Ottilia sighed and reached for her little gold watch. She was relieved to discover her musings had taken her well past her appointed hour. It was almost midnight. She ought by this time to be at liberty to check doors with impunity.
Rising from her bed, she put on her dressing robe and slipped the marchioness’s key into her pocket. She lit a fresh candle, blew out the old one that had half burned down, and set the new one in its place. Taking the holder in hand, she slipped noiselessly from the room and embarked upon her search.
Her intention being to roam the domestic quarters unobserved, Ottilia headed for the main stairs, feeling reluctant to set foot upon the narrower staircase unless she must. Hardly had she turned the comer on the landing than she saw a glimmer of light beyond the first floor vestibule.
A feather brushed her heart and she stilled. Remembering her own candle, she cupped it, straining to see across the distance.
No shadow betrayed the presence of anyone in the lobby, and the gleam falling into it showed it to be empty. Then realisation filtered into her mind and the answering acceleration of her heartbeat pattered into her throat. Someone was in Emily’s dressing room.
Chapter 15
Instinct warned her to retreat, but Ottilia paid it scant attention. She was alone, yes, but she had only to scream to bring half a dozen persons hotfoot to the scene, Lord Francis among them.
The last thought was curiously comforting. Ottilia took a grasp of the stick of her candleholder instead of its base, with a vague thought of using it as a weapon at need, and braced herself as she took the remainder of the stairs.
Gliding silently on tiptoe, she moved into the vestibule and slipped to one side, peeping around the jut of the intervening wall. The door to the dressing room was only partially ajar and she could not see inside. Listening intently, she thought she could make out a soft scrabbling sound, followed by a click and then a swish, as of wood against wood.
A premonition shot through her mind, and she forgot caution.
Rushing forward, she called out softly, “Who is there?”
A startled gasp answered her. Then the gleam of light vanished. A shadowy figure lurched through the doorway just as she came close to it. She caught a glimpse of a masked face, and then a blow from the back of a man’s hand struck across her chest, knocking her against the wall. The candle in its holder dropped from her hand and the light went out.
In the ensuing pitch of night, Ottilia could see nothing, but instinctively she reached out, grabbing at the man who had been there. Her fingers found only air.
A light thudding of footsteps sounded, and Ottilia remained perfectly still, trying to judge their direction. The sound changed, became hollow. Which staircase was he using? Then there was a thump. Had he missed a step in the dark and fallen?
Intent, she strained her ears, not daring to move for fear of coming to grief herself. She could hear nothing more, try as she would. The invader was gone.
Ottilia discovered she was trembling and leaned back against the wall. Her eyes were adjusting to the intensity of the dark and she could make out dim shapes for the walls and doors.
Oh, for her candle! But even if she could recover it, she had no means of lighting it. The thought of groping her way around the walls to the stairs and thence to her chamber caused a chilling sensation to sweep through her stomach.
Then she remembered that Lord Francis’s bedchamber was a good deal closer.
The tapping entered his dreams. The puzzle of its intrusion lasted but a moment. As he woke, it resolved into a furtive knocking at his door. A hoarse whisper reached him. “Lord Francis!”
The recognition was instant. Surprise as much as instinct caused Francis to thrust himself out of bed and patter to the door in his bare feet. He grasped the handle and pulled it open. The figure without was a mere shadow in the gloom, but he had no doubts of its identity.
“Ottilia! What the devil are you up to now?”
“Hush!”
She put out a hand and it touched his chest. It was cold and Francis instinctively grasped it.
“You’re like ice, woman. What is the meaning of this?”
“I will tell you directly,” she answered, her tone low, “but for the present, could you light a candle?”
“I should think I’d better.”
With scant regard for the proprieties, Francis drew her into the room and closed the door. She remained where he left her as he crossed to the bedside and groped for his tinderbox. A light was soon struck and a glow sprung up in the room as he lit the candle. Then he turned with it in his hand and went up to Ottilia, holding it high so he could see her white face.
“You look like a ghost.”
The characteristic gurgle was drawn from her. “I feel like one.”
“Here, take this.”
Francis handed her the candle and retrieved his dressing gown, shrugging it on. “That’s better. Now, tell me all.”
He watched her draw a breath and sigh it out, as if she had passed through a difficult experience and was only now relieved of it.
“I’ve just disturbed someone who was doing something in Emily’s dressing room.”
“What? Who?”
“That I don’t know, but it was a man. I’m afraid he escaped and ran away. I could not tell which staircase he used, but I suspect the main one, as I heard his steps clearly. Oh, and he had no time to shut the door, so we may readily discover what he was doing in there.”
“We may, may we?” Francis eyed her in growing irritation. “What in the world possessed you to go wandering around the house in the middle of the night? And without a candle?”
“Of course I had a candle! I dropped it when the fellow knocked me to one side.”
A sliver of ice traced a path down Francis’s stomach. “He did what? Are you hurt?”
“Do keep your voice down,” she begged. “The last thing we need is for someone to wake and find us together in this condition.”
“Lord, yes,” he agreed feelingly, his tone lowered. “We have scandal enough as it is. But did he hurt you?”
“I was a little jolted, but that is all. I am perfectly well, I assure you.” Her fingers reached out and grasped his sleeve. “We are wasting time.”
Francis shoved his feet into slippers and allowed himself to be shepherded into the lobby. He followed her to the vestibule, torn between indignation at her unorthodox wanderings and a lively anxiety for her safety. Impulse threw him into savage speech, albeit in a whisper for fear of waking his mother.
“If I do not end by shaking you unmercifully, Ottilia Draycott, it will be in no wise your fault.”
A faint laugh reached him and she looked back. “What, because I encountered a marauder?”
“Because you are possibly the most infuriating female ever to cross my path,” he returned. “Why must you venture into the night completely unaccompanied? A word would have secured my aid. Or don’t you know that?”
She paused, turning to look at him and holding the candle up as she studied his face. “To be truthful, it did not occur to me to do so. But you will allow I lost no time in coming to fetch you when I found myself in difficulties.”
Francis’s annoyance melted. “True. But what were you about?”
“I wanted to find which door that key fits.”
“Could you not have searched during the day?”
“Not in the domestic quarters, if I did not wish to advertise my actions to the servants.”
He cast up his eyes. “What is so particularly maddening about you, Ottilia, is that you have an answer for everything.” He grinned at her. “Lead on, then.”
She turned again, moving quietly in the calm way she had. Francis reflected how often it had soothed his anxieties, if momentarily. As they reached the dressing room, its door still ajar, she spoke again.
“I am in hopes we may obviate the necessity to search the house, if we follow in the man’s footsteps.”
“You suppose he will have
entered the house by that way?”
“It seems likely, don’t you think?”
Francis mused on this as he followed her through the doorway. “Have you had any thought as to what the fellow was doing?”
“Yes.”
She did not elaborate and Francis balked. “Well?”
Ottilia was standing before the neat chest of drawers, but she glanced over her shoulder. “I think that has just become obvious.”
So saying, she indicated the top drawer. It had been left pulled open. He watched as Ottilia tugged it further out. Then she turned back with a smile.
“Would you hold the candle, if you please?”
Francis went up to her and took it. “What do you expect to find?”
She was rummaging within the drawer. Her hands stilled and she cast him a look of triumph.
“This.” She brought out a velvet-covered box. “Emily’s jewel box, I believe.”
Francis set down the candle on top of the press and took it from her. “He returned it? And left the key in the lock.”
Turning the little key, he opened the box. At the bottom, metal and stone winked and glittered in the candlelight. Ottilia’s fingers reached in and drew out a necklace. Below it there was nothing bar a pair of ill-assorted earrings.
“This cannot be all.”
“Obviously not,” Francis agreed. “Our thief has seen fit to keep the bulk of it. Then why return the thing at all?”
“In hopes it might not be noticed?”
“He cannot have been so foolish.”
“Or, if he originates from inside the house, since the theft is known amongst the staff, perhaps he thought it might avert suspicion from himself and spread it across a broader canvas.”
“Then that hope is dashed, since you caught him at it. In which event, we may at least now eliminate the female staff.”
Francis watched her examine the necklace, holding it to the light.
“Could this be mere paste?”
She held it out to him and Francis examined it more carefully, aware of a stirring at the back of his mind. At length he was obliged to concede defeat.
“I am no expert. But I can’t imagine why Emily would have need of a paste bauble. She had funds enough.”
As he was about to lay the necklace back in the box, his memory jumped. He paused abruptly and lifted it once again to the candle flame. Light dawned.
“This must be genuine. It is the one Emily wears in her portrait. I thought it looked familiar.”
Ottilia peered closer and he held it for her to see better.
“I recall she was wearing a necklace, but I could not swear it was this one.”
“You may take it from me that it is.” He laid the necklace back in the box and allowed Ottilia to tuck it back in its place in the drawer.
“I will ask Mary about the rest. She will know precisely which jewels have been taken.” Closing the drawer, she picked up the candle and gave it to Francis. “Now for the escape route.”
Francis hesitated. “I’m sure I ought to refuse to let you come with me.”
Her eyes lit with mischief. “And I am just as sure you ought not. How can you prevent me?”
As he eyed her, he was aware of disturbance in the rate of his heartbeat and an unsettling shortness of breath.
“I can think of several ways,” he responded without thinking.
Colour fluctuated in Ottilia’s cheek. With an effort, Francis wrenched his attention away from the images crawling in his head.
“If we are going upon this adventure, we had best make haste.”
Without a word, Ottilia turned for the door, and Francis felt abruptly distanced. He followed, reaching out to her shoulder to stay her.
“You had better let me go first.”
She stood back in the lobby, and he passed her. “Shall we try the main stairs first?”
“Heading for which door, do you think?” Francis asked, starting off through the vestibule.
“Oh, Francis, wait!”
He halted and turned, regarding her with question. Then he realised she had left off his title and his mind froze momentarily. She began casting about on the lobby floor.
“Pray bring the light closer.”
“What is it?”
“I wish to retrieve my candle.”
Francis glanced down and saw a gleam of silver. He stooped to pick it up and in the narrow confines of the space his body brushed against her. The contact threw him back into confusion and he hastily rose, shifting back.
Ottilia got up from her knees, the candle in her hand. It hung crookedly. He gave up the holder to her but protested when she tried to fit the candle back into it.
“You can’t use that. The candle is broken.”
“The stub will serve. I have only to cut the wick.”
His suppressed emotions found expression in irritation. “Yes, if you have a knife or scissors about you, for I have not.”
She looked up at him. Francis read puzzlement in the clear gaze and regretted his tone. There was something in her voice to which he could not put a name.
“I will do it later. It need not go to waste. Besides, it will not do to leave the thing here for the servants to find and wonder about.”
Finding nothing to say that would not prolong a pointless discussion, nor assuage his conscience, Francis merely nodded.
“Let us proceed.”
Once upon the stair, Francis went ahead, holding the candle to the side to throw light for Ottilia.
“Can you see?”
“Well enough, I thank you.”
He was relieved to hear normality in her tone once more. She was adept at recovering herself, he reflected, recalling instances when she had looked briefly disconcerted. It could be a tempting game to try to discompose her. But he had done enough tonight. Besides, he liked her too well for that.
The realisation filtered into his consciousness. He did like her, far too well. The question was, whether his liking was to any degree reciprocated.
Before he could lose himself in the agreeable recollection that Ottilia had shown herself to be at least enjoying his company on occasion, he arrived at the ground floor.
“Where now? The front door or the back?”
“The back, I think. It must be by far the fastest route.”
As he started down towards the lower landing, Francis recalled adventurous forays of his own. A laugh escaped him.
“I used to creep out to the garden as a child to escape my tutor. I little thought I should resume such madness in my riper years.”
“It just shows one never knows what one may come to,” said Ottilia from behind him, and the note of mischief Francis was coming to recognise struck him with pleasure.
Arrived at the landing, he paused before the door. “Have you the key?”
She produced it from her pocket and gave it to him, taking in its stead the candle as he handed it to her.
“Hold it lower.”
He stood aside so the light fell upon the keyhole. The key fitted perfectly, and he turned it.
“Eureka!”
The door opened onto blackness and a whoosh of cold air. Francis hurriedly went to shut it again and found the wood warped so that he was obliged to thrust hard enough to make the door slam.
“The devil! Let us hope no one was awakened by that.”
Ottilia said nothing and he turned to find her eyes fixed upon the door. Francis remembered the look. Her mind was otherwhere.
“What is it?”
She blinked and seemed to come back to him. “There is one mystery solved.”
“You are to be commended.”
She gave a light laugh. “Hardly. It was your mother who first suggested the possibility of the marchioness supplying a lover with a key. And if Venner had not alerted me, I should likely have dismissed this one I found in the night table.”
“But you said at the outset there must be a way for a lover to get into the house without being detected.�
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“True. But by being supplied with a key? I can think of few more dangerous enterprises.”
“Well, it certainly proved dangerous enough for Emily.”
He saw a shiver shake her and felt instantly remorseful. But she spoke before he could voice it.
“I meant only that to be giving anyone access to your house is foolish. Suppose the key were to fall to some other hand?”
“According to Quaife, Emily only loaned the key long enough for the fellow to come in. I cannot think she would have given it wholly over to anyone.”
“No, not if she was prone to change her lovers in the way she changed her clothes.”
Francis was startled. He had never before heard her speak so acidly.
“If anyone kept a key,” she went on, “it would be Quaife, for he appears to have remained longest in her affections.”
“You don’t approve of her, do you?”
She looked away. “I dislike any form of betrayal. Too many people take their marriage vows lightly. If one is fortunate enough to inspire affection, one should strive to deserve it, do you not think?”
He was struck by the passionate undertone, and a memory slipped into his mind. In just this way had she spoken that very first day, and upon this very subject. It seemed to Francis an age since that moment.
“Time has overtaken us, Tillie. I feel as if I have known you for weeks.”
She was staring up at him, searchingly, he thought.
“What did you call me?”
Francis thought back and could not remember. He gave a self-conscious laugh. “I hardly know. I have fallen into the way of using your given name, though I should not, I know. It is as I said. I have lost track of time.”
Still she gazed at him. “You called me Tillie.”
Something in her clear eyes tugged at his senses. Francis was hardly aware of smiling at her. He wanted to set his hands either side of her face and hold her so.
“If I did, it was instinctive,” he said, hardly aware that he spoke. “It suits you.”
A moment longer her look held, and then a slow flush mounted into her cheeks and she drew away a little. Francis was conscious of regret for a moment lost.
The Lady Fan Series: Books 1-3 (Sapere Books Boxset Editions) Page 25
