Temptress in Training (34 page)

Mrs. Wimpole clucked her tongue. “It was a cruel thing she did back when she was a girl of just seventeen, treating the family honor as if it were nothing, flaunting her affair with a married man and then making a public spectacle of herself when she took off with him. It was cruel, and it sent her mother to an early grave.”

“Sometimes love makes people do horrible things,” Annie said quietly.

Sophie kept silent. She knew she certainly had no room to disagree with that statement. Mrs. Wimpole, however, seemed to have acres for disagreeing.

“Love makes people better,” the older woman declared as one who'd had decades to think on it. “Any sort of love that makes people destroy their family and throw away their lives is not any sort of real love, if you ask me.”

“But why would she wish to destroy Lindley?”

Annie had the answer to this.

“Because of your father, Sophie. That locket truly is the key to some sort of treasure, and your father knows where it is. If Lindley gets him first, Eudora will never get her hands on that money. And she wants it badly.”

“And,” Mrs. Wimpole added, “she'd be the last surviving heir to Haven Abbey.”

Good heavens, was that true? Indeed, with all of that, it seemed Madame had ample reason to kill her own nephew. Sophie's heart turned over in her breast. What if Madame had already succeeded?

“Then Lindley may already be…” She couldn't bring herself to finish the sentence.

“And likely she'll do the same to us if we interrupt her plans,” Annie added.

“Well, I do not intend to sit idly by and not interrupt them,” Sophie announced. “Mrs. Wimpole, I have my own plan.”

The woman smiled. “Whatever we can do to help you, miss, my husband and I are willing. You can count on us.”

“Good. The first thing we must do is to kill Annie and little Rosie.”

Mrs. Wimpole actually went pale at that. Annie chuckled.

Sophie quickly corrected herself. “Rather, what I mean to say, we must first convince Madame that Annie and her child are dead.”

Mrs. Wimpole only regained a bit of her color and frowned in a most disapproving fashion. Sophie held up the little bundle she'd been sewing much of the night. From a distance it looked quite convincing. Someone who did not investigate too closely might believe it was, indeed, a small child.

Sophie smiled at the older woman and hoped she would not balk at the risky and macabre scheme she and Annie had come up with in the night.

“This is why I asked if you had any spare fabric or old clothes,” Sophie explained. “I'm hoping that very shortly someone will discover that poor Annie has taken her child and leapt from the walls of the castle into the moat. There is still a moat around the rear of the building, I believe?”

It took a moment, but finally Mrs. Wimpole showed faint signs of a smile. “Yes, miss. There is. It would surely be a most horrible way to end one's own life.”

“I certainly hope Madame feels the same way and is not at all tempted to closely examine the bodies.”

“I will see to it she does not,” the housekeeper said. “Now, start on your breakfast before the little one wakes up again. You can tell me what I must do, and I should be making my way back down before Miss Eudora wonders at my absence.”

Sophie was only too happy to do as instructed. With Mrs. Wimpole approving of their scheme, it was just a matter of time before she might be able to leave here and go to warn Lindley. She prayed it would not be too late.

They had hoped by convincing Madame they had already escaped in the night she might not be hunting close by for them. The ploy was to let her believe Sophie had gone after Lindley. This would give Sophie time to construct the effigies of Annie and Rosie, then have them dragged from the moat. When Madame was informed of the “find,” they hoped she would stop hunting for Annie altogether. Annie could simply stay here, hidden safely away in this ancient tower with her child until Papa could come for her.

It was an ambitious plan, to be sure. Much could go wrong. But for the life of her—and considering she had nothing but her skill with a needle and a hope that God still heard her prayers—Sophie could think of no other way. She simply had to make this work.

She had to find Lindley and keep him safe. Even if it meant Papa's freedom…or his life. Indeed, perhaps she was no different from Eudora, after all. She loved a man she could never have; loved him enough to risk everything she claimed to care about.

Lindley knew what it was to lose everything he'd ever cared about. He was experiencing it all over again and his gut wrenched at the thought. But one thing he knew: anger was not helpful. He'd learned that three years ago when he was presented the lifeless bodies of his family. His whole family—his mother, dearest Maria, little Charlie who was growing to be such a fine boy, his best friend Charles…everyone he truly cared about. Yes, he'd been angry then, and it had done nothing good.

It was only when he'd been able to tamp that anger down and use his brain that he'd been able to make some headway. He'd recalled things—little things like words and phrases that had popped into conversation—and was able to take them to the Home Office. Captain Warren asked him to be of use to them in their efforts to ferret out the men who had orchestrated these and other horrific murders, and he'd agreed without hesitation.

Three years ago tensions had still run high between the English and the French. Napoleon was still a viable threat. England still had men in sensitive positions, dangerous positions, monitoring the enemy. If their identities became known, those men could—did—lose their lives.

And apparently, others—women and innocent children—along with them.

Damn it, the anger was threatening to overtake him once more. He would not let it. His priorities had changed now. He was not hunting D'Archaud. He was after Sophie—anything he did to Fitzgelder or any of the others involved in those past crimes would be done not to avenge the dead but to rescue the living. Sophie must be saved.

First, though, he'd have to find her. He'd gone to Hartwood only to see no sign of her there. The acting troupe was nowhere to be seen, and Dashford's stuffy butler had refused to give any word on anyone's whereabouts. It wasn't until Lindley found a stable hand to rough up a bit that he learned Dash-ford had taken his friend Rastmoor out riding. Toward Loveland.

So the action would be taking place there, after all. He urged his horses even faster now as he left Hartwood behind. Loveland was five miles—he could travel that in no time. If Sophie was there, he would find her. He would protect her if it was the very last thing he did with his damned life.

And it seemed it might very well be.

Two hotheaded grooms were following from Hartwood. What the hell did they want? Lindley pressed his horses faster, hoping they would not injure themselves on the rutted road. He did not have time to waste dealing with Dashford's servants. Damn it, but he'd always considered Dashford a friend. It was deuced frustrating to think the man might actually be an enemy.

And Rastmoor, too, it would seem. Lord, but this was a frustrating mess. Whatever was transpiring at Loveland, he needed to be there in time to sort it all out. That would mean he'd need to outpace these bloody servants.

The men were closing in on him fast, but just up ahead Lindley saw another group of riders and wagons directly in his path. Damn, he would have to pull his phaeton up sharply if he hoped to avoid a collision. And he most heartily did hope for that.

His horses were aware of the danger and followed his commands perfectly. They didn't shy or tear off the road in panic, and he managed to pull them under control rather expertly, if he did say so himself. By now he was close enough to the other travelers to recognize them: two wagonloads of actors accompanied by Dashford and Rastmoor riding astride.

The grooms came pounding up behind him. “Watch it, sir!” one of them called to Dashford. “He might be armed!”

Well, that didn't do much to convince Lindley his friend Dashford was guiltless in all this and simply out for a quiet ride in the morning air. Clearly the grooms were aware of dangerous happenings if they suspected Lindley of being armed, which of course he was.

“What's this about, Lindley?” Dashford questioned.

Lindley smiled cheerfully for his friend. “I stopped at Hartwood to see you and was told you were out here.”

One of the grooms spoke up. “When he left, her ladyship thought it might be a good idea if we came along, too.”

“Did she now?” Dashford said.

“I say, is something going on that—” Lindley said, then stopped short when his gaze fell on the man in the rear wagon. “You!”

It was D'Archaud, sitting there glaring back at him.

“Lindley, you dog. What in the bloody hell have you done with my daughter?” the man shouted, scrambling to get out of the wagon. Three of the nearby actors worked to restrain him.

“I was hoping to find her here with you, D'Archaud,” Lindley replied calmly, tamping down his own fury. “Am I to take it she's missing?”

“I'll murder you!” D'Archaud declared loudly. “What have you done to her?”

Rastmoor seemed clueless to the significance of the situation here. He was practically laughing when he spoke. “I see you've been busy making friends wherever you go, Lindley.”

“And just what, exactly, did you do to this man's daughter?” Dashford asked, as clueless as his companion.

Lindley gave up trying to rein in his anger. “I tried to keep her out of the mess this man is making of his life! Watch him, Dash, he's not to be trusted.”

“Oh?” Dashford responded. “Some would say you aren't, either.”

It seemed no one here was to be trusted, and immediately the subject of the treasure came up, with various parties accusing each other of wanting to steal it while others claimed they had exclusive right to it. Really, the whole scene was a waste of time and rather difficult for Lindley to follow. He knew one thing, though. That damn French treasure was the key to everything.

So, the loud, flamboyantly dressed actor must be D'Archaud's partner in all of this. Lindley studied him. Aside from the tasteless, garish clothing he wore, the man had an undeniably superior bearing about him. And he was clearly French, although for some odd reason today the man spoke with the most hideous Italian accent Lindley had ever heard. The others kept calling him Giuseppe, but he strongly doubted that was the man's real name.

This must be the one who helped D'Archaud amass the so-called treasure. Warren had said it was earned by years of payment from the French for activities they carried out on English soil, spying and ruining good men's lives. Likely they found it easy to hide their identities and cover their tracks by posing as humble actors, traveling here and there as they conducted their clandestine treachery. No wonder they had eluded the Home Office for so long.

And now somehow, when they had come to retrieve their hidden treasure, Dashford and Rastmoor had gotten involved. Yet where was Fitzgelder during all this? And even more important, where the hell was Sophie?

The garish Frenchman suddenly turned his attention on Lindley. “He's after the treasure, too.”

Dashford was visibly annoyed. “I'm afraid you're just going to have to wait your turn with it, Lindley,” he said, patting the metal box he was holding across his lap. “Your friend D'Archaud back there got his hands on it first, but I claim right of ownership for my wife. Just what claim do you have on it?”

“That's the treasure?” Lindley asked.

“Don't get any ideas,” Rastmoor warned.

Lindley frowned. “
That's
the treasure? Odd. I rather thought it would be bigger. I suppose I shouldn't be surprised, though. Those French…they always exaggerate.”

Dashford seemed surprised by this. “French, you say? The treasure is French?”

“Indeed. I know little about it, but I do know it's French.”

Dashford seemed to ponder that a moment, then shrugged. “Well, no matter. Our friend here”—he gestured toward D'Archaud—“has graciously informed us of where we might find at least one of the keys needed to open the box. Since the box was hidden in my wife's property, and since the presumed holder of one of these keys is currently a guest at Hartwood, we are headed back there to see about opening it. Perhaps it did indeed come from France, but it's in England now.”

“You already have one of the keys?” Lindley asked. Thank God! Did this mean Sophie was there and they still believed her to have the locket?

“Not quite,” Rastmoor said. “It's en route to Fitzgelder, we believe.”

Damn, Fitzgelder.
So he was the guest at Hartwood with some knowledge of the locket, was he? Just what did that mean for Sophie?

“Are you certain of that?” Lindley asked.

“Not at all,” Dashford replied.

“Well then, who has the other? Two are required, I believe?” Lindley questioned.

“Sadly, that one belonged to an actress,” Dashford explained. “One Julia St. Clement.”

Ah, this was a surprise. Lindley knew the name. The St. Clement chit was an actress who had broken Rastmoor's heart some years ago, the one he was still not entirely recovered from, poor sap. Hellfire, but for the first time Lindley realized he could actually empathize with Rastmoor's misery.

“If the St. Clement woman had it, this would mean it is already in Fitzgelder's possession, wouldn't it? She was, after all, his wife, wasn't she?”

“Yes,” Dashford said.

“No,” Rastmoor said.

Everyone looked at him, but he offered no explanation. Lindley decided he would remedy that later, when there was less of an audience.

“At any rate,” Dashford went on, “Fitzgelder is in my possession. Lindley, what do you say to returning with us to Hartwood? My grooms, of course, will see that you encounter no difficulties on the way.”

Lindley recognized that for what it was—Dashford's warning. No one trusted anyone in this motley little group, yet they were all traipsing back to Hartwood in hopes of finding the key to a treasure. Oh, but this was bound to be interesting.

Upon their arrival, the gathering at Hartwood was an absolute fiasco. Lindley paced angrily, cooling his heels in the upstairs room Dashford had assigned to him, too frustrated to think straight. By God, they'd gathered D'Archaud, the bloody Frenchman, Dashford's wife, and even Fitzgelder together all in one room and still Lindley had no better idea of how to find Sophie.

He had learned, however, that the Frenchman was in fact D'Archaud's brother-in-law, that the young actress who'd posed as Sophie's husband was in fact the Frenchman's daughter, making her Sophie's actual cousin—although it seemed neither of them knew it—and that same actress was also the very Julia St. Clement whom Rastmoor had been grieving all these years. Apparently she was not dead, nor had she ever been married to Fitzgelder. It was all very convoluted and confusing.

Fitzgelder, for his part, did seem very much interested in killing her now. The bastard was in a foul mood and seemed very much interested in killing practically everyone, as a matter of fact. Dashford had enough sturdy footmen standing guard to assure them this would most likely not happen.

To top it all, however, the damn locket Lindley had been flaying himself over stealing from Sophie turned out to be bogus! When he dramatically produced it in an effort to speed this process along so he could get back to the business of locating Sophie, the damned Italian-Frenchman declared this was the wrong locket. Apparently Fitzgelder had not gotten a chance to examine it thoroughly before it was dropped into Sophie's apron, so all this time they'd been chasing a locket that, in fact, held no value. Somewhere along the way it had been switched, and the real one was still at large.

Nothing was going well. Dashford was storming because Rastmoor had brought his not-dead-actress-whore into this house, Rastmoor was fuming because he'd gotten word his young sister had fallen prey to Fitzgelder's seduction, and everyone still seemed to eye Lindley as if he was perhaps the greatest villain of the lot. And still his Sophie was missing.

It was almost a relief when the whole blasted party disbanded and Dashford sent everyone up to refresh themselves in rooms he assigned them. Lindley could certainly use a moment or two to consider things. Damn, but he needed some answers and he needed them now.

First, he needed to lose the two liveried watchdogs Dashford had placed on guard over him. They loitered in the corridor, just outside the room where Lindley had been ensconced as luncheon was being prepared. He opened the door and called to them.

“I say, it's bloody dull around here. Where is everyone?”

The servants exchanged glances, then seemed to acquiesce they had no instructions against speaking to the prisoner. One of them cleared his throat and spoke in lofty tones.

“I'm sure when it's convenient, his lordship will entertain you.”

Well, that didn't do anything to dislodge them. He'd have to be a bit more specific.

“What about those actors? One would think a whole bloody troupe of bloody actors could provide some bloody diversion.”

Perhaps if he overused the same offensive word enough he could annoy them into letting him escape. Lord knew he was finding it annoying. They, however, were of sterner stock.

“They are down in the kitchen with the servants, sir.”

Well, at least that answered one question. And, it gave him an excellent idea.
Bloody
excellent, in fact.

“In the kitchen? Well, what sort of bloody household is this where some dirty actors off the street get bloody fed before their betters?”

Ah, yes, he was succeeding. He caught one footman rolling his eyes.

“Her ladyship said some luncheon is being prepared and will be brought up to you, sir,” the man replied almost eloquently.

“I'm bloody particular about my food, young man. How do I know what sort of conditions your cook keeps in her bloody kitchen? By God, this is a bloody outrage! I'm an earl, bloody dammit, and I'll not stay penned up here like some bloody cooped chicken!”

He stormed out into the corridor, fussing with his cravat and giving every evidence of being a self-centered prig. The watchdogs moved toward him, but as the only threatening thing about him was that he might insult their attire or use the word
bloody
a dozen more times, they simply followed as he passed. Not entirely what he had hoped for, but it was progress in the right direction.