"When Carleton found out that Ewan and Julianna were planning to elope, the black-hearted devil abducted and ravished her."
"Abducted!" Gilly exclaimed. His gaze traveled wonderingly to meet Phaedra's. This was far different from Hester Searle's version of the story.
"Why was Carleton never arrested?" Phaedra protested.
Glencoe's eyes clouded. "No one ever had a chance, for James got to him first. That temper of his! Not that I fully blamed James for what he had done. But even at his own trial, when he might yet have saved himself, he ranted like a madman, saying there had been a conspiracy to murder his sister. James was accusing everyone, Carleton Grantham, the son Ewan, some other prominent man named Weylin. Poor James was clearly out of his head."
Phaedra could not conceal a start at this mention of her grandfather, but the doctor was too overcome to notice her dismay. The old man sought surreptitiously to wipe his eyes.
"The rest of the tale you've likely heard. James was duly hanged. I brought his body back for burial in the churchyard here. Maida's heart was quite broken. Between losing both her son and her daughter, I saw her health fail more each day. She became thinner and paler."
"But what about Jason?" Phaedra asked, feeling that the younger brother was like a lost shadow in all of these tragic events.
Was it her imagination, or did Glencoe hesitate before saying, "I sent him away, to take his mother out of the country. A mistake on my part. I should have seen at the outset that Maida was not strong enough to survive the voyage, but she was not about to be separated from her son, and it seemed the best I could do for the boy. I feared for his reason. After James was hanged, he retreated so far into himself, that he terrified me. No grief, no emotion of any kind, it was as though his heart were encased in ice."
The doctor's words painted such an accurate picture of Armande that Phaedra had to look away to hide the tears that filled her eyes.
Glencoe's voice thickened with self-reproach. "Mayhap if I had been there that night with James, I could have prevented ... " He allowed the thought to trail away unspoken, shaking his head. "Well, it is of no avail raking over the past. I have done it often enough to know there is no profit in it."
He reluctantly inched the figurines across the tea table toward Phaedra. "I am sorry I cannot be of more help to you, Miss Fitzhurst. I am sure Jason would have been delighted to have this work of his sister's returned.”
"But you are.certain there is no way of tracing Jason," Gilly persisted. "What if he had decided to leave Canada and return to England?"
"God forbid!" The doctor exclaimed. "I would hope not. There is nothing for the lad here but bitter memories. I have always prayed that he started his life anew and put the past behind him."
Phaedra had not the heart to tell the old man her fear that his prayers had gone unanswered. She tensed as Gilly maneuvered himself toward the cabinet.
"I see you possess some fine examples of Julianna's work yourself, Doctor. And bless me! Are those little portraits of the Lethingtons? Such a handsome family."
"Aye, so they were," Glencoe said.
Phaedra shot to her feet. "Gilly, we have taken enough of the doctor's time."
But the doctor had already risen from his seat and shuffled forward to open the cabinet. "Of course, Julianna is not amongst them, since it was her own hand that painted these." Phaedra watched with dread as the old man handed up the ovals to Gilly one by one for his inspection.
Phaedra sank back upon the settee, digging her nails into the faded velvet. Her gaze never left Gilly's face, and she knew immediately from the arrested expression in his eyes that he had found the evidence he sought.
Silently, he held out one of the miniatures to her. For a long moment she refused to take it. Then her fingers closed about the smooth oval of china. Slowly she lowered her gaze to the portrait, wondering at the sudden sharp ache that pierced through her. Had she still been foolish enough to hope it would be the face of a stranger she gazed upon?
But it was Armande looking exactly as he had a few days ago in the meadow, his blue eyes laughing. Except that the man in the portrait was somewhat younger, an Armande with no shadows brushing his face, caught in all the strength, the arrogance, the innocence of his youth by his sister's loving artistry.
Not Armande, Phaedra reminded herself sadly, but- "Jason Lethington."
She didn't realize she had spoken the name aloud until Dr. Glencoe turned toward her with a look of mild astonishment.
"Oh, no, my dear. You've made a mistake."
When she glanced up at the old man uncomprehendingly, he said, "That is not Jason's portrait you are holding. That is our poor Jamey. James Lethington."
Chapter Eighteen
Before the curricle Gilly had hired had even come to a stop, Phaedra gathered up her skirts, and leaped to the ground. She swayed slightly as her feet hit, but quickly regained her balance and rushed off into the darkness. With only the moon to light her way, she ran through the graveyard behind the small church. Behind her she heard Gilly utter an oath. He hissed her name while he strove to secure the horse's lead reins to the cemetery's iron gate.
But Phaedra was lost to everything except the sensations of shock and horror that rose up in her breast, threatening to suffocate her. With little thought for the sanctity of the dead, she stumbled across the mound of a new-laid grave and made wildly for that corner of the churchyard where Dr. Glencoe claimed he had seen James Lethington laid to rest.
She staggered to a halt and stood gasping several moments before she could focus on the weather-worn stones before her. In the moonlight she could just barely make out the simple carvings. A succession of unknown names passed before her eyes until she came to the last and smallest headstone.
JAMES LETHINGTON ... BELOVED SON OF MAIDA AND DANIEL LETHINGTON.
"There!" she cried. "It isn't true. I knew it wasn't." Her voice broke as she relived again that chilling moment in the doctor's cottage, hearing the old man identify the portrait of the man she loved as that of the murderer James Lethington. The doctor's sight must be failing, his words must be false for here was James Lethington's grave before her, the dust long settled over his tormented soul.
She heard Gilly's footsteps as he came running up behind her. "Fae-"
"Look for yourself," she said shrilly. "James Lethington is buried beneath six feet of earth. Armande is not ..."
Gilly forced her around and held her close, as though the fierceness of his hug could still her shaking, hold at bay her fears and dispel the nightmare that descended upon her.
"The old man is mad." She muffled the words against his cloak. “It is impossible."
"I was as shocked as you, Fae. But as for being impossible, I am afraid it is not."
"Then you are telling me I have fallen in love with a ghost."
"No. James Lethington is very much alive."
She drew away from Gilly, shaking her head. "Ewan saw him hang. Dr. Glencoe brought the body back here for burial."
"Aye, but did you notice the good doctor's reaction after he identified James? You turned white as bed linens. Then when I began to hint we thought we might have seen the man in the portrait, Glencoe hustled us out like we were carriers of the pox. I would wager my last shilling it was because the doctor knows James is not dead."
"Then what did he do? Practice some magic arts upon the crowd so that they all simply thought they saw James hang?"
"What I'm thinking happened is a deal worse than that." As the moonlight skimmed Gilly's features, she realized her carefree cousin had never looked so grim. "You've never been to a hanging, Fae. You could not imagine how horrible it is. Very few snap their necks at once. Most die by slow strangulation."
"I've been regaled with enough of my grandfather's gruesome tales. I don't need you to-"
"I am only trying to explain to you that James would not be the first man to survive such an ordeal. I've heard of cases where doctors can detect signs of life in the condemned even aft
er dangling for an hour. They can revive a hanged man."
Phaedra turned away, but she could not shut out the sound of Gilly's voice. "The procedure is known as a bronchotomy. The surgeon makes an incision in the base of the throat, which helps the man start to breathe again."
Phaedra's hands flew to her throat. But it was not her own flesh she was feeling, but rather the memory of Armande's neck, of running her fingers over that tiny scar. A result of something a friend had done, he had told her.
Gilly continued, "Dr. Glencoe admits he was there at the hanging to recover the body. If James had been yet alive, he could have revived him and spirited him away, and buried anything in that grave, even a coffin weighted with rocks."
Phaedra walked away from Gilly, toward the gravestone of James Lethington. She bent to trace the carved lines with her fingers as though somehow her touch could draw forth the secrets of the grave, raise up the spirit of a dead man to refute Gilly's words. But she heard nothing but the wind whispering mournfully through the grass. The coldness of the stone seemed to seep through her like the chill of death itself.
Gilly settled her cloak more snugly about her, then wrapped his arm around her waist, drawing her away from the headstone. "Come, Fae. Lingering here will change nothing. It is time I was taking you home."
She said nothing, permitting Gilly to lead her back to the curricle. They rode away from Hampstead in silence, the sleepy village already lost in the hush of night. Gilly, ever alert to the dangers of traveling after dark, kept a brace of loaded pistols at the ready. Phaedra sat numbly beside him, with no fear of highwaymen. Her terrors were the conjurings of her own mind, phantom memories of a summer that would never come again, an illusion born of the heat and a too-bright sun. She had stripped away Armande's mask at last, and found not love, but death.
The long, dreary ride back to Heath passed in a blur. The plan had been for her to slip back unseen from the day's outing. Even now Lucy was covering for her, saying that her mistress was in bed, ill from her shock of Hester Searle's death.
But such small deceptions did not seem to matter any longer. Wearily Phaedra directed Gilly to drive her up to the Heath's main gates. The sleepy-eyed porter regarded her arrival with some surprise, then shuffled to swing wide the iron bars.
The curricle swept down the length of the gravel drive. Blackheath House was silent and dark at this late hour. The moonlight skating off the stark block of granite, unadorned except for the tall white Corinthian pillars, gave the mansion the look of a Greek temple-cold and forbidding, awaiting its sacrifice.
When Gilly drew the curricle to a halt, he twisted the leather of the reins between his hands, nervous and unsure about permitting her to alight. "I never counted on us returning so late. Perhaps I should come in with you. We could talk to your grandfather now-"
"No!" Phaedra cried. “Grandfather is likely already in bed. Surely there is no need to disturb him tonight."
Gilly placed his hand soothingly over hers, but his voice was firm as he said, "It is a different situation now, Fae. Your grandfather has a right to know he harbors a murderer under his roof."
"Don't call him that."
"Fae, you cannot still be denying-"
"I'm not denying anything. I'm only asking you for a little more time to think matters through." She clutched at her cousin's fingers, pleading. "Give me just the one more night, Gilly. Then tomorrow, we can do whatever you think necessary."
He held her hand for a long time, obviously uneasy at her proposal. Finally, with great reluctance, he agreed. "I suppose you have been through enough hell for one day. But you take great care. And for the love of God, stay away from de LeCroix."
That was an easy pledge to make. Phaedra was afraid to face Armande, knowing what she did, terrified to look into his eyes, and see the eyes of James Lethington staring back at her. Yet she bridled. "He would never hurt me, Gilly."
"Perhaps I don't believe he would, either," was her cousin's last admonishment, "but all the same, you keep your door locked."
Alighting from the curricle, he saw her safely back up the lane to the house, not parting from her until she slipped in through the front door.
Despite the fact that it was not yet midnight, the Heath seemed oppressively silent. None of the footmen were in attendance, nor did she see any of the other servants as she stepped into the front hall. Without Hester's grim presence, the household had already grown a bit lax.
She supposed she should count herself fortunate that someone had remembered to leave an oil lamp burning upon the hall table. She found a candle end in one of the drawers and touched it to a lamp's wick to light her way up to bed. She should have been grateful to find no one abroad, for her return would go unremarked. But the house's relentless silence preyed upon nerves already stretched taut from the shock she had received at Glencoe's cottage.
The candle trembled in her grasp as she glided through the hall. The stone walls loomed above her, the candle flame sparked glints of illumination upon the collection of medieval weaponry. She averted her eyes, trying to avoid the sight of wicked curving hooks and sharp blades.
She loathed the hall even in the daytime. Why now, of all nights, was she lingering here instead of bolting up to the security of her bedchamber? Perhaps she sought to prove to herself that she was not afraid. Sometime in the hours between now and dawn she would have to come to terms with the truth of Armande's identity as James Lethington. Perhaps that was best done here in the hall, where it had all begun seven years ago-the chain of tragedy that reached out from the past to threaten her.
Drawing in a deep breath, she forced her feet past that one part of the hall she had always avoided. The suit of armor stood cloaked in shadow, the lifeless man of iron menacing her with the weapon in its upraised gauntlet. Mocking eyes seemed to regard her through the slits in the plumed helmet, the lower joining of the visor appearing curved into a taunting smile.
She attempted to confront the worst of her fears, picturing Armande's face distorted with the fury to kill, his strong, supple fingers replacing that fist of tarnished iron, grasping the mace. Her heart rebelled, refusing to allow such an image to linger even in the darkest recesses of her thoughts.
"So you have returned at last."
The familiar silken voice sliced at Phaedra out of the darkness, terrifying her with its sudden proximity. She cried out, whirling to look behind her, stumbling and clattering against the armor. The candle dropped from her hand and rolled across the floor, sending wild arcs of light through the chamber. She caught a glimpse of the hard angles of Armande's face set beneath his thick mane of dark hair, his eyes like blue flame, his shadow falling across her as the candle spun away.
She cowered against the suit of armor, unable to speak. Miraculously the candle did not snuff itself out, but came to rest against the wall, dripping wax upon the stone floor.
Armande turned aside long enough to retrieve it. He held the taper so that the light fell fully across her face. She flung her hand before her eyes in a defensive gesture.
"I am sorry if I frightened you," he said. "You needn't tremble so. There are no windows here."
His sarcastic reference to her suspicions regarding Hester's death did nothing to calm Phaedra's racing heart. Armande's lips curved in a bitter half-smile, his frozen look not quite concealing some darker emotion that raged within him. His wintry eyes never left her face as he snuffed out the candle, the smoke curling in wisps between them, the hall entombed in darkness except for the glow of the oil lamp by the door.
Phaedra inched away from the lamplight toward the marble stairway, the concealing blackness of the landing above them. "I wasn't expecting anyone to be awake," she said.
With one deft stride, Armande placed himself in front of her.
He made no move to touch her, but the breadth of his shoulders formed an impassable barrier between her and the stairs.
"I looked into your room this morning, but you were gone," he said. "I have been watching
for your return all day. I believe you have something that belongs to me."
The accusation was couched in the softest of accents, yet Phaedra detected the anger beneath. Unable to meet his stare, she lowered her eyes to the cravat knotted with precision about his neck, the lace-trimmed linen concealing that familiar small scar.
She moistened her lips. "I-I don't understand."
He took a step closer, the movement rife with an impatience barely held in check. "The figurine is missing from the wooden chest in my room. It was taken either by your hand or your cousin's. I don't care who took it. I want it returned."
Phaedra's hands fluttered to the joining of her cloak, but she abandoned any further attempt to deceive him. Fumbling beneath the mantle's dark folds, she produced the small parcel from one of the voluminous pockets. Silently she handed Armande the shepherd without unwrapping it. He pocketed it, his mouth pinching into a tight white line. After a moment's hesitation, Phaedra drew forth the shepherdess. Slowly she peeled away the cotton batting. She raised the diminutive statue so that it was outlined by the lamp's glow.
She heard the quick intake of Armande's breath. He stared for a long moment. In a constricted tone he asked, "And how did you come by that?"
"I found it a long time ago in my garret. I didn't know the significance of it until I saw yours." Rather clumsily she held out the statue. "Take it. By rights it belongs to you."
He made no move to accept it, his gaze raking her, the lean planes of his face flushing dark with suspicion and uncertainty.
She retreated a step, essaying a shaky laugh that was but a whisper away from a sob. "You were right about me all along. I never know when to stop asking questions. Today I asked one too many." She swallowed. "I-I went to see a doctor named Glencoe."
The name seemed to thud between them with all the force of a hammer's blow. When she fell silent, Armande prodded harshly, "And? What then?"
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