Page 42 of The Villain’s Fatal Plot (Gravesyde Village Mystery #1)

FORTY-TWO: VERITY

Verity had listened to the men plot through dinner. Unaccustomed to speaking up or arguing, she let them rattle on without her.

But this was her personal nightmare. If they were right... her own uncle had killed her father! And wanted her dead. It couldn’t be more personal than that.

She supposed she ought to let Rafe do things legally. That’s how he was, and she certainly appreciated that he wouldn’t burn down anyone’s home or push them under a carriage. But she had learned to defend herself by any means available, since there had never been anyone else to do so. She didn’t have any qualms about using whatever means necessary to stop a scoundrel.

She simply didn’t know how.

As the men went off to set a trap, the women gathered to worry in the withdrawing room after dinner. Verity refused to sit. She simply couldn’t, not while Rafe and others were prepared to protect her worthless life.

Cuddling Marmie, she swallowed her fear of speaking to an audience of respectable ladies. “I think we should arm ourselves,” she said uncertainly. When conversation stopped and all eyes turned to her, she trembled, but it didn’t matter if she made a fool of herself. No one else should be harmed because of her. “We have no way of knowing that my uncle is at the inn. If he is in Gravesyde, it would be easy for him to learn that I am here, at the manor.”

Minerva was instantly out of her seat. “Thank you. I agree. I am comfortable with a pistol and a knife. How about you?”

Not having thought that far, Verity gave her cane a wry glance. “A sword? A frying pan?”

Patience instantly popped up. “I have sharp hoes!”

Lavender removed a vicious pair of scissors from her sewing basket. Coming in late, Lady Elsa—not only a cook but an excellent horsewoman—suggested riding crops and whips and returned to the kitchen for suitable weaponry for the others.

“We need a signal,” Mrs. Huntley—Clare—decided. “If we are to spread out, we need to sound an alarm if we see anything untoward.”

The curate’s mother, also the manor’s housekeeper, arrived carrying a broom and a carpet beater. She nodded her head at this suggestion. “The place is too large for us to see each other. Perhaps if we shout something innocent, like huzzah ?”

“Hallelujah,” Patience said with a grin. “I could sing it.”

Verity loved that these women had immediately leapt to her aid. She feared they would hurt themselves, however, and that had never been her intention. “I know you have a footman and butler at the main entrances. Do we need to guard all the doors?”

“I’ll see that we have maids and footmen at every entrance to sound an alert, although guarding every window, or even room, is impossible,” the housekeeper admitted.

“Quincy and his son can patrol the main corridor,” Minerva suggested. “Does anyone know how to unlock Hunt’s gun vault? They should probably be armed.”

“I do.” Clare rushed out to find the ex-boxer butler and his son.

“I suppose this is good practice,” Thea said with a frown. “We are isolated and can’t expect the men to always protect us. I might manage a rapier if all I need to do is stab someone’s toes. I hope the boys are safely in bed and don’t hear us or they’ll be down directly.”

“I can’t imagine the schoolroom is in any danger,” Minerva said, “but we should send a note up to Mr. Birdwhistle to warn him of what we are doing. He might be a little alarmed by an outbreak of hallelujah .”

Verity tried to slip out with the others scattering to find weapons, but Minerva caught up with her. “I’m not letting Paul go into danger without me,” she whispered resolutely. “So whatever you’re planning, I’m with you.”

“Perhaps, for the first time in my life, I am not planning anything,” Verity admitted. “I simply know I cannot let anyone be harmed for my sake. I’ve lost too much. I have nothing. No one will miss me if I’m gone. But the rest of you... have no reason to sacrifice yourselves.”

Minerva made an inelegant noise. “Rafe would burn down the town if anything happened to you. You are one of us now. You are not alone. We do not let criminals roam free. It may be akin to eradicating rodents, hopeless, but crime has to be addressed.”

“A female army of constables?” Verity suggested in amusement, only because she was very, very afraid.

They followed Clare into the captain’s study. Verity claimed a small sword. If she used her cane, she only had one spare hand. She was far more comfortable with the cane. Minerva took a pistol and expertly loaded it, then added a dirk to her arsenal. She was petite and all the swords were large and heavy.

Verity tried to slip away again while the rest of the weapons were distributed, but Minerva stayed with her. She supposed the librarian had a reason to be concerned about her fiancé. Mr. Upton was, after all, dressed as Verity.

“I don’t want to ruin my new gown,” Verity decided, trying to balance her weapons. “I need to change.”

“Boots,” Minerva agreed. “Aprons for pockets. Cloaks for concealment. ”

They hurried upstairs. Several of the others apparently had the same thought. Verity could hear them down the family side of the corridor as she entered her chamber in a front guestroom. Lavender had brilliantly designed her dinner gown for someone without a lady’s maid, but it took a few minutes to remove it and pull on her old blacks. She tucked Marmie into a drawer of linen with a torn handkerchief the kitten liked to shred.

At the main stairs, she met Minerva wearing a concealing cloak. Together, they hurried through the manor and slipped into the dark night from the unused east wing by the drive, making certain a footman locked it behind them.

“The original medieval manor block was built like a fortress,” Minerva said as they cautiously crossed to the stable without a lantern. “Whoever added the new wings added too many doors and windows for it to ever be used as a fortification again.”

“Sharpshooters in all the towers?” Verity suggested, trying to keep her tone light. She had utterly no idea what she was doing but she welcomed the idea of a whip and riding crop.

Lady Elsa was there ahead of them. She had rounded up the stable lads—including Luther—and every weapon they could carry. Verity didn’t think her uncle’s former footman a wise idea.

“Unless you want to use him as a target, I suggest locking Luther in a stall,” she said dryly as the new coach driver stumbled down the stairs from his room in stocking feet.

“A lure,” Minerva cried happily. “Exactly what we need. If Mr. Palmer is anywhere about, he’ll be certain to seek someone he knows for aid.”

Luther protested volubly. One of the other stable men ran upstairs for Luther’s boots.

“You’ll be well guarded, sir,” Lady Elsa said happily. “No one wants to harm you. Just stroll down the drive, make yourself visible.”

Verity thought she might choke holding back laughter. This was deadly serious business, but the ladies... were fearless. And quite insane. She left Luther cowering in a corner, protesting .

Instead of guarding inside the manor as she’d proposed, the ladies were apparently slipping like shadows through the gardens and yard and around hedges, protecting the perimeter. Verity didn’t think if they sang the entire Messiah, there would be enough hallelujahs to reach all ears, but she was glad she’d aroused awareness.

With a riding crop in her apron band, cane in one hand, sword in the other, she followed the row of trees lining the drive, keeping an eye on shadows.

She didn’t know her uncle well, at all, she realized. She’d known he was a drunkard, a mean miser, and accustomed to city streets and servants to do his bidding. She supposed that might make him hideously uncomfortable in a country setting, more so than she had been. He couldn’t ride about in a carriage and wouldn’t appreciate taking dark lanes on foot.

Rafe was correct. If he was here, Uncle Warren had most likely hidden in the inn. But if he was the man who had pushed her, he’d escaped on a horse earlier. Would he return? He had to go back to London soon if he was to protect his alibi—but riding at night was treacherous.

Minerva drifted toward the orchard, on the east side of the hill. She probably knew footpaths that Verity didn’t. She stayed with the drive that she could see rather than get lost.

There, further down the drive, the evergreens moved. There was no wind. Minerva couldn’t see the movement from the path she’d taken. This could simply be one of the men keeping watch or going home for the evening. Well, she had no other plan. She might as well watch and follow too.

The overgrown grass muffled her feet as the distant shadow took a footpath away from the drive and down the hill. This concealed path seemed to lead in the direction of the chapel and inn, but that meant little, if Rafe had him guarding the inn.

Surrounded as it was by trees, the path couldn’t be seen unless one was on it. She swallowed hard and hoped that wasn’t her uncle, although the silhouette appeared the right height. A cloak prevented seeing more. Except for Mr. Upton, most of the gentlemen were taller than this, but she didn’t know all the servants.

She heard a muffled curse and splashing. A brook ran along the manor property, she recalled, one that rushed down to the river on the other side of the hill. She’d been told the captain had recently built a new bridge on the carriage drive but apparently not for this path. Apparently the shadow wasn’t as familiar with the path as she’d thought.

Her target squelched up the opposite bank. She carefully chose rocks to cross on. It hadn’t rained recently, so the water was low.

As they crossed the field toward the chapel, the inn loomed large against the clear night sky. She knew Rafe and Mr. Upton had hoped to lure her uncle here, but if this were he... had he seen them going down the drive and simply took a different route?

As she watched, lamplight illuminated one of the inn’s upper guestrooms. She held her breath, watching the window. The silhouette passing in front of it seemed large enough to be Rafe, and her heart pounded a little faster. He’d arrived safely. Clenching her weapons, she waited. A moment later, a light appeared in the kitchen window. She covered her mouth to smother a laugh at the silhouette of a stiff figure in a bonnet and what appeared to be a shawl. The curate? Did they really think that a shawl and bonnet resembled her ?

The shadow she’d been following hesitated, then crouching down, scurried toward the crumbling wall around the inn. She caught her breath. That silly silhouette had caught his attention? Surely not...

He crossed at a broken place and slipped into the inn yard. Concealing himself like that could not mean anything good.

Where were the others? She didn’t want to sound an alarm and have everyone rushing in and ruining the trap if this wasn’t the killer.

She froze as the demons of uncertainty circled. Rafe was risking his life for her! She had to decide and act now . Not ten long years later.

Setting her jaw, she approached the wall and shouted, “Uncle Warren!”

To her utter shock, the cloaked figure swung around and blackened the air with familiar curses. “You! You never did stay where you belonged!”

... as if she were the one at fault for making him come out here!

Instead of cowering like simple Faith, Verity drew on years of suppressed rage. There was only one reason for the reprehensible villain who had killed her father and destroyed her home to be in Gravesyde—to kill her too!

Without thinking twice, Verity sang “ Hallelujah, hallelujah ,” at the top of her lungs. Forgetting her broken foot and clumsiness, swinging her cane with the vigor of the song, she ran toward the man who wielded death and destruction.

He opened his lantern and a torch abruptly illuminated the dusty yard.

A torch . Recalling a fiery inferno emblazoned against a night sky... Sheer terror ripped through Verity.