Rules of Attraction

by Christina Dodd

  “I wouldn’t dream of it!”

  Dougald and Hannah watched as Seaton tripped off down the stairway.

  “I wonder how long it will take him to find her,” Hannah mused.

  “If I were a wagering man, I would say within the hour.”

  For over an hour, they sat in the darkness waiting. Dougald and Hannah. The aunts. Charles. And Seaton, who had heard about the discovery of Alfred’s body at the foot of the tower and, when he came to confront Dougald, realized he had the front-row seat to the greatest scandal since the marquess of Bersham discovered his wife was a bigamist.

  Dougald allowed him to come—he was afraid of what Seaton might do if left on his own—but Dougald had also threatened Seaton with dismemberment if he so much as peeped.

  Everyone sat on the far right of the chapel, away from the wall with the stained-glass windows. The pew was hard beneath Dougald’s behind, and although his wound had been bandaged, his shoulder stung like the blazes. Hannah moved restlessly beside him. He wondered what the aunts thought of Hannah’s request that they remain here without speaking until something—she wouldn’t tell them what—happened.

  He also wondered why he had let Hannah talk him into inviting the aunts. He would rather have done this alone, but she seemed adamant that the old ladies accompany them. The whole arrangement reeked of calamity, but he had taken the precaution of arming Charles.

  Dougald himself remained alert, a motionless warrior waiting for battle. “What do you think we’re going to find?” he murmured close to Hannah’s ear.

  She answered him just as quietly. “Papers of some kind. Keepsakes. Possibly even a marriage certificate.”

  Perhaps she was right. After all, he had no other answers.

  Eventually Hannah dozed, her head on his shoulder. One of the aunts snored softly.

  The clock in the great hall had struck nine. The servants’ curfew was in effect when Dougald saw the faint light of a single candle and heard a woman’s faltering footsteps.

  He shook Hannah awake. Someone must have done the same with the snorer, for she ceased with a snuffle.

  Mrs. Trenchard entered. The single flame lit her face, and Dougald realized gauntness painted the formerly plump hollows of her cheeks. She wore a black gown and an apron, and she moved like a woman with a mission, a woman who knew the chapel in both daytime and darkness.

  With a shock, Dougald realized his wife must be right. Mrs. Trenchard had come to remove the evidence. But what? What paper or keepsake could be so important that she would kill so many of her lords?

  Everyone remained perfectly still. The lone candle did little to lighten the gloom. Mrs. Trenchard didn’t seem to notice the onlookers at all. All her attention was focused on a single location, on the left wall close to the altar. The place where Hannah had been struck down.

  Mrs. Trenchard knelt. She placed the candlestick on the floor beside her knees. Taking a small pry bar from one pocket, she worked it under the deteriorating panel of wood and lifted it free. Raising the candle, she shined it into the recesses of the wall, and inside Dougald spied a small wooden box.

  He had seen enough. The woman must be insane. It was time to capture the criminal and end the series of murders which had so shadowed Raeburn Castle.

  Standing, he said in a slow, patient voice, “Mrs. Trenchard, what are you doing?”

  The woman gasped, then turned so quickly Dougald blinked in astonishment. She held her candle high. In her other hand, she held a pistol. She aimed it at him—and Hannah.

  Seaton dived for cover.

  The aunts gasped.

  Hannah tried to step between Dougald and the barrel.

  He pushed her behind him.

  And in a quavering voice, Aunt Spring asked, “Judy, is that where you buried my baby?”

  28

  The candle started to shake and the pistol drooped.

  Dougald relaxed his painfully tense muscles. He’d been shot once today. That was enough.

  Aunt Spring stood and walked toward Mrs. Trenchard. Kneeling beside the wall, she touched the brown box. “Is my baby inside?”

  As Hannah sank back into her seat, she whispered, “Oh, dear heavens.”

  At a gesture from Dougald, Charles hastened to bring more light from the office, and illumination sprang from the two candelabras he fetched.

  Seaton stood, back pressed to the far wall as if he realized he didn’t wish to witness this scene after all. Aunt Isabel sat, eyes fixed on the sad scene, her handkerchief over her mouth. Aunt Ethel wept softly. Miss Minnie moved closer to Aunt Spring as if trying to lend her strength to the tiny old lady.

  “M…Miss Spring?” Mrs. Trenchard stammered.

  “What are ye doing here?”

  “I came because Hannah asked me to, Judy. The dear girl wanted me here, and now I know why.” Aunt Spring smiled sweetly at her. “I always longed to know what had happened to my baby. I’m so glad she’s here in the family chapel. Judy, did you put her here?”

  Mrs. Trenchard looked around at the pitying, accusing, horrified faces, then fixed her gaze on Aunt Spring. “I did it. Yes, I did it.”

  Aunt Spring took the pistol out of Mrs. Trenchard’s hand and without looking, passed it to Miss Minnie. “You were always so good to me.”

  Dougald took the pistol from Miss Minnie and carefully unloaded it.

  “I didn’t want to be good to ye,” Mrs. Trenchard said to Aunt Spring. “I didn’t like ye at all.”

  “I know.” Aunt Spring rescued the candle from Mrs. Trenchard’s shaking grip and set it on the pew. “But you were good to me anyway.”

  Mrs. Trenchard twisted her apron in her large, work-roughened hands. “My mother made me be good to ye.”

  “Your mother was a lovely woman.”

  “Of course ye would think so.” Mrs. Trenchard seemed sunken, cowering before the smaller Aunt Spring. “She loved ye better than she loved me.”

  “This is horrible.” Hannah moved forward to stop Mrs. Trenchard.

  Aunt Spring waved her away. “Sit down, Hannah.” Her voice was firm, not at all like the Aunt Spring Dougald had come to know.

  Hannah sat.

  Miss Minnie nodded at her and gave a rueful smile.

  “Your mother coddled me because I wasn’t clever like you.” Aunt Spring stroked Mrs. Trenchard’s shoulder. “How I used to envy your height and your strength!”

  Dougald realized that, while Aunt Spring might be vague, she understood more than he had realized. He sat beside Hannah.

  “No, Miss Spring, ye shouldn’t have. Ye shouldn’t ever have envied me anything.” Mrs. Trenchard breathed heavily through her mouth. “All the time I was growing, all I heard was Help Miss Spring. Give it to Miss Spring. Don’t upset Miss Spring.”

  In a soothing voice, Aunt Spring said, “How tiresome for you.”

  “Then I got old enough to get away, so I got married.”

  “Mr. Trenchard seemed like a pleasant man.” Aunt Spring lifted her brows in inquiry.

  “He was a disappointment,” Mrs. Trenchard said flatly. “He didn’t take me away. He just lolled around on his arse and said, Make Miss Spring happy. Then I won’t have to work. So I had them both at me all the time. Mother and Trenchard, using me and adoring ye. Ye got older. Ye were thirty-two and couldn’t find a man. I comforted myself that ye were on the shelf. I had a man, for what he was worth. Then ye…ye met Mr. Lawrence. He was handsome and strong and brave.”

  Aunt Spring smiled at the memory. “Oh, he was.”

  “Everything I didn’t have. I resented ye so much, it ate at my guts. I was glad to arrange yer secret meetings.”

  “I appreciated your help.”

  “I know ye did. Ye saw nothing but goodness in me.”

  “Dear…”

  “No. I wasn’t being good. I was hoping yer brother would catch ye and throw ye from the castle. Instead, ye know what happened? Mr. Lawrence got ye with child.” Mrs. Trenchard put her hand over her eyes and gave a sob
. “I couldn’t have any babies. In all those years of marriage, my body never quickened. But ye…ye were increasing. His Lordship, yer brother, sent Mr. Lawrence away to the wars, but ye were still happy, hugging yer secret to yer bosom. Ye glowed, and not even the prospect of yer disgrace could make up for my unhappiness.”

  Tears trickled down Aunt Spring’s rosy, wrinkled cheeks. “Judy, you’re not responsible for what happened.”

  “I ill-wished ye. I wanted all yer happiness to die.”

  Hannah’s icy fingers convulsively clutched at Dougald’s, and he took her hands and warmed them between his.

  “If ill-wishing could end a pregnancy, Trenchard, there’d be many a woman who would be childless,” Miss Minnie pointed out.

  Mrs. Trenchard didn’t seem to hear. She spoke to, listened to, only Aunt Spring. “’Twas my fault. I just hated and hated. I imagined yer death, and the babe’s death…instead, the word came about Mr. Lawrence. I didn’t mean to hurt him. I tried to take it all back. I truly did, but the news shocked ye so much. Ye lost the babe.”

  “Judy, dear, it wasn’t your fault.” Aunt Spring tried to embrace Mrs. Trenchard.

  Mrs. Trenchard shrank back. “I helped Mother deliver it. A sweet infant girl, perfectly formed, too tiny to live.”

  “I remember.” Aunt Spring’s voice shook.

  “Mother gave it to me to bury. She said to bury it in holy ground so it could be blessed, but hide it so no one would ever discover its existence. She said if we managed this right, no one need ever know about the disgrace, and ye could marry and be happy.”

  “But I couldn’t marry another.” Aunt Spring wiped tears away with her trembling fingers. “I loved Lawrence, and he was dead.”

  “I failed. I swaddled the babe and put it in my sewing box and brought it here. I thought it would be safe. I protected the babe from everyone who tried to find it. I protected ye, Miss Spring.” Mrs. Trenchard lifted her gaze from Aunt Spring at last to toss Hannah a contemptuous glance. “But that nosy bastard found the place—”

  Hannah lunged toward Mrs. Trenchard.

  Dougald caught her arm.

  As if nothing had happened, Mrs. Trenchard finished, “—And now because of her, ye’ll never marry. Ye’ll never be happy.”

  Hannah settled in her seat, but she trembled in little spurts, like someone who’d been gut-shot.

  Dougald had never seen her react with such vehemence, but then, he’d never heard anyone call her a bastard before. “She’s crazy,” he murmured to Hannah. “No one cares what she called you.”

  “I care.” Hannah glared at him, then turned her face away. “Crazy or not, I care.”

  Aunt Spring took Mrs. Trenchard’s hands in hers and stared her in the eye. “Judy, dear, did you kill all the earls of Raeburn?”

  “So she does understand,” Dougald murmured to Hannah.

  “Poor dear Aunt Spring,” Hannah whispered back. “To face this, now.”

  Mrs. Trenchard answered Aunt Spring without hesitation. “I didn’t kill all of them. Not yer brother, or his sons. But the other two, aye. They were going to tear apart the chapel to fix it. I couldn’t allow that.”

  “Judy, killing people is a bad, bad thing,” Aunt Spring said.

  “I know.” Mrs. Trenchard sounded impatient with Aunt Spring’s gentle instruction. “But I was already damned for murdering Lawrence and the babe. What did the others matter?”

  Aunt Spring shook Mrs. Trenchard’s fingers. “You must promise never to kill again, not even for my sake.”

  Mrs. Trenchard nodded. “I won’t, Miss Spring.”

  “Now, Judy, I think you should go rest.”

  “Yes. I need to rest.” Moving with the weary lethargy of an aged crone, Mrs. Trenchard hefted herself off the floor and left.

  A stunned, grieving silence settled on the chapel.

  Finally, Hannah murmured, “I shouldn’t have meddled.”

  “You had no choice.” Dougald turned her to face him. “I object to being murdered for whatever the reason.”

  The candlelight changed Hannah’s hair to molten gold, gave her eyes the curve of mystery and blessed her with a ethereal glow. But Hannah was not ethereal, and the problems between them wouldn’t be solved on some heavenly plain.

  They had to talk.

  He didn’t want to. While it was easy to blurt out truths in a rage, this conversation involved painful truths, confessions and possibly even emotion.

  But if they didn’t communicate, they would separate again. He couldn’t bear that.

  Hannah tilted her head, her eyes wide with alarm. “Dougald, what’s wrong?”

  “We need to—”

  In a loud, nervous voice, Seaton asked, “Lord Raeburn, shouldn’t you send someone to arrest Mrs. Trenchard?”

  Dougald wanted to snap at Seaton. Tonight, he wanted to be free of the duties of lordship. For a few hours, he would like to be alone with his wife to talk, and then, if everything went well, he would pleasure her until he had imprinted himself onto her forever.

  “That woman killed two earls of Raeburn,” Seaton insisted. “You have to arrest her.”

  Dougald gazed at the aunts. Miss Minnie, Aunt Ethel and Aunt Isabel sat on the floor beside Aunt Spring. Aunt Spring, who had been the catalyst for so many dreadful events, and who cried now for her baby, her lost love and an old friend. He glanced at Charles, still holding two full candelabra and looking as aghast by the emotional events as only Charles could look. He watched Hannah, whose tears still trembled on the tips of her lashes. And he thought about the broken old woman who even now made her way down the stone steps to the kitchen.

  Dougald was the lord. The babe needed to be removed and placed in a proper coffin. The chaplain would have to be called to minister to Aunt Spring. Mrs. Trenchard…he would have to decide what to do with Mrs. Trenchard. Dougald couldn’t escape his duties tonight.

  His talk with Hannah would have to wait.

  “Charles, will you follow Mrs. Trenchard?”

  Charles placed the candelabra on a table and hurried out of the chapel.

  To Seaton, Dougald said, “You don’t need to worry. Mrs. Trenchard wouldn’t hurt you, and I doubt she is going to run before morning.”

  29

  The funerals were over. The mourners were gone. Only the flowers remained with drooping stems and faded scent. The flowers, and Dougald and Hannah.

  They sat side by side, alone in the chapel, not touching, while the awkward silence stretched so long Hannah wondered if she should pretend an emergency and escape out the door.

  Finally, Dougald commented, “A grim day.”

  Grateful that he’d spoken at last, Hannah said, “I don’t know. More than Mrs. Trenchard and Aunt Spring’s baby were buried today.”

  He turned to her, black brows raised, complexion pale. “What else?”

  Hannah realized that, after last night’s events—the discovery of the tiny coffin, Mrs. Trenchard’s confession, the fainting spell she had suffered, her fatal fall down the stairs—he might well be alarmed to hear anything had been buried without his knowledge. “I just meant a weight has been lifted from Aunt Spring and all of the Raeburn lands. The mystery is solved, the stain dissolved, and tomorrow is a new day.” She smiled at him in the hope he would smile back. “Tomorrow we will welcome the Queen of England.”

  “Because of you, my dear.” He didn’t smile, and his formal praise chilled her. “Because you listened when Aunt Spring spoke of her lost love.”

  He wore a black suit and an implacable expression. Yesterday’s ease between them had vanished. She didn’t know why. She had seen his transformation occur here in the chapel the night before. He had been staring, intent, focused only on her. Then Seaton had spoken, and the Dougald who held her hand, who listened when she spoke, who respected her opinion, vanished. In his place was the old, remote, responsible Dougald, lord of the manor and master of organization.

  Did he regret the things he’d said yesterday? The truths he
had revealed? Had she said something which made him realize how deeply he rued their marriage?

  Did he intend to tell her to leave today?

  For her part, Hannah behaved like any wife who was about to be cast off. She sat serenely, her back straight and her hands at rest, and worked to retain a pleasant expression. In short, she behaved with dignity and grace. “Aunt Spring is just vague, not crazy. She cried last night over both bodies, she buried them in the family plot today, and soon she’ll be upstairs with the other aunts putting the finishing touches on the tapestry.”

  “So you like my Aunt Spring?” Dougald asked.

  “Very much.” Hannah watched as the afternoon sun radiated through the stained-glass windows and striped Dougald’s black suit and beloved features with azure and scarlet and gold. “The aunts are lovely, and none of them seemed particularly surprised by the tale of Aunt Spring’s baby.”

  “She had told them.”

  “That’s not the kind of tale a woman will tell. It’s hard to talk about something so painful, but the truth was there if you listened.”

  “Are you saying I don’t listen?” he asked abruptly.

  His defensiveness startled her. “Not at all.”

  “Because it’s probably true. My father never listened, and I have worked to be like him. Until recently, I succeeded rather well.” He leaned forward, elbows on his thighs, and stared at the altar. “Did my grandmother ever tell you the tales about my father and me?”

  Hannah’s breath caught. Dougald was going to talk about himself. About the past. To her. Striving for a faintly humorous tone, she said, “No, in fact when I asked, she said your father was a saint and as a child you were a saintlet.”

  He chuckled, as he was supposed to, but he still didn’t look at her. “She would. Grandmama perceived her function in the family as peacemaker and developer of the icons, and if she had to lie to fulfill her duty, it was a lie well told.”

  Hannah noticed Dougald’s hands. They were clasped, and his knuckles were white with tension. This was difficult for him; so difficult, she wanted to pat his hand and tell him never mind. But she didn’t. He wanted to tell her something. He actually sought a conversation not precipitated by a fight or a bullet wound. “I had suspected you weren’t the saintlet she claimed,” she said.