The Untold Tale of the Winter Duchess: A Historical Regency Romance Novel

by Emma Linfield

  “They were all of that,” he replied. “But they are down to stay, I think.”

  “They enjoy bedtime chats with you,” Lillian said. “Sometimes they will talk about what you discussed the next day. But not always,” she held up a hand, “I have never known them to divulge a confidence.”

  “That’s a relief. I feared that my entire moral code was about to be spread out before the world.”

  “No, no. They talk about things like going fishing with you and whether they will be allowed to go hunting next year. Your secrets are safe, Your Grace.”

  Sebastian felt as if the word “guilty” was blazoned across his brow, but he said, “Well, it is good to know. How are you? Do you feel as if you could sit a few minutes still?”

  “A very few. I have a feeling that Martha Louisa will be here to chase me back to bed shortly.”

  “Where is Martha Louisa?”

  “Walking her beau back to his pallet by the fire downstairs. Have no fear, they are chaperoned by more than half the village, all of whom are bursting with delight at the romance that is finally blossoming.”

  “Is there one, truly?”

  “There is. It seems that they were an item when they were younger, but Martha Louisa wanted to earn her own way. And she completely cannot abide dogs in the house.”

  “Oh, my, now that would be a problem. I’ll have to see to it that there is a way to build Mr. Rowe a stout kennel that will be snug and dry for his hounds. It would not do for him to have to give up breeding, he has built up a fine reputation.”

  “I think she might budge on that point a little bit, because she was upset about the dogs being poisoned.”

  “If I can make someone’s romance run a little more smoothly, I shall. Besides, it gives Parkforton a certain cache to have the finest hunting and tracking hounds around.”

  “I see. All for the reputation of Parkforton.” Lillian smiled warmly at him.

  “Shall I help you back to your room now, Miss Doyle?” Martha Louisa asked from the doorway.

  “I am reluctant for the evening to be over, this has been so pleasant,” Lillian said.

  “We can do it again tomorrow,” Sebastian assured her.

  “With everyone?” she asked, a twinkle in her eye.

  “With everyone,” he said, catching her meaning. “But for now, Martha Louisa is reminding me that we promised to have you back to your boudoir before the Chanticleers of the world start singing.”

  Lillian laughed, and extended her hand to him.

  Sebastian took it, and gently kissed her knuckles. “Until tomorrow,” he said, lightly squeezing her fingers.”

  “Until tomorrow,” Lillian replied, squeezing back.

  She then carefully stood up out of the wingback chair on her own, but consented to lean on Martha Louisa’s arm as she went back to her room.

  Sebastian sat down in his wingback before the schoolroom fire and stared into the flames for a long time, thinking over the events and conversations of the day.

  Chapter 38

  Lillian huddled under the covers of her bed, fighting off the urge to get up and flee this very minute. It was almost Twelfth Night. She had meant to be gone before Twelfth Night. It was the coward’s way out, but that was the direction she had taken from the start. She had believed her maid,Heloise, that she would be accused of Charles’ death and arrested for it.

  It was still true, really. She would be accused of Charles’ death, and she would be hanged for murder. That she had nothing to do with it made no difference at all.

  So Sebastian had sent a letter to his lawyer. That was why the constable was here, not because she had been attacked. She was so weak from her illness, she could scarcely stand. How could she possibly get away? Where could she run if she did? Sebastian might believe her. Might have believed her if she had told him the truth at the start, but now…how could he believe her now?

  Had he realized that she could hear most of his conversations with the boys? He said that he was sure that she was in trouble. Oh, that was an understatement of such magnitude as to be the pea beneath the royal princess mattress.

  At least Martha Louisa had consented to go back to her own chambers. Although her spots still itched a little, most of them were gone. Lillian had heard what Dr. Gavril had said about them going back in if she didn’t let them fade on their own, but she would just have to take the chance. She had a little while before Sebastian would ask again. She would have to use it to grow strong enough to run again.

  With that resolve, Lillian cuddled down in the blankets and comforters of the soft bed. She would enjoy the snuggly warmth one more night, but tomorrow, she must find a way to go. Wrapped as much in the regard she had received from the household as the warm blankets, she closed her eyes and slept.

  When morning came, Lillian found that she felt much better. She insisted on getting dressed, although she acquiesced to wearing a simple woolen gown with the loosest of stays, and three flannel petticoats beneath it. It felt good to stand up and move.

  While she was at breakfast, Sebastian, who was still in a heavy house robe, brought a gift. “These belonged to my father,” he explained as he handed a pair of blue-tinted eye shades to her. “No one has worn them since his death. I talked with Dr. Gavril. These will allow you to be up and about without the risk of eye strain.”

  “What about your brothers?” Lillian asked.

  “Have no fear. They have their pairs also. Meanwhile the village glassmaker and the blacksmith are colluding on how to make more so everyone in the village can have a pair. They are about to become all the rage, I believe.”

  Lillian laughed, in spite of herself. He was so kind, so endearing, so thoughtful. How could she have brought him the possibility of the pain and misery of sheltering someone accused of murder? No, she could not do that. She must slip away today, and these glasses would help make it possible.

  “Thank you, Your Grace. They are splendid. And I am sure that the ones the smith and glassmaker will create will be wonderful as well. Your blacksmith does some very beautiful work, almost as fine as a jeweler.”

  “Oh, did I neglect to mention that the jeweler is helping also? These will be very splendid glass shades, even if the sparkling decorations are cut glass rather than gems.”

  “Perhaps you are creating a Parkforton industry,” Lillian suggested.

  “Perhaps I am. Goodness knows we could use a little good fortune around here. See what you have inspired, Lillian?”

  Oh, see, indeed. Oh, by all the saints, I must leave before I hurt him. How can I explain? Write a note? Hide it somewhere. Yes. That is what I will do.

  It was all Lillian could do to smile at Sebastian and not let her trembling hands betray her as she put the glass shades on. “How do I look?”

  “Splendid and mysterious. I can scarcely wait for a warm spell so that we can go walking out.”

  Oh, Sebastian. I can’t wait for a warm spell, and I can’t go walking out with you. I have to disappear, which means I won’t be able to keep your wonderful glasses because they would be too noticeable.

  Lillian’s smile warmed. “Sebastian, you are so wonderful to me. I can recall no one who has been more wonderful or more dear.”

  “That sounds suspiciously like a good-bye,” he said.

  Oh, you perceptive, sensitive gentleman. “Just a heartfelt thank you, Your Grace. I will never be able to repay you.”

  “Of course you will. Tomorrow is January 6th, Twelfth Night. At the bonfire where we burn all the decorations and welcome in the New Year, I will ask you that important question again.”

  “I shall look forward to it, Your Grace.” Now her hands did tremble, and she could not stop them.

  Sebastian folded her two, cold little hands in his big warm ones and said, “Don’t be afraid, Lillian. Everything will work out, you will see.”

  As soon as Sebastian was out of the room, Lillian added another woolen dress over the one she wore and took the fleece-lined leather clo
ak out of the closet. It was too fine, but she would need the glasses and the cloak to be able to get as far as she could before Sebastian realized she was gone.

  They say that when you lie down in the snow, it begins to feel warm as you die. That you go peacefully, without pain. It has to be better than strangling or having your neck broken at the end of a rope.

  Lillian quickly dashed off a letter explaining what had happened in London, blew on the ink to dry it, and tucked it into the copy of Canterbury Tales. She did not want to smirch the Arabian Nights or Aesop’s Fables with her pitiful story.

  She pulled on her cloak, checked the hall in the schoolroom area, and finding it empty, slipped away down the servants’ stair. Instead of going into the bustling kitchen, she took the side door out into the gardens and quietly lost herself in the maze.

  Lillian had looked down on the maze from her window and she thought she understood its secret. There was a way out into the forest on the other side.

  The sun was very bright, and it made the snow glitter almost unbearably. When Lillian saw her own footprints in the snow, she knew that she had taken a wrong turn, and had to trace her steps almost all the way back to the beginning. It was nearly dusk when she slipped out into the forest on the other side.

  Already cold and more than a little frightened, Lillian almost gave up on her plan. But she could not bring herself to pull down that kind of trouble on Sebastian, Luke, and Nicholas. No, better that she walk and walk until she had no energy left, and then to become a skeleton that would be found in the spring.

  Suicide truly was the coward’s way out. Charles had told her that on more than one occasion. What would he think of her now, in her brown, woolen stuff gown with four layers of petticoats on beneath and wrapped in a cloak so old that it must have been out of fashion before she was born?

  She didn’t care. It was silly to wear layers of warm clothing when you planned to deliberately freeze yourself to death, but she could not face the cold in her nightgown. Nor did she want to advertise the idea that she had deliberately planned to lie down in the snow.

  Lillian started walkingup the graveled path from the maze. The way was marked with tall pickets on each side that eventually gave way to simple fence posts.

  As she kept walking, the fence ended, and only markers pushed up out of the drifted crunchy snow. When she came out in a meadow, she realized that she was in the meadow where she had arrived and stumbled into the hut. Now, there was only a blackened ruin where it had stood.

  I should have just died then. It would have saved so much trouble. But I wouldn’t have met Sebastian or the boys, or met any of the villagers. I wouldn’t have known what love is or how many kinds there can be. I have that, and I do not regret it.

  Lillian made her way around the edge of the meadow to keep from leaving an obvious trail across it. The moon rose, casting a surreal light across the snow. The shadows of the evergreens were deeper because of it. She was just starting up the steep path on the other side when someone grabbed her by the shoulder and yanked her cloak tight up around her so she couldn’t move.

  “There you are!” a man’s voice hissed. “I knew you would run eventually. Did you really have measles or was it all a farce? Did you paint yourself with dots? Did you pay the physician to tell your new lover that you were ill?”

  “No. And I wish I were still contagious so that whoever you are you could have them too. I have never felt so miserable in my life. Who are you, anyway?”

  “I am the bounty hunter hired to catch you, foul murderess, and bring you to justice.”

  “You aren’t a constable.”

  “Oh, I used to be a constable. But constables are poor saps who work for a pittance. Now, I do much the same work, but I get paid a lot better.”

  “Was there ever a constable?”

  “Oh, yes. He’s up there in the tree line. If he’s lucky, someone will find him before the wolves eat him or he freezes to death. You are going to be blamed for his death, too.”

  “Why are you doing this? What have I ever done to deserve such treatment?”

  “Really, I have no idea. I’m just doing what I was hired to do. But by morning, you will, no doubt, have answers to your questions. Billy Bob?”

  A tall young man stepped from the shadows. Lillian recognized the way he stood and moved. He was the man who had attacked her in the garden.

  “She the one, Billy Bob?”

  “That’s the mort,” the lanky man replied. “An’ I’m gonna take great pleasure in returnin’ the favor that gardner did me. Just say the word, Honest John. Just say the word.”

  “Let’s go deliver the package, then we’ll find out what our employer wants to do. Might could be she’s to swing. I’m thinkin’ that might be the way of it.”

  “But why?” Lillian burst out. “I didn’t do anything. I am innocent.”

  “That’s what they all say,” drawled Honest John. “But I say guilty until proven innocent. It don’ matter none to me. All that matters to me is I get paid. Innocence and guilt is up to someone else.”

  “Tell me then. Of what am I accused?”

  “Oh, that. You’re accused of murdering your husband. An’ you’re going to be accused of murdering the constable. You didn’t want to meet him because he would prove you guilty, remember?”

  “But Lord Sebastian will know that he isn’t the man who came to the castle.”

  They came out into a small clearing at the top of the hill, where a man was tied against a tree. Honest John walked over to the man, and lifted his sagging head by the hair. “Oh, I don’t think there’ll be any problem identifying him. You see, he’s my twin brother.”

  Lillian stared at him in horror, too stunned to even struggle against Billy Bob, who now held her cloak fast around her. “You are going to kill your own brother?”

  “Well, he ain’t rightly much of a brother. We wus separated at birth, like, an’ for a while there we wuz both constables. We used to pull off some pretty good capers, lookin’ so much alike. But I got wise, and he stayed a plain old constable, workin’ for a copper a day.”

  “But surely that isn’t a reason for fratricide. You can’t just kill him.”

  “No,” said a sweet and all too familiar voice, “He isn’t going to kill him. You are, Lady Lillian.”

  Chapter 39

  January 6th at Parkforton had dawned clear and cold. When Sebastian returned to his rooms after delivering the glass shades to Lillian, a message was waiting for him, was required at the parsonage. “Rough work clothes,” he directed his valet. “I’ll need to wear something I can peel off in layers if I need to work.”

  The slender man who cared for his wardrobe and his person looked faintly scandalized at the idea of a member of the aristocracy doing any work, but he only said, “Of course, Your Grace. Will you have country ordinary or hunting garments?”

  “Country ordinary, if you please. I’ll be about the village most of the day, I don’t doubt.”

  Sebastian hurried down the stairs, pausing only to grab a quick bite in the dining hall, where trestle tables were laden with foods that people could grab in passing. Formal dining was impossible with the press of people housed in the castle. A meat roll and a cup of tea were sufficient sustenance for the moment.

  Sebastian stepped out into a glittering world of nearly blinding brightness after the gloom of the previous several days. The mild sunlight was reflected off nearly every surface, as the buildings, trees and shrubs were all liberally coated with snow and ice. The limbs of the trees bent low to the ground, and in some places they had broken off. It boded ill for the next season’s fruit crops.

  As he walked, a tree limb broke, giving off a report that sounded almost like a gunshot. Sebastian flinched but kept on walking down to the chapel and the parsonage.

  Parson Jamison waved to him from the chapel door as Sebastian approached. “Come in out of the cold,” he called.

  “Good morning, Parson. You sent word that you needed to
see me?”

  “Indeed, Your Grace, I did. Many of our sufferers are beginning to recover, but will not be fully well for some days yet. I understand that plans are underway to make eyeshades for everyone?”

  “You have heard correctly. It seems the blacksmith, glassblower, and jeweler are combining forces to create many pairs. Miss Doyle jokingly suggested that they might be starting an industry for Parkforton.”

  “Ho, ho!” the parson laughed. “That one! Such an imagination, and sometimes right on top of things. Dr. Gavril was here, and says that she is recovering nicely, as are many of our patients housed in the chapel.”

  “But you did not send for me to talk of eye shades and cottage industries,” Sebastian lifted his eyebrows in query.