My Lady Caroline

by Jill Jones

  “What the hell?” Nicki groaned.

  “Nicki, damn it. I know you like a good joke, but give me a break,” Alison said with genuine wrath. Then she gave a shaky laugh. “How did you do it?”

  “Do what?”

  “Get those flowers. Did you go back to that séance room?”

  “What flowers? What are you talking about?”

  Cold prickles chased across Alison’s skin suddenly as she realized her friend had no idea what she was talking about. She pointed to her pillow. “Those flowers.”

  Next to the indentation in the pillow where her head had been lay two flowers, a red rose and a pink carnation.

  Alison Crawford Cunningham had never believed in ghosts. Didn’t want to believe in them. But the only other explanation she had for what had happened to her in the past week was that she was losing her mind.

  Perhaps that was a possibility. People had always considered her flaky. Maybe with all the stress of recent events, she’d slipped over the edge. It seemed more reasonable than conversing with an actual ghost for three nights straight, not at that spooky hotel but in her own bedroom. More reasonable than finding those confounded flowers on her pillow every morning. Was Nicki paying Alison’s housekeeper to keep up the joke? Nicki swore not, but if she was, Alison had ceased to find it funny.

  The apparition had visited her in dreams at first, like it had the night in the hotel. Then it had become more brazen, rattling around in Alison’s room until it woke her, but then disappearing instantly. Then three nights ago, it had made itself fully visible. At first, Alison was startled by the specter’s resemblance to herself and considered that she might be experiencing some sort of weird hallucination which reflected her own image, although she’d never dressed like that. The figure was short, a woman, she thought, although it could have been a teenage boy. Its hair was cropped and curly, but in the gloom of night, she couldn’t make out the color. She’d turned on the light, and the ghost had disappeared, leaving her to wonder if she’d seen anything at all. But the moment she’d turned the light off again, the figure had returned. And this time it spoke!

  Remembering the scene vividly, Alison fidgeted uncomfortably in the chair in the waiting room at Pierce, Buckner, Fromme and Withoff, glad that she now had some fourteen hundred miles between her Palm Beach bedroom and here. She might not care for Drew Hawthorne, she might feel inadequate during these trying discussions about her affairs, but anything, anything was better than those conversations she’d held in the dead of night with an apparition.

  Alison had told no one, except Nicki of course, about the nightly visits from the spirit who called herself Caro. The shade claimed she was indeed Lady Caroline Lamb, and that she had been bitterly betrayed by her lover, Lord Byron.

  And that she could prove it.

  And that Alison had to help her.

  At first the conversations had been one-sided, with the ghost weeping intermittently and carrying on so that Alison couldn’t have said anything if she had wanted to. But after a few nights, the supernatural encounters, which Alison wasn’t sure weren’t creations of her own ebbing sanity, began to wear on her nerves, until finally she’d called out to the whateveritwas, “Get out!”

  The ghost had looked up at her with such a pitiful expression Alison had wanted to cry for being so mean to it. “But you said you would help,” it whined.

  “How can I help? I can’t do anything. I can’t even be sure if I’m in my right mind or not.” Alison couldn’t believe she was actually talking to the thing.

  “That is what they said about me,” the ghost lamented in empathy. Then it reached small white arms out toward Alison, who in spite of her alarm, felt a distinct twinge of sympathy for the pathetic creature. Perhaps she didn’t know how it felt for everyone to think you were crazy, but she certainly could relate to having everyone around her believe her to be incapable of thinking and acting responsibly.

  “Please,” the ghost wailed, “say you will come to my aid.”

  Alison dropped her head and shook it from side to side in disbelief at what she knew she was about to do. Then she raised her head again, took a deep breath, and said, “Okay. I’ll try. But you’ll have to tell me what to do. And,” she added in desperation, “you’ll have to promise to leave me alone when I find whatever it is you are looking for.”

  The ghost had instantly shifted into the personality of an excited little girl, the same as it had done at the séance. “I felt assured you would agree,” it said enthusiastically, trying to clap its little hands. “I knew when we spoke at Mary’s that you were the one. It has taken me e’er so long to find you. I have the memoirs, Byron’s memoirs, the ones thought to have been burned. But the real ones were not burned. I copied every page when Mr. Moore left them with me. It was the copies that were burned, you see. The real memoirs are at Dewhurst Manor. You must go to Dewhurst and find…”

  All this in a breathless rush, and then suddenly, nothing. It was as if a light went out in the room, and Alison no longer felt the presence there. Well, maybe it had used up all its ectoplasmic energy and that would be the end, she thought hopefully as she nestled back into bed.

  And so far, it had been. The ghost of Lady Caroline had stayed safely in the next plane or wherever it is that ghosts reside. And Alison had been able at last to sleep through the night in peace.

  She was anything but peaceful this morning, however, and as the minutes ticked by and Drew Hawthorne kept her waiting, her irritation mounted. She picked up a magazine and began turning the pages with a sharp flick of her thumb, not really looking at the four-color spreads flashing by. Not, that is, until she came upon a page with a photo of a place she recognized instantly.

  It was in a real estate advertisement. And the photo was of the house she’d seen in her dream the night of the séance. She was certain of it. Same trees. Same stucco and timber facade. All that was missing was the ghost.

  She glanced at the name on the ad and was startled to note that it was an estate agent in Hertfordshire, England. She flipped back to the cover and realized she’d picked up a copy of Country Life, a magazine printed in Britain, obviously dedicated to the bucolic lifestyle of rural, wealthy Brits. A ruddy-faced Prince Charles laughed at her from the cover photo. Quickly, she found her place again and studied the photograph. Then she read the description, and her heart stood still.

  “Dewhurst Manor. Fine Sixteenth Century Manor House with Great Hall, three reception rooms, domestic offices, sixteen bedrooms, most updated to include private baths. Twentieth century additions include new guest quarters and heated swimming pool.”

  Alison let the magazine drop into her lap and looked around furtively, as if the ghost might pop out of nowhere. But it didn’t need to.

  It had made it clear where it wanted her to go.

  “I awoke one morning and found myself famous.”

  Lord Byron—March 1812

  Seeking to behave in a fashion befitting my station in life, that of the sixth Lord Byron, and anxious to uphold the rumors that I was indeed my own dark hero, Childe Harold, upon my return to London from the Orient, I undertook seriously the conquest of the Ladies of Society. During those years when I was the literary lion of London, I managed to set my confusion aside and indulged in a number of brief affairs, most of which were with women who sought short, titillating encounters to relieve the boredom of their tiresome marriages. These were, for me, safe indulgences, for none required that I fall in Love.

  There was one, however, who was not content with a brief affair, despite the fact that she was married and in a position of high rank. She also made that fatal Demand upon me which I could not, I thought, fulfill—she fell in love with me, and expected me to reciprocate her devotion. I did not know these things, however, when I first laid eyes on the slender, boyish but beautiful Lady Caroline Lamb. I longed for her instantly, as sore a mistake as ever I could have made. I had no suspicion that my beautiful seductress (to whom I fell willingly) would soon beco
me instead an obsessive huntress aiming for sole possession of my heart, or that in the effort to free myself, I would seek to destroy her, only to be destroyed in turn by her.

  I wish in these memoirs to sort out my life, and therefore, I must exact the full Truth of these matters from the darkest depths of my soul. Ah, but what is the Truth when it comes to Caroline? How difficult, painful even, it is to describe what took place during that spurious affair, even from the distance of my Italian courtyard and of many years. But I must recall it all, and bear the pain, as I drain the poison from an old wound. And so I begin, from outset of that dreadful liaison—

  I was in my rooms in London, a happy man, or happy as I can recall ever having been, when the fateful knock fell upon my door. The year was eighteen and twelve. March, I believe the month. My valet opened the door to find a page with a letter for me—not so unusual in the event, but the epistle was most provocative. It was lengthy and filled with flattery, written by an unnamed female admirer of Childe Harold. She asked that I not attempt to discover her identity, but she closed the letter with a truly Carolinish touch, saying that if I wished to, I could easily enough discover who she was, although she swore that it would be a disappointment to her.

  I could have left her an unknown Devotee, as intriguing as I found this note, until a second letter arrived shortly upon the heels of the first. She again flattered me, telling me how she admired my superior Mind. I was new to the business of being Famous, and therefore was on fire to know the name of this ardent fan. It was not difficult to discover that the sender was Lady Caroline Lamb.

  I arranged a meeting at Lady Westmoreland’s house, fully expecting Caro, as she was called by the Devonshire House girls, to join the throng of other admiring young beauties that surrounded me in the drawing room that day. When I saw her, my breath deserted me, for from her appearance alone, I was instantly drawn to her. Caro was young, and gamin, and gay and beautiful and outrageous and innocent—a complex creature that immediately captivated my imagination. Perhaps with one such as she, I thought immediately, I could experience with a woman what I had heretofore known only from the male of the species. To my great astonishment and dismay, however, the moment she saw me, she turned on her heel, as if piqued by my very existence, and left the room, exclaiming that I was mad, bad and dangerous to know! Ah, Caro, was it me you were describing, or yourself?

  Outside, a spring storm raged. Lightning sizzled over the slate rooftop, followed by grinding thunder. Inside, the fire crackled cozily in the grate in the large main bedroom at Dewhurst Manor, and Jeremy Ryder sat opposite on a comfortable sofa, reading once again a photocopy of the incredible letter that had brought him to this place. On a small table in front of him were stacks of books, resource material for his search.

  Books about Regency England. And Lord Byron.

  And Lady Caroline Lamb.

  He folded the paper carefully and slipped it inside the cover of one of the books. He’d subjected the original to McTighe’s intense forensic scrutiny, and only a few days ago, he’d received the results—McTighe and his colleagues all agreed…it could have been written by Caroline Lamb.

  Armed with that knowledge, and a contract he’d negotiated with Coutt’s to appraise the entire contents of the house, he’d decided immediately to take up temporary residence at Dewhurst Manor. It was the most expedient manner in which he could accomplish his appraisal work, he’d explained to his banker friends, who had been pleased, or rather ecstatic, to learn that they might recover a great deal of their unpaid mortgage from the liquidation of the antiques in the house. Jeremy had generously offered his services, at no fee, in return for the contract to dispose of the inventory when it was evaluated and tallied properly. He could achieve this all quickly if he were able to work on the project undisturbed.

  He smiled. It was perfect. They had no clue as to the existence of the letter, and Jeremy felt no qualms at withholding that bit of information. After all, it really wasn’t any of their business. The letter belonged to him. And the property described in the letter didn’t belong to the bank either, as he saw it. It belonged to Lady Caroline. Or Lord Byron. Or the British Museum. Or…

  Finders keepers.

  Gina Useppi was the only one unhappy with the arrangement. She’d thought he was a legitimate prospect, and when she’d found out that all he wanted was access to the antiquities at Dewhurst, she’d made no attempt to conceal her contempt.

  Jeremy, however, deflected her ire, sweetening her disappointment with a large bouquet of deep red roses and an offer of a percentage of the profit after the goods were liquidated. Flowers and money. It was a time-honored tradition for placating women.

  So now, he was ensconced comfortably in the master suite of the old Tudor manor house, surrounded by an unprecedented profit potential and an equally tantalizing treasure hunt. The problem he faced at the moment was where to start.

  Jeremy thought back to the day Gina had given him a tour of the house, and to the letter’s vague description of where Byron’s memoirs might have been placed. If I were Lady Caroline looking for a hiding place in this house, where would I go? he asked himself. The place was rich with possibilities. But only one came quickly to mind.

  The wine cellar.

  Gina had revealed its secret compartments, and of course, he hadn’t seen a stash of old papers anywhere. But maybe there were more secret places. If not, he could at least begin his inventory with the dusty bottles that lay in the cool earthen-walled room. Maybe all the good wines had been sold or otherwise disposed of, but one never knew…

  Slipping on a heavy black pullover against the chill he knew lay outside the bedroom door, Jeremy picked up a notebook and pen, determined to go about this in his usual methodic way. Now if he could only remember how to get to the cellar.

  The rain had let up, although the sky remained overcast with the promise of more to come as Jeremy crept stealthily toward the cellar. He tried to ignore the eerie feeling that someone was watching his every move, not approving of his intrusion. He knew that was ridiculous, but he thought suddenly of the woman in the recurring erotic dreams he’d been having lately. The woman with the large eyes and seductive manner. Caro. Was Caroline’s spirit still around, peering over his shoulder?

  Nonsense.

  He laughed nervously, then walked straight into a thick curtain of cobwebs that stretched across the gloomy stairwell leading into the cellar that he’d somehow managed to avoid on his earlier visit. “Ugh!” He wiped his face and spit at the cottony fibers that clung to his mouth. Even though he made his living in the trade of things old and rare and often dusty, he despised this aspect of his business.

  Reaching the bottom of the stairs, however, he forgot about the cobwebs and the sensuous nightmares and focused on the target of his search. According to the letter, Caroline had purposefully secreted the authentic memoirs of Lord Byron here at Dewhurst Manor. From his studies of her history and personality, no place was more likely for her to be than the wine cellar. Cognac had been a favored and frequent friend after she’d lost Byron’s affection.

  He groped for the secret panel Gina had shown him, and when it gave way, found the hidden latch and released the door. Inside the Dutch room, he switched on the light, and his heart began to beat harder.

  With the chatelaine’s key to the wine cellar poised to gain access to the vault, Jeremy paused, certain he’d heard a noise overhead. A thump of sorts. Probably a tree limb hitting the roof, blown down by the storm. He inserted the key and heard the metal grating of the lock.

  He heard another thump. Then a series of thumps, somewhat louder. And then the distinct creak of a door opening.

  The hair on his arms stood up in spite of his conscious effort to control his unreasonable fear. He didn’t believe in ghosts or haunted houses. More than likely, the wind had blown a door open or a shutter loose. But he decided to investigate and put the matter to rest before continuing his quest.

  Retracing his steps, he reached
the Great Hall, but found nothing amiss. The front door was closed, and he heard nothing that sounded like shutters flapping in the wind. He let out a deep breath and scolded himself for behaving like a ninny. Get on with it, he thought, stepping backwards, not looking behind him, and running squarely into something that felt far more tangible than a ghost.

  “Aiiee!” An ear-splitting shriek echoed into the far corners of the Great Hall, and Jeremy nearly jumped out of his skin. He whirled around, his muscles tense, ready to flail his assailant, but to his astonishment, instead found his arms around a small, delectably feminine figure, with large—and familiar—golden hazel eyes.

  Chapter Five

  “It was when Childe Harold came out upon Lord Byron’s return from Greece that I first had the misfortune to be acquainted with him—at that time I was the happiest and gayest of human beings I do believe without exception…”

  Lady Caroline Lamb to biographer Thomas Medwin

  A smarter man would have left it alone after Caroline’s rebuff, but I was swept up in the idea that somehow this woman was different from all the rest, and therefore right for my own tormented soul, & so I pressed for a second meeting. I anticipated further Rejection, but my sudden and surprising longing for Caroline Lamb was greater than my fear. I need not have worried, however. When finally I received the touch of her little hand, I said, “This offer was made you the other day. May I ask why you declined it?” With that I turned on her the brooding “under-look” which I had worked to perfect in front of the mirror & which had won the Sympathy of many another young lady. She murmured something indistinguishable, but I noted with great satisfaction that her cheeks, normally pallid, were spotted with high pink. She gave me a slight, wavering smile, her large golden-brown eyes filled with adoration. I felt a swell in my bosom, and Hope knocked upon my heart’s door.