The Painted Castle

by Kristy Cambron

  “In the ballroom,” she finished for him, her midsection generating a nervous tick under his scrutiny. “Yes, I know.” She tucked her reticule at her side, out of sight, in the folds of her gown.

  “Hadn’t you better return to your line of dance partners? No doubt they are lost without the charms of your company.” He stepped to a desk nearby and casually leaned against it.

  “As we have not been introduced, sir, I will beg your pardon and take my leave back to the ball. I have yet to meet our host, and I should like to thank him for his generosity in arranging such an evening. I bid you good night then.” Elizabeth bowed and, in a fluid motion, lifted her hem and quickened heeled slippers toward the door as if her feet had been put to a flame.

  “Stay—” He rebounded like a shot, the desk creaking to signal he’d risen from it. “Bitte.”

  The protest arrested her. Elizabeth turned, found him standing with a hand out, half bowed and elegant, offering a leather wingback across from the fire.

  “My apologies,” he offered, keeping his post. “I welcome the diversion. We can be introduced and the doors will remain open, if that is at all concerning to you. But please do not leave me to the wolves out there. I fear I should not survive it.”

  Wolves?

  Elizabeth suppressed an offbeat smile at the thought she and the stranger may have something in common. Marriage seekers in ballrooms could be wolves—including Elizabeth and her mother by very definition—but in the library, they both detested the packs with the same fervency.

  Reading her smile as confirmation that his hook had worked to draw her back, the gentleman bowed. “Pardon, Fräulein. I am Franz.”

  Odd. One was never introduced with simply a Christian name and no title or surname to accompany it. No doubt they did things differently on the Continent.

  She bowed in return, reluctance keeping her gaze upon him. “Elizabeth.”

  “Not Lady Elizabeth?”

  This ball was a misstep. Another loss. Why not tell him the truth? They’d never meet again.

  She walked to the fire and eased her gown down to the edge of the wingback’s leather cushion, keeping her back poker straight. “In the ballroom, perhaps. My mother is the Dowager Countess of Davies, and she wishes me to remember that fact when I am amongst the peerage. But lost in a library such as this? No, sir. I assure you I am quite plain in comparison.”

  “Plain you are not,” Franz scoffed, but nodded as if satisfied with her answer in some measure. He moved about the room, his tension appearing to ease as he took a decanter from behind the library’s ornamental desk and held a crystal tumbler to the dance of firelight. “Would you care for one?”

  She shook her head. “No, thank you.”

  “Then you won’t mind if I indulge.” Franz poured amber liquid into the tumbler and hesitated not at all before he partook of a deep drink. He eased into the wingback opposite her, his regal silver-fox coat melting against leather as he surveyed the room, a spell of orange cast by the firelight.

  “And what is your reason for escaping the wolves, Lady Elizabeth?”

  “I have no reason to be discontent—not in a ballroom such as the viscount owns here.”

  “That is not what I asked.”

  What purpose was behind the cat-and-mouse game he’d initiated? “You ask me to insult our host and fellow party guests by naming them ravenous beasts?”

  “I suppose I did.” He chuckled and offered an artful tip of the brow, signaling humor was easy for him. “But we should have nothing to fear in speaking openly. Not as we are both hiding.”

  “If you must know, I sought the artist. Then I saw paintings in here and wondered if he—”

  “The artist? And who is he?”

  “It is said there is a portrait maker in attendance tonight. I seek to inquire whether those rumors are true.”

  “Gossip? I would have guessed that above you, if you are not one of them.” He twirled the liquid in his tumbler.

  A thought sparked within her.

  He was foreign. Direct in manner. Noticing of details others might overlook. And perhaps even playing the part in clothes borrowed from a wealthy viscount? It wouldn’t have been completely unforeseen . . .

  “You are not he . . . are you, sir?”

  “What gave me away?” Franz gave off such an air of disinterest coupled with outright folly at the notion that the thought died almost as soon as Elizabeth had entertained it.

  “Well, I fear I will remain disquieted until I learn the truth.”

  “The truth?”

  “Yes. If he is, in fact, penniless.”

  “Penniless?” Franz let loose an easy laugh and stretched his legs, crossing one riding boot over the other at the ankle. “What manifold tales! Pray go on. What else has talk of the dance floor seen to produce but a sorry character as a penniless painter come to fritter away hours with England’s noblest wolves?”

  “You misunderstand. I seek only to learn if his plight is real, not to feed rumors of speculation.”

  “But what is your interest?” When she didn’t answer, he continued, his voice a mocking whisper. “Perhaps . . . you are an artist?”

  She tilted her head to the side, matching clever for clever. “Are not all accomplished ladies expected to be such?”

  “Ach, I should be more direct with someone as witty as you. Perhaps matrimony is its own art form. Many a lady has mastered it and found herself far from penniless as a result. There is but a ballroom of eligible ladies beyond these library doors.”

  Elizabeth bristled at being smacked with truth. Even more at a stranger’s boldness in judging her so completely. “That is quite a remark, sir.”

  “Forgive me. I am a foreigner. We know no better.” He stopped, as if that explained all, and threw back a final gulp from his glass.

  “I haven’t a wish to marry into anything, sir—not a grand library or an estate.”

  Franz stood, as if he disbelieved her claim and had already lost interest because of it. “Revolutionary talk for a lady. And what makes you so much better than a ballroom of wolves? Hmm?”

  “Better? I wouldn’t think to—”

  “Of course. We would never say such a thing.” He abandoned the tumbler on the desk and turned back, amusement at play in his smile as he tapped his index finger to the side of his head. “But we might think it.”

  That’s quite enough.

  Her mother may have plucked and pulled her taffeta gowns and reared her for such a time as dancing the long hours through a gilded ballroom of gentlemen, but her pa-pa didn’t raise a fool. Nor a milquetoast either.

  Elizabeth stood, ready to quit the room and certainly to forget his abhorrent presence in it. “Pray forgive me, sir, for speaking with such sharp overtones. But I would not pledge to marry a man simply for what accompanies his name. I will be no pawn, not even if a gentleman possessed every painting in England. If you’ll excuse me then. I find the air in here is a little weak.”

  Elizabeth bowed and quit the library in a singular breath, then whisked down the hall with the art of composure on her mind.

  Brash and bombastic . . . How dare he! No one had ever spoken to her in such a manner of insult.

  Not in any ballroom of polite society in London and Yorkshire combined. Perhaps East Suffolk was farther away from civilized society than she’d anticipated. But despite the biting rebuke, it steeled her resolve if anything could. Elizabeth was determined—now more than ever—that a contract of marriage would not be in her future. Not if she’d be forced into the tight little box of convention and expectation where the fairer sex was concerned.

  Sketches and paintings may not purchase a future, but something would be salvaged of the circumstance fate had seen to level against mother and daughter. Whatever it was, it would be by her own hand.

  The music continued, as did the jovial chatter of guests, an oblivious melody of high spirits greeting Elizabeth when she returned to the ballroom. She tipped her chin up, noble and
serene as she could make it while weaving in between guests, though embarrassment coated her insides like wax. She’d been a fool, emboldened by the lump of a tiny pistol weighing down her reticule, and so prideful as to believe herself stronger and mightier than she truly was.

  Had she no worth other than to seek revenge for something that could never be undone? Or in the same vein, could do nothing more with her mind, passions, or convictions than to adorn a gentleman’s arm?

  Both were prisons. And neither would set her free.

  As the moments ticked by, Elizabeth sought her mother’s form through the maze of gowns and dancing partners, flowing gauze and feathered coiffures, and the swirling of couples with whom she knew she’d never fit in. But soon, relief. Standing near the fireplace in quiet conversation with a gentleman of no particular notice stood Ma-ma.

  Elizabeth could place nothing of the man beyond a tall frame, tailored white tie dress, and a crown of refined brunette hair that was somehow mussed as if the wind had toyed with it, even within the confines of an obstinately hot ballroom. She watched them, determined that once the gentleman had left, she would convince Ma-ma to make their excuses and part ways from East Suffolk for good. They could rest at an inn in the nearby market town of Framlingham, at least for the night, and then use the journey home to consider their next step.

  Stringed instruments faded to a halt and couples slowed, leaving the center of the room a mismatch of dancers without partners. Elizabeth peered through the crowd, then in horror her heart sank as understanding set in.

  The eccentric, loose-lipped foreigner from the library stepped into the ballroom and every head turned to gaze upon him. Ladies twittered with awestruck whispers and flopping fans. Gentlemen parted as he entered, their animated conversations giving way to bows and wistful smiles, so Franz might make his way unfettered through the crowd.

  He glided through with an air of practiced elegance, smiling and boasting with playful eyes, but he wasted no time in stalking over to interject himself into the same cozy conversation Elizabeth so intently watched. He patted the taller gentleman on the arm in brotherly affection and bowed most elegantly to Elizabeth’s mother.

  Oh no . . .

  Elizabeth tightened her grip on the reticule in her palm, feeling the cool metal of a gun barrel stinging through the satin of her gloves. While the gentleman spoke with Ma-ma, Franz talked and nodded in her direction as though they’d been in acquaintance for years instead of having just met. He paused, then leaned to whisper something against the other gentleman’s ear.

  The gentleman nodded—a quick flit of the chin at which Franz erupted in smiles—and patted his shoulder as a father might a proud young lad who’d just caught his first fox at hunt.

  “Ladies and gentlemen! Good eve to you all.” Franz clapped his hands to draw attention that had already been his. The echo of his shout seemed enough to tickle the teardrop crystals on the chandeliers, and even the service staff looked caught up in the man’s felicitation.

  “I, Franz Xaver Winterhalter, greet you—”

  The blood drained from Elizabeth’s head.

  Franz Xaver Winterhalter . . .

  Who wouldn’t know the name of the most famous portrait maker for the crowned heads of Europe? It was he. Standing in that very room. And she’d just insulted the life out of him in his closest friend’s library.

  “It is my esteemed honor to attend your gathering this Nacht—a celebration I do not deserve but will no doubt indulge from the kindest of gentlemen on this the day of my birth. An artist’s travels are never so enlightened as when he is in the company of dear acquaintances. So it is with even greater honor that I announce the Viscount Huxley—our very own Keaton James and our host this glorious eve—is to take a wife.”

  The ballroom erupted in a riot of gasps and clapping praise.

  Elizabeth looked to Ma-ma, who was fairly in tears as the applause continued. She met Elizabeth’s gaze across the ballroom, and as the throngs of guests celebrated, and more than one young lady wondered whether she was to be queen of such a grand estate as Parham Hill, Ma-ma nodded. Just once, with maternal pride glowing like fire in her cheeks.

  Elizabeth knew exactly what it meant: their efforts had finally proved some worth.

  The deal had been brokered, and Elizabeth had been sold.

  Following the pronouncement of her name—Elizabeth Anne Margaret Meade, daughter to the Earl of Davies—she heard only a fog of voices. Her insides churned and roiled like she’d swallowed a caged beast battling for freedom.

  This cannot be.

  Not now . . . not ever.

  The Viscount Huxley offered her mother his arm. Stringed instruments resumed their jolly melody, and the guests clapped around Elizabeth as he turned and then moved in her direction, presumably to claim her as his prize.

  A man of seemingly careful manner and noble brow advanced toward her, yet nothing could untangle that moment. Eyes of the stormiest steel with a jagged line of gold bored into her soul with their decade-long familiarity, stealing the breath from her lungs. All Elizabeth could think was that her dear ma-ma had been proved right for the first time—it was the night they’d both waited for.

  Mother and daughter had each found the man they hunted, never realizing he was one and the same, nor that the night would end with Elizabeth betrothed to her father’s murderer.

  Seven

  Present day

  Parham Hill Estate

  Framlingham, England

  What seemed only a few moments of time morphed into a long silence as Keira inspected the intricacies of Victoria’s visage, absorbing the tiny strokes of light and dark, the blues and crimson and crisp white hues dulled by time to a creamy yellow.

  Running her index finger along rosewood shelves, Keira walked the length of the room, cataloging titles in her mind. Then she peeked over Ben’s shoulder, asking a few but not too many questions about a curious row of wood planks he was working to unearth from behind a patch in the brick wall. And in the midst of all the beauty and mystery of a forgotten library, as the rumbles of thunder outside had begun to drift away and the team had gone about their work, Keira had all but forgotten Emory was standing behind her.

  She turned. Found he waited with a quiet presence, having faded into the background so Keira might have the freedom to gather what information she sought. He leaned against a doorjamb on the far wall, watching with one leg casually crossed over the other. “Have a question, or twenty?”

  “You know I do.”

  Emory tipped his head to a tarp tacked up at his right, pulled it back like a curtain, and leaned in, gesturing for her to walk through. “Good. Let’s get some air.”

  Feeling a bit like Alice stepping into the library’s secret rabbit hole, Keira walked through and emerged from the cutout of plaster and wood into a gilded ballroom on the other side.

  Coffered ceilings soared. Pristine robin’s-egg walls gave the expansive room a regal but cool tone. And floor-to-ceiling windows let in natural light despite the gray veil of rainclouds outside. It was both vast and grand, but dispirited in a way without a host of settees or even a piano to keep it company.

  Keira turned in a slow circle, boots clicking on the dull floor, imagining elaborate gatherings around the room’s central fireplace and ballgowns that swirled as tuxedos led them in circles over the gleaming hardwood.

  Had anyone a clue that such a treasure had been walled off right behind this one?

  “And this is what’s better known as the Regency Ballroom.”

  She had to hand it to Emory—he knew how to punctuate a moment.

  A laugh slipped out of Keira’s lips before she could stop it. “I wonder if you go through life pretending to be mysterious until the truth suits you, Mr. Scott. It’s not usual to woo a prospect to a job while sharing almost no details of the work she’ll be doing. You know you’ve hooked me with Victoria, even as you’ve told me nothing about her. What am I to make of that?”

  “You
can tell we’re wooing you? That’s good. I was worried we hadn’t made that clear.”

  “You weren’t worried.” Keira sent him a squint-eyed glance that told him so, even if it was layered under lightness. “And you know you aren’t being the least bit clear. Is it intentional?”

  Emory stopped to look back at her. He waited before her like he was nothing if not entirely comfortable in his own skin. A quiet confidence defined him—so opposite from her that Keira felt it above all else in the room.

  “Maybe. I’d like you to tell me what you see.”

  Victoria was a stunning hook to tempt Keira to stay on. But if she ventured too far into this thing with her answer, she could be in danger of reordering her life.

  “Well, based on fade marks of the wallpaper in the library, several other paintings had hung in there with Victoria. That tells me light was allowed to flood in the length of the room for quite some time. For years maybe. But where are the windows? Or other paintings?”

  “Windows—we’re working on that. Paintings—a search is being conducted in the manor now. This place has quite an attic to sift through, if you can believe that. But if there’s nothing to be found, it won’t be for lack of trying.”

  “I can’t understand why such a treasure was closed off from the rest of the world. The library alone is a masterpiece, even before considering the things it might have contained. At least the books are still there, though I’d have to see what condition they’re in to say much more about how they fit in this puzzle.”

  “You authenticate books too?” He smiled, as if hoping to add to her role more responsibilities as the moments wore on.

  “You don’t want me to.”

  “Look, I’m sorry we don’t have more answers. Not yet at least. Carter may not have found the library at all if he hadn’t employed a clumsy contractor for renovations. He’s been trying to decide what to do with this place—restore, sell off, or employ some combination of the two. When this all started, he just wanted to unload an old family manor he’d inherited. And if it wasn’t for the crew knocking an errant hole in the wall, it might have happened that way. Then neither of us would be standing here now.”