by Claudy Conn
“Rick, I saw her.”
“You saw who?” Rick demanded.
“The girl in the cupboard,” Randy returned on a whine.
“The girl in the cupboard? Have you gone daft? I think you have.” But Rick knew better. He had to think and was stalling as he tried to find an answer to this new turn of events.
“You know I haven’t. What’s more, you know who I mean. I am not needle-witted, never have been, but I know what I saw. I know what I heard and it’s all too smoky by half. Pack up your sister and take her back to Brighton, that’s the ticket. It is the only reasonable thing to do.”
“You’ve gone noddy on me, cuz. What are you talking about?” Rick still stalled as he hadn’t a clue how else to handle this.
His cousin lowered his voice. “Look here, Rick, the thing is…she didn’t mean for me to see her. ‘Tis none of my affair if Lady Penrod chooses to hide girls in her cupboard and if you choose to play your games, but if Ness gets mixed up in this muddle, Uncle will have both our heads, and that is a fact!”
“What makes you think Ness will get involved?” Rick asked, still stalling.
“What makes you think Ness won’t?” Randy snapped, now out of patience, and fidgeting.
“We can’t go home. Randy, you don’t understand,” Rick said quietly.
“I understand we are slipping into something better left alone. Rick…I…I thought Sheila an angel, but last night…I had myself a good listen and a good look. These Echworths are not the thing, you know, but they are searching for their niece, you know that, and I suspect Lady Penrod is hiding her in the cupboard.” His voice now was exploding with desperation.
Richard of Grey grimaced. “How do you know that for sure?”
“Who else could the girl be? And it’s no use saying you know naught about the affair when it was you she was calling for this morning!”
“What?” Rick knew he was now at a dead end. He was nabbled. “Explain yourself.”
“I was in the library, relaxing with my coffee, when at my back I hear, “Psst, Richard, psst.” Randy shook his head. “You know we look alike and from the back she must have thought I was you. At any rate, I turned around, only natural thing to do. There she was, this little bit of fluff, who I never expected to scream as loud as she did, but scream she did, nearly bowled me over I was so startled, and then poof, she dove behind the cupboard and vanished. I tell you frankly, Rick, I don’t like this.”
Ricky made an inarticulate sound of disgust. “I don’t see the resemblance between us, but we do have the same blond hair, so from the back…although my shoulders are broader…”
“Is that what you have to say?” Randy was outraged. “And my shoulders are just as broad.”
“Absurd, anyone can see…”
“Turn about,” Randy demanded, diverted by his cousin’s claim. “Come on, back to back and we’ll see whose shoulders are broader.”
“Don’t be a noddy. Anyway, this is getting us nowhere. We must instead think just how to deal with our new situation.”
“Go home. That is how to deal with it,” Randy returned anxiously.
“That is very poor spirited of you, cuz. The girl is in trouble. You said yourself that the Echworths are not quite the thing. We can’t allow them to get their hands on her. ‘Tis why Lady Penrod is keeping her here…safe. Besides, someone wanted her brother dead—and no doubt would benefit from her death as well.”
“Are you implying that the Echworths would…would…no, Rick.” Randy backed off this idea.
“I don’t know, and until we do know, we must help Lady Penrod keep her safe,” Rick answered.
“Not our affair. Not mine, not yours, and devil take it, not Ness’s. Uncle would go off into an apoplexy if he thought we were embroiled in yet another escapade that is bound to end in scandal. How could it not? Lady Penrod is harboring the Montlaine chit in secret, keeping her from her rightful guardian. It is bound to end in scandal.”
Rick reflected on this for a moment. “No, if Lady Penrod is involved, no scandal will follow. Why, she leads the haut ton…no, and besides that, it ain’t Ness’s establishment and she has no control over what her hostess does.”
“Famous! You are sticking your head in the sand. Ness is bound to make the entire thing her affair. She will discover the poor little thing and step up to protect her…”
“And you wouldn’t?” Rick eyed him.
“Well, as to that, yes, yes, I would should she find herself in danger and require…but, Rick, that is neither here nor there.”
“Randy, cousin, that is the crux of it. She is a damsel in distress and we, you and I, are gentlemen.”
“Gentlemen, yes, but not knights of the Round Table.” Randy sighed heavily. “You mean to drag me into this. I can see it all now. Our next place of exile will no doubt be in some outlandish place…France.”
“Ah, Paris…I hear the Parisian women are exquisite,” Rick said.
“Yes, I have heard the same,” Randy agreed once again, momentarily diverted. However, he recalled the subject and waved it off. “You know there will be a rare set-to in the end if Ness’s name becomes embroiled in all of this. You are serving your sister ill by allowing her to remain here.”
Rick frowned. Was his cousin correct? Should he try and get Ness to leave? Could he abandon ‘the girl in the cupboard’, as Randy had dubbed her? He shook his head. “The thing is, Ness won’t leave and there is no way we can force her. Also, the truth is I wouldn’t even if I could. Mary is in trouble. Her brother was unjustly served. Lady Penrod isn’t the one to continue to handle this—we are.”
“We? What do you mean, we? How is it you think yourself qualified to this task?” Randy almost choked out the words.
“Well, as to that, we are a sight more qualified to protecting a young woman…a girl really, than her ladyship, besides that, she shouldn’t have to deal with this alone. Never say you would turn your back on a poor child and allow her to be thrown to the dogs!”
“Certainly not, but I would hardly call the Echworths a pack of dogs, after all, Rick. Come on, ‘ole boy, doing it a bit brown, aren’t you?”
“Yes, I would, at least…damn if I know, but not about to take the chance. There is a great deal of money they would have control of if they had control of Mary. Money confuses people’s better instincts at times, don’t you think?”
Randy considered this. “I actually do, but they wouldn’t dare do anything to harm their cousin, would they? I mean, all eyes would be on them.”
“Accidents happen, who could prove anything? They could say she was despondent over losing her brother…they could say whatever they wished, who could counter them?” Rick offered.
“Still, there is a solution if she came forward and went home to the Echworths. It seems the reasonable thing to do. We could then keep guard.”
For a long moment, Richard of Grey did not trust himself to respond, however, he bolstered himself and tried offering logic. “Aside from the fact that you are daft and not thinking straight, you must consider this. We can’t be there all the time and one day we will have to return to London, what then? She is only sixteen.”
“No, no, that isn’t what I am saying. I am saying, let’s offer the child as bait and not allow them to see that we are watching, but we will watch and keep her safe, and catch them in the act if they try anything,” Randy said excitedly.
“Plague take you for a half-wit,” Rick returned before stalking off back in the direction of the house.
* * *
Ness stared at herself in the mirror. She looked strained. Her face showed the evidence of a restless night, and emotions that were struggling with her mind and heart.
She put a brush to her long thick blonde hair, leaving its silky waves to hang about her shoulders. Her stylish riding habit of green silk over a white lace blouse indicated that she had lost some weight. She sighed, setting a matching top hat at an angle over her head. She turned away from the looking glass and
headed out of her room to take the stairs.
She would shake loose her doldrums with an animated ride. That was what she would do. She would forget the viscount and his ugly words, his delicious kisses, his feral hands on her body, making her bend like a…oh, she would forget—she must.
The sight and sound of her brother slamming the front door sent her hurriedly down the remaining steps as she called out, “Rick! Whatever is wrong?”
He cast his eyes up at her and said, “Come with me to the library. I want to have a word with you.”
She raised a brow, but decided not to address his unacceptable tone, and instead silently followed him.
Once alone with him in the library, she removed her riding gloves, sat on the sofa and said, “Now, if you please, why are you behaving like a little boy who has just been beaten at cricket?”
“Stop, Ness. This is no funning matter and I won’t be put off this time,” he said grimly.
“Ah, what is it then?”
“Randy has seen Mary, ‘the girl in the cupboard’ as he puts it. He means for us to leave Penrod, and I fear he may take matters into his own hands and write our father.”
“Oh no, he must not, we cannot leave. I won’t leave…oh Rick.” Ness was on her feet and grabbing his lapel.
He gently pulled himself out of her hold and shook his head. “I have given him a good talking to and I won’t stop until he agrees to help. Once I have pulled him into our mess, he won’t be able to write Father without implicating himself.”
“Yes, yes, that’s the ticket,” Ness agreed.
“It is a dastardly thing to do,” Rick said, and slumped onto the sofa she had just vacated.
Ness hurriedly sat beside him. “I agree, but we don’t seem to have a choice. I tell you I can’t…won’t leave.”
He eyed her strangely. “Ness, tell me the truth, how deeply are you embroiled in Mary’s situation?”
“Embroiled?” Ness responded cautiously. “I don’t know what you mean by that precisely.”
“Don’t you, my girl? Somehow, I don’t think you’re telling me true. Come on then, Ness, are you playing me false in this?”
“How can you say such a thing to me?” She avoided his eye and waved the subject away with a flippant hand. “I care, certainly I care about Mary of Montlaine and the horrible situation she had to endure, but…”
He sighed and got up to take a turn about the room. “What is to be done?”
“About Mary? I think we should continue to protect her secret at all costs. She cannot go to the Echworths…it is unthinkable.”
“Yes, I quite agree, but what about our cousin?”
“Well, we could truss him up and lock him in the tower,” Ness suggested, and laughed.
He grinned. “Would that we could. He wants to hand her over to the Echworths, says that is the only way to flush them out. Can’t believe Randy would suggest such a thing. ‘Tis daft, of course.”
“You know,” Ness said thoughtfully as her finger wagged at him. “He might be onto something. His notion needs refining, but it is not a very terrible notion.”
“Burn it, girl!” Rick was incredulous. “You can’t mean it!”
“Only do think. If we were to tell the Echworths that Mary has returned and is staying at Penrod—tell them she is still in a decline over her brother’s death, that she would rather stay with Lady Penrod, who is her godmother after all…they could do nothing openly for the time being.” She put up a hand to stall his response. “However, she would be free to roam about the house and outdoors, and even take a walk as far as the main pike and back. Bait, you see, but under our watchful eye. No one could get to her while she is in the house or near the house, but when she goes for a long walk…which we will make known by saying, ‘Oh, Mary loves to walk in the early afternoon, just before high tea,’ well, that would set her up, bait, and we would be there, wouldn’t we?”
“No. Dash it, Ness, how could you?”
“But it is a splendid notion,” said a small voice at their backs.
Two pair of eyes turned to find Mary of Montlaine clothed in a bright yellow muslin. She closed the panel at her back and moved into the warmth of the library to stare up adoringly at Rick.
To ease the situation, Ness said, “Hallo, Mary. I suppose you already know I am Ness, Rick’s sister, and my, what a lovely dress.”
“It is, isn’t it,” Mary said, smoothing it over with both hands. “Lady Penrod went all the way to Bleinbarth, the next town over, to purchase me a wardrobe to use while I am here, as my other dress has turned into a rag and the gown she lent me from her salad days did not quite fit.” She walked right up to Ness’s brother and took his hand in her small one and said, “Please, Richard, Ness’s plan will work because it must. I cannot go on like this. Something must be done, and I will be perfectly safe with you watching over me.”
Ness looked from her brother to young Mary. Clearly the girl was infatuated. She sighed, but was unconcerned. Her brother was a gentleman and would never take advantage. Quite the opposite in fact. He displayed this by removing his hand from hers and saying, “Mary, you have a puffed up opinion of me. I am not a hero.”
Ness’s eyes opened wide. He did seem a bit taken with the girl. Well, this would never do. Clearly the girl was going through a stage of ‘puppy love’, but would go off to school and in the following years her heart would be given to another. She did not want her brother hurt in this either. Besides, Mary was sixteen.
Rick looked genuinely ‘involved’. Even though she knew him well enough to know he would never move on his feelings, she saw no easy way out of the hurt he would one day feel when young Mary grew up and turned to ‘another hero’.
“This is a serious situation, Mary. You—we cannot rely solely on Rick’s powers of protection. There is a great deal of danger involved and imagine his guilt if you were to be hurt while he was trying to keep you safe. No. That would not do. Besides that, I was speaking hypothetically. We cannot even be certain that the Echworths are behind your brother’s troubles…”
“My brother’s troubles?” Mary interrupted. “My brother’s death, you mean.”
“Yes, well, there is no proof they…”
“There is no one else. Only Duncan and, of course, Orson. They both hated my brother, in spite of all the help he gave them over the years. Those two, encouraged by their mother, always wished him ill and coveted all that he had,” Mary once again interrupted, her voice harsh with anger.
Ness was struck by the chit’s likeness to her brother. She did not have his height, for she was petite of statue and figure. Her features were finer, more chiseled, but there was something in the tone of her voice, an expression of countenance, a style of movement, and the words spilled out before she realized she was even speaking. “My, you are so much like your brother…” She stopped herself.
“Am I?” Mary beamed. “But did you know Bret?”
Ness looked away. “No, unfortunately, I had not that privilege, but there is a portrait of him at Montlaine.” Whew! She slipped out of that one.
“OH, yes, yes.” Mary’s expression softened. “I think you two would have liked one another had you met. He was so very spirited and I have seen that you are as well.”
Ness patted Mary’s arm. “Oh, I am sure.”
“Let us get back to the business at hand, Ness. You must convince Mary that all this is wild talking. It would never work, and even if it had a chance to work, it is too dangerous. We cannot put Mary in such a situation. Why, it is unthinkable,” Rick said with vehemence.
“You are quite right, brother,” Ness agreed. “On the surface it seems a solution, but now, with Mary here, flesh and blood…no. There has to be another way.”
“There isn’t. Please, Ness…I may call you Ness?” Mary said.
“Of course,” Ness agreed.
“Excellent, now, please do but consider. We are out of options. Eventually, I will be discovered. Eventually, they will want me to stay at
Montlaine…this seems a way to flush out the culprit, I just know it.”
Ness considered this quietly for a moment.
Rick expostulated, “No. It puts you in the line of direct fire…if the Echworths are the ones behind all this mayhem.”
“Indeed, Rick is right, but on the other hand, you are right. Eventually, you will be discovered. If we disclose your whereabouts and insist you remain here with your godmother, there is little they can do…at least until it is time for you to return to school. It would be better to have Mary here with us for the remaining summer, and thereby have a watchful eye on her,” Ness summed up.
“Your sister and I are very right. Please, Richard…don’t be difficult,” Mary pleaded with her eyes as well as her hand, which tugged on his.
Rick shuffled his feet to this, but seemed disinclined to respond as he dived into thought.
Ness broke the quiet of the moment and said, “Well, we won’t decide now. What we will do is talk it over with Lady Penrod before we make a final decision. Her input is invaluable.” She chewed her bottom lip. “Indeed, as soon as I get back we shall have a sit down, all of us, with Lady Penrod. For now, I must go.”
“Go? Where the devil are you off to now?” Rick demanded suspiciously.
“I have an errand that cannot wait.” And with that, Ness waved herself off.
She heard the exasperated sound her brother made at her back, but didn’t look back at him as she heard Mary cajole, “Richard, only think, once we have told them all I am here, we—you and I, can go about the countryside together. I am a bruising rider and I will show you Cornwall. It will be ever so much fun.”
“Egad!” Ness heard her brother utter and smiled to herself.
Chapter Twenty
Montlaine hills rolled in waves of green around the majestic estate. Its tall trees had age and statue. Wildflowers danced with the breeze, but Edward Parks looked only at the lovely woman strolling beside him.
She was angelic of face and he inwardly marveled at the incongruity of it.
How could a woman look so lovely and have such a hard heart? His eyes swept over her as she teased and flirted with him.
