After he had left her, closing the door quietly behind him, Caroline rose and removed her gown. It was hopelessly wrinkled and she didn’t have another one. She smoothed it the best she could and laid it over the back of a chair. She lay down again on her back, her arms crossed under her head. She felt tears stinging her eyes and closed them tightly. Just the way he’d tucked those covers just under her chin, it had broken her, brought back her mother, whose face she couldn’t begin to picture anymore in her mind. And those memories didn’t really matter, not in the face of Aunt Ellie’s murder. Who could have killed her? Nothing seemed to make any sense anymore, particularly when she was lying in bed in the house of a gentleman she’d met barely a week before.
What was she going to do?
She knew she looked a fright, but at least she was fairly clean. She’d awakened to find a bowl of still-warm water on the round commode table. She’d stripped off her
underclothes and scrubbed herself. Four days without a proper bath was too many. She wished the phantom servant who’d brought the bowl had brought instead a regular tub for her to bathe in. However, after the greeting she’d been given the previous night, she supposed a bowl of warm water was quite a concession all in all.
She walked slowly down the grand staircase, wide enough for at least three ladies dressed in full regalia to walk side by side. There was an immense chandelier that hung from the floor above down two floors to come to a stop some twelve feet above the entrance hall. It looked to have quite a lot of gold in its ornately curved holders that were not only sparkling clean but held candles that gleamed so brightly they looked as if they’d even been polished.
She stopped a moment on the staircase, looking around her. It was a magnificent old house. No, rather she supposed, it was more of a castle that had been reshaped in the direction of a huge manor house over the centuries. But it was still a castle with a castle’s grandeur. Its cavernous entrance hall, which must have been built many centuries before the great hall, was long and narrow, but narrow only in the sense that it wasn’t as wide as an average manor house. She’d never seen its like before. She felt something quite odd as she gazed about her, a sort of recognition, a sort of wistful longing, which surely couldn’t be right. She shook her head, but the feeling didn’t go away as she continued looking around her.
The walls of the vast entranceway below were very nearly covered with portraits of men—no women, just men—and they seemed to stretch back well into the sixteenth century. She looked more closely. No, there were no women at all. How very odd.
Why weren’t there any paintings of women? Surely women had to have given birth to all of those men, and they
were, she imagined, legitimate. Surely they had lived here at least part of the time. It was very strange.
“Good morning.”
Her host stood at the foot of the stairs dressed in buckskins, beautifully polished Hessians, and a white lawn shirt open at the neck and covered with a pale brown coat. For the first time she looked at him as a man and he looked quite lovely. His dark hair was long, too long for fashion, but on him, here in the wilds of Cornwall, master of a huge edifice that would be a castle until time itself came to its end, it looked just right. It surprised her to realize that he was quite handsome. It was also disconcerting. She saw him suddenly holding her while she’d cried—both times, like a blubbering ninny—then she saw him leaning over her, tucking her into bed.
“Er, hello,” she said.
“Did you bathe your foot?”
“My foot? I bathed all of me, though there was but a small basin of water. Not that I’m complaining, North, it was really quite thoughtful. Was it Timmy the maid who brought me the water?”
He waved away her question. “Your stocking is torn and your foot is abraded, obviously from rubbing against your boot for many days. Did you bathe it? How bad is it?”
“Oh. It does hurt a bit. There wasn’t anything I could do about it. You see, I had to leave my valise in Dorchester. What I’m wearing is all I have, torn stocking and all.”
He frowned at her, saying finally, “It won’t do.” He turned and shouted, “Tregeagle! Come here immediately!”
He turned back to her, his frown in place, saying nothing until Tregeagle appeared. She was interested to see this housekeeper who had put her in a very nice bedchamber. When he appeared, she nearly gasped out loud. He was quite tall and quite the most beautiful older man she’d ever seen.
He looked like the
beau idéal
of a grandfather: a head of full silver hair, very clear blue eyes, and a face with clean lines and angles. This lovely older man was the housekeeper? This was surely a very strange household. She said, “Thank you for my lovely room, Tregeagle. Also, I appreciated the warm water.”
“It should have been hot,” Tregeagle said. He bowed briefly in her general direction, then said, “My lord?”
“Bring me ointment for a raw blister and some clean cloths for bandages. And a basin of very hot water. In the library. Now.”
“Yes, my lord, but it is an odd request. May I inquire—”
“No, just do it.”
“Yes, my lord. Miss.” He gave her but a curt nod, turned, and walked slowly and with the stateliness of a bishop toward the back of the house.
He expected her to tell him to leave her be—to turn into a horrified maiden on him—which, he supposed would be natural enough since she was young and a maiden, and she was here in his home without chaperon, but instead she said, “Your home is beautiful. It’s incredible, actually. A real live castle that so many people have put their stamp on, so many changes, softening, I guess I’d say. It makes me just want to sit here on the steps and let it settle into my bones.”
He merely cocked a dark brow, saying nothing.
“What is the family crest?”
“Well, it isn’t a nightingale bird, if that’s what you’re thinking. It’s two lions fighting each other with crossed swords behind them. Again, the Nightingale motto doesn’t have a thing to do with any nightingale bird, rather it says simply,
Virtue appears like an oak.
”
“That’s neither wildly romantic nor strikingly profound.”
“I know. I’m disappointed as well. Maybe that was all
my long-ago ancestor could think of when he decided he wouldn’t have a thing to do with a damned nightingale bird.”
“You said it was two fighting lions with crossed swords. Where’s an oak?”
“In the background somewhere.”
“Well, at least you’ve got a family crest and a motto. Indeed, you’re very lucky. My home—Honeymead Manor—is quite nice, but nothing out of the ordinary, a manor house no more than sixty years old, no family crest or motto either, but here”—she drew a deep breath and looked toward the very old suit of armor that resided in the far corner next to a mammoth fireplace whose inside was black from fires at least a century old—“but here, it’s magic. It’s wonderful.”
“Thank you.”
It was her turn to frown at him, which she did.
“Ah, Tregeagle, all my doctor’s implements. Ah, some bascilicum powder as well. Place them on my desk in the library, if you please. Now, Caroline, come with me.”
“Caroline?” Tregeagle turned in some surprise to his master. “My lord, you called the Young Person by her first name. It’s a nice name, even though it is on the common side, but it’s still her given name, and thus it isn’t appropriate that you make such easy use of it. She only arrived last night and she will be leaving right after she has breakfast. Surely her last name would be more appropriate.”
She could but stare. As for her host, he flushed, looking ready to wrap his hands around his housekeeper’s throat, but at the last moment he managed to gain control over himself. “Thank you, Tregeagle, for your observation, which was quite the thing to say if you want me to break your damned neck. Go away. See to the breakfast. Tell Polgrain we will eat in ten minutes. Ah, Tregeagle—”
“Yes, my lord?”
“Don’t forget, the food will be heaven-sent.”
“Yes, my lord.”
She looked after the retreating housekeeper. When he’d finally seen himself out of the library, she said in some wonder to North, “He is like one of my schoolmistresses at Chudleigh’s Young Ladies’ Academy. She couldn’t bear the girls, not really, but at least she tried to hide it just a little bit. I don’t understand, North. There are no portraits of ladies. Perhaps all their portraits are kept in a special ladies’ gallery, but even if that’s true, it’s still very strange. Another thing, all your servants are men. You told me it was a household of men last night. It’s obvious they don’t want any female here. Why?”
“Forget it. It’s nothing to concern you. Actually it’s none of your business. Now, sit down and put your left foot up on that hassock.”
“I can see to my blister myself, North. It’s not like it’s on my back and I can’t reach it.”
“Be quiet and sit down.”
She did. He came down on his knees in front of her, unlaced her boot and slipped it off her foot. She’d wadded a handkerchief against the side of her foot. He recognized it as one of his own, his initials elegantly embroidered on it—a gift from his old tutor—and wondered where she’d gotten it. He pulled it free of the blister. Beneath, the flesh was raw and inflamed. In his army years he’d seen too many men with such minor abrasions like this who’d died in a delirium of fever. He studied the blister. There were no angry red lines radiating out from the sore like spokes from the center of a wheel. That was something at least.
“Hold still. This won’t feel all that good in the beginning.” That was an understatement, she thought, as he ripped the remainder of her stocking up to her ankle and
dipped her foot into the basin of hot water. She nearly rose right out of the chair.
“Hold still, the pain will lessen.”
“It better,” she said between gritted teeth, “else I will shriek and then your servants will doubtless come running in here and shoot me.”
“No, I doubt they’d do that. Too messy, too noisy. They’d just see that you were clubbed over the head and buried in the garden.”
“Wonderful,” she said, and began to relax, at least until he lifted her foot again and began to wash it thoroughly. “Perhaps they’d consider just deporting me. I’ve always wanted to visit Botany Bay.”
“Come now, Caroline, I know it hurts, just hold on a little while longer. There, all clean. Now, some of my fine French brandy—no, don’t try to escape. I know it burns—”
Her fingers were white clutching the arms of the chair, her teeth gritted against the pain. She looked ready to scream, but managed instead to say calmly enough, “Burns, my lord? Let me tell you, North Nightingale, burning is but a small part of the agony. It’s ghastly, it’s stretching my bravery—”
“Don’t whine. There, all done. Now, just a bit of the bascilicum powder.”
He was gentle, she’d give him that. She hadn’t realized her foot was quite so bad. She gripped the arms of the chair as hard as she could when he began to wrap her foot in some white linen strips.
“I’ll never get my boot back on,” she said, observing the thick white bandage covering the top half of her foot.
“No boot or slipper. Indeed, you will walk as little as possible for a good week. After you’re settled in at Scrilady Hall, Dr. Treath can look at it. All right?”
She looked down at his dark head, at his equally tanned hands holding her foot. This was all very strange, she thought, wondering why, during the past minutes, she hadn’t thought once of her situation, of her aunt Ellie, dead, of herself, now completely alone.
It was there, of course, and she felt that wretched bowing pain again.
“Does it still hurt?”
“No, thank you, North.”
“All right,” he said, rising. “Let’s go have some breakfast. Then I’ll take you to Scrilady Hall.”
And there, she thought, she’d wait for her former guardian to come, and she knew he would come. It was obvious Mr. Ffalkes needed money badly, and she was the only pullet about for him to pluck. Yes, she’d think about him just as she would about who killed her aunt Ellie. Tears came again, stupid useless tears. She simply turned away, trying very hard not to sniff.
He said nothing, bless him, merely waited until she got control, then led her to the breakfast room. Let him think it was her foot that pained her, that was better than his pity.
S
HE TRIED TO
feel just a very small pinch, just the veriest dollop of compassion for the young man who was seated before the blazing fire in the drawing room of Scrilady Hall, his head down, his hands loosely clasped together between his knees, but she couldn’t find it. She drew on a sorely depleted store of patience. It wasn’t easy because, truth be told, she wanted to smack him.
“Cousin Bennett,” she said, limping toward him. “I know it’s difficult for you. It’s difficult for me as well. Come have some tea now. It will make you feel better. Mr. Brogan is here to speak to us about Aunt Ellie’s will.”
“Who cares about her bloody will?” Bennett said, not looking up at her. “I want to see my uncle’s will. That’s the important one, not
hers.
”
“Why? Your uncle died five years ago, or something like that. He left all his possessions to his wife, Aunt Eleanor.”
“I don’t believe it now. I never believed it. I’m his only male heir; he would have left everything to me. I know she must have changed it, hired Mr. Brogan to change it, probably became his mistress so he would do what she wanted.”
Her patience was dwindling at a rapid pace. She said sharply, “If you believed that, then why didn’t you act at the time?”
“I was only twenty-three when he died. Who would have believed me? I had no money, no important friends. It was that damned widow they believed. She was a strumpet, did
you know that? I’ll wager she even slept with Mr. Brogan, who has the look of one of those damned little Cornish piskeys—all wizened and old. I’ll wager he lives in a tree trunk and not a house.”
“Yes, and no doubt he thrashes corn on moonlit nights. Now, mind your tongue, Bennett. Just be quiet. Stop acting like a fool. Why are you sitting there shivering? It’s not the dead of winter, it’s not snowing. Goodness, it’s not at all cold.”