Amanda Scott (30 page)

The butler permitted himself a smile. “If I may say so, m’lady, the young master has fallen rather quickly into his new position. I doubt he misses his American adventures in the least.”

She chuckled. “No doubt you are in the right of it. He is fairly wallowing in his earldom, is he not? I daresay Papa never enjoyed being Lord Tallyn half so much as Joss does.”

The butler bowed, and she took herself upstairs to the drawing room, hoping Sir Antony would not keep her waiting long. She could not depend upon Lady Cadogan and Eliza to loiter once their errands had been attended to, nor could she be certain Jocelyn would not come home early for once. Thus it was that she fairly leapt to her feet when Marwyn opened the drawing-room doors at last. But the figure behind him was not large, nor did he instill any wish in her to fling herself upon his chest and pour out her problems.

Peter Trent slipped past the butler even as that outraged worthy was announcing him, and executed a graceful bow. “Your message to my master brought me to you, ma’am,” he explained quickly. “Sir Antony is, most unfortunately, out of town, so I took the liberty of scanning your note, which was not sealed, you know. Your footman had said it was most urgent and must be delivered at once to Sir Antony. I hoped perhaps I might be of service in his absence.”

“Well, it is certainly distressing that Sir Antony is not at home, but I do not know what you may think you could do for me, Trent. The matter is one that I can discuss only with him, you see.”

Trent glanced at the butler. “If you please, m’lady, I should prefer to speak to you privately.”

Marwyn, becoming more stately than ever, stepped nearer to the valet. “You may prefer such a thing, my man, but you may believe me when I tell you that her ladyship will not be entertaining the likes of you without a proper chaperon.”

Trent said nothing. He merely looked at Meriel with an odd glint of conspiracy in his eyes that intrigued her at once. She smiled at the butler and said, “It is all right, Marwyn. Mr. Trent and I became acquainted, you know, upon my journey into France. I am certain he may be trusted to keep the line. You may go.”

“I’ll just bring refreshment, m’lady.”

She saw Trent give a slight negative movement of his head, and instantly took the hint. “No need for that, Marwyn. I’ll thank you to see that we are left undisturbed until I ring.”

“Very well, my lady,” the butler said, every line of his majestic body stiff with disapproval, “it shall be as you request.”

“I thank you, your ladyship,” Peter Trent said smoothly, moving a step nearer when the butler had gone. “Now, perhaps we may speak freely. I am aware that certain information has come into your hands, and I assure you that you may confide in me. I am the very embodiment of my master.”

His smooth self-assurance unaccountably annoyed her, and she rather wished she had not sent Marwyn away. “I cannot think what gave you the notion that I might confide in you,” she said, turning toward her chair again. “Indeed, your attitude is unseemly, Mr. Trent. I assure you that I merely wish to ask Sir Antony’s advice upon a matter that is entirely person—”

Her last word ended in a startled squeal as the valet’s muscular arm came round her throat and a knife flashed before her eyes.

“I believe there’s more to the matter than that, my precious lady. Until this very day I thought I must have mistaken my man. But now you’d best hope that butler of yours don’t take it into his head to disturb us before I get to the right of things, or this day’s light will be the last you ever see.”

M
ERIEL DREW BREATH TO
scream, but the knife point pricking at her throat turned the scream into a sobbing gasp instead.

“Not a sound, m’lady,” Trent growled in her ear, “for I shan’t hesitate to use this, and I assure you, that old puffguts butler of yours would be of little use to you once you was dead. Now, quickly, have you got a message for Sir Antony? Did the priest give you something, is that it?”

“He told me nothing,” she gasped. “He merely helped my maid and me to escape the soldiers. You must realize we were running for our lives!”

Trent allowed himself a grim chuckle, but the pressure of the knife against her throat did not relax. “I don’t doubt you was escaping, but don’t try to bamboozle me into thinking that priest ain’t hand in glove with the English and didn’t give you a message to relay to Sir Antony Davies. I can’t think of any other reason you’d have run to him from Paris, and I know for a fact you did that, for I was with Sir Antony when he went there for news of you. I didn’t leave their sight for a minute, howsoever, so I know the old man passed nothing along to Davies or to that other fellow that was with him—Carruthers.”

“Well, Père Leclerc gave me nothing for Sir Antony either,” Meriel said truthfully. “In any event, if he had, don’t you think I’d have given it to him at once?”

“Perhaps, if you had been conscious when ’e found you. Or even if you’d been alone with him aboard the yacht. But you wasn’t. And maybe you wasn’t supposed to pass it along at all, now I come to think about it. Only reason for you being involved at all as I see it is that no one’d suspicion a female might carry an important message. Perhaps Sir Antony was naught but dust thrown in my eye to keep me from considering you, all along.”

His body relaxed a little as his thought processes stirred, and Meriel could no longer feel the knife at her throat. With her head held back as it was, she could see very little other than the ornate ceiling above, but her arms were relatively free, and she began to reach out with the right one carefully, feeling for some object that might aid her. Knowing she must be quite near at least one of the occasional tables that littered the room, she was not altogether surprised a moment later when her seeking hand came into contact with one of the Grecian sculptures. Thinking the marble might prove too heavy for her purpose, and realizing that she would have only the one opportunity, she braced herself and heaved the statue with all her might, bringing it up and over as much by guess as by awareness of where Trent’s head must be. Her aim was admirable, however. The base of the statue caught Mr. Trent just over the eyebrow as he wrenched his head around in a belated attempt to see what she was about.

The knife fell from his limp hand as he sank into oblivion, and Meriel stepped quickly away, feeling much as she would have had she stepped upon a viper. As she turned to see what she had done, her hands flew to her mouth, for there was blood upon Trent’s forehead and she very much feared she had killed him. She tried to call out, but the words refused to form themselves upon her tongue. Her throat seemed to have shut tight, making it difficult to breathe.

From some distance away she heard voices, masculine voices. She shook her head a little, thinking she was imagining them, but they only grew louder. There was a clattering, too, as of footsteps upon marble. Drawing a long breath, she straightened her shoulders and faced the door onto the gallery. Her heart was pounding, but she willed herself to be calm, certain now that the noise heralded the arrival of friends, not more enemies.

When the tall doors were thrown open to reveal Sir Antony, with Mr. Carruthers, Lord Tallyn, and a visibly anxious Marwyn just behind him, Meriel looked straight at the only one who mattered and said quietly, “I’m afraid I’ve killed your valet, but indeed, I did not know what else to do.”

At first she had been so distraught herself that she had imagined Sir Antony was breathing hard, that he was frightened at what he might see. But now she realized she had quite mistaken the matter. As his gaze met hers, he appeared to be as calm as ever, and although there was a certain enigmatic glint in the hazel depths, there was strength there as well. She drew from that strength as she had done before, and when he moved toward her, stepping around the prostrate Trent, she held out her hands to him, expecting him to take them in his own. To her surprise he crushed her into his arms instead, and the action seemed perfectly natural to her. She snuggled there willingly, certain her troubles were over.

“My poor girl,” he said gently. “Trent acted much more quickly than we had any reason to expect. I hope you will forgive us.”

Shock raced through her, stiffening her body in his embrace. She raised her head from his chest and looked searchingly into his face. “You knew he had come here? You expected him to do so?”

Sir Antony nodded, but before he could speak, Jocelyn said angrily from the doorway, “What goes forward here, if I may ask? Who is that fellow on the floor and why is no one attending to him? I daresay it makes no never-mind to the rest of you, but I for one would as lief he not bleed all over my carpet. What were you about, to be alone in this room with a man like that, Meriel? Your conduct wants correcting, my girl, and so I tell you. As for you, Davies, what do you mean by such behavior, sir? I daresay the girl was a trifle upset when this fellow collapsed at her feet, but as she’d no reason to be here with him in the first place, I’d take it kindly if you was to release her at once. You’ve taken a number of liberties that I don’t hold with, now I come to think about it, liberties you oughtn’t to take without you pleaded your case to me first, sir. London manners must have changed these seven years, dashed if they ain’t.”

Sir Antony released Meriel, exchanged a glance with Carruthers, who stood near the butler just inside the doorway, and then addressed himself to Jocelyn. “I cannot explain the whole business to you, my lord, without discussing it first with some others more directly concerned, but I can assure you that your sister did not entertain this fellow by choice. It would certainly have been better had he not been left alone with her. Your butler ought to have remained in the room.” A choking sound from the indignant butler drew his eye toward that worthy. When Marwyn folded his lips and glanced at the ceiling, however, Sir Antony’s gaze shifted to Meriel, and there was enough steel in the look to send a shiver racing up and down her spine. He continued in a harder tone, “We—rather foolishly, as matters transpired—assumed that Lady Meriel would simply give into his keeping that which he came for. That she would refuse him, or that he would do anything to harm her if she did, never occurred to us.” He glanced down at Trent, his jaw tightening. “That knife on the floor belongs to him, does it not?”

This last was addressed to Meriel, and she nodded, nibbling at her lower lip and wishing he would behave more as she was accustomed to see him behave. Gone was his languid manner, along with the lazy look in his eyes. He was angry, and she very much feared, despite his comforting hug earlier, that she was the one who had angered him. She glanced at Carruthers and saw him looking at her, his expression a mixture of amusement and compassion. She glared back at him, and he gave a little shrug, moving to take a closer look at the man lying on the floor.

Lord Tallyn spoke again, petulantly. “I do not understand you, Davies,” he said. “What business had my sister with a man who carries a knife upon his person? And who is that fellow? I demand an answer to that much at least.”

“My valet,” returned Sir Antony curtly. He glanced at Carruthers. “I shall leave you to deal with this—as quietly as possible, if you please. No doubt the butler will know how to remove him with the least disturbance to the household.”

“Indeed, sir,” said Marwyn at his stateliest. “You may with perfect confidence leave everything to me.”

“Thank you,” said Sir Antony with a slight smile. “Just don’t lose him. I’ve a few questions to put to that lad if her ladyship hasn’t put him beyond answering them.”

“He’s still alive, Tony,” said Carruthers, kneeling now beside Trent.

“Well, thank goodness for that,” said Jocelyn, eyeing his sister. “At least you won’t have to stand trial for murder, Meriel. I shall have a few things to say to you later, my girl, but for now I daresay you’d best take yourself off to your bedchamber until we get this business cleared up.”

Meriel turned on him indignantly, prepared to tell him precisely what she thought of such an order, but just then Sir Antony said calmly, “If you please, Tallyn, I should like a few moments of privacy with Lady Meriel before I depart. There are certain matters I wish to discuss with her.”

“Oh,” said Jocelyn, looking at him in surprise but with a light of dawning understanding in his eyes. “It’s like that, is it? Well, I must say I’ve expected no less, Davies. You pick a damn peculiar time for it, but I suppose if she does not object, we needn’t be too finicking about that. You may take her down to my library if you wish, sir. She knows the way. And as for you,” he added, turning to his sister and ignoring her gathering fury, “you must count yourself fortunate, I suppose, that Davies here is prepared to see that all your damned odd behavior don’t destroy your reputation altogether.”

“How dare you!” Meriel sputtered, taking a step toward him, then whirling to face Sir Antony, who was regarding Jocelyn in mild astonishment. “How dare the lot of you! ’Tis bad enough that I have been used as a mere puppet by persons to whom I have no connection whatsoever, but to have been used in that same manner by two men who pretended to be my friends is the outside of enough. You, Mr. Carruthers,” she added, shooting a glare at that gentleman, whose eyes were twinkling irrepressibly with unholy glee, “you laugh to think how clever you have been to have played games with all of us. But you, sir”—and here she planted herself firmly in front of Sir Antony and pushed a hard, sharp-nailed finger straight into his broad chest—“for you to pretend to my brother now that you mean to offer for my hand and that there is no more than that left to discuss, when not two minutes ago you made it perfectly clear to me if to no one else that you as good as arranged for that abominable toad to come here like he did, is going beyond what anyone might tolerate. You used me just as Mr. Murray and the others did. Indeed,” she added, her fists flying now to her hips, “I should not be at all surprised to discover that the entire plan was of your devising from first to last. Well, I shall not go to the library or anywhere else with you. Moreover, I shall not ever speak to you again, and I pray you may take the greatest possible care of Trent. The two of you deserve each other!”