“I suppose so,” Gage confirmed.
Mr. Stuart stood stiffly, considering the matter. It was clear the finger bones were more important to him than the money. He liked the idea of knowing he’d gotten his revenge over the men who had so callously left his wife and child to die, and those bones were his proof. But his shoulders deflated as he plainly realized that either way they would be taken away from him.
Much as I sympathized with him and all that he’d been through, I was not about to let him keep the finger bones of his victims. It was macabre, and unfair to the Tylers and Lady Fleming and all of the other families who worried their ancestors would have trouble rising from the grave on Judgment Day if their bodies were not made whole. Now that Dodd’s killers had been caught, allowing Mr. Stuart to flee the country to avoid a scandalous trial for all involved was in the best interest of the families, but letting Mr. Stuart keep their loved ones’ bones was not.
Mr. Stuart reached into another pocket inside his jacket and extracted a handkerchief. Crossing the room, he pressed it into my open palm. I peeled back the pristine white cloth to examine the bones inside and make sure they were all accounted for. When I was certain, I began to remove the bones from the fabric, but he stopped me.
“Keep it,” he told me with sad eyes. “A token to remember me by.”
I nodded, refraining from telling him I had absolutely no intention of doing so. Not with such a gruesome connection to its contents. But if it made him feel better to believe I did, then so be it.
I wrapped the bones carefully in the handkerchief and tucked them into the pocket sewn into the inside of my cloak.
Gage instructed Mr. Stuart to gather his things and ride out with Trevor and Jock, who waited for him outside. One of the men would escort him to Berwick to be certain he boarded his ship.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
By the time the four of us who remained behind had closed up the farmhouse and set out on horseback toward Blakelaw House, the light of dawn had already begun to creep over the sky in the east. It appeared in a wash of pink and then yellow light spreading across the sky and tinting the few low-lying clouds shades of purple and mauve. The moorland was blanketed with frost, and as our horses crested a rise, the sun itself broke over the horizon between two ridges, scattering light over the frozen landscape. The blades of heather and bracken sparkled like a tiny ice forest. Even the branches of the beech tree standing to our right flashed and shone in the dawn light.
I reined Figg in, pausing to marvel at the sight laid out before us as if painted on a master’s canvas. The rest of the horses, all laden down with satchels of the remaining ransom money, shuffled to a stop beside me. Even Gage’s gelding, which the Edinburgh thieves had conveniently stolen when they attacked him, and taken with them to the farm at Pawston Lake.
We all sat in silence, awed by such a magnificent sunrise after a terrifying and exhausting night. The weariness and worry that had seemed to weigh down my bones only a moment before all but melted away. That is, until Gage suddenly decided to dismount.
“What are you doing?” I asked in alarm, knowing how much it had hurt him to mount his steed, let alone to ride him. “Gage, are you well?”
He grunted as his feet hit the ground. “Of course.” He passed his reins to Anderley and rounded his horse toward me.
“Then what are you doing?”
He stared up at me where I perched on Figg’s back and offered me his hand. “May I have this dance?”
I blinked down at him in shock. “Gage, you can’t dance. You’ve cracked, and quite possibly broken, a few of your ribs. Not to mention the wound to your head and all of your other scrapes and bruises.”
Ignoring me, he pulled my foot out of its stirrup and reached up toward my waist with both of his hands. I swatted them away.
“You can’t lift me down. I’ll do it myself.” And I proceeded to do so before he hurt me or himself.
He reached out to steady me as my feet hit the ground. I stared up into his face in concern, but he merely smiled back, unperturbed.
“This is ridiculous,” I argued, though I allowed him to pull me out into the field, away from the horses and Anderley and Maggie, frost crunching beneath our feet. “Gage, you’re in pain . . .”
“Hush,” he insisted, swinging me around to face him, so that our breath condensing in the cold air mingled as one. He gripped my right hand with his left, and he rested his right hand on the small of my back just above my waist. His gaze was very determined. “Every time I plan to dance with you, something gets in the way.” His voice softened with tenderness. “Not this time.”
My heartbeat quickened. “But we don’t have any music,” I replied, a feeble attempt to prevent the inevitable.
“Anderley,” Gage called out, never taking his eyes from me.
“Sir?”
“Sing.”