But who would Mandell have? It was him she grieved for more than herself. No doubt he would resume his rakehell lifestyle, likely find another mistress who would be ... what was the word he had used? Conformable. Maybe he would even acquire that wife he had spoken of, the elegant, ambitious lady who would want nothing more from him than his name.
But he would be alone as he always had been. His nightmares would still come, with no one to soothe him as he slept, no one to understand.
Anne thought she would never forget the anguish in his eyes when he had said, I do not believe in love or forever afters, but by God, Anne, you make me wish that I did.
Until that moment, Anne had never realized how close she had come to touching his heart. It had made the parting from him that much more painful, more poignant, as she saw so clearly what they might have had together. She had longed to kiss him, to hold him, to desperately find some way to give him back the part of himself that had been torn from him long ago by a terrible black night in Paris, by the enduring bitterness of an old man. But she realized the impossibility of such a thing.
“I wanted to lead you from the darkness, my love,” she whispered. “But I could not do so. I fear you must find your own way back.”
Her eyes burned, and she was able to weep at last, but only a single tear that cascaded silently down her cheek. She dashed it away with the back of her hand. Glancing back toward the house, Anne saw that the lights from the drawing room no longer shone so bright.
Someone had begun to extinguish the candles. It must be even later than she had realized. She was a little surprised that her absence had not been noted. The furor over Mr. Drummond's elopement must have absorbed everyone's attention, even Mandell's.
Lily probably assumed that Anne had retired to her room, and Anne was glad that no one had come in search of her. She did not feel equal to facing her sister. Lily had been too preoccupied with her own affairs these past days to notice much of what had passed between Anne and Mandell. But Anne feared that Lily had observed enough tonight to ask Anne some awkward questions Anne had no desire to answer.
But she was not eager to find herself locked out of the house, either. Shivering, she noticed the air seemed cooler than when she had first ventured outside. Clouds sifted across the face of the moon, making the garden darker, no longer so soothing, somehow more unfriendly.
Anne rose from the bench, shaking out her skirts. She prepared to follow the path leading back to the terrace steps when she heard the sharp snap of a twig. Peering through the gloom, she thought she saw a shadow pass behind one of the trees. Perhaps Lily had sent one of the footmen in search of her after all.
Surely she would have noticed someone coming down from the house. Anne fretted with the lace at the neckline of her gown, a sense of uneasiness stealing over her. She started when she detected the crack of another branch. This time the sound seemed to be coming from behind her.
She spun about, her heart thudding. “Is there anyone there?” she called. “John? Bettine? Firken?”
No one responded. The path threading through the plants and flowering shrubs remained empty. Feeling a little foolish, Anne ventured a few steps along the gravel walkway. As she neared the stone wall, she was disturbed to see the garden gate standing ajar.
Left unlatched, it had been blown open by the wind, she tried to tell herself. Except that the breeze was hardly strong enough to disturb the delicate branches of the rose bushes, let alone move a heavy iron gate.
The night itself seemed to stir around Anne, taking on a presence. She could feel the hair prickle at the back of her neck and experienced a strong urge to flee for the shelter of the house.
“Stop being ridiculous, Anne Fairhaven,” she scolded herself. It would be a bold intruder indeed to invade the sanctuary of someone's private garden. The open gate was a sign of nothing but one of the servant's carelessness. Anne forced herself to go forward, intending to slam the gate closed and lock it.
But her fingers had no sooner touched the cold metal of the bars when a figure loomed out of the shadows cast by the wall. Anne started to scream, but she was roughly seized, one arm pinned behind her back. Her cry was choked off by the gloved hand clamped over her mouth.
“Don't scream, Anne,” a familiar voice rasped. “It is only me. Lucien.”
His words conveyed to Anne no sense of reassurance. Rather, her heart gave a terrified leap and she put up a frantic struggle to free herself. Lucien's grip only tightened more cruelly, the leather of his glove bruising her lips.
“Anne, please. I am not going to hurt you. I must talk to you.”
Anne sensed a level of desperation beneath Lucien's harsh whisper. His body reeked of stale sweat and strong spirits. Dear God! He had been drinking. The realization only deepened her fear.
“If you will promise to be quiet and not to run away,” he breathed close to her ear, “I will let you go.”
Although her heart pounded madly, Anne attempted to subdue her panic, sensing that cooperation might gain her more than her futile efforts to break loose of Lucien's grasp. She made herself go still, and after a few agonizing moments she felt Lucien's hold on her slacken, his hand easing away from her mouth.
She twisted free of him and backed away a few steps, gasping, “Lucien! What are you doing here?”
“I had to find you. I needed to see you.”
“Then come into the house and—”
“No!” He swayed slightly forward and Anne gained a fleeting impression of his appearance, his hair unkempt, his clothing dirty and rumpled as though it had been slept in for many days. He sounded too sober to be drunk and yet there was a wildness about him she found even more unnerving.
She glanced toward the house, attempting to gauge the distance and the chances of reaching the security of those walls before Lucien intercepted her. As though guessing her intent, Lucien shifted, planting the solid outline of his stocky frame directly in her path.
“I don't know what you want with me,” she said. “We have nothing more to say to one another. You are not even supposed to be here in London. Norrie said she saw you peering out the window at her, but I did not believe her. What sort of game are you playing with us now?”
“No game. I have been hiding, trapped in my own house.”
“Hiding? From whom?”
“That devil. Your high and mighty Lord Mandell.” Lucien spat out the name with loathing and dread.
“Nonsense,” Anne faltered. “Mandell has no more desire to seek your company than you do his.”
“Is this nonsense?” Lucien stumbled closer, gesturing toward his face. The moon had drifted from behind the clouds enough to illuminate the ravaged contours of Lucien's features.
Anne choked back a soft cry. His nose was bent to an angle, a large bump forming where the bone was not healing properly. His face was yet streaked with sickly yellow bruises, the pockets of flesh beneath his eyes puffy from lack of sleep. But it was the eyes themselves that truly horrified her, glazed over and bloodshot. He looked exhausted. He looked haunted. He looked ... mad.
When Lucien thrust his face even closer, Anne could not refrain from shuddering and looking away.
“What is wrong, Anne?” he asked. “Can you not bear the sight of what your lover did to me? He wanted to kill me. He still does.”
Lucien's voice rose on a note of hysteria. “He's been stalking me. Every time I look over my shoulder, he's there. I catch just a glimpse of his cloak. Even in the daytime, even hidden away in my own house, he watches me. I should have destroyed him when I had the chance. I should have had my revenge on all of you. Even the child.”
Lucien's eyes gleamed wildly and Anne did not wait to hear more. She made a panicked effort to dart past him. He clutched at her arm, but she managed to wrench free. Her heart thundering, she raced up the path, expecting to hear him come crashing after her.
But instead his voice shattered on a mighty sob. “Anne! Please. I am sorry. I didn't mean that. Don't leave m
e. You have to help me. You have to make Mandell stop. You have to m-make him.”
Anne hesitated long enough to glance back. She saw Lucien sag to his knees. Burying his face in his hands, he rocked back and forth. His ragged sobs went right through Anne. He sounded so much like the pathetic boy she had once known, she was moved to pity in spite of herself.
Although she knew it was unwise, she returned. Maintaining a cautious distance between them, she said soothingly, “Hush, Lucien. I don't know what has put such strange notions in your head, but I assure you Lord Mandell has not been following you. He does not even realize you are still in London.”
Lucien raised his tear-streaked face to stare up at her. “Is that what he says? He lies. He has been after me day and night, just waiting for his chance. And I'm all alone. My servants have deserted me. The c-cowards fled the night I saw Mandell's reflection and I had to shoot the mirror.”
Lucien crushed his fingers against his brow so hard he seemed to be trying to shatter his own skull. “I cannot bear it anymore,” he wept. “I can't sleep. This accursed pain in my head grows worse every moment. Even the tincture of opium does not help anymore.”
Opium. Dear God, Anne thought. At least that accounted for his strange delusions. “You should go back home,” she said, making one last effort to reason with him. “And try to rest. I will summon a doctor for you.”
“Doctor? What doctor? The sort that would have me clapped up in Bedlam?” Lucien shrilled at her, glaring through his tears. “You'd like that, wouldn't you, Anne? Shutting me away would be as good as having me killed. Maybe you are even helping Mandell to do this to me.”
His sudden shift to anger alarmed Anne into retreating again. Attempting to humor him, she said, “I don't want to hurt you, Lucien. I will make sure you are safe. I will fetch some of Lily's footmen to escort you home. They will protect you.”
But Lucien was clearly no longer listening to her. He had tensed, jerking upright, like some wary beast sensing the approach of the hunter. He whipped about, staring, and pointed a shaking finger. “There! What did I tell you? He's there again.”
“Where?” Anne asked. She peered into the darkness at the end of the garden, seeing only the breeze stirring the tendrils of ivy along the side wall.
“There! Over by the gate!”
“Lucien. There is no one here.”
“Can you not see him?”
Anne watched stunned as Lucien lurched forward, shrieking.
“Curse you, Mandell. Show yourself. If you want to kill me, do it. But I can bear no more of this hellish torment.”
He staggered forward, thrashing about amongst Lily's rosebushes. Anne stood paralyzed with a mixture of horror and pity. She had never seen anyone driven by madness before. The sight was dreadful. She knew she had to force herself to move, summon aide from the house and find some way to stop Lucien before he brought harm to himself.
But as she turned to go, Lucien vanished from her line of sight. She could still hear his hideous sobbing and cursing. She took a cautious step along the path and looked for him. He was by the gate.
Her blood froze. She wondered if she had been afflicted with Lucien's madness. She saw him grappling with a phantom, a creature that should have had no existence outside of Lucien's insane imagination. The spectre's ink black cloak blended with the night, his features shadowed by a large plumed hat as he attempted to level a pistol at Lucien.
Anne's throat closed with terror as she watched Lucien make a desperate grab for the weapon. The force of the struggle carried the two men beyond the gate, out onto the pavement.
Anne attempted to scream for help. She rushed forward to Lucien's aid, not knowing what she meant to do, what she could do. A loud retort rang out and Anne saw Lucien stagger back, clutching his chest.
Anne forced her trembling limbs to move faster, but by the time she reached the gate opening, the cloaked man had vanished, melting into the darkness like the vision from a nightmare.
There was only Lucien, sprawled out on his back, the light from the street lamp glinting on his golden hair, the crimson tide of his blood staining the pavement. Shaking, Anne crept to his side.
His face was contorted with pain, a rasping noise emanating from his throat as he struggled to breathe. He stared up at her through half-closed lids.
“Anne”
She glanced frantically along the darkened street, praying that someone had heard the shot besides herself. To her relief she heard the echo of distant footsteps, and behind her she saw more lights begin to glow behind Lily's windows. The household had been aroused.
Anne knelt down beside Lucien, her knee striking up against something. The pistol. Lucien must have wrenched it from the man's hand even as he was shot. Scarce thinking what she did, Anne picked up the weapon.
“Anne,” he groaned. “What have you done to me? Would never have happened but for you.”
“Hush, Lucien,” she said, touching trembling fingers to his brow. He already felt so clammy and cold. “Try to be still. Help is coming.
“'Too late. Curse you, Anne. You've killed me.”
His chest heaved in a violent convulsion as he made a desperate effort to draw air into his lungs. A horrible rasping noise came from his throat. His head lolled to one side and he went suddenly still, his eyes vacant and staring.
“Lucien?” Anne whispered. She blinked as light fell over his distorted features. Only then did she realize she was no longer alone. Someone stood over her, holding up a lantern.
Dazed, Anne glanced up to see a pool of stunned faces, some she recognized as Lily's servants. But the swaying light was held aloft by the old charley who patrolled Clarion Way, and he was staring down at the pistol still clutched in Anne's hand with a deep reproach in his ancient eyes.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Morning sunlight streamed through the windows of the marquis's study, but the warmth did not touch Mandell where he sat slumped in the wing chair by the hearth, lost in troubled slumber. He had known if he dared sleep, the dream would come, but he could no longer bring himself to care. Since his parting with Anne, he had struggled with feelings of desolation, of utter hopelessness. Sometime near dawn he had surrendered, falling into an exhausted sleep, eventually allowing the nightmare to claim him.
But it was different this time. Mandell frowned, sensing it even in the depth of his slumber. He heard the knocking at the door, the thunder of the dream command. Open! Open in the name of the tribunal! But this time it was not his mother's soft hands seeking to thrust him into the closet, but bony fingers, gnarled with age.
A mocking voice cackled in his ear. Forget, boy. Forget everything except that you are the marquis of Mandell.
“No.” Mandell muttered, tossing his head against the chair's hard cushion. He could not forget. “You don't understand. Have to save her.”
Struggling to free himself from those clutching hands, he peered down the length of a mist-shrouded street. He could see the distant forms of the mob, mad, howling like a blood-crazed beast with a hundred mouths. And she was there, in their midst, being hauled away by a black-cloaked phantom in a plumed hat.
Anne! Anne!
The phantom glanced back when Mandell called. He could sense the burning mockery of its gaze, but its features were obscured by a death white veil, clinging to its face like a gossamer layer of skin. The phantom dragged Anne toward a towering scaffold and Mandell could see the guillotine, its sharp blade already rich with blood.
He had to get to Anne, had to tear away the veil that hid the phantom's hideous features. It was the only way to save her. Mandell fought against the restraining hands, but it was hopeless. The aged fingers seemed only to grow stronger, entwining him like vines, pulling him back into the suffocating darkness of the closet.
When he was thrust inside, the door slammed closed. He could hear insane laughter and then the hammering. The door was being nailed shut so that he could never escape.
“No!”
Mande
ll's head snapped forward. He wrenched awake with a start. His breath coming quickly, his gaze roved round the study as he tried to recollect where he was and shake off the last vestiges of the dream. It bewildered him because he was certain he was fully awake. And yet the hammering had not ceased.
He blinked and realized that someone was knocking insistently upon the study door. Before he could recover his wits enough to issue any command, the door inched open, Hastings thrust his head through the opening and inquired anxiously, “My lord?”
Mandell pressed his fingertips to his eyes and indicated with a curt gesture that the footman could enter. Hastings stepped inside.
“I am sorry, my lord. I did not mean to disturb you.”
“You didn't. I had merely dozed off for a few minutes.”
Hastings frowned. `Did my lord sleep all night in that chair?”
“No.” Mandell ran a hand over his unshaven jaw. “I came down to read just before daybreak.” He looked for the slender volume of Shakespearean sonnets and discovered it had tumbled to the floor. Upon the small tripod table stood a pool of wax that had once been a candle. “What time is it?” he demanded.
“Near nine of the clock, my lord.”
Mandell frowned. Obviously he had dozed off for more than just a few minutes. He noticed Hastings regarding him with a troubled expression and snapped, “Well, what is it, man? What did you want?”
“Begging your pardon, my lord, but there is a lady that insists upon seeing you.”
“A lady?” Mandell straightened, unable to help the eager note that came into his voice.
“It is not your lady, sir.”
“Oh.” Mandell sagged back in the chair and murmured. “I did not suppose that it would be. I no longer have a lady, Hastings.”
“I am very sorry to hear that, my lord.”
Mandell averted his gaze, discomfited by the level of sympathy and silent understanding he read in the younger man's eyes. He asked with no real interest, “What wench is it that would plague me at such an ungodly hour?”
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