Iain Pears - An Instance of the Fingerpost

“No, I do not; it is done and cannot be changed.”

“You must tell me what you know, however little it is. When did you last see him?”

She stared long at the fire that was fading in the grate and letting the cold wrap itself around our bodies; it was always an icy house, and even in the summer you needed a heavy coat if you went out of the main rooms. Now winter was coming in, the leaves falling and the winds beginning to blow, the chill was taking over the house once more.

It took some urging before she answered my questions about papers and letters and documents which might show what took place, for Wallis’s request was still in my mind and I wished to oblige him if I could. Several times she refused, changing the subject and trying to divert me into other matters, but each time I insisted. Eventually she gave way, realizing it would be easier than to resist. But her unwillingness was obvious and I never entirely forgave her for it. I told her that I had above all to know everything possible about what had happened around January of 1660, just before my father fled, and when the plot against him was reaching its climax. Where was he? What had he done or said? Had she even seen him in that period?

She said she had; indeed, it was the last time she had ever seen him. “I received a message through a trusted friend that your father needed me,” she began. “Then he came here unannounced and at night. He had no dealings with your uncle and spent only one night here, then left again.”

“How was he?”

“Very grave, and preoccupied, but in good spirits.”

“And he had a troop with him?”

She shook her head. “Just one man.”

“Which man?”

She waved my question aside. “He stayed the night as I say, but didn’t sleep; just fed himself and his comrade, then came to talk to me. He was very secretive, making sure that no one heard, and making me promise not to reveal a word to my brother. And before you ask, I have not done so.”

I knew at the bottom of my heart that I was on the verge of receiving a message of unparalleled importance, that my father had meant me to hear this, otherwise he would have sworn my mother to complete silence. “Go on,” I said.

“He talked to me very intently. He said he had discovered the worst treason imaginable, which had shocked him so greatly he had initially refused to believe the evidence of his own eyes. But now he was convinced, and he was going to act.”

I all but cried out in frustration at this. “What treason? What act? What discoveries?”

My mother shook her head. “He said it was too much to confide in a woman. You must understand that he never told me any secrets, or gave me any confidences at all. You should be surprised he said so much, not that he said so little.”

“And that was all?”

“He said he would uncover and destroy men of the greatest evil; it was dangerous, but he was confident of success. Then he pointed to the man who had been sitting in the corner all the while.”

“His name, madam? What was his name?” At least, I thought, I might have something. But again she shook her head. She did not know.

“He may have been called Ned; I do not know. I think I had met him before, before the war. Your father told me that, ultimately, only your own people were to be trusted, and that this man was such a person. If anything should not take place as planned, then this man would come and give me a packet, which contained everything he knew. I was to guard it well, and use it only when I was sure it was safe to do so.”

“And what else?”

“Nothing,” she said simply. “Shortly after they left, and I never saw him again. I received a message from Deal a few weeks later saying he was having to leave the country for a short while, but would be back. He never did come back, as you know.”

“And this man? This Ned?”

She shook her head.”He never came, and I never received any package.”

However disappointing it was that my mother had nothing to help Dr. Wallis, the information she gave me was an unexpected bonus. I had not expected her to have such knowledge, and had applied to her only as an afterthought. Sad though it is for a son to acknowledge, I found it increasingly hard to maintain my civility with her, so much was she being drawn back to her own family, which had only ever approved of my father while he possessed a good estate.

No; my purpose in going into Warwickshire was quite different, for I wanted to consult the papers concerning my Lincolnshire estate, so that I might know when I could expect to take possession. I knew that the matter had been complicated; my father had told me so on many occasions. By the time the fighting became serious and his confidence in the king began to slacken, he was aware that far more than his own life was at risk, and that the entire family might well be destroyed. Consequently, he drew up a settlement designed to protect it.

In brief, and following the latest practice in the country, he devised the real estate on a trust, for the use of himself and, on his death, of myself. A will drawn up at the same time made my uncle his executor and Sir William Compton my guardian, charged with the proper disposal of both the personal and real estate. It sounds complicated, but nowadays any man of property will understand it all perfectly well, it has become such an ordinary means of protecting a family from danger. Back then, however, such complexities were all but unheard of—there is nothing like civil strife to make men ingenious and lawyers rich.

I could not ask to see the papers, as they were in the keeping of my uncle and it was scarcely likely he would agree to the demand. Nor did I want to warn him of my interest, lest he take steps to destroy them, or alter anything in his own favor. I had no intention of allowing my uncle to cheat me, an activity which came as second nature to him.

So that night, when I was sure everyone was asleep, I made my search. My uncle’s study, where he conducted the estate business and held meetings with his agents, was unchanged from the days when he used to summon me to give me lectures about God-fearing good conduct, and I crept quietly in, remembering without even thinking about it that the door had a squeak that could easily rouse the entire household. Holding up my candle, I could make out the stout oak table where the accounts were laid every Michaelmas, and the iron-banded chests in which the vouchers and accounts were kept.

“Formidably difficult, are they not? Do not worry, when they are your responsibility you will understand them. Just remember the golden rules of property—never trust your managers, and never bear too hard on your tenants. You will lose in the end.” Thus I remember my father talking to me, I suppose when I was five, maybe less. I’d come into his own office at Harland House because the door was open, even though I knew it was forbidden. My father was alone with reams of paper all around, the sand shaker by his elbow, the wax heated for affixing the seals to the documents, the candle smoking in the wind. I half expected to be beaten, but instead he looked up and smiled at me, then gathered me onto his lap and showed me the papers. When he had more time, he would begin my education, he said, for a gentleman had much to learn if he was to prosper.

That day never came, and the thought made my eyes smart with tears as I remembered that room at my own home, the home I might have lost forever and which I had not even seen for more than a decade. Even so, the smell of it came back to me, strong and sure, a mixture of leather and oil, and I stood for some time in sadness before coming to and remembering my task, and the urgency of getting on with it.

My uncle used to keep the keys to the strongbox in the sword cupboard, and it was here that I immediately looked when I recovered myself. Fortunately, his habits had not changed and the big iron key was in the usual place. Opening the box took no time at all, and then I sat down at the big desk, positioned the candle, and began to go through the documents which I took out, one by one.