Haunting Violet (7 page)

“What's this for?”

“Strawberry ice cream.” He pushed the ceramic crockery pot between us. “The dairy maid's sweet on me, so she saved me the scrapings from the ice cream she made for your supper tonight.”

“You're sweet on the dairy maid?”

“I didn't say that, did I?” He winked. “I said she's sweet on me.”

Oh. The thought of Colin kissing the dairy maid made me feel queer inside.

He leaned on his elbow while I told myself it was ridiculous to feel cross. “Maybe I'll run away with the dairy maid and live in a cottage and eat ice cream all day long and you'll live in London with your prince and drink out of gold teacups.”

“Gold cups wouldn't be at all practical,” I felt the need to point out. He grinned. His black hair fell into his eye, as it always did. He could never be bothered to use pomade to sleek it back like the fashionable gentlemen did, and he was more handsome for it. His sleeves were rolled up, revealing strong wrists and muscular arms. He sprawled, utterly comfortable and utterly confident. I could see how the dairy maid might think he was a bit of all right.

I concentrated on scraping the pink ice cream at the bottom of the pot. It was cold and sweet on my tongue, melting away as it slid down my throat. I nearly purred.

Colin cleared his throat. “Like the ice cream then?”

I opened my eyes. I hadn't even realized I'd closed them. “Heavenly.”

“Thought you might.”

We ate in a companionable silence. A honeybee drifted between us. A warm breeze ruffled the mint. Birds sang in the hedgerows and someone was playing one of the pianofortes in the house. I refused to think about the ghost in the parlor, the water in my room, or Tabitha. I wasn't going to spoil this moment. I was sitting in grass with ants crawling over my boots and sticky ice cream on my lips and I was happier than in my best dress under the crystal chandeliers. It was the first time I'd felt myself since we'd left London.

I wondered if there really was something wrong with me.

CHAPTER 6

I
barely slept that night.

Instead, I played the incidents over and over in my head: Rowena's ghost dripping onto the flagstones, the water running down the walls, Tabitha glaring at me. I'd made her angry and vulnerable and I didn't need to be told she wouldn't forgive me for it. I knew girls like Tabitha—I'd been raised by one. She would need some kind of revenge. I didn't know how to tell her she needn't bother expending all that effort on my behalf; I was hardly competition. If I could convince her of what she already suspected—that I was beneath her notice—things would be easier for me.

And it was easier to worry about Tabitha than it was to wonder how I was going to keep all of this a secret from my mother. Because although I might not know very much about actual conversations with the dead, I did know my mother. She would have me talking to the deceased members of every influential family in the entire city of London, right down to the queen, if she had her way. I had no wish to pursue this newfound talent for seeing spirits. It was already getting me into trouble, and it had been only two days.

Referring to myself as a medium did nothing for my humor.

I had never really considered that other mediums might truly have psychical experiences. I assumed they used the same tricks we did, with varying degrees of success. But I couldn't deny, however much I wanted to, that something out of the ordinary was occurring.

I punched at my pillow a few more times before giving it up as a lost cause. Clearly, sleep would remain elusive. I sighed and sat up, reaching for my little book of Tennyson's verse, but even
The Lady of Shalott
couldn't keep my attention. It was too easy to imagine myself in a barge seeing visions and floating to my doom. I tucked the book under my pillow, feeling wild, as if I'd had too many honey cakes.

The moon shone through the windows. I'd left the drapes open as it seemed a shame not to take advantage of the view. My window at home was a quarter the size of this one and showed only a scraggly elm and the bricks of the house next door.

I pulled my shawl around my shoulders and opened the glass door leading out onto a wedge of balcony. The night was warm enough that I was comfortable in my faded nightdress and a mended lace dressing gown that had belonged to my mother. The stars flickered like candles, and the wind was full of roses and larkspur.

I couldn't ignore the pale glimpse of moon-touched water from where the hills gave way to the manicured lawns of Whitestone Manor.

The bushes rustled beneath my balcony. There was a muffled curse.

“Keep your voice down. Do you want to wake the entire house?”

I knew that tone, bitter, disapproving. Caroline Donovan, Tabitha's governess.

“Darling, you worry too much.”

I didn't recognize the second voice, male and all smug condescension. I crouched down so I wouldn't be seen and peered through the gaps between the stone railings. The ground was cold under my feet.

“Everyone's asleep,” the man reassured her, sounding vaguely bored. I could see only the cuff of his dark jacket and the gleam of his boots. Caroline was half wedged into the yew bush, staring all around her. What on earth was Tabitha's governess doing here at this time of the night?

“I don't know about this,” Caroline murmured.

“It's too late now,” he said cheerfully.

“Be serious, won't you?”

“Why bother? You're serious enough for the both of us.”

“We have to be careful.”

“Did you pull me out here for that? I've cards to play and brandy to drink.” The answering silence was strained, brittle. Not that he noticed, apparently. “At least give us a kiss.”

I wasn't the only one with secrets. I shifted to ease the pressure on my knees and tripped on the ribbon of my dressing gown. I tumbled with a muffled “oof.”

“Did you hear that?” Caroline asked fearfully.

I froze, squeezing my eyes shut as if that would help me be invisible. I pried one eyelid open. From this angle I could see a third person watching them from the privacy of a rose arbor. I only chanced to see him because from this angle, the moonlight gleamed on his silver cravat pin. He scanned the gardens, his face hidden in the shadow cast by his hat.

“Probably nothing,” Caroline's mysterious beau murmured. “All the same, you should get back.”

They parted without another word, Caroline sneaking away across the lawn, the man easing back inside. After a few moments, I straightened, rubbing my elbow, which was now throbbing as much as my knee.

“Psst.”

I swatted away what I assumed was a fly. But the noise came again, from below me in the shadow-thick gardens. The white roses seemed to glow in the faint moonlight.

“Psst!

I leaned over the railing. “What?”

It was hardly what Juliet might have said to Romeo, or indeed what any well-bred girl might say. I probably ought to have giggled enticingly or shrieked and dove under my blankets.

Instead, I leaned farther and nearly toppled right out.

Colin emerged from behind a decorative hedge shaped like a mermaid. The gardens were as crowded as Covent Garden on market day. He looked as handsome as any young lord, even with the coarse wool of his coat and the calluses that I knew ridged his palms.

“Shouldn't you be in bed?” For some reason, saying it made me blush. He grinned.

“Shouldn't you?”

I almost told him why I couldn't sleep. I almost told him about the water in my room and about the drowned girl and the way she looked at me: hopefully, pleadingly, demandingly.

But I didn't.

“Someone will see us,” I said instead. I hated how proper and prim I sounded.

I could have sworn he was disappointed. Since that hardly made sense, I ignored it. He bowed once, mockingly. I turned and sailed back inside, shutting the door pointedly behind me.

I couldn't say why he seemed to follow me, invading my empty bedroom and my thoughts.

Or why I found it comforting.

I woke up scowling. I scowled through my cup of tea, I scowled when Marjorie brushed my hair, and I even scowled at the sunlight when it fell prettily through the windowpanes onto the carpet.

It was early. Too early.

I scowled all the way down the stairs, at each of the Jasper ancestors in the portrait hall, and even at a potted fern that fluttered across my hem as I passed. The fashion for ferns showed not the slightest inclination of fading if Rosefield was any house to judge by. Large green fronds grasped at me like hands as I marched down to breakfast.

I had just enough sense to pause before entering in order to collect myself. A headache pulsed viciously behind my eyes. I pasted on a polite smile before showing myself. Most of the guests were gathered at the long table. All of the men rose briefly. Frederic grinned. Since I didn't hear Elizabeth's customary stifled sigh, she must still be asleep, like any sensible person. One of the guests was a tall man, thin and with a predatory look about him. The effect was underscored by the way he stared, his black eyes peeling back the layers we all wore like shawls in polite society.

Something else about him made me uncomfortable: the silver cravat pin he wore. It was the same man who'd been hiding in the gardens last night, watching Caroline stealing kisses.

But why?

“There you are, darling.” Mother's voice was decidedly crisp. She eyed me critically over her cup. Her smile was pointed. “Why don't you have a seat next to your Mr. Trethewey?”

I instantly forgot about the man with the cravat pin and instead blushed violently. One of the ladies cleared her throat sharply.

“Mother,” I whispered. She was being too bold. I could see the censure in Lord Jasper's sister's expression and the gleam in Tabitha's eyes as she sat on Xavier's other side, smiling prettily at him. I stifled a groan. I had no wish to play the games Mother or Tabitha expected me to play. The headache jabbed at me, mercilessly.

“It would be a pleasure,” Xavier murmured. I could only be grateful his parents were still abed.

“Tell Jasper I miss him.”

I blinked, looking at the guests. No one else seemed to have heard the breathy voice, whispering.

“The locket is under the settee. Vera dropped it there last week.”

I definitely heard that. I lifted a hand to my head, which throbbed mercilessly.

“Can you hear me?”

“And me?”

“Please, answer me!”

There were more voices, all layered on top of one another like a windstorm. I think I might have whimpered. I really didn't want this to be happening. Seeing spirits was bad enough; hearing them was no better. I clapped my hands over my ears. I had to get out of there.

“Violet,” Mother snapped.

Her voice, at least, was real, and it was sharp enough to cut through the haze of panic. Lord Jasper was staring at me quite intently. I smiled weakly and turned to the sideboard. I just needed to be alone, needed quiet. I was tired, that was all. The chattering and the clinking of silver cutlery frayed at my nerves.

I reached for a plate, waving away the help of a footman. I'd never understood that. Surely I was capable of carrying my own plate, even though I felt tired and awful. I made my way back to the table with my eggs and toast, trying to breathe through the anxiety and the ache in my temples. I wasn't paying attention to Tabitha.

That was my first mistake.

The second was that when she surreptitiously reached back and yanked on my elbow, I let out a most unbecoming yelp, like a monkey tumbling from a tree.

And third, I dropped my plate.

Or rather, I threw it.

It sailed out of my hand and I could only watch in horror as it proceeded to make its descent. Jam-covered toast turned over once, twice … and landed on Xavier's shoulder with a most undignified
splat
. The eggs rained onto the floor and the bacon slid across the pristine white tablecloth, leaving grease stains like skating grooves on an icy pond. There was a shocked silence before the ladies all gasped in unison, as if they'd just been thrown underwater. Mother sent me a glare, and Tabitha's laughter trilled out, delicate as a mockingbird's song.

“I'm—” My voice was more of a croak. Why did Tabitha get to sound like a songbird while I imitated a toad? And was it entirely too late to crawl back into bed and refuse to come out?

“I'm terribly sorry,” I finally managed to say as Xavier stood to wipe at his sticky shoulder with a napkin. Tabitha rose as well and all but purred.

“Oh, how dreadfully clumsy,” she said. “I would be simply mortified. I would just
die.
” She smiled at Xavier. “Let me help you with that.”

“I'm sorry,” I whispered again before fleeing the room. I stopped in the empty hallway, pressing my back to the silk-papered wall. Embarrassed, I closed my eyes. At least the pounding in my head had been reduced to a dull ache.

I wish Elizabeth had been there; it might have seemed a little funnier then. I'd probably laugh about it later. I'd laugh harder if I'd managed to smear jam in Tabitha's ringlets. That, at least, would have been amusing and worth the mortification. When the same event involved the handsome young man who was tentatively courting you, it rather lost some of its humor. I'd never seen Mother's eyes go so round. Lady Ashford's forkful of jellied fruit had landed on her plate with a
plop
, and Frederic's tea had shot straight out of his nose.

It took me a moment to realize I was giggling. I pressed my fist to my mouth but the giggles wouldn't be stifled. Tears sprung to my eyes as I struggled to catch my breath. If there was a slight hysterical tint to my laughter, I decided not to notice. Laughing was still preferable to the panic, holding it at bay like an angry dog on a chain.

“Miss Willoughby.”

I was still chortling like a deranged goose. My eyes flew open.