A Bewitching Governess

by Patricia Rice

  Tying their reins to a hitching post, they proceeded toward the side door, only to have the women sail out. Olivia didn’t seem to be in any particular hurry, but Simon imagined storm clouds gathering over her head.

  He was too relieved they were safe to fling her over his shoulder. That probably wouldn’t be a strategic move in any case, he decided, as she approached him, blue eyes flashing even in the lowering darkness.

  “I will set fire to the place before I’ll let Hargreaves have it.” She marched onward toward the pony cart.

  Phoebe flung her arms around her new husband, kissed him soundly, and announced, “Thank you for bringing me here! This is so much fun.” Then she, too, headed off for the cart.

  “Your wife is insane, isn’t she?” Simon asked as he climbed back on Thor.

  “She grew up in a murderous slum. This is all good clean fun to her.” Casting a glance up at the still circling rooks, Drew shrugged and returned to his saddle.

  “I should send you back to Edinburgh, but then Olivia would set fire to the hall by herself,” Simon said gloomily, following the pony cart as it rattled out the back gate.

  Which meant he should send Olivia back to the city with Drew and Phoebe, and the thought depressed him far more than it ought.

  It was dark and spitting snow by the time they returned the horses to the stable. Climbing out of the pony cart, Olivia very badly wanted to go up to the nursery and cuddle the children and read them storybooks and pretend the world was a pretty, fairy-tale place for a little while. Just until her nerves stopped trembling and her stomach stopped clenching and her fury was under control.

  Simon obviously wasn’t about to let that happen.

  A brothel! She’d never been so shaken in her life. She couldn’t stop shivering. She clutched her elbows to hold herself together. How could people be so awful?

  Apparently having learned to watch for their arrival, the new footman was waiting at the side door to take their coats and mention dinner would be ready shortly.

  “I’ll have to change,” Olivia said, still hoping to escape until she could settle her thoughts into cohesive action instead of horror.

  “I’m hungry now,” Simon declared. “We’ll pour ourselves some whisky to warm up.”

  He placed her hand on his arm as if he were escorting her into an elegant dinner and led the way to the withdrawing room where he kept the liquor.

  She wasn’t exactly filthy. She and Phoebe had done nothing but poke around where they shouldn’t be. But she felt filthy. She wanted to scrub herself all over and burn the servant’s dress. Before Olivia could protest Simon’s high-handedness, Phoebe excitedly launched into their tale.

  Olivia rolled her eyes and stayed to prevent anyone from removing broadswords from the wall.

  She was the one who had to go back there with weapons. The Hall was hers.

  “A gambling hell and probably a brothel,” Phoebe was still exclaiming sometime later, as they finished their sherry and whisky and proceeded into the dining room, still dressed in servants’ garb. “It’s beyond all imagination!”

  “Glengarry,” Drew reminded her. “If he’s involved, the Association is most likely involved.”

  “They’ve turned to skullduggery to finance their depredations?” Simon asked, helping Olivia into the chair on his right, as if she were dressed in silks and not rags.

  “Where’s Mrs. Dunwoody?” she asked, not wanting Simon’s aunt to hear any of this.

  He turned to the maid serving them—he hadn’t hired a butler or another footman yet—and asked after his aunt.

  The maid bobbed a curtsy. “She’s taken to her bed with a megrim, sir, says the storm upsets her phlegm. Miss Emma is with the bairns.”

  So much for chaperonage, Olivia thought with a sigh. There was no escaping this discussion.

  “I will go to Glasgow and press the lawyers to speed their search for the trust documents,” Simon declared the instant the servants left.

  “It’s about to snow a blizzard,” Drew pointed out. “You’ll go nowhere until the rails are clear.”

  “What are the chances those two evil demons we heard are poisoning the viscount?” Phoebe asked out of the clear blue sky.

  They all turned to stare at her. She’d pinned up her heavy chestnut curls, but a few escaped to dangle about her angular face. She raised dark eyebrows in anticipation of their response to her bombshell.

  “I cannot even imagine. . .” Olivia set down her soup spoon and regarded her cousin with horror. “What would make you say such a thing?”

  “He was almost a cherry red when he arrived the other night,” Phoebe pointed out. “We all assumed it was from the cold. But I’ve been taking chemistry classes, and the would-be physicians are rather ghoulish. They talk about the many ways one can consume poisons. Arsenic is the one they play with most, but apparently, some forms of photography use a chemical called cyanide and another uses mercury, both dangerous. Mercury is what causes hatters to go mad—which might explain some of the viscount’s behavior. My photographer friend says cyanide is only for architectural prints, but it’s also found in tobacco and the pits of fruits that some quacks use to create medicines. Some of the symptoms are very pink skin, weakness, bizarre behavior. . . I’d have to look it up but I believe vomiting and diarrhea—”

  “Which would explain why Hargreaves is so thin!” Olivia said, understanding. “That just can’t be true. It doesn’t make sense. Why would they kill the goose that laid the golden—”

  “If he owes them a fortune, he’s not golden anymore, is he?” Phoebe said gently.

  Silence settled over the dinner table. Olivia pushed away her soup.

  “I cannot believe anyone would be so cruel. . .” But she ought to. She’d been victim of her father-in-law’s greed. Which made the problem obvious. “With no trust agreement, they must think they can petition the Chancery and claim the Hall for debts.”

  “And they may fear Hargreaves knows where to find the trust agreement,” Simon added unhappily. “If they kill him, then that’s one last witness to the truth.”

  “We have to rescue the viscount from himself,” Phoebe said, not quite as cheerily as usual.

  “And then can we kill his steward?” Olivia asked, in a bloodthirsty mood. “And maybe this Glengarry person. I think they must be the men we heard. I don’t think squirrels in the wall are likely to scare them off, or lack of liquor.”

  “We can’t rescue Hargreaves if we don’t even know for sure that he needs rescuing,” Drew pointed out, reasonably enough. “I know a physician in the city, a professor, with a wide range of. . .”

  “We could be snowed in for days. He could be dead before we dig out,” Simon warned. “I’ve little sympathy for the lad, but if his brain is being poisoned, is he really responsible for his actions?”

  “I’m not sure he was ever responsible for his actions,” Olivia said with a heavy dose of cynicism. “And I’m inclined to let him pay for his sins, but not if it allows those other two monsters to take his place.”

  Simon covered her hand with his. “I agree. There’s no time to tarry. We need to empty the Hall tonight, one way or another. It’s too late in the day to fetch the sheriff. I could summon an army of miners and tenants, but I don’t want to endanger poor men unable to defend themselves if this goes wrong. Drew and I will take care of it.”

  Olivia glanced at Phoebe. Phoebe nodded. In tandem, they pushed back their chairs. For sustenance, Olivia plucked a slice of roast beef from the platter and put it on her roll. Phoebe did the same.

  The men leaped up, protesting.

  “Do you know a cure for cyanide or mercury poisoning?” Olivia asked as she headed for the door.

  “No, but perhaps Dr. Napier will if we tell him what we suspect,” Phoebe suggested. “Do you think we might take Enoch? He’s been very useful in the past. We could hide him—”

  Simon’s roars shook the chandelier.

  Twenty-one

  “I’m go
ing in the front door like a man,” Simon declared as they rode back to the Hall. His stomach was still empty. The women had rushed out before he could do more than grab fistfuls of bread and meat.

  Up ahead, Olivia drove a wagon with some foolish notion they could load the ill viscount into it. After seeing the fop screaming in his drawers, Simon had his doubts, but he damned well wasn’t letting her go without him.

  And he had no authority to stop her. Drew might have a word with his impetuous wife, but Simon could say nothing at all to a viscountess who essentially wanted to go home. Even if said home was filled with thieves and scalawags.

  “If you rush into a den of thieves, we’d have to rescue you too,” Drew argued. He patted the saddlebag he’d hastily loaded. “I’m not sure my chimney sweep device is ready yet, but if we can reach the roof, we’ll find out. It’s meant to go up, not down, so the trick has a fair chance of working even if the device simply falls straight down.”

  “Filling the parlor with soot is better than haunting them with birds,” Simon agreed reluctantly. “But you’re likely to fill every room in the house with filth.”

  “It’s already filled with filth,” Drew pointed out.

  There was truth to that. What the women had told him about a brothel and gambling hell sickened Simon. In all good conscience, he could take a dirk to a scoundrel attacking an innocent, but how did one deal with corruption so deep that it infiltrated half of respectable society? The dastards planned on bringing young nobles to the Hall to pollute their morals, bankrupt their estates, and spread the diseases of whores to future generations. All for the sake of a few gold coins. He couldn’t fathom the decadence.

  Or maybe he could. Too many rich men left their sons idle, without the lessons taught by hard labor. Idle hands did the devil’s work. Simon vowed that Enoch would learn as he had done—with his hands and brains and not the ease of coins. His bairns wouldn’t go hungry as he had, but they’d learn to work for what they had.

  The wagons that had been in the stable yard earlier were gone. The few remaining servants were probably at their dinners. Even the stableboys didn’t appear as the wagon stopped in the heavier shadows of the windbreak at the back of the property. With snow still spitting, Simon flung a blanket over Thor before he crossed to the wagon to help the ladies down.

  He’d almost accept this infiltration if it meant saving a man from harm, but his temper ignited again the instant a blanket lifted in the back of the wagon and his damned son and Aloysius climbed out.

  “Boys!” Olivia cried in obvious surprise, double-checking under the blanket. “You didn’t bring Joe, did you?”

  “He has to stay with his mam,” Aloysius said politely, although his expression was defiant.

  “But what in the name of all that is holy are you doing?” she asked.

  Her shock took some of the edge off Simon’s, and he waited with interest to see what excuse they drummed up.

  “I heard you,” Enoch answered mutinously. “You need me. I’m not a baby. I can help.”

  Olivia slammed a gloved hand over Simon’s mouth before he could roar loud enough to shake the stars. “We can’t go back now,” she whispered. “We’ll leave them with the Jamesons.”

  “The ones with the murky auras?” Simon muttered in retaliation, peeling her hand away. “The lot of you stay in the kitchen until Drew and I drive the blackguards out.”

  “You can’t reach the roof without us. You don’t know where the hidden stairs are,” Olivia argued.

  “We’ll take the servants’ stairs. If anyone is creeping up and down them, we’ll throttle them,” Simon said irascibly, heading for the kitchen door.

  He was suspicious when she didn’t argue, but once in the kitchen where the small staff gathered, he was relieved to see the boys surrounded by the loyal servants who had once served Olivia and her husband. As the late viscount’s son, Aloysius had a place here, Simon supposed. And Enoch with his dark head of curls would be a lady-killer one day, should he live through this escapade. Simon throttled his temper again.

  Everyone was invited to join the meager table. Simon’s stomach rumbled, but he could see the fare was light, and he and Drew declined.

  “I’ll have to show you the way,” Jameson stiffly answered Simon’s request. “The attic stairs are behind a concealed door on the third floor. Access to the roof is through a panel in the attic joists. It won’t be visible.”

  “We need you to watch Enoch and the women,” Simon ordered. “Give us an oil lamp, and we’ll light it when we’re up there. We have sharp eyes.”

  “Has anyone seen the viscount today?” Olivia asked while a maid ran for a lamp.

  “He doesn’t come out much,” Mrs. Jameson said worriedly. “We take up meals, but he’s always in bed or half-dressed and looking sickly. He won’t let us call a physician. I think Mr. Glengarry has brought remedies. They may just be laudanum, though.”

  “Hargreaves won’t leave with us,” Olivia said, worriedly watching Simon as he lit the lamp. “What are you planning to do?”

  “His lordship will flee like everyone else when we’re done,” Drew said optimistically, adjusting the saddlebag on his shoulder.

  If the viscount hadn’t the sense to flee, Simon figured he’d knock out the bastard and haul him down over his shoulder—for his own good, of course. The pleasure derived was a bonus.

  As soon as Drew and Simon departed up the servants’ stairs, Olivia and Phoebe settled down with the boys and the staff and plotted.

  “Our goal is to drive all the guests out of the house tonight,” Olivia explained. “I believe there is one last train out this evening. Those who don’t want to take it can stay at the inn.”

  The servants frowned in concern, but they were accustomed to taking orders from Olivia. They nodded understanding.

  “They’ve not had enough to drink to believe in ghosties,” Mrs. Jameson fretted.

  “I’ve a little of the malt reserved,” her husband reported. “I can give them that, say I just uncovered a barrel not quite empty. I don’t know if it’s enough.”

  “May I have a sheet?” Enoch asked politely, then glanced at Olivia. “Would that be all right?”

  He was asking if showing his gift to the Hall’s staff would be safe. Olivia had no idea. She opened her hidden eye and examined the auras of the servants she barely knew anymore. As she’d detected earlier, the Jamesons were muddier than when she’d known them, but they were good solid earth colors, just sullied by insecurity and uncertainty. The kitchen maids showed a muddy blue in the throat area—reflecting their fear of speaking.

  For safety’s sake, she turned to the housekeeper. “Could you take Enoch to the large linen closet?” Where he could experiment out of sight of others, she left unsaid. She turned back to Enoch. “The closet is large enough for you to be comfortable. Leave the door open slightly, but do not leave unless it is with one of us. We’ll come for you when it’s safe.”

  “Should I go with him, my lady?” Aloysius asked.

  Seeing the protective gold shimmer over his natural dark red, Olivia smiled at her late husband’s son. Aloysius possessed many of his father’s fine qualities. He wanted to guard Enoch, not completely realizing how dangerous Enoch could be.

  They were both so very young.

  “I think it might be best if you stay in the servants’ stairwell on that floor,” Olivia said, thinking about the upstairs hall layout. “You’ll be able to watch his lordship’s door and the closet. If you see trouble, run down here and find help.”

  Solemnly, the boy nodded his dark head.

  Phoebe was sitting quietly—too quietly. Olivia cast an anxious glance her way, but she didn’t want to disturb whatever mental acrobatics her cousin was perpetrating. She turned back to the rest of the staff. “The rest of you continue as always. We don’t want the guests to have any notion that anything is different until the soot begins to fly. I apologize in advance for the mess we’re about to create.”

&n
bsp; “If it takes filth to drive out filth, then so be it,” Mrs. Jameson said pragmatically. “Come along, boys, I’ll show you the best hiding places.”

  Olivia was fairly certain it would take swords and axes to drive out Glengarry and Ramsay if they were the men planning on turning the Hall into a brothel. But if she could narrow the enemy to two, she’d have the upper hand.

  Of course, it might take Hargreaves testifying against them to put an end to their plundering, but Olivia could only plan for the moment, which meant separating the viscount from the villains. And maybe hunting for Owen’s documents, if they had time.

  Overhead, they could hear scrabbling noises of tiny claws and shouts that might be of disgust. Jameson rose from the table to fetch the remaining whisky.

  Unaware of Phoebe’s propensity for setting wild creatures loose indoors, the maids appeared perplexed by the sudden noisy activity above. The bell from the front parlor rang frantically.

  “Let me answer the ring,” Phoebe said, speaking for the first time, adjusting her mob cap.

  They both still wore the servants’ costumes they’d worn earlier. Picking at a hole in her rough woolen skirt, Olivia fretted. “I have a little more experience with drunken lords. It might be better—”

  Phoebe laughed. “I’ve had experience with drunken thieves and taverns. I think it’s time you take a knife to the desk. I’ll provide the distraction.”

  “Beggin’ your pardon, miladies,” one of the maids said. “You’ll need to look much older or the gentlemen will. . .” She blushed profusely.

  Phoebe picked up a broom and hunched over. “Like this?”

  The maid draped a ragged shawl over Phoebe’s head and shoulders. “This helps somewhat. And scraping your feet.”

  Olivia pulled her old-fashioned mobcap over her hair, completely concealing it. They both added a touch of ash to their cheeks. Olivia wrapped herself in a length of flannel another maid offered, pinning it with a hatpin. By the time they were prepared, Jameson was back with a decanter.