Never to Part (26 page)

“Oh, my.” Daphne gulped. She looked at Saddie in stunned disbelief. “’Tis verses. Much like the others.”

“Glory be,” exclaimed Saddie. “Who sent them?”

“There is no signature.”

“The seal?” asked Nanny Hayley.

“I . . . I think ‘tis the Dremore seal,” Daphne said hesitantly. “I know I have seen it somewhere.”

“Are these verses clues?” asked Nanny.

Daphne read them again. She froze when she came to the mention of Blanchard’s House. “I know where I saw the seal,” she exclaimed and blessed the instinct to come here.

“Where child?”

“At Heart Haven.”

Nanny Hayley nodded. “Lord Dremore sent it.”

“More like his mother did so,” Daphne rebutted. “’Tis the first Dremore’s seal.” She frowned and studied the writing. “But her script is nothing like this.”

“Can you truly read those scratchings, miss? What does it say?” asked Saddie.

“Read it aloud,” ordered Nanny Hayley.

When Daphne finished the two women shook their heads.

“Don’t you see,” Daphne explained. “Blanchard’s House is Heart Haven. The baroness explained how Lord Ricman had it built especially for his wife after he received the title and the Spanish
reales
, pieces of eight. Gold.”

“Pirate treasure? You ne’er mentioned pirates,” Saddie accused.

Daphne studied the first verse on the parchment. “I have to go to Hart Haven on a moon lit night.”

“Three days hence be the new moon,” Nanny Hayley told her. “This night’s wind’ll scatter the clouds for days. What else do it say?”

“Something about a shady grove and twined, ah, plait,” Daphne answered and folded the parchment. She rose and paced away. Walking back, she sank to her knees before her old nanny.

“How can I get there? It must be nigh fifteen miles.”

Nanny Hayley reached out and brushed back a tendril that had loosened from Daphne’s coif. “I may be able to help. I nursed Farmer George’s wife through a fever summer past.

“To bed with ye now.” The nanny caressed Daphne’s cheek.

Daphne did so and tucked the verses beneath her pillow and blew out her night candle.
To open eyes with love true and blind to Blanchard’s special bower
, she silently recited.
Where love confirmed
— She hugged herself beneath the heavy coverlet; tried to stay the pain of Richard’s rejection.

Love him I do but his
eyes are certainly blinded.

I too was blind for so long, Daphne thought.
How could I not have guessed long ago
? Daphne went over all that had happened at the inn. Tears welled at the memory of Richard’s accusation.

How could he believe I plotted against him with his dreadful co
usin?

Daphne could still see the bearded man in the public room with a pistol trained on Richard. She could almost smell and taste the acrid black power and hear the explosion of noise, fire, and smoke when he had fired the pistol. She could still see Richard’s blood on her hands.

He gave up the verse to protect me. He must care a l
ittle. Daphne remembered quite clearly that even as Richard spoke so coldly to her she still could not see his aura. She sighed.

When she closed her eyes she was back in The Hound’s public room. She saw the arc of the parchment as Richard tossed it. The sight of it in the stranger’s hand stole to the fore.
Richard couldn’t have sent it to me. He gave it Eldridge.

Daphne sat up. “Or did he?” She squeezed her eyes tight shut; envisioned the paper before the stranger picked it up. “Wasn’t the one I gave him larger?” Falling back on the bed, Daphne fisted her hands in the quilt. Her heart ached.

Who betrayed whom, my lord Dremore?

All’s fair in love and treasure
, her Conscience replied.

 * * * *

Richard stumbled up the stairs to his bedchamber. He had drunk far too much but not enough to dim his inner turmoil. He grunted a greeting to his waiting valet.

The man’s moue of displease reminded Richard that he was indeed foxed. He decided he did not care. He slumped to a sitting position on the side of his bed. When his valet hurried forward and reached to unbutton his waistcoat, Richard pushed at his hands.

“Go ‘way,” he slurred. Richard kicked off his shoes. “Wanta sleep.” He lay back on the pillow and stretched out his long form. Richard ignored his valet’s loud tsk and closed his eyes.

The valet drew the coverlet over him, Richard continued to ignore the man.
Daphne
, he thought,
where are you? Are you safe? What should I do
?

When the valet left and silence filled the room, Richard raised his hand and put the back of it against his forehead.

Daphne never once complained. Never let on that matters were as horrible as they were. I should have known by the state of the house, by the fact that she never had new gowns. Damme me. What am I to do
?

Richard drifted closer and closer to sleep.

“He looks so young and innocent,” mused Lady Laurel. She sat on the bed next to the baron’s head.

Lord Ricman strolled to the side of the bed. “He ’twill be e’en more susceptible in his present state. Get about it.”

“Thou canst be tired,” drawled Lady Laurel to Richard. She flicked the ostrich feather she held against his nose. The third time he raised a hand but did not reach to bat at it.

“Mayhaps I should get a pitcher of water,” Lord Ricman said.

“That would wake him,” Lady Laurel said as she ran the tip of the feather down Richard’s cheek. “He would not be in a receptive frame of mind then. “Ahh,” she said when Richard batted at the feather. Her smile widened when his eyelids fluttered. “He is almost with us.”

“Give me the blasted feather while thou preparest,” Lord Ricman said.

“It takes but a moment.” When her husband thrust out his hand, Lady Laurel grimaced but handed the feather to him.

“Whenever you are ready,” Lord Ricman said.

Lady Laurel floated just above the foot of the bed. She moved her right hand in a slow circle. Her form shimmered. With a glow around her, she shook out the skirt of a dress identical to the one Daphne had worn the past summer at Heart Haven. “I do not understand how women can wear these flimsy garments,” she told her husband. “The corsets are indelicately light weight.”

“’Twould be vastly attractive in a come hither way.” Lord Ricman grinned at her and winked.

“Wake him,” she answered with a roll of her eyes. “I wish to return to my own garments as soon as can be.”

On the edge of drifting off he became aware that his nose itched. When the sensation of a brush of a teasing fly did not go away, he batted the air near his noise. The tickling continued. With an oath, Richard opened his eyes.

To his shock a soft glow illuminated his bed and a small area around it. Richard rose up on one elbow.
What an odd light
. A glance confirmed the draperies were drawn across the windows. Another around his chamber told him not a single candle was lit. The glow brightened at the foot of his bed. It began to shimmer.

Richard shook his head to clear it and instantly regretted doing so. The dull pounding he had scarce noted before now throbbed behind his eyes. Sitting up, he pressed the palm of his hand to his forehead and closed his eyes.

The glow penetrated even this. Richard shaded his eyes against the bright light at the foot of the bed. He saw sprigs of laurel atop his blanket. When his eyes began to adjust to the brightness, Richard made out a feminine shape.

“Dremore,” the form spoke as its shape grew clearer. “Richard, you must help me.”

The urgent tone chilled him. Richard belatedly realized he knew the voice. With narrowed eyes he studied the figure. The blue gown he recognized and then the shape’s face came into focus.

“It can’t be,” Richard protested. He scooted back in the bed.

“Help me, please Richard,” Daphne’s figure begged.

Richard closed his eyes and leaned back against the headboard. “’Tis an illusion.”

Daphne. He closed his eyes and shook his head. A cold grip on Richard’s wrist made him open his eyes. The hand was opaque; the bones visible.

“Come to Heart Haven,” the figure of Daphne pleaded. “My life is in danger. Only you can save me.”

“You aren’t real,” Richard roared.

“Heart Haven. Come to Heart Haven and the treasure shall be ours.

“
Intertwined laurel, Intertwined hearts, Where they meet, They never shall part
.”

“Dear God,” Richard moaned as the words faded into silence.

The form vanished at his words. The strange glow winked out like a candle extinguished. Richard scraped his hand across the coverlet and came up with a handful of laurel.

“Are you here Lady Laurel?” he asked. “Is she truly in danger?”

Daphne sat at the kitchen table staring at the verses. The words had long since blurred before her eyes but she knew them by heart. She traversed the past verses and where each had led.

Into Richard’s arms. All but this last one now before her.

Daphne refocused on the parchment. “How can I go back to Heart Haven after all that has happened?” she wondered aloud.

“Have you choice?” Nanny Hayley asked behind her.

“What good would it do to go? The verse calls on
true love
to provide a solution.”

The old nanny put a hand on Daphne’s shoulder. “You ne’er know when ye’ll find love of any kind.” She gave a squeeze and then sat in chair at the end of the table. “Do ye wish to wed this Wardick?” When Daphne shook her head, Nanny Hayley sighed. “Then go to Heart Haven.”

“There remains the matter of how to do so.”

“Spoke with Farmer George this mornin’,” Nanny said. “He’ll lend his cart and cob for a day. Two at most.”

“When?”

“He’ll bring them by cottage in morn.” Nanny heaved up from the chair. “Pack for one night.” She waved away Daphne’s objection. “’Tis Heart Haven. They’ll not turn ye away.”

Daphne didn’t know what she feared most. That they wouldn’t or that they would.
What if Dremore is there
?

What if the treasure is not? ‘Tis the treasure or Wardick
.

Daphne shuddered.
If I find the treasure and there is more than enough to pay Geoffrey’s debts I will give the remainder to Richard. We will repay the rest as we can.

He still won’t love you,
her heart whispered.

 * * * *

Richard stared unseeing at his breakfast plate. All he could think about was his
dream
for lack of a better explanation.

“My, what an appetite you have,” Lady Laurissa said.

Richard nodded.

“Dremore, what troubles you?”

“The eggs are fine, Mother,” he replied as he shoved his food back and forth on his plate.

“Gossip was rampant last eve at Sir Joshua’s,” his mother gushed. “You wouldn’t believe what was said. The women were atrocious with spitefulness. Did you find the men in like mood?”

“Mmmm, yes Mother,” Richard answered without looking up.

“Yours ears would burn if you bore the name Stratton.”

Richard stilled and grew pale. About what had his mother been prattling? Which Stratton? He went ghost white. Should he have heeded last eve’s message at once. “What was that, Mother?”

“Are you certain your shoulder isn’t troubling you?”

“’Tis healing, Mother.” He swallowed his impatience. “What was it you mentioned earlier?”

“I am sorry to have disturbed your breakfast, dear. I was nattering about nothing.”

First a glowing spectre and now his mother.
What gossip had she heard about the Stratton’s? Did the troublesome chit actually need his help
? Richard had lain awake pondering that question through what remained of the night after his “dream.”

Why can’t I make sense of it? Was it just a dream
?

In the light of day that rang like a lame excuse to do nothing. Was he like a wind chime that turned and twisted in the wind, never in control?

Richard rebelled at his indecision.
How poor spirited am I? The honourable thing to do is to rescue her if Daphne—if she is in danger. Dear God, what am I doing sitting here
?

The baron stood abruptly and tossed his napkin onto the table. With only a nod, he strode to the breakfast room door.

“Where are you going in such a rush?” the baroness asked.

“To Heart Haven,” Richard snapped. He glanced over his shoulder in time to catch a glimpse of his mother’s grin.

“Take care to contemplate the last verse very carefully,” she said. “’Tis of vast import to your future.”

The baron gritted his teeth.
‘Chance missed’ be dammed.

“I mean to do exactly as you have hoped and prayed I would ever since father died six and ten years ago,” he said. “I’m going to either find the treasure or disprove its existence for once and all.”

 * * * *

Geoffrey ran up the stairs at Brooks. He rushed from one room to the next until he found Eldridge conversing with another man. “I’ve news.”

“What news?” the gentleman with Eldridge asked.

“Stratton probably discovered some new gaming hell.”

“Don’t continue to be a fool,” the other man chided Geoffrey. “Retire to the country while you still have a house.”

Geoffrey bristled. “I am—”

“Going to stroll with me,” Eldridge said with an undertone of steel. “Until the morrow,” he told his companion.

Geoffrey followed Eldridge into the first empty chamber he found. He grinned.

The older man demanded, “What news?”

“Dremore has left London. His groom said he was bound for Heart Haven. I’ve a hired coach. It awaits us.”

“Excellent,” Eldridge said. “I’ll make use of it.”