“They took all of Mistress Elizabeth’s money.”
“No!” Dorothea’s hand flew to her mouth. “Not your entire fortune.”
“Of course not,” Elizabeth snapped, irritated by what she considered her stepmother’s inappropriate concern.
None too gently, Stafford pushed Grace away. “How much, Elizabeth?”
Grace shook herself like a dog who had just emerged from a lake. “It was more than two hundred pounds, m’lord.”
“It was less than twenty.”
“But Mistress—”
“I know how much I lost!”
Elizabeth felt her father’s arms tighten around her. “I’m just glad you weren’t hurt,” he said. “And since you have much more on account, ’tis no calamity.”
“I thought you told us you were going to return with the first installment of our loan.” Beneath her powder, Dorothea’s face was as white as curdled milk. “Which is it, Elizabeth, twenty pounds or two hundred?”
“I assure you, everything is fine. My funds are still intact.” Handing Papa her statue and parasol, she retrieved her bank statement from her traveling bag. “It’s all here on account,” she said, waving the paper in front of a dozen startled faces. “The robbery was a minor matter, I tell you. The highwaymen were courteous and apologetic, a couple of patricians down on their luck.”
“Patricians, my arse.” Stafford jerked the statement from her hand. “This looks fraudulent to me, my dear. I suspect you’ve not only been robbed, but you’ve been duped by your publisher, which is hardly a surprising turn of events. Women have no place in the business world.”
Elizabeth snatched the paper back. “Enough! I know what I’m worth, and I know what I was robbed of, and I refuse to discuss this further.”
“My dear Elizabeth,” Stafford said, his voice and manner solicitous, the attitude of a rational man attempting to soothe an hysterical woman. “You’ve so often told me that your scribbling would afford you a decent living. I fear, however, that you have no head for figures, and I suspect that you’ve been deluded by a disreputable businessman. Which means, my dear, that you’ve risked spinsterhood for naught.”
Elizabeth pictured the Beresfords’ palatial town house, her shelf of published books, the sums she had periodically withdrawn from her account, and she felt like whacking Stafford over the skull with her parasol. “If your name headed this document,” she said scornfully, “you would have no doubt as to its authenticity. You seek to discredit me and Minerva Press simply because it angers you that a woman can earn a comfortable livelihood through her own efforts.”
“My beautiful Elizabeth, how I do admire your spirit. Unfortunately, locked up with your books, you know nothing about the real world. Twenty pounds is hardly a comfortable livelihood.” He held up a hand to still her heated protests. “Nevertheless, you have been robbed, no matter how paltry the sum. Since today is Sunday, the Sunday Trading Act relieves the authorities of any responsibility. I mean, of course, for the reimbursement of your money.”
“Yes. And since it was such a paltry sum, I don’t even plan to pursue it.”
“What? Do you have a fever? Are you overcome with fear?” Stafford stretched to his full height and looked down his long narrow nose, as he always did when trying to intimidate her. “Of course you’ll pursue it. You must. Those blackguards will not stop with one coach. Now, give me a description of them, anything you can remember. I shall attempt to jog your memory with pointed questions. What were their clothes like? Their accents? What kind of horses were they riding?”
“It was dark. I couldn’t see well. Their horses looked like horses. They wore masks.” She smiled. “The men wore masks, not the horses.”
“One was hugely tall with a big belly,” Grace offered. “And the other one wore a black cloth over his face, and his hair was dark, I think.”
“What else?”
“They both had pistols, and the dark-haired one pointed his at Mistress Elizabeth.”
“Yes?” Stafford prompted impatiently. “What else?”
Grace considered. “I was so scared, m’lord.”
With her maid’s powers of observation, Elizabeth figured the highwaymen were in no immediate danger. Stafford then questioned the coachmen and guard, who recalled little more than the pistols and masks.
“I am sorry this happened,” said Lawrence, still holding Elizabeth’s parasol and bronze. With his free hand, he patted her head. “It was fortunate you did not carry a large sum on your person.” He glanced toward Dorothea, then focused on Elizabeth again. “That’s my Bess. ’Tis a blessing you inherited your brains from your mother, not your old papa.”
“We must pursue this in all haste,” Stafford told Lawrence, who was one of the local constables. “If those brigands think to terrorize the Dales and thwart me, their reign will be short, their end brutal.”
“Aye. So it will, m’lord.”
The men gathered together in an excited cluster. The ladies, save for Dorothea, comforted Grace.
Brown eyes bright, Dorothea faced Elizabeth and spoke in a low, angry voice. “You’d better hope Lord Stafford is wrong and you are still a wealthy woman. If there’s no two thousand pounds on account, in a few months’ time you’ll lose your entire inheritance, and your father and I will be homeless. How will you feel about that?”
“Before Papa wed you, he seldom gambled,” Elizabeth replied. “Perhaps his marital unhappiness has forced him into reckless habits.”
“Your father always gambled. If you think otherwise, your illusions have become reality.” Dorothea lifted her chin, and with an air of dignity remarkable in so petite a woman, she walked back toward the inn.
Clutching her traveling bag, Elizabeth followed. “Welcome home,” she muttered.
But everything wasn’t pure disaster. Far from it. John Randolph was in the Dales and they would meet again. He had said so. She would make certain of it. He had promised to return her money, and somehow she knew, deep down inside, that John was a man who honored his vows. The only danger lay in Lord Stafford finding him before she did. But Stafford couldn’t find his way home. How could he be expected to find a couple of highwaymen intent on hiding from him?
After she met up with John, she would retrieve her two hundred pounds and talk him into giving up his life of crime.
Then what? Perhaps she’d write a novel about him, something like Confessions of a Former Highwayman.
Reforming John would be the first order of the day, Elizabeth calculated.
She couldn’t let herself fall in love with a man who might end up swinging from a hangman’s noose.
Seven
And Lady Guinevere murmured to her beloved, with tears trembling at the corners of her shining eyes, “Dearest husband. Now we shall ne’er be parted again.”
Elizabeth put down her quill and rubbed her temples. With that paragraph, Castles of Doom was completed. It had taken her eight weeks, during which she had been plagued with nightmares and distracted by her search for John. Yet, ultimately, she had triumphed. Rather than relate the rebels’ true fate, she had consigned Simon de Montfort and Ralf Darkstarre to exile in France. Tomorrow she would post the manuscript, and soon she would be reading flattering reviews, or scathing ones, depending upon its reception.
She wondered what James Waterman would think. Perhaps the library curator would simply shrug his stooped shoulders and condemn her to his list of “silly writers.” On the other hand, Simon de Montfort was probably laughing at her from the bowels of the earth, sharing his mirth with Ranulf the Black and Lucifer.
The candle flame atop the girandole sputtered, as if from a sudden draft. Elizabeth stretched, then massaged her stiff neck. Outside, mist painted the diamond panes of her casement window. It was a night reminiscent of the night when she’d last seen John.
Since then, the Gentleman Giant and h
is Quiet Companion had plagued the Dales. They had proven remarkably resourceful—and active. In addition to the usual mélange of thefts, they had robbed post boys carrying mail from York, and they had even prigged a coach while it was changing horses in Middleham, virtually under Lord Stafford’s aristocratic nose.
Despite his abominable language and disgraceful behavior toward Elizabeth, the Gentleman Giant treated others graciously. Lawrence Wyndham told of interviewing a lady who had refused to part with her favorite ring. The gallant Giant had said that a kiss on the lovely hand wearing it would constitute fair trade.
John, however, remained a nebulous figure. Nebulous to Elizabeth, as well. He had obviously lied about seeing her again, although he couldn’t simply present himself at the White Hart and ask for Miss Wyndham. She had questioned everyone who might have conceivably come in contact with John, from Woodale to Horsehouse, clear to Middleham. But she had invariably been met by blank looks, or sly winks, or a curt shake of the head. Nobody seemed to know anything at all about the slender, dark-haired highwayman.
Small wonder John and his companion have achieved such success, she thought with an unladylike snort. They must be bribing half the Dales.
A coachman’s horn blasted, announcing the arrival of yet another carriage. Elizabeth drew her shawl closer around her neck and shoulders, hiding the white fichu that adorned her blue woolen dress. The very stones of the wall seemed to radiate cold, and she fancied she could decipher faces clinging to the window panes—spectral faces bleeding into drops of rain.
Suddenly, inexplicably, she thought of the watchers who had attended her mother’s funeral. They had waited for Barbara to move, but Barbara had remained motionless. They had watched to see if Barbara would bleed, but she hadn’t bled.
Elizabeth heaved a deep sigh. Even after twenty-one years, she still thought of the watchers when her mood was melancholy or the night’s shadows lay especially heavy, like cobwebs inside a long-abandoned room.
“Stop this,” she admonished, but her normally comfortable bedroom had been transformed into an alien, sinister place. The fog swirled against her ground floor window. Quickly, Elizabeth stood, causing the girandole’s flames to dance. The melting wax from one of the candles coiled round its shaft and spilled beyond its holder, in the manner of a winding sheet.
A bad omen.
“Ridiculous,” she whispered. Good Lord, she should be celebrating. Her career was intact, her literary reputation saved, and soon she would regain her inheritance. Except for her failure to find John, life couldn’t be better. Well, it could. Charles Beresford could send her the money he owed her, Walter Stafford could leave the Dales, and Dorothea could—no!
It was better not to contemplate a fitting fate for her stepmother. Elizabeth had already consigned Dorothea to the rack in The Conqueror’s Conquest. For her next endeavor, she thought she might place Dorothea inside an iron maiden. And snakes would add a nice touch. Dorothea was terrified of snakes.
As soon as Elizabeth entered the common room, she was enveloped by a feeling of warmth and good cheer. An inviting fire burned in the huge stone fireplace. The air was redolent with tobacco, pork pies, wet wool, smoke, and hickory. Servants bearing pewter trays loaded with food and homemade beer scurried to and from tables, accompanied by clacking plates, conversation, and a sprightly tune, compliments of Dorothea and her pianoforte.
Elizabeth crossed to her father, who was shaking awake one of the regulars, asleep at the bar. “I’m all finished, Papa,” she said. “We shall post the manuscript tomorrow and instruct Mr. Beresford to send the whole amount you need by return post. He should have sent the money after my London visit, but in his last letter he said he was waiting for the completion of Castles. Now ’tis finished, and we still have six more weeks before your note is due.”
Lawrence had become increasingly morose as the mortgage deadline neared. Face brightening, he said, “I promise I shall never look at another card or bet on another cock fight for the rest of my life, Bess. I’ve learned my lesson.”
Dorothea launched into a new melody. Passengers from the latest coach settled at their respective tables. A sprinkling of lords and ladies, some wearing far more jewelry than was safe considering recent circumstances, supped on the roast capon, lamb, and pork pies. A young couple, the woman with a baby in her arms, lounged on a bench near the door. The baby had huge brown eyes that seemed to register awe at everything it witnessed, from its mother’s finger to the swinging pendulum of a nearby grandfather clock. Elizabeth quickly passed the family on her way to the parlor. Cozy domestic scenes—and babies, especially babies—were better ignored. Sometimes, when she considered how she had forfeited children along with marriage, she felt a deep, aching sorrow. She told herself that the mothering instinct was just another basic animal urge, like the need to protect one’s territory. After all, she lived in an age of reason, where everything could be explained away by science, including inappropriate yearnings.
The parlor was deserted save for a handful of locals playing cards or billiards. Since John’s arrival, Elizabeth figured business had decreased by half.
“Be ye ready t’ finish our draughts game, Miss Elizabeth?” called out Daniel, one of the regulars.
She slid across the bench opposite him. “I’ve not bested you in so long, I don’t know why you bother.” Daniel had recently lost his wife of forty years, and he spent much of his time at the inn. Although Elizabeth made it a point of honor never to acquiesce to a man in anything, she generally let Daniel triumph.
While he agonized over every move, her mind swirled as relentlessly as the fog. Where was John tonight? she wondered, drumming her fingers on the tabletop. Was he gazing into the darkness, remembering their all too brief encounters?
Hardly, she thought, expelling her breath on a derisive sigh. A man of broken promises is what ye be.
Suddenly, Elizabeth had the strangest feeling she’d uttered those exact words before, and she couldn’t control the small gasp that escaped her lips.
“Don’t be so impatient,” Daniel admonished. “You young folks nowadays are always in such a hurry.”
“I wasn’t. I’m not in a hurry, truly.” How could she explain that her gasp had been evoked by fear, not impatience?
While Daniel tentatively fingered the board, Elizabeth vowed to ignore her recent unease. Instead, she contemplated her next move—with John.
Once she had retrieved her two hundred pounds, she would forget him, for the truth was plain enough. He didn’t care one whit about her. If he did, he would have been as irresistibly drawn to her as Ralf Darkstarre had been drawn to Guinevere. Besides, while John was attractive, he was a disreputable sort of handsome. Chapbooks wrote that highwaymen were romantic and dangerous and bound for the gallows, where women would weep and men would cheer. Which seemed an apt summation of John and his impending fate.
I won’t shed a tear, she vowed. You are neither a proper hero nor a proper villain, John Randolph. My lovers would never be so cavalier in their treatment of the heroine. They would not dare, or I would kill them off in the first chapter.
“I’ve bested ye again,” Daniel cackled. “A second game, Miss Elizabeth?”
She shook her head. “I believe I shall go for a ride.”
“In this weather?” Daniel gestured with his pipe toward the window, where mist clung to the glass like a frightened child. “’Tisn’t fit for man nor beastie.”
“Then it should suit me just fine.”
Vapor rimmed the wooden sign above the inn’s front door. The painted white hart seemed to leap from the surrounding darkness, as if seeking the warmth and laughter of the interior. Elizabeth raised her face to the drizzle, perversely enjoying its cool caress against her cheeks and brow. Heading toward the stables, her petticoats swished upon the cobblestones like whispered voices, and once again she thought of the watchers.
What is wro
ng with me tonight?
As she passed the shoeing shed and smithy, she heard a man say, “Pay close attention, you dolt,” and she stiffened like a fox who had just heard the first bay of hounds.
“You must check every cloak-bag,” Walter Stafford continued. “If you find one empty, sound the alarm. Highwaymen carry bags for show rather than to burden their horses.”
“Damn,” Elizabeth breathed. She had thought Stafford would be well on his way home by now. Yet here he was, making a nuisance of himself with poor Tim the Ostler.
“Aye, m’lord,” said Tim. “Ye’ve told me all this before.”
“Notify Master Wyndham immediately if any guest seems unduly concerned over the owners of the horses,” Stafford persevered. “Or if they question you about the owners’ occupations, their destinations, or when they plan to resume their journ—why, Elizabeth, what are you doing out here?”
“Obviously, I’m taking a stroll.”
Stafford held her knuckles to his lips, and the ruby ring on his finger caught the stable light. “You are looking especially enchanting this evening, my dear.” He rearranged her shawl, which had slipped from one shoulder. Then he tsked his tongue against the roof of his mouth. “Whatever could you have been thinking of to have left your hat and gloves inside?”
“I was contemplating a brief stroll, my lord, alone.”
Walter Stafford hesitated, unsure whether to use the frontal assault he usually reserved for his social inferiors, or to feint. With Elizabeth Wyndham, one never knew what might work, if anything would. The woman was a conundrum, which was precisely the reason why he had been unable to forget her.
“Dear Elizabeth, this meeting is extremely fortuitous,” he said, bowing his head so that his nose was leveled at her thick dark lashes. “I see so little of you these days with your writing and other, er, pastimes. Really, all that close work must be hard on your eyes, not to mention your personal life.” Stroking the froth of lace at his throat, he laughed mirthlessly.
Angry, Elizabeth refused to look at him. Instead, she stared at the ruby on his ring, which glistened like a drop of fresh-pricked blood.
The Landlord's Black-Eyed Daughter Page 7