Richard and Judy Bookclub - 3 Bestsellers in 1: The American Boy, The Savage Garden, The Righteous Men
this house, in the old one that was here before. His grandpapa laid out the park. You can see his name on the obelisk.”
“We lived here? Monkshill was ours?”
Mrs Frant coloured. “It was never ours, my love. Your grandpapa sold the property to Mr Cranmere many years ago.”
Charlie leaned on the back of her chair and had the wit to change the subject. “Come out with us, Mama. You can show us where the treasure might have been found.”
“There was no treasure,” she said.
“But there was money,” Miss Carswall said. “Silver coins. Is not that treasure?”
Mrs Frant laughed, and so did we all. “I suppose it is.”
“Well then,” Charlie said. “There may be more. We won’t find it if we don’t look.”
Mrs Frant glanced out of the window, at the silver expanse of the park lying beneath the hard blue dome of the sky. “I believe it would do me good to take the air. Will you join us, Flora?”
Miss Carswall said she would prefer to sit by the fire. I tried to catch her eye but she had returned to her figures.
A quarter of an hour later, the boys were running along the path while Mrs Frant and I followed at a more sedate pace. We walked quickly, however, because of the cold. The air brought spots of colour into Mrs Frant’s usually pale cheeks. We inspected the obelisk, found the inscription that recorded the virtues of Charlie’s great-grandfather, and took a path leading eastward into a shallow valley. The boys scampered ahead, and were soon out of earshot. By this time, any embarrassment caused by the mention of Mr Frant had been entirely dissipated.
“I hope you do not find us too dull,” Mrs Frant said. “You must be used to a deal of noise and bustle, I daresay. Charlie tells me that you lived in London before you entered Mr Bransby’s school, and that before that you were a soldier.”
“All the more reason why I should relish the calm of the countryside.”
“Perhaps.” She darted a glance at me. “My father served in the army too. Colonel Francis Marpool – I do not suppose you knew him?”
“No. I enlisted in the army only in 1815. As a private soldier.”
“You fought at Waterloo?”
“I was wounded there, ma’am.”
She gave me a look of admiration that filled me with shame.
I said, “I did not fire a single shot, however. I was wounded at an early stage of the battle, and then had a horse fall beside me, which prevented me from moving. I was a most inglorious soldier.”
“I honour your frankness, Mr Shield,” she said. “Had I been a man, and on the field of battle, I’m sure I should have been terrified.”
“To be blunt, I was terrified.”
She laughed as though I had said something wonderfully witty. “That merely confirms me in my opinion that you are a man of sense. You did not run away: that is glory enough, surely?”
“I could not run away. A dead horse on top of oneself is a powerful argument against motion of any sort.”
“Then we must be thankful that Providence afforded you its protection. Even in the form of a dead horse.” She pointed to the crest of a low hill we were ascending. “When we reach the top, we shall see the ruins below.”
The boys appeared on the skyline as they reached the brow of the declivity. Whooping like a pair of savages, they ran down the far side.
Mrs Frant and I reached the summit. The ground sloped down to a little valley, on the floor of which were the remains of several stone walls. Some way beyond these scanty signs of habitation was a line of palings, which marked part of the demesne’s northern boundary. The grey roofs of a substantial cottage were visible on the other side of the fencing.
“Oh!” exclaimed Mrs Frant, pressing her hand into her side. “They might kill themselves!”
She ran down the hill. The boys were swarming like monkeys up the tallest of the few remaining walls of the ruin, which at its highest point was no more than eight feet above the ground.
“Charlie!” she cried. “Be careful!”
Charlie ignored her. Edgar, less accustomed to Mrs Frant’s nervous disposition, paused in his climb and looked over his shoulder.
Her foot caught on a tuft of grass and she stumbled.
“Mrs Frant!” I cried.
She regained her balance, and ran on.
From the ruins came the sound of a shout. I tore my eyes away from her. Charlie was sitting astride the wall at its topmost point, bellowing with the full strength of his lungs. His words were inaudible, but his agitation was unmistakable. An instant later, I saw Edgar, a crumpled figure on the ground below.
I thundered like a cavalry charge down the slope to the ruins, passing Mrs Frant on the way. In a moment I was bending over Edgar. His eyes were closed, and he was breathing heavily. A procession of potential calamities flocked through my mind, ranging from the loss of my position to the boy’s death.
Charlie landed beside me with a thud. “Is he breathing, sir? Will he live?”
“Of course he will live,” I snapped, fear bringing anger in its train.
I took Edgar’s wrist. “There is a pulse. A strong one.”
“Thank God,” murmured Mrs Frant, so close to me that I felt her breath brush my cheek.
Edgar opened his eyes and stared up at our faces poised above him. “What – what –?”
“You fell,” I said. “You’re quite safe.”
He struggled up to a sitting position, but at once gave a cry and fell back.
“What is it?” said Mrs Frant. “Where does it hurt?”
“My ankle, ma’am.”
I probed the injured limb with my fingers, and moved it gently this way and that. “I cannot feel a break. You may have twisted it as you fell, or sprained it.”
I stood up and helped Mrs Frant to her feet. She drew me a yard or two away from the boys.
“Are you sure the ankle is not broken, Mr Shield?”
“I believe not, though I cannot be certain. But I learned something of these matters while helping my father with his patients; he acted the surgeon as well as the apothecary upon occasion. Besides, if the ankle were broken, I think the boy would feel more pain.”
“So foolish of me. If I had not called out, he –”
“You must not think that. He might have fallen in any case.”
“Thank you.” Her fingers squeezed my arm and then released it. “We must get him back to the house.”
“He should be carried.” I calculated the distance in my mind, and knew I could not comfortably bear Edgar’s weight for the whole of it. “It would be better to fetch help. He should not trust his weight to the ankle until the extent of the injury has been determined. Besides, he would be more comfortable on a hurdle.”
“Look,” Charlie said. “Someone’s coming.”
I followed his pointing finger. Beyond the ruins, near the palings, was a woman, her dark cloak flapping about her as she strode towards us. Mrs Frant turned her head to look. She expelled her breath in a sound expressing either pain or perhaps irritation.
“I believe it is Mrs Johnson,” she said in a quiet, toneless voice.
We watched in silence as she drew closer. Mrs Johnson was undeniably a fine-looking woman but there was something hawk-like in her countenance that made