Kasey Michaels - [Redgraves 02] (16 page)

She tore her gaze away from the maze, hoping she’d committed it to memory, and looked at Simon. Oh, dear. She knew that look, had seen it on Gideon’s face more than a time or two. He was right, she wasn’t going to win. Not this round at least.

“You know this is killing me inside, don’t you?”

His smile was actually sympathetic. “I do, thank you.”

“You’ll bring pistols back with you? And Liam.”

“I can trust him? You trust him?”

She nodded. “His family has been at the Manor forever and ever. I’d only get in your way because you’d feel some silly responsibility toward me and perhaps not be as careful with yourself because of that.”

“You’ve heard that lecture before?” Simon asked.

“Obviously.” She looked at him for a long moment, her hands going into fists at her sides so she wouldn’t be tempted to reach out, touch him, before turning away. “You’ll be in a hurry to be shed of me and go exploring. I imagine the horses are ready for another gallop.”

CHAPTER ELEVEN

“A
HHHH
.
” S
IMON
LAY
BACK
in the warm tub, resting his head on the rolled towel his valet had provided for him, and then waved the man out of the room, telling him he could take it from here. He didn’t mind someone else lugging water buckets and preparing his bath, laying out fresh clothing, but he’d be damned if someone else was going to wash him.

His aches still ached, his pains still pained him, but the day’s discoveries went a long way toward easing both:

1720 double-aged Madeira should be sipped, not gulped.

He rather liked his brains dripping out from his ears; Davey had never mentioned that part.

More than a year now separating him from his time in the Royal Navy, he was still alert on all suits, still at ease in a position of command...and still loon enough to deliberately agitate an armed man twice his size and believe his sense of presence adequate protection.

And he’d discovered the Society’s ingenious smuggling route. That should be the topper, and it nearly was, although narrowly beaten out by the dripping brains thing. Possibly more than narrowly.

Definitely more than narrowly.

He’d decided against going anywhere near the cottages, to hunt for the opening to the tunnel from that side, and didn’t waste time looking for its exit on the other side of the man-made boulder land-jetty, as he’d begun calling it in his head. Instead, he’d concentrated on the maze itself.

Some of the boulders were too large for anyone but the gods or an army of unfortunate captives to move from where they’d landed; some were haphazardly, it seemed, stacked atop each other, with flatter rocks employed to keep them from tumbling down again.

If he stood at the water’s edge, all he saw were boulders; with no pattern, no reason to believe they were anything more than they were. After all, even if the land-jetty did possess a tunnel, all it did was go from one side of it to the other, so what was the point of it?

Liam had been reluctant to climb down with him. Ghosts, his grandfather had told him. Ghosts of long-ago soldiers who died in a fierce battle “right on this very spot, m’lord. Nobody comes here. Yer can hear the screams in the night, the swords banging. Makes your skin creep, that’s what it does.”

A story like that would help keep the curious away, Simon had decided, and left a grateful Liam up on the hill.

Although he’d felt he’d fairly well memorized the layout of the maze, once he was on the beach he found navigating his way through wouldn’t be that easy, and if it weren’t for Jacko’s wheel tracks, he’d have just wandered aimlessly until he came to a spot where the boulders, most of them reaching a good three or four feet above his head, made further progress impossible.

He could see places where the “walls” had been patched or rebuilt. There were boulders so high they nearly blocked the sun, and a few open spaces along the way to make wrong turns possible, just enough to hide any hint in daylight that there was really a twisted but navigable maze here, visible in the day, unfathomable on a moonless night, if anyone was even clever enough to look.

And, from the look of it, only accessible by land in low tide. He could clearly see the marks on the stones, showing how far the water would reach at high tide. That alone proved his theory that the shoreline had greatly changed since the Romans landed. The beach on the other side hadn’t been similarly affected; even at high tide the water wouldn’t reach any closer than fifty yards below the cottages. This side? This side would be a death trap if you couldn’t make it to the end of the maze in time, or climb up the cliff he’d just climbed down.

How old was this cove? How long had the stones been here? Soldiers could hide here, loose arrows at galleys rowing close to the shoreline, and then disappear among the boulders. Enemies could be lured into the tunnel, and then dispatched easily as they stumbled about to be slaughtered on the maze side of the beach when they emerged. Conversely, soldiers could use the maze and tunnel to spring surprise attacks on the beach side, where the cottages now stood. After all, England in those years was a very large and wild place, overgrown with trees, and settlements were mostly along the shores. What had it served to protect? Lympne Castle, perhaps, in any of its many incarnations, from the time of the Danes, the Normans, the Romans?

Other than satisfying his own curiosity, and fascinating as any history of the place would be, more important, he was certain the maze also concealed a route to—where? His investigation had answered half that question, again, thanks to Jacko. He’d enjoy telling Kate of his discovery.

“Do you always smile in the tub?”

“Kate! For the love of God...”

“Oh, I don’t think He has anything to do with this. And don’t worry. I learned my lesson this morning. I already knew you were... That you’re not— Now you’re grinning. That’s really rather insufferable of you, you know.”

Simon kept quite still, not knowing where she might be standing, and actually not all that eager to find out.

“You don’t know where I am, do you?”

“I know where you should be, and that’s not here. Where’s Senorita Click-Click?”

“There wasn’t room enough for her back here, not that she’d approve. Besides, Consuela’s taking a nap. She naps every afternoon at this time. Your hair looks darker, wet like that against your forehead. It very nearly curls, doesn’t it? That’s so adorable. I’m almost tempted to come in there and kiss you.”

“Kate, I’m going to kill you,” Simon growled. Her voice was coming from somewhere behind him, yet somehow she was seeing his face. Ah, the mirror; she was looking at his reflection. But from where? He sank lower into the tub.

“Which I won’t, of course—kiss you, that is. Because of the wager, you understand. So, what did you learn while crawling about on the rocks? Liam didn’t seem to know anything.”

Simon kept looking up into the mirror hanging above the dressing table. It had been tipped to a rather strange angle. Then again, he’d taken his last tub in his bedchamber, not the dressing room. Why had the tub been moved in here?

What did he see in the mirror? Not what Kate saw, he was certain of that. It all depended on the angle from which the person viewed the mirror. At least he could see the wall behind him reflected in the thing. Aha!

“Don’t tell me those are your eyes looking at me from that portrait behind me,” he said, trying not to laugh.

“You found me out. Very good, Simon. All the dressing rooms in this wing, reserved for guests, you understand, are similarly
available
for monitoring.
Trixie showed me the false corridors, years ago. She never showed the boys, only me. She said someone had to know about them, and decide what to do with them once she’s gone. I wonder if she thought Gideon would immediately close them up, and ruin all her fun. And only heaven knows what Valentine or Max would have done.”

“Naughty little buggers, your ancestors, peeking at the ladies in their tubs.”

“Yes, I suppose so. Trixie used the peepholes a time or two herself, she told me, to peek at the gentlemen. And once, to see two guests sharing a tub, and both were the same sex. She wouldn’t tell me which sex or what that meant, but, then, I was only seventeen.”

“She shouldn’t have told you if you were ninety-two. For an innocent, you’re pretty damn corrupt, do you know that?”

“Probably.”

He could almost see her shrugging those magnificent creamy shoulders of hers. Yes, Lady Katherine Redgrave was one of a kind. Which was probably a good thing—the world might not be able to survive two of her.

“But I made sure to angle the mirror and tub so that I can only see your face.
And
I waited until your valet left the room to sneak downstairs and pest Lily, one of our housemaids, so that I was certain you were in the tub. I do have scruples, you see. Just not many of them. So, what did you discover? Surely you found something.”

Simon knew he could continue his protest, but there really was no point in it. “I found my way through the maze of rocks, nearly to the end, hesitating only briefly when I chanced to see a freshly bent branch on a bush, courtesy of our friend Jacko. I’m certain it marks a concealed tunnel entrance. Very clever. You’d expect the tunnel, if there were one, to be fifty yards farther along, at the end of the maze.”

“Simon, that’s wonderful! Where does the tunnel lead?”

He noticed the water beginning to cool. “I wondered how long it would take you to ask that. The answer is, I have no idea. I kept walking to the end of the maze, stood and scratched my head as if cudgeling my brains, shrugged my shoulders, angrily kicked at a small stone and then turned around and headed back. For anyone who might be watching, I believe I was the living picture of confusion and frustration.”

“Or an exceedingly bad actor, there is that.”

“Oh, really? Let’s see, how did it go? Oh, yes. You’ll pay for that, Kate Redgrave. I don’t know when, I don’t know how, but then again, neither do you.”

“Aren’t you amusing,” she grumbled back at him. But, because she was Kate, she then went back to the point that interested her most. “This tunnel you think you found. It could lead anywhere, couldn’t it? But it most probably runs beneath the West Run somehow, remaining on Redgrave property.”

“Agreed.” He smiled again, waiting for her to come up with any number of wild ideas, all of which she’d insist he assist her in pursuing. He counted inside his head:
Four, three, two—

“Simon!” The sound of his name was followed by a dull
clunk.
“Ouch! I hit my head on something. That will teach me to get too excited. It’s entirely too close inside here, and dusty into the bargain. Still—Simon!”

“Yes, Kate?” he asked, the words rather rolling off his tongue.

“This tunnel could run all the way to join with the tunnel beneath the greenhouse. Or perhaps it’s a natural cave, and not a tunnel at all. Oh, my goodness! Think about it. There could be a whole
warren
of caves beneath us. If they’ve lasted since the Romans were here, they’re still useful, yes?”

“Unlike the man-made tunnel I was nearly buried in, yes. Interesting to contemplate, isn’t it? Why don’t you just go do that, Kate? Have yourself a jolly time, wondering and pondering. As for me, I’m done with my bath now and will be standing up in three seconds. Three, two—” He laughed as he heard the snap of a small shutter being closed, and looked to the portrait. The eyes of the long dead person depicted there once again looked as dead as the brace of pheasants pictured at his feet.

* * *

T
HERE
WERE
ONLY
the two of them at dinner since Adam was still keeping to his deathbed, or three if one counted Consuela, and Kate knew she must. Therefore, as hostess, she was forced to keep the conversation quite general and boring, while Simon, drat the man, replied in nods, grunts and one-word answers. Mostly, he ate.

She could only think, hope to believe, he was in a hurry to get the meal behind them so that they could take a walk in the gardens—which they couldn’t, because it was raining—or in some other way outmaneuver Consuela so they could be private.

So she ate. Although she had absolutely no appetite.

That lack was made up for by Consuela, clad in her black crow and camphor best, who seemed to enjoy sitting at the other end of the long table while in her role of duenna, being waited on rather than serving.

“There was a letter from Gideon today,” Kate finally said, inventing an imaginary post. “He reminded me to ask you about something or other you were supposed to tell me.”

“Did he, now. Did he happen to give you any indication of what that something is?”

Men were so thick—thick as planks! “I believe it had something to do with Henry.”

Simon frowned (and if he frowned that obviously while investigating the stone maze, there wouldn’t be a person in the world who’d seen that clearly contrived frown and swallowed it whole). “I don’t believe I know any Henrys. Could you be a tad more explicit?”

“Henry Midnight. It would appear you and he were to meet someone just the other night,” she pronounced through gritted teeth.

Consuela called one of the footmen over to her, signaling she’d like another slice of beef. Honestly, she probably wouldn’t be satisfied until she’d downed the entire cow. And all in one sitting.

“No.” This time Simon shook his miserable empty head. “Still can’t say I recall a Henry Midnight. I’m so sorry.”

If the table wasn’t so wide as to make it impossible, she’d kick him, then he wouldn’t have to feign being
sorry.
“That’s strange. Because just the other night you patted his dog and poked your finger in his ear.”

His lips twitched. “Oh,
that
Henry Midnight. I remember him now. Never much cared for the man. Now his sister? I always found Miss Libraria Midnight pleasant enough.”

Libraria? There was no such name as— Oh! The
library
at midnight. So he wanted to meet her in the library. Wasn’t that cute—the rotter! “That should be sufficient.”

“I cannot tell you how gratified I am,” Simon drawled, and deposited another forkful of beef between his smiling lips.

He’d pay for that, too. She was keeping a tally in her head. Perhaps he’d smile out of the other side of his mouth when she presented the final bill!

Consuela motioned over the footman and had him ladle more vegetables onto her plate.

Simon lowered his voice as he leaned toward Kate. “You might suggest Dearborn remove the candles. Before she eats them.”

Click-click, click-click!

“Hearing’s fine, isn’t it?” he said from behind the serviette he’d raised to his mouth.

“Not the hearing so much as the eyesight. You were leering at me across the table.”

“I was not,” he said, sounding like a spoiled child. “Believe me, when I
leer
you’ll know it.”

“Could we talk some more about the you-know-what?”

“In code? I don’t think so. My brain is taxed enough with all the balls we’ve already got in the air. One more, and they’ll all probably fall on my head.”