Patricia Rice (10 page)

Everyone instantly stopped what they were doing and dropped curtsies.

This was the reason duchesses didn’t appear in kitchens, Christina noted wryly. “Please, go on about your duties. I’m just passing through. Where does that door lead to?” She hastened toward a door she’d seen last night but hadn’t explored.

“That’s the archive room,” Meg explained. “All the old journals and family documents are kept there. My father has an office behind it.”

“Journals!” Christina was familiar with journals. Her family was notorious for keeping stacks of them. She wasn’t much for pen and paper, but her sister Felicity loved them. Perhaps this summer they could have a good visit and dig through the old volumes. “Would your father mind if I poked around a bit?”

“Of course not. The estate belongs to you, not to us. My father is just the steward here and seldom spends much time in his office.”

“Where is he now?” Christina crossed the kitchen, and spurred by Cook, the servants returned to their chores.

Meg stopped interviewing to accompany her. “He’s in Scotland. Harry wanted to sell some family lands and a hunting lodge up there, and my father is looking into it.”

“They’re not entailed?” Hand on the doorknob and itching to explore, Christina halted just long enough to question this oddity. She hadn’t thought Harry the kind of man who would sell off family holdings except in a dire emergency.

“No. Apparently none of it is,” Meg whispered. “But do not say I told you. There is apparently some legal uproar over the matter.”

Christina gazed longingly at the partially open door to the archives. She dearly wished to continue her exploration, but a dukedom—
not
entailed
? “How can that be?” she murmured, so she couldn’t be overheard.

“Peter says Edward never signed the legal documents. He had some plan to parcel out the land into smaller estates. But I am not privy to these matters and cannot say for certain that this is true.”

Christina stared blankly over the lovely kitchen designed by Harry’s mother, thought of the wonderful old manor and castle probably brimming with Harry’s ancestors and heirlooms, and couldn’t comprehend selling such riches.

“Harry could sell the house?” she whispered in horror, grasping the full extent of the situation.

“Quite possibly,” Meg replied. “Especially since he dislikes it so.”

“Christina! What are you doing over here? Didn’t I tell you to stay in the new wing?” Harry’s roar carried down the corridor Christina was currently traversing after a day of exploration.

She waited for him to catch up. Now that their trunks had arrived, he was dressed respectably in a dark blue coat and gold vest that nicely set off his tawny hair, but his expression wasn’t any less frazzled.

“What the devil is going on here?” he demanded as footmen and maids skittered to and fro, carrying furniture and linens up and down the hall from one room to the next.

“I put my maid and your manservant in charge of choosing suitable chambers.”

“You left
Luke
in charge of choosing our chambers?”

He sounded so horrified that she didn’t waste time explaining that their choices were limited given the destruction by field mice and squirrels. “He seems a perfectly pleasant young man. He and Matilda were snarling and circling like caged cats, so I left them to work it out. I’m sure they’ll find something suitable.”

“Caged cats,” Harry muttered, “do not choose their cages for a reason. I don’t want anyone over here until I know it’s safe.”

Entering the chamber her maid had chosen for her, Christina set her sketch down on the dresser. “I cannot house servants in a ballroom, a card room, or a library. Unless you care to finish the bedchambers in the new wing, we must all sleep over here. I don’t know what you’re fretting about. Your father has opened the old manor to the new wing on every level. It’s perfectly accessible.”

“I will not lose a wife because she is too headstrong to take care of herself,” he growled. “I’ve sent to London for someone to check the safety of these old buildings. Until they’ve passed inspection, stay out of any areas I haven’t had tested.”

Harry succeeded in looking exceedingly formidable. His eyebrows drew down in a frown that would suit any duke in the kingdom. His square jaw clenched, and a muscle over his sculpted cheekbone jerked. She thought even his queue quivered.

Christina studied the dark flecks in his brown eyes, then patted his bristly cheek. “All my life, people have been telling me what to do, Harry Winchester. I’m willing to listen, but not to nonsense. Do you see any floors collapsing?”

Longing to turn her touch into something much more fierce, Harry stifled his frustration. Instead, he changed the topic, unwilling to argue before the parade of footmen trailing in and out with furniture. “How did you find so many servants so quickly?”

“Meg did,” she said. “But they insisted on being paid before they would work, and you didn’t leave enough coins. That’s an odd custom. Do they pay you back if they quit after a day or two?”

Harry had a hunch that the pay was for work that had gone unpaid during his father’s time. He kept hoping he’d figure out where his father had hidden his wealth—and he prayed it was in a bank account and not in a cellar full of expensive French wine and artwork. Despite a day’s search, he’d found no bank drafts or receipts or letters giving evidence of any hidden wealth.

“I’ll give you more funds. Don’t worry about the servants quitting. We offer the best employment in the area. How did you persuade them to stay if you couldn’t pay them?”

“I used my pin money. They didn’t cost much, so I also told Meg to order fresh linens. We’ve put together enough furniture in the attic rooms to house everyone. We’ll need new feather beds if we hire more people. The shopkeepers demanded payment in advance as well. Perhaps you should arrange to set up accounts with them, so I needn’t bother you excessively.”

“I’ll do that.” He tried not to sound too grim, but he was clenching his back teeth. He needed Jack here to explain why the village merchants hadn’t been paid. That was beyond negligent. The village depended on the estate for their livelihood. If this had gone on for long, it was no wonder Sommersville looked as if it had slid into a slough of despond.

Sweeping through the room, Christina emptied her pocket bag onto the freshly made bed and began sorting through a strange array of artifacts. “Matilda, tell Luke that His Grace would like to wash and dress for dinner.”

At Christina’s casual dismissal, the servants scattered, leaving them alone. Harry noticed the chamber chosen for their use had a distinctly feminine air. The delicate bed didn’t suit his taste, nor did the rose comforter and flowered draperies, but who was he to complain? The place smelled of fresh air, no rodents ran about, and he could actually see himself in the mirror.

He wanted to see himself on the tester bed with Christina. “What are you looking for?” He began removing his jabot so he could shave, but his wife’s activity held him intrigued.

“When I was exploring, these things dropped out of the air,” Christina said, holding one of the objects up to the sun. “I was trying to see if there was any connection between them. Your ghosts appear to be rather shy.”

At her nonsensical answer, Harry considered pounding his head against the wall, but he feared he’d bring the roof down. “Out of the air?” he asked in trepidation, hoping he’d misunderstood.

“Yes, I suppose. I never actually saw them fall. I’d hear a noise and turn around and there they’d be. Look, this one is a very worn ring. And here’s an old coin. Did they have coins like this in King Hal’s time?”

Harry took the copper coin. “King Hal?” He studied the image imprinted on the metal and understood her reference before she answered.

“Doesn’t it look like Henry the Eighth? Could the coin be that old?”

“This section was under construction during Elizabeth’s reign, so I suppose it’s possible the coin could have fallen into the rafters during that period. I should think coppers like this would be in circulation for decades.” He turned the penny over to inspect the other side, relieved to hold a real coin and find a reasonable explanation for its existence. “I’ve not studied currency from the period, but it looks genuine.”

Curious despite himself, he began poking through her trove of treasures to see what else she’d found. “No diamonds or pearls, I see.” A pity. If they were to have ghosts, they ought to be useful ones showing him the way to a treasure trove of jewels.

He caught himself before he uttered that undukely remark… or before asking if she’d seen any more ghostly auras. No point in encouraging her, or giving anyone an excuse for calling him an eccentric as well, although out of unseemly curiosity, he really wanted to know more.

“If the objects all come from the same spirit,” Christina said, “I could assume she was a married woman from the sixteenth century, and that she has secrets to be unlocked.” She displayed a tarnished brass key in her palm.

“That’s going too far, Christina.” He glanced at the key, but old houses like this had more keys floating about than the sea had shells. “All your running about has no doubt jarred loose some old rafter. I told you it’s not safe over here. Now let’s get dressed. I’m starved.”

He looked for his shaving gear on the washstand and not finding it, searched for his valise. Assuming Luke had carried it off, he opened the wardrobe for his clean shirts.

The wardrobe was crammed with silks and laces, without a coat or shirt in sight.

“Christina, what is the meaning of this?” He gestured at the colorful array.

She glanced up with a slight frown. “Meaning of clothes? Meaning of wardrobe? Meaning…?” She lifted her eyebrows expressively.

“Where are my things? I need a fresh shirt.”

“Oh, that.” She began gathering up her oddities. “Luke has put your things in your wardrobe. He complained excessively about not having cedar something-or-other and wanting papers to line the drawers. I gave him some of my mother’s aromatic pomanders. I hope you don’t mind their scent.”

Harry ignored all her perambulations except the relevant one. “
My
wardrobe? And where would that be?”

“Across the hall. The rooms on either side of this one had leaky windows and water stains, I assume from the storm yesterday. But the one across the hall is quite lovely. It overlooks the front lawns, and you can literally count sheep.”

“I don’t
want
to count sheep,” he said in a voice any sensible woman would have recognized as belonging to a man on a dangerous brink. “I want to sleep in a bed with you. Now tell Luke to get my things over here, now. Haul over the whole damned wardrobe if he must!”

“Don’t be ridiculous, Harry. Dukes don’t sleep with duchesses. No one expects it.” She began lining her treasures up on the dresser as if he wasn’t a level short of roaring like an angry lion. “We can take this time to know each other while you’re waiting for your London inspectors to approve of the larger suites.”

Deciding there was no more point in arguing with Christina than there had been with his addled father, Harry stalked to the hall door and shouted. “Luke, bring my shaving gear over here immediately! And then start hauling in my clothes and a wardrobe.”

He was the duke here now. People had to listen.

For the first time since the deaths of his father and brother, Harry was almost glad he was a duke. He watched smugly as servants leaped to his command, bustling like ants to haul his belongings, a larger washstand, more pillows, and a dresser into the already crowded room.

Matilda and Luke started arguing over the bedding to be used. Two burly footmen held the dresser aloft, waiting for him to name its position. Several round-eyed maids with their arms full of clothing stared at him as if he might snap off their heads.

Turning around to demand that Christina take charge, he watched her eyes widen at something in a back corner. Before he could say a word, she lifted her skirt and petticoat and dashed out of the room through a doorway he hadn’t noticed earlier.

“Luke, get this place in order,” he commanded. Before his startled manservant could protest, Harry ran out the main door and glanced down the hall in the direction Christina had gone.

She didn’t emerge from the next room, so he opened the door a crack and peered in. Empty drawers hung open, cobwebs covered the bedposts, and a musty odor struck his nose, but he still didn’t see Christina.

That didn’t make sense. The door she’d gone through had been on the other side of the wall to this chamber. He could swear the rooms up here only connected in the family suites, not in guest rooms like the one she’d appropriated. Although what his father had done since his last visit was unknowable.

Slamming the door open so hard that it hit the wall, Harry cursed at his lack of a candle. The servants had apparently washed the windows in the other room so sunlight still illuminated it. In here, ragged draperies hung over filthy glass and the barest of light entered. He stubbed his toe on a blanket chest and barked his shin on a chair when he staggered forward. “Christina!” he bellowed.

He thought he heard a muffled reply, and his gut clenched in sudden fear. What if she’d fallen through a rotten floorboard? Instantly more concerned than angry, he shoved aside the clutter of old furniture that had accumulated in here, attempting to locate the sound of her voice.

“A solar, Harry,” drifted down from somewhere above his head. “Look, look at this!”

He recognized her excitement. She wasn’t in pain. Relief flooded him. He bent his head backward to scan the ceiling, turning in circles to figure out where she could be. He was tired, angry, and confused, and now she had him spinning in circles! “Christina, where the devil are you?”

“Up here. The key unlocked the cupboard, and there are stairs inside.”

Stairs. In the cupboard. His father had been at it again.

With exasperation, Harry sought anything resembling a cupboard. Finding a door built into the wall, he pulled it fully open to find the narrow ladder inside.

“Dammit, Christina! You could kill yourself on this thing. Come down here at once.” Which was an insensible thing to say, since he was already climbing up to get her. Christina had that effect on him.

He didn’t want her to have that effect on him. He wanted her to stay where he put her and act as he needed. Be a proper duchess. A soothing, calming, sensible woman who would make order out of the chaos into which he’d plummeted.

He might as well ask the sun to curtsy and perform a minuet in the heavens.

Light poured through a mullioned window that had been built into the slanted ceiling. He’d explored every inch of this house when he was a youth, and he didn’t think there had been a room up here originally.

Glancing around from the top of the ladder, he saw Christina investigating a spinning wheel. An old card of wool was still attached to the distaff, and he could swear thread was still wrapped around the spindle. “Don’t touch that,” he warned as Christina reached for it.

Her hair sparkled golden in the fading light as she looked up, laughing. “You have been reading fairy tales,” she cried in delight. “Isn’t this just like Sleeping Beauty’s castle?”

“No, I don’t think so. For one thing, this isn’t the castle, it’s the manor house.” He hauled himself up the last step and climbed out onto the wooden floor, testing the planks with his heavy weight. They seemed sturdy enough.

“Look! Look at this. Isn’t it cunning?” She dashed over to a tabletop attached to the wall, and before Harry could stop her, released the latch and pushed the table up. The top became a decorative wall panel, revealing a crudely carved, brilliantly painted Gothic chest containing a washbasin and pitcher beneath. Vermilion and gold seemed to be the order of the day, Harry decided, appalled at the decor.

A medieval tapestry of a lady and a unicorn woven with glittering threads hung behind a bed frame sans mattress. A massive trunk—painted with red and gold medallions—sat in one corner with the crude writing instruments of an earlier time.

“I don’t know my history well, but this looks as if it could be a lady’s solar from the time this house was first built,” Christina said. “Do you think it’s been hidden here all these years and no one else has found it?”

“I sincerely doubt it,” Harry said drily, knowing his history—and his father—a little better than that. “This looks like one of my father’s fantasies. The paint from that period did not survive this long, and if the original structure had a solar, it’s long gone. My father made this up.”