They continued searching and questioning neighbors in the area for the rest of the day. There were a few vague sightings, though people were uncertain as to which boy they might have seen. A boy was a boy, apparently and they all looked the same.
Tired and dejected, they returned to Lakeside Cottage as evening was falling.
They were met at the front door by the housekeeper, in great distress. With tears running down her face she babbled on about carpets. “Oh, your grace, something terrible, I’m so sorry. It was the carpets you see, we only take them up once a week to beat and today’s the day, only when we took up the mat at the front entrance there it was, underneath. Someone must have shoved it under the door, but instead it went under the mat and nobody knew, nobody knew. It might have been there for days, and goodness knows what those villains thought when they didn’t get any reply—and, oh, what if they hurt him, poor little lad? And all because of the carpet.”
Hart unraveled the torrent of words. “What went under the mat, Mrs. Harris?”
“The letter—the ransom note, of course! It was addressed to Mr. Jephcott, so of course he opened it.”
“What? Where is this ransom note?”
Jephcott, having heard the commotion in the hall, came hurrying down the stairs brandishing an envelope. “Here it is, your grace, I have it.” He handed it to Hart who scanned the note inside.
Bring £5,000 to the bridge by the old mill and leave it under the broken stone just before dusk. Or the boy dies.
There was no date, no way of telling when the note had been written. And nobody knew how long it had been under the mat.
Hart glanced at the sky. “It’s almost dusk now, but—”
“Come on.” George was already running for the stables.
They rode to the old bridge, taking Stanley, the groom, as a guide. They found the broken stone, but of course there was no other sign of anything or anyone. They searched the old mill, but going by the thickness of the dust and cobwebs that covered the place, nobody had been there for years.
“Any other likely buildings nearby?” Hart asked the groom. Stanley suggested a couple of run-down and abandoned buildings, and even though full dark had fallen, there was enough moonlight to enable them to find those buildings, and ascertain that they too were uninhabited.
They returned to Lakeside Cottage even more dejected than before. Had the delay in discovering the ransom note caused the death of young Phillip?
“All we can hope for,” Hart said to George as they prepared for bed that night, “is that the gossip that spread the news of young Danny’s disappearance will also reach the kidnappers and let them know that their ransom note has only just been found.”
“Are you going to pay it?”
“At this stage,” Hart said heavily, “with the ransom demand having gone astray for an unknown length of time, I don’t think I can afford not to. Their patience must be almost at an end. I won’t antagonize them any more by delaying. Of course, we still have tomorrow during the day to track them down, but if we haven’t discovered anything by nightfall, I’ll leave the ransom there.”
“Can you get that much money in time?”
“Before I left I arranged a large sum of money to betransferred from my London bank to a local branch. I’ll ride over and withdraw the ransom sum tomorrow morning.”
He didn’t say so, but George realized he must be going to pay the ransom out of his own pocket. Phillip’s father had left nothing but debts. He was a good man, her husband.
She knew he wouldn’t be interested in making love that night—they were both too tense from all the revelations of the day. Leaving aside the flimsy seductive nightdress that Lily and Rose had given her, she donned a plain cotton one, her mind whirling with depressingly unanswerable questions.
“Does the fact that we received a ransom note for Phillip augur well for the fate of young Danny?” she wondered aloud. “I mean, they wouldn’t murder one boy and ransom another, would they? It doesn’t make sense.”
“We don’t even know if Phillip is alive,” Hart said heavily. “For all we know, that ransom note has lain under that blasted mat for nearly a week. I can’t imagine kidnappers waiting indefinitely with no response to their demand. They’d most likely cut their losses and move on.”
He sounded so weary and dispirited, so full of self-blame and despondency, she hurried across and wrapped her arms around him. She knew what he meant by “cut their losses”—it meant they’d kill Phillip. There was nothing she could say to comfort or reassure him; there was no comfort to be had from words.
He held her hard against him, saying nothing. She could feel his heartbeat under her ear, and ached for him. She could not comfort him with words, but there were other forms of comfort. She slipped her hand beneath his drawers, and caressed him lightly. “Come, let us go to bed.” He hardened immediately against her palm.
“Yes.” He kissed her, and she tasted despair and brandy and need.
They made love then with quiet desperation, seeking solace and oblivion. But Hart did not neglect her. For the first time ever, as he came to his climax, she shattered around him in hers.
And they slept.
***
Hart collected the money the next morning and left the ransom in place late that afternoon, well before dusk. “I can’t risk not paying,” he told George. “The money doesn’t matter. There’s no chance to investigate or negotiate. I don’t want to antagonize them any more with any further delay.”
