The Rogue (15 page)

Saint waited in the doorway, then went with her to the final door at the far end of the corridor. It opened onto a narrow staircase: a servants' stairwell, perhaps to an old, exterior kitchen, descending into shadow.

“You have no lamp,” he said over her shoulder. “I will go first.”

“You think I lack the courage.”

“I think you seem too eager to throw yourself into danger.” He moved around her swiftly and started down the stairs, pulling a knife from his sleeve.

“You have a knife hidden in your sleeve as well as a dagger in your boot?” she whispered, placing her feet carefully down each riser as the stairwell grew darker.

“I am not wearing boots at present. Thus the sleeve.”

“I would like to have a hidden knife.”

“You know, it isn't particularly wise to reveal one's weaponry to an adversary waiting in the dark below.”

“There is no one below. But the next time we creep down a servants' staircase in the dark, you can provide me with a hidden knife and I won't speak at all. Agreed?”

As they came to the bottom of the stair, the blackness concealed them almost entirely. She felt for a door handle, and turned it, but it remained fast.

“A door to the exterior, most likely,” he said, his voice muted in the close, chill space.

“Why would he have left the party secretively, if not to conceal something?”

“This is an unsafe position to remain in.”

“No escape except from above,” she agreed. “It seems increasingly that you believe in the danger.”

“The stairwell is too narrow for me to draw freely. The darkness, however, provides ideal opportunity—”

“For you to kiss me.”

“No. You are insane. I am not going to kiss you. We are adversaries in this, Constance.”

“If you don't wish to, you should not, of course. And I don't want you to, anyway.”

“That is a bald-faced lie. And I do want to kiss you. Quite a lot. Much more than kiss you. And I intend to. But not in the dark again. Not in secret. Never again in secret, do you understand?” His hand encompassed hers on the door latch, jerked it down, and the door sprang open.

Frigid air rushed in. A shadowy figure stood before them in silhouette.

“Constance? Mr. Sterling?” Libby Shaw's surprise sounded crisply in the night air. “What on earth are you doing
here
?”

T
he moon was nearly gone, retreating beyond the mass of Arthur's Seat, visible to the south even at this distance.

“I stowed away under the seat and climbed out after Mr. Rory went to warm his hands,” Libby said. “There are a great many hedges, so it was not difficult to sneak around the side of the house. I had no idea how I would get past all the guests and servants at the main door. I imagined I would be obliged to climb a trellis or drain or some such thing.”

“I don't understand.” Within minutes the snow had seeped into Constance's slippers, and she tightened her arms around herself. Saint had refused to remain in the indefensible position of the stairwell or to allow her to speak with Libby in the stairwell without him. Now she shivered in her gown that had been made for a drawing room full of people, not the back stoop of a house in March at midnight. “Why did you wish to sneak in at all? I thought you didn't care for parties.”

“All the people in one place make me cross. I want to study the duke's collection of human bones. Yesterday when he was leaving our house I asked him if I could come see
them, but he refused. I knew you would be taking the grand carriage to the party tonight, and I have stowed away in such places before. It seemed my only opportunity. I did not have a complete plan as to how to get inside once I was here, but then I found this door.”

“Human bones?” Her teeth chattered upon the words.

Saint removed his coat and wrapped it around her shoulders. It was heavy, and warm from the heat of his body.

“Tell us about the duke's collection, Miss Shaw,” he said.

“It's one of the best in Britain. The duke has specimens from all over the world. My father says there must be three dozen skulls alone. I would like to compare the size of male and female crania.”

“Has Dr. Shaw seen this collection himself?”

“No one has been allowed to study it for more than a decade. But
your
brother lived in this house for weeks on end. I wonder if he was allowed to see the collection. Did he ever mention it to you?”

Saint frowned. “How do you know that my brother lived in this house?”

“Lady Easterberry told Constance yesterday. I am so sorry about him. Perhaps he would have been more forthcoming than the duke.”

“My brother was not interested in science or antiquities, Miss Shaw. You said this door was propped open before?”

“With a brick from that pile.” She pointed. “I went in and got as far as a parlor upstairs. But the other doors were locked. I intended to continue, but then I remembered that Rory had an augur bit in the carriage I might use to pick those locks.”

“I have a new appreciation tonight for ladies' skill at breaking and entering,” he murmured.

“I went back to the carriage,” Libby continued, “but the door prop was gone by the time I returned here. I'm so happy you two appeared, or I never would have gotten back inside.”

“You are not going back inside.” Constance returned Saint's coat to him. “You and I are now going to the carriage
and Rory will drive us home. I cannot blame you for wanting something that is prohibited, but this is not the way to achieve your goal. Tomorrow I will ask the duke and we will hope for a positive response.”

“I will see Miss Shaw home,” Saint said. “I'll send the carriage back.”

“But—”

“You will not have your positive response from the duke tomorrow if you desert him in the middle of the party that he has given for you,” he said, throwing Constance's stomach into tumbles.

“I am deeply disappointed.” Libby's brow was stormy. “Deeply.”

The chill sank beneath Constance's skin. It was not childish tantrum on Libby's face now. Through the tunnel of memory, she recognized this anger—it was the anger her mother had expressed in tears so often before the end, when her wishes were thwarted—her wishes for the house to be free of dust, the draperies drawn precisely, her dinner served in exact proportions, certain words never to be uttered, subjects never to be broached. When Constance, her father, and the servants had not done all of these perfectly, the duchess had raged. But mostly she had wept.

And Libby's crossness with crowds . . . it was the same, too. Until the illness consumed her, the duchess had been a loving mother. But she had never found the world an easy place to bear.

The memories moved Constance's feet forward, and her hands surrounded Libby's.

“My dear, I understand,” she said softly. “I am sorry for this disappointment.”

“But I
must
measure those skulls, Constance. My study will not be complete without those measurements.”

“Yes, of course. You must be very frustrated,” she said with the same soothing tone she had learned as a girl to speak to her mother. “We will try to see them tomorrow.”

“How can you be certain that the duke will agree to it?
What if he does not agree? And what if he thinks me too persistent and becomes more vigilant about keeping them secret?”

“I do not have an answer for you tonight. But I promise that I will do my best. I promise, darling,” she said, and waited for the explosion.

But Libby's lips shut tight. “I am sorry, Constance,” she said thickly, her fingers digging into her own palms. “I will return home now with Mr. Sterling and wait until tomorrow.”

“Excellent,” she said gently. “I commend you on your patience. Now go along.” She looked at Saint. “Good night.”

He studied her without speaking.

“I won't,” she finally said, shivering but deliciously warm inside.

“I don't believe you,” he said.

“You can.”

“And yet.”

“What are you two talking about?” Libby said.

“I promise I won't do a thing,” she said. “At least not tonight. Then it will not matter to you if I do or don't, will it?”

“If you think I still plan to leave, then you truly are mad.”

And just like that, in an instant, Constance didn't care that Libby Shaw was what she had long suspected—her half sister, or that her father must know the truth of it, or that the man courting her had a collection of human bones hidden in his house. Tomorrow when she awoke, she would care. But for one precious moment she was happy.

“I will see you in the ballroom tomorrow after breakfast?” she said.

He gave her the knife. “You might want to find a place to hide that before you reenter the party.”

With a smile, she drew the door open and tossed him the kerchief he had lodged in the handle. Then she retraced her steps. The door to the gallery remained unlocked. Moving swiftly across the long room, she paused to tuck the knife into the crack between the base of the display case and the floor. For the next visit.

Standing before the antechamber door to the drawing room, she pinched her cheeks so they would match her cold nose and rubbed her hands over her arms. She opened the door a crack and slipped through and into a group of guests.

“
Another
cloak?” the lady beside her whispered with round eyes.

“Rather, a coat,” another lady exclaimed in a hush.

“Are you certain?” a gentleman muttered skeptically.

“Oh, yes! On the bank of the loch, not a stone's throw from this very house. The Devil's Duke has struck again. But this time he left the body!”

I
N THE CARRIAGE
on the journey home, no member of the Duke of Read's party had any conversation except the duke himself. Commenting on the wisdom of Loch Irvine to host such an event in Edinburgh given his intention of living at nearby Haiknayes, he appeared entirely unmoved by the furor stirred up during the last hour of the party.

The rest of the people in the duke's carriage as it climbed to the new town were silent: Eliza dour, Dr. Shaw thoughtful, and Lord Michaels white-lipped. Festivities had ended well past midnight upon a flurry of whispered conversations, hushed exclamations, and horrified stares at their host who, rumor had it, had received the news at his door directly from the men who had found the girl.

Driving their sheep to Lochend Toll, two shepherds had paused to water their animals and discovered her on the bank of the loch. One of the men recognized her; she hadn't been there above a day, he guessed, and her features were clear. Like the two missing girls, she was a local lass, and unmarried. And drawn on her coat in chalk was a six-pointed star.

C
ONSTANCE ARRIVED IN
the ballroom after breakfast to find it empty.

“He is gone then,” Eliza said. “It's for the best.”

“My lady.” Mr. Viking stood in the doorway. “Mr. Sterling
requested that I deliver this to you.” He extended a folded sheet of paper.

The paper bore only four words penned in a bold, neat hand.

“Well, is it an apology for leaving without notice?” Eliza said when Viking had left. “Or a poem? How happy I was when that foolish poet ceased courting you. What was his name? Cicero? Virgil?”

“Lord Warbury?” she said, relief slipping through her. “He called himself Dante.”

“His poetry was dreadful. So what is it? A sonnet or a ballad?”

She folded the paper and tucked it into her sleeve. “My cousin Leam is a poet, Eliza, if you recall. Quite a good one.”

“I did not say all poets were dreadful. Only the poets that hang after you.”

“Mr. Sterling does not ‘hang after' me, of course. And it is not a poem. It is an address in the old town. A shop.”

Eliza sighed. “With the snow, my rheumatism is wretched today.”

Constance smiled. Eliza was only adamant about protecting her virtue when it was comfortable and convenient.

“Mr. Viking can accompany me.”

She donned a fur-lined cloak and they set off. Cold wind cut across the Mound, which connected the newer part of town to the medieval city. The day before, she had taken this walk to find Maggie Poultney's house. Now she picked her way through icy puddles and along narrow passageways to the shop that Saint had indicated. The marquee above the door showed two crossed sabers split up the center by a dirk. Inside the room lined with racks of swords, knives, and daggers, the air smelled of leather and metal. The
clank
of a smith's hammer upon an anvil sounded from beyond a partially opened door.

The opening widened and, ducking his head to pass under the low lintel, Saint came into the room.

“Good day,” he said to her, and, “Viking.”

“My lady, do you wish me to remain?” Mr. Viking said.

“No. Mr. Sterling will see me home.”

“Very good, ma'am.” The footman departed.

She turned to Saint. “Mr. Sterling will see me home, won't he?”

“He will.” He gestured to a stool. “Have a seat.”

“You are very mysterious.” She removed her gloves and hat and set them on the counter. “Is this your shop?”

“No. I am not a bladesmith. But if I were, I am fairly certain I would have mentioned it to you by now.”

“Would you have?”

“I am not the one of us who keeps secrets, Constance. What you see is what I am.”

Unaccountably, her heart did an uncomfortable shudder.

“But I know a fine bladesmith when I meet one,” he said. “When we are finished here I will introduce you to Ian MacMillan—if, that is, the daughter of a duke is permitted to enter a smith's workshop?”

“The daughter of a duke can mostly do whatever she likes, really.” Except marry as she wished.

“That is a weight off my conscience,” he said dryly. “Sit, please. I have a gift for you.”

“A gift?” She perched upon the stool. “My birthday is not for weeks yet.”

“This cannot wait weeks.” He took up an item from the counter and knelt before her. Constance's pulse quickened. He glanced up at her and his eyes were brilliantly green, like a woodland glade after a rain.

“Lift your skirts,” he said.

Heat.
Everywhere. In her abruptly labored breaths and in her cheeks.

“Scabbard.” He brandished a finely cut flat strip of leather with two slender buckles. “Dagger.” Upon his other palm balanced a small blade, perhaps four inches long, with a handle fashioned of ivory. “Your right leg, if you will.”

She pinned her lips together; she did not trust her voice to
not reveal her erratic pulse. Bunching up her skirts, she slid her right foot forward and bared her calf.

“Good,” he said, and laid the leather against the side of her shin.

She closed her eyes and tried to breathe evenly as his fingers skirted her ankle, then higher. “Good?” she mumbled.

“This will remain in place securely over wool stockings like these.” He glanced up. “Or bare skin.”

She swallowed. “Oh?”

“When you wear silk stockings, fasten it just below the knee.” Circling her leg, he ran his hand upward, his fingertips strafing her calf. “Over this bone.” His thumb caressed. She caught a gasp between her teeth.

“With the scabbard here”—he stroked again—“the dagger will be more cumbersome to retrieve swiftly from beneath your skirts than when you bind it just above the ankle. But it will not slip down to your shoe when you are dancing.” The caress came again, under her knee. On her thigh.

“Remove—” She dragged in a breath and looked everywhere but at him. “Remove your hand from my leg.”

He drew his hand away. She pushed her skirts to her toes.

“This dagger should suit you.” He offered the handle to her. “It is small, but lethal if used correctly. You will have to practice striking at lower targets: the tendons behind the heel and knee, ideally. But given your impressive trick with a hairpin and skill with the sword stick, I suspect you will master this soon enough too.” He waited. “Take it.”

“I do not wish to at this moment.”