Sarum - Edward Rutherfurd [539]
“Your guns, please,” said Shockley calmly.
And as the highwayman reluctantly threw them down, Adam grinned at his little friend.
“You were right, Mr Mason, it worked.”
The reward of five hundred pounds was handed over promptly to Shockley and Eli Mason by Sir Joshua Forest on his return two weeks later.
“Best five hundred pounds I ever spent,” he assured them. “Not only have you caught my highwayman, but you’ve given me a story to dine out on for years.”
Shockley did not keep his share.
“Your plan, your risk. I only gave the word,” he said, and finally only accepted fifty pounds to keep the little fellow happy.
As for his business with Forest, it was agreed he would call upon him two days later. “Though why you still haven’t made up your mind,” Jonathan said crossly, “I cannot imagine.”
The highwayman turned out to be a young man named Stephen Field, who came from Warminster. No one at Sarum knew anything about him; he was held at Fisherton gaol. That his grandfather, who had worked at an inn at Bath, had been born the son of Susan Mason and George Forest he did not even know himself. It made little difference since he was due to hang.
When Eli Mason returned home with his reward, he carried out the rest of his plans, and this part he had not confided to Adam.
He went straight to his sister’s room, dumped the bag of gold in front of her, and stated proudly:
“That’s your dowry for when you marry, from your brother Eli.” And before she could protest, he added firmly: “Better marry Captain Shockley, sister, if I was you.”
The next day, in the early evening, when Mr Jonathan Shockley was out at the house of Mr Harris for his regular game of whist, and the two young Shockleys were away at Wilton, Adam Shockley alone in the house was surprised to receive a caller.
Miss Mary Mason requested to see him on private business.
Wondering what she could want, he ushered her into the little parlour on the first floor.
She came straight to the point.
“I wish to know about land in America, Captain Shockley. I understand that it is at a much lower price than land here.”
“Certainly,” he informed her.
“One could buy a tolerable farm for five hundred pounds? In a state like Massachusetts or Pennsylvania?”
“I would say yes.”
“And for, say, a thousand one could stock it too?”
“I think so.”
“Your commission is worth fifteen hundred pounds, I believe.”
“It is.”
“And do you still desire to go to America, Captain?”
He had been pondering the question all day.
“In my heart, yes,” he told her frankly.
“If you went, you would probably not return.”
“I know.”
To go out at his age alone though, he had been thinking. Could he face it? But she was speaking.
“Then will you take me to wife?”
He blinked. What had she said?
She repeated it, calmly and seriously.
“Would you take me to wife, Captain Shockley? On condition we go to America as soon as peace is signed?”
He gazed at her in astonishment.
“An old dog like me?”
“Yes,” she replied matter of factly.
“I’ve been wounded. And I’ve been sick in the tropics,” he warned her.
“Pennsylvania is hardly the tropics.”
A grin spread over his face.
“Then by God, Miss Mason, I will.”
“Good.” She looked about her calmly.
“Where is your bedchamber, Captain Shockley?” she enquired.
He frowned, puzzled.
“In the next room,” he gasped. “Why?”
Quietly and methodically she now began to take off her gown. His eyes opened wide in astonishment.
“Shouldn’t this wait until we are married?” he asked.
She shook her head.
“Best not.”
At the Assizes that autumn, Stephen Field, notorious rogue and highwayman, aged twenty-six, a slim, handsome fellow with ringlets of black hair that made him look more like a cavalier than a common thief, was sentenced to death.
A week later, the deputy sheriff of the county recommended to the secretary at the War Office that the said Stephen Field, having received sentence