Shadows in Scarlet (18 page)

Within seconds her head cleared and Amanda was damning her stays and Cynthia equally.
Smooth one.
She'd covered herself in glory that time.

Carrie hurried in the door, sat down beside her, and peered into her face. “That particular shade of green skin doesn't go with a red dress. Are you all right? Or just hyperventilating after that dirty trick Cynthia played on you?"

For a moment Amanda thought she was talking about Cynthia suddenly unveiling James's mortal face. But Carrie didn't know about James. “You know Cynthia,” Amanda muttered, sitting up straighter. “She doesn't leap to conclusions, she makes them up out of whole cloth."

"All that about footsteps, you mean?"

"Lucy Benedetto heard footsteps coming this way, I don't know when, last week sometime. So she figured Wayne was sneaking in to see me after hours—he hasn't been too obvious or anything. And she's so anxious to make points with Cynthia she told her.... No, I'm not mad at Lucy. She means well. So does Cynthia, for that matter, deciding I'll make her a dandy daughter-in-law, signed, sealed, and delivered on a silver tray. I've got to stop playing Sally, everyone thinks I'm just so sweet and biddable.” An acid taste rose in her throat and she swallowed. “Now I've got to either browbeat Wayne into telling the truth or tackle Cynthia myself."

"You don't think Wayne put Cynthia up to it?"

"He seemed just as shocked as I was, if no way as horrified."

"She had me going there for a minute,” Carrie said. “So did you. You looked as though you'd seen a ghost."

Something soft but intense exploded inside Amanda's head. The truth about Wayne. The truth about James's death. The truth about James, period. All the truths had to come out, or none of them would be valid. Like a house of cards, each reality leaned against another. “I have seen a ghost."

"What?"

"I think the Benedettos really did hear footsteps. It's kind of comforting that they did. It means I'm not crazy."

"What?"

"Cynthia didn't have to stage a seance,” Amanda explained. “Captain Grant's ghost really is here. Lucy heard his footsteps coming up to the house. He's focussed on the house. He died here. That's why he's buried here."

Carrie looked around the room, probably expecting to see white-coated guys with butterfly nets hiding in the bedroom. When she spoke her voice was very gentle. “Amanda, I understand why you're hooked on Grant—it's a compelling story. That skull reconstruction gave me the willies, too. There probably are things going bump in the night here at Melrose, tree limbs and the cat and the house settling. You're here by yourself, of course you're hearing things. But a ghost? Come on."

"I'm not making him up. I'm not imagining him."

"Well no, it's not necessarily your imagination. There's something called autosuggestion, kind of self-hypnosis, like when you're sitting up late reading a horror novel and you just know a monster's hiding beneath the bed. Except you're not seeing a monster, you're seeing this exciting man."

Amanda saw James sitting on the staircase, his scabbard across his knees, his eyes hurt and bewildered. “It's not like that. I have seen him. I've talked to him. I've touched him. I knew it was him before you and Hewitt identified him. He said he was from Dundreggan before I saw the name on the picture."

"I know sexual frustration's been used as an excuse for everything from witches to global warming,” Carrie came back, “and I don't mean to imply..."

"...that I'm Exhibit A?” Amanda grabbed Carrie's forearms and fixed her with what she had the awful feeling was a maniacal gaze. “I'm not saying that's not in there. But there's more to it than that."

Carrie met Amanda's eyes evenly but doubtfully.

"You don't believe me, do you?"

"I believe you believe you saw something."

I knew this would happen.
But she couldn't go back now. Amanda released Carrie, hauled herself to her feet, and walked over to the open door. Voices echoed down the hall, Helen playing straight woman to Cynthia. Amanda hoped Wayne's ankle would keep him in the entrance hall.

"I know I sound like I've lost it,” she said. “But James is real. He's handsome, he's intelligent, he's charming, and in that uniform he buckles a hell of a swash. He actually lived in the eighteenth century—he's given me insights into the speech and the culture I'd never get out of a book!"

Carrie was watching her, not blinking.

"He's different. Even without his sword he's got an edge to him that's, that's—glamorous. You know, the old Scots word meaning enchanting, casting a spell over, not
Entertainment Tonight
glamorous.... “She sat back down. “Really. I swear on Thomas Mason's diaries."

"You can actually talk to him?"

"Yes, I can."

"Have you—er—touched him?"

"Oh yeah. When he's solid enough to touch."

"And you're the one who claims to have no romantic illusions."

"This is no illusion, even if it is romantic as hell."

"Are you sure it's no illusion? I mean, okay, so you see him and everything, but even with living, breathing guys you see what you want to see."

"I know,” Amanda said with a groan. “I know. Be careful what you ask for and all of that."

Carrie shook her head. “I'm sorry, Amanda. I thought my kids had thrown me every possible curve, but you really take the cake with this one. If you'll excuse the mangled metaphor."

"Mangled metaphors are my stock in trade.” At least Carrie was listening to her. Amanda indulged in a rueful laugh of her own. “This is totally absurd. I know that. But it's true."

"Okay, okay, I don't disbelieve you. Is that good enough?"

"That's a start. Thanks."

"You said you had a theory about why he was buried in the garden?"

"It's more than a theory.” Amanda launched into the true history of Isabel, Archibald, and James, a tragedy in two acts, concluding, “So it was murder, pure and simple."

Carrie mulled it all over. “The other officers must have noticed James wasn't at his assigned post before the battle."

"So each one thought he was some place else. There hasn't been a battle in history where everybody was right where he was supposed to be."

"Archibald did become the heir,” admitted Carrie. “He did go home and marry Isabel, and James really was buried here at Melrose even though the record says he died at Greensprings Farm. But as for Archibald being the guilty party, once you eliminate James's—er, testimony—it's all circumstantial evidence. At a distance of two hundred years, yet. You'll never be able to bring Archibald to trial, let alone prove him guilty."

"Maybe it's just as well the Scots have that ambiguous verdict of ‘Not Proven,'” Amanda said. “No, the only way James is going to get any satisfaction at this late date is by my revealing the truth."

"That's what he wants?"

She could hear James's smooth voice in the back of her mind. “He wants revenge. He wants his sword. He wants to go home. I can help with the first, and we may have located the sword, but getting him home? It's up to the relatives, the Grants, to say what they want done with him. No reason they won't just tell Hewitt to bury him at Yorktown. I've tried hinting to Cynthia about old family cemeteries and such, maybe she'd pay for shipping him back to Scotland—making the arrangements would give her an excuse to mingle some more with the aristocracy, after all—but she'd love having a big re-creation military funeral here, too."

"The question,” said Carrie, “is whether you're willing to let him go."

Bullseye.
Amanda eyed her own hands, folded so tightly on her lap the knuckles glinted white, her bones shining beneath her skin. She was going to have to let him go. Whether as a ghost or as a soldier on the prowl, James was not even remotely a prospect for long-term commitment. “I may not get the chance to do anything. Last night I suggested to him that he was dead. That upset him. He may already be gone for good. Which doesn't mean I can't tell his story."

"No, it doesn't. We need to see if there're any more family records, to back the story up. To give you the excuse to tell it—for the sake of the article, of course."

"The article. Absolutely."

"Cynthia seems to be trying to stake the Grants out as her own personal territory,” Carrie went on with a smile, “but we can make an end run around her. If you're brave enough."

"I sure am. After today. After the way she faked that seance yesterday and then made me her accessory after the fact."

"How she'd do it?"

"She smuggled in some nail scissors and cut off the flowers while everyone's eyes were closed, and she brought in her own candle, one of those that won't stay out."

"She's a force of nature, isn't she?” Carrie asked in admiration and resentment mingled. “But you are an accessory. If you spill the beans, she'll just laugh and say it was all a joke, and then give you a bad reference."

"She may do that anyway, after all this with Wayne."

"You stick to your guns with Wayne. If you don't want him, you don't have to have him. This is the twenty-first century."

"Sometimes it is,” said Amanda. “Cynthia thinks I'm a sweet little eighteenth-century sap, and James thinks I'm a saucy little eighteenth-century baggage."

Even as Carrie laughed she raised a cautionary finger. “I don't know what's going on here..."

"Something weird,” Amanda assured her.

"So keep your wits about you, okay?"

"I'll try. But it's kind of like trying to swim upstream. The current can get a little strong."

"Then climb out onto the bank and walk."

"Yes, ma'am,” Amanda said, without the least sarcasm.

Cynthia's voice drifted down the hall, making concluding remarks. Amanda made a face. “What's really funny is that when Cynthia had her eyes closed after her flower and candle routine, James lifted the candlestick right in front of her and she never saw it."

"I wish I'd been there.” Carrie glanced toward the door. Cynthia's brisk footsteps were approaching, punctuated by Wayne's uneven ones. “Speak of the devil."

Amanda groaned. “I'm going to go hide, if you don't mind covering for me."

"Go on. I'll tell them you're indisposed."

"Don't tell them I almost tossed my cookies, Cynthia will think I'm pregnant and start hiring florists and caterers. God, can you imagine what it would be like having sex with Wayne? Cynthia might just as well be standing there at the foot of the bed giving directions—put it there, dear, in and out, that's right—if she ever bothered to notice the process herself, that is. I'm not so sure she didn't find Wayne under a cabbage leaf."

Suffused with laughter, Carrie shooed Amanda into the bedroom. Where she shut the door and stood listening as Carrie turned at bay. “Yes, she's just fine. Her stays are pretty tight, you know. The heat and—and everything. She's taking a shower before she checks over the house. It's past closing time."

Amanda couldn't hear Cynthia's words, just the sound of her voice in duet with Wayne's.

"Wayne,” said Carrie, her own voice retreating, “let me walk out to the parking lot with you. You're certainly brave to come to work with that sprained ankle."

Moments later a door slammed. Giving thanks for a friend like Carrie, Amanda crept out and listened. The house was silent. She felt like she hadn't breathed all day. She stripped off her clothes, dumped them on the bed, and stood breathing deeply. If James wanted to materialize and ogle her again, more power to him. She couldn't blame the moth for being attracted to the flame.

She showered, dressed in blessed loose cotton, and found her clipboard. By the time she'd done the gardens and returned to the house her batteries were running low.

It'd been a relief to tell Carrie about James, yes. But she'd have to deal with Wayne and the bogus engagement tomorrow, and the dreaded Cynthia Monday. And while the very thought of James not only tickled her curiosity but her erogenous zones, she might never be able to deal with him again.

And if he did come back? Well, she told herself,
carpe diem
and all that.

In the entrance hall Amanda looked at the reconstruction. It was hideously empty, a shell inside a husk, a mockery of a human face. James had been alive. Then, between one second and the next, a bullet had stopped his heart and he was—if not dead, then reduced to his minimum.
I want my sword.
Amanda touched the box containing the scabbard as though she could touch the evocative bend in its length. No matter what she did for him—no matter what she did with him—he'd never live again.

She turned off the lights, went upstairs, and stood in front of Sally's portrait. The Armstrongs hadn't had to leave that night. The British had moved out the next day. “But Daddy had to protect you, didn't he?” Amanda said aloud. “Not from James or even Archibald. From yourself. Do I ever know the feeling."

Sally's painted features remained static. Shrugging, Amanda went downstairs and scooted Wayne's chair back against the wall. There was one of Helen's cameras on the floor. She'd probably given it to Wayne to hold. No surprise he'd forgotten to give it back. But Helen would probably be at Cynthia's lunch and admiration society Monday.
The Grant project.

Not one item in the house had been moved. Good. Amanda would give James a broken glass—he had little left besides passion, both good and bad—but she hoped his unstable temper wouldn't trash some priceless artifact. Carrie might humor her ghostly fancies, but no one else would.

Amanda fed both Lafayette and herself. Two microwaved burritos and the evening news, though, were a poor substitute for what she really wanted. She could see herself and James cuddled up in several yards of tartan wool, exchanging post-coital nuzzlings and tidbits of eighteenth-century history.

Might as well set the scene. She put on a CD of
Greatest Hits of 1777,
which James would think was contemporary music.
He
wouldn't make appalling puns on the title of Bach's “Air on a G String.” She'd tell him the musicians were in the next room. Not that he'd care—people of his class weren't inhibited by the presence of servants.