Page 66 of Miss Flibbertigibbet and the Barbarian
With Rory, Addie visited all the shops and stalls around the marketplace, those that were permanent fixtures and not there only for the markets on Wednesdays. As it was Tuesday and she found no one with any useful information, as she and Rory walked back to the inn to report their comprehensive failure, she mused, “We might have to wait until tomorrow and ask again, once all the market stallholders are here.”
She didn’t—truly didn’t—want to waste another day. Another night, however…
Rory’s reply jerked her back to the here and now. “Perhaps,” he offered, “the others have found something. Stands to reason one of us will. The villain came here, so where did he go?” Jaw setting, Rory nodded. “Someone has to know.”
“Hmm.” Addie saw no reason to argue. “The challenge is to find that someone.”
On Addie’s and Rory’s heels, Jed and Mike trailed into the inn. At Addie’s questioning look, they grimaced. “Nothing,” Mike reported.
“Not a whisper,” Jed confirmed. “You?”
Addie shook her head and led the way to the parlor.
She walked through the open doorway to see Dickie and Young Gillies looking as pleased as punch. Her heart leapt. “You found him?”
Nicholas, too, was smiling. “Not quite. We’ve been waiting for you to come in to put it all together.” He waved them to the table on which the map of the town lay spread and anchored at the corners.
Drawing nearer, Addie saw that he’d been busy. He’d got wagering counters, presumably from Quilley, and used the small discs to mark the sightings they’d found while on their way into town. The red discs denoted their positive sightings, and black discs indicated those places where they’d had solid confirmation that the thief hadn’t passed that way.
The line of red discs traced the progress of the thief and The Barbarian into and through the town.
“As of this morning, we’d traced the thief to this point.” Nicholas tapped the red counter that sat at the corner of the marketplace. He glanced at Addie, Rory, Jed, and Mike. “Given where you were searching, I trust none of you discovered any positive sightings of our quarry?”
They all shook their heads.
“That’s to be expected.” Nicholas glanced at Dickie and Young Gillies. “Courtesy of our latest information, this is where our thief went.”
Addie watched him place a red counter over the front of the inn.
Nicholas elaborated, “Quilley did as he’d promised and asked his staff. One of the serving girls works only on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, and when, this morning, he asked her about the horse and rider, she said she saw the rider on the chestnut horse leading The Barbarian up Northgate, heading north past the inn. She was leaving to walk to her home, which is out along the Boston road, but she paused and stared at the horse—even she recognized that The Barbarian was noteworthy. Then, however, she turned south, so she didn’t see where the rider went, only that he was heading north past the inn.”
Along with the others, Addie waited as Nicholas picked up another red counter. “Next.” He placed the disc a little farther along Northgate; Addie leaned closer and saw the counter lay on top of the manor house, just up the street. Nicholas went on, “While Dickie collared the squire, Young Gillies spoke with his stable lads. Three of them were dallying in the yard, kicking a ball about, when one spotted The Barbarian trotting past. As you might imagine, they stopped and stared, and despite the distance from the road, they gave an excellent description of the horse.”
Young Gillies nodded. “No doubt at all that it was The Barbarian they saw.”
“The shadows were lengthening by then,” Nicholas went on. “We don’t have another positive sighting, but Dickie and Young Gillies persevered and found a group of laborers repairing a drystone wall here.” He placed a black counter farther up Northgate, beyond the edge of the town itself. “This”—he tapped the line that, at that point, led west from the road—“is a lane called The Drove. The four laborers were at the corner last Wednesday and are sure the rider and The Barbarian never passed them.”
“They are absolutely sure.” His eyes bright, Dickie added, “And they were there until full dark and back again at first light the next day. They’re being paid on completion, so they were—still are—pushing every day to get it done.”
“So”—Nicholas straightened, although his gaze remained on the map—“the question before us now is where did the thief go after he passed the manor?” He shook his head. “There’s not much of the town left and no lanes leading into the country at all.”
“Only this lane.” Addie tapped a line leading east from about a hundred yards beyond the manor. It was labeled Church Lane and, predictably, led to the church before curving south again, eventually joining Eastgate. “He could have taken that, but it simply curves and leads back into the town.”
They all stared at the map, then Nicholas said, “Either way—whether he took Church Lane through the backstreets or found shelter somewhere beyond the manor but before The Drove—given the hour, he must have stayed with someone in the town.”
Dickie looked up. “We should check with the other inns and taverns. Perhaps he stayed at one of those.”
“If he had,” Nicholas said, “I expect we would have already heard of it.” He glanced at Addie. “I doubt The Barbarian would have been easily housed or, at least, not without some fuss.”
She humphed. “One can never be sure with that horse. He might have decided to play meek and mild, just to see what happened.”
“But he wouldn’t have liked being closed into a typically small inn’s stall or, worse, a tavern’s stall, would he?” Nicholas’s gaze remained on her face.
“No,” she admitted. “Besides, if the thief had stayed overnight somewhere around there”—she waved at the area on the map—“then on Thursday morning taken Church Lane back into the town, most likely he would have headed out along Eastgate. Otherwise, he would have passed right through the town again, which makes no sense. Regardless, we still should have found someone who saw him that morning. Heaven knows we asked enough people throughout the town.”
Rory and Dickie agreed.
“The Barbarian’s not a horse people miss,” Young Gillies pointed out. “We’ve proved that again and again.”
