“Hell and damnation!” reached him in muffled tones from inside the room. Didn’t sound like Franchot, though. “I’m through with it, I tell you,” the voice announced. “I have taken all I will take, and now the time has come to seize matters with my own hands.”
A murmur followed, a placating female murmur, unless Calum was much mistaken. Bloody hell, Justine was trapped in there with some marauding maniac.
He should have armed himself, but now it was too late. Casting about, he fixed his eye on a pair of ancient steel battle-axes displayed on the wall.
Tiptoeing close enough to reach the axes was a simple matter and they were easily enough lifted from their brackets.
Calum returned to his place beside the door and held both axes in his right hand. Stretching out his left arm, he made contact with a door handle, turned it stealthily and flung the door open with all the power in the fingers of his very strong left hand. And he praised God for giving him the gift that had brought such disapproval in his schoolroom days—equal dexterity with either hand.
Quickly, hoping it would not be seen by anyone inside the room, he dropped his arm to his side and held his breath. The element of surprise could be his most valuable ally here.
Carefully securing a firm grip on an axe in each hand, Calum waited.
What he waited for was unclear to him.
“Come in! Or stay out!” a loud male voice demanded. “Or shut the bloody door!”
Justine would be beside herself with fear.
Bracing himself, Calum lifted the axes aloft and charged, praying as he went that his opponents would not be armed with pistols or, in fact, armed at all. “Back!” he roared, rushing to the center of the dramatically proportioned chamber. Holding his arms above his head, he brandished his evil-looking weapons and glared. “Leave us, Lady Justine. The rest of you—against the wall or I’ll have your heads!”
Moments passed—and more moments. Nobody moved.
“What is it, Calum?” Lady Justine asked at last. “Are you unwell, dear sir? Something you ate, perhaps?”
Calum looked around the room. The thudding of rapid footfalls made him spin toward the door just in time to see Max, his freckled face crimson, his green eyes avid, leap into sight and come to a panting stop a few feet from him.
“In God’s name,” Struan said in a voice that held complete disbelief, “what are you about, Calum?”
“You were a marvel, sir,” Max said. “An absolute marvel. Wasn’t ’e…Papa?”
Struan wrinkled his nose. “Hmm. A marvel.”
Calum looked from Lady Justine to Struan to Max and back to the one newcomer in the salon. The young man was disheveled, his clothes splattered with mud as if from a long, hard ride.
“I thought…” Calum spun in one direction, then in the other. There was no one else in the room. “I understood some dangerous altercation was in progress here.”
“Well,” Struan said, “it isn’t. Put down those ridiculous axes.”
Calum realized his arms had begun to ache and lowered them awkwardly. “There is no corpse?”
Lady Justine gasped audibly.
“No,” Struan said, clearly annoyed. “Kindly avoid frightening Lady Justine with your wild talk. Are you in your cups, man?”
“No, I am not in my cups.” Calum felt dangerous.
Calum felt a fool.
“Sabers,” Max said darkly. “I think they’re ’iding somewhere about. I ’eard the lady shout about sabers. An army is ’ere somewhere, I tell you. They’ve said they’ll kill everyone if they’re given away.”
Calum stared at the boy.
“Max,” Lady Justine said, “do come and sit with me. You are oversetting yourself. What you heard me say was Saber. Saber is this gentleman’s name.” She indicated the dejected-looking fellow sprawled on a chaise with no apparent care for the boots that were muddying blue brocade upholstery.
“You shouted it,” Max said stubbornly, walking slowly toward Lady Justine.
“I said it excitedly,” she told him. “Saber is one of my favorite people—my only cousin, in fact, and I was delighted to see him.”
“ ’E looks the ruffian to me,” Max insisted. The flush had left his face and his carrot-colored freckles stood out sharply.
“Brat,” the man on the chaise said disgustedly. To Calum he said, “We meet again, Mr. Innes. You remember me?”
“Lord Avenall?” Damn the axes that made him look like an ass. “We seem doomed to meet in less than tranquil circumstances.”
“Life is less than tranquil,” Avenall said. “Please call me Saber. Justine has told me she thinks highly of you. Anyone trusted by Justine is trusted by me.”
Calum could not be certain, but it seemed probable that young Avenall was a little the worse for drink. “Thank you, Saber. You seem in ill humor. Has some ill befallen you?”
Saber gave a barking laugh. “Divest yourself of the war tools, Innes. And get one of the damn flunkies around here to bring more cognac. I find myself in need of a great deal more cognac tonight. You must all join me.”
“A drunkard,” Max said suddenly and too clearly. “Beware the drunkard, Fast Freddy always told us. And ’e ought to know. ’E was a drunkard.”
“You should be in bed,” Calum and Struan said in unison. Calum wasn’t certain who Fast Freddy might be, but he had a good idea that discovering that person’s identity in this company might not be at all the thing.
Saber pushed himself to his feet, walked unsteadily to the soaring plaster fireplace emblazoned with the Franchot coat of arms and began to tug on a satin pull.
“I believe there’s port in the decanter,” Lady Justine said.
Saber tugged and tugged and tugged. “Don’t want port. Mewling female swill. Cognac!” he said with full lung support. “Come along, Innes—and you, Hunsingore. You’ll join a man in finding the courage to do what he must do.”
“The boy,” Lady Justine said in a small voice. “Have a care what you say in front of the child, Saber.”
Max, as if suddenly realizing he might miss a show, shot to sit beside Lady Justine on a stiff little couch. He crossed his bony knees inside the green velvet breeches that were part of the clothing Struan had rapidly supplied before leaving London.
Lady Justine leaned over to look into the child’s face and smiled. She brushed back the straight hair that drooped over his eyes and kissed his brow.
Calum waited for an outcry of disgust. None came. Instead, Max nestled into Lady Justine’s side and seemed satisfied to sit thus indefinitely.
“Can you get hold of a flunky, Innes?” Saber asked, sounding desolate. “I shall die if I don’t get some brandy.”
“Calum,” Innes told him. “Call me Calum. Do you think you’ve had enough brandy, Saber?”
“Never,” Saber announced, just as Figerall, the castle steward, made a surprising appearance. Evidently he’d been informed of conditions requiring the attention of a servant of great authority. “Finally,” Saber said, bunching up his lips. “I should damn well think so. Cognac, man. And be quick about it.”
Figerall, short, bald and ruddy, looked at Lady Justine. There could be no mistaking the respect in his manner toward her, or the fact that he seemed to expect her to tell him the right thing to do.
“Kindly bring cognac,” she said. “And I think some coffee would be nice, Figerall. I know the hour grows a little late, but could you perhaps persuade Mrs. Biston to send up some sandwiches? Substantial sandwiches?”
The steward’s smile was for Lady Justine alone. He bowed calmly, said, “As you wish, my lady,” and withdrew.
“Sometimes you have to be firm with these people,” Saber said, his words slurring. “Show them their place. Good enough. A good start. From now on, I’m taking control of the things that matter in my life. No more acting the flunky to that cousin of mine.”
The effect of his announcement was electric. Struan looked hard at Calum, who raised a brow before checking Lady Justine’s
reaction. Pink had spread over her rounded cheekbones and there was a brilliance in her dark eyes.
His sister was a lovely woman, Calum thought, and found that simply thinking about her as his sister brought a rush of pride.
“Franchot being hard on you?” Struan asked in a tone that encouraged trust.
“I’m three and twenty,” Saber said, spreading his booted feet. “No longer a child, in God’s name. I want control of what’s mine, I tell you. I want Shillingdown and all that goes with it, and I want it now.”
Lady Justine cleared her throat. “You should sleep, Saber, dear. You’ll think more clearly in the morning and then you can start to decide how best to present your case to Etienne—and to Grandmama.”
Calum’s interest was sharply piqued. “What does the duke have to do with control of your estate?” he asked before realizing his interest would appear inappropriate.
“He’s my guardian, damn his eyes,” Saber said, with no sign of reticence on the subject. “My father and the previous duke were brothers. My pater, God rest his soul, died at sea. Intelligence for the Crown. Highly secret stuff. Attacked by pirates, and all aboard murdered.”
Justine’s hands went to her cheeks. “Do not torment yourself with these memories, Saber. It was so sad.”
“Yes,” Saber agreed. “My father was a great man and I’ve missed him terribly. But he’d made arrangements for your father to oversee things for me if anything happened—with Mama already gone and no one else to ask.”
“I know,” Justine said. She had grown pale and her face was strained. “So much sadness. You are very important to us, Saber. You always will be. Never think of yourself as alone or without a family. We are your family.”
“You are my family,” he said darkly.
“Let me get you a little port, Lady Justine,” Struan said suddenly, rising to his feet and going to a tray on which a single crystal decanter stood surrounded by glasses. “You have had far too much excitement for one evening.”
Struan poured the port and brought it to Lady Justine. He bent over her and waited until she took a taste and smiled up at him. “Thank you,” she said. “You are very kind.”
“I’ve ’ad too much excitement for one night, too,” Max said in his piping voice. “A little port would probably put me to rights.”
Struan eyed him narrowly and walked away. While his back was turned, Lady Justine put her glass to Max’s lips and tipped a sip of port into his mouth. By the time Struan had sat down once more, Max was smiling up into Lady Justine’s face with open adoration.
“I am a man,” Saber declared as Figerall arrived to deliver the cognac himself. The white cockerel Calum had encountered outside the salon scuttled in his superior’s wake with a food-laden tray.
“I am a man,” Sable repeated, signaling for Figerall to pour drinks. “And I expect to be treated as one. The time for some wet nurse to wipe my nose and tell me when I should and shouldn’t do things is past.”
He accepted a shimmering bubble glass half-filled with glowing amber brandy, promptly emptied it and held it out for more.
Plates of sandwiches and substantial slabs of fruit cake were placed upon a low table. Sugar-coated fruits were mounded on a three-tiered silver dish, and an array of sweetmeats had also been included, together with a variety of little tarts.
Before the servant backed away, Max slipped to the floor and sat with his feet under the table, eyeing the food with the avid concentration of any healthy ten-year-old boy.
At last the servants left, and Saber went to appropriate the entire decanter of brandy. This he set upon the mantel, above a fire that crackled in the grate.
“This is what I’m going to do,” he said expansively, refilling his glass yet again and waving the bottle around. When everyone else had declined, he set the decanter down and said, “Eat, boy. You look like a scarecrow.”
“Saber,” Lady Justine said crossly, “do not be unkind.”
“Why not? I’ve suffered enough unkindness for an army of boys—and men.”
A clear voice from the doorway captured everyone’s attention. “You ’ave not suffered it for my brother, sir,” Ella said. Dressed in a demure, high-necked white muslin gown and white satin slippers, she ventured a few steps into the room. Her black hair was drawn smoothly up at the crown and cascaded in loose curls around her shoulders. She blinked her dark, almond-shaped eyes slowly, and her heavy lashes made shifting shadows on high cheekbones. Calum decided he had never seen more perfect skin than Ella’s golden skin. He wondered, not for the first time, at the exact nature of her parentage.
“Ella,” Lady Justine said, “I thought you were long since in your bed, child. You must be exhausted.”
The unexpected crash of glass on granite made Calum start violently. He heard both Struan and Lady Justine exclaim.
Saber, his intensely blue eyes fixed on Ella, had let his brandy glass slip through his fingers to the hearth.
“I couldn’t sleep,” Ella said, as if nothing had happened, “so I looked for Max and found ’e wasn’t in ’is bed. It frightened me, so I dressed and came looking for ’im.”
There were, Calum decided, and not for the first time, far too many secrets about Ella and Max. To date they had even managed to avoid giving a family name.
“Didn’t mean to frighten you, Ellie,” Max said around a large mouthful of strawberry tart. “There was a fracas ’ere. ’Ad to go in search of reinforcements.”
Calum glowered at the boy. “You came to me with a pile of untruths, my boy. A more rigid man would suggest you be horsewhipped.”
“But you are not more rigid,” Lady Justine said, twinkling at him. “Obviously Max misunderstood what he heard and became agitated.”
“Max tells stories,” Ella informed them calmly. “You’d think it was on account of ’is very active imagination. It’s a great trial and a nuisance sometimes. But once you understands, learning to ignore him is a simple matter.”
Struan coughed, and Calum saw that he smiled at the girl like a proud…father? Dear heaven, Struan was beginning to persuade himself he really was parent to these two mysterious and very possibly hazardous creatures.
“Who is she?”
For an instant Calum wasn’t certain who had spoken. Then he turned to look at Saber—and felt his own gut suck in as if he’d been struck there. The Earl of Avenall stared at fifteen-year-old Ella as if he’d been brought into the presence of Venus.
Struan was the first to recover. “Ella, kindly take Max and ensure that he goes to his bed and stays there. Then retire yourself, please.”
“What right have you to send her from me?” Saber said to Struan without ever taking his eyes from the girl. “Your name is Ella?”
“Yes,” she said simply. To Max she directed a stern frown and told him, “You oughtn’t to stuff yourself so late, Max. You know ’ow delicate your stomach is.”
“Hah,” the boy scoffed. “You don’t know ’ow often my stomach ’as ’ad no reason at all to be delicate. You was lucky. While you were at Lu—”
“Enough!” Calum and Struan bellowed together.
“Don’t you dare shout at him,” Lady Justine said, getting to her feet and going to stand beside Max. “You stay where you are until you’ve had your fill. Boys’ stomachs can take a great deal. Boys require large amounts of food to sustain their considerable energy.”
Saber scoffed. “When did you become an expert on boys, Justine?” he said, although his attention still centered on Ella. “Should have thought the sewing of fine seams was more in your line of expertise.”
“Something tells me Lady Justine has made an acute study of the human condition,” Calum said swiftly, unnerved by his own rush of protectiveness toward the lady. “Unless I am much mistaken, she could well advise us all in matters relating to the care of children.”
A small, awkward silence followed—broken only by the sound of Max’s loud chomping.
“You flatter me undeservedly,” Lady
Justine said, but she smiled gratefully at Calum.
“I don’t think he flatters you,” Struan said. “I think he speaks the truth, and I, for one, am certainly grateful for your help in the matter of—er—these children.”
“Do you ride?” Saber asked Ella, evidently oblivious to the discomfort he might have caused others in the salon.
Ella raised her pointed chin. “I ride very well, sir.”
“ ’E’s a lord,” Max said, using both hands to pop several sweetmeats into his mouth at once.
“I beg your pardon, my lord,” Ella said, and Calum thought she was considerably more responsive to handsome young Saber than a fifteen-year-old girl should be.
“Not much of a lord,” Max continued with bulging cheeks while lifting a piece of bread to examine the contents of a sandwich. “ ’E’s got an estate, but ’is cousin’s in charge of it, not ’im. Makes ’im testy, Ellie. A nasty temper ’e’s got. Threatening sort. The sort who creeps up on a body and pushes thistles down ’is back.”
“I beg your pardon,” Saber said, his mouth falling open.
“Stories, you see,” Ella said, as if that explained everything about her incorrigible brother. “Escapes into ’em.”
“ ’Is estate’s called Shillingdown,” Max said, studying a piece of fruit cake from all sides. “Don’t know where it is, but ’e’s going to try to get control of it. ’Is cousin’s—”
“Go to your bed,” Struan thundered. “At once!”
That got through Max’s dramatic muse. He brought his pale red brows down, regarded Struan anxiously and got to his feet. “I don’t think I can find me way to me bed,” he said, sounding querulous. “This is the biggest place I was ever in and—”
“Take him, please, Ella,” Struan interrupted. “Or are you also lost?”
“I’ll take them,” Saber said quickly, detaching himself from the mantel and going to stand over Ella. “Should you care to ride in the morning, Ella?”
“Saber,” Lady Justine said gently, rising to her feet, “we will pursue the question of riding when tomorrow comes. For now, I should like to take Ella and Max to their rooms myself. You stay and talk with Calum and Viscount Hunsingore.”
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