Lady Anne and the Howl in the Dark (23 page)

She bit her lip but decided to share at least one of her thoughts, the one safe for him to hear without making him vain about his masculine charms. “I was admiring how your thick and unruly eyebrows have been singed. It gives them an interesting piquancy. I had a maid once, when I was young, who burned my fringe just that way with an overheated curling iron.”

“You seem to suffer hair torture from time to time, judging by your torment at the hands of the maid the first day at Ivy Lodge.”

“Ah, yes, my gorgon style; alas, I was hoping to set a new trend in classic hairstyles, but Mary will have none of it, and any intelligent woman is a servant to her abigail, you know. That style was the work of Ellen Henderson,” Anne said, brought back with a thud to the problem at hand. Where was Ellen? As the carriage still rumbled swiftly along the road to Darkefell, Anne frowned off into the cloudy distance. “I’m worried about Ellen,” she said aloud. “She seems to have disappeared completely.”

“No doubt she stayed with a friend in town overnight and made her way back to Ivy Lodge late,” the marquess said. “Mrs. Hailey will reprimand her, and all will be done.”

“I hope you’re right, but I have an uncomfortable sense about it.” At least the mystery of the other missing maid, the one Anne had followed away from Ivy Lodge, had been solved; Caroline had run away with one of the grooms from the livery stable in town, they had learned when the marquess retrieved his carriage. It was a juicy scandal, and all the world loves a scandal.

It was beginning to rain. Anne absently scanned the open field as they passed a wooded copse and saw a flash of movement. “What was that?” she asked. It was a creature loping through the lush green grass of the field surrounding the woods; as she caught sight of it again, it stopped and howled. She grabbed the marquess’s arm. “Darkefell, stop the carriage!”

He pulled on the reins. Anne jumped down even as the carriage was still moving, stumbled, and staggered back onto her feet, but by the time she regained her balance, the animal had disappeared into the woods; the bushes moved just on the edge of the glade. Determined to establish what the animal was, once and for all time, she lifted her skirts and began down the raised embankment and across the grassy field.

“Lady Anne! Anne!
Stop!
”

But she bolted, an anxious fluttering in her stomach. Dog? Wolf? Killer? She had thought she was sure of her and Darkefell’s conjectures, but her mind churned with questions. All she wanted was to see more closely.

“Anne, get back here,
now!
” Darkefell shouted.

She looked over her shoulder; he was bounding after her. She put on a burst of speed, secure in the knowledge that he would follow, concerned only that he would catch her, being much swifter and unencumbered by skirts and a cloak. She reached the perimeter of the woods just as the rain began in earnest, pouring down as if someone was emptying a bucket over her; she paused a second then pushed through the thick brush at the edge, moving in. She could see movement in the shadows. Her bonnet was roughly pulled off her head, and thorns and branches caught at the cloak she wore over her caraco, but she would not stop, not while she could see that movement ahead of her. What was it? She was so close to an answer!

The woods were dim and damp and cold, but they were protected from the deluge. She shivered and stopped, peering into the dank shadows. Where now? She saw another movement, and a howling bark cut through the silence, shivering down her spine with the unaccustomed sound. Instinctive fear roiled in her stomach, but something else caught her attention besides the animal movement she could detect and the yip and howl of the creature.

Something blue… an unnatural blue never seen in the middle of a woods. She pushed through as she heard the marquess call her name in commanding tones. Bluebells? Violets? Not in the middle of the woods!

She yanked her cloak out of the greedy grasp of the tangled brush as she found the source of the blue just beyond the thorny bush. Was it a heap of clothes or perhaps an abandoned cloak or blanket? Breaking off a branch that impeded her progress, she used the broken branch to prod the pile of clothes, trying to grab it with the hooked end of the branch.

“Ooooh!”

Anne jumped back and screamed at the movement and sound emanating from the bundle.

“Anne! Anne!” Darkefell cried, crashing through the bush like a draft horse in a pony stall.

“Here! Darkefell, someone is here!” She had used an indefinite word, but she knew who it must be. “Ellen! It’s Ellen,” she said, pushing past the last brushy obstacle, animal forgotten, her worry for the girl paramount. She crouched by the cloaked figure as the marquess, panting, reached her.

“Do not
ever
disappear on me again!” he bellowed.

“It’s Ellen Henderson, and she’s hurt but alive.” Anne, on her knees, pulled the maid’s cloak hood back and gently turned the girl over, the maid’s golden hair catching on her brushy bed. Anne gasped in horror; Ellen’s round, pallid face was bruised and cut, crusted blood matted into the hairline and flaking in dried rivulets. Her lip was cut and swollen, and one eye sported a dark purple, swollen bruise under it.

Ellen moaned and stirred. “My money… want my money… my Jamey… ” She groaned and fainted.

“We must get her back to the lodge,” Anne cried.

Darkefell didn’t hesitate a moment, and Anne blessed both his vigorous nature and his physical strength, for he put his arms under Ellen’s knees and back and gently lifted her as if she was a light as a lamb. Anne glanced around, for though haste was clearly needed for the girl’s well-being, Anne was also aware that finding the maid had been merest luck, brought about by seeing the dog-creature and following it. What was it doing so close? Ellen did not appear to be ravaged by the creature, nor was there any sign of animal attack.

Even while Anne looked about, she wondered about Ellen’s words: money, Jamey?

Anne saw another flash of movement and longed to follow, but Darkefell was single-mindedly moving back toward the road, and she knew she must follow. “Darkefell, I thought I saw a person back there,” she said breathlessly, looking back over her shoulder as she followed him. “It could be whoever attacked Ellen.”

“They waited around for twelve hours until she was found? This girl has been lying there some time. The wounds aren’t fresh.”

“How do you know?”

“The color of the blood and the smell,” he grunted but did not elaborate.

She eyed his broad back as she reluctantly followed him. One always had a sense, with the marquess, that there were hidden depths, things of which he did not speak. How he came to know what a wound smelled like after several hours was one of those things.

The rain still poured down. Fortunately, they were only minutes from the lodge by carriage, but still, they were soaked by the time they got there. There was a rush of activity as they pulled up and the marquess carried Ellen in. The maid was soon in the competent hands of Mrs. Hailey. Anne turned to the marquess, but he was rapidly heading toward the door. She swept after him; they had things of which to speak, and she wasn’t about to let him go without some acknowledgment of how this latest twist fit with their idea of what had been happening.

“My lord, wait!” she said, exiting the lodge after the marquess, followed by the curious gaze of the footman. Darkefell leaped up into the seat of the phaeton. “I am about to get a crick in my neck from looking up at you,” she complained, the rain splattering her cheek. She wiped drops out of her eyes.

“Did you follow me merely to say that?” he asked.

“Of course not.”

“Then go back in and dry off. Our plans stand.”

“Despite finding Ellen?”

“Yes,” he said.

“Good,” she said, determined to be his equal in brevity. “Until this evening, then.”

She reentered the house and headed for Mrs. Hailey’s chamber, where Ellen had been taken, but the maid was still unconscious and had not said another word.

The minute he entered the castle, Darkefell headed for his library and summoned Osei. Harwood brought him a towel, and he dried as best he could. Armed with new suppositions raised by his enlightening conversations with Lady Anne, he was able to ask pointed questions and demand answers of Osei. In truth, Osei appeared relieved to be able to tell what he knew of Cecilia Wainwright’s actions. With child by Jamey, desperate to marry and gain an establishment, she had played a dangerous game, and if Darkefell and Lady Anne’s conjectures were correct, had reaped the unfortunate consequences.

Brooding, Darkefell sat and stared into the empty fireplace after their conversation. Osei finally stood and said, “If that is all, my lord?”

“What? No, sit for a moment longer.” He watched his secretary for a long few moments. “Tell me the truth—were you in love with Cecilia Wainwright?”

Osei’s dark eyes clouded with pain, and he looked away. “I do not know, my lord. She listened to me as no one else did, and I came to care for her.” He shrugged as if there were no adequate words for his emotion. “I do not understand the workings of my own heart, I think. Perhaps that comes only with more years than I have yet lived.”

Darkefell nodded. “And your last minutes together were spent as you have said?”

“Yes.”

“Why did you say nothing afterwards about what she said she was going to do?”

“I never suspected such a conclusion as that to which you and Lady Anne have come. Ellen did not tell me whom she was meeting or when, just what she hoped to accomplish, so I thought I would have time to convince her of the folly of her plan. I pointed out the dishonor of blackmail, and we argued. She said only men thought that way, and when I had a child, I would understand the need to provide a better life, no matter what it took.”

“So you knew she was with child and who the father was?”

“Yes.”

“Why, then, did you react as you did to the news the morning after her death?”

Osei shook his head. “The public exposure of her condition and conjecture of her character—she was dishonored, as well as dead… a terrible moment.”

Darkefell nodded. Knowing Cecilia in a way none of them did, as a cherished friend, Osei was hurt deeply by what was said about her. “You agree that evening must have proceeded the way we imagine, after you and she parted?”

“Yes, though it fills me with sorrow. I am sorry that man is so lost to the world and heaven that he would do it.”

The marquess watched Osei for a moment; the fellow had turned to Cecilia, another person who felt alone in Yorkshire and at his estate, for solace. Darkefell had been remiss, perhaps, in not making efforts to ameliorate his secretary’s loneliness, but his mother already considered that he “coddled” his secretary. Though he did not guide his actions by her measure, he must have taken some of her axioms to heart and behaved accordingly, as he had with his father’s harsh tutelage.

But he was approaching thirty. It was past time to act according to what he felt and thought down to his core. The most powerful thing he had learned in his brief acquaintance with Lady Anne Addison was to guide oneself according to one’s deepest feelings, as she did. He admired her more than he could express in words, for in her he saw a vigorous honesty, tempered by flashes of charm and wit, boundless energy, and beneath her asperity, great kindness. Her beauty was the sort that emanated from within, and every moment spent in her company, he saw it more clearly, glowing through her skin. She attracted him in a way no other woman ever had.

“I miss her so very much,” Osei said, his voice thick and strange.

Darkefell looked up; his secretary stared toward the window but not through it.

“In Cecilia,” Osei continued, “I saw the prospect of a life beyond what I had imagined for myself. It was not that I thought I could have that life with
her—
she was in love with another—but I saw what it would be like to have a woman with whom to speak, one who sympathized and yet added her own thoughts, allowing me to see from another’s perspective. She shared her emotions in a way men seldom do.”

Against every bit of training from his youth, the strict discipline of his father, Darkefell could feel the seductive pull of just that… having a woman to talk to and in whom to confide. Women—or one woman, at least—offered an openness missing in daily converse with any other soul. Was that what marriage could bring if one selected wisely… a deep, all-trusting, all-confiding friendship?

A wife, among his acquaintance, was an indispensable nuisance, a legal necessity to produce an heir. Affairs of the heart and delights of the flesh were to explore with a mistress. With men, one shared opinions and ideas. But could one woman unite all of that?

This was far too close to the bone and marrow of him for comfort. “Osei,” he said, anxious to change the subject, “they are talking in London of sending Africans back to their various homelands. I don’t know if you’ve ever thought of it. I’ve been meaning to raise this subject for some time but never found the opportunity. If you wish help in finding your family, I would offer what I could. Even if you would like to return to your homeland… I will help.”

Osei stood and bowed, his spectacle lenses glinting in the lamplight and concealing his eyes. “Thank you, sir, but my home is here.”

“Good,” Darkefell said, feeling awkward and so resorting to the hearty mannerisms his father had employed in such a situation. “Good, good. No need to speak of that again, then!” He rose and clapped Osei on the shoulder. “I must go and dress for dinner at Ivy Lodge. Is everything prepared according to my instructions?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Good.”

***

Agitated, Anne paced, viewed sternly by Irusan, who sat atop her vanity table among the brushes and pots of cream. Mary sat in a chair by the fire, trying to mend the damage done to Anne’s cloak by the brush Anne had pushed through. Robbie, who had been helping the Ivy Lodge stableboy, entered just that moment; by the excited gleam in his eyes and triumphant grin, Anne knew he had information.

“You know something,” she said to the child, who went directly to his mother. “Robbie, you have the look of a fellow with a head stuffed full of information. Out with it!”

He nodded as he leaned on his mother’s shoulder. “Bertie—that’s Gilbert, mum, ’oo is stableboy ’ere—’e sez Miss Cece gave ’im a note, and ’e took it to the fella like you sed. ’E can’t remember rightly if it were that day, but ’e got in bags o’ trouble from Mister Lisle—’e’s the head groom—’bout missin’ ’is chores that afternoon, then remembers you comin’ milady, so ’e thinks it
were
that day.”

Anne sat abruptly on the edge of her bed, deep in thought. Irusan leaped down from his perch and gracefully up to the bed, then padded across to her and settled half on her lap and half on the bed. He flexed his claws, tangling them in the fine fabric. She picked his claws from her skirt and smoothed the threads.

“’E’s scaret o’ you, milady—’e sez ’e shut you inta the tower by mistake an’ is afraid of a hiding if ’e sez he did it.”

Well, that solved that little mystery, too, Anne thought; so the boy had accidentally locked her into the tower and run away out of fear. “All right,” she said and suddenly stood to pace again. Irusan, dumped unceremoniously from her lap, let out a squawk of disapproval and leaped to the vanity table, knocking down a bottle. The resulting crash made him even more cross, and with a chatter of fury, he leaped swiftly down from the vanity, up to the bed, and then, with one mighty leap, up to the top of a bookshelf. Robbie clapped and laughed. “All right, m’boy,” Anne said, “you’ve done very well. You shall have the entire bag of boiled sweets I promised you, so you can make yourself as ill as you please. But off with you, now. I must dress quickly for the evening.”

Robbie headed off to the dressing room where he and his mother slept, and Irusan, with one reproachful look at Anne, leaped down from his perch and followed the boy. This, of course, was his action whenever he wanted Anne to know that he was especially peeved with her; for to prefer the attentions of a small boy was a “catty” way of expressing extreme indignation.

Anne ignored him. Once the door was closed behind them, she was just about to strip down to her chemise, but a tap at the door stopped her. “Who is it?”

“It is Hailey, milady. Ellen is awake an’ asked for you in particular.”

With an exultant hop, Anne raced to the door, flung it open, and faced the housekeeper. “She asked for me by name?”

“Yes’m,” Mrs. Hailey said. “Wants to tell you something.”

Anne was gone for a half hour. Ellen spoke with some difficulty, because her throat was raw, but what she had to say was worth hearing. Anne would now have to hurry to dress appropriately, she realized as she returned to her room. However, the rush was worth it. She wondered if she ought to send a message to the marquess; but no, she would see him soon enough and would let him know that their conjectures were fully supported by Ellen Henderson’s information.

She explained what she had heard to Mary, and then, trembling all over as she stood in the middle of her bedchamber, said, “Mary, I wish to look my absolute best tonight. Despite the odd mix of dinner guests, I expect fascinating conversation and scintillating revelations.” She sat in the vanity chair.

Mary began with her hair. “This interest in your attire wouldna be because of his lordship, would it?”

Anne twisted and stared up at her maid, giving her a sour look but not saying anything. Of course, Mary was partly right. As much as she wished it were not so, she did care what the marquess thought of her. “All right, then—I wish him to think well of me, if nothing else. Make me as attractive as is possible.”

The grin on her maid’s face was broad, and she rubbed her work-worn hands together. “Aye. Now there’s a challenge to sink ma teeth into.”

“Thank you very much,” Anne said, on the edge of being insulted. Her sense of humor reanimated, and she finished with a laugh and said, “I expect wonders, then. Make me as pretty as Emma Hart.” Though she had never met the young woman—of course no lady
could
meet such a woman as the notorious mistress of the Honorable Charles Greville—she had seen a couple of the paintings Romney had done; they were rhapsodic, and Emma must be a glorious creature. Anne admired beauty, whether male or female, though she never confused pulchritude with politesse.

“I’m verra good, milady—but I’m no’ a miracle worker.”

“I should sack you for impertinence,” Anne said tartly.

“No one else would put up wi’ your captiousness.” With that last sally, Mary set to work in earnest.

Though Anne had decided on her favorite green sarcanet, Mary was firm; she had been given free rein and had her own idea of what Anne must wear. Once the elaborate hairstyle was done, it was time for Anne to begin dressing.

“First, scent,” Mary said, spraying Anne’s chemise with fragrance of hyacinth. “Then your stockings and stays.” She firmly laced in Anne, pulling hard until Anne could barely breathe.

“Why so tight?” Anne wailed, tying her garters with some difficulty.

“We’re going to make the most of your figure, because you’ve got a verra good one, and there is not a man alive who doesn’t like to see a nice pair of upthrust breasts.” Mary’s rolling r’s drew out the last two words.

Anne began to feel the first quivering of anxiety. She was going to look like a trollop, she just knew it! She would have huge upthrust bosoms under her chin and a pinched expression on her painted face, her eyes bulging from the tightness of her stays; she’d frighten everyone but Irusan.

“Now, rump pad, and petticoat,” Mary said. She tied the little roll around Anne’s waist, then fetched a silver-tissue petticoat from the wardrobe, pulled it down over her mistress’s head, and laced it, too, around Anne’s waist, along with a pair of pockets. “And now the gray tabby silk,” she said, fetching the dress from the other room then dropping it over Anne’s head and lacing her up, “and silver-embroidered stomacher.” Finally, lilac damask slippers with silver buckles, the matching lilac damask fan with silver fittings and amethyst cabochons, and a fine jeweled mechlin collar around her long neck.

When they were done, Anne, afraid to look at herself, turned away from the cheval mirror. “I can’t do it,” she said, shivering. “I can’t look.”

Mary briskly grabbed her shoulders, saying, “Don’t be daft,” as she whirled Anne around.

Anne stared at her reflection. Her hair was glossy, the rich brown color illuminated by pomade and lilac feathers; it gleamed like silk in the lamplight. Her bosom was creamy white, and a single silver locket hung from a glistening chain and nestled in the décolletage below the mechlin lace band. Overall, the silvery dress and petticoat was elegant and lovely, her figure perfection, and tears welled up in her eyes. She had never in her life looked better. She should have known she could trust Mary.

“I will never be Emma Hart, Mary, but you’ve made me a modestly attractive woman. Thank you.”

The abigail’s eyes glittered, and she smiled. “His lordship values the woman beneath the attire far more, if he’s wise, for never have I met a woman wi’ a heart like yours.” She paused then tagged on, pragmatic as always, “But borrowed feathers willna hurt you for one night.”

“Why have you never done this before, this, this…?” She broke off and gestured to her reflection in the mirror.

“Ah, nouw that’d be whisperin’ tales to a birdie, wouldn’t it?” Mary said with a wink.

“I have no idea what you mean.”

“Good. It’s time to go down, milady. Have a good e’en, and don’t muddle wi’ a murderer.”

***

The family gathered as the guests arrived. Lord John and Lydia sat in the drawing room while Lady Darkefell stood near the door, greeting people as they arrived: Sir Trevor Pomfroy, the vicar and his wife, Richard Allengate, Hiram Grover, Mr. and Mrs. Benjamin Jenkins, Miss Beatrice Lange. It was an odd assortment. His mother had complained, but the marquess overruled her objections in ordering this impromptu dinner party.

But where was Lady Anne? Darkefell fumed, glancing at the clock in the hall. She was necessary to their plan, for she was the only one he trusted to play her part perfectly and to catch things he might not. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw a movement on the stairs and turned.