Heart Burn (2 page)

"Will you go swimming with me later?" he asked.

"I don't know if I should. We were spotted yesterday."

"Don't worry about Mrs. Moore," he said, referring to the housekeeper. "She's very discreet. That's why August likes her."

"Yes, but how long will it be until someone else sees? Someone less discreet."

Some of the good humor left his eyes, revealing the turbulence that I was more familiar with. "Are you…?" He swallowed. "Are you regretting our liaisons in the lake?"

"Not at all." I leaned forward. My fingers itched to touch him, but I held back. I would have to convince him with words. "I regret nothing. I know some consider our kisses shameful, but I do not. I look forward to meeting you in the lake more than anything."

His chest expanded with his deep breath. He stared back at me, his intense gaze seeing all the way through to my soul. The corners of his lips inched up in a small, relieved smile.

"I'm mindful of maintaining a sense of propriety," I said to fill the thick silence. "It's important to Sylvia and Langley. I don't want to give him any cause to send me away." Not only would I have nowhere to go, but I was dependent upon him to find a cure. I was dependent upon him for a great many things.

"He wouldn't do that," Jack said, but he nodded in understanding. I knew he wouldn't pressure me. "Hannah, if things were different, if you and I could touch, I would take you—"

"Don't, Jack. Please." I held up my hands for him to stop. "Not now."

Whether he was about to say he would take me as his wife or lover, I didn't want to know. Our future together could be wonderful. I knew that with deep certainty, but I had doubts as to whether I had a future at all. Making plans only saddened me, and I didn't want to spend what few weeks I had left wallowing in self-pity. I wanted to live my life as best as I could in the time I had left, and regret nothing when the end came.

"Perhaps we could go to the lake at night," I said, pushing my melancholy thoughts away.

He smiled, but it didn't reach his eyes. My dislike of discussing the future bothered him. Many times he'd wanted to make plans together, as if a cure was a certainty. But Langley had given us no such hope. I couldn't pretend, so I tried to ignore the future all together.

"I'd like that," he said. "Like it very much."

"Tonight then." I looked out the window and realized we'd slowed for the approach into Harborough. The shops along High Street came into view. Few people were out in the freezing cold. The small shops huddled together for warmth and company beneath the gray, cheerless sky. I scanned the area for Reuben Tate, but saw no sign of him. Not that I expected to. He knew he could not abduct me while Jack was near. Tate was much too weak.

We turned a few corners and finally stopped outside a row of cottages with no front porches or yards. They were all joined together under a single roof, the brickwork a little crooked in places as if they'd been quickly laid. They seemed deserted, but perhaps that was because everybody was either elsewhere or inside. Younger children would be at school, husbands and older children at work and wives in the kitchen.

We knocked and waited. I was afraid Mrs. Mott wouldn't answer. She might be in a state of despair, or perhaps not home, although there was also the chance that she'd seen our arrival and wasn't answering. Some of the villagers avoided us at all costs, preferring to cross the muddy road than pass by the residents of Freak House.

Eventually the door opened, and I was relieved to see that she was neither terrified of us nor in the depths of despair. I'd been impressed by her composure at Mr. Mott's funeral. Her face had been stoic, her posture upright as she comforted her children. I did wonder if her lack of tears stemmed more from an acceptance of the hardship of her life rather than bravery.

The Motts were a part of that class that Sylvia did her best to ignore. They lived cheek by jowl in the cottages, wore ragged clothes, and scratched out a living in whatever way they could. I was suddenly very glad Jack had set Mrs. Mott up with an annuity until she remarried. Since her husband's death had occurred at Frakingham while he was employed to restore it, Jack felt somewhat responsible. 

"Miss Smith! Mr. Langley! What a surprise." Mrs. Mott gave us a sad smile and opened the door wider. She was a tiny woman of indeterminate middle age. The bones in her face were sharp, the skin stretched tightly over cheeks and jaw. Small but pronounced wrinkles underscored her eyes. She seemed genuinely pleased to see us. Perhaps that was because Jack, as manager of August Langley's estate, was now her benefactor.

"Come in out of the cold before you catch your…" She swallowed, and her eyes dulled. "Well, come in."

She accepted the basket of pies, preserves and canned soup I'd brought with profuse thanks and led us to the front room. A fire burned in the grate, throwing out enough heat to make me feel like I was suffocating in the small parlor. A chair sat close to the hearth, a piece of brown woolen fabric on the seat and a sewing basket on the floor beside it. Mrs. Mott scooped up the fabric, but not before I saw it was a pair of men's trousers that she was shortening.

"Are your children at school, Mrs. Mott?" I'd seen the three children at the funeral, two lanky boys in their teens and a young girl. It had torn my heart as they'd watched their father's coffin descend into his grave. The girl and one of the boys had cried, but the older one did not. The modified trousers were probably for him, having belonged to his father.

"Aye, they are."

Jack and I sat in the only two other chairs in the bare room and Mrs. Mott sat in the one beside the fire. She self-consciously tucked her dark brown hair under her cap and smiled uncertainly at us.

"Would you like tea?" she asked.

"No thank you," Jack said. "This is a quick visit. We're sorry to disturb you at this time, but we wanted to express once again how sorry we are for your loss."

"Thank you." She blushed a little at Jack's sympathetic smile.

He didn't often show his gentler side, but when he did, I was reminded of just how charming he could be when he tried. With his dark good looks and bright green eyes, he was achingly handsome. It was no wonder Mrs. Mott blushed when all he did was give her his full attention.

"Do you have everything you need?" I asked her. "Is there anything we can do for you and your children?" I wasn't sure what to say. I'd already given her my sympathies on the loss of her husband at the funeral, but I still felt awkward sitting in her house mere days after his death. I wasn't sure of the etiquette for bereavement. Should I have brought flowers instead of the food? I wished I'd asked Sylvia before we left.

"That's kind of you, Miss Smith, and I thank you." She turned adoring eyes on Jack. "But Mr. Langley has already done so much for me and the children. I don't know where we'd be without his generosity."

"I'll pass your gratitude on to my uncle," Jack said.

Mrs. Mott's smile slipped a little, although mine broadened. I covered it discreetly with my hand. I knew the annuity had been all Jack's idea, and that he'd implemented it too. August was probably not even aware of it, although it was his money. It was just like Jack to downplay his own role and let someone else receive the gratitude.

"Right then," Mrs. Mott said. She rubbed her dry, cracked hands together and blew on them. "Sorry it's a mite cold in here. I'll add some more coal."

"Not on our account," I said. "We're warm enough."

"I insist," Mrs. Mott said, pouring coal from the scuttle onto the fire. "Don't know why I was savin' it anyway. We've got coal to last us through the winter and into spring. Mr. Mott saw to that just before he died." She set the scuttle back down and sat again.

That was something at least. I felt relieved knowing the family would be comfortable despite the icy temperatures.

"Mrs. Mott," Jack began, "we need to ask you something regarding your husband's recent behavior."

"Oh?"

"Was he acting any differently in the weeks before he died?"

Her bottom lip protruded as she thought. "In what way?"

"Did he become friendly with anyone new, for example? Anyone not from Harborough?"

She shook her head. "The only time he left the village was to work on Freak— I mean Frakin'ham House." She made an elaborate show of tucking her hair under her cap again, avoiding our gazes.

"How about new acquaintances
in
Harborough?" I asked.

"I couldn't say, Miss Smith. He might have met someone down at the Lion. That's the Red Lion, on High Street. Mr. Mott drank there twice a week, sometimes more. If he met anyone new, it would have been there."

I sighed, unable to hide my disappointment. We would have to traipse down to the Red Lion and ask more questions of the proprietor. It wasn't that I didn't want to. It was more that weariness was beginning to pull at me. Not that I would tell Jack. He would insist on returning home, and I didn't want to waste the opportunity of learning more.

"Thank you, Mrs. Mott," Jack said, rising. "You've been most helpful."

Mrs. Mott tucked her hair away again, although it looked neat enough to me. "It's good of you to visit me, Mr. Langley. You and Miss Smith. But, forgive me, why are you askin' about my husband's friends? Did he do somethin' wrong?"

"No," I said quickly. I didn't want her to know about the terrible thing her husband had unleashed up at the house. For one thing, she might think us mad, and for another, he probably didn't fully understand what he was doing. It was best that she remembered her husband fondly. What was done was done, and he'd paid a terrible price for his actions.

"Mr. Mott mentioned that he was doing some work for another builder," Jack said, lying through his teeth. "The plans sounded impressive, and I wanted to see them. I have an interest in architecture. That's all." He gave her a smile.

She smiled back, but it soon turned into a frown. "Well, that would explain the coal."

"Pardon?" Jack and I said together.

She waved a hand at the full coal scuttle. "He came home with sacks full of coal about two weeks ago. He shared it with our neighbors, and so pleased they were too. Another building job, you say?" Her frown disappeared, and she looked relieved. "Thank the lord. I don't mind tellin' you both now that I worried where the coal came from. Mr. Mott has always provided for this family, but I knew him well enough to know his work weren't always honest." She pressed a hand to her chest. "I am mighty relieved to hear you speak of another proper job. He must have been paid already."

"So you don't know who that employer may have been? Did Mr. Mott mention anything about another job to you?"

"I think I do recall somethin' like that." Her smile was quite false, and I didn't believe she'd suddenly remembered something important. Her reluctance to tell us earlier was understandable. If her husband had indeed gotten the coal by illegal means, she would have had to give it back. She might be an honest woman, but she was a widow with three children. Who could blame her for being cautious? At least now she was telling the truth.

"Oh?" I prompted. "Did Mr. Mott give you a name for the other builder?"

"Not a person's name," she said. "He just spoke of 'the Society.'"

Good lord. Surely not. The only society I knew was the Society For Supernatural Activity, a group that Langley and Tate had once belonged to. They had interests in all things paranormal and would certainly know how to summon demons.

"Does that mean anything to you?" Mrs. Mott asked.

"Not really," Jack said idly, without meeting Mrs. Mott's gaze. He had obviously made the same connection I did.  

We said our goodbyes and thanked her. I waved at her from the carriage window and didn't turn to Jack until she was gone from view.

"Well," I said, settling back in the leather seat. "How do you think Mr. Mott came to be involved with the Society?"

Jack's finger skimmed across his top lip as he thought. "More importantly," he said, "
why
was the Society paying Mott to summon a demon onto Frakingham?"

CHAPTER 2

Jack insisted that I eat luncheon in my bedroom and nap afterward. I grumbled half-heartedly, but obliged. I awoke two hours later a little more refreshed. The internal heat still raged, however. I was always warm now, unless I took a dip in the ice-cold lake. Rest helped, but I refused to lie down any more than necessary. Time was too precious to waste it sleeping.

I found Sylvia downstairs in the drawing room. She was staring out the window, her lips plumped into a pout. I followed her gaze and saw Jack and Samuel standing off to the side, surveying the scaffolding frame that covered part of the house like an external skeleton. No work had been done on the renovations since the builders had run off in fear at the first sign of the demon a week earlier.

"Is something the matter?" I asked, standing beside her. "It's not falling down, is it?"

"Good lord, I hope not." She turned away with a sigh. "They're discussing what's to be done next. Jack is not having much luck enticing the builders back."

"Not even with extra wages?"

"Some, yes, but not enough. He and Samuel are considering whether to offer them more money or get others in from further away."

"People who aren't afraid of Freak House you mean," I said wryly. "He didn't tell me he was having difficulty finding builders."

"He's trying to spare you the mundane details of day-to-day life."

"I wish he wouldn't. There are so few things to focus on aside from…aside from Tate and the cure, that any detail, no matter how minute, is a welcome distraction."

She took my hand and squeezed it. "I'll be sure to tell you everything about my day from now on. Shall we start with what I ate for luncheon?"

"That's quite unnecessary," I said quickly. "Let's discuss your dancing practice instead. Was Samuel a capable dancer?"

"Oh yes. Not quite up to Monsieur Bourgogne's standard, but very good. I'm sure I improved. I wouldn't expect anything less from a gentleman though."