Thrown Out on Christmas Eve, She Took Shelter in an Empty House — Unaware the Duke Was Coming Home
Chapter 14
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"I'll begin with the candles, sir, since Mr. Pike has. He says my father signed receipts for 60 pounds of beeswax candles a month, every month, for nine years. I can't tell you whose hand is on those papers; it may look like my father's. But I can tell you that my father never made that many candles. And I don't need his word for it, or mine: I need Mr. Rudd's."She turned and looked toward the back of the room. A small, round, bald man in spectacles stood up, looking startled at being named. Everyone knew Mr. Rudd: he was the excise officer for the district."Sir Henry," said Hannah, "every chandler in England pays a tax on every candle he makes. The law says so. Before a single candle leaves the shop, the excise officer comes and weighs it, and writes the weight in his book, and the chandler pays the duty on it. My father paid duty on every pound of wax he ever dipped. If he had made 60 pounds of beeswax candles a month for Ashmere House, it would be in Mr. Rudd's book. Mr. Rudd, did you bring it?"Mr. Rudd held up a fat, leather-bound ledger. "I did, miss. You asked me to, and I did. Though I don't see—""Would you read us my father's total for beeswax," said Hannah, "for any year you like?"Mr. Rudd opened the book. He ran his finger down a page, adjusted his spectacles, and ran it down again. "'Walter Lowe, Chandler, Lower Ashmere,'" he read, "'beeswax candles, year ending Michaelmas, 1815: 91 pounds weight, duty paid in full.'" He looked up. "That's the year's total, Sir Henry, for all his customers together. It's the highest year he had."The room was silent."Ninety-one pounds in a year," said Hannah. "And Mr. Pike says he bought 720 pounds a year from my father for Ashmere House alone. Either my father cheated the King's Excise on 630 pounds of wax a year, every year for nine years, and Mr. Rudd never noticed—or my father never made those candles, and never sold them, and never signed those papers." She turned to look at Mr. Pike. "And someone else did."Mr. Pike had gone very still."Mr. Rudd," said Sir Henry slowly, "in your experience, could a chandler hide that much wax from you?"Mr. Rudd looked offended. "Not from me, sir. Not in my district. Walter Lowe was the honestest man I ever weighed for."There was a sound in the room then—a kind of rustle as a hundred people let out their breath at once. Sir Henry turned the bundle of receipts over in his hands. He looked at Mr. Pike for a long moment, then he set them aside very carefully, the way a man sets aside something he intends to return to."Go on, Miss Lowe," he said. "The candlesticks."Hannah walked to the small table where the candlesticks stood. She did not touch them."May I ask a question, sir?""You may."