[Flying Dutchman 01] - Castaways of the Flying Dutchman

for those who danced around.

The carrion crow doth perch above,

light bearers ’neath the ground.”

Mrs. Winn looked around. “Well, what do you make of that?”

The lawyer meticulously copied the words onto a piece of paper, before taking charge of the cross.

“I’d better get this locked away in my office safe with all dispatch. Will, could you run me down there in your gig, please?”

“You ’ave some lunch first, sir,” Eileen chimed in. “Then my Will can drop you all off.”

Over hot meat and potato pie, Mr. Braithwaite made out another copy of the words for his own use. “Hmm, very good, very good. Must, er, get back to the, er, library, of course. I’ll, ah, er, study this and let you know my findings, yes, very good!”

Amy made more copies in her fine, neat hand and distributed them to everybody, keeping one for herself and her brother. After lunch it was decided that they would spend the rest of the day each trying to solve the riddle. They had the time.

Will delivered Mrs. Winn to her house first. Ben stayed in the gig, alighting in the village square with the others. Mr. Mackay read the notice tacked to the board on the post not far from his office. He turned to them, his face grave. “Two days from today the clearances start. That means Smithers and his partners will be here with the county official and the bailiffs. Payments will be made to the evacuating tenants, the land will be cleared, and, unfortunately, Chapelvale will cease to exist as a village community and become a limestone quarry and a cement factory. Those are the facts, my friends.”

Ben’s blue eyes grew hard. “Not if we can help it!”

33

SMITHERS TAPPED LIGHTLY ON MAUD Bowe’s bedroom door, and he called out as gently as his gruff, demanding voice would allow. “Are you in there, Miss Bowe, I’d like a word with you in the sitting room, if possible.”

Maud opened the door a crack and was confronted by Smithers’s rather worried-looking face. “I think you owe me an apology first, for the way you insulted me this morning, Mr. Smithers.”

It galled him to do it, but there was no other way. “Well, er, I was a bit, hasty shall we say. Forgive me, I’m a gruff fellow sometimes. Comes of doin’ business among men all the time. I shouldn’t have raised my voice to you, young lady. I mean, Miss Bowe.”

She stared at him, enjoying her moment of triumph, then shut the door in his face. “I’ll be down presently.”

Obadiah Smithers drew in a deep breath, clenched his fists, and strode purposefully along the corridor to his son’s room. Flinging the door wide, he marched in without a word and dragged the coverlet off Wilf, who lay huddled, still covered in breakfast mess. Smithers curled his lip in disgust as his son sniffed and sobbed.

“It wasn’t me, he went in there on his own, I had nothing to do with it, honestly, I never!”

His father towered over him, ignoring his pleas.

“Enough, sir, no more lies! I saw Regina’s father in the village this morning. He caught her sneaking in, long after midnight. So you can stop your sniveling lies. I know exactly what went on around the old almshouse last night!”

Wilf cowered on the bed, his face ashen. “Regina’s the liar, it was her who got Alex murdered, not me. I swear!”

His father’s voice was like thunder. “What nonsense is this, eh? Murder indeed, I saw the very boy you’re talking of, the animal vet’s young son. He was alive and well, sitting in a dairy cart with his friends. So you can stop your lying about murder!”

Wilf was temporarily lost for words. He sat openmouthed as reality flooded in on him. Alex was alive, there would be no policemen calling on him. No judges, court, or prison.

His father ranted on furiously. “A disappointment to me, that’s what you’ve been, lad, a thorough disappointment! Letting y’self get beaten by a boy half your size, then thinking up stupid murder plots. Still, I blame m’self in ways—you’re not half the young fellow I was at your age, no backbone! Mollycoddled, that’s what you’ve been, spoiled rotten! But all that stops right here and now, sir, d’you hear me? No more being waited on by a maid an’ hiding behind y’mother’s skirts. Oh no, m’lad, it’s boarding school for you. They’ll straighten you out, an’ no mistake!”

Wilf had only heard the latter part of his father’s tirade. He leapt out of bed, a look of horror on his face. “B-boarding school?”

His father took him by the arm and shoved him in the direction of the bathroom. “Aye, boarding school. There’s a good one up in Scotland, so I’m told. I’ll make the arrangements today. Now, get in there an’ clean that mess off y’self. Then you can tidy your room up an’ pack your trunk. I’m not havin’ the good name o’ Smithers scoffed at by village bumpkins. No use appealin’ to your mother. My decision’s final, sir. Final!”