Left alone I looked around the room and weighed my options. So far it had been a crazy day. I’d risen earlier than usual this morning in my own time, and a part of me was tempted by the bed and by the knowledge that I likely had at least an hour to spend in here alone before the merchant and the constable had finished with their dinner and were gone.
But then, I wasn’t confident I could sleep while the constable was in the house. I felt too much on edge.
The problem was there wasn’t much else I could do here while I waited. There was nothing to tidy and no books to read. I was stumped till I noticed the tinderbox set on the mantelpiece. Not that I needed a fire, it was warm in the room, but the starting of fires was a skill I still needed to work on, and practising would at least keep me distracted from what might be happening downstairs.
This tinderbox, like the one in the kitchen, was made of plain metal and held a worn flint and a ring of hard steel on a soft pile of bits of charred cloth. Kneeling on the hearth, I tried to focus and remember what Fergal had showed me that morning, the steps that he had taken.
I still found it much harder than it should have been, and clearly I was doing something wrong, because this time I couldn’t even raise a proper spark. It proved a frustrating endeavour, but it did help pass the time. Before I knew it, I heard footsteps in the corridor and Fergal called my name outside the door.
I set the flint and steel aside and, standing stiffly, went to let him in.
‘Our visitors are gone, so you can come downstairs again when you’ve a mind to. Just be careful how you go, for there’s a wee bit of a storm wind blowing down there at the moment.’
I could tell what he was getting at the second that I stepped onto the landing. Jack’s voice, raised in anger, carried clearly up the stairs.
‘Have I not told you that I’m grateful? Should I bow to you and kiss your boots as well?’
‘We keep a code, Jack.’ Daniel now, his own tone dangerously level. ‘We have always kept a code. We do not take what is not ours.’
‘’Tis noble of us, surely, but—’
‘You robbed a man.’ He fired the accusation like an arrow, straight across his brother’s argument. ‘We are not thieves.’
A silence followed.
Fergal, who had no doubt heard the brothers arguing like this before, kept walking down the stairs, but I stopped halfway down, unsure, not really wanting to intrude.
Jack’s voice dropped slightly, but they’d moved into the kitchen now and I could still hear every word. ‘King George might not agree with that.’
‘The Prince of Hanover is not my rightful king,’ was Daniel’s stubborn answer, ‘and for that I owe him nothing, for a free trade is a fair trade. What we sell we have already bought and paid for in good faith, we have not stolen it from strangers who can ill afford the loss.’ I heard him exhale with impatience. ‘Have you never stopped to wonder why, in spite of Creed’s advances and his bribery, not one among the people of Polgelly has betrayed us? ’Tis because they do respect us, Jack. They know that we are honest men.’
‘Well, you are,’ Jack acknowledged. ‘I myself have never owned that reputation. Nor, in truth, have I considered it worth owning. Being honest cannot furnish me with all I want.’
‘And will that make you happy, having everything you want?’
The answer came back with defiance. ‘I will let you know.’
A hand came gently round my elbow. Fergal had come back up the few stairs to where I stood. ‘Come on now, they are only talking.’
‘I think they want privacy.’
He seemed amused at that. ‘And can you hear them where you’re standing now?’ There was no need for me to answer, and he gave a knowing nod. ‘If they were caring about privacy, I promise you they’d talk where they would not be heard. Besides, I think the worst is over.’
He was right. We came into the kitchen to find both the brothers in a kind of stand-off, like two soldiers on opposing sides who’d used up all their ammunition but weren’t ready to step off the battlefield.
They noticed Fergal’s entrance more than mine.
Daniel asked him, ‘Fergal, will you tell Jack there are things in this life greater than himself?’
To which Jack countered, ‘Fergal, will you kindly tell my brother that I suffer from a weaker moral nature than his own, and so he should not hold me to his standard?’
Fergal looked from Daniel to Jack and said drily, ‘I had rather tell the pair of you to mind that there’s a lady present. And,’ he said to Jack, ‘if you think Danny’s yelling at you for the theft alone, then you’re a greater fool than I’d have known you for. He feared you would be hanged, you flaming idiot, and him not able to do aught but stand aside and watch. He’ll never tell you that himself, but there’s the reason.’ Glancing round at Daniel he said, ‘And you know it, too, so you can stop pretending you’re so hard.’
The fight drained out of Jack, first, and he looked across at Daniel as though looking for some proof of Fergal’s statement. ‘Were you truly worried?’
Daniel asked him, ‘Were you not?’
Jack shrugged, attempting to look brave. ‘A jury would have set me free.’
‘Creed did not mean to use a jury,’ Daniel said, and then he raised his own broad shoulders in a shrug and added lightly, ‘And finding another first mate for the Sally would not be a simple task.’