Joan Wolf (11 page)

“I need a bath.” She rose to her feet and involuntarily winced as her bruises made themselves known.

“Are you all right?” he asked quickly.

“Just bruised and sore, I think. Nothing’s broken.”

“Shall I summon the doctor?”

“No, truly, Mark, I am all right. All I need is a bath and some fresh clothes.”

“I’ll come upstairs with you,” he said, and watched her carefully as she walked beside him, slowly but steadily. He didn’t leave her until her maid had arrived and the tub before the fire was being filled with hot water.

He went back downstairs, intending to return to the library, and was informed that Lord Monksleigh was in the Chinese saloon and desired to talk to him. Mark walked to the designated room, a look of guarded remoteness on his unusually white face.

* * * *

The Easter party for the orphanage children was a great success, at least from the children’s point of view. There were all sorts of races and competitions held on the magnificent south lawn of Castle Dartmouth. There were pony rides. There was a magician. And, set up in the sumptuous Italian ballroom of the house, there was enough food to feed an army, let alone a troop of little boys and girls.

A surprising number of Laura’s wellborn neighbors attended as well. Maria Dalton had always been interested in the orphanage, but Lady Monksleigh and Lady Countisbury had taken it up only recently. It was, they had decided, the fashionable thing to do. These ladies had brought along their husbands, the rector was there with his wife, and Sir Giles Gregory was also present.

Laura was too busy with the children to pay much attention to her neighbors. They had all been given ceremonial functions, but she hardly expected much in the way of actual assistance from the baronesses or their husbands. Maria Dalton and Giles were in charge of the food, and Laura, the rector, and Mark ran the games on the lawn.

 All the workers were so involved with the children that they scarcely had a chance to speak to each other. Laura herself did not even sit down until all the children were sitting around tables in the ballroom, stuffing food into themselves with astonishing rapidity.

“Good heavens,” she said to Mark as she collapsed into an empty chair next to him. “The older boys have finished already! One would think they hadn’t been fed for weeks.
  
And the food at the orphanage is quite good, really.”

Mark looked with her toward the two tables of restless boys. Then he looked around his priceless ballroom. “I’ll take them outside,” he said promptly, and rose to his feet. The boys looked positively ecstatic as he collected them and herded them out the door with the promise of organizing a game of ball.

 The remainder of the children were happily occupied, and for the first time Laura was able to turn her attention to her upper-class assistants. Leaving Giles and Maria Dalton in charge of the ballroom, she made her way to the small dining room, where food had been served to Lord and Lady Countisbury, Lord and Lady Monksleigh, and Dr. and Mrs. Norris.

 When the rector saw her come in, he immediately said, “Do sit down and have some refreshment, Lady Dartmouth. I will go and lend my assistance in the ballroom.”

Laura smiled at him gratefully. “Thank you, Dr. Norris. Things are rather quiet at the moment. His lordship took the older boys out on the lawn to play ball, and the little ones are still eating. But I’m sure Sir Giles would be glad of a chance to sit down, if you’d care to relieve him.”

“Certainly,” said Dr. Norris, who was a very scholarly, very religious, and very nice man.

Laura accepted some food from one of her footmen and said serenely to her friends, “Mark is so wonderful with boys. It must come from all his years in the navy. He just seems to understand them.”

There was absolute silence as her guests all exchanged glances over her unconscious head. “Er ... yes ... quite,” said Lord Monksleigh finally.

Lady Monksleigh cleared her throat. “Laura,” she said a little awkwardly, “has Lord Dartmouth spoken to you about your accident? About the phaeton, I mean?”

“The phaeton?” Laura looked around at the five faces seated at her table. “What do you mean, Louisa? The wheel came off the phaeton. That’s how I was thrown.”

There was another silence, and this time Laura registered its strangeness. She put down her fork. “What do you mean?” she asked Lady Monksleigh directly.

That lady hesitated and then looked at her husband. “The wheel shaft on the phaeton was sawed through, Lady Dartmouth,” he said heavily. “I spoke to Dartmouth about it Thursday afternoon. I thought he would certainly have told you.”

“Perhaps,” said Lady Countisbury with deadly sweetness, “he fired one of the stableboys.”

Laura felt her breath beginning to come shallowly. What were they talking about? What were they insinuating? She stared about her with pale cheeks and wide, frightened eyes. “Sawed through?” she said.

“Yes,” came the voice of Lord Monksleigh. “Bertram saw it first and called my attention to it. There wasn’t a doubt of its being deliberate, I’m afraid.”

“But who?” said Laura dazedly; and then, as they all looked down at their plates, she knew. They thought Mark had done it. But good God— why? Why should he do such a thing?

She pushed back her chair. “Excuse me,” she said. “I must get back to the children.” And fled.

Chapter Fourteen

Laura was deeply upset by Lord Monksleigh’s revelation. She got through the rest of the day in a daze, her body going efficiently through the motions that had to be done while her mind was in a chaotic whirl. Her first impulse was to dismiss Lord Monksleigh’s words; he was mistaken, she told herself. He had to be mistaken. There was no
reason
for anyone to want to harm her.

But Lord Monksleigh had said that Mr. Bertram had also seen what he had. The shaft had been tampered with. That was evidently a fact, and she must accept it as such.

But why? And who? And why had Mark not told her?

The children eventually departed, tired and happy, and she and Mark were left alone together. They went by mutual unspoken consent into the yellow saloon. Laura sat down in a comfortable chair and Mark went to stand by the chimneypiece.

 Now, she thought, now he will certainly say something. He must know that the Monksleighs would have told me about the wheel.

 ‘The party went very well, I thought,” he said in a cool level voice.

“Yes,” returned Laura. She folded her hands in her lap and sat very still, her eyes on her husband. He looked very tall as he leaned against the graceful marble chimneypiece.

“Dr. Norris appears to be a thoroughly decent man. He’s new since I left. A distinct improvement over our former rector, I thought.”

“Yes,” she said again. “He is a very fine person, an excellent clergyman and scholar. We are fortunate to have him.”

A silence fell and Laura thought to herself incredulously: He isn’t going to mention it. She looked searchingly at his face and he returned her look calmly, his face without expression but for a light, watchful look in the eyes.

 For a long moment they looked at each other across an invisible barrier of apprehension and constraint. Then he pushed himself away from the wall and came across to where she was sitting. He held out a hand to her and she put her own in it, very conscious of his closeness, of the lean strength of his body as she rose to her feet and found herself beside him. For a brief second his hand tightened over hers, and then he released it. “Shall we go up to bed?” he asked.

“Yes.” Her voice was a little uncertain, a little breathless. “I suppose we should.” As they went up the stairs she could feel his hand, possessive and demanding, on the small of her back.

If Laura had had any doubts about the opinion of her friends and neighbors in regard to her accident, they were resolved the following morning. It was Easter and she and Mark and Robin went together to church. It was clear, from the moment they alighted from their carriage, that Mark was
persona non grata.
There were warm smiles for Laura and Robin, frosty nods for Mark. No one quite dared to cut him completely, but it was obvious everyone would have liked to. Laura’s cheeks were very flushed as they walked up the center aisle to take their places in the family pew at the front of the church.

The Easter service was lovely, but Laura could not concentrate on it. She seemed to feel hundreds of eyes boring into the back of her head throughout the prayers, the hymns, and Dr. Norris’ really excellent sermon. She glanced once or twice at Mark as Dr. Norris was speaking from the pulpit, and the loneliness of his taut, uplifted profile filled her with unexpected pity and tenderness.

 She couldn’t bear to see that remote, guarded look come back to his face and felt a surge of anger against all the well-meaning people who had put it there. As the service ended and they went back down the aisle, she slipped her arm through her husband’s and walked very close beside him, her other hand holding Robin’s. Once they were outside, she said, “I’m not feeling very well. I’d like to go straight home, if you don’t mind.”

“Of course, Laura,” said Mark very quietly. He handed her into their carriage and he and Robin climbed in afterward. Their ride home was silent except for Robin’s innocent chatter.

* * * *

The week following Easter was outwardly much like any of the weeks that had preceded it. Maria Dalton and Sir Giles Gregory visited Laura at different times, and both attempted to bring up the question of the damaged phaeton.

 To both, Laura said in a clipped, tightly controlled voice, “I am not going to discuss that topic. If you persist I will have to ask you to leave.” Both her friends had obediently changed the subject, but their grave, concerned faces did nothing to sooth Laura’s own perturbation.

There was nothing to do, she decided, but to take each day as it came. She tried to put the memory of Lord Monksleigh’s words out of her mind. The phaeton wheel, she decided, had been sawed through by some malicious prankster. It had quite possibly been meant to harm Mark, not her. After all, it was Mark’s phaeton. She simply could not, would not, believe that her husband wished to hurt her. It was impossible.

It took her the better part of the week before she realized that John Evans, the sailor whom Mark had rescued in London and employed, was following her. At first she had thought his unusually frequent presence was a coincidence. By Saturday, when she saw him waiting across the street as she came out of the library in Dartmouth, she was certain that coincidence played no part in his persistent appearances.

 He was following her. And he was utterly devoted to Mark and had been under her husband’s direct orders ever since he had come to Castle Dartmouth.

* * * *

The weather turned cold for a few days, then warm. Laura and Robin got out their fishing poles and took to going down to the lake which lay at the far end of the deer park. There were several delightful spots that one could fish from and there was also a small rowboat that Laura used occasionally. She had always refused to take Robin out in the boat. She could not swim and was always afraid that if he got excited for some reason and tipped them over, they would both drown. Consequently, she took the boat out only when he was not with her.

Robin liked to fish and was remarkably patient for a five-year-old, but he simply was not up to sitting still for hours while waiting for a bite. Laura was. There are those for whom fishing is a pleasant pastime and those for whom it is a passion; Laura belonged to the latter category.

The weather was not ideal for fishing, as it was unusually sunny, but Laura badly needed a distraction, and for a solid week went down to the lake every day after Robin’s lessons, returning at teatime with a few unimpressive-looking trout and a large appetite. Robin came with her twice, and both times teased her to put the boat into the water, but she would not. “Perhaps Papa will take you out one day,” she told him placatingly. “He can swim.”

“Papa’s too busy,” said Robin with unaccustomed sulkiness. And it was true. In the last weeks Mark had been spending even more hours than usual in the library.

“Well, we’ll ask him,” said Laura. “But you are not coming out with me, Robin, so stop badgering me.”

* * * *

The Monksleigh ball was scheduled for the last week in April, and Laura was reluctant to attend. She asked Mark if he wanted to go, but he simply raised his brows and said coolly, “Why not?”

 Laura knew very well why not, but they had gotten to a point where the only real communication between them took place in bed. It was not a happy situation.

The day before the ball was cool and overcast, a perfect day for fishing. Laura left Robin in the charge of one of the maids and headed happily for the lake. She was distracted for about fifteen minutes by the unexpected arrival of Giles Gregory, who, after a brief conversation, decided to accompany her. As Giles had fished with her before and she knew she could trust him to be an undemanding companion, she obligingly provided him with a pole and the two set off together on foot. They walked slowly, chatting amiably, and arrived finally at the lake, planning to put the small boat into the water.

 Before they had come out of the trees they heard Robin shouting, and both broke into a run, arriving on the shore to find that the boat was not in its accustomed mooring but out in the middle of the lake. Robin was in it.

““Robin, bring that boat back here this instant!” Laura shouted furiously.

“I can’t, Laurie,” the little boy screamed back. “I can’t move it. It’s all full of water!”

“Oh, my God.” Laura turned to look at Giles. He was deathly white.

“I can’t swim,” he said in anguish.

“Oh, my God,” Laura repeated. She waded a little way into the cold water, and Giles grabbed her arm. “He’s out too far, Laura. You can’t get to him. It’s too deep.”

Giles was right. The lake was shallow for the first ten feet and then dropped steeply after that. Robin was twenty yards from shore. “Robin!” called Laura, desperately trying to keep panic from showing in her voice. “Try to push with the oars.”