The Pleasure Trap (26 page)

Penshurst was a pretty village dominated by the church that also seemed to guard the gates to the splendid seat of the ancient Sydney family. Memories that she had forgotten came back to Eve in a tide. The whole area was steeped in history, and the proposed quarry garden was the least of what had interested her mother.

“We went to Hever Castle,” she told Ash as they drove through the village, “you know, where Anne Boleyn lived before her marriage to the king? My mother was going to write a story about Anne. She was a tragic figure, wasn’t she?” She stopped and gave him a sideways glance. “Do you think my father was right? Was my mother morbid? Am I?”

“Was Aeschylus? Or Euripides? Or Sophocles? They wrote tragedies, Eve, and the world is a better place for it.”

“I had no idea,” she said quizzically, “that you were such a learned gentleman.”

His reply was dry. “Not nearly as learned as I ought to be. I don’t know why I missed it. It has been staring me in the face all this time, and like a blockhead I never thought to question it.”

“Question what?”

“Why Angelo chose that name when he published your mother’s stories. A schoolboy with a smattering of Greek would have put it together.”

She threw up her hands. “Put what together? Will you speak in plain English?”

“His name. Angelo. It’s from the Greek
angelos.
It means
messenger.
”

She wrinkled her brow. “I thought it mean
angel.
”

“It does. Same word. Angel or messenger. That’s what an angel is, a messenger.”

“Oh.” She was thinking of golden harps and heavenly choirs.

“Yes, ‘oh.’ He was using his own name.”

“Thomas Messenger.” She smoothed a frown from her brow and let out a long sigh.

“What is it?”

“Somehow,” she shook her head, “the pieces aren’t fitting together the way they should. I haven’t changed my mind. I still say that the man who attacked Lydia is afraid of exposure.” She looked up at him. “How does Messenger fit into it? Did he have the stories published, or is he the man who attacked Lydia?”

He took his eyes from the road and flashed her an easy grin. “Don’t twist yourself into knots trying to figure things out. These things have a way of clicking into place when our brains are rested. Ah, here we are.”

He pulled up in front of a half-timbered building with the sign of a white hart swinging in the breeze.

“Poor beast,” Ash remarked. “He looks as though he has caught the scent of the hunters.” He looked around. “Where am I supposed to water my horses?”

“There’s bound to be a lane in the back leading into the yard.”

Ash flicked the reins and drove his team to the end of the road, turned the corner, and was soon driving into the inn’s courtyard.

The ostler who came to take the reins from Ash looked as sleepy as the village of Penshurst. No one was in a rush. The yard wasn’t bustling. People strolled, they didn’t hurry.

Ash and Eve wandered into the lobby and, seeing no one, pushed through a door that Eve remembered gave onto the dining room.

“It hasn’t changed a bit since I was last here,” said Eve.

Small leaded windowpanes let in very little light. Dark oak beams supported the low ceiling. The sooty stone fireplace was set in an inglenook. No more than four tables draped in white cloths could fit into the cramped room.

“We’re the only customers.” Ash spoke in hushed tones. “Where is everybody? The landlord? The waiters?”

“I think you’re supposed to ring the bell at the lobby counter for service.”

Ash cursed under his breath.

“What did you expect?” Eve was amused. “This isn’t Grillon’s.”

“Wait here. This will only take a moment.”

Eve wandered over to a table by the window and sat down. This was where she and her mother used to sit when they stayed at the White Hart. How long were they here before the accident? A week? She couldn’t remember. Her eyes strayed to a table in the corner. That’s where the Messengers sat after they arrived.

Her heart began to thunder against her ribs. Her throat went dry. She tried to tear her eyes away, but they were held as if against her will. The shadows took shape and she saw them as clearly as she’d seen them that last night.

The table was set for four, but only three people were there. Mrs. Messenger was almost invisible, a timid woman who dressed to melt into her surroundings. The son, a tall gangly youth, was as sullen as ever, and the man was darkly handsome, with lines of dissipation etched deeply into his face. Thomas Messenger. She thought they’d left, but they were still here.

There was a brandy bottle in the middle of the table. He reached for it, tipped it up, and filled his glass.

Hatred like she’d never known engulfed her—not hatred of her, but hatred of her father. She braced herself as Thomas Messenger’s thoughts spilled into her mind.

Dearing! It’s all his fault. Just because he kowtows to the gentry, he gets all the credit while I’m pushed to the side. I’m the one with the talent. He’s a second-rate hack. This was my job. He stole it from me. He’s jealous of me and always will be. Well, I’ll show him! I’ll show them all!

The anger flared to a white-hot conflagration.
Tonight, I’ll do it tonight. Then there will be no more Dearing and I’ll be right here to get my job back.

The violence of his drunken laughter recoiled inside her head, and she closed her eyes as she tried to shut out the sound.

She jumped when she felt a hand on her shoulder. “Mama?”

“Eve, are you all right?”

For a moment, she stared at Ash blankly, then her breathing gradually slowed and she came to herself. “He—” She had to swallow to get rid of the huskiness in her throat. “He was here, Ash. Thomas Messenger was here that night with his wife and son.”

He frowned down at her. “Is this a memory, Eve, or one of your visions?”

That frown brought her out of her daze. “I remember it clearly now that I’m here.” And that was the truth. “He blamed my father for all his misfortunes. He was—”

“Yes?”

“I think he wanted to kill him. He was drunk and raving.”

She didn’t want to argue the point or elaborate on what she had told him. She wanted to go to the quarry. She wanted to make sense of her dream. She had to know what happened the night her mother went out. Her sense of urgency was overpowering.

She got up. “I want to go to the quarry,” she said.

“Fine. I’ve ordered sandwiches and tea. We can go after we eat.”

“I want to go
now.
”

“At least give me time to ask directions.”

“I need no directions. I’ve made the journey in my dreams a thousand times. Don’t look so worried, Ash. It’s not far.”

“That’s not what I’m thinking.”

She was almost at the door. Turning to face him, she said coldly, “And I’m not mad, either.”

When he came up to her, he draped an arm around her shoulders. “You’re not reading my thoughts, Eve, and I must say that’s a great relief. What I was thinking, you foolish girl, is that it’s high time you learned to trust me.”

“I trust you,” she said quickly, and she pushed through the door.

The path to the quarry was downhill and protected on either side by a screen of overhanging bushes and thick shrubbery. Then suddenly they came out of the shadows and entered a terraced grotto that was drenched in sunshine.

“This is not how I remember it,” said Eve. “It was drenched by the light of a full moon, and I thought it was bigger.”

“It’s beautiful,” Ash murmured. “It doesn’t look like a quarry, does it? More like a sunken garden.”

On every side, terraces carved into the rock supported a plethora of plants, some flowering, some just coming into flower: bluebells, primroses, lilies, climbing vines, and honeysuckle. On the floor of the quarry, nettles, gorse, broom, and other wild specimens had forced their way in to soften the bare quarry floor. The air was fragrant with the scent of blossoms. The sound of a waterfall was a touch that was almost too perfect, too theatrical.

Ash was enchanted. “This would make the perfect setting for
A Midsummer Night’s Dream,
” he said.

Eve’s eyes were scanning the terraces. “Or a Greek tragedy,” she responded. “If I were Iphigenia, I wouldn’t linger here.”

He was mentally kicking himself for having forgotten that the garden could never be a thing of beauty to Eve.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I wasn’t thinking.”

She gave him a quick smile. “You don’t have to coddle me, Ash. I wonder who designed it.”

“I can answer that. I asked the landlady when I ordered our sandwiches and tea. She couldn’t remember his name, but he was an Italian fellow who completed the job and turned tail and made for home because he couldn’t stand our English winters.”

Eve laughed. “I don’t blame him. Did you mention my family to the landlady?”

“I did, but she wasn’t much help. The inn has changed hands since you were here, and the new people have never heard the name Dearing or Messenger. The same goes for the owners of Hazleton House. The old boy who owned it was the last of his line, and when he died it was bought by strangers.”

After a moment, Eve said quietly, “I saw the way you looked when my father mentioned the boy who had drowned. It still hurts you to think of him, doesn’t it?”

“Hurt isn’t the word for what I feel. Harry would have been about your age if he had lived. I have to know the truth about how he died. You visited the gardens with your mother, didn’t you? Did anyone mention Harry to you?”

“No. But they wouldn’t, would they? I was only ten or eleven at the time.” She leaned toward him. “Antonia wasn’t mean-spirited, Ash. She wouldn’t have written a story that could hurt the innocent. There was a purpose to what she did. Messenger…” Her voice faded and she shook her head. “Too many coincidences,” she said softly.

“Yes. I know what you mean. Messenger works on four gardens, and four victims meet with a tragic accident.”

“Do you think he is mocking us? Why would he publish my mother’s stories and draw attention to himself? It doesn’t make sense.”

“Not yet it doesn’t. When we find Messenger, we’ll force him to tell us the truth. We’ll make the connections, Eve, I promise you. He won’t get away with what he has done.”

She put a hand on his arm. “Now who is getting ahead of himself?”

He smiled. “You’re right. The thing is, I never believed that Harry would go swimming by himself. Someone had to be there to help him. His death has always weighed heavily on my conscience. I promised to be there to take him out, but instead,” he clenched his hand, “I went off to the races with my friends. I never gave a thought to Harry.”

Her eyes searched his face. In a voice that was almost soundless, she said, “I know what you’re feeling. That’s why I’m here. I feel guilty for my mother’s death, too, and I don’t know why. Perhaps the quarry will tell me.”

They fell silent then and moved slowly, aimlessly, into the depths of the grotto. Ash stopped now and again to admire a particularly fine display of wildflowers. Eve scanned the terraces as though she was looking for something.

“What are you looking for, Eve?” Ash asked at length.

“Mmm? Oh, there should be steps carved into the bare rock going up to the top of the quarry. I never climbed them, I wasn’t allowed, but my father used to come and go that way when he visited us.”

“Steps, leading up to the top of a quarry?” He sounded doubtful.

She shrugged. “They were old and not very stable. It was a shortcut from the house to the village.”

They found them a little way farther on.

“There’s a handrail,” he said. “Would you like to go up to the top?”

She shuddered and shook her head. “No. But you go up if you like. This is where I found my mother. If you don’t mind, I just want a little time alone with my thoughts.”

He didn’t climb the steps, but he did give her some space and privacy. He understood only too well. When his brother drowned, and even to this day, he didn’t want company when he became lost in his memories.

There was a stone bench strategically placed beside a waterfall. Ash sat down and gazed around him with interest. He thought that it was incredible that this beautiful, man-made garden had been created from anything so barren as a stone quarry.

His gaze moved to Eve. She had wandered farther into the quarry and was standing with her head bowed as though in prayer, her hands clenched tightly in front of her. Five minutes went by. One minute more, he promised himself, then he would bring her attention back to the present.

He was moving toward her when she gave a little cry. He quickened his pace when he saw that she was shaking. “What is it, Eve?” He reached for her and gathered her in his arms. “What is it, Eve?” he repeated, his alarm making his voice rough.

She blinked up at him with unseeing eyes. Finally, recognition dawned and she let out a long, pent-up breath. “I know now why I always feel guilty when I remember the night I found my mother. Take me home, Ash. I want to go home.”

Chapter Twenty-two

When she said that she wanted to go home, she didn’t mean to the White Hart, she meant back to town. Ash decided not to take her to the Manor but to his rooms in Grillon’s. At the Manor, she would be surrounded by females, fussing over her and asking questions. He could see that Eve was in no condition for company. She wasn’t ill. All she needed was time to come to herself.

He’d done everything possible to make her comfortable on the long drive from the White Hart: hot bricks for her feet, a warm blanket to cover her. She’d slept most of the way, her head resting trustingly against his shoulder. All the same, when he lifted her out of his curricle in Grillon’s courtyard, she was deathly pale, and he could feel her start to shiver beneath the folds of the blanket.

“Where are we?” she asked, her eyes blinking as she came awake.

“Grillon’s. When you’ve eaten and are rested, I’ll take you back to the Manor.”

Her nod was all the permission he needed.

“I can walk,” she protested.

He said something soothing and made for the entrance that gave onto the back stairs. Ostlers and stable boys smothered their grins as he passed by.
And why shouldn’t they?
he asked himself sourly, struck hard by the irony of the situation. They were used to seeing a steady stream of women coming to his rooms by the back stairs. Why should this one be different?

But she was different, and the next time Miss Eve Dearing came to his rooms, she would come through the hotel’s front door, and every groom, stable boy, and ostler would touch his forelock out of respect for my lady Denison.

He was bound and determined to make it so.

The suggestive grins were easily dealt with. A killing look from eyes, as hard as flint, had men hastening to tasks they had either momentarily forgotten or newly invented.

When he entered his rooms, he carried her to the parlor and set her down in a chair next to the fireplace. They were the only two people here, since both Reaper and Hawkins were still at the Manor. He might have rung for a footman or a chambermaid, but he didn’t want anyone to see Eve. He didn’t want her to be embarrassed, he didn’t want her reputation to be tarnished, and, above all, he didn’t want anyone to take care of her but himself.

The first thing he did was light the fire. It wasn’t dark yet, but dusk was settling over the city, so he lit several candles around the room. He poured two glasses of brandy and brought one to her.

“Drink it,” he said, “then I’ll order soup and sandwiches from the kitchen. You’ve hardly eaten a thing all day.” He held the glass to her lips.

She obediently took a sip of brandy and choked on it. Pushing his hand away, she got out between sputters, “I’d rather have a cup of tea.”

He grinned. “You’re beginning to sound more like yourself.”

Her smile was valiant though feeble, but at least she was smiling.

“Wait here,” he said, “and I’ll see about something to eat.” He added delicately, “The little room is at the end of the hall if you, uh, want to freshen yourself.”

“Thank you,” she replied, without a trace of embarrassment.

He wondered whether that was a good or bad sign.

It took him several minutes to find a footman and arrange for their meal, and when he returned to the parlor, Eve was on her feet, looking at everything though at nothing in particular. She’d removed her bonnet and pelisse, and her simple long-sleeved twilled gown, so appropriate for Eve, wiped the smile from his face. He was thinking of so many others he’d entertained in this very room, and the gowns they’d worn had left nothing to his imagination. That she should be the one to capture his heart no longer amazed him. He hadn’t known what intimacy was until he’d met Eve. He was everyone’s friend but confided in no one. Until Eve. They’d only known each other a short time, but he felt as though he’d known her all his life.

When she looked up with a quizzical smile, he felt that a weight had been lifted from his shoulders. The waif was gone and she looked more like herself.

“You do yourself proud, don’t you?” she quipped.

“What?”

She held up her glass of brandy. “The crystal is Waterford. The porcelain is Sèvres. The candlesticks are silver. Or does the hotel supply its guests with only the best?”

“I like the finer things in life,” he said, crossing to her, “and the finest and best is standing right before me.”

She looked at him uncertainly, and no wonder, he thought. The compliment sounded like the blandishment of a practiced womanizer. In a different voice, he went on, “My father was the one with the expensive tastes. When he died, I inherited all his possessions.”

He wanted to tell her that when they were married, she could change things around at his house in Richmond to suit herself. He didn’t care whether he drank out of crystal glasses or wooden mugs, just as long as Eve presided at his table. He held his peace because her mood was fragile, too fragile to take advantage of her in a weak moment.

He indicated the fireplace. “Come and sit down close to the fire. Your color is coming back to your cheeks and you’ve stopped trembling. That’s something. You had me worried there for a while. Eve, what happened back at the quarry? I’d like to know, if you feel up to telling me.”

She took her chair again, her gaze focusing on the fire as flames licked around the coals. He pulled a chair close to hers and waited for her to begin.

When long minutes had passed, he said gently, “You said that you know now why you feel guilty when you remember that night.”

She leaned her head on the back of the chair. “I always wondered,” she said, “why my mother went out that night. Well, now I know.” She turned her head slightly to look at him. “I told her that Mr. Messenger was planning to kill my father.”

He didn’t interrupt when she paused, because he didn’t want to break her train of thought.

“It all came back to me when we were in the White Hart’s dining room. I was twelve years old and he didn’t know I could read his mind. Mr. Messenger, I mean. He was sitting with his family at the table in the corner, and I could hear him ranting and raving inside my head. He wasn’t supposed to be there. It should never have happened.”

She looked a question at him, and when he did not respond to that look, she went on, “I should have told her straightaway. I knew she hadn’t absorbed his thoughts. It doesn’t work that way. I think I told you that we can’t choose who we are receptive to? Antonia’s charisma was exceptional, but even she couldn’t read anyone’s thoughts at will. We Claverleys have a saying: ‘Claverleys don’t choose their subjects. Their subjects choose them.’”

She paused, then went on, “If I’d told her about Messenger, though, she could have gone to warn my father when it was still light, but I held my tongue because my father had persuaded me that people who heard voices inside their heads were crazy. He was ashamed of my Claverley charisma and made me ashamed, too.” She shook her head, a sad little movement that spoke volumes. “I would have done anything to win my father’s approval.

“So,” she heaved a sigh, “I didn’t tell my mother until I went to bed. I couldn’t sleep, and she heard me tossing and turning. When she came in to see what was the matter, I poured out the whole story.” She gave a faint smile. “And she told me that there was nothing to worry about because Mr. Messenger was sleeping off the effects of a night of drinking. His snores, she said, had the whole inn in an uproar.”

She lifted her shoulders in a tiny shrug. “Naturally, I slept, and the next thing I remember is waking in the middle of the night with an awful feeling of doom hanging over me. My mother’s dog was there, and Sheba led me to the quarry. Messenger must have pushed her over the edge when she tried to stop him—”

He couldn’t help interrupting at this point. “You saw him?”

“At the quarry today, I knew she had been pushed to her death, but I didn’t see the face of the man who did it. It had to be Messenger. He had murder in his heart when he thought of my father.”

He didn’t know what to say. She was talking about things he couldn’t get his mind around, no matter how hard he tried. He felt on surer ground when he stayed with the facts.

“You said your mother’s dog led you to your mother. Did he go with her when she went out?”

She nodded. “I think so. Sheba was wet when she came in to get me, and it had been raining that night. But Sheba was lame because of arthritis in one hip. She wouldn’t have managed to climb those quarry stairs. Had she been with my mother, she would have attacked anyone who tried to harm her.”

He tried to sound as neutral as he could manage. “Are you telling me this from memory, Eve, or is this what you’ve gathered from your visions?”

She looked at him as though he’d said a bad word. “Most of it comes from memory, a memory I locked away in the deepest dungeon of my mind until I stood on the spot where my mother died. There’s something else I remember—my mother’s voice telling me that it was an accident. But it wasn’t. I know she was pushed to her death, so why would she lie to me?”

He smoothed his fingers over his brow. “All that comes to me,” he said, “is that she wanted to protect you.”

“Protect me from what?”

He shrugged. “Messenger? I don’t know. Maybe she thought you’d panic if she said someone had pushed her. Maybe he was still hanging around, waiting to see what would happen next. And maybe…”

“What?”

“Maybe it
was
an accident.”

For the first time, her confidence seemed to waver. “Ash,” she said, “it wasn’t an accident. She was pushed. I know it.”

“Fine. Let’s go on to something else.” Fearing that he’d been too abrupt, he gentled his voice. “What happened to Messenger? Did you see him again? Speak to him?”

“No. I never saw him or any of his family again. Maybe my father would know.” Her voice faded as a thought occurred to her. “There was a daughter, too, a sickly girl. I didn’t see much of her.” She was remembering the fourth place at the Messengers’ table.

She looked into space and sighed. He leaned toward her, arms braced on his knees. “You have nothing to feel guilty about,” he said. “You did the right thing, didn’t you? You told your mother about Messenger.”

She rubbed her eyes with the heel of her hands and nodded. “I suppose so.” She dropped her hands. “But at the time, I was confused. My father had me believing that there was no such thing as the Claverley charisma, that it was a form of hysteria. I doubted myself and the voice I’d heard. What if I’d sent my mother out that night on the strength of something I’d only imagined? How could I bear it? That’s what I’ve tried to forget all these years.”

She looked down at her tightly clasped hands and gradually relaxed her fingers. Bitterness crept into her voice. “From that night on, I became more determined than ever to suppress the Claverley part of my nature. I wasn’t always successful, but nothing earth-shattering troubled my mind, until the night of the symposium. That’s when it began. I dream, I have visions, I hear voices, and this time there’s no denying them.”

She gave him a fierce look. “I don’t want to deny them. It’s who I am, and I won’t change myself, not for anybody.”

Her words made the fine hairs on the back of his neck rise. “Eve,” he shook his head, “we don’t know that it’s Messenger. It’s possible it’s someone else. Do you know what he looks like? People change as they get older, and that’s especially true for drunkards.”

“It doesn’t matter what he looks like. I can find him by listening to his thoughts. I’m not sure how it works, but—”

“Damn it, Eve!” He brought his open hand down on the arm of her chair, making her jump. “Will you listen to yourself? This isn’t make-believe. This is dangerous. You can be hurt. There’s a right way of going about this, and it doesn’t involve visions and voices in your head.”

When he saw her stiffen, he tried to check his frustration. He hated feeling so helpless, but the stark truth was, he felt more afraid now than he had in all his years as a soldier. At least he’d known who the enemy was.

He lowered the temperature in his voice. “As I see it, we track Messenger down and bring him in for questioning. Once we find him, we can delve into his background, see if we can find hard evidence to tie him to those earlier murders or to Lydia’s attack or the heckler’s murder.”

She spoke in a low, flat monotone. “You don’t believe me, do you? You don’t believe in my visions or that I can hear his voice.”

He dragged his fingers through his hair. “It’s not that. I’m thinking of what will happen in a court of law. What kind of witness would you make? You can hardly tell the judge that you know that Messenger is a murderer because you heard his voice inside your head. Surely you can see that? As I said, we need hard evidence to convict him.”

He was distracted by a discreet knock on the door. Their meal had arrived. The footman was well trained and didn’t lift a brow when Ash insisted on taking the tray himself.

After letting himself out, the footman flipped the coin Ash had given him as a gratuity and held it up to the light.

A passing chambermaid observed him. “That was quick, Ernie. You just this minute entered his lordship’s rooms.”