Liz Carlyle - [Lorimer Family & Clan Cameron 02] (10 page)

Evangeline watched him go, her mind caught in a whirling vortex of emotion. She stood in the doorway as Elliot mounted his horse with an easy, languid grace, throwing one long booted leg across the saddle and urging the big horse forward in a smooth, flowing motion. Then, reining the prancing chestnut into a tight circle, Elliot held her eyes briefly, smartly touched his hat, and cantered down the long drive in a spray of gravel. At the end of Chatham’s lane, horse and rider turned north toward Wrotham Ford, quickly disappearing from sight. Elliot did not look back again.

Evangeline remained standing in the doorway, unaware that Winnie had slipped into the hall until she felt a warm, familiar arm circle her waist. Winnie sighed and pulled her close. “Oh, Lud, Evie. I saw how he kissed your hand! He’s perfect. Perfect for you. What ill luck that such a man should be already betrothed.”

Evangeline heaved a sigh, too. “Well, Winnie, there’s the rub.”

“Oh, my dear!” Winnie clasped her hand to her chest. “You’ve fallen for him, have you not?”

“He isn’t betrothed.”

Winnie’s hand flew to her mouth, and suddenly Evangeline found herself abruptly shoved into the library, the door thumping shut behind her.

“What do you mean, not betrothed?” Winnie demanded, leaning back against the door. Her hands were splayed stubbornly against it as if she feared Evangeline might attempt to escape her interrogation.

“Mr. Roberts’s engagement has been ended, Winnie,” answered Evangeline softly, dropping down into her usual chair. “That is all I can tell you.”

Winnie came slowly away from the door and wrapped her arms uneasily around herself. She walked to the front window to stare pensively across the gardens. “Evie, a broken engagement is all but unheard of. Did his fiancée cry off ?”

Evangeline pressed her fingertips hard into her temples in a futile attempt to forestall an approaching headache. Winnie was right. A sickening uncertainty pressed down upon her. “I do not know, Winnie. He simply said it was ended.”

Winnie turned from her place by the window and began to flit throughout the library in quick, anxious motions, pausing to straighten books that were not crooked and to rearrange ornaments that were not out of place. As she moved, she spoke softly. “My dear,” she began in the low, thoughtful tones she so effectively employed with upset children. It was her governess voice, Evangeline always thought. “Peter does trust me to look after your best interests, though why he thinks I might do so effectively is quite beyond me, for I am the feather-head and you are the sensible one.” She paused to fuss with a floral arrangement that was already perfect. “Nonetheless, I find nothing disagreeable in Mr. Roberts’s countenance, and I think we must accept what he says at face value.”

Suddenly, Winnie ceased her flitting and turned to face Evangeline’s chair. “Indeed, Evie, he seemed quite charmed by you. He scarcely took his eyes from you throughout the whole of dinner last night. I vow, he’s as besotted as poor Stokely.”

Evie dropped her hands into her lap. “Winnie, given my responsibilities here, I hardly think—”

Unexpectedly, Winnie cut her off with a sharp toss of her tiny hand. “Oh, I know, I used to be your governess, and Peter depends upon me to lend countenance to your present situation, but dash it all, Evie, you aren’t getting any younger. Consider your future!”

“That, dear friend, is precisely what I do consider! And Michael’s, as well. Oh, Winnie, the child is but eleven! What shall we do if my grandfather dies and they try to take Michael away from me?”

“Bah!” snorted Winnie with another hand toss. “Old Lady Trent has said she’d rather roast on a rusty spit in hell than acknowledge your—”

“She lies!” hissed Evangeline. “Oh, she disowned my father quickly enough when he followed his heart. And she did not hesitate to make certain that my grandfather took no interest in any of his grandchildren. But mark my very words, Winnie, she will take a remarkable interest when Grandpapa is dead. She will rip that child from the heart of this family and thrust him into a nest of vipers if I let her.”

Winnie nodded weakly. “Oh, Evie, I fear you may be right.”

“Depend upon it,” replied Evangeline grimly. “And when she makes the first move, we return to the Continent at once.”

Winnie looked vaguely hopeful. “Yes, but a . . . an alliance with a gentleman like Elliot Roberts could go a long way toward frightening off Lady Trent, nefarious old bag of bones that she is. Peter, as Michael’s trustee, is naught but half English, and foreign-born at that. However, an English husband would be something altogether—”

Evangeline forestalled Winnie with an upraised hand. “Yes, any honorable man would wish to be helpful under such dire circumstances, but let me remind you of the power and influence wielded by Lady Trent and the Stone family. Yes, Mr. Roberts looks to be a gentleman and is no doubt reasonably well set up. But she! She is a peer, a staunch Tory. Rich and ruthless beyond measure.”

“Well,yes . . . that’s all too true, but—”

Evangeline exhaled sharply. “Winnie, a commoner like Mr. Roberts has no more influence than Peter. Moreover, Mr. Roberts would have no notion how to manage such a witch. And from the looks of him,” she added dryly, “he isn’t much given to martyrdom.”

Winnie took her customary seat opposite Evangeline, her brow furrowed in thought. “Yes,” she mused, pensively staring at her tiny feet. “And unfortunately, he’s Scottish. Did you notice his voice?”

“Scottish?” Evangeline’s voice was sharp. To her Flemish ear, all the King’s English sounded very much alike.

Winnie nodded slowly and lifted her gaze from the floor. “Yes, I think so. No—I’m sure of it, Evie. A touch of an accent remains . . . ’tis very slight, when he makes a joke or such. I may have spent half my life in Flanders, but I’m an old Newcastle girl, and I know a burr when I hear one.”

“Yes, the name probably is Scottish,” considered Evangeline, fixing her stare on the cold hearth, “which only reaffirms how very little we know of him, Winnie. And we can ask nothing of Peter until he returns from Italy.”

“La, dear, you are too cautious! Must your life be an endless path of seriousness and suspicion?”

“Yes, to be sure,” responded Evangeline, returning her gaze to Winnie. “A great many people depend upon me. Seriousness and suspicion have thus far stood me in good stead.”

Restlessly, Winnie sprang up from her chair and began to drift through the library once more. “Oh, Evie! I would not encourage you to be imprudent! I simply wish for you what I had with my darling Hans. Indeed, it is my fondest dream! I want you to have the happiness one finds only with one’s soul mate, and I cannot help but wonder if Mr. Roberts is not the one for you.”

“Why?” asked Evangeline softly, genuinely mystified.

“Why?” Winnie whirled again, now nervously twining a linen handkerchief back and forth through her fingers. “I do not know!” she responded plaintively. “I just see it, that’s all. There is something in the way he looks at you, the way he seems to belong here. And the children! They were taken with him at once. Elliot’s face has this compelling expression—somewhat baffled and charmed and happy all at once.”

“Ah, Elliot is it now?” Evangeline’s tone was arch. “Winnie, indeed! You are foolishly romantic. I think Peter looks to me to guard
your
virtue!”

Crossing her arms stubbornly, Winnie turned to gaze out the window once more. “And I agree with Augustus, much as the admission pains me, that you haven’t a romantic bone in your body!”

So chastised, Evangeline rose and crossed the room to join her friend before the window. Apologetically, she snaked one arm around her companion’s waist. “I dare-say, Winnie, that you may be right, and I take no pleasure in it. I shall try very hard to change. But you must admit, there is something mysterious about Mr. Roberts.” Slowly, she leaned forward and pulled back the drapery to peer intently into the sunlight, as if the truth might be hidden within Chatham’s front gardens. “Something is missing; some bit of information is wanting.”

“Oh, bother!” fussed Winnie impatiently. “The only thing that big, strapping man is wanting is a kilt! Just think of what his knees must look like!”

At this, Evangeline threw back her head and laughed. “Ah, Winnie, you are too awful! He shall return in a week’s time. You must simply ask to see them.”

“Why do not you ask, Evie?” quipped Winnie with asperity. “After all, darling, you’re the artist.”

It was a tempting thought, that.

The Wrotham Arms was little more than a shabby coaching inn that had undoubtedly seen better days, all of them occurring in the preceding century. Even in his weatherworn clothes, a man of Elliot’s intimidating size and imperious demeanor garnered swift attention, yet the increasingly foul mood that had seized him upon leaving Chatham Lodge was barely pacified when a thin, nervous potboy agreed to show him directly to the innkeeper. Following the lad through the squalid taproom as he darted between the rickety tables and worn settles, Elliot made his way to the back of the chamber and down a filthy corridor into a narrow office.

Seated behind a stout worktable piled high with dishes was a corpulent, garishly dressed woman, marginally occupied with wiping out tankards. Her age was uncertain, but her station clearly was not. “I said
innkeeper!
” barked Elliot to the skittish servant, then instantly regretted his words when the potboy jerked backward, flinching. In all likelihood, this wasn’t the lad’s fault. “I’m wanting the innkeeper, Mr. Tanner,” he repeated to him, softening his tone.

“Aye, an’ who might you be?” rasped the woman at the table, spitting violently into a tankard then ramming in a rag with one meaty fist. She jerked her head toward the door, and the round-eyed servant immediately skittered back down the hall.

“I’m an acquaintance of Mr. Tanner’s daughter,” answered Elliot stiffly, turning his full focus on the tawdry woman. Beneath the tumble of wiry red and gray hair that spilled from a yellowed mobcap, her eyes were like bright jet beads set deep into the folds of a florid face. A thick, beefy nose hung between heavy jowls and over thin lips, set in a visage that could never have been pretty.

She grinned sarcastically, showing off a set of nearly complete but blackened, stubby teeth. “Which ’un do ye want? But I needn’t ask, do I, sir?” She chuckled to herself. “Not me poor Mary, I’ll wager, for she’d have no use for the likes of a fine gent such as yourself.”

“Annie Tanner,” interjected Elliot irritably. “I am looking for Annie Tanner.”

“Aye, above half the gents in Lunnon be acquainted with me Annie,” replied the woman, nodding shrewdly. “And them as ain’t likely will be.” The tankard, now apparently cleaned to her satisfaction, was put down with a hearty thump, and she returned her narrow gaze to Elliot.

Watching the woman clean the dishes, Elliot paused to thank God he’d avoided putting up for the night in this rat hole. No matter how much physical discomfort his unslaked desire for Evangeline had given him, it was better than a bad case of the bloody flux. “I’m the marquis of Rannoch,” he said coldly. “And I wish to see Mr. Tanner. Now.”

The woman jerked her thumb back over her shoulder and cackled obnoxiously, her bosom and mobcap shaking in unison. “Do ye, indeed? Well, ’ee be right across the lane there, m’lord. Third grave left o’ the small oak tree.”

“Dead?”

“Aye, gone on to ’is eternal reward these three weeks past,” she replied sarcastically.

“And pray who are you, madam, if I may ask?”

“I’m the grievin’ widow, thank ye kindly,” replied the woman, still grinning. “And I’m just settling up matters here.”

Good Lord.
Antoinette’s mother
. He might have guessed. “Then where, madam, might I find your daughter?”

The woman eyed him suspiciously with her sharp black gaze. “Annie? Can’t rightly say as I know.” She shrugged nonchalantly. “Me Mary housekeeps for a fine family in Mayfair—mayhap she’s heard from ’er.”

Elliot suppressed a rising tide of aggravation and anxiety. God, but he wanted this over and done with. Antoinette’s wardrobe girl had said the actress was returning to Essex. Damn it, she had to be here. Undoubtedly, she was still hiding from him. “Mrs. Tanner, I have business to settle with Annie, and I should like to get on with it.”

Mrs. Tanner squinted at Elliot appraisingly, scanning his length with one dark, beady eye. “Aye, a great buck of a man like you, I ’spect you’ve business aplenty for her!” The woman cackled again, then promptly stopped, narrowing her gaze speculatively. “But I’ll be seein’ me Annie soon, no doubt. She’ll turn up ’ere, or I’ll go down to Lunnon once I get this place done for.”

Elliot swallowed hard, desperate to shove Antoinette and all that she represented into his past where it belonged. Impulsively, he reached a decision and dug deep into his pocket to pull forth the velvet case. He slapped it onto the desk with a harsh clack. “See that she gets this, Mrs. Tanner. And the note that is enclosed.”

A burning light in Mrs. Tanner’s eyes flared, then just as quickly died again. She shifted her gaze away to pick absently at the worn fabric of her bodice, then sniffed pitifully. “Aye, that’s all very well for me girl, but I’m a poor widow woman. ’Tis a long trip to Lunnon—”

Elliot tossed a handful of coins onto the tabletop, and they clattered against the plates and tankards. “That should make it worth your while,” he replied in a soft, cold voice as the woman began to rake the money into her apron. “But make no mistake, Mrs. Tanner. Should I have the regrettable misfortune to discover that Annie did not receive that box or my letter, you’d be well advised to dig another hole under the oak tree.” Then Elliot turned hard on his boot heel and strode back down the hall toward the filthy taproom, almost tripping over the nervous potboy who stood hidden deep in the shadows.