For a few seconds he idly rubbed one thumb against the seal on Beecham’s note. Then, abruptly, he broke it.
Hallie watched him as he read, watched the lowering of his dark brows and the part to his lips, as though he would read the contents aloud. She silently repeated the words to herself. When at last he looked across at her she felt the intensity in his gaze.
“The poor fool is in love,” he said. His eyes, holding hers, were accusing.
“Pardon?”
“Beecham. ‘Tis plain as day. The poem says it all. No wonder I have had nothing from him. The besotted moonling has succumbed to the charms of some female. Although,” and he frowned, “there is that about it-”
As he returned to the letter, Hallie again rose uncomfortably to her feet and stood with hands clasped before her. She felt cold, miserably cold and utterly unprepared. It was time for the masquerade to end. Jeremy had ensured it. But first she had to ask: “Is it not a good poem?”
“Oh, aye,” Marksley muttered as he read. “‘Tis a good and terrible poem”
Hallie swallowed.
“Richard,” she began once more, only to falter as that considering gaze suddenly fixed on hers. “There is something I must tell you. I should never have left it so late, but I feared … feared you would not understand or … forgive.” As Marksley’s frown deepened, Hallie tried to rush ahead. “Because of my uncle, whom you have reason to know too well, after Tolly’s death, I needed a way-” She stopped as a flurry of footsteps in the hall preceded Gibbs and a strange child, an unkempt boy with unruly black hair and ragged clothes that bespoke his gypsy ties. He was very thin, but Hallie guessed him to be about ten years old.
“My lord, this scamp has news of Beecham,” Gibbs announced, maintaining a hold on the child’s arm, though the boy made no effort to escape.
“Beecham again? Release him then, Gibbs, as I can only assume he came here freely.”
“Too right, yer excellency,” the boy said in a high treble. “‘At I did. There’s a cov what’s hurt hisself at our camp, see. An’ as none of us knows `is name-not `is proper name as you’d know it-there’s on’y this then” He handed over a sheet of paper, which Hallie recognized as one of Marksley’s letters to Beecham. She had last seen that page when she entrusted it to Jeremy, with the letters of credit for George Partridge.
“George-” she gasped, only to draw her husband’s alert regard.
“George?” he asked.
“I … it simply reminded me of something. Pardon me.”
He looked most dissatisfied, but turned to the boy. “You say the man is injured at your camp?”
“Just happen he stood too close to a fight twixt my uncle Sherengo and Rosabelle’s new beau. Hurt `is head an’ arm. `Taint so bad, but he’d best leave.”
“And where are your wagons?”
“‘Bout three miles t’other side o’ the river bridge, on the highway. I ken take ya. I ran most the way,” he added proudly.
Marksley turned to Gibbs. “I shall take the boy with me on Apollo, Gibbs. Send the carriage after us and summon the doctor. If Beecham can be moved, I shall bring him back here.”
“Yes, my lord.” Gibbs responded with surprising alacrity, but paused at the door. “This explains the other letter then, my lord, does it not?” To Hallie’s hearing, the elderly man sounded relieved.
“It might, Gibbs. It very well might.” But Marksley’s face was troubled as he at last set Beecham’s poem carefully down on his desk. He looked at the boy.
“This stranger … he was not your Rosabelle’s new beau by any chance?”
“Cor!” The boy exclaimed. “Why Rosabelle wouldna look at him! A gorgio-not a brother-an’ on’y along to listen to the jib.”
“The jib?”
The lad shifted his feet and looked down. “The way we talk `mong ourselves”
“Will you be afraid to ride with me on my stallion? I shall keep you safe, but he is very tall and fast.”
The imp grinned in delight. “‘Taint scared, yer worship,” he breathed.
Hallie’s thoughts were racing. She felt responsible for George, though she knew he had always pursued his researches in his own eccentric way. That particular note, in which Marksley had explained how the letters of credit would work at the banks, might have led the gypsies to believe he had funds on him or easy access to funds. Why else had the lad been sent all this way, if George’s injuries were not severe? Marksley might be heading into a trap.
“My lord,” she said, “had you not best take Thomas with you, or perhaps a groom, in case there are many of them?”
Marksley’s understanding was quick, but he responded with equanimity. “I am quite certain there are many of them” He turned to the boy. “What did you think when you first read this letter?” he asked.
“Can’t read, yer excellency” The boy grinned. “No one can. ‘Twas on’y my uncle Sherengo seen the sign,” he pointed to the letterhead, “on the gate, out at the road” For a second he looked suspicious. “It’s the same sign, idnit?”
As Marksley glanced triumphantly in her direction, Hallie struggled to think of some other way to keep him from the camp. George Partridge had been injured, even if unintentionally. Something similar might happen to Marksley.
“Richard,” she urged, surprised by the panic in her voice, “will you not wait for others? Surely the magistrate, Squire Lawes-”
“‘Twill be sufficient to inform him once I have assured myself of Beecham’s safety.” Marksley spoke even as he walked to the door with one hand on the boy’s shoulder. He turned to offer her a quick smile. “Do not fret, my dear. I thought you had expressed an interest in this very camp? I promise you I shall return shortly”
She could not believe him. The second he quitted the room, Hallie followed him to the stable, intent on keeping him in view. Perhaps George’s injuries were worse than portrayed, enough so that the gypsies had sought outside help. Could not something similar happen to Marksley? That people should settle their differences in so violent a manner led her to suspect the possibility of further harm. In that, she knew, she was interpreting the gypsies’ behavior in the worst light, but as all she now cared for rode untroubled into their camp, she could not view the situation dispassionately. Augusta Lawes’ dire warnings of their unruly ways had found a susceptible mark after all.
Hallie was determined that Marksley and George should have her aid, that they should not be alone.
She listened to Marksley speaking softly to the restless Apollo as the stallion was saddled. As soon as he had left she presented herself to the stable boy and asked for a mount of her own. The lad looked uneasy; he wished his lady would go out with the carriage, but he did as she requested and dubiously handed her a small lamp as well. Though the night was moonlit and clear, Hallie would be traveling an unfamiliar road and she could not be certain to keep the speedy Apollo in view ahead of her.
Her gentle mare started at a steady trot, leaving Archers’ grounds then turning from the road that lead to Penham. In the moonlight, Hallie had no difficulty following the stable boy’s direction to the ancient stone bridge over the river. Away from the river the road led to Denhurst and the few lights she could see, but the moonlight, though not full, was sufficient for her needs. Her one challenge was the chill in the air, for though she had draped a wool stable blanket across her shawl, she felt the want of a cloak. Her thin dinner gown hardly sufficed for an autumn night’s venture.
When she caught sight of a rider ahead on the road, she quickly doused her light and pressed on. As her mare tossed her head, Hallie concentrated on keeping the animal quiet. The unexpected outing, or perhaps the scent of another horse on the road ahead of them, had clearly excited her.
For a mile or more, the road was level and empty, then it turned away from the river valley and Denhurst, and narrowing, began a gradual, curving ascent through a fragrant forest. The shadows of the trees loomed somberly along the way. Just as the dark proximity of the woods
began to oppress her, the trees yielded abruptly to a wide field, lying fallow now in the late season. At the far end, a number of lanterns danced brightly. Though still almost half a mile away, Hallie could hear laughter and smell wood smoke.
Apollo’s large, burdened shape was very clear against the lights-too clear, in Hallie’s estimation. She dismounted at the lane’s margin, leaving the little mare’s reins to trail and keep her from wandering, then set out on foot to the gypsy camp.
In the short time it took her to reach the edge of the camp, Hallie’s feet in their evening slippers learned to resent the cold, hard ground. She was so chilled that she gazed longingly at the blazing fires around which the caravan clustered. In the flickering firelight, she could see horses and donkeys confined in a makeshift pen of rope and wagons. Dark women in colorful skirts passed to and fro before the flames while children scampered at their feet. A number of scruffy dogs, hungering for scraps from the table, circled a seated group of men. Some raucous game or gambling appeared to be in progress. Occasionally a voice rose above the others or someone laughed loudly.
Hallie’s anxious gaze scanned the circle once more. She saw no sign of Marksley, although one of the boys, hovering eagerly near the group of men, looked very much like the young visitor to Archers. Hallie studied the wagons more closely, perceiving that a few of them were occupied, the lamps inside casting silhouettes against curtained windows and entrances.
With deliberation, she moved toward the one closest to her, prepared to discover Marksley and George Partridge imprisoned inside. But as she neared it, a gypsy woman cradling a baby in her arms stepped forward to the bench seat. Hallie could see that the interior of the wagon did not shelter any other occupants. As the woman cooed softly to the child and started to sing, Hallie slipped away in the wagon’s shadow, toward the next. A dog began to bark. For a few seconds Hallie froze, thinking it must have seen her or heard the rustling of leaves as she walked. But the animal was quickly silenced and she carefully moved on.
Before the lamp in the next wagon, two elderly men hunched over a checkerboard. The scent of their pipe smoke hung pleasantly in the air. As Hallie backed away, she reflected that none of the activities in the camp struck her as suspicious in any way. Indeed, given the humble circumstances of its inhabitants, she had increasing doubts. Augusta Lawes’ charges against them seemed most implausible. She felt very much the intruder here in this picturesque little community. These people were harmless-they may even have aided a friend. She could see no evidence of any dispute, of the recent fisticuffs that had injured George.
A burst of laughter from the men at their play temporarily halted her steps, but as one of them left the group to take up a fiddle, the music offered a welcome distraction. The haunting strains of the violin mingled with the fires and moonlight in intoxicating combination. For a moment Hallie paused, her senses unexpectedly alive. But she was close to the last wagon.
As she peered in the open back, she saw George Partridge resting in the lamplight, a dirty cloth tied about his balding head and one arm bound in a makeshift sling. His spectacles were askew upon his thin nose, but his eyes were open and bright as he watched Marksley kneeling to blanket him with a heavy traveling cloak.
“I should never have guessed, Partridge,” Richard was saying with some amusement, “that you were capable of such adventures. Though I suppose, in the role of Beecham-”
The casualty smiled wanly as Richard reached to straighten his spectacles for him. But George’s eyes widened in surprise when he caught sight of Hallie at the entrance.
“I never thought … to see you two … together,” he managed faintly.
Even as Richard spun around, Hallie heard a step behind her.
“Gorgio shunella!” a high voice shrieked and bony fingers clutched at her blanket. She heard Richard’s sharp “No!” before something struck her.
Richard repeatedly relived the events of that night: the lunge to catch Hallie as she fell, the dismay of the gypsy granny who had coshed a slight female instead of a looming, blanketed “listener,” the endless, panicked wait for the carriage, the mad dash at midnight back to Archers and the doctor. Two invalids at once were almost more than that poor physician could handle. George Partridge, who had indeed merely witnessed a battle between Romeos, had been promptly patched up and sent along to London the next morning. But now, even after another full day, Hallie still lay in this unmoving state. The cold night air and resulting fever had felled her as surely as that ill-judged blow to the head.
Richard had remained sleepless. Even the longsought discovery of Henry Beecham’s identity had not eased his mind.
Oh, George Partridge had admitted to nothing. And he had said almost as little. Despite holding Beecham’s letters, the linguist had been even more taciturn than usual. When taxed about his role as the secretive poet, he had silently demurred, shaking his head and expressing only sincere concern for Hallie’s health.
Richard had not pressed him, for George had been nursing a sprained wrist and a devil of a headache, and his concern for Hallie had been justified. Yet there was no recourse beyond patience. So Richard could only sit, powerless, at her bedside. He knew he must leave her shortly to the careful ministrations of Mrs. Hepple and the maids. But her sweet, still features and her lustrous hair, spread against the pillow, kept him watchfully present.
He had been callous and ungracious, only to discover with each passing day how sensitive and honest she was. He would find some way to make amends for all the indignities she had suffered at the hands of the Marksley family-at his hands.
He ran a weary palm over his whiskered cheeks. He might start by ridding himself of his beard, lest Hallie wake and quail at the sight of him. At least the task would move him to concentrate on preparing for her return to this world, rather than her demise. That possibility did not bear thought.
He lowered both booted feet to the floor, but as he rose to leave his tired gaze fell upon the journal she kept at her bedside.
He had noticed the familiar volume throughout the doctor’s visits and the careful attentions of the household staff, but he had been too distraught to focus upon it. In any event, he had never been alone. He had not been tempted. Now he was both.
He reached for the book and stood by the bed, at first only admiring the neat hand in the candlelight, thinking that the script suited her. But something about it invited more than passing interest.
The first dated entry was from almost five months before, so she had written a considerable amount. It was a fat volume, with several loose pages tucked among the bindings. He smiled for a moment, remembering her excessive desire the other day to have the journal returned to her care. Young people, he reflected, were possessive of their secrets, so predictably selfconscious. Once he started to read, however, such thoughts fled his mind.
He read rapidly, hungrily, silently repeating certain lines and phrases, noting the fragments of poetry spilled upon the pages like so many gems from a treasure chest-glittering in their own right yet swamped by dazzling company. Though he stood motionless, fixed fast in the candle’s flickering light, his pulse increased and the room warmed.
“The little minx-” he muttered and spared one glance at the author, who slept blissfully on.
He held in his hands Henry Beecham, the work so unquestionably the poet’s that Beecham might have stamped his signature upon each page. Here was the close attention of the naturalist, recording with an artist’s eye the finest raptures of the seasons and the senses. Here was the reflective observer: in spirit with friendship, death, liberty-and love. As with anything Richard had ever read of Beecham’s, the words mirrored his own memories and thoughts had he been gifted enough to express them so.
Here too, were a few thumbnail sketches, of flowers, a squirrel, a peddler’s cart. One of Jeremy granted him a butterfly’s wings. A few small, strong lines rendered Archers’s distinctive facade.
There were no references to Richard Marksley.
With growing tension he skimmed the pages, identifying the first stirrings of a poem The Tantalus had recently published, noting the dearth of entries for much of the past few weeks, following with fascination how the latest passionate poem had reached fruition. She had taken such care with her script in anything she had sent to him, but she could hide nothing here. Beecham’s voice seemed to speak aloud in the quiet predawn darkness.
Why had she not told him? Revealed herself to him at once? Saved herself from his initial disdain, this rudely abrupt marriage-from him?
Hallie Ashton, Henry Beecham, could only feel trapped by all of this. Richard would have sacrificed much to spare her, to free her from her boorish uncle. He would have paid out a small fortune, even mortgaged Penham, to send her far from any distress.
As his fingers trembled over the pages, three letters fell out upon the floor: two from Jeremy and one of his own. He quickly scanned them, then placed them back in the book. His disappointment was severe; in Jeremy, who had not trusted their friendship; in George Partridge, who had maintained his stoic silence, even yesterday, in the face of all attempts to elicit more from him as `Beecham;’ and in himself, for believing that he and a faceless poet had established a rapport. Why had he not been privy to the secret she shared with Jeremy and George? Perhaps it was understandable that they had remained mum with him; they had respected her wishes, the wishes of an orphaned young woman with little protection and no independent means. But surely he had earned her trust as well.
Given the volume’s revelations, his own last letter struck him as naive and misguided. Henry Beecham, Hallie Ashton, had simply used him. What did she care for loyalty or sentiment? She did not need encouragement. She had even pulled Jeremy and George into her elaborately constructed web, all to obtain the payments from The Tantalus.
He glanced at Hallie’s face as he quietly replaced the journal by her bedside. Then, he crossed purposefully to the small desk in her room and searched it. In one of the neatly organized drawers he found a wad of ten pound notes. He could only assume she had troubled to obtain it now in order to flee, to flee him. But he was not such a monster! He left the bills in their hiding place, then returned to stand by the window. He reflected moodily on his wife’s secret, even as his gaze sought her face anxiously and often.
The Honorable Marksley Page 14