The Next Best Bride (25 page)

It was obvious that the housekeeper fought an internal struggle for a few moments. Helena wondered what dreadful secret was about to be revealed. Or hidden. But Mrs. Robson told her the truth. "The earl."

She looked down at the mangled instrument, puzzled. "Why would he do such a thing?"

The housekeeper dipped her gaze to the floor. "I don't like to gossip, milady."

Gossip. As if Helena were some stranger asking out of idle curiosity. "Surely it is not gossip to tell me how this harp came to be so savagely damaged? I am mistress of this household, am I not?"

"The earl was angry." Mrs. Robson's words came through clenched jaws. "He didn't want to go to the main house. He was furious that his mother was gone."

What an odd way to talk about his mother's death. But the destruction became understandable. Not quite so horrible. "I suppose that is natural, then. A child in the throes of grief when his mother died."

Mrs. Robson looked as though she would object, but then she subsided. "As you say, milady."

Helena ran her fingers lightly over the destroyed harp. In her mind's eye she could see the scene. Rand, in a fit of mad grief, destroying his mother's favorite instrument. Not able, at his age, to understand why his parents had deserted him.

Her own parents had died when Helena was just about the same age as Rand had been at his parents' deaths. She remembered her utter lack of understanding. Of death. Of the change in their household: money had become scarce, servants had left.

She had not thought of those times in many years. If not for Miranda holding their family together... Her sister had rocked them, and told them stories with happy endings to distract them from the sad truth of their own lives. To give them hope for the future. She could not imagine the marquess comforting a frightened, angry, heartsore little boy.

But she could not ignore Mrs. Robson's certainty that the problem was not grief, but madness. Helena watched the woman as she asked tentatively, "Perhaps he was simply anguished over his parents' deaths?"

"I couldn't say, milady. The doctors seemed to think it an instability of the mind."

Doctors. "So long ago. He was a child, then." Helena temporized, not wanting to believe what the housekeeper told her. She had seen no signs of madness in him in their brief time together. And Ros would have known — wouldn't she?

"Perhaps, milady." Mrs. Robson would not dare say otherwise, Helena realized.

Although her expression indicated she held to her own opinion. "I just know what I saw. And there was not sorrow in his eyes, there was blood and madness."

Helena thought of the man she had spent a month living with and learning to know. She said firmly, "He is not mad now."

The housekeeper's eyes flickered to Helena's face and then back to the floor. "Only because he is afraid to go back."

Back? Helena felt a cold dread seize her. "Back where?"

Mrs. Robson's small black eyes were lit with cold satisfaction. Apparently she felt she could vindicate her own opinion with facts. "Back to the madhouse."

"He —" He had never told her. But, then, that was not something a desperate man would tell his reluctant bride, was it? Especially if he wanted her to bear a child. His child.

"Rand was put away?" Still, a madhouse seemed excessive. Had the marquess overreacted. "For cutting the strings of a harp? When he had just lost his mother?" Helena was stunned at the cruelty.

Mrs. Robson shook her head. "No, milady. He just got a proper beating and sent to bed without supper for that. The marquess didn't have to have him locked up until later — when he turned eighteen." The woman shook her head with patently false grief. "I was there, so I'm not carrying tales, milady."

As if she relished Helena's horrified attention, the housekeeper nodded, her eyes flashing as she remembered the details. "Mad as a hatter, he was. Ranting and raving. He didn't just destroy a harp that time, milady."

Helena was afraid to ask what Rand had ruined at eighteen. A man nearly grown, no mere child. A man who didn't believe in love. Or had he, then? She sank into a nearby chair. Afraid to hear the rest of the story. Afraid not to know the truth.

The housekeeper no longer seemed reticent. In fact, she seemed to relish telling Helena the truth about the man she had married. Her dislike for her new mistress had been for the most part concealed before, but now it was on full display. "His grandfather had to put him away. Took three big men to carry him out."

In the face of the housekeeper's undue elation at her news, Helena strove to keep her tone calm and without judgment — or horror. "How long was he...away?"

As if she thought the punishment not nearly enough, the housekeeper said dolefully, "Only for two weeks, mind you. And then he came back meek as a lamb."

"And he has been fine since then? No hint of...anger?"

"So it would seem, milady." The housekeeper agreed reluctantly. Her mouth tightened a moment before she added, "But no matter, we all knew."

"Knew what?"

"Knew he could do it again."

Helena felt a sense of dread even as she asked what she knew she must ask. "What did he do that was so horrible?"

But the housekeeper was no longer forthcoming. Helena was not certain whether she truly felt the need for discretion, or had decided it would be more satisfying to torture her mistress with the limitless possibilities. "I think you'd need to ask the earl himself for the answer to that, don't you, milady?"

There was a loud bang from above and Mrs. Robson hurried to the doorway to peer upwards. "Is that all, milady? I need to keep an eye on those men."

"Thank you for your honesty, Mrs. Robson. Helena nodded.

She had not needed to think another minute before she knew who she could ask about what had happened when Rand was eighteen. And it would certainly not be her husband. Or his grandfather. Both of those men had ample reason to tell her a fairy story meant to ease her fears, whether they were justified or not.

As she dressed for her dinner with the marquess, she contemplated how she should ask her questions. At last she decided a direct approach would be best.

"Marie. Mrs. Robson has told me the earl was sent away when he was eighteen."

"Yes, milady." Her cheerful countenance took on a wary cast.

She kept her voice gentle so that the girl would not become alarmed and uncooperative. "Is that why you are so afraid of him when he is home?"

The girl began a wailing excuse. "I don't mean to be —"

Helena waved her to silence. "What are you afraid of, exactly?"

Marie sniffled. "That he'll do it again."

Helena wanted to scream, but she didn't think it would make the girl any more quick to answer her questions. "Do what again?"

At last Marie told her what she needed to know. "Hurt a girl from the village, milady."

"He hurt someone?" Helena did not want to ask any more than she already had. But it was too late. "Are you certain?"

"Yes, milady. Jennie Bean. He killed her, he did." Marie's face shone with conviction, but then darkened. "Well, it was suspected so. There was blood in her cottage and her not to be found to this day."

Blood. Still, there were many explanations for that. "He gave no explanation? No reason?"

Marie looked at her blankly. "What does a madman need with reason, milady?"

* * * * *

The marquess paid her an unexpected visit one afternoon. Mrs. Robson did not announce him. Helena might not have known he was there for hours, except that she had just finished a particularly exacting hour's work on the leg that gripped the horse's midsection in her painting.

As she took a moment to stretch her aching back, she caught movement out of the corner of her eye. She turned, thinking... hoping...that she would find Rand there, offering to sit for her again. Offering to answer the questions that swarmed in her mind about the things she had learned since he had been gone. She managed a smile of welcome when she saw that it was not her husband, but instead his grandfather.

He was seated in one of her delicate chairs even though he was much too large a figure for the chair's thinly curved legs. She had no idea how long he had been there and she was not aware he had been watching her paint until he said abruptly, "My grandson did not exaggerate your talent, I see."

She looked at the nearly complete painting, trying to see it objectively. "Thank you my lord." At times she thought it captured her husband perfectly. At times she was tempted to burn it and start over.

Despite his praise, his expression indicated an aversion to the painting itself. Was it the subject? Rand was a handsome man and she had let his reckless joy in life show in both his pose and his expression. Had the marquess noticed a slight hint of madness about the mouth and eyes, or had Helena herself imagined the effect because of the story she had pried from Marie's reluctant lips?

The marquess, true to form, returned to the subject dear to his heart. A subject that she had heard nightly at dinner for weeks. "Mrs. Robson says you have not taken care of yourself properly since that irresponsible husband of yours took himself off to London."

Knowing that he had taken the trouble to visit out of concern, Helena answered without showing the uneasy irritation she felt. "I sometimes forget myself when I paint."

He snorted. "You don't eat. You don't sleep. Are you expecting?"

"It is too soon to say." Helena answered evasively. She was almost certain that her painting was not the cause of her tendency to eat and sleep less of late.

She knew he waited for her to confirm his suspicions. Instead, she began to clean her paint brushes. "I have given the matter little thought since there is nothing to be done. It is either true, or not." She thought she would find in a few weeks that she carried a child. But she did not want to say until she was absolutely certain. A few more weeks. Perhaps when Rand came home. If Rand came home.

"We'll see about that." The marquess snorted again and departed with a shake of his head.

A week later he returned, with a stranger in tow. A small round white haired woman with serious brown eyes and pink cheeks.

Helena was at tea. Mrs. Robson announced them properly, this time. But a proper entrance did not make the marquess display any more than his usual abrupt manner, after he had kissed her cheek.

"You're pale as milk, girl." He pulled her to her feet. He fixed her with green eyes so eerily like Rand's, and yet with less warmth...or was that her imagination taking liberties with her memory?

"I'm healthy as a horse." She made the comparison knowingly, since he was eyeing her in the same manner he eyed his acquisitions for the stables.

He said brusquely, "Twirl around girl." When she executed a quick pirouette, he shook his head. "Slowly. Twice."

Helena did so, feeling as if she were six years old again. The only thing missing was having Ros to wink at her as she turned.

He turned to the as yet unintroduced woman. "Well? What do you say?"

The woman did not look at Helena as she spoke. "I believe you may live to see a great grandson, my lord. In the very near future."

He nodded in satisfaction. "Good enough."

"My lord?" Helena felt as if she had been stripped naked. "Who is this?"

"What?" He turned to her, confusion dimming his broad smile. She wondered for a moment if he remembered that she was still in the room. "Oh. Nanny Bea."

Then he turned to the woman again. "I'll have the coachman bring your bags in. Mrs. Robson has gotten your old quarters ready for you."

The older woman regarded her with a frank and appraising stare. There was no pretense in her assessment. But no unfriendliness, either. "So you’re the one my little Rand picked for a wife, hmnh? Little on the thin side. Have you been having trouble keeping your stomach settled?"

Helena nodded, wondering if Nanny Bea would approve or disapprove of the sickness which had kept her from eating much these last few weeks.

"Well." The woman took her hand and patted it gently. "We'll take care of that. I promise you'll be eating and sleeping better now that I'm here to look after you."

Helena waited until the woman had bustled away before addressing the marquess. She worked hard to suppress the quiver of rage that threatened to display itself to him. "Have you added to my staff?"

He blinked, as if surprised she was able to speak. "Nanny Bea. For the child, of course."

She looked at him in astonishment, although she couldn't have said whether it was more for his hiring a nanny for her without consulting her, or being certain there was a need for a nanny. "There is no child."

"There will be soon. Nanny Bea knows these kinds of things." He reached out and pinched her cheek.

"My lord, if I am to have a child, it will not be here for some months." Helena hesitated before she added, "And I do not mean to doubt Nanny Bea's abilities, but it is early yet to know for certain—"

He patted her cheek to silence and comfort her in a single gesture. "Bit soon, I know, my dear. But with all this painting you do, you need someone to keep you fed and rested. That timid maid of yours has barely got the knack of dressing you. You need someone who'll make you eat."

Helena knew that he meant his actions in kindness. Didn't he? "I hardly think—"

"Blood means everything to me, my dear." His gaze pierced through her. "Sometimes I don't know if my grandson values it as he should."

"I'm certain he does."

"Are you?" He gave her another sharp look and then shook his head. "I had high hopes you might bring him to heel. I guess I’m just an old fool." There was true sorrow in his words.

"I hardly think you are a fool, my lord. My husband is not meant for rusticating, but he did not take himself to London until after seeing that I was settled in. I have no complaints." Except that Rand appeared to have taken her heart with him to London. Not that the marquess would think that a problem.

He snorted. "No need to defend the reprobate to me, my dear. I've paid good money to clear up the messes he's left behind him." He sounded surprisingly bitter when he added, "If he does value the blood, you can't tell it by the way he gambles with our good name."