Page 59 of A Winter Chase

“It seems unlikely, but…”

“We must try everywhere. Might she have gone to the church to pray? Lightwood, will you go and see? Check the vestry, too.”

“You are kind souls,” Fletcher said wearily. “Thank you.”

“Will you have a brandy, sir?” James said, after Thomas and Lightwood had gone.

“I think I will. Thank you.”

James fetched the half empty brandy bottle and a couple of clean glasses, and poured generous measures.

“Leadbetter is right, of course,” Fletcher said, sipping his brandy. “We must look everywhere we can. I even went to ask Mrs Reynell — I thought Jules might have gone there to apologise. But if she is not in the village… we cannot get to the Wheatsheaf in this weather. Not until the morning, and only if the snow stops.”

“It will not last long, I think,” James said, with more assurance than he felt.

He brought out some bread and cheese, with the thought of toasting them, but that only reminded him of happy times in Julia’s company. At that moment, he would have given up toasted cheese, and a great many other indulgences too, to know that she was safe.

In time, Lightwood returned, and then Will and Johnny Fletcher, and finally, covered from head to foot in snow that melted and dripped all over Mrs Pound’s clean kitchen floor, Thomas Leadbetter. None had any news to report. Wherever Julia had gone, it was not to any acquaintances in the village.

“Will you stay here for tonight, sir?” James said to Fletcher. “The snow is not easing at all, and the road is becoming treacherous.”

“I thank you for your kindness,” Fletcher said, “but I must report back to Mrs Fletcher, and reassure her as best I can. We have lanterns, and our route home is an easy one to follow, even in driving snow.”

“Let me come with you, to help guide you. I have walked to the Park in snow more times than I care to remember over the years.”

“You are very good, Plummer, but we will not lose our way in so short a distance. It is but a step to the gatehouse, and so long as we stay between the trees lining the drive we shall do well enough. We are from Yorkshire, after all, and no strangers to winter weather.”

“Try not to fall in the lake,” James said.

They laughed, taking it as a joke, and were soon gone, leaving James with three more people to fret over.

“Stop worrying,” Thomas said. “There are three of them, and the young Fletchers will look after their father.”

“May I worry about Julia?”

Thomas hesitated. “I am not sure I can stop you, but you have always said she is sensible, James. She will have found shelter. It is not as if Hertfordshire is some desolate wilderness, after all. It is impossible to walk more than a quarter of a mile in any direction without seeing a habitation of some sort, and no one would refuse to take in a young lady caught in a storm. She will be sitting snug as you please in a farmhouse or labourer’s cottage, you may be sure.”

“Of course she will. Of course. Bound to be. She is too sensible to persevere once the snow started. Naturally she would have made for the nearest safe refuge. Where is that map, Thomas? Let me see if I can determine the most likely places to try tomorrow.”

Willingly, Thomas fetched the parish map, and then the one for St Agnes, as well, which included the Wheatsheaf, and James pored over them eagerly, trying to work out the route Julia might have taken and which barns and cottages were situated near enough to provide shelter.

Eventually, when even James’s feverish study had subsided to a dull resignation that they did not know and could not guess where she might be, Thomas tentatively suggested that they retreat to bed.

“You will want to be up at first light, I am sure. Best to get some sleep while you may.”

It was, of course, an eminently good suggestion, except for the small impediment that James could not conceive of sleeping while Julia was out there somewhere, trapped by the snow. He meekly withdrew to his room, therefore, but made no attempt to ready himself for bed, dismissing Lightwood with a curt wave of the hand. And then he built up the fire and slumped in the battered chair beside it, bathed in the ghostly light of the flames, while his mind ran and ran in circles.

No matter how much he tried to concentrate on the probability that Julia was safe and warm somewhere, his imagination threw up pictures of her lying in the snow, curled up under a hedge in the pitiful attempt to shelter, or huddled under a tree. He told himself repeatedly that she would not have abandoned all prudence just because she was angry with him. She was a good walker who knew the byways around the Park intimately, and she would have seen the bad weather coming in. Of course she would be safe! Yet despair and grief gnawed at him like a physical pain. He could not bear it if she were to die, and all because of him! She would not run away, surely! It was madness…

But if she had not gone to the Wheatsheaf, where would she have gone?

He sat up abruptly. If she had not gone towards Ware, then perhaps she had walked to her favourite spot, the place she returned to over and over — the gate at High Field. And if she had gonethere, and set off in almost any direction, then there was one obvious sanctuary that would draw her if she were beset by snow — the hut.

He padded downstairs, found his boots and greatcoat, lit a lantern and crept out into the night.

20: Home

The snow had stopped, all but a few drifting flakes. Not that it mattered, for James could find his way to the hut blindfolded, if need be. Out to the road, walk alongside the rectory wall and then the church wall, past the Park gatehouse and then if he could not see the outline of the rough track that connected the hut to the road, he need only follow the boundary wall up the hill.

---