by Eve Silver
He paused there and looked about, and it was then that Catherine noticed a black leather bag in his hand.
Wrapping her arms about herself, Catherine shuddered. The sight of that bag elicited a slew of unpleasant memories, for she knew only too well the instruments of torture it held.
After her parents’ deaths, Jasper Hunt had come and taken his inherited and rightful place as the new Baron Sunderley. He had taken her home from her, and anything that was entailed. The creditors had taken the rest. It seemed her father had not been particularly good at managing the family fortune. Fortunately for Jasper, he had money of his own, and the title had simply been the jewel in his crown. How kind she had thought him when he let her stay on in the room of her childhood.
He had claimed that he took his responsibilities seriously. All his responsibilities, including her, the destitute daughter of the previous baron. She was family, after all. His distant cousin.
At first, she had only been grateful. Then she had thought she was in love. It was not until much later that she had learned to be afraid. Of him. Of the cadaverous doctor he summoned when he deemed her in need of care. Or discipline.
With a sharp breath, she dragged her thoughts to the present. She must not allow her own prejudices to hamper Madeline’s recovery. She had no reason to think ill of Dr. Graves—who turned now to close the carriage door— no reason to assume he was other than professional and even kind.
Still, she meant to be there every moment that the doctor was with Madeline, just as she had promised. It would take an act of force to make her leave the room, and even then, she would claw and fight against removal. She could only hope it did not come to that.
She was about to turn from the window when St. Aubyn exited the front of the house and strode across the drive. The two men shook hands and spoke. The doctor’s pinched expression was clear to her, illuminated by the carriage light, but she could see only a bit of the side of St. Aubyn’s face, not enough to gather anything his features might betray.
Of course, in all likelihood, he would betray nothing at all. He never did… except earlier that afternoon, when his expression had betrayed his lust. That recollection made her uneasy.
Her gaze slid to the place she had seen the unidentified watcher at the edge of the woods. There was no one there now. But as she had done once before, she made mental measure of the distance, and felt certain that St. Aubyn could not have traversed it in time to be at the front door now, nor could he have crossed the open space unseen.
Which left her with a puzzle.
Angled toward each other, deep in conversation, the two men stood by the carriage for a few moments. Then St. Aubyn nodded at something the doctor said and both turned their faces toward Madeline’s window. Of course, it was perfectly reasonable for them to be discussing Madeline. The doctor had come specifically to see her, after all.
Yet Catherine could not help but feel suspicious of exactly what it was they discussed.
The doctor turned away, but St. Aubyn stared up for a moment more. He saw her there. She had no doubt of it. He spoke in reply to the doctor’s words, but his gaze remained fixed upon her where she stood framed by the heavy drapery, backlit by the light of the fire and the candle flame that writhed and jumped.
A step to the side and she was shielded by the curtain, unseen from below but able to continue watching the two of them, unobserved. St. Aubyn stared at the place she had stood for a slow count of ten, then he spoke to the doctor once more and together they walked toward the front door.
Turning from the window, Catherine found that Madeline was awake. She had levered herself to a sitting position and her eyes were fever bright.
“Do not let him hurt me,” she pleaded, though her tone suggested that she believed nothing could save her from that.
“No, I will let no one hurt you,” Catherine reassured her again.
“You will not leave me?”
“Not for a moment.”
Masculine voices echoed from the hallway moments later. A knock sounded on the door and Catherine opened it to find that both the doctor and St. Aubyn waited there.
“May we?” St. Aubyn asked.
She drew the door fully open and stepped aside to let them enter. Her nose twitched as Dr. Graves passed. He smelled of sweat and camphor, and she saw that his hands were not clean.
“Here is Dr. Graves,” St. Aubyn said, though it was apparent that Madeline knew very well who he was and had no need for this introduction.
Dr. Graves made a short bow, first to Madeline, then to Catherine. He set his black case on the small table beside the bed, and Madeline turned her head to stare at it, her blue eyes shimmering with horror and fear.
The doctor reached out and made to take her wrist in his hand, but she flinched away. He froze with arm outstretched, exchanging a glance with St. Aubyn.
“Will you be so kind as to afford us a little privacy?” the doctor asked. His tone was clipped, his voice rough. Impatience hung on every syllable.
Catherine was not certain if the doctor spoke to her, to St. Aubyn, or to the both of them, but she moved only as far as the foot of the bed while St. Aubyn inclined his head and went to stand by the open door.
Dr. Graves looked at her with a startled expression. “If you please…”
“I do not please,” Catherine replied. “Madeline has requested my presence. I am a comfort to her. I shall remain exactly where I am.”
The doctor blinked and cast a look at St. Aubyn, who was half turned toward them, watching. His expression was as bland as boiled custard, but his eyes glittered with interest. His gaze slid to Catherine’s and he raised a straight, tawny brow.
“I must object,” the doctor blustered.
“I must insist,” St. Aubyn interjected, darkly soft. “Please, proceed, but I will stay here and Miss Weston will stay there and there will be no discussion about it.”
The unflinching assertion should have been a comfort. Instead, it sent horror crawling along Catherine’s spine. No discussion. Of course. St. Aubyn could do almost anything he wished with Madeline, and no one would gainsay him. There was no one to protect her, just as there had been no one to protect Catherine when she was similarly ensconced in a powerful and autocratic man’s home. A home that had once been her own.
The similarities were chilling.
Dr. Graves altered his expression then, molding it into a parody of kindness and concern, one that rang purely false. Catherine did not trust him, did not believe the persona he projected, but she made no indication of that by gesture or expression, wary of unsettling Madeline who watched her with frightened eyes.
“Now,” said Dr. Graves, putting down the sheet enough that he could grasp Madeline’s wrist and hold it. She let him do it, though her muscles were rigid beneath her skin, and her jaw set tense and hard. “Your cousin says you are not eating, and that you sleep poorly. Is that so?”
Madeline said nothing, merely stared straight ahead, small shudders racking her frame.
“She was in fine health for the full week after I arrived,” Catherine said, drawing the doctor’s attention. Her gaze flicked to St. Aubyn. “Then she began to decline the week after that until she has come to this point.”
The doctor frowned. “Does she eat in your presence?”
“She did. But now she does not.”
“I see,” Dr. Graves said and nodded, as though the information was of great import. Again, he and St. Aubyn exchanged a look. “Well, she must be eating at some time, for she is well fleshed.” He reached up and dragged the neck of her nightrail a bit to one side, baring her collarbone. “Her cheeks are not sunken, and her clavicles do not protrude.”
Instinctively, Catherine stepped forward as Madeline flinched from the doctor’s touch. But she saw the point he made: Madeline was pale and wan, but she did not appear malnourished, for there was flesh on her bones and her muscles were not flaccid. Catherine was glad of it. But she was also confused. She had visited hosp
itals, seen the sickly and weak. Madeline was both, and yet neither.
“She ate well while”—she cast a glance at St. Aubyn— “Sir Gabriel was away.”
“Hmm.” Dr. Graves turned to his bag and withdrew a black box. Catherine regarded it in distaste. A scarificator. Inside the box were dozens of sharp blades that would cut Madeline’s skin and make her bleed. With an involuntary movement, Catherine’s hand shifted to her own arm where she yet wore the faint marks of her experience with that particular instrument of torture. Reaching into the bag once more, the doctor removed a shallow glass cup.
“I’ll need the fire stoked,” he said. “The cup must be warmed to draw out the blood.”
Catherine’s gaze jerked to Madeline’s face. She lay there, eyes closed, lips taut and white. Unable to fathom the benefit of cutting and bleeding her, Catherine stepped forward, intent on arguing with the doctor. To her shock, St. Aubyn was there first.
“No,” he said, his tone brooking no argument. His expression was as cool and blank as ever she had seen it, but somehow, though she could see no evidence of it, she sensed his fury.
The doctor glanced up at him, pausing in his preparations. “I beg your pardon?”
“I do not wish you to bleed my cousin. Only give her something to help her sleep.”
“She must be bled, Sir Gabriel. If it is the scarificator you object to, I shall use the lancet or the leech.”
“You will use none of them. I abhor this ridiculous process, and I will not allow it in my home,” St. Aubyn murmured, the very softness of his tone bolstering the words with steel. He did not need to bluster and shout. A whisper from his lips was effective enough. The doctor took a step back.
Catherine wondered if St. Aubyn would simply reach over and snap the man’s fingers if he refused to acquiesce. She did not doubt that St. Aubyn would have his way by whatever means necessary. The thought ought to horrify. And, to a degree, it did. But there was comfort, too, in the knowledge that he would stick to his word and not allow the doctor free rein in Madeline’s care.
“Why did you summon me if you do not intend to let me treat her?” Dr. Graves asked peevishly.
“I intend to let you treat her. I do not intend to let you bleed her or otherwise perpetrate quackery upon her person.”
“Quackery!” Dr. Graves drew himself to his full height, two spots of color burning in his pasty cheeks.
A long moment passed where neither man spoke, and then with a sound that was somewhere between a grunt and an oath, the doctor dropped all he had removed back into the bag. He delved deep to draw out a brown bottle, and set it on the table with a definite thud.
“A few drops in a glass of water or wine is enough,” he said through tight lips. “More than that and she may sleep entirely too long. Sleep her life away. I have seen it often enough.”
“Thank you,” St. Aubyn said. “I shall see you out.”
They left without any further conversation, the doctor’s posture stiff and unyielding, fury sparking in his gaze.
Catherine watched them go and listened until the sound of their footsteps faded away. Then she stepped close to the bed and brushed Madeline’s hair back from her forehead. Her skin was clammy.
“I was afraid.” Madeline shuddered. “I hate to be bled. I hate the sight of it dripping into the bowl. I hate the smell of it, like old pennies.” She shuddered again. “I thought he would let Dr. Graves do it. He has let him before.”
Catherine stared at her a moment, noting that her words conflicted with the story St. Aubyn had offered. According to Madeline, he had let her be bled. But according to what he had said earlier in the day, it was Mrs. Bell who had summoned the doctor while St. Aubyn was away.
Crossing to the washstand, Catherine pondered the contradiction. She poured water into the bowl and carried it to the bed, along with a small towel. She dipped the cloth and wrung it out, then smoothed it across Madeline’s brow.
“Are you certain it was Sir Gabriel who allowed the doctor to bleed you on his last visit? It was my understanding that Mrs. Bell summoned him that day.”
Madeline only stared at her, a wounded look in her eyes, as though Catherine’s questions somehow breached her trust.
After a moment and some consideration, Catherine tried a different tack. “Dr. Graves appears to be a man who is used to taking charge. I suspect he is unaccustomed to being gainsaid.”
Madeline continued to stare at her, guileless blue eyes, wide and clear. “He is my cousin’s minion. As is the housekeeper and the groundskeeper and the head groom. They watch me. They keep me here against my will. They torment me at every turn.” Closing her eyes, she was quiet for a moment. “One day they will kill me. If not by poison then by some other means.”
The certainty in her tone made Catherine wary. Not because she necessarily believed such a thing, but because Madeline clearly believed it.
“Madeline, I am here now. I will let no one harm you.” She paused, formulating the questions in her mind, wishing to pose them in a way that would do the least harm. At length, she asked, “Why do you think such a thing? Why would your cousin do you harm? What benefit to him?”
“Why would he do me harm?” The words came low and hard, and Madeline panted sharply as though struggling for control. Then one side of her mouth quirked in an unpleasant smirk. “Revenge for what I did to him. And as to the benefit… Cairncroft Abbey is entailed and so it is his, but the fortune is not. He has funds only because he is trustee of what is mine. My cousin is poor as a church mouse and, though I despise lending voice to such crass truth, I am rich, Catherine. What better reason for murder than greed?”
Her tone was calm, matter-of-fact, making her assertions all the more dreadful. Catherine searched for some words of comfort, a way to convince Madeline that surely she was mistaken, but a part of her could not completely discount the possibility that she was not mistaken at all.
Was it only a form of madness talking?
Something nagged at her thoughts. A memory. And then it came to her, whispers at Browning that Madeline’s dead parents had left her nothing. So what was the truth and what was fabrication? Did Madeline even know?
“He only bides his time,” Madeline said, her gaze never wavering, “and waits for the perfect opportunity, one that will paint my death in a believable and credulous light. My cousin will kill me at the first opportunity. Do not doubt it, Catherine. Do not.”
Her eyes were clear, her words lucid, and in that moment, Catherine thought Madeline perfectly sane.
10
Alone in her chamber at last, Catherine set her candle on the table. Troubling thoughts gnawed at her. Madeline’s assertions. The doctor’s visit. The way St. Aubyn had looked at her with something primitive alive in his gaze—unveiled lust.
The recollection made her shiver even now.
What was she to do with that, and with the answering call she felt singing in her blood? She was not such a fool as to repeat the mistakes of her past, to allow a man, any man, such power over her ever again. Least of all a man who was so shrouded in mystery that she could not hope to see clearly through the fog.
Madeline’s accusations against him, her assertions that he would commit murder to gain a fortune, were distressing in the extreme. There were many people who would do exactly that. Kill for money. Kill for pleasure. Kill for revenge.
People killed for any number of reasons. She knew that only too well. But were Madeline’s accusations true, or the fancies of a troubled mind?
At the moment, Catherine had no way to know with any confidence. And what sort of creature did it make her that she was attracted to such a man? Fascinated by him?
Seeking to divert her thoughts, she opened the cover of the book where she had secreted Mrs. Northrop’s neglected letter. It was the volume of Frankenstein that St. Aubyn had lent her. The letter from Mrs. Northrop lay there, innocuous and inoffensive. But only because it was as yet unopened. Catherine had no doubt that the contents would be
far from dull, for what purpose could such a venomous woman have in writing to her, other than to cause some sort of distress?
Should she open it now, or wait for morning?
The thought made a short huff of laughter erupt. As if she could find it in herself to wait. Perhaps the contents would provide a necessary diversion and keep her from spending the night tossing and turning and pursuing avenues of contemplation that invariably led back to her enigmatic host.
Lifting the letter, she flipped it over and traced the tip of her index finger along the flowing script of Mrs. Northrop’s name and direction, stark against the pale paper. Their acrimonious parting had been accompanied by Mrs. Northrop’s insistence that if she never saw Catherine again, it would be a fine thing. She had refused to provide a reference and had only grudgingly provided the last of Catherine’s wages. There was no imaginable reason for her to send a correspondence. Which left only an unimaginable one.
With a shudder, Catherine set the letter down, then reached over and drew back the curtains, letting the moonlight come through the panes. She stepped around the small table, unlatched the window, and pushed it open a hair, enough to let the fresh night air kiss her skin. The maids thought her preference for open windows to be exceedingly odd. The bravest one had warned her that outdoor air carried miasma and evil humors that would only make her ill. Catherine disdained the possibility. She could not see how it was perfectly acceptable to walk outdoors, but not acceptable to allow a bit of the outdoors in.
Besides, she had spent enough time as a prisoner in a locked room, working the window latches until her nails tore and her fingers bled. She had never succeeded in getting them open, for they had been painted shut with exactly that purpose in mind.
She cringed away from the memory, and the tumult of other, darker recollections that would tumble free if she let them. The experience had left her with a distinct aversion to closed doors, closed windows, heavy draperies, and stale air—which was why it had made it so easy to recognize the same aversion in Gabriel St. Aubyn. Had she not known the signs so well, she likely would have missed them.
