Sea Mistress (30 page)

It was late afternoon by the time Bridie reached her cousin's house. The building was modest, made of warm stone it was situated on top of the hill, looking out over the small village spread along the line of the canal.

Collins knocked on the door and a young maid opened it almost as though she had been expecting them. Behind her, in the cheerfully lit hall, was Jono, a smile spreading across his face as he saw her.

‘Bridie, my little love, you're looking better than when I saw you last in Swansea, bit more colour in your cheeks. You're not so thin, either. Come into the warm, I've got a lovely fire burning in the grate.' He looked at her bag. ‘You come to stay then?'

‘If you'll have me, Jono.' She held her breath as between them, Jono and Collins lifted her chair over the few steps leading into the main body of the house.

‘My house is your house
cariad
, you know that.' Jono looked down from his great height and, tall though Collins was, Jono towered over him.

‘This is Simon Collins,' Bridie explained, ‘he's a very dear friend.'

‘In that case, Collins, you are very welcome, too.' Jono pumped his hand and Bridie hid a smile knowing that Collins was more than a little embarrassed at being accepted as an equal.

‘I have no money, Jono,' Bridie said when she was settled before the blazing fire. ‘It's a long story, I'll tell you all about it later but right now I could do with a wash and a long rest.'

‘Both those things are easy enough to provide,' Jono said in his slow voice. ‘As for money, I've got enough for both of us.' He left the room for a moment and he could be heard issuing orders to the maid to prepare two of the spare rooms and then to fetch some hot water.

Bridie looked at Collins who was standing uneasily near the door as if wondering what to do next. She smiled, ‘Sit down, for goodness sake, there's no use trying to stand on ceremony with Jono, he just won't have it.'

Her cousin returned to the room. ‘You know I've done very well these last few years,' he said easily. ‘There's more than enough to go around so you must stay with me just so long as it suits you, right?'

Bridie nodded, ‘Right.' Jono had never been short of money but since he had invested in Arian Smale's newspaper business, he had become quite wealthy. Whatever he had, he had earned it. Jono put his back into the work he did for Arian Smale. Before the publication of
The Swansea Times
he had rescued the printing machines from the cellar where they had been rusting for years. He had renovated them, treated them lovingly until they were functioning effortlessly again. He had put funds into the enterprise too and Arian Smale had been generous in repaying her debt of gratitude to him.

Bridie settled back in her chair, waiting with a patience newly learned for her room to be prepared. Jono was seated on her right, his long legs stretched out before the fire. Opposite, on the other side of the fire sat Collins. There was silence but it was an easy, comfortable silence and Bridie felt more at peace than she had done for a very long time.

Collins was covertly watching her and she was well aware of his scrutiny. He was so necessary to her she mused, and she would never have known the real man at all if it had not been for the events that had changed her life. Who would have thought that in so short a time she would have been cheated out of her dignity as a wife and out of her fortune? She was, in one stroke of the pen, worse off than any of her servants. And yet she was content, she was warm, she was welcomed and she was, she realized, almost happy.

Matthew felt inordinately pleased with himself. He'd been very clever fooling Bridie Marchant who had thought to buy him off with a paltry few pounds. Everyone in Swansea knew how rich Bridie Marchant was, or had been before her husband had outsmarted her, taken all her money. Paul Marchant was a man after Matthew's own heart. Not that he would have hesitated to expose him as a crook if it had been in his best interests but the more he spied, something he found he was very good at, the more he had learned about the man and his nefarious dealings. It had been a good day for him when he'd discovered the opium in the hold, safely secreted inside the leather tack.

At first he had intended to go to Bridie Marchant with his findings, figuring out that when she claimed back her empire he would be richly rewarded. But that would have taken a great deal of time so he had decided it was better to work out the true lie of the land and how wise he'd been.

It was when he was deliberately eavesdropping on Paul Marchant's conversation with his lady friend that the truth had become clear. Marchant had been bedding the girl, something Matthew would have liked to have done himself, she was a real Irish beauty. Marchant had been boasting to her of his cleverness. He told her he'd managed to get a hold of all his wife's assets, she was in his power, she would be obliged to do just as she was told. He'd made plans to take his little whore home with him on his next trip and when she had protested that her parents wouldn't willingly let her go, he'd promised he'd see them all right. It was then that Matthew had decided which side he would take.

At first Marchant had tried to bluff him. He had blustered, bluffed and argued until, at last, Matthew had produced his ace, had shown him the small packet of opium he'd taken from inside one of the leather horse-collars.

‘I can be of use to you, Mr Marchant,' Matthew had urged, ‘a man like me can do a great many useful things.'

‘Prove it,' Marchant had taken up the challenge, ‘get rid of someone who has become a nuisance and you've got a job for life.'

Charlesworth was the master of the
Marie Clare
but it seemed he also had too much knowledge of the deals in which his boss was involved.

‘He's become a threat,' Marchant said bleakly, ‘I want to be rid of him.'

It was easy to arrange an unexpected ride for Charlesworth in a boat heading for Hong Kong; the man had never known what hit him, one moment he was returning to Ma Murphy's ale house, the next he was on board a foreign ship. It was doubtful if the man would survive the trip, he was travelling as part of the crew and the ship's master was one who believed in blows rather than reason. No, Charlesworth was well out of the picture. And Marchant had been suitably gratified.

Now Matthew was on his way towards Glyn Hir Tannery, he would be seeing Ellie again and this time, he would have the whip hand. He would be clever enough to make money out of her as well as out of Paul Marchant.

The yard was just the same, the stink of the leather, the noise of the grinder were all familiar to him and for a moment, a wave of something like nostalgia swept over Matthew. He had enjoyed his life here, making up to Ellie while at the same time having a fine old time with Rosie. He saw the same men in the yard, Luke and Harry looked up and nodded as he passed but there was no welcome in their faces. Well to hell with them, he needed no-one. Boyo looked out of the grinding house, he was taller, bigger built now but Matthew could still beat the living daylights out of him if he chose to.

Ellie was not pleased to see him. She stared at him blankly for a moment and her small figure barred his entrance into the house.

‘I must talk to you, in private,' he said bluntly, ‘it's in your own best interests Ellie, I'm warning you, you're in deep trouble and I've come to help you out.'

‘I don't know what you can possibly mean,' Ellie was adamant. ‘Please go away, Matthew, I don't want you here.'

Matthew glanced around him and spoke in a low voice. ‘Do you know you have been aiding and abetting Paul Marchant to smuggle opium out of the country and into Ireland?'

‘Rubbish!' Ellie stepped back as though his words were a physical blow. ‘If this is the truth why haven't you gone to the constabulary with this tale?'

‘Because I wanted to protect your good name, Ellie,' Matthew said smoothly.

‘I'm not such a fool as to believe that.' Ellie looked at him for a long moment. ‘You'd better come in and tell me the whole story.' She reluctantly held the door wider and let him into the hall, ‘Now either come to the point, tell me why you are really here or get out and leave me in peace.'

‘The leather you sold Marchant, it was for tack, collars, saddles that sort of thing.'

‘Yes?' Ellie stared at him, ‘Our waggons delivered the skins to the saddler's and then to Marchant's ships, so what?' Her head was high, her expression one of distaste and Matthew felt anger begin to burn inside him. He didn't fancy her, she was far too prissy for that but he'd love to bed her just to teach her who was boss.

‘So, your leather was paid for very generously, wouldn't you say?'

‘I sold it for the going rate.' Ellie was frowning, ‘I don't see how you can accuse me of anything illegal. Get to the point, Matthew for heaven's sake.'

‘You recommended the saddler, didn't you?' Matthew said with maddening slowness.

‘Yes, I did and he's a good man.'

‘Oh, he's a good man, all right,' Matthew laughed shortly. ‘The saddler was the one who placed the opium inside the tack, that way there was no duty to pay on it, you see?' He looked at her shrewdly. ‘Of course you will say you don't know anything about it, you'll put the blame on the saddler. He will say different, I've already spoken to him.' Matthew paused to let his words take effect.

‘Even if folk think
you
are innocent, they will not believe Jubilee didn't know anything about it, this little scheme has been going on since before his death.'

In that moment, Ellie felt fury run through her like a torrent, she had never hated anyone in her life, but for Matthew Hewson she could make an exception. He would stop at nothing, he would stoop so low as to besmirch the good name of a man no longer able to speak up for himself.

‘Now,' Matthew said, ‘if you look at your books properly you will see that your payment for the leather was way above the going rate, why was that? Questions will be asked such as why buy from you when Marchant could buy good leather at any number of places much more cheaply.'

Ellie shook her head, trying to think clearly but her mind was clouded with anger and she couldn't marshall her thoughts into any sort of order.

Matthew spoke again, softly, insistently, ‘People will think you were a willing accomplice. You see, Ellie, things are beginning to look bad for you.'

Ellie forced herself to be calm. ‘We can settle this now, I'm sure you are wrong about the payment made to us by Paul Marchant.' Ellie led the way through the house to where the books were kept. ‘Caradoc Jones, my accountant, he's not mentioned anything about all this extra money you say I've had.'

She thumbed through the books, and stopped when she came to the relevant sheets. She was not very good at figures but even she could see that the income from the leather sold to Paul Marchant was, as Matthew had claimed unusually high. ‘I must talk to Caradoc,' she said almost to herself, ‘ask him what this is all about.'

‘I've told you what it's about,' Matthew was growing impatient, ‘it's about you being an accomplice to smuggling, that's what it's about.' He paused. ‘And what would that fancy boyfriend of yours think about it and him going into the church? Wouldn't look good for him, would it, consorting with criminals.'

Ellie put down the books. ‘What's all this to you, anyway? What do you want, what do you really want, Matthew?'

Matthew felt himself relax. ‘I want what I was promised by your husband, by Jubilee, but now my demands won't be so modest.' He looked at her with narrowed eyes, ‘And as for talking to Caradoc or anyone else, if I were you, I'd keep my mouth shut, people don't understand this sort of thing, they have scruples, they do silly things like going to the police.'

Ellie felt trapped. ‘I want proof that what you say is the truth,' she said desperately, ‘I can't believe the Marchants would be mixed up in this sort of thing. Give me dates and times of sailing, I want to know who Paul Marchant's contact is in Ireland and I want to see the leather in which you say this opium was smuggled.'

‘You don't want much, do you?' Matthew asked with sarcasm. ‘What makes you think I'd give you all that information?'

‘I might just sign over to you half my inheritance from Jubilee if I think it's worth it.' She looked directly at Matthew, estimating the power of his greed. ‘We could do it almost at once but I want proof of what you have told me before I take any action, wouldn't you do the same in my place?'

‘How can I trust you?' Matthew said hesitantly.

Ellie shook back a curl of hair from her brow. ‘You'll just have to, won't you, what choice have you got? If there's proof of what you've told me, I'll have to pay up, if not, you are wasting my time and yours.'

Matthew took a small packet out of his pocket. ‘Here is some of the opium,' he said showing it to her.

She shook her head. ‘Opium it may be but how do I know where you got it from? Oh no, Matthew, you are going to have to do better than that, it's only reasonable I'd want convincing, didn't you think of that?'

‘Of course I did,' he said quickly but of course he hadn't. He'd imagined that Ellie would crack at once, would pay him anything not to have the good name of her dead husband besmirched. She had grown tougher since he'd last seen her, more resilient.

He moved closer and touched her hair lightly. She looked up at him. ‘I might give you money,' she said, ‘I just might but don't think you'll get anything else from me, I'd kill you first.'

He stepped away from her, he wasn't used to being spurned and Ellie had done it once too often. ‘I don't want you, don't flatter yourself,' he said sulkily.