The Lady's Ghost

by Colleen Ladd

  It was the work of a minute to get her hat and join him on the drive. The hat was several years old, but Ellie had adorned it with some of the lace she’d removed from the dress Portia was wearing and it suited well enough. She only remembered that she still didn’t have gloves when he handed her into the carriage, holding her fingers longer than necessary, or proper.

  “Ho,” Courtland called to his tiger when he had the reins in hand. “Plant yourself, George.” And with that, he took off down the drive without giving the tiger time to climb on behind. “Better if we have no witnesses, I think.”

  “Oh?” Portia hung onto the edge of the seat, relaxing only when they reached the main road, where Courtland could spring his horses without throwing her off.

  “It’s an unpopular task we’re engaged in, Lady Ashburne. Folks hereabouts aren’t fond of Ashburnes, especially Giles Ashburne.”

  That didn’t jibe with what Foxkin had told her, but the innkeeper’s perceptions may have been skewed by his obvious fondness for his master. “Oh?”

  Courtland slanted her a look. “What does that mean?”

  “Tell me about him.”

  “Why the interest?” He turned toward the village, his horses trotting along at a brisk clip. The hedgerows were high, the sun warm on her back. It had been an eternity since Portia had ridden along a country road with a handsome lord, and it was only with an effort she remembered she had more pressing concerns.

  “How am I to prove the man innocent if I haven’t a clue what he was like?” When he continued silent, she sighed. “Or tell me what you’ve found in the village. It’s why we’re here, isn’t it?”

  “It may be why you’re here, Lady Ashburne.” Courtland let up on the reins until the horses fell into a smooth walk, and his free hand found hers. “I had hoped to take a pleasurable ride with a beautiful widow.”

  Portia was not blind to his implication, nor unaware that he’d chosen the word widow deliberately. Roger had introduced her to the marriage bed, though he’d given her precious little reason to regret his disinclination to return overmuch to it. Carrying on the family line had not been as important to Roger as carrying on in London. If he had not married to produce an heir, however, she was at a loss as to quite why he’d bothered. Certainly, it hadn’t been for money, or out of love, or even an appreciation for such attractiveness as she might have, though he’d been most convincing about those last two before they were wed. The realization that the man she’d wed—the man she thought she loved—neither loved nor desired her had been among the most lowering of Portia’s life.

  As for Courtland’s proposition, while as a widow she could dally without sullying her reputation, so long as she was discrete, she failed to see any reason she should. She needed Lord Courtland’s assistance, however, so she didn’t free her hand from his and said merely, “It is a pleasant day, isn’t it?”

  “All right,” Courtland said with a laugh, releasing her to take up the reins again. “I know when I’m out-maneuvered. What do you want to talk about: Giles Ashburne, or what I found in the village?”

  “Lord Ashburne, if you please.”

  “There’ve been two of that title since Giles Ashburne, but I expect in the village there’s only the one Lord Ashburne, even yet. For a mere viscount, Ashburne was demmed top-lofty. He was fortunate to be so tall. It meant he didn’t have to stick his nose in the air to look down at you.”

  Courtland didn’t sound much like a man describing his friend. Then he smiled. “He was also loyal to a fault. Where he trusted, he trusted, and where he did not...” He hitched his shoulders. “Take Ransley. Now there’s an untrusting old bastard.” Ransley hadn’t seemed particularly old to Portia. No older than Giles Ashburne at any rate, and not much older than Courtland himself. “Liked Ashburne, though.”

  “What does that have to do with Lord Ashburne’s loyalty?”

  “He agreed to marry the chit, didn’t he? She was pretty, I’ll give you that, but a demanding baggage. And he didn’t love her. I don’t think he even particularly cared for her. When they danced, he might as well have been squiring his sister around the floor. If he’d had one.”

  To touch you is sometime more than I can bear. I have lived so long in hopes of one day finding the dearest treasure of my heart that I do not quite know what to do now that my hopes bid fair to be fulfilled.

  Portia opened her mouth, then thought better of it. Not only would it reflect poorly on her to have read Ashburne’s personal correspondence, she couldn’t feel right about sharing something so intensely private. Even if he was dead. “Why did he agree to marry her, then?”

  Courtland shrugged, the horses surging briefly into a trot at the shift of the reins. “Ransley’s idea, combine the estates. He promised to settle Tynesfield on Amelia’s son if he died without an heir of his own getting. Told you, they were friends. Have you seen him?” he asked suddenly.

  “Who?”

  “Your ghost. Have you seen him?”

  “My ghost?” Portia said, feeling unaccountably flushed. “The Hall’s ghost, you mean. If there is one.”

  “Then you have seen him.”

  “Of course not.” Dreams didn’t count, however vivid. Portia ignored the fact that the first time she saw him, she was wide awake.

  “What sort of things has he done?”

  “I told you, it’s the servants. They want me out of the Hall, God knows why, and they’re willing to do anything to make that happen. What did you find out in the village?”

  Courtland made a face and slapped the reins, drawing a little more speed from his horses. “Not a demmed thing.”

  “But you said—”

  “No one wants to talk about it. No one wants to even think about it. They’re scared.”

  “Of Ransley?”

  “Him or the ghost.”

  “That’s nonsense. Someone must know something.”

  “If they do, they’re not talking.” Courtland turned onto a track barely wider than the curricle and reined in on the edge of a lovely green meadow. The sun drifted down in a languorous haze that matched the sleepy drone of bees. A lark warbled in greeting.

  “Now I wish I hadn’t left my tiger behind. I might get you to walk with me if I had someone to hold the horses.” He wrapped the reins loosely around his fist and turned to face her. “Lady Ashburne, you must leave off.”

  Portia glared at him. “You said you’d help.”

  “I’ve had time since to consider the matter. My lady, if you don’t leave off, someone will get hurt. And I’m very much afraid it might be you.”

  “Nonsen—”

  “For Christ’s sake, woman! Do you really think, if someone other than Ashburne did kill Lady Amelia, that he’s just going to sit back and wait for you to unmask him?”

  She hadn’t thought beyond clearing Lord Ashburne’s name so she had a chance of living at the Hall in peace. Certainly she hadn’t thought asking questions about a ten-year-old murder could be dangerous. But if the murderer wasn’t Lord Ashburne, and if he was still around, still watching…. She shivered, and was immediately disgusted with herself. If she gave up before she even started, what then? Was digging into Lady Amelia’s murder really any more dangerous than living in a house like to fall down about her ears any moment? “What happened the night Lady Amelia died?”

  “Dammit, woman! Haven’t you been listening?”

  “What happened?” Portia persisted. Courtland swore, dragging his free hand through his hair. “You were there.”

  “Yes,” he said through clenched teeth.

  “Tell me.”

  “What’s there to tell?”

  “What happened? How did it happen? Who found her? Who was there?”

  Courtland stared at her so long that Portia was convinced he wouldn’t answer, when he suddenly said, “Everyone who was anyone in the neighborhood was there and half of London besides. Ashburne had the hosting of it, but it was Lady Amelia who chose the guests, less to celebrate the betro
thal than to prove to the bride to be she wouldn’t be moldering in Ashburne Hall for the rest of her life, no doubt.”

  “Cynical.”

  “I told you, she was a demanding little thing. Not the least happy to be foregoing her Season just because she was already spoken for.” He laughed suddenly. “Oh, how I’d have loved to be a fly on the wall when Ransley told her she was to be wed. I wonder if she dared show him her claws.” Courtland turned an earnest look on her. “You see how useless it is to pursue this? Ashburne Hall was full to bursting and dozens more were guested at Tynesfield. People who’d never been here before, nor have been since. Your murderer could be anywhere, assuming he’s not rotting at the bottom of the sea.”

  “All the better for us if the real murderer’s not nearby. He won’t know his danger until too late.”

  “And if he is close at hand, he might take your head off before you even know who to fear, puss.” He shook his head. “It’s no wonder you led Roger a merry dance.”

  Portia swallowed an angry denial. If Roger was dancing during their marriage, in any sense of the word, it wasn’t with her. “Go on. “

  “I wasn’t staying at Ashburne Hall. Not with my own house so close. Roger was with me—said he couldn’t stand tripping over people morning, noon and night. God knows how Ashburne was holding up; he was never much for doing the pretty. The bride to be went home to Tynesfield every night. That’s Ransley for you. A house full of chaperones, but his ward would not spend one night under her intended’s roof until they were wed. Much good it did. Ashburne wasn’t the one Ransley needed to worry about. Lady Amelia had already bestowed her favors elsewhere.”

  “How do you know?”

  His expression mocked her. “Everyone knew.”

  “Did everyone likewise know the name of her beau?”

  “I never did learn who was enjoying her.” He was deliberately crude, but Portia didn’t let him put her out of countenance. In truth, what shocked her was not what Lady Amelia may have done, but how certain everyone had been that she’d done it. Without, it appeared, a scrap of evidence.

  “Did Lord Ashburne know?”

  “That she was sharing her favors? I don’t see how he could have missed the gossip. As to whether he knew who it was, that I couldn’t say. If he actually caught them together, as the story goes, then he must have.”

  “That assumes he killed her.”

  “Lady Ashburne,” Courtland said, faintly mocking, “you’re the only one making the assumption that he didn’t.”

  “Who found her?”

  “The house party had been together more than a week. Lady Amelia’s dainty little hand was everywhere. Breakfast picnics. Battledore and shuttlecock on the lawn. Forfeits and crambo and charades at night. Though there was dancing most nights, she’d insisted on hosting a grand ball with all the trappings. You’ve seen the ballroom at the Hall, of course.”

  Portia vaguely remembered a large room echoing with old footsteps, dust an inch thick on the floor. She hadn’t concerned herself with it—it had no furnishings to speak of and there was no need to set it to rights. for there could be no chance of it being put to its proper use while she was in residence. She nodded.

  Courtland leaned back against the squabs, staring sightlessly over his horses’ twitching ears. “Decked out with flowers and shining lace. Musicians on the dais. Lobster and I don’t know what all in the supper room. Lord, the blunt that must have taken to lay on. All gone to waste. The bride to be never appeared. Her maid helped her change into her ballgown in an upstairs bedroom some half-hour before the neighboring families were to arrive, and that was the last anyone saw of her. We all turned out to search.”

  His voice fell and Portia leaned closer to hear.

  “It was Ashburne found her. Out on the green where there was to be yet another picnic the following morning. Carried her back to the Hall himself, golden hair spilling over one arm, the ballgown a cloud of silver lace over the other, and all in between red as red. When he laid her before Ransley in the great hall, his shirtfront was covered in blood.” He turned and something dark swam in his eyes. “Her throat was cut ear to ear.”

  Portia flinched. She looked away from him and swallowed. “That’s all? That’s the only evidence against him?”

  “There were no gypsies in the area. No tramps or vagrants. She’d been robbed of neither her jewelry nor her virtue, assuming she still had it. It wasn’t the work of someone outside the Hall.”

  “Then one of the guests....”

  “Who else had cause?” Courtland untangled the reins, flexing the hand that had been clenched around them. “Ashburne fled justice a week later.”

  It was a long and silent ride back.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  He wasn’t watching for her return.

  Where Portia Ashburne went and what she did was no concern of his. So long, of course, as she was not pawning his silver, and he’d already given Foxkin additional monies in anticipation of that eventuality. As for anything else she might take it into her head to do.... Giles hated to see whatever shreds of respectability the Ashburne name still bore trampled into the mud, but he could hardly chase around the countryside after her.

  No, he wasn’t watching for her return. The room in the servants’ quarters where he’d taken refuge from that bustling Amazon of a lady’s maid merely overlooked the drive. That he was looking out when Courtland drove off with Lady Ashburne was the merest coincidence. That he was looking out when they returned, purest chance.

  Courtland’s tiger, whose loitering about the drive for the past hour guaranteed that whatever Portia Ashburne was about, it would not add any countenance to the family name, ran to take the near horse by the headstall. Courtland—still partial to peacock colors, Giles saw—leapt down and came around to lift her down, his hands lingering too long on her waist, as of course they would. Why should Courtland be any more immune to Portia’s slim waist and pleasing curves than Giles? He cursed himself for returning the gowns he’d taken, but how could he know Portia and her maid would turn his mother’s cast-offs into such flattering fare? Courtland said something to her, and she turned her cheek for his kiss, which he bestowed with unmistakably passionate fervor.

  Damn him! What the hell was Courtland about? Did he think he could give her a slip on the shoulder, help himself to her favors, and walk away when he’d had his fill, as he doubtless would, flying back to Town as soon as he was flush again? The hell of it was that he probably could. Portia Ashburne had shown little delicacy of feeling when her husband was alive, even carrying on under his very nose. Why should she display any better morals now he was dead?

  Giles turned and walked out of the tiny bedchamber without remembering to check the hall first. Thankfully, Lady Ashburne’s maid was not still flitting about the servants’ quarters, squirreling away gowns in every room in the wing. Giles had found that amusing, earlier.

  He reached the landing and stood looking down as Portia came in alone. She walked to the center of the great hall and stopped, staring down at the heavy flagstones polished smooth by ages of Ashburnes. She stood so near where Lady Amelia had lain, and looked so long upon the flagstones, that Giles felt a crawling begin under his skin.

  She finally looked up, an audible gasp escaping her lips when her gaze lifted to the first floor landing. He’d taken advantage of her absence to return his portrait to its usual place, and she stared at it, for all the world as if she expected it to move of its own accord.

  “My Lord Ashburne,” she murmured, and Giles’ heart froze. “How you must have bled to find her there. No wonder they believe you haunt the Hall. How many of them know in their hearts that you’re innocent?”

  Giles was so startled he nearly let her catch him out.

  *****

  “Blast!” Carefully, Portia began to unpick her stitches. She oughtn’t be working on the copper gown by candlelight, and most assuredly not when she was so distracted as to sew the hem of the skirt to the bodice. T
hank heavens she’d sent Ellie to her bed hours ago. The maid had driven her to distraction, fluttering about her bedchamber in a perfect agony of indecision, not certain which to be more excited about: that she’d hit upon a method of keeping Portia’s wardrobe out of the ghost’s hands, or that Portia was, to Ellie’s mind, already well on her way to attaching another gentleman. Portia didn’t have the heart to dampen her enthusiasm, but neither could she bear her maid’s blithe assumption that marriage was her mistress’s best option.

  Portia dropped her sewing into the old workbasket she’d found playing host to a family of mice under the drawing room couch. Emptied and cleaned, it proved in surprisingly good condition, given it hadn’t been used since the previous Lady Ashburne last sported the gown Portia wore. Thomas hissed and batted free of the gown’s encompassing folds.

  “My apologies, Sir Thomas,” Portia told the cat, who fixed her with an accusing eye. “But you ought to know better than to sleep in a lady’s workbasket.”

  He stalked off in high dudgeon and Portia turned her eyes to the fire with a sigh. It was no use attempting to concentrate on anything when her mind was full of broken vows and creeping blood. She’d seen nothing of the countryside on the ride back to the Hall and missed entirely whatever rote words of courtesy Courtland had extended when he helped her down from the carriage. His kiss had come as a shock, and she’d instinctively turned so it landed on her cheek. He laughed, but his eyes had snapped with something that looked a great deal more like irritation than amusement. Covered in confusion, she’d retreated into the Hall, where Giles Ashburne’s portrait glared unexpectedly at her from the landing. She felt both unsettled and reassured by his presence.

  For the first time, Portia could truly believe the Hall haunted. She could see Lady Amelia lying in the great hall in a pool of blood. She could feel a presence lurking in the flat black eyes of Ashburne’s portrait, doomed for all eternity to stare at the place his fiancée had lain.