Gentleman's Master

by Jo Ann Ferguson

  “We will, but first I want some answers.”

  “But someone has been hurt. The blood . . .”

  “Would have gotten on it if someone had held the fabric close to a wound.” He sketched the bloody pattern above the cloth. “See? The least dried blood is in one spot, as if someone pressed it against a wound in an attempt to staunch bleeding. Someone who was not able—or willing—to come to the house for help from such a grievous wound.”

  She put her hand to the center of her breast, but could not calm her frenzied heart that wanted to explode from beneath her skin. “Could a highwayman have come here to look for shelter after being attacked?”

  He shook his head. “Not likely. There is a hedgerow behind this cave. A man who had been shot would not fight his way through that.” He rubbed his fingers against an unbloodied section. “The fabric is fine. Too fine for a highwayman to aspire to possessing.”

  “Unless it was stolen.”

  Again he shook his head. “You need to understand, Pris, that a highwayman does not hold onto prime stake from a robbery. He sells it as quickly as he can, takes the coin, and spends it just as swiftly. You saw yourself. Many are men trying to provide for their families. Fancy fabric cannot ease a child’s pangs of hunger.”

  She curved her hand along his cheek, wondering how often a younger Neville had suffered from starvation. He enjoyed telling amusing stories about his past, but he never spoke of its hardships.

  Knowing that she would embarrass him by voicing her thoughts, she said, “Mayhap the thief just acquired it and then was injured.”

  “Shot, I would say, from the concentration of blood in one spot.”

  “I hope you are wrong.” She shuddered. “But you know far more about this than I do. Where do you think it came from?”

  “If I were to wager a guess, I would say that . . .” He stood and sighed. “I cannot wager a guess, Pris. Any way I look at this, everything refuses to fit together. A thief carrying the fabric would have seen Cross and sought help.”

  “But if the thief was too weak from the loss of blood?”

  “I thought of that, but there is no other blood on the ground. It is as if the cloth fell from the heavens.” He looked up at the trees. “The lowest branches are too high to climb. Who would be in the water garden at this late hour?”

  “We are, and Lady Rossington and her daughters, and—”

  He gave her a lopsided smile. “All right, I withdraw the question. But there is something peculiar about this, something that eludes me.”

  “And me.” She tapped her finger against her chin. “Mayhap if none of the sensible answers serve, we should consider less sensible answers.”

  “Such as?”

  A scream echoed across the garden.

  “Lady Rossington!” she cried and, grabbing the lantern, ran.

  Neville swore once, then more loudly as he raced after Priscilla. Just once—just once—he would like her to run away from danger rather than toward it.

  Ahead, light bounced with her steps. More screams battered his ears. A full chorus. He grabbed a branch from the ground, not slowing, before he reached the bushes. The light was straight ahead, so he plowed through briars. Tearing himself and his coat, he pushed free, raising the stick in case he needed to bash it into someone’s skull. His feet sank into mud, and he realized he was on the pond’s shore.

  He ran along the water’s edge toward where Priscilla was holding the lantern close to the ground. Other people grouped around her in an arc leading down to the pond. He heard sobbing and a moan. What was happening? His foot caught, and he looked down to see hoofprints in the mud. Deep prints, as if the horse had been on its hind legs.

  “Neville!” Priscilla’s voice was emphatic, but no hint of hysteria tainted it. “Please hurry.”

  He used the stick to climb higher on the bank, then rushed to her. As he looked over her shoulder, he clenched his fists.

  Miss Verlyn was unconscious on the ground. Even from where he stood, he could see the dark stain of blood on her riding habit’s shoulder. She had been shot? None of this made sense.

  “Edgar,” Priscilla said, “take the ladies to the house straightaway, and have Mrs. Betts send for the doctor.” Her face was colorless in the lantern’s light, but Miss Verlyn’s was the sickly gray of a corpse.

  The young woman must still be alive if Priscilla had requested a doctor instead of the coroner and the constable. At that thought, Neville called after Edgar, “And send for Kenyon, too.”

  The thief faltered, but Agatha called for him to keep up as she steered Lady Rossington toward the house on the other side of the pond. She had one arm around the baroness’s shoulders and another around one of Miss Verlyn’s sister’s.

  Mud seeped through Neville’s breeches as he knelt beside Priscilla. She turned to him and said, “I think she fell off her horse. If it is nearby, we could get her onto it and to the house.”

  “It would be better to put her on a litter.”

  “We should have asked Edgar to bring one.” She started to rise.

  He put his hand on her arm. “Mrs. Betts will send one, I am sure.” Looking at the prone woman, he asked, “How is she?”

  “Alive . . . at least for now. I have not had time to check her further than to find a pulse.”

  “Let me.” He reached out to run his hands along Miss Verlyn’s arms.

  Priscilla elbowed him aside. “No, let me. If she rouses while you are being so bold, she will be horrified.”

  He nodded and sat on his heels while she examined the young woman. At times like this, when a young woman had been hurt, propriety should be damned, but he knew many in the ton would not share that opinion. Fools!

  “I cannot find any broken bones,” Priscilla said when finished. “Now I must look at her shoulder.”

  He shrugged off his coat and held it out to her. With a quick nod and a fleeting smile, she folded it under Miss Verlyn’s head. A small groan came from Miss Verlyn, but she did not regain her senses while Priscilla studied the wound. Lifting the lantern, he tipped it so she had more light.

  “I cannot see the source of the bleeding,” she mused. “Mayhap it is beneath her.” She slid her hand between Miss Verlyn’s shoulder and the earth. She bent to peer under the young woman, and he moved the lantern again. When she sat up, her eyes widened in disbelief. “Nothing. No sign of any sort of wound.”

  “But all the blood—”

  “Oh, goodness, Neville! Look here!” She gently tipped Miss Verlyn’s head to the left.

  The young woman moaned.

  He saw the blotch of scarlet on Miss Verlyn’s crushed bonnet. He carefully untied the ribbons and drew it off. Another half-sob of pain slipped past Miss Verlyn’s lips.

  “There!” Priscilla pointed to a line oozing blood from beneath the young woman’s hair. “She has been shot!”

  “Are you sure? She could have struck a branch while riding. You saw the neck-or-nothing speed she rode.”

  “I have unfortunately seen enough wounds to know.” Her voice was stern as she ripped a strip of fabric from Miss Verlyn’s torn petticoat. “But only grazed by the ball. She may need to have it stitched to stem the bleeding. After all, you are the one who saw the bloody fabric and guessed it was from a wound.”

  “It was a silly question,” he said, not wanting to own that the thought of someone shooting at Miss Verlyn sent a pulse of fear through him as his foolish heart imagined that the target could have been Priscilla. “Forgive me.”

  She said nothing as she carefully wrapped the cloth around Miss Verlyn’s skull. Only when she was finished did she raise her face so that it was washed with both the moonlight and the glow from the lantern. His palms yearned to cup those smooth cheeks, savoring their soft warmth, while he lost himself within her eyes’ sapphire f
lames. The time would soon be theirs, but when? He could be a patient man, but not when he wanted her so much.

  “Forgive me,” she said, each word shaking him out of his selfish thoughts. “You are not the person with whom I am furious.”

  “Whoever shot her—”

  “She should not have been out riding alone at this time of night! Having a close brush with a ball is not the worst thing that could have happened.” She closed her eyes and sighed. “Forgive me again, Neville. I am prattling like a fool.”

  “Prattling mayhap, but no honest person could ever accuse you of being a fool.”

  Shouts came from the house.

  “Good,” he heard Priscilla whisper. “Help will be here soon.”

  Neville was about to reply when he heard a crash from farther along the pond. “Wait here,” he said, squeezing Priscilla’s shoulder. He picked up the branch and balanced it in his hand. “I will be right back.”

  “Be careful.”

  “Am I ever anything else?”

  “You are always anything but careful.” A smile tugged at her tense lips.

  Leaving the lantern beside Priscilla and Miss Verlyn, even though it pinpointed them in its pool of light, he crept up the bank. The noise grew louder. Was someone trying to pull bushes out by their roots?

  Then he heard a frightened neigh. The horse Miss Verlyn had been riding must be caught in the briars.

  As he pushed through the thick bushes, he kept the branch. He wanted to be sure nothing more than the briars frightened the horse. He heard fabric rip, but pushed through the tangle. He cursed when a pair of thorns stabbed his hand. Wiping blood on his torn breeches, he scanned the bank and the wood beyond it.

  Where was the dashed horse? And why had someone terrified of highwaymen been riding alone at night? Or had Miss Verlyn been riding alone? If she had been on her way to or from a tryst, she needed to be more cautious. The baron’s daughter would be assumed by common thieves to be carrying something of value, even if only her clothes.

  He squinted through the dark. When he had seen her riding earlier, it had been on a pale gray horse. It should be easy to see, because moonlight would reflect off its coat. Just as it had reflected off the coat of the horse Priscilla had seen before Watson was murdered. That thought froze him. Could the horse have been gray instead of white? He needed to mention that to Cross.

  Cross!

  A sickness cramped Neville’s gut. Had Cross fired on Miss Verlyn? If she had chanced to come near him, he would have seen that as an opportunity for profit. Her skills as a horsewoman could have sent the horse fleeing fast enough to save her life, but not swiftly enough to escape the shot altogether.

  Neville was so lost in his thoughts that he did not see the horse until it tried to rear. He stumbled back a few steps, fighting the briars. Only the fact that the horse’s reins were tangled in the thorns saved Neville from being struck by its hooves.

  “Steady there,” he said as he began to extricate the reins.

  The horse was black, which was another reason why Neville had failed to detect it among the bushes. It was so frightened that the whites of its eyes glowed ghostly in the night. Each time Neville loosened another length of the reins, the horse tried to flee. And each time Neville had to readjust his grip.

  As soon as he had the horse free, he drew it around the briars. He led it to a tree and lashed the reins around the trunk. Putting his hand on the horse’s shoulder, he was not surprised it was trembling. Its eyes were still wild.

  “You are safe.” He started to pat the horse, but froze and stared at the saddle.

  It was a man’s saddle. Why would Miss Verlyn have been riding astride? When they had seen her from the carriage, she had been riding a light gray in a proper manner. Why had she selected a man’s saddle tonight? As soon as she regained her senses, he had a score of questions for her.

  A half dozen forms burst out of the darkness as Neville walked back toward the lantern light. Several carried weapons. He began to run, then slowed, relieved to hear Priscilla instruct them to put Miss Verlyn on the litter they had brought.

  As the men complied, Neville grabbed Edgar’s arm. He did not let the thief shake off his grip.

  “Edgar, come with me.” When they reached the tree a few paces away, he ordered, “Take the horse back to the stables.” He lowered his voice. “Ask if anyone saw Miss Verlyn leave with this mount. Mayhap if someone did, he will know why she took a horse with a man’s saddle.”

  He nodded. “Fine beast, but ’tis been ridden ’ard.”

  “If someone shot at me, I would put the whip to the horse, too.”

  “Aye,” he said. His voice gentled when he spoke to the horse. “Come on along there, m’darlin’.

  Neville hurried to where Priscilla was coming to her feet as the litter was raised. She gave instructions and praise and warnings to the two men who seemed to be having a tough time holding it steady. He stepped forward to take the place of the man standing at Miss Verlyn’s head. Priscilla gave him a thankful smile before she bent to pick up the lantern.

  No one spoke as they went through the gardens. Neville bit back the questions plaguing him. Until Miss Verlyn woke, he would not get an answer to them.

  The procession wound its way across the terrace and to an open door where Mrs. Betts waited. The housekeeper told them the family waited upstairs in Miss Verlyn’s room. As she led the way, silence fell over them again.

  Agatha walked with them, exchanging a glance with Edgar. Neville could not catch the message passing between them, but he guessed something had happened. Had Cross dared to come into the house to speak with Agatha? Not even the head of the highwaymen’s Order would be so bold. For a moment, he considered the idea that Rossington was involved with the knights of the pad. He dismissed that. Rossington did not have the wits to hold onto the money he had inherited, letting his son squander what should have been his daughters’ dowries. The baron needed guile to deal with thieves.

  Going up the stairs was slow, and Miss Verlyn groaned on each step. Neville was relieved when they entered a ruffled sitting room. Relieved and astonished. He had not guessed Miss Verlyn would surround herself with frills, lace, and every possible shade of pink. She had seemed more at home on horseback than anywhere else.

  Walking past Miss Verlyn’s sisters gathered there, Neville and the other man went into the bedchamber beyond the sitting room. It was a more sedate room, devoid of lace and a subdued pink that had faded almost to white. The tester bed set to one side of the bow window wore a no-nonsense coverlet in shades of blue and green. On a chair by the window, clothes had been tossed, as if Miss Verlyn either did not care or had been in a great hurry.

  Where were Lord Rossington and his wife? Neville had assumed they would be in the inner room. He could not imagine Priscilla staying away if one of her children—heaven forbid!—was hurt.

  A man stepped from around the bed, gruffly introduced himself as the doctor and gave his name as Crawford. Dark hair and deep-set brown eyes could not distract from his long jaw and longer nose. His mouth was almost lost between them. He was not an old man, but he possessed an air of competency. He did not flinch when, after the young woman was transferred from litter to bed, Neville drew him aside and explained what they believed had happened to Miss Verlyn. His thin lips grew sparser, but he nodded.

  He insisted that everyone wait in the outer chamber, save for one of Miss Verlyn’s sisters. Neville wondered which would be of any use. Two sisters sat in a corner crying while two others giggled nervously, clamping their hands over their mouths. Miss Sharon, the eldest, stepped forward to help, and Neville was pleased. She seemed almost as sensible—and as unlikely to giggle—as Miss Verlyn.

  When Priscilla remained on the other side of the bed, the doctor glanced at her and quickly away. Neville’s respect for the man, who obvio
usly had seen with one look that she would not be moved, rose.

  “We will be fine, Neville,” she said in her quiet, calm tone that belied the storm of emotions he knew were boiling within her. “Please wait close by.”

  “Just in case I am needed to run an errand.”

  “Yes. Exactly.” Her smile vanished as she bent over Miss Verlyn, helping Miss Sharon loosen the buttons along the front of the young woman’s coat.

  Neville went into the main room. It was cluttered with the sisters, the men who had come to help, and Mrs. Betts and Agatha. He shooed the men out, suggesting they might find something cool to drink in the kitchen. He caught a glimpse of Edgar in the hallway, but the thief vanished along with the other men before Neville could ask what he had learned.

  Suddenly, Lady Rossington burst into the room. She walked straight to the bedchamber door, not looking in any other direction. He wondered if she realized the rest of them were there.

  “What happened to my daughter?” she demanded, as she swung open the door.

  Crawford tried to hide his disbelief that everyone in the house did not know the truth, but Neville saw it.

  “I will explain if you wish, Crawford,” Neville said from behind the baroness. “That way, you can focus on your patient.”

  Relieved, the doctor turned back to Miss Verlyn.

  “My lady . . .” Neville motioned toward the window seat in the bow window.

  Lady Rossington did not move as she stared at the blood on the bed.

  “My lady . . .” he tried again, a bit louder because she may not have heard him.

  The result was the same.

  He opened his mouth for a third attempt, but closed it when Priscilla went to the baroness. She put her hand on Lady Rossington’s back and guided her to the window seat. Sitting beside her, she took the lady’s hands in hers.

  “Miss Verlyn should be all right,” Priscilla said quietly.

  “Should?”

  “She will be all right is what I should have said.”