by Allison Lane
Intelligent, sexy, caring, tolerant. The perfect male. Too bad he lived in the wrong time period. She sprawled onto the couch and frowned. Surely the combination wasn’t that rare. There must be any number of men in her own time who were equally enticing. She just hadn’t noticed them yet. And that was hardly surprising. After walking out on Willard, she’d wanted nothing to do with men. A very acrimonious divorce hadn’t changed that. So what had?
She frowned, trying to pin down when the numbness of the last two years had worn off. Pain, grief, and despair had piled up, layer upon layer, until she could barely drag herself out of bed – fights about her worthiness to be a Cardington, arguments over her pregnancy, the accident that had nearly killed her and had killed her son, months of recovery, the dingy room she’d called home during the divorce proceedings, six new rejection letters, this last-ditch effort to do enough research so that her next book might have a chance, the unvoiced admission that she would never be a writer and should abandon this dream too . . .
When had despair turned to hope?
When Drew had lifted her from the hearth and cradled her close. The safety and security had overwhelmed her, answering a need she had not recognized, but one that had gnawed at her all of her life. The need for warmth, unconditional acceptance, and love.
“Damn it, you’ve fallen in love with the man,” she scolded herself furiously. “What a fine mess you’ve gotten yourself into this time!” And what utter stupidity! Buying a death sentence couldn’t hold a candle to loving a man who had perished more than a century before she was born.
Hadn’t she learned anything from the disasters she had already survived? This jaunt to the Regency was temporary, so forming an attachment was just plain dumb – worse even than marrying Willard. She and Drew could never be together. Even discovering a way to return to 1812 in her own guise wouldn’t help. He was off limits. He loved Emily, and Emily was everything Cherlynn wasn’t – beautiful, adoring, and conformable; the kind of wife who would devote herself to serving her husband and would never dream of arguing with him. He frankly hated Fay, whose independence and determination matched Cherlynn’s own.
This was yet another reason to get this job over with. She needed to leave before Drew discovered her idiocy. He would pity her, and that was the last thing she wanted. Visiting the local gossips would keep her out of his way for now. With Dr. McClarren due back as early as tomorrow, there was no further need to pretend weakness. Only if she learned something useful would she see Drew. Or perhaps she would write him a note with all the specifics. Another tête-à-tête in the library would risk both exposure and a broken heart.
* * * *
By late morning Cherlynn was sitting in Miss Langley’s sitting room, drinking a cup of tea. Grace had disappeared into the nether regions to interview Miss Langley’s maid.
Somehow, the conversation had moved onto the topic of flighty young girls – the spinster hurriedly disclaiming that Emily was included among their numbers. “Like that silly Maude Gardner,” she said with a snort. “She’d caught the eye of a prosperous farmer, and seemed quite puffed up with her prize. But two days after the first of the banns were called, she ran off without a word.”
“Where to?”
“No one knows. She disappeared last spring and hasn’t been heard from since.”
“That is odd. But perhaps she changed her mind about the match.”
“It’s possible,” conceded Miss Langley. “She was the one who did most of the chasing, becoming scandalously forward at times, but perhaps she had merely meant to flirt. Some claimed she was taken aback when her father accepted the offer without consulting her. Or they may have had a disagreement. But we’ll never know. Both her father and her betrothed died not long after she left.”
Cherlynn shivered, but couldn’t for the moment think why. It didn’t matter anyway. She needed to move the conversation to Fay. “So many people have died this year. Mr. Raeburn mentioned that his entire family succumbed.”
“Tragic,” agreed Miss Langley, “but hardly surprising. If people will insist on moving to such uncouth places, they must expect it. Why anyone would choose to live among savages, I do not know. Poor Mrs. Raeburn must have been terrified. She was always such a sensitive girl.”
“Were she and Miss Raeburn’s mother really twins?” she asked, hoping to find a place to start. There must be something in Fay’s background that Drew could use against her.
“My, yes,” twittered Miss Langley. “Identical as two peas in a pod. The marriages shocked the neighbors something awful, but who could blame the boys? Despite their breeding, the Ryder twins had long attracted the eye of every gentleman in the area. They were beautiful – blonde hair, blue eyes, lovely figures – and they exuded an aura that attracted men like bees to honey. Dangerous, of course. Even my late brother, who was happily married, felt their allure.”
“Circe,” Cherlynn murmured, sipping her tea. “So they caught the Raeburns?”
Miss Langley nodded. “Lord Raeburn’s heir – that would be Master Jonathan – was staying with him that summer. The Ryder girls enslaved them within days despite being so far beneath them.”
“I understood they were gentry.” As a baron, Lord Raeburn was at the bottom of the aristocracy.
“Barely. Their father was Squire Ryder of Wychurch, who had married a yeoman’s daughter. But the Raeburns didn’t care. They seemed almost bewitched.”
“Surely not!” She put enough disbelief into her tone to elicit further information.
“I wouldn’t be surprised,” confided Miss Langley. “There have always been strange doings in that line – whispers, secrecy, and who knows what else. Faith and Hope the girls were named, in hopes they would avoid the curse.”
“Curse?”
“Madness.”
Memories of Frederick’s story twitched shivers across her shoulders. “Is all the family mad, then?”
“No,” the gossip admitted, helping herself to a biscuit. “No one has confirmed a single case, but rumor is rife – and has been since I was a child. Where there is smoke, one usually finds fire.”
“Is rumor specific?” What would this mean to Frederick and Anne?
“At times. The ill health that prevented Mrs. Ryder from attending the weddings was madness – or so the story goes. And my own mother recalled how Mrs. Ryder’s mother killed her son’s pet dog, though to be fair, the animal had destroyed a good part of her wardrobe. But ’tis also rumored that an aunt was locked away for crimes too awful to discuss in decent company.”
“How about the twins themselves?” She accepted a second cup of tea.
“They seemed quite all right. Both doted on young Frederick – now there was a bonny babe, full of mischief and inquisitive as a cat. I best remember finding him in Jeb Perkins’s fishing boat – he would have been about two – trying to untie a rope so he could float out for a closer look at a schooner in the Channel. Always loved boats, he did. His nurse wasn’t able to keep up with him from the day he took his first step.”
“Poor woman. But you were describing the twins.”
“Yes, I was. His mother was perfectly normal during the time she lived here,” she admitted. “Except for hiring that nurse. The smartest move she made was leaving the woman behind when they left for America. Nothing odd there. Of course, she’s been gone a good many years. Lady Raeburn was a bit eccentric, but did nothing that could be construed as mad, unless you count hiring the same nurse for the infant Fay. Miss Testmark is still at Raeburn House and no more able to keep up with Fay now than she was twenty years ago with Frederick.”
True, but she was a family connection so keeping her around was not exactly mad. “When did Lady Raeburn die?” she asked, trying to recall everything she knew about genetic mental illness, which unfortunately wasn’t much.
“Six years ago. She got lost during a snowstorm – it rarely snows here, so she must have become confused – and died of exposure.”
“How sad.
Miss Raeburn must have hated losing her mother.”
“She ran quite wild afterward.”
Further probing yielded nothing she could use. Fay may have run wild at age fourteen, but she had carefully covered any misdeeds in the years since. Her return to apparent decorum coincided with Drew’s declaration that he wasn’t interested in marriage, and probably arose from it. The change was too profound to be coincidence. Fay’s fifteenth year passed normally. Only after Drew moved to Thurston Park did she begin to backslide.
But Miss Langley knew nothing beyond an abrasive personality. Or did she? A note of unease simmered deep in the woman’s eyes. Was it Fay herself who kept gossip quiet? Grace had heard rumors of witchcraft – not that Cherlynn believed in such a thing. But a common thread connected tales of the family madness. Murder – of a dog, of a husband and children, of . . . what? Was murder behind the crimes too awful to mention? Did Miss Langley fear for her safety if she enraged Fay? It seemed preposterous, but then Cherlynn’s entire life of late had been preposterous.
She collected Grace and bade her hostess farewell. The vicar’s wife was out, as was Lady Travis, so she could do nothing but return to Broadbanks. Hardwick informed her that Drew would like to see her, but she was still too shaken by her morning revelation to seek him out. Instead, she headed for the garden where she might be able to think.
Lord Broadbanks was on the terrace.
“Good afternoon, Lady Emily,” he said slowly, gesturing for her to join him. His color was slightly better this day, but he was still a visibly ill man. By her calculation, he had less than a month to live.
“My lord.”
She accepted yet another cup of tea, exchanging pleasantries. His mind was apparently troubled, for his conversation wandered without purpose for several minutes. Not until he began talking about Randolph did she concentrate on what he was saying.
“Such a loving son,” he murmured, half to himself. “His death was tragic.”
“Tell me about him,” she suggested, suspecting that he wanted to talk, but that Drew could never have listened. And she was suddenly overwhelmed by the feeling that Randolph was more important than she had suspected. Was he the key to neutralizing Fay?
Something teased her mind, but she couldn’t quite bring it into focus.
“Such a loving son,” he repeated with a shake of his head. “Yet there was that in his eyes that sometimes made me wonder. He was too much like me.”
“I would think that was good.”
His brows lifted. “In a way. I often wished that he had been first-born. Drew holds too many ideas I cannot accept. Yet I fear I did Randolph a disservice by favoring him. It widened the rift that had already existed between them.”
“Brothers do not always get along,” she agreed.
“Perhaps not, but encouraging Randolph to manage the estate was wrong. I had no unentailed estate to give him and knew well that Drew would never appoint him as steward. Their ideas were too different, and Randolph would never accept subservience. Yet I prevented him from pursuing an acceptable career. Military, church, government. He was trained for none of them.”
“Perhaps, but that is not entirely your fault. He could have chosen differently.”
“With me demanding his assistance and playing on his affections? I think not. As I said, he was much like myself – weak; following always the easiest path. I recognized it. Keeping him by my side was a misguided attempt to protect him from the dangers of London, but I failed. He sowed his oats with as much abandon as any young man, overindulging in wine, debauchery, gaming, and pranks without understanding that forgiveness is less forthcoming when one is not heir to a title. Society often condemns younger sons for deeds it ignores in their older brothers.”
She nodded. “Did he get into trouble then?”
“Some. Enough to underscore his status as second son. I should have controlled him better, but he was ever my favorite. I should have taught him moderation, but exposing my own heedless youth risked losing his regard. Ah, vanity! If he had indulged less in wine, he would not have died. Guilt has weighed heavily on me ever since.”
“Don’t, my lord,” she begged. “Every parent since Adam has faced the specter of an imperfect child and tormented himself with guilt. But there is no need. You made the best decisions possible. He was well past his majority at the time of his death and thus responsible for his own actions. A man of four-and-twenty is capable of reason. If he chooses to imbibe more than is seemly, then he must bear the consequences. It is tragic that he died so young, but you can only accept it and move on. Your health will not recover until you can put this behind you. Remember his good qualities without dwelling on the mistake he made at the end.”
“But I should have taught him more,” murmured the marquess. “I knew – who better? – where wanton self-indulgence can lead. Perhaps he would have lived if I had shared my experiences with him.”
“Perhaps, but children are rebellious by nature. Would he have listened? Or would he have ignored your warning, assuming that you were prosing on about situations that he would never face? He might even have done worse just to prove that he was better or smarter than you had been.”
“You have a grasp of human nature that belies your years,” he said with a tremulous smile. “That is precisely what he would have done, for he never balked at a challenge. And he could find challenge in situations that most people would ignore.”
“A common trait in younger sons. They must constantly prove themselves to be the equal – or better – of their older brothers. Did not your own brothers do as much?”
He smiled. “Ah, yes. In riding; in flirtation . . .” His head nodded in fond memory even as his voice died away.
“Set your fears aside, my lord,” she urged as Hardwick approached. “The past is gone and cannot be changed. Accept it and move on to the future.”
“Mr. Raeburn requests a word with you, my lord,” said Hardwick.
“I will leave you, then,” she said, slipping into the gardens.
* * * *
Half an hour later she was returning to the house when that elusive memory jumped to the fore. Why had Randolph been walking home? She must send Grace into the village to ask a few questions.
But that action had to be postponed. Broadbanks was still on the terrace, his face looking several years older. Fearing that he was on the brink of another attack, she was turning toward the door when he beckoned her.
“Are you all right, my lord?” she asked.
He nodded. “I have received several shocks. May I intrude upon your time to make use of your uncommon sense?”
“Of course.” She waited patiently while he sifted his thoughts for a place to begin. But her mind was less than patient. What had Frederick said that had upset Lord Broadbanks so badly? It was too much to hope that he had denounced Fay and broken off the betrothal. She examined the marquess’s gray face. Had he learned of Fay’s charges against Drew? That would put an end to the connection, but it would also widen the chasm between Drew and his father, creating ill will that would plague Drew’s mind long after Broadbanks died.
He sighed. “Mr. Raeburn has requested leave to pay his addresses to Anne.”
“I know that he cares deeply for her, and I believe she returns his regard,” she said carefully, wondering why this turn would shock him.
“That is not the problem. In making this request, he felt it necessary to air all his family skeletons. His mother ran mad not long ago, and he has learned since his return that the problem is common in her family.”
“I had heard hints of this,” she admitted as her mind slipped into high gear. Would Frederick have investigated his family if Emily had died on schedule? The news had obviously shocked the marquess. She didn’t want to precipitate an early death, but Frederick may have discovered something that Drew could use. “Our discussion of his mother may have prompted his probe of her family. But I do not know any details. Lady Langley mentioned the twins’ eccentric
mother, grandmother, and aunt. Are there others?”
“He spent two days in his mother’s home village and questioned several people. Nearly a third of the family members are afflicted.”
“Are any men included in that number?”
His gaze sharpened. “An odd question.”
“Not at all. Many inherited traits affect only sons or only daughters. For example, I have met several men who cannot distinguish color. When I questioned Dr. McClarren, he admitted that it is a deficiency found only in men. In like manner, he recounted skeletal problems that occur only in women and an odd bleeding disease confined to men. Perhaps this form of madness is similar.”
“Perhaps. The people that he mentioned were all female.”
“How many cases did he discover? If it is a female problem, then it must move from family to family.”
“Fourteen, though once he retreated past three generations, the evidence becomes apocryphal. As you say, the families involved kept changing, and the lower classes keep few records.”
“Were daughters of male offspring also afflicted?”
“No.”
“Then you need not fear that either he or his children will suffer.” She bit her tongue to keep from mentioning Fay. Let him raise that issue on his own. It sounded as though he was already leery of the match. “Did you approve Mr. Raeburn’s courtship?” she asked instead.
“I will discuss it with Drew, and possibly Anne.”
“A good place to start. I doubt Anne is in any danger, but she should be informed.”
“Quite. Would you summon my valet, Lady Emily? I must rest before facing my son.”
She nodded and returned to the house.
Was this the break that would free Drew? Probably not. Publicly disclosing the family madness would harm Frederick and Anne. Jilting her without mentioning the madness would destroy his own reputation. And she doubted that Fay would end the betrothal to avoid disclosure.
