it—when forced to—with the worst rubbish from the attics!’

‘A double dose of black draught for Lord Thomson,’ Mr Wilson said with a laugh as he watched her. ‘Enough to keep him in the necessary and out of your business!’

Trust the Wilsons to cheer her up, she decided as she hurried to the greengrocer to buy food to tempt the American’s appetite. Mr Selway had smoothed her path with the local merchants. She ordered food and timidly told the proprietor to direct the receipt to Philip Selway, Esq., Exeter, Postal Box Fifteen. The man didn’t even blink. ‘Aye, Gracie,’ he told her. ‘That solemn-looking solicitor gave us strict orders about your invoices.’

So it went at each store she visited; everyone was curious about Captain Duncan. Grace resigned herself to being part of the most interesting thing that had happened in Quimby since Quentin Markwell, Exeter’s own notorious highwayman, had galloped through town a century ago, pausing to steal the vicar’s smallclothes from his washing line.

She returned to Quarle in good humour, at least until she saw Lord Thomson watching her out of an upstairs window, his glare evident even from some distance. ‘Surely it is but a matter of months until this poor man is gone,’ she muttered. ‘Lord Thomson, be a little less odious, if you can.’

Grace’s irritation at the marquis did not improve when she entered the dower house. Emery was waiting for her, sitting on one of the rickety chairs in the small foyer and looking uncharacteristically glum.

‘We’ve lost him already, Gracie,’ he said.

‘Impossible,’ Grace retorted, trying to hide her sudden fear. ‘I left him asleep upstairs before I went to the Wilsons. He was too weak to move.’

‘He’s moved, Gracie. Trouble is, where?’

Chapter Eight

Why in heaven’s name did I ever agree to this parole? Grace asked herself as she quickly set down the purchases she had brought with her—choice dainties to tempt that wretched man’s appetite. The constable will shoot him on sight? Only if I don’t beat him to it, she thought grimly.

‘He can’t have just vanished, Emery,’ she stated, hands on her hips. ‘He could barely walk!’

‘Perhaps we are underestimating him,’ Emery offered.

‘Or he’s only trying to fool us so he can escape,’ Grace snapped back. ‘Where on earth would he go?’ She sat down on a rickety chair in the entrance hall. ‘Is there not a chair in this silly house that doesn’t list?’

She was silent then, listening to herself: querulous, testy and complaining. She sighed. ‘Emery, I wish you would smite me when I complain.’

He recoiled. ‘Never! That would go against every bit of butlering I can think of. Which ain’t much,’ he added philosophically.

She couldn’t help smiling, despite her worries. ‘Don’t you know you should humour a lunatic?’ she teased. ‘If I am not imposing, would you please even off these chair legs?’

‘Consider it done,’ the old retainer told her.

She stood outside for a long moment, wishing herself calm, even as she wanted to smack Lord Thomson and throttle Rob Inman. Where was he? She berated herself again for choosing Rob Inman, out of all the miserable American prisoners she could have selected. She walked to the modest circle drive in front of the dower house, totally at a loss. Emery had thought the parolee would have no trouble blending with the seamen that walked about Plymouth, but he would have to get there first. Plymouth was not close, especially for someone teetering just this side of starvation.

If you’re found, you will be shot, you wretched man, she thought, walking into the road, but not ready to pass the manor house again, not with Lord Thomson watching her. She rubbed her arms, chilled at what would happen to him if the marquis had even an inkling that the captain had left the house unaccompanied.

‘Where would I go, if I were you?’ she asked out loud. ‘You’ve said you like the wind on your face.’

And then she knew and realised she had better be right. Looking about to see if Lord Thomson was in sight, Grace hiked up her skirt and ran towards the highest point of land on his property. It wasn’t much of an elevation, but just enough of one to tempt someone homesick for the sea, who might think he could see Plymouth Sound from its height. She used to walk there occasionally with old Lord Thomson, when he’d had the strength, because he or one of his ancestors had put a bench at the top.

Sure of herself now, she hurried to the high point, rehearsing in her mind what she would say to Rob when she found him. To her amazement and growing fear, he was nowhere in sight. She even stood on top of the bench, the better to scan the countryside.

Defeat settled on her shoulders like a blanket. He hadn’t been in her charge for much more than a day and she had already lost him.

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