Until the Dawn (3 page)

Sophie heard the Vandermarks before she saw them. The clopping of horse hooves and the bumping of carriage wheels across the rocky front drive sounded like impending doom. Florence had put a kettle on to heat, and a bowl of Sophie’s blueberry muffins and a Dutch sweet cake were at the center of the table, still warm from the oven and lending a comforting aroma of sweetened vanilla to the room.

Sophie sat at the kitchen table, rotating a mug of tea between her suddenly icy fingers. Why was she so anxious? They hadn’t done anything wrong . . . or at least, they hadn’t done anything the Vandermarks explicitly forbade them to do. It had been easy to feel like she belonged in this wonderful old house, but
all that would change now that the real owners had returned. Sixty years—it had been
sixty
years
—how was she supposed to know they would return with no warning?

Footsteps thudded up the porch steps. She had already unlocked the front door, since it would seem presumptuous to force Quentin Vandermark to knock for admittance into his own house.

He didn’t knock. The front door banged open, and more heavy footsteps clomped on the hardwood floors.

“Where is she?” An angry voice roared through the old house, echoing off the walnut paneling in the grand foyer and hurting her ears.

Sophie sprang to her feet and headed to the entrance hall, where the group of imposing men trudged into the house. Mr. Gilroy passed her a tense smile, but the man whose bellow had shaken the rafters was a stranger to her. He was a slender man who leaned heavily on a cane as he lurched around the entrance hall. With dark hair and stormy gray eyes, his lean face was drawn tight with anger.

“Where is she?” he roared again as he limped toward the formal parlor, raising his cane long enough to strike at the draperies. Dust motes swirled in the air, and she feared the fragile silk might rip and come tearing down.

“Are you looking for me?” she asked calmly. Fighting fire with fire was rarely a good idea, and Sophie refused to do it.

He whirled around, shooting her a scorching glare. “Are you the one who has been telling ghost stories to my son? The one who terrified him so badly we can’t get him out of the carriage?”

His voice lashed like a whip, and he was so daunting it was hard to look him in the face. Even the burly men in the grand foyer seemed cowed.

“Somehow I doubt I’m the cause of the boy’s anxiety, Mr. Vandermark.”

The man’s eyes narrowed as he plodded across the parquet floor to scrutinize her. He would be a handsome man were he not so ferociously angry. With a lean face and high cheekbones, he looked like something straight out of a Brontë novel, and apparently he had the temper to match.

“Are you the person responsible for turning my home into an obscene tourist attraction? The one selling postcards and cookies down by the pier?”

“My name is Sophie van Riijn. I provide meals to the staff at the house, but I am not on your payroll, nor am I the cause of whatever has put you into a foul mood. I’d be happy to welcome you inside and get you all something to eat and drink. I imagine you are tired after your journey.”

Mr. Gilroy stepped forward, unruffled by the raging tantrum of his employer. “Thank you, Miss van Riijn. We would be grateful.”

Quentin Vandermark acted as though he hadn’t heard. Leaning both hands on his cane, he scanned the impressive rooms on either side of the entrance hall. He seemed particularly fascinated by the portraits of a dozen Vandermark ancestors from earlier centuries, their powdered wigs looking strange to modern eyes. What must this man be thinking as he saw his ancestral estate for the first time? Sophie had been coming to this house since she was a child, but everything was new to Mr. Vandermark. He would need a guide just to find his way through the forty-room mansion.

“If you’ll follow me to the kitchen, we have a kettle warming and some fresh blueberry muffins. I’m sorry we did not know of your arrival or we’d have prepared the dining room. Will Pieter be joining us?”

Mr. Vandermark tore his gaze from the old portraits. “He is in the carriage with his governess. I don’t want him in the house until we establish the ground rules. My son has had a difficult
year and is prone to fits of anxiety. Filling his head with tales of his ancestors floating dead in the river and people turning into hunchbacks from setting foot in this house is going to stop at once. Is that clear, Miss van Riijn?”

“Perfectly.”

“And whoever is selling postcards with photographs of this home will cease and desist immediately.”

Sophie tilted her head. “Artists and photographers have been featuring this house on their postcards for decades. We aren’t responsible for that.”

Reaching inside his coat, he grabbed a postcard and waved it in her face. “This postcard shows the
inside
of the house. Someone let them in to take those photographs, and I demand to know who.”

Sure enough, the postcard he clenched in his fist was of the drawing room, sunlight streaming through the windows and fresh flowers in vases placed about the room. For scale, a little blond girl stood beside the fireplace, a bouquet of tulips in her hands. The photograph had been taken by her father more than twenty years ago, and Sophie was the little child, but she doubted Mr. Vandermark would recognize her.

“I believe that photograph was taken decades ago,” she said. “I doubt you’ll discover who is responsible. There has been a lot of turnover here at the house.”

“So I gather. Dead people stumbling over rakes and dying of terrible diseases. Such charming tales you tell.”

“Mr. Vandermark, the tour guides on the steamboats are all from Manhattan. If you have a complaint with their services, you will need to return to the city and take it up with them. All we do is tend to the house. Florence has the tea ready, if you’d like to follow me to the kitchen.”

She didn’t wait for a reply, but given the lumbering footsteps behind her, the men followed. Both Florence and Emil rose as
they heard the group approach. Emil swept the cap from his head, brushing his straw-colored hair from his forehead with a nervous hand.

“This is Florence Hengeveld, the housekeeper here for more than forty years. And Emil Broeder has been keeping the grounds ever since he took over for his father two years ago.”

“Tea?” Florence asked, lifting the copper kettle. The scent of Earl Grey filled the kitchen as Sophie began slicing a loaf of
ontbijtkoek
, a Dutch sweet cake spiced with cinnamon, ginger, and nutmeg.

Mr. Vandermark kicked out a stool from beneath the work table and twisted around to sit. His teeth clenched as he rubbed his knee, but he ignored the basket of blueberry muffins Florence pushed toward him.

“And what is
your
role here?” he asked, piercing Sophie with narrowed eyes.

She hedged. Apparently none of them had noticed the weather station on the roof, and now wasn’t the time to discuss it. “My mother was the cook here before she died. There really isn’t need for a permanent cook anymore, but I’ve always loved cooking, and Florence lets me use the kitchen to prepare a few meals for the staff each day. I also do a little baking now and then.”

He reached inside his coat and then threw a packet of Dutch cookies on the counter. “Are you responsible for those?”

Her mouth went dry. She wasn’t the only one to sell goodies to the tourists who stepped onto the pier each morning, but Sophie’s baked goods were always the most popular. She sold cookies and sweet cakes to the vendors who manned the stalls near the pier and then gave the proceeds to her father. That money had paid for the town’s only telegraph station.

“I am, but I haven’t done anything wrong,” Sophie said. “I don’t use Vandermark money for the ingredients, and there is no crime in selling food to hungry travelers.”

“Then let me outline the
crimes
for which I have evidence,” he said in a clipped voice. “The servants at Dierenpark have participated in exploiting my home as an obscene tourist attraction. You have fueled malicious slander about the tragedies in my family. You have used this house in a manner I never authorized. You’ve done nothing wrong? Miss van Riijn, let me count the ways. Your wrongs surpass the depth and breadth and height a soul can reach. . . .”

His ability to mangle the immortal sonnet of Elizabeth Barrett Browning would have been amusing if she weren’t so intimidated by him. She forced her voice to remain calm.

“I’ve never met someone who can take one of poetry’s most remarkable passages about the purity of love and twist it into embittered screed on the spot,” she said.

He quirked a brow, and for the first time, she saw a gleam of respect light his handsome features. “We all have our talents,” he said dryly. The flash of humor was fleeting. His face iced over again as he fired another question at her. “How many tourists have you allowed into my house?”

“We don’t allow tourists inside,” Sophie said, wincing at the memory of telling Mr. Gilroy that on special occasions some tourists were welcomed in. Mr. Vandermark rose from the stool and stalked down the hall leading to the parlor where they relaxed once their daily chores were finished. It was an impressive room, with a bank of windows overlooking the river and a fire burning in the brick fireplace. A table beneath the window was full of antiques—a large Delft platter from the seventeenth century, a silver soup tureen embellished with arching dolphins for handles, even a few candlesticks from a medieval monastery. At the front of the table was a small card printed in Sophie’s own handwriting.

Please don’t touch
.

It was proof they had allowed visitors into the home.

Mr. Vandermark stiffened as he glared at the note. He picked it up and carried it toward her, leaning heavily on his cane as he approached.

“If you allow no visitors, which of the servants need a reminder such as this?” he asked in a tight voice.

Heat flushed her face. She needed to confess what they’d been doing, but there wasn’t an ounce of compassion or kindness in his expression. “On rare occasions we invite a select type of visitor—”

He cut her off. “And
on rare
occasions
I believe the staff at Dierenpark are conspiring to violate every principle of loyalty on earth. You’re fired. You’re all fired. You have ten minutes to get off my property, and don’t ever come back.”

Sophie flinched. This estate was her refuge, her paradise on earth.

Mr. Gilroy stepped out of the shadows. “Quentin, perhaps we should wait . . .”

Sophie held her breath, praying for a reprieve. Mr. Vandermark seemed to sag and weaken as he hobbled toward a kitchen stool, easing onto it with a grimace. His face was ashen and drawn in pain. Perspiration beaded on his face, and when he dabbed at it with a handkerchief, Sophie noticed his hand trembled. Perhaps it was her imagination, but it seemed he was barely ahead of an avalanche of pain and sorrow gathering behind him. When he finally spoke, his voice was devoid of anger.

“Loyalty is important to me,” he said with an exhausted, hollow tone. “I need to make this house a safe place for my son, and I don’t trust any of you. It is clear that the misuse of Dierenpark has been occurring for decades. I want you out of here. The lot of you.”

Behind her, Emil let out a mighty whoosh as though he’d been punched in the gut. Emil had lived his entire life on this
estate. How was he going to get his wife and three children out in the space of ten minutes? Where would they go?

But even worse was Florence. The old woman had crumpled into a chair, her head sagging on her hunched shoulders. Florence had lived most of her life in this house. She started to quietly weep.

Sophie blanched as two of the fearsome men lumbered toward her. Instinctively, she stepped back. She’d never had such menacing glares directed at her, and it was intimidating.

“All right,” she said quietly, picking up her cloak and folding it over her arm. “You’ll find plenty to eat in the larder, and there is firewood on the back terrace. I’ll help Florence collect her things, and we will be on our way.”

But she would be back first thing tomorrow morning. There had to be a way to defuse the acrimony simmering inside Quentin Vandermark, and she just needed a bit of time to plan her attack. Her weapons wouldn’t be menacing bodyguards or seething anger. She wouldn’t fight on his level. But that didn’t mean she intended to surrender. The real battle would begin tomorrow morning, and she wouldn’t be put off easily.

2