Taking Liberties

‘Sorry for your loss, ma’am.’ The woman didn’t look at Diana; her eyes were on Powell. ‘But, see, my daughter’s missing and that man there knows where she is.’

It had been a terrible day, a terrible week for Makepeace and Oliver Hedley. After a breakneck journey from Newcastle to London, it had transpired that Andrew Ffoulkes, the rising young luminary of the diplomatic corps on whose help Makepeace had counted, was absent, sent abroad on a secret mission. At the house of the Marquis of Rockingham, another influential friend, they’d learned that the master was in Yorkshire.

Though they’d scattered money like rose petals around the Admiralty, its clerks had been too harassed by the developing situation at sea to search for the information needed by an increasingly distraught woman. When, finally, they’d managed to trace the fate of the Lord Percy, the news had been awful.

Nor had it been final; that was the thing. Apart from the fact that they had been involved in dreadful events, whether Philippa and Susan were alive or not was still uncertain; they had been supercargo, civilian passengers, and, as such, no department had been willing to assume responsibility for them.

At last, one clerk had been helpful. ‘You want the Sick and Hurt Office, ma’am. They got them sort of records.’

‘I know where she is?’ Mr Powell asked now.

‘That’s what they told me.’ Makepeace was keeping her voice steady, but when she tried to get up from her chair she sagged. She hadn’t eaten and had barely slept for seventy-two hours.

Oliver began to fan her with his hat. Idly, the Dowager handed him her fan. ‘Use that, young man.’ She recognized desperation when she saw it and was touched. She turned to the commissioner. ‘Perhaps you had better deal with this person, Mr Powell. Now, I think, and here.’

‘Oah, but all records are in my office.’

‘They can be fetched,’ the Dowager told him with finality. The woman was obviously exhausted. In any case, she found herself intrigued and had no intention of missing the story about to unfold. ‘I am prepared to wait.’

‘Very well, if your ladyship is sure.’

She was sure. She took a chair at the back of the room out of everyone’s eyeline. ‘Please proceed.’

Obediently but somewhat put out, Mr Powell seated himself at the head of the table opposite Makepeace and Oliver. ‘Name?’

‘This is Mrs Hedley. I am Oliver Hedley, her stepson.’ Oliver took up the running. He produced a notebook. Having won her point and the necessary attention, Makepeace had slumped.

‘March the sixth this year,’ Oliver said, ‘a Royal Navy dispatch carrier, the Lord Percy, left New York bound for London. My stepsister and a friend, Miss Susan Brewer, were on board. Halfway across the Atlantic, the Percy was engaged by the American navy corvette Pilgrim. Percy’s captain was killed.’ Without looking up from his notes, Oliver put a hand on Makepeace’s shoulder for a moment; she’d been fond of Captain Strang. ‘Lord Percy was forced to strike her colours and the remaining crew and passengers were taken aboard Pilgrim. That is what the Admiralty told us.’

Mr Powell rose from his chair. Makepeace looked up, quickly. ‘Are you listening?’

‘I’m sending for the records, madam,’ Mr Powell told her. He went out into the corridor to speak to someone and came back to Oliver. ‘Yes, yes, continue. Your sister and friend, now aboard the Pilgrim. American vessel.’

‘They were. But on May the fourth Pilgrim encountered a British man-of-war, the Riposte and’ – again Oliver’s hand reached for Makepeace’s shoulder – ‘the Riposte sank the Pilgrim.’

There was silence. The Dowager averted her eyes and stared instead at a portrait of Commissioner Samuel Pepys.

Mr Commissioner Powell said, quite gently: ‘So the American vessel went down …’

Oliver nodded. ‘So the American went down but … but some of her people were picked up. The Admiralty says the Riposte took on survivors and headed for England. Home port Plymouth. She arrived there in June, we’ve learned that much. The Admiralty told us American prisoners were on board and they were put in gaol. They don’t know how many or their names or where they are …’

‘Excuse me again.’ Once again, the commissioner went to the door and gave more orders.

Makepeace said, her voice rising: ‘So where is she? Where’s my Philippa? Where’s Susan Brewer? If they’re in gaol … if you’ve put them in gaol …’

Mr Powell tutted. ‘No, no,’ he said, ‘we don’t put females in prison. Boys under twelve and females are set at liberty, see, but I’m not sure we keep the names.’

The starched and waxed sailor who’d accompanied the Dowager to the room came into it with a pile of ledgers.

‘Now then.’ Mr Powell peered at the books. ‘Plymouth, Plymouth …’ He selected one and licked his fingers. ‘June, June. Busy month, June and, o’ course, Plymouth is a busy port. But yes, yere we are, HMS Riposte. Docked June the seventh to unload prisoners. Look at this now, there’s near a hundred of ’em, French as well – she must have sunk a Frenchy on her way home. Prize money there then, I expect. Name again? Hedley, is it?’

‘Dapifer,’ said Makepeace, her voice suddenly strong, like a tolling bell. ‘Her name is Philippa Dapifer.’ It began to break as she added: ‘She’s eleven years old. Twelve in September. Travelling with her godmother, Miss Susan Brewer.’

‘Sir Philip Dapifer was my stepsister’s father,’ Oliver added, knowing it would help.

It did. Mr Commissioner Powell looked up. ‘Not Sir Philip Dapifer? There now. Sir Philip. A good friend to the Admiralty, Sir Philip. Not that I knew him well, mind, but …’

‘Just get on,’ Makepeace said, wearily.

Encouraged that he was not dealing with hoi polloi any more, Mr Powell got on, his spectacles glinting in the turn from side to side as his eyes searched the page of a closely written list.

At the back of the room, the Dowager’s interest increased. Sir Philip Dapifer, well, well. She had met him rarely and only then by chance – being a liberal Whig and an influential supporter of the Marquis of Rockingham, he had been anathema to Aymer who’d refused to meet him socially – but she had liked what she’d seen of him. Charm and excellent breeding.

The same could not be said of Sir Philip’s first wife. Well born and exquisitely pretty but a voracious trollop. Aymer had not been so particular about her, the Dowager recalled. There had been a rumour that they’d had an affair, one in a long line of various affairs for them both; the woman had been shameless. Hadn’t there been something about her and Dapifer’s best friend?

Yes, there had been, and Dapifer had gone to America to divorce her quietly, trying to protect her name and his. And returned … yes, it was all coming back now … and returned with a totally unsuitable new wife, an American, a serving girl from a Boston inn – something like that. So that poor female there had been the second Lady Dapifer, had she?

But Dapifer had died, suddenly and much too young. The Dowager remembered the surprisingly sharp pang with which she’d heard the news, as if something valuable had been taken out of the world …

Mr Powell was muttering to himself. ‘Dapifer and Brewer we’re looking for. I’ve got a D’Argent here, no, no, that’s a Frenchman …’

He’s not going to find them, Makepeace thought. They’re not there. It’s coming and I won’t be able to bear it. This is like it was when Philip died. It was a return to affliction, an old terror come again so that she felt she did not belong where she sat but should be somewhere else.

Behind her, the Dowager continued to squeeze her memory. Yes. The first wife had claimed the Dapifer estates back after Sir Philip died on the grounds that the divorce had not been legal. The scandal sheets were full of it at the time. And then she and her lover had frittered the lands away and somehow – the details were hazy – this second wife had got them back. Now, poor thing, she’d lost her daughter.

The commissioner’s finger was approaching the end of the list.

‘No, no,’ he said, ‘I’m sorry …’ He turned a page. ‘Wait now, here’s something. Supercargo.’

Yes, Makepeace thought, please. Please.

Mr Commissioner Powell tilted his book to see the page better. ‘“Supercargo, American. Two …”’ he read, ‘“one female, one ship’s boy. Released June the seventh.’ He looked up, smiling as if he had not just turned the screw to the rack’s limit. ‘There we are then.’

The Dowager took a hand. ‘Names?’ she suggested. ‘Ages? Location? Are such people let go to wander as they may when they arrive on these shores? A child? In this case, possibly two children?’

‘Well.’ Mr Powell blew out his lips; some people refused to be satisfied. ‘It just says “supercargo” yere. I agree with your ladyship, the names should be on the list but when a captain’s engaged with the enemy … And by rights, supercargo’s not our concern, there’s charities to deal with them, we got enough with prisoners. I’m sorry I can’t tell you more, Mrs Hedley. Perhaps there’s some record in Plymouth.’

She felt helpless before the world’s oppression, but while there was a crack of hope in it, she had to go on. ‘Plymouth then, Oliver,’ she said.

He nodded and took her arm.

As Mr Powell opened the door for them, the Dowager was moved to say: ‘Have you a conveyance, Mrs Hedley …?’ It was kindly meant; the Dowager was a kind woman and, had the answer been no, would have gone on to offer the coach in which she had travelled from Chantries. However, her accustomed languid tone fell on Makepeace’s ears as condescension.

For the first time Makepeace became fully aware of the woman who’d been sitting behind her, listening to her misery. She was tall, elegant and, from what could be distinguished beneath the veil, beautiful. But she also looked disdainful and belonged to a class that, with one or two exceptions, had always treated her, Makepeace, like a squaw wandered into its midst with a tomahawk. She represented a female set which, during her first marriage, had patronized her, belittled her and, when she’d been brought low after Philip’s death, had not lifted one of its beringed fingers to help her.

She stiffened. She said: ‘I got my own coach, thank you.’ There was no gratitude in her voice. She went out.

Yes, well.