The Ghost and Jacob Moorhead (4 page)

“No one would believe me if I told them you visit me in this fashion.” Jenna smiled.

Oh
,
I don
’
t know
.
It seems Jacob can hear me
.
He doesn
’
t believe it is me
,
of course
,
but he does hear me
.
It is quite humorous
,
that faint edge of fear it rouses in him
—
but that
’
s mostly because he thinks he
’
s on the verge of being taken off to Bedlam
.
Hearing voices
,
you know
,
is not a good sign
.
I think
, he said, suppressing a smile,
that just perhaps that will be all that is needed to take care of one of my grandnephew
’
s problems
.

“And that is?” The housekeeper edged her hand along the covers. Melton moved his closer to it.

His drinking
.
He
’
s concluded he
’
s been drinking too much
.
Which
,
of course
,
he has
,
but not to the point he
’
s hearing things
.

They stared at their two hands, the one showing a few age spots, the other a shadowy, not quite solid but stronger-looking and longer-fingered, a more masculine hand. They each sighed and then looked at each other. “I do wish I could feel you as well as see and talk to you. I miss…our loving,” said Honey Jennings. The name had been given her at birth but no one still living knew it. His lordship did but of course he didn’t exactly
live
. Not as in live and breathe…

So do I wish it
,
Honey
.
Oh
,
my love
… He sighed.
But it isn
’
t your time
.
And I
’
ve an eternity of time now
.
Waiting for you
…
Well
,
I am glad we can at least discuss our problems
.

“I’ve a new one, you know. Your granddaughter must be chaperoned if he is to live here.”

Mel chuckled, a rather hollow sound but very pleasant. “My grandnephew agrees. He has sent for Mary.”

Honey Jennings relaxed. She moved her hand just a trifle nearer his, felt the ghostly chill they’d discovered she could not tolerate and edged it back again. “Will it be long before I come to you?” she asked after a moment and with a touch of longing.

I don
’
t know
,
my dear
.
I only know it is not yet
,
that there are things you must do
.
But I want you to listen to Jacob when he suggests you retire
,
which he means to do and then you are to help chaperon Verity
.
Verity needs you
—
but you do not need the work and worry and
,
now I
’
m dead
,
I
’
m going to insist
,
as I should have done after my wife died
,
that you give up this nonsense of being merely the housekeeper
.

“Your neighbors will have a fit.” There was a pettish note in that. It was an old argument, after all. “Worse, they may ostracize my
niece
Verity when they won’t your
granddaughter
Verity.”

Mary and Jacob will see that doesn
’
t happen
.
You
’
ve been very ill
,
Honey
.
I want you to do whatever is necessary to recover your old health
—
and not squander it in worrying about running this household
. He grinned a rather sly grin.
Instead
,
you can squander it worrying about Verity and Jacob
.

She lifted her eyes to meet his gaze. “Verity…and Jacob,” she repeated, her tone flat.

I want them married
.

“I…don’t think that’s a good idea.” Again her voice had that flat note it got when she knew she was going to disagree with him.

He
’
ll change
,
Honey
.
Lose any rakish tendencies he may have and he
’
ll stop drinking
.
Don
’
t worry about all that
.
They
’
ll fall in love and they
’
ll wed and they
’
ll live here and fill the nursery with children
,
with laughter and love and
…
and all those things that have been missing at High Moor for so long
.

I didn
’
t mean that
, she thought. “You know I didn’t mean his
character
,” she said and followed it immediately with, “Besides, just whose fault was it that no one used the nurseries?”

Mine
.
All mine
.
Me and my temper
. He shook his head sadly.
Even when his older brother died and I reinstated him
,
my younger son wouldn
’
t come home
.
Except the occasional short visit
.
He resented my attitude toward his wife
…

“Mine too,” she said quickly and reached her fingers to touch the back of his hand and then, the cold spilling into her, jerking away. “Oh, Mel, it was so bad of us to disapprove that marriage. They loved each other and neither of us was willing to admit it, saw only the misalliance of it.” She sighed, a sad sound.

It was a misalliance
,
love
,
but it was also
,
from everything I could discover
,
a very happy marriage
.
We must remember that
.

“But if your son and my sister hadn’t…” She paused, drew in a breath, tried again. “If they hadn’t
resented
our attitude, they’d have come home when your elder son died, they’d have been
here
and not romping around in those blasted Swiss mountains and…” Tears welled and spilled down Honey’s faintly lined cheeks.

And they
’
d be alive
, he finished for her, speaking softly. He started to reach a comforting hand for hers but drew back as he remembered they could not touch. Or they
could
but it would not be at all comforting for Honey… Merely cold. Cold as the grave…

Chapter Three

It wasn’t until the next morning that Verity knew that Jacob Moorhead had not slept in his bed and was nowhere to be found. Yesterday, she’d been angry when Jacob had not appeared for tea with her aunt. Then, later, she’d shrugged when he’d not come to supper. He was a man after all and, according to rumor, a rake, a wild spirit, probably a gambler as well. He couldn’t be expected to enjoy a tame existence at High Moor, which lacked equally wild friends and women and…and whatever.

I can
’
t be expected to know all he misses
,
can I
?

But, if truth be told, she’d felt more than anger when he hadn’t come at teatime as he’d promised Aunt Jenna. She’d felt restless for reasons she couldn’t understand. Or
refused
to understand? She swept that thought from her mind. In any case, she’d wandered the house for hours. Finally, tired, she’d locked both her bedroom doors and, much in need of a nap, fell into a restless doze, which turned into much-needed and very deep sleep.

When she rose the next morning she was forced to change from the rumpled gown in which she’d slept the night through. She entered the hall where an upper-housemaid informed her Jacob’s bed had not been slept in. She frowned and thought for a moment before sending a footman to the stables to ask if Jacob’s horse had returned. When word returned that it had not, she frowned in earnest and sent for the butler.

“A search must be organized. I don’t know this region so cannot do it, but if my grandfather’s heir to this estate is lying somewhere, hurt or worse, he must be found. You must see to it, Reading.”

Something well over an hour later, Jacob stalked into the house and yelled for Verity. “What the devil do you mean by it?” he demanded when she appeared.

“Mean by what?”

“By embarrassing me to death,” he said, growling out the words.

“And just how did I embarrass you?”

“Demanding I be searched for like a little boy who has run off and gotten lost, that’s how.”

As angry then as he, she demanded, “Your horse didn’t come home last night. Was I to leave you lying somewhere out in the hills, a bone broken or your skull cracked and do nothing?”

He opened his mouth to retort and then shut it. “Oh.”

She blinked. “Is that all you have to say?”

His eyes narrowed. “If you expect an apology, you won’t get it. I will, however, admit that I should have sent Reading a message.”

Verity opened her mouth to demand he tell her where he’d got to, but then realized it was not her place.
Not at all
.
However curious I am
,
I cannot ask
.

He was, as he’d already pointed out, fully adult. He was also a man who liked women. It would be unwise, if nothing else, to ask him where he’d been when it should be obvious, even to someone who was supposed to be naïvely innocent and unaware of such things,
exactly
where he’d spent the night. Or if not
where
, exactly, then that he’d spent it in some female’s bed…

“Since I’m here,” he said, breaking into her thoughts, “I’ll have George pack a box with the bits and pieces I’ll need in the next few days and have Reading send him and it over to the village inn.”

“You were…at the
inn
?” The inn where Aunt Jenna had said he must go? Verity stiffened and turned away. “I told my aunt. I told her!”

“Told her what?” he asked, his foot on the first step and his hand on the newel post.

“That I must leave. It is
my
place to go, not yours.” She swung around. “You belong here. I’m the interloper.”

“And here I’ve been worrying that
I
’
m
the trespasser.” He grinned but sobered when she only frowned more fiercely. “It is only for a few days, my dear, and then your Aunt Mary will be here to play propriety and all will be well.”

“My Aunt Mary… The explorer? That Aunt Mary?”

“Have you so many?” he asked. She merely glowered. “But yes, that Aunt Mary, you idiot child.”

“I’m not an idiot,” she said absently. “Or a child… Aunt Mary… She visited us in Italy. I told you, didn’t I?”

“She must have been the only one of our relatives who did.” Suddenly concerned, he asked, “You didn’t lie, did you? You
did
like her?”

Verity’s eyes lit up. “Very much. But is she not off on another of her travels?”

“I think she’s pretty much given up exotic foreign travel. At least when I visited her not long ago she had no plans, although I think she wasn’t entirely happy about that.” He frowned. “I’m not certain why…” The frown faded and a rather sardonic smile appeared. “But I’ll admit I’m glad she is home because we need her. Now, if you’ll excuse me—or even if you’ll not—I’ll just go up and order packed what I’ll need until she gets here.” He rubbed his chin and grimaced. “If nothing else I’d like my own razors.” He took the stairs two at a time and disappeared down the hall toward his room.

His room—with hers just across the hall.

“Blast Aunt Jenna anyway,” muttered Verity. “If she’d allowed me to make use of the day bed in the housekeeper’s suite, there wouldn’t be this problem.” She turned on her heel to go have a word with Cook about meals while Jacob was gone. “If she had allowed me to share her rooms, I’d
be
the servant I should be and not the neither-nor thing I am and no one would have a word to say about whether he slept under the same roof as I did.”

* * * * *

Lady Mary Tomlinson lolled on her chaise, one knee bent in a most unladylike manner, the other leg crossed over it. She held a small dark cigarillo away from her face as she reread the short missive from Jacob Moorhead. “Verity? Orphaned? Living half-servant, half-daughter of the house…and much in need of a chaperon?”

Lady Mary suddenly felt more alive than in a very long time. She grinned—another rather unladylike character trait. Enjoying a few more puffs on the cigarillo, she stared at the ceiling and plotted. And then she frowned. “The relationship…might it be a bit close? But no. Father’s sister-in-law strayed and Jacob’s mother’s real father is quite obvious, the two being as alike as two peas in a pod. Jacob, therefore, is not much of a real relation at all and, even if he were, as a second or third cousin or whatever it is, he’s far enough removed.”

She dropped the cigar into the big brass urn that stood for that very purpose by her couch. Rising to her feet in a rolling manner others her age would envy, she raised her voice to a dull roar. “Rube! Where are you? I need you.”

A stately looking man, wearing eyeglasses and his head bound in a smallish, crisply folded, gold
lamé
turban, stalked into the room frowning. “Yes, madam?” he asked coldly. His hands were gloved and in one he held a tall candlestick, in the other a polishing cloth. “You barked?”

“I did not. I only… Oh well, maybe I did. We leave for my father’s northernmost estate early tomorrow. See to it.”

“High Moor Hall?” His brows arched up his dark forehead and the scowl deepened. “
Tomorrow
, madam?”

“Oh, come down off your high horse. I am needed there. I’ll leave with no more than what I need for a few days while you finish here and follow with the rest. Will that satisfy your majesty?”

The prince, for that was what he was among his own people, stared down his long narrow nose.

“Well?”

He sighed. “Mary, you know I cannot allow you to go off on your own. Alone. Without me. You know…”

“I know.” She sighed, looking at a distant prospect no one else could see. “I also know no one has attempted to kill me for upward of two years now. They’ve given up, Rube. Why can you not see that?”

“They haven’t. There have been the…messages. Besides, I know the man.” Rube’s jaw jutted in a stubborn fashion. “He will
not
give up. I
know
.” There was intensity to the low rumbling voice that etched up Mary’s spine. The two stared at each other.

Finally Lady Mary sighed. “Very well,” she said. “When
can
we leave?”

Suddenly white teeth flashed against his darkly golden skin. “Tomorrow?” Before she could express the irritation following the shock of his conceding to her wishes, he added, “I’ve changed my mind. We’ll steal away early before those who watch you are up and around. They’ll be some time discovering we are gone.”

Mary sighed. “I wish I understood why that high muckamuck fixed on me in his grief, wanting revenge for his loss. And to such a degree he is determined to do me in, in the worst fashion he can devise.” She met Rube’s eyes. “I can never thank you for rescuing me as you did.”

His skin took on a rosy red-gold glow. “You saved my mother, did you not? How could my family not repay that debt?”

“But saving your mother involved no more than a few days by her sickbed. You have been at
my
side for nearly three years and there is no end in sight. Your father must wish your return.”

“My father has other sons. I am not needed. He knows and approves that I will protect you to the end of my life if it is necessary,” he said softly. “Now,” he continued, his voice returning to its normal tones, “I’ve much to do if we are to set out early tomorrow morning. Before daylight if possible,” he added, giving her a stern look.

“Yes, before my enemies are up and around and know what we are about. Perhaps they’ll not immediately learn we’ve gone and then there’d be time before they learn
where
we’ve gone.” She brightened. “A bit of peace,” she said and, wistfully, added, “I’ll like that.”

“Peace for you perhaps,” he said indulgently. “
I
must be ever-vigilant.”

He stalked off to give orders to various servants—servants chosen with care for their honesty, their strength of character and their loyalty to Lady Mary. He replaced the candlesticks he’d been polishing in the hidden safe with her ladyship’s other valuables and made certain it was locked and well hidden behind the paneling. The old, easily entered safe was moved back in front of the real one and, as usual, stocked with far less valuable items, but enough that a common housebreaker would be satisfied.

He went to his own suite of rooms and packed what he’d take, including several items of which Lady Mary would not have approved, assuming she’d known of their existence. He grinned. Her ladyship had been so pleased when she’d converted him to her religion. He’d not hurt her feelings by informing her it was not
entirely
true…

* * * * *

“Whist?” The widowed lady with whom Melissa Rumford spoke looked wistful. The two widows had met in London’s Green Park near the old icehouse after an exchange of notes. “If only I dared. It would be great fun, would it not?”

Melissa had chosen carefully. Lady Merriweather was known to be an avid gambler and her recent widowhood, forcing her away from locations where one might find a game, leaving her open to Melissa’s suggestions for their entertainment.

“But wouldn’t it be wrong?” asked the lady.

“I thought perhaps if only widows played? Just four of us, you know? We who cannot with propriety go into public might meet in our own homes for an afternoon’s quiet entertainment and would hurt no one, nor contravene the prohibitions that say we must not enter society for a time.” She named two other slightly less recently widowed ladies. “Do you know them?” she asked.

“Oh yes. Lady Alice and I have been friends forever and we are both acquainted with Lady Fredericka.” Lady Merriweather adopted a wistful look. “Oh, if only we could. I am so
bored
.”

“So am I,” said Melissa and heaved her very best sigh. After a moment she added, “Why do you not ask Lady Alice what she thinks? If she agrees, perhaps you could approach Lady Freddy?”

“Oh!” Lady Merriweather’s shrill trill of laughter lifted into the air. “You must not call her that, you know. I am told she dislikes it excessively.”

“Does she? I will remember. It is only that Fredericka is such a mouthful.” Having achieved her goal, Melissa wished the interview ended. On the other hand, she couldn’t very well simply walk off and leave a woman she’d invited for a stroll. “Shall we see if the dairymaids are behaving as they should and watching over their milk cows?” she asked, not knowing what else they might do.

“One should, I suppose,” said the other but sounded a trifle doubtful. “One buys from them a glass of fresh milk, does one not? It is their means of earning a living, I believe?”

“I suppose one
should
order a glassful but I cannot bear to drink the stuff, can you?” The two exchanged a look of understanding. Melissa brightened. “Ah! Are there not usually a few ragtag boys about? Surely they will drink it if one offers it to them.”

“Charity? Yes, that is always good…”

Melissa, who was not known for her charity, blandly agreed that that was what she meant. She wondered if she could bear Lady Merriweather’s inane chatter for whatever period of time they must remain together. At least the woman shut her mouth when she played cards. Melissa yearned for a game almost to the degree her dupe did. Actually she yearned for anything that would break the tedium of her days while she was forced to maintain a pretense of mourning for the brute she’d been so
very
glad to be rid of.