Andrew Pepper - The Revenge of Captain Paine

‘Now shut your eyes, hold your breath and count to ten.’

Milly did as she was told and Pyke counted with her, ‘One, two, three…’, her face reddening as she did so. ‘Six, seven, eight, nine, ten.’ Her eyes opened and she gasped for breath.

Before she’d had time to think, Pyke asked, ‘What did you see?’

‘Dog.’ The word tumbled out of her mouth before she could stop it. For a moment they looked at each other, trying to come to terms with what had just happened. Her voice had sounded like a tiny croak.

‘What kind of a dog, Milly?’

She looked away and pursed her lips.

‘A big dog, Milly? Was it a big dog with a light brown coat and a black face? The dog you drew in the picture?’ He had tried to conceal his excitement but hadn’t done a good enough job because she looked at him, startled, and then folded her arms.

‘Was there a dog in the room the night your parents were killed, Milly?’

When Milly didn’t answer him, Pyke grabbed her shoulder and jerked her towards him, harder than he perhaps should have, hard enough to make her gasp. But something inside him had snapped and he couldn’t stop himself from shaking her and demanding to know about the dog, until her sobs became screams and it wasn’t until Pyke put his arms around her, whispered that everything would be all right and stroked her matted hair, that her wails started to ebb.

‘It was a big brown dog with a black face and it saw me hiding under the table but even though it growled and sniffed, it didn’t give me away. The gemmen never even saw me.’ Milly spoke in halting sentences between the sobs.

He hugged her tiny, trembling body and whispered that everything would be all right.

‘I heard ’em shout, Ma and Pa, but there weren’t nuffin’ I could do. I tried to help but my legs and arms wouldn’t move. I sat under that table while it happened, listening to their screams, but I couldn’t move. I couldn’t even open my mouth…’ She began to wail again, this time pausing only for breath. Pyke held her tightly and tried to mop her sweat-stained brow. ‘Let it out, let it all out,’ he whispered, as her wailing intensified. He heard footsteps outside the door.

Finally, when the sobs had started to subside, Pyke called out, ‘Royce, would you step into the room.’

Annoyed that Pyke had heard him, and knew it was him, the elderly butler shuffled into the nursery holding a lantern and muttered, ‘I heard the girl crying and wondered if I might be of assistance.’

‘That’s good of you, Royce. Actually there is something you could do.’

‘Yes, sir?’

‘Tell Jennings to prepare the carriage. I’ll need to be at the Swan with Two Necks tomorrow morning at six.’

‘At six, sir? In the morning?’ Royce frowned and shook his head. ‘Jennings will be asleep by now. I’m not sure it’s possible…’

‘Then wake the lazy codger up and tell him to have the carriage waiting for me at half-past four or I’ll come and find him and pummel him to a pulp.’

For a moment Royce stared at him open mouthed, unable to hide his shock that he’d been spoken to in this manner, but then his training and a lifetime of subordination took over, the outrage in his eyes glazed over and his composure returned. ‘Very good, sir. Will there be anything else, sir?’

‘Yes, dress Milly here and make sure she’s ready to leave at four thirty on the dot.’ Pyke looked at the girl, who was clinging to him and sniffing. ‘We’re going to try and find your sister Kate. Do you remember Kate?’

‘Kate?’ Milly’s eyes widened and her expression seemed to lift. He had given her hope and he hated himself for it.

‘It’s a long journey, Milly, and you’ll need to be strong for it. If Royce here brings you some food, will you eat it?’

Even before Milly had nodded, Pyke called the butler back into the room and told him to bring her some supper. This time Royce didn’t offer any protest.

There were two coaches departing for Ramsgate the following morning, the faster mail coach at six o’clock and the other, run by a different company, half an hour later at six thirty. Pyke had hoped to secure two inside seats on the six o’clock coach but was told by a bored clerk that the mail coach was already full. Not content with this answer, Pyke went looking for the stand where the mail coach was due to depart from and saw only at the very last moment that Sir John Conroy was waiting to catch the same coach. Pulling Milly, who was staring in wonderment at the horses and giant painted carriages, behind a group of passengers waiting to board another coach, he stole another glance, to make sure his eyes hadn’t deceived him, and cursed. If, as seemed most likely, Conroy was returning to Ramsgate to rejoin the royal party, his task had suddenly become much more difficult. Pyke needed to talk with one of the princess’s ladies-in-waiting, Helen Milner-Gibson, the name he had been given by Freddie Sutton before his death, without threat of running into the comptroller. Above all, Pyke didn’t want Conroy to know he’d visited the south coast.

The six o’clock mail coach departed on time. Pyke watched it leave the yard, Sir John Conroy sitting next to the window reading a newspaper. But the half-six coach that they had been forced to take didn’t leave until nearer seven, after Pyke had taken the driver and young groom to one side and offered them an inducement of ten pounds if they managed to beat the mail-coach to Ramsgate.

‘Beat the mail coach?’ The driver had stared at Pyke, as though he were a madman. ‘They’ve got eight horses to our six and a faster carriage.’

‘But they’re carrying more passengers and more luggage,’ Pyke had said. ‘And if you get me to Ramsgate before the mail coach, I’ll give you fifty pounds, not ten.’

That swung it. The coach pulled out of the yard just a few minutes later, without a couple of the passengers who had been dawdling in the waiting area.

Not including the two of them, there were five passengers inside the coach sitting opposite each other and another four riding on the roof, together with the luggage. To his immense relief, no one seemed to want to talk inside the coach — it was too early and too cold — and very soon they had all settled into their thoughts, Milly staring in wonder out of the window, making the occasional remark, but on the whole too preoccupied to want to speak. They crossed the Thames using London Bridge and clattered along the Old Kent Road at an amble, there being too much traffic and too many people to go any quicker, but once they had passed through Deptford and climbed up the steep hill into Blackheath, the driver and groom chivvied the horses from a canter to a gallop, so that even those inside the carriage had to keep hold of their hats.

The journey as far as Rochester took a little over four hours and as their carriage pulled into the inn and was surrounded by a swarm of vendors, ostlers and pot-boys, the mail coach was just departing. The driver and groom hurried the feeding and watering of the horses and chivvied the passengers back into, and on top of, the coach and they were on their way within twenty minutes. Out on the open road, they quickly urged the horses into a gallop and very soon all that could be heard inside the carriage was the clattering of the wheels and the clanking of the brass-and-steel harness. About an hour into the journey one of the passengers, a middle-aged woman, professed to feeling unwell and asked the driver to stop for a while, but her request was turned down. Rather the carriage continued along the newly macadamised road at a very brisk pace, and by the time they reached the town of Sittingbourne, the mail coach hadn’t yet left the inn’s yard. While the grooms attended to the horses, Pyke took the opportunity to loosen one of the fastenings on the harness. At one point he had to duck under the window that Conroy was looking out of but he didn’t think the comptroller had seen him. This time they had to change horses, and when they finally pulled out of the yard, they were still half an hour behind the mail coach. Milly sat by the window, still rapt at the sight and sound of open fields, and from time to time she would ask questions about things that he knew nothing about: why cows slept standing up, what made the rain, the difference between wheat and barley. It was odd, to hear her talk with such confidence, and Pyke wondered what might happen to her if they couldn’t find Kate, her sister.