Love by the Morning Star (28 page)

Hannah, reading through the letter a second time, saw nothing more than a perfunctory letter one writes to family or some obligatory social contact. There was nothing romantic in it to clue Hannah in. She assumed Anna was excited about Teddy's postscript.

Feeling a rush of sisterly camaraderie, Hannah said softly, “I think I might be in the same boat as you.”

“Really?” Anna asked, her joy in Teddy's letter deflating a little as she felt again that surprisingly sharp stab of jealousy at the thought of Hardy admiring anyone but her. Poverty usually made people so ugly in her eyes. Why hadn't it done so with Hardy? “I'm so . . . happy for you.”

“You won't tell, though, will you? I'd rather keep it a secret until it is official, and I think he would too.”

Anna understood completely.

 

T
WO GIRLS, ONE THOUGHT
: Wait for night.

They were used to nothing happening during the daytime. Full light was for formality. Hannah's work kept her out of the upper crust for most of the day, and though she hoped to run into Teddy while she tended Anna, she never did. She was tempted—oh, how she was tempted—to seek him out, to creep into his room or beard him publicly, his note with its imperious command in her hand, and say loud and clear,
Yes, I will marry you
. But her pride, which had kept her in her place of degradation, rebelled.
He will come to me
, she insisted.
If he loves me he will come to me
. She would go so far as to wait in the yew, nothing more.

Neither did Anna get any satisfaction by daylight. She too was sorely tempted to sneak into Teddy's room in a robe and nothing underneath for a reprise of that glorious night. But ladies did not behave that way, however much they yearned to, and she had to remember that she was a lady. Well, a lady by proxy, by will and ambition.

It is for him to come to me
, she thought.
If he loves me, he will. And if he cannot manage to get me alone today, I will find him by night in the greenhouse
.

Their paths crossed, of course. He arrived at breakfast and sat down to nibble toast and tell about his graduation. Then, after he freshened up, he and Anna and his stepsisters played billiards, then lunched together. Her hopes rose when he suggested a walk, but he spoke too loudly and all of the little nieces and nephews heard and clamored to tag along. Proposals among the nursery set simply aren't possible.

Night could not come quickly enough.

 

A
NOTHER BLOODY NEW MOON
, Anna thought as she sneaked out of Starkers. Though there
was
something romantic about it, touch and sound alone.

But we are both so beautiful
, she thought.
We should be able to look at each other
.

Now, where was that greenhouse? It should be easy to find—an entire building—but there was no glint of moonlight on the glass, and none of the low-burning fires that had kept the interior warm on winter nights. She could scarcely see her hand in front of her face . . .

Then, without warning, there
was
a hand in front of her face. It clapped hard over her mouth as she tried to scream. Another hand circled her neck and tightened, and a voice said into her ear, casting spittle, “Come quiet-like or I'll slit that pretty throat.”

She smelled tobacco—not the comfort of a pipe or the wealthy associations of a fine cigar, but that rank old tobacco smell of fingers stained by chain smoking. Muscular bulk pressed against her back, and stubble grated against her cheek. Her first thought was ravishment. Her second, that Teddy must never know. Her third, that if she resisted, her beauty might be spoiled, but if she acquiesced, she might escape with nothing but her dignity crushed and broken.

She allowed herself to be dragged deep into the semidomestic woods that lay beyond the Starkers gardens.

“I'm going to let you go now. Make a sound and I'll break your nose. That don't look so pretty on a gal. Savvy?”

Anna nodded, and the clutching hands released her. She turned to find the same burly man who had told Hannah to prepare the salad of bitter herbs.

He looked her up and down and let out a low whistle. “Now that's what I mean by a looker. I got a little suspicious when I talked to that other bird. They said the one I was to contact was a real stunner. So I went back and asked, and they gave me a better description. Big, blond, tits out to here. Weren't my fault. They're the ones just told me to ask for the new kitchen maid. Whoo, you sure don't look like a kitchen maid.”

“As it happened I took another position,” Anna said weakly. “With the family.”

“You're supposed to be in the kitchen. How can you poison someone if you aren't handling his food?” He slapped his forehead. “And the NAFF says I have to work my way up—they're the ones who've bungled the business. Did that other skivvy do what I told her to? That would be a lark.”

“She tried, but someone told her yew was poisonous and—”

“Someone being you?” he said, and in an instant had her by the throat again and up against a tree, breathing his tobacco breath into her face. “You were there? You heard?”

“I . . . I was hiding. I heard.”

He knocked her head against the tree. It didn't hurt, much, but made her see how very easily it could.

“And you let it get mucked up? Thought you were supposed to be a clever girl. Your da says you are. What do you think I'll do to you if you don't cooperate, eh?” He pressed himself closer. “Whatever you're imagining, it's only the beginning. This is the real thing, doll. You do as you're told or you die, and it won't be quick, and it won't be fun. Not for you, anyway.” He gave her a leer. “Maybe for me.”

“B-but no one said I'd be asked to commit murder,” she stammered.

“Not asked,” he corrected. “Told.”

“I can't kill anyone, especially the king! Are you all mad? It's treason. You'll be hanged.”

“Desperate times, my dove. There's a war going on.”

A war? She hadn't read the papers lately, but surely someone would have said something.

“A class war and a race war and a war to keep the bloody Jews and reds from taking over the world. Killing a king is nothing. A man stands in your way, you kill him, king or beggar.”

“Then
you
kill him,” Anna said miserably.

“Look at me. You think the likes of me can get anywhere near a king? He goes from fortress to fortress, with guards all around him. You have to plant someone in the fortress. That's you.”

“Get someone else. I can't do it!”

“There is no one else. The NAFF is counting on you.”

“But the king came and left. I won't have another chance.”

He gave her alabaster throat a squeeze. She could feel her pulse on either side beating madly against his hand.
He'll kill me
, she thought.
He really will, if I don't do what he says
.

“You get the king back to Starkers, and you kill him. Plain and simple. If you don't, I'll cut off that pretty face bit by bit, and then afterward I'll . . .” He whispered something in her ear, something so inhumanly filthy that if she'd had the means she would have killed herself right then, just to escape the merest possibility of that ever coming to pass.

When he finished whispering he let her go, and she sank to her knees in the grass and nettles.

“Well?” he asked.

All she could do was nod, once, in utter submission.

“I'll be watching,” he said, and stalked off into the night.

For a moment she froze, trembling, unable to move, although she was afraid he'd come back with more threats, or worse. Finally her body seemed to unlock, and with a low shuddering wail she staggered back toward Starkers.

Safety . . . where can I find safety?
She could not do any of the things she knew—scream for the police, ask some man to defend her. The obvious thing to do was to run to the first person she could find, babble out her terror, admit to the plan, and beg for mercy and protection. That would save the king, but would it save her? She believed that man's threats. Was the law a match for him? He would come after her, she was sure. And if not him, then someone else in the NAFF. The organization that had once been her salvation, raising her father and thus raising her, was now her enemy. They would hunt her down if she betrayed them. Her father himself would kill her with his own hands if she betrayed them.

And what of Teddy? After they were securely wed she might be able to confess her real name and position, but would he forgive her before? Afterward—well, she might be in love, but she was pragmatic, too, and there is no such thing as an aristocratic union dissolved without a big payoff. She desperately wanted Teddy and the title, but a great deal of alimony would suffice. He could cast her off, but only after they were married.

She could tell no one. She was in this all too deeply—in her deception with the Liripips, and her mission for the NAFF. She would have to at least bring the king to Starkers. She would have to . . .

“But I can't!” she wept. “I just can't.” She ran and fell and ran again, bruising her knees and cutting her hands. She felt the gravel path beneath her, and at least knew where she was. She'd been running blind, but now she realized the greenhouse must be just ahead.

There was only one way to be safe. Ladies—real, titled ladies—are not murdered by tobacco-scented thugs. The chatelaine of Starkers does not have her face cut off.

“Where are you?” she cried into the night. “My love . . .”

She ran headlong into strong, comforting arms and was pulled against a broad chest. For a moment she fought, but there was no tobacco smell, and a voice said, “Is it you, sweetheart?”

She was weeping so loudly, she could hardly hear him. She knew those arms. She couldn't wait for him to ask her.

“Marry me,” she begged, falling to her battered knees and clutching at his legs desperately. “Please, oh please marry me. I'll die if you don't.”

She heard him chuckle, low and loving.

“Since you put it that way,” he said, and drew her into the pitch-black greenhouse, where he lay her down among the nasturtiums and made her almost forget her fear.

She ran away from him before they could talk about their future together. She did not want to give herself the chance to confess—or him the chance for regret. They had agreed to be married. If she had her way, no words would follow until they both said
I do
. She curled into a tiny ball in her bed and did not let herself think of anything at all, only chanted the name Lady Anna, over and over.

 

“Y
ES
,” H
ANNAH SAID IN HER
tender German when Teddy called her name softly, dropping the
H
in the way she found so very appealing.

“Yes, my morning star?” he answered in the same language. He reached into the dark yew bole for her hand.

“Of course yes, you fool, despite what you have put me through. Do you know, if you weren't going to be a spy I would think you quite a coward, refusing to admit our love to your mother. My position has not been an easy one, you know.”

“I imagine not. Will you say it one more time?”

“Yes,” she breathed, as he stroked the scar on her thumb, his favorite spot. “Oh, yes!”

He gave her a tug. “I want more than your hand now.”

But she would not be drawn out of her hollow. “No. That is very hard to say after my emphatic yes, my a-thousand-times-yes, but you must be punished.” She said it flippantly, but she was serious. She had been deeply disappointed, and he had to prove himself before she said yes to anything else. “Not until you announce our engagement to your mother.” She remembered a prim phrase from one of those English books she'd laughed at as a child. “First you must make an honest woman of me.” She chuckled. “Then I can be as dishonest as you like. Though it doesn't sound as good in the reversal. I mean to be honest with you, ever after. After you tell your mother.”

“I have to leave in the morning.”

“More cloak and dagger?”

“Yes. I'll be going to . . . well, I oughtn't to tell you exactly. You shouldn't even know I'm doing spy work, but I trust you not to blab. I won't be able to write often, if at all. I'll have to put it out that I'm on a walking tour of the Lake District, complete with pastoral picturesque ecstasy, so don't mind if my letters don't sound like me. All part of the cover. I'll be learning radio operations and code and how to use a gun. I've missed every pheasant I've ever aimed at, so that might be hopeless, but we shall see. They promised me at least a few days at home before I'll have to go to Germany. In September, I think. May I tell her then? I'll arrange a party, ostensibly a welcome-back party, and invite simply everyone. I'll try to snag some royals, too. They always make good witnesses. Mum can't kick up much of a fuss with a Highness in attendance.”

“She will so hate that I am marrying you,” Hannah said, unable to hide a note of gloat in her voice.

“And I will so love it, my morning star,” he said, kissing her hand. “Really? Engaged, and this wee hand is all I get?” He sighed, but kissed it again. “Then I'll just have to make the most of it.”

O
N
S
EPTEMBER
1, 1939, G
ERMANY
invaded Poland, Starkers prepared to celebrate Teddy's homecoming with a banquet and dance on the lawn, and Anna utterly failed to close the zipper on her dress.

Only the last caused Anna any concern.

She'd always relied on her own discipline to keep her body in its proper shape, but lately she'd had to resort to a snug girdle to fit into her clothes. Today, even the girdle didn't do the trick.