“What is it?”
“Someone has written something. The ink has leaked through to this parchment, see?”
“So?” She walked toward the desk.
“It’s not my uncle’s writing,” Simeon replied.
“So?” When he looked up at her impatiently she rolled her eyes. “What is to say that someone quite innocently came in here to write a quick note? It’s probably nothing,” she declared dismissively.
Simeon stared down at the ghostly outline of words and letters on the parchment. He didn’t know how he knew, but he was positive this had something to do with his uncle’s death. He would have noticed something like this when he had searched the drawers several weeks ago. This had been written while he had been away.
“I wish there was enough light to see,” he groused.
“In the morning there will be,” she replied crisply.
He glared at her. “Are you always this positive about everything?” he challenged darkly.
Eloisa turned to look at him and smiled a little sheepishly. “If you look on the positive side of things, you will always realise that whatever situation you are looking at could be a lot worse. I mean, look at us. The intruder locked us into the pantry – with all the food. The intruder had you running around the first floor after him – only to stop at the top of the stairs and be hit with the food he had just lost. He has stolen your horse – but he now has to race it across the wet, soggy fields in the dark.” She pointed to the window. “Although we are stuck in this house for the time being, we are warm and dry, and have full stomachs. He is outside, cold, wet, and undoubtedly thoroughly miserable. Not only that, but there is a runaway coach and horses charging around the country lanes somewhere, most probably without a driver by now as well as its passengers. Luck may shine on us and run the intruder over.” She shook her head and looked around them. “Dark and foreboding it might be here, but we are a lot better off than him right now,” she declared firmly.
He suddenly grinned at her and, in spite of the dangers that seemed to lurk in every corner, had the sudden urge to laugh. She was right. It was easy to get bogged down with the seemingly endless mysteries that surrounded them. Now that she had pointed out the facts, their situation wasn’t as bad as he had first thought. At least they had a nice warm bed for the night and were drying out with each minute they were in the house.
“I take your point,” he mused wryly. When something unusual caught his eye, he frowned and stared at it.
“What is it this time?” Eloisa asked impatiently when she noticed his scowl. She wondered if he liked to err on the side of doom and gloom. He always seemed to be so serious and worried about something.
“What have you noticed?” he asked casually as he leaned back in his chair. He folded his hands behind his head and studied her.
Backlit by the fire, she had a golden haze around her that made her look a little angelic. The voluminous skirts that seemed to enshroud her glistened and sparkled as they swirled in the firelight. While her slender shoulders were bare, they emphasised the fullness of her bosom, bound tightly within the confines of her corset. He studied her waist carefully and wondered if his hands could span her slender waist.
Eloisa felt a little unnerved by the rather assessing way he was studying her and turned her attention to the room they were in.
“What?” She asked, when she couldn’t think about anything other than the intent way he was watching her.
“The fire,” Simeon mused. “At least our intruder had the foresight to light a fire for us.”
She gasped and whirled around to stare in horror at the roaring flames. “He was in here all along.” She threw him a dark look and frowned at the hearth. “Why didn’t we see the light beneath the door when we went upstairs?”
Simeon shrugged. If he was honest, he had been too busy thinking about their kiss to pay any attention to the house itself. He knew his way around - sort of - and had been more intent on getting to the bedroom and away from danger than he had about looking at the bottom of doorways.
“He may have put something against the bottom of the door,” she murmured thoughtfully.
“Maybe, I don’t know. It doesn’t really matter, does it? It does point to the fact that he was in here and was most probably looking for something.”
“Is there any safe or anything in here where you uncle kept his private papers?”
“I have everything of importance,” Simeon assured her. “The documents relating to the house were with George’s solicitor at the time of his death. They were handed over to my legal representative weeks ago. The personal financial papers, and the papers I considered important, were removed the last time I was here. I don’t think George had a safe, or a secret hiding place, anywhere.”
“A secret hiding place; like secret stairs and passageways?” Eloisa asked with lifted brows.
A tendril of suspicion swept through him. “Yes, exactly,” he murmured thoughtfully. “If he has something of worth, he would undoubtedly stash it where he knew it wouldn’t be found.”
Eloisa nodded. “Like a secret passageway.”
“Exactly. There is nothing we can do about finding them right now though. Even if we could find the entrance, we wouldn’t have enough light to see. I don’t know about you but I don’t want to spend what’s left of the night stuck in a dark and creepy corridor.”
Eloisa shuddered.
“Come on, I think I have seen enough for one night.” He escorted her to the door and remained by her side all the way to her bedroom.
“Good night,” she whispered quietly, suddenly very aware of the intimacy of being alone in the dark with him.
“Good night, Eloisa. I will knock on the door when it is time to get up.”
She nodded but before she could open her mouth to speak, he vanished into the darkness across the corridor. She stared about her in consternation before she realised she was alone. She let herself into her bedroom for the night, and closed the door with a shudder.
Once inside the room, she hurried over to the bed. Without a fire it was cold; too cold to remove her clothing. Shivering, she clambered eagerly between the sheets and tugged the covers up to her chin. She had gotten used to the warmth of the fire in the study and was now painfully aware of just how chilly the rest of the house was. It took some time before warmth began to permeate her bones, and she started to feel blessedly warm again. It was only when she was staring at the canopy overhead that she realised Simeon hadn’t gone into the room he had said he would use directly opposite. He had disappeared toward the Dowager’s old rooms instead, and the servant’s staircase.
Where was he going to sleep then?
As soon as he heard the quiet click of the door, and was assured she was safe for the night, Simeon made his way down the back stairs toward the kitchen. Not only did he want to conduct another tour of the house to make sure that everything was alright, but he had the strangest feeling that he was missing something, only wasn’t quite sure what that ‘something’ was.
It took him an hour to complete a thorough search of the servant’s quarters and kitchens. As far as he could tell, everything was still in its rightful place. Apart from the fresh food in the pantry, it was evident that the place hadn’t been lived in for several weeks. A thin layer of dust covered practically every uncovered surface. Even the covers that lay over some of the furniture had a thin layer of dust on them.
He wandered into the formal dining room. The huge rectangular room echoed his footsteps as he walked toward the highly polished table that could seat twenty people with ease. He sighed and stifled a yawn. Was his imagination was running away with him? He wondered what the time was and looked at the clock on the mantle at the far end of the room.
A quiet sense of satisfaction swept through him as he studied the empty space where the clock should be. The hairs on the back of his neck stood on end as he searched the room, but found no sign of the family heirloom. Not only had the ornate clock been r
emoved, but two highly decorative silver candelabras that had once sat on either side of the clock had been purloined too.
His temper grew when he spied the space on the wall directly above the sideboard. There had once been a beautiful landscape of the folly in the gardens hanging there but it too had vanished.
“Where the hell has that gone?” Simeon growled as he made a large circuit around the table.
That particular landscape was huge, and would be difficult for one man to get off the wall. To carry it through the house would be impossible without help.
Determined to establish the true extent of the thefts, he retraced his steps and began a more careful assessment of the house. This time, when he searched each of the rooms, he did so with fresh eyes. By the time he reached the door to his bedroom, his temper was raging. He had seen more than enough to confirm that someone had been pilfering valuable items from the house while it was empty.
Not one of the downstairs rooms had been untouched by thieving hands. Not only that but no attempt had been made to cover the spaces where the furniture had been.
Was this the work of some opportunist thief who had learned of the demise of his uncle and decided to raid the house at his leisure now it was empty? Or was the thief someone who was connected to the family? Someone who felt cheated out of a piece of George’s will?
Simeon frowned at that and mentally ran through the family members who had been a little put out that they had not received anything from George. There was a cousin, Constance, but she was overweight and lazy, and by far the very last person who would hurry anywhere, least of all with a huge landscape tucked under her arm. There was also his cousin Ivor, but he could barely remember where his own house was, and lived all the way up in Edinburgh. Even if he could be bothered to head in the general direction of Mitchelham, he would struggle to find it – even with the turrets on the skyline to give him guidance. There really was nobody else in the family who really knew Uncle George well enough to expect anything; not on the male side of the family anyway.
When another yawn escaped him, and was rapidly followed by another, Simeon finally gave in and made his own way to bed. As he climbed between the sheets, his thoughts turned toward his delightful guest. She was wonderful, and intrigued him so much that he knew he had to find out more about her.
Eloisa murmured sleepily and rolled over in bed. She felt a cool breeze tickle her arm and wished that she was somewhere warmer. As sleep slowly receded, she gradually became aware that she could still hear the wind howling outside. Rather than ease, they seemed stronger than ever, which was a little disappointing.
She frowned when another icy blast swept over her bare skin of her arm. Sleep began to draw her back under but something urged her to stay awake. She tried to warn herself that it was just her wayward imagination, but something urged her to pay attention.
In search of a more comfortable position, she turned over and yawned sleepily as she snuggled beneath the covers. The blankets were tucked under her chin as far as she could pull them. If only that blasted breeze would just stop, she might be able to warm up a little. When another breeze swept over her, she scowled deeply. Was it her imagination or was the cold air stronger across her arm?
Had she left her window open? She could have sworn it had been closed when she had gone to sleep. Surely she would have remembered if it had been open given how bad the wind was?
Suddenly, the events of the evening slammed all trace of sleep out of the way. Her eyes popped open, and she stared blankly at the altered bedroom. To begin with she couldn’t quite absorb what she was seeing and blinked several times just in case it was some strange dream. The more she stared and the image remained the same, the more she realised that this was no dream.
She was in fact staring at a man; a strange man. He was dressed head to foot in black. His face was obscured by a large, bushy beard and a big floppy hat. Not only that but he was standing in front of an open doorway where there should be a wall.
Her scream was loud in the silence of the night and was seemingly endless. The only time she stopped screaming was to drag in another deep breath. She sat bolt upright and clutched the sheet to her chest protectively when the man jumped and glanced worriedly at the door. Everything within her was urging her to leave the bed and get out of the room, but her limbs refused to move.
She watched as, faster than a blink, the intruder spun on his heel and disappeared through a door beside the bed. She watched the door close behind him and only then launched herself out of bed.
Simeon jerked upright in bed when he heard Eloisa scream.
“Eloisa, what the hell?” he demanded as he burst through the door braced for a fight.
At any other time the sight of her standing beside the bed with her hair a wild cascade of tumbling curls around her shoulders would have been too much temptation to resist. However, the fear in her eyes warned him that something had terrified her. He scanned the room for the source of her distress, but couldn’t see anything amiss.
“There,” she gasped and pointed with a shaking finger toward the panelling. “There was a man. He was here; beside the bed. He came through there.”
Her breaths came in hiccupping pants. She didn’t seem able to stem her shaking enough to make sense. Even through the darkness she could see the confusion in his eyes and knew he didn’t believe her. She watched as he stalked straight past her and started to push at the panelling on the wall beside her table. To her consternation, nothing happened.
“We checked this earlier, there is nothing here,” he murmured. He didn’t dare question what she had actually seen, but he had been the one who had tapped this panelling. It was as solid as the brickwork behind it. He wondered if she had had a nightmare because of everything that had happened and had become confused when she had woken up.
“He was there, I tell you. He was standing right beside the bed watching me,” Eloisa gasped.
Now that her fear had started to subside, anger replaced it. She was furious, not only at the stranger who had the audacity to invade her bedroom while she was asleep, but at Simeon, who didn’t appear to believe her account of what she had seen.
She knew the stranger had been there. “I felt the chill from the open doorway on my arm. It is what woke me up,” she snapped. When she read the doubt on his face, she stomped over to the spot where she had seen the door.
“Eloisa.”
She ignored him and began to thump on the panelling. “It’s here, I tell you. I didn’t imagine it. He was wearing a long black cloak.”
“What did he look like?” Simeon asked calmly.
“He was shorter than you and had a big beard.”
Simeon frowned at that. He had seen the intruder they had encountered in the hallway. He too had a beard; a grey one. Had their intruder gotten back into the house somehow?
“There isn’t much we can do about it now. Even if we do find the doorway, neither of us is going to go into any secret corridors right now. Not with him in the house. I don’t think he is dangerous, but he is here for a reason,” Simeon sighed.
“I know you don’t believe me,” Eloisa accused. “But he was standing right here, I tell you.” She stepped toward him and looked down at her feet when she felt them become wet.
“Look,” she gasped and pointed to wet patches on the floor.
Simeon shook his head as he tried to see what she was looking at, but sighed when he was unable to see through the darkness. He yanked the curtains open but still didn’t have enough light.
“Wait here,” he growled, determined to ease her fears so he could get back to bed.
“I am not staying here by myself,” she gasped. “I am not,” she repeated when she saw him heave a sigh and roll his eyes. “He may come back.”
“I doubt it with how loud you scream,” Simeon muttered.
“Pardon?” she asked somewhat hoarsely.
“Nothing. Let’s go and find a light, and quickly because I want to see those footprin
ts before they dry off.”
“In this house, that is hardly likely. It’s colder than the graveyard in here,” Eloisa groused as she rubbed chilled fingers down arms that were liberally smattered with goose bumps.
“Wait here,” he snapped at the top of the stairs. “I am just going to the study –”
“I am not staying anywhere in this house by myself,” Eloisa bit out. She glared at him challengingly, silently daring him to object.
Simeon studied her for a moment and suspected that he would have to tie her up to stop her following him. “Hurry up then,” he snapped, and raced down the stairs without a backward look.
Encumbered by her voluminous skirts, Eloisa had to take her time or else fall down the long flight of stairs. She watched him vanish into the study only to return moments later with a lit spill. He raced past her and charged back upstairs toward her room without slowing his pace.
She sighed and shook her head as she stared into the hallway below. She didn’t really care where the secret corridor was, or where it went. She wanted to get out of this house. It suddenly felt so claustrophobic that she wished that she had never tried to find refuge here in the first place. Not only did she now have the awful intruder to deal with, but her host was causing her significant problems.
Simeon made her feel things that she should never feel for a man who was far out of her reach, socially and financially. She had no business even being a guest in his house. It may not mean much to him, but her reputation mattered to her. She couldn’t afford to lose it. If anyone caught her living in the house, even for one night, alone, without even household staff in attendance, her reputation would be in tatters, and there would be nothing she could do about it.
He would undoubtedly walk away from the situation scot free whereas she would never recover because she lived locally.
Her heart ached. She tried to put it down to being tired and worried. It was well past midnight, and she had just had the fright of her life after all. However, no matter how much she tried to convince herself that she shouldn’t feel anything for him, all she had to do was look at him to know it was impossible to ignore the attraction she felt for him. As annoying as he could be sometimes, she suspected that once she was free to leave, she would return to a life that would never quite be the same again.
Eloisa's Adventure Page 9