Currents Page 11

  Harry’s father interjected. “Why wouldn’t she have said something then, right away when it happened?” Raw fury caused his voice to crack.

  “Claims she was terrified, her husband away and all. She insists that I arrest Harry immediately and have him locked up in Parkhurst Prison where he’ll be no threat to her or her stepdaughters.”

  “Oh, my Lord.” Harry’s mother fell weeping against her husband. “Parkhurst Prison?”

  “She even brought up the Queen.” Alfie went on, sweating profusely now. “‘What would our Queen do if she thought you were allowing a thief to roam around the island simply because he is your nephew?’ she asked me.”

  “Where is the evidence beyond her word? Where is the silver and painting now?” Harry’s father angrily demanded, slamming his hand on the table. “This is lunacy! You’ve only this woman’s word, Alfie! Harry would never do such a thing.”

  “I’ve seen the items in a box in our house. And I would know if he had ever been in the attic,” Bess argued. “He has never even been above the ground floor. Surely you believe us.”

  “I have no choice,” Alfie said with a heavy heart. “She is the Duchess of Kent. Harry’s word means very little next to hers. Have you seen Harry with anything at all that looks like it might have come from Attwood?”

  “Are you out of your mind? Of course not!” Harry’s mother said, beginning to sob louder. “I tell you this is not true. It can’t be!”

  “This is just outrageous. The duchess is lying—I swear to it!” Harry pleaded, his whole body trembling with anger and indignation.

  “I’m telling you, too, Harry didn’t do this!” Bess cried in frustration.

  But the duchess had signed a complaint that said she’d seen him with her very eyes. And everyone knew that Alfie couldn’t afford to lose his job. So despite the boy’s angry protests, Bess’s support, and his parents’ pleas, Alfie Fletcher reluctantly deposited his frightened nephew in the infamous Parkhurst Prison.

  Chapter Thirty-One

  “How could you?” Bess burst into Attwood’s drawing room a while later. Fueled by anger, she had run all the way from the Fletchers’ cottage. She found Elsie completely concentrated on painting some flowers.

  “I didn’t hear you knock,” Elsie said, not looking up. She was admiring the colors of the leaf and petals on her painting.

  “Harry Fletcher stole nothing!” Bess raged. “I demand that you have him released from Parkhurst!”

  This made Elsie giggle. “You demand? You are so amusing, dear! Oh, but I think not. Young Harry will be sent to the penal colony in Australia where he belongs.”

  “I shall tell everything I know. It’s you who has been looting the family treasures. Not Harry. You can’t get away with this! It’s been you all along.”

  “Oh, my goodness, who would ever believe such a thing?” Elsie put a dab of sap green on one of the leaves.

  “Gertrude, for one,” Bess said. “She knew there were boxes there every week. Gertrude will vouch for it.”

  “Oh, dear. Didn’t I tell you? Gertrude is gone. I let her go just after I came back from the Constable’s office. All those creamy chowders and such—too rich for my figure. I had Eldridge take her in the carriage headed to the docks. Booked her ticket on a boat to Portsmouth and sent her off with a letter of recommendation. I’m hiring a lady from town who used to cook for the Cat and Mouse Tavern. She has excellent references. But Gertrude. Oh, my. Well, Gertrude is long gone. Her boat is probably halfway to Portsmouth at this very moment.”

  For the first time she looked up from her painting at Bess. In a steely voice she said, “You do see that it will be your word and the word of a lowly stonemason’s son against mine. Not very good odds for you, I’m afraid. I won’t quarrel with you any longer. Please close the door behind you.”

  Bess’s hands were in tight fists, trembling at her sides. She wanted to grab Elsie’s silly little painting and smash it on the floor. But she also knew that raging and pleading would not free Harry Fletcher. In all the adventure books she had ever read, the only way to succeed against evil was to be at least as calm and calculating as the villain you faced.

  Bess willed herself to take a deep breath, took full measure of the enemy in front of her, and closed the door behind her.

  When Chap’s boat pulled up to the dock the next morning, Bess was waiting for him, pacing.

  “And it’s not even Thursday! To what do I owe this pleasure?” He hopped off the boat and began tying the ropes to the dock.

  “It’s Harry Fletcher,” Bess blurted out.

  She could barely tell the story straight, standing there in the cold shadow of Parkhurst Prison, knowing Harry was locked up inside its bleak walls. She willed herself not to fall down in a heap and cry.

  “Ah, Bess.” Chap whistled and shook his head slowly when she’d finished explaining. “A duchess against a poor stonemason’s son. I’m sorry to tell you this, but he doesn’t stand a chance. He’s not the first innocent boy to be put in Parkhurst, and he won’t be the last one.”

  “What will they do with him?” Bess cried.

  “Unfortunately, they will probably put him on the boat like the rest of the lads. First Monday of every month, the ship pulls in, loads up the prisoners and takes them off either to stand trial in London or to the penal colonies on Australia or New Zealand.”

  It was too much, and she found herself sobbing on his shoulder.

  “I must get him out,” she said as she wept.

  “Now be serious, girl. How are you going to do such a thing? Even if you could, they’d find him. Every so often some lad takes off, but they always find him within a day or two. Where can he go? Unless he can steal a boat, he’s stuck on the island and surely someone would notice if he tried to leave. What a shame,” he said, shaking his head. “No place for the poor boy. No place for any human being.

  “Have they let you visit him yet?” he asked.

  “No. I’m allowed to see him for ten minutes later this morning—at 11:30,” Bess said.

  She took his rough hand in hers and pleaded to him. “You could get him out. You have a key to the back door. Oh, Chap. You could put him on your boat and sail him over to the mainland. You had to leave those men chained to that wagon all those years ago. You had no choice then, but you have a choice this time. You don’t have to leave Harry.”

  She searched his eyes and saw she’d struck a chord. But he didn’t say so.

  “Ha! I come marching out the back of Parkhurst Prison with a prisoner and just stroll on down to my boat?” he reasoned. “There are too many people around the docks at all times of the day and night. They’d see me with him. Bess, you aren’t thinking straight.”

  “Yes, yes, of course.” She sat down. She needed to have her wits about her. She needed to quiet her heart and let her head take over. “But I need your help. Please.”

  She pulled a knotted handkerchief from her skirt pocket, opened it, and held up a double strand of pearls with a gold clasp.

  He practically jumped back away from her. “Aye! You’re not going to ask me to get in trouble for stealing from the duke, too!”

  “They’re not my father’s. They’re mine. I keep them in my jewelry box, and I can do with them what I wish. I wish to give them to you in exchange for your help. Chap, they will not buy you a palace, but they should fetch enough on Bond Street to pay to repair your boat. And perhaps enough will be left over to let you sail off somewhere else. To one of the places you always talk about going if you weren’t stuck here.”

  “I don’t want your pearls, Bess.” Chap shook his head, his one blue eye staring straight at her.

  “I have other strands of pearls, Chap. I’ve only worn these once. No one will ever notice. And when I’m eighteen I’ll receive several more. I don’t need these. But I do gravely need your help.”

  He dragged his fingers through his silver hair and visibly shuddered at the thought of prison. “Every day I take the buckets of fish
up there, I feel my stomach clench. To lose your freedom—it’s not the kind of thing that ever leaves you,” he said.

  By the time she paid a visit to Harry in Parkhurst later that morning, their plan was well laid.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Bess’s heart was already pounding as she slipped out the back gate of Attwood two nights after her visit to Chap. Her hair was pulled back tight, and she wore a scarf so that in the event someone saw her, she would be harder to identify.

  She had never been out by herself at this hour, let alone traveled down the dark, deserted lanes. Chap said it was important they do it when there was no moon, since they would be harder to spot. But they needed to act soon, while Harry was still being kept in the quarantine section of the prison. Once he was moved into the regular population, he would be securely locked up in one of the cells.

  Bess was prepared to duck into the woods if she met someone, but the island was asleep at this hour, and she was alone the entire way. Creeping along the edge of the cliffs behind Parkhurst Prison, she saw Chap’s boat steering away from the dock. She didn’t have much time.

  Fumbling in her pocket, Bess pulled out the key Chap used when he delivered fish to the prison and slipped it into the lock, turning it slowly. It seemed to her like the clink it made when the bolt flipped open could be heard from the docks. She stood silently for a moment, waiting to hear if someone was coming. Nothing. She edged the door open just enough to slip in, stole silently down the hall into the kitchen, and rapped once on the door to the boys’ quarantine room.

  The door opened partway, and Harry’s face immediately rose up in front of her. She almost screamed, but he reached out and put his hand on her mouth and slid through the opening and into the kitchen.

  “I was so afraid you wouldn’t come,” he whispered, his hands shaking.

  She didn’t answer. They both turned and moved quickly down the dismal, dank passageway and out the door.

  “Wait,” she said. She locked the door behind them with the key. “Now let’s go.”

  They traveled in the opposite direction of the docks so they wouldn’t be spotted. Stealing along the beaches wherever they could, they bent down low next to the bushes. But when the cliffs were too steep, they were forced to move along the paths that occasionally passed by a cottage. They were relieved that there were no lights on in any of them.

  Finally reaching the path that led down to Singing Beach, they almost collapsed with relief when they saw Chap’s boat bobbing just off the shore. They half ran, half slid down the rocky embankment to the beach.

  Chap was motioning to them to hurry and frantically waving a lantern. If another boat passed by Singing Beach, they would be sure to remember that they saw Chap Harris’s boat anchored off shore. Swept by crosscurrents, this was not a spot where any of the locals fished. If the Land’s End were spotted, there would be questions.

  “What will you do when you get to London?” Bess asked.

  “I don’t know, but something better than what I’d be doing in prison, half a world away.” He hugged her awkwardly with one arm. “Thank you, my Bess.” “Here. Here is Chap’s key to the prison.” Bess pressed it in his hand. “Give it back to him. Oh, Harry,” she said. “I don’t have any money to give you to help you when you get there.”

  “I don’t want any money from you,” Harry protested.

  “Just wait. Please wait.” She ran over to the rock outcropping.

  “I can’t, Bess—I have to go.” He headed down toward the water. She reached inside the little cave and grasped the bottle with the cross and the slave’s note inside. Running after him, she pressed it into his hand.

  “Take this. I hid the cross here so Elsie couldn’t steal it. It’s real gold and pearls—you can sell it once you get to London for some money to tide you over.”

  “Now!” Chap’s rasp came over the black water. “Now, or I’m leavin’ without you!”

  “What about the note inside?” Harry asked, looking at the bottle.

  “Agnes May has been cooped up in that cave long enough. It’s high time she set off on another adventure. She’ll be fine company for you.”

  Chap had already started to pull up his anchor, and the water was slapping hard against the boat’s hull.

  “It’s now or never,” he called out. “Come on, lad!”

  Harry tucked the bottle inside his waistband and waded out to the boat, grabbing the edge and hanging perilously onto the side. For a moment it looked as though the boat had pulled away from him and Harry had been sucked under the inky water. Chap leaned over the side, plunged his hand in, and grabbed Harry’s arm. Bess let out a gasp as she watched him yank Harry aboard. She could see he was drenched by the time he was hoisted up on to the Land’s End, his clothes hanging off his lean frame. It occurred to her then that he had nothing else to wear.

  Chap guided the boat carefully out of the cove and into the open channel. She knew Harry would be watching minutes later as the tops of the island houses he’d known all his life vanished into the ghostly clouds.

  She stood on the beach, fingering the carved heart in her pocket and watching until the boat had disappeared.

  “Take care of yourself, Harry,” she said softly.

  Bess hoped that when the Land’s End was close enough that they could see the lights of Portsmouth flicker in the distance, Harry would be able to relax a little. Chap could sail the waters between the island and mainland with his eyes closed and his hands tied behind him. He would drop Harry off, go do his usual fishing and pull in to the dock at the Isle of Wight with his catch just like he did every day. She had no idea what would become of a young boy brought up in the country trying to make it alone in the city. But it was out of her hands now. She hurried to get home before she was missed.

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  The next morning the talk on the island was about Harry Fletcher’s escape from Parkhurst Prison during the night. The small police force, led by Constable Fletcher, searched the entire island and then searched it again. They combed the forests and inquired of the ferry routes to the mainland.

  “Do you even know how he escaped?” Elsie demanded of the embarrassed constable when he came to report the incident to her personally. Bess stood quietly behind her stepmother.

  “We do not, Your Grace. Perhaps he hid in a supply-delivery cart. We’re checking with the suppliers now. But I knew you would want to know directly. I truly don’t believe you have anything to fear from Harry.”

  “I know, I know, Harry is a good boy,” she mocked. “Save for the fact that he’s robbed us blind and is now on the loose, a desperate prison escapee, no less!”

  “We’ll find him, ma’am. We always find them,” the constable halfheartedly assured her. “No place to go on the island. He’ll get hungry sooner or later.”

  He turned to Bess. “Would you have heard anything from him? I mean, you two being friends and all? Did he say anything when you visited yesterday?”

  “No. I have no idea, constable,” Bess replied flatly. “Blame an innocent boy for something he hasn’t done and put him in prison. There’s no telling what he’ll do.”

  “Oh, for heaven’s sake.” Elsie threw her hands up and rolled her eyes. “Do you see what I have to endure?” she asked Alfie. “Anything, anything at all to defend this thief.”

  A sad look passed between Alfie and Bess before Bess turned away and walked toward her bedroom.

  “I give my word that we’ll find him shortly, Your Grace,” Alfie said. “And we’ll let you know as soon as we do. Put your mind at rest.”

  Bess heard Elsie sigh heavily as she abruptly closed the door.

  From her bedroom window, Bess watched poor old Constable Fletcher hop on his bicycle, his face as red as a plum as he pedaled off down the drive to search for Harry.

  Two days later, Bess frantically scanned the front page of the Island County Press newspaper, which confirmed what islanders had been speculating:

  Between the
black moonless night and the heavy fog, Chap Harris may never have seen the steamship Annabelle before it was full upon him, ramming his small boat and slicing it clean in two.

  The captain of the Annabelle threw life preservers overboard in the hopes that some poor soul might be able to use one. But he told investigators that he doubted it. He reported the accident an hour later, when he pulled into port in Portsmouth.

  Rescue boats searched for hours, but all they found was debris from the smashed boat and one empty life preserver drifting nearby.

  When there was no word of Chap turning up anywhere, he was first presumed and then, two weeks later, declared dead.

  A small memorial service was held on the island. Bess overheard the few fisherman friends of Chap’s whispering among themselves about why a duke’s daughter was in attendance.

  Bess stopped going to the library for a while. She couldn’t bear to pass by the dock and see a strange boat in Chap’s old mooring. It was clear from island talk that Harry’s parents blamed everyone at Attwood Manor for what they publicly insisted were ruinous lies that cost them their only child. They never believed Harry was guilty. They also refused to accept that he had died trying to escape the island. They lit candles weekly in Whippingham Church for their son. But after two months of intensive searching, it was assumed that Harry had either made it off the island or died trying.

  No bodies ever turned up. Not Chap’s. Not Harry’s. After the first few weeks, Bess realized she might never know. But she prayed that maybe the stonemason’s son might be safe—perhaps he was somewhere where he could find his own true north.

  Three months after the sinking of the Land’s End, Bess and Sarah were eagerly counting down the weeks until the Duke of Kent would return from Africa. Bess had carefully planned out the conversation she would have with her father when he returned to Attwood. She felt certain that he would believe her. He would have the resources to locate the dealer on Bond Street and verify that it was Elsie, not Harry, who was stealing from Atwood. But there was little she could do without him here.