Dawn Thompson (6 page)

“It is settled then.”

She nodded. It was a reluctant nod, but a nod nonetheless, and at this point, he would take whatever he could get. There was more that needed to be addressed, however.

“Once your feet are sufficiently mended, I would like
you to join me downstairs for your meals. No, wait! I have valid reasons. It will give Grace and Amy a breather. This house is short staffed, Miss Applegate. My servants will do all in their power to accommodate you, but carrying food trays up and down stairs three times a day will be difficult. Grace is in her seventies, and she suffers from rheumatism. I would take it as a kindness if you would ease her burden. Breakfast and luncheon are served in the breakfast room. Dinner is served in the dining parlor.” She made no reply, and he went on quickly. “I must insist that you not prowl the house unattended. The Abbey is old, and much of it is in need of repair. I would not want to see you do yourself a mischief.” This, of course, was a half truth. His uneasiness in regard to the coachman and the strangeness that had begun to come over him were at the root of his warning. “There is one more thing,” he said. “When you speak with the coachman, I will be present.”

She was about to speak, when Grace appeared in the open doorway and made her presence known by clearing her throat.

“Evidently I did not make myself plain earlier, Grace,” he said, “when I said Miss Applegate was not to be left unattended.”

“I had ta take the tray down, sir,” the woman defended.

“Yes, well, see that Jonathan brings a cot up to the dressing room for Amy. She will serve as Miss Applegate’s abigail while she is in residence. And in the future, one of you must be at hand here
at all times.
I do not care if the trays pile up to the ceiling. Is that clear?”

“Y-yes, sir,” said the housekeeper, her owlish eyes fixed upon his bloodied brow. It looked even worse now that the blood was drying.

“Good!” he responded, turning away. “I shall speak
with Amy. Carry on, and remember: either you or she must be in attendance in this suite at all times.”

He quit the room without a backward glance, wondering what had made the Applegate girl so distrustful of men. It had to be something to do with the young knave in the coach on the moor—Clement was the name she had said. Why was there no remorse, no tears at his demise—or her father’s either for that matter? Her scent threaded through his nostrils: lemon verbena and roses. It suited her. She was not unlike the rose, velvety soft and fragrant, inviting a man to touch if he dared brave the needle-sharp thorns that kept him at his distance.

There was no denying that Joss was attracted to her, and curious, and possessed of a fierce urge to protect her despite her obvious ability to take care of herself. That, he knew, was a brave front, and if it was the last thing he did, he was going to prove himself worthy of her trust.

Puffing on a cheroot, Joss paced before the study hearth. Cora hadn’t come down to nuncheon. He hadn’t expected that she would; it was too soon. She was justified in being incredulous over one thing—disrespect of the dead. He might not be able to dig the coach out of the drifts in order to move it, but he could certainly fetch the bodies back to the Abbey, where at least they would be safe from desecration at the mercy of wild dogs. There was an old sledge in the stables. He couldn’t recall the last time it was put to use. He would take Sikes with him. Aside from needing help with the bodies, he wasn’t about to leave Cora Applegate and the coachman alone in the same house with naught but two feeble servants and a simple-minded maid-cum-abigail in attendance.

He yanked the bellpull to summon Bates. When the butler arrived, Joss closed the study door and faced him.

“Bates, have you kept an eye on the coachman as I asked?” he said.

“Aye, sir, I have. A mite talkative, but otherwise he’s been no trouble.”

“Good. I am taking him with me this afternoon to collect the bodies from the coach on the moor. It should have been done long ago. We need to fetch them before the wild dogs return. One of them is Miss Applegate’s father.”

“Beggin’ your pardon, sir, but you’re outta your head goin’ way out there in this. It’s a regular whiteout. You’ll lose your way.”

“Trust me not to do that,” said Joss. “I’m taking the sledge. I cannot leave Sikes here—not after finding him prowling about the yellow suite right under Grace’s nose. Besides, I will need help with the bodies. They will be frozen stiff by now, and likely buried under a mountain of snow in that coach. The door was flung wide. That’s how the dog got in that I prevented from savaging her before.”

The butler shook his head. “Who’ll we send ta fetch you, when ya get bogged down yourself?” he said. “If your father was here—”

“Well, he isn’t,” Joss said, “and I shan’t get lost. What I need from you in my absence is to look sharp, keep the doors bolted shut, and let no one in.
No one,
Bates . . . not even an animal, should one present itself on the doorstep.”

The butler swayed as if he’d been struck, and his weathered skin turned as white as the snow frosting the study windows. He seemed to shudder visibly, and Joss took a step toward him.

“Are you unwell, Bates?” he said, reaching out toward the butler.

Bates swallowed audibly. “N-no, sir,” he said.

“What then?”

“ ’Tis only, what ya said just now, sir . . . Your good father said them same words ta me before he went off abroad before you was born. It gave me the creeps, it did, sir, is all. . . .”

“That reminds me,” Joss said, scowling. “We need to talk when I return. I wanted Sikes out of the house before I broached the subject with you, but that may not be possible now. ’Tis about Father, and Mother, too, come down to it. About what happened to them, and what might be happening to me.”

“S-sir?”

“Do not play the idiot with me, Bates,” Joss warned. “You know exactly what I mean, and my very life could well depend upon it.”

“A-aye, sir,” the butler said. “I pray not, sir.”

“As do I, Bates, as do I. But in their absence, I must have my answers from you.”

“As you say, sir.”

“Good! Now go and fetch Sikes. Where is he?”

“He’s napping, sir.”

“
Napping,
at this hour? Well, go and wake him. Tell him to dress warmly and meet me in the stables straightaway.”

Bates loped off with a nod and a grunt, dragging his lame leg, clearly glad to escape, and within the hour the sledge was gliding over the snow with Joss at the reins and Sikes bundled head to toe beside him, scowling.

“I don’t credit the press,” the coachman growled from beneath his muffler. “The dead could stay as they lay until the thaw. They shall have to anyway. What matter if they do so here? It isn’t as if we can bury them with all this snow.”

“It will be up to Miss Applegate where they are to be buried. Meanwhile, we cannot leave them thus for the dogs to devour. I should have come back for them at once.” The coachman passed a grunt, and burrowed down beneath the carriage robe, his eyes shuttered against the stinging snow.

“Bates tells me you were napping. Do you always nap after nuncheon?”

“ ’Tis a habit of mine,” Sikes drawled. “I’m not at my most powerful during the day—too many night runs.”

“Well, I’m sorry to have roused you from your nice warm bed, but it couldn’t be helped.”

“ ’Tis not fit out for man nor beast to rescue the living, let alone the dead,” the coachman grumbled.

“I shall turn ’round and take you back, if you like, but you’ll wait in the stables until I return.” It was a gamble, but there was more than one purpose to this mission. Joss was looking for a reaction. By the look of the coachman’s narrowed eyes—like two black obsidians trained upon him with what could only be described as venom—it was plain he was about to succeed.

“Why the stables?” Sikes said.

“Because I’ve given Bates instructions not to admit anyone in my absence—not
anyone
—‘man nor beast,’ as you say, unless they are with me.”

“Why on earth would you give such a command? You let
me
in readily enough, when I darkened your door.”

“So I did,” Joss said, raising his voice above the wind. “But that was then and this is now, Sikes. What shall it be . . . do I turn ’round, or press on?” It
was
a dreadful day to be abroad on such a mission; the man’s reaction thus far was normal enough, but still . . .

The coachman heaved a blustery sigh. “There’s nothing
for it now,” he complained. “But I still don’t see why you need me for this.”

“To help me lift the bodies, man. They are surely frozen stiff.” Joss urged the horses on with the buggy whip; their stamina had started to flag. “Who else had I to bring? Bates is far too old, and so is Otis, my stabler, and my footman is too frail. We are understaffed at Whitebriar Abbey at present. Besides, it is your coach after all; you should have a hand in its recovery.”

The coachman shrugged. “I’ve written the coach off,” he said. “By the time the elements have had their way with it, it shan’t be fit for use again.”

The drifting snow had changed the face of the landscape so severely Joss was hard pressed to stay on course. Mercifully, the coachman fell silent, though more than once Joss caught him staring at the gash on his brow. His beaver hat didn’t quite cover the ragged wound the broken pitcher had made from his scalp to the middle of his forehead over his right eye. The brim of the hat rubbing against the wound had broken it open again, and fresh blood had begun to ooze. The air was so cold he hadn’t felt it until the blood threatened his eyebrow.

“Is something amiss?” he asked the coachman, catching him staring.

“Perhaps it is I who should ask that of you, sir,” Sikes replied, nodding toward the wound.

Joss wrinkled his brow and looked up, wincing. “Oh, this?” he said. “A piece of crockery fell from a shelf. I didn’t step out of the way in time. It’s nothing.”

“Mmm,” the coachman grunted. Burrowing his tall frame deeper in the fur robe, he closed his eyes and said no more.

Half an hour later, a large mound of snow rose up to meet them. The carriage was completely buried. Joss had nearly passed it by, thinking it a boulder. He reined the horses in, tied off the ribbons and nudged the coachman awake.

“We are here,” he said, “and there isn’t much time. The sun is descending. We will lose the light soon.”

The coachman yawned and stretched awake. Joss lifted the shovels from the back of the sledge and thrust one toward Sikes. “Free the boot,” he said, “Miss Applegate’s traveling bags are inside. Then see if you can open the other door. The coach is filled with snow. It will go faster if we shovel from both sides.”

The coachman nodded, and began shoveling snow from the back of the carriage, while Joss began shoveling out the inside of the coach through the wide-flung door. The latch on the boot was frozen shut, and it took several blows of the shovel to crack the ice, and more than one body slam to loosen the crust that had formed around the edge before it opened.

“Which are Miss Applegate’s?” the coachman called over the howl of the wind.

Joss stopped shoveling and stared at the man. “You are asking
me
?” he said. “You loaded them, Sikes. How would I know?”

“Yes, yes, of course,” the coachman said. “I load so many bags I tend not to notice anymore. They all look alike to me.”

“Take them all, then,” Joss charged. “Load them in the sledge, and start on that other door. The sun is setting!”

Thanking Divine Providence that he’d thought to bring a carriage lamp, Joss unhooked it from its bracket on the sledge, propped it in the snow nearby and began shoveling like a man possessed. The coachman’s shovel
thrusts on the other side grew sluggish, and the twilight was overtaking them. Joss called out to the man several times, but Sikes’s mumblings grew fewer as time passed, and finally ceased altogether.

“Put your back into it, man!” Joss shouted. “We cannot both shovel from the same side.”

“I’m doing my best,” the coachman said.

Joss stopped asking. He heard no more shovel thrusts from the other side of the coach, though Sikes’s grunts continued for a time. Joss scarcely noticed. He’d cleared the seats, but there were no bodies on them.
They must have fallen back on the floor,
he decided, directing his attention there. Shovelful after shovelful flew over his shoulder. He should be unearthing bodies now. Instead, his shovel scraped the carriage bottom. Frantically he scraped the snow away, exposing the bare wood planking. Tossing the shovel down, he snatched the lantern and thrust it inside. The squabs were still caked with snow, and some still remained in the corners, but the carriage was empty. The bodies were gone.

Joss staggered back from the coach, his eyes wide, the thin layer of remaining snow tinted pink with the blood of the victims that had lain there.

“Sikes!” he hollered. “Leave that and come here!” Silence. “Sikes? Damn it, man, wake up! Come and look at this!”

Silence.

Cursing the air blue, Joss plowed through the snow to the other side of the carriage, only to pull up short. Sikes’s shovel lay discarded in the snow alongside a pile of clothing still warm from the coachman’s body heat. Joss snaked Sikes’s long red traveling scarf out of the mix, his head snapping in all directions in search of the
coachman. There was no sign of him—not even a footprint. He took a closer look. Animal tracks! A dog? A long plaintive howl lingering on the wind corrected him. No, not a dog; a wolf. He ought to know: It was the same as his own wolf howl.

Cold chills that had nothing to do with the storm raced the length of Joss’s spine.
Vampir.
The dreaded word too horrible to speak but in hushed whispers since he was a child—what his mother and father were, and what he feared he was becoming. Sikes was a vampire, and Joss had let him into the Abbey!

His mind reeled back to the night he’d found the coach, to the image of the dog that had savaged the passengers inside—all except Cora Applegate. Only, it wasn’t a dog at all, it was a wolf. Could it have been Sikes, and he was still after her? Could that be why he’d been in her apartments?