Once he swallowed the eggs, he’d found a reply. “As I told you last night, you’re free to leave. But perhaps you could tell me your story before you do so. Michael thinks that you’re in some danger. Why is that?”
Blanche shrugged and clung to her bread. “I don’t know this Michael. I cannot imagine what he is thinking. My house burned down and nearly took everyone in it. That is a very frightening event in itself. I would like assurance that my staff escaped safely. I must see that they have places to go, that they are not hungry in my absence. I cannot do that while trapped here.”
That was an exceedingly mature viewpoint from one who couldn’t possess more than eighteen or nineteen years, at his best guess. Gavin frowned some more, but she didn’t flinch. He didn’t know about her blindness, but her bandages obviously protected her from the sight of him.
Since she couldn’t see enough to fear him and apparently didn’t have sense enough to understand the danger of residing secretly with a strange man without protection, he saw no purpose in frightening her with words.
“When Michael returns, I will send him out to check on your servants. Do you have a man of business who might see that they are paid?”
She hesitated, then stared down at her plate. “Only my cousin Neville’s solicitor. He handles all my funds. Dillian always told me that was a mistake. Perhaps I should have listened.” She looked up with an air of defiance. “But he always handled the family affairs. I cannot believe he would betray me, not any more than I can believe Neville would.”
Gavin found that an interesting starting point, but he didn’t know if he ought to take advantage of it. He didn’t want the chit harmed, but he didn’t want to become permanently entangled in her affairs, either. He didn’t possess the Good Samaritan instincts of his brother. He had enough problems of his own without looking for more.
“Perhaps if you could pen a short note, we could have it delivered without anyone knowing its source. Your solicitor would recognize your signature and obey your wishes?”
She thought about that. “I believe so. He’s never refused anything I’ve asked of him.” She lifted her damaged hands uncertainly. “I cannot say how recognizable my signature would be.”
Gavin felt dubious, too, but he didn’t mention his doubts out loud. It was the only solution that occurred at the moment. “I’ll write the note that you dictate so all you need do is sign. Perhaps if I hold your hand while you hold the pen, we can keep it legible enough.”
He suspected she was giving him a skeptical look. Her reply confirmed it.
“I will make the note very brief, but I will write it myself. Will you bring me pen and paper?”
If he really meant her harm, he just wouldn’t mail the note. Gavin didn’t impart that bit of information as he trailed off, shoeless, in search of the required instruments.
The rustle of slippered feet on the old stairway behind him went unnoticed.
Chapter Three
After sleeping the better part of this second day away while the marquess of Arinmede Ruin reluctantly entertained Blanche, Dillian felt more equal to the task of keeping her protégée protected. At twenty-five, she considered herself firmly on the shelf, but Blanche deserved to have the entire world laid at her feet to pick and choose from. Dillian fully intended that her cousin have those choices, Neville and his obstinate family notwithstanding.
Patting the cat the marquess had so thoughtfully provided for his purported rats, she crept from the bed wearing the boy’s shirt and breeches she had confiscated from an attic trunk. She would dearly like a glimpse of the man who hid in shadows, but she needed to avoid his notice more than satisfy her curiosity.
Stifling her overactive imagination, she ran her fingers through her dark curls as a substitute for a comb and tiptoed downstairs to check on Blanche, before setting about finding food.
She had to fend for herself if she wanted to eat. Blanche had only hidden a few rolls and a chicken wing from the marquess’s eagle eyes. Dillian quit worrying about starvation once she learned this pathetic household contained an amazingly plentiful larder. The marquess might live in ruin and grime, but he didn’t go hungry while doing so.
Snacking on a perfectly delicious meat pie, Dillian navigated the back steps rather than the front ones near his lordship’s study. She had discovered to her dismay that his lordship preferred sleeping on his couch rather than in a bed. She’d had to leave the family history volume rather hurriedly that first night.
But she’d learned enough from that brief foray to know Arinmede Ruin had housed generations of Lawrences, and the eldest sons were marquesses. Judging from the study littered with account books and tomes on modern farming, the hooded beast ran this place.
She couldn’t see the feckless carriage driver as a titled aristocrat, but the eccentric monster suited her fancy. Only they ought to call him the Beast of Effingham and not the marquess.
She carried the rest of her stolen food up to the third floor, where she had made a chamber for herself. She’d used Blanche’s washstand for freshening herself. Now she decided to hunt for something more suitable to wear than breeches. Clinging to the back of a carriage, collecting all the dust of the road, hadn’t improved her only remaining gown. Deciding if the wardrobe in Blanche’s chamber contained ball gowns, perhaps others contained something more sensible, she set out to explore.
Humming softly, Dillian ravaged one wardrobe after another, claiming a shawl here, an old-fashioned gown there, a petticoat elsewhere. She even found delicate silk stockings in the bottom drawer of a dresser in Blanche’s room. Blanche really should have those, but she was doomed to wear nightclothes for a while longer yet.
Perhaps this obviously bachelor household would eventually recognize that their patient needed clean clothing. She would remind Blanche to request some when she woke again.
Dillian felt much better once she discarded her improper attire for a gown, even if the clothing did come from a different century. She felt certain the gown must be French, from the Directoire period. The long tight sleeves were a bit of a nuisance, but the simple skirt with its slightly high waist felt familiar enough, and the light blue silk suited her, although the scooped neck did not. The gown sported a gold corded belt and a long fringed tassel hanging at the side. She wondered idly if she couldn’t find sandals somewhere to match it. She felt like Marie Antoinette playing shepherdess. Or was that Josephine? Her history left something to be desired, but she knew good clothes when she saw them.
She slid her own dirty slippers on over the stockings and after stirring up the fire to keep Blanche warm, she slipped back into the hall. Blanche had told her about the note to her solicitor. Dillian feared that had not been a smart thing to do, but she understood her cousin’s fear that the servants might come to harm otherwise. The village was a small one, after all. The parish couldn’t support them for long. Still, she wished she could determine if the marquess had actually sent the note.
She wished she had some way of exploring the marquess’s study while he went about his work during the day. The room might contain information about Effingham, and she would like to find a few more secret passages. But she couldn’t go in there at night while he slept and she prowled.
Instead, she explored the library. Large gaps showed where someone had removed volumes and never returned them. At least in here, as in several of the downstairs rooms, the dust and grime had been eradicated and some semblance of normality restored.
But, as in every other room she’d explored, this one, too, had the appearance of a room stripped of its valuables. Magnificent mahogany shelving and elaborately carved display cases sat empty of the generations of trinkets that should have adorned them. She was familiar enough with the houses of wealthy noblemen to know what belonged on their shelves.
She deduced that the marquess had systematically sold anything of value not entailed to the estate. She didn’t like the sound of that. What was the current marquess’s vice? Gambling? Women? Or
just dereliction of duty and general incompetence? The only consolation she could find in the dismal state of affairs was that it had gone on much longer than any one man could have accomplished on his own.
She couldn’t locate any more family histories or volumes of interest. The marquess apparently didn’t use the library for anything but a financial resource. The only novel she could find had been printed in the late 1700s. The Effinghams weren’t given much to fiction, it seemed.
Frustrated, she tried locating a panel that might lead to a secret passage into the study. If she could slip in and out, she might learn a few things to help her current situation. A man as financially desperate as the marquess could very well be driven to kidnapping. Did kidnappers keep correspondence on their vile deeds? She really didn’t want to move Blanche if they were safe, but she didn’t feel particularly safe.
Growing bored with her inability to discover anything, Dillian returned upstairs. Blanche slept much of the time, and she didn’t dare disturb her rest. But the blasted beast seldom ever slept, so entertaining herself was dangerous.
She found his attempts to chase the rats out of the walls amusing, but it didn’t seem quite fair annoying the poor man. So far, he had done nothing but bark gruffly and keep Blanche comfortable. She owed him a debt for that. She leaned over and patted the cat following her about.
She wondered about the story behind the villagers who wouldn’t come near the place. She had counted only four servants maintaining this rambling monstrosity. She could understand why the owner stayed in the few rooms downstairs rather than seek comfort in the spacious chambers above. But she had time on her hands and an active mind that wouldn’t let her sit idly. Whistling under her breath, she returned to the task she’d set herself.
* * * *
“I tell ye, my lord, I heard her myself. The lady is walking again. Som’at’s dreadful wrong. Could ye talk to her? Do ye think she’s warnin’ us?”
Sleepily, Gavin ran his hand through his tousled hair. It was a damn good thing he slept in his breeches, he concluded, or Matilda might have got the shock of her life. Maybe he could take to wearing nightshirts, and he could haunt these halls at night. A few glimpses of him at midnight should scare a few people into keeping to their rooms, where they belonged.
“I think we have a serious infestation of rats, is what I think,” he growled to placate his cook. “If you’d not feed the wretched cat, he’d earn his keep around here. But I’ll take a look around. Just go on back to your room. If the house is in imminent danger of caving in on itself, you’re safe enough back there.”
“Rats! I dinna allow rats in any house I live in, my lord. I know better than to leave food where those rascals will find it. Those dinna be rats walking up there.”
Gavin left Matilda shaking her gray head and muttering while he took the stairs two at a time to the upper floor. The only rats he suspected were the two-legged kind. He still didn’t want to believe Blanche anything but innocent. Perhaps Michael had come home without telling him. That was a hundred times more likely.
He saw nothing at the top of the stairs or down either corridor, but the wings stretched into eternity and contained more doors to hide behind than he could check in one night. In stocking feet, he hurried down the east wing to Blanche’s room. He found her sound asleep with the fire dying to embers. He stirred it and added more of the coal he’d ordered up from the village. She tossed restlessly on her pillow but didn’t wake.
He returned to the corridor and stood still for a minute, listening for whatever the servants heard. As a military man, he’d learned how to keep silent and observe the enemy. They hadn’t taught him how to hunt ghosts, however. A cat meowed in the distance, and he felt some grim satisfaction in blaming the feline for his discomfort.
Feeling like an idiot standing here listening for something that didn’t exist, he gave up and took the corridor back to the main front of the house. A board creaked somewhere, and Gavin jerked around, trying to locate the sound. In a house like this, boards creaked all the time, but he couldn’t help feeling jittery. If an arsonist meant to destroy Blanche Perceval, then he could very well have followed her here. This house might be an atrociously expensive ruin, but it was the only ruin he owned. He didn’t mean to lose it.
Deciding the servants’ stairs in the back deserved consideration if someone were sneaking about the place, he carried his candle in that direction. Another board creaked, and he hurried a little faster.
Thinking he heard a soft footstep in a spare bedchamber behind him, Gavin stopped and flashed the candle around. Cursing the darkness, the heavy draperies, and his decision to leave this room intact, bed hangings and all, he scoured the interior before discovering the damned cat licking its paw in the corner. Cursing, he continued toward his original destination.
The servants’ stairs leading up to the third floor were narrow, dark, and made of wood that creaked with every step he took. He didn’t know how he could have imagined an arsonist sneaking up here. The man would be insane to even try. He started back down again.
At the sight of a suspicious light flickering on the downstairs landing, Gavin hastened his steps, nearly breaking his neck as he tripped on a loose board.
He could almost swear he heard a ghostly voice calling, “Careful now!”
* * * *
Dillian sat cross-legged behind the wall, petting the cat and listening to the monster storm from room to room in search of rats or ghosts. She had disturbed his terribly light sleep three nights in a row now. She thought him most probably ready to strangle whatever he found. Or whomever.
The idea didn’t disturb her too terribly. She had led a boring life on the whole. Playing the ghost of Arinmede Ruin tickled her fancy. And her mischievous streak rather enjoyed the challenge of outwitting the Monster of Effingham. Even in his stocking feet she could hear him creeping down the hall, intent on discovering her lair. She’d left a little surprise for him in the master chamber. She hoped he appreciated the sentiment. In the meantime, as much as she would like to see his face when he found it, she’d best remove herself from this passage. As long as there was any doubt as to Blanche’s safety, she had to retain the element of surprise.
* * * *
Gavin cursed as his lantern light caught on the perfect red rosebud set in a crystal vase beside the bed in the master chamber. He swung the light around to search the room’s shadows for hidden prey. Instead, he discovered the furniture newly dusted and polished, the linen changed and fresh, and the rotting draperies torn from their rods to expose mullioned bay windows. He had no idea where “the lady” had hauled the material, for no evidence of it remained. For the first time since his arrival in this ruin, the master chamber appeared a welcome haven instead of a home for rats.
“Why roses?” he yelled in frustration at the hollow walls.
He thought he heard drifting laughter, but by now, his imagination could easily conjure up entire leagues of floating ladies in ghostly apparel.
Frustrated, disbelieving, Gavin knew the foolishness of following a phantom, but he refused to believe in ghosts. Hitting the panel hiding the secret door, he entered the dark passage beyond, immediately tripping over the abandoned draperies on the other side. His recently acquired cat purred and snaked around his ankles.
He didn’t even bother cursing this time. He caught his candle before it fell and examined the pile of moldering velvet as the cat bolted back to the bedroom. No ghost had done this. He held the light up to the passage, but it didn’t pierce the length. Could Michael have returned and hid himself for some reason?
He dismissed that notion quickly. Michael wasn’t inclined to dusting and polishing furniture. And if he stole draperies, he would do it for profit and not for aesthetic purposes. It had to be Blanche.
But every time he sought the invalid’s room, she slept soundly with the laudanum. He had dressed the wounds on her hands and face and knew their painful reality. He had caught glimpses of other, lesser bums, bu
t she had modestly insisted on caring for those herself. Still, he didn’t think her capable of moving as swiftly and silently as this intruder, even could she see. Gavin wished Michael would get his scrawny ass back here so they could send for a better physician than the local quack. Someone needed to address the problem of the lady’s vision.
In the meantime he would tackle the dilemma of their newly arrived ghost.
He slipped back to the corridor, knowing the passage behind these walls came out in only one other place— Blanche’s bedroom. If the ghost hid in the walls, it could only run one of two directions. It could slip past a sleeping Blanche easily enough, but it wouldn’t slip by him.
Gavin carefully lit the lamps he’d set at intervals all down the hall. He had the ghost trapped now.
* * * *
Silence had never sounded so ominous. Dillian waited behind the hidden panel. The monster usually stormed into Blanche’s room by now, certain the poor patient led him a merry dance. She heard no sound of his approach.
Curiosity driving her more than sense, she slipped through Blanche’s darkened room and peered into the corridor, hoping to glimpse the monster marquess. All she saw for her effort was a large cloak striding down the hallway, lighting lamps. Other than noting his height and the overlong length of black curls, she could discern nothing abnormal. Muffling a giggle, Dillian slipped back to the secret passage. She had feared he might get clever and set a trap. Well, she had prepared for that eventuality.
Swinging the small lamp she had confiscated from the lower floor, she cautiously crept down the secret passage toward the master chamber. Those old draperies would make an excellent bed. She need only outwait him. She hoped he hadn’t found her bowl of soup. He really did have the best cooks she’d ever encountered.
* * * *
Gavin woke to someone kicking the soles of his feet. Growling as he stretched aching limbs, he grudgingly opened his eyes to discover he slept in the upper corridor with only his cloak for a blanket.
The Marquess Page 4