The Sherbrooke Series Novels 1-5 (112 page)

Colin didn’t find that observation to his liking. He gave Douglas a look, but the earl of Northcliffe only shrugged.

“It’s true, Colin,” Sinjun said. “I’m very strong.”

“I know,” Colin said, kissed Sinjun’s forehead, and sighed.

Sinjun was sitting in a pile of straw, playing with some kittens whose mother, a stable cat called Tom, had delivered in the third stall, thankfully empty, some four weeks before. She heard Ostle speaking to Crocker. She heard Fanny snort in her stall two doors down, doubtless wanting some hay.

She was tired but also blessedly numb, although the fear was still waiting deep inside her to come out again. She’d left Colin speaking with Mr. Seton. Her brothers were with the crofters doing hard physical labor. “It calms my mental works,” Ryder said when Sophie asked him why he was doing it.

“Douglas wanted to sweat as well,” Alex had said. “It’s frustration. It’s been two days since Aunt Arleth’s death.”

Sinjun had left the two wives arguing even as they went about the castle checking every door for possible clues. She wanted some private peace of her own. The kittens soothed her. Even now, two small toms were climbing up her skirt to settle into her lap, purring while kneading her legs through her many petticoats.

She patted them absently. Ostle’s voice was far away now, growing dimmer. Had he said something to her? No, surely not. And Crocker was hard to hear now as well. Fanny snorted again, but Sinjun only dimly heard her. She felt very relaxed. Soon she slept.

When she awoke, not much time had passed at all. The kittens were asleep in her lap. The sun was very high in the sky, shining fully through the big window in the stable.

MacDuff was on his haunches beside her.

She shook her head, smiling up at him. “Hello, what a wonderful surprise. Let me get up and greet you properly, MacDuff.”

“Oh no, Sinjun, you needn’t move right now. Have some consideration for the kittens. Cute little buggers, aren’t they? No, just stay there, I’ll join you.”

“All right,” she said, and yawned. “So much has happened, so very much. I just wanted to get away from everyone for a little while. Have you seen Colin? Do you know about Aunt Arleth? Are you here to help us?”

“Oh yes,” he said. He leaned down very close to her. He gently lifted the sleeping kittens from her lap and placed them on an old blanket.

“Now,” he said, and drew back his fist and slammed it into her jaw.

Colin looked around the drawing room. It was late afternoon and everyone was assembled for tea.

“Where’s Joan?” he asked.

“I haven’t seen her since just after lunch,” Sophie said. “Nor has Alex, for we were together all afternoon.”

“We were looking for clues, specifically which door the murderer entered to come into the castle. But we couldn’t find any clues or a plausible entry.”

Sophie threw a scone at her. “You are so stubborn, Alex! We did find the door. It’s the small one off the kitchen, Colin. I know it had been forced, but Alex here claims that it was just normal use because it is so old.”

“I will look at it,” Colin said. “Thank you both for trying.”

“Where the devil is Sinjun?” Ryder asked the drawing room at large.

It was a small son of one of Colin’s crofters who delivered the letter.

“Don’t move,” Colin told the boy as he ripped open the envelope. He read it once and then again. He paled. Then he cursed.

Colin questioned the boy, but he could tell him nothing. It was a gentleman, the boy said, his hat pulled down over his eyes, and he wore a scarf that muffled him to his ears. He did look something familiar, but he didn’t know, not really. He was on a horse and he never got down from the big brute.

Colin walked into the drawing room and handed the letter to Douglas.

“Good God, I don’t believe this!”

There was pandemonium until finally, it was Ryder who read aloud:

Lord Ashburnham,

I have your heiress wife. I will kill her if you don’t bring me fifty thousand pounds. I give you
two days to fetch the money from Edinburgh. I suggest you leave immediately. I will be watching. When you return to Vere Castle with the money I will contact you again.

“Blessed hell,” Alex said.

A few moments later Philpot came into the drawing room to announce that one of the lads had just found both Crocker and Ostle bound and gagged in the tack room. Neither man knew who had done it to them. Just talkin’ they were, an’ knocked all over their heads.

Colin turned to stride from the room.

“Where are you going?” Douglas asked, catching his arm.

“To Edinburgh, to get the damned money.”

“Wait a moment, Colin,” Ryder said slowly, stroking his long fingers over his jaw. “We must do a bit of thinking now. I do believe I have a plan. Come along.”

Sophie flew to her feet. “Oh no you don’t! We came here to help Sinjun and you shan’t exclude us now!”

“No indeed!” Alex shouted, then clutched her belly and ran to the corner of the room, where Philpot had placed a basin.

MacDuff watched Colin ride from Vere Castle early the following morning, riding that huge brute stallion of his, Gulliver. Fast as the wind, that one was. He’d supposed that Colin would have left immediately, but then again, this marriage hadn’t really been to Colin’s liking. He’d married Joan Sherbrooke only to get his hands on her money. Why should he hurry? Why should he care overly if she was killed?

Of course, his honor would demand that he ransom her.

Colin rode alone. MacDuff rubbed his hands together. With luck, Colin would return to Vere Castle sometime tonight, money in hand. He’d decided to let them all gnaw on their fear for her, and not deliver the other letter until the following morning. But something urged him to bring it all to a close. There was no reason to draw it out.

He rather liked the notion that both her brothers and their wives were here at Vere Castle. He hoped they would try to interfere, that they would somehow try to fool him with some stupid plot, and come with Colin into the trap MacDuff had set for him. He would enjoy showing them up as inept English bastards. He was rather pleased they were here; he couldn’t have planned it more to his liking.

The English losing soundly. That had a delicious irony to it and MacDuff was pleased. It dulled the ever-present pain in his chest.

He waited a while longer to see if either of Sinjun’s brothers would leave the castle, but no one came through the great front doors. He waited another hour. Finally satisfied that nothing was afoot now, MacDuff mounted his horse and rode back to the small croft.

It was Jamie, the youngest of the crofter lads, who slipped into the side door off the kitchen, the infamous doorway Sophie swore was the one used by the murderer to get into the castle. He was only one of a dozen small boys who’d been stationed around the castle in a wide perimeter, well hidden, waiting and watching.

Colin was waiting there, seated at the kitchen table, a mug of thick black coffee in his hand.

“ ’Tis a man, milor’. ’Tis yer cousin, th’ giant wi’ all th’ red hair. MacDuff ye calls him.”

Colin paled. Ryder’s hand came down on his shoulder.

“Who is this MacDuff, Colin?”

“My cousin. Douglas met him in London. Dear God, Ryder, why? I don’t understand any of it.”

Ryder gave Jamie a guinea. Jamie, mouth agape, gasped and said, “Thank ye, milor’, thank ye! Me ma’ll bless yer soul, aye, she will.”

Colin rose. “Now, Jamie, take us to the place you saw him.”

Douglas slipped through that side door off the kitchen an hour later. His eyes glittered with ill-suppressed excitement. He looked up to see the same look in his wife’s eyes. “We’re two of a kind, aren’t we?”

“Oh yes. And soon we’ll have MacDuff. Remember him, Douglas? He was the very nice giant of a man who came to see Colin in London. Colin was knocked off kilter. He doesn’t understand why MacDuff would do this.”

“Dear God.”

“I know. It’s a shock. Colin and Ryder went with the lad who saw him to the place he is hiding.”

“Soon we’ll have Arleth’s murderer as well as Fiona’s. I do wonder what his motive was.”

Alex just shook her head. “I don’t know, Douglas. Neither does Colin. Ofcourse, Sophie is claiming she would have suspected him instantly if only she’d been in London with us to meet him.”

Douglas laughed.

When Douglas rode back to Vere Castle at seven o’clock that night, he knew MacDuff was watching him and from what vantage point. He was careful to keep his face averted from that dense copse of fir trees. He was careful to ensure that
MacDuff got a good look at the bulging packet fastened to his saddle. He hoped MacDuff wouldn’t notice that Gulliver wasn’t sweating from his hard ride. Indeed, Gulliver had been running only about ten minutes. He was a terror, Douglas thought, wondering if Colin would sell him the horse.

Thirty minutes later, Philpot retrieved the letter that had been left on the front steps. He opened it and read it. He smiled.

MacDuff was whistling as he pulled his horse to a stop in front of the deserted croft that huddled beneath some low-lying fir branches just short of the eastern edge of the Cowal Swamp. It was a damp, utterly dreadful place, redolent with rotted vegetation and stagnant water. The croft itself was on the verge of collapse. Supposedly an old hermit had lived there for years upon years. It was said that he’d just walked into the swamp one night during a mighty storm, singing to heaven that he was on his way. There was one window, long since stolen and now boarded up, but even the boards were sagging and loose, one constantly swinging by its rusty nail. He pulled off his gloves and strode into the one room. There was a packed dirt floor, one narrow rope bed, one table, and two chairs. Sinjun was tied securely to one of them. He’d brought the table and chairs. He didn’t fancy sitting on the dirt floor to eat his meals. There were rats to eat the remains. He imagined that they’d kept Sinjun excellent company whilst he’d been gone.

Sinjun eyed the huge man when he walked through the door. His head barely missed the frame. He looked very pleased with himself, damn him. She closed her eyes a moment, picturing Colin and her brothers. They would find her. She didn’t
doubt it for a moment. On the other hand, it would never have occurred to her not to try to escape. She was nearly ready.

“Not long now,” MacDuff said as he sat down on one of the chairs and rubbed his large hands together. The chair creaked ominously under his weight. He cracked his knuckles, a ripping sound in the silence. He opened a brown bag and pulled out a loaf of bread. He tore off a huge chunk and began to eat. “No,” he said, his mouth full, “not long. I saw Colin riding back from Edinburgh just a while ago. I left the letter on the front steps. No sense waiting until morning. Perhaps he wants you back alive, my dear. Who can say?”

“He is very honorable,” Sinjun said, her voice carefully neutral. She wasn’t stupid. She was afraid of MacDuff.

MacDuff grunted and swallowed the bread. He ate steadily until the entire loaf was gone. Sinjun felt her stomach knotting with hunger. The bastard didn’t care if she starved.

In that moment she found herself wondering if he truly intended to let her go as he’d promised.

“I’m hungry,” she said, eyeing the other brown bag.

“A pity. I’m a big man and there just isn’t enough for you. Maybe a bit for the rats, but not for you. Yes, a pity.”

She watched him eat until both bags were empty. He wadded them up and threw them into the far corner. The air was redolent with the smells of sausage and bread. “If the rats want the crumbs, they’ll have to eat through the bags.” He laughed at that.

Nearly free, she thought. Nearly there. He rose then and stretched. With his arms over his head, they touched the sagging roof of the croft.

“Perhaps you’d tell me now why you’re doing this?”

He looked at the bruise on her jaw where he’d struck her the previous afternoon. “I was tempted to strike you again when you asked me that last night.” He made a fist and rubbed it against his open hand. “You don’t look like such a lady now, my dear countess of Ashburnham. You have more the look of a frowsy slut from Soho.”

“Are you afraid to tell me? Do you think I can somehow free myself and kill you? You’re afraid of me, aren’t you?”

He threw back his head and laughed.

Sinjun waited. She prayed he wouldn’t hit her again. Her jaw hurt dreadfully. She prayed he wouldn’t go ahead and kill her now.

“So, you want to taunt me into talking, huh? Well, why not? You’re not stupid, Sinjun. You must know that, if I please, I can easily kill both you and Colin. You are so very different from Fiona. Colin must believe he’s already died and gone to mighty rewards. You have an independent spirit and you have money, an irresistible combination. I will think about it. But, you know, telling you makes no difference to the outcome and we must pass the time. So why not tell you?”

He stretched again, then took a turn around the small room. “What a filthy place,” he said more to himself than to her.