Judith E French (13 page)

Lady Kathryn blew her nose daintily and began to fan herself despite the draft from the open window. “I’m sure she told you so,” she began. “You’ve always been too trusting.”

“Leah’s surname is Stewart, Mother, and she possesses a very valuable gold necklace—a family heirloom. I can trust her, I assure you. She risked her own life to save mine more than once. Without Leah, I’d never have lived to return to you.”

Lady Kathryn snapped her fan shut. “Stewart, you say? Which branch of the Stewarts? Where are the family estates?”

“By the bloody head of Saint John!” Lord Kentington growled. “Am I to die of exposure? Shut the damned window!” The older maid hurried to obey, and Lord Kentington slapped the bedcovers with his walking stick. “Christ’s wounds, you’ve no more sense than a village drunkard. Whatever possessed you to marry the wench in a church?”

“Stop your snarling, Father. You know you’re glad to have me home. Leah’s a real beauty—you’ll like her, I promise. Nothing’s ever dull when she’s around.”

“Have you got her with child?” the earl demanded.

Brandon laughed. “No, I have not. I married her because I wanted to. Didn’t you pick mother over your father’s protests?”

“He objected only because she was a cousin and he didn’t want you to be born with two heads.” Kentington cleared his throat and leaned forward in the bed. Immediately, a manservant propped several pillows behind the earl’s back. “Should have listened to him,” Kentington continued. “The lady he wanted me to wed is the mother of five sons, each one a credit to his family. Not a one involved in Jacobite plots. Nary a one has ever had arrest warrants filed against him—nor driven his father to the brink of the grave.”

“Hush such talk, Raymond,” Lady Kathryn protested. “Pay no heed to him, darling,” she said. “Lady Dacre has the temperament and the morals of a goat. Two of her sons were reportedly sired by a stable groom, and the youngest has the nose and ears of her husband’s valet. Your father wouldn’t have Lady Dacre if I dropped dead this instant.”

“You should have waited to wed,” Kentington said gruffly. “Lady Anne is widowed, and she’s been here twice asking for you. You could have had Anne and her money.” He made a noise of derision. “You still could, if you’d agree to get rid of this creature upstairs.”

“It’s true, dear,” his mother chimed in. “Anne is smitten with you, and she would make a much better match.”

“Enough,” Brandon said. “I’ve heard all I wish to. You’ve both made yourselves clear. Now, once and for all, let me do the same. Leah and I are legally married. I don’t care that she’s penniless. I’ll inherit enough for both of us. You will treat her as a daughter in this house—as my wife should be treated—or I’ll go and take her with me. I’ve the London town house, and the manor in Kent.”

“Mother of God! Don’t think of such a thing,” Lady Kathryn cried. “You’ve only just come. Of course you and your wife are welcome here. We only want what’s best for you, dear. Tell him, Raymond. Tell him there’ll be no more talk of leaving again.”

“Keep the wench if it makes you happy,” his father said grudgingly. “So long as she doesn’t come in here and make me miserable with her war dances and heathen practices, I’m sure I’ll not slight her. Like as not the Wescott blood is strong enough to overcome even a red savage’s. But if your sons are born with feathers instead of hair, don’t blame me.”

“I’ll take the chance,” Brandon said dryly. “Now, if the servants wish to serve breakfast here, I’ll bring Leah down to meet you. Mind”—he glared at his father—“I’ll expect you to be on your very best behavior.”

Lord Kentington grunted as his manservant adjusted a fresh wig on his large, shiny head. “Bad enough that a man is confined to his bed without having to take sass from an arrogant young pup. Have you no pity for a dying man?”

“I crossed the Atlantic in winter storms to attend you, Father.” Brandon turned to his mother and took her hand. “You are as lovely as ever. I was afraid tending him would wear on your own health.”

“I have a delicate constitution, as you well know.” She rose and embraced him. “But seeing you safely home is better for me than all the physician’s medicines. Bring your bride down. If she’s your choice, dear, then we shall all make the best of it, I’m sure.”

“As you wish, Mother.” Brandon chuckled as he took the black-veined marble staircase two steps at a time. The interview had gone much better than he’d expected. And his father looked spry for a dying man, spry enough to live for years.

He paused at the first landing where a life-sized Greek water bearer in rose marble stood guard. Absently, Brandon traced the worn right foot with his fingertips. His cousin Charles had told him that it was good luck, and, as a child, he’d never run down the staircase without stopping to rub the statue. This house held so many memories for Brandon, mostly good ones . . .

His father had always been difficult. After the loss of three babies over fifteen years, Brandon’s mother had been ecstatic to have a live, healthy son. The earl hadn’t been so easy to please.

Charles was older by two years, and he had already been a member of the Wescott household. Until he was nine or ten, Brandon could remember striving to match his cousin’s skill in games and riding. No matter how hard he tried, Brandon could never quite run fast enough or put enough arrows in the bull’s-eye to beat Charles. And the earl . . . Brandon shrugged. His father was never satisfied with his attempts, not even when Charles stopped growing and Brandon caught up with him and then passed him in size and ability.

No, nothing he ever did pleased Kentington, and, eventually, he’d stopped trying to win his father’s approval and concentrated on his own pleasures.

Brandon gave the water bearer a final pat and continued ascending the curving steps, wondering just how many of his youthful indiscretions were committed to spite his father. He hoped marrying Leah and bringing her home wasn’t one of them.

The maid, Nancy, met him at the door of his bedchamber in tears. “What’s wrong?” he asked.

Nancy clutched her apron with both hands, balling the starched linen in utter despair. “It’s Lady Brandon, your lordship.”

“What is it? Has something happened to her? Is she ill?”

Nancy shook her head as a fresh flood of fat tears rolled down her blotchy face. “She . . . she . . .” Nancy pointed toward the open door leading to the balcony. “She’s gone, sir. Out of the house.”

“What do you mean? We’re three stories from the ground!”

“Yes, sir, but it’s true.” Nancy wiped her nose on her apron. “She said she was goin’ and she went. Over the rail of the balcony and down the side of the building.” She gulped. “Wearin’ nothing but her shift.”

L
eah opened the iron gate and entered the boxwood maze. Inside, the evergreen hedge rose higher than she could reach, and she could barely see the tile roof and massive stone chimneys of Westover. The bare earth was cold beneath her stockinged feet—she’d not dared to climb down from the balcony with shoes on, so she’d borrowed a pair of Brandon’s woolen stockings to pull over her own. Curious to see what lay within the passage of hedge, she shut the gate behind her and followed the neat pathway.

Brandon would be furious when he returned to their chambers and found her gone, but she didn’t care. She’d not been outside alone since she’d left America. Brandon hadn’t wanted her with him when he went to greet his mother and father. That was fine with her. Now he could wait until she chose to return to her prison.

She looked up at the puffy white clouds skittering across the pale blue sky and drew in a deep breath of clean country air. She’d believed that the foul air aboard the ship would smother her, and the air of London had been even worse. Gooseflesh rose on her bare arms, and she shivered. It was cool this morning, and she wished for her deerskin cloak and leggings. The satin gown Nancy had laid out for her would have been warmer than the linen shift, but the thought of trying to get out of the house in her gown and hoops made her laugh out loud.

She had learned a great deal about England since the
Dependable
docked in London. The English, she decided, were a perverse people. Custom had decreed that Brandon hire a coach and driver to bring them from London to Westover here in Dorsetshire. The journey—with servants, and baggage—took nine days. The great heavy vehicle could hardly go any distance at all before it mired in the mud or broke a wheel. It made no sense to her. There were roads leading from the city to Westover. If she and Brandon had ridden the coach horses instead of sitting on the hard seats of the teeth-jarring coach, they would have covered the distance in three days or less and avoided sleeping in flea-infested inns or being attacked by highwaymen.

On their fourth day out of London, two masked men on horseback had tried to stop the coach with a log across the road. The coachman had shouted a warning to Brandon and wheeled his coach and team around the barrier, nearly running down one of the highwaymen. The other bandit had fired a shot at the coach, but Brandon had seized his musket from the floor and shot back. Neither outlaw had cared to follow the speeding coach, and Brandon and the coachman had shared a mug of ale and laughter at the next stop.

Brandon had said it was “a pitiful attempt at robbery. Nothing to be alarmed about.” He’d warned Leah not to mention the incident to his mother, who would become hysterical after the fact. “Highwaymen are a nuisance travelers must contend with,” he’d observed calmly as he rewarded the quick-thinking coachman with a handful of silver coins.

Leah hadn’t been particularly disturbed—after all, the whole episode had been over in the time it took to skin a rabbit—but the terrified maid had sobbed for hours. It had proved to Leah that England wasn’t quite as tame and civilized as Brandon liked to brag.

Continuing through the boxwood maze, Leah reached a fork in the path. One way led left, and an equally inviting trail opened to the right. Alex had once told her that given a choice, most men will always take the left branch of a trail because a man’s heart is on the left side. A wise trapper knows this. If he sets a snare for a human, he will hide the trap on the left fork. Leah chose the right. The pathway narrowed disappointingly, and the hedge closed overtop to make a tunnel. She continued on, and when the path divided again, she knelt and examined the earth to see which trail was the more used, then took the other.

A dried maple leaf lay in the path, its once golden color faded and dull. Leah picked it up and held it in her hand. My love for my husband has become like this leaf, she thought. Once it was a living thing, strong and green. Now . . . She crumpled the leaf in her hand and sprinkled the pieces in the air. She closed her eyes and pictured his face with his sky-blue eyes and his long yellow hair. “Oh, Brandon mine,” she murmured. “Why?”

She brushed the bits of leaf from her hands. Brandon was not the man here in England that he was in the forest. He’d not lied to her when he said he was a man of importance. Wherever they went, men bowed to him and doffed their hats. They spoke to him in hushed, respectful voices and hurried to do his bidding. She had watched and retained all these things in her memory—they made her even more confused.

Brandon was not a great warrior—by his own words, he had led no war parties and had no following of braves. There were men who obeyed his word as though it were law, but they did it for silver and copper coin, not out of loyalty. He was not a war chief or a sachem, and he certainly was no shaman. He knew little of the healing arts and still less of the workings of their mind.

Could it be possible that the English revered men such as her husband merely because of their birth? Brandon had told her that his father was a powerful earl and that he possessed great wealth. If this was true of Brandon’s father, Kentington, was it not also true of her own father, Cameron?

“I have so much to learn,” she murmured to the cold winter earth beneath her feet, “and so little time to learn it.”

The evil that Brandon had done to her had caused a great breach between them. He knew that he had done wrong, and the more she reviled him, the colder his eyes became when he looked at her. It was possible that it was already too late for her to win back his affection. Leah folded her arms across her chest and rocked back and forth in silent misery.

“I will die rather than seek his help,” she whispered. But she knew that it was her pride speaking and not the inner wisdom of her soul. If she ever wanted to go home again—to see her child and breathe the sweet air of her forests and rivers—she must have her husband’s help.

She began to walk faster down the path, taking first one fork and then another as the path split and doubled back. Finally, she was running, trying in vain to escape the truth. When she reached the little round-topped stone house in the center of the maze, she dropped to her knees and wrapped her arms around a carved stone pillar. She pressed her cheek against the cold marble and sobbed dry sobs of anguish.

After a few moments, she rose and straightened her shoulders. She was the daughter of a Shawnee peace woman; she would not shame her ancestors with cowardice or useless wailing. As the lump of frustration melted away, she was rewarded with words of wisdom from her heart. Brandon had used her when he was a captive of the Shawnee—he had sought out her love to free himself. Now, their positions were reversed. She must use him. She must gain his trust and his love in any way she could.

Her lips moved silently. “Do I want to go home badly enough to pay the price?” The answer was a great lightness that bubbled up inside her. “Yes! Yes! And yes again!”

“N’mamentschi,”
she said. I rejoice. And she knew that, for the first time since she’d left the Shawnee village, her heart and head were as one.

 

As Brandon emerged from Westover’s grand entranceway, he noticed a man on horseback trotting across the enclosed courtyard lawn. Brandon shaded his eyes from the bright morning sun and grinned. “Charles!” he hurried down the curving steps. “Damn you, cousin! You look in fine health.”

Charles dismounted, and Brandon threw his arms around the smaller man and hugged him tightly. “We got your message from London, but no one told me you’d arrived,” Charles said. “I’ve been trying out this new hunter.” A groom took the reins of the horse and led him away. Charles slapped Brandon on the shoulder. “It’s good to see you. We thought you were lost in the Virginias.”

Brandon drew back and inspected his cousin. When they were growing up together here at Westover, Charles had been a thin, sickly boy, much given to sulking. Brandon had felt sorry for his cousin’s orphaned state and had fought more than one battle when the older boy’s irritating manner had set someone’s teeth on edge. “In truth, cuz,” Brandon said, “you show no signs of ill health. You were suffering from the pox when I left for the Colonies, and I feared the worst for you.”

“A light case,” Charles said. “I’ve a few scars, but nothing like the one you gave me.” For a second Charles’s stare was malevolent, then he broke into a charming grin.

“You’ll never let me forget that, will you?” Brandon laughed and grasped his cousin’s arm again. “I was fourteen, for God’s sake.”

Charles’s gray eyes narrowed. “Old enough to swive my sweetheart.” He struck Brandon’s shoulder again playfully. “No hard feelings. I’ve more than made up for Cecily.”

“Poor chit. I’ve never forgotten her. Funny what sticks with you, isn’t it. A shame she died. It’s bothered me ever since.”

“Has it?” Charles shrugged. “God’s truth, Brandon, I can’t remember the jade’s face.” He rubbed at the old knotted scar that ran up his neck. “I’d have given up drubbing you about this long ago, if the damned thing didn’t stare at me in the mirror every morning.” His plain face brightened. “Well, where is she? I hear you’ve brought home a little savage for a wife.”

Brandon frowned. “Your humor is ill taken, cuz. I’ve had all of that I can take this morning from Kentington. And, as to where she is . . . Actually, I’m not sure. While I was making peace with the old man, she took it in her head to leave the house. I’d appreciate it if you’d give me a hand in finding her.”

Charles chuckled. He removed his cocked hat and ran a hand through his thinning brown hair. “Leads you a merry chase, does she? This is one lady I’m anxious to meet.”

Brandon glanced around the empty courtyard. “I don’t think she’d go far.” His voice took on a tone of sarcasm. “She isn’t dressed for it.”

“Consider me at your service.” Charles laughed. “This play is becoming more fun by the moment. What, pray tell, is the Lady Brandon wearing?”

Brandon’s reply was barely audible. “Her shift.”

“Her shift? God’s teeth! What a tale for the whist table.” Charles threw up his hands in mock defense and stepped back. “Peace. I was only joshing you. You know our dark family secrets remain so.” His features became serious. “I was shocked to hear you’d become involved with the Jacobites. Surely it isn’t so. That route has been the downfall of far too many—”

“False, all of it. I’d rather see a good English king on the throne than a German—I’ve never made bones about that—but George is our lawful sovereign. I’m no traitor. You, above all, should know that. By the Holy Shroud, Charles, you know my nights are spent arguing agriculture, not politics. And if my mind did run to treason, I’d think too much of the Kentington titles and fortune to throw them all away on dreams of civil war.”

Charles nodded. “So I told his majesty’s agents when they questioned me. There was quite a to-do. Lord Harval summoned your father, but you can imagine the answer Uncle Raymond sent back. He may not think much of you, Brandon, but since you’re his son and heir, he’ll defend you until the second coming.” He nodded again. “It was wise of you to make yourself scarce in Virginia. Two new heads went up on London Bridge, and Miles Chester lost his estates and had to flee to the Low Countries.”

“I’m sick to death of Jacobite plots. The less said, the better. Miles should have had more sense.”

“Still . . .” Charles looked thoughtful. “You have to admire a man like that, who’d risk everything for a cause.”

“Just be glad you’re too well-known for raising cups and petticoats to be considered a threat to the Crown. Too many men have coughed away their lives in the Tower because of rumors and unfounded accusations.”

Charles laughed wryly. “A disciple of Bacchus, that’s me. Now, shall we hunt for your lost pigeon or wait until we hear drums?”

Brandon swore a foul oath, only half in jest, and the two strode off toward the gardens. When they reached the first fountain, Charles set off to the right and Brandon to the left.

Brandon paused by the gate to the boxwood maze and called Leah’s name. A peacock’s shriek was the only answer. He turned away from the maze and searched the topiary walk and the statuary garden. He found gardeners and a stray sheep but no sign of a Shawnee woman in a linen shift. As the moments lengthened into an hour, Brandon’s concern increased and his patience dwindled. Kentington would be furious, and his mother would work herself into one of her infamous fainting spells. With each passing minute, Brandon saw his chances of gaining acceptance for his marriage to Leah fading.

“Leah!” he called again. “By the grace of God, if you don’t come out, I’ll—”

“Up here.”

He stared up at the cedar tree over his head. “Leah? What the hell are you doing up a tree?”

She laughed. “I can see far. Come up, Brandon mine. There’s a field of black-nosed sheep, and a river, and a hill with a strange white dwelling on it.”

“You get down here! You’ve kept my parents waiting and given the servants a feast of gossip. Have you taken leave of your wits, woman?”

“What is that funny white house with columns?”

“Father’s architect’s interpretation of a Greek temple.”

“What is it for?”

“Pigeons to roost on. Now get down at once!”

She laughed again. He heard the rustle of branches, a bough parted, and Leah dropped lightly to the ground in front of him.

He scowled at her. Her shift was torn and smudged with grass stains; one braid had come loose and the other was tangled with bits of cedar greenery. Leah had a long scratch on her cheek, and her hands were dirty. He let his scorching gaze travel down over her bare, scraped knees to the damp, sagging woolen stockings. “I’ll have an explanation for this,” he demanded.

She shrugged and a smile danced across her lips. “I be tired of living in boxes,” she said meekly. “I wanted to breathe and see something other than the window of a bouncing coach.”