The Lord Who Sneered and Other Tales (8 page)

“Dearest girl,” Theo said, scarcely able to believe his excellent fortune, “if it suits you, you shall have your own pig!

*

It was with a great sense of relief that Baldwin watched the Dowager’s guests emerge from the trees and enter the house, a sensation that was short lived when the ghost that haunted the house of Crenshaw materialized at his side, his face set in lines of stony anger.

“Why must you tell such falsehoods?” the ghost wailed.

“Surely, you don’t expect me to allow you to scare that young woman half out of her wits. And what of Her Grace? She is beside herself with worry as to the possible fate of her grandson.”

“But if they do not believe in me, how am I to warn them? It is my fate to warn,” moaned the ghost.

“Well then, out with it and be off,” Baldwin demanded.

The ghost looked a bit affronted but did not hesitate to speak his piece. “If the current duke does not mend his ways, he shall suffer an ignominious death.”

“What ways might those be?”

“His extreme hubris and sense of entitlement, his belief that his good fortune is due to his superiority rather than an accident of birth, his lack of concern for his fellowman, as well as his enormous care for comfort and power at the expense of all whom his life touches.”

“What is there in that?” Baldwin asked. “You have described more than half the men and women in the kingdom, titled or not. The Duke is amongst the worst of the lot; I’ll give you that. There is not a soul who should mourn his passing nor be in the least surprised that he’s dead.”

“But I must warn,” keened the ghost. “It is my penance.”

“Then tell me; what of Sir Anthony? Is he doomed to die in the next year?”

“No, he is safe. Never shall he be doomed to spend eternity warning his descendants of impending disaster.”

Baldwin grunted. “Well, that is a relief, to be sure. If that is all, I have my bed to think of.”

There came a pause as the ghost seemed to grow in size and transparency. “There is a babe,” he intoned.

“There be two babes, one belonging to Sir Anthony and one to the Duke.”

“The son of the Duke is my concern. It is with his birth that the line continues, unbroken. So does the evil. He might prove to be the most evil of them all. Take care to keep his feet on the path of righteousness or much of goodness could be lost.”

“I will be sure to pass the message along to the Dowager, but I can’t promise that she will be eager to share your warning with her son, the Duke.”

“He must be warned!” the ghost wailed as it grew ever larger and more translucent so that the clouds scudded through him.

“But what does it have to do with the two of ‘em?” Baldwin asked, jabbing his jaw in the direction of Anne and Theo as they lingered at the portal of Dunsmere House.

“Naught, it has naaauuught,” wailed the ghost as it loomed so large and thin that it became at one with the night sky of clouds and mist. “They shall be blessed forevermore.”

A Rose for Christmas

England, September 1812

Baldwin, gardener of the Dunsmere estate, deposited the last of the day’s accumulation of autumn leaves onto the cerise and titian mound and set it on fire. Although he was more than fond of the vibrant display, it would never do for the oak and Chinese tupelo leaves to obscure the meticulously manicured, emerald green lawn of the Dowager Duchess of Marcross. No, indeed.

Through a haze of smoke, he surveyed the roses that filled the area between the front lawn and the park and saw that all was well. The beautiful rose garden with its dozens of heirloom varieties had originally been planted nearly a century prior and was the pride and joy of the Dowager Duchess of
Marcross. If the wind were to pick up and carry the fire in the wrong direction, it was as much as his life was worth. He doubted not that Her Grace would go gladly to the gallows over the loss of her roses; she had very little else she cared to live for save her favorite grandson, Sir Anthony, a man who filled his days with the pursuit of pleasure and precious little else.

However, the arrival of the newly orphaned Ginny six months prior was proving to put a permanent sparkle in the old lady’s eyes. The fact that Miss Ginerva Delacourt’s first London Season had been just shy of a full-out disaster did not keep the Dowager sunk in poor spirits for long. Indeed, the presence of the young maid, granddaughter of the old lady’s beloved brother, had softened many of her ways since Ginny had come to live at Dunsmere.

Preoccupied with his thoughts, he didn’t hear the approach of his mistress until she appeared at his side, her face a mask of disapproval.

“Baldwin, I pray you know what you are about, burning these leaves in such proximity to the roses!”

“Yes’m, beggin’ your pardon, ma’am,” he said with a tug at his cap as he cursed his thoughtlessness. Though he had burned the leaves on the very same patch of ground every autumn since he had been taken on at Dunsmere, he knew the Dowager was particularly fretful this year. She was to enter a new variety of rose at the annual flower show and once she had won, as she was persuaded she must, people would flock from near and far to visit her spectacular rose garden. “I have taken care to cart out a barrel of water in the case it is needed.”

The Dowager grunted her approval, and he thought she looked not quite so grim.

“Tomorrow I shall rake the leaves to the verge of the east lawn, if’n it please you, Your Grace.”

“As long as it is not too close to the potting shed, mind. Were everything on the property to burn to the ground save the roses and that potting shed I should not care one fig!”

As the potting shed housed the specimen of the Christmas rose they had been developing the past four years, Baldwin cursed himself yet again and bowed deeply to hide the burning of his face.
“Yes’m; nothing shall harm any of the roses, I so swear.”

He stood upright to see how the Dowager gazed longingly across the lawn in the direction of the potting shed and suppressed a sigh. “If you wait but a moment, Your Grace, I shall have the fire out, and we might see how fares the new rose.” He didn’t wait for the assent that would surely come but took up the bucket at his feet and dipped it into the barrel on the nearby cart. He put out the fire under her anxious eye, and they walked, side by side, along the circular path from the front of the house to where the potting shed stood at the end of an avenue of ancient limes.

He hadn’t even a moment to wonder if the Dowager hadn’t yet expelled her store of scoldings before she started in again. “As I am sure you are aware, that foolhardy Squire Barrington cannot be trusted! There are no lengths to which he would not go to foil me. I have born bravely his victories these past few years, knowing I had the beginnings of an absolute triumph propagating in the greenhouse, but what should I find this morning?” she asked in a voice that promised to brook no argument. “The door to the shed was unlocked!”

“Yes, ma’am, it is as you say. I heard the rattle at the door, but as you did not enter, I carried on with my work. I would never leave the Christmas rose unprotected, Your Grace.”

The Dowager did not apologize for her misapprehension but only uttered a deep “harrumph”, her most common concession to his pride. Nevertheless, her doubt produced an anxiety in him that grew as they drew closer to their objective. He knew he had locked the shed right and tight when he had last closed its door behind him, but he could not help but fret as he fingered the key in his pocket.

As they rounded the curve at the end of the avenue and the potting shed came into view, he saw that all appeared to be in order. It was clear that the door was pulled to and that the padlock hung at the expected angle. When he took it in his hand and gave it a hard tug, it was locked in place, just as expected. Once he had twisted the key in the lock and pushed open the door, however, his soaring spirits plummeted and his knees turned to jelly; the floor of the greenhouse side of the shed was marred with a quantity of broken glass and what remained of the Dowager Duchess’ Christmas rose.

Quickly, Baldwin began to calculate the odds that he might be successful in slamming shut the door before the Dowager had a chance to enter, but she pushed past him in a trice. As he watched her face in the pale light of the afternoon, he wanted nothing more than to run, even as he knew it only could serve to delay his punishment. By the time the Dowager’s face had turned a deep plum he thought of nothing but the condition of her heart and whether or not he would be needed to catch her before she fell to the glass-and-thorn-littered floor.

Her ensuing screams brought the young mistress running from the house and before long she came through the door of the shed. He could see that she comprehended all with one glance of her lovely gray-green eyes, but she seemed as much at a loss as how to proceed as did he.

“Grandaunt Regina!” the girl called, but the Dowager seemed not to hear. Ginny then turned to Baldwin. “The maids are washing the windows on this side of the house and have heard all. The housekeeper has asked if she should not send for an officer of the law!”

Frantic, he cast about for a chair and managed, with Ginny’s help, to get the Dowager seated. As the screams mellowed to low moans, his eyes met those of the girl’s over the quivering feather that adorned the Dowager’s turban. It was clear that Ginny was terribly shook up and that she depended on him to set matters to rights. If only he knew what was to be done. It was impossible to determine whether the glass was broken by a human or animal, by accident or design. A deer might have torn the rose bush to shreds and dragged its potted roots into the park, yet, it might have been done by a person, as well, someone who had every reason to envy the Dowager her prize rose.

“Baldwin, what can be done? If you haven’t a solution, then who?” Ginny beseeched him.

Not for the first time, the pain in her eyes put him in mind of Holly, his own motherless daughter who had no brother or sister with whom to pass the time. She had been but twelve years of age when he and the Dowager had conceived of a rose guaranteed to bloom at Christmas, one with the headiest scent and deepest crimson petals; one that was so perfect in every way, it was sure to win first prize at the annual flower show. How could he return home to tell his Holly that he had failed to protect
the Christmas rose they had spoken of so often? It was then Baldwin knew that to return home was exactly what he must do and without delay.

“Take her to the house and set her by the fire with a cup of tea,” he instructed Ginny. “I will meet you in the sitting room as soon as may be.” Without waiting for a response, he pushed his way out the door at a run, cut his own path through the gracefully curved avenue of lime trees, skirted the mound of autumn leaves and zigzagged his way through the rose beds until he gained the entrance of the cottage he and his daughter shared.

“Holly!” he shouted before he had even opened the door. She was there on the other side, her eyes wide with fear at the tone of his voice. He was in need of catching his breath and was still bent over double, hands on his knees, when he told her what he wanted. “The rose, the one you have been propagating from the Dowager’s cast-offs; is it in bloom?”

“Yes, Papa, it is.” She went to the window where she had placed a single stem in a vase of water and brought it to him to inspect. It was a rose of exceptional beauty, its petals a bit smaller than the Dowager’s version, but with the same deep color and scent.

He stared at the rose, hardly able to believe his good fortune. However, the superior quality of the Dowager’s rose was its guaranteed availability of abundant blooms in time for decking the halls. “But, will it yet bloom at Christmas?”

“It bloomed at Christmas last year, Papa, but I can’t be sure until it will do so again. The Dowager’s rose has bloomed at Christmas for three years running. There is no way of knowing if my poor substitute will ever fare as well prior to the flower show. Surely, it is her rose that shall take the prize.”

Baldwin said nothing in reply, only went out the back door to the little walled garden wherein his daughter grew her vegetables and a few roses of her own creation. The Christmas rose was there, awash with blooms that would be full-blown or completely spent within a few days while the flower show was still nearly a week away. Closer inspection revealed a number of new buds that might—or
might not—open in time to display their beauty for the show. This was something he would have to worry about later; for now he needed to bring the Dowager hope. He snipped off the loveliest bloom and ran with it back the way he had come.

When he reached the manse, he entered through the front door, ran through the front hall past the astounded butler who dropped his tray in his haste to be out of the gardener’s way, and on to the staircase that led to the sitting room. He stopped short when he passed the library and spied the Dowager seated by the fire. Ginny was with her, but the mood was somber in spite of the cheerful flames. The aroma of strong tea rose to meet his nostrils as he burst into the room and two pairs of eyes, full of anticipation, met his. He had always been a man of few words, but there were none that could speak as loudly as did the deep, red bloom he held aloft.

“But, what does it mean, Baldwin?” Ginny implored. “Are we to suppose you have found the very plant, alive and well? That the original was merely displaced?”

“No, Miss, not exactly,” he said as he studied the Dowager’s reaction. He thought her complexion turned a trifle more ashen at his words. He saw that all her hope was in him and knew that if he failed her, he would be gone. The Dowager was an exacting mistress, but he had never labored for anyone who loved growing things as much as he; the care of her beautiful gardens was his life’s work and he must see it through to the end. As such, he must convince her that Holly’s rose was a suitable substitute for the Dowager’s own.

He bent to kneel at his mistress’s feet and placed the rose in her lifeless hand. “Your Grace, this was propagated from the same cuttings we used in the potting shed. It might differ in one minor way or t’other but it is, essentially, the same rose. P’raps you might consider entering it in the contest.”