Silent Melody (28 page)

“She was an unhappy woman when Gregory started paying court to Katherine,” Sir Henry said. “As unhappy about it as I was.”

“But you were her lover,” Ashley said without opening his eyes.

“Katherine's?” Sir Henry said stiffly. “No. I behaved with honor toward her.”

“No,” Barbara Verney said. “He means Alice's, Henry.”

“Alice's?” Sir Henry looked shocked. “I was Alice's lover? Is
that
what she told you? Egad. 'Tis not true, as I live.”

But Alice had not been a virgin.
She had not been a virgin.

“I can see,” Sir Henry said, “that all of this is new to you, Kendrick. I am sorry. Truly sorry. I assumed when you told me Alice had told you all that she had told you the truth, even if she had withheld the most violent and incriminating part of it.”

“Your quarrel with Kersey,” Ashley said, “was occasioned by the fact that you both loved the same woman. 'Twas not because he knew you had debauched his sister.”

“Dear Lord God,” Barbara Verney said.

“No,” Sir Henry said quietly.

“Her attachment to her brother was so strong that she would kill him rather than lose him to another woman?” Major Cunningham asked. “Do you have any proof that she shot him, Verney? Or is this a wild guess?”

Yes, her attachment was that strong, Ashley thought with certainty.
They had been lovers.
Her eyes had been fiercely fanatical when she had told her husband of twenty-four hours that she still loved the other man, that she would always love him.
Always.
Yes, she had loved him enough to kill him. And to live in torment ever after.

“She was on the hill,” Sir Henry said. “I saw her fleeing downward when I stopped and looked back after hearing the shot. She denied having been there when I confronted her, and then admitted it. She claimed to have been coming to join the shoot—she did sometimes—and to have heard the lone shot and to have seen her brother down. She claimed to have been too filled with horror and panic to go close. She had run back to the house for help. But there was a firmness, an intrepidity about Alice that made that explanation ring not quite true. Besides, she did not send Binchley to look until hours later. Do I have proof that she killed Greg? No. Perhaps I have always been glad that I did not. I kept my mouth shut. Even Barbara has only guessed these things until this morning. She is now hearing for the first time, as you are, that I saw Alice.”

“Why might it have been suicide?” Major Cunningham asked. “Why might Kersey have killed himself on the morning of his wedding?”

Ashley's elbows were on his knees, his face in his hands.

“His—love for Katherine was a sudden thing,” Sir Henry said, an edge of bitterness in his voice. “And he was an unhappy man. We had always been close friends. But there was a barrier there between us even before he took Katherine from me. There was something he was not willing to talk about. Something I could only guess at. 'Twas only later that I discovered Barbara had made the same guesses.”

“He was trying to make his life more . . . normal, then?” the major said.

“I believe so.” Sir Henry had gone to stand at the window, his back to the room.

“Henry has been puzzled and hurt by the extent of your hostility,” Miss Verney said quietly to Ashley. “'Tis clear now that there has been a huge misunderstanding. I think we should take our leave, Henry. Major? He looks in a state of near collapse.”

“I shall see to him, madam,” Major Cunningham said. “I am his friend.”

“Yes,” she said. “I can see that. Come, Henry.”

Ashley was aware of Sir Henry Verney's stopping beside him on his way to the door. For a moment a hand rested on his shoulder.

“I am sorry,” Sir Henry said.

Ashley kept his head down, his face resting on his hands. His wife's brother had also been her lover. She had killed him because he had been trying to break free of an incestuous relationship by taking a wife.

•   •   •

“Henry,”
his sister said as their carriage drove away from the house, “he did not know. That poor man!”

“There is one thing no one seemed to think about,” he said, “though I daresay Kendrick will think about it soon enough. The person who killed Greg cannot be the same person who shot at Lady Emily this morning—not if our suspicions are correct. So who did shoot at her? And why?”

“I thought all unpleasantness concerning Penshurst was at an end when Alice went away,” she said with a sigh. “Now it seems to be back again. But can there possibly be any connection? What
were
you doing all morning?”

His smile was rather crooked. “Are you wondering if I was on that hill?” he asked.

“Of course not,” she said briskly. “I am just curious.”

“I was riding for most of the time,” he said. “If you were to ask me exactly where I rode, I would be unable to answer. I do not remember. I went to see Katherine earlier. I often do, you know, before Eric rises and she has no time for me. I offered for her at last—I finally got up the courage. She refused me.”

“Oh, Henry,” she said, and she leaned across the space between their seats to lay a sympathetic hand on his arm. “But why? She has always been fond of you. I used to think she loved you. I have thought recently that she loves you again—if she ever stopped.”

“She said no.” He set his head back against the cushions. “She would offer no explanation. Just no.”

“I am so sorry,” she said.

But when the carriage reached the gates to the park, Sir Henry turned to rap on the front panel for his coachman to stop outside the Binchley cottage. Eric was, as usual, swinging on the gate. He was smiling and waving.

“What is it today?” Barbara called to him after pulling down the window. “A horse? A ship?”

“A cloud,” he said. “I am riding across the sky. Grandfer told me a story about a god who rode his chariot across the sky. But I am riding a cloud.”

“Eric,” Sir Henry said, “ask your mama if she will step outside for a moment.”

Eric went skipping off up the path.

“I will not intrude upon her,” Sir Henry explained when his sister looked at him in inquiry. “But I very much need to talk to her.”

She came, wiping her hands on a clean white apron as she did so. She did not look at the carriage but somewhere on the ground before her feet. She looked as if she might have been crying.

“Katherine,” Barbara said, “you are busy as usual, and as usual you make me feel like an idler.”

“Kathy,” Sir Henry said, “we have come from Penshurst. Lady Emily Marlowe was shot at this morning by an unknown person for an unknown reason.”

Her eyes looked up at him, wide with dismay.

“She was not badly hurt,” he said. “She is suffering more from shock than from her wounds, I believe. I tell you only so that you will be careful. So that you will stay close to the house unless your father is with you. And so that you will watch Eric. Promise me?”

Her face had blanched.

“Kathy?” he said.

“You have frightened her,” Barbara said. “There is no reason whatsoever to fear, Katherine. Only to be a little cautious, perhaps. How lovely all your flowers are. You are so very clever and industrious.”

Katherine Smith had set her arms around her son from behind. She lowered her face to kiss the top of his head.

“Kathy,” Sir Henry said. He sighed in frustration. “Be careful.” He signaled his coachman to drive on.

She stood for a long while with her arms about Eric, looking after the carriage. Eventually he protested and she released him so that he could continue with his game. She stared sightlessly around at the flowers.

E
MILY
came downstairs for tea. Apart from a slight pallor and her heavily bandaged hand, one would not have known that anything was very wrong with her, Ashley thought, bowing over her good hand in the drawing room and seating her beside him on a sofa. She was dressed prettily and fashionably in spring green with delicate flowers embroidered onto her stomacher and the robings of her open gown. Her hair was neatly dressed beneath a frothy little wing cap. He resisted the need to sit closer to her than propriety would allow and to draw her arm through his.

She answered all inquiries about her health with a smile.

“She refused to lie abed any longer,” Anna said, “or to take any more laudanum. The hand must be very painful, though.”

“Sometimes pain is preferable to the feeling of being drugged,” Luke said. “'Tis but a cut, Anna, though a nasty one to be sure.”

“Lady Emily's courage is to be much commended,” Major Cunningham said. “Many ladies of my acquaintance would cower in their rooms for days or even weeks after such an experience.”

Emily smiled her way through tea. Ashley noticed that she made little attempt to follow the conversation.

It had not taken Ashley long after the departure of Sir Henry Verney and his sister to realize that the mystery of what had happened to Emily that morning and two days before had deepened. Only she herself could enlighten them—but now seemed hardly the time.

Luke and Anna thought that they should take her away, back to Bowden, at least until Theo and Lady Quinn returned to London. Ashley could not help but agree, though with the greatest reluctance. He wanted to marry her. He was half convinced that this time she might be prevailed upon to accept his offer. But how could he marry her if she must leave Penshurst? If it was not safe for her?

There was only one answer, of course, and Roderick Cunningham had provided it in private, after the four-way conference on Emily's safety had been concluded over luncheon: Ashley must live elsewhere with her. The offer to purchase Penshurst was still open.

It was an offer Ashley hated to consider seriously. Penshurst was his. He already felt the attachment of ownership. He and Emily had loved here and found happiness together here—lasting happiness, he hoped. He wanted to settle with her here, have children with her here, grow old with her here. He did not want to be driven away. He did not want to fear to bring her into this part of the world. And who knew for sure that the strange assaults would not follow her elsewhere? He would far prefer to find her assailant than to run from him—or her.

But he had told Roderick that he would think about selling.

His friend had laid a hand on his shoulder. “I know 'twould wrench your heart, Ash,” he said. “But I know that giving up Lady Emily would shatter it. Think about my offer. There is no hurry, no pressure. We are friends.”

“Come for a walk, Emmy?” Ashley asked now, setting a hand on hers to draw her attention. “The rain has stopped. Will it frighten you too much to leave the house? With me at your side?”

No, she told him, she was not afraid. She left and came back with one of her attractive wide-brimmed straw hats perched forward over her brow and secured with a wide ribbon bow at the back of her neck beneath her cap.

But he stopped her in the hall before they stepped outside. He made sure that he was not within earshot of any of the footmen, then said, “Emmy, answer some questions before we leave. We may need pen and paper. You did not see the person who shot at you this morning. Did you see the person who frightened you two days ago?”

He could see she had, though she was obviously reluctant to say so. But she did nod eventually. He breathed an inward sigh of relief and satisfaction.

“Who?” he said. “Tell me who.”

“No,” she told him, biting her lip.

“Emmy.” He caught at her upper arms and bent his head closer. “Let us go into the study. Write the name for me. I must know. I must be able to protect you from further harm.”

“No,” she said, frowning.

He drew a deep breath and let it out on a sigh. “Tell me, then,” he said. “Do you believe there is any connection between the two incidents?”

She was very firm in her answer. No, there was no connection. But how could she be certain? he wondered.

“Are you very sure of that?” he asked her. “Sure beyond any doubt at all?” He searched her eyes.

“Yes,” she said.

And so his final hope was gone. It was frustrating not to know who had frightened her so badly, but she seemed quite convinced that whoever it was had not also tried to kill her that morning.

They strolled along the river walk, her arm drawn firmly through his. Though he usually wore it only for evening dress occasions, he was wearing his sword beneath his skirted coat. And in one pocket of his coat he carried a loaded pistol. It was not a good way to be in one's own home, he thought. Perhaps in a different home he would feel more in control, better able to protect his woman.

“Emmy,” he said, dipping his head so that she would see him beneath the brim of her hat. “Luke and Anna wish to take you home to Bowden. Perhaps even tomorrow.”

She stopped walking and stared at him with wide eyes.

“I cannot fight them on it,” he said. “I do not have the right. And I am as concerned for your safety as they are. What is your wish?”

She spoke very carefully. “You wahnt it?” she asked him. He could tell by her lifted brows that it was a question, not a statement.

Love made him selfish. He hesitated, but he shook his head finally. “No,” he said. “But you have been very badly frightened here, Emmy. Perhaps you ought to go. I can come to Bowden when I have settled a few things here.”

“No,” she said.

“You would not want me to come?” he asked her.

She tipped her head to one side and looked reproachfully at him
. I
will stay here,
she told him firmly with her hands.

“I will make Penshurst safe for you, then,” he said. “I promise you, Emmy. And then you can live here without fear—forever, if you wish.”

It was the wrong time to say more, though he yearned to do so. And her eyes appeared to tell him that she wished it too. It just seemed to him that his life was still too full of tangles—or perhaps fuller of tangles now than it had been even the day before.

He bent his head and kissed her.

•   •   •

She
woke up with a feeling of deep dread. The room was dark despite the fact that the curtains were pulled back both from about her bed and from the window. It was still. Not a shadow moved. But why would she expect one to do so? And why this feeling?

It was only when she gripped the bedclothes covering her and felt the bandage on her left hand and winced with the pain of the sudden movement that she remembered. She did not like the helpless feeling that fear brought. All her life she had fought it. Because she was deaf, she was perhaps more susceptible to fear than most people. But she had never been willing for fear to master her. She had fought hard to be in control of her emotions, to make peace the dominating force of her life. She had tried again when she came to bed earlier. She had refused to have either Anna or a maid sleep in her room with her. She had even refused to allow herself to leave the candles burning.

It seemed that since coming to Penshurst there had been nothing but one fear following another. Perhaps she ought to do what Anna and Luke wished her to do and what even Ashley advised. Perhaps she should leave Penshurst and go home to Bowden. But she did not want to leave. She wanted to stay with Ashley. He had mentioned forever during their walk by the river. She wanted forever with him, or at least the rest of their lives. She even dared to hope that he was coming to love her as she loved him. Besides, she did not want to run from her fear. If she ran now, perhaps she would find herself running all her life. She would start seeing herself as a handicapped person.

She had given in to the temptation to take a small dose of laudanum again at bedtime, she remembered. Her hand had been stinging beyond her power to ignore. The effects of the drug had worn off. Doubtless it was the disorienting effect of emerging from her drugged state that had caused her to wake up in the state of panic that still had her heart thumping uncomfortably against her rib cage. The fear was so very hard to shrug off. She dared not move. But why?

She deliberately turned onto her side, wriggling and squirming to find a comfortable position. She would conquer this fear soon, she decided. She would close her eyes and go back to sleep.

But her eyes focused on the small table beside her bed. The familiar contours of the candle in its ornate candlestick were obscured by something larger. She tried to remember what it was. Her small prayer book was at the edge of the table where she had placed it last night. What was the larger object? Her mind puzzled over it, tried to remember—entirely without success. Finally she was forced to sit up in order to lean over and touch it. She picked it up and still could not remember. It was heavy, a picture frame. No, two picture frames, hinged together.

And then she knew. The feeling of dread returned, redoubled in strength.
How had it come here?
It had not been here when she went to bed.

She scrambled out of bed, clutching the frames to her bosom. She looked wildly about her for her night robe. It should have been over the back of the chair beside the fireplace, but it was not there. She could not remember where she had put it. She set down the picture frames on the bed and went searching in her dressing room. But her mind was too distraught even to remember what she was looking for. She opened the door into the corridor outside and fled along it.

His door was unlocked. She opened it in a hurry, rushed inside, and closed it behind her. She stood with her back against it, trying to catch her breath, trying to calm her mind, trying to remember why she had come. And where she was.

And then her eyes focused on the bed. He was getting out of it and coming toward her. He was naked, she could see in the near darkness. His hands were on her shoulders. He was talking to her, she knew, though she could not see his lips clearly. His hands gripped tightly and pulled her against him. She shuddered into his warmth.

She was on the bed then without knowing how she had got there. It was soft and warm from his body heat. He was sitting on the edge of the bed, close beside her, lighting a candle. He had pulled on a red silk robe, though she had not seen him do so.

“Emmy?” He leaned over her. “My love, what is it?”

Her teeth were chattering. She was in his room, she realized. Why? His fingers were smoothing through the hair at her temple.

“You woke up and were frightened?” he asked. “You should have allowed Anna to stay with you, or at least one of the maids.”

Yes, she had woken up frightened. And alone. There had been a shape . . .

His mouth was on hers, warm, comforting. “Shall I send for Anna?” he asked her. His eyes suggested something else.

No, she told him without words. No, she could not move again. She could not go back
there.
But where? And why could she not go back?

“Are you in pain?” he asked. “The laudanum must be wearing off. It has left you disoriented.”

Her hand was throbbing. She became aware of the fact only when he asked. It was not unbearable. She did not want any more laudanum. Laudanum made her strange, filled her with fears. She hated being afraid. She was still afraid from the last dose. She could feel her teeth chattering.

“No.”

He stood up then, undid the belt of his robe, and let the whole garment slide to the floor. He bent to blow out the candle. He was so very beautiful, she thought, even if he was somewhat thinner than he should have been. He was still well muscled, and possessed a graceful masculinity. He lay down beside her and held her close so that she could draw on his warmth and his strength and eventually relax into them. When he finally made love to her, he lay heavily on top of her and pushed swiftly and deeply inside without first loving her with hands and mouth. He moved with hard, firm strokes. It was as if he knew her need to lose herself in him, to become one with his strength and virility. She did not participate. She lay relaxed and open and grateful. She felt him pressing at her core and gladly on this one occasion allowed him to master her.

Sleep came almost at the same moment as the hot gush of his seed.

•   •   •

Holding
her asleep in his arms in his own bed and in his own home as he did now brought stark reality to his mind. She was unmarried, yet very possibly she was with child by him. She was a guest under the protection of his roof. Her sister and his brother were under that same roof. Yet she was in his bed. He had been inside her body. It would not do. He could not simply allow matters to continue like this.

She would have to go away from Penshurst. That was quite evident now. And if she must go, then he must too. He could not live without her. And he would not do so unless she was very adamant in her refusal. He did not believe she would be. Besides, her choices were very limited now. He did a quick mental calculation of the number of times he had put her in danger of conceiving. She had to go away. And so would he.