Lady Hawk's Folly (27 page)

A look passed from Hawk to Sir James and then to Lord Breckin before Hawk turned again to Mollie. “That is all? She said nothing more?”

“Nothing more about Prince Nicolai, sir, but you know how she is. She talked a great deal about a great many things. I couldn’t hope to remember the half of it. Nevertheless,” she added when he continued to look at her, his expression more serious than she was used to seeing it, “I am reasonably certain she said nothing more about his highness.”

Sir James sighed. “’Tis a pity we didn’t have this information before we left London,” he said dolefully.

“Why?” Lady Gwendolyn inquired. “What possible import can it have to anyone? I, for one, found Madame de Staël’s conversation incredibly wearing. I cannot think how one could be expected to remember two words out of ten once one had escaped her company.”

Recalled to their senses, the gentlemen at once denied any particular interest in Madame de Staël and pressed her ladyship for further items of gossip that might have come her way. As always, Lady Gwendolyn was delighted to comply, and the subject of Prince Nicolai’s antecedents was allowed to take its place in memory.

Though Worthing pleaded fatigue soon after tea was brought into the front hall at ten o’clock and accompanied the ladies upstairs, the other gentlemen remained below, chatting amiably. Mollie would have liked very much to remain with them, but she had a strong notion that Hawk would send her away if she attempted to stay, so she went up to bed with the others. Remembering what he had told her the night before, she left her own bedchamber the moment she was ready to retire, and climbed into bed in his room without the slightest pang of conscience. But try as she would to stay awake until he came upstairs, her eyelids simply would not obey her sternest commands. At last, fearing to set the bed curtains afire if she left the bedside candle to burn any lower, she snuffed it, turned over once, and went to sleep.

When she awoke the next morning, the only evidence she had that Hawk had even come to bed was the fact that the bedclothes were disarranged on his side. When she rang for her chocolate, Cathe informed her that most of the gentlemen has been up for a while and were even now enjoying a large breakfast together in the main dining hall. Mrs. Bracegirdle, the maid confided, had been ordered to see everyone else served in the breakfast parlor.

“Talking gentleman talk, most like,” the girl said, tossing her head in a clear opinion of such goings-on. Mollie smiled at her, and thus encouraged, Cathe informed her that gentlemen, to her mind, took themselves much too seriously.

“I am persuaded that you are right, Cathe,” Mollie said then. “Ring for Miss du Bois, will you? We’ve a busy day ahead of us.”

The truth of her words was brought home to her even sooner than she expected, for the first of their guests, having chosen to spend the night at Forest Row, arrived well before noon, and others arrived in what seemed like a continual stream until well into the night. Mollie began to feel as if her face were stretched from constant smiling. And after what must have been a thousand words of cheery welcome, she began to long for the chance to snap at someone, anyone. The Countess de Lieven was haughtier than ever away from London, and many of the other women adjusted their own manners accordingly. More than once, Mollie found her sister-in-law’s dancing eyes turned in her direction, and that, more than anything, helped her to remain calm and poised.

Of the gentlemen they saw little. Those who were directly involved in whatever plots Hawk was brewing engaged themselves in seemingly innocent pursuits for the larger part of the day, but she knew well that there was another long night session after the others had gone to bed. Prince Nicolai approached her only once, but her reception was so blighting that he made little effort after that to engage her in anything more than polite guest-to-hostess conversation, for which Mollie was profoundly grateful. She had scarcely known where to look when he first approached her, and she was certain that every eye in the room was upon them, speculating. She glanced at her husband, at that moment taking his ease, one foot on the fender of the fireplace, his elbow resting upon the mantelpiece while he chatted with Lord Bathurst. Hawk raised an eyebrow as if he were asking her if she needed his assistance, but he showed no sign of disapproving of her conversation. Encouraged by his trust in her, she soon made her escape from the prince, excusing herself to see to some newly arriving guests.

Only once had there been a moment that stirred her curiosity. Conversation had turned to Wellington’s success at Vitoria, and a general discussion had ensued, during the course of which Mollie had surprised an odd look on her husband’s face. Someone had clearly said something to pique his interest, but she had been paying little heed to the conversation, so she had no idea what, specifically, had been said. She was certain that the clearest voice just before she had glanced at Hawk had been Prince Nicolai’s. However, there was no break in the conversation, nor was there any opportunity for her to ask her husband about the incident.

By the following morning nearly everyone who had been expected had arrived with the exception of the Prince Regent and his party. Mollie was already so tired that she could scarcely enter into Lady Gwendolyn’s enthusiasm and found relief, for once, in Lady Bridget’s placid acceptance of things.

“I cannot believe this house party of yours,” Hawk’s sister said soon after they had left the Countess de Lieven and several of her followers in the breakfast parlor. “I had no notion Hawk was on such terms with men like Lord Bathurst or Monsieur de Lieven, let alone the Regent. Why, I’m sure he hadn’t so many as two political notions to rub together before he went to the Peninsula.”

“Well, they seem to have become well acquainted over the past weeks,” Mollie replied noncommittally.

But Lady Gwendolyn had not been acknowledged as one of London’s greatest gossips for a number of years by virtue of a dense mind. She regarded her hostess narrowly. “I cannot pretend to know what goes forward here,” she said almost tartly, “but I know my brother well, Mollie, and there is something stirring beneath the surface that has nothing to do with simple entertainment.”

“Well, don’t ask me what it is,” Mollie replied wearily, “for I cannot tell you. And don’t eat me. I am as much aware of the atmosphere as you are, but when I attempted to discover what was going forward, your charming brother nearly snapped my head off.”

“He is charming, isn’t he?” Lady Gwendolyn said, allowing herself to be diverted. “I wasn’t by any means certain that the two of you would ever make a match of it, you know, though I hadn’t the slightest awareness of his reasons for leaving so precipitately, but I want you to know, Mollie, that no one could be happier than I am to see the two of you constantly looking sheep’s eyes at each other.”

Mollie stared at her in astonishment. “I’m sure I’ve not the slightest notion what you mean, Gwen.”

But the other young woman merely laughed at her, and at that moment Lady Bridget approached them to suggest that someone be posted to look out for the Regent’s arrival.

“Like Mrs. Bracegirdle did the other night, you know,” she explained. “It would give ample warning for a proper welcome, I think.”

“Unnecessary, Aunt Biddy,” Ramsay said behind her. “Hawk and Lord Breckin have ridden to meet them, and Hawk already gave orders for one of the stableboys to ride up to the ridge to keep a lookout. I think, as a matter of fact, that Harry rode along with him.”

“With Hawkstone?” Lady Bridget inquired, frowning slightly. “I cannot approve of that,” she said. “It is not fitting that the Prince Regent should be met by a little boy.”

“No, no, of course not,” he said, chuckling. “Harry went off with the stableboy, I believe.”

Lady Bridget’s face smoothed again at once, but her relief was short-lived, for less than an hour and a half later the Prince Regent and a party of some twenty cavaliers rode into the central courtyard unannounced. There was no sign of Hawk or Lord Breckin.

M
OLLIE, LADY GWENDOLYN, AND
Lady Bridget did the honors of the castle, hiding their worry as best they might, their hospitable efforts warmly seconded by the Countess de Lieven and her husband as well as Lord Bathurst. It was the latter who asked what had become of their host.

“Damme if I know,” replied the corpulent Prince Regent. “Haven’t seen hide nor hair of him, you know. Damme, but I haven’t.”

“Didn’t you say Harry and a stableboy went to keep watch?” Mollie inquired of Lord Ramsay in an undertone.

“That I did. Wonder what became of them. I can tell you, Moll, I don’t like this.”

Lord Bathurst assumed that Hawk and Breckin had merely taken a different route than that chosen by the royal party and had somehow missed them. But a few judicious questions made it perfectly clear that such was not the case.

“It cannot be,” Lord Ramsay stated flatly, “for it will have taken his highness some time to reach the valley from Cross-in-Hand. There is only the one road, and there is no way Hawk could have missed him. Besides the which, we are also missing my younger brother, Harry, who was to have kept watch over the valley road.”

The Regent was distressed by what was rapidly being accepted as Hawk’s disappearance, and was disposed to discuss at length various possible courses of action to take in the matter. In the meantime Sir James Smithers, acting with uncharacteristic haste, demanded to know who among the men employed at the castle best knew the surrounding countryside and who among them was best at reading sign. Lord Ramsay, responding automatically to the note of authority in Sir James’ voice, not only gave him Haycock’s name but sent for the gamekeeper and his two sons to attend Sir James at once in the rear hall. He was anxious himself to accompany the search party Sir James meant to form, but Mollie grabbed his arm before he could follow the older man.

“Ramsay, wait. Have you seen Prince Nicolai?”

“A few moments ago in the courtyard,” he responded promptly. “He came out with the de Lievens.” He looked around. “I don’t see him now, however.”

“Well, we must find him,” Mollie said anxiously.

“What for? He cannot have had anything to do with this. I’ll swear he’s not left the castle. No one has, or we should have been told.”

“He might be in league with someone, with d’Épier, for example.”

“For heaven’s sake, Mollie, d’Épier is still in London, and we do not know that Hawk’s disappearance has anything to do with anything. It might well be that he and Breckin were merely set upon by footpads who took their horses and left them in a ditch somewhere.”

She shuddered at the thought but stood her ground. “I don’t think so. Anyway, we must find Nicolai. He might slip away in all the excitement.”

It was an anticlimax to encounter the Russian prince descending the main stair as they entered the front hall. He nodded at them, volunteering the information that Monsieur de Lieven had sent him upstairs to fetch some important papers he wished to present to the Regent. Mollie looked after him skeptically.

“He was anxious to explain being upstairs, was he not?”

Ramsay shrugged. “I think you are seeing bogies, Moll. I mean to go with Smithers. If Hawk needs assistance, I want to be there.”

Filled with misgiving, she followed him to the rear hall. Every feeling told her that Nicolai was somehow involved in Hawk’s absence, but she could think of no way to convince her brother-in-law. They found Smithers delivering rapid-fire orders to a sizable group of men, and Mollie was in the process of attempting to convince herself that if Hawk could be found, the search party would find him, when the door from the stableyard crashed back on its hinges. The sound, followed by the clatter of quick footsteps across the anteroom floor, startled them all, and as one, they turned to see Harry charge into the room.

“Mollie, Ramsay, they’ve abducted Hawk! We saw them!” The boy’s face was flushed, he was breathing heavily, and his clothing was in disarray.

“Where?” Smithers asked tersely.

“On the upper valley road just below where we were waiting on the ridge.”

“How long ago?”

“More than an hour, I believe,” the boy told them. “I don’t know for sure, but it seems ages and ages. There was a group of them, four or five at least, and they just swooped out of the woods, taking them quite by surprise, I daresay. Anyway, it was over in a flash.”

“Why did you not tell us immediately?” demanded his brother.

“They headed down the valley toward Hurst Green, and we tried to follow them,” Harry explained, “but it took us a while to get down to the road, and by that time they had taken to the woods again and we couldn’t find any sign of them. We searched for a long time, and when we came back to the lake road, we learned that the royal party had already passed by. Since we knew you would want to hear what happened, we came back.”

“Look here, Harry,” Smithers said. “You will have to come with us to show us just where all this business took place. We should be able to pick up a trail. Never fear, my lady,” he added kindly, speaking to Mollie, “we will get them back.”

She nodded, knowing he meant every word he said, but still unable to rid herself of the notion that his efforts would be in vain. She touched Ramsay’s arm, and he turned to look at her, worry plain on his face.

“Ramsay, don’t go with them. Call it feminine instinct or whatever you want to call it, but I have the strongest feeling that Hawk’s life is in danger and that the danger comes from Prince Nicolai. You must know they suspect him of being in league with the spies, for you know more about that business than you have told me. Hawk insisted that it would be dangerous for me to know what was going forward here, but I’m certain the plotting and planning has much to do with his disappearance. I remember you said you had been told to insist to d’Épier that all the information he seeks is in Hawk’s head. What could be more logical than that they have abducted him in order to force him to reveal what he knows?”

Ramsay grimaced. “I didn’t realize I’d said so much, but I am certain that one reason Sir James is so distracted is that that same possibility has occurred to him. But whatever Hawk’s suspicions regarding the Russian may have been, he’s kept them to himself, Mollie. I’ve no reason to believe Nicolai is any more likely a suspect than anyone else.”