"Then, I'm coming, too."
"Ashleigh, are you out of your mind?" Brett looked at her as if she'd grown horns.
"I'll leave you two to sort it out between you," Patrick muttered. Turning abruptly, he ran toward the head of the stairs.
"Ashleigh." Brett placed a staying hand on his wife's arm as she started for her dressing room. "Till now, I wasn't aware pregnancy affected a woman's wits."
"I'm as sane as a bishop, Brett Westmont! If it were your friend in trouble—"
"Then, prove it to me," he said gently. "Sweetheart, what's this all about?"
She heaved a sigh. "Will you at least allow me to dress while I explain? It will save time if I'm able to convince you I must go, and"—she shrugged—"well, no harm done if you still feel I'm mad to suggest it."
"Fair enough," he said, ushering her gently toward the dressing room with a pat on her bottom.
"There's really no need for you to dress as well," she told him as he followed her. Out of the corner of her eye, Ashleigh noted he was gathering up the apparel he'd discarded earlier—Brett had his own dressing room, but he was too impatient a lover to use it at bedtime. "I mean," she added, smiling to herself, "I could wake one of the grooms to drive me if—"
"Hammer the grooms," he growled. "If you go to Ravenskeep Hall—and I do mean if— no one's driving you there but me. Now tell me what the devil's happened to Ravenskeep's bride—and why it's got you and Megan the Bold in such a taking."
Ashleigh gestured at the upholstered divan in her dressing room. "Brett, darling, I think you had better sit down for this ..."
***
The first thing Brett noticed when his barouche rounded the final bend in Ravenskeep Hall's long, winding drive was the lights. There were dozens of them, from the lanterns over the stables, to the torches borne by a pair of footmen hurrying across the lawn, to the candlelight gleaming from every window of the house itself. The damned place was lit up like a Vauxhall Gardens fireworks display! "Something's definitely afoot here," he muttered as he slowed his cattle to a trot and guided them round the curve of drive in front.
He hadn't known what to think when Ashleigh began her account in a hushed voice, her tone implying something ominous and dreadful in the offing. When at first she mentioned a "devil's bargain" that his neighbor in Kent had made while back in London, Brett had been perplexed, for the subject seemed utterly mundane. Knowing the reputation Ravenskeep had gained for himself since returning from the Peninsula, he had assumed she was referring to some ill-advised wager or the like. An unfortunate mistake on Ravenskeep's part, but hardly something to inspire dread.
Like himself, Adam Lightfoot had led a less than tame existence as a young buck on the town, but since his return he'd been nothing short of reckless. The man he'd known before the war was rakish and wild, true, but never imprudent or dishonorable; the returning war hero, on the other hand, had seemed determined to wipe out every shred of honor implicit in the military laurels that had been heaped upon him.
In short, Ravenskeep was, in Brett's estimation, eminently capable of having gotten himself in dun territory over gambling debts, or worse. Not that he'd be unique among the haut ton in suddenly finding himself with pockets to let, though Brett had felt it rather out of character for a man as intelligent and worldly wise as Ravenskeep.
Then again, there'd been the tragedy of that fatal carriage accident in the spring. Of course, word had it the Ravenskeep marriage had been loveless, the marquis and his marchioness all but strangers to each other; still, it was a common enough occurrence among the upper crust. His wife's demise might have been taken as regrettable, but it was surely nothing to inspire wild grief in her husband.
On the other hand, no one doubted Ravenskeep's love for his son, and the child had been left in a bad way. Not impossible to believe that aspect of the tragedy had unhinged his father, which might account for all manner of "devil's bargains.'' At that point in Ashleigh's recounting of Caitlin's story, Brett had hardly taken those words literally; rather, he'd left room for any number of interpretations, given the colorful metaphors he thought a callow young Irishwoman might be prone to employ.
At that point, but not after. His wife had soon disabused him of his initial—and quite rational—assumptions. Once Ashleigh began to explain how Caitlin came to be involved, he realized things had quickly passed the bounds of the rational.
God's blood, he could scarcely credit it! Hadn't, until he saw the fear and worry in Ashleigh's eyes. She certainly believed it, and Ashleigh was not a woman given to superstition or irrational fantasies. Moreover, there'd been that "miraculous" healing of Andrew Lightfoot's maimed leg to lend credence to what Caitlin had told her and Megan. There'd been nothing for it, then, but to follow the St. Clares here, he thought grimly, as he drew his team to a halt behind the gig Patrick had borrowed.
He was just alighting from the barouche when the front door opened. A middle-aged woman wearing a nightcap over an iron gray braid, and holding a shawl clutched over her bed gown, stepped out. "Would you be the physician, sir?" she inquired anxiously.
"Ah, welcome, Your Grace." Ravenskeep's majordomo appeared in the doorway, easing his way past the woman before Brett could reply. "Sir Patrick said that you and Her Grace might be coming."
"What's this about a physician?" Ashleigh asked worriedly as her husband helped her from the carriage.
"We've summoned the physician from the village, Your Grace," said Townsend. "To attend to the marchioness, that is." Unlike the woman in the bed gown, the majordomo was fully dressed, his manner impeccably correct, but there was grave concern in his eyes. "Her ladyship is lying abed, unconscious, do you see, and—"
"Unconscious!" Ashleigh went pale.
The duke curled an arm about her shoulders to steady her. "Easy, love," he murmured, taking his wife's hand and giving it a reassuring squeeze. He still wasn't happy with her being here. According to her physicians, Ashleigh was at least a fortnight away from delivering the babe, but he had heard of women birthing early as a result of something greatly oversetting. He had agreed to bring her to the Hall only because he was certain that keeping her at home—fretting over possible consequences arising from that hair-raising "devil's bargain"—would have distressed her even more. "Is the marquis with your mistress?" he asked the majordomo.
"He is, Your Grace. And now, I believe, Sir Patrick and Lady St. Clare have joined them."
"And is his lordship.. . er, is the marquis well?" Brett asked carefully. Is he still alive and whole? Or has he perhaps sprouted horns and a tail?
"As to that, Your Grace, I cannot rightly say," Townsend replied as the duke led his wife up the steps. "It was his lordship who roused the staff shortly after midnight and had me send for the physician." He paused a moment, as if considering whether he should say more; the commanding stare of the duke's intense turquoise eyes decided it, and he went on. "I, er, believe he found her ladyship lying unconscious in her former chambers. His lordship was still there with her when his shouts brought me running from the servants' wing, do you see. I saw him emerge from her door and start down the hallway. He held her ladyship, limp and clearly unconscious, in his arms, and I asked what he would have me do. He called instructions to me as he carried her. Said I was to send the physician to his chambers soon as he arrived. But since then, Your Grace, there has been ... er, no further communication from his lordship. That is to say, none toward the staff. He—"
"No communication?" Brett questioned impatiently. "What the devil are you saying, man? Is he alive and conscious, or isn't he?"
"He won't speak to any of us, Your Grace, because he spends every minute on his knees!" The outburst came from the woman in the bed gown. "On his knees, praying over his poor lady wife!"
Brett and Ashleigh exchanged pointed glances. Brett couldn't help recalling the emphasis his wife had said Caitlin placed upon Ravenskeep's tragic loss of faith: in particular, his utter inability to pray. Even if it meant saving his damned, soul
"And who might you be, madam?" he inquired briskly.
"Begging your pardon, Your Grace," she said, pausing to drop a curtsy to him, then another to the duchess. "I am Hodgkins, his lordship's London housekeeper. We were invited by the marquis to come down from town for the wedding, do you see. That is to say, he invited me along with Jepson, his lordship's butler. We had both grown very fond of the Irish Angel—er, I mean her ladyship, the marchioness—and she, of us, if I may say so, Your Grace."
"And do you say the marquis has been praying, Mrs. Hodgkins?" Ashleigh asked anxiously, as Townsend closed the door behind them.
"Indeed, Your Grace. Praying nonstop, poor man ... er, that is, if I may be allowed to say so, Your Grace."
Brett gave his wife's hand another reassuring squeeze and regarded the servants' worried faces. "Perhaps you had better take us to them," he said.
***
By the time they approached Ravenskeep's chambers, Brett reconsidered the advisability of allowing Ashleigh to come. The scene in the hallway resembled a wake. A throng of servants—at least, he assumed they were servants, for most were still in their nightclothes—had gathered about the door. Each and every countenance was grave. Some of them were weeping softly, some were praying—he heard the click of rosary beads as a young maid with an Irish accent murmured over them, head bowed—while others simply stood there, wearing long Friday faces.
He turned to the majordomo and was about to ask where the St. Clares were, when the crowd parted. A thin, unsmiling man approached from the opposite end of the hallway. He led young Lord Andrew by the hand, then paused and bent to whisper a word in the child's ear. Andrew nodded, thoughtfully but without a hint of the dour expressions of those ranged about him, and they drew near the door.
"Why, it's the duke and duchess!" the child exclaimed when he spied them. "Have you come to wake Mama up, too?" He glanced up at the man who still had him by the hand. "Jepson came to tell me about it, do you see, and we talked about how it was when I was the one couldn't wake up, after the bad accident. And I said it was Caitlin woke me—when no one else could, not even the Prince Regent's rude physician— and shouldn't I try to wake her, now she's the one needs help?"
"I see," said the duke, not troubling to hide a smile. By God, the lad makes sense! It was obvious, first time I saw them together, the Irishwoman adores the child. And he, her, of course. Who better, to try penetrating that senseless state? Ravenskeep may be too irrational, too gripped by emotion, to reach her. I know I'd damned well be half-mad if it were Ashleigh lying there. The boy, on the other hand, seems . . . I don't believe I've ever seen a young child that collected and purposeful in the face of such a crisis. Could be just what's wanted.
Brett met the eyes of the servant who held the child's hand. "Jepson, is it?"
"Yes, Your Grace," the butler replied, bowing. And after another bow, for Ashleigh: "I beg Your Graces will pardon me if I have overstepped my bounds, but—"
"Not at all," Ashleigh put in. "It's clear someone had to inform the child. As a mother, I can appreciate the care you've taken in the matter, Mr. Jepson. Indeed, from what I've heard"—she smiled at Andrew—"you appear to have made an admirable job of it."
"Thank you, Your Grace. I—" Just then, the door opened, and Patrick St. Clare peered out "There you are, lad. Come, your father's—" He spied Ashleigh and Brett. "You, too, Ashleigh. Megan's been asking for you." St. Clare flung the door wide, motioned the ducal pair forward, and, smiling, held out a hand for Andrew. The child gave him a quick smile, released the butler's hand, and took Patrick's.
Brett couldn't help smiling as well. His friend's enormous paw of a hand seemed to swallow Andrew's whole. The smile faded as they all started inside, and he threw Patrick a silent query over Ashleigh's head: What's the story?
The big man's uncertain shrug was less than satisfying. But the uneasiness in his eyes was worse.
***
The tableau at bedside drew Ashleigh up short. Since she was first to enter, when she paused to take it in, the other three were forced to halt behind her. She didn't notice. Megan's sister lay on the large tester bed, still as death. She couldn't help recalling Caitlin's rosy complexion, with its charming dusting of freckles across the nose. Now all she noticed was how very pale she was. So terribly pale, the freckles standing out against the unnatural whiteness of her skin like spatters of dried blood.
At the far side of the bed, Megan stood, tall and watchful, as poised and graceful as a cat Indeed, almost regal in her bearing. With that fiery mane tumbling down her back, she resembled some pagan goddess out of Celtic lore. She was looking down at her sister. Her barely audible murmur—Ashleigh thought she recognized the words as Gaelic—was the only sound in the quiet room. A rosary dangled from Megan's hand— Ashleigh had never known her to carry a rosary—but she didn't appear to be using it Or perhaps she was, in her own way. Megan had always had a penchant for making her own rules.
Half-kneeling, half-slumped beside his wife on the mattress, Ravenskeep bent over Caitlin's lifeless hand; he clutched it to him, his forehead nearly touching the limp fingers. The marquis's lips appeared to be moving, but Ashleigh was too far away to be sure. In any event, she couldn't apprehend any sounds.
The poor man looked half-dead himself. His hair was wildly disheveled, and a dark shadow of beard covered his jaw. The scar on his face stood out lividly against his tanned skin, which had taken on a grayish cast. He was barefoot and bare-torsoed, a pair of wrinkled, buff-colored breeches his only apparel. He reminded Ashleigh of someone who'd been in a physical fight, as if he'd been dealt several crippling blows. In a way, perhaps he had.
Brett's hands closed about Ashleigh's upper arms, and he urged her gently aside, making way for Ravenskeep's boy. Patrick stepped forward to join them but said nothing; his eyes, like theirs, were trained on the bed. The child went directly to it There, he stopped for a moment, taking in the pair on the mattress. Then he reached out, and gently touched his father's arm. "Papa, don't be afraid," he said. Softly, but it stopped Megan's stream of Gaelic cold.
Ravensford's head came up with a start. "Andrew... ?" He looked at his son as if in a daze.
The boy nodded and again patted his arm. "I came to help Mama wake up."
When his father didn't answer, only stared at him numbly, the child patted his arm yet again. Then Andrew leaned over the mattress—the top of it met him at chest level—rand stretched an arm out, until he was able to touch Caitlin's cheek. When he spoke, his child's voice piped loud and clear: "Mama, it's Andrew. I love you, Mama. We all do. We love you, ever so much, and we need you to be awake. Please, Mama . .. won't you wake up?"
Then, in a heartbeat, several things happened at once. A wrenching sob broke from Adam Lightfoot's throat.
Ashleigh gave a startled cry. Brett whipped his gaze from the bed to his wife. She was staring down at her feet. And plucking the skirt of her gown away from her legs. It was soaking wet, and so were the carpet and her shoes.
"Mother o' God, her water's broken!" cried Megan.
"By Heaven, she's moving," Patrick thundered. "There—her eyes just opened!"
"Look, Mama—we're all here!" This from Andrew, and he was laughing.
And from the bed, where Caitlin O'Brien Lightfoot used her husband's bare—and none too steady—shoulders to pull herself to a sitting position: "Ach, sure and someone had better fetch the doctor—right quick! Her Grace's wee son's that impatient t' be born!"
Epilogue
The tale of the extraordinary events that happened in Kent one night, in the second decade of the nineteenth century, became a legacy. And by the time the new millennium dawned, nearly two hundred years later, it had begun to take on the aspects of a legend. A story told and retold myriad times through the years. Yet it was passed down among only a select few. Beginning with those who had actually been there, it made its way through generations of their descendants. Some of them, that is, but not all.
Those who could be trusted to
keep a secret heard it. The imprudent and loose-tongued did not. Neither did the faint-of-heart. Very young children and old, old grandmothers were spared certain details, lest they prove too unnerving, evoking bad dreams—or worse. In essence, it was only one story, but it varied in the telling. The version that came down depended upon what the original witness had seen, and of witnesses there were several.
Yet the most truncated version came from one who was not a true witness at all. Still, the vicar of Ravenskeep had a part to play in the saga of what had happened to the fifth marquis and his Irish bride. Not a large part, to be sure, since the facts had touched him only marginally. As a man of God, it fell to Mr. Wells to remind those who would listen of a transformation in his patron—a "before and after," as it were.
Wells was not an imaginative man, so perhaps this was a good thing. He could be relied upon to make much of a sinner who saw the light, without speculating too deeply upon the specifics. To Wells, the marquis was simply a man who had found God, perhaps through the inspiration of his young bride. He would begin by citing his patron as a man who had never attended church at all. Until he wed, Wells would go on, when the marquis's became the faith-inspiring voice that led the rest of the congregation in prayer—and continued to do so every Sunday, his wife and children beside him, for as long as he lived.
What that same man of God would have made of the cause of that transformation one can only surmise. The church, to be sure, made reference to the devil in its liturgy. In the rite of baptism, for instance, those who witnessed the baptism were asked to "renounce Satan." Suffice it to say that when Adam Lightfoot spoke those words, it never occurred to the good vicar to ask why his hand always reached for his wife's. Or why her voice would rise with his over the rest of the congregation's, until the rafters rung with their solemn renunciation.
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