Susan Carroll

by The Painted Veil

  His kiss braced her, warmed her and comforted her more than the most potent of brandies could have done. He drew back, and even in the fading light she could see the tender shadow of his smile.

  “Faith, my dear,” he said huskily. “And to think I have always believed Hastings to be a most superior sort of footman. You perform services that make his devoted polishing of the silver pale by comparison.”

  Anne realized he sought to relieve her apprehensions with his jest and she wished she could have obliged him by smiling. But the chill of those forbidding prison walls still seemed to cling to her and she shivered.

  Observing this, he released her and produced a ring of keys which he proceeded to try upon the mansion's imposing front door. Anne leaned wearily against one of the pillars, the recent escape already fading to become a blur in her mind—helping Mandell to truss up Griffiths's unconscious form, scrambling into the footman's livery, locking the cell door, creeping down to the courtyard.

  Only one moment stood out with terrifying clarity. All had gone smoothly until they were to pass beneath the shadows of the prison lodge itself. The guards were too busy harassing and checking the more humble visitors. None of the turnkeys presumed to question the lordly figure that was Mandell any more than they had dared to search him on his arrival. But one of the younger guards had frowned at the sight of Anne, perhaps realizing that my lord the marquis had somehow acquired an odd-looking footman within the prison walls.

  As the guard had approached them, Anne's heart had threatened to stop, not with fear for herself, but for Mandell. Despite his cool exterior, she sensed the danger in him. In that instant she had realized he was prepared to fight to the death before he would have allowed anyone to touch her.

  But the guard had only winked and offered to clear a path for the marquis and his servant through the common herd. Mandell had nodded tersely, slipping a small purse into the man's calloused palm. Anne had felt so weak with relief, she marveled that she had been able to continue playing her part, following a few steps behind Mandell until they had cleared the final gate.

  After that she had a dazed remembrance of being bundled into a hackney cab, alighting to trail Mandell on foot through a maze of streets and alleys designed to confuse any pursuer until they had at last slipped into the grounds of this strange abandoned house.

  Going through key after key, Mandell muttered an impatient oath until he slotted in the one that fit the lock. The door creaked loudly as Mandell shoved it open. Anne bent to retrieve her hat and followed him inside.

  She felt awkward and self-conscious in the masculine clothing Mandell had provided to disguise her for the escape. Hat in hand, she gazed nervously about a great hall, the gallery above where musicians must have once piped tunes for ladies in farthingales and ruffs, the gentlemen in doublets. But the vast chamber stood empty now, cobwebs clinging to the lion head brackets upon the chimneypiece.

  “Mandell, what is this place?”

  “Windermere Palace, one of the family icons.” Mandell grimaced at the layering of dust he dislodged as he brushed up against the wall. “A relic of late Tudor times. Anyone with any sense sold off their riverfront property at a great profit, but my ancestors persisted in clinging to this lumbering pile and my grandfather upheld the tradition. He wanted to give it to me, but I made haste to decline the honor. The property was then to have reverted to Nick, but since his recent marriage, I doubt that will happen.”

  “Is is safe for us to be here?”

  “Safe enough for the present. No one ever comes here anymore except perhaps Nick. Most of the locals tend to avoid this place like the plague because of the legends about the house being haunted.” Mandell slipped his arm about her shoulders. “You don't believe in ghosts, do you, Sorrow?”

  “After what I saw happen to Lucien, I am no longer so sure,” she murmured.

  “We will discuss that presently, but first permit me to escort you to less daunting quarters.”

  Linking his arm through hers, Mandell cautioned her to beware of rotting floorboards and guided her toward the end of the hall. An L-shaped staircase stretched upward, the intricately carved newels adorned with snarling lions the same as on the fireplace.

  When she and Mandell reached the top, Anne saw there was a landing that led to a long gallery, pale splotches on the wall bearing testimony to the portraits that must have once hung there.

  Mandell went along the gallery, trying door after door. “I know there was one of these chambers that Nick had partially restored. Ah, here it is,” he said as he opened the last door but one. He beckoned to Anne to join him.

  She stepped across the threshold of what had once been a large bedchamber. When Mandell located a tinderbox and managed to light a candle, Anne saw that unlike the rest of the house, this room was furnished. A worn Turkish carpet covered the floor and a faded tapestry of a hunt scene graced one wall. A massive bedstead minus its hangings dominated the room, a small chest tucked at the foot. To one side, stood a small battered desk and chair.

  The chamber was damp and musty, reminding one of the house's close proximity to the river. Anne rubbed her arms to dispel the chill. Seeing her do so, Mandell frowned.

  “I wish I could light a fire, but I cannot risk anyone seeing the smoke and becoming curious enough to pay us a call. Nor can I vouch for the condition of this chimney. I daresay it has not been cleaned for years.”

  He whipped off his cloak and draped it about her shoulders. “And this time I trust you will remember to return it sooner, milady,” he teased gently, trailing his fingers against the curve of her jaw.

  She caught his hand. “Please don't, my lord. It is not necessary for you to try so hard to delude me with this show of good cheer. I fully realize what a desperate case we are both in. They will soon be searching all over London for me, and you, too. I should never have allowed you to take such a risk for me.”

  “So you have protested several times, and at the most inconvenient moments. Damsels are not supposed to raise such a fuss when being rescued.”

  Although he was still smiling, Anne sensed the underlying edge of his tension starting to pierce through. But she could not refrain from saying, “I should not have let you do it. I should have guessed what you were about as soon as you entered my cell. I should have found a way to have stopped you.”

  “You had grown so fond of Newgate, then, that you wished for a longer residence there?”

  “No, God help me, wretched coward that I am. The prospect of the trial, of being found guilty terrified me so, I would have given anything to have been free.”

  “Well, then?” Mandell said impatiently.

  “Anything , but sacrificing you to do so. Now you are as much a fugitive as I. They will want to arrest you for helping me.”

  “So they will. What of it?”

  “So perhaps if I surrendered myself now, your conduct would be excused”

  Mandell swore, a fire leaping into his eyes that was as much fear as anger. He gripped her shoulders so hard it hurt. “Don't you dare even to think of such a thing or I swear to God I will bind you up and hold you prisoner myself if I have to, to keep you from such folly.”

  When she flinched he eased his grip, but she felt the tremor in his hands. “I fully understood the dangers when I set out to free you, but I did not give a damn. Do you think I could have endured leaving you in that place, waiting upon the whim of some oafish judge to decide your fate? I would have gone mad, do you not understand that, Anne?”

  She comprehended far too well. She could see the shadows of the ages old nightmare, the anguish in his remarkable dark eyes.

  She reached up, brushing her fingers over his brow, trying to ease the lines of pain she found there. “Yes, I do understand, Mandell. This whole thing stirred memories for you, of what happened to your mother.”

  “It was worse than that,” he said. “I thought I knew what hell was, but I didn't, not until I stood outside those damned prison gates, fearing that yo
u might already be exposed to that cursed gaol fever or to the brutalities of some coarse guard.”

  A shudder of strong emotion wracked through him. “No, Sorrow, I could not have endured you being in that foul place another moment. I could not take such risks with the woman I -”

  He broke off. The word he could not bring himself to say seemed to hang suspended in the air between them. Anne's heart hammered so wildly she could hardly breathe, for she found the thought completed in the depths of his eyes.

  The woman I love.

  The moment was too intense and solemn for Anne to feel a flooding of joy. Mandell turned away from her, grinding his fingertips against his eyes. He said shakily, “You see, Anne, it is not you who is the coward. I have never known any woman possessed of such quiet courage and strength, capable of feeling such compassion, even for a wretch like me who cannot tell you what you deserve to hear even now.”

  “Mandell,” she breathed. He refused to face her. The most she could do was rest her hands upon his shoulders, press her face against the iron line of his back.

  His voice cracked as he continued, “You deserved a prince, my dear. Not one like Gerald Fairhaven, but a truly noble man. Instead you got the dragon.” He raised his hand in a gesture of hopelessness. “I wonder if all dragons are like me, on the surface fire and bluster, but beneath it all, nothing but smoke and fear.

  “You were right that day in the park when you accused me of living my life as though I were still trapped in a dark closet, afraid to allow myself to feel anything but the most shallow emotions. But sometimes you are forced to confront the things you fear, whether you will or not.”

  He turned slowly to face her, his eyes glistening. “I love you, Anne. And it hurts as much as I always feared that it would.”

  She cupped his face tenderly between her hands. “It is not supposed to be all pain, my love.”

  “I know that.” He caught one of her hands, pressing a heated kiss within the center of her palm. “But now I am vulnerable. Now I have something to lose.”

  “You will not lose me. I am here with you now and everything is going to be all right.”

  She flung her arms tightly about his neck. He responded with a low groan, crushing her in his embrace. His mouth sought her lips, raining feverish kisses over every inch of her face.

  “I love you, Anne,” he repeated again and again, as though each word was a prayer, a blessing, a miracle. Anne returned his kisses, for one moment allowing herself to be deliriously happy.

  His arms tightened about her, straining her close as though he would gather her into the recesses of his heart and hold her safe there forever.

  “There was a great love between my mother and father,” he said. “Even as a child, I was aware of that. But in the end, she died alone, horribly. Her death left me so confused and bitter. My grandfather taught me it was better not to love, that it was an emotion reserved for fools, and I believed him.”

  Mandell buried his face against Anne's hair. “He wanted me both to forget and to remember. And so the nightmares started, tormenting me until I would cry out in my sleep, a child wanting his mother.”

  Anne stirred in his arms, realizing there was something about those dreams that Mandell did not even comprehend himself. She drew back a little, saying hesitantly, “But Mandell, the night that I overheard what you said , you were not crying for your mother. It was your father whose name you called.”

  He frowned down at her, his eyes clouding with disbelief. “But I hated him. I always have. He failed my mother when she needed him most. I swear that will not happen with you.

  “I won't fail you, Anne,” he vowed passionately. “I will find a way to keep you safe. But you must tell me everything about that night in the garden with Lucien.”

  Lost in Mandell's arms, dazed by the admission of his love for her, nothing else seemed to matter to Anne. It was as though the events surrounding Lucien's murder were a bad dream, an illusion already half forgotten. Only this moment was real.

  But Mandell persisted. “Obviously you did not slip away to your bedchamber as I had supposed. And after you had faithfully promised me to stay away from that bastard, that there would be no more midnight wanderings! Then I hear that you have been arrested for shooting Fairhaven.”

  “I did not kill Lucien, Mandell, I swear it.”

  “It would not matter to me if you had, love. Now go slowly and tell me everything that happened.”

  Anne forced her mind back to those last hideous moments of Lucien's life. Haltingly, she related to Mandell every detail of the terrifying encounter that she could remember.

  “Thus the accursed Hook claimed yet another victim,” Mandell said. “But for no reason apparent to any sane man. And why the deuce did he use a pistol this time?'

  “I don't know.” Anne managed a shaky laugh. “He did not tarry long enough for me to ask him.”

  Mandell cradled her close, depositing a kiss upon her brow. “One thing is now certain. We are dealing with no common footpad. This brigand marches to some tune of his own devising, and it has nothing to do with mere robbery. Yet I fear your innocence cannot be proved until this villain is unmasked.”

  “But how, Mandell? He is indeed like a phantom. No wonder poor Lucien was so terrified, being stalked by such a creature. He rose up in the garden like some specter from hell, and vanished just as quickly. No one can guess at his identity.”

  “There is one man who might be able to do so. Briggs.”

  “Sir Lancelot? But you told me that you feared he had lost his reason.”

  “Then I must endeavor to help him find it again.”

  Anne heard the grim note in Mandell's voice. She tipped her head back to peer anxiously at him. A determined light had come into his eyes.

  “I have felt all along that Briggs knows something about the Hook, something that he feared to tell. He was so shattered after the attack that I felt loath to press him, but now the matter is more urgent. I will find a way to slip into his house to see him this very night, induce him to speak.”

  “No!” Anne caught at the folds of Mandell's frock coat “You must not go, Mandell. If you are seen upon the streets, you could be arrested.”

  He covered her hands with his own. “I must take the risk, Sorrow. Briggs is our only immediate hope. Besides, I never intended that we should spend our lives as the resident ghosts of Windermere Palace. Even now, Hastings will be working to ready provisions, arranging a passage for us away from London. It was all I could do to keep the young fool from storming Newgate with me.”

  Mandell's lips crooked into a deprecating smile. “I seem to have inspired this misplaced devotion and concern for my welfare in Hastings and you.”

  He bent to whisper a kiss upon her trembling lips. “Don't be afraid, Anne. I will be careful, I promise you. If I have no success with Briggs, we shall be gone from the city this very night. I shall tuck you away someplace safe until your innocence can be proven.”

  “And if that day never comes?”

  “Then I shall find a way to fetch Norrie, and the three of us will make a life elsewhere. I have heard tell that America is not quite so barbaric these days. We could be a family. I would do my best to make Eleanor a good father, and you a tolerable husband. That is, if you would have me.”

  Anne had never thought to hear such a humble request from Mandell. Still, she was obliged to shake her head in sorrow,

  “What! The lady rejects me again?” He cupped her chin, his eyes shining with tenderness. “But I thought my wretched heart was all that you desired, Anne. And that is what I am offering you.”

  “It is all that I desire, all I ever dreamed of. But Mandell, I could not permit you to make such a sacrifice for me, abandoning your estates, your title, everything that you are.”

  “Everything that I am, everything that I want to be, I find reflected in your eyes, milady.”

  He pulled her close, his mouth covering hers to still any further objection. His kiss was fi
erce and demanding, claiming all of her, body, mind, and soul, as though he would bind her to him forever.

  Reason was no match for a force as powerful as Mandell's embrace, and Anne surrendered, molding her body to his hard muscular frame, remembering all that he had taught her of passion, returning it to him with love, the two powerful emotions blending to become one.

  They kissed, clung, and caressed until they both stood in danger of forgetting the time, the place, and the peril that threatened them. It was Mandell who came to his senses and wrenched himself away.

  He drew an unsteady breath and laughed. “You make it deuced hard for a man to leave you, Sorrow, but I must. I want many more nights in your arms, and without any shadows cast over our lovemaking.”

  He caught her hand and held it to his lips for a long moment. “I shall return very soon. You must wait for me. You will not be afraid to be alone here?”

  Anne shook her head, summoning up her bravest smile. “I shall always have the palace ghost to bear me company.”

  “As long as he quite understands that you belong to me.” Mandell quickly abandoned the jesting tone, his eyes turning intent. He drew her into his arms one last time, saying, “Everything will be all right, Anne. You must believe that.”

  She believed anything when he looked at her that way, holding her within the circle of his arms. He kissed her, this time more tenderly, and Anne basked in the glow of his love, a rush of warmth thrumming through her veins. Only when he had gone did she begin to feel the cold.

  As time crawled by, the bedchamber at Windermere House began to seem worse than a prison. Anne felt isolated and alone, trapped in a place where time had frozen like the hands of a clock that ceased to move. She paced the worn Turkish carpets, watching the candlelight flicker over the dark heavy furnishings. The faded tapestries breathed of a grandeur long past, an age of splendor that had vanished.