Beguiled

PROLOGUE

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

God, do not save the queen!

T
HE PEN WAS INDEED MIGHTIER
than the sword. His fingers might work upon a typewriter, but the sentiment was the same.

Giles Brandon felt his power as he worked in blessed silence. And thank the Lord, he was just coming to the end.

By God, he was good.

Giles pulled the final draft of his article from his typewriter, a self-satisfied smile on his lips. It might be said he was smirking, he thought, amused, but this was probably the best and most inflammatory piece he had done yet.

He set the paper down, leaned back in his chair and folded his hands over his chest for a moment, basking in his achievement and this moment of silence in which to savor his own talents. His London town house was one of the few set back from the busy street, so he didn't have to deal with the sounds of the common man hurrying about on business, the clatter of hooves on the pavement that came with horse-drawn vehicles, or, by God, the growl and heave and obnoxious horn-tooting of the new-fangled automobiles now becoming more and more popular among the monied classes—and even those not quite so monied, as well. Thick damask drapes covered the windows, adding to the insulation. Indeed, he could hear nothing from the street.

He lifted a hand whimsically. “Indeed,” he said aloud. “The pen
is
truly a far more lethal weapon than the sword.”

Of course, there was no one to answer. He'd sent his wife—God bless her, the fortune she had brought him, and the fact that she was easily browbeaten by his genius—to her sister's. Talent such as his demanded total concentration. He'd also given the skinny old bag of a housekeeper the night off. He was in his element now. Alone.

He laughed and spoke aloud again. “Alone with my favorite companions, sheer intelligence and cunning—and myself.”

Reverently, he picked up the typed sheet of his own brilliance. “This will have them all riled up in the streets.” He made a chortling sound. He wasn't so sure he wanted to be in the midst of such upset himself, but he certainly enjoyed the concept of bringing it about. He had been mocked one time too many, his name had been left off one too many invitation lists when it had certainly deserved to be there.

So now…those in power would pay.

He read his headline out loud with dramatic intonation.

“‘Has the Monarchy Resorted to Cold-blooded Murder?'”

Yes, people would be grumbling in the streets. There was already suspicion brewing. Well, naturally. It was those who were campaigning to rid the country of the monarchy who had met such a sorry demise.

If he weren't so well mannered, he would certainly have rubbed his hands together in glee.

He stood back from his chair and looked around, reveling in what he had accomplished. This incredible house—of course, it had come through his wife's family, but no matter. His desk was the finest cherrywood. The lamp on his desk was a Tiffany. His carpet was rich and thick and from the Middle East. Yes, he had done well, and all because of the brilliance of his written word.

Tomorrow, the article would run.

And by mid-afternoon…

“By George, I am…” For all of his dexterity with the English language, he could think of no other word. “Brilliant!”

The sudden sound of clapping from just behind him startled him so badly that his heart skipped a beat. He swung around, stunned. He had been alone for hours, so who…?

A figure stood at the rear of the room, right in the corner where the rows of bookshelves met, clapping not with enthusiasm but slowly, rhythmically, with…mockery.

“You!” Giles said, his eyes narrowing with fury. He glanced at his office door. It remained closed, as it had been. The house was locked up; of that he was certain. The housekeeper knew he would have her ears if she ever dared leave without locking up.

So…?

“Brilliant, Giles, oh, yes, just brilliant,” the intruder said. “What are you doing here? How the hell did you get in?”

The visitor shrugged, walking from the shadows into the pool of light cast by the lamp on the desk.

Though Giles could now see his unwelcome caller—and could see no weapon—he felt a sudden sense of acute terror. It was impossible that anyone had gotten in. Impossible that they were alone in a vast world of shadow.

He could not hear the world inside this haven of his…

And no one could hear
him.

“I serve the greatest good of this country, and I do it well,” Giles flared.

“You serve yourself, and you are an egotist,” replied the figure. A slow, wry smile touched cruel lips. “But you are about to perform a far greater service. After all, as you have written, we must all be willing to sacrifice.”

Giles Brandon's eyes widened.

Only now did he see the weapon.

“No!” he roared.

“You will serve your country, and I promise you, your eulogy will be…brilliant.”

Fight!
he told himself.

He was a big man.

But, sadly, not an agile one.

He was barely aware when his feeble attempts at defense were thwarted. He didn't even feel the pain.

He
was
aware of his own terrible scream…

Thoughts, madly, insanely, rushed through his head.

The pen
was
mightier than the sword. But a well-honed knife in the hands of a madman…

He felt the hot spill of his own blood; the darkness that had encircled the little haven of light surrounding his desk began to encroach. It flooded his eyes with gray and shadow. And then…

He reached for the paper on his desk. His article. Brilliant. Oh, yes, he was brilliant. His hands spasmed; his fingers shook.

He touched the paper.

He heard his own scream growing fainter, fading….

Scream, he ordered his mouth, his throat, but his body disobeyed.

He choked and gurgled, a horrible gasping sound.

That, too, went unheard beyond the walls of his office, isolated so that a mind such as his would go undisturbed by the annoying clatter of humanity.

Outside the world went on, the sound of hoofbeats on cobblestones and pavement loud. An automobile horn blasted. Music blared from one of the restaurants. A horse whinnied….

And behind the heavy draperies, in the office far from the street, all was finally silent.

Giles Brandon's blood seeped into the fine Middle Eastern carpet as he stared with unseeing eyes.

He heard his heartbeat slowing.

Thump, thump…thump…

And then no more.

He died in quiet, in the silence he had craved, his last thought still an insistence that he was all powerful, the pen, mightier than the sword….

But flesh was weak and a knife sharp.

“D
OWN WITH THE MONARCHY
!”

Ally Grayson could hear the shouting as the carriage slowed. They were passing along the main street of the small village of Sutton, and she had suspected, even as they neared the town, that there might be trouble. Both saddened by the mood of the country and curious, she drew back the curtain of the carriage window.

People were milling about in an angry mood bearing placards that read “End the Reign of Thieves!” and “Royal Murder!” Some trudged the street in silence; others shouted angrily before the fine redbrick building that housed the sheriff's office.

Sour stares met the carriage, but no one moved against it. Ally was on her way to see her godfather, Brian Stirling, Earl of Carlyle, an admired and beloved figure despite the fact he was an ardent supporter of sad and aging Victoria. No one would wield a finger against him, his property or those beneath his protection, as his carriage proclaimed her to be.

Still, the tension in the streets was ugly.

Ally saw several people she recognized. Just outside one of the decaying Tudor houses that were so common in the area, she could see the journalist Thane Grier, not taking part in any way but observing avidly. She took time to observe him herself. He was a tall, handsome man, eager to move up in the world and be recognized as a writer of note. She wasn't at all certain what his opinion on the matter at hand might be, nor would he himself think it mattered. She thought—having read many of his articles—he would report objectively. He was not so determined to be an essayist as he was to be known for his acute eye and sound evaluation of the facts.

“See here!” came a shout from the sheriff himself as he emerged onto the steps in front of his office. “You will all stop this nonsense and go about your business!” he roared. “By God, what have we come to? Circus shows?”

Ally felt sore that the sheriff, Sir Angus Cunningham, would have the power to quiet the crowd. He was a war hero who had been knighted for his service in India. A big man, tall, broad-shouldered—and in the process of acquiring an ample girth—he had a head full of snow-white hair, muttonchops and a distinguished mustache.

Even so, there were a few more rumblings, despite the sheriff's words. “Murder,” a woman cried out weakly. “Two men murdered—and them men who spoke out against the waste in Her Majesty's court. Something must be done about a queen who condones—no, orders—such heinous and foul deeds.”

Ally couldn't see the woman's face. She was clad in black, a veil observing her features. She was wearing widow's weeds. She did recognize the woman standing next to her, who tried to hush her and draw her into her arms. It was Elizabeth Harrington Prine, widow of Jack Prine, a valiant soldier who had died in South Africa. Through her husband, she owned thousands of acres just west of the forest surrounding the village.

“Murder!” the woman in black shouted again.

Sir Angus didn't get a chance to reply. He was joined on the steps by an ally in the cause of justice, the elderly Lord Lionel Wittburg. Wittburg was taller but thinner, and his hair was pale silver rather than solid white. His reputation, however, reached back almost as long as the queen's reign, and the country had always loved him as a stalwart soldier. He echoed the words that were in Ally's own mind. “How dare you?”

But though he spoke the words full force, Ally sensed he was about to start crying, and she knew why. Hudson Porter—a man with whom he had little in common but who had been a dear comrade from his days in India—was one of the anti-monarchists who had so recently been slain.

A third man joined them. He was far younger, very attractive, a gentleman often seen on the society pages— a man who had the ability to charm those around him. “Please, this is unseemly behavior for good Englishmen. And women,” he added with a roguish smile. “There is no call for this, no need for this.” He was Sir Andrew Harrington, cousin of the widow trying to give solace to the woman in black. Hudson Porter had not been married, Ally knew, so the woman could not be his widow. A sister, cousin…lover? The other activist who had been slain, Dirk Dunswoody, had been eighty years old if a day at the time of his murder, and in all those years he had remained a bachelor, studying law and medicine, traveling abroad with the queen's army for much of that time. Why he had turned so violently against the monarchy, no one knew, unless it was because he had felt he should have been knighted for his service. Ally knew there had been a strange scandal associated with his name, and in its wake he had been passed over.

“Please, please, everyone. Go about your business. We will solve nothing here, and all of you know that,” Sir Angus told the crowd.

There were continued murmurings, but there was movement, as well.

The crowd was apparently dispersing enough for Shelby, Lord Stirling's coachman, valet, assistant and man of all work to drive the carriage through the streets. As he carefully wended his way, Ally saw that Thane Grier, still keeping his silence and his distance, was busy scribbling notes on a pad he pulled from his vest pocket.

She dropped the curtain as they left the small village square behind and headed along the road through the forest.

She didn't notice at first when the carriage began to pick up speed. She had dropped deep into thought, worrying about the state of the realm, then about her own situation. She couldn't help but wonder about the summons that was bringing her to the castle. It undoubtedly had something to do with the fact that her birthday was fast approaching. Though she had considered herself an adult for quite some time, her guardians had wanted to protect her from the world as long as possible, and it was only on this birthday that she would finally be considered an adult in their eyes. She loved those who had raised her and cared for her, but she was eager to have a say in her own life. Though her upbringing had been sheltered, she thrived on newspapers and books, and had savored each of her few excursions into the city, to a world of theaters and museums. She certainly considered herself intelligent and well educated, even if most of that education had taken place in a small school in the country or from the private tutors who had been sent to her humble home deep in the woods.

She had managed a bit of a peek at the real world. Though she had grown up in the care of her three “aunties,” she'd also had the benefit of her three sets of godparents. How she had been so blessed, she couldn't even imagine. Three wonderful, sweet women to actually raise her, and as an incredible addition to her life, three couples numbered among the peers of the realm to see that she received the best education and many benefits. Those latter three ladies—Maggie, Kat and Camille—were amazing, unique, and had once been hellions, she dared say to herself, even if not to them. She was glad of their wild past, because if they were to become angry when they discovered she had been taking her future into her own hands, she could remind them they were rather modern women themselves. Lady Maggie had defied all convention to minister to the prostitutes in the East End, Camille had met her Lord husband through her work in the Egyptology department at the museum; and Kat had already ventured out on several expeditions to the pyramids of Egypt and even into the Valley of the Kings. They could hardly expect her to be meek and mild and
not
want to make her own way in the world.

As she brooded, the carriage began to go faster and faster, and finally it began to career madly down the road.

Ally was roused from her meditations when she was slammed from one side to the other. She struggled to find her seat once again, and then held on for dear life. She wasn't afraid, just puzzled.

Was Shelby worried that the protesters who had filled the village square might be coming after them? That couldn't be. Surely he knew that frightened farmers and country shopkeepers would offer no real threat. Especially not when there were such illustrious men as Sir Harrington, Sir Cunningham and Lord Wittburg there to assure them.

So why was Shelby suddenly driving like a maniac?

She frowned, scrambling for balance, and realized that the deaths that had brought on the fear and frenzy in the village were certainly frightening enough. Two men murdered, public figures whose views opposed the Crown and who had pushed for an end to the monarchy. The deaths were terrible, and the times in general were hard. The poor queen, Victoria, aging and still so sad; Prince Edward taking on more and more duties; the threat of war in South Africa again…naturally, people were distraught. For many, poverty and ignorance superceded the amazing progress that Victoria's reign had brought in the fields of education and medicine. Workers were protected now, as they had never been before. There were those who protested the allowance given the Royal House. Those who felt that the royals did not do enough to warrant the money spent on the upkeep of their many properties and lavish lifestyle. England had a prime minister and a Parliament, and many felt that should be enough.

With a sharp thunk, a wheel went into a pothole, and she nearly hit the ceiling. What was going on? Shelby wasn't the type to be easily alarmed. He wouldn't be frightened by law-abiding protesters. Then again, the protesters were not the ones actually causing the tremendous unease in the streets and the press at the moment. That unease could be laid at the feet of those trying to inflame the crowd by making people believe that the monarchy was behind the murders of those politicians who were speaking out against them. There were far too many people willing to believe that the Crown was silently behind the murders.

She knew from her studies that anti-monarchists were not new to English politics, and she even understood, at least to some degree, why such a movement had come to the forefront again now. Despite Queen Victoria's determination to bring abstinence and goodness back to the Crown, her children, including her heir, had behaved scandalously. Back in the days of Jack the Ripper, there had even been a theory that her grandson, Prince Albert Victor, was the murderer. Since that day, a very vocal faction of anti-monarchists had not hesitated to step forward. These current murders, said by many to be the monarchy's attempt to quell that faction, had brought the political fever to such a rabid pitch that many of the country's sanest politicians were warning that there must be compromise and temperance, or there would be civil war.

Ally had never met the queen, but from all she had seen and heard, she couldn't believe that the woman who had brought such progress to her empire and still mourned a husband lost decades ago could be guilty of such horror.

But for all her knowledge of history and politics, she realized, she still had no idea why the carriage was racing so terrifyingly fast.

Suddenly, with a jerk, the carriage began to slow.

Surely, she thought, this could have nothing to do with the furor going on because two men, two politicians and writers who had viciously slandered the queen, had been found dead, their throats slit. Or with the distraught people in the streets, bearing their signs to protest the queen and Prince Edward. No, the cause of this had to be quite different, and if so…

If so, she knew the answer.

They moved slower, the horses walking now, not galloping. She heard the sound of a gunshot, and froze. There was shouting from nearby; then she heard Shelby calling hoarsely in return, but she couldn't understand his words.

“Stop the carriage!” a deep, authoritative voice thundered.

Tense, knowing that they were nowhere near the castle, Ally leaned toward the window, pulled back the drapery and looked out.

Her eyes widened in surprise, and it was then that icy rivulets of fear at last snaked through her system.

She had been right.

There was a rider right by her side, a man seated upon a great black stallion, clad in a black coat, hat and mask. Other riders shifted restlessly behind him.

The highwayman!

She had never dreamed that such a thing could happen in her humdrum life. As a devotee to several newspapers, she'd read about this man and his accomplices. In an age when more and more automobiles were finding their way onto the roads, they were being threatened by a highwayman on horseback.

He hadn't killed anyone, she reminded herself. In fact, some were comparing him to Robin Hood. No one seemed quite able to say just which poor people he was giving to, although shortly after the Earl of Warren had been held up, churches in the East End had suddenly been offered large sums to feed and clothe their flocks.

The highwayman had been stopping carriages for the past several months, and had stolen several things here and there, items of sentimental value, that had mysteriously made their way back to their owners. A thief, but not a murderer….

In fact, he had begun his depredations just after the first murder had taken place. As if the country had not had enough to worry about.

The wheels ground to a halt; she heard the whinnying protest of the horses, drawn up so short. And then she heard the coachman's words.

“My man, you'll not be harming the lass. You'll be shooting me first.”

Dear Shelby. Her bulky champion and guardian for as long as she could remember. He would protect her to his dying breath.

And because of Shelby, she found courage.

She threw open the carriage door and called out to him. “Shelby, we'll risk no lives for the likes of this thief and his brigands. Whatever the fellow wants, we will give it to him and be on our way.”

The highwayman reined in his great black steed and dismounted in an agile leap. His accomplices remained seated upon their horses.

“Who else is in that carriage?” he demanded.

“No one,” she said.

He clearly didn't believe her. Striding to the open door, he reached in, seeking no permission. His hands landed upon her waist, and she was lifted unceremoniously from the elegant carriage and set upon the ground. The man apparently believed there must be some hidden compartment within, for he disappeared into the carriage, then jumped out to stand beside her.