by Mary Balogh
Either the smiling Englishman was stupid or he was sly. Antoine leaned rather toward the latter opinion.
His employer returned before luncheon from a morning of farm business, and Antoine came out to the stables to rub down his horse. The other servants of the house looked at him askance when he did such things, he knew. He was not a groom, the housekeeper had pointed out to him once. He was his lordship’s valet, wasn’t he? It seemed that in England one could be only one thing, never two or more. Antoine did not care.
He carried shirts up to his employer when they were needed, and he rubbed down his horse when it had been out.
And he took horses from the stables for his own use and made the other grooms nervous. But they said nothing to him. He suspected that they were a little afraid of him. The thought made him chuckle. He took a horse after finishing with the earl’s, and followed his usual path along the valley toward the sea. He would not be popular for missing luncheon and arriving back as hungry as a bear before it was teatime—that delicate English meal when one was supposed to nibble at delicacies that teased the palate rather than satisfying it.
Someone was among the trees, he saw as he rode. A woman.
She was far back from the stream and she scrambled to hide behind a tree trunk as he approached. That was the fact that made him curious. If she had waved or even ignored him, he would have ridden on by. He turned his horse and guided it among the trees, dipping his head to avoid branches.
“Winnie?” he said when he drew closer. She was standing behind a tree, her back against the trunk, but she was unmistakably Lady Nancy’s personal maid. She liked to flirt with him—and with the second footman and one of the grooms as well. And yet, the groom had told Antoine with a sigh, no one ever got anywhere with the girl. She was looking for a wedding ring, that one, Antoine guessed.
She did not answer him. Her silence set him to frowning and swinging down from the horse’s bare back. He looped the reins over a tree branch and walked toward her.
“Go away!” she said when he came into her line of vision. Her voice was shaking. “Go away!”
“Winnie?” Her face was red and swollen. The hem of her dress was dark with wetness as if she had been wading in the stream. There was a smear of blood down the front of her skirt. “What ‘appened?”
She averted her face and closed her eyes. Her hands were gripping the tree trunk behind her, her nails digging into the bark like talons.
“Go away!” she said.
She had hurt herself and was ashamed of her tears. He reached out to touch her shoulder—and found himself fighting with a wild thing.
Except that he was not fighting. He held up his hands palm out.
“Don’t touch me!” she shrieked at him. “Don’t touch me. Go away!”
He took a step back. “I’ll not touch you,” he said quietly. “What ‘appened?”
“Nothing,” she said. “Nothing at all. Go away.”
It was not embarrassment or a minor accident. An-toine’s eyes narrowed. He had not been born yesterday. He was twenty-seven years old.
“Who was ‘e?” he asked. The groom? he wondered. “William?”
“No.” She shook her head. “He was nobody. Nothing happened. I came out for a walk, that’s all. I have a cold. Go away. Please go away.”
The footman? But no, not the footman and not the groom.
Antoine knew suddenly who it was. “The visitor from London, was it?” he asked. “Mr. Martin ‘Ony-wood?”
She shook her head and began to cry against the back of her hand.
It looked as if she had been doing a deal of crying. If Antoine had not known her before, he would not have guessed that she was pretty.
“ ‘e raped you?” he asked quietly.
“No, no,” she said through her sobs. “Go away.”
“You ‘ave blood on your dress, Winnie,” he said. “Don’t tell me you ‘ave fallen. Mon Dieu, it was that son of a bitch, non?”
She looked at him with red and miserable eyes over the top of her shaking hand.
“Come,” he said, “let me ‘old you. You need someone’s arms, non? I will not ‘urt you, ma petite. I ‘ave six sisters. Come to me. I’ll not frighten you by coming to you.” He opened his arms to her.
She hesitated and then flung herself forward until his arms closed strongly about her. “I didn’t come willing,” she sobbed against his shoulder. “I told him I had to get back to my lady. He forced me to come, Mr. Bouchard. I didn’t ask for it. I didn’t, I swear. And then he—he—”
“I know,” he said. “I’ll ‘old you for a while, Winnie.’E’ll not touch you again. I kill the bastard for you.”
She jerked back her head. “Oh, no, Mr. Bouchard,” she said.
“They’ll hang you for sure.”
“Then I follow ‘im to ‘ell and kill ‘im again,” he said. “I come with you to tell your mistress when you feel better.”
Her eyes grew round. “Oh, no,” she said. “No one must ever know. Please, Mr. Bouchard, you must not tell anyone. I would lose my position. My mum needs the money I send her.”
“Lose your position because that pig raped you?” Antoine’s frown was ferocious. “Did ‘e tell you that? Threatened you, did ‘e? It’s nonsense.”
Her look became frantic. “You don’t understand,” she said.
“Maybe it’s different in the wild land you come from, Mr. Bouchard. But here gentlemen are always right. And girls like me are always sluts once fliey have lost their m-maidenhood. That is what I will be called if anyone knows. Or whore. Please, Mr. Bouchard.” Her hands clawed at the lapels of his coat.
“Sh, ma petite,” he said, drawing her into his arms again, soothing her. “Sacré coeur, sometimes I forget that now I am in a civilized nation where maidens who are raped are sluts and ‘ores. Civilization is a wonderful thing, n’est-ce pas? Your name will not be dragged to the dust because of me, ‘ave no fear. But that son of a louse ‘ad better grow eyes all about ‘is ‘ead. One of these days the knife of Antoine Bouchard is going to sheath itself in Mr. Martin ‘Onywood’s ‘eart.”
Winnie made no protest this time. She sniffed against his shoulder.
“It hurt so much,” she said. “I feel dirty all over, Mr. Bouchard. I don’t believe I’ll ever feel clean again.”
“You are as white as snow, ma petite,” he told her. “Come, I take you back to the ‘ouse and smuggle you upstairs to your room. You send a message down that you have the bad ‘eadache, non? They will send up something to ‘elp you sleep. And tomorrow Antoine talk to you again and make sure you feel safe.”
She nodded and he took his horse’s reins in one hand and set the other arm protectively about her shoulders until they came in sight of the house. Antoine wished fervently that he had fired his rifle through the window of the visitors’ salon the day before and blown the bastard’s head off. Better still, he should have blown his balls off.
But, he thought, there was more satisfaction to be gained from taking the life of a man who deserved to die with the point of a knife.
He knew that from experience, having killed men both ways.
Mr. Martin Honywood should perhaps be thankful that Winnie was not one of Antoine’s six sisters. If she were, then Antoine’s knife would be used to perform surgery before being plunged to the heart.
The following two days were almost anticlimactic in their quietness. It was as if all of them had taken fright on that first morning of Martin’s visit and had decided that matters needed to be taken more slowly.
Martin set himself patiently to win Elizabeth’s trust and affection.
He no longer touched her or tried to force information on her, welcome or otherwise. He waited for her to ask questions, as she began to do, and make overtures of affection to him. She kissed him on the cheek each night.
Christopher was very quiet, always there to hold Elizabeth when she needed to be held, to reassure her when she needed reassuring, to love her when she needed lovin
g.
Nancy kept quietly in the background, waiting for the inevitable explosion, helpless to do anything to prevent it.
Gradually the story of Elizabeth’s past was filled in so that she came to feel familiar with the life of that other woman, Lady Elizabeth Ward. But it was still hard to grasp the fact that she was that girl, or had been once upon a time.
Perhaps she was half conscious of the fact that all the stories she was told—and there were many of them— ended abruptly seven years before with her wedding to Christopher. Without fully realizing it she was developing a dread of hearing about those missing years. What was wrong?
Something was. But she never asked the question, even in her conscious mind. Her mind skirted around it, ignored it, behaved as if the question were not shouting to be asked.
Martin and Christopher had a few private conversations together. Martin considered it important that Elizabeth be told the full truth. And soon. They must not delay indefinitely. There was no point in further delay. It was not fair to his sister.
Christopher agreed in the main. But they could come to no agreement on what the truth was that she must be told. Martin, it seemed, had come eventually to believe in Christopher’s guilt.
Elizabeth should be told everything.
“She will surely forgive you,” he said reassuringly. “After all, it was a long time ago, and she has grown up since then. Then she expected you to be perfect. Now she realizes that no one is. She will surely still love you even when you have fallen from your pedestal. I sincerely hope she does anyway. But you can never be at peace with yourself, Trevelyan, if you hide part of the truth. Better to make a clean breast of everything now. Besides, her memory may come back one day and she may take it hard if you have deceived her.”
“But I want her to see things as they really were,” Christopher insisted. “I want her to know that the only way I wronged her was in running away.”
“Well,” Martin said, “perhaps we can compromise. We will tell her what everyone believed, including me in the end, I must confess. And then you can tell her your story. She can decide for herself. She will doubtless decide in your favor. She loves you again, I can see, and I’m not sorry for it. And even if she cannot believe you, she will forgive you.”
They shook hands on that. After all, Christopher thought, Martin was going out of his way to be fair and decent, ignoring the very real crimes that had been committed during the past two and a half weeks.
Christopher had made arrangements to spend all of the fourth full day of Martin’s visit and the next day too with his steward. They would wait then, he and Martin decided, until the day after that.
Then together they would talk with Elizabeth and tell her about the past seven years.
It felt a little like a death sentence to Christopher.
Chapter 12
Elizabeth was trying hard to like Martin, to feel comfortable with him. He was being very patient with her, she noticed, and he was always friendly with Christopher. She did not know why she could not like him when it seemed that she always had. And Christopher could not understand her aversion to Martin.
She tried hard to overcome it. When Martin asked her after luncheon on the first day Christopher was away if she would care for a walk, she smiled at him and suggested they go up onto the headland.
It was a cool and blustery day with heavy clouds hanging low though it was not raining. They were buffeted on top of the cliffs and looked down on a leaden and foam-flecked sea. It made Elizabeth shiver with more than cold.
“That is a path?” Martin asked, pointing to their right. “Shall we go down onto the beach? It will be more sheltered down there.”
She felt herself stiffen unwillingly. The beach belonged to her and Christopher. “The path is too steep,” She said. “I always prefer to stay up here.”
“I would hold your hand,” he said, smiling at her. “But never mind.”
They strolled along the headland, away from the path.
“Lizzie,” he said, “I think it is time you came home with me. Tomorrow perhaps or the next day.”
“You mean to London?” she said. “I am home. And I don’t want to leave here for a while, Martin. Certainly not without Christopher.”
“Do you have any memories of this place?” he asked her. “The sea? The cliffs? The house? Anything?”
“I have told you,” she said a little impatiently, “that I remember nothing.”
“And yet,” he said, “you have told me that you remember something of London. Why not of Penhallow, then? Is there not even a feeling of familiarity here?”
“No.” She sighed. “Persistent questioning is not going to bring anything back, Martin.”
“Have you ever thought,” he said, “that perhaps it would not be familiar to you even if you had your memory? Have you considered the possibility that you were brought to Penhallow for the first time after you fell out of that carriage?”
She looked at him sharply. “Don’t,” she said. “You are frightening me.” She laughed but she was feeling anything but amusement. “This is Christopher’s home and I am his wife. Of course we have been living here. Where else?”
He shrugged. “Perhaps at Kingston,” he said. “Perhaps you have been living there, Lizzie, with Papa and me.”
“Don’t do this to me, Martin,” she said. “Why are you trying to confuse and frighten me? Why would we have been living at Kingston when we belong at Penhallow?”
“You alone,” he said. “Perhaps Trevelyan has been at neither place. He did not inherit until his father died last year. Has he told you that? Have you asked him where he met that rather strange valet or groom or watchdog that he keeps for a servant?”
“Mr. Bouchard?” she said. “He was in London with a fur-trading ship and wanted to stay.”
“And Trevelyan and he just happened to cross paths?” he said.
“The man is French-Canadian, Lizzie. He is the type of man known as a voyageur. That is, his job is to man the fur-gathering canoes into the interior wilderness beyond Canada. It is not part of his job to sail on the trading ships. He would have done that only if someone he had met in the course of his job had persuaded him to leave it and take another—as a servant, perhaps.”
“What are you saying?” Her voice and manner were determinedly calm as she stopped walking and turned to face him. “That Christopher and I have been living aDart?”
He set his head to one side and regarded her with sad, kindly eyes. “It is at least a possibility, Lizzie, is it not?” he said.
“But not a probability,” she said. “It is not true.” But she could feel her hands begin to tremble.
“Lizzie,” he said, “let me hold you. Let me hold you tight. Let me take you home.”
“I am home.” Her chin came up and her eyes sparked. “But I wish you would go, Martin—to Kingston or London. I wish you would not stay just for my sake. I want to be alone with Christopher again. I was happy before you came. You have told me much about my past and I am grateful. But I don’t think I want to hear any more. I don’t think I need to hear any more. I am happier as I am.”
“There is one thing you must know, Lizzie,” he said.
“No.”
“I am not going to tell you now,” he said. “My servant should be back from London tonight. I sent him there a few days ago. He is bringing something that you must see—tomorrow morning.”
“No,” she said.
“Yes,” he said. “You must.”
She turned and began to walk back in the direction of the house.
“Lizzie.” He hurried after her but did not attempt to touch her.
“It breaks my heart to see you like this. You are afraid to know the whole truth, aren’t you? You are afraid that it will make you unhappy. You were not unhappy, believe me. Quite the contrary. You were wonderfully happy.”
“And still am,” she said. She looked across at him, at his pale, concerned face. “Very well, Martin. I will look at
what you have tc show me tomorrow morning. But only if you will promise me one thing. Promise that you will leave Penhallow immediately after. I cannot beg Christopher to ask you to leave. He likes you and insists that I do too and he must, of course, be a courteous host. But I am asking. Promise me you will leave?”
“I promise,” he said. “I will leave as soon as I have shown you what Macklin is bringing.”
They walked back to the house side by side and in silence.
They had not made love and for the first time Elizabeth had not snuggled against him in bed and invited his arms to come about her.
She was lying on her side facing away from him. She was breathing quietly. Christopher could not tell if she was asleep or not.
He should leave well enough alone, he thought. He should close his eyes and go to sleep. He had had a busy day and there was another to come. And then the day after that he and Martin were to fill in the final gaps in her story and she would know that he had no right to bring her to this house. Or this bed.
Then he was going to have to start fighting for her. Or forgetting her. He still had not decided which it would be.
He touched her lightly on the shoulder and felt it stiffen almost imperceptibly. So she was not asleep.
“Do you want to talk about it?” he asked.
He thought for a while that she was not going to answer, but then she rolled over onto her back and stared up at the high canopy over their heads.
“How long have we lived at Penhallow?” she asked, her voice toneless.
Ah, he thought, Martin had not waited after all. How much had he told her?
“Have we been here for seven years?” she asked.
“No,” he said quietly.
“Had I been here at all before my accident?”
“No.”
“Where were we?” she asked.
He lifted himself on one elbow and looked down at her. “How much has he told you?” he asked.
