Wynthall Manor- The Wynthall Manor Trilogy

by Brianne E Pryor

  “You think he stole Lady Eva away himself?”

  “Maybe not himself, but I believe that given the chance he would have made certain she was not in any situation to inherit her father’s peerage.”

  “Then why would he desire your help in finding her?” Grey shook his head. “I am sure I don’t know. My theories are hardly factual.”

  “And yet you are resolved to think the worst of His Grace’s brother. Perhaps because of your history with him?”

  A darkened haze fell over Grey’s face and his voice grew tight. “I am resolved to think the worst of a man who has given me no reason to think any differently.”

  Bondeville nodded. “And you do not intend to involve yourself in the search for the duke’s daughter?”

  Grey looked down at his fingers drumming a constant beat on the desk. “You say she was seen in Lochson?”

  “On the road between Lochson and Calgar.”

  Grey pursed his lips and nodded. “And this lady, have you met her yourself?”

  “I have many years ago. A ball at Covingdell Castle, I believe it was. Very handsome and exceedingly charming, I dare say. Much like her father in a female sort of way.”

  “A promising prospect for the dukedom then.”

  Bondeville nodded. “Very promising.”

  “Tell me, you say she was handsome. Was she dark or fair?”

  The earl frowned, trying to draw the old imagine of the then very young lady from his mind. “Fair, I believe. And she had the most striking blue eyes. I recall because my wife complemented her on them.”

  “I see.”

  “Why do you ask, Grey?”

  The baron only shook his head. “No particular reason. I am afraid you can do little to persuade me, Bond. I shall not aid in the search but will inform the people in Calgar to keep their eyes open and report to me should they see the lady or anyone resembling her.”

  Bondeville smiled gratefully. “That is help enough. I understand your desire to separate yourself from Lord Alex and will not pressure you otherwise.”

  The two men rose from their seats, Lord Bondeville preparing to take his leave. “However this ordeal turns out, I am grateful that I shall not have the problems of leaving my estate and peerage to a daughter. When one is in the place of nobility, it is crucial that an heir is produced.”

  Grey said nothing to this, knowing what it was his friend meant to convey.

  “But what of you, Grey? Is the probability of an heir for the barony still unthinkable?” the earl continued to press.

  Grey nodded gravely. “It is.”

  “I worry for you, James,” Bondeville spoke earnestly. “You cannot leave your title and lands to a next of kin of whom you know nothing.”

  The baron only shook his head. “And yet that is exactly what will happen I am afraid.”

  “Now, now, you cannot be so suborn as to—”

  “I will not raise an heir, Bondeville,” Grey insisted vehemently, his expression beginning to tighten.

  “You must be reasonable, Grey,” Lord Bondeville still attempted to persuade. “Think of everything your father worked and strived for to leave this title to you and your children. It’s been twelve years, son. You must forget.”

  “I will not forget!” Grey snapped angrily. “And I will thank you not to bring up the subject again.”

  Lord Bondeville sighed in defeat. “Forgive me. I only worry for you and your future.”

  Grey sighed, his anger escaping him. “You needn’t apologize, Bond. The fault is mine.”

  Bondeville clapped the younger man on the back as they moved toward the door together. “You are a good sort, James. Your father would be proud of you. And I look forward to our next meeting. Take care of yourself, son.”

  Grey nodded. “You do the same. Give my regards to your family.”

  “Thank you, I shall. Good day to you, Grey.”

  “And to you.” As the library door closed behind the earl, Grey stood in silence, staring after his departed visitor, only one thought occupying his mind. Was the missing Lady Eva truly lost forever? Or was she, in fact, very nearby? Nearer perhaps then anyone knew.

  ~ 8 ~

  Long minutes passed as Grey’s gaze wavered from the library door to the shaded window. His mind turning over the words that Lord Bondeville had spoken in regards to the missing Lady Eva. She had supposedly been seen near Calgar though Grey was unsure how reliable the source could have been. Perhaps the man had only said as much in hopes of a reward, but that did not explain the reason for Lord Alexander’s sudden request of Grey’s aid in the matter. He had demanded help from the people of Calgar only a day after Lord Bondeville had been told of the sighting. That must have been the reason he came to me, Grey concluded. Why else would Alexander seek my help now rather than the moment she was discovered gone? He must have known she was in the region. This, however, still failed to explain why Lord Alex had not revealed this information to Grey when they had met the day before. Unless the duke’s brother were attempting to hide something that may prove him the culprit, Grey could think of no other reasoning behind the concealment of such a vital piece of knowledge when Lord Alex was so in want of the baron’s help.

  Despite his curiosity over the matter, finding out the true scheme behind Alexander Vastel’s apparent secrecy was not what dwelt foremost in Grey’s mind as he rang the bell for Byrum. The words of Lord Bondeville in description of the missing lady had stuck quite a familiarity in Grey’s mind.

  “Yes, my lord?” Byrum bowed as he entered the library where his master still stood behind the desk.

  “I sent Merek to inquire after the young woman but have yet to hear from him. What news have you?”

  “Rather good news, my lord. She seems to have improved and her fever has not returned, though she has still not fully recovered her strength.”

  Grey nodded. “She still does not tell you who she is or where she comes from?”

  “No, my lord. Mrs. Byrum has asked her many times, but she still does not speak a word to anyone.”

  Grey frowned, knowing this was a ruse that he had half-expected her to abandon after their meeting that night. She had no way of knowing that Grey had not told his staff of her speaking. By continuing on with her silence, she was risking much and Grey was determined to know the cause of it. “I’d like to speak with her,” he told his butler, whose expression betrayed his surprise. “Is she well enough?”

  “Um, I certainly believe she is, my lord, but it might be best I ask Mrs. Byrum her thoughts with your permission, sir.”

  Grey nodded. “Go immediately and come to me as soon as you have an answer.”

  Byrum bowed. “Yes, my lord. Of course you know that the young lady will most likely not be able to converse with you, sir.”

  “Of course, but I wish to speak with her nonetheless.”

  “Yes, my lord. I shall return directly.” Grey waved his butler away and moved to stand in front of one of the many library windows which lined the long wall, parting every other bookcase so that light might be shown over the hundreds of volumes laden with ink and the musty smell of aged paper. Parting the drapes just enough so that he might look out over the gardens and parish grounds, Grey found himself picturing the image of the girl’s face in his mind. Did he dare think that she was whom he suspected? Did he dare even imagine that he himself had mistakenly happened upon the very girl for whom the duke and his brother had been searching for three months? The soon-to-be Duchess of Dawcaster, who had disappeared in the midst of the night without any trace of her whereabouts? And yet if it was not she, then who was it who now lay in his house with a speech only he had heard and no name or connections that she willed to reveal? If it was not the Lady Eva, then who was it?

  I am mad, truly mad, Grey berated himself for such suspicions. To think that this woman abandoned on the road could have anything to do with the daughter of the Duke of Dawcaster. Despite his inward protests, however, a part of him was nearly certain that the cir
cumstances surrounding both the missing heiress and the young woman he had found on the roadway were much too similar not to intertwine. He had discovered her only a day after Lady Eva was supposedly been seen in Lochson and had not only the fair complexion Lord Bondeville had spoken of but also the rather striking blue eyes. Grey recalled the way she had looked at him in the darkness of the upper corridor. Her sea-colored eyes were filled with a mixture of fear and curiosity, sadness and restraint as though her free spirit had been tied down by binds she could not break. He recalled the sound of her strained voice as she spoke to him and the ever so familiar feeling that came upon him as he lifted her trembling frame from the ground.

  A rush of forgotten memories struck him boldly; feelings coming over him that reminded Grey so vividly of another figure he had lifted into his arms and another pair of eyes that had once looked upon him, though they had not been the same brilliant blue as the ones that he had seen first in the darkness of the forest and then in the light of the lamp in the upper hall but a soft, shaded brown—the same gentle gaze that had looked upon him the night before. Though they were unalike, the similarity of these two beings had struck him so that Grey wondered if he dare look upon the young woman again for fear of the memory she unearthed within him.

  It was this moment in which the baron’s engrossing thoughts were interrupted by his butler arriving in the library once again, saying that their visitor was being examined by the physician and could not see the master until a later time. Grey released the curtain that he held back, allowing it to fall into place and the light from the sunny morning to disappear behind it. “And what does the man say of her?” he inquired.

  “I am afraid he’s only just arrived, my lord,” Byrum answered. “But he did mention that to his knowledge there is no one in Calgar or the surrounding counties that is looking for the girl.”

  Grey shook his head. “I suspected as much. Had she gone missing from a family nearby, we certainly would have heard of it by this time. Unless of course they cast her out, in which case she most likely does not want to be returned.”

  “Perhaps that is why she keeps silent, my lord?”

  “Perhaps.” Grey departed from the now shaded window to approach his desk.

  “From the bruises on her face, I would not be surprised if she ran away from her apparent abuser, my lord,” Byrum continued to muse.

  His master nodded. “I’ve thought as much myself, or she could have obtained those bruises from someone she met on the road, a robber or something of the kind. We may speculate all we wish, but we shall never know the truth unless she herself tells us.”

  “Which, it is apparent, she cannot do, my lord.”

  “Indeed,” Grey muttered quietly as he sat back in his chair, staring ahead of him in deep contemplation; the mystery surrounding the young woman he had saved intrigued him all the more now that he realized who it was she could be.

  “My lord, are you quite well?” Byrum’s voice broke the momentary silence, causing Grey to look up at his butler, annoyed by the man’s ever-present desire to know how he fared. “Of course I am well. I found a woman nearly dying on the road two nights ago and do not know who she is or where she comes from. I know not what to do with her, nor do I want her here where she might…” Grey stopped himself abruptly, swallowing the continuation of his sentence as he looked down at the clutter of his desk.

  Byrum too averted his eyes from his master, knowing precisely what the baron had meant to speak of. “She will not find out, my lord.” He attempted to reassure Grey who could only shake his head hopelessly.

  “She is with no one who might tell her and has no knowledge of even your brother’s death to be asking questions in regards to it,” Byrum continued. Grey ran a hand through his black mane and sighed heavily. “I suppose. But nonetheless we must do all we can to discover who she is. Go and see if the physician has finished.”

  “Yes, my lord,” Byrum left the library immediately. Grey’s eyes darted forth and back across the room as his mind raced with the knowledge he had gained over the past twenty-four hours. The words of Lord Bondeville only minutes before and the ever so timid whispers of the girl in the darkness that night mixed with scenes long past, which continuously played themselves over in his mind, caused the baron great distress; in an attempt to block out all his overwhelming reflections he covered his face with his hands. So many pieces fit as though they were a puzzle awaiting assembly, and yet just as many seemed to have no place among the others, questions that went unanswered seemed to not be a part of that same puzzle, though Grey knew they must be. All he desired was for the outside world to leave him to himself; that was all he had wanted for twelve years, and for twelve years, he had gotten his desire—solitude and confinement to hide what had been and what was sure to be from anyone who might decipher it. But now it seemed as though the devil himself were determined to deal one last, ending blow.

  ~ 9 ~

  Quite some time had elapsed before Byrum returned to the library only to find his master leaned back in his upholstered armchair his eyes closed in a light slumber. The elderly butler knew of the battle Grey fought every night with his dreams for he had heard the baron cry out from his sleep many times throughout the years and now resolved to allow him a moment of rest. Backing from the library, Byrum closed the doors quietly and returned to the Orange Room, where his wife had just emerged with the doctor, a long-faced man with thin spectacles and a balding head of gray hair.

  “Is Lord de Grey going to try and speak with the girl?” Mrs. Byrum asked her husband.

  “He is, but I found him resting and did not want to disturb him,” the butler answered.

  “He does, of course, know that she will not return his conversation?” the baron’s physician inquired.

  Byrum nodded as the trio made their way through the dark upper corridors to the great hall lit only by the stained-glass window above the door. “I believe his lordship wishes only an attempt at gaining some intelligence on the poor girl,” Byrum commented.

  “Little good it will do, I fear,” the doctor continued. “I daresay that girl is mad. She says nothing to anyone, and yet there is no physical reasoning behind her silence. From my examination of her throat and vocal cords, her voice should be in quite the working order.”

  “And her appetite seems quite small for one her age,” the housekeeper commented. “I do feel sorry for the child. She seems so very frightened.”

  “I would say in her situation that is to be expected,” the doctor agreed. “She was more than likely born dumb and her family cast her out when she grew ill, hoping to rid themselves of a mouth to feed. They could most probably account for the bruises as well. I hardly know what Lord de Grey will be able to do with her. If she will not tell who she is or where she comes from, he can have no alternative but to have her taken away to the workhouse.”

  “The poor thing.” Mrs. Byrum sighed. “I do wish there was another way.”

  “I’m afraid the choices are slim, my dear,” Byrum spoke regretfully as he opened the front doors for the doctor’s exit. “She can not very well stay here, and if she will not tell us where she belongs, then the workhouse will be the only alternative.”

  “When she is well again, she may simply want to leave us,” Mrs. Byrum pointed out. “It is not for us to determine the poor girl’s fate.”

  “We can not very well allow her back on the streets alone,” her husband opposed. The three stepped out into the front lawn, carrying on their conversation about the unfortunate young woman’s circumstances, until they were disrupted by what seemed to be a rather loud disagreement occurring at the front gate. A frown of perplexity coming over his face, Byrum excused himself and made haste across the lawn to the closed iron gate where the gatekeeper was most adamantly declining entrance to a man and his mount. “I was given strict instructions to deliver my message to none other than Lord de Grey himself,” the man—no more than five and twenty years—insisted vehemently, sitting high atop his b
lack mount, his face flushed with displeasure.

  “What goes on here?” Byrum demanded as he joined the dispute.

  “Sir, ya told me not to admit anyone from Covingdell, but this man insists he’ll speak with Lord de Grey,” the gatekeeper explained; Byrum turned his head toward a very irate messenger who struggled to keep his sweating horse at a standstill. “You have some sort of message from His Grace the Duke?” Byrum inquired.

  “Not from His Grace,” the young man answered, “from Lord Alexander, who said I was to deliver the message to none other than Lord de Grey.”

  “What can his lordship have to say that he did not speak of yesterday?”

  “Much has happened over the night, sir, and I must speak with your master immediately.”

  Byrum sighed. “Very well then. Open the gate, Edmond.”

  “Yes, sir.” The gatekeeper unlatched the large iron gate and swung it inward, allowing the man and his gray horse to enter the grounds. He followed the butler to the front of the manor where the doctor was just taking his leave. “Wait here. I shall tell Lord de Grey you have come.”

  “Am I expected to wait out here on the lawn?” the messenger snapped irritably.

  Having no intention of disobeying his master’s orders to not allow anyone from Covingdell Castle into the house, Byrum nodded stiffly. “You are.” Continuing inside Byrum made his way to the library. Raising his hand to knock, the butler was stopped just short of the door by a rather unintelligible mumble from within the room. Seconds later, the sound was uttered again only louder, and Byrum knew what it must be. Pushing open the door, he found a scene exactly as he had feared, his master in the midst of one of his nostalgic dreams.

  Grey's hands gripped the arms of the chair and his brow creased as his mouth uttered senseless murmurs. Byrum hurried to his side, shaking his shoulder gently calling to him to awaken. When his dream only seemed to worsen the butler shook him forcefully. “My lord! My lord!”