Puritan Bride (31 page)

There was no one to help her, to remove this second burden of death. Her immediate impulse was to escape from this deadly turn of events. She sprang to her feet, gathered her skirts in her hands, heedless of the smears of blood, and fled the room, heels clicking on the polished boards.

‘Kate!’ Marlbrooke knew in that moment that he must prevent her, knew that she would need some source of solace in her grief. But she gave no response, did not even turn her head, but continued her flight.

‘But the paper. Mason’s confession.’ Felicity had picked up and now held out the folded sheet, which she
had just unfolded, and broke the ensuing silence in an uncertain voice. ‘There is no name here.’

‘No.’ Marlbrooke’s austere response did not encourage discussion.

‘So Mason did not name the killer?’

‘No, she did not. But she did not have to, did she?’ He looked down at the body of Richard Hotham, his expression shuttered and unreadable. ‘The culprit was perfectly willing to confess, after all. I suppose justice has been done.’

But there was no victory in it. He would see Kate’s white face and shocked eyes in his nightmares. Just as she would undoubtedly see Richard’s blood on his hands.

‘Oh, Marcus! What an impossible situation this is.’ Lady Elizabeth closed the door firmly behind her when she finally ran her son to earth in the library. He had been avoiding her with some success for the past several days. She seated herself in the chair next to his desk, arranged the folds of her stiff brocade skirts to her satisfaction as if she intended to stay, and smiled innocently in answer to his raised eyebrow. He would avoid her no more. She would stay until her planned conversation with him was complete and to her liking.

‘I know it. It is damnable.’ Marlbrooke sat behind his desk, estate papers strewn before him, accepting the inevitable when he saw the determination in his mother’s
face. He smiled ruefully and put down the quill pen, which he had not been using to any effect.

He looks so tired, she thought. He covers it well, but the strain is beginning to show. In spite of the tragic circumstances, it amused her that her notorious son should be disturbed to any degree by the vagaries of a woman. She hid a smile at the prospect, effectively disguising her inordinate fondness for him, as she allowed her eyes to linger on his stern but handsome features.

‘We seem to be living in a nightmare from which there is no escape.’ She folded her hands in her lap and fixed him with her clear gaze, which he had inherited. ‘I cannot believe that you actually fought a duel and killed a man, here in this house.’

‘It was not my obvious intention, ma’am.’ He was cool, noncommittal, any expression in his face carefully hidden from her. This was not going to be an easy interview. ‘In fact, I remember that it was a near-run thing. I have a painful scratch along my ribs to prove it. Would you perhaps have preferred that Richard had killed
me?
’

‘Of course not! You know I did not mean any such thing! I wish we were back in London.’ For an unguarded moment Elizabeth picked fretfully at the lace edging of her deep cuffs. ‘Life seemed so much more predictable there.’

‘I will transport you back there whenever you wish. It would probably be a good idea for you to leave this place.’ His tone was perfectly conciliatory, perfectly distant.

‘That was not what I meant either! You are being obtuse, Marlbrooke!’ It was time to be more direct if she wished to force her son in to any sort of personal comment or show of emotion in this duel of words. ‘Should we, do you think, have allowed Simon Hotham to return home?’

‘Why not? We could not have detained him. It is better that he is not here in the circumstances. Whatever his involvement in recent events, he has lost his son. He would not wish to be away from home.’

‘Do you really suppose he was responsible for Mistress Adams’s death?’

‘Simon or Richard? In all probability Simon was the instigator. Without doubt, he is a man driven by ambition, disillusioned over the past and fearful of the future. Embittered and vengeful. I remember Kate’s words and she had the right of it. All his hopes were pinned on Richard, the will and an alliance with Katherine. With Richard as the tool to carry out his devious plotting, Gilliver was an easy target if she was alone and refused to hand over the relevant papers.’ He pushed his fingers impatiently through his hair. ‘And now, with Richard dead and the will destroyed, his plans have gone awry and he will have lost his hold on the future. Nothing left to him but his pride and his declining health. I should feel compassion for his loss—but I cannot find it in my heart to do so.’

‘No. You should not try too hard, Marcus. Simon has brought fatal harm and distress to too many to deserve
our sympathy. And we still have no idea where Mason is.’ Elizabeth pressed on. They would reach the nub of the problem eventually. ‘I feel in some sense responsible for her.’

‘There is no reason why you should—but I understand. I too feel that we should give her some protection. She is probably in hiding in the attics or cellars at Widemarsh.’

‘I suppose.’

Giving in to the silent criticism that sat so elegantly before him, Marlbrooke pushed back his chair and strode to the window to look out over the drear scene of cloud and rain, which so perfectly mirrored his mood. And he knew exactly what his mother intended. With a shrug of compliance, he turned to face her, a dry and not particularly pleasant smile curving his lips.

‘You have not—very tactfully, if deliberately—mentioned the worst part of this débâcle, my dear mother. Perhaps you should spell it out before we both die of anticipation!’

‘I know.’ She sighed a little. ‘We both know. It is Kate.’

The Viscount strode back and flung himself into his chair once more, his dark brows meeting in a heavy frown as the memory of his recent efforts to see Kate flooded through him.

On the third abortive visit to Widemarsh Manor, having been refused entry on the two previous occasions by a firmly bolted door, there was a dangerous
light in the Viscount’s eye, but he kept his temper reined in. There was, after all, he admonished himself, nothing to be gained from frustrated aggression. He dismounted in the courtyard, handed the Falcon over to a stable lad and knocked on the door. This time the door opened a merest crack; the dark eyes of an elderly servant gleamed through.

‘Yes, m’lord? I didn’t expect you again so soon.’

‘I would speak with Mistress Harley.’ Marlbrooke felt that he was reliving a nightmare. He had been here before.

‘Mistress Harley is not receiving visitors, m’lord.’ The door closed in confirmation.

Marlbrooke’s patience finally snapped. He hammered on the door with the haft of his riding whip as if to wake the devil. ‘Open the door or I will surely break it down.’ His voice remained remarkably calm, but there was no denying the change in temperature.

The door opened again almost immediately. ‘The lady says she’s seeing no one, m’lord. I can do nothing for you.’

Before it could be closed on him again, Marlbrooke put his shoulder to the door and pushed so that it smacked back against the wall. The servant retreated hurriedly. Marlbrooke advanced.

‘Be so good as to tell the lady that I do not leave this place until I have seen her.’

From her concealment in the parlour, amidst the dusty
neglect and bunches of herbs, Kate listened to the potent exchange. She would have to see him, but what would she say? The muscles in her throat tightened at the prospect. She felt torn apart. She longed to see him, to feel the touch of his hands, to hear his voice—just to be in his presence. But, engulfed with guilt and remorse, what would she say to him that would make any sense and that he would understand? She must pay for her pride and wilfulness. Perhaps the price was too great to be borne—how would she exist if she never saw him again? She loved him so much, yet she had damned them both with blood and she would have to live with it. For the first time she knew some of the torment that kept Isolde from her grave.

Gathering her courage, Kate stepped from the parlour into the hall. ‘There is no need for Crofton to carry your message, my lord. I am here.’

Marlbrooke’s frustration remained, but his anger evaporated at the sight of her. She looked so drained and vulnerable. Her eyes were wide with apprehension and something that he could not name. He wanted nothing more than to take her in his arms and smooth away all her fears, kiss the shadows beneath her eyes, but he could not. There was too much between them, an invisible barrier, impossible as yet to breach.

‘Katherine.’

She stood back so that he might enter the parlour. She
followed, but remained at some distance, a stretch of oak boards between them.

‘What do I say to you, Katherine?’

‘Why, nothing, my lord. I do not blame you for what happened, but rather myself. Because of our marriage and my determination to pursue the claim of the Harley family, two people are dead. Whether it is your fault or mine I truly know not. But I carry their deaths on my heart.’

‘Will you let their deaths come between us, then?’ He placed his hat and gloves carefully on the table beside him, thinking rapidly of any argument that would carry weight with her in her distress.

‘I feel that they are between us whether I wish it or no.’

‘My love for you is not enough?’ It was as if he were fighting his way through an impenetrable mist that held his limbs captive and allowed no progress.

‘Your love is magnificent, but I have repaid it with murder.’

‘Then will you let me comfort you?’ He wanted to hold her, just to touch her but could not. What was he to do? ‘Do you return my love?’

‘I love you. But there is no comfort and I cannot talk about it. Not yet. The guilt is too strong. What right have I to be happy when I have caused such distress? Richard and Gilliver dead. Mason lost somewhere. Simon wrapped in grief. Why should I take my happiness at their expense?’

But what about my happiness?
The response echoed in Marlbrooke’s head, yet he chose to remain silent. Such a question would merely compound the issue.

‘Kate—I can do nothing to help you.’ She was such a slight figure to carry so much burden on her own. But he could not fight her resistance. He turned to pick up his hat and gloves from the table. He hated to leave her alone at Widemarsh with her memories. ‘Would you at least come to the Priory with me?’

‘No.’

He bowed in acknowledgement—but vowed that he would not leave her unprotected. He would send some of his own people to keep watch. He took possession of her hand and raised it to his lips. It was cold, so cold. He could find no words to ease her heart or his own. He bowed again and strode out.

Kate remained in the parlour. She refused to watch him ride away, but stood, tears once more coursing down her cheeks, unable to decide what to do next, now that she had wilfully destroyed her one true hope of happiness. And she did not know how much will power it took for him not to bundle her into a cloak and carry her off to the Priory.

The gulf between them was vast.

‘What do you want me to say?’ the Viscount demanded of his mother. ‘You know the situation! When I forced the issue I could not get through to her. It was as if there was
an unbridgeable chasm, with the bodies of Gilliver and Richard between us. And since then she refuses to see me. Even to open the door. I have been to Widemarsh three times since, but short of battering down the door I cannot force her to come out. I will admit that I am tempted to do just that. God save me from stubborn females—and managing ones!’ He returned his mother’s placid smile of triumph with a wry grimace.

‘Is there nothing you can do? She is probably as unhappy as you are.’

‘Unhappy! Ha! You do not know the half of it!’ He surged to his feet again and took a hasty turn about the library. ‘Short of standing on the gravel beneath her window and shouting my requests for all the world to hear, I can do nothing. What is she thinking? Is she able to sleep? Is she eating?’ As he turned to look at his mother, hands clenched in frustration, she realised the true depth of his concern and impatience at his forced inaction. ‘I feel helpless!’

‘She is hurt. Do you remember her words as she ran from the room?’

‘Of course I do. They are engraved on my soul.’ He turned his back on her. ‘And the horror in her eyes when she looked at me with Richard’s blood on my sword.’

There is so much blood. I cannot bear it!

‘And so she sees her cousin’s blood on
my
hands,’ he continued, spine held rigid beneath the soft velvet coat.
‘This is no basis for marriage. Her husband guilty of killing the man she loved.’

‘Marcus—’ Elizabeth’s voice might be gentle, but the tone was strong with conviction ‘—Kate did not love Richard.’

‘No?’ His tone was bleak. ‘Probably not. But his blood is still on my hands.’

‘She told me that she did not. Affection, yes. Family loyalties, of course. And a lifetime of upbringing when they saw much of each other. She thought she did—I believe it was a strong case of hero worship—but it is many weeks since she believed that she loved him.’

‘How can I know that?’ He could barely disguise the hint of desperation as he raised his eyes to his mother’s. ‘How can I know what to do?’

‘Don’t forget, Marcus, she deliberately destroyed her father’s will. If she had wanted Richard, wanted her father’s wishes to be carried out, why not simply hand the document over to Simon as he demanded? She had the choice, and chose not to, but to destroy it.’

‘Yes. Of course.’ He sat again, some semblance of calm restored. ‘It breaks my heart to think of her alone at Widemarsh.’ Their eyes met and held. He remembered Kate’s recognition of Elizabeth’s grace and generosity in spite of all she suffered. And marvelled at it.

‘Do you want me to interfere?’ Elizabeth asked finally. Anything to heal the hurt buried beneath her son’s carefully controlled features.

‘What’s this? Are you asking for permission?’ His smile at last was one of genuine amusement. ‘I do not believe it!’

‘Of course. I have an idea.’