A Bluestocking for a Baron : Book 3: Rose: Clean Regency Romance (A Duke's Daughters - The Elbury Bouquet)

by Arietta Richmond

  “Perhaps, Lady Rose, it would be wise if we stopped, no matter how much I might desire to continue. You should go up to your chambers – the books will still be here tomorrow, and we can then speak of the future, when our minds are clear….”

  Rose looked at him, at his deep brown eyes, which were filled with a look of hazy desire, and wondered if her own face mirrored that hungry expression. She did not want to go. But he was right – staying might lead to things which, whilst utterly desirable, were not wise… yet…

  She nodded.

  “Much though I do not wish to say so, I believe that you are right, my Lord. Until tomorrow, then. And thank you… for…”

  He lifted her hand to his lips, and placed a lingering kiss upon it.

  “Everything… has been my pleasure, my Lady.”

  She turned, and walked to the sleeping maid, giving her a gentle tap on the shoulder. The maid jerked upright with a shocked expression.

  “Oh! My Lady… I…”

  “Don’t worry, I am not upset in the least. But please, show me up to my chambers now.”

  <<<>>>

  Francis Farquhar sat in the gazebo of the Wrenton Hall gardens, watching the house, his greatcoat and scarf wrapped tight about him.

  After his man had reported to him the previous afternoon, he had known that it was time to act. As he had expected, the noble occupants of the house were late risers, and by arriving here before dawn, there had been no obstruction to him examining the experimental ice house himself. It had proven more complex and less comprehensible than he had hoped.

  Now, he had a decision to make.

  He was not sure that he understood it well enough to sabotage it, as he had previously considered doing, which left him with a need to use other means of persuasion to make Wrenton give him the information, and no longer pursue it himself. That would gain Farquhar a great deal, and cost him nothing,

  Nothing but a well organised threat.

  It was probably best to use the girl as leverage. He doubted that she would be able to resist, if he took her, and he was quite certain that Wrenton would do whatever was required to protect her. Which left him with two questions – when to snatch her, and where to hide her.

  Providentially, the first question was about to be answered for him.

  <<<>>>

  Rose woke early, and could not get back to sleep. She chose not to disturb Millie, but slipped out of bed and dressed herself in a simple day dress of heavy fabric.

  Taking up her fur lined pelisse, she slipped through the quiet house.

  The door to the terrace opened silently, and the gardens lay before her. The first rays of the sun were just touching the landscape, and the ice crystals on the trees sparkled gold and pink from that light.

  There had not been any more snow overnight, but the white blanket of yesterday’s snow was largely undisturbed. It was, she thought, uniquely beautiful. The bare branches of the trees seemed not stark, but simply drawn to emphasise the white around them.

  She set off down the paths, her boots crunching on the frosted gravel, and the crisp cold air turning her cheeks pink. There was what appeared to be a gazebo in the distance, part way to an indent in the landscape which she suspected would prove, come Spring, to be a small ornamental lake. The gazebo’s roof poked up amongst some tall, neatly shaped hedges of evergreen shrubs, and the path led her through that tangle, each turn providing a new vista into the distance.

  It would be, come summer, quite magnificent.

  A rustle of leaves came to her, and she paused – surely there was no one else out here, so early? There was no further sound, so she set off again. It had likely been a bird of some sort. She turned another corner, and the view before her was breath-taking – out across the suspected lake, to some mountains in the distance. She stopped, simply to appreciate it.

  Moments later, before she could comprehend what was happening, she was roughly grabbed from behind, and a ghastly smelling rag thrust over her mouth and nose. She gagged, feeling as if the world spun beneath her, suddenly dizzy and faint.

  As everything faded to black, one word drifted through her mind.

  Ether.

  <<<>>>

  When Farquhar had seen the door open, he had been hard pressed to believe his luck. But it was definitely the right girl – not one of her sisters. That pale gold hair was escaping around the edges of her bonnet, and the shape of her face was unmistakeable. Quickly, his mind racing, he came up with a plan. He slipped back to that infernal experimental ice house, and the small building beside it. There was ether in there, bottles and bottles of it.

  He grabbed one, pulled the handkerchief from his pocket, then raced back across the gardens. She was walking down towards the hedges around the gazebo. He could not follow her directly, for the sound of his boots would be clear on the gravel if he did – he instead had to leap from one garden bed to another. Achieving silence and speed at once was difficult – but he was not going to lose this chance.

  Amongst the hedges, being quiet was even harder, and at one point, he thought that she had heard him. He froze in place, trying not to breathe, until she went on. Then, he soaked his handkerchief in ether, and followed, fast. When she turned a corner and stopped, he was close enough – this was his chance. He leapt forward, wrapping an arm around her, pulling her back against him, and clamped the ether-soaked cloth over her face. She squirmed, but almost immediately began to go limp on his grasp.

  He shoved the handkerchief back into his pocket and lifted her, glad that she was slender and light, then set off towards the copse of trees where his carriage waited. Halfway down the hill, her bonnet slipped from her curls and fell to the snow, unregarded.

  As he went, his thoughts raced – where could he hide her? Where might she be put, where she was not likely to be found rapidly? He did not yet know. He reached the closed chaise, and deposited her inside, rummaging in the storage space under the box until he found an old lead rope, which he then used to bind her hands. He was not sure how soon she would wake – it wouldn’t do for her to escape him.

  Within minutes, he was driving off down the road. No one had seen him, he was sure, and the carriage had been well concealed. He just needed to hide her. He drove through the town, and out along the river road out of habit – he always went home by this road, so that he could spy on activities at Wrenton’s large ice house on his way.

  That thought jolted him. He’d heard, when he’d been in the town yesterday, that Wrenton had given all of his workers the week off, now that the intense activity of the ice cutting was done, and Christmas was but a few days away. Which meant that the ice house would be deserted. He slowed the carriage, his mind racing. Did he dare? It seemed rather fitting, somehow.

  She was warmly dressed – she’d survive quite some time in the cold, especially as there was likely still some food stored down there. And surely it was the last place Wrenton would think to look for her. And if Wrenton did not comply with his demands? Well… it would be hard to blame Farquhar, if she was eventually found in Wrenton’s own ice house.

  He rounded the bend by the lake, and the ice house façade came into view, the snow drifted against the hill, but the path to its door worn mostly clear. He drew up close to it, and slipped down. After tethering the horses, he checked on her – still utterly unconscious – all the better. Now to gain entry. The big main doors were secured by a bar and a huge lock, but the small door inset in them appeared to be secured only by a simple key, if the keyhole was any indication. He drew his own keys from his pocket, and set about systematically trying them, praying that he would be lucky – generally, there were only so many patterns of key.

  On the final key, he heard the grinding click he had been hoping for. The door opened onto darkness and silence. On a table just inside, a lantern and a small tinderbox sat. He lit the lantern, cursing fingers clumsy from the cold, then opened the doors at the top and bottom of the stairs. The looming walls of ice in the depths put ou
t a palpable chill. The place was even bigger than he had thought – avariciousness sparked within him – a pity he had not managed to buy it.

  He carried the girl down into the depths, and settled her on the floor near the centre of the room, then covered her with some carriage blankets. After some thought, he untied her hands – once he locked the place, she would not be able to get out anyway, especially if he blocked the door to the stairs. Satisfied, he took the lantern and left. The darkness swallowed her, and the door was soon jammed. The only way she would get out was by his hand – assuming that Wrenton cooperated, of course.

  <<<>>>

  Evan was in his study, dealing with some final business matters, before Christmastide, when a tap came at the door.

  “Enter.”

  The door opened, and Lady Camellia Gardenbrook came in, her normally calm expression marred by a frown.

  “Lord Wrenton… do you, perchance, know where my sister Rose is?”

  Evan felt an unaccountable rush of dread at her words.

  “I… I do not – I thought that she was likely still abed. Why? Is ought the matter?”

  Lady Camellia’s frown deepened.

  “She is… she is missing. None of us have seen her this morning, not even her maid. And her warm gown and pelisse are missing. I thought at first that perhaps she had gone for a walk in the grounds… but it is snowing a little now – surely she would not stay out in that?”

  Evan had risen to his feet without thinking, the papers on his desk forgotten in an instant.

  “Missing? But… when was she last seen?”

  “When she went to bed last night, my Lord.”

  “I see. Well, let us not panic,” in truth, Evan was already panicking, but he refused to let himself believe that anything could have harmed her, here in his home, “let us search the gardens and surrounds and see if we can find her.”

  Within minutes, servants had been marshalled, and a careful search through the house and grounds begun.

  Evan himself went out into the gardens, and stood, considering. Where might Lady Rose have chosen to go, if she wanted to walk and explore? Towards the lake, perhaps?

  He set off in that direction, studying the ground for any indication of footprints, but between the gravel, and the light snowfall, it as hard to see if anyone had passed. As he neared the hedges, he did notice some odd uneven marks in the garden beds, but they did not seem relevant – for surely Lady Rose would have had no reason to step there?

  He wound through the hedges, until he came to the spot he loved most, the place with the best view in the entirety of the Wrenton Hall grounds. He stopped as he always did, to look across the valley. Fear was beginning to grow within him – she had not been in the gazebo when he’d looked, and he’d seen no sign of her elsewhere. What could have happened to her?

  He stepped forward again, and something twisted under his foot. He bent to retrieve it. It was a pin – the kind that ladies used to pin their hats on, with a round polished stone on its end. A pin that he had seen, just yesterday, in Lady Rose’s bonnet. The fear closed about his heart, hard. He looked about him, carefully, but there was no sign of a bonnet – yet surely, if the pin had come loose, so would the bonnet? But perhaps she had dropped the pin, but managed to retrieve her bonnet?

  He expanded the range of his search, and, halfway down the hill towards the lake, was rewarded for his determination. In a patch of deeper snow, footprints were clearly visible – and beside them, half crumpled, and with its ribbons in a tangle, lay Lady Rose’s bonnet.

  He could not imagine anything but foul play.

  Chapter Twelve

  Cold. She was so very cold.

  That was the first thought. Followed soon after by the realisation that she was in utter darkness, save for an odd, and very faint, ghostly glow off to one side. Everything ached. She blinked, confused, then went to sit up.

  That was a mistake. Without warning, her body rebelled, and she flung herself to one side, casting up her accounts violently. Her mouth tasted like stable sweepings – or at least as she imagined they would taste. She pushed herself into a sitting position, pulling the blanket around her, and tried to think.

  The last thing that she remembered was standing amongst the hedges at Wrenton Hall, looking across the valley. And then… it was very unclear in her mind, but she thought that someone had grabbed her… and she had recognised something... something important… but what?

  It took minutes, while she stayed perfectly still, to remember. Ether. A cloth soaked in ether had been held to her face.

  Rose shivered, this time from fear. Someone obviously intended her ill. But why? And what? Why would they have taken her, and then left her here? And where was here?

  She turned her head, attempting to see. There was only darkness, and, out to both sides, that faint ghostly hint of a paler dark. She stretched her arm out as far as it would go, leaning a little to the side. Nothing. She tried the other side, and encountered what felt like wood. A shelf, of some sort?

  Cautiously, she stood, keeping the blankets clutched to her – blankets? Who had provided the blankets? – then took one step towards the wooden thing she had touched with her finger tips, grateful that it was in the opposite direction from that in which she had cast her accounts.

  She reached out again. It was definitely a shelf. Many layers of shelf, at least as tall as she was, in all. She explored it with her hands, finding that, very slowly, she was beginning to see tiny gradations in the blackness around her.

  Her hands found something – a woven basket, from the feel of it – and she reached into it, refusing to contemplate such things as spiders. Her fingers found something round, and she lifted it, bringing it close to her. A faint scent teased her nostrils. It was an apple.

  Was she in a cellar? But cellars were rarely this cold. Where else did people store food, though? And… the thought arrived slowly, as she struggled through the confusion of the situation… it was an apple… and this was nigh on Christmas. By now, most apples were eaten, sliced up, stewed and sealed in jars, or all shrivelled up… So… where might an apple survive until Christmas without suffering such a fate?

  There was only one place. She was in an ice house. She could see no other logical conclusion.

  But which ice house? And why?

  And how could she get out, before she succumbed to the cold, and simply lay down and faded away, as people had been known to do in the snow?

  She tucked the apple into the pocket of her pelisse – she could not face the thought of food yet, but she knew that she would need it, eventually.

  She began to move along the shelf, her hand never leaving it, attempting to determine the size of the place she was in. It was soon obvious that it was huge – the shelf seemed to go on forever. But, eventually, she reached an end. She stood there, looking about, and listening. Down, near her feet somewhere, she could hear a faint trickle of water – the drain for meltwater?

  Hand out before her, she very carefully stepped forward. Four steps later, her outstretched hand met a hard, cold surface. She snatched it back, for the cold was almost burning, then tentatively reached again. Almost definitely the wall of ice. She bent, and felt towards it at floor level – straw, piled against it, and off a little to the side, a dip in the floor – a dip through which cold water ran. Bending, she scooped up water with her hands, and brought it to her mouth, rinsing away the remaining disgusting taste. Then she stood again, and thought.

  If this was like the ice house that Lord Wrenton had shown her, or, terrifying thought, was the ice house that he had shown her, then logic said that she was at the far end of it, away from the entry – for that was where the meltwater went out.

  So, if she turned around, and retraced her steps along the shelf, and kept going to the other end, she should find the wall in which the exit door was located. That thought gave her courage, and she turned carefully, stepping back to the shelf, and starting out along it. She had to believe that she c
ould get out, or that someone might find her, before the cold took her. And surely the best way to attempt escape, and to stave off the cold, was to keep moving.

  She did not wish to contemplate the unanswered questions, yet her mind kept asking them

  Why was she here? Who had put her here? and… if this was Lord Wrenton’s ice house, was he somehow involved? Had her assessment of him been wrong, from the start? Her heart refused to accept that idea, but her logical mind considered it, regardless. She wanted, in that moment, to crumple to the floor and cry. She did not, she would not. To get answers, she first needed to get out of here, so that was what she would focus on.

  <<<>>>

  “My Lord.”

  Evan looked up as Chater stood in the doorway of the parlour. The room was very quiet, even though everyone was present. They had searched for some hours, and the oppressive knowledge that they had found nothing of Lady Rose but the pin and the crushed bonnet weighed heavily on them.

  “Yes?”

  “There is a… message… it was found on the kitchen doorstep, not ten minutes ago. No one knows where it came from, or how long it had been there.”

  He proffered a partly crushed sheet of paper. It was sealed with a blob of plain candle wax, and bore no inscription beyond Evan’s name. Twelve sets of eyes watched as he broke the seal and unfolded it. No one said anything. The writing was inelegant, yet still an educated hand, a little clumsy, almost as if the writer sought to write in a manner apart from their usual style. The words were stark on the yellowing page.

  Wrenton,

  By now you will realise that she is missing. If you want her back, you will do as directed, and do it rapidly. As seems appropriate for something that I wish to have keep as long as necessary, I have put my ‘insurance’ on ice, so to speak. The chances of you discovering her, before it is too late, are slim, so I would advise your rapid compliance.

  You will deliver, in a sealed box, the full details of your experimental ice house, with all necessary diagrams and documentation, plus a witnessed agreement that you will no longer pursue the commercialisation of anything that you may have discovered. The box is to be left in the courtyard of the old abbey ruins, by midday tomorrow. Do not think to set a watch on it, or to do anything other than instructed here, or she will not be returned to you.