The Nightingale Legacy (Legacy 2)

Caroline opened her eyes to find herself not on the ground, not in North’s arms, but in a small mean room, lying on a narrow filthy cot. An elderly man with a high shrill voice was speaking to Ffalkes, or trying to, his stammer worsening as his voice rose. North was bound to a chair in a shadowed corner opposite her. The two villains were standing by the door, their guns now both pointed at North.

“S-see here,” the small elderly man was saying, “this is more than h-highly ir-r-regular, sir, this is im-impossible. The young lady is u-u-unconscious! She can’t even s-say her lines. This s-special li-li-license is surely in order and a pretty pence you paid the Arch-arch-archbishop of Canterbury for it, b-but the wo-woman must respond, sh-she—”

“She will,” Ffalkes said, striding over to the narrow, quite smelly mattress where she was lying on her back, her eyes now tightly closed. “Caroline.” He lightly slapped her cheeks. “Come on now, my dear, wake up. You don’t want to miss your own wedding, now do you?”

She opened her eyes, felt more clear in her thinking than she had before, knew she could bear the pain, and said quite clearly, “I won’t marry you, Mr. Ffalkes. Let me go.”

“It sim-sim-simply w-won’t d-do,” the small elderly man said.

“Shush, Caroline. That is the vicar, Mr. Barhold. You wouldn’t want him to get the wrong impression.” Before she could yell to the vicar, Ffalkes lightly lay his finger over her lips. “Look over there in the corner, my dear. It’s Lord Chilton, and he doesn’t look any too happy, does he? Now, here is the bargain I am offering you. If you wed me, I won’t kill him. If you continue refusing me, I’ll have Treffek put a bullet right through his mouth. And Treffek would, Caroline. He’s the biggest knave I’ve ever met, and believe me, I’ve met many in my life. Just look at those black eyes of his, all dead and empty and colder than a winter in the Highlands of Scotland. Aye, he’ll do anything for a groat.”

North said quite clearly, “Whatever he’s telling you, Caroline, it doesn’t matter. Spit in his face.”

Without hesitation, she spit in Ffalkes’s face.

Ffalkes drew back, so furious he wanted to kill her. He raised his fist, his eyes glittering, then slowly, slowly, he lowered his arm. “No, I shan’t let you goad me, not now, not when it is nearly done.” Then he smiled and rose from the narrow bed. “Trimmer, take Mr. Barhold outside for just a moment. It isn’t raining and the moon is shining quite in a very romantic fashion. I’ll call you when we are ready for the ceremony.”

“Mr. F-Ffalkes, I-I’m n-not certain—”

“Go, Mr. Barhold. My betrothed simply doesn’t quite yet understand the complete extent of her good fortune. She will, very shortly.”

Ffalkes waited until Trimmer and Mr. Barhold had closed the very old and flimsy front cottage door behind them.

He looked from North back to Caroline, even as he wiped his handkerchief over his cheek. “Now, Caroline, if you willingly wed with me, Lord Chilton here goes back to Mount Hawke and to his own pursuits. If you don’t willingly wed me, Treffek will kill him here and we’ll bury him so he’ll never be found. Didn’t someone kill your dear aunt? In Lord Chilton’s case, there won’t even be a body for anyone to find. Don’t doubt me, Caroline. I need your money badly. I will do anything to get it. Now, will you have me for your husband in exchange for Lord Chilton’s life?”

She looked at North, tears filling her eyes. She said clearly, with no hesitation, “I will marry you, but first I want to see Lord Chilton freed and away from here.”

“Oh no, I don’t trust you enough for that, my dear girl. You will just have to have faith in me.”

Then she smiled and it was a mean, very malicious smile. “Very well, Mr. Ffalkes. I will marry you. If Lord Chilton isn’t freed, unharmed, you will believe that I will kill you. It won’t matter if I hang for it. It certainly won’t matter to you because you’ll be dead and rotting, the flesh falling from your old bones. Don’t think Owen will cry over your worthless carcass, because he won’t.”

Ffalkes wanted to say something amusing perhaps, something to let her believe he didn’t believe her for an instant, because, after all, she was only a girl. He thought of that exquisitely painful hack of her hand against his throat, he thought of that blow of hers to his groin. Would she kill him if he harmed her lover? Yes, he knew in that instant that she would, and yes, he knew Chilton was her lover as well. As for Owen, certainly his son would cry over him, but not for many years, yes, long into the future, when he would finally die in his bed, all comfortable and ready. He said, “So, you’ve moved very quickly, Lord Chilton. You met my betrothed just weeks ago and she is already your mistress. No, I didn’t believe you’d taken her at that inn in Dorchester, though you did make me doubt for a while. But since she’s arrived here, things have changed, and you have nestled between her legs, haven’t you? Evidently you’ve done it well, for her devotion to you is quite charming, don’t you think? And a surprise, I must admit. She’s a deceitful little piece, all full of pride and that damnable arrogance and an independent streak that isn’t at all proper, yet she seems willing to give any and everything for you. Yes, it’s touching.”

North couldn’t believe his ears. He said nothing, he was simply too stunned by what she’d said and by Ffalkes’s conclusions.

Ffalkes said now to Caroline, “It doesn’t appear that his lordship shares your tender feelings, my dear, but no matter, they’re all one-sided; it is women, you know, who spout all that romantic drivel. Men aren’t touched by such nonsense, thank the wise Lord. They do what they have to do to have a woman part her legs, but after they’ve relieved themselves, they then return to what’s important to them. Now, let’s have the ceremony.”

Trimmer brought in Mr. Barhold, who was very quiet now, his head bowed.

“You call yourself a man of God?” Caroline shouted at him. “You’re naught but a sniveling pathetic excuse for a worm! You’re a fraud!”

Very swiftly, and with a smile on his face, Ffalkes backhanded her. “No more, my dear. No more. Treffek, move a bit closer to his lordship. Show my lovely betrothed just how close to his divine maker his lordship is if she doesn’t cooperate and keep her mouth properly shut.”

“You will surely pay for that, Ffalkes,” North said, his voice very low and deep.

Caroline was very afraid, not for herself, but for North. But he would be all right. She knew Ffalkes believed her. If he dared harm North, she would kill him, oh indeed she would. It occurred to her then to wonder how much longer she would be a wife before Mr. Ffalkes made himself a widower. He simply couldn’t afford to let her live, could he? There should have been irony there, but she couldn’t find it.

“All right,” she said, swinging her legs to the floor and standing.

“Ho, guv,” Trimmer said from the door. “Lookee who’s ’ere! It’s yer dear little boy wot was sick but is all full of piss now and—”

Trimmer dropped where he’d stood, falling forward into the cottage. Owen came in behind him, a gun in his hand.

“No, Father, don’t start screaming at me again. You won’t do any forcing with Caroline. It’s over, all over. I won?

?t let this continue.”

“Owen,” his father said, walking toward his son, but Owen knew his father well. He quickly moved to stand behind the vicar. “Don’t try it, Father, else I’ll shoot the vicar, then there won’t be anyone to force Caroline to marry you.”