AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Pippa contained her surprise remarkably well if he had in fact shocked her. She gave him a pert little smile and turned her back to him without so much as a response. She hadn’t blushed at all, which was disappointing.
William watched her walk away until she disappeared from sight, and he found himself wondering when he would see her again. He had the oddest notion that when it came to a battle of wits, he’d just met his match.
* * *
The hole in the ground at the back of the long shed was nowhere near as deep as it should be, but William was growing weary of digging. Why Father wished for the hiding place to be dug at all was lost on William, for he could not honestly intend to utilize it, not after everything that had occurred in Dorset. Perhaps it was merely a precaution. Even William could admit to the odd discomfort he felt knowing he was without a safe place to store merchandise—regardless of the fact that he had no merchandise in need of storing. He simply felt vulnerable.
It would take some effort, but he had to remind himself that he was out of the game. He was no longer a smuggler; he was a fisherman now. Or perhaps a farmer. He’d yet to decide.
Stabbing the shovel into the ground again, he kept digging, working his muscles to relieve his frustration. If he worked hard enough, he’d be so tired that he wouldn’t have time to worry about the predicament Roger and Father had put them in.
It wasn’t working. His mind was the ever-revolving wheel of a longcase clock, spinning and turning regardless of how hard he tried to pause it. Every scoop of damp soil he shoveled was a click of time, begging the same question repeatedly. If they were truly out of the game, why had his father directed him to dig a hidden storage space in the shed?
William liked to think he was an intelligent man, but even he had shrouded his misgivings with excuses. But standing in the midst of a hideaway for smuggled goods, he could no longer employ denial. It was plain that he hadn’t been given the whole of his father’s plans.
If he had a choice, William would gladly walk away from smuggling. He would throw himself into the task of becoming the best farmer or fisherman he could, and he would be done with late-night brandy runs and evading the revenue men for good.
His shovel hit a rock, jarring him from his musings as pain radiated up his elbow to his shoulder. He tossed the shovel aside, breathing heavily. He was quite literally standing in the proof that his father did not intend to let him walk away. They may have moved to a whole new county and taken up residence in a long-forgotten cottage on his grandfather’s old land, but smuggling was in his blood. He could imagine his father repeating the words he’d said many times before. All we need is a moonless night and the coast.
Unfortunately, in Devonshire, they would still have access to both of those things.
Roger stepped into the dim shed and looked around, resting his hands on his hips. His blond hair was darkened by dirt—no doubt a byproduct of wrestling with the ivy on the cottage walls. His gaze snagged on the small boat hanging from the rafters, one side of the rope broken as it hung perilously lopsided. He flicked his blond head toward it. “That’s our skiff?”
Roger was a friend, not a relation. It wasn’t their boat, it was a Blakemore boat. But that distinction sounded petty, and William tamped it down before he could make his frustration known.
He reached for his shovel again and stabbed it into the dirt at his feet, working around the rock. “Yes. Once the dust is cleared it shouldn’t be in too bad of shape.”
“Your father truly intends for us to try to be fishermen?” Roger asked, approaching the small rowboat with disbelief. He tapped it, and the rope groaned as the boat swung.
“Yes. Unless you want that coming down on top of you, you best stay clear of it.”
Roger took a large step back, grinning.
William leaned his hip against the muddy wall of his hole. “Has the ivy on the house been taken care of?”
“Almost. We can apply more mortar to the walls by tomorrow, most likely. The walls are intact on the south side, so I left a bit of it there.” He puffed up his cheeks and blew a breath out, a heaviness to his eyes that revealed how little he thought of their current plan to lay low. “I wonder—”
“Best leave the thinking to me,” Father said gruffly, stepping through the open doorway. He dragged his bad leg behind him, leaning heavily on his cane.
“Of course, sir,” Roger said, silencing his errant thoughts immediately.
Father looked around the shed and rested his eyes on the boat. “All will come about in due time. If fishing is too unsavory for you, Roger, you can always take up the post of manservant or go back to Dorset.”
“Fishing will be grand, sir,” Roger said. He was likely thinking that he already had become something of a manservant since coming to Ravenwood Cottage, and William didn’t fault him for his irritation. It was difficult shifting from a life of relative ease with servants aplenty to this minuscule hovel without a single helping hand.
But going back to Dorset alone would be dangerous until Roger knew he was in the clear. He would be better off remaining with William and his father for a few months at least until the threat of discovery had worn off and Ainsworth’s attention was elsewhere.
Father stepped again, his bad leg dragging on the earth and drawing a long mark in the dirt. “We need a cook. Why don’t you go into Collacott tomorrow and hire a kitchen maid, Will? Someone who can prepare dinner and clean a little.”
“Tomorrow is Sunday. And anyway, do you not think we should be more cautious? It could be reckless to bring a stranger into our house.”
“It hardly warrants the name house,” Roger mumbled.
Father turned, testing the sturdiness of an old, dusty crate before lowering himself to sit on it. “No. Quite the opposite, I feel. If we are to hide away here, that will only bring further attention to us.”
William blinked. “Are we not in hiding, though?” He looked to Roger. The reason they’d come here at all was to protect that man.
“If we were in hiding, William, would I bring us to my father’s old house where we could easily be discovered?”
