Whether Spencer even heard the crash of the sofa, the toppling of the table, and the shattering of the figurines, Victoria could not say. Tiny shards of the delicate porcelain crunched under his footsteps, like so much gravel, as he charged around the upended sofa, intent apparently on jerking Loyal up and pounding the daylights out of him, if he wasn’t already dead. And he very well could be, too, because he had yet to move so much as a muscle since Spencer had hit him. Victoria didn’t think Spencer cared if Loyal was dead or not. He still meant to make the man, or his dead body, suffer. It was all the same to him.
But not to her. She would not have her husband going to prison or facing a firing squad or a hangman’s noose because of the likes of Loyal Atherton. She had to stop him and she would … in any way she could.
That meant she had to move quickly since Spencer was unceremoniously hauling Loyal’s limp body up by his lapels. Making little mewling sounds of desperation, Victoria despaired of what she could do, how she should intervene. Spencer was lost to reason, that much was obvious. Mere words would not stop him. Maybe she could grab his arm and hold on to him, but he was more than twice her size. She doubted her weight would slow him down in the least. And besides, she didn’t want him to miss and hit her instead. Why, she’d wake up in heaven.
Then, she spied it. The iron fireplace poker. No. She didn’t want to kill Spencer, just stop him. Oh, dear Lord, he had Loyal up now and was getting ready to hit him again. Panicked, crying out, Victoria grabbed a substantial vase of flowers from off an end table, ran up behind Spencer, reached up, and crashed the vase down on his head.
Spencer made a tortured sound like “Aah” as the vase broke over his skull. The water baptized him and then cascaded over every surface in its path. Shards of china vase joined the shattered porcelain. And fresh-cut flowers shot about like errant arrows.
Horrified by the effectiveness of her actions, Victoria stumbled backward and watched Spencer fold up like a lady’s parasol as he lost his grip on consciousness and Loyal at the same moment.
Both men did a slow and graceful crumple onto the carpet. And just lay there, side by side, on their backs … amid the debris of sofa, figurines, water, the vase, and the flowers.
CHAPTER 11
Victoria stood transfixed with shock as she stared at her handiwork. Though her heart pounded blood throughout her body and raced her pulse, though every instinct urged her to think and to do, she found she could not voluntarily move.
In the next instant, the parlor doors were flung open with such force they slammed against the walls behind them. Jumping in surprise, crying out and clutching at her full skirts, Victoria swirled around to see—
An armed mob obviously intent on charging in to the rescue but stopped abruptly in their tracks by the sight greeting them. In their forefront, and wild-eyed, Edward swung about an unnervingly large pistol as he evidently searched for a target. Flanking him on one side was Hornsby, a riding crop in his upraised hand. On Edward’s other side, Mr. Milton stood ready to do damage with the large book he held raised over his head. Tillie was there, weaponless but with eyes wide with shock. Another maid Victoria believed was named Ruby sported a heavy silver candlestick in her fist. The cook, a large, florid, and balding man whose name Victoria could not recall, something Swedish, had come armed with a meat cleaver.
Several other assorted servants, black and white, rounded out the mob of would-be defenders of the home front. Their weapons, too, were remarkable. Some had knives. One had a shoe off and held high. Another, a walking cane. And yet another, an iron tool of some sort. However, apparently realizing there was no one left to fight, they advanced no farther into the room than the threshold.
“Victoria! Thank God you’re all right,” Edward cried, breaking the jagged seconds of silence that had claimed the parlor. His expression as incredulous as that of his companions, he swept his gaze over the ruination in the room. His expression revealed his evident confusion over who he should run to first—her or the downed men. “This is absolutely unbelievable! It looks as if a battle has taken place in here.”
As he’d stated the obvious, Victoria saw no need to comment. Though rational thought had eluded her moments ago, she now thought furiously as she formulated and rejected several versions of the truth and what and how much she should say. A bit of luck in her favor, and giving her time, was the positioning of the bodies in relation to the upended divan. The big, heavy piece of furniture lay at an angle—padded cushions toward Edward and his cohorts—and hid all but the odd leg or arm of the two unconscious men. This meant no whole persons were revealed who could be readily identified and fretted over.
Distracting the army, too, were the splattered water, flung flowers, and shards of porcelain dotting the carpet and wood flooring. As well, the tipped-over round table, which had, until only moments ago, proudly displayed the precious figurines, now rolled drunkenly back and forth, back and forth, in an ever-slowing arc. Its motion seemed to entrance the confused congregants.
All except Edward. Obvious concern wrinkled his brow and rounded his eyes. “Victoria, what happened?”
Blinking back a sudden onrush of tears, she cried, “Oh, Edward, it was awful. I wish you’d been here. You shouldn’t have left me alone.”
“But, my dear, that’s just it. You were alone when I left not ten minutes ago to make a mad dash for the, uh, necessary room. One can only drink so much tea and lemonade before one must— Oh, bloody hell, what am I going on about? I am terribly sorry for not being present when you so obviously needed me. But, great heavens above, what the devil happened in here?”
What, indeed. “I had a visitor.”
Edward raised an eyebrow impossibly high. “A visitor? Forgive the mention of the name in this house, my dear, but who was your visitor? General Sherman, perhaps come back around for another try?”
“Don’t be silly. I wish you’d come sooner.”
“But we came as soon as we heard loud voices and crashing about,” Edward explained. “And as soon as we could gather our weapons.” He paused, allowing his continued concern for her to bracket his eyes and mouth. “Are you certain you’re quite all right, Victoria? Your color doesn’t look good.”
She put a hand to her cheek as though she could determine her color by touch. “Yes, I’m fine, thank you.”
“As you are the only one left standing, I will agree.” Edward indicated—with his gun as a pointer—the scene of battle between him and her. “But what happened to … them?”
He still didn’t realize, apparently, exactly who “them” were, and Victoria wasn’t certain she should enlighten him—not in this mixed company, for certain. But she had other, larger, and more frightening concerns. What if Loyal was dead and Spencer had killed him? The law and morals aside, she could not see herself pointing the finger of guilt at her husband. And what if Spencer was dead and she had killed him? She’d lose her sanity, that was what. Therefore, the two men had to be—must be—simply unconscious. Nothing else would do.
Cognizant of the quiet as Edward and the others awaited her explanation, Victoria waved her hand vaguely at the two men sprawled about in the veritable Greek ruins of the parlor. “They fell.”
“They fell?” Edward squawked, sounding like a parrot. He still had not come any farther into the room or lowered the gun he held. Neither had his cohorts with their assorted weapons. They did, however, and behind Edward’s back, exchange disbelieving glances with each other.
“Yes,” Victoria said, this time more emphatically. “They fell.”
Edward stared at her for an awkwardly long time before raising his gaze to the ceiling and studying it. His associates followed suit. Victoria could not stop herself from peering upward, too. She supposed they expected—maybe hoped—to see a gaping hole there. Perhaps they believed the men had fallen through from the floor above. Certainly, such a catastrophe as that could explain this debacle here on the first floor. However, she knew differently. She lowered her gaze and fo
und everyone again staring her way.
Taking a few steps to his left—and followed step for step by his posse—Edward pointed, again with his gun, toward the fallen men. “Who is that?”
He had to mean Loyal, since he knew Spencer. But before Victoria could formulate any type of response, Hornsby worked his way to the front of the crowd where he gained a clearer view of the victims. “Great Scott, it’s His Grace!”
He and Mr. Milton, who had gasped loudly at Hornsby’s revelation, broke from the herd and ran for their employer. Edward shouted: “Stop right there! I have a gun!”
Amid the general gasps—one of them Victoria’s—making the rounds in the room, the two men stopped right there and swung around to face Edward. Hands and weapons—a book, a whip—held high in surrender, they stared wide-eyed and terrified at the armed earl. “There’s nothing you can do but hurt him worse with your bumbling about. Leave him be until I can look at him. Come back over here, please.” They did. Edward then swung his gaze and his gun to Victoria as he nodded his head in the direction of the downed victims. “There’s no blood. I take it he’s not mortally wounded?”
He meant Spencer, Victoria knew. “No. I don’t think so.”
Looking relieved, Edward nodded. “Good. And who is that other man?”
She would have to tell him. Feeling hollow inside and with ravaged nerves drying her mouth, Victoria said: “He’s Mr. Loyal Atherton, of the Savannah Athertons. Banking and shipping. His mother is a Conover of South—”
“My dear, I don’t mean to interrupt you,” Edward said, interrupting her and smiling as he did so, “but perhaps we should save the pedigree and the introduction for when the man is conscious?”
“Oh. Of course.”
What Edward didn’t know, because they were behind him, but Victoria did because she faced them, was that the cook and maids and butler and assorted other Redmond employees had tensed the moment she’d identified Loyal Atherton. They knew the name and the context, even if Edward and Hornsby and Mr. Milton did not. At this point, the servants … slowly, quietly … inched backward toward the open doors behind them.
The subtle noises of their retreat caught the British contingency’s attention. Edward, along with Hornsby and Mr. Milton, divided their befuddled gazes between the exiting employees and Victoria, who still stood across the room from them, strangely isolated. As though she inhabited an island surrounded by a dragon-filled moat and they dared not approach her and she dared not try to move, either.
“How did this man happen to … fall with Spencer?” Edward wanted to know.
Victoria eyed him and then the mob of domestics, who by now had backed up sufficiently to allow Ruby and … Sven! That was the cook’s name!… to each grab a door to the parlor and start pulling it closed after them. “Wait!” Victoria cried. They did. She turned to Spencer’s employees. “Hornsby, Mr. Milton, would you please go with the others? I wish to speak with the earl in private.”
The combined prompts of the Duchess of Moreland’s request and the Earl of Roxley’s gun had them bowing and silently joining the American staff in leaving the room. Once the doors closed behind them all, and in the silence remaining in the parlor, Victoria could hear their dispersing and departing footsteps. Hopefully, no curious ears were pressed to the doors.
This left her alone in the room with Edward, who tucked his gun into the waistband of his trousers. Victoria’s gaze locked with his. Though it seemed hours had passed since Spencer had barged in on Loyal kissing her, it had, in reality, been only minutes from that event until this moment.
“It’s all right, Victoria, come here.” Edward waved her over as he stepped over to his fallen cousin. “When he comes around, I’m sure your face will be the first one he wants to see.”
Though Victoria seriously doubted that, given the circumstances that had put him on the floor to begin with, she hurried over to Edward, who surprised her by holding his arms out to her to offer her a quick hug of reassurance. She gladly stepped into his embrace. For her, his warm, slender solidness held the comfort of an old friend. “Oh, Edward, I was so afraid.”
He patted her back affectionately. “The evidence in this room says you had every reason to be.” With that, he released Victoria and knelt down beside Spencer. Victoria stood behind him and watched as he pressed two fingers to his cousin’s neck and held them there. “Pulse good and strong.” He raised Spencer’s eyelids and checked. “Jolly good.” He looked up at Victoria. “Did he hit his head, do you know?”
Victoria’s response was the cautious truth. “His head was hit, yes.”
Edward raised an eyebrow. “Curious wording, my dear.” But he said nothing else as he raised Spencer’s head and probed the back of it. Spencer moaned as if in pain.
Victoria clutched at Edward’s shoulder. “You’re hurting him!”
“Not terribly so, but hurting him at this moment can’t be helped. It’s for his own good. Ah, there’s yesterday’s large lump. Now, just let me see…”
Victoria let go of Edward and stood by quietly as he continued his examination of her husband’s head. “What I don’t understand,” the earl said, “is why Spencer and this Atherton chap got into it.” When Victoria said nothing, Edward again glanced up at her. Apparently, her solemn expression gave her away. “Ah. I see. Then, is he who I suspect he must be?”
Shame and anger again filled Victoria’s heart. “Yes, he is. And he behaved horribly here today.”
“It would seem so. There now, all done.” Edward gently laid Spencer’s head back on the carpet and, a hand resting on his thigh, focused on Victoria. She felt certain her heart would explode with dread and hope before he rendered his verdict. “Good news, my dear. Nothing serious I could detect—”
“Thank heavens!” Victoria clapped her hands together over her heart. “Oh, Edward, that is such wonderful news.”
“He’ll have a severe headache. Maybe a slight concussion. But for the most part, he’ll come around just fine after some bed rest. We might want to have a real doctor look in on him, just to be sure.”
Victoria nodded. “I’ll get a message straightaway to Dr. Hollis. He’s been my family’s doctor forever and a day.”
“Excellent.” Edward turned now to Loyal Atherton and looked him over, saying drolly, “Oh, bad luck. It appears to me as if this one, when he fell, hit his jaw on the way down to the floor and oblivion.” Edward then looked up at Victoria. “All that aside, and our ‘official version’ being he fell, tell me what really happened in here, if you would.”
With no other choice, really, she launched into her story. “Loyal bullied his way past the butler, after being told I would receive no more visitors and then burst in here, nearly startling ten years’ growth out of me. I told him I had nothing to say to him, that I’m a married woman and he must leave. But he grabbed me and, completely against my will and my wishes, he forced himself on me and kissed me—”
“Unforgivable. And that exact moment was when Spence made his grand entrance?”
Victoria pressed her palms to her too-warm cheeks, reliving it in her mind. “Yes. It was the most awful scene, Edward, the two of them going at it like that. I could not get a word in edgewise to explain to Spencer what he had seen.”
“All he saw was another man kissing his wife. So, I daresay the truth would not have sat any better with him than did his leap to a conclusion fueled by his long-held suspicions.”
“What long-held suspicions?”
“Oh, surely, Victoria, you know what he suspects—and has done since he arrived at Wetherington’s Point and found you gone.”
“No, I assure you I do not.” Victoria watched as Edward pointed from Loyal to her … and back. Realization burst into her consciousness and slackened her jaw. “Spencer thinks I came back here to be with him?” Her features now a study in pure distaste, she mimicked Edward by pointing to Loyal Atherton and then herself. “Him? And me? Never. Why would he—?”
“Among all the other and
obvious reasons, Victoria … the letter.”
Shame and dismay had her covering her mouth with her hands and staring at Edward. Then, lowering them, she said, “Will this never end? I should have known. He thinks the letter is from Loyal, doesn’t he?”
“I hate to sound harsh, my dear, but of course he does, given … everything else, and then the way you left England after receiving it and without telling him.” Puzzlement suddenly claimed Edward’s features. “But hold on. Didn’t you tell him last evening about the letter? I thought that’s what you went upstairs to do.”
“Yes. It was.”
“And…?”
“I never got the chance. It’s complicated, Edward, but I got called away and then when I came back, he was asleep. And then I hadn’t seen him today until he burst in here. Oh, this is all my fault.”
“Yes, it is,” he said, sounding cheery and friendly, “but don’t fret, my dear. Since you did not run away from Spencer at this man’s urging, then it’s all very fixable. A matter of a simple conversation, really.”
Maybe on this one point, Victoria knew, but not on all the others. Conversation alone could not cause a birthmark to be. And then, there was still the letter and the real reason she’d come back to Georgia. Conversation could not solve that crisis, either.
If Edward noticed her prolonged silence, he gave no hint. “Now, tell me, how did this Loyal Atherton dandy get the best of our man Spencer?”
Victoria smoothed her skirts, paying very close attention to the lay of the delicate muslin fabric. “He didn’t. I did.”
“You did?”
“Yes. The vase of flowers.” She indicated the broken pieces littering the carpet and floor. “I hit him with it. I was afraid he’d kill Loyal, and I didn’t want him to hang for that.”
“I see,” Edward said. “Very noble of you.”
To Make a Marriage Page 17
