Cinders and Ashes (Cavendish Mysteries 2)

“I am almost certain he was hanging around with Ballantyne on the very edges of society. He could have made acquaintance with the wretched man at one of the dubious gatherings.”

While talking, he casually placed his hand upon his daughter’s shoulder, inwardly delighted when she didn’t shake him off and move away. He would have loved to give her a hug, but knew there was still a wariness that warned him not to push. Still, he had gotten further in a day than he had ever considered possible, and he was overjoyed with progress.

“Is it possible that he was associated with Ballantyne?” Sebastian shot, with a look at Eastleigh.

“Oh, I think it is inevitable. They moved in the same circles. Dissolute gamers and whore-mongerers the lot of them. Apologies, ladies,” Eastleigh mumbled, with an abashed look at Isobel and Amelia.

“That doesn’t explain how Hawksworth came to be hung for the murder of a servant. Surely he couldn’t have been so drunk that he couldn’t remember killing someone, or wouldn’t even try to explain who he was?” It sounded too incredible to consider.

“I think he was set up,” Peter added. “I spoke to the gaoler at Derby, who said he could remember the man quite clearly. He was different from the scourge they usually accommodate. Apparently, the man spoke with a cultivated tone and kept asking for his friend, but the gaoler couldn’t remember the friend’s name. Someone did visit him in the family room the day before his hanging, but nobody knew what was discussed. They had to drag Hawksworth to his cell in the end, as he kept protesting that they needed to know the truth. Began shouting and fighting them as they dragged him back to the condemned cell. They put it down to the mad ramblings of a man facing death, and ignored him. Right up until he was taken to the gallows, he kept screaming and kicking, insisting he wasn’t Jack Cunnington.”

“The poor man,” Amelia whispered, looking at the mask with renewed eyes. “He took his secrets, and the truth, to the grave with him.”

“Hawksworth hasn’t been heard of since. He supposedly departed for the Americas, but took the family coffers with him and disappeared,” Edward added. “Hawksworth’s family did confirm the maid who died, Martha Bainbridge, was a maid at the Ballantyne residence.”

Dominic swore. “The bastards set him up.”

“But I don’t understand why they

are trying to kill Sebastian. He didn’t know Hawksworth. Did you?” Amelia turned to look at Sebastian.

“Never met the man before in my life. I don’t think he was after me per se, I think he is after Edenvale Manor. Or something in it,” Sebastian replied, trying to recall the details of his time in the cellar, in case he missed something.

“He wanted to kill you for the Penny Dreadful?”

“There is something we are missing,” Dominic added with a frown. “What’s at Bertram’s that Ballantyne needs to get to, and is willing to get you out of the way to get access to it?”

“If what we suspect is true, he has killed before and gotten away with it. There is no telling what is going on in his mind, or what he thinks he can get away with.” Amelia shuddered. “He has already tried to kill you once, and very nearly succeeded. He also knows you are alive and well. You have to be careful, Sebastian. Given what happened at Edenvale Manor, we all need to be careful.”

Eastleigh frowned at the assembled group. Sensing his curiosity, Sebastian quickly recounted events, ending with their return to the safe confines of Tingdale.

“Then we need to act, and act quickly,” Eastleigh stated decisively.

“We need to visit the maid’s family and see if she can tell us any more,” Amelia added.

“You can’t go.” Dominic frowned at Sebastian. “You are too much of a risk.”

“I can’t just sit here and do nothing.” It went against everything within him to just sit back, and let everyone else take action on his behalf.

“You need to remain here and take care of Amelia, and the mask.” Dominic studied his wife for several moments. “Isobel and I will go.”

Isobel looked askance at her husband as he turned back to Amelia and Sebastian. “She kept the long trousers she used to use. We can pose as man and son, and go to the village undetected.”

Amelia almost clapped at the cleverness of the idea.

Isobel looked delighted. “Don’t you think they will think it slightly odd that we are sharing a room?”

“There is no way on this earth you are going to share a room with other men,” Dominic stated bluntly in a tone that brooked no argument. “If they hear the bed going in the middle of the night, then we will have to leave them with raised eyebrows.”

That earned him a slap on the arm from his flushed wife, who carefully ignored the smothered sniggers from the room’s other occupants. “What?” Dominic asked his wife with a smothered smile. It didn’t hurt to throw the unexpected at her occasionally, he mused with a sly grin.

“We need to go through Bertram’s house again to check for anything else that may be hidden,” Peter mused, carefully covering the death mask back up.

“But we already checked all of the books,” Amelia protested, thinking of the hours and hours of endless and futile searching.

“Yes, but we didn’t check the papers for letters or anything.”

“I think that instead of anyone spending any more time there for the moment, it is best if the papers are packed up and brought here. The house needs to be emptied of all personal effects, anyway,” Sebastian added.