While Dora huddled in the boat wrapped in a blanket, Alex and Jacob made a thorough search of the woods on the margins of Windermere at this point. There was no blood trail, nothing to suggest the man had pulled himself to safety.
‘That man is such a fiend I won’t be convinced he’s dead until his body floats to the surface,’ said Jacob as they climbed over the tree roots to get back to the boat.
‘But drowning is a good result.’ Alex probed under a bush with a branch and found nothing. ‘If Dora was the one to land the killing blow, it saves her the notoriety if we put out the story he drowned trying to escape justice.’
‘That’s a good point, even if I would’ve preferred to see him face trial for everything he did.’
‘He would’ve ended up on the gallows– this just hastens the same conclusion.’
That was indubitably true.
They got back into the boat. Pushing off from the shore, Jacob took over the rudder, Dora huddled beside him. Alex went to the prow to help balance the boat.
‘Where do you want to go now?’ he asked her.
She yawned and leaned against his arm, exhausted by the events of the past hour. ‘We must get Mr Barton. He’s very sick.’
‘I’ve sent word for the doctor from Bowness to tend him. He needs something to bring down his fever and good nursing, but he is best left while he sleeps. There is no rush to move him.’
‘Knotte was giving him willow bark. You saw what happened to him?’
Jacob gave a grunt of assent. ‘He wouldn’t have felt any pain. It was instant.’
‘He was trying to help his friend– and Langhorne just shot him!’
‘Langhorne was a vicious killer– he wouldn’t have stopped. You did the right thing stabbing him.’
‘Trust me: I don’t have any regrets about that. It was him or me.’ She sighed. ‘I should tell you I got close enough to do it by pretending to be the whore he thought me– and all women. I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s left a trail of female victims in his past.’
‘Then he got his comeuppance.’
‘You’re not disgusted at me?’
‘What? Why? It was brilliant. You played the role you had to assume. It’s no more you than Lady Macbeth.’ He let a moment pass. ‘Do you want to set a date?’
‘Oh, Jacob.’ She patted his leg affectionately. ‘I’m still thinking about it. We’ve only known each other four months.’
‘But we’ve packed more into those four months than many people do in whole lives.’
‘That is true.’
‘I won’t press you for an answer to that, but I do want to know where you want to go now.’
‘What are our choices?’
‘I suppose it’s Elleray with my brother, or home.’
‘Then let’s go home.’
ChapterThirty-Two
Loughrigg Tarn
When Ruby saw the state Dora was in as they dismounted from Nero, she screamed from the front step: ‘Get yourself into bed right now, Dora Fitz-Pennington!’
Dora caught sight of herself in the mirror that hung in the hallway. Every jot and jag of the adventure clung to her from her straggling hair to her rapidly developing black eyes.
‘It’s kind of you to care, Ruby, but I should be perfectly well after a warm drink and perhaps some soup.’
