She was musing upon the painting when, all at once, there was a blinding flash of light, and the silence was shattered by an almighty crash that seemed to echo through and through the long gallery. She ran to the window and, peering with difficulty through the driving rain, she perceived that a tree was down across one of the bridle paths that led up to the stable courtyard. Two terrified horses were galloping, riderless, along the path. Even as she watched, their grooms ran out to the animals, catching the bridles and dragging down their tossing crests.
She heard shouts and running feet and, pausing only to snatch up her shawl, she ran to the door, wrenched it open, and hurried towards the sound of voices. But she was bewildered by the maze of rooms and staircases, resulting in many minutes lost before she reached the modern part of the house. She found Sturridge in the hallway shaken but retaining his dignity. The big double doors were wide open, and the curtains were flapping wildly in the wind that roared through the chamber. He was directing two of the footmen to find blankets and boards to be used as a stretcher.
‘Sturridge, what is it? Who is hurt’ she cried breathlessly.
‘The master is not injured—but, still, it is as bad as can be, your Grace. Poor Mr Wilkinson is down under the tree, and the master holding the weight of a great branch off his chest with his own back.’
‘Oh, good God!’ She clasped her palms to her cheeks, forcing back panic by sheer will and constraining herself to think. ‘We must have props to take the weight off the Duke. What can we use?’
The old man looked around vaguely. ‘Aye, that is what I was thinking. There’s logs in the back for the fires, but I doubt they’re long enough or strong enough.’
‘No, no, that would not do,’ she cried impatiently. ‘Besides, there is no time. There, use one of those.’ She pointed at two marble columns about three feet high, which stood one on either side of the door, each surmounted by an urn filled with hothouse blooms.
‘What? The master’s marble pillars that he brought back from Greece!’
‘I daresay they have been put to stranger uses in the past two thousand years—and in worse weather, too!’ She snatched the urn off the nearest column and beckoned to two footmen standing nervously by the door. ‘You, John and—and—Robert, is it not? Can you each take an end of this pillar and run with it as fast as you can to the Duke?’ She turned on Sturridge. ‘Rope, we must have rope! Find some and follow.’
The two hefty young footmen did as they were bid, staggering a little under the weight at first but making good time. Minette, her cloak wrapped around her and her hair streaming unheeded in the wind and rain, followed them.
Fortunately, they had not far to go, for the Duke and his agent had almost reached shelter when the disaster struck. Wilkinson was unconscious, lying upon his back with one leg stretched out before him and the other twisted beneath him at an unnatural angle with jagged bone protruding through the torn and bloody cloth of his breeches. Rochford was crouched across the man’s chest, with his own weight carried upon his elbows and knees while, with his back, he held clear a half-splintered branch heavy enough to crush a man’s ribs. A group of men hovered uncertainly around them but, even as she came up to them, she heard Rochford’s voice. ‘For God’s sake, take care! This branch is just balanced enough so that I can hold it clear. One wrong move and it could crush us both.’ Even as he spoke, the trunk of the fallen oak rolled a little, and the bulk of the branch shifted. An involuntary grunt of pain was wrenched from the Duke, but he braced himself and, with a prodigious effort that cracked the muscles of his back, he eased the weight off the injured man once more. He shook the wet hair out of his eyes and saw Minette standing beside him. ‘What in God’s name are you doing here? Get back to the house at once!’
Minette took absolutely no notice of this command. Instead, she calmly directed John to angle the front end of the pillar so that it was just under the branch. It was at too low an angle to take any weight, however. Then Sturridge came staggering through the storm with a coil of rope. ‘Good. Give that to me.’
‘Eugenie! I forbid you to— Here, one of you men take the— Eugenie, are you listening to me?’
‘No.’ Carefully, Minette stepped to Rochford’s side and tossed the end of the rope across the base of the branch where it joined the fallen trunk. Then she knelt in the mud and scrabbled blindly in the hollow beneath until she found the rope end. With the greatest care, she repeated this procedure three times and then tied a knot. ‘There, I think that will hold.’ Rising, she tossed the free end of the rope across the trunk to the two footmen. ‘Sturridge, when the men pull on the rope, push that pillar upright while I hold it steady.’
‘Yes, your Grace,’ the old servant said, determinedly avoiding the Duke’s fulminating eye.
‘Now, on the count of three—one, two, three!’
The rope tautened as the two young men pulled. The tree rolled, the branch lifted clear of the Duke, and Sturridge, heaving manfully against the base of the pillar, was able to wedge it tightly so that all the weight of the timber was held up by the antique marble column. As soon as he was clear, Rochford staggered to his feet and thrust his hands under Wilkinson’s blood-soaked greatcoat. Minette and Sturridge ran to help him, and together they heaved the unfortunate agent out of danger.
‘You can let go of the rope now,’ directed Minette breathlessly, and the footmen obeyed her. The trunk rolled forward, but the prop held, only settling deeper into the mud.
Sturridge, displaying some discretion, backed away, leaving his master and mistress to stare at one another. ‘How dare you disobey me?’ demanded Rochford, wiping the back of his hand against his mouth. ‘You could have been killed.’
‘Had I not come to your rescue, I think you certainly would have been,’ countered Minette defiantly. ‘Or did you have a clever plan that I did not suspect?’
His mouth twisted. ‘I should have thought of one eventually.’ He held out his hand to her, and she put her own into it. There was a squelch of mud where their palms met. Minette tried to remain solemn, but a bubble of hysterical laughter overcame her and, after a short struggle, she burst into giggles.
Rochford stared at her, shaking his head while a rueful smile curved his mouth. ‘Is this indeed my dainty Duchess? All drenched in mud and blood, with your hair in tangles and your petticoats wet through and clinging around your ankles?’
‘It is, Sir, or will be once I have had a hot bath and put on some clean clothes.’
He bent to kiss the dirty, little hand he held. ‘I am in your debt. Thank you.’
The laughter left her face, and a lump rose in her throat. She schooled her countenance to indifference and said coolly, ‘You are not in my debt. I only did what anyone would have done.’
‘No, do not say that,’ he said quickly. ‘I have great pleasure in being under an obligation to you.’
‘I cannot conceive why you should say that.’
‘Can you not?’
‘This is a very foolish and pointless discussion,’ she said in scolding accents and, turning on her heel, trudged wearily back to the Castle.
Six
Minette did not meet the Duke again until dinner, which was served at a rather later hour than was usual. She had seen to the disposition of Mr Wilkinson in one of the Castle’s many bedchambers and returned to his bedside as soon as she had bathed and changed into a warm gown of soft brown lambswool, fashioned with a high collar of ruffled lawn and long, tight sleeves.
Dr Eastwood, punctiliously attired in a snuff-coloured frock coat and the powdered wig of his profession, peered over the top of his spectacles at her and said in the accents of one who always took a gloomy view of life, ‘It is bad, your Grace, very bad. A grave injury for a man of his years. What we call a compound fracture of the Tibialis Anterior.’
Minette was in no mood for this medical pomposity. ‘Yes, yes, I could see for myself his leg was broken. Whom should we notify? Is there a Mrs Wilkinson?’
The d
octor began packing his instruments away, first wiping those that had become bloodied upon his handkerchief. ‘No, Wilkinson has been a widower for many years. There is a daughter settled in London, I believe. It is as well if he remains at the Castle until I can arrange for a nurse to care for him in his home.’
Minette averted her gaze from the gory implements, saying with an effort, ‘Of course. I shall speak to Mrs Pritchard. I am certain the Duke will say he must stay with us as long as is needful.’
The doctor bowed his appreciation of this liberality. ‘I have given him a dose of laudanum, and no doubt he will sleep for several hours. I will send my apprentice over with an opiate draught. He will need it when he awakes. Apart from that, he must be kept warm and given only barley water and a little bouillon, for I am fairly sure he will develop a high fever before morning.’
‘Shall you return tonight?’
‘Oh, I do not think it necessary. Tomorrow morning, I shall bleed him, and that will make him very much more comfortable.’
Minette privately considered that the poor gentleman had lost enough blood already, but she made no remark, simply bestowing her hand and a smile upon the doctor before she left the bedchamber to make arrangements for the agent’s care. She had quite expected that the housekeeper would be much put out but, as she was speaking with Mrs Pritchard, it struck her that the lady’s manner was warmer—she agreed, smiling, with everything her young mistress said and seemed anxious to oblige.
‘Now, do not you worry about anything, your Grace. We will take every care of the poor gentleman. You go and eat your dinner and be sure the master gives you a glass of good red wine before you sit down. You are as pale as can be, and I am sure it is no wonder after what you did. So brave as you were!’
Minette smiled waveringly, and tears stung her eyes. She was unused to praise and rather surprised to discover that the household now regarded her as a heroine who had saved two lives, and one of those that of their adored master. As she made her way to the little salon that opened into the dining room, she was met on every side by smiling faces and little murmurs of appreciation.
She found Rochford waiting for her. He, too, had washed the mud from his person and changed his stained riding coat and buckskin breeches for a neat, double-breasted coat of dark blue wool and tight yellow pantaloons. He moved somewhat stiffly, as though his back ached, but did not seem otherwise the worse for his misadventure. ‘Eugénie, my dear, come sit by the fire. You are chilled.’
‘No, not at all.’ Her teeth chattered, and she gave an involuntary shiver. ‘Well, perhaps a little.’
He picked up a decanter and poured a generous measure of Burgundy into a glass. ‘Drink this. It will do you good.’
She smiled up at him and took the glass from his hand. His fingers brushed hers for just a moment, and it was as though she touched a flame. Her hand shook slightly, and he bent his gaze upon her with concern. ‘It was foolish to go out in this weather when you have so recently recovered from the influenza. I say nothing of the sheer lunacy of putting yourself in danger as you did.’
She sipped her wine and said with creditable composure, ‘You make too much of it. I was never in the least danger.’ She relaxed as the warm glow of the wine soothed her, and she allowed herself to sink back against the cushions of her chair, grateful that Grandmère, who never allowed her spine to touch the back of a chair, was not there to scold her for her slovenly posture. ‘How did it come about that you were in that dreadful fix? I mean with the tree lying across you like that?’
‘Believe me, it was quite unintentional. I had no ambition to play the hero. Wilkinson’s horse reared and threw him when the lightning struck. He was quite clear of the tree when I went to assist him, but the trunk shifted and rolled in the mud, and that damn branch came down on top of us both.’
‘Intentional or not, Mr Wilkinson certainly owes his life to you.’
‘Nothing so dramatic! I, unlike you, really was not in the least danger.’
She twinkled up at him. ‘Shall we agree that neither of us did anything at all noteworthy and drop the subject?’
He shook his head. ‘There, I cannot agree with you but, by all means, let us talk about something else. For instance, just why did the girl, who once upon a time could not bear to look at me, risk her own life to save mine?’
There was a glow in his face that she had never seen in his or any other man’s. A glow of admiration and something warmer. The wine caught in the back of her throat, and a sudden recollection sobered her. This was Génie’s husband, not hers. And Génie loathed him! Why she should do so, her twin would never understand; but since it was so, it was her clear duty to repulse him. She could not transform this loveless marriage into a fairy-tale romance for her own sake and then, when the time came for her to leave, condemn Rochford to disillusion and bitterness. At least he had cared no more for Génie than she did for him. She should not, must not, allow her own feelings to intrude or influence his.
So she said in a hard little voice, ‘You are being quite absurd. I told you I would have done as much for anyone in danger. And you are quite mistaken in thinking I could not bear to look at you. The truth is I did not give the matter a thought.’
Two lines became visible above his nose in a quick frown, but he did not appear to be angry. When he answered her, his tone was that of a man attempting to work out a conundrum. ‘No, this is not you. I understand that you wish to set me at a distance for some reason, but it is not you.’
‘Of course, it is me. Who else could it be? I do not understand you.’
‘You mistake me. I meant that you have been playing a part since our marriage but, for some reason, since you returned to me, you have not been able to keep it up.’
‘You are quite mistaken!’
‘Am I? Let us make an experiment.’ He bent over her, delicately cupped her face between his hands, and pressed his lips to hers for a long moment. In spite of all her resolutions, her mouth quivered beneath his and her hand stole up to caress his scarred cheek.
When he released her, he was as pale as she was fiery red. ‘Eugénie, my dear, I—’
They were interrupted by Sturridge who, regarding them with an approving eye, announced, ‘Dinner is served, your Grace.’
Not for nothing had Minette been raised by the Marquise de Montauban. She knew that nothing was more vulgar than to wear one’s heart upon one’s sleeve. She could never hope to emulate Génie’s glittering charm, but no one who observed her calmly consuming a light repast while maintaining an effortless conversation with Rochford could have guessed that she was suffering inner turmoil.
She had the impression that Rochford, too, was conversing very much at random. His gaze rarely left her face, and his expression was still that of a man confronting an enigma. At one point, he did bethink himself of the fate of his agent and asked, ‘Does Wilkinson have everything he needs?’
‘Mrs Pritchard has him in charge,’ she answered. ‘He was sleeping when I left him. There is nothing to be done but to keep him warm and feed him liquids when he awakes.’
‘Poor old fellow. He should retire, but I have not the heart to suggest it.’
‘Why do you say that?’
He glanced at her questioningly. ‘Are you really interested?’
‘Why should I not be?’
‘Because the last time you visited Camer you made it perfectly apparent that you were counting the moments until you could return to Town.’
She flushed and cast her eyes down to her plate. She was making mistake after mistake; Grandmère and Génie should have known how it would be. Rochford suspected something, there was no doubt, but she trusted the truth was too fantastic to occur to him. She shrugged and said lightly, ‘But since then I have suffered such ennui in Town. Always the same people, the same parties. A period in the country makes a refreshing interlude.’
‘I am delighted to hear it.’ He continued to converse amiably. That dreamlike encounter before dinner might
have never occurred. But, foolishly, she could still feel the pressure of his lips upon hers, and she was very sure that, beneath his cool courtesy, Rochford was thinking of little else.
Yet, when she rose from her seat to withdraw and leave him to his port, he surprised her by saying, ‘I shall say goodnight and farewell for the time being. I have no doubt you wish to retire to rest after your adventures, and I shall have left for London by the time you are awake.’
‘Oh? You are leaving? I did not know.’
‘I have already stayed longer than I originally intended. I have engagements in Town that I must not neglect.’
Fleetingly, she wondered if one of those engagements would be with Lady Ashbury and was quite shocked by the stab of jealousy that pierced her at the notion.
He strolled forward to open the wide double doors for her, waving aside the wooden-faced footman. He took her hand and bowed over it as though to a mere acquaintance and just brushed his lips against her hand. ‘I hope you will continue to find the countryside refreshing. If, however, you should begin to find it dull, recollect I shall be sending my little sister to relieve your solitude.’
She smiled with great sweetness. ‘I shall look forward to having her with me.’
‘Do you know, I believe you will,’ he answered. ‘You are really most—er—unexpected.’
Seven
It was just a week later that a travelling carriage drawn by four handsome chestnuts clattered into the courtyard and halted outside the massive doorway. There had been a heavy fall of snow the previous night, and the Castle now appeared like some enchanter’s stronghold, the towers and gables heavy with snow that gleamed in the cold sunshine and bathed the whole courtyard in reflected light. It produced an eerie and slightly sinister effect.
However, mystery was banished when the steps were let down and a girl jumped impatiently from the top step and ran into the house, almost colliding with Minette, who had hurried downstairs to meet her, delighted to be relieved of her solitude. She had lost even the dubious distraction of Wilkinson’s presence when that gentleman’s daughter had arrived and whisked him away to her London home in the Duke’s well-sprung carriage. The days that followed had been dreary beyond belief, and only anticipating the arrival of Rochford’s little sister had enabled her to support her spirits.
Magical Masquerade: A Regency Masquerade Page 4