The English Heiress

by Roberta Gellis

  In the cellar, Roger had wakened periodically because of being cold and cramped. Leonie, more accustomed to sleeping under such conditions, slept soundly. At first Roger was afraid to move much for fear he would wake Leonie, and each wakening was a renewal of hell. He would lie still as long as he could, but then he would have to more to ease a cramp, and Leonie would move also, following his warmth. That would start him off again, precipitating him into a desire that could have no satisfaction. The third time, Roger could endure no more. He inched out of Leonie’s arms, slipped out of his coat, and covered her with it. After listening with his ear pressed against the cask for a while, he eased it open.

  The cellar was quite bright to his eyes, so it was not late enough for any real activity. However, after listening intently and hearing nothing, Roger took off his boots and crept carefully to where Henry’s body had been hidden. He sighed softly with relief when he saw it was undisturbed. His next act was to find a distant corner and relieve his full bladder. Again Roger listened without result. Then, foot by foot, he crept to the stairs and up them. Judging by the light, it might be evening, Roger saw the wet spots the rain had left and decided it was probably late afternoon. Holding his breath, he crept along the corridor, to the servants’ stairs. Ears and eyes strained to the uttermost after each step told him there was no one moving in the house. Praying he was not deceived, Roger turned right past the stairs and eased himself into what had been the breakfast room. His goal was the formal salon where he had found the drape used to wrap Henry’s body. There had been another drape hanging in that room, and Roger was going to get it. The cloth was heavy and would serve admirably as a blanket for Leonie. Even at the cost of his life, Roger was not going to endure again the unsatisfiable stimulation Leonie’s embrace gave him.

  The adventure did not cost Roger’s life, but it was near thing. He managed to get the hanging down without noise and was retracing his steps, a trifle incautiously, because he had examined the ground through the window of the salon and has seen no one. Just as he was about to step into the front hall, which was shorter route, a creak of wood froze him. Roger did not leap for shelter. He did not breathe or blink his eyes. Still as a hunted hare, which escapes detection by immobility, he waited. The wood creaked again, and a heel scuffed the stone steps of the porch. Another scuff, but the doorsill did not creak nor was the step onto the wooden hall floor—another step.

  Roger’s breath trickled out, and he shifted the hanging to his left arm so that his sword hand was free. Simultaneously he realized he could not afford to attack whoever was on the porch. There was no guarantee the man was alone. Roger had heard the phrase “minutes like hours”. He had thought the minutes long while he fought his own body in Leonie’s arms, but he now learned that fear and regret can draw time much longer. Fool that he was! To provide himself with comfort, he had probably thrown away everything, including his life and Leonie’s. There was plenty of time for Roger to contemplate his own weakness and idiocy, to taste the bitter bile of fear and shame.

  Finally, Roger realized it could not be merely the stretching of time. Several minutes had gone by, more than long enough for the man to have come in if he was going to come in. Softly, slowly, scarcely breathing, Roger backed toward the end of the room from which he had come. He faded out of the salon, silently offering prayers of thanksgiving. The unlit corridor to the back of the house was far safer, but Roger did not make another mistake. He crept along close to the wall and eventually came safely down the stairs and into the black haven behind the cask.

  It was then the work of minutes to put on his coat again and wrap the drape around Leonie. To his pleasure, he found the hanging long enough to serve as a cover for him also, even when he was far enough away not to touch her. He was somewhat discouraged by the evidence that watchers had been left, even though Henry’s body had not been discovered. Perhaps they had found the horse or recognized that the carriage did not belong in de Conyers’ stable. He tried to guess how long the men would stay, but he soon concluded that such speculations were useless. After a while he came to the not very brilliant conclusion that he would simply have to investigate periodically, but he was warm now and he was sure there were hours before dark. He slipped into a doze again.

  The idea of investigating was still in his mind when he woke, and he muttered a soft curse because he had no idea how much time had passed or how to judge the further passage of time.

  “Are you awake?”

  The soft murmur made Roger turn his head. “Yes. Have you been awake long?”

  “I have no idea,” Leonie relied, a smile in her voice. “I think not very long, but I haven’t been thinking about time.”

  Leonie had been awakened by an urgent need to relieve herself. This she had accomplished without waking Roger, by feeling her way along the wall until it turned. Then, having felt her way back, she slipped carefully under the covers Roger had provided, drifting into a soft, pleasurable half-dream, comforted by the warmth of her covering and by Roger’s steady breathing beside her.

  “How in the world did you find a blanket?” she asked.

  “I have been up into the house.” Roger told her the rest of it and at first Leonie could think of nothing that would help. After a moment, however, she exclaimed that it must be near evening or even night already, because she was quite hungry.

  Roger laughed shortly. “That is not much of a guide. I was starving when I woke, and it was barely dinnertime then. Neither of us had had anything to eat, really, since yesterday.”

  “Yes and it is reasonable for you to be hungry. You are accustomed to eating breakfast and perhaps even a luncheon, as well as a supper at night after dinner, but I am not—not for many months. We were only fed once a day, and I have grown accustomed to much less food than you are used to eating.”

  Roger stared through the dark. He could not see Leonie’s face, but the voice… Again he was finding it hard to believe his ears. She sounded so good-humored. It was as if she were delighted that her deprivation had led to something that could help them. “My dear,” he urged, his heart wrung with the thought of her suffering, “eat some more of the sausage.”

  She laughed. “But that would spoil everything. I must wait until I am really hungry, until I begin to have images of food in my mind. Then it will be time for us to try again and see if it is night.”

  “No!” Roger managed not to shout, remembering the way sound acted in the tunnel, but the depth of his revulsion at the idea of using Leonie’s suffering to increase his safety rang through the controlled tone.

  “What is wrong?” Leonie asked, stretching her hand to seek him in the dark.

  “Do you think I would let you go hungry so that I could know the time?”

  “But—”

  It had always been assumed that Leonie would help and protect, and yield her convenience, to the other members of her family. She had never resented it because no unkindness was meant or practiced. It was a simple and natural outgrowth of the situation. Leonie was the elder child by many years, and naturally protected and cared for her younger brother. Yet François was the male child, the heir to the lands and name, and his preferences came before hers.

  When their world had been turned upside down, Leonie had, little by little, become the leader, the strong and responsible member of the family. Papa had been destroyed by what happened that first night. Mama had remained strong, but only for long enough to support Leonie over the shock and terror that had crumbled her world. When François fell sick, all Mama’s attention had been centered on him. She had accepted the little comforts Leonie had brought for him without question. Then Mama had also sickened. Leonie had struggled to save them all, never thinking of assuaging her own hunger with the tidbits she “stole” from Louis. She was so accustomed to the acceptance of the sacrifices that she was startled and even a little angered by Roger’s rejection.

  “There are no ‘buts’ for such a thing,” Roger said harshly. “I a
m trying to protect you, not torture you more.”

  That statement, of course, wiped away Leonie’s brief anger and filled her with a warmth mixed with gentle amusement, so that when Roger pushed a substantial piece of sausage into her hand, she took it without argument.

  “Eat,” he insisted, “and do not tell me you are accustomed to doing without. I cannot bear it. I will get out of this house and get more food for you, even if I have to kill that guard.”

  Leonie giggled, although her eyes were full of tears of gratitude. “Don’t be silly,” she murmured. “A full stomach is not worth a man’s life, and more especially, it is not worth the danger you would face. Besides, we have enough food for now.”

  Nonetheless, she did eat what Roger had given her because she realized it was the only thing that would relieve his anxiety. She was quite right. As he heard her chew and swallow, Roger calmed down. The violence of his reaction surprised him in afterthought. Of course he would be distressed at the idea of any gentlewoman suffering hunger and would help if he could, but the sensation of hysteria with which he had urged food on Leonie was excessive. Most likely it was because he was hungry, he told himself cynically, not wishing to investigate the feeling that if he lost Leonie he would have lost everything. After all, it was ridiculous. He did not “have” Leonie.

  “There is no need to judge by our stomachs anyway,” Roger said suddenly, shaking his head over his own slowness at a seeing an obvious fact. “All I need to do is open the cask a little. Our eyes are so used to the dark that the slightest bit of light in the cellar will seem bright to us. When I went out, it was like day to me and the light above blinded me for a while.”

  They did just that and it worked perfectly. The first time Roger slipped the hook from its hasps there was still a dim grayness, and he pushed the cask shut again. Actually, they could have come out then, because the men Marot had left on guard had already retreated to the gatekeeper’s lodge. However, the second time the cellar was nearly as dark as the tunnel. Roger tried to convince Leonie to remain in safety while he reconnoitered, but she would not, and indeed, she was as silent and steady as he.

  It took them nearly an hour of watching, hiding and listening, but at last they were convinced that the house was empty and there was no one in the immediate vicinity. Possibly men might be hiding in the shadowed area of trees that edged the lawns. Roger went to investigate, and this time Leonie did not argue when he forbade her to come. In the house she could have been of help if Roger was attacked. She could have struck an enemy with a broken piece of furniture or thrown rubbish in his face. In the open she would only increase Roger’s peril.

  However, there was no peril to increase, although twice Roger had been startled by a mottled shadow that seemed to approach him and then skitter away. It must be a rat, Roger told himself, but it was very odd behavior for a rat. More important, as far as Roger had penetrated it, the park was empty. It was not reasonable that watchers would be farther away, because the house would not be visible to them. Roger returned and gently broke the subject of their next duty—to bury Henry. There was a brief silence, Leonie’s face quivering on the verge of tears in the light of the rising moon. Then she sighed.

  “Yes, but—but how?”

  “I will manage. There are broken shafts and other things I can use for tools in the stable. What I need to know, Leonie, is where? I am sorry, but I do not think I would be able to take him to the churchyard. I—”

  “There is no need. We have our own family place. It is nearby also. For state funerals, the carriages went down the drive and along the main road—”

  She was interrupted by Roger’s groan, which he turned into a cough. “That means the horse and carriage,” he sighed, “Well—”

  “No, no,” Leonie hastened to assure him. “There is a path west of the house. You cannot see it because the maze is in the way, but Mama used it often because it was a pleasant walk and she liked to tend the graves. There is a small chapel there. We could lay Papa there while you”—her voice broke but she steadied it—”while you make everything ready for him.”

  “My dear, my poor child,” Roger said gently, “would you consider saying farewell to your papa here in the house? I will do this as quickly as I can and then we will leave. I only wish to spare you pain, Leonie, but I do not know what would hurt you least. If you would stay here and pray for your papa while I lay him to rest, perhaps your memories would be less painful.”

  Leonie considered that, but after a moment she shook her head resolutely. “I would have to go with you. The path branches. You might miss the way.” She sighed again. “I must go so far back to find pleasant memories…”

  “But my dear, I have no—I am so sorry—I have no way to—to provide—dignity.”

  Leonie lifted her face to his. Tears leaked slowly from her eyes and tracked down through the dirt on her face. “It does not matter,” she whispered. “Papa was a good man—truly good. His dignity is in himself, not in an ebony box with a satin lining, or mutes to carry it, or black plumes nodding on horses.”

  Unable to do anything else for her, Roger took Leonie into his arms. “You are right, and I assure you that I will feel true reverence for his body, even if I cannot always handle it just as I would wish.”

  It was, of course, impossible to handle Henry with dignity. The corpse was still in rigor and had to be carried between them, stiff as a board. Fortunately, they had laid it decently flat and were able to carry it wrapped in the hanging. However, Roger was prevented from bringing along such poor tools as he had hoped to find. As he laid Henry down in the tiny chapel and turned to start back to scrape up what he could, Leonie commented that everything here was untouched.

  “And if they did not come into the chapel, perhaps they did not steal the tools from the shed behind. They were kept there for the gardeners who tended the graves and planted bushes and trees here.”

  Owing either to neglect or to superstition, no one had disturbed the chapel, and the key to the shed was in the little cupboard where it had always been kept. Roger sighed with relief as he opened it and found everything he needed. He had been much concerned that, in addition to the lack of a coffin, the lack of proper tools would not permit him to dig a deep enough grave to protect Henry’s body from scavengers. The mattock and spade he took assured him that he would at least be able to provide that decency.

  In the small graveyard, the first things Roger saw were two relatively new grave mounds, one larger than the other. Stooping, he made out the lettering on the temporary wooden markers—Marie Victoire Leonie de Conyers and François Henri Guillaume de Conyers. Good God! Would Leonie be racked anew to find her mother and brother buried here? Roger could only assume that the bodies had been passed on to some friends to save the “state” the cost of burial. Briefly he considered trying to hide the fact by digging Henry’s grave elsewhere, but then he reconsidered. Aside from the fact that, wherever he dug, Leonie might well notice the new graves, he also felt that when she recovered from the first shock it would probably be a comfort to her to know her family was all together. He began to dig beside Marie’s grave.

  In spite of blistered hands and an aching back from such unaccustomed work, it did not take Roger very long. The ground had already been softened by the previous burials and the afternoon’s rain. When Roger had a neat trench, he returned to the chapel to find Leonie sitting quietly beside her father’s body. He told her what he had found as gently as possible and was relieved to see a sad pleasure on her face.

  “I am so glad,” she sighed. “Papa wanted so much to be with Mama. Now I do not need to grieve that I could not even do that much for him. They will be together and I will not worry about them. They were always happy together.”

  She did not cry when they carried Henry to the grave, even thought they were both badly startled by a sudden reappearance of the scuttling black-and-white animal. It darted at them and, when Leonie jumped and cried out, rushed away. Leonie h
ad almost dropped her father’s feet, but she did not look down as she tightened her grip on the cloth. She stared after the creature, which had disappeared again into the shadows cast by the cypresses that bordered the graveyard. Even after they had lowered the body into the grave, she did not weep, only murmuring, “Goodbye, Papa, goodbye,” but when Roger lifted the first shovelful of earth, she covered her face.

  Roger laid down the spade and embraced her carefully. “Go back now, Leonie,” he said. “Please go back to the house, or into the chapel.”

  Before she could answer, a long, thin, heartrending howl came from the cypresses. Leonie jumped and Roger clutched her tighter. She shuddered in his grip, then braced her body and nodded.

  “Stay in the chapel if you are frightened,” Roger urged.

  “Frightened? No. I was only startled. The dog—it is silly to say one recognizes a dog’s voice—but that sounded so like my spaniel. She must be dead also, poor thing, she was so useless, so small and frail. No one would have taken her because she could not work.”

  Leonie shuddered again. The dog was still howling. Then she eased herself out of Roger’s arms and began to walk back toward the house. Roger turned toward where the sound had come from, but he could see no flicker of black and white. The moon was almost down too, and he had better hurry and finish burying Henry.

  Jean-Paul Marot had enjoyed his dinner far less than Leonie had enjoyed her piece of sausage. She sat on the ground in the cold and dark, but her heart was warm and full of hope. Jean-Paul had achieved all the warmth and light and elegancies that he had ever dreamed of in his present surroundings, but his heart was cold and dark. Somehow, the more his desires were satisfied, the emptier he became. For a long time after his victory, he had almost forgotten Henry de Conyers and his family, but there had been a burning, bitter renewal of his first satisfaction—when he soiled the wife and daughter—when the news of the son’s and wife’s deaths was brought to him. Little by little de Conyers would be stripped of everything. He would end where Marot had started. Somehow, de Conyers was Marot’s symbol. As Henry descended from power to nothing, Jean-Paul rose from nothing to power.