Page 12 of The Wordsworth Key (Regency Secrets #3)

Chapter Seven

Windermere

M uch to her chagrin, Mr Barton insisted on escorting Dora back to her cottage.

‘You really need not take the trouble,’ she argued.

‘No trouble at all!’ he declared. ‘I can sail us to Waterhead and we can walk from there. It won’t save much time, but it will give us a respite from tramping back up the hill.’

Resigning herself to his company, Dora watched him ready his little sailing boat for the journey.

He was amusingly enthusiastic, checking a list he drew from his pocket to get the steps right.

It did seem an awful lot of trouble when her own two feet could already have taken her a fair way home.

When he noticed her watching, he said sheepishly:

‘It’s a new boat– bought this season.’

An amateur sailor? Why was that not comforting? If she was risking her life, she had better use the opportunity to make progress with her enquiry.

‘You said that Mr Coleridge is in London, sir?’

‘He is.’ Barton held out a hand to help her into the skiff. ‘Mind your step.’

‘Aye aye, captain.’ Dora settled herself at the bow. ‘But his wife and children are here?’

‘That’s a long story.’

‘I think we have time, do we not?’

He pushed off from the bank and jumped aboard. The wind was kind for once and quickly filled the sail, though to Dora’s inexpert eye they looked to be travelling further south than they wanted.

‘And we’re off! We might need to tack but it won’t take long with this breeze.’ He trimmed the sail and settled back with a pleased expression that they had not yet met with any disaster. ‘I think I’m getting the hang of this.’

Dora looked down at the iron-grey water warily. ‘Might I mention that I can’t swim?’

‘Never fear, my lady. I’ll not spill you out. This is a steady vessel. The only ones of my friends who have ended up in the water fell out of their own accord.’

‘Fell out…?’

‘Luke Knotte– Slipknot as we’ve called him since. It might have involved drink. Yes, it definitely involved too much wine.’ He grinned at the memory.

‘Who else was on that fateful outing?’ She wondered who the closest were to him, the ones who most often came to his boathouse.

‘Wright, Langhorne and me. They’re all on the list I gave you.’

It sounded like the small boat was somewhat overloaded. The sooner they got this voyage over, the better. ‘You were saying about Coleridge?’

‘I would describe him as a man of intense passions– poets often are– and I’m afraid he’s rather fallen out of love with his wife and fancies another lady. Fortunately for all, Mrs Coleridge is sister to Robert Southey’s wife.’

‘Robert Southey?’ The name was familiar. ‘Another writer?’

‘ Exactement . Southey now also resides at Greta Hall in Keswick where Coleridge first set up when he came to be near Wordsworth; the solution was for Mrs Coleridge to continue there and live with the Southeys and Coleridge to leave.’

‘And Keswick is… where?’

‘About eighteen miles north of here at the far end of Derwent Water– a beautiful spot, you must see it. It’s dominated by Skiddaw, which in my opinion is the most fearsome of the mountains in the district.

There’s something bleak and terrible about it.

I’ve tried writing about it but it escapes me.

I fear my natural subjects are on a smaller scale. ’

They were in danger of tacking towards the subject rather than heading directly to what she wanted to know. ‘But Mrs Coleridge…?’

‘Has been left high and dry.’ He swapped position as the boom swung to the other side.

His eyes were on the sail rather than on his passenger, which allowed her to examine him.

There was something endearing about him.

He had a younger brother air, not that she’d ever had one of those, boyish and a little vulnerable.

She feared he was the sort others would take advantage of.

‘STC suffers from ill health– the kind of ill health that opium addiction brings one. That probably explains the lack of constancy in his affections.’

‘I see.’ Jacob had explained to her the terrible grip opium got on a person who started using it too freely. He was still struggling to escape his own weakness for the drug. ‘Still, I pity his wife.’

‘So do I. It must be hard to be married to genius. Say what you like about Robert Southey?—’

‘I had no intention of saying anything.’

‘Many do. He has travelled from presenting himself to the literary world as a nineties radical poet to today’s staid writer of epic poetry.

The flash new generation– the Byrons and whatnots– struggle to forgive him that.

But it is indubitably in Southey’s favour that he has taken in Mrs Coleridge and her children.

I believe the Wordsworths are also involved in their upbringing, having children of a similar age. ’

‘I imagine that draws them closer.’

‘Especially since the two boys, Hartley and Derwent, are at Reverend Dawes’ school in Ambleside just near here. They all muck in to raise the children.’ He pointed to the little town that lay at the head of Windermere.

Could the theft of the manuscript be a childish prank, wondered Dora.

If Wordsworth and Coleridge were on the outs with each other, could the boys have taken revenge on behalf of their father?

It was easy to idolise the absent parent and buck against the paternal figures who tried to rein you in.

She hadn’t considered that angle, but the oddness of the theft suggested it could be done for its mischief value.

‘Do you know the boys?’

‘Oh, yes. They are in and out of my cottage, and even borrow the boat when I’m not looking. Pair of little monkeys, both of them.’ He sounded fond of, rather than annoyed by, them.

‘And yet they are not on the list?’

‘Oh… well, no. I didn’t think of them.’ He frowned. ‘You don’t think…?’

‘Mr Barton, my mind is open to all possibilities, but a childish game is the most innocent of explanations so the one worth investigating first. Will they be in Ambleside?’

‘They lodge in Clappersgate with an old lady during term– I’m afraid she lets them run wild when they’re there.

’ He spoke as he thought, she realised, not editing his words to reach the answer.

He had to take her through his workings.

She would wager one of the faults of his poetry was that he hadn’t learned that brevity was the soul of wit.

‘As it’s the school holidays, I’m not sure where they are.

Maybe they’re in Keswick with their mother, though they do like to roam.

They could well be camping, or fishing, or doing whatever it is boys get up to during their holidays. ’

‘Then let us go ask someone who does know.’

* * *

The old woman who housed the Coleridge boys told Dora and Barton that she had last seen them a few days ago. The children had told her they were camping near the cave on the shores of Rydal Water.

‘They’re playing Indian scouts,’ she said as she scattered a handful of seeds to her chickens. ‘Though even Indian scouts like to come calling when it’s baking day.’ She cackled at that.

Dora thanked her, and then she and Barton turned in the direction of Ambleside.

‘What say you to buying a half a dozen buns to lure out our native friends?’ asked Dora.

‘I’d say that was a jolly good idea. I remember I had a ravenous appetite at that age. I should warn you: if they are deep in their character they may not act like perfect gentlemen.’

‘Don’t worry– I know all about playing a character.’

Sweet treats secured, they made their way along the banks of the River Rothay to Rydal, a pleasant walk of less than an hour at a moderate pace.

With all this walking, Dora could feel the glow of exercise heating her skin, the perspiration gathering under her breasts and trickling down the small of her back and it made her grateful for any shade.

She wished she could do this in a shirt and breeches like Barton.

The dip in the tarn with Jacob hovered in her memory like a mirage of all that was cool and delicious.

Women’s clothes were damned annoying in summer.

‘Tell me about the cave,’ she asked to distract herself from her discomfort.

‘It’s actually a jolly old slate mine– it looks natural but has long provided the roofing tiles for most of the houses in the area. I can see why it would attract two boys. When no one is mining, it is a perfect haunt for “Indian scouts”.’

They approached along a stony track on the west side of Rydal Water.

A little island– a green oasis in the middle of the deep blue lake– made this the prettiest stretch of water Dora had yet seen.

It was marvellous how a spell of sunshine transformed the landscape from the sublime to the beautiful.

She would be writing her own travel guide next, she thought ruefully.

‘Heron Island,’ said Barton, seeing where her gaze was directed. ‘I hope they aren’t camping there, or we will have a devil of a time reaching them.’

‘We’ll have to send them smoke signals,’ Dora murmured, amused.

This was the most fabulous playground for imaginative children.

She would’ve loved to wander here herself at that age, getting as brown as a walnut and toughening the soles of her feet as she left off shoes.

Oh, the mischief she and Anthony could have got up to!

A wave of grief followed on the heels of that thought. Her brother had been murdered but three months ago and yet it felt like a lifetime had passed since then.

‘Miss Fitz-Pennington, are you well?’ Barton touched her elbow.

Dora smiled brightly at him, ignoring the sheen of tears in her eyes. ‘Very well, thank you, sir. Now, let’s find ourselves our quarry.’