Chapter 39

Friday, 17 October, 1707

With my friend Lieutenant Turnbull back, a change had come to Caldow’s Land. More than a week had passed since he’d come home. Our lives had settled into a predictable and regimented order, and although it would have killed my soul to live confined by rules forever, I’ll admit I found it soothing, in the short term, after what had come before.

Turnbull had been grateful for the service I had done by taking his part in the inquiry. “I’d not have had the patience for it,” he confessed, but he’d gained the reward. Not only had Lord Grange sent formal thanks, but yesterday had brought an invitation to attend a private dinner with Lord Grange and several friends, a prospect that had Helen so excited she could barely eat her breakfast.

“And of course it would be when I am too large to fit into my best gown,” she complained.

“You will look lovely in your blue one,” Turnbull told her.

“I do thank you for your confidence. Except my blue one always makes me look too pale, I think. A little like a corpse. Which does remind me”—Helen danced with lightness from one topic to another—“you recall that man they found dead at the Regent Murray’s tomb on Tuesday morning last past?”

Turnbull said he was not likely to forget. “You’ve talked about him daily since I have come home.”

Ignoring his remark, she said, “A friend of mine has overheard there was a warrant out for his arrest, and that he sought to take his life by his own hand as an escape from a more painful execution.”

“For what crime?” asked Turnbull.

“I believe he was a forger,” Helen said.

“Well then, your friend is wrong,” was Turnbull’s answer, “for I’ve never known the courts to hang a man for forgery.”

“Perhaps he had intended to escape his guilty conscience, then,” said Helen, “for they found a pistol near him, but the final judgment seems to be that he did lose his footing and fall back and strike his head against the monument.”

I drank my ale and offered nothing, mainly because Helen was not altogether wrong. That was essentially what happened, except Archie wasn’t trying to escape his execution or his conscience—when he’d tripped and fallen back and struck his head its fatal blow against the Regent Murray’s tomb, his frightened eyes had been on me.

And I was fine with that. I’d stood a moment in the moonlit silence, looking at the brass plaque on the tomb, and I’d decided Justice after all had played her part. The debt was paid.

Helen seemed to hesitate. “My friend does also tell me Dr. Young will soon be traveling to London with his daughter, Violet, there to spend the winter.” With a glance at me, she added, “I am sorry, Adam.”

I assured her it was of no matter. “I would do the same, if I were Violet’s father. He will find a better match for her in London, I should think.”