Sebastian had cleared his plate and was feeling human once more. He set down his cutlery, pushed aside the plate, reached for his wine glass, and leaned back in the chair. “Let’s see—dealing with a Scotland Yard inspector and a magistrate, both engaged in investigating two murders, then riding out searching farmhouses, cottages, haysheds, barns, and the like for barrels of gunpowder, then scrambling down a cliff face, trudging through sand, following a tunnel into a dark cavern, finding evidence of ten barrels of gunpowder having been stored there, being shot at and having to take a dive, then racing back out to the beach, scrambling back up the cliff, riding like the wind across the estate, then riding out again in pursuit of the murderer—also the only one we knew of who could tell us about that gunpowder—only to find the man dead. Shot.” Sebastian arched his brows. “Then we had to pack and drive up to town. So yes, eventful enough.”
Drake had frozen in the act of skewering a potato. “Gunpowder.” He stared at Sebastian, then looked at the potato, stabbed it, transferred it to his plate, then imperiously waved at them both. “Start at the beginning, and if at all possible, leave nothing crucial out.”
Sebastian settled to relate all that had happened from the moment they’d arrived at Pressingstoke Hall. Antonia added her observations as appropriate.
When informed of Ennis’s last words, Drake frowned. “Gunpowder here.” After a moment, he shook his head. “At least you managed to find it.”
“Unfortunately not—we only found where it had been.” Sebastian continued describing all the pertinent events up to the point of them discovering the imprint of ten barrels in the cavern off the beach, and their deduction that the barrels had been moved during the previous night.
“So most likely into a wagon and most likely ferried up to London.” Drake paused, then refocused on Sebastian. “And then?”
With several interjections from Antonia, Sebastian recounted how they’d been shot at by the man involved, who had proved to be Connell Boyne, how they’d missed catching him at the house and had given chase, and subsequently found him murdered in the coppice.
Drake had finished eating and, like Sebastian, was now sitting back in the carver and sipping wine. He grunted. “Dead men pass on no information.” He sipped, then frowned. “But why was it necessary to kill him? Why not just spirit him away?”
Sebastian shrugged. “Too risky now the authorities knew who they were looking for?”
Drake’s golden eyes narrowed. “Possibly.” After several moments, he said, “The way I see this, Ennis, as well as his brother, Connell, had been secretly supporting the Young Irelander movement, but in Ennis’s case, that support was by donation and encouragement, rather than by being actively involved. Connell, on the other hand, appears to have been seduced into actively working for the cause. Given he spent most of his time on the Ennis estate in Ireland, it’s not hard to see how that might have come about.”
“Possibly without Ennis knowing,” Antonia said. She, too, was sitting back, cradling her glass, and listening avidly.
Drake inclined his head in agreement. He focused on the goblet he was slowly twirling between his long fingers. After a moment, his eyes hooded, he continued, “I was summoned to Ireland because my sources had heard whispers of some major plot being afoot. By the time I arrived in Dublin, they’d heard that the plot involved gunpowder. Subsequently, I learned that a group of Young Irelanders had secured a quantity of gunpowder—exactly how much, I didn’t find out—and it had been dispatched to somewhere in England’s south. The ship had already sailed from Limerick. The choice of port seemed odd at the time, but it might be explained by the Ennis estate lying in the countryside north of the town. Unsurprisingly, I decided we needed to know more about where the gunpowder was destined and for what purpose it was intended, so I worked my way deeper into the movement’s hierarchy.”
He frowned. “The strange—and to be truthful, troubling—fact was that no matter how high I went in the movement’s upper ranks, no one seemed to know anything about this plot. No one was in charge of it, and it hadn’t been discussed at any of the various inner council meetings.”
“Did you reach deep enough—high enough—to be sure of that?” Sebastian asked.
Drake’s expression hardened, and he glanced at his scraped knuckles. “Yes—that’s what nearly broke my cover. I kept going higher in the organization. But I should have been following a solid trail from the foot soldiers who arranged the shipment—the Connell Boynes of the enterprise—to the upper echelons, but the moment I stepped away from the field, as it were, there was no trail—seemingly no connection whatsoever.” Drake raised his lids, and his golden gaze met Sebastian’s eyes. “And that makes me question whether this is, in fact, a Young Irelander plot at all.”