He wanted Laura but she, of course, did not want him, sensible creature. She knew he was betrothed and she was no wanton.
For himself, he wanted to understand why he wanted her – other than the obvious, primal reasons – and how he could square any of those wants and needs with his conscience and his honour. It had been a profound mistake to rush towards matrimony but he recognised now why he had done it. A wife might have made him feel like the responsible, real, Viscount Northam, not some imposter.
And, of course, he wanted to solve this mystery of the gold coin in the tomb, of why Will had been attacked, of why –
‘My lord. The door,’ Laura said, and he realised he had sat down and left it ajar.
Laura was sitting on the forward-facing seat sandwiched between Nell the maid on one side and Perry on the other. Theo and Will faced them. Perry’s groom Wimblett was on the box with Terence the footman next to him. That had left Jed, Waggett, Edward and Pitkin at the house, although Mrs Bishop had nodded at the shotgun propped by the kitchen range when Perry had asked her if she was comfortable with only four guards. Theo rather thought that anyone attempting foul play was likely to receive both barrels long before any of the men got to the intruder.
Theo slammed the door, settled into a corner to leave Will as much room to get comfortable as possible, and closed his eyes the better to think without having to look at the woman opposite him.
He woke as the carriage clattered into the yard of the Maid’s Head, the venerable inn in the shadow of the cathedral close’s walls. If he had managed to have a single constructive thought before he had fallen asleep it evaded him now.
Laura lowered her veil and climbed down with Perry, Nell and Terence. Ten minutes later Perry returned alone, having settled her in a private sitting room where she would be safely out of sight while the rest of them went to call on the Bishop.
‘We might well have to wait,’ Will cautioned as the carriage drove out of the inn yard, into the street called Tombland and almost immediately through the Erpingham Gate into the Cathedral close. ‘I know he is in residence, but I have no idea of his commitments.’
> ‘We’ll wait,’ Perry said firmly.
Will seemed to become paler by the minute as they wended their way decorously around the towering cathedral to the Bishop’s House at the eastern end.
‘What’s he like, Bishop Bathurst?’ Theo asked.
‘He’s about seventy,’ Will said. ‘Quite the liberal – supports Catholic emancipation, surprisingly, and he’s prepared to go against the norm when approving candidates for ordination. But I don’t think the poor man ever recovered from his second son disappearing like that near Berlin.’
‘I remember that,’ Theo said. ‘Diplomat, wasn’t he? When was it? ’08?’
‘’09,’ Will corrected. ‘Great mystery – he walked out of his room at the inn and vanished between that and his chaise. There was talk he had been a spy.’
‘I suspect all diplomats are,’ Perry remarked as they drew up in front of the imposing mansion. ‘There’s all this nonsense about it being un-English to carry out intelligence work, but I ask you, how else are we going to beat Boney without undercover intelligence work? I’ll wager we are running all kinds of espionage over there.’
The Bishop was in conference, they were informed, but his secretary, an earnest young cleric in an immaculate wig, assured them that Bishop Bathurst could give them some time in an hour or so.
By the time they were summoned Will looked ready to faint and even Perry’s exuberance was somewhat dimmed by the room where they had been waiting, its walls lined with heavy theological tomes.
The Bishop struck Theo as intelligent and likely to be prepared to listen to their improbable tale. He had a mournful face with deep pouches under his eyes and a wide, unsmiling mouth, although he seemed more weary than annoyed.
He greeted Will kindly, expressed dismay to hear that he had been injured in an assault and urged them to sit and take sherry. ‘You have not all come to report an attack, I believe,’ he said. ‘Mr Thwaite would be better in his bed and your lordships must have a pressing reason for escorting him.’
‘My lord, we have a disturbing story to report to you,’ Will said after a reviving swallow of sherry.
Half an hour later the Bishop sat silently as Will reached the end of the tale, leaving out only the discovery of the gold coin and their conclusion that the attack on him was linked to the tomb.
‘I hope I need not emphasise, my lord, that Mr Thwaite warned us most strongly about disturbing the tomb during our antiquarian researches and that its opening was mere chance,’ Perry added.
Will looked faintly pained at this bending of the truth but the Bishop nodded. ‘I can see that this must have come as a great shock to all of you. You have said nothing to the Rector or to Sir Walter’s family?’
‘We thought it best to consult you first, my lord. And the Reverend Finch’s wife is Sir Walter’s half-sister which makes it even more sensitive,’ Theo said.
‘And the crypt had been blocked off? I recall nothing of that.’ The Bishop reached out and rang the bell on his desk. When the secretary appeared he was sent off to check the ledgers for any faculty concerning the church of Hempbourne Marish.
‘Faculty?’ Theo whispered to Will.
‘Permission to change something in a church. More complicated than that but –’
He broke off as the secretary came back with an open ledger in his hands. ‘Nothing remotely relating to the crypt or the churchyard in over fifty years, my lord.’
‘I see. This is most worrying and it seems that you gentlemen have acted very correctly in coming to me first. It must have been a difficult decision for you, William, not to inform the Rector, but I will ensure that he understands that this course of action meets with my full approval. Something very wrong has occurred at Hempbourne Marish, albeit some twenty years in the past. One can only hope that time has softened the grief of the family for their missing uncle, although this discovery can only be exceedingly painful.’