by Amanda Scott
“I see. Then you told them the truth?”
“I thought they deserved to know,” he said gently. “Would you rather I hadn’t?”
“Of course not,” she replied quickly, then in answer to a gleam of mockery in his eye, she added, “I don’t really know, sir. All I know for certain is that I’ve no wish to confront her ladyship for a good long while!”
Nicholas chuckled. “I don’t doubt it.” He glanced at Miss Penistone. “And you, ma’am? Have you quite settled in now?”
“Indeed, my lord. The house is coming about rapidly, thanks to Mr. Dasher’s extraordinary powers of organization.”
“I’m delighted to hear it, though not surprised. Dasher’s greatest talent is his ability to conjure up the impossible at a moment’s notice. It made him an indispensable asset in the Peninsula, I assure you.” A few moments later, they glimpsed a party of men servants under Dasher’s personal direction carrying two bedsteads, and Nicholas left them to finish putting their house to rights, observing that he would see them both at dinner.
Lizzie arrived as promised about four o’clock and, after a rapturous reunion with her mistress, exclaimed and scolded over the state of Sarah’s wardrobe. But when she declared that she would like to have a few moments alone with the person who had been caring for her mistress’s clothes, Sarah called her to order, explaining that, though Betsy had never been trained to it, she had done her best.
“She has been very kind to me, Lizzie, though she was hired as a housemaid, and I shan’t allow you to scold her. “Now, do put off your cloak and never mind my affairs until you have quite settled in. Then I shall ask you to help me dress for dinner, so the gentlemen will stare!”
“And so they shall, m’ lady,” Lizzie promised in her soft Irish lilt as she hurried out the door to see to the bestowal of her own things. She was soon back, ready to go to work. She had changed her gown for a fresh one and bundled her fiery red hair into a snood at the nape of her neck. Her blue eyes twinkled, but her pert little nose expressed distaste for Sarah’s black gowns.
“I know, Lizzie, but nothing can be done about it,” Sarah said. “He was my husband, after all.”
“Aye,” replied Lizzie tersely, “and ’tis none of my place to say what I think about that!”
“Certainly not!” Sarah agreed, but she smiled. “I know what you think, Lizzie, and I apologize for deceiving you as I did. All I can say now is that I made a foolish mistake.”
“Well, as to apologizing to the likes of me,” Lizzie said sharply, indicating that Sarah should sit in the dressing chair, “there’s no call, m’ lady. My faith! If only you could have seen her ladyship’s face when I told her you’d gone!”
Sarah grimaced. “I heard about it, thank you. You might have chosen a time when Lady Jersey was elsewhere.”
Lizzie chuckled. “And didn’t I hear about that later! The very instant m’ Lady Jersey took her leave. ‘Miss O’Hare, you are never again to burst into my drawing room in such an unseemly way.’ My sainted Patrick, but she was in a snit!”
She mimicked Lady Hartley’s tones exactly, and Sarah couldn’t help laughing, though she knew she ought to reprove her instead. It was certainly not proper for her to allow her maidservant to make jest of her aunt. But she was glad Lizzie was here. She said so, adding, “No one else could ever do my hair so well.”
Lizzie just grinned, and her nimble fingers went right on working. Sarah watched closely but, even so, could see nothing unusual. Just a twist here and a tuck there. Nevertheless, the result was wonderful and vastly becoming. Her bronze tresses were piled atop her head like a tumble of curls arranged any which way. Tendrils curled around her ears and down the nape of her neck, and the style gave her height and an extra touch of elegance as well.
She pinched her cheeks to give them extra color, while Lizzie inspected the dress she had chosen to wear, flicking imaginary bits of lint and smoothing a tiny wrinkle before holding it ready for her to don. Once the buttons had been fastened and the skirt twitched into place, she stood back to view the results.
“Well, ’tis passable,” Lizzie sighed, “but not what we like. Black is not your color, my lady. There just isn’t enough of you to carry it off. It overwhelms you.”
“I know, Lizzie.” Sarah smoothed her skirt, hating the feel of the bombazine and wishing the dress needn’t be quite so plain and priggish. With a low-cut bodice and short sleeves, she would not seem so enveloped. But it could not be. She slipped her feet into a pair of silver sandals, for she had not thought to do anything about proper shoes and had been wearing her dark green kid boots till she was heartily sick of them. A few moments later, when she entered the library with Penny beside her, Nicholas eyed her approvingly from the top of her head to the gentle folds of her floor-length hemline.
“I am glad you were able to secure proper attire so quickly,” he said. “Of course, you will not wish to sport so frivolous a hair style at the funeral, but amongst us here, it does not matter.”
Colin had been eyeing a tray of wine glasses and sherry when they entered, but his uncle’s remark brought a grin to his face. “He might at least mention that the style becomes you charmingly, Lady Moreland,” he observed sweetly.
“That will be quite enough out of you, my lad, if you wish to dine with the grown-ups,” his uncle warned. “You may make yourself useful, if you please, by pouring a small glass of sherry for each of us.”
“There are only three glasses,” Colin mentioned suggestively.
“So there are,” Nicholas agreed. “Pour, brat.”
The boy obeyed and seemed not the least cast down by his lack of success. Later, over dinner, Sarah asked him about school, and he obliged with several amusing anecdotes, seeming quite at home in adult company.
“Will you not miss having your friends about you?” she asked, once the laughter following one of his tales had died away. “I should think Ash Park would seem rather lonely after Harrow.”
“Not at all, my lady,” Colin replied. “I shall have my horses here, and there are streams nearby for fishing. I like the Park. Besides, Uncle Nick has said I might invite one or two of my friends for a visit if I like or perhaps go to visit some of them later.”
He seemed perfectly content, and although he cast an indignant look at his uncle when told, after dinner that he might now take himself off to bed, he went without argument. Once Colin had gone, Sarah and Miss Penistone would have left Nicholas to enjoy his port in solitary splendor, but he requested that it be served in the library and asked them to join him there.
“I wanted to speak to you both about the funeral,” he said quietly, when they had seated themselves. “It is to be very private, without any grand fuss, but there is no telling who might come from Town. Dasher will be ready for anything, of course, but I wanted you to be prepared as well. What on earth have you got on your feet!”
Sarah, though listening conscientiously, had idly held one foot out to the fire. She snatched it back, tucking it primly under her skirts. “I’m sorry, my lord, but I didn’t think about shoes before. Nearly everything I have is of a color to match a gown. I thought these would be the least offensive.”
“Well, you certainly cannot wear silver sandals to your husband’s funeral,” Nicholas declared flatly. “Have you any suggestions, ma’am?”
“No, my lord,” Penny replied. “My own shoes are black, of course, and I should be pleased to lend them, but my feet are of a larger size than her ladyship’s, so they would not answer.”
“Well, don’t be silly, Penny,” Sarah said acidly. “We could always stuff the toes, if his lordship will insist upon every propriety being met.”
“An excellent notion,” applauded Nicholas. “I am glad to hear you propose it. That will do very nicely indeed.”
Sarah stared at him, dumbfounded. “You are joking!”
“Indeed I am not, madam. You should have thought of the need for shoes before I left for London, where I could easily have seen to their
purchase. But since you did not, and since Miss Penistone has offered to lend you a pair, you will have to make do.”
“Well, no one else thought of them either,” Sarah declared, her temper flaring, as usual, at his authoritarian attitude. “And you cannot truly expect me to attend a funeral where you admit you don’t know whom I might meet in stuffed-up governess shoes!”
Nicholas swallowed the last of his port and got to his feet. “’Tis a pity we didn’t think to hire someone to do your thinking for you, Countess, since you seem unable to accept that responsibility for yourself. However, we did not; And since I very lamentably failed to realize that you would need black shoes, you don’t have any. Nevertheless, you will be properly dressed tomorrow or be prepared to answer to me. And whatever the reason for this,” he added, looking down at her grimly, “there is no cause for you to speak so insultingly of an offer that was kindly meant.”
Flushing to the roots of her hair, Sarah opened her mouth to answer him in kind, but encountering the cold anger in his expression, she faltered, stammering an apology instead.
“So I should hope,” Nicholas replied uncompromisingly. “But you would do better to make your apology to Miss Penistone, rather than to me. Now, if you ladies will excuse me, I have work to do.” He held the French doors open for them and, her eyes filling with sudden, burning tears, Sarah flounced past him, the placid Miss Penistone following in her wake.
“That abominable man!” Sarah muttered wrathfully, after striding for some moments in irritated silence.
“Well, he was perhaps a trifle severe, my dear, but you cannot deny provoking him,” Miss Penistone observed fairly as they mounted the steps to the house. “I am sorry you do not like my shoes.”
Sarah was immediately contrite. “Oh, Penny, don’t be absurd. It has nothing to do with your shoes, and I am truly sorry if I offended you. Indeed, I don’t know what it is about that man that makes me fly into the boughs like I do.” She pushed open the front door to the sight of Erebus sprawled at the foot of the stairs, his tail thumping the floorboards in greeting. “Dogs sleep outside,” she said firmly, pointing out into the night. With a heavy sigh, the huge dog lumbered to his feet, his soft brown eyes brimful of reproach as he treaded ponderously to the door. On the threshold he turned back with a final plea for mercy. “Out,” said Sarah, and defeated, he plodded down the steps and melted into the darkness beyond. “Where was I, Penny?” she asked, shutting the door.
“Something about not knowing—”
“Oh, I remember. That was silly. Of course I know. Sir Nicholas—that is, Lord Moreland—is so puffed up in his own arrogance that it just makes a body boil. I’ve a strong notion to wear my gold dress tomorrow, just to teach him that I am not to be ordered about like a lackey.”
“I shouldn’t advise it, love.”
Sarah remembered the cold fury in his lordship’s eye and unaccountably shivered. “No, perhaps not.” She sighed. “I suppose we’d best have a look at your shoes, Penny.”
A pair of black leather slippers was found that could be induced to stay on Sarah’s tiny feet, and so it was that she appeared at the funeral in strict widow’s wear from tip to toe, with her hair swept back severely from her face and all but hidden under a black lace veil. There were very few mourners. Beck was there, but he made no attempt to approach her and, accosted by Sir William Miles, left with that gentleman as soon as the coffin was lowered into the ground. As expected, several people did arrive from town, but they were all men, and as it transpired, they were men to whom Darcy owed money. Once the ceremonies were over, they accompanied the family back to the house and disappeared, one after another, into the library with Nicholas.
Sarah did note one familiar face at the funeral. It was the strange man who had visited with Darcy in the library the afternoon before his murder. He stood to one side of the gathering at the churchyard and, later, seemed to have followed the small procession back to the house. Sarah’s curiosity was aroused by the way he seemed to peer at each of the guests in turn, with a particular interest in the men who accompanied Nicholas to the library.
At last, his lordship finished his business and came out to join the dwindling company. Dasher, on the lookout for him, promptly presented a glass of wine. “Thank you.” He turned to Sarah. “I hope your shoes are not pinching, my lady.”
There were lines etched around his eyes, and she thought he looked tired. But whether he was or not, she had no intention of quarreling with him. A night’s rest coupled with the solemnity of the day had convinced her that she had been wrong to take exception to his reproof the night before.
“The shoes are fine, my lord,” she said quietly. “And if they did pinch, ’twould be no more than I deserve for taking snuff at your remarks last night. I hope you will forgive me.”
“Very prettily said, Countess. Did you practice?”
Her eyes flew wide, and all her good intentions dissipated. “You are insufferable, my lord!”
“That’s better,” he approved. “I like the way your eyes hold fire when you are angry. They were a trifle insipid before.”
“Oh!” Suddenly aware that other eyes were turning toward them, Sarah managed to keep from stamping her foot, but she could no longer stay beside him without causing a scene. So she dropped a barely civil curtsy and moved away. When she looked back a moment later, he was talking to the man she had observed earlier.
They disappeared toward the library, and all the mourners had gone by the time Nicholas reappeared. Sarah was still out of charity with him, so although she was nearly consumed with curiosity, she refused to question him. No doubt the man had come to demand payment of some debt or other as the others had done, which would also explain his previous long meeting with Darcy and the latter subsequent argument with Beck on the subject of money. Or partially explain it, she tempered. Nonetheless, her ears pricked up when Colin asked the question uppermost in her mind.
“Who the devil was that queer nabs, Uncle Nick?”
Nicholas fixed his nephew with a pointed stare. “If you mean to ask the name of the person who was just with me in the library, I wish you will phrase your question in a more civilized manner.”
“Well, then,” said Colin, unabashed, “that is precisely what I wish to know. Who is he, if you please?”
“I am afraid I cannot imagine how that might be any concern of yours,” pronounced his uncle in quelling tones. “So if you will excuse me, I have matters that must be tended before dinner.” And he left the room, leaving at least two of the three remaining persons to stare at each other in no little consternation.
IX
SARAH’S CURIOSITY WAS WELL and truly aroused by Nicholas’s attitude toward the stranger. If he had simply provided the man’s name and added that their business was of a private nature, she would very likely have thought no more about it. But his abrupt dismissal of the subject piqued her curiosity and stimulated her imagination. The stranger had, after all, visited Darcy on that fatal day. At the least, he might be able to cast some light upon the mystery. At the worst, he might prove to be the murderer. The notion caught her unawares while she was walking back to Dower House to refresh herself before dinner. She stopped quite still in her tracks, turning the idea over in her mind, examining it from all sides.
“Sarah, love, whatever is the matter?” Miss Penistone inquired gently at her side.
Filled with an excitement completely out of keeping with the horror of her idea, Sarah turned with sparkling eyes, fully prepared to explain the matter. But something in that gentle, alert expression caused her to think twice before laying her accusation.
“Nothing, Penny,” she replied vaguely. “Just a silly notion, not at all suitable to the day.” Miss Penistone said nothing at all to this, and they soon arrived at the Dower House. Pleading a need to rest before dinner, Sarah soon found herself tucked up on the French seat in her own room, alone with her thoughts.
Who was the mysterious stranger? The question sounded as thou
gh it had sprung directly from Mrs. Radcliffe’s pen. Surely, such occurrences belonged in the world of her Udolpho and were out of place at Ash Park! Nevertheless, she was certain that her mysterious stranger could cast a light on Darcy’s death.
A sharp movement in the garden below caught her eye, and she turned to see young Colin waving frantically. He made other odd gestures once he had her attention, and she quickly came to realize that he had something of a private nature to impart to her.
Sarah did not doubt for a moment that Colin wanted to speak to her about the mystery, so she quickly slipped on her horrid shoes, smoothed her skirt, and hurried downstairs to join him in the front garden. He did not disappoint her.
“That man we saw,” he began urgently, “the queer one Uncle Nick wouldn’t speak of … he’s down at the stables. I saw him!”
“Are you sure, Colin? Maybe he left his horse there whilst he spoke to your uncle.”
“That was ages ago,” the boy scorned. “I’m sure Uncle Nick thinks he left. That fellow’s up to no good, my lady. Mark my words.”
Sarah smiled at his intensity. “Why did you come to me, Colin? Why not inform your uncle?”
“He would only say I was interfering in matters that are not my concern,” was the candid reply. “But I think there’s more to that fellow than meets the eye. And I’ll wager you agree with me.”
She couldn’t deny it. “Perhaps, if we were just to stroll down toward the stables,” she began tentatively.
He grinned. “I knew you were a right one, ma’am. We’ll soon see what he’s up to.”
But when they arrived at the sprawling stables, it was to find that their quarry had flown. Sarah stifled her disappointment and agreed that Colin should question one or two of the stableboys. She watched intently as he spoke first to one and then another; consequently, she did not hear the approaching footsteps behind her.
“What the devil are you doing down here?”
She spun around to face Nicholas. He was frowning, and she found herself without a plausible answer. “I … that is, we … we were just … some exercise before dinner!”
