by Joan Wolf
Dave said soothingly, “All the hotels were booked for the weekend. If you don’t want to remain at Silverbridge after Sunday, I’m sure we can make other arrangements. But for now, I think you’ll be more comfortable here than you would be at a bed-and-breakfast.”
“We have a nice big bedroom for you, Tracy,” Meg said. “It even has a painting by Claude.”
For some reason, Tracy felt panicked by the thought of staying at Silverbridge. “I don’t want to disrupt your family any more than they have been already,” she protested to Meg.
“Don’t worry about that,” Dave said. “We’re paying Lord Silverbridge hotel fees for you and Jon.”
Tracy racked her brain for a valid excuse not to stay at Silverbridge for the weekend and could come up with nothing.
“Do you feel well enough to walk?” Dave said solicitously.
Tracy slowly breathed in and out. Then she did it again. “Yes,” she said.
Despite her assurance, Dave put a hand under her elbow and supported her as she stood up. To her relief, the world remained clear and steady. She smiled at her concerned director. “I’m fine, really I am. Go back to work and don’t worry about me.”
“You look better,” he said. “A little color has come back into your face.” He turned to Meg. “Lady Margaret, if you would accompany Tracy to the house, I would be grateful.”
“Not to worry,” Meg said. “Come along, Tracy. I’ve already had Mrs. Wilson make up your bed. You can crawl right in if that’s what you want.”
Tracy made one last plea. “This has to be an imposition, Dave. Really, I wouldn’t mind a B&B for a few days.”
“That photographer will have much easier access to you at a B&B than he will if you stay here,” Dave said.
Tracy thought of Silverbridge’s huge extent of private property that Jason Counes could not trespass upon and gave in. “This is very kind of you, Meg.”
Meg smiled. “It will be fun having you.”
Tracy looked apprehensively toward the terrace. It was empty.
“Go with Lady Margaret,” Dave said firmly. “We’re finished with you for the day, you aren’t on call tomorrow, and we’re taking Sunday off. By the time you report for work on Monday morning, I expect to see roses back in those cheeks.”
Tracy didn’t even attempt a smile as she turned toward Meg and a house she did not want to enter.
A side entrance took them into a wood-paneled vestibule with a green marble floor. The staircase that led upstairs from the vestibule was steep and narrow. “Our apartment is on the second floor,” Meg said. “My father thought that the rest of the house was just too big for modern living.”
Tracy nodded.
“We have an elevator if you’re not up to the stairs,” Meg said. “My brother had it installed for Mummy when she broke her hip.”
“I’m sure I can manage the stairs,” Tracy said.
“This way, then.” Meg led the way upward.
The first flight of stairs ended in a landing that opened to the left onto a delightful sitting room furnished in chintz and rosewood and bowls of fresh flowers. “How pretty,” Tracy said, peering in through the arched doorway.
“This is the morning room.” Meg walked into the room and gestured for Tracy to follow her. “This room and the kitchen are where we basically live. You are welcome to make yourself at home here.”
Tracy looked around the room, which ran from the front to the back of the house, with tall windows on three sides. In front of the south wall windows there was a rosewood table with six chairs set around it and a magnificent vase of fresh flowers in its center. Six more matching chairs were set along the walls for use when the table was expanded. Meg said, “If we have a dinner party, we usually eat in here.”
A small black cat, who had been curled up on one of the chinz sofas, stood up and stretched, arching her back. She then fixed a pair of unnerving green eyes on Tracy and uttered a short, angry-sounding yowl.
“That’s Ebony, Harry’s cat,” Meg said. “She doesn’t like strangers.”
“Most cats don’t,” Tracy murmured, her eyes on the outraged Ebony. “I once had a cat that would hide under the bed every time someone new came into the house.”
“Ebony is a little more confrontational than that. She’ll glare at you and yowl and prowl around you, but if you ignore her she won’t actually scratch you or anything.”
“How nice,” Tracy said ironically. Then, curiously, “How on earth does she deal with the dogs?”
Meg straightened a copy of Horse and Hound that had been carelessly tossed on the coffee table. “They have different territories. The dogs stay downstairs, in the kitchen and Harry’s office, and Ebony stays up here.” She smiled. “Come along, and I’ll show you to your bedroom.”
They exited the morning room and went down the wide, picture-lined corridor that lay to the right of the landing. Three large oak doors punctuated either side of the corridor. One of the doors was open; the others were closed.
“These are the bedrooms,” Meg said. “The room on the far end of the passage is the original drawing room, which lies at the top of the main staircase. We had the morning room made by knocking down the walls of the two end bedrooms.”
“Is the drawing room part of the apartment?”
“Yes, but it’s used for entertaining, and we haven’t done a lot of that since Mummy died.”
They went past the open bedroom door, and Meg said, “That’s Harry’s room. He always leaves the door open so that Ebony can come in and out.”
Tracy stopped herself from looking in. “Your brother seems to have very devoted animals,” she said lightly.
“He found Ebony when she was a starving kitten that somebody dumped. People still have such weird ideas about black cats. Anyway, he brought her home, and she worships him.” Meg stopped at the end door on the opposite side of the passageway from Harry’s room. “This will be your room,” she said, and opened the door.
This bedroom, like the other rooms on the floor, had a twelve-foot ceiling, two long, many-paned windows, and a white wood fireplace. The landscape by Claude that Meg had promised hung over the mantel. The bed was a four-poster without a canopy, and the rug was an Axminster. A great bowl of pink roses reposed on the table that stood in front of the fireplace.
“It’s lovely,” Tracy said honestly.
Meg opened a door that led into a white-tiled, old- fashioned bathroom. It was quite large and, except for the usual conveniences and a scale, exhibited a lot of empty white tile floor. Meg said, “I’m afraid that you’ll have to share a bathroom with me. The only rooms with private baths are the two closest to the sitting room, and Harry has one of those and the other one had a leak in the ceiling and has to be redone. The two other rooms on each side share a bathroom. There are locks on the bathroom doors, however, and when you’re using it, just lock my side and I won’t be able to come in on you.” She gestured toward the sink. “Mrs. Wilson has put out a new toothbrush and toothpaste for you, and I will be happy to lend you what you need in the way of clothing.”
Tracy privately thought that there was no way she would ever fit into Meg’s clothes, which had to be size 00. Out loud she said, “I appreciate the toothbrush, Meg, but Gail called our London hotel this morning and asked the concierge to send everything we had left behind down to Wiltshire. I expect some clothes to arrive before evening.”
After Meg had finally gone, Tracy went over to the window and stood looking out across the front lawn. She was still deeply perturbed by her earlier hallucination. It must be an hallucination, she thought. What else could it possibly be?
She turned back into the room, and it was then that she realized for the first time that her family photographs had been left behind at the Wiltshire Arms and were probably ashes.
My wedding picture! she thought in panic. The other photos were all blown-up snapshots and could be duplicated, but her wedding picture had been done by a studio, and the only other copy belong
ed to her mother.
I have to call Gail. She looked around for her purse and realized that it, too, had been left at the hotel. She didn’t have her cell phone, and there was no phone in her bedroom.
There has to be a phone around here somewhere, she thought and hurried out into the corridor and back to the morning room. There was a phone there, and she dialed her secretary’s cell phone number. Gail answered on the third ring.
“Gail!” Tracy sounded almost as panicked as she felt “I left my wedding picture back at the hotel. Can you call my mother and see if the photography studio still has the negative?”
“Of course,” Gail replied. “In fact, if you have the name of the studio, I’ll call them myself.”
Tracy shut her eyes and thought. “Wilson Photography,” she said finally. “It’s in Westport, Connecticut.”
“Okay, I’ll call. But I’m sure they’ll have the negative, Tracy. In fact, they probably have the picture hanging in their showroom.”
Tracy slowly hung up. Her irrational fear that if she lost the picture she would be losing Scotty again was slightly abated by Gail’s rational words.
She was exhausted, but the adrenaline was still flowing too strongly to make sleep possible. When she saw the closed door at the far end of the corridor, she decided that she would take a look at the drawing room before she went to bed. She walked past Harry’s room, Meg’s room, and her own room, softly turned the knob on the drawing room door, and opened it.
The drawing room was much larger and grander than the morning room. Hanging over the marble fireplace was a magnificent painting of a mother and child, which Tracy later learned was a Gainsborough portrait of a previous Lady Silverbridge holding the hand of her young son. Green velvet sofas and green-and-rose-striped chairs were grouped around the fireplace, and a large grand piano stood in one pale green corner. Tracy’s eyes moved slowly across the stunning room, with its magnificent moldings and chandelier, in the direction of the tall window, which looked out over the back lawn and the fountain.
A man and a woman were standing a few steps away from the window. They were very close to each other, but not touching. The man, who looked like Harry, wore the blue morning coat and pale yellow pantaloons that Tracy had come to recognize as standard for a Regency gentleman. The girl, for she could not have been over twenty, wore a simple muslin dress, and her auburn hair was pulled back into a chignon. Tracy had a clear view of her profile and, except for the darker hair and straighter nose, it was like looking in a mirror.
The strangest feeling settled over Tracy as she beheld this couple. No longer was she startled, or frightened, or upset. It was as though a great stillness had encompassed her, almost like the stillness she had felt when she first met Harry. She stood, motionless and silent, and watched.
The man lifted a hand and gently traced a finger along the girl’s cheekbone. He left his finger where it was as he said, “God, Isabel. What am I to do?”
His voice was the voice of a living man. The couple looked completely solid as they stood there in front of the window.
“You can’t do anything, Charles,” the girl replied. Her accent was English. “We can’t do anything. You are married, and I am your third cousin. And that is all we can ever be to each other.”
“I know that you are right.” His voice sounded harsh. “At least my head knows that you are right. It’s my heart that tells me otherwise.”
The girl did not reply. She just looked at him. Very slightly, her mouth quivered.
He jerked his hand away from her face and turned to stare out the window, the tension in his broad shoulders visible. “Christ, this is a pretty sight. Here I am, trying to seduce my children’s governess. I have always despised men who took advantage of their dependents.”
“You haven’t taken advantage of me,” the girl replied. “Something happened between us. It wasn’t something either of us wanted. It just”—she lifted a hand in a helpless gesture—“happened.”
He turned back. “I know. But I can’t go on like this, Isabel. I can’t see you day after day, and want you, and know you are living under the same roof as I…”
She crossed her arms over her breast in a protective gesture. “What am I to do, Charles?” There was a desperate note in her voice. “Caroline took me on because there was nowhere else for me to go after Papa died. I’m too young to get a job as governess with any other family.”
The sun suddenly peeked out from beneath the clouds, lighting the man’s hair to gold. Tracy felt a pain somewhere in the region of her heart. He reached out and gathered the girl into his arms. “I have no intention of putting you out, sweetheart. Forget my ravings. We shall do just fine.”
The girl rested her cheek against his shoulder in a small gesture of confidence and trust. She did not see, as Tracy did, the look of grim despair carved into the flesh of the man’s face.
Yeeooow! Tracy jumped at the high-pitched screech and looked down to see Ebony standing behind her in the doorway. The little cat’s hair was standing on end, making her look twice as big as she really was, her tail was fat and standing straight up, and her glittering green eyes were fastened on the space in front of the window. Once again she let out that bloodcurdling sound.
Tracy looked back to the window, but no one was there. Her heart, which had accelerated at Ebony’s yowl, continued to race as she stared at the empty space where just a minute before two people had stood. Then she looked back down at Ebony, who was still staring at the window and still in a state of full alarm.
I’m not crazy, she thought. There was something there. Ebony knows it. She looked once more around the empty room and began to tremble. In the name of God, she thought, afraid as she had not been before, what is going on here?
8
Tracy slept for five hours and when she awoke the light outside her window was dimming. The first thing she thought was, I’m starving. I hope I haven’t missed all the food.
She went to the window to see if the catering truck was still there. It was, but the caterers were packing up to leave.
Damn. Tracy had crawled into bed in her clothes, and she looked with disgust at her wrinkled turtleneck and jeans. She turned from the window to see if her clothes from London had arrived.
Someone had placed a large leather suitcase and a smaller matching tote bag along the wall next to the door. A green garment bag was draped over a chair. Tracy heaved a sigh of relief and went to pull out some warm clothes. She had been delightfully toasty under the down comforter, but the air in the bedroom was decidedly colder than she was accustomed to.
She wanted to take a shower before she dressed, and went into the plain, functional bathroom she was to share with Meg. The old white tub was long and narrow and, to Tracy’s relief, a striped shower curtain indicated the presence of a shower.
The bathroom was freezing. Tracy started the shower and stripped off her clothes, praying that the water would be hot. It was. She climbed through the shower curtain, borrowed Meg’s soap and shampoo, and was out again in five minutes. She had no wish to linger and find that she had run out of hot water before she had washed the suds out of her hair.
Shivering even more than before, she hurried into her underwear and a pair of wool slacks and a lavender cashmere sweater set, the kind of clothes she would wear to a gathering of friends in Connecticut. She couldn’t find a hair dryer in the bathroom, which, except for a few shelves holding towels, was utterly devoid of storage space, so she dried her hair as best she could with a towel. Then she set off for the morning room, hoping to find Jon.
The person she encountered was Lord Silverbridge. He was sitting in a large, comfortable-looking wing chair with Ebony on his lap and a folded newspaper propped up on the chair’s arm so it was out of the little cat’s way. He looked up as Tracy came in.
“Good evening,” he said. “Meggie said that you were sleeping. I hope you got a good rest.”
His words were courteous, but his tone was indifferent. He was w
earing a pair of horn-rimmed glasses that, outrageously, made him look even more handsome than usual.
He could have been the twin of the man she had seen in the drawing room.
“Yes, thank you, my lord,” she replied expressionlessly.
“You must forgive my not getting up, but Ebony dislikes being disturbed.”
Tracy narrowed her eyes. You arrogant bastard, you’re the one who dislikes being disturbed. “Where are Meg and Jon?” she asked.
“They still appear to be shooting down in the garden. I haven’t seen either of them since I got in.”
Tracy looked at the paper he was holding. “Is that an evening edition?”
“It is indeed,” he replied. “And there is a picture of you prominently displayed.”
Tracy cursed.
“You look quite fetching in your pajamas,” Lord Silverbridge went on. He turned the paper around and held it out to her. “Here, would you like to see?”
She took the paper from him silently and regarded the picture that Jason Counes had taken at the fire. He had caught her smiling at Jon.
“Damn,” she said. “Now the gossip will start that I’m having an affair with Jon.”
“Are you?” he asked blandly. Then, as she glared at him, he held up his hand. “I’m sorry. I know all too well how the press can distort things.”
There was a bitter note in his voice, and Tracy remembered Jon’s story about Silverbridge’s relationship with a model. Then her stomach gurgled, and she said, “I missed dinner, and the catering truck is leaving. Is there any way I could get some food? Are there any area restaurants that deliver?”
“No.” He took off his glasses and rested them on top of a table. Very gently he shooed the little cat off his lap. She leaped to the floor with a protesting squawk, gave Tracy an indignant glare, and began to clean her paws.
“I’ll take you down to the kitchen,” he said. “I’m sure there will be something you can eat.”
He was wearing brown twill pants, a tattersall shirt open at the neck, and a pair of polished brown moccasins. As he joined her, Tracy could see that he was taller and slimmer than his phantom counterpart, but their faces were almost identical.
