River Of Fire (54 page)

In the wake of understanding came suffocating fear.
Pretend ignorance
. "What a pretty ring. Thank you, Lord Frazier."

"Put it on," he ordered.

Uneasily she slipped the band onto the ring finger of her left hand. "It's a little loose." She started to remove it.

"Leave it on," he commanded. "Helen was larger than you, but no matter. The ring is necessary."

Desperate to leave, she said brightly, "I'll tell my father you've arrived. I'm sure he'll want you to dine with us tonight. I'll see you then."

She started to pack her drawing supplies in her basket.

"Don't bother with that," he drawled. "You don't need your watercolors to join your mother."

The most frightening thing was his utter calm. He might have been discussing the weather.

Still dissembling, she said, "I don't understand."

He flexed his riding crop between his hands. "I think you do. You're a mousy little creature, but not stupid. Still grieving over your mother's sad end, you will join her in death. No one who saw your
Transfiguration
painting will be surprised. A pity the significance of the ring will not be understood. It's the details that make a picture."

Her chances of escape were almost nil; he was tall and strong, and his coolness increased the menace. Perhaps if she could discompose him, it might work to her advantage. "If you kill me, Kenneth will know. He deduced that Mother was murdered. He'll realize that the same thing happened to me."

Frazier only shrugged. "Kimball must be more clever than he looks, but it won't do him or you any good. I had already planned to eliminate him. The man irritates me, preening over the shallow praise for his ugly paintings."

"You can't hurt him," she said scornfully. "He's a soldier, a man of action. He could break you in half with his bare hands."

"Even men of action die when they take a bullet in the heart," he said imperturbably. "I may not be a soldier, but I am an excellent marksman." He started toward her.

Her heart clenched with fear. "Why are you doing this?" she cried. "My father has been your friend! How can you let your jealousy turn you into a murderer?"

Frazier paused. "Anthony
is
my friend—my dearest friend in the world. The only thing I love more is art. My actions have not been aimed at Anthony, but at the wicked influences that have corrupted his work."

She stared at him. "Corrupted his work? He is the finest painter in England. His portraits, his landscapes, his historical paintings—all are brilliant."

Frazier's face twisted with the first emotion he had shown. "It's all
rubbish
. Helen ruined Anthony as an artist. When we were students at the Royal Academy Schools, he had a passion for all that was highest and best in art. His early paintings in the Grand Manner were glorious—full of nobility and refinement."

"They were beautifully executed but not very memorable," she shot back. "It wasn't until he finished his schooling that he developed a distinctive style and vision."

Frazier's knuckles whitened on his riding crop. "Helen
destroyed
him! To support her, he turned to tawdry portraits and vulgar paintings that Hampton could engrave and sell to any fishmonger with a shilling in his pocket. Anthony could have been the equal of Reynolds. Instead he dishonored his talent."

Horribly fascinated by his warped thinking, she said, "Do you consider
Horatius at the Bridge
to be a disgrace?"

Frazier spat on the ground. "A perfect example of what is wrong with his work. A resonant classical theme, superb execution. It could have been brilliant— but he spoiled the picture with blatant emotionalism.

A
pity it didn't burn in the studio fire. The ideal of the Grand Manner is to transcend nature, not wallow in it."

"My father transcends the Grand Manner," she said dryly. "He and other real artists show the world in fresh ways. They don't regurgitate the same tired scenes over and over."

"Kimball was right when he said you had great influence on Anthony's work." He angrily slapped his riding crop into his left palm. "I had thought the real problem was Helen, that after her death he would return to more worthy painting. But how could he, with you spouting stupid female ideas about art? When I saw your work in the exhibition, I realized what an insidious influence you have been on him. A pity that foolish poet I sent after you wasn't more competent."

It was another stunning shock. "Did you hire Frederick to seduce me?" she said incredulously.

"Nothing so formal. I merely pointed out how romantic red hair was, and how wealthy you would be someday. His own fevered imagination took care of the rest." Frazier shook his head. "If you'd married him and moved from under your father's roof, it wouldn't have come to this. You have only yourself to blame."

"That is the most ridiculous thing you've said yet." Rebecca rested her hand on the water jug used for rinsing her brush, and tensed in readiness. "No wonder you're such a poor painter. You have terrible judgment and no sense for truth. Your Leonidas was pathetic. I was a better artist when I was ten."

Her words were the final straw that snapped his control. He lunged at her furiously. She screamed at the top of her lungs on the chance that a shepherd or walker might hear. At the same time she lifted the water jug and hurled it at Frazier. It smashed into his face, water spraying into his eyes. As he howled with pain, she bolted from her sitting position and ran to the right, away from him. When she was clear of the rocky ledge she had been sitting against, she pivoted into the birch grove.

She had barely made it to the first trees when he recovered and came after her. His long strides closed the distance in seconds. He grabbed and caught her shawl. She let it slither from her shoulders and kept running even though she knew escape was impossible. A moment later he caught her arm and jerked her around. Blood streamed down his face and his handsome features were distorted in a mask of rage. She screamed again and slashed at him with clawed fingers.

"Damn you!" He slammed his fist into her midriff with stunning force, knocking her to the ground. Her head banged into the soil and her breath was blasted from her body, leaving her dizzy and incapable of movement.

As he loomed over her, she lay eerily helpless, able to see and hear but without strength to resist. She was at the mercy of a madman, and in a few moments she would become the falling woman who had haunted her nightmares.

Sir Anthony pointed ahead. "This is Skelwith Hill. The crag is on the other side of that birch grove."

A woman's scream cut through the air, followed an instant later by a masculine bellow.

"Christ! Rebecca!" Kenneth kicked his horse into a gallop and bolted ahead of his companion. He entered the trees first and drove his mount through at a lethal speed, flattening along the beast's neck so he wouldn't be knocked off by a branch. As he wove through the trees, Rebecca screamed again.

He emerged from the grove almost on the edge of the precipice. As he wrenched the terrified horse to a halt, he saw a scene that scorched his mind like a brand of fire. A bloody Frazier was half-carrying, half-dragging Rebecca toward the cliff. Her limp body hung like a broken doll, her red hair and blue dress whipping in the gusty wind.

It was a tableau of death.

He reacted instinctively, vaulting from his horse and shouting furiously to rattle his opponent. As he charged forward, he pulled his pistol from inside his coat and cocked it.

Frazier took two long steps toward the brink and raised Rebecca before him Like a shield. "Stay away from me, Kimball!"

Kenneth stopped in his tracks. Then he lowered the pistol, his heart hammering with fear. If Frazier made one false step, he and his captive would both go over the cliff. "If you kill Rebecca, you're a dead man, Frazier. Let me have her. You can go free." He took a wary step toward the other man.

"Stop or I'll take both of us over," Frazier said wildly. His eyes were crazed, like a cornered boar.

Kenneth halted again, unsure how to deal with a madman. Frazier's facade of normality had disintegrated, and the first victim of his panic would be Rebecca. She was disheveled and seemed stunned from her struggle. But Kenneth saw awareness in her eyes. She knew how close she was to death.

In the tense silence, Sir Anthony rode from the woods. He reined in his horse, his face white with horror when he saw his daughter. Dismounting, he said with attempted calm, "The joke has gone far enough, Malcolm. Bring Rebecca to me."

A muscle jerked in Frazier's face. "This isn't a joke, Anthony. I had hoped to persuade you to return to real art, but I've bungled it. There is no going back." He glanced down at Rebecca, his face indecisive. "At least she'll pay for her part in ruining your work. You should have avoided become entangled with women, Anthony. They're good only for bedding and forgetting. Listening to them is poison to a serious artist."

Sir Anthony shook his head. "No woman poisoned my work. Not Helen, not Rebecca, not Lavinia. Any failings are my own."

"If you had been allowed to develop naturally, without the pressures of supporting a family, you could have been another Raphael," Frazier said stubbornly. "Instead of a handful of great works, you have produced a mountain of rubbish."

"We will never agree on this." Sir Anthony began to move cautiously toward Frazier. "For God's sake, don't take your disagreement out on my only child. If you must throw someone off this damned cliff, let it be me, not Rebecca."

The other man said in an agonized voice, "I could never hurt you. You're my friend. My best friend."

In Frazier's face was a dawning realization that he had already lost everything he cared for—his friendship with Sir Anthony and his position in the art world. He was a coward and a bully, and Kenneth knew with absolute certainty that in another moment, he would escape from his unbearable dilemma by jumping and taking his captive with him from sheer vindictiveness.

There was no time to waste. While Frazier's attention was on Sir Anthony, Kenneth smoothly raised his pistol and sighted on Frazier's head. Though he ran the risk of hitting Rebecca, shooting her captor was her best hope.

At the same instant Kenneth squeezed the trigger, Frazier made up his mind and took an ungainly step toward the precipice, changing the position of both him and his captive. Kenneth watched in horror as the bullet slammed into Frazier's shoulder so close to Rebecca's head that it might have struck her, too.

Frazier gave a shriek of pain and spun around, dropping his captive. Rebecca fell farther down the slope, hitting the ground hard.

Then slowly, inexorably, she began rolling down the angled brow of the cliff toward the final drop-off.

As Sir Anthony gave an agonized cry that echoed across the rocky hills, Kenneth sprinted toward the cliff and dived down the angled surface. He landed hard on his belly with his right arm reaching for Rebecca. She was just beyond his grasp, her limp body on the verge of tumbling over the brink.

He propelled himself forward and managed to catch her slender wrist. She stopped with a jerk that strained his arm. For an instant they were still, both of them flattened on the slanting surface like starfish. Then they began sliding slowly downward, drawn by the implacable force of gravity.