A Baron in Her Bed (6 page)

There was a long pause as the horse crunched its way through the snow. The icy wind stung her nose while she berated herself for her stupidity. The more familiar with him she became, the more difficult it was to pretend.

“Do you prefer the company of men, Simon?”

She almost missed his quietly spoken question. “I have several friends,” she said, deliberately misunderstanding. Was he repulsed? Might he now think her like those Romans Catullus spoke of in his poems? She clamped her lips shut on a nervous giggle. In India, she had found a French translation in the library of their rented house. Her French was adequate enough to have made sense of them. Those poems had shocked her to the very core, but she couldn’t help turning the pages. There had been a collection of Persian literature too, some with pictures, and she’d smuggled them into her room and poured over them late at night by the light of the candle.

“We play cards and hunt when we get a day off,” she said.

“But you are
artistique
, no?”

“There is artistry in many things, my lord,” Horatia said with a shrug. “The skill in crafting a fine saddle, for instance.” The comment would not stand up under scrutiny, she knew. But fortunately, it had the effect of silencing him. But were there doubts now planted in his mind? When next he met her, as he was sure to do soon enough, would he recognize her and be angry enough to denounce her?

They continued on with just the creak of saddle leather and the cry of the birds wheeling overhead in the frigid, grey sky.

“We seem to have reached the main thoroughfare,” he said with obvious relief.

Horatia could only agree.

The General stepped out onto Rosecroft Hall’s rutted gravel drive, which was lined with knobby, aged oaks. She urged the horse into a trot. The hall sat in queenly, if shabby, grandeur on a rise in the distance, its clusters of blackened chimneys highlighted against the sky.

“You know the history of the house?” he asked, pride warming his voice.

“A little, my lord.” Of course Horatia did, but she wasn’t about to disappoint him.

“Rosecroft Hall was built in fifteen-fifty-seven by William, the first Fortescue. It consisted of little more than the great hall, solar, buttery, and a few bedchambers. Lord Robert, the third baron, extended it in the seventeenth century. He added the west wing and gatehouse. The fourth earl added the sash windows and water closets. All of the Fortescues are buried in the crypt in the parish churchyard in Digswell, with the exception of my father.”

Horatia made an encouraging sound in her throat. She had roamed the churchyard and knew the ornate crypt of which he spoke.

“Rosecroft Hall’s great chamber boasts a carved minstrel’s gallery, where many fine paintings hang.
It is renowned for its Elizabethan panels and plasterwork ceiling. But more than this,
mon ami
,
there’s a secret door below the solar with a tunnel that leads to the woods. My father used it when he was a boy. I intend to find it.”

Horatia smiled at his boyish enthusiasm. “I wish you luck, my lord.”

“The gardens too are
magnifique
. The lime walk, the topiary…” His voice fell away as they rode farther on and the neglect became more obvious, with unclipped hedges and rangy gardens beneath a layer of snow.

Horatia remembered the last time she’d visited. The house had been in need of attention even then, with cracked plaster and faded draperies, and she doubted much had been done since. Men were not always aware of such things. It needed a woman’s touch, and Eustace was a widower. He had never spoken of his wife. Perhaps her passing still weighed heavily upon him as her mother’s did her father.

“The grounds need work,” he said. “I wonder why it hasn’t been done.”

“Most likely due to Mr. Fennimore’s health.” Horatia voiced her thoughts, feeling a swell of loyalty for her godfather.

They approached the massive sandstone house. The columned forecourt was covered in a flowering creeper, the walls thick with ivy. She reined The General in. The long, mullioned windows looked blankly down. A footman rushed out to greet them. Thankfully, there was no sign of Eustace.

“Please come in and partake of some breakfast,” the baron said to Horatia. “I’m sure Mr. Fennimore would like to thank you.”

He jumped down and stretched his back with a groan as Williams hurried around the corner from the direction of the stables.

“Most kind, my lord.” Horatia eyed the approaching groom. “But I must ride straight home. I’m concerned about my master.”

He bowed his head. “Thank you, Simon. I am indebted to you.”

“Nonsense, my lord. Anyone would have done the same.” She sank her chin beneath her scarf and ignored Williams’s penetrating stare. He would recognize The General. She turned the horse’s head, directing him back the way they’d come with a sigh of relief. If Williams didn’t question his lordship too closely, she might pull this off, but she had yet to face what lay in wait at home.

As The General cantered down the drive, she turned. The baron stood, legs apart and hands on hips, staring after her. He raised a hand in farewell. She wondered where Eustace was, for he still hadn’t appeared. He was sure to be relieved that his relative had arrived safely.

She swung her arm in a casual mannish gesture of farewell and rode on. Instead of the expected relief, she found herself saddened, as if she was saying goodbye forever to a friend. How odd. Lord Fortescue wasn’t a friend, and now would never be.

Guy watched Simon disappear. He’d been off balance in the groom’s company but regretted seeing him go. What was wrong with him? He’d been unsettled the whole of last night and this morning, and he was damned if he knew why. Perhaps the head injury had more of an effect on him than he’d realized. It still ached a little. He walked up the steps and entered the paneled great hall. Dust had faded the fine woodwork, and the ceilings were stained with smoke. The damask drapes at the long windows were threadbare, almost in tatters.

Guy tried to suppress his anger and disappointment as he pulled off his gloves and handed them, along with his coat and hat, to the butler. “
Merci
…” His brows rose in query.

“Hammond, your lordship.”

“Is Mr. Fennimore at home, Hammond?”

“Yes, my lord. He is in the library.” Hammond snapped his fingers, and a footman led the way up the wide, carved oak staircase.

Guy could have found the library by himself. He had discussed the house so often with his father he knew his way around as if he’d lived here.

The footman scratched at a set of double doors, and a man’s faint voice answered.

Guy walked in to find Fennimore in a green velvet chair by the fire, resting his foot on a fringed footstool. The room smelled musty. The green silk at the windows was faded. The bookshelves and the cedar furniture were thick with dust. Long windows looked down over the terraced Tudor rose-garden. Through the murky glass panes, he glimpsed woody roses grown out of shape. Mildewed statues wearing a mantle of snow rose like ghosts from the tall grass.

“
Bonjour
, Eustace.” Guy walked over to shake his relative’s hand. Eustace’s plentiful ginger hair was streaked with white. He had an attractive cast to his face and must have been good looking in his youth, despite a receding chin. His faint smile failed to banish the bleakness in his eyes.

“So, Guy, you have arrived at last.” When he failed to rise, Guy leaned down and shook his limp hand.

“I expect you wondered what had happened to me.”

“I did, my boy. I did.” Eustace nodded towards the window, where a watery sun broke through the clouds, turning the snow a luminous white. “I daresay the storm was fierce. You’ll need a good breakfast.”

“
Merci.
I’m as hungry as a bear.” Guy watched him carefully. The man looked as if he suffered from ennui. Guy wondered if he had contracted a malaise. Simon might have been right. It seemed a logical reason for the estate to be in such a bad way.

As if reading Guy’s mind, Eustace said, “I’m afraid I have a touch of the gout. Forgive me if I remain seated.”

Guy nodded. “
Je regrette
.”

Eustace waved a languid hand towards the damask chair opposite him.

Guy declined and gestured to his clothes. “I need a bath and a change of clothes. I trust my trunk has arrived?”

“Yes. A strange horse turned up at the stables during the night. Would that be yours?”

“
Oui
. I’m glad my horse found shelter.” Guy frowned. “Did they bring in my portmanteau?”

“No. There was nothing on the horse bar the saddle.”

Guy groaned. “Then it is gone.”

“I expect so.” Eustace dabbed at his mouth with a monogrammed silk handkerchief. He was far better dressed than the house, wearing an elaborately patterned banyan over a fine linen shirt and well-cut pantaloons. “I expect you’ve brought evidence you are who you say you are?”

“It was in my portmanteau. Lost somewhere out there where the horse and I parted. I shall have to go and search for it.”

Eustace eyed Guy’s wounded forehead. “You fell from your horse?”

The man’s yawn behind his hand outraged him. “I was set upon by bandits. As I outrode them, I collided with a low branch and was knocked out. A man from the village came to my aid.”

Eustace leaned forward in his chair. “You were lucky to find anyone on that road. Who was it?”

“Simon Rawlings, a groom in the employ of Colonel Cavendish of Malforth Manor.”

“You were lucky.” Eustace picked up a bell from the table next to him and rang it. “A servant will show you to your chamber. We have much to talk about. I’ll join you in the breakfast room after you’ve bathed.”

Guy followed the footman to his bedchamber, noticing further evidence of neglect. He had been given one of the lesser suites in the east wing. Eustace had not felt the need to vacate the famous blue suite where royalty had once slept. It had been Guy’s father’s bedchamber and his grandfather’s before him. The room had not been cleaned for many a long year. Guy rang for a servant and gazed at his room’s dull paneling and faded yellow brocade. It appeared that Eustace resented him being here, despite the house remaining at his disposal if he wished to stay. Guy had made that clear in his missive, and he was more than little annoyed at the man’s casual attitude.

Over breakfast, Eustace didn’t see fit to question where Guy had spent the night, so Guy didn’t offer the information.

“I plan to leave for London when the season begins.” Eustace raised a tankard of ale to his lips.

“This house will remain your home should you chose to live here,” Guy said, making sure Eustace understood.

Eustace’s smile did not reach his eyes. “Thank you, but Parliament opens soon, although London’s a bit thin of society until spring when everyone returns to open their houses. The lease of your London house does not expire until the end of the year, as I informed you. Then it will take considerable time for the rooms to be made fit for your use.”

“I saw enough of it to know I can’t take my bride there. I expect I shall sell it and buy a townhouse with a better address.”

“You have chosen a bride?”

“No. But I intend to begin looking for one.”

“You’ll wish to do that in London. You’ll reside with me, of course.”

“I am grateful for your kind offer
,
but I don’t plan to return to London for a while. There is much to do here,” Guy said with a careful glance at Eustace. “We could do with more servants and the house and grounds are in need of repair.”

Eustace’s salt and pepper eyebrows snapped together. “I did my best.” His shoulders stiffened. “The whole country is in a bad way. There’s revolutionary talk in the air, and the servants prefer the large towns over the country. It has been very hard to find suitable staff.”

“London appears to be filled with homeless soldiers and sailors, and the half-starved unemployed,” Guy agreed. “I wonder if I might find some suitable servants among them.”

Eustace shook his head. “Untrained and unscrupulous men are worse than none.”

“Then I shall write to a London employment service.”

“The cost to keep an estate this size has become crippling in recent years.”

It was Guy’s turn to frown. “What about the tenant farmers?”

“England is in a very poor state after years of war,” Eustace reiterated. “There’s little money to be made on the land. Once you’ve recovered, I’ll instruct the office manager to show you the ledgers.”

His nostrils pinched, Eustace rose and excused himself, leaving Guy to eat alone. He chewed on a piece of bacon. Things must change and fast. He beckoned to the lone footman standing against the wall in his threadbare livery.

“Moody, isn’t it? What is the estate manager’s name?”

“Mr. Ellis, my lord.”

“Find him and inform him I shall expect him in the library with his books at eleven o’clock.”

The footman bowed and left Guy to plan his day, despite a persistent headache. If the weather permitted, he would ride out and search for his portmanteau. He hoped to visit some of the tenant farmers. He needed more information before he accepted Eustace’s excuses. His relative had been given a very generous allowance for the upkeep of the estate. Throughout the years in exile, his father had found a way to send money.

Guy threw down his napkin and rose. There was much to do here, and the quicker the workmen and gardeners began, the better. He must get on with his life. He hoped the local society would prove good company. He needed to learn more about English ways.

The butler handed him his hat and gloves and assisted him into his coat. Guy walked out into fragile sunshine along the graveled lane to the stables. Perhaps his future wife was to be found here in the English countryside. He pulled off his hat and raked a hand through his hair. The extraordinary happenings of the past few days troubled him, but when he tried to replay them in his mind, instead of the attack on his life, his mind returned to Simon. He gritted his teeth, which made his temple throb.

“
Zut!”
he muttered, startling the groom who hurried to greet him.