by Cheryl Bolen
“We would have stayed there if it weren’t for the baronetcy,” Lizzie said. “Papa was obliged to return to England and take over, or the treasure hunters would have ruined the entire house.”
“Or died in the process,” John said. “Some already did, and it serves them right. At least they were guilty of something.”
As opposed to someone who wasn’t? Edwina wondered, but instead asked, “What treasure were they looking for?”
“The Ballister necklace,” Lizzie said. “People thought it was in the keep, because that’s where her husband imprisoned her until she died of a broken heart.”
“That’s why we hear the sound of dragging chains,” John added.
“Oh, go on, you,” Mrs. Cropper said suddenly from across the room, where she was scrubbing a pot. “I never heard no chains.”
“That’s because you sleep by the kitchen,” John said. “If you slept upstairs, you would hear them from time to time. Mostly, though, she just walks.”
“That she does,” Mrs. Cropper said, “poor lady.”
Involuntarily, Edwina glanced at Richard, who raised a sardonic brow. “I suppose I shall have to explain.”
“I would much appreciate that,” Edwina said as politely as if she’d never met him before today. As if they were the merest acquaintances with no past bitterness between them.
Richard set down his spoon, wiped his mouth, and sat back in his chair, long legs stretched before him. “The original Ballister built the keep here in the thirteenth century, and a small manor was built next to it a couple of centuries later. That manor was torn down and replaced by this one during the reign of James I. Sir Joshua Ballister brought Louisa, his bride, home to the newly-finished house. Louisa’s dowry was a ruby necklace of surpassing splendor, or so they say.” He picked up his spoon again and twirled it in his fingers, his eyes now on the table.
“By all accounts, theirs was an unhappy marriage. A few years after the birth of a son, Louisa took a lover and planned to elope with him, but her husband caught her as she tried to escape. When he found that the necklace was missing, he became irate—evidently it mattered far more than her infidelity.” His voice had grown harsh. He cleared his throat. “In any event, she denied all knowledge of the missing necklace—one assumes she still hoped to flee—and her husband confined her in the keep in chains, with nothing to do but pace back and forth, gazing out the window in the hope that her lover would come and save her.”
“But the lover never came, because her husband murdered him,” Lizzie said.
“Or so it is said,” her father said with a shrug.
“And threw his body to the crows,” John added.
“Little ghoul,” Richard said. “The necklace was never found, nor were the lover’s bones, and the lady still walks, waiting for him to return.”
“What a maudlin story,” Edwina said. “It seems more likely that the lover absconded with the necklace, leaving Lady Ballister to suffer a horrid fate.”
“Oh, no!” Lizzie cried. “He would never do such a thing. He loved her with eternal devotion.”
“That’s a lovely sentiment, Lizzie, but the fact remains that many a man swears devotion when he doesn’t really mean it,” Edwina said.
“Or woman,” Richard said, with a glance at Edwina that didn’t match his bland tone of voice.
“I beg your pardon?” Edwina strove to sound indifferent and polite.
“Anyone, male or female, may be more devoted to the god of mammon than to love.”
That sounded like an accusation, but for heaven’s sake, why? He was the one who’d wanted to marry her solely for her money, whilst she’d been fool enough to believe he loved her.
Lizzie frowned. “What is mammon?”
“Riches,” John said. “From the Greek, I think. I’ll ask the vicar at my next lesson.”
“Maybe that’s so, but Lady Ballister’s lover wasn’t like that.” Lizzie pouted.
“No, I shouldn’t have suggested it,” Edwina said. “It rather ruins the story, doesn’t it? Far better to think of the lady and her lover reunited in the end.”
“Yes, but they won’t be as long as her ghost still walks,” Lizzie said.
There was a strange and pregnant silence, as if something hung in the air, waiting to be said. The little family seemed to close ranks, excluding Edwina. “Mrs. Cropper, may we have the apple tart now?” Richard said. “With tea, please, as I expect Mrs. White would enjoy that.”
“Thank you, I should like that very much,” Edwina said, distracted from wondering what had been left unsaid by this unexpected consideration on Richard’s part. She missed drinking tea in the evenings. Her relatives were stingy with the good tea, only serving it to visitors, and her employers had made her eat with the children and spend her evenings alone—too lowly to sit with the family but not lowly enough to be accepted by the servants.
She was so tired of being alone, tired of having no one to talk to, no one who cared a jot for her. During her marriage, she’d had female friends, but not one of them had lifted a finger to help her once she was widowed and destitute.
Over the apple tart, Richard had the twins explain where they were in their various lessons. It seemed they had struggled on as best they could between governesses. “I am no teacher,” Richard said a little ruefully, but immediately dispelled the mild charm of that statement by a sardonic question. “May I assume you have some experience as a governess, Mrs. White?”
“You may assume whatever you like,” Edwina retorted, and then regretted her tone. He had just ordered tea for her; it was most unfair of her to snipe at him over nothing. Besides that, he could still throw her into the rainstorm. She wasn’t quite ready to die. “But yes, I have served as governess to two different families, neither of whose children, I may add, were as intelligent and well-behaved as yours.”
If anything, his mood darkened, but both children grinned, and Mrs. Cropper said, “Lovely children, aren’t they? What a pity their mother didn’t live to see them grow up.”
“A pity indeed,” Richard said. “Now, if the two of you have finished eating, you may help Mrs. Cropper clean up. I shall show Mrs. White to her bedchamber.”
He supplied her with a candle, picked up her valise, and accompanied her silently up the wide oak staircase. The elegant carving gleamed in the candlelight. “As Lizzie told you, we don’t use that wing,” he said, pointing to the left and leading her right. He indicated the children’s bedchambers on the way and led her to a commodious room—better than the usual governess’s lot–with a fire sizzling in the grate and sheets airing before it. “I hope you know how to make a bed, for I don’t, and Lizzie has done enough for today.”
“I’m sure I shall manage,” Edwina said. “I don’t know why you stay in this godforsaken place where your children have to work as servants.” Oh, damn–she shouldn’t have said that either.
“I have my reasons, none of which are your business,” Richard said, “and if you think paying my children pretty compliments will make me wish to retain your services, you are quite mistaken. I can still show you the door.”
“And I can still leave of my own free will,” she retorted. “My compliments were sincere, and their mother must have been an angel, for they certainly never got their good qualities from you.”
“Good night, Mrs. White,” he said, containing his temper better than she—and why not? He must know her threat was pure bravado, whilst his was terrifyingly real. Damn him, was he amused? “And by the way,” he said, “it was only natural that you should learn a little about the sad history of our ghost, but I shall be most annoyed if I find that you have encouraged the children to discuss it. Kindly keep to their lessons and nothing else.”
Before she could summon a retort, he shut the door and left.
It was nowhere near bedtime, so once she had unpacked her meagre belongings, made the bed, and dried her hair by the fire, there was nothing to do. She had only the one candle, so couldn’t risk bu
rning it down to nothing—and in any event she had nothing to read and no stitchery to work on. If only she’d thought to ask for some mending, of which there was always plenty in a household with children. She pondered going downstairs and asking Mrs. Cropper, but Richard had so pointedly dismissed her that she daren’t risk annoying him again tonight.
Which left her with nothing to do but sit in the dark—a melancholy occupation, because all she could think of was her probable fate. In order to stay at the Grange, she would have to kowtow to Richard Ballister, no matter how rude and unkind he might choose to be. As long as she performed a useful service, as long as the children liked her, he might allow her to remain.
He might even pay her, unlike her other employers. She could only hope. Otherwise, the future was unspeakably grim.
After a while she heard the children come upstairs to bed. Then there was silence but for the rain on the window panes and a blustery wind. At last fatigue took over from worry. She undressed, spreading her gown over a chair. Her other gown was still drying out in the kitchen. She put on her only nightdress—she’d sold almost all her clothing, bit by bit–and tried counting her blessings: she was clean, dry, well fed, in a warm bedchamber, and had a reasonable prospect of breakfast in the morning. On that hopeful note, she fell asleep…
CHAPTER THREE
You’re finally here, thank the Lord. Come, we must save him! A hand gripped Edwina’s wrist. Come now!
She started awake to the sound of a drawn-out wail. Save him? Save whom? She sat up, heart thumping, and threw back the bed curtains, but the dim light of the banked coals showed no one lurking in the room. She must have been dreaming—of someone grabbing her and tugging her out of bed. She massaged her wrist, which hurt as if someone had truly gripped her there.
The wind soughed outside her window. Ah, was that what she’d heard, not someone wailing? How stupid–she had allowed herself to be affected by that ridiculous ghost story. She closed the curtains, lay back in bed, and shut her eyes. She was just dropping off when the creak of a floorboard jerked her wide awake.
She sat up and parted the bed curtains again. No one was in her room, so the sound must have come from the passageway. Whoever would be wandering about at this time of night? She listened hard. Soft footsteps, barely audible, reached her ears. Stocking feet, not shoes or boots.
It was none of her business. She should go back to sleep.
On the other hand, perhaps one of the children was ill, and she really had been wakened by a moan. She should at least make certain all was well. She got out of bed, tied her hair away from her face, tiptoed to the door, and cautiously opened it. To her surprise, the corridor wasn’t dark, as when Richard had first brought her upstairs. Someone had lit candles in the wall sconces. She glanced left and right…
A slender figure in a white nightdress, carrying a lantern, was just crossing into the opposite wing—the unused one. Unused because it took too much upkeep, Edwina supposed, for the ghost tale was just that—a tale. And that white figure was no ghost, but Lizzie, judging by her long, fair hair. Why would she venture there in the middle of the night?
Edwina hastened down the passageway after her, reaching the unused wing just in time to see the girl disappear through a doorway to the left. She followed, but what she saw in the doorway gave her pause. The dim light from the passageway showed that the room before her was a picture gallery with tall, intricately glazed windows its entire length. Lizzie walked—no, almost glided, so graceful was she—to the end of the gallery, sailed around a pianoforte that stood there, and flowed back, facing straight ahead, the lantern held aloft, and turned again, giving no sign that she had seen her governess.
Edwina put her hands on her hips, about to speak, when a hand clapped over her mouth. Another clamped her by the waist and dragged her into the passageway. She struggled, jabbing her captor with an elbow, but he squeezed tighter, her derriere pressed against his groin, and spoke in her ear. “I shall remove my hand from your mouth if you promise not to say a word.”
She nodded, and Richard uncovered her mouth. Slowly, he set her on her feet, but not before she realized that he was aroused. She shivered, suddenly and disconcertingly aware of the heat of his hand, of his large body close behind hers, of her nakedness under the nightdress.
He hustled her down the passage, away from the picture gallery. “I’ll take care of her. Go back to bed.”
Must he always be so peremptory? She fumed, controlling her temper, and then realized what was going on. “She’s sleepwalking?”
“Yes. She does so almost nightly.”
“Is that why you have the candles burning in the sconces?” He was fully dressed, she realized. He must have stayed awake to keep watch over his daughter, for it was dangerous to waken sleepwalkers.
“Yes, for I fear she will tumble down the stairs. I cannot tell what she sees and doesn’t see. Her eyes are open, but she doesn’t notice me or others—as she didn’t notice you.” His voice was impatient. Aroused or not, clearly he wanted to be rid of Edwina.
“But—but perhaps that’s why the myth of the ghost persists! Any villager may see her walking and assume she’s the ghost.”
“Nothing will stop them from believing in the ghost,” Richard said. “Go back to bed.”
“But why encourage them?” she persisted. “Surely if you explain, you will be able to hire more servants, and–”
“I shall explain nothing to the villagers, and nor shall you,” Richard said, “or you may be sure that I shall dismiss you.”
Her annoyance at his repeated threats was ousted by a more distressing emotion. “Is it perhaps that you cannot afford to hire any servants?”
“No, certainly not,” he said, sounding goaded. “If you are worried about your own pay, you need not be. For the last time, Mrs. White, go back to bed.”
“Very well,” she said, turning away, but she had gone only two steps when he said, “If I should decide to dismiss you in the morning, where will you go?”
“With one day’s pay?” she asked. “Or not even that?”
He shrugged, frowning. “One day’s pay.” In other words, a few measly pennies.
“Unless the vicar needs a housekeeper–” Her desperate heart battered her chest.
“He doesn’t,” said Richard. Oh, God, he was going to turn her into the street.
It was so unfair that she didn’t care anymore. “Then I shall have to offer my services at the inn,” she hissed, “in whatever capacity the landlord wishes. He finds me pretty, so I have no doubt about how he will choose to use me.” She turned and hurried away before the tears came, but then whirled again. “You used to be a gentleman, Richard. I even believed I loved you at one time. But now… oh, now you will burn in hell for forcing a decent woman to become a whore.”
“Wait, Edwina,’ he said, but she kept on going—she had to, or she would break down and sob before this monster. He followed and took her by one arm. “I shan’t dismiss you,” he said curtly. “It was a hypothetical question. I merely wished to know…”
“How desperate I am?” She tugged her arm from his grasp. “Well, now that you realize the extent of my abasement, you can gloat all you like.” She shook her head, wondering once again why he should do so. Once, long ago, she’d thought him a kind and loving man.
“I’m not gloating, damn it,” he said. “Come with me.” He stalked past her down the passageway, further away from his sleepwalking daughter.
“What about Lizzie?”
“She’ll be fine.” He stopped at the door to his bedchamber. “Wait here.”
She did, shivering and watching the dimly-lit passage for signs of Lizzie. As long as the girl stayed away from the staircase, she would be safe.
“Here.” Edwina started as Richard came out of the bedchamber and pressed something into her hand. “An advance on your wages, yours to keep whether you leave now or later. Good night.”
*
Richard watched as she stumbled down
the passageway, the money clutched in her hand as if her life depended on it—which perhaps it did.
She had loved him once? A strange notion of love that was. They’d been set to elope. He wasn’t a rich man like Harold White, but he’d had enough to support a wife in comfort, if not the first style of elegance. But just as he’d been leaving for their rendezvous, he’d been arrested by the bailiffs for debt. By the time he’d managed to prove that the debt in question wasn’t his, she was married to Harold White. At first he’d wondered if he’d got her with child and she’d married White out of desperation, but when no baby was born in due course, he knew that wasn’t the case. Harold White’s fortune—far larger than what she would inherit from her father—had weighed more with her than love.
Oh, what did it matter? She needed his help now, and he’d given it. He couldn’t help but see the irony in the current situation, but he wasn’t the sort to gloat over another’s misfortune. Nevertheless, something about her stripped him of his customary civility, leaving a man as wounded now as when he had lost her years ago.
What happened next was in her hands. He didn’t want her here, but nor could he quite bring himself to dismiss her. Hopefully, she would decide to leave in the morning. He returned to the portrait gallery, where Lizzie still glided gracefully back and forth.
“That’s enough, love,” he whispered from the doorway. “But you’ll have to keep it up all the way to your bedchamber, in case Mrs. White is peeking from her doorway.”
Lizzie grinned. “I did well, didn’t I, Papa? I didn’t give myself away by even a blink of an eye.”
“You did marvelously, sweetheart, and if those new treasure hunters are on the watch, you may have convinced them as well. Off to bed with you now.”
He saw her to her bedchamber, the consummate little actress, and finally went to his own cold bed. It was no surprise, he supposed, that holding Edwina so closely against him had awakened his libido. He’d had to force himself to let go. Apart from the fact that Edwina detested him, one didn’t tup the governess.