“How did you get up here?” Flavian thundered.
“No be mad, Vav.”
“You do not sleep here. I padlocked the door.”
Arabella shrugged her shoulders and dipped her head, like a child imitating contrition. Then her eyes shifted to Claire. “These are my things,” she said, as if issuing a warning.
The rats disappeared into their hidey holes. Struggling to keep her voice calm against the staccato of her heart, Claire said, “How did you gather so . . . much?”
“Everyone be so generous. Of course, they know Vav is my guardian, so they give me.”
Claire swallowed, unable to respond.
Flavian’s hands fell away and full rabbit panic replaced their warmth. Chest tight, Claire fought to breathe normally, scanning the piles for movement.
Arabella cocked her head to the side. “Is late for visitors. Everything look better in sunlight.” She pushed a tattered comforter aside and slipped dainty bare feet onto the feces-covered floor. “You no like my things?”
“Why would you want them?” said Claire, too overcome to realize the rudeness of her question.
The smile left Arabella’s face. “Dey for my brother. He die in Russia. He follow that fool Napoleon to Moscow. Dey tear him from horse like wolves, and eat horse. Dey steal his boots and coat. He die betray by his soldiers—starving, frozen.”
“How awful.”
Arabella’s gestures molded her brother’s torment like a sculptor. “Hernando die with Cossacks riding down on him. Attacking from woods, attacking in middle of night, when he long for rest. He die on way back from Moscow, walking over carcass of a thousand dead men.”
Leaving her, Flavian went to his ward and laid a calming hand on her shoulder. “It’s all right, Bella. Tell Lady Claire in the morning. It’s late.”
But the girl didn’t stop, or even seem aware that he’d spoken. “There no food in Moscow, but he warm because the city burn . . . that night, and days after.”
“Let’s get you to your room downstairs,” Flavian coaxed. “It’s more comfortable.”
“At least he warm in Moscow. But the Russians, they leave that city. It empty when Hernando get there. He starve to death.” She looked at Flavian, tears of woe streaking her cheeks.
“They didn’t take all the food,” he said gently. “Hernando had a hot meal in Moscow. I’m sure of it.”
Arabella’s despair shifted instantly to suspicion. “What he eat, Vav?”
Flavian bit his lip and appeared to search the piles of rot for inspiration.
Suddenly Arabella clapped her hands like a small child. “I know! The wheat, just like this.” She bounded toward Claire and caught her by the wrist. “Come quickly.”
Darting into the cave-like opening, Arabella laughed and chirruped in delight, pulling Claire back under the filthy sheet and into the hall. “Wheat,” Arabella cried, poking a finger through a rat hole in a bag. A stream of yellow seed poured onto the floor. “This what Hernando ate!”
* * *
“Ratafia?” Flavian asked in the parlor after they’d left Arabella in her clean bedroom upstairs.
“No! Nothing with the word ‘rat’ in it. I’ll have brandy,” Claire replied, standing beside him as he poured. The drink wasn’t proper for a young lady, but she needed something stronger than a dainty cordial.
Her hands shook as she accepted the glass of amber liquid.
“I’m sorry the tower was a shock to you. I didn’t give you sufficient warning.”
“I’m the one who needs to ask forgiveness for forcing you to take me there.” She hoped the nightcap would still her trembling fingers. “I panicked.”
“You only did what any natural being would. It’s a terrible place.” He took a swallow from his snifter and ran a hand over his face.
He looked so sad and worried. “It must be difficult to explain,” she said, “the tower . . . Arabella’s feelings about her brother.”
“More than painful.”
“How can she bear the filth, the disorganization?”
“She doesn’t see any of it. For her, that mess is a great accomplishment—years of labor for a noble cause.”
All Claire could do was swallow. The tower’s horrors came back, replaying so powerfully it was as if she were seeing it all again: rats dashing toward her skirts, burrowing under filthy rags; the rubble; the stench. Her nose filled with the scent. The buzzing started, black dots blocked her vision then her arms went numb. Holding onto the back of a chair, she fought to keep from fainting as the black dots thickened.
“You’re pale,” Flavian said, taking her brandy with one hand and supporting her with the other. “Come, lie down.”
The room went black, and her legs buckled. As if he were miles away, she sensed Flavian lifting her.
When she came to, she tried to apologize, but the words wouldn’t come. There was only the smooth silk upholstery on the settee, cool under her fingertips. She closed her eyes, fighting tears, struggling to rid her brain of images old and new. The chill edge of the brandy glass touched her lips. “Drink,” he said gently. His hip touched her waist as he sat beside her. The fiery sweetness of the liquor washed over her tongue.
She swallowed. “I don’t faint normally. It’s rats—they terrify me. Once, we played hide-go-seek, and Reggie Stackmorton, the vicar’s son, locked me in a granary. Rats came out of everywhere, and I thought I’d go mad with screaming.”
“By God, what a horrible child!”
“He was, truly. I beat the door until my fists were bruised. It felt like hours before the gardener found me.” She tried to laugh, but a strangled croak came out. “To add to that, right in front of Reggie and my sisters, I fainted, just remembering the rats. Ever since then, those dreadful rodents cause me to collapse.”
He took her hand. “Well, even pale and frightened, you are still the most beautiful woman I’ve ever laid eyes on.”
“How kind of you.”
He shook his head. “Kindness has nothing to do with it.”
For a long moment, they studied each other. A question drifting between them. She wanted to shout, ‘Yes!’ And though she didn’t move a muscle, and not a word was uttered, an animal-like fire lit his eyes. His gaze slipped to the top of her bodice. He swallowed, then spread his fingers and glanced at them, as if counting each finger. Then melancholy shaded his features and he stood to pull a fold of her dress over her ankles.
But she wanted him near—longed for the heat of his body at her side. “Take my shoes off,” she whispered so softly she wondered if he heard—and half hoped he hadn’t.
He stiffened for an instant. Then, as if losing a battle for control, dropped to his knees at the far end of the settee. With the reverence of a starving man offered a cup of ambrosia, he ran a hand along the exposed top of her foot. Light as a feather, he pushed the gown back up past the ribbon binding her slippers. As he exposed her ankles, he drew a short breath. Fingertips jostled the bow, and the silken ribbons unraveled, dropping like leaves. His hand lingered on the ridge of her right shin before it brushed down to her ankle and circled its slim circumference. He lowered his head as if he were going to kiss the tender bone above the joint, and then, with obvious effort, controlled the impulse and sat back. The heat of his palms, the strength of his fingers, sent a bolt of sensation to her core. For the first time, she became aware of a deep primal urge that made her pant slightly in the confining cloth of her garments.
So subtly that even she wasn’t sure it actually happened, she pointed her toes at him. He hesitated, but once again seemed to lose the test of will, and his hand plunged between the arch of her foot and the slipper. Sensuously his thumb traced the crescent of her sole then the footwear clunked to the floor.
The next shoe came off more quickly, Flavian removing it as if he could no longer wait for the appearance of her toes, concealed by only the thinnest silk stocking. Where the ribbons had strapped her flesh, cool air now stirred. His hands, hot and insistent, c
aressed her ankle and stroked her heel. Again, he hesitated. Claire closed her eyes and, without meaning to, stretched ever so slightly toward him, her body humming. He touched her stocking-clad toes, tugged on each one, and then slipped a finger between her big and index toes. She gasped, her body shaking with sensation.
Instantly, he bolted to his feet.
Avoiding his eyes, she sat up, overcome with shame.
He turned away, looking equally discomfited, and headed for the brandy decanter. The front of his pants jutted. “I took advantage of your vulnerability,” he said, “your distress over Arabella’s state. It was a terrible thing to do.”
“Please don’t say that. I . . . I’m equally responsible…”
He took a long time pouring more brandy, and she used the opportunity to smooth her skirts, allowing him the privacy to calm his excitement and end her own.
At a loss for something to fill the silence, she turned to a safe subject. “You’ve tried to stop Arabella’s collecting, I presume?”
Before answering he took a deep draught of liquor. “Every specialist in England has been to see her. One wise sage told me to beat her each time she brought something home. He suggested I use a green branch because the whirring sound would be the most frightening and the sting would last the longest. Another thought the cat-o’-nine-tails we used in the navy would be more effective.”
He returned to the settee carrying the cut crystal decanter. “God help me, I did it.” He placed the vessel on a side table within easy reach. “I beat her.” Rubbing a hand over his eyes, he stared at the decanter without seeing the candlelight that refracted in the glass, created wavering stars on every surface.
“Oh dear,” Claire whispered.
“I wasn’t even angry when I took her to the tower and started the lashing. She kept screaming, ‘Why are you doing this?’ And then she fought as if possessed by the devil. Even when she was free, she didn’t stop. Anything she could get her hands on she threw or smashed or tore. The girl came apart— there was nothing left of her reason.”
“What did you do?”
“Two footmen held her down while I forced whisky into her mouth. We tied her to the bed, and her maid slept in a chair that night. At six the next morning, Arabella woke in such agitation, she broke a tooth.”
“Dear God.”
Looking exhausted, as if his body weighed too much, Flavian sank against the back of the settee.
“She spit the tooth at me when I came to see her.”
Claire wracked her brain for something comforting to say. “I’ve heard they treat lunatics with rhubarb, chalk, and mercury. None of it seems very effective, though.” She dropped her hands into her lap. “I’ll have to consult my books.”
He straightened. “Then you think there might be a cure in one of your remedies?” Before Claire could speak, he gripped her hand. “I can’t tell you how grateful I would be for anything . . . anything you could do.”
“Madness may be like short legs or baldness, a cure could be impossible. If we concentrate on the frenzy of the mind, perhaps that’s where medicine might help,” she said. “There’s the German scientist, Friedrich Serturner, He’s separated the painkiller in opium from the hallucinogenic that creates the feeling of wellbeing in laudanum. The drug is called morphine, and I’m guessing it will be less additive. But Arabella’s voice, her vibrancy—would you be willing to lose that?”
“If there’s a chance for her to be better, any chance, let’s take it.”
The excitement in Flavian’s voice made Claire want to smile and weep at the same time. When Papa became an earl, many potential suitors had called at Fairland. But the two who showed interest in her and not in her sisters were off-putting. One had pointed teeth and rent his food like a canine; another boasted of drinking only milk, calling the beverage with cream ‘red wine,’ and milk with the cream skimmed off, ‘white wine.’ Perhaps it was petty to dislike them for such minor offenses, and if her parents wished the match, in time she might have learned to accept them, but it was the suitors’ distaste upon learning of her healing abilities that ended further contact.
And then she’d met Flavian—a man who seemed to enjoy everything about her, who discussed with interest the patients she saw and the cures she’d employed. “He’s like a wonderful pair of shoes that fit perfectly, and make you feel comfortable and splendid all at the same time,” she had told her sisters as they reviewed their day together, piled on a bed at the Davenport home. “A shoe?” said Ellie. “And his gaze is what? The eyelets through which you tie the laces?”
Well, the analogy wasn’t poetic, but it was true, and straight to her bones, she knew he felt the same way. Until, inexplicably, he disappeared.
Claire studied his troubled eyes, dark as slate, flecked with green. If Arabella could be cured, would he stop worrying about her? Would he turn his attention to the healer if the sick were healed?
She swung her legs off the settee and stared at the floor a moment before getting up. “I’ll do some research in the morning.”
His Lordship's Darkest Secret: Chapter Four
Rain streamed from the sky, and the raw chill penetrating Bingham Hall was even more oppressive in the wake of a temper tantrum Arabella had that morning. Perhaps he should have waited to speak with her until she’d eaten breakfast, Flavian thought. When he’d said Claire would be treating her, and that a London singing debut was, for now, out of the question, Arabella hurled a plate of marmalade toast on the floor and fled the room screaming. And she’d kept on screaming until she started hurling the furniture. Even with his immense strength, he needed Hancock’s help to subdue her. It had been over a year since she’d had such a fit—not since he’d tried brutally to stop her collecting.
Ensconced by the fire in the main parlor, he peeked up from The Times to gaze on Claire sitting in the window seat with a book of herbal treatments. Would Arabella hurt her? The girl had never harmed anyone before… and she seemed fond of Claire. Still, he’d put a bolt on her bedroom door, just to be sure.
Claire turned the page, glimpsed up at him, smiled and went back to her reading. That smile lingered like a benevolent spirit, and he felt a pang of joy. It had been so long, he’d forgotten he was capable of such happiness. Were her eyes almond shaped? No, because an almond wasn’t wide enough, wasn’t grand enough to capture their shape. As for their color—they were pools of blue a man could drown in, sometimes dark as the sea; other times, light as sapphires. Don’t think these thoughts.
Still, he stole another glance, and at that moment, with a little sigh, she dropped the book into her lap and looked wistfully at the garden.
It would be nice to talk with her somewhere that Arabella couldn’t interrupt them and Mrs. Gower wouldn’t misinterpret his every word as a marriage proposal. And a little fresh air might do her good. He slipped folded The Times and set it aside. “Have you a cloak?” he whispered, so as not to wake the chaperone who appeared to be asleep in a wing chair. “The rain isn’t all that bad and we’ve a pretty path to the cliffs.”
“Oh, what a relief,” mouthed Claire, coming to her feet. “I would love a walk.”
Mrs. Gower, feet propped on a footstool, sank lower into her chair’s upholstery, and emitted a soft snore.
“I don’t seem to be entertaining my guests terribly well,” he observed.
Claire hid a smile behind her hand. “I think she’s worn out, poor soul.”
He took a decorative shawl from the back of the settee and tucked it around Mrs. Gower, then motioned to Claire, and they tiptoed from the parlor.
Outside in the cool, water-laden air, he took a deep breath and appraised the situation. The idea had been that with rain slashing down, Claire’s face would be hidden in her cloak, and he would be forced to stop admiring her. Unfortunately, the rain was not slashing but misting, and sodden and unlovely as the sky was, its silver light only enhanced her beauty. He cleared his throat. “I’m glad you’ve got on solid boots.” Striding down
the driveway, he added, “The sea is a bit far.”
“Don’t worry, I’ll be fine.”
When they walked together two years ago at Cowick Hall, words hadn’t mattered—the tone they’d used carried an unspoken message that they would walk together forever. His throat tightened. Now? …Well, now was now, and nothing could change reality.
“Can you tell me about your days in the Royal Navy, my lord?” she asked.
His heart stopped, but he reminded himself that she wasn’t asking because she suspected anything. Lengthening his stride, he stalled for time. But Claire seemed undaunted by his speed. Without huffing or puffing, without getting red faced or sweaty, she remained at his side, awaiting an answer.
“Ah, well,” he said, concentrating on the terrain, not daring to look at her. “Being the son of a rear admiral, I was promised to the navy at eight years, and Father had me on the sea by thirteen. Lancelot, the heir apparent, was the only one to escape that fate. Yet I outlived him.”
“And here you are, Viscount Monroe,” she said.
“And here I am.” He made the mistake of looking at her. Had the rain moistened her lips? An overwhelming urge to kiss her caused him to reach out, nearly touching her before he snapped the errant arm back to his side.
Claire seemed puzzled by the gesture. Embarrassed, he picked up the pace even more.
After another minute or two of silent walking, she asked, “Were you disappointed when your father took you out of naval life?”
“When I first set sail I missed my mother and governess so much that I wept over the gunnels. There I was, a midshipman crying for my mummy, but God, how I learned to love the sea.”
“It was exciting?”
“That it was,” he said.
“Were you ever in battle?”
“Many times.”
“Have you the scars to show for it?” she asked.
Her Perfect Gentleman: A Regency Romance Anthology Page 80
