The Notorious Lord (11 page)

Rachel was biting her lip now and Cory clamped down on the urge to kiss her. To step outside the role of elder brother would do neither of them any good. Instead he took a careful breath and gave her a gentle smile. ‘I wish you good fortune, Rae. I hope that you find what you are looking for.’

Rachel gave him a smile of such dazzling brilliance that Cory’s heart missed a beat.

‘Thank you, Cory,’ she said. She scrambled to her feet. ‘I must go. There is still some unpacking to be done and dinner to be prepared.’

Cory put out a hand to her. He wanted to be with her even though it was, in some ways, a terrible temptation to him. ‘Stay here with me for a while. We have barely had chance to talk yet—’

But Rachel was already halfway down the path to the stile. Cory watched her go, a slight frown on his face. It felt as though she was running away from him. Cory clenched his fists, then slowly relaxed. Perhaps he had frightened her, stirring everything up with his comments about passion and his refusal to stay neatly in the place marked out for him as her friend. He could tell that she was uncomfortable with the idea of their friendship changing into something else and yet it was not dislike of him that made her run away. He had seen the mix of desire and curiosity in her eyes the previous morning by the river, heard the breathless note in
her voice last night when she had made light of his suggestion that he might kiss her…

He picked up his trowel again and sighed as he started to scrape away at a piece of pottery half-buried in the edge of the trench. His trowel caught the lip of the vessel and it shattered, several shards tumbling down into the ditch. Cory swore. He bent to pick them up and stood cradling them in his hand, looking in the direction that Rachel had gone. So now she was coming between him and his work. He was thinking about her when he should be concentrating.

Cory placed the pieces of pottery in a basket and shook his head slowly. He knew that he was fortunate to have Rachel Odell as a friend. He would be a fool to put that friendship at risk when it was one of the most precious things that he possessed. Nor could the friendship grow into anything else, for they wanted different things. In fact, he epitomised all the things that Rachel was rejecting, the travel and the excitement and the restlessness of an unsettled life.

Nevertheless, Cory watched her all the way back to the house. Despite his best intentions and Rachel’s wariness, he had the conviction that something had to change.

In the cool of the hallway Rachel paused and pressed her palms to her hot cheeks. She was not at all sure why she was feeling so disturbed. It was not simply the heat of the day that had made her feel so light-headed, for she had lived in far hotter climates than Suffolk in June. The conversation with Cory had made her feel self-conscious, and then she had compounded her folly by rushing away from him. No doubt he would think she had run mad. She was half-persuaded that she had. Cory had never had that effect on her before. At least not before their encounter by the river the previous day. Since then something about his behaviour towards her had unsettled her. He had disturbed her the previous night and he had done so again now…

‘Do
you
think me attractive?’

‘I have never really thought about it.’

But she had thought about it. She had thought about it and she had looked at him and in that moment she had
felt,
not seen, what a very attractive man he was. The knowledge was so sudden and so shocking that she had been completely dumbfounded. It had been like the moment he had swept her into his arms at her début ball, only much more powerful. It felt exciting and it felt all wrong, because Cory was her friend and she simply did not think of him in such terms. And when he had fixed her with that clear grey gaze and asked her about passion, she had remembered his comment about kissing her and had felt a wrench of anticipation shiver along her nerve endings, and a most unaccustomed warmth in the pit of her stomach. She had
wanted
Cory to kiss her, but when he had smiled and gravely wished her luck, she had also felt a huge relief.

She looked at her reflection in the pier glass. Her eyes were bright, her cheeks flushed. She looked rather pretty. Rachel stared, arrested by the sight of her high colour and sparkling gaze. She looked…excited. She looked as though in some strange way her feelings were awake…

The opening of a door further down the hall distracted her. Sir Arthur Odell emerged, head bent, peering over his glasses at the papers in his hand. His dirty boots left a trail of sand across the stone floor. He narrowly missed colliding with a small rosewood table. Rachel moved it to one side and put her hand on her father’s arm. Sir Arthur jumped.

‘Oh! Didn’t see you there, m’dear.’

‘No,’ Rachel said. ‘What are you doing inside, Papa? I thought you were down at the dig.’

‘Just came up to read this.’ Sir Arthur said, eyes gleaming. ‘Cook told me the post had arrived. The Royal Society Journal has an article by Cory on the Wiltshire barrows. Damned fine piece of writing. His conclusions are all wrong, of course, but can’t dispute that he writes well. Must tell
the boy. He’s a damned fine antiquary, even if he draws the wrong inferences…’ And he wandered out through the front door, the sand dropping from his boots and being trodden underfoot.

Rachel sighed and went through to the kitchen in search of a brush. Mrs Goodfellow, the cook, was standing at the table chopping carrots and grumbling under her breath in continuous monotone. Rachel smiled at her.

‘Good morning, Mrs Goodfellow. Why are you doing the vegetables? What has happened to Kitty this morning?’

Mrs Goodfellow’s grumpy face had melted into a reluctant smile at the sight of Rachel. She wiped her hands on a cloth and rested them on her broad hips. ‘Good morning, my duck. Kitty’s down at the excavations this morning.’ She snorted. ‘Your mama said they needed help with sorting the pots they’ve dug out, so the next thing I know, Kitty ups and offs down there. Any excuse. She’s got her eye on that man of Lord Newlyn’s, if you ask me.’

Rachel smiled slightly. Kitty, the kitchen maid, was no slouch when it came to spotting a likely young man, and Cory’s valet, Bradshaw, was a very well set-up lad indeed.

‘There’s just me and Rose,’ Mrs Goodfellow continued, nodding at the lumpy housemaid, ‘and she’s kept busy washing the pots your mama is digging out.’ She gave a sudden bellow of laughter, her chins wobbling. ‘Your mama asked if I’d like to help out today, Miss Rachel. Can you see me in a trench? I’d likely sink in the sand and need to be dug out myself!’

‘I’m sure that you would do a splendid job, Mrs Goodfellow,’ Rachel said, ‘but we need you here. If my parents persist in borrowing all the servants to help run their excavation, we shall all starve.’

‘Wouldn’t catch me down there,’ Mrs Goodfellow said, picking up her chopping knife again and attacking another carrot with gusto. ‘I’ve seen those ghosts, so I have, Miss Rachel, and I’m keeping well away!’

Rachel frowned. She had come across superstitious servants often on her travels, but would not have placed Mrs Goodfellow as one of them. Her practical common sense had always seemed much like Rachel’s own, leaving no room for fanciful ideas.

‘Ghosts, Mrs Goodfellow?’ she said. ‘Surely you don’t believe in such nonsense?’

‘Seen them with my own eyes,’ the cook said bluntly, ‘flitting about down there on the mounds in the moonlight.’

‘Ghosts flitting about in the moonlight? Have you been having a bedtime tipple, Mrs Goodfellow?’

Cory Newlyn had come into the kitchen, his hands full of pottery. Bradshaw was following him in with a bucket full of shards. Rachel jumped at the sight of him, then winced as more sandy soil was trampled into the house.

Mrs Goodfellow beamed at the newcomers. ‘No need for your sauce, my lord! I haven’t touched a drop since my John died. No, and I know what I’ve seen as well. Men with shields and helmets on, just like in the history books.’

Cory raised his brows. ‘Men with shields? Really? We have just found some bits of Anglo-Saxon pottery, so who knows, you may be right, Mrs Goodfellow.’

He put the pot gently into the sink and gave the housemaid his heart-shaking smile. ‘I do apologise for bringing you all this extra washing up, Rose…’

Rose looked as though she was about to melt under the warmth of Cory’s smile. She bobbed a curtsy and mumbled something incoherent.

‘It’s no trouble,’ Mrs Goodfellow said, changing her tune rather smartly. ‘Anything for you, my lord.’

Rachel smothered an unladylike snort. She suspected that more than one woman had said that to Cory in his time.

‘I could lend you Bradshaw later if you have any heavy jobs need doing,’ Cory offered. ‘By way of a thank you.’

Mrs Goodfellow eyed the valet. ‘Thank you, my lord, but no. I don’t want my girls’ heads stuffed with any more silly
ideas than are already there. You keep the lad with you and out of trouble.’

Rose giggled and blushed.

Rachel came forward to have a look at one of the pieces that Cory was washing gingerly in the sink. Clearly this was too delicate to be entrusted to Rose, and when she saw it Rachel could understand why. It was a drinking horn with a decorated metal rim and, though it was a little battered and had a piece missing, it was still very beautiful.

‘How lovely! I wonder who this belonged to…’

Cory gave her his swift smile. He leaned closer, so close that his hair brushed her cheek and momentarily distracted her. His shirt sleeves were rolled up to the elbow and Rachel was taken by an insane desire to run her fingers over the smooth nut-brown skin of his arm. She put both her hands behind her back.

‘I think it was for feasting and was modelled on an auroch horn,’ Cory said. He held it out to her. ‘The decoration on the rim is incredibly delicate.’

‘It must have been kept for very special occasions,’ Rachel said, touching the damp surface very gently. ‘I can see Mrs Goodfellow’s warriors all sitting around a fire in the great hall, passing the drinking horn and telling their battle stories…’

She looked up from the horn to see Cory smiling at her. She felt her knees go weak and caught hold of the edge of the sink to steady herself, pretending that she was checking the pieces waiting to be washed.

‘It is nice to hear you so enthusiastic, Rae,’ she heard Cory say. ‘I thought you did not care for antiquities.’

‘I like history,’ Rachel said, trying to concentrate. ‘It is all the digging I cannot abide.’

‘Ah, then you will not wish to join us this afternoon.’

‘No, thank you. I am visiting Mrs Stratton in Midwinter Mallow.’ Rachel wiped her hands on a cloth. ‘Papa was
looking for you, Cory. He has read your article in the journal of the Royal Society.’

‘I know,’ Cory said. ‘I saw him as we were coming in. He told me that my conclusions were all wrong.’

‘He told
me
that you were a fine antiquary,’ Rachel said. She saw how pleased Cory looked and felt warmed. ‘So you had better get back out to the excavation and prove him right.’

Cory went, still smiling, and Rachel felt happy and relieved. Things were back to normal. She and Cory had achieved their old footing and the same easy friendship as before. No doubt everyone felt weak at the knees when Cory smiled at them. It was just his way.

‘Yon’s a fine gentleman,’ Mrs Goodfellow said, pointing her knife in the direction that Cory had gone. ‘Surprised you did not snap him up years ago, Miss Rachel.’

‘Oh, Cory and I are just friends, Mrs Goodfellow,’ Rachel said airily. ‘Nothing more.’

She bent to sweep up the dirt on the floor and therefore completely missed the cook’s look of transparent disbelief. Mrs Goodfellow even went so far as to roll her eyes and shake her head, setting Rose the maid off into a paroxysm of silent laughter.

‘Friendship, eh?’ Mrs Goodfellow murmured, as Rachel went outside to put the sand back where it belonged. ‘The Quality can never see what’s under their noses. They say that love is blind, Rose, but Miss Rachel gives a whole new meaning to the notion!’

And Rachel, pausing by the sand pit in the courtyard, was busy proving that very point for she found herself standing staring in the direction that Cory had gone, long after his tall figure had disappeared.

Chapter Six

A
meeting of a very different nature from that of the reading group took place at Kestrel Court that night. Although the June dusk lingered, the curtains were drawn tightly and the candles were lit. Cory Newlyn joined the Duke of Kestrel and his two younger brothers, Richard and Lucas, in the drawing room, where Justin Kestrel dispensed glasses of brandy to the gentlemen and then put forward a certain proposal.

It was lucky that his companions had strong drink with which to fortify themselves, for the shock was extreme.

Cory was the first to regain his breath. ‘I beg your pardon, Justin, but you wish us to do
what,
precisely?’ he said incredulously. A look of complete disbelief spread across his face. ‘Forgive me, but I thought that you said that, in order to trap the Midwinter spy, you wanted us to make love to the ladies of the Midwinter villages!’

Justin Kestrel sat back in his armchair and tilted his brandy glass to his lips. A smile lingered in his eyes as he surveyed the consternation on the faces of his guests. ‘You heard me correctly, Cory,’ he said. ‘That is exactly what we would like you to do.’

Cory and Richard Kestrel exchanged a glance. ‘You silence me, Justin,’ Richard said, ‘and that does not happen
very often.’ He threw himself down into the chair opposite his brother, completing the circle of three sitting before the fireplace. Lucas Kestrel preferred to stand, restlessly pacing the room whilst the others lounged at their ease.

In the flicker of the candlelight the expressions on the faces of the Duke’s guests were varied. Richard Kestrel was a renowned poker player and his face, dark and saturnine, revealed nothing of his feelings. Lucas was looking frankly perplexed at his brother’s words. And Cory, who had thought that a day of hard excavation work had made him unnaturally slow and possibly deaf, waited for Justin Kestrel to elucidate, with a half-smile still lingering on his lips.