The Mysterious Heir (29 page)

“You are called ‘Elizabeth,' Miss Smythe?” Rose asked slowly, scrutinizing the note she held.

“Oh, yes,” Elizabeth cried gladly.

“A boy brought this for you, then, for we haven't another Elizabeth hereabouts.”

Elizabeth took the note eagerly and quickly read the few lines scrawled upon it in a heavy, dark, masculine hand.

“Elizabeth,” it read, “Please come to Lyonshall at once,
alone. But come round the back way. I shall meet you in the Shakespearean garden and explain all.”

It bore no signature, but it needed none. Such an imperious summons to the lost Simon's refuge could have come from only one person. The urgency of the message drove all of Elizabeth's vows never again to set foot at Lyonshall from her mind. He needed her, that was clear. And, she thought as she absently handed the note to Rose, he had said “please.”

“I must go, you see,” she explained rapidly. “There is proof enough.”

“I dunno,” Rose said thoughtfully. “It isn't signed, you see.”

“Perhaps there wasn't time. Oh, I must go at once,” Elizabeth cried as she went toward the door.

“Aye,” Rose said slowly, “but still you cannot walk there. Not in your thin slippers. It would take until dark. And I don't fancy sending you off alone. I'll have Ferdie get out the gig, and we'll have you driven there. I do suspect,” she said, seeing her guest's great hurry to go, “that you don't even know the back way to Lyonshall. It's for servants and deliveries, and not for the Quality.”

It seemed an eternity till the gig was brought round, and Elizabeth could only thank her benefactor briefly, she was in such a flurry of impatience. As they drove off she said not a word to the stableboy who held the reins, she was so occupied with mentally urging the horse along to a faster pace.

Rose had been right, she did not recognize the narrow road that led round the back of Lyonshall. There was little traffic here; only one farm cart was seen trundling by, and one large closed coach by the roadside, which must have lost its way, for the horses were feeding idly and the occupants could not be seen. It was a quiet country lane else, protected from the setting sun by the interlaced boughs of the towering trees that stood on each side of it.

The boy slowed the gig. “We're almost there, miss,” he said respectfully.

All Elizabeth could see was a wood filled by enormous trees, and a narrow path that led between them. As the boy
began to turn the horse to enter the path, Elizabeth said quickly, “No. Stop here, I will walk the rest of the way.”

Clearly torn between what he perceived to be the duty owed to a young woman of Quality, and that same female's orders, the boy halted the gig. As a sop to his conscience, however, after he helped Elizabeth down and turned his horse to go, he pointed toward the path with one mud-streaked finger. “If you foller that there,” he volunteered, “a long ways, never stepping off, although it curves like a snake, you'll be at the end of the wood. Then there's the grassy part, and then the house itself. Do be careful, miss,” he called back over his shoulder, “for you can turn an ankle quick as a snap on them stones, if you ain't careful.”

Then, feeling that his advice was as good an amulet as any against Rose's possible wrath, he tipped his battered straw hat and departed.

The path was difficult to travel in her thin slippers, Elizabeth realized, but nevertheless she stepped lightly and quickly in her impatience to arrive at her destination. There were times during that long walk up the back drive when her eyes would dart to the cool woods at the side of her path, and she would long to make her way through the soft bracken rather than the stony path. But she remembered the stableboy's warning, and kept to the path no matter how her feet stung. Due to the twisting nature of the path, when she turned to see how far she had traveled, she could no longer see where she had entered the grounds, and when she looked ahead, she could not see the outline of Lyonshall. But she went on as rapidly as she could, for she could see the sun growing redder as it began to sink beyond the tops of the ancient trees.

A sudden turn in the path gave her the view of Lyonshall at last. She could see where the trees ended abruptly and the long sloping lawns commenced. Narrowing her eyes against the setting sun, she could pick out in the distance the great willow that stood at the foot of Simon's garden. Then she realized that it did not lie directly in back of the house, as she had thought, but rather off to the right side of it.

As her present path would lead her only directly to the back entrance of Lyonshall, she noted with relief that she
could at last take a transverse route over the softer ground of the wood and in that manner achieve her goal even more quickly.

Elizabeth entered the blessed shade of the wood and stepped over the cool mossy earth with alacrity. She was fretting about her ruined slippers to prevent herself from worrying about her approaching interview with the Earl, when she noted a tall figure, backlighted by the brilliant sunset, coming toward her rapidly. For one moment she thought that it was he, but a breath later she remembered that he was incapable of such a fluid stride. And though the sunlight created a blazing halo about the figure's head, she realized that no light could transform deep auburn hair to such a glittering light yellow shade.

She stood still then, watching the figure approach. The moment's pause helped her to get both her fluttering breath and heart back to their normal states. As she waited, she realized that this cool copse was the last clearing in the wood. Only a few steps farther and the forest ended, and then only a fair easy walk up the manicured lawn would bring her to the garden.

When the figure was still too far for her to see the face properly, but close enough to speak to, she called out, “Bev! What has happened? Why was such a hasty summons sent? For I came running, as you see, as fast as I could.”

“And I am sorry that you did, for it is a wretched business for me, Elizabeth,” Lord Kingston said as his long strides brought him to her.

For that moment, Elizabeth's speech failed her, and she could only gaze up at Lord Kingston. Then she blurted, “It was you? You sent me the note?”

“No,” he explained carefully in such a strange tone that she stepped back a pace, “I did not. Morgan did, to be sure. But as you may have noted, he often fails in his resolve. And when he decided that he could not, after all, face you again, he deputized me to his purpose. Blast!” Lord Kingston said savagely. “It is not an easy thing to be Morgan's house guest. First he has Bev send you away, then he calls upon me to depress you further. If the bonds of friendship between us
were not so strong, I would have denied him. But as it is…” He shrugged.

“Bev failed?” Elizabeth asked in confusion.

“How could he else?” Lord Kingston sighed. “For once Morgan gets hold of an idea, he is intractable. When he discovered you were still in the vicinity, he was furious. He took his rage out upon Bev first, then poor Tony. He sent for you, I suspect, to do similarly. But at the last, he decided he could not even look upon you again. ‘Do the business for me, Harry,' he said, and stalked away. I wanted to spare you the pain of actually coming to the garden to get your congé, so I set out to intercept you. I did not know that you would arrive so soon. I planned to meet you at the gates.”

“Oh,” Elizabeth said, for she could think of no other reply. She had not known him as well as she had thought, but as she stood and tried to absorb all she had been told, still she could not envision the Earl so cruel, nor so lacking in spirit as to send another man to do his battles. But then, she remembered, he had told Lord Beverly to see them from Lyonshall.

“Then,” Elizabeth said suddenly, avoiding Lord Kingston's eye, “I shall leave. There is no need to explain further, I understand.”

She turned to go, but he stepped in front of her and blocked her way. “The least I can do,” he said softly, “is to accompany you back to the inn. I have a carriage waiting at the gate, for it was there that I expected to meet you. Come, I will walk with you.”

He offered her his arm, but Elizabeth shook her head. “No,” she said resolutely, “I need no further assistance. In fact, I should rather walk, for in that way I can clear my thoughts. It is kind of you, my lord, but I assure you I am not such a fine lady that I have not walked miles farther at home. Thank you anyway, and tell his lordship I shall not fret him again, for I shall never return.”

“I think,” Lord Kingston said slowly, now taking her arm, despite her attempt to pull away, “that I must insist.”

Now that he was in front of her, Elizabeth could see his expression clearly without the radiance of the sun to obscure
it. And the expression she read alarmed her. She tried to drag herself away and grew more anxious as he held her fast. Although now the sun was at her back so that he could not read her countenance, he seemed to understand her well enough.

“Useless,” he said implacably. “You shall come with me, Elizabeth.”

The last bursts of the sun's fading light sent radiance to touch upon the scene, making Lord Kingston's neckcloth dazzling white and Elizabeth's hair shot silk. It touched upon the leaves, upon the stones, and struck a glint upon the pair of spectacles that peered out from behind a tree. But neither of the pair struggling in the clearing noticed it. The eyes behind the spectacles grew wide with fear and foreboding. He had come after birds' nests and found a hornet's nest instead.

After only a second's pause, the glint disappeared as the owner of the spectacles decided rapidly that discretion was, in his case, both sadly and easily the better path to valor. The small figure wasted not a moment, but crept bent double, a difficult feat for such a bulky little parcel of a boy, silently from the scene. And then, once he had achieved the wide lawn, he straightened and began to run flat out.

He had kept his own counsel unhappily but conscientiously for all these past weeks, remaining silent through intimidation and the inescapable awareness of his own helplessness. But he knew full well from his own bitter experience that his new true friend, Elizabeth, was now in certain though unspecified danger. The decision was sudden and irrevocable; no true hero from any of his treasured secreted books would ever have let a maiden fair suffer due to his own cowardice. So he ran as though possessed. And he was, both by fear for her and by fear of his own wild recklessness.

But it was difficult for such a rotund figure to make much headway, though he was impelled as though pursued by demons. Thus it was that when he finally reached the Earl's study, he was panting so that it took several long gasping moments for him to state his case so that it could be half-understood.

“Elizabeth, Elizabeth,” Lord Kingston said, shaking his head sadly as he imprisoned her hands in his and held her fast, “what am I to do with you? Here I try to be a gentleman, and all you can do is run from me like a frightened deer. Now, come, be a good child and come with me as a lady should. For all I want to do is the right thing.”

“The right thing,” Elizabeth said through clenched jaws, “would be to let me go my way unmolested.”'

“Oh, is that what you fear?” He smiled. “I'll admit I am tempted. Have been tempted since I first saw you. But I fear your reaction yesterday quite put me out of sorts. I am an expert in such matters, I assure you, and I could see that your thoughts did not match mine in that direction. Still,” he said, smiling down at her, “it is never too late. Now that Morgan has spurned you, you have no future except that dreary little shop. No fortune, no prospects. You could still do better with me, Elizabeth. You are a devilish tempting little creature. There is nothing for you here, or at home either. Why not cast in your lot with me? I am not hard to take. I'm considered quite expert in the ways of love, in fact. Come with me to London. We'll live at the top of the mark, and I will see that you don't regret it.”

“I would not marry you for any reason,” Elizabeth cried once again, trying to tug free of him.

“I did not mention marriage,” he said coolly.

Elizabeth started and then said, in an effort to match his coldness, “You are not a gentleman, and I may not be a lady, but that does not make us a pair. Release me instantly.”

“Or what?” he said angrily. “No, it was a bad idea to start with. It's as well you turned me down. For it was the work of impulse, and Isabel would skin me if she found out. No, I shall stay with my original thought. You shall come with me, Elizabeth. And if you continue this struggle, I can, I assure you, guarantee your compliance. But I do not think you'll relish a bruised jaw, nor I the effort of carrying you down to the carriage. Now,” he said calmly as she ceased her resistance and only gaped at him, “you will walk with me, my dear, and you will enter the coach with me. Then I will bid you a tender farewell. And you will leave Lyonshall, just
as you wished, forever. No, don't look at me like that. I'm no murderer. I have too much wit for that. But you will be sent on a journey across the seas. And by the time you get back to England, if you do indeed decide to return after your weary travels, all will be changed. Morgan will be gone from here, as it is not his custom to remain for long. Even if he is in residence, I do not think you will have any reputation or word to be honored, not after your odd disappearance and your long sojourn abroad.”