She swallowed, dragging her gaze free. “How are the Robinovs? Is Carla better? What has happened to Kenneth over the thefts?”
“They are well and spent Christmas with me at Cotley Hall. Carla is almost back to normal, and Dorothea is looking for a place to settle while the legal matters of her inheritance are completed. Lacey seems to have given up on Kenneth. I believe he is off the hook.”
“Why?”
“Because, upon Lacey’s inquiries, other, very similar thefts came to light, from before the Robinovs were even in the country. And they do indeed follow the Marshalls. I told him about our dealings with them, and I believe he wrote to the magistrates here. Alvan will be aware of that.”
“And the Marshalls are quite oblivious to this small army closing around them?”
“I believe they are.”
“Poor Anne,” Helen said ruefully. “I wonder what will become of her?”
“I suspect in the end, she will make a match of it with Kenneth. But they are too young, and Kenneth’s patrimony in Russia too unsettled to support them just yet.”
“She is very fond of children,” Helen observed. “And somehow, she has acquired a decent education. Despite her youth, she would make an excellent governess. I never asked if Lady Overton had replaced me yet?”
“I believe she has not.”
They lapsed into silence once more. A few birds sang their pleasant evening songs as the sun grew lower in the sky. The woods lent a dangerous sense of isolation, a feeling that the rest of the world did not touch her here.
He said conversationally, “We—Dorothea and I—have let it be known that we are not engaged to be married.”
She could not resist a quick glance at him. “You have to stop betrothing yourself to people to help them out of scrapes.”
He held her gaze. “You make it sound like a habit. I only ever did it once, and you may recall, it was not my idea.”
“But the idea was firmly in your head. You promised Mr. Robinov. You were about to go to Russia for her.”
He sighed. “In winter, in wartime, I know. Do you want the truth, Helen? I was bored. Weary of my life in England. I grasped onto Russia as an excuse to do something reckless and dangerous as well as useful. To shake off this…malaise of ennui and tedium. That was my state of mind, the reason I was so unforgivably grumpy and rude at the Hart when you first walked into my life.”
“I know.”
He stopped, turning to face her. “And then there was you, challenging my every word, making me laugh, forcing my interest, intriguing me. I didn’t need adventure. I needed a friend.”
Butterflies were jumping in her stomach as he took her hand.
“Are we friends, Helen?” he asked softly.
“Of course, we are.” Since the world seemed to be standing still again, she searched his intense eyes for his true feelings, for something more than friendship. She took a breath. “When we last met, I did not intend to be rude or hurtful. But I do not believe friendship is reason enough for marriage.”
“But it is the beginning. The foundation of a successful union.”
“That sounds very staid,” she offered.
“Ah, that must be where the love comes in,” he said with mock understanding. “To quicken the heart and raise a mere friendship, however staid, to the dizzying heights of passion and delight.”
She flushed and tried to tug her hand free. “You are making fun of me.” In truth, that wasn’t what disturbed her. It was his talk of passion and delight.
Smiling, he held on to her hand, turning it to press a kiss into her palm. Even through her glove, her skin burned. And somehow, his thumb had slipped under the cuff of her glove, idly caressing her wrist. A sweet, dizzying awareness took her by surprise.
And then he placed her hand in his arm and walked on.
It was never my own love I questioned! She wanted to shout the words at him, but they stuck in her throat, along with fear of losing this moment. God help her, she had begun to hope again.
For the rest of the walk back to Ingolby, they talked intermittently of unimportant things. At least they seemed unimportant compared to the turmoil in her heart. But by the time they parted, she knew rather more about his home, his family, and the state of the land he had brought back to prosperity. She learned a little about his childhood, much of which was spent in France, since his mother was French, and about his most recent adventure to rescue his injured brother.
“In comparison, my life must seem very dull,” she observed.
“I don’t see how, when you are not,” he said unexpectedly. “That is what I have learned from you. One doesn’t need to travel the world or brave war-torn countries to give meaning and adventure to one’s life. There is adventure just in getting to know another person, meaning in small acts of kindness and understanding.”
She considered that somewhat doubtfully, for it was a novel way of looking at her life. But she liked that he had said it.
“Perhaps there is a place for both,” she allowed. “For I would like to see some more of the world one day.”
“I hope you will,” he said mildly. “In the meantime, our adventure is catching the Marshalls in their crimes.”
He left her civilly and quite properly at the Carlukes’ gate, tipping his hat and murmuring that he would see her at Mooreton Hall on Friday. As he walked away, she could not help pausing to watch him. Her hand crept over her heart, as though trying to calm it, for he was right. There did seem to be a massive adventure just in spending an hour with him.
Chapter Twenty
Mooreton Hall, as one would have expected, was a huge, palatial house. From a massive great hall, decorated with potted plants and trailing greenery, a magnificent stone staircase swept upward to rows of galleries. Helen trailed after Mr. and Mrs. Carluke with Sarah and Sophia dangling from either hand, through the great hall to another passage and another broad staircase. They climbed two flights of stairs, then followed a twisting passage to a suite of connecting rooms. Two of the chambers could be entered separately from the corridor. Baby Selina had a cot in her parents’ chamber, and her sisters shared a little dressing room between there and Helen’s chamber.
Although the furniture and the decorations were old, everything was comfortable and clean. It would, she thought, be a fascinating house to spend some time exploring. The duchess looked in to make sure they were comfortable, bringing George with her to take the Carluke girls to tea with the other children.
Helen went with them to the nursery, and on the way, George surreptitiously pointed out the door of the Marshalls’ room.
“Close to the corner,” he murmured with a grin. “So easy to hide while we’re watching it!”
At the children’s tea party, Helen was delighted to see Eliza happy in the company of her twin and her friend Jane Verne, all of whom greeted Helen with almost embarrassing enthusiasm. She introduced Sarah and Sophia, who sat beside them, and Eliza made it her business to look after the younger girls. Helen’s duties were hardly arduous, but if she had hoped to hide among the children until their bedtime, she was quickly disappointed.
She was expected to dine with the other guests before the main festivities began. And there, for the first time, she glimpsed Lord and Lady Overton, and some distance down the table from them, Philip and Phoebe Marshall. Fortunately, there were so many guests at dinner, they could all at least pretend not to see each other.
Sir Marcus saw her though, bowing to her from across the dining room before sitting beside Lady Sydney.
Helen wore the evening gown Lady Cecily had given her, so at least she did not feel too overwhelmingly dowdy among the glittering guests. She was seated beside the local vicar, who made conversation for them both, giving her time to observe her fellow diners. She noticed Anne beside Julius Moore, laughing and clearly enjoying his company. She saw Phoebe pointing out to her neighbor—Lord Verne, the duke’s brother-in-law—what a charming young couple they made.
After di
nner, formality collapsed. The ladies could withdraw if they wished. The gentleman could stay and drink port if they wished. But everyone was invited to view the pictures in the gallery, to attend poetry readings, or musical recitals in various salons, or dancing in the great hall which would begin in half an hour.
Since the gallery was on her way back to the bedchamber, where she meant to make sure the girls were asleep, Helen paused to examine some of the pictures. A rather wild landscape caught her attention, perhaps because of the shadowy yet splendid building that seemed to be tumbling down as one looked at it. Far in the background lurked a watching figure.
“I like that one, too,” Mr. Carluke said behind her. “Very atmospheric.”
“Who is the artist?”
Mr. Carluke pointed at the scrawl on the bottom right, which looked like Tamar. “I heard a rumor he’s the long-lost Marquis of Tamar.”
“How is he lost?”
“Well, no one ever sees him. He and his siblings ran feral after their father died, leaving them with nothing but a pile of debts. Last I heard, they were all dead, though I hope not. Do you think my wife would like this?”
She opened her mouth to reply, but was distracted by a feeling of being observed. Glancing around, she found Philip staring at her from only a few feet away.
“You!” he uttered in disbelief.
She tilted her chin in defiance. After what he had done, he had no right to look at her with such contempt.
Mr. Carluke turned to him in his vague, amiable way, as though expecting an introduction. Philip’s spiteful eyes flickered, assessing the relationship between them, and guessed correctly.
At least he spoke quietly, confidentially. “Sir, I hope you have not employed this creature as your children’s governess. You should know that she is no better than she should be and quite unfit to associate with a gentleman’s children. There is a reason she has no reference from her previous employer.”
It seemed he was going to ruin her life for a third time, and from sheer spite. There was just no need, no reason for him to say such a thing to her new employer. Except that she had rejected him and thwarted his plans. This man she had once loved.
She felt her shoulders droop, waited helplessly for Mr. Carluke to demand details, but determined she would not run away.
“Actually,” Mr. Carluke said. “I prefer my own eyes and the word of friends to that of complete strangers.”
Helen gazed at him in astonishment.
“Also,” Mr. Carluke added in his mild manner, “I’ll thank you not to slander the lady.” He moved away, ushering Helen before him.
“Sir, you are kind,” Helen said intensely, “and with no explanation from me!”
“I had Alvan’s before I ever met you,” Mr. Carluke said.
Helen glanced back over her shoulder at the vanishing figure of Philip. “He did not even argue with you.”
“I should think he’s in awe of my brother—Lord Gantry, you know,” Carluke said carelessly. “I believe Gantry is quite a leader of polite society, though I barely notice such things myself.”
Helen closed her mouth.
“Best see to the children then,” he advised and grinned. “Before the fun begins.”
*
In a house of this size, with such easy-going hosts, it had not been difficult for Marcus to avoid the Marshalls, beyond distant bows when they found themselves in the same room for breakfast or dinner.
Only Anne had taken the trouble to come up to him and say bluntly, “You should know I don’t believe these rumors that Miss Milsom ran away with you.”
“Nor should you,” he replied, “for she didn’t. And wouldn’t.”
She beamed at him with approval. “That’s just what I said! And though I still don’t want to marry you, I don’t believe, either, that you would do such a thing.”
“Why, thank you. I am much moved.”
“No, you’re not. Society wouldn’t care much if it were true. It’s women who suffer from such vile rumors.”
“You are quite right,” he said, impressed again by this unexpected perception in the daughter of Philip and Phoebe Marshall.
For an instant, he was tempted to tell her that Miss Milsom’s friends were about to scotch any such rumors with the truth. But he didn’t want her blabbing anything to her parents that might warn them of the forces against them.
Surreptitiously, he watched Phoebe as she left the dining room, but she was too smart to purloin any cutlery or other silver at the moment. There were too many people, and she only had a reticule in which to hide anything.
Strolling into the gallery, he was in time to see Marshall notice Helen for the first time. From sheer instinct, he sped his pace toward them, but fortunately Carluke was with her and appeared to give Marshall a flea in his ear—judging by the older man’s dropping jaw.
Marcus turned in the opposite direction. He should not show Helen any undue attention in case it fed the Marshalls’ rumors. He wanted nothing to compel Helen into marriage, for he knew her well enough now to realize that such compulsion would always stand in his way. He had to be free to choose her for no other aim than love. And she had to choose him for the same reason. If there was reason to any of this.
It was a pity in some ways that the duchess’s entertainment was so scattered. At a ball, there would have been but one room in which to observe Phoebe’s light fingers. Here, she could flit from salon to salon to ballroom to gallery. Fortunately, there were enough conspirators to keep watch wherever she went without drawing attention by trailing after her.
In the musical salon, the duchess stood beside the pianoforte, twisting an ornate and probably uncomfortably heavy ring on her finger. Gracefully, she introduced the wonderful new soprano who was about to become the rage of London and left her ring on the edge of the pianoforte when she stood aside.
Phoebe was patient. She waited until the rapt audience all but mobbed the talented young singer before she brushed against the instrument and swept up the ring as she passed. If anyone noticed, she could claim she was keeping it safe for whoever it belonged to.
Over the heads of the gushing crowd, Marcus caught the duchess’s eye and nodded. She didn’t even glance where the ring had been, merely carried on talking a few minutes more before slipping out of the room.
Marcus strolled out of the salon a little later and lingered in the gallery, wondering whether to buy one of Tamar’s paintings. He didn’t know if he was the mysterious young marquis, but he liked the artist’s work. At the door of the poetry salon, he encountered Sydney Cromarty.
“She’s not in there anymore,” Cromarty murmured. “But she swiped my loosened cufflink before it even fell off my cuff. She’s as good as any pickpocket.”
“She’s got Her Grace’s ring. And there she is coming out of the dining room and heading, I suspect, for her chamber.”
“I’ll send Henrie after her,” Cromarty murmured and strolled off toward the ballroom.
Marcus entered the poetry salon, quietly edging around the rapt listeners to sit in the window seat. From there, it was quite easy to drown out the tortured verse while gazing down onto the courtyard.
Only a few lines into the next poetic offering, something moved in the shadows outside. The fence. It was almost time to strike.
*
“Someone’s coming,” Horatio hissed, bolting back around the corner with Eliza to join their brothers and Helen.
As the footsteps approached, Helen held her breath, and sure enough, they paused at the Marshalls’ chamber door. There was a rustle and then the sound of a key in the lock. Clearly, Phoebe had learned the lesson of Helen searching her room at Audley Park.
Helen edged forward, just in time to see Phoebe’s yellow gown whisk into the room.
“Time to summon the chambermaid, I think,” Helen murmured.
Obligingly, George sped off to the back stairs, but then another set of footsteps hurried along the passage, and everyone jerked back around the c
orner out of sight. They waited, but the footsteps kept coming until Helen feared they would all be caught skulking. She tried to think of an excuse for playing hide and seek in her evening gown with the children who were no longer her charges.
Horatio peered around the corner, and Helen tugged him back by the shoulder.
“Mr. Marshall,” he mouthed.
An instant later, Phoebe flitted out of the chamber, her reticule looking considerably lighter as she hurried back along the passage.
So, it was Philip, not Phoebe, who would meet the receiver. Helen wasn’t sure how she felt about that. She didn’t want Phoebe to get away with what she’d done, and she didn’t want the woman casting all the blame on Philip.
“Where is she, Miss M.?” Henrietta, Lady Sydney breathed behind them.
Helen pointed around the corner. And then at the side wall of the bedchamber and mouthed, “Philip Marshall.”
Henrietta nodded and scampered back the way she’d come.
A moment later, Philip emerged and locked the door behind him. As his footsteps faded along the parquet floor, Helen peered around the corner, the twins popping their heads around beneath her. Philip wore his greatcoat and his pockets were bulging.
“Gone to take the air,” Helen murmured just as he veered around a dark, narrow passage that only the servants used. “Where does that lead?” she asked the children.
“To another back stair,” Horatio said. “Even the servants don’t use it, so it will be in total darkness.”
“Is there a door at the bottom?”
“Yes,” Eliza said decisively.
“Well, they’ll find him,” Helen said with a satisfaction she didn’t really feel. Since she didn’t want the children following him when he could turn like a cornered cur, she urged them back to their bedchambers and let them see her returning to her own. She wanted to make sure that the Carluke children were all asleep.
They were, even the baby, although a maid dozed in a chair in the chamber with her.
The Weary Heart Page 21
