by Mary Brendan
Deborah picked up her teacup and took a gulp from it. Oh, she knew very well what was on his mind. He was remembering how she’d shamelessly clung to his neck and had revelled in being kissed and caressed into insensibility behind a marble pillar. Perhaps he imagined that for old time’s sake she might again be persuaded to allow him to take a few liberties whilst he was in the vicinity.
To jerk her mind away from arousing memories she focused on the incident that had coupled them together far more recently. The business with the Luckhursts was in its own way equally disturbing to her peace of mind. Because of it there was much she still had to say to him. Her thanks and apologies were overdue. He had saved her from coming to harm, yet she had accepted his escort home, and his protection, with very bad grace.
She knew, too, that she ought to offer her condolences on his brother’s demise. But she would skirt about mentioning their past or when he would be leaving the area. She had been in his company for only an hour or so after many years spent apart yet, oddly, she knew how easy it might be for her to again feel his absence. That silly thought was chased away; in its place she firmly put a reasonable explanation for such mawkishness. Naturally his presence had thrust to the forefront of her mind her salad days when, as a débutante of eighteen, and believing herself in love with Randolph Chadwicke, she’d had a scintillating life as the pampered, popular daughter of Viscount Cleveland.
‘I have not properly thanked you for your assistance this afternoon,’ Debbie briskly rattled off. ‘I also must say sorry for having been rather…prickly towards you. It was a great surprise to see you and I…well…I did not intend to seem churlish. My mother, too, was probably similarly flustered by being confronted with a ghost from the past.’ It was a paltry effort and she inwardly winced on acknowledging it. Hastily she picked up her tea and took a sip.
‘Was the last impression I made on you so bad?’ Randolph asked huskily. ‘My understanding was that we parted on reasonably good terms.’
She could sense the smile in his words as he dared her to recall their exciting tryst in Marcus’s hallway. Reasonably good terms hardly did justice to describing the passion they’d shared away from prying eyes.
‘My understanding was that your absence abroad would be reasonably short.’ A languid hand attempted to make light of her spontaneous retort. Again she’d not managed to control her lingering hurt and anger over it all. ‘It seems at the time we both were under a misconception.’ Idly she twirled a flaxen curl about a finger. ‘It was a long time ago and is now unimportant.’ Before he could respond she fluidly changed the subject. ‘I must convey my condolences on the loss of your brother. Did he pass away recently? Had he been ill?’
‘It was a few months ago. He had been suffering a malaise for a considerable time,’ Randolph added carefully.
‘Did living in a hot climate contribute to his poor health?’ Debbie asked, her voice resonating with sympathy.
‘It did him no good at all to go there,’ Randolph answered bluntly. ‘Twice he suffered bouts of malaria.’
‘I’m very sorry he died. He must have been still quite a young man.’
‘He had just turned forty-one.’
‘Your poor mother; she must be very sad. I imagine she was worried about you, too, whilst you were in the Indies.’
‘I escaped any major illness,’ was Randolph’s succinct reply.
‘I know your brother was reputed to be a roguish character, but nevertheless he was a son and a brother. You have a nephew and niece, so his wife and children must be missing him too.’
‘I also must offer you my condolences.’ Smoothly Randolph altered the course of their conversation so it focused on her. ‘You mentioned earlier today that your fiancé was killed by the smugglers.’
Deborah nodded, a frown creasing her smooth, ivory brow. ‘It occurred more than two years ago. Edmund was on coast watch. There was an affray between the dragoons and a gang of smugglers in a lane leading to the coast.’
‘Was the culprit brought to justice?’
‘It was reported that a fellow nicknamed Snowy fired off the gun that fatally wounded Edmund.’ A glaze appeared in Deborah’s eyes as she recalled the awful time. ‘Snowy was later murdered,’ she resumed huskily. ‘The smugglers would sooner kill one of their own than have the dragoons snooping about in the villages looking for a suspect.’ She sighed. ‘There was no proper trial…save the one his colleagues put on. One cannot be sure that it was Snowy who was responsible for Edmund’s death.’
‘Did you meet your fiancé in London?’
Deborah shook her head. For a moment she remained silent, for she was tempted to tell him to mind his own business. But if she divulged a little of what had occurred to her in the intervening years, perhaps he might tell her what he had been doing; she knew she had a curiosity to know it. ‘My stepfather was a sociable sort of chap. When the militia were billeted close by he would offer hospitality. Occasionally he would hold small parties for neighbours and the officers. It was at such an event that Edmund and I were introduced.’ Her voice tailed away and she looked at him. ‘And you, sir?’ she asked with an admirably neutral tone. ‘Have you a fiancée or a wife and children?’
‘No…’ Randolph said quietly. ‘Once I thought I had met the right woman, but I was mistaken. Now I’m happy to remain a bachelor.’
‘I see,’ Deborah said in a stifled little voice. ‘How very sad for you.’
‘Indeed, I’m deserving of your pity…let’s talk about something more cheerful,’ he suggested silkily. ‘I had the impression that your mother would like to visit town.’ Randolph had placed down his cup and saucer. He relaxed back in to his chair and a booted foot was raised to rest atop a buff-breeched knee. Idly he splayed long brown fingers on a Hessian’s dusty leather. ‘Do you go to London very often?’
‘Unfortunately not. But you’re right; my mama would love to frequently visit town,’ Deborah answered him automatically, although her mind was in turmoil. She knew very well what he’d hinted at. Once he’d believed he’d wanted to marry her, but then he’d gone away and discovered that he’d found it easy to forget her. A burning indignation roared in her chest. Yet of what could she accuse him? He’d never told her he loved her, neither had he promised to marry her. And he certainly hadn’t forced her to kiss him. She’d been a very willing participant in that! The most she’d had from him were compliments and complaints that she was a seductive little miss who could drive him wild with desire. It was probable she’d had a lucky escape. Had he not gone away when he did she might have let him properly seduce her. The consequences of that didn’t bear thinking about. But she was determined not to let him know that any of it bothered her.
‘It is my mama’s greatest wish that we return to town to live.’ Her voice sounded shrill despite her attempt to keep it light and level.
‘Are you also keen to return there to live?’
‘I certainly miss the gaiety and the friends I had there,’ Deborah answered, more composed.
‘If you returned to London, you’d avoid the necessity of living amongst the likes of the Luckhursts.’
‘I shan’t allow them to drive us away,’ Deborah retorted with a defiance that made him cock a dark brow at her. Had he told her he found her attitude immature he could not have made his opinion plainer. ‘We have some friends here,’ she continued doggedly. ‘Harriet and her brother are nice people. So are Mr and Mrs Pattinson. Not everybody hereabouts is in league with the smugglers. Evil will triumph if good people are too cowardly to combat it.’
‘Certainly,’ he agreed drily. ‘But a lot of decent folk don’t consider contraband a bad thing, but a benefit.’
A defeated little grimace was Deborah’s acknowledgement of the truth in that statement. Her stepfather had been a good man, yet he had happily paid to have his cellars stocked illicitly.
‘Why do you not return to London to live?’ Randolph asked. A few brown fingers curled to rest close to his narrow mouth as he
waited for her reply. After a silent moment he prodded, ‘Is there more to it than a battle of wills with the smugglers?’
Deborah got to her feet and collected the cups to put on the tray. She spun about to face him, feeling an odd unwillingness to admit that she—once an heiress with a magnificent dowry—now could not afford to live in London. Yet she had nothing to be ashamed of. She had not squandered her inheritance; it had been taken from her. Again she had an inclination to tell him that he had no right to ask. But then that would imply that she cared what he thought. And she didn’t.
‘When Papa died the whole estate was entailed on the next male heir. I have no brother, as you know. There was no close relative on the paternal side who might have felt morally obliged to treat us generously. A distant cousin—a gentleman we haven’t met who resides in a castle in Scotland—took the title and estate. Mama was very well provided for in my father’s will, and my inheritance was held in trust. Unfortunately it was one that could be breached.’ She shrugged, clattering crockery.
‘When your mother remarried her assets became Mr Woodville’s,’ Randolph guessed.
‘Indeed,’ Debbie muttered, her fingers tightening on the edge of the table until the knuckles showed bone. ‘And Mr Woodville had a son and a strong belief in primogeniture.’
A silence ensued and whilst Debbie stared fiercely through the window Randolph watched her.
‘You have enough to live on?’ he eventually asked quietly.
‘Oh, yes. Mr Woodville left Mama enough to carry on living here comfortably, if we are careful. When she has passed away the house and estate will go to his son, Norman. In order that I would not be left destitute, he also left me a bequest of a few thousand pounds to tempt a prospective husband. It is not quite the sixty that my father had wanted me to have.’ She turned with a smile on her lips. ‘Well, as we have finished tea, sir, shall we now take a stroll in the gardens?’
Chapter Five
Once in her chamber Julia went directly to the small anteroom where her writing desk was positioned close to a window. When seated in that spot she had a splendid view of the rosebeds and lawns that flowed in an undulating emerald swathe to a stream edging an area of deciduous woodland. The trees were a beautiful sight to behold, garmented in shades of gold and red. At present the charming view did not lure Julia’s interest, rather her desk did. She sat down before it and got from a pocket in her grey gown a key. She used it to open the bureau, then, having found the little spring with a finger, she put pressure on it until a secret compartment came open. Gravely she gazed at the contents within. An unsteady hand trembled forwards to withdraw a few letters tied with ribbon.
‘Oh…Gregory, he has come,’ she whispered. ‘He seems angry with her, too, despite his courtesy. But I think he still wants her. We should not have done it,’ she murmured to her beloved first husband. ‘Our Debbie did not make the excellent match she deserved. Nice Edmund Green is lost to her, too. She is a spinster…soon to be twenty-five. A beauty still, indeed she is, but past her prime.’ She pressed pale fingers to her watering eyes. ‘Now you are not here and I alone must decide what to do. What shall I say if she asks if letters arrived for her? Must I deny it all? Shall I burn them or hand them over with excuses?’ She dropped the unopened letters back whence they came. ‘Will they think the letters were innocently lost and accept it as fate’s way rather than our way of telling them their love was not to be?’
* * *
An hour or so later Julia woke from her fitful slumber with a start. A thought had been pricking at her semi-consciousness. Now it surfaced and made her gasp. She had forgotten to visit the kitchens and tell Cook they had a guest to dine. She used her elbows to get upright on the coverlet where she had been napping.
A woman’s musical chuckle was heard coming from outside and it drew Julia from the bed to the window. The sun was setting in the west, filtering through autumn-hued trees and turning the eastern boundary to a fiery panorama. A movement on the southern path caught her eye and she watched as the handsome couple strolled. With a woman’s eye she noticed straight away that her daughter had not taken Mr Chadwicke’s arm whilst promenading. They were side by side, and smiling, but a good space was between them. Despite their time alone, and their amiable appearance, no intimate conversation had taken place. Julia knew, to her shame, that she was glad their pride held them apart. She hoped he would leave and go about his business without making any mention of his letters.
Deborah had been a touch formal with him. Julia had sensed that immediately, in spite of her daughter’s attempt to conceal her emotions behind good manners. But Julia was sure that Mr Chadwicke still had a hankering for Deborah. She was not so shrivelled that she could not recognise when a man had a certain twinkle in his eye. She craned her neck as the couple began to disappear from sight in the direction of the walled garden. She imagined Deborah was intending to show him the parterre and the fishpond situated beyond the iron gate.
Drawing back with a sigh, Julia was about to turn away when a movement to the north of the plot caught her attention. Instinctively she shrank back in fear as though to conceal herself behind the heavy curtain. A fellow was lurking and appeared keen to secrete himself behind a huge yew whilst peeping in the direction that her daughter and Mr Chadwicke had taken. Julia knew the burly individual was one of the Luckhursts. He and his brother were alleged to be notorious criminals, although it seemed they always managed to escape arrest. When she’d been shopping with Deborah in Hastings Julia had seen them brazenly swaggering about with their cronies. She had never liked the way the younger one smirked at her daughter with a mixture of lechery and belligerence on his coarse face.
On moving to Sussex with her second husband Julia had initially felt an indifference to the fact that they lived amongst smugglers. But since her daughter’s fiancé had been killed, she had been thrust into awareness of the true price of contraband. Deborah loathed the smugglers and let everybody know it. On many occasions Julia had cautioned her daughter to guard her tongue. One never knew who might be listening.
Blood began to pump deafeningly in Julia’s ears. Why was Seth Luckhurst in the garden spying on Deborah? Had her daughter recently challenged him again over his wickedness? Again she peeked out. For a moment she was mesmerised by the brawny fellow who was glancing this way and that. He seemed to be checking if the coast were clear before making his move. Julia skittered backwards away from the window as she saw him look up. She was frightened he might have spotted her. She collapsed on the edge of the bed, her fingers threaded tightly together. A calming thought occurred to her: their guest might be the person drawing his interest. Randolph Chadwicke looked a well-to-do fellow with his handsome appearance and stylish apparel. Perhaps the miscreant had been following him. Was he watching for him to leave so he might ambush him and rob him of his valuables? A moment later Julia was again fretting for her own safety. Anybody could see that Mr Chadwicke had a lofty height and a fine pair of shoulders on him and would put up a good fight. It was more likely that Luckhurst was watching for their guest’s departure so he might burgle Woodville Place. A coil of fear tightened in Julia’s stomach and she sprang up and rushed to the door.
* * *
‘There is no one out there now, Mrs Woodville, you have my assurances on it.’
‘But are you sure, sir? They are a wily lot and know how to hide themselves away. He was loitering behind the yew hedge on the north perimeter.’
‘We have checked thoroughly,’ Randolph again reassured her. He took a look over his shoulder at Basham who, it seemed, had the position of general factotum in the household. ‘Your manservant will confirm that we have made a good search of the grounds.’
‘But the felon might return when it is dark,’ Julia insisted in a squeak. ‘It is almost dusk now.’
‘We intend to check again later,’ Randolph reiterated soothingly, ‘And take flares to light the way.’
‘I’ll get the flares prepared, m’m,’ Basham
immediately offered. ‘Anybody out there up to no good, we’ll find them sure enough.’ He made a fist and shook it in a meaningful manner.
Julia looked unimpressed by her manservant’s brave statement. Basham was a trusted employee who had been in residence long before she had arrived at Woodville Place. Unfortunately his youth was now far behind him. At almost fifty-six years old, and with his stockiness due more to middle-aged spread than to muscle, Julia knew he was no match for the young thug who had been spying on them. Fred Cook, the coachman, was more of an age to be useful in a scuffle. ‘Is Fred in his quarters? Why was he not helping you in the search?’ Julia demanded peevishly.
A significant look passed between Randolph and Basham. Both knew that Fred Cook was indeed in his quarters…with a cold compress on his head. By the morning he was sure to be sporting two very black eyes.
When a bloodied Fred had crept in through the side door earlier, Basham had soon been apprised by the youth how he’d come such a cropper. He’d discovered, too, that Miss Woodville didn’t want her mother worried over it all. The few servants left at the house accepted that the daughter rather than the mother held sway at Woodville Place, and they were grateful for it. Since the master had passed on, his widow had grown increasingly unpredictable and nervous. Nevertheless, the worrying news that one of the Luckhursts was on the prowl had sent Basham directly to find out if his only male colleague was yet in a fit state to be of assistance. He’d found Fred still groaning in pain from his beating earlier that day, and more likely to be a hindrance than a help in a brawl.
In the event he’d not needed him. A gentleman had miraculously turned up who Basham reckoned could take on the Luckhursts single-handed if he chose to. Elegant and refined Mr Chadwicke might appear to be, but Basham sensed he was also an intensely dangerous fellow and the sort of cool character who was always needed in a crisis, but was rarely to be found.
