“Scream?” interrupted the secretary but was ignored.
“You planned this from the off!” Christopher growled.
“Yes. We did,” Evelyn replied with a smug smile. “But we also managed to give the ladies a lovely day out, did we not, my lord?”
“That we did. Ah! And here’s your escort, Audley!”
The secretary looked over his shoulder. Two burly men stood in the doorway of the mill, and at Shrewsbury’s beckoning stepped out into the light and came forward. At their backs were two more men of equal size. The secretary stared at the Spymaster General.
“I don’t understand. My escort?”
“Your game’s up, Mendacius,” Evelyn said near the secretary’s ear. “Best to come quietly. Best not to make a scene. Mrs. Keble did and she was dealt with, and it wasn’t pretty—”
“Mrs. Keble? Dealt with? Wasn’t pretty?” Philip Audley’s eyes went wide and then his face lost color. He looked wildly about, at Shrewsbury, at Evelyn, at the two men who now stood at his back, and then finally he looked to Christopher and surprised everyone by appealing to him.
“Bryce! You cannot believe—This is outrageous! You know who I am. I am the Duke’s secretary. I cannot be touched. They cannot touch me! You cannot allow this—”
“For the first time in your life, Audley, show some humility. And for God’s sake, tell the truth.”
With that Christopher turned on a boot heel and strode off in direction of his house, and despite the scuffles and sounds of struggle he left behind, he did not look back.
TWENTY
FIVE DAYS came and went before Mary enquired of the steward’s assistant if he had received any communication from Mr. Bryce. Mr. Deed had not. Two more days went by—two days that Christopher usually spent at Abbeywood, and this time did not. In two years he had never missed a day. Mary again summoned Mr. Deed to her drawing room. The little man was as mystified as she as to the Squire’s absence.
She went for a stroll in the garden, woolen shawl tight about her shoulders, then sat at her escritoire to write the Squire a short note, one she had formulated in her head while out in the bracing fresh air. She wondered if his aunt was unwell, or he himself had taken ill. Though she thought the latter unlikely; he was as strong and as healthy as a prize stallion on race day, and she had never known him to be ill a day in his life. She enquired when he might next be at Abbeywood as she wished to discuss certain particulars concerning a visit to Treat after Christmas; her cousin the Duchess was due to deliver her baby in the new year.
With the letter written and the ink dry, she asked for Luke. But then she had second thoughts about sending it and was about to dismiss Luke when the youth startled her.
“M’lady, the master said if thou was to ask, I was to show ye.”
“Ask? Ask you what, Luke?”
“’Bout the master’s whereabouts. ’Bout where Mr. Bryce he be.”
Mary sat up. She hoped she wasn’t blushing.
“You know where he is?”
Luke nodded.
“And he asked that you take me to him?”
Luke nodded again.
Mary drew in a deep breath then stood, decided.
“Then take me.”
Luke hesitated. And that made Mary anxious.
“What is it? He’s not ill is he?”
The youth shook his head.
“No, m’lady. But thee rides to yon Puzzle, and then be a walk—a long walk—through the vorest. Thy ladyship will need thy boots and cape.”
BOOTED AND CAPED, with the hood up over her hair, Mary sat sidesaddle on her mount while Luke walked the mare deep into the Puzzlewood. About halfway in, he had Mary dismount. Leaving the mare tethered, he took her off the well-worn path, via a secret track that was no secret at all because it was used by journeymen, poachers, and travellers who walked the length of the Cotswolds. Particular markings on tree trunks showed the route. And while Mary had little idea of where she was in relation to the broader landscape, the canopy of entangled branches high above allowing for only filtered light, she felt the gradient rise under her boots and the angle of the trees change so that she knew they were walking along the ridge.
And then the canopy gave way to milky blue sky and she was on a rocky outcrop with the cool breeze chafing her cheeks, and looking out over the valley floor. Below her was Brycecomb Hall in all its honeycomb-colored glory, and to the left, the mill and its weavers’ cottages, and running through both the river twisted and curled like a loose hair ribbon dropped from the head of a giantess.
Luke waited until Mary turned from the view, then led her down a winding path and back under cover of the wood. They were now descending into the vale. More than once she gave her gloved hand into the youth’s firm grasp to help her around a particularly rocky outcrop of limestone, or over fallen trees, or across the smooth stepping stones that spanned fast-flowing rivulets. All done in silence and with only the sound of disturbed leaf litter under their feet, and the bubble of water over rocks, the forest eerily quiet of birdlife, flown to warmer climes for the onset of winter.
And then after what seemed like hours, but was less than one, the forest opened out into a small clearing. And on the edge of the clearing set back from the stream was a gamekeeper’s cottage, its chimney smoking. But it was no ordinary cottage, for though it was built from the same yellow stone as the local cottages, this one had a columned façade, reminding Mary of an Italianate folly, a gentleman’s whimsy found in the parklands of many a great house. Treat had a few such buildings scattered about its extensive grounds, so too did her childhood home of Fitzstuart Hall. But the folly was of passing interest, for by the stream, angling rod dangling out over the water, was the Squire in shirt sleeves and boots, faithful hound by his side.
“MY LADY.”
“Mr. Bryce.”
Christopher had set aside his angling rod, but had not moved from his spot on the bank. Mary came up to him, but halted a few feet away. Both were acutely aware of the other, but also that they were not alone, and the silence stretched. And then Lorenzo sat up, ears pricked. The movement was enough for Mary to take her eyes from Christopher and frown at his four-legged companion, gloved hands tightly held in front of her.
Her uneasiness gave Christopher an excuse to move, and he turned to Luke who was shuffling his feet, gaze respectfully on the moss under his shoes.
“Luke. Take Lorenzo home, and give this to Carlo for her ladyship’s companion.”
Christopher held out a letter which he’d taken from his waistcoat pocket. It was not sealed and did not need to be. Luke could not read. Carlo could not read English. It would be left to Fran to inform her mistress he would be gone for a few days, maybe longer. Though he had added a line for Fran’s eyes only, that if he was urgently required Luke knew where to find him.
The youth took the letter and had Lorenzo to heel when he hesitated, a swift glance at Mary. “Will thee be takin’ ’er ladyship ’ome?”
“When she wishes to return. In the meantime, you know what to say.”
“Aye. I’ll not let thee down, master.”
Mary watched Luke, with Lorenzo trotting beside him, disappear back into the wood, then turned to focus on Christopher. Carefully removing the hood of her cape back off her hair and settling it on her shoulders she asked,
“What is he to say?”
Christopher closed the gap between them and smiled down at her. “Nothing. He is to say nothing.”
“Oh!” Mary smiled up at him, but then tilted her chin in enquiry. “Why have you stayed away from Abbeywood since the picnic?”
“Why has it taken you this long to want to find me?”
“I didn’t—I mean, I didn’t know you were here. I thought—I thought you may have taken ill, or your aunt had, or-or perhaps after what I said at the mill you were displeased—that I may have embarrassed you.”
“You think too much, my lady.”
Mary nodded and sighed in resignation at the trut
h in his words. “Yes. I do.” She met his gaze. “So why, if not for the reasons I stated, have you stayed away?”
“Because, my lady—Mary,” he murmured, taking her face gently between his hands and lowering his mouth to within an inch of hers, “I am on the cusp of madness. All I think about is kissing you.”
“You do? And so it is with me,” she breathed in surprise, and in expectation of receiving his kiss went on tiptoe, hands pressed to the front of his wool waistcoat to steady herself. “And if you do not kiss me,” she confessed shyly as she yielded her mouth, “I will go mad.”
WHEN THEY CAME up for air, she was disorientated and disconcerted because he had been the one to break off their heated kiss. He desperately wanted to go on kissing her, to scoop her up and carry her into the cottage and there, on the bed, make unbridled passionate love; to indulge in the kind of lovemaking where conscious thought and physical need were as one, where inhibition is cast to the winds, and where they would lie naked and exhausted amongst a tangle of limbs and bedding, utterly satiated.
That moment would come, he did not doubt it, but not yet, not until he was certain she was ready to be his, body and soul. And if he were truthful with himself, he was more than a little apprehensive at the prospect of initiating her into lovemaking. For he was convinced she had never made love. Ten years married to a selfish, self-satisfied pig of a man who locked her into her bedchamber could only have left her fearful and with an abhorrence of the sex act.
While for him, who had only bedded experienced women, lovemaking had always been uncomplicated, though it had at times bordered on the mechanical. So much so that once he left Lucca and closed that chapter of his life, he had not made love since. Not until Mary had his physical appetite returned, only for it to be suppressed because she was married and thus unobtainable. He had wanted to make love to her for so many years now it was a dream rather than a possibility. And now that the dream was to be fulfilled, making love took on a whole new significance. It would be very different with Mary. He loved Mary beyond reason. And so the thought of bedding her threatened to overwhelm and cripple him. For his own sake as well as hers he needed to take matters slowly, with every action and reaction between them deliberate. There would be nothing perfunctory about making love with Mary.
Thus he released her, stepped away and smiled. Taking hold of her hand, he pushed back the edge of her glove to expose the white bare flesh of her wrist, and here he kissed her before straightening and smiling into her eyes. He kept hold of her hand.
“Come. Let me show you my humble lodgings.”
“THE COTTAGE was here before my father turned it into his angling lodge,” Christopher explained, standing on the shallow steps that led up to the front door. “The estate’s gamekeeper lived here for a time, and then, after my grandfather made his discoveries, he built the gamekeeper another cottage on the other side of the wood, and kept this for himself. But it was my father who added the front colonnade to give the structure an Italianate appearance, built on a third room and altered the foundations to allow for the heating mechanism.”
“Discoveries?”
“My father was an antiquarian, and a collector of Roman artifacts. His father before him discovered the remains of a Roman villa just behind this cottage. Which no doubt sparked my father’s interest in all things Roman. There are coins, pots, and various implements up at the Hall. They are all drawn and catalogued—”
“By your father?”
Christopher shook his head, then grinned at a memory.
“No. My father was a poor draughtsman. My mother was the artist in the family. He co-opted her—co-opted us both—into his passion for antiquities. She faithfully and diligently made drawings of all his finds, and even had the patience to allow me to sketch with her.”
“You had a happy childhood.”
It was a statement Christopher readily agreed with. “I did. They both loved me very much, as you do Teddy. And they were a well-matched couple. Some of their happiest memories were here at the cottage…”
“Cousin Duchess would be vastly interested in your father’s collection,” Mary said, when the silence stretched between them. “She reads the Roman and Greek writers in their own tongue, and I’ve no doubts could date the coins, too.”
“Then when Her Grace visits, I will be sure to show her the collection,” Christopher quipped, putting this fanciful notion in the same basket as the existence of fairy folk and elves. “The locals mistook what was left of the Roman villa as the ruins of an ancient fairy kingdom—”
“Fairy kingdom?”
“Yes. And with no other source of knowledge but their own folklore, why would they think otherwise?” Christopher reasoned. “It made perfect sense to them. But my grandfather had his men—those who were not superstitious of upsetting the fairies—clear the site. What they discovered was not a tiny set of buildings built by fairy folk, but the remains of a Roman villa, with colonnades and many rooms. Most of the stone had been removed, no doubt used elsewhere, but the outline of stones and a mosaic tiled floor remained, with the terracotta pots and some coins. Would you like to see where it is?”
“Oh, yes, please! I have never seen a Roman villa, though I have visited Bath on several occasions, which I’m sure your father told you was occupied by the Romans. Did your grandfather ever visit Bath?” she asked, knowing she was prattling, all because he had taken hold of her hand again, and this simple gesture had the power to flood her with happiness. “The King’s bath is fed by a thermal spring, and one can taste the waters. But it tastes quite foul and there is an odor to it—Oh! But of course you would know this,” she added, suddenly selfconscious. “You lived in the Italian States—”
“Which does not necessarily mean I know the first thing about the Romans,” he countered mildly. “But yes, I do,” he added with a smile over his shoulder as he guided her through a wooden gate which was set in an archway heavy with an entangled ancient rose vine. “My father’s collection of coins fascinated me and set me on that path. As did this ruin, and the thermal spring. Here is where the foundations are, but the mosaic floor is—”
“But there is nothing here,” Mary interrupted, disappointed, staring at a small rectangular clearing that was bare but for a covering of autumn leaves. She had expected ancient carved stones or foundations at the very least.
“It is still all there, but my father had the site covered to protect the foundations from weather and pilfering.”
“And the mosaic tiles?”
“Ah! I’ll show you those in a moment. But first come see the source of our very own thermal spring. And there is also a bathing pool.”
“Bathing pool? Was that built by the Romans, too?”
He shook his head. “No. It is a natural phenomenon. It’s where the hot waters of the spring spill into the stream… Here! Here’s the source.”
He pulled aside a curtain of entangled roots and vine, clinging to a large piece of jutting rock that was part of the escarpment just beyond the furthest point of the outline of the villa. Here was a small pond. Though this pond was very different from any Mary had seen before, because steam rose from its surface and she did not doubt the water was very hot, possibly boiling. She tugged off a glove and held her hand over the water, fascinated that such intense heat radiated out of the earth without the need for fire to heat it. She flinched as her palm smarted in the steam, and quickly drew back, but not quickly enough for Christopher, who caught her about the waist and lifted her up and away, thinking she had burned herself.
“Show me!” he demanded, grabbing her wrist and turning over her hand to inspect her palm. His sigh of relief was audible. “Thank God. I’d never forgive myself had you burned yourself! Your hand would not recover from such an injury…” Relieved, he did the most natural thing in the world and pressed his lips to the center of her palm. “You are the most precious thing in the world to me.”
“I am?” Mary said wonderingly.
“Yes. You are.
But surely you knew that?”
“I have never been that to anyone before.”
He smiled. “You are—to Teddy.”
“Oh, yes, to Teddy. But she is my daughter and I her mother. Between mother and child that is a given.”
“It is. My mother made a habit of telling me how much I was wanted. But what of your own mother?”
Mary swallowed and looked away. “No. Not to my mother.”
“I should not have said—”
“It is perfectly all right, Mr.—Christopher. It is the truth. If I’d been a boy, I would be the heir, and it would’ve meant one less pregnancy for her to endure.” It was her turn to smile. “I’m glad your mother felt the same way about you as I do about Teddy.”
“Yes. Yes, they both felt that way. Which made the situation all the more heartbreaking—”
“Heartbreaking?”
“Let me show you why I brought you here,” he said, deftly changing the subject. “My grandfather believed that this hot spring was used first by the Saxons, and then the Romans, possibly as a place of worship to their pagan gods.”
“So the building your grandfather uncovered could’ve been a temple perhaps?”
“He thought so. But just as the temple was left to ruin, so too the spring silted up and was lost. My grandfather uncovered it, but it was my father who harnessed the thermal properties to heat the cottage. He built a weir and a pump, then had laid a series of pipes. Here is the pump and this valve can shut off the flow of water in summer, diverting it through that larger pipe straight to the stream. But for most of the year the hot water flows through these series of parallel pipes that run under the foundations of the cottage, heating the floor and in turn the interior. The pipes then carry the water to the stream where it discharges into a pool, another weir built by my father.
“Come,” he said, taking hold of her hand and leading her back through the arbor-covered gate, past the cottage, and downstream past where his angling rod still lay propped on the wicker fishing basket that held his lures. “Here’s the pool. The hot water is released underwater, and by the time it reaches the weir it’s still hot, but not scalding. The icy water of the stream helps to dilute the heat and make it a pleasant temperature for bathing.”
Proud Mary Page 27