Claire Thornton (18 page)

‘What?’
Angelica could hardly believe it.

Her father hadn’t left his town house since the accident.

‘I understand that neither your letter, nor mine, reached him,’ said Benoît. ‘I don’t know what happened to my messenger.’ A flicker of concern glowed briefly in his eyes. ‘Simpson’s an old sailor. He’s served with me for the past five years. He’s utterly loyal. I hope he hasn’t come to harm.’

For a moment Benoît’s eyes remained clouded as he thought of his friend and servant, then he focused on Angelica’s face. ‘The Earl is at Holly House now,’ he said quietly.

‘Here?’
Angelica gripped Benoît’s hand convulsively. Not for an instant had she considered the possibility that the Earl might follow her. ‘Have you spoken to him?’

‘Not yet,’ Benoît replied. ‘I realised he was ahead of me when I was on the road. He probably arrived last night. He’s come after you, and I thought the sooner he found you the better—so I didn’t delay.’

‘Oh, my God!’ Angelica felt almost sick with anxiety and guilt.

What fear or anger had driven the Earl to leave the security of his home after being secluded there for more than eighteen months?

‘He must be so worried about me,’ she whispered. ‘I should have gone home straight away. Oh, God! What have I done?’

‘He will surely understand you had doubts about me,’ said Benoît bracingly. ‘As I remember, he is not the kind of man to accept another man’s opinion without question. Your actions were entirely natural in the circumstances.’

‘I suppose so,’ said Angelica doubtfully.

She was still stunned by the fact that the Earl had travelled all the way into Sussex when he had refused point blank to go anywhere by carriage since his accident.

‘I never thought he’d leave the house again,’ she said wonderingly. ‘I kept trying to make him go out, but he wouldn’t. Perhaps…’ A smile suddenly lit up her eyes. ‘Perhaps his nightmares have receded and he’s no longer so afraid of the outside world. Perhaps he didn’t realise it until I came into Sussex. He used to like visiting Sir William.’

‘I mentioned his arrival to Sir William,’ said Benoît. ‘I expect he will call later, when he has arranged for Adam’s transportation.’

‘Yes. Papa would like that,’ said Angelica eagerly. ‘He’s very fond of Sir William. Let’s not waste any more time, Benoît. Papa will be so pleased to know you’re going to rescue Harry.’

D
espite her brave words, Angelica felt extremely apprehensive when the curricle drew up outside Holly House. She let Benoît help her down from the curricle, then lifted an instinctive hand to touch her golden curls.

Benoît smiled at her gesture.

‘You’ve obviously been practising your skills,’ he said humorously. ‘I’m not sure what Martha would say, but to my untutored eye you look charming.’

Angelica blushed self-consciously.

‘Thank you,’ she said.

Then her smile faded, an expression of elusive sadness flickering over her face.

‘I don’t know why I’m concerned,’ she said quietly. ‘Papa won’t see.’

She turned her head as Mrs Faulkener came out of the house to meet them. The Frenchwoman’s expression was
quite calm, but her eyes were strained and worried as she looked at Angelica.

‘The Earl is in the library,’ she said softly. ‘His secretary is with him. They’ve been here since late last night. He is not…very happy.’

Angelica looked sharply at Mrs Faulkener, hearing the undertones of stress in her voice. She had a feeling it would take a great deal to ruffle the Frenchwoman, but the Earl had clearly succeeded.

‘He’s angry?’ said Angelica flatly, needing no further explanation.

Lord Ellewood’s displays of temper were never a pleasant experience for anyone.

‘Yes,’ said Mrs Faulkener simply.

Angelica pressed her lips together in a firm, resolute line, and walked into the house to confront her father.

The Earl turned his head sharply when he heard the library door open. The secretary leapt to his feet.

‘Who’s there?’ Lord Ellewood demanded harshly.

He was a gaunt, ravaged shadow of the man who had once met Benoît on the seashore. He was still tall and rigidly upright, but his fair hair was prematurely white—and the darkened spectacles he wore could not hide the ugly scars on his face. There were deep lines around his mouth, his expression was hard, anxious and angry. His bitterness and frustration at what had happened to him were almost palpable, even submerged as they were by his more immediate fear for Angelica.

If he hadn’t known who the Earl was, Benoît wouldn’t
have recognised him. Despite everything Angelica had said, he was momentarily shocked into silence by his old opponent’s altered appearance.

‘It’s me, Papa,’ said Angelica calmly.

‘Angelica!’
Lord Ellewood heaved himself to his feet. His secretary offered him a well-meaning hand and he struck it furiously aside. ‘Come here!’

She went to him, stretching out her hands towards him. He groped blindly before him, found her wrist and seized it in a painful, vise-like grasp.

‘Are you safe, girl?’ he asked fiercely.

He was standing near the window; the scars on his face were livid in the bright sunlight as he turned his empty eyes towards her. He kept hold of her wrist in an almost brutal grip and ran his other hand rapidly up her arm to her shoulder.

‘Are you harmed?’
He shook her roughly back and forth in the ferocity of his anxiety.

‘No, Papa!’ Angelica cried out sharply, feeling a stab of pain at the bitter fear she had caused him. She reached out instinctively to reassure him. ‘I’m quite all right.’

For a single heart-beat the terrible intensity of emotion in the Earl’s face relaxed. It was possible to see in the ruins of his once handsome features the man who had chosen not to denounce Benoît—but then his expression darkened.

He released Angelica as violently as he had grabbed her; thrusting her away from him so forcefully that she stumbled back and would have fallen if Benoît hadn’t caught her.

‘I’m
sorry—
’ she began—but the Earl’s angry voice overrode her attempted apology.

‘How dare you flout my orders?’ Lord Ellewood snarled. ‘Do you think I’m soft-headed as well as blind? What kind of daughter have I bred? A liar and a coward! Not worthy of the name she bears! By God! I’m glad to be spared the sight of you now!’

His lips were drawn back in an ugly grimace, his tone full of cruel, unmerciful contempt. His words had been intended to wound as deeply as possible—and they found their mark.

‘No!
Papa!
’ Angelica cried out in horror.

She had seen his rage before, many times, but this was the first time it had ever been directed entirely at her. She had known he would be angry with her, but she hadn’t guessed he would be so unforgivingly, corrosively furious.

‘Hargreaves!’ The Earl turned his grim, sightless head towards his secretary.

‘Here, my lord.’ The young man leapt forward instantly, almost knocking over the wooden globe in his anxiety to obey.

‘You are dismissed,’ said Lord Ellewood harshly. ‘Now that my daughter has returned—inadequate though she is—I no longer have any need for a secretary who connives behind my back and cannot be trusted to obey a simple order.
Get out!
’

Mr Hargreaves’s face was bleached with shock and confusion. He opened his mouth to protest, turned to Angelica in mute appeal, then stumbled out of the room without saying a word.

‘You can’t do that!’ Angelica protested hotly, appalled at her father’s injustice. ‘It was
my
fault, not his.
I
decided to bring the letter. You
can’t
punish him for my fault.’

‘He should not have disobeyed me,’ the Earl said unrelentingly, his voice grating painfully on Angelica’s ears. ‘I will not be served by disloyal men.’

‘But—’

‘Silence!’ Lord Ellewood roared savagely. ‘I can banish Hargreaves—
your
disloyalty I must live with!’

Angelica stared at the Earl. Her face was drained of all colour, both hands were pressed against her mouth. She knew that her father’s vengeful anger stemmed mainly from his fear for her and his overwhelming sense of helplessness—but that didn’t make it any easier to bear.

She felt Benoît come to stand beside her and she glanced up at him, recognising the intent, watchful expression in his brown eyes. The wolf in him had been roused.

‘My lord,’ he said coldly, his quiet, even tones in stark contrast to the Earl’s ungovernable ranting. ‘I am sorry that you have had such a disturbing few days, but you have no cause to abuse Lady Angelica so. She did not intend to worry you—and her motives were unimpeachable.’

‘Who’s there?’ Lord Ellewood flung up his head, almost like a hound sniffing the wind. ‘Who are you?’

‘Benoît Faulkener.’ He approached the Earl.

The two men were much of a height: tall and broad-shouldered. But the Earl’s body was wasted with pain and inactivity, his movements clumsy and awkward.

Benoît moved with the lean, controlled grace of a panther: silent, wary—and potentially dangerous.

The Earl stood listening tensely to Benoît’s soft-footed approach, his hands trembling with furious, impotent energy.

Angelica caught her breath as she watched the two men. The difference between them revealed her father’s ruin more brutally than ever. She could remember when he had been as assured and relaxed as Benoît.

‘Yes, I should have guessed,’ said Lord Ellewood bitterly. ‘I remember your voice. An arrogant, insolent knave. I should have known better than to take you at your word,
What have you done to my daughter?
Why wasn’t she here when I arrived?’

Angelica gasped. The Earl had been so angry about her secretive departure from London she’d almost forgotten she had anything else to explain to him. The nightmarish situation was getting worse and worse, and she could think of nothing to say to abate her father’s fury—no excuse for her behaviour.

But she was also growing angry herself, and she experienced a wild desire not to explain anything to the Earl. She couldn’t believe he had treated Mr Hargreaves so cruelly, dragging him all the way to Sussex only to dismiss him at the moment of her arrival.

‘Lady Angelica was quite safe,’ said Benoît calmly.

His dark eyes were intent on the Earl’s face. He was standing very still, poised and alert. There was a coiled,
deadly spring of energy within him, but as yet he had made no attempt to engage the Earl’s fury.

‘Where was she?’

‘This morning she was with Sir William Hopwood,’ said Benoît evenly. ‘Last night she spent the night at an inn in Littlehampton. I think the only hardship she had to endure was a certain amount of boredom. She has come to no harm, my lord.’

For a few moments the only sound in the library was the harsh, angry sound of the Earl’s breathing. His chest rose and fell as he tried to master his seething fury. Angelica stared at him, white-faced; her hands were clenched together so tightly that her nails dug into her palms.

Even now, she could not imagine what it must be like for her father, unable to see where he was, or how many people confronted him, forced to judge their intentions and sincerity purely by the sound of their voices.

She knew that many blind people found ways of adapting to their handicap, but the Earl was not among their number. His memories of his former prowess were very vivid, and he was too bitter and impatient to learn new skills—yet he was also too young and too active to be content with a life spent confined within four walls. His anger seemed always to be roiling just beneath the surface, ready to scald anyone who inadvertently caused it to erupt.

‘Have the carriage prepared,’ the Earl ordered tautly. ‘We are leaving. I want nothing further to do with this house or the people in it. I am sorry I ever thought of writing to you,’ he added savagely.

‘I’m sorry my messenger didn’t reach you two days ago,’ said Benoît equably. ‘I replied to your letter immediately. Her ladyship also wrote to you to explain her delay. If you had received those letters, my lord, you would have been spared a great deal of needless anxiety. I have every intention of rescuing Lord Lennard.’

The Earl gave a brief, derisive, insulting laugh.

‘Your fine words come too late,’ he said scornfully. ‘My son does not need the help of a presumptuous jackanapes! And I’ll not leave my daughter in this house another minute! Your own actions betray you, cur! I should have had you flogged when I had the chance. Angelica! Order them to put the horses to!’

Benoît’s eyes narrowed. He had been keeping a firm grip on his temper, partly for Angelica’s sake, and partly because he could imagine the torment the Earl must have been in when he didn’t know where his daughter was. But there were limits to his tolerance.

‘Whether you wish it or not, I will help Lord Lennard,’ he said, an icy, dangerous edge on his soft controlled voice. ‘I do not forget my obligations. Nor will I stoop to barter insults with you. You are free to leave when you wish—but Angelica can choose for herself whether she goes with you. I suggest you speak to her more courteously, my lord! Neither her love for you nor her loyalty can be questioned—
but I will not allow anyone to abuse her!
’

Angelica stared wide-eyed at Benoît, some of her anxiety dissipating in pure astonishment. He was as furious as the Earl.
His lean, dark face was rigid with barely controlled anger, and she could sense the fierce tension in his whipcord body.

‘
You
won’t allow…!’ The Earl’s scarred face was black with uncontrollable rage. ‘A swaggering dunghill cock! I’ll destroy you! How dare you interfere! My daughter—’

‘May shortly be my wife!’ Benoît interrupted curtly. ‘Your threats hold no fear for me, my lord. I will not compel Angelica to stay—though it might make it easier for her if I did—but she deserves better than to be forced to share the barren hell you seem to have made of your own life!’

Angelica’s heart thudded with amazement, joy and distress. She had wondered if Benoît would ask her to marry him, but in the end there had been no proposal only a flat statement to her father. She was overwhelmed by an almost unbearable maelstrom of conflicting emotions as she glanced from Benoît’s rigid face to her father’s.

The Earl lifted his head, shocked out of his ranting fury into some deeper, darker emotion by Benoît’s words.

‘Angelica!’

She didn’t immediately answer, and he stretched out a demanding, unforgiving hand in her direction.

‘Come here!’

Angelica stared at his hand for a few, heart-stopping seconds. His gesture was terrible in its fierce, unmerciful authority. She took two, horrified steps backwards, away from her father, and looked up at Benoît. His expression was intent and uncompromising.

‘Is that the life you want to lead?’ he asked ruthlessly.

‘I…’ Her voice failed her and she shook her head in a desperate attempt to deny everything that had just happened.

‘By God! You’ll pay for this!’ The Earl raged. ‘A smuggling weasel to lay hands on my daughter!
Angelica!
’

He took an unwary step towards her, stumbled into the globe and lost his balance. He struggled wildly for a moment, then crashed to the floor. The globe landed partially on top of him. He cursed viciously and flailed at it, smashing his fist into the object which had betrayed him.

At the sight of her father, fighting with the globe like a madman, Angelica’s composure finally broke. She fled out of the library, wrenched open the front door and stumbled out of the house.

The Earl lay on the floor, his energy spent. He was angry, afraid—and humiliated. Above all else he felt humiliated, and his sense of degradation made him vicious. At that moment he was beyond reason. He felt the globe being lifted away from him and he tensed, ready to lash out, but nobody touched him. Benoît set the globe on its feet a safe distance from Lord Ellewood and walked out of the library without a word.

Lord Ellewood heard the door close. He lay still, his anger-crazed mind beginning to clear. He was not even sure if he was alone, but he could hear no sound except his own harsh breathing.

A log collapsed, hissing in the hearth and he turned his head sharply towards the sound.

‘Who’s there?’ he demanded fiercely—but nobody answered.

At last his rigid muscles relaxed and he pushed himself up onto his knees, groping clumsily around him. He was in a strange room. He had no idea where any of the furniture was, or what obstacles lay before him.