Cottage by the Sea (9 page)

   On Blythe's fourth day as a recovering invalid, Mrs. Quiller disclosed that she and her husband, John, the undergardener, were indeed Luke's last remaining employees. Neither the kindly older woman nor the recuperating visitor referred to Blythe's continuing emotional crisis.

   For his part Lucas Teague kept his distance, to both Blythe's relief and her mortification. However, Mrs. Quiller brought a vase of fresh rhododendrons every morning, along with several novels by Daphne du Maurier—all set in Cornwall—that the housekeeper presented to her on her meal trays. The books, Mrs. Q informed her charge proudly, were courtesy of her employer's extensive library and delivered to the sick room as per his instructions.

   As if it were an assignment that would give Blythe a reason to keep breathing, she became determined to devour the author's novels in the order they had been written.
The
Loving Spirit,
first published in 1931, was one she'd never read, and she plunged into the story that spanned three generations of a Cornish family whose fate was tied to the sea. Each day her sore throat improved and her respect for du Maurier's magical storytelling increased. And each day she rediscovered the deep pleasure she had once enjoyed indulging in the sheer act of losing herself in the world of fiction—an activity that Christopher had found utterly alien to his world of manufacturing visual images.

   However, in the hours before dawn on the fifth morning of her unscheduled stay at Barton Hall, she awoke with the oppressive sense that the four walls of her lonely bedchamber were closing in on her. Clad only in a sheer batiste nightgown that she assumed belonged to Lucas's deceased wife, she set out in search of another du Maurier novel to distract her.

   The long hallway leading to the landing was several degrees chillier than her room. Hurrying along the corridor, Blythe had a brief vision of herself as some updated version of Cathy in
Wuthering Heights,
flitting downstairs at Barton Hall in a filmy peignoir "on a dark and stormy night." Only the Cornish sky had remained remarkably cloudless all day, even at dusk.

   
Will you cut it out? Where do you think you are, Gothic City?

   Nevertheless Blythe could not shake the eerie sense that she knew exactly where Lucas's library was located. Sure enough, at the bottom of the broad staircase she turned toward a door to the right of the lower landing.

   Silvery beams of moonlight were streaming into the room through two tall windows, flooding the wall behind Lucas's desk where an impressively framed parchment sheet, decorated with colorful family crests, hung against the mahogany paneling. The other walls were covered with floor-to-ceiling bookshelves crammed with leather-bound volumes and tattered paperbacks.

   Flipping on the desk-lamp switch, Blythe noticed with some amusement that a worn, leather-bound edition of Shakespeare's Sonnets was piled on top of the latest edition of a publication put out by the United Kingdom's Inland Revenue Service.

   Turning away from Luke's desk, Blythe padded softly around the leather wing chair to have a closer look at the huge genealogy chart that loomed on the wall nearby. She stared up at the myriad branches of the Barton-TrevelyanTeague family tree. Filled with a clandestine curiosity about Lucas Teague, she began to trace her finger along the line that commenced with her landlord's name and date of birth.

   He was nearly thirty-seven and a widower, as he had disclosed to her, for the chart noted that Lindsay Wingate Teague had died as Luke had disclosed, eighteen months previously. Obviously the ornate document had been carefully kept up-to-date for hundreds of years.

   In the section chronicling a cluster of Luke's eighteenthcentury relatives, a line ended with the name Garrett Teague sketched in elegant calligraphy. From there the line veered to the left and led to the names of Garrett's first cousins, Ennis Trevelyan and his elder brother, Christopher "Kit" Trevelyan.

   Blythe's hand began to tremble as she realized that this ancestor of Lucas Teague's, Christopher Trevelyan—a man with the same first name as her former husband—had married a woman named Blythe Barton in 1789!

   No wonder Lucas had urged her to have a look at his family's genealogical records. Perhaps her grandmother's fanciful dynastic claims were correct. Her American Bartons might indeed be descendants of the people who had held this land for hundreds of years. Who was to say what specific ancestor was the link between her family and her landlord's, but certainly Lucas Teague could actually be a distant cousin, many generations removed.

   Mesmerized by the swirling pattern of the chart's oldfashioned lettering, she continued to stare fixedly at the four names: Christopher, Ennis, Garrett, and Blythe. Once again she extended her forefinger, this time brushing it against the letters spelling Christopher "Kit" Trevelyan.

   "Christopher…" she breathed aloud, the sound of her ex-husband's name echoing in her throat.

   As soon as she touched the glass that protected the framed genealogy chart, a strange force began pulling at her arm. The bizarre undertow then spread to her shoulders. In an instant it had invaded her entire body, as if she were being sucked into a violent whirlpool on the mighty Snake River in Wyoming that bordered the Double Bar B ranch.

   The next thing she knew, a door slammed behind her, startling her nearly witless.

   "Ah… here you are, you damnable bitch!" a voice growled menacingly.

   Blythe whirled around, and there, in front of the paneled entrance to the book-lined chamber, stood a man with a thunderous expression etched upon his face and a heavy broadsword clutched in his hand.

   "And just what do you plan to have inscribed on that parchment of yours in a few months' time?" he demanded, gesturing angrily with his sword at the chart chronicling her ancestors. "My name? Or that of Brother Ennis? A Trevelyan in either case—is that your damnable scheme?"

   The intruder's dark-blond hair was fastened haphazardly at the nape of his neck, periwig style. His sweat-stained cotton shirt fell loosely from the waistband of soiled, buffcolored breeches, and his knee-high leather riding boots were covered with mud. In similar disarray, an elaborate lace neck cloth lay limp and torn beneath the blunt features of his smooth-shaven face, pitted mercilessly by a rash of deep, disfiguring smallpox scars. The man standing in the library of Barton Hall this moonlit night brandishing his sword was distraught and disheveled and dangerously close to committing violence.

   As anyone could see, the mere sight of Blythe Barton Trevelyan had provoked her husband to a murderous rage.

For the love of St. Goran, will you calm down!" said Blythe, practically shouting. Sleet was beating against the window, and she could feel a draft swooping down the chimney.

   "Don't you dare to patronize me, wife!" Kit barked back. "Not that you've ever acted as a proper helpmate, you damnable jade! Like it or not, you married me, Kit Trevelyan—not
Ennis Trevelyan—and I shan't hesitate an instant to run tha
t scoundrel through if he ever sets foot in Cornwall again!"

   Moisture had started to fill his eyes, belying his bellicose words. His shoulders began to heave as he slowly lowered his fighting arm in defeat, the glittering weapon thumping heavily against his muscular thigh.

   "I loved you, Blythe, you harlot!" he cried brokenly. "You are my wife! Ennis is my brother! The whole village must have known! How in the name of Christ could you do such a thing?"

   "Christopher—K-Kit—" Blythe ventured in a low voice. "I—" She hesitated, fearing to antagonize him further. She glanced at the half-empty brandy decanter.

   "Don't say another word, you reckless slut!" Christopher Trevelyan whispered hoarsely, his voice laced with sorrow and disgust. He jabbed his finger roughly at his wife's midsection. "In your lust, could you think of no one else? Not even the fate of that babe you carry in your womb?"

   A bulge round as a melon protruded from under Blythe's swollen breasts. She ran her fingertips down the thick folds of the boned brocade gown and continued to stare at her bloated belly. She felt a fluttering of butterfly wings that could only be her baby stirring inside.

   "I knew you never loved me, you lying trollop! But to dishonor both the Barton name and mine in such a vile—"

   Kit's eyes blazed with mounting fury, and once again he raised his sword. Blythe grasped the back of a chair to steady herself, prepared for an attack. However, her enraged accuser stormed past, flinging open the library door. He charged toward a framed oil canvas hanging in the reception hall.

   "You bastard!" Kit screamed. "Bastard… bastard… bastard!"

   With murderous force he began to rip deep gashes in the portrait of the stylishly attired young man, his brother, who had fathered the baby Blythe was carrying.

   Kit continued to stab at the face in the picture with his weapon until he had reduced the artwork to shreds. At length he whirled around, exhausted from his outburst. His pitted cheeks were glistening with tears as he slowly advanced toward the open door to the library.

   "And you… my lady wife," he said in a ragged whisper as he reentered the room, slamming the door behind him. "What… punishment… fits… your… crime?" he asked, slowly advancing toward her.

   Then, as the raging laird of Barton Hall moved ever closer, Blythe Barton Trevelyan emitted an ear-piercing scream and began to run.

Lucas Teague was awakened from a dreamless sleep by the unearthly sound of a woman's shrieks. Thanks to his lifelong habit of sleeping in the nude, his navy-blue cashmere dressing gown was in its usual place at the bottom of the massive "Barton Bed," the outsize canopied four-poster that had witnessed the births, wedding nights, and deaths of generations of his ancestors. The screams continued as he bolted down the broad staircase, two steps at a time.

   By the time he reached the closed library door, however, the terror-filled cries echoing from the other side had ceased. Once inside, he saw a single small lamp glowing on his desk. As for the rest of the chamber, it was suffused by an almost unearthly silver light that poured through the south windows. A three-quarter moon outside the castle's walls illuminated the rolling hills that tapered down to the Channel, whose waters glistened in the distance with a metallic sheen.

   Lucas was alarmed to find his American houseguest, clad only in a sheer cotton nightgown, standing with her back to the genealogy chart and staring right through him with unseeing eyes. He was beginning to think the poor woman needed professional care, considering her precarious emotional state. Yet his heart went out to her in ways he knew would not be possible had he not suffered his own bout of anguish.

   "Blythe? Blythe!" he said sharply.

   She flinched and then turned to stare at him, dazed.

   "I—" she began, and then fell silent. Next she inhaled and blew her breath through her lips while blinking her eyes several times, as if she were trying to wake up.

   "Blythe… what can I do?" Luke asked urgently. When she didn't respond, he cautiously moved closer and touched her shoulder lightly. "Here… let me help you. We'll get you back to bed… Come now."

   Just at the moment that her legs seemed to give away he wrapped his arms around her shoulders to give her support. He eased them both into the large leather winged chair that faced his desk. As if it were the most natural thing in the world, he settled this woman who was a virtual stranger into his lap and began rather awkwardly to stroke her curly mass of shoulder-length auburn hair. As his fingers tangled in its luxuriant strands, he suddenly had a vision of Blythe Stowe stepping out of her bath and shaking this unruly mane to allow it to dry, like some sort of naked twentyfirst-century Botticelli.

   Her curls might be Botticelli-like, he corrected himself silently, but her slim, long-legged body and the perfectly proportioned thighs that were pressed against his legs were straight out of
Vogue
magazine. Not so, however, her lovely, rounded breasts. Now, they—

   His hand paused, mid caress. His wandering thoughts were fast congealing into full-blown lust! His chest tightened at the sight of the moonlight pooled around their chair, and he had the unearthly sense that he might still be alone in that enormous four-poster upstairs, having an erotic dream. If so, he thought recklessly, why not make the most of it? He slid his right hand down the silken sheen of Blythe's hair once again and gently began to massage the muscles in her neck. Her skin was smooth and felt strangely familiar.

   With a rapid intake of breath, he abruptly stopped stroking Blythe's neck. Such provocative behavior on his part, he realized with sudden embarrassment, was totally out of character. But, then, so was hers. This highly intelligent young woman hadn't expressed a coherent thought since he'd entered the room. Instead, her expressive brown eyes merely gazed at him with alarm.

   "Now, tell me… what's got you into such a state?" he inquired gently. "No thumps in the attic or rattling of chains has brought this on, I should hope?" he added in an attempt to lighten the atmosphere and channel his thoughts in new, safer directions.