Lady Anne 01 - Lady Anne and the Howl in the Dark

by Donna Lea Simpson

  The shopkeeper’s expression was dark. “She makes it her life to… to know things… anything. Everything. About people.” She edged forward, speaking to Anne in a hushed, confidential tone. “She’s a… a harpy! A horrid young woman! And she’ll not stand any interference in her and her husband’s relationship, even so far as destroying the reputation of any woman who so much as catches his attention.”

  “And you helped her!” Anne said, not concealing her disgust.

  “I did nothing, my lady, truly! ’Twas Mrs. Jenkins who did everything.”

  “I would advise,” Anne said, with the same gimlet stare still fixed on the seamstress, “that you revisit the circumstances surrounding Mrs. Parker’s arrest. Theft is a hanging offense, madam, as I am sure you are aware, and if Mrs. Parker suffered that fate, I would not want to have to say that I knew a murderess. You, to make my point perfectly clear. That would be more harmful to your reputation than any embargo, I think.”

  With that, and not a single glance at Darkefell, she swept from the shop.

  He followed, and once outside, storm clouds darkening the sky over their head, he swept her an elegant bow. “Never, my lady, have I seen such a complete rout! She was flanked, outmaneuvered, and defeated on the field of dishonor.”

  She paused on the walk and glanced up at the storefront. “I would like nothing better now than to confront Mrs. Jenkins with her culpability, but it’s far more important that she attend our little surprise soiree tonight, and if I tell her what I think of her, she won’t.”

  “You’re wise to leave it for the moment. Let me deliver the invitation to Benjamin Jenkins, for no matter if his wife hears what you have done to Mrs. Holderness, she still will not go against her husband, and he’ll accept any invitation from me.”

  “Is it wise to invite them?” Anne asked.

  “Regardless of our other suspicions, I wish to see her confronted with your work today, and for her to know she’s uncovered as a jealous, troublesome wench,” he said grimly.

  At Anne’s request, they stopped at a modest cottage on a back street in Hornethwaite, the home of Ellen Henderson’s widowed mother. Mrs. Henderson, a careworn woman of about fifty, with a couple of grandchildren clinging to her skirts, told her, with wide and frightened eyes, that Ellen had not visited them at all the day before. She hadn’t expected her, the woman said, as a young girl had other things to do on her half day off than visit with her poor old mum, so she had thought nothing. Of course, Anne’s visit and questions now had her worried. Anne did her best to reassure the woman that her daughter would be fine.

  After a few more stops, they began the journey back to Ivy Lodge. Some of what had gone on lately between Darkefell estate and the village finally made sense, but as Anne said, “If our suspicions are correct, much of this has nothing to do with Cecilia Wainwright’s murder.”

  “I think you’ve hit on some truths, my lady,” the marquess said, “and some mischief or worse done, but it doesn’t surprise me that there is no connection. I’ve never felt the matters were intertwined.”

  “Hmm,” Anne murmured. “We still have a few questions I would like answered for sure.”

  “And you will have what you desire before the night is done,” he answered. “It will all be out in the open before long, I hope.”

  She glanced over at the marquess, whose mouth was set in a grim line at what they had conjectured. He was an admirable companion when he kept his mouth shut in the right places, but then, he would likely say the same thing about her.

  At least now they had some suspicion, as shocking to both of them as it was. The next twenty-four hours would tell the tale.

  The clouds were thickening as they approached Darkefell estate along the hard-packed road. A distant rumble of thunder and light patter of rain warned of a deluge to come, so the marquess smartened his team’s pace. Just for a moment, Anne wondered if this was what it would be like to be mistress of this estate and to be wed to the man beside her, this amiable silence and the preceding hours of working together effectively. She glanced over at him and was surprised that the thought unnerved but did not disgust her. He was surprisingly agreeable when he chose to be.

  Of course, her good sense chose that moment to assert its dominion over her imagination; when he chose to be was the phrase that must be heeded. He could not command her. She was free, independent. As his wife, a woman would be at his command, and he struck her as having an iron will. He would not be conformable to feminine impulses, she thought, nor would he be even the slightest bit bendable. Once the courtship was over and the ring thrust upon the appropriate digit, the ball would be over. That saved her from anything like regret that such a union never would be.

  He would never want to marry someone like her anyway. She was willful, stubborn, a “devil woman” as he called her in his angry moments. She was plain and proud and nosy. Brisk. Contrary. She sighed. If anything, this trip to Yorkshire had shown her that kisses, even those visited upon her by the same man, could have various effects upon her; they could make her swoonish, wary, angry, and on occasion she experienced a new sensation she could name only “lusty,” for want of any more accurate term. This was an uncomfortable sensation for a determined spinster.

  His kisses were likely not going to trouble her further, anyway. Darkefell, she had always suspected, kissed her to confuse her, and now that she knew his secrets, especially that he was the dreaded werewolf, there was no need. That thought came with a pang. She rather liked the unexpected nature of his kisses. How like life to teach her a new enjoyment just as it was to be taken away from her. She glanced sideways, and her mouth twisted in a smile as she noticed that part of his thick eyebrows had been burnt to frazzled crisps from her incineration of his werewolf costume the night before.

  “I hesitate to ask, but of what are you thinking as you glance toward me so frequently, my lady?”

  She bit her lip but decided to share at least one of her thoughts, the one safe for him to hear without making him vain about his masculine charms. “I was admiring how your thick and unruly eyebrows have been singed. It gives them an interesting piquancy. I had a maid once, when I was young, who burned my fringe just that way with an overheated curling iron.”

  “You seem to suffer hair torture from time to time, judging by your torment at the hands of the maid the first day at Ivy Lodge.”

  “Ah, yes, my gorgon style; alas, I was hoping to set a new trend in classic hairstyles, but Mary will have none of it, and any intelligent woman is a servant to her abigail, you know. That style was the work of Ellen Henderson,” Anne said, brought back with a thud to the problem at hand. Where was Ellen? As the carriage still rumbled swiftly along the road to Darkefell, Anne frowned off into the cloudy distance. “I’m worried about Ellen,” she said aloud. “She seems to have disappeared completely.”

  “No doubt she stayed with a friend in town overnight and made her way back to Ivy Lodge late,” the marquess said. “Mrs. Hailey will reprimand her, and all will be done.”

  “I hope you’re right, but I have an uncomfortable sense about it.” At least the mystery of the other missing maid, the one Anne had followed away from Ivy Lodge, had been solved; Caroline had run away with one of the grooms from the livery stable in town, they had learned when the marquess retrieved his carriage. It was a juicy scandal, and all the world loves a scandal.

  It was beginning to rain. Anne absently scanned the open field as they passed a wooded copse and saw a flash of movement. “What was that?” she asked. It was a creature loping through the lush green grass of the field surrounding the woods; as she caught sight of it again, it stopped and howled. She grabbed the marquess’s arm. “Darkefell, stop the carriage!”

  He pulled on the reins. Anne jumped down even as the carriage was still moving, stumbled, and staggered back onto her feet, but by the time she regained her balance, the animal had disappeared into the woods; the bushes moved just on the edge of the glade. Determined to establish what the ani
mal was, once and for all time, she lifted her skirts and began down the raised embankment and across the grassy field.

  “Lady Anne! Anne! Stop!”

  But she bolted, an anxious fluttering in her stomach. Dog? Wolf? Killer? She had thought she was sure of her and Darkefell’s conjectures, but her mind churned with questions. All she wanted was to see more closely.

  “Anne, get back here, now!” Darkefell shouted.

  She looked over her shoulder; he was bounding after her. She put on a burst of speed, secure in the knowledge that he would follow, concerned only that he would catch her, being much swifter and unencumbered by skirts and a cloak. She reached the perimeter of the woods just as the rain began in earnest, pouring down as if someone was emptying a bucket over her; she paused a second then pushed through the thick brush at the edge, moving in. She could see movement in the shadows. Her bonnet was roughly pulled off her head, and thorns and branches caught at the cloak she wore over her caraco, but she would not stop, not while she could see that movement ahead of her. What was it? She was so close to an answer!

  The woods were dim and damp and cold, but they were protected from the deluge. She shivered and stopped, peering into the dank shadows. Where now? She saw another movement, and a howling bark cut through the silence, shivering down her spine with the unaccustomed sound. Instinctive fear roiled in her stomach, but something else caught her attention besides the animal movement she could detect and the yip and howl of the creature.

  Something blue… an unnatural blue never seen in the middle of a woods. She pushed through as she heard the marquess call her name in commanding tones. Bluebells? Violets? Not in the middle of the woods!

  She yanked her cloak out of the greedy grasp of the tangled brush as she found the source of the blue just beyond the thorny bush. Was it a heap of clothes or perhaps an abandoned cloak or blanket? Breaking off a branch that impeded her progress, she used the broken branch to prod the pile of clothes, trying to grab it with the hooked end of the branch.

  “Ooooh!”

  Anne jumped back and screamed at the movement and sound emanating from the bundle.

  “Anne! Anne!” Darkefell cried, crashing through the bush like a draft horse in a pony stall.

  “Here! Darkefell, someone is here!” She had used an indefinite word, but she knew who it must be. “Ellen! It’s Ellen,” she said, pushing past the last brushy obstacle, animal forgotten, her worry for the girl paramount. She crouched by the cloaked figure as the marquess, panting, reached her.

  “Do not ever disappear on me again!” he bellowed.

  “It’s Ellen Henderson, and she’s hurt but alive.” Anne, on her knees, pulled the maid’s cloak hood back and gently turned the girl over, the maid’s golden hair catching on her brushy bed. Anne gasped in horror; Ellen’s round, pallid face was bruised and cut, crusted blood matted into the hairline and flaking in dried rivulets. Her lip was cut and swollen, and one eye sported a dark purple, swollen bruise under it.

  Ellen moaned and stirred. “My money… want my money… my Jamey… ” She groaned and fainted.

  “We must get her back to the lodge,” Anne cried.

  Darkefell didn’t hesitate a moment, and Anne blessed both his vigorous nature and his physical strength, for he put his arms under Ellen’s knees and back and gently lifted her as if she was a light as a lamb. Anne glanced around, for though haste was clearly needed for the girl’s well-being, Anne was also aware that finding the maid had been merest luck, brought about by seeing the dog-creature and following it. What was it doing so close? Ellen did not appear to be ravaged by the creature, nor was there any sign of animal attack.

  Even while Anne looked about, she wondered about Ellen’s words: money, Jamey?

  Anne saw another flash of movement and longed to follow, but Darkefell was single-mindedly moving back toward the road, and she knew she must follow. “Darkefell, I thought I saw a person back there,” she said breathlessly, looking back over her shoulder as she followed him. “It could be whoever attacked Ellen.”

  “They waited around for twelve hours until she was found? This girl has been lying there some time. The wounds aren’t fresh.”

  “How do you know?”

  “The color of the blood and the smell,” he grunted but did not elaborate.

  She eyed his broad back as she reluctantly followed him. One always had a sense, with the marquess, that there were hidden depths, things of which he did not speak. How he came to know what a wound smelled like after several hours was one of those things.

  The rain still poured down. Fortunately, they were only minutes from the lodge by carriage, but still, they were soaked by the time they got there. There was a rush of activity as they pulled up and the marquess carried Ellen in. The maid was soon in the competent hands of Mrs. Hailey. Anne turned to the marquess, but he was rapidly heading toward the door. She swept after him; they had things of which to speak, and she wasn’t about to let him go without some acknowledgment of how this latest twist fit with their idea of what had been happening.

  “My lord, wait!” she said, exiting the lodge after the marquess, followed by the curious gaze of the footman. Darkefell leaped up into the seat of the phaeton. “I am about to get a crick in my neck from looking up at you,” she complained, the rain splattering her cheek. She wiped drops out of her eyes.

  “Did you follow me merely to say that?” he asked.

  “Of course not.”

  “Then go back in and dry off. Our plans stand.”

  “Despite finding Ellen?”

  “Yes,” he said.

  “Good,” she said, determined to be his equal in brevity. “Until this evening, then.”

  She reentered the house and headed for Mrs. Hailey’s chamber, where Ellen had been taken, but the maid was still unconscious and had not said another word.

  Twenty-Two

  The minute he entered the castle, Darkefell headed for his library and summoned Osei. Harwood brought him a towel, and he dried as best he could. Armed with new suppositions raised by his enlightening conversations with Lady Anne, he was able to ask pointed questions and demand answers of Osei. In truth, Osei appeared relieved to be able to tell what he knew of Cecilia Wainwright’s actions. With child by Jamey, desperate to marry and gain an establishment, she had played a dangerous game, and if Darkefell and Lady Anne’s conjectures were correct, had reaped the unfortunate consequences.

  Brooding, Darkefell sat and stared into the empty fireplace after their conversation. Osei finally stood and said, “If that is all, my lord?”

  “What? No, sit for a moment longer.” He watched his secretary for a long few moments. “Tell me the truth—were you in love with Cecilia Wainwright?”

  Osei’s dark eyes clouded with pain, and he looked away. “I do not know, my lord. She listened to me as no one else did, and I came to care for her.” He shrugged as if there were no adequate words for his emotion. “I do not understand the workings of my own heart, I think. Perhaps that comes only with more years than I have yet lived.”

  Darkefell nodded. “And your last minutes together were spent as you have said?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why did you say nothing afterwards about what she said she was going to do?”

  “I never suspected such a conclusion as that to which you and Lady Anne have come. Ellen did not tell me whom she was meeting or when, just what she hoped to accomplish, so I thought I would have time to convince her of the folly of her plan. I pointed out the dishonor of blackmail, and we argued. She said only men thought that way, and when I had a child, I would understand the need to provide a better life, no matter what it took.”

  “So you knew she was with child and who the father was?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why, then, did you react as you did to the news the morning after her death?”

  Osei shook his head. “The public exposure of her condition and conjecture of her character—she was dishonored, as well as dead… a terr
ible moment.”

  Darkefell nodded. Knowing Cecilia in a way none of them did, as a cherished friend, Osei was hurt deeply by what was said about her. “You agree that evening must have proceeded the way we imagine, after you and she parted?”

  “Yes, though it fills me with sorrow. I am sorry that man is so lost to the world and heaven that he would do it.”

  The marquess watched Osei for a moment; the fellow had turned to Cecilia, another person who felt alone in Yorkshire and at his estate, for solace. Darkefell had been remiss, perhaps, in not making efforts to ameliorate his secretary’s loneliness, but his mother already considered that he “coddled” his secretary. Though he did not guide his actions by her measure, he must have taken some of her axioms to heart and behaved accordingly, as he had with his father’s harsh tutelage.

  But he was approaching thirty. It was past time to act according to what he felt and thought down to his core. The most powerful thing he had learned in his brief acquaintance with Lady Anne Addison was to guide oneself according to one’s deepest feelings, as she did. He admired her more than he could express in words, for in her he saw a vigorous honesty, tempered by flashes of charm and wit, boundless energy, and beneath her asperity, great kindness. Her beauty was the sort that emanated from within, and every moment spent in her company, he saw it more clearly, glowing through her skin. She attracted him in a way no other woman ever had.

  “I miss her so very much,” Osei said, his voice thick and strange.

  Darkefell looked up; his secretary stared toward the window but not through it.

  “In Cecilia,” Osei continued, “I saw the prospect of a life beyond what I had imagined for myself. It was not that I thought I could have that life with her—she was in love with another—but I saw what it would be like to have a woman with whom to speak, one who sympathized and yet added her own thoughts, allowing me to see from another’s perspective. She shared her emotions in a way men seldom do.”