Colin's Conundrum: A Steamy 19th Century Romance (The Victorians Book 3)

by Simone Beaudelaire

  Tears stung Daisy's eyes. “That's so kind, Mrs. Bullock. I… I don't know what to say. I just hate that you and your children are facing this danger because of me.”

  “Honestly, ma'am, the only ones who have seen anything are you and Lord Gelroy. At this point, I don't think any of the rest of us are at risk.”

  She's right, Daisy realized, which makes it even more likely to be my fault. But all she said was, “I'm glad. Do be careful anyway, won't you?”

  “Of course,” Mrs. Bullock agreed, just as the men burst back into the room. Even from where she stood, Daisy could hear their bellies rumbling, and she recalled that the hearty breakfast Colin had requested had never been made.

  Shake off your guilt, woman, and get yourself together. You have duties as well as the men do, and you cannot abandon them because of a scare, even a really big scare.

  The smell of the soup—of beans, bacon and summer herbs—teased Daisy's appetite and she took a seat at the table, surrounded by the Bullock children, and tucked into a tasty lunch.

  * * *

  “Did you find what you needed, love?” Colin asked, approaching Daisy in the stationer's shop. She stood near the front, examining a display of different colored inks and papers.

  “I did,” she replied. “I think I have enough to finish the project I'm working on with some left over for Katie. What did you find?”

  “Two mastiffs,” Colin replied. “A mother who has long since been trained to guard flocks and her son, who is half-grown and almost trained. They should serve us well. Gentle giants, but not easily fooled. Oh, and I picked up some mail. You had three letters waiting for delivery, and I have an interesting note from one of my old school friends.”

  Colin handed Daisy a bundle of letters. A quick glance revealed two from her sisters and one from Katerina Bennett. Smiling, she tucked them into her reticule to examine later. “Well, don't leave me in suspense. What does yours say? You're practically bouncing on your toes in excitement.”

  “Do you have your ink already?”

  She nodded.

  “Then let us walk to the inn for a cup of tea.” Taking Daisy's arm, he led her into the summer-warm street.

  Here, away from the estate, the constant feeling of someone looming over her faded and the hubbub of people about their everyday business took precedence. So refreshing.

  “I received a letter, as I said, from an old friend,” Colin murmured, his voice barely audible over the clatter of horses and carts and the chatter of random conversations. “He heard I had acquired Pesadilla, and since he has decided to try his hand at breeding racehorses, would like to negotiate a meeting between the stallion and his mare. He mentions a couple of friends who might like to do the same. This is prime horse breeding season, and my friend would like to stop by sometime this month to see if the beasts are interested.”

  Daisy grinned. “That's wonderful, love. Um… is it safe?”

  “We'll have to try all the harder to catch our harasser. I'm sure Beauty and Henry will help.”

  Daisy raised an eyebrow.

  “The dogs, love.”

  “Someone named a mastiff 'Beauty?' ” She giggled.

  “I'll call her anything she likes if she helps us get rid of… our problem,” Colin quipped.

  Daisy laughed again, but it sounded more hysterical than humorous, so she swallowed it down.

  Colin squeezed her arm. “Ready to head home, love?” He paused, turning to look at her. “It feels wrong to bring you back home under these circumstances. I would rather send you back to visit my mother or perhaps the Bennetts until we clear up this mess. I need to know you're safe, Daisy.”

  Daisy opened her mouth to protest and then closed it again, considering. “It would seem that guarding me is keeping at least one man at a time from either tending the animals or hunting the perpetrator. If I was just… gone… and no one knew where, it might confuse him long enough for you to catch him. I hate to go. Things were getting so lovely between us, but…”

  “But it's worth considering?” Colin suggested.

  She nodded, even as her throat burned and her eyes stung.

  “I'm not rejecting you,” Colin reminded her. “I'm not casting you out, and I'm not asking for an annulment. I only want my wife to be safe. Is that wrong for a husband to request?”

  “Of course not.” She swallowed again, her voice harsh and raspy. “I would need to stop by the house, if only briefly, to pack a bag. It's one thing to pop in on your mother uninvited. It's another to do so with not even a spare pair of bloomers to my name.”

  Someone near them tutted.

  “Oops. I forgot we were in public.” Another hysterical giggle tried to break free.

  “It's the shock,” Colin replied under his breath. “Everything happened… just this morning. It's been a long day with no end in sight and no time to process.”

  She nodded, drawing in as deep a breath as her stays would allow and then releasing it.

  “Here we are,” he said, pointing to a café with rentable rooms on the second story, not unlike the one she grew up in.

  He ushered her into a dining room with small round tables and simple white cloths.

  “Terrible wallpaper,” Colin mentioned as he ushered her to a table and into a seat. “I've honestly never noticed it before.”

  Daisy glanced while her husband procured tea and a biscuit for each of them, though she struggled to focus her eyes. At last, she managed to understand the messy pattern of uneven lines. I must be more in shock than I realized. It's getting worse, too. What on earth? “I wonder if it's messy like that on purpose,” she guessed, sipping a cup of tea and grimacing because she'd forgotten to add any sugar. “Colin?”

  “Yes, love?” He bit into his biscuit, choked a bit on the dry crumbs, and sipped his tea.

  “I want to go home, but I'm afraid to go home.”

  His gentle expression turned grim. “I understand. I feel the same way.” He sighed. “We'll leave shortly. Jones has promised to meet us at the edge of the woodland path to the estate, with the dogs in tow. I'm sure no one will try anything funny with two gigantic mastiffs nearby. You can pack, and I'll send you on to Mother with no one the wiser. Once you're safe, we'll put the dogs to work. I just know we're on the brink of a breakthrough.”

  Daisy tried to smile, but her mouth felt stuck upside-down. She bit her lip instead.

  Colin reached across the table and grasped her hand.

  Daisy gulped down her tea, ignoring the biscuit, and the couple made their way out into the sun, which now hung lower in the sky. “Will there be time for me to get anywhere today?” she asked. “If we go back to the estate and return, I might be able to catch the last mail coach, but popping up on your mother's doorstep in the middle of the night doesn't seem too mannerly. Not to mention, I'll be all alone in London well after dark.”

  Colin crunched on his biscuit as he slowly pondered her words. “I see your point. Do you have enough pocket money with you to send a telegram? We could have you go tomorrow and send word that they should expect you. I'm sure Mother won't mind, but you're right. Welcoming a visitor in the middle of the day is better. If we keep the dogs inside the house with us, we'll be safe enough. It's strange, though.”

  “What is, love?”

  “That this… person has never gone after the animals, nor the garden. Nothing. He threatens us directly but does no other mischief.”

  “He's never shown himself to any of the tenants either. They've only seen the aftermath of his threats. It's so subtle… and so strange. Clearly, he wants us injured and afraid, but… I had no idea John Orville was so clever. He's more the sort to stomp up to someone and punch them in the face. Someone must have given him this idea.”

  “Do you think your father could have done it?”

  “I don't know,” Daisy replied. “He might be angry enough at having his plans thwarted, but what would it profit him to wage a scare campaign against us? Besides, with me gone, he has double
the work to do. He wouldn't have time to make trouble, would he?”

  “If I were dead,” Colin pointed out grimly, “he could try to enact his plan again. That might be worth the sacrifices it required.”

  Daisy raised an eyebrow. “True, he could try, but he would not succeed. I'm old enough to make my own decisions, and if I were a widow, the law would be on my side. It already was, which was why he staged an assault in the first place, I'm sure. He tried to pressure me. He tried to bully me into marrying Orville. He tried everything except force because legally he couldn't force me.”

  “That's why he tried the trap?”

  “I suspect so. I just never understood why. Orville is an idiot. What would Father get out of forcing us together? Is his lust for control so strong?”

  “Control and money,” Colin pointed out. “Your mother managed to keep your dowry from him, and your grandmother passed your inheritance directly to you, bypassing him altogether. If you married an idiot, the control of all that lovely money would go to, well, him.”

  Understanding dawned. “That makes too much sense,” Daisy said, feeling the blood drain from her face until she wanted to stagger. “Orville goes along whatever Father tells him because he's not a thinker. I wouldn't put it past them to come up with the original plan, but murder? Father's a brute and Orville's a dolt, but killers? That doesn't sound like either of them.”

  “Maybe it isn't?”

  “Maybe not,” Daisy agreed, “but who else would bother? A couple minding their own business on a small, almost unknown estate in the countryside rarely generates such random vitriol.”

  “The whole situation is mad,” Colin said, finishing his biscuit, gulping the last of his tea and sitting back in his chair. “It strains the imagination. Why on earth would anyone want to do such things, particularly as there's nothing to gain from it?”

  Daisy shook her head. “I honestly cannot imagine. Shall we go, love?”

  “I suppose.”

  Pushing in their chairs, they made their way out of the café and began the long walk home.

  But will it ever feel safe like home again?

  Chapter 13

  “Henry was whining, so I let the dogs outside,” Colin announced. “They seem a little… sad.”

  “They're mastiffs, love. With those wrinkly foreheads and dangling jowls, they always look on the verge of tears.” Daisy rolled up a pair of bloomers and tucked them into her carpetbag. “Though I must say, they are surprisingly attractive for their breed. I like the sharp line between their black faces and their tan coats.”

  “Beauty is still a stretch for a big, drooly dog, though,” Colin pointed out. “She's quite lovely for a mastiff, but she's still a mastiff. I do think they're a bit homesick.”

  “Any idea why they had to leave the farm they grew up on?” Daisy tucked a few dresses into her bag and turned to open the top drawer of her bureau, considering which of her treasures she might want to bring with her for comfort. One perfume bottle will have to suffice. A scarf. A couple of handkerchiefs and of course, my letterbox… I should add my sisters' new letters. Something to read on the train.

  “The woman selling them said her father passed away. Her brother had gone to America long since, and she didn't want the responsibility of the farm or the dogs, so she was sending them to a new home.”

  “No wonder they're sad.” Daisy lifted the lid of her letterbox, the new documents in one hand, and froze. “Colin,” she breathed, unable to force a full sound past her pounding heart.

  “What?” He crossed the room in a few long-legged strides. “What happened, love?”

  Daisy pointed into her letterbox. On top, instead of one of her many letters from her sisters—the way she had left it—a sheet of thick, gray paper lay in the box, scrawled with a messy message in handwriting she didn't recognize.

  Sinners meet a rocky end. Deuteronomy 21:18. Leviticus 20:10. Exodus 22:18.

  A fine trembling began in Daisy's hands. Her knees buckled. Colin's arms wrapped tight around her, preventing her from falling. The silence roared in her ears. Spots danced in the sunlight before her eyes. She leaned her head on his shoulder, forcing air into her laboring lungs so she didn't faint.

  “What did you see, love?”

  “He's been in the house. He left… left a note… in my letterbox.”

  Colin edged toward the bureau and stared. “Scripture verses? What are they?”

  Daisy shook her head. “I can't think.” She swallowed against a wave of nausea. “He's been inside the house. Inside our bedroom. Oh, God.” Her breathing shattered into sobbing sounds and again, blackness threatened.

  “Rocky. Clever.” Colin's voice sounded grim. “We thought this person was trying to scare us, but it would seem he had a more…. Biblical end in mind. Not to mention a deep knowledge of sacred text.”

  Forcing her words past her terror, she pointed out, “It can't be Orville then. Nor Father. Neither one knows or cares about scripture enough to produce something like that.”

  “I see that. Well, then, the verses are a clue, not only to what this person wants but to who they are.”

  Daisy nodded.

  “You need to sit down, love.” He escorted her toward the bed.

  Daisy's feet stumbled on the smooth floorboards, and she sank gratefully on the soft surface. The scripture references ricocheted around in her head, slamming into each other as they tried to communicate to her chattering mind.

  “I think I recognize one of the verses,” Colin said, returning to the box to stare at the missive.

  Daisy lay back on the bed. “I'm trying to remember,” she whispered.

  “The second one is that passage about adulterers, isn't it?”

  “I think so,” Daisy said.

  “But that makes no sense. Are they accusing me of something? I haven't, of course. Even I were so inclined—which I'm not—I've had neither the time nor the opportunity. Even when I was a wild youth, I kept my exploration to professionals, not married women.”

  “We've both been threatened with stones,” Daisy pointed out. “I've scarcely been married long enough to stray. It would seem that someone thinks our marriage is invalid… and that one of us is married to someone else.” The rolling dice clicked into place. “It's me. They're accusing me of adultery.”

  “What? How?”

  She shook her head, the pillow displacing her hairpins to dig into her scalp. “The first one. I remember it now. The vicar's wife used to force me to read it over and over when I was young. It's the passage about what to do with recalcitrant children. If a child engages in ongoing and unrepentant rebellion against their parents, they were entitled to have the child executed.” She gulped. “I didn't rebel against my father back then, but against her sensibilities. As vicar's wife, she felt strongly that the behavior of everyone in town reflected on her.”

  “This still points to someone from your village.”

  She nodded again.

  “Is the old woman still alive?”

  “She died shortly before our wedding. Only a couple of days before. I was quite surprised to see the vicar out and about so soon.”

  Colin sighed. “This doesn't make any sense. Someone who is offended that you thwarted your father's plan to force you into marriage has come all this way to accuse us of adultery—as though the marriage between you and Orville had ever actually existed—and stone us. It's madness.”

  “It is.” Daisy's eyes burned, and one tear spilled down her cheek. “Madness. Utter madness.”

  “But it wouldn't be Orville or your father because neither one knows the Bible enough to produce these obscure verses?”

  “Father's a happy sinner, and Orville is stupid. It wouldn't be in character for either of them.”

  “What is this last reference?”

  Daisy studied the bird pattern wallpaper she'd affixed to the bedroom wall, focused entirely on the red-breasted robin that lay at eye level. Katie is such a talented artist. She deserves to have
her work hung in the Royal Academy. The idle thought failed to comfort her.

  Colin's trousers swished as he crossed the room. Another soft sound suggested he was pulling a book off the bookshelf beside the bed.

  “Exodus 22:18. 'Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live.' ” There was a loud thump as the Bible fell to the floor. Colin's boots stomped on the floorboards as he ran out of the room. A moment later, the outer door of the house creaked open and fell shut again.

  * * *

  “It makes no sense,” Colin argued with himself as he ran, full speed, across the meadow toward the row of tenant houses that fronted the woods.

  Each one has a back door that opens out of sight, he recalled.

  “But how could she? She doesn't even know where Daisy came from. She rarely leaves her home.”

  Except to go to church on Sundays… all day long. It wouldn't be impossible for her to take the train. It's not that far.

  “But why would she? How would she have even known about Daisy's father and the marriage trap?”

  She already thinks Daisy's a witch. She started throwing stones long ago. She must have wanted more ammunition and went to nose around. Anyway, it doesn't matter. It's madness. Don't look for sense in it.

  “She's big for a woman. Tall and bulky. Figure like a man. Rough features. Add a hat and muffler, and it would be hard to tell the difference. Especially from far away.”

  Heart pounding, Colin approached the Farrell family home and pounded on the door. Without waiting for an answer, he wrenched it open to hear Mrs. Farrell's voice whisper, “Hurry. Hide. Get in there.”

  “Mrs. Farrell,” Colin shouted. “You come here right now.” Though he was breaking every societal norm and several laws, Colin did not care. Threaten my wife and no law on Earth or in Heaven will protect you.

  “What do you want, my lord?” Mrs. Farrell, her grizzled hair standing on end, her clothing rumpled and misaligned, stepped out of the bedroom and glowered. “This is most irregular. My husband will not stand for it.”