Shadows in Scarlet (37 page)

"Good,” Amanda told him.

"You said something about a bath, Mr. Grant. Malcolm."

"By all means. Collect your luggage and I'll show you to a room."

Norah came back inside, cheeks pink, just as they were starting up the stairs. “Did you sort it with Mrs. Chancellor, then?"

"Oh, yeah,” Amanda told her. “Everything's okay."

"Good.” Norah nodded at the row of artifacts. “I'll find packing material for this lot."

"Thanks.” She owed Norah. Did she ever owe Norah.

Wayne and Malcolm had gotten ahead of her. Amanda caught up with them in front of the row of portraits on the landing. “There's the original o’ your mum's miniature,” Malcolm was saying.

"So that's the rest of James,” Wayne returned. “He looks better with his skin on. What was all that about his ghost?"

"His ghost was at Melrose,” explained Amanda. “Now it's here."

"Okay,” Wayne said indulgently, with a glance at Malcolm that seemed to say,
you work fast, don't you?

And she'd thought Wayne would be the only person who'd believe her, Amanda told herself. Her batting average was going from bad to worse.

"That's James's cousin Archibald,” Malcolm went on, “who inherited the estate when he died. And Archibald's wife Isabel."

Wayne considered the other two portraits. “Archibald looks like Page, doesn't he? A nice solid citizen."

He trudged on up the staircase, Malcolm herding him from behind. Of course, Amanda told herself, a home run with Malcolm would skew the stats to her side, no doubt about it.

She frowned up at Archibald's portrait. No, he didn't look like Page. He looked like Wayne, with the broad forehead, the heavy jaw, and the general air of constipation—which in Archibald came across as complacency but in Wayne as anxiety. She'd been trying so hard the last few days not to think about Wayne she hadn't noticed that he looked just about as much like Archibald as Malcolm looked like James.
Weird.
But then, there were only so many faces and body types to go around.

The men disappeared around the curve of the steps. Amanda went into the library. She turned on all the lights and the electric fire, but still shadows crammed the corners. Cerberus came ambling forward, whining and wagging his tail hopefully. “I know, I know,” she told him, “you were minding your own business and this crazy American dumps a ghost on you."

The wagging tail changed rhythm. Good. Like Malcolm, he was okay with the issues. Not that the issues were in the least okay. She sat down with her references, gripping her pencil like a sword.

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The library windows might have been those of a submarine, streaked with damp, gray and sullen. The sound of the rain ebbed and flooded like the tide. When Malcolm showed up he peered resignedly outside, gave Amanda a quick kiss, and sat down at his computer. Cerberus stretched out before the electric fire, his chin resting between his paws.

Amanda tried to focus on her work, choosing which pages of Archibald's memoirs to actually copy and which to summarize, but she felt twitchy. The walls really did have eyes. Somewhere in the house doors opened and shut. The telephone rang. Maybe Wayne had drowned in the bathtub—he didn't reappear.

For a time the room was quiet, the only sound the occasional chirp of Malcolm's computer. Then the notes of the tin whistle floated through the air, snatches of melody mixed with contemplative trills. Yes, Amanda thought, Malcolm had a versatile tongue. She gave up any hope of concentrating and put the papers back in the cabinet. “How about a walk?"

"It's teemin’ doon ootside,” he returned. “But we can have a dander roond the house."

Cerberus leaped to his feet, ready to go. Malcolm and Amanda secured the electrical gear and headed out, up the flights of steps, past the blocked-off doors, and down the dead-end hallways that testified to each generation's bright ideas in home improvement. Along the way they rooted through drawers and cupboards, turning up everything from rusted agricultural equipment to crumbling butterfly collections. They didn't really expect to find the sword and the scabbard. Even in the cellar, a damp and dark but thoroughly clean stone box, there was no trace of James. Still, as afternoon darkened into night, Amanda was sure she was sensing his presence.
My sweet, my own.

She and Malcolm strolled into the great hall. Amanda inspected the tapestry, wondering if she could duplicate such an intricate pattern in 14-count needlepoint. She looked up at the pikes, halberds, and muskets fanned out on the walls and remembered what Carrie had said about her own tours of Great Britain:
All those old houses have enough weaponry stuck on the walls to supply a good-sized army.

But the sword and its scabbard weren't hidden in plain sight. “I keep expecting James to jump out and say ‘gotcha.’ Or, ‘unhand that damsel, you knave.’ Whatever."

"So do I,” Malcolm returned. “But you're no callin’ him any more, are you?"

"No way.” She heard a mocking echo of her own voice,
with me you're strong.
“Maybe when I leave he'll leave—no, he has the sword back, doesn't he? He may not need me any more. And I sure don't want to go away and leave you with a freaked-out ghost.”
I don't want to leave you.
But she didn't have to say that.

"What matters noo,” Malcolm said, “is findin’ a way to turf him oot."

"To get rid of him? Or to help him rest?"

"However you're wantin’ to say it."

Maybe she still felt some furtive sympathy for James, the little kid camouflaging his weaknesses with bravado.... Like she hadn't had a damn good chance to notice he was a grown man? “He needs to go away. Absolutely. Got any ideas?"

"Oh aye, that I do,” Malcolm said with a nod. “I agree James's energy's in his scabbard noo, but I'm wonderin', even so—if it was you made him strong, then it could be his fate's in your hands."

"In my ... You think that just by telling him to go I can send him away?"

"I dinna ken, lass, but it'd make a gey interestin’ exercise in positive thinkin', eh?"

"Yeah, I guess so,” Amanda said. But she wasn't putting much trust in her thinking skills. She'd made a habit recently of forcing illusionary square pegs into the round holes of reality. She'd been wrong about James, the Grants, even Wayne. And she still couldn't get a handle on Cynthia, the fairy godmother from hell.

That image made her smile. So did Cerberus, sitting on the floor between them and watching their conversation like he was watching a tennis match. “My emotions aren't jet-lagged or anything,” she admitted.

"Mine too, and I've no even gone travelin'.” Malcolm angled his forehead so that it touched Amanda's. “Which disna mean I'd no consider a spot o’ travelin'—a bit o’ research into historic property management."

The regimental flags ranked high overhead waved in a breeze. A cold breeze, that trailed icy fingers through the roots of Amanda's hair. The tapestry billowed from the wall and settled back again. Cerberus cringed.

"Stuff that for a game of soldiers,” stated Malcolm. “Come along, let's see what Mum did wi’ Wayne's ill-gotten gains."

Yeah, right, James. Like I'm really going to get off on a supernatural stalker.
Her lips crimped, Amanda walked beside Malcolm and almost on top of the dog down to the dining room. Tidy cardboard and tissue paper packages were arranged along the sideboard. Norah was like Cynthia in one way, Amanda thought. She did things up right.

Amanda followed Malcolm into the kitchen, where they built sandwiches, fried chips, and brewed tea. Each with a tray, they went back up the stairs to the sitting room.

Norah was seated with Denis on her lap, Margaret tucked in beside her, and Wayne ensconced in an easy chair nearby. The television was tuned to a cricket match. “Lovely, very good of you,” Norah said when she saw the food, and added, “Irene rang. They'll be spending the night with Marie."

"There's no need for them to be drivin’ in the rain and dark,” Malcolm agreed, and made room on the coffee table for the trays.

Cerberus trotted over to Wayne and fixed him with an adoring expression. Wayne's expression was a lot less depressed than Amanda would have thought, considering. Norah probably had been doing some counseling. If she could raise a fully integrated male like Malcolm, she could rein in some of Wayne's galloping insecurities.

The four humans and three animals were barely finished with their supper before the footsteps began, steady steps that marched across the floor of the great hall below like those of a sentry guarding his post.

Cerberus hurled himself onto Malcolm's feet. The cats did their vanishing act. Norah, Malcolm, and Amanda shared a glance that was part cautious, part exasperated. Wayne muttered, “Yeah, we used to hear funny noises at Melrose when I was a kid, tree branches and stuff like that."

His equivalent of Morag. Once again Amanda tried some consciousness-raising. “It's the ghost of James Grant, Wayne, like we told you earlier. He's not a happy camper."

"After camping out at Melrose for two hundred years, I'd guess not.” Wayne chuckled at his joke. The others managed to contain their amusement. “Malcolm, Lady Norah, I really appreciate the hospitality, but I'm bushed. A plastic couch at the airport isn't nearly as nice a bed as the one you've given me upstairs. Do you mind if I go ahead and climb into it?"

Norah made a gracious gesture toward the doorway. “Good night,” everyone chorused.

Wayne's plodding steps receded down the hall and disappeared. The crisp steps below stopped. A door opened and shut. Amanda held her breath, waiting for Wayne to come racing back babbling about scarlet coats and swords, but no, he'd passed unscathed. Something about fools rushing in, probably.

"Well then,” said Norah, “I think we should leave the dishes ‘til the morn. I'm taking a book to my room. Good night.” She left with a smile.

If she'd seen Norah and Denny at the ceilidh, Amanda told herself, Norah had seen her and Malcolm. Not that now was the time or the place to get closer. Malcolm sat at the far end of the couch, tense as a twelve-year-old at his first boy-girl party. The electronic laughter of a televised game show couldn't penetrate the hush of the house. After a while Amanda realized she was holding her breath. “This is ridiculous."

"Oh aye,” Malcolm agreed.

Footsteps rang on the staircase, not growing louder and louder but starting suddenly out of nothing. A tearing, ripping sound followed by a crash reverberated through the corridor.

Sharing a dubious look, Amanda and Malcolm crept down the steps to the landing outside the great hall. Where they found Archibald's portrait lying across the angle of floor and wall, its gilt frame twisted. A vicious slash had turned his prim expression into a scream and eviscerated his ample chest. The edges of the canvas waved faintly in a cold draft that seemed to blow less from the ground floor than from the grave.

"Bugger it,” said Malcolm.

Amanda scowled up at James's portrait, at his self-satisfied smile, at his hand resting on the hilt of his sword. “Are you happy now?” she asked.

"I'd no make book on it.” Malcolm propped up the painting, trying to straighten its twisted frame. “Another job for the restorer in Edinburgh, right enough. The man's a bull in a china shop."

He meant James, not the restorer. “Maybe he's finished his search and destroy mission for the day."

"One way or the other, we'll be layin’ doon some plans the morn.” Defiantly Malcolm put his arm around Amanda's shoulders and walked her to her room. “Would you like me to sleep on the floor, to keep you company?"

"He'd love that."

"Like wavin’ a red flag afore his nose? All right, then, but give a shout if he comes courtin'. He needs a lesson in manners.” They indulged in one kiss, a wary look up and down the corridor, and then another. “Good night."

"Watch your back,” Amanda told him, and went into her room. There was another evening gone of the precious few remaining, damn it all anyway.

Her cosmetics lay scattered across the dressing table, eye shadow crumbled over the starched linen mat, lipstick a gory gash across the mirror. In the bathroom the flowers were not only beheaded but crushed into the tile floor.
Oh shit.

A cold gust of wind chilled her to the bone. She spun around.

"Amanda, Sweeting,” James said. “Were your words of love but lies?"

She'd never seen him like this, dream distorted into nightmare. His eyes were hard and cold as marble. His mouth was set in so determined a line she suspected he was trying to keep it from quivering, either with rage or hurt or some explosive combination of the two.

His hand rested on the hilt of the sword. The genuine sword, its brass hilt catching and shading the light as his hand, as his entire body, did not. Of course the real sword fit the undamaged memory of the scabbard, and yet.... She squinted. Yes, the twisted and time-abraded scabbard hung partly over and partly under its smooth twin, making a weird double image.

"My sweet, would you betray me?"

"No,” Amanda returned. “You weren't exactly honest with me, were you?"

"Fie, madam! How dare you judge my account of such weighty matters as my very death!” He stepped toward her. The light bled from the not quite solid scarlet of his coat.

She stood her ground. If only his eyes weren't so hurt. He made her feel she'd done him wrong. He made her feel sorry for him.

"I had thought you different from the others of your sex. I had thought you not fickle but faithful. But no. You are but a strumpet, a trollop, spreading your legs for any man with the words to woo and the coin to pay."

"Oh, for the love of ... Come off it, James. I never lied to you. Yes, I told you I loved you. I got carried away. I'm sorry. But you took my feelings for you and stomped on them. If that's not betrayal, what is?"

His pain seared into anger. His lip curled. “You speak of love, do you? So did Clytemnestra love Agamemnon. So did Medea love her sons by Jason. Love, in a woman's voice, is nothing but an infernal lie."

"It is? Is that why I did what you asked me to? I brought you home. I gave you back your sword. I warned you back in Virginia you couldn't get revenge against Archibald, but I promised to tell your story. And I did, damn it, I did."