A Regimental Murder (30 page)

I could imagine her rising before the
astonished Eggleston, rage and scorn radiating from her. I hoped
she'd made Eggleston crawl away on his belly.

"Colonel Westin was lucky to have you," I
said.

"Roe was a good man. I wish you could have
known him. He did not deserve to be in thrall to someone like
Richard Eggleston." Her expression softened. "I also recognize that
you are a good man. And you did not deserve what I did."

"I did it to myself," I said, knowing the
truth. "You beckoned to me, and I was willing to oblige. I would
have done anything for you, even lived a lie."

She held up her hand. "Do not, please,
Gabriel, I do not think I can endure gallantry just now."

"I did fall in love with you," I admitted.
"But do not worry, the madness has passed."

She pressed her shaking fingers together. "I
am so sorry. I had realized that day--the day you found me
ill--that I could not go on deceiving you. But you had made me feel
. . ." She broke off, smiling faintly. "I had never had a lover
before. I had not known I could feel what you made me feel." She
made a helpless gesture. "I so did not want to give that up."

"Few people do."

"But I realized how unfair it was to you. I
was ready to lay my burden upon you, to let you ruin yourself to
take it up. When I lay ill, Mrs. Brandon explained to me about your
first marriage. You ought to have told me you were already married,
Gabriel. I certainly would never have tried to trap you."

"My life was already in ruins. Taking up your
burden could only have improved it."

She flushed and did not answer. We sat in
silence again. "You are lying about one thing," I said after a
time.

She looked startled. "Am I?"

My anger, nearly forgotten, began to simmer
again. "You have just told me you'd never had a lover before. That
is a lie. Someone fathered the child you destroyed. Who was
he?"

Her face whitened, and she looked swiftly
away.

Behind my stillness, the anger reached out
and clawed the last of the fog away. "I believe I have guessed it,"
I said. "But name him."

She shook her head. "Please do not make me.
He is gone. I have sent him away."

Outside, a sparrow began singing a belated
summer song in the flowerless lilac tree. A soft September breeze
whistled in the chimney.

I said, "I thought he was to marry your
daughter."

Her eyes glittered. "I would never have let
that happen. I persuaded her to cry off. Do you think I wanted him
married to her?"

"Why did you go to him?" I asked in a hard
voice.

When she looked up at me, her eyes held the
imperious defiance I remembered from our first meeting. The great
lady had returned. "Know this, Gabriel. I never went to him, never.
He looked upon me, and he wanted me." She shook her head. "Other
gentlemen have done so in the past. I do not know why they
should--when I look into a mirror, I see only Lydia the silly
schoolgirl who has grown into a woman with wrinkles about her
eyes."

If she did, she saw so little. Those eyes
held a dark fire, a passion burning beneath her cool and
aristocratic gaze. The elegant way she carried herself only made a
gentleman wish to smooth that delicate skin, to feel her blood
pulsing beneath his fingertips.

"But he wanted me," she went on woodenly. "He
wanted my daughter as well, but he knew he must hold himself from
her. Mr. Allandale always obeys the rules! He must keep pure the
young maiden he was to marry, because to do otherwise would be
wrong. Scandal must never touch their pristine marriage. But a
married woman, she may take a lover if she is discreet."

Even if that lover was his fiancee's mother.
The fury within me danced and snarled.

"And so he proposed it. I was shocked and
showed him the door. The next day he had the audacity to return and
ask if I'd changed my mind. Of course I had not. I threatened to
tell my husband. And then . . . Oh, Gabriel it was horrible. He
changed. He had always been polite and soft-spoken to all of us, so
friendly, such a help. And then all that vanished in an instant.
His face . . . He was like a beast. He terrified me. He said he
would hurt Chloe if I did not oblige him. He said he had ways of
hurting my husband. Still I defied him--I thought that I could go
to my husband and we could defeat Mr. Allandale between us. And so
. . ." She closed her eyes. "He took it from me. I tried so hard to
stop him. I tried and tried, but he was too strong. I have never
before not been strong enough to stop anything."

She trailed off. The room went silent.

Within me I was anything but silent. She had
described a beast in Allandale's eyes, which I too had seen, but
one also lurked inside of me, its red-hot rage holding me in its
grip.

I did not think she lied. Her anguish was
real. When she spoke his name, her voice filled with loathing.
During the wars I'd served in, I'd known women who had been raped,
by enemy soldiers, by our own soldiers. They had all shown what
Lydia did now--fear, anger, remembered terror, the shrinking inside
themselves when something startled them. Their trust had been
ripped away, their comfortableness with themselves gone.

I forced my lips open. "You did not send for
a magistrate?"

"To prosecute him for rape? Who would believe
it? I am a married woman, older than he; I should know better. And
there are those who knew that Roe could give me nothing. They would
say that doubtless my own behavior must have provoked him. What a
depraved thing I must be to cause Mr. Allandale to lose his respect
for me . . ."

She was right, she likely would be blamed, I
thought bitterly. And Allandale, with his soft-spoken politeness,
his gentle smile, would have been viewed as the victim, perhaps
even pitied.

I rose to my feet. She looked up in
consternation. "I swear to you, Gabriel, I never meant to hurt you.
I am ashamed. I have lived with so much shame. What I have done--
"

"Is done," I said.

I leaned down and gently kissed the tear that
trickled down her cheek. She touched my face with trembling
fingers. I straightened, and her hand slid away.

"Go to your daughter," I said. "She will need
you."

Lydia nodded. Tears beaded on her lashes. "I
am taking her away. Abroad." She smiled a little with a mother's
fondness. "She wants to go to Italy and paint. She is
romantic."

My lips should have curved into a returning
smile, but they would not move. "Give her my compliments," I said.
"Good-bye."

I turned and walked to the door, neither
swiftly nor slowly.

She must have seen something in my face,
because I heard her draw a sharp breath. "Gabriel?"

I did not answer. I reached the double doors,
opened one. William, stationed down the hall, came alert.

Lydia's silk skirts rustled as she rose.
"Gabriel?" Her slippers swished on the carpet behind me.

I pulled the key from the door's lock, shut
the door before she could reach it, inserted the key, and turned
it. She rattled the door handle. "Gabriel, what are you doing?" The
imperious tones returned, though her voice was still weak with
tears. "William!"

I passed the open-mouthed William on my way
to the stairs. He started for me, but I gave him a hard look, and
he stepped hastily back.

I pocketed the key and started down the
stairs. "Let her out in an hour," I said. And I departed.

*** *** ***

Fate allowed Mr. Allandale to be out when I
called. I knew he was truly out, and not simply "not at home,"
because I backed his valet to a wall and demanded he tell me where
Allandale was. The man stammered that his master had gone out to
his club. Which club, the valet could not say, though he looked
quite unhappy that he could not.

I took pity on him and went away.

I expected to find Grenville ensconced at his
own club at this time of day, but he was in fact at home in his
dining room.

Bartholomew's brother Matthias, who opened
the door, looked neither surprised nor dismayed when I appeared
without invitation, but led me through the quiet stateliness of the
hall to the main dining room.

Grenville was sitting at one end of his
dining table, with Anton hovering at his left elbow. A maid, hands
ready to snatch dishes away as soon as they were dirtied, lingered
nearby. As I entered, Anton reached down and, with a flourish,
removed a silver cover from a tray. Beneath it lay a small, perfect
oval of pudding.

"This is it, is it?" Grenville looked the
pudding over, turning the silver tray all the way around. "The
grand masterpiece?"

Anton nodded, clearly beyond speech. At his
signal, the maid produced a ladle and decanter of brandy. Anton
poured brandy into the ladle, then set fire to it by holding it
over one of the candles. He poured this burning liquid straight
over the pudding, and the whole thing flamed merrily.

I tramped into the room. The members of the
tableau started, looked up.

"Lacey," Grenville said. "You are just in
time. Anton has just perfected his summer pudding. Berries and
custard and cream, he tells me. Flamed without, cold within."

The little fire burned itself out. Anton
lifted a silver cream boat, and carefully poured yellow-white thick
cream around the base of the pudding. He pressed two raspberries
into the pudding, in its precise center. He stood back and let out
a sigh of satisfaction.

"I need to find Mr. Allandale," I said
abruptly.

Grenville's famous eyebrows elevated. "On the
moment?"

"Yes." At any other time, I would have
eagerly seated myself and rubbed my hands in anticipation of
another of Anton's concoctions, but rage and darkness churned
within me, leaving no room for elegant puddings.

"I must find him," I repeated.

"Now?" Grenville said, his voice cooling
considerably.

"Yes."

"Lacey," he said with forced patience, "Anton
has spent three days creating this."

I dragged out a chair and dropped into it.
"Enjoy it, then."

Grenville stared at me for a long time, then
gave Anton a curt nod to proceed.

Any other time, I might have found the whole
thing amusing. Anton handed Grenville a spoon. With exaggerated
care, Grenville scooped up a minute portion of custard, and
inserted it into his mouth. He closed his eyes. Anton held his
breath. Grenville chewed, very slowly. He swallowed. He remained
motionless for a long moment, then he opened his eyes, and
sighed.

"Exquisite," he said. "You have outdone
yourself."

The maid relaxed. Anton beamed. All was well
in Grenville's world.

"Certain you will not have some, Lacey?"

I shook my head. It would have been dust in
my mouth. I rose. "Just tell me where to find Allandale. I will go
alone if I must."

"No, you will not." Grenville gave his chef a
placating nod. "Set this aside for me. I will have it with my
supper."

No one in that room was terribly happy with
Gabriel Lacey.

Once we were settled in Grenville's carriage,
he said to me, "I know you rarely do anything without purpose,
usually good purpose. So why are you so eagerly pursuing the very
dull Mr. Allandale?"

I told him. I told him the entire story, not
even suppressing the bits that wounded my pride. When I was
finished, he stared at me in astonished horror. "Dear God, Lacey,
if that is true, I apologize to you for my coolness. I ought to
have known you would not ask favors lightly." He paused. "Are you
certain he has done this?"

"Yes," I said. "I do not think she was lying.
But, of course, I will ask him."

He cast me a wary glance, but subsided.

* * * * *

Chapter Twenty-three

We found Allandale at Brooks's. He was
playing billiards with a few desultory members who looked bored in
the extreme. They brightened when Grenville appeared.

Allandale looked a query. "Gentlemen?" he
asked in his smooth, polite voice.

I wanted to smash my fist into his face right
then and there. "A word with you in private." My teeth were so
tightly clenched I could barely speak.

His brows flickered. "Of course." He laid
down his cue and excused himself from the other gentlemen. They did
not look in the least displeased to see him go.

Allandale led the way down a short hall to
another room. I came behind him, my fists clenching. Before we'd
gone halfway, Grenville stopped me. "Lacey," he said. "Let me just
hold your walking stick."

He eyed me steadily, his hand out. I frowned,
but slapped the walking stick into his open palm.

Allandale had already entered the little
room. I quickened my pace and gained the threshold several steps
ahead of Grenville. I turned, abruptly closed the door in his face,
and locked it.

"Lacey!" Grenville's alarmed cry came through
the panels. Like Lydia had, he rattled the handle.

Allandale faced me, puzzled. The room we
stood in was quite small, containing only a table and chair, a
small bookcase, and a window. Here a club member could pen a letter
or read away from the noise and bustle of the billiards and card
rooms.

"I have some advice for you," I began. "Leave
England. Today."

Allandale's politeness wavered. "I beg your
pardon?"

"I said, leave England and do not
return."

He studied me uneasily. "And if I choose not
to?"

"Then I will certainly kill you."

He stared for one more bewildered moment,
then his oily smile slipped into place. "Please tell me what you
are talking about, Captain Lacey."

He ought to have been afraid. I had locked us
in here, and no one was here to aid him against me. "You raping
Lydia Westin." I took a step toward him.