“What is that supposed to mean?”
“You are an intelligent woman. Think about it while I lay your dress for supper on the bed.”
Edwina vanished into another room, leaving Amalia to fume. “She likes the way he looks at me and he says, ‘love and affection’. How am I supposed to—Oh, Lord.”
Amalia’s mouth dropped into a wide O of surprised understanding. Taking the letter, she rose from her chair and marched into her bedroom where Edwina examined potential gowns for supper that evening, carefully evaluating each one. Amalia shook the paper.
“Are you hinting that Reggie is in love with me?” she demanded.
“I do not recall hinting at anything, My Lady.” Edwina pulled a dark gold gown from the armoire. “How about this dress? It will truly accent your eyes.”
“But you like the way he looks at me.”
“Yes.”
“And he says he feels love and affection for me in addition to friendship. Does that mean he is in love with me?”
Edwina eyed her sidelong and sighed in exasperation. “Why are you asking me? You should be asking Lord Lyonhall.”
Amalia wanted to stamp her foot. “He is not here to ask, Ed. If he felt only friendship for me, which I truly believe is all I am to him, why would he add this other?”
“I cannot read a man’s mind, My Lady. Nor a woman’s, either. Yes, I do think this gown at supper tonight. Lord Eastcairn will be drooling all over you.”
Groaning, Amalia declared, “Good God, that is the last thing I need. Can you not find a dress that makes me look hideous?”
Scandalized, Edwina stared. “Even if you have such a gown, and you do not, by the way, I would hardly dress My Lady in it for supper.”
“And with Reggie gone and Father ill, I must face his marriage proposals alone. That means you will have to chaperone, Ed.”
“Oh, excellent.” Edwina smirked. “I would adore watching a verbal sword fight.”
“And witness me falling beneath his blade.”
“Hardly that. You are an even match for him, believe me.”
Edwina must have felt disappointment as she stood behind Amalia at supper, for only Patrick arrived for the meal. “Freddie had to leave after breakfast this morning, Amalia,” he said in answer to her question. “I am not sure why or where he went.”
Taking her place at the table, Amalia met Edwina’s eyes and quickly rolled her own where Patrick could not see it. “What a pity,” Amalia replied happily.
“You look absolutely stunning in that gown, cousin,” he said, his tone and expression admiring as he looked her up and down. “Freddie would absolutely be drooling over you if he were to see you in it.”
Amalia lifted her chin and her wineglass. “A pity he is not here, then.”
Toasting her silently, Patrick shook his head sadly. “I had really thought you and Freddie would be drawn to one another immediately. He really is an excellent match for you, Amalia. Young, wealthy, an Earl. He attracts women by the score.”
“I have nothing against your friend, Patrick,” Amalia said and wondered if she had just told an untruth. “I do not want to be married or courted right now. Father is deathly ill, and all you and he want to talk about his marrying me.”
Patrick leaned forward. “That is exactly why, cousin. If His Grace dies, and I pray every day he does not, then who is there to see you to a fruitful marriage? You have no father, no brother to take care of your interests. Yet, if you marry now, with His Grace’s approval, you are secure if, God forbid, he passes.”
Her previous happy mood gone, Amalia pondered his words. It was true that if her father died soon, and she was unmarried, she could become a victim of any husband the Prince Regent might choose. “You do have a point, cousin,” she replied, sipping her wine.
“Of course I do. But if you marry Freddie, you have a secured future to a good man worthy of you.”
“Is not Reggie worthy of me as well?” she asked carefully.
Patrick’s jaw dropped. “Reggie? Well, yes, I suppose his lineage is certainly high enough, but do you really want to marry a Marquess when you can marry an Earl? And Reggie does not love you, not the way you want to be loved, anyway. To him, you are Marshall’s sister, and a means to an end.”
Suddenly angry, Amalia all but slammed her glass down. “A means to an end? The dukedom of Thornhill, no doubt. And your friend does not also have this same motive? He bears me no love, Patrick. At least Reggie has some love for me.”
“Yes,” Patrick said slowly. “Freddie does love you. He fell for you the moment he saw you.”
“That is not possible. While I do believe in love at first sight, it goes both ways, not one.”
“Not true. If you had not been so worried about His Grace, you might also have felt it.”
Amalia curled her lip. “I also find it interesting that your good friend shows up just as Father falls ill, pressuring me to marry him.”
“A coincidence only.” Patrick sighed. “He does love you and promises to make you a very happy woman.”
“Makes promises to you, not to me.”
“He would do so if you gave him a chance.” Patrick glanced aside. “If you had not made him so angry, he might have been able to convince you.”
“And had he not made me so angry, I would not have made him so. He dares to raise the subject at every chance even when Father told him I can take my time and choose a husband.”
“This is getting us nowhere, Amalia,” Patrick replied with a small smile. “Please. Let us dine together as cousins and friends.”
Amalia’s returning smile felt strained on her lips. “Of course.”
Pushing his horse as hard as he dared without exhausting it, Reggie rode through the afternoon and into the dusk. His stud farm on his estate in Surrey lay about twenty-five miles southwest of London, a sprawling three hundred acres of prime pasture and woodland, his house and the stables comprising of fifteen structures that included his manor, the stables themselves, barns, sheds, a coach house and cottages where his gamekeeper and stud manager lived.
His gelding, already fit from nearly constant travel, moved strongly under him as Reggie alternated trotting and cantering, and he occasionally dismounted to walk and let the horse get its wind back. Despite his care, foam drenched the dark bay hide, and the gelding stumbled often by the time he reached his estate several hours after dark.
Having been seen and recognized as he trotted into the wide stable yard, grooms rushed to take his exhausted mount and walk the gelding until it was cool enough to unsaddle, water, and feed. “Where is Martin Rush?” he demanded as he dismounted.
“In the foaling barn, My Lord.”
Hurrying to the long structure where his mares gave birth to their foals before being turned out to graze on the lush green pastures, Reggie half- walked and half-ran inside. He found Martin, his stud manager, in a stall on his knees beside a stricken mare lying in the straw on her side. Her baby whinnied in a high-pitched voice, and Reggie wanted to echo its sentiment.
“What happened?”
Reggie opened the stall door and knelt, unmindful of his clothes, beside the mare. Martin gazed at him with a mixture of rage and grief.
“I do not know, My Lord,” he said, his voice thick. “I swear none of them colicked, I swear it. They suddenly went down with no symptoms at all.”
“That is impossible.”
“I know,” Martin snarled, the turned his face away. “I apologize for my tone, My Lord.”
“Do not apologize. Tell me exactly what happened.”
Martin drew a deep breath, his hand on the dead mare’s neck. “Yesterday afternoon and evening, all was as usual. Nothing amiss, all the horses eating, happy. Then last night, a groom came to tell me a mare was down. Suddenly—down. By the time I got here, she was dead.”
“And her foal?”
“Alive, crying for his mother, unharmed. Two more went down a few hours later. I searched the feed, smelled and tasted
the water, but it was all the same the other horses received, and nothing happened to them. I sent a messenger to you immediately.”
“I got it.”
“Since then, two others died. This old lady was the last.”
“Six mares?” Reggie asked. “And their foals are fine?”
“Yes, My Lord.”
Reggie sat back on his haunches. “I expect we can rule out poison.”
Martin started gaping. “Poison?”
“If they were poisoned, their foals would get it in their milk.”
For a long time, Martin said nothing and stared at the crying foal. “That is not true, My Lord.”
“How so?”
“If it acted fast enough, the mare would have gone down almost immediately. The foal would have had little chance to nurse. In addition, the poison would need time to get to her milk.”
Reggie nodded slowly. “Then perhaps they were poisoned. Have we any new grooms hired recently?”
“You cannot mean a groom did this?”
“I do. Who was hired in the last week?”
Martin’s brows furrowed. “Henderson. A young lad from a nearby town.”
“Take me to him.”
Rising from the straw, Reggie and Martin strode out of the stall and down the aisle toward the cluster of grooms watching them. From what he read on their faces, he saw a mixture of fear, anger, resentment, and worry on their faces. “Where is Henderson?” Reggie demanded as they bowed low.
“Gone, My Lord,” said a man, Gerald, who had worked for the estate since before Reggie inherited. “Left sometime this afternoon.”
Reggie cursed. “Did any of you get to know him? Be familiar with his family, perhaps?”
“No, My Lord. He did not mix with the rest of us much, kept to himself.” Gerald glanced at his fellows. “Seemed standoffish, he did.”
“This is what we are going to do,” Reggie said. “All the surviving mares and foals are to go out to pasture right now. The young geldings and mares under training are also to be turned loose, tonight. The orphan foals are to be bottle fed at the old estate over the hills. I am sorry, lads, but you will be trudging back and forth until this miscreant is caught and punished.”
“Come morning I will have the constables looking for Henderson, My Lord,” Martin promised, his ruddy countenance grim.
“Good. I will talk to them myself. Now the stallions will have to be taken to the old estate buildings as well. I cannot risk them. Have there been any problems in the stallions’ building?”
The grooms glanced at one another, shaking their heads. “Not that we heard, My Lord,” Gerald replied.
“I will check there next. I promise you all extra pay for the extra work to keep my horses safe.”
“But if Henderson is gone, My Lord,” Gerald asked, “why the precautions?”
“Precautions because who knows in what feed he put the poison. No feed we have right now is to be taken to the old estate. Martin, you order fresh feed from the merchant, throw out all the old. The pastures will be safe enough, I expect, as is the former structures before this estate was built.”
“My Lord, we will need nursing mares to milk from,” Martin pointed out. “Might we take a few of them to the old estate as well?”
“Of course, yes. Take the more docile ones you know will not kick your head off when you milk her. Anything I might have missed?”
“Will these old lasses be safe in the pastures, My Lord?” asked a young groom. “What if someone tries to shoot them?”
“You lads will take turns watching over all the herds, that is why. But the fields offer no cover to shoot from, and a horse murderer would be hard put to get close enough without being seen. Anything else?”
“Why would Henderson want to hurt our lasses, My Lord? They never hurt no one. They be innocent.”
Reggie nodded grimly. “They are innocent, you are right. And I intend to find out. And whoever is behind this will answer to me. That I promise you.”
Leaving the grooms to begin removing the mares and foals to the pastures and Martin to oversee them, Reggie strode to the stallions building next. Alerted to trouble, the grooms attending the ten valuable breeding studs stood anxiously by, bowing as he entered. Glancing first at the equine heads hanging over stall doors inquiringly, he felt sweet relief surge through him.
“Has there been any horses sick in here?” he asked the grooms.
They glanced at one another. “No, My Lord. All is quiet.”
“Excellent. Now we have to move these lads to the old estate buildings right now. Someone is maliciously poisoning my animals, and they need to be protected. I will come along. George, be so good as to saddle Conquistador for me.”
In less than an hour, he rode the huge black and white piebald stallion across the fields through the darkness. With a lantern in his hand, he led the long line of grooms leading the other stallions, with others handling the crying babies. Behind came a few nursing mares, their foals bouncing happily at their sides. His stables, emptied, Reggie breathed easier.
“Now try to slaughter my horses,” he muttered grimly.
The old estate structures, abandoned more than a hundred years ago, were made of stone and still relatively intact. Reggie had kept them in good order as he had planned to use them in the future in expanding his breeding business. Now they would serve to keep his prized animals safe from attack.
Dismounting, he strode up to Martin, busy directing the grooms into housing the stallions and mares separately. He bowed low as Reggie stepped to his side, Conquistador at his shoulder. “Who is doing this, My Lord?” he asked. “Why?”
“I honestly do not know,” Reggie admitted, caressing the stallion’s nose. “Do you think Henderson would be foolish enough to remain in the area?”
Frowning, Martin shook his head. “He does have family in the village, so he might. Or he might flee, then return when he thinks no one is searching for him.”
“Come the morning, I will speak to the constables,” Reggie informed him, watching the grooms settle the horses into their temporary home. “I will also offer a reward for Henderson’s capture. That might motivate people to turn him over to the authorities.”
“And if he had nothing to do with this?”
“Then we keeping looking for whoever was responsible, and why.”
Chapter 13
“Daughter.”
Amalia woke from a light doze instantly and found her father staring at her from his pillow. “Father.”
The hour was past midnight, and Amalia had fallen asleep in the chair beside the bed. Grateful she had, for had she been in her own rooms, she might have missed his awakening. Edwina slept on a sofa nearby, unable to remain awake. His smile for her appeared weak, but it was nonetheless there and real, and he was still alive. “May I have water?” he muttered, his tone husky.
“Of course.”
She rushed to the sideboard to pour from a pitcher into a glass and called for Mr. Hill. “He is awake.”
Amalia held the glass to his lips, and relief swept through her like a gale-force wind. “No more getting out of bed for you, Father,” she informed him. “This time, you stay in bed until you are completely well and recovered.”
The Duke finished the glass and leaned back with a sigh. “You believe that my getting out of bed too soon is making me relapse?”
“Yes,” Amalia replied.
“I believe that as well, Your Grace.”
Mr. Hill bowed, then entered the room. “You must retain all your strength until you fight this persistent disease off. You must eat even if you do not feel hungry, drink all the liquids you can in addition to my herbal remedies.”
“I expect that between you both, I have little choice.”
Amalia brushed her fingers over his brow. “You do not. And if I must, I will call in footmen to enforce your bed rest.”
“They obey me, daughter, not you.” But the Duke smiled. “I will stay abed until I am fully healed.�
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“Good. Now, please, drink this tea and eat a little. I will watch over you.”
“And in order to ensure the purity of what you eat and drink,” Mr. Hill stated firmly, “you will partake of only what I prepare myself. Heaven alone knows what you might partake of in ignorance.”
Amalia stared at him. “Diseases spread through food and water?”
“Oh, very much so. Contaminated water—” The little man shuddered. “I was in India for a time, studying. The diseases that spread through there, you cannot imagine.”
“But why are the rest of us not ill?” she asked, confused.
“Many reasons, My Lady. A natural immunity, for instance. In India, some people took ill and died while others did not, yet all drank the same water. Take the Black Plague in our own history. Most died, yet others never got sick at all.”
“That still makes little sense,” Amalia protested. “We should still see others in the household ill as well.”
“I am suspecting that His Grace ate or drank something contaminated, and we are still seeing the effects until it is washed from his person.”
“Perhaps that is it.” Amalia turned back to her father. “Now, you will heed Mr. Hill? He is your best hope of recovering. And no more adventures at the supper table.”
His eyes widened. “And miss your theatrics while angering Lord Eastcairn?”
“Yes, those as well,” Amalia replied with a laugh. “Right now, you need all the rest you can get.”
“I will obey you, daughter. Is Reginald still here and hosting in my place?”
“He was forced to leave on an emergency,” she answered, brushing his hair from his brow. “He should return soon.”
“And Lord Eastcairn? Is he still angry?”
“He, too, left yesterday, Father. Patrick did not know why.”
“Perhaps that is best for now. I am feeling tired and wish to go back to sleep.”
“Then I will see you in the morning.”
Leaving his side, Amalia watched for a moment as Mr. Hill encouraged her father to eat some fresh bread and drink his tea remedy, then gently woke Edwina. With her maid yawning behind her, she left her father’s rooms and returned to her own. Edwina helped her to undress and garb herself in her nightgown, then Amalia crawled wearily into her bed.
The Last Lady of Thornhill Manor Page 7
