“I’m certain that inventing some will not be a problem.” He turned his head to her ear once more. “Not for us.”
Late that night, Calliope slipped downstairs to the parlor. The house was quiet. Montwood’s soft lullabies on the piano had worked magic on the inhabitants of Fallow Hall. All except for her and, apparently, Duke.
The dog sat waiting outside the parlor, his head quirked as if he’d been expecting her.
“I couldn’t sleep,” she explained in a whisper. Not with the end of my quest so near.
Accepting her answer, he stood and wagged his tail. Thankfully, he wasn’t near enough to any tables to cause damage. She scratched him behind his ears as she stepped into the room. He followed, loping along beside her.
Holding her lamp high, she searched the room for the basket of clues. Duke offered a low woof, drawing her attention. Paws on the table where they’d played cards the previous evenings, he sniffed the basket in the center.
Her heart beat faster. Though her steps were quick as she crossed the room, it felt like an age had passed before she finally arrived.
“You are a very good boy, Duke. I completely forgive you for misleading me last night.” She rubbed his head and patted his neck, his tongue lolling off to the side. “Tomorrow, I’ll ask Mrs. Swan for a special bone for you.”
Setting down her taper, she took the basket in her hands and upended it. Folded scraps of foolscap skittered onto the table.
She held her breath. This was it. She would know in a single moment if the love-letter Casanova was here.
Drawing the first one from the pile, she studied the scrap carefully. The script was small and even, without a flourish. Not a match. The next one she’d written. The one after that had swooping, rounded letters that took up the entire space, as if it were a royal decree. Pamela’s. The following one was nondescript, every letter formed as if it had come from a tutor of penmanship. Casanova would never write with such a lack of finesse.
Now, there were only two remaining. Reaching out, she chose the one on the right. She opened it and let out a breath, noting a very sloppy, severely slanted script. Recalling what Brightwell had said about his hand injury, she imagined this was his. Not a match.
She didn’t allow herself to feel relief quite yet.
There was one left. This could be it, she told herself. She’d already found both hers and Pamela’s, so this last one belonged to one of the gentlemen. The candlelight flickered, and she realized she was breathing hard.
Placing a hand on her chest to keep her heart from leaping out, she opened the last one.
Calliope closed her eyes. Not his. Not a match. The handwriting was too perfect and without a flourish. And so, that meant Casanova was not here at Fallow Hall. She was correct to discount Danvers and Everhart. She even crossed Montwood off her list. More important, it was not Brightwell.
Relief swept over her. She hadn’t been wrong to refuse him after all. And yet . . .
Now she was back to where she’d been since the beginning. She still didn’t know Casanova’s identity. And the more time she spent with Everhart, the more desperate she was to find out.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Tension gripped Gabriel by the throat. The lighthearted mood he’d carried with him yesterday had evaporated during another sleepless night.
Playing at seduction with Calliope was going to kill him. He didn’t know what had come over him last night. Or the previous one, for that matter. Asking her to imagine his lips on her flesh had backfired. Because all night long, he’d known she was thinking about him as much as he’d been thinking about her.
He was taking a ridiculous risk by spending any time at all with her. With each and every encounter, he found himself more and more drawn to her. He thought of her constantly and found himself roaming about the manor simply to know where she was at any given time.
This had to stop.
“You appear inordinately preoccupied,” the Duke of Heathcoat said, standing beside the chair across from him. Gabriel’s father and grandmother had arrived a short time ago, along with the bespectacled family physician, who was now examining Gabriel’s leg with a series of indecipherable murmurs.
Gabriel cast his father the careless shrug he’d perfected over the course of his life. “I was just thinking of an expedition to South America and hoping our good doctor would proclaim me fit enough to disembark within the month. I hear von Humboldt will be returning there soon. Perhaps he wouldn’t mind a stowaway.”
After all, if Gabriel had something else to occupy his thoughts, he could remove Miss Croft from all of them.
Alistair Ridgeway stood up from his kneeling position and removed his pince-nez with a pinch of his thumb and forefinger. “The bone has set nicely. You were fortunate that it was such a small break and just above the ankle. It has been six weeks since the accident?” At Gabriel’s nod, Ridgeway continued. “Your movement will likely remain limited for a few more weeks, perhaps months, but I see no reason to resume the splint. What you need now is to strengthen the leg, but carefully. I would suggest that your valet continue to wrap it. Perhaps a shoe, but not a boot yet. You may begin to walk by using a cane.”
The fact that Gabriel had been doing that for weeks went unsaid. He merely nodded, glad to finally be rid of the blasted splint.
“Thank you. That will be all, Ridgeway,” the duke said, dismissing the doctor with the same severity as he spoke to everyone. After the door to the map room closed, he returned his attention to Gabriel. “You were fortunate this time.”
“Yes, I—” Gabriel stopped. The instant he met his father’s hard glare, he knew they were no longer speaking of the accident. No. They were speaking of the scandal surrounding it. Neither the gossips nor papers had ever breathed a word of it. Gabriel had paid to keep everything quiet. And yet, apparently his father had found out anyway. “There won’t be another.”
The duke issued a humorless laugh and set about wandering the room. “You have said that before.”
Begrudgingly, Gabriel admitted that was the truth. It now seemed like ages ago. He felt like a completely different person, in a way that he never had before. “Yes, well . . . this time, I mean it.”
“You’re only saying that because you want me to provide the funds for your expedition.”
“Not entirely.” There was no point in avoiding the truth with his father. “I do feel ashamed of my actions. Otherwise, I wouldn’t be here, would I?”
The carriage accident and Lady Brightwell’s involvement had been a huge mistake. Nothing he would ever repeat. While he might be accustomed to letting people down with his actions, on that occasion he’d let himself down as well. He could not simply shrug off this mistake.
With a purse of his lips, the famed austerity in the duke’s expression was complete. “I do give you credit for not running away this time. Then again, much of that had to do with your leg, I’m sure.”
“My leg could have healed just as easily on a ship.” Gabriel stood in an effort to dispel the tightness climbing along the back of his neck and stretching across his shoulders. Testing the stockinged foot, he leaned forward on it. A sensation of pins and needles climbed up from his heel.
“Your mother would not have wanted you to go on another expedition.” The duke extended the cane that had been perched against the arm of the chair.
At the mere mention of her, the inescapable void she’d left behind was all the more apparent in the lines on his father’s face. It was almost as if his outer husk was crumbling. There was a time, Gabriel remembered, when his father hadn’t been so empty. When he was more man, husband, and father, rather than a duke.
Gabriel waved off the cane, earning his father’s growl of disapproval. “I disagree. She was the one who sent me on small adventures, preparing me for the larger ones later in life.”
“Perhaps when you were younger, but now that you are eight and twenty, I know that she would have expected you to put aside the waywardness of youth
and find your rightful place.” The cane fell against the low table with a clatter, rousing the dog from his lounging place by the fire, ears slanted backward.
“This isn’t about Mother,” Gabriel said, feeling his own hackles rise as he turned, unsteadily, to face his father. “This is about what you want—what you’ve wanted all along.”
The Duke of Heathcoat released a slow breath. “Your mother and I were alike in this regard. We only desired your happiness and yes, part of that is dependent upon your assuming your rightful place as my son and heir.”
The pressure to live up to expectation surrounded Gabriel, closing in bit by bit. If it wasn’t his father or his grandmother, it was Montwood, Danvers, and Calliope.
Out of everyone, Calliope’s assault was the worst and because she expected nothing. Not a damned thing! Which—insanely enough—made him expect more from himself. He was used to the outer battles with others. But this inner war could kill him.
Gabriel felt a wave of panic rise up his throat. He wanted to run from it but couldn’t. It was inside him, forcing him to face his fears. “Do you realize that every conversation we have revolves around Briar Heath?”
“Because it is where you belong!”
“I am honored that you would visit me here at Fallow Hall, Your Grace,” Pamela said, smiling serenely from one of the green chairs in the sitting room across the hall from her chamber.
Calliope fought the urge to shake her head in disbelief. Her cousin did not seem to be aware that she was in the presence of one of the ton’s elite. One could not simply speak to the Dowager Duchess of Heathcoat as if she were an equal or presume that she’d traveled all this distance to sit and chat with a baron’s wife, whom she’d never met with previously.
“Undoubtedly, you are.” The dowager duchess quirked her brow, incredulity in every arched wrinkle. Then, without another word, she shifted her attention to Calliope. “Miss Croft, my maid informs me that you are responsible for the fresh flowers in my rooms.”
Calliope felt as if a trapdoor yawned in front of her. If she accepted responsibility, then she could easily be perceived as taking advantage of her hosts by raiding the hothouse in an effort to win favor with the dowager duchess. On the other hand, if she explained that she’d been assisting in the management of Fallow Hall, then more questions would arise, along with the likely assumption that she had an understanding with one of the gentlemen here.
She settled on a better option that completely removed her own involvement. “Mrs. Merkel is quite the capable housekeeper and ensures that all guests feel welcome, including providing the flowers for your rooms.”
The dowager duchess tapped the tip of her silver-handled cane on the Turkish carpet at their feet and turned more fully in Calliope’s direction, all but dismissing Pamela from the conversation. “I imagine such a capable housekeeper would be too busy to take me on a tour of Fallow Hall. Perhaps you would be so inclined.”
Nervous, Calliope noticed that her words were not enunciated as a question. Therefore, she had no choice but to accept. “It would be my pleasure. If you are fond of flowers, we could begin with the hothouse.”
“Dear cousin, you know how the flowers make me sneeze,” Pamela interjected. “I would not be able to join you unless you began in the gallery. I’m certain Her Grace would enjoy the portraits far more.”
Again, Calliope was both shocked and dismayed by her cousin’s behavior. Pamela had spent so much of her life believing herself a queen that she’d lapsed into insensibility.
Across from her, the dowager duchess’s shoulders stiffened as she rose from the chair. Calliope rose too. There was never a stonier expression than the one the dowager duchess cast down to Pamela, who remained seated. The dowager duchess did not say a single word, but instead made her way to the door.
“Miss Croft,” the dowager duchess began, “I much prefer landscapes to portraits, as well as flowers of any kind. I should very much like to begin our tour in the hothouse.” She held her cane as if it were more of an accessory than an aid. Or perhaps, even a device of expression.
Although wary at the moment, Calliope found herself liking that idea. It was as if they were all walking around on pages with words forming at their feet and climbing up the walls, and a single tap of the dowager duchess’s cane was an exclamation mark.
Inclining her head, Calliope joined the dowager duchess, leading the way toward the garden doors at the opposite end of the house, leaving Pamela behind.
“If I may”—Calliope waited for a nod of consent from the dowager duchess—“there is a particularly lovely landscape of meadow flowers in the hall outside the drawing room. It is but a small detour and takes us past the map room, where your grandson likely is at the moment.”
The dowager duchess seemed pleased by this and smiled. “I’m not surprised that Gabriel would choose to spend his time in a room that constantly reminds him of explorations. From the moment he could walk, he was always on an adventure, in search of whatever prizes his dearly departed mother had asked him to claim.”
“He doesn’t speak of her,” Calliope remarked but was instantly astonished by her own audacity. To mention such a personal matter—and with Everhart’s grandmother, no less—suggested a level of familiarity between the two of them. She desperately hoped the dowager duchess did not catch the unintentional slip.
“Gabriel was ten years old when she passed. His mother, dearest Anne, was a delight,” the dowager duchess said, almost absently, though no one could ever accuse her of being lost in thought. She was as sharp as the tip of a penknife and had earned a reputation for cutting to the quick. “A more romantic person than I might say that Gabriel’s father loved her to distraction and was lost without her.” She released a slow breath, as if the event still pained her. “Of course, my son’s current marriage is a perfectly amicable union of mutual regard. Much of society could not hope for more.”
Calliope agreed without a word. She didn’t want to make the error of speaking out of turn about her own parents’ marriage. They, too, loved each other to distraction. Their example had set the course for her own life. She wanted life-altering love as well.
Days ago, she would have declared that her only chance at love had ended years ago. Now, more and more, she believed that her heart was ready to love again.
“Though I gather the same cannot be said of you, Miss Croft,” the dowager duchess added, staring straight ahead and not seeming to notice that Calliope suddenly tripped over the hem of her own gown. “Otherwise, you would be Lady Brightwell today, in place of your cousin.”
Sharp as a penknife, indeed. Calliope felt the point of it against her pulse. “A more romantic person than I might proclaim that mere friendship was not inducement enough for marriage.”
The dowager duchess laughed, an unexpectedly hearty sound. “I can see why Gabriel found himself in an unlikely friendship with the reserved Milton Brightwell all those years ago.”
An unlikely friendship? No, that wasn’t correct. “Everhart and Brightwell always were friends. They attended school together.”
“Two years apart, Miss Croft. With boys of that age, two years is quite a large expanse of time. Young men can be rather competitive at that age, or at any age.” The duchess stopped suddenly in the hall. “Would these be the meadow flowers you brought me this way to see?”
Calliope looked up and blinked, orienting herself. Preoccupied, she hadn’t been aware of making the turn of the last corridor. “Umm . . . yes. They are lovely, are they not?”
“Indeed. You have a good eye for art,” the dowager duchess mused. “You would get along well with my granddaughter-in-law, Emma Goswick, Viscountess Rathburn. She is an artist in her own right.”
“Yes, we’ve met.” Calliope cast aside the muddled line of her thoughts and wondered why it should matter to her when Everhart had become friends with Brightwell. It wasn’t as if she’d played a part in it. “Lady Rathburn is a dear friend of my brother’s wife. We share a commo
n interest in needlework, though I must admit your granddaughter-in-law has the greater skill.”
The duchess turned away from the painting and regarded Calliope closely. “And where does your skill lie?”
“I am an excellent reader, Your Grace.” The words spilled forth in a nervous jumble. All at once, Calliope felt like a dragonfly pinned to a board for scrutiny. She couldn’t dare admit to gorging on romantic novels. “I’m nearly finished with an accounting of a French explorer’s expedition to South America. It’s quite fascinating.”
Too late, she realized what she’d said and how closely the topic resembled Everhart’s interests. The last thing she wanted to do was to give the wrong impression.
The dowager duchess angled her chin in such a way that it appeared all her attention honed in on the center of Calliope’s pupils. “A woman of great confidence is allowed to fancy herself an explorer . . . when she is married, of course, and at her husband’s side.”
“Of course,” Calliope agreed for agreement’s sake. She was not going to have the same argument with the dowager duchess that she’d had with Everhart. “Shall we continue on toward the hothouse?”
“Yes, but perhaps we should see my grandson first. I must make certain you haven’t persuaded him to embark on another expedition by your enthusiasm on the topic,” the dowager duchess said with a hint of disapproval. “He is forever on the hunt for something he cannot name, or will not.”
“Perhaps he is searching for that elusive prize of finding himself,” Calliope blurted again, realizing far too late that it almost sounded as if she were coming to Everhart’s defense. As if there were a level of familiarity between them.
“Very astute of you, Miss Croft.” Surprisingly, the dowager duchess rewarded her with a wrinkled grin before she schooled her features again into a mask of cool regard. “Though for my grandson’s sake, I would hope he could learn sooner rather than later that he can only find himself in the places he’s already been.”
The Elusive Lord Everhart: The Rakes of Fallow Hall Series Page 14
