the new horse and return with nails.”
Then John spoke. “God bless and preserve us all.”
Not much later, Lucy heard the grim sound of boards being nailed across the front door. Pounding, pounding, pounding …
Lucy’s heart raced. She felt like they were being sealed in a tomb. John was the coffin maker, and they were the dead. The dead must be kept from the living.
* * *
Deep in the night, Lucy stole softly into the mistress’s chambers, to check on her as she slept. She and Cook had taken turns tending Annie, the mistress, and now Lawrence, who had just fallen ill. The master had not left his wife’s side, holding her hand, gazing at her dimly lit form. With her curling hair spread across her face and bodice, and the lines of complaint gone from her mouth, she looked beautiful. Del Gado’s portraits popped into Lucy’s mind, but she pushed the image away.
“Sir,” she whispered. “Perhaps you should try to get some sleep.”
Master Hargrave lifted his anguished face to Lucy’s. “Lucy, I have to stay with her. God knows I’ve been away from her for so much of our life together; I must be with her now.” More to himself he added, “I know she sometimes found enjoyment with others, but I never blamed her. If anything, I blamed myself for being away from her side so much. She’s the only woman I ever loved.”
As if hearing him, from deep within her deathly stupor, the mistress smiled ever so slightly, and a small sigh escaped her lips.
Lucy nodded and stoked the fire in the hearth a bit. As she replaced the warm potatoes at her mistress’s feet, the magistrate looked up, recalling her presence in the room.
“Oh, Lucy. Adam told me that William was declared innocent, was he not? You must be much relieved.”
She nodded. The events of the day, of the trial, were so far off. With the mistress being so ill, she barely had time to think about her brother.
“Your friend was the one who presided over his case,” Lucy said, smoothing the cover around the mistress’s still form.
The magistrate smiled slightly, looking old and tired. “Yes, Ernest, he’s a good man. I knew he’d give your brother a fair trial. Adam insisted that he be the one to hear the case, you know. I don’t really have much say over these matters, but we justices usually work out the demands of the docket, and change things around when necessary.”
Lucy gazed into the fire, tiredly holding a mug of cooling mead, trying to stay warm and awake.
“The evidence was very circumstantial, I know, but heavily against William’s favor. Something must have decided Ernest’s mind. Do you know?”
“’Twas amazing, sir. Richard, the bast—, excuse me, sir, the man who had accused William, lied about him and, in fact, ended up recanting at the last moment.”
A glow came to her voice as she spoke. “Adam, well, he ended up asking the questions for Will. Richard came to admit that he had tied Will up, so it was impossible that my brother could have done the foul mischief upon Bessie.”
Lucy did not mention the Quakers’ involvement in “working Richard over,” as John had put it. She thought Adam might not like it if she told his father about his friendship with the Quakers.
“So Adam got Richard tied up in knots instead.” The magistrate chuckled. Then he cleared his throat, his face growing serious. “For what it’s worth, Lucy, none of us ever believed that your brother had any part in that dastardly business. But the law must run its course. I’m just sorry that he had to spend so much time in that bloody prison.”
Both fell silent. Lucy drifted a bit, trying to recall the bliss of the afternoon, those moments when she, John, Adam, and Will had walked home, before this new terror had gripped their hearts. The joy of Will’s release seemed to have swept away her earlier animosity toward Adam, and indeed, he seemed to have thawed a bit toward her.
A movement from the bed caused the magistrate and Lucy to stir. The mistress was awake, gazing at the magistrate. “What is going on, dear?” she asked, her voice raspy. “What are you doing in here?”
The magistrate pulled his chair close to her side and held her hand. “My dear,” he said, raising her hand to his lips, “you are ill, very ill.”
The mistress’s lips trembled. “What do you mean?”
In short, measured words he told her, his voice