“I believe they are gone to London,” I said drily, remembering their fear of the Reverend and his vanished silk, “on rather pressing business. The result of having mislaid something of value to their current employer.”

“They've never gone and filched from Mr. Crawford?” James exclaimed, in surprise.

“Mr. Crawford?”

“Aye. They've been a-workin’ them fossil pits, and his bit of a smithy, most o’ the summer now.” The manservant scratched his head in wonderment. “Dick and Eb, run off with Mr. Crawford's property! There's something like. Now what they want with them bits o' stone, then?”

Chapter 22

…and Absolution

25 September 1804

MR. CRAWFORD, THE EMPLOYER OF DICK AND EBENEZER — Mr. Crawford, whose passion for fossils allowed him unquestioned observation of the Charmouth coast, and a presence for labourers on each and every day, and a cavernous excavation where he might easily have constructed a hidden room, for the purpose of secreting contraband — Mr. Crawford, whose demeanour and reputation assured him an unquestioned propriety, the better for conducting his nefarious business. Mr. Crawford, who never lacked for tea, or the best of brandies, and whose sister went about clothed in a dressmaker's dream of black silk; Mr. Crawford, whose fortune seemed so easy, despite his open hand to friends, and the liberality that too often placed others in his debt — a debt, perhaps, that might purchase goodwill and silence, did those friends think to question his activities.

Mr. Crawford, who clearly knew of Sidmouth's habit of marking his horses” shoes, and was quick to tell the entirety of his dinner guests the fact, only a day before Captain Fielding met his untimely end. Mr. Crawford, whose friendship with Sidmouth might make him privy to the man's concerns, and cognizant of the import of a white lily left by the dead man's feet; and whose sadness at discovering the very hoofprints that should betray his friend, must disarm the suspicions of ail — particularly Mr. Dobbin, the justice, who could not be expected to believe such a gentleman in any way involved in a crime of passion. Mr. Crawford, whose forge at the fossil site might readily have served to craft such a set of shoes, well before he undertook to murder the man whose relations with the Lyme Customs officer, Roy Cavendish, had quite disrupted his lucrative trade.

Mr. Crawford the Reverend, and Percival Fielding's murderer. It strained even my propensity for cynical calculation.

I sat down upon the lowest step in an attitude of shock, the lighted taper dropping from my nerveless fingers. James could not suppress an exclamation of anxiety, and fell to his knees by my side.

“Dear miss!” he cried. “Are you unwell? What can I have said?”

I reached a shaking hand to ward off his concern. “It is nothing, James — nothing — a mere trifling indisposition. I shall be myself in a moment.”

“A glass o’ water, mebbe?” He dashed into the scullery and rummaged about in a cupboard, reappearing instantly with a saucerless teacup filled to the brim. “You drink that down, now, miss, and you'll be right as rain.”

I brushed his hand aside and rose, my faculties all but routed. “I must be off at once,” I said. “I must speak with Mr. Dobbin!”

“At such an hour?” James's voice was doubtful, and I saw from his look that he thought my senses quite fled. “He'll be a-bed, surely, or close to it.”

“That is as nothing. The man must be stopped.”

“What man, Miss?”

I ascended the stairs as hastily as I knew how, in search of a bonnet and cloak, paying little heed to my father, who emerged from his bedroom in nightshirt and cap, his countenance overlaid with wonder.

“Are you intending to pay a call, my dear? And in the middle of the night?”

“It is not above ten o'clock,” I replied crossly, and turned from him in haste. “I do but go to Mr. Dobbin, and shall return directly.”

Comprehension dawned on my father's face. “But do you know the proper direction? Had not I better accompany you?”

At this, I paused — for indeed, I had not the slightest idea of where the justice of the peace was to be found. “I shall have James to accompany me,” I said, with an air of decision that brooked no reply. “He will know the way, and may serve as greater protection in case of need. Do not alarm yourself, Father, and endeavour to disguise the truth to my mother. Inform her I have been called to the side of a sick friend — Mrs. Barnewall, if need be — at the lady's request.”

“Are you certain, Jane, that such activity is required of your benevolence?”

“Justice demands it, Father. I shall not be long.” I gave him a swift kiss, and received his hand on my head in blessing, and turned from him in a swirl of my wool skirts.

It was as James and I stepped out upon the threshold of Wings cottage, and turned up Broad towards the center of Lyme, that the glow upon the horizon — so incongruous in so dark a sky — astounded our senses. We stood aghast, our purpose forgotten at the sight of the blaze, and smelled the sharp odour of wood and tar upon the wind.

“FIRE! FIRE!”

All was chaos, with the old wooden buildings at the center of town aflame. Fire licked at the stone pavements, and found no purchase, and so turned to leap greedily from thatched roof to thatched roof, in a crackle and volley of sparks that suggested a riotous celebration, as though the Devil himself had determined to hold a party. Several of the principal buildings along Silver Street were ablaze, and a long line of men were engaged in swinging buckets from the town's main cistern; but the water was as a drop to the throat of a dying man; it had no power to stem the course of events, except in that it allowed the onlookers to feel comfort in the activity of refusal.

“How did it start?” James cried hoarsely to a passing man.

“Dunno,” the fellow replied. “Does it matter?” and he handed my manservant a sack of burlap and a stout shovel. “Get you to the fireguard, there, and join in the diggin’. If the flames come near, beat at ‘em with the sack.”

James did not hesitate; in an instant he had disappeared into the thick cloud of smoke and townspeople collected near the blaze; and I was alone at the periphery of Hell.

I gazed in horror, remembering Sidmouth's words of but a few hours ago — unless it be that chaos reign and fire cover the earth — and that swiftly, I felt I knew how the blaze had begun, and the object of so much general diversion. Did the townsfolk exert their energies in an hour of true crisis, they should be little likely to guard the gaol. The Royalists had done as their leader predicted. Fire rained down from the heavens, and chaos reigned[76]; and in the midst of it all, I knew that Sidmouth was fled.

I turned away from the prospect of Silver Street, and ducked down a narrow alley towards the whitewashed stone keep. The fire was at just enough distance from the gaol, and threatened so valuable a number of shops, as to ensure complete distraction. A very few moments sufficed to bring me to Gordy Trimble's cubby; and to find it deserted, and the doorway beyond flung wide. I did not bother to look within; for I knew I should find the manacles burst, from the blow of an axe, and the prisoner gone into the dark.

I turned — in the grip, at the moment, of indecision; and nearly collided with a gentleman at my back.

“Miss Austen!” he cried, and despite the disorder of our surroundings, did not neglect to bow.

“Mr. Crawford!” I replied, in a tremulous tone — and wished, of a sudden, for James by my side. “The blaze has brought you out, I see!”

“How could it not? I observed the light of the flames from Darby's high position; and waited only long enough for Miss Crawford to put up some bread and cheese, before mounting my horse and hastening to town. You cannot know, I realise, that we are very much prey to such blazes, here along the coast; a similar fire not a year ago quite nearly levelled the lower part of town; and every man's aid must be necessary at such a time.”