Beauty and the Duke (24 page)

Last week, she had written to Joseph and Amelia and asked them to come to Scotland. Joseph Darlington had been a decent geologist before he’d specialized
in paleontology under her father’s tutelage. Tenting her hand over her eyes, she peered at the distant crags. If she had to share her dragon, then she would have it be with Joseph if it meant answers. She had not found one fossil.

Not one.

“
You can only want one thing most in the world
.”

Looking up at the sky, she mounted. Today was a clear blue so bright the sun hurt her eyes. She adjusted her hat and nudged Miss Pippen forward with the heels of her boots. In no great hurry, the horse walked out of the yard, and only after they had reached the stone gate did the old mare pick up her pace.

“Miss Pippen might be a dawdler, mum,” Hampton said. “But she be of sturdy stock. There be nothing wrong with sturdy stock.”

The equipment she’d bundled in a knapsack and tied to the back of the cantle rattled with the choppy gait almost as loudly as her teeth did.

She had spent two hours last night grooming the mare Erik had given her, but she had not been able to make herself ride the beautiful horse. It was just a horse, after all, she’d told herself. Christine smoothed the aged woolen cloth of her skirts. Besides, she was more like Miss Pippen than the delicate mare. Hardy.

“There be a crew up on the high road again,” Hampton said. “We might want to bypass.”

“I thought Hodges told Lord Sedgwick the road had been repaired.”

“Hodges thought at first someone be makin’ the potholes mottling the road, but now he does not think so. There are more of them than before. He is recommending closin’ the road permanently.”

“More potholes?”

Christine reined in Miss Pippen and pulled out her map. The road connected to the drover trail and sat between the waterfall and the cliffs. She’d already surveyed the area where the carriage accident had occurred, but that was shortly after the road had already been repaired. Her heart began to thump.

Time and man had carved the high road over the crags. It would not take as long for rushing water to carve through weaker substrata beneath. Water flows toward the area of least resistance. Perhaps the reason why no more fossils had been washing up on the riverbanks was because the water had already eroded and perhaps expanded the lava tube enough, thus minimizing the powerful ebb and flow of water against the walls. Yet with expansion…

“Did Hodges say what is causing the abundance of new potholes?”

“He thinks there could be a sinkhole beneath. That’s why he called back Bailey, mum. Hodges already sent a message to his grace in Dunfermline to inform him.”

Another rider suddenly approached. Christine returned the map to her knapsack as Hampton moved slightly in front of her. She let him, as he was single-mindedly devoted to protecting her from all threats, seen as well as imagined.

“It be Lord John Maxwell,” Hampton said.

Indeed it was. Christine tipped back her hat and awaited the miscreant’s approach. He looked handsome atop a sleek bay hunter. He might sit a horse well and look distinguished in black. He might even resemble Erik from a distance, but there was nothing about him she liked. Today he was without his sister, Lara.

Reigning in his horse, he tipped his hat, his eyes a deep cobalt blue beneath the narrow rim. “Lady Sedgwick. How fortuitous that we meet again.”

Johnny Maxwell might be related to Erik by marriage and even be some distant cousin by blood, but the man was no relative of hers. She was not required to be polite. “Considering you are on Sedgwick land, I do not find it
fortuitous
at all,” she replied.

He feigned injury. “You are still offended over my comment at the festivities,” he said. “I would hope you know they were not aimed at you.”

“Your barb was indeed aimed directly at me, sir. It just didn’t have the result you wanted.”

Maxwell rubbed his chin. “You think not?”

“Why are you here?” she asked. Maxwell must have known that Erik was not here.

Maxwell looked around him. “I’ve been informed you have been digging near the falls.”

“Have you now? Considering only a few people know that, I’m rather curious to learn how you came about that information and found me.”

“If I tell you, will you allow me to accompany you?”

She could not believe he had the audacity to ask. “I would not.”

“May I inquire then, what are you searching for up at the falls? Rumors say you are a hobbyist fossil collector looking for the great winged Sedgwick beast. Me? I think you are searching for my sister, and I would ask to be included in that search, too. I want to know what you know.”

Christine did not intend to allow him anywhere near her search. “Then you are not one of those who believe Lady Elizabeth is still alive, haunting these crags and
sending a grief-stricken parent letters?”

“I am one of those who believe your husband had much to do with her demise. Maybe you are just a little curious, too. I wouldn’t be surprised if he isn’t the bastard who sent that most recent letter to my father to throw the scent off his back. My father is in frail health.”

“How fortuitous for you then, since you will be next in line for the duchy.”

Maxwell’s eyes narrowed. “Perhaps if Sedgwick had been more generous to my family, his grace would not be in the predicament he is in now.” Maxwell leaned forward. “By generous, I mean kinder to an old man who wants to know his granddaughter. You want the real beast of Sedgwick, look no farther than your bed, sweetling.”

Christine’s hand tightened on the quirt. “You may go, Lord John.”

“Or what? Hampton will throw me off precious Sedgwick land?”

“Your rank may forbid Hampton from laying a hand on you, but it will not stop me. Or Hampton from defending me should you attempt to strike me back.”

Eying her quirt, he laughed. “I believe you
would
strike me.” Grinning, Maxwell leaned a forearm on his thigh and said, “Since you are about to find yourself out of matrimony, I believe I might decide to court you myself.” He laughed and swung his horse around. “Even if you are an odd one, your grace.”

She hated that his words made her flinch.
Out of matrimony.

Watching Lord John ride away, she frowned. “Have you told anyone what I am doing in these hills, Hampton?”

He blanched. “I would never say anything, mum.”

She reined around Miss Pippen to head back to the stable. “I think I will postpone our outing until later today.”

“Where is Lady Rebecca?” Christine asked Becca’s maid, catching the girl belowstairs.

Christine had left the stables and gone directly to Becca’s chambers. When she found the door locked and no answer to her summons, she went to the dining room. No one had seen her since yesterday evening.

Becca’s young maid folded her hands nervously in front of her. “Mrs. Brown told me I was not to disturb her, mum.”

“Does Mrs. Brown often give you these dictums to leave her alone?”

“Only when Lady Rebecca awakens in the night with one of her nightmares, mum. They have become more frequent of late.”

“I don’t understand. Does his grace know she suffers these afflictions?”

“The doctors wanted to put her into an asylum but he would not allow it.”

“Find a key and open the door.”

Wide-eyed, the girl bobbed. “Yes, mum. Follow me.”

Boris was standing outside the door when Christine arrived with the key. “Mrs. Brown was concerned you would awaken Lady Rebecca, your grace,” he said. “It is always better after an episode that she sleep. She has been asking for her mother, mum. All day she has been asking. She has only just now returned to sleep.”

Christine chewed on her lower lip. “What is wrong with Becca, Boris?”

He shook his head. “The nightmares began shortly after Lady Elizabeth’s disappearance. She never remem
bers waking up or sleepwalking.”

Erik had once told her his sister had been the last one to see Lady Elizabeth alive. “What did Becca see that night, Boris?”

Boris looked uncomfortable. “You will have to ask his grace, mum.”

T
hree days later Erik returned. Christine had just come down from the hills when she saw the Sedgwick coach in the carriage yard. The horses had already been led away to the stables, and men carrying buckets of soapy water were scrubbing the wheels and doors.

“He arrived home a half hour ago, mum,” one of the livery boys told her as she slid off Miss Pippen’s back and dropped to the ground.

Erik was home!

A moment later, Christine was rounding the third floor in the tower, slowing as she peered up the stairwell. She gathered her skirts and took the final flight of stairs. At the top-floor landing, she walked to the doorway opening into the bedroom. Only then did she dare pause and catch her breath. Whether from her exertion or seeing Erik, her heart thudded in her chest.

He stood in the middle of the master’s suites, his hands at his side as he turned in a slow circle. He still wore his cloak and gloves as if he had come up here almost at once upon arriving. Holding her breath, she watched the play of his expression in the light filtering through the leaded windows, waiting for him to see her. Her hand stripped the scarf from her hair…and suddenly she was looking into his face.

Before she could dwell on the weight against her heart, she said, “I hope you do not mind the changes I have made up here.”

She hurried to stand before the bed and brushed her hands over the emerald velvet draperies. “These were in another bedroom in another part of the castle. We painted the walls. Have you been upstairs? The shelves are repaired. New glass for the cabinetry will be installed next week. We had to send out to St. Andrews for a suitable glassmaker. You have your room back.” She began to run out of things to say to fill the void she knew would follow in the silence. And then he would tell her what happened in Dunfermline.

He came two steps nearer. She took a step backward.

“Christine—”

“Don’t say it, Erik. Do not come up here to my tower and tell me that with all your wealth and riches you could not buy us a reprieve.”

Amusement softened his eyes. “
Your
tower, is it now?”

“You gave it to me.” She scrubbed the heel of her hand against each cheek. “You said I could have it to do as I would. So now I have it and it’s mine.”

As you are mine
.

“And I will not relinquish it.”

He withdrew a handkerchief from inside his cloak. “What have I told you about wiping your nose on your sleeve?”

She snatched the lacy cloth from his gloved hand and glared at him. “Do not lecture to me about my lack of decorum. I…”

He pulled her into his arms, and with his hand, he pressed her cheek against his shoulder. His cloak cocooned her against him, and there she remained, unable to say anything more.

“I do not believe I have ever had anyone fight for me that I did not well pay for the service.” He pressed his lips against her hair. “You honor me.”

She held her wet nose against his waistcoat. “You
have
paid me. You gave me this tower.”

His chest vibrated against her forehead. After a moment, he said, “It is beautiful up here. I had forgotten.”

The windows looked toward the distant crags. Piercing sunlight created a flawlessly blue sky, perfect in every way. She could see for miles. “I would have you live up here with me, Erik.”

His hand framed her cheek as he lifted her face. Before she could breathe or whisper his name, his mouth was on hers. He kissed her with infinite gentleness. She could feel the solid beat of his heart against her palm. He pressed his lips to her hair. “I’m sorry you have been through hell over this,” he said. “If I were anyone else, our marriage would not have been an issue. But because of who I am—”

“You are no longer my husband.”

His mouth moved across her temple. “I am your husband in every way, Christine.”

“Oh, God, Erik.” Her knees nearly gave out. “You have no idea how I have worried over this issue. Why didn’t you tell me the moment I walked in here?”

He lowered his arms and walked to the window. He braced his palms on the sill. “A hundred people have sworn they have seen her, Christine. I read eighteen witness depositions from the past few months alone. These were journeymen, tenants, ordinary people who
swore
on a Bible that they had seen her in the hills between here and St. Andrews. I saw the letter written to her father that said she was alive and happy and that he
should no longer worry for her. It was her handwriting. Lord Eyre truly believes Elizabeth lives.”

“What do you believe?”

“I believe the Maxwell clan will soon learn a hard and costly lesson about the follies of waging a war with me.”

“That is not what I asked.”

He slowly turned his head. Christine saw the flash of pain in his eyes and knew she could not possibly understand what it must feel like, blaming yourself for some horrible tragedy that might have been prevented had you
just
done something, anything, differently. Finding Elizabeth alive could take away that guilt and pain inside him. “Are you truly beginning to question this yourself?” she asked.

“The fact remains that despite the legal inconsistencies regarding her date of disappearance, she
has
been absent seven years and is not my wife any longer.”

She laid her hand on his arm. “If the letter is a hoax, then it must also be aimed at Elizabeth’s father. Have you considered that? What could anyone hope to gain by that manner of cruelty, Erik?”

“Robert and Johnny Maxwell are the only two who have anything to lose should you conceive my heir. They need our marriage nullified.”

Still, the pieces did not fit. “No one can expect you to remain bound forever to a ghost. What can the person who perpetuated such a hoax expect to happen in the next few months to change anything?”

“I believe I am expected to die in the next few weeks, madam.”

Christine gasped. Erik pulled her into his arms. “Ah, love, it is not my intent to make light of the curse. I do not want you hurt by this.” He framed her
face with his hands. “But even if I could go back and change the past few months…I would not do anything differently.”

“I am relieved to hear that.” She dabbed the handkerchief at her nose. Her chin tilted. “We are partners, Erik. I am not going to allow anyone to run me away from here. I think it is time we bring Aunt Sophie into the fold. She is an anthropologist. I want her to examine the human jaw bone and teeth you found last spring. Let us make sure. She has been saying it might be time for her to go. This will be a reason for her to stay.”

Pausing, she gnawed at her lower lip. “I also wrote to Mr. Darlington and Amelia and asked them to come here.” A smile trembled on her mouth. “If Elizabeth is out there, we’ll find her and the answers you seek. I promise.”

Erik shook his head but whether in disbelief or amazement, Christine did not know. Yet, suddenly the world seemed less bleak than it had when she climbed the stairs to the tower, barging in like Attila the Hun prepared to do battle on his behalf. He wrapped her in his arms, so close that she found herself no longer afraid.

“You honor me, Christine. I…I do not know what to say.”

“I love you” would be a start.

I love you would be a beginning.

“Da!”

Erin’s voice came from the stairwell.

Erik stepped away from Christine. His daughter’s blond head appeared in the stairwell, then suddenly she was standing in the doorway. Wearing a red dress and white pinafore, her face lit with a smile. “Da!” she ran across the room and flung herself into her father’s arms.

Her nurse huffed up the stairs. “Lady Erin!” Her face red with exertion, Mrs. Whitman caught her hand on the door. “I am sorry, your grace. The lass heard ye had come home and couldna’ wait to see ye.”

Erin wrapped her arms around her father’s neck. He picked a cobweb out of her hair. “And where have you been playing this morning?”

“She has been following the dreadful cat, running through the servants’ corridors. We found her in the kitchens again.”

Erik tipped his daughter’s chin. Then peered over at Christine. “Your cat is a bad influence, madam.”

Mrs. Whitman cleared her throat. “Boris is downstairs waiting for you. Mr. Hodges is here. Since I was on my way up, I said I would inform you.”

Still holding his daughter, he walked to the doorway. “Tell my sister I am back and would have her join me later for lunch.”

Mrs. Whitman cast a brief glance at Christine. No doubt expecting Christine to be the first one to tell Erik his sister was in the village with her mother. Christine knew in her heart she needed to tell him about Becca.

But first, she had something else important. “Mr. Hodges is here about the road, Erik. That is where I have been the last few days. We found something.”

“Do you want to tell me what we are looking for?” Erik’s voice came at Christine from the ledge above.

She tented her hands over her eyes. “Take the rope,” she suggested. “I’ve latched it to a solid root. It will hold your weight.”

He worked his way down the slope. “And if it does not?”

She looked over the ledge at the river twenty feet below. Fast white water spumed up against the slimy
face of the rock. “Then you will end up down there. Though it does not look too deep, it does lead to the waterfall.”

They’d left their horses tied to the lower branch of a tree, and tramping through newly leafed oakbrush, walked down the hillside to where part of the rock face had slipped away into a river below. Shreds of talus rattled beneath his steps. She looked over her shoulder just before she moved lower on the slope.

She had been taking him along the rift in the road toward the sound of the waterfall. Two days ago, Christine had taken one look at the cracks in the now impassable road and recognized that more than the most recent spate of storms caused the damage. She stood and followed the narrow rim until she had found what she was looking for and sat. The evening air was cooler near the river.

Erik suddenly dropped down on the ledge beside her, sending scree over the edge. “Lord, Christine—”

“Look here.” She pointed to a slim crevice in the rocks on her right.

He leaned around her. “What am I looking at?”

“A
cavern,
Erik.”

He gave her a skeptical look. “If that is a cavern, then it is the bloodiest smallest cavern I have ever seen.”

“Put your hand over this place here.”

She helped him remove his glove, edging his hand across her lap to reach the crack. She knew he felt what she had felt, a strong draft, which meant air entered from some other access, picking up speed and strength as it funneled into the narrow crevices seeking an escape, much in the way air escaped from a hole in a hot-air balloon, following the path of least resistance.

They were a quarter mile from the cliffs and ancient drover trails she had been working around these past
weeks. Now more convinced than ever a lava tube of some sort interconnected this entire area, she felt the excitement in her voice as she spoke, despite the grimness of the news. “A fissure has appeared since your crew repaired the road.”

He scooped up a handful of scree in his gloved hand, letting it slide through his fingers. She knew a visual inspection of the road had been performed before he’d left for Dunfermline. “Fractures must have been present deeper down in the rock. If I were a bird, I could look down upon this entire region and give you a more thorough assessment.”

He slung away the dirt. “Are you bloody telling me we might have some geological disaster in the making?”

“No. But this area is part of old volcanic terrain. Fissures have probably been present long before water began threading through these cliffs. This kind of rock formation is ideal for an underground aquifer that has probably been feeding the loch for eons. My guess is that the railroad opened something akin to a dam. The pressure has leveled off in recent months, but not before doing damage. The only thing we can know for sure is that there is a cavern beneath us.”

She turned to assess his silence and found him looking down at the river. The river fed the waterfall. “I have already looked in the area behind the falls,” she said. “There is no cave entrance.”

“Is this entire area in danger of collapsing?” he asked.

“From what you have told me, some of it already has.”

He swore, then lay back against the incline. She joined him. Shoulder to shoulder they both stared up at the sky. He didn’t speak for a long time. Then he turned and rose on his elbow. A cloud smothered what
remained of the sunlight passing over them. “What happened to Becca while I was gone?” he asked. “I saw the look Mrs. Whitman gave you.”

“Becca is suffering nightmares. Mrs. Brown spent two days with her.”

Erik sat up. The skin across his cheekbones seemed to grow taut. His wrist laid across his knee, he looked away. She pushed herself up. “You once told me your sister was the last to see Elizabeth alive. What did Becca see the night Elizabeth vanished?”

Shaking his head, he studied his hand. “I can only conclude she saw me arguing with Elizabeth. I can’t explain what else Becca saw or didn’t see that night for she has never spoken of it. She was young and the doctors feel the entire ordeal traumatized her. My sister has always believed in my innocence, but at a great cost, I fear.”

Christine brought his hand to her cheek and wanted desperately to tell him everything else. “Erik…”

Talus suddenly trickled down the slope from above them. Christine looked up and saw movement among the trees. Then it was gone. Beside her, Erik had not moved. “Your men must be walking around wondering what has happened to you,” she said. “We should probably be starting back.”

Erik stopped her as she reached for the rope. “Wait. I sent my men back already. No one should be up there.”

Christine’s hand froze on the rope. “Maybe one of the horses has got loose.”

He jerked the rope taut as if testing it. It held. He tugged again.

“Erik…”

“Wait here.”

“I will
not
. Are you armed?”