An Affair Downstairs (19 page)

“I'm not much of a hunter, as evidenced by my fall from a horse. And to her credit, Sophia does far more than swan around. Especially once I gave her a purpose. She took to caregiving with an unexpected fervor. I didn't think I would ever manage to get out of her sight.”

“But you did, and I'm delighted to have you with me. One can't help but notice you, Alice, even with your sister in proximity. But of course, it's your conversational skills that held my attention. I've missed our talks.”

“As have I.” She tucked her hand into his as they walked on. “And if by conversational skills, you mean my ability to talk until you have no choice but to listen and respond, then yes. I'm very skilled.”

He led her along the bank of the brook toward the Kirkland house. He stopped at the edge of the woods, where the brook curved before it turned into the marsh and the slate roof of the manor house was just visible over the treetops.

“This is where I met Julia.” He gestured at the clearing all around them, drab brown with the winter, but green with new life in the spring. “I suffered from shyness when I was a boy.”

“Not exactly hard to believe.”

“She found me here one afternoon, by that tree.” He continued walking to where he pointed, leading Alice by the hand, and stopped to lean against the trunk. “We were eight years old. I'd gone for one of my long walks. Mother had died the previous year. With John off at school and Father always so busy, I spent a lot of time out of doors on my own. And I had quite an imagination, as children do. When she came across me, I was knee deep in the water, trying to catch a fish with my bare hands like a bear would.”

Alice giggled. “Did you frighten her with your mighty growl?”

“I jumped when my hands actually made contact with a fish and fell in the water, and she roared with laughter at me. It was humiliating.”

“Poor Logan. Your ego was bruised.” Alice rumpled his hair.

“Until Julia got in the water with me. She claimed to be an expert on bears, that she had seen them fishing in the brook on numerous occasions, and she knew exactly what to do.”

“Oh.” Alice blushed. “Like another woman who claimed to know what do with lemon trees. You keep running into females with vast experience in your topics of interest.”

He brushed a wisp of hair from Alice's eyes. “Yes, it's my good fortune. For her part, Julia said that fishing all came down to knowing how to use one's claws to spear the fish at just the right moment. The fact that neither of us had claws didn't occur to us. We got very wet, and of course we caught no fish. But we became fast friends that day and remained so for many years. We would often meet here, at this very spot, and hatch our plans for the day's adventures.

“Years passed. I went away to school. Julia became bored waiting for me to come home and met someone else. It was inevitable. She was a beautiful seventeen-year-old girl, and some other man had the advantage of winning her heart in my absence. I'd had no idea. I came home and proposed right here on this spot with a ring that had been my grandmother's, a moonstone, not the most expensive stone but one that would mean something to us. We'd stayed out as late as we could when we were together in the summers. The nights with a full moon were our favorites because we could see at night almost as clearly as during the day.

“I used to tell her I would capture the moon for her, if I could, and here I was presenting it in a platinum band set with tiny diamond chips, like twinkling stars, on either side of it. She looked at me, astonishment widening her eyes, and said it was a lovely ring that I should save for the right girl.”

“She didn't understand what you were asking? That you thought she was the one?” At Logan's side, Alice relaxed, leaning against the tree to hear the rest of what she'd rightfully decided was going to be a longer story.

“She understood perfectly. When she turned me down, though she did it as sweetly and gently as she could, I was angry. Hurt, but that came out as anger. I said things I regretted instantly. I threw the ring in the brook.” He stomped to the water's edge and mimed the toss, reenacting, and turned back to Alice. “We didn't speak for a year. She married her earl and became Countess of Stanhope.

“Unfortunately, her marriage was not the fairy tale she'd dreamed. As she later told me, Stanhope spent much of his time gambling and drinking, and his estate was deeply in debt. When Julia accepted Stanhope's proposal, her mother had been dead for two years and her father's health was in steady decline. Stanhope proposed believing that Julia's father would be dead soon, leaving Julia his sole heir and enabling Stanhope to pay off his debts.”

“How awful for her. I'm so sorry.” Alice's brow furrowed with concern.

“The longer William Kirkland lived, the angrier and more resentful Stanhope became. He took it out on Julia. He would stay out gaming too long and drinking too much, and come home raring to tear into someone. It started as a slap here, a push there, and escalated to knocking Julia unconscious and even breaking bones. For her father and for the doctor who treated her, she always had a ready excuse.”

“But she finally came to you. She knew that you would still do anything for her.”

He shook his head. “It wasn't like that exactly. I happened upon her here one day. As I walked up”—he gestured to the path they'd followed—“I could see that she was soaking wet. I thought perhaps that she'd fallen in the brook, but she threw herself in again. And again. She kept throwing herself back into the water only to emerge a minute later.

“I thought she was trying to drown herself and going about it badly, and I ran all the way to try to stop her. That's when I saw her black eye, and I realized that she wasn't just wet from the brook, that she'd been crying. I said she had to stop whatever she was doing and talk to me. She said she was done, that she had finally learned to fish like a bear, and she held up her catch, shining in her palm.”

“Your grandmother's ring.” Alice's mouth gaped. “Fate. That's what Agatha would say.”

“It felt like fate.” He nodded. “She told me that she'd made a mistake in turning me down, and that she missed me. I held her while she cried. Finally, she told me about her marriage. I was ready to kill Stanhope right then with my bare hands. Of course, she convinced me to step aside. She was expecting his child. Her father believed her happily married, and his fondest wish had been that he could hold his first grandchild before he died. I should have protested. I should never have let her go back home to that monster, but I…”

“Whatever happened, Logan, you can't blame yourself.”

He went on. “I believed her when she said that telling Stanhope about the baby would make all the difference, that he wouldn't do anything to her that would hurt the child. She was five months along and she hadn't told him yet. At first, she'd said she was hoping he would beat her so that she would lose the baby and be free again, no trace of him remaining with her. Then, once she'd first felt the baby move, she realized how desperately she wanted to be a mother.”

“My apologies, Logan.” Alice placed her hand on his back consolingly. “I thought perhaps that Grace was your daughter, and that was why John and Ellen had agreed to raise her.”

“I wished she could be.” He had to inhale deeply to calm himself and keep the tears from his eyes as he thought about what happened next. “She was right, though. He didn't touch her for months after hearing they had a baby on the way. She continued with her pregnancy in good health, but she'd lied to Stanhope about when the baby was due. She hadn't wanted him to get angry with her for keeping things from him. She thought when she went into labor, she would say it was an early delivery and he would simply believe their child a miracle.

“In the meantime, we planned to run away together after the birth. Once we got to France, we would go on to America. I would claim her as my wife and the child as our own, and Stanhope would never find us. Again, I started to worry, and I told her that it might be easier for us to get away before the baby's birth. But Julia wouldn't hear of it. What would happen to her father? He wouldn't live much longer, and he deserved to hold his grandchild at least once.

“One afternoon, I was waiting here for her. She stayed with her father when Stanhope went to London on business, and she would come out to meet me. When she came riding up on a horse, I was overcome. She was heavily pregnant, too far along to be riding. Then I saw him chasing her on another horse, charging up behind her.” He gestured to the clearing between the trees in the opposite direction from whence they'd come. It was as if he could still see Julia on her horse, approaching, looking behind her desperately to see how close Stanhope had gotten.

“A week earlier, Stanhope apparently had stumbled on a list she'd made herself, a list of things to pack. She'd tried to explain it away, but he'd apparently followed her undetected and had watched her with me. Our meetings were innocent. Sometimes I held her hand, but nothing more. Still, Stanhope concluded that the child was not his. He didn't snap right away. Instead, he coiled in wait to strike, the snake that he was.

“He pretended he was going off to London as planned and then surprised her at her father's house with the truth of his suspicions. When he started hitting her, she believed, rightfully so, that he didn't plan to stop until he'd killed her and the baby. She somehow managed to grab hold of a fire poker and hit him with that, knocking him unconscious long enough for her to get to the stable and mount the horse that she found saddled there.

“Stanhope came after her. He didn't even saddle a horse, just rode bareback all the way, and he caught up to her. On foot, I couldn't reach her before he did. He pulled her from the saddle and jumped on top of her and kept swinging. I ran and pulled him off and let the punches fly, telling her to run for help. Instead, she ran and grabbed my rifle from where it leaned against this tree, and pointed it at us. It had been John's birthday, and my excuse for getting out of the house was that I'd wanted to catch his birthday dinner—rabbit, John's favorite.

“I warned her not to shoot, afraid she would hit me by mistake, and fortunately, I managed to hit Stanhope with a good right hook that laid him out. Julia put the rifle down. We had just enough time, I believed, to get out of there before Stanhope could come after us again. But I was wrong. Julia had started to bleed and she was having contractions. I thought she might deliver her baby right there with Stanhope clinging to consciousness only feet away. He did, in fact, start to get up. I'm not sure he had the energy to come after us again, and I wasn't about to find out. I grabbed the rifle, and I shot him. He never got up again.”

Logan paused, leaning against the tree with one arm for support and wiping his brow with the other. The high emotion of that fateful day came back to him in a rush—the worry, the fear, the joy, and the pain.

“But you had to. He would have killed Julia, or you both.” Compassionate tears sparkled in Alice's eyes, and Logan had never loved her more for understanding the situation immediately. “He was a despicable man, and you were only protecting the woman you loved.”

“At that point, I might not have been protecting anyone. I'm not sure he was in any condition to come after us, but I would not take the risk. I shot him. I only wished I'd done it sooner. But before I could get help for Julia, she was too far gone, about to give birth. With my own two hands, and plenty of sweat and tears, I delivered Julia's baby girl. I'd never been so scared, and I had no idea what I was doing, but that baby cried the loudest cries I'd ever heard at her birth.

“Julia and I smiled at each other, so relieved, because we knew the cries meant that the baby was strong and healthy. Julia wanted to name her Grace, after her mother. I had to leave them long enough to ride for help. The doctor came with a rig, and we were able to get Julia back to the house. She insisted on watching her father hold his granddaughter for the first time before she would agree to let the doctor have a look at her.”

Alice looked puzzled. “Stanhope had been waiting at her father's house, beating her. Didn't her father know? The servants? How could no one have come after her?”

“Stanhope had arrived earlier that morning and dismissed all the servants with the exception of the one attendant who looked after Julia's father. They both somehow napped through Julia's arrival and Stanhope's first outburst. I suspect Stanhope might have actually drugged them.”

“Drugged them?” Alice's eyes widened and she nibbled her lip, as if she'd thought of something, and then shook it off. “Horrifying. And Julia?”

“She'd lost too much blood. I thought, at first, that I'd done something wrong with the delivery, but the doctor suspected she had internal injuries from Stanhope's beating. She died hours after giving birth, and her father died the next day. Stanhope finally would have had what he wanted, but it was too late.”

“I'm so sorry, Logan. I thought—”

“That she'd lived? How I wish. I lost her all over again, and I lost our dream of raising her child together. I went directly to the constable and turned myself in for the murder of Alexander Blythe, Earl of Stanhope. Despite my admission of guilt, witnesses came forward. The doctor testified about how badly Julia had been beaten. William Kirkland's servants testified about Stanhope arriving at the house and sending them away. Stanhope's own servants testified about his history of abuse and his debts. Stanhope's reputation suffered.

“Our family attorney was building a strong case for self-defense, but it wasn't self-defense. I wouldn't declare that it was. I insisted on sticking to my story, the truth, that I shot Stanhope to save Julia's life, and that my biggest regret was that I hadn't killed him sooner. It remains my biggest regret.”