“What’s to be done?” I asked.
A moment of thoughtful silence before Thayne asked, “Does Anton enjoy the attention of the maids?”
“He’s a shocking flirt,” I returned as his train of thought suddenly sank in. “Do you think he—”
“I do not want to think about it at all,” Thayne growled. “But tomorrow I shall inform him he must confine himself to encouraging only the female members of my household. “I have already spoken with Avery and Rab,” Thayne added in a tone that revealed as much reluctance as determination. I have made it clear that I am enjoying the first decent meals I’ve had at Falconfell in years. If anyone has to leave, it will be Avery.”
“Oh dear.” But of course it would be Avery who would be ejected. Rab was Thayne’s brother by blood, Avery merely a brother by marriage.
“Exactly.”
“Love can be . . . difficult,” I ventured.
“Lust,” Thayne snapped back.
“I don’t think that’s the right word for Avery and Rab.”
Fingers to his forehead, the Lord of Falconfell swore, softly but succinctly.
“I have to admit Rab’s a great loss to females everywhere.”
Thayne’s head jerked up, a bark of laughter shook him. “Dear God, Serena, you’ll be the saving of us all.”
We discovered we weren’t as exhausted as we thought we were.
Sometime during the night Fraser awoke, but he had aged ten years. Frail and elderly, he was but a wraith of our competent butler. He had no recollection of what happened; he did not even recall going to the cellars last night. My heart went out to him, even as I faced the reality of a country house of more than a hundred rooms with no butler and no housekeeper. Fortunately, however, every servant was at his or her post, bright-eyed, if a bit wary, ready to resume their duties. I asked the head footman, Donald Murchison, to act as butler, then descended to the kitchen, where I found Anton standing, a trifle unsteadily, over his pots. I greeted the entire kitchen staff with a hearty good morning before offering a cool, “I trust you are feeling a bit better, Mr. Fournier.”
He winced at the formality. “Yes, my lady. Thank you, my lady.”
I took a second look at his battered face, imagined the bruises to his body from his fall off the cliff, and found it difficult to retain my annoyance. Avery really could have been more circumspect in his admiration of our handsome new cook. After informing the kitchen staff of Murchison’s new duties, I visited Isabelle and Maud before making my way to the nursery.
“Violet,” I declared, “tomorrow I would like you to join Lady Hammersley, Miss Maud and myself for tea in the drawing room. Would you like that? Monsieur Anton makes lovely treats, and you can wear one of your pretty party dresses.”
Violet’s narrow little face turned solemn, her lower lip jutting out in a decided pout. “Will there be a great many ladies?”
“Oh no, dear. Just Lady Hammersley, Miss Maud, and I.”
“But you’re Lady Hammersley.” Maud’s black eyes glared at me from Violet’s face.
“You know perfectly well I mean your grandfather’s second wife, the dowager Lady Hammersley.” Exasperated, I spoke a trifle sharply. Violet’s scowl deepened. “I don’t understand,” I added. “I thought you would be thrilled.”
With a great sob Violet ran from the room. I turned to Nanny Roberts. “What did I say?”
Nanny pondered the matter for nearly a minute before offering, “It’s her Mama, I think. She rarely saw Violet anywhere but the drawing room and frequently there were visitors. So the poor dear associates the drawing room with her mother. Who was also Lady Hammersley,” Nanny added softly.
Horrified, I sank into the rocking chair, steepling my hands in front of my face. I should have thought . . . I should have known. Walks were perfectly all right because Helen had never walked with Violet, but visits to the drawing room . . .
“Perhaps you might have tea in the Yellow Room or the Green Salon,” Nanny suggested. “And have her wear one of her new gowns instead of one of the party dresses her mother ordered for her.”
Of course. And here I thought I was doing so splendidly as Violet’s step-mama. Clearly, I had a great deal to learn about children. A decided detriment to a new bride with hopes of children of her own. “The Green Salon then, tomorrow at five. And thank you, Mrs. Roberts.”
I found Violet face down on her bed, sobbing. I apologized for upsetting her, told her about our new arrangements for tea, kissed her on the cheek, and left. She showed not the slightest sign of recognizing my presence.
My eyes misted with tears of chagrin over my failure as a mother-substitute, I started down the narrow stairs. Suddenly I was flying through the air, bouncing off the left wall, grabbing for the handrail on the right. My ankle wrenched, I went down on my rump, sliding sideways, only an occasional successful grab for the railing slowing me sufficiently to keep me from breaking my neck.
I lay in a crumpled heap at the bottom of the staircase, attempting to understand what had happened, when I heard Nanny’s anxious voice from the top of the stairs, followed by Violet screaming, “Serena, Serena!”
I raised my head, shouting, “No!” But Violet launched herself down the stairs, tripping on the same obstacle I had. As she tumbled down, head over heels. I struggled to sit up so I could catch her, but she landed on me with such force we both toppled over onto the bare wooden floor.
“Violet? Violet?”
There was no response.
Chapter Twenty-five
Once again the doctor was sent for, no doubt making no complaint about the long journey as surely he was growing rich on the calamities at Falconfell. Fortunately, Violet had suffered no more than a few bruises and having the wind knocked out of her when she plunged into me at the bottom of the stairs. The ever irascible Mr. Appleby strapped my ankle, told me to stay off it for a week, accepted Thayne’s generous purse and his invitation to spend the night at Falconfell.
So there we were. No butler, no housekeeper, the lady of the manor confined to bed, the cook barely able to stagger about the kitchen, and no alleviation in the miasma of evil. For I’d had time to recover my wits and analyze my disaster. Time to be almost certain it was not an accident.
Thayne soon confirmed my suspicions, as he strode into my room, holding up a long strand of knitting wool nearly the same color as the nursery stairs. “Nanny gave me this,” he said. “Do you know what it is?”
“I suspect that’s what I tripped over.” I clutched my bedcover, my face twisting in anguish. “I hoped I was mistaken.”
“Tacked across the second step, and strong enough to survive your tripping over it,” Thayne returned grimly.
“So now we know.”
He dangled the yarn in the air, staring at it as if he could coerce it into revealing whose hands fixed it across the stairs. “I suppose,” he said slowly, “after the attack on Fraser, pretense was no longer possible.”
“In short, we have a killer at Falconfell.”
Helen and Justine had been poisoned, I was nearly certain of it now. Poison, it’s said, is a female crime. But could a female strike down Fraser? I doubted it. Particularly frail Maud? And what reason would she have? As a member of the family, she had even more right to be in the cellars than Fraser did.
As if he read my thoughts, Thayne said, “I will ask your Bess to supervise the preparation of your meals and deliver them to you herself.”
Feeling utterly defeated, I could only nod. Beneath the pain of my ankle, every muscle throbbed, warning of worse to come. By morning I would be fortunate if I could climb out of bed to use the chamber pot. I was helpless. And someone wanted me dead.
Thayne, who benefitted from the deaths of Helen and Justine, both impediments to his remarriage?
But if so, why show me the yarn? And I was doing what he wanted me to do—organizing his household, nurturing Violet. He had made love to me under the stars.
Was it Maud, not senile, but truly mad?
And if madness ran in the Hammersley family, anything was possible.
Common sense warred with my insidious inner voice. Thayne, Lord of Falconfell, had no reason to strike down Fraser. Nor would he have set up an accident that might harm Violet. Unless, with the tunnel vision exhibited by so many men, it never occurred to him that Violet might be affected.
No! Absolutely no. My fall had rattled my brain along with my body.
Yet who but a husband would wish to kill the brides of Falconfell? A would-be bride as well?
“Serena . . .” Thayne paused, looking decidedly uncomfortable. “When I asked you to marry me, I had no idea I was putting you in jeopardy. This entire succession of events seems incredible, but I have stationed a footman outside your door. From now on we must assume there is a madman on the loose. I assure you Ross and I will make every effort to discover him.”
I managed a wan smile before closing my eyes and falling into oblivion, waking only when Bess brought me a meal Anton had clearly prepared to tempt an invalid’s appetite. Clear soup and bite-size meat pies, with a creamy custard for dessert. God bless the boy, no wonder he’d turned Avery’s head.
The next time I woke I was looking straight into Maud’s black eyes, which seemed to be dancing with delight in the glow of a flickering candle. “I’ve brought you a potion,” she chortled. “A love potion. Drink it down, child, and you’ll not have to worry about your man wandering from skirt to skirt. Makes the plainest woman into a beauty, it does. And no more fear he’ll try to replace you.” Her chortle turned to a cackle that pierced the night.
A dark shadow rose up from my chaise-longue, a large hand closed around the glass bottle in Maud’s hand. “That was very thoughtful, Aunt, but I assure you I am satisfied with Serena just as she is. She has no need of a love potion, nor do I.”
“But, Thayne, Falconfell needs love—”
A tear spilled out of my eye and rolled down my cheek. Somehow in that moment I could almost forgive her for poisoning Helen, if indeed she had done so. The poor old soul must have seen Helen’s infidelity, her indifference—to Thayne, to Violet—and might have . . .
Oh, surely not.
Thayne removed the candle from Maud’s hand and used it to light the candle on a stand next to my bed. Then, slowly and gently, he led Maud to the door, where he asked my current guard to escort Maud back to her room. When he returned to me, Thayne picked up the glass with Maud’s potion and held it up to the light. “I wonder if Appleby can discover what’s in this,” he murmured.
“I cannot see Maud tacking yarn across the stairs and bringing me a love potion a few hours later.”
“Ah, but is it a love potion? Perhaps having one trap fail, she is but following up with another.”
I sat up so fast I cried out in pain. I hurt everywhere. “She’s your aunt, your father’s sister. How can you say that?”
“Quite easily. You’re forgetting I’ve known her all my life.”
After digesting that for a moment, I decided to change the subject. “What were you doing on my chaise?”
“Sleeping.”
“Guarding, more like.” A infinitesimal shrug, a raised eyebrow. “I’m so glad,” I cried, holding out my arms. “Oh, Thayne,” I added as he sat on the bed and clasped me in his arms, “how have we come to this? What’s happening here?”
He heaved a sigh, chest to chest, my own expulsion of breath echoing his. “I am as mystified as you are,” he confessed. “None of this makes any sense.”
Evidently while my muscles were stiffening, my brain was coming back to life, for I heard myself ask, “Thayne, who is next in line for the barony?”
“Don’t be ridiculous!” he snapped, letting me go so fast only my mound of pillows kept me from whacking my head against the headboard.
“Who?” I insisted.
“Ross, of course. My best friend. Right arm. How can you even think such a thing?”
“Best friend? I thought you suspected him of being Violet’s father.”
“If so, the blame falls on Helen.”
I gasped in outrage. Men! How could they be so, so . . . dense? Oblivious? Irresponsibly loyal?
Then again, what had Ross ever done but be the epitome of the perfect steward, complete with charm and good conversation? Certainly he had done nothing I could accuse him of. And yet . . . “He is your Uncle Hugh’s son, yet looks as much like your father as you do.”
Thayne hung his head, searching for, and finding, my hand among the bedcovers. “I confess to wondering about that a time or two. I have the impression there is some mystery in the family to which I was never privileged.”
“Would Maud know?”
“Very likely, but something has always kept me from asking, as if I knew I wouldn’t care for the answer.”
Another mystery we did not need. With something close to a groan, I slid down under the covers. Thayne tucked me in, like a child, and kissed me on the forehead. “No fears, Serena. I’ll be here ’til morning.”
My inner voice reared up, ready for a sarcastic remark about the fox enclosing himself in the chicken coop. I swatted the nasty insinuation to the back of my mind and slammed the door. I’d had all I could take for one day, thank you very much. I would not accept the concept of my husband as a villain.
No matter he was still at the head of the list of those who might have wanted Helen and Justine dead.
Mr. Appleby paid me a visit before driving back to the village, assuring me that Violet was doing well, though worried she had added to my injuries when she careened into me.
“I’m fine,” I told him, even though I couldn’t move without pain screaming from every part of my body.
He gave me a sharp look, the flick of an eyebrow. “Bravado will see you an invalid for the rest of the summer,” he intoned. “Stay in bed, eat well, rest, and you should be able to direct the household from the drawing room in a week.” He shook a finger under my nose. “But no descending to the kitchens until I say you may. One set of stairs at a time. Do I make myself clear?”
I scowled but nodded my acceptance of his dictates. The prospect of being invalided to my room for weeks on end was enough to curb my ever-present urge to keep my hand on the helm.
Over the next few days our household remained somnolent, as if we all needed time to recover from recent events. Bess relayed my orders to Murchison. Isabelle, Maud, Nanny Roberts, and Violet visited me daily. Maud peered into my eyes. “Did you drink it all, child? If so, he’s lost. Yours forever. You’ll see, my dear, just wait and see.” She winked, the witless smile on her face giving me chills before she turned and scuttled out of the room.
Thayne, after a second night on my chaise-longue, returned to his own bed, but a series of footmen and sturdy outdoor servants still guarded my door around the clock. My week of confinement finally played itself out. I welcomed the drawing room, still dark, drear, and in dire need of refurbishment, like a long-lost friend. At last, something besides the four walls of my bedchamber. Anton, his looks much improved since the last time I’d seen him, brought in the menus for approval. Fraser, still with dark circles under his eyes, made it up the stairs to greet me. Our words might have been formal, but our handclasp was warm as we inwardly commiserated on each other’s pain. Shortly after Fraser tottered off with Anton’s hand under his arm, Isabelle made her appearance, welcoming me with the most sincerity I had yet felt from her. Had she expected me to demand Avery’s immediate departure from Falconfell?
“Maud is locked in her stillroom, as she has been for the last sennight,” she told me, looking less self-assured than I was accustomed to seeing her. “I confess I have taken the liberty of asking the kitchen staff to make certain she does not add any of her potions to our meals.”
“Very wise, Isabelle. Thank you.”
Reverting to the proud dowager baroness I was accustomed to, Isabelle offered an abrupt nod and turned toward her favorite chair and the needlework bag containing her embroidery materials. I settled down
to finishing the most recent of the many novels Bess had found for me in Thayne’s library.
“My lady,” Murchison said from just inside the doorway, “there is a visitor asking to see you. A Mrs. Randall. I would have turned her away but she says she wishes to apply for the position of housekeeper.”
Housekeeper? Someone had actually come all the way to Falconfell without being summoned? An act which certainly showed initiative. Or desperation?
“Please ask her to send in her references.”
“Yes, my lady.” Murchison disappeared, returning in a less than a minute with a sheaf of papers in his hand.
My heartbeat quickened as I read the encomiums given to Mrs. Randall by her vicar, the squire, and the solicitor for her past employer, now deceased. All praised her skills and devotion to duty. I told Murchison I would see Mrs. Randall.
As I waited, I could feel Isabelle’s eyes boring into my back. Something was amiss. But if so, why did she say nothing? Perhaps she was merely as curious as I about this possible solution to one of our most pressing problems.
Nell Randall was not at all what I expected. Though no older than I, she was far more attractive. A woman with looks so striking, even confining her long dark hair in a severe bun failed to detract from her beauty. Her dark eyes were shrewd, proud. With an odd glint I couldn’t quite place.
She oozed confidence. But so had Alice Maxwell, and look how that had turned out.
I invited Mrs. Randall to sit and she did so, folding her hands neatly in the lap of her very proper gray gown. “Are you married,” I asked, “or is the Missus the usual courtesy title for a housekeeper?”
“I had a youthful disappointment, my lady, and chose not to marry. A life of service suits me, I’ve discovered.”
Truthfully, Nell Randall was not a woman any lady with a husband short of his dotage would ever consider hiring . . . but we were desperate. Yet there was something about her—a certain smugness, or was it a secret?—that scratched on my nerves. Warning . . . warning what? That I was plain and she, for all her prim and proper façade, was a man-magnet.
Brides of Falconfell Page 18
