Barbara Metzger (17 page)

“But he didn’t?”

“The lieutenant could clean and load that rifle in his sleep, ma’am.”

“And you don’t think he killed himself?”

“No way. He and Mona was going to get married as soon as he could get leave. It was all he talked about. Fellow getting legshackled don’t up and shoot hisself.”

Senta thought of Lord Maitland and wondered if that was true. If he was desperate enough to end a marriage… “You say Lieutenant Morville loved this Mona?”

“As God is my witness. And then there was the Frenchy blunt they found in his billet. Well, it wasn’t there in the morning when I made up the bunk. They
made me swear not to talk about it and then they
made sure I was shipped off so I couldn’t ask any more questions.”

“So what do you think happened?” Senta asked.

Waters scratched his bald head. “Well, some turncoat gave away our position, that’s a pure fact. Then the rat framed Lieutenant Morville.”

“And…killed him?”

“He would of defended hisself, otherwise. Dead heroes don’t tell no tales. There were two fine London gents in camp the week of the battle, gambling and drinking with all the officers. My guess is one or both of them was the traitor. Now they’re out to blackmail Lord Maitland, on account of the brass letting him claim an accident with the gun.”

“Is that why Lord Maitland went to London, because someone was blackmailing him?” No wonder he was distracted!

Private Waters eyed her narrowly. “Didn’t he tell you what he was doing?”

“He, ah, didn’t want to worry me.”

“Well, you best worry. Iffen I miss my guess, one of those lying, cheating toffs is a murderer asides.”

Dear heaven, Lee was in danger! Senta looked toward Sir Parcival for help, but he was combing his hair in the little washstand mirror.

“Do you have any proof? Do you know their names? Their direction?”

“No, but Mona saw them and heard them talking about someone named Antoine. That’s a Frenchy name for sure. She was serving in the cantina at the time, and they didn’t know she could speak English. Don’t go thinking Mona’s just a tavern wench, like the colonel said, when she went to him with her suspicions. She was a right proper lady, but the war killed her family and she had to make her own way. She was working there just until she and the lieutenant could get hitched, so as they could have proper digs, not a tent in a muddy field.”

“I see, I think. But Mona doesn’t know the men’s names? Can she recognize them?”

“She could of, if his high-and-mighty lordship hadn’t gone off in a rant, begging your pardon, ma’am. Now he’s liable to stir up a real hornet’s nest, leading right back to Mona and me. So I’ll just go fetch her from that inn in your village, and we’ll be on our way.”

Private Waters quickly learned that Lady Maitland was nearly as hardheaded as her husband. She didn’t lock him up, but she took his wooden leg with her in the gig, to go fetch Mona.

“Then we’ll find you a safe place to stay until his lordship gets back and can listen.”

Waters spit out the door. “And pigs’ll fly.”

*

Mona was happy to leave the inn with Senta once she saw the peg leg. She’d been nervous there by herself, even with Private Waters’s wallet and pistol. She pulled the latter out of her wide black skirts, to Senta’s discomfort. In her imperfect English she made it quite plain that she would do anything she could to clear her lost love’s name and hold his murderers to account.

“I, Ramona Consuela las Flores y Vegas, I shall tear their hearts out with my bare hands,” the small, dark-haired woman swore, “the way they stole my
corazon
.”
Then she started to cry.

“Another weeping willow,” complained Sir Parcival. “Man, I can’t stand this.” He tried to put his arms around her. “That’s all right, Mona.” His arms went right through her, and she kept crying and shivering, until Senta suggested she go upstairs and gather her belongings.

When Mona returned, she wasn’t carrying bags and boxes; she had a baby in her arms.

Oh Lud, Senta was thinking, and the private said she was a lady. Lord Maitland wasn’t going to be happy about this. Wheatley wasn’t going to be happy about this. Her own mother would have kitten fits, if she ever
found out. Senta turned to Sir Parcival for some guidance. He was as happy as a grig, entranced by the infant who was gurgling up at him and reaching for his gold necklace. The babe seemed confused when her little hands couldn’t touch the glittery object. Senta was confused, too.

Sir Parcival shrugged. “It’s a female thing. And innocence.”

Innocence, which seemed to be in short supply on the Peninsula.

Mona raised her chin. “We were,
como se dice
,
promised? We were going to be married, my Miguel and I.” Shifting the baby to her shoulder, Mona reached into the bodice of her heavy black dress. She pulled out a chain. “Miguel, he said, ‘
Cara
,
until we can wed, wear my ring around your neck.’”

Senta recognized the Maitland family crest on the gold ring, a match to the one her husband wore constantly. Michael would not have parted lightly with his. Sir Parcival nodded.

Mona tucked the chain back out of sight. “But to wait, with the battles, the danger…” She shrugged. “Things are different with the army.”

“You can say that again, ma’am.”

The Spanish girl turned the baby in her arms. “He never got to see his daughter, but Miguel, he would have loved her very much. I named her Vida, for life. Vida Miguela las Hores y Vegas.”

“Vida las Flores? Vida las Vegas? Man, that almost sounds familiar.”

Mona smiled tenderly at the infant, while Senta scowled at Sir Parcival for fussing with his lost memory now. Unfortunately, Mona caught Senta’s look of disgust. She stared back defiantly. “If you cannot accept my
nia
, me and my Miguel’s love child, I will understand. This is not the thing for grand señoras, this I know. We can wait here for Private Waters. He is a good friend.”

“I’m sure he is, but my husband will want to make provision for his brother’s child.” Senta crossed her fingers behind her back. Maitland was so very proper. He already believed Mona was a mere camp follower. Heaven knew what he’d think if she sprang a baby from the wrong side of the blanket on him. “Besides, until we find the real traitors, you are not safe here alone.”

“But I am not alone. Private Waters left his dog here to guard me and Vida.” She handed the infant to Senta and went to fetch the animal.

“I had a dog once,” Sir Parcival reminisced while Senta jiggled the baby. “I’m sure of it.”

“Will you forget about remembering what you forgot!” Senta hissed. “We have to figure what to do with all of them.”

An old brindle bitch plodded at Mona’s side. “Her name is Sheba,” Mona told them.

“Old Sheba? Nah, that wasn’t it.”

*

There was a problem when they returned to fetch Private Waters. Senta had thought getting Maitland to accept Mona and Vida, and listen to Private Waters, was her big hurdle. She didn’t even consider what she was going to tell the staff at the Meadows to explain the unlikely trio. Quartet if you included Sheba, who was nothing like the sleek, well-fed foxhounds in his lordship’s kennels.

That wasn’t the problem, however. After a hurried conversation with the old soldier in Spanish, Mona refused to go to the Meadows.

“
Su
esposo
,
your husband, he believes my Miguel was a traitor.”

“That’s what the army told him. We have to help him prove otherwise. That’s why you came, isn’t it?”

“He called me
puta.
I will not sleep under his roof. We will stay here, in this little house.”

Senta didn’t bother saying that the cottage was as much Maitland’s as the Meadows was. “But the man he
sent to guard Private Waters will be back. He’ll lock him up and toss you out.”

Mona was adamant. “Me, I have slept on the ground before. We will camp in this forest until he begs my forgiveness, your so proud viscount.”

“But it’s cold!” Senta feared it might be a cold day in hell before Maitland took in a baseborn child and its unwed mother. “And you must think of the baby! January in England is not what you are used to in Spain.”

Private Waters scratched at his chin. “She’s right, and there are game wardens prowling about, and poachers, too. It ain’t safe. We can’t go back to that inn neither; the keep’s wife weren’t none too keen on babies, or foreigners, or young girls with no wedding ring, even if I did say you was my daughter-in-law. And getting hauled out of there oncet was enough, thankee.”

Senta did some quick thinking. “I know. There used to be a hermit living in a cave by the ornamental lake. It was all the rage in Lord Maitland’s mother’s time, he told me. But they couldn’t get anyone to take the position, to look picturesque, you know, until they built a snug dwelling at the back of the cave, with a fireplace and all. It’s still habitable. His lordship took me there before Christmas.”

Senta pretended to fuss with the baby’s blanket, to hide her blushes. They were supposed to be gathering holly and ivy to decorate the hall under the watchful chaperonage of Mama, two cousins, and an old aunt. Instead, the viscount had tugged her inside the cave for a quick kiss, their first.

“No one goes near there in winter, and it’s close enough to the house that I can come visit and bring whatever you need, just until Lord Maitland gets home and straightens everything out You’ll be warm and safe from prying eyes in the grotto.”

Sir Parcival looked up from making the baby coo with his humming. “In the grotto? You’re going to stash them in the grotto?”

* * *

Now all Senta had to do was explain to Wheatley how the footman’s visits to the cottage in the forest were no longer necessary. She did not want the stable hands and gardeners scouring the home woods for a one-legged soldier.

“About that small difficulty at the gamekeeper’s cottage,” Senta informed Wheatley, trying her hardest to imitate Lady Drummond-Burrell’s haughtiest tones. “I have taken care of matters myself.”

“And that troublesome report of a young foreign person in the village, with an infant?”

Lud, nothing got past Wheatley. “I have seen to that also. They have all left the countryside.”

Wheatley was relieved. Such hayey-cavey goings-on at the cottage were not what he was used to, and that other situation boded no good for anyone. With no directions from Lord Maitland, Wheatley had been at a stand: leave the young person in the village to generate heaven knew what rumors or insults, or incarcerate her with that other fellow, quite illegally. Let the young mistress deal with it. Lord Maitland would never have her pretty young head on a platter.

“I am going to want some baskets of food,” Senta told him, so he could notify the kitchens. “I noticed some of the tenants appeared to be in need.”

Wheatley nodded, as if Lord Maitland would ever let any of his people go hungry. He’d guess she had the ragtag group in the boathouse or the grotto. He’d have to warn the staff to keep their distance. Welladay, she’d make a viscountess yet.

*

So Senta saw her guests settled in, and sat back to wait for Lord Maitland’s return so she could surprise him with proof that his brother wasn’t a loose screw, just a tad impatient. What a surprise that would be! She waited for him, and waited…and cried herself to sleep.

Sir Parcival walked the halls of the Meadows night after night, echoes of Senta’s fallen teardrops jumbled in his head with all the confusion of places, people, poetry. He had no one to talk to when Senta slept. Out in the grotto the baby would gurgle for him, but she wasn’t much of a conversationalist, and her mama cried. He had no way to make things right for her, either. He was no closer to promoting anyone’s happiness or regaining his own memory.

With heavy heart, Sir Parcival went back to the slumbering soul in the suit of armor in the entry hall. “Are you lonesome too, knight?”

Chapter Six

Lord
Maitland did not come home that week. He was not going to come home the following week. Senta knew it in her heart, the same as she knew that if she wanted to save her marriage, she had to go to London. He couldn’t very well claim irreconcilable differences if they were living in the same house, could he? On the other hand, he would be so furious that she’d followed him to Town like a lost puppy that he might pack her up, bag and baggage, and ship her to her parents in Yorkshire, or some one of his far-flung holdings. Then she’d never get to prove to him that she hadn’t married him for his wealth and title.

But if she did travel to London, Lord Maitland might think she merely craved the parties and entertainments of Town life, that she couldn’t be content in the country. He’d think she’d spun her love of the rural life out of whole cloth, just to meet his requirements in a bride. When she’d told him how much she enjoyed smalltown living and bucolic pastimes like riding and gardening and observing nature, she hadn’t meant all by herself!

She also recalled blushing when the viscount had asked if she liked children. What did it matter that she
adored babies, if she was never to have one of her own? Tiny Vida was precious, but she was Mona’s baby. Maitland wasn’t about to beget his heir by wishful thinking…if he still considered Senta a fit mother to his children. How could she stand his telling her not, face-to-face? No, she’d better wait here and hope he came to his senses. Perhaps a letter?