Bonfire Night by Deanna Raybourn Page A

finish the sentence, a single note from a hunting horn split the night, and an enormous dog, black as a shadow, bounded past. “They haven’t missed a trick, have they?” he asked.
    “Well, we haven’t visited the plague cottages,” I pointed out.
    “And we shall not,” Portia said firmly. “I’ve had quite enough haunting for one night.”
    But of course, that was not the end. We made our way back to the hall, where we sat through another two hours of wailing and rattling chains and lights bobbing about in the garden and the coach tearing down the village road until Brisbane ventured a thought.
    “Do you suppose they’re waiting for us to go to bed to put an end to this?”
    “Dear me,” I replied. “I hope not. How awkward of us.”
    “I think Brisbane has a point,” Plum put in. “The last run of the coach seemed decidedly slower than the rest, and the wailing lady is quite hoarse now.”
    “She does sound as if she could do with a bit of salt water to gargle,” I agreed.
    We retired, and as soon as our doors were firmly barred, the haunting stopped. The ghostly lights disappeared from the wood, the coach rode no more, and the weeping lady gave up her moaning with something that sounded suspiciously like a sigh of relief.

Chapter Five
    Curiously enough, the next five days were somehow idyllic. The weather was fair with crisp mornings and a bit of unexpected sunshine to warm the noon hour. We spent the days in playing with Little Jack and taking the children for walks into Narrow Wibberley, where they were much admired, and we spent freely to encourage goodwill.
    But our smiles and our coins also bought us opportunities to investigate. Brisbane, taking a leisurely stroll about the village—which in itself would have alarmed the neighbourhood had they known that Brisbane never did anything entirely for leisure—discovered a black coach discreetly parked behind the smithy. The lanterns were fitted with green glass, and if that were not proof enough, a quick glance into the coach revealed a coachman’s livery of unrelieved black as well as a hood.
    Likewise, on his visit to the pub, Plum made the acquaintance of an enormous black mastiff, clearly our spectral hound of death. Portia herself unearthed a cache of small, old-fashioned lanterns behind one of the plague cottages, while I met the postmistress’ son, a truly strapping lad who seemed to be suffering from a strained back, the result—or so he claimed—of a sporting injury. It was not difficult to imagine he might have sustained it instead in moving an enormous Tudor bed across our bedchamber, I reflected with a sympathetic smile.
    The villagers were clearly behind our haunting, and to our amusement, they continued with them, doggedly rattling their chains and lighting their lanterns every night between midnight and two. We sat up and watched them, warming ourselves with an excellent supply of single malt provided by Mrs. Smith. It was merely the latest in a string of that lady’s successes. Every meal was a triumph, and no sooner did any of our party express a wish for a particular book or set of paints or bit of sheet music than she somehow produced it. I might have wondered if she practised witchcraft, so intuitive were her services, and we were deeply content as we played with the children on the lawn just after breakfast on Guy Fawkes Day.
    The morning post had come, and Brisbane was perusing his letters while the nannies hovered just out of reach in case we had need of them. Mrs. Smith was bustling about with cushions and rugs to make certain we were warm enough, but the late-autumn sunshine was particularly brilliant that morning, and the babies gurgled happily as they played together.
    Jane the Younger was in especially rare form as she shrieked at Little Jack for his stuffed rabbit.
    “No, Jack,” Portia said patiently, “you must learn to share your toys.” She plucked the rabbit from his grasp and handed it to her offspring.
    If