Romancing the Rogue (121 page)

Brambles clawed her
arms and snagged on the sleeves of the gray dress. Even the sturdy material was no match for the determined thorns. Using the slender box as a shield, she pushed some prickly stems aside. But the branch slipped off the polished wood and slapped her left arm. Searing pain exploded from her elbow to her shoulder. Tears sprung to her eyes, and she blinked furiously until the sting cleared.

What an ill-fated excursion her latest scheme was turning out to be. She should have stayed at the cottage and hidden in the scullery to open the wooden case. After all, Seabrook had absented himself on another mysterious outing shortly after tea, leaving her quite alone. Logic told her that Abby wouldn’t return before she delivered supper.

Still, something about the way the case had been secreted in the wall… While it piqued her insatiable curiosity, it also stirred a bee’s nest of unease in her middle. She could think of no legitimate reason for its being set there. That alone seemed to call for the utmost caution when investigating its contents.

A branch whipped into her face, and she gasped with surprise. Perhaps her decision to travel into the woods had been a bit extreme. She stared at the wall of tangled brush before her. The deer track had long since dwindled to nothing. But surely the secluded thicket where she and Juliet had once played was near.

At the snap from behind her, Annabella glanced over her shoulder. Had she been followed? She stilled her movements and waited. The leaves overhead whispered in the warm breeze. In the distance, a lark trilled a lonely song. The brook bubbled somewhere ahead. She was definitely on the right trail. She waited a moment longer, but no more twigs snapped, and she didn’t so much as hear a rustle from the tall grass at her feet. Annabella moved forward.

As she slipped between two thick trees growing close together, the sound of the brook grew suddenly stronger. But she’d found it. She stood in the tiny glade she’d been seeking.

The three flat-topped boulders that resembled a table and two chairs stood off to one side, the bases now partially obscured by lush green grass. Annabella picked her way carefully. If so much as a volemouse scampered across her feet, her courage would desert her.

The largest boulder was dusty, with small bits flaking off in patches, leaving shards of sharp gravel strewn across the top. She brushed at the mess but only managed to dirty her hand. With a shrug, she set the wooden case down. She studied the box for a moment then pulled out a hairpin and jammed it into the simple lock. It took a few tries before she was rewarded by a tiny
snick
.

Thank you, Juliet, for showing me how to force a lock.

The hinges were stiff, but the lid lifted without a sound. Papers fluttered and resettled with a sigh.

Annabella stared. “Banknotes!” She pushed them aside only to reveal more beneath. “Piles of them! There must be hundreds of pounds here. Maybe thousands.”

One-pound notes, ten-pound notes. The case was filled with them. All with different dates and drawn on a handful of different banks. Annabella recognized none of the bank names, but that was unsurprising, as she held little interest in financial matters.

She rifled through the notes, frowning. Who on earth would put such an abundance of wealth in the wall of a derelict old cottage? Surely the former tenants wouldn’t have left such a thing, even if they’d
had
the means to amass such riches.

She peered at the ten-pound note in her hand, drawn on the Salisbury Shaftesbury Bank and dated only a few months before. And another from a bank in Middlesex, dated the previous year. Rose Cottage had fallen into disrepair while her stepfather was still living.

“What
is
all this?”

As though in answer, a finch tittered at her from the bushes.

And what did it mean that it had been hidden in the wall? Should she return the case to the hiding place so its owner could find it? But once again, that brought up the dilemma of just who the owner might be. She shuffled the bonds again.

They all seemed to be made out to
“bearer,”
so that was little help. She pushed more of the papers aside and picked up the last handful. Her eyes fell on a name she recognized.
Graeme Roland Dominick Markwythe, Sixth Duke of Wyndham.

“Markwythe!” These were
his
? It hadn’t been enough that he’d given them the cut? He’d concealed thousands of pounds worth of banknotes in an old cottage whilst she and her mother had suffered in near poverty? Annabella had witnessed her mother struggle to keep Wyndham Green running on ever-dwindling funds. The lines around her eyes and across her forehead had deepened as she’d tried to hide her worry that one day they might end up having to leave their home. “That hateful— Oh!” No curse was adequate for such despicable treatment.

Her ranting raised a grouse from the grass rimming her little glade. She grabbed up all the notes and shoved them back into the case. She had half a mind to storm to London herself and shove the banknotes in his face, demanding answers.

Juliet!

Annabella’s heart jumped into her throat. Of course, if she raced to London with her discovery of Markwythe’s treachery, their own deception would be found out. Juliet would be caught in the middle. Better to bide her time, perhaps use some of the funds to send for “Annabella.”

Abby could help her. She wouldn’t want Juliet to be in trouble, either. Of course, that meant she’d have to confess to the maid what she and Juliet had done and pray Abby held a bit of sympathy — for Juliet at the very least.

Her mind made up to approach Abby, Annabella closed the wooden case, but the top wouldn’t go down. The notes seemed to want to spill over and the lid simply would not lower enough to set the lock. Frowning, she rubbed her hand back and forth, shifting the papers, trying to get the notes to settle into place. When they still wouldn’t fit, she pulled out a wad of them, clutching the notes tightly against the tug of the capricious wind.

About halfway down, the reason for the change became apparent. A leather pouch rested in one corner, pushing up some of the notes. The metallic chink as she picked it up captured her full attention, and she tugged on the ties. That sounded like…

She spread the top open and peeked inside. “Coins…” She eased a few into her palm. Mostly half crowns and shillings, but a lot of them. “Enough to get me to London so I can rescue poor Juliet.”

As she moved to replace the pouch in the case, she brushed aside a handful of notes. Softness whispered against her skin. Surprised, she yanked her hand back then stared at the black velvet bag. Oblong and fat, filled with something of nearly equal proportion, it had been tucked into the case opposite the coins. Annabella lifted the bag and laid it on the stone table. Mindful of the increasing wind, she set the pouch with the coins next to the velvet bag then quickly replaced the notes and shut the case.

The drawstring bag had been sewn of the finest velvet she’d ever seen. A French
fleur-de-lis
had been embroidered in golden thread near the center, and under that a single name,
Lascombes
. Had the bag been brought from France? Surely not, with the war going on. Perhaps her discovery belonged to a refugee of the war?

Her hands shook with excitement as she eased the drawstrings apart. A roundish glass bottle lay cocooned in the velvet. As soon as she pulled it out, the flash of streaky sunlight brought the green glass to life with dancing glints. With the bottle corked and waxed as it was, the liquid sloshing inside must be wine or some other spirit.

She’d never seen wine in a bottle before. Geoffrey had always seen to filling the decanters from the casks in the cellar. She rolled it over. An oval-shaped label, ivory in color, bore the word
Bordeaux
in blue.

She frowned. Was that a person’s name or the name of the wine? Hadn’t Miss Lucy once told her about French wine? She squinted at the bottle and tried to call up the memory. It had been so long ago, before Papa—

Shaking her head, Annabella pressed her lips together to stop the quiver in her chin. It wasn’t the time to dwell on Papa.

“Think, Annabella. What did Miss Lucy say?”

French vintners sold their wine by the bottle, with labels of blue or gold or silver. Did the colors indicate quality? Or type of wine? Annabella squeezed her eyes shut and tried to picture her old nursery, struggled to remember the things Miss Lucy had taught her. But it was no use. All her memory would supply on the subject had to do with meals and planning the proper wine with each course.

She ran a finger over the wax seal that covered the cork. Her mouth watered at the thought of consuming a civilized glass of wine again. But how did one open such a bottle? Obviously it was a matter of removing the cork that had not only been rammed into the neck of the bottle but then coated with thick burgundy colored wax.

Mayhap she could find a tool at the cottage. She slid the bottle back into its velvet sheath. As she stood, her gaze fell on the case filled with banknotes. It belonged to someone. But to whom? Had Markwythe truly been secreting funds in the wall for some despicable scheme?

“Oh pish!” She shook her head. What a ludicrous thought. The estate and all on it belonged to him. He had no reason to hide funds. And if he wanted to be rid of her and her mother, well… giving them the cut had effectively assured them a miserable life already. Still… Lord Seabrook had come, apparently sent by Markwythe, or at least with his blessing. He seemed to have no particular business. How close were the two men? Could Seabrook be stealing from her stepbrother?

“I wish you were here, Juliet. You were always good at figuring things out.” Annabella sighed wistfully.

The breeze rustled the leaves overhead and seemed to mimic her friend’s silken laughter. She could even imagine what Juliet might say.
“Annabella, you chicken brain! You see conspiracy in everything.”

Perhaps she did… and mayhap she
was
being a silly chicken brain. And yet… Seabrook’s sudden appearance at Wyndham Green, his demand that he stay in the cottage even though it was clearly not guest-worthy…
Had
he come for the case of banknotes?

She slapped the flat rock. “It’s not making sense!” He’d been there long enough to have retrieved it and taken his leave. She could think of no logical reason why he’d want to stay in that forsaken cottage any longer than necessary.

Unless he didn’t know precisely where the banknotes had been hidden.

The wind blew through the trees again, and Annabella shivered. Sense or no sense, the case wouldn’t be safe at Rose Cottage where Seabrook might lay his hands on it. Annabella scanned the little clearing. She and Juliet had used many hiding places there for their childhood secrets. If just one still existed… A grandfather oak stood off to the side, not quite part of a cluster of beech trees. There! Tall grass had grown up around the base of the old tree, but surely that was the one with the hollow bottom.

She picked her way through the grass, refusing to consider what wild things she might be encountering without realizing it.
Voles, spiders… adders.
Her heart gave a little jump as something grazed her leg, poking at her through her stocking.

A snake’s fangs!

She closed her eyes, hardly daring to look… but she must. Trembling nearly overcame her as she opened one eye and stared at the ground. A dead, gray stick had become snagged on her stocking. She caught a motion from the corner of her eye. Had something slithered past?

“Stop that!” She wasn’t going die a horrible death. She couldn’t. What would happen to poor Juliet? It took several hard shakes of her leg to loosen the grasp of the branch. By the time it fell off, one of her best stockings had a tear running from her ankle to her knee. Gnashing her teeth, she pressed on, taking slow, careful steps, holding her breath each time she placed her foot on the ground.

When she reached the tree, she used the wooden case to brush aside the blades of grass and smiled at the rewarding sight of the gaping hole in the trunk. It wasn’t as large as she recalled from her childhood, but it was big enough. She turned the box sideways and slipped it into the opening.

A giggle freed itself as she righted the blades of green against the tree trunk to cover the hole. “Out of the wall and into a tree.”

Rustling near her feet sent Annabella scurrying out of the tall grass. Her gaze fell on the coin pouch and the black velvet bag where she’d left them on the stone table. Her mouth watered at the thought of the wine. She hadn’t dared pinch any of the wine from the decanter Abby had brought with Seabrook’s supper, certain the miserable sot would miss even a swallow. Well, maybe he’d miss the wine from the wall if Markwythe had indeed sent him. But he could hardly say anything to her, could he?

She planted her hands on her hips and lowered her voice. “Pardon me, but did you find a bottle of wine hidden in the wall of the cottage?”

Another giggle slipped out then another.

No, he couldn’t very well complain — if he was even aware of the wine’s existence. She picked up the bag and slid her arm through the drawstring handle. The coin pouch she secured in the deep pocket of the ugly gray dress. At least it was good for something. None of her pretty gowns and day dresses had such pockets. After a last glance around, she fought her way from the thicket. Tonight, she would have wine with her dinner.