The Other Countess (30 page)

‘What!’ Will’s world shook in a late shockwave from the blast.

‘Sir Arthur Hutton?’ Jane’s face had gone very pale.

‘Aye, that’s the man. Blew himself to pieces, they say. No sign of him. Left Walsingham high and dry because he’d invented this grand formula for explosives then died before he could record it. Very frustrating.’

‘And his daughter?’

Wetherby looked puzzled. ‘A daughter is it? That explains why Henry hared off to the grieving family’s side.’ He chuckled. ‘You mustn’t worry about her: I expect someone will step in to see the lass is provided for.’

Will was desperate to leave. He was standing here playing the dutiful suitor while across the river the wolves were circling Ellie. He had to find out for himself if she was safe. He turned to make his excuses to Jane, only to find her already moving to the door.

‘I must go to my friend, Father,’ she said brusquely.

Lord Wetherby stood in her path. ‘Nay, Jane, you stay here. Whatever this girl was in the past to you, she is quite out of your reach now. Your brother …’ He changed his mind about what he would say, settling for something less direct. ‘You don’t understand these things but from now on, it won’t be
decent for you to be seen with her. Your future husband, I’m sure, would not approve.’

Will moved to Jane’s side swiftly, tucking her hand in the crook of his elbow. ‘On the contrary, Lord Wetherby, Lady Eleanor is an entirely suitable companion for my wife. Henry won’t find the welcome from her that you anticipate.’

‘Nonsense! From the hints he let drop the girl will have no choice but accept a protector – no money, no family.’

‘But she has friends. Come, lady, I’ll escort you to the Tower and see what can be done.’ Will raised an imperious brow at Lord Wetherby. ‘If you have no objections, sir?’

‘Humph! I suppose not. You’re soon to have the responsibility for her so I suppose you might as well start now. But if you’re wrong about the Hutton girl, you will bring my Jane back immediately and cut all contact between them.’

‘I’m not wrong, sir.’

‘We’ll see. You may know the lady, but you don’t know my son. He can be very persuasive.’

Ellie’s last task for her father was to pack away his notebooks and writings in a large trunk for dispatch to Oxford. The apartment was no longer hers to stay in so she had to clear their things. She could not keep much where she was going and he had spoken of acquaintances in New College so she was sending the papers there. That would please him, she thought: his work given respectful consideration by his fellow scholars.

Her hand hovered over the notebook he was using on the day of his death. Grief swamped her and she lost track of what she was about.

He was dead. The worst of it was she kept forgetting, thinking
him still just in the next room. People who had lost a limb said they could still feel it – that was what it was like, a phantom presence of completeness.

‘
Señor Jesucristo, sálvam
e,’ she whispered, stroking the calfskin binding on the notebook.

A tapping at the door disturbed her from her prayers. She looked up to see Sir Henry Perceval standing there, his face solemn but his eyes sharp, assessing her circumstances in one glance.

‘My poor Lady Eleanor,’ he began, ‘I cannot tell you how sorrowful I was to hear of your loss.’

Ellie struggled to her feet, clutching the notebook in front of her like a shield. He was the last person she wanted to see.

‘Sir Henry.’

‘The warder told me you were to be found here. He said you were quite prostrate with grief.’

Words felt like stones in her throat. ‘It is hard, sir.’

‘Yes, I know, sweeting, so hard, so unfair. Your father died in the service of our country and yet you are to be put out of your lodgings here.’ He took a turn about the room, picking up books at random, muddling the piles she had spent the morning organizing so carefully.

‘They are required for another, sir.’

‘And you? What is to become of you now?’

Ellie had plans, but Sir Henry was not to know them. ‘I’m going away, sir.’

He stopped, put down the book he was holding, and closed the distance between them. ‘Lady Ellie, you must know why I’ve come.’

She took a step away, recalling her previous horrible
encounters with him and determined not to get trapped again. ‘Sir, I do not want to hear this.’

‘But you must listen to me. I offer you so much – you can barely conceive of the comforts I can give you, the pleasure we can take together. Dorset can’t do a fraction of what I can.’

‘Dorset?’ squeaked Ellie in surprise.

Henry smiled sardonically. ‘I know you’ve been his lover, sweeting. I’d prefer it otherwise, but I am a man of the world and can overlook your lapse.’

‘He was not my lover!’

He cupped her cheek in his palm. ‘So sweet, you almost make me believe in your innocence.’

‘I’m untouched, sir!’ she declared hotly, though why she was bothering to defend herself to him when she should be running, she could not fathom.

‘We’ll see, won’t we?’

She batted his hand away with the notebook. ‘No, we will not. Go away, sir. I don’t want or need your offers of protection.’

‘Oh, but you do.’

He made a grab for her arm, but Ellie was too quick. She threw the book at his face then snatched up a glass alembic from the workbench and tossed it over her shoulder. It shattered on the wall behind him. ‘Just leave me alone!’ Brass scales came next, then a pair of tongs. Henry ducked the bombardment and even had the nerve to laugh at her.

‘Ellie! Ellie! You are magnificent!’ he declared. ‘Such passion! Such fire!’

It was too much – on top of the loss of her father to have this … this vile beast stalk her.

‘
Dios y sus ángeles!
I hate you!’

A pipette bounced off his forehead, spraying him with mercury.

‘Come back, sweeting!’

A vial of some unidentified liquid exploded as she chucked it in his direction, spattering him with glass splinters. Taking advantage of the distraction, she reached the door, stumbled down the steps and fled. Her plans to leave had been brought abruptly forward. She was not going to stay in the same city as Henry a moment longer.

Will, James and Lady Jane arrived at the Tower to find Henry sitting among the ruins of what looked like numerous glass instruments and odd-shaped brass objects. He was thumbing through a book, dabbing at a cut on his cheek with a handkerchief.

‘What happened here?’ Jane asked.

Her brother looked up, showing no surprise to see them at the door. ‘Lady Eleanor has a temper.’

Will barely restrained his urge to plant a fist in Henry’s face. James put a hand on his arm.

‘Let’s find out where she is first,’ James said in a low voice.

‘And where is she now?’ Jane made the enquiry for him.

Henry shrugged. ‘Ran off after smashing her father’s instruments. I’m waiting for her to come back.’ He flipped through the pages of the notebook. ‘You know, Sir Arthur really was quite mad – this is all nonsense. He repeats the same experiments several times and doesn’t even notice.’

‘What did you say to her, Henry?’ Jane asked coolly, picking her way through the glass shards.

‘I offered her a shoulder to cry on.’

‘And?’

Henry glanced awkwardly at Will. ‘I say, Janie, I don’t think I can talk about such things to you.’

‘I’m not stupid, Henry: you asked her to be your mistress and this was her answer.’ Jane ground a piece of glass under her toe.

Henry gave a self-mocking laugh. ‘You know something, Janie, I don’t think she likes me very much.’

‘Only just realized, have you?’

‘She likes someone else.’ Henry smirked at Will.

‘Don’t think in your anger with her you can make trouble between Dorset and me, Henry. I already know that Lady Eleanor and he hold each other in great affection.’

With an evil glint in his eye, Henry beckoned her closer and bent his mouth to her ear. ‘And did you know that they were lovers?’

Jane reared back and slapped his face. ‘That is for my friend.’ She held up a palm to stop Will advancing on Henry. ‘He does this to torment you, my lord. Pray do not give him the satisfaction of provoking you.’

Henry rubbed his cheek. ‘See what you’re getting, my lord? She seems so meek and mild, doesn’t she? But that’s all show. She isn’t what you think she is.’

Impressed by her spirit, Will gave Jane his first genuine smile and kissed the reddened palm of her hand. ‘No, she isn’t. I think she’s quite splendid. Come, my lady, let’s go seek our friend.’

The warder’s wife greeted them in her parlour. Her kindly face was troubled, but she was obviously struggling to hide her upset.

‘The Lady Eleanor? I’m afraid you’re too late, my lord. She
took a boat up the river but an hour since, leaving instructions for her father’s things to be sent on to Oxford.’

Will’s alarm rocketed. To run off with the packing half done, Ellie must have been sincerely scared by Henry’s actions. The man must not have told them the whole truth about what had happened. Will resolved to go back and teach him a lesson, then go fetch the silly girl and keep her safe as she should’ve been from the start!

Calmer than him, Jane asked all the questions he should have thought to put to the lady. ‘Did she say where she was going, ma’am?’ Jane asked.

‘Yes, my lady. She said something about relatives in Gloucestershire. She’d intended to wait until she received an answer to her letter, but then announced suddenly that she had to leave immediately.’ The warder’s wife wrung her hands. ‘She wouldn’t listen to reason; I fear her loss has overset her.’

Jane glanced at Will, her look asking if he knew anything about these relatives, but he had no more knowledge than she did of Ellie’s wider family.

‘And do you know where they live?’ Jane enquired.

The lady shook her head and Will’s hopes plummeted. ‘But my husband will, for it was he who dispatched a messenger with the letter only yesterday. As I told Lady Eleanor, if she’s not careful she’ll overtake the man on the road and arrive before news of her father’s death reaches his brother.’

Henry had not waited around for Will to exact punishment from his hide for scaring Ellie away.

‘Can we leave the chamber like this?’ Jane asked, gesturing to the mess in the tower room.

‘I’ll ask one of the yeoman to send someone to box up the last of the books and clear the glass,’ Will replied. ‘But it worries me that she didn’t have a chance to finish it herself.’

‘Then we should put aside a few things that she might like later on.’

They took a few sentimental mementoes from the room that they thought Ellie would appreciate: her pearl brooch, a notebook belonging to her father that lay on the hearth, a book of verse, a sewing kit. The latter gave Will a bittersweet memory of her terrible embroidery skills. He took particular care of it, tucking it away in his doublet, and then escorted Jane to the boat waiting to return them to Greenwich.

‘An uncle,’ mused Jane. ‘I thought Ellie was alone in the world.’

‘She mentioned that her father’s obsession had driven a wedge between him and his family.’ Will drew his cloak around his shoulders, gazing back at the grim silhouette of the Tower against the cloudy sky. Rain spat angrily at the river, forming scattered rings on the surface.

James pulled a canvas sheet over Lady Jane’s lap to give her more protection from the weather. ‘That’s good news, isn’t it? She’s going to her uncle.’

‘But with no certainty that he’ll take her in, sir,’ Jane said soberly.

Will clenched his fists in his lap. He had the unnerving sensation that of everyone only Jane understood him; his cold bride had become his ally. Despite this, the conviction had been growing that he couldn’t go through with his plan to marry her. The prospect had been bearable when Ellie had been precariously safe with her father on their perch in the
White Tower; now she’d been toppled from that nest there was no peace of mind until he knew she was happy. But to go after her to Gloucester would declare his unusual attachment to the lady, insulting Jane and ruining Ellie’s reputation unless he married her.

Unless he married her. The very thought was both exhilarating and frightening, spitting in the face of all duties and responsibilities. But somehow he knew he’d already taken the decision; the hard part was telling everyone else.

Jane saw more than the earl realized as they took the chilly journey back to Greenwich. The man was torn between love and duty. Well, there was something she could do about that. The accident had changed everything: Ellie clearly needed Will far more than she did. He would carry on without the Perceval money whereas it was by no means clear her friend would survive without him. As for herself, suitors were never difficult to find. How had she ever thought she could happily marry into a family where her friend loved her husband and she loved his brother?

She looked down with longing at James’s hand resting on the bench next to hers. It sounded so ugly when put like that, but it was the unvarnished truth. Like some fiendishly complicated play, all the lovers were mixed up and if she did not do something to untangle the knot, it was not going to end well.

But her father would not be pleased. She closed her eyes, wincing at the remembered pain of beatings that he called discipline when she was a few years younger. He had always accused her of having an unfeminine spirit, too stubborn for her own good; too much like him if the truth be told. She prayed her age would spare her now, for he was bound to think
some wicked spirit had entered her when she point-blank refused to wed an earl.

I need to summon the bitter harridan who poured scorn on men
, she thought ruefully, remembering her feelings when she arrived at court, before she met Ellie and James.
That Jane would get through this and snap her fingers at them all for their disapproval
.

The boat slipped into its moorings at the landing stage. James helped her ashore and the earl took her arm to escort her back to her rooms.

‘My lord, might I have a word in private?’ Jane asked haughtily. She couldn’t do this in front of James – that was too much to demand of herself.