Clandestine (35 page)

“It's Peters, sir,” he said, doffing his hat as soon as he drew level. “I've bad news.”

“Important enough to meet me out here?”

“Well, someone's waiting at the cottage, sir, and I thought you might like to know this first: Croft's dead. Killed in a fight with the revenue men above Stonebridge Cove.”

Sarah's heart stopped dead, but Guy seemed perfectly calm.

“When did this happen?”

“Last night, sir. Word is that someone tipped off the authorities, and the officers set up an ambush.”

“Anyone lost besides Croft?”

“No, sir. The others all got away safe, though the goods were all seized.”

“Thank you. You were right to come out here to tell me,” Guy said. “Who's waiting at the cottage?”

“Not one of us, sir. Never seen the fellow before. But he was most insistent that you'd want to see him right away. Since he already knew your real name, we thought it best to let him stay and keep an eye on him.”

“This man knows me as Guy Devoran?”

“Yes, sir, but he's not much more than a boy, truth be told. We're keeping him cooling his heels in the stables.”

“Then tell our mysterious stranger that we're on our way and will be delighted to meet him. You may send him in as soon as we arrive.”

“Very good, sir!”

Peters jammed his hat back onto his head, turned his pony, and rode away into the mist.

Sarah did her best to crush her sense of dread. The carriage jolted forward.

“Do you think Daedalus arranged it?” she asked.

“Croft's death? Possibly, but why turn murderer at such a late date? No, it's probably just a damnable coincidence, though I'm sorry for it, because I'd planned to interview the man again.”

“You think you could have made him tell you who Daedalus really is?”

“Yes.”

Sarah pressed her hands to her cheeks as if she could rub away her distress. She could imagine the skirmish in that narrow, deeply cut path from the beach. The revenue officers springing down the banks, swords and pistols drawn, the smugglers scattering like leaves or fighting back, and Croft the gardener meeting a sudden, brutal death.

“Daedalus is Lord Moorefield, Guy, and I believe him capable of real violence.”

“Very likely. But I cannot act against him until I have proof.”

“Why not?”

“Because if we confront the wrong man, the secret will be out and Daedalus will become truly desperate for the first time. What the devil's he thinking right now? He knows that Rachel discovered that her baby was stolen, but also that she can't be certain of his identity. Since he sent Croft to town to arrange those attacks, he must have trusted his gardener absolutely. Now, much to his gratification, Rachel's disappeared and there's been no shred of rumor since then that his son and heir is an impostor. Thus, he's feeling wary, but safe.”

“What if he knows about Mrs. Siskin?”

“I don't think that's likely, though just in case I left a couple of lads to surreptitiously watch over her. Meanwhile, the midwife and her husband are both dead, and Croft's just joined them. So no one's left to bear witness to Rachel's mad tale. If she publicly announced her claim, Daedalus could dismiss it as the ravings of a madwoman. All that would change immediately if we were to create the scandal of the age by accusing one of his innocent neighbors of stealing Rachel's child.”

“Especially if the accuser was Blackdown's nephew?”

“Exactly. Meanwhile, perhaps he suspects us, perhaps not. But right now he can't know that we've come back to Dartmoor, which gives us a tiny advantage.”

“So who's this stranger waiting at the cottage?”

Guy sat quietly for a moment, as if listening to the horses' hooves on the stony surface of the road.

“I hope it's the lad who delivered Rachel's note before you left Buckleigh,” he said at last. “I've had men looking for him ever since I left.”

Sarah swallowed her trepidation, though she had no idea why she felt so desperately afraid.

“Then you think that this boy may be our only link to discovering where Rachel's been hiding?”

“Yes,” he said quietly. “Precisely that.”

T
HE HORSES STOPPED IN FRONT OF A BUILDING
. T
HE MIST
had thickened to soft, heavy cotton, but two flambeaux wavered beside a doorway, staining the air as if it were soaked with yellow dye.

“Our new abode,” Guy said, leaping down.

Sarah took his proffered hand and climbed from the carriage. The facade of an elegant stone house loomed up in the mist.

“You call this a cottage?”

“It was a rectory once, but the parish is depleted these days. Mr. Handfast was able to rent the whole place very reasonably. In pursuit of his hobby, you understand: studying lichen.”

“Lichen?” she asked. “Rather a comedown from orchids, don't you think?”

“I have my own orchid,” he said. “Why the devil would I care to look at any others?”

Guy swung her up into his arms and kicked open the door to carry her over the threshold.

Though she was living every day now in a haze of uncertainty, Sarah squealed and laughed, and he kissed her as he set her down in a small parlor.

Perhaps all her fears were for naught. Perhaps nothing could stand in their way now: no mystery, no past, no buried grief, no doubts, not even Daedalus.

A single lamp cast its warm glow over the room. A fire burned merrily in the grate to ward off the night chill from the moor. In front of the single tall window the table was already set for supper. A tray on the sideboard held wine and glasses.

Guy helped Sarah off with her coat, then bent to light a taper to set a flame to more candles.

“A hot meal should appear at any moment from the kitchen,” he said. “But the staff understand that they're otherwise to make themselves scarce.”

“I am,” Sarah said, “starving.”

“So I am,” a light, musical voice said behind them. “May I join you for dinner?”

They both spun about. A young man stood awkwardly in the doorway. A shabby greatcoat enveloped his body. A shapeless hat shaded his forehead.

Yet his chin tipped with something like defiance.

He gestured over one shoulder. “Peters said you wished me to come in straightaway.”

Sarah felt as if she had been knocked in the jaw and were spinning away into an ashen mist. Glad? Yes, of course she was glad! Yet a huge sorrow had also crashed over her, pressing her down like a rogue wave, a wave that snapped great ships in two and sent them straight to the bottom of the ocean.

She clutched at the back of a chair, holding on until her vision cleared and the gladness surfaced through her selfish distress like a cork—until she saw Guy's face and heard the bitter shock in his voice.

“Please, don't hesitate,” Guy was saying. “Pray, join us! I must say that you make a very pretty boy, though I suppose we must all regret the loss of so much golden hair.”

The newcomer ducked his head to pull off his soft cap—and Rachel looked up, her eyes brilliantly blue beneath a halo of cropped golden curls.

“I didn't know how else to hide,” she said. “I don't care about my hair. I care only about my little boy. Please, don't be angry!”

Sarah sank onto the chair and sat pinned beside the fireplace. Rachel dropped her cap to the floor, walked straight into Guy's arms, and burst into tears.

He held her, cradling her head against his chest as if he comforted a child. Candlelight glistened over Rachel's gilt hair. The short cut only emphasized her perfect bones. Her throat and jaw were as pure and clean as an angel's.

“Hush,” Guy said. “It's all right, Rachel. I'm not angry. I was a little taken aback, that's all, but we're here now. We'll rescue him.”

Sarah met his barren gaze above her cousin's fair head. His eyes held nothing but darkness. Limned in candlelight, he and Rachel made a flawless couple, so striking that any observer might feel breathless to see them together.

Still clutching Guy's sleeve, Rachel turned to face her cousin. “I knew you'd get Guy to come to Devon, Sarah. I couldn't go to him myself. You do understand?”

“Yes,” Sarah said, though the knots had tightened in her stomach. “We both understand. Come and sit by the fire. You look frozen.”

Rachel stumbled to a seat. As if suddenly returned to life, Guy strode to the sideboard. Sarah had no idea what he was thinking or feeling. He seemed shuttered, entirely self-contained. She knew only that something in him had shattered and that he fought to hold himself together.

“We already know all about your baby, Rachel,” Sarah said. “We spoke with Mrs. Siskin and Mrs. Lane, and we've pieced together most of the story since then—about Knight's Cottage and Goatstall Lane and why Lord Jonathan found you in that kitchen in the Three Barrels. I'm so sorry.”

“I thought I could steal him away by myself.” Rachel pushed slender hands back through her curls. “But when I first arrived here from Hampstead, I had no idea who had my baby. I tried to talk to Mr. Croft—he was at Barristow Manor then—but he claimed to know nothing. When I insisted, he laughed and said that Barry Norris's little boy was his own and he could prove it, and I'd be hauled away to Bedlam if I tried to insist otherwise. No one else would see me.”

Guy poured wine. His eyes seemed almost terrifyingly calm, like the water in a deep well that might hide unknown ghouls.

He gave Rachel a glass. “Did you show Croft Mrs. Siskin's letter, or mention her at all?”

“No!” Rachel's long lashes swept down over her eyes as she stared into the glass. “He frightened me. I just said I'd heard a rumor.”

“But why didn't you wait for me to come home from Birchbrook? You know I'd have helped you.”

“I didn't want you to know the truth. Sarah understands.”

Perhaps she did. Rachel may have believed that Guy loved her, but she loved another man and always had. She'd been alone in the house with the chimneys when she'd first learned that their baby had lived, after all. Any woman might have thought it better to make a clean break in the circumstances, though perhaps not such a cruel one.

“So when you couldn't get anything further out of Mr. Croft, you hid in London?” Guy asked.

“Yes,” Rachel said. “I didn't know where else to go. And I did try your townhouse, Guy, but they said you'd gone down to Wyldshay and they didn't know when you'd be back.”

Guy leaned both shoulders against the wall, his gaze hawk-dark. “You could have written.”

“No! I couldn't write, not after the note I'd left you in Hampstead. And I am sorry about that. Truly! When I read Mrs. Siskin's letter, I felt frantic, desperate. I couldn't think. All I could imagine was getting down to Devon as fast as possible to find my baby.”

He tipped his head back and closed his eyes. Tension drew taut lines at the corners of his mouth.

“Yet I think what you wrote was the truth,” he said. “Though it's best forgotten now.”

Rachel had the grace to blush, a charming warm glow that suffused her peerless skin like a sunrise.

“So Mr. Croft rebuffed you and you came back to London empty-handed,” Sarah said quickly. “Then when someone began attacking you, you wrote to tell me how frightened you were.”

“Yes, because I realized then that Mr. Croft must have talked about me to the man who really had my baby. I thought he must want to kill me in order to keep his secret.” Rachel's blush deepened and she set down her wineglass. “I didn't mean to deceive you, Sarah—”

“Yes, you did,” Sarah said. “But it's all right. I understand. When you first fell in love at Grail Hall, it must have felt far too overwhelming to share with anyone, even me, though you poured out all those feelings into a tale about remembering Mr. Devoran on the yacht. But once you'd begun to spin such a network of falsehoods, at what point could you possibly retreat?”

“It was like falling into a well,” Rachel said, “where all you can do is keep falling.”

Sarah met her cousin's gaze, filled with genuine remorse, and fought to find her higher self. Whatever it cost her, she could not let herself give way to ignoble jealousy or resentment. Especially not for the cousin she'd grown up with!

“And a great love can feel very private,” she said. “Something to treasure secretly deep in one's heart, especially if you fear that a future together may prove impossible.”

Rachel dropped to her knees at Sarah's feet. “I knew you'd understand!” A new note of excitement colored her voice. “A love like that! I'd never imagined, never known—Can you ever forgive me, dearest? Though I did make up stories, my heart's always been true!”

Sarah caught her cousin's hands. “I've never doubted your heart, Rachel.”

“His name's Claude d'Alleville,” Rachel said. “His father owns a chateau in France.”

Guy's dark eyes, fathomless and quiet, met Sarah's gaze. They both recognized the name from Lord Grail's guest list.

“He was at Grail Hall for the Egyptian gathering?” Sarah asked.

“Yes. I was asked to attend the meetings to take notes. Claude's English is perfectly fluent and I speak as much French as any other lady, but we fell in love before we'd even spoken. He's the handsomest man you ever saw, Sarah! It was love at first sight. Can you believe that?”

“Yes,” Sarah said. “Yes, of course.”

Guy walked up to the table. “I'll ring for dinner,” he said. “And an extra plate.”

Rachel rose with a small, nervous laugh, and allowed him to help her to a seat. Sarah followed. His hands brushed briefly over her shoulders as she sat down, sending a little shock like an electric current through her veins.

Some of Guy's men brought in the supper dishes, a slightly rough crew to serve at table. As soon as they left the room, Guy turned back to Rachel.

“Monsieur d'Alleville disappeared, though you wrote to him every day?”

“He said when he left England he was going on a new expedition to Egypt, but his father would forward my letters. I don't doubt him,” she added. “He'll come for me as soon as he can.”

“But it's been over two years,” Sarah said gently.

“So? He's probably in Nubia by now, and my letters won't reach him until they all arrive together in a bundle—carried on camels!”

Guy seemed fascinated by the candles on the table. “Meanwhile, in your reluctance to seek me out directly, you sent Sarah those letters filled with panic. Though you traveled back here to Devon from Goatstall Lane several days before she arrived.”

Rachel pushed some boiled cabbage to the side of her plate. “I was too afraid to wait. A wall fell down and almost killed me. And the man who had my baby would never suspect that I'd come here to live right under his nose, would he? So I sold most of the rest of my jewels and dressed like this—only more respectably, of course—then rented a little out-of-the-way place on the moor. No one suspected me.”

“And you visited Barristow as soon as you could?” Sarah glanced at Guy. “Mr. Norris said that a young man had met his little boy in the garden.”

“Yes,” he said. “I overheard. I just didn't know at the time that it might be important.”

He poured himself more wine and turned back to Rachel. “Thus you hid in plain sight. Which of my men found you and didn't tell me?”

Rachel pursed her mouth like a rebellious child. “It was my fault. You can't blame him.”

“I don't. No male could ever resist you. I assume it was Oliver?”

She colored. “He probably guessed you'd understand.”

“Then he's right. And, fortunately for him, he's young enough to be unafraid of my retaliation. So was Master Norris your son?”

“Oh, no! That's why I never went back there, and anyway the nurse panicked. No, when I did find my little boy, his nursemaid never breathed a word to anyone.”

“Which nursemaid?” Sarah asked.

“Betsy Davy, of course! I went to Moorefield Hall next, because I discovered that Mr. Croft had moved there from Barristow Manor. As soon as I saw my little boy, I knew for sure.”

Guy had become very still, as if his heart had slowed. “How did you get access to the child?”

“I hid in the gardens. Betsy was scared the first time she saw me, but I pretended to have wandered into His Lordship's grounds in pursuit of a goldfinch. Though she soon realized that I wasn't really a boy, she didn't mind. She's lonely.”

“You told her who you were?”

Rachel shook her head. “No, I just made up another story about running away from a vicious husband: a terrible man who beat me and threatened my life. I said he'd sent my own babies away, so I'd never see them again. It wasn't so very far from the truth. Betsy even cried a little when she heard it. She doesn't have any real friends at the Hall. After that we met almost every week, whenever she could sneak out with Berry into a concealed part of the grounds.”