Chapter Seven
As with most situations in is life, Tamar simply enjoyed the moment. He knew he shouldn’t have touched Serena, and yet he couldn’t be sorry that he had. That she’d kissed him back, that she’d seemed to want him as some kind of formal suitor both stunned him and warmed him to the bottom of his heart. It could never be, of course, and she’d see that in time, but for now, it was unspeakably sweet, something to hug to himself in the cold light of reality.
Which, at the moment, was the bizarre discovery of gunpowder, and eating chocolate cake with some very young ladies and their governess.
To his surprise, the governess supported Serena in her veto of his idea that he should watch the cellar door from his old hiding place for the rest of the night.
“There must be somewhere from inside that gives one the same view,” she said.
Tamar raised his brows. “I thought you’d be the first to push me out the door and lock it.”
She met his gaze with very un-governess-like boldness. “Lady Serena appears to trust you, and I trust her judgment of character.”
“Do you?” Serena said, apparently both surprised and touched. After all, to the world, she was the girl who’d ruined her engagement by dancing three times with Dax, a notorious rake of the first order. Not everyone would have recognized that Dax wouldn’t hurt her, but Serena probably had. And perhaps, unconsciously, she’d wanted to end her dull but worthy engagement.
I would make her happy.
The wistful thought hit him from nowhere, causing his lips to twist in sheer self-mockery. No, I wouldn’t. I’d make her miserable, and poor, and the sparkle of her brilliant eyes would dull… He couldn’t bear that. At even the thought of it, pain clawed at his gut.
This was stupid. He’d known her for what, three days? Four? Ruthlessly, he squashed the pointless meanderings of his mind and refocused on the discussion in hand.
“My bedchamber looks onto the old courtyard,” Serena said. “That was how I saw them in the first place.”
“Well, Lord Tamar can hardly watch from there,” Miss Grey pointed out.
Serena blushed adorably. “Of course not. But he could see from the rooms beneath just as easily. There’s the still room and a spare bedchamber.”
“It sounds more comfortable than the oak tree,” Tamar admitted, glad of the table to hide his body’s wayward reaction to the thought of Serena’s bedchamber.
“We’ll show you where it is,” Lady Helen offered, springing to her feet.
“And then it’s back to bed,” Serena said, “for all of us! Except poor Lord Tamar, of course.”
They all escorted him out of the kitchen and upstairs, then along winding passages to another, narrower staircase in an older part of the house.
“Serena prefers it here,” Alice offered.
“Why is that?” Tamar asked.
“I think Frances and I were just desperate to grow up and get away from the nursery,” Serena said, almost ruefully. She cast the governess a quick smile. “We never had a Miss Grey.”
“No, you had a Miss George,” Maria recalled with a shudder. “Terrifying woman. She retired from the position, thank God.”
“I don’t blame her,” Miss Grey said tartly. “And I can see why you’ve run through so many governesses since then—you have no respect.”
“We have for you,” Helen said, hugging her arm.
Miss Grey snorted, and Serena cast a quick conspiratorial smile at Tamar that almost undid him. He wanted this girl as his friend. Mind you, there was something appealing about all of them, something about this bizarre expedition that reminded him of his own family just after the old marquis had died. A sense of freedom and fun…before it had all gone wrong and they’d all grown up for the worse.
He veered away from the memory as Maria threw open a door on the left of the wood-paneled passage. The bedchamber inside smelled a little musty from lack of use, but when he walked over to the window, it was clean enough to see clearly down onto the courtyard below. He might not have been able to see the cellar door, but he could see anyone entering the yard.
Serena said, “You don’t have to do this, you know. I could watch.”
“No, you must have been up half of last night,” he protested.
“So must you.”
He had, and it had not been a night well spent. Fortunately, the ill-effects were little more than a distant memory. A lot seemed to have happened since he’d woken up on his lumpy couch.
“I’m used to it,” he said.
Despite the younger girls’ offer to keep him company, Serena and Miss Grey herded them out and closed the door. He could hear their voices in lively discussion, fading as they walked away. The sound of Serena’s infectious laugh was unmistakable.
His stomach twisted, but he refused to acknowledge regret or waste time on imagining what might have been. Instead, he folded himself onto the window seat and settled in to watch and listen.
As dawn broke, he doubted any strangers would risk venturing near the castle now. And it was time he left before he was seen by the servants.
Unwinding himself from the window seat, he stretched prodigiously and picked up his coat. Although he couldn’t yet hear any movement in the castle, it would be bustling soon enough.
He walked to the door and opened it as softly as he could. A quick glance showed him the passage was empty, so he emerged, closed the door behind him, and walked along to the stairs—where he almost bumped into Serena.
“Oh,” she gasped. “I was just coming to show you the way out.”
Trapped between him and the step behind her, she stood much too close to him for her own good. He could have stepped aside, but he didn’t want to. He could smell her subtle scent, like spring flowers and fresh sunny mornings after rain. Her chest rose and fell too quickly, as though she’d run down from her own chamber. Or was affected by his nearness. His arms ached to hold her again, to taste her willing lips. To take her back to the chamber he’d just left and show her delight.
Her tongue darted out, nervously wetting her lips. He swallowed. Forcing his heavy feet to move, he turned and led the way downstairs, only too aware of her every movement behind him.
“This way,” she murmured, squeezing past him at the foot of the stairs. Her gown swished against his leg, her shoulder brushed his arm.
He followed her along the passage to the side-door they’d entered by last night. He watched her slender hand insert the key in the lock and turn it, and couldn’t help remembering the touch of her soft fingertips on his cheek, his nape. There were so many places he wanted her to touch him.
Without conscious volition, he moved closer, just as she stepped back to open the door. He didn’t care that she stood on his toes, for her rear bumped against him and the heat of her body, the scent of her skin, inflamed him.
She gasped, whisking herself away, and though he truly didn’t mean to, his hand shot out, seizing her elbow and spinning her back against him.
He stared greedily down into her face, her parted, rosy lips and her beautiful, brilliant eyes, full of surprise and hope and trust.
It was the trust that saved her.
Emitting a sound between a groan and laughter, he released her. “God help me,” he said. “Open the door and throw me out.”
Of course, he couldn’t wait, and his hand closed over hers on the latch, lifting it and drawing the door open. Her hand twisted under his, as if it would be free. At once, he dropped his hand and slipped hastily around the door.
“Let me know what happens,” he said huskily.
“We might take a walk in the orchard this afternoon,” she murmured, and his gaze at once flew back to her. She wasn’t angry. She wasn’t angry at all.
He shouldn’t have felt relieved. He shouldn’t have been glad. But he was. He liked her.
Managing a faint upward quirk of his lips, he turned and strode away from the house. He broke into a run, trying to ease the ache of longing.
*
Serena was so impatient that first thing, she sent servants off with notes to both Mr. Winslow the magistrate and Major Doverton at the barracks. Although the notes explained that her butler had discovered strange barrels of gunpowder in the castle cellar, she hadn’t yet had time to take Paton down there to look.
Paton, however, had known her a long time, and when she finally managed to drag him to the cellar and show him what she’d found, he expressed no surprise at her strange behavior, and accepted without a murmur his role of discoverer before the magistrate.
Mr. Winslow and the major arrived together, and scratched their heads over the barrels, which they agreed did indeed contain gunpowder.
“Perhaps your supplies have been robbed?” Mr. Winslow suggested to the major. “Either at the barracks or en route?”
Doverton shook his head. “I’ve heard of no such thing, and I don’t have so much else to do that I don’t keep track of all our supplies.” Like most soldiers, he would rather have been fighting on the Peninsula with the rest of his regiment than stuck at home training recruits. Especially now, when it seemed the war was close to ended and Boney almost beaten.
“Well, someone has already moved a couple of barrels,” Paton said, obedient to his instructions. “When I first noticed them, I assumed his lordship had arranged for their delivery during his last visit, and thought no more of it until last night when I realized two were missing. Obviously, that could not have been his lordship since he is in London! That was when I opened the barrels to see what was in them.”
“You could have knocked him down with a feather,” Alice added, since she had escaped the schoolroom for luncheon.
Inevitably, the magistrate started asking the questions Serena already had and discovered that Paton had first noticed the cellar key to be missing the morning after his night off, which he’d spent at the Blackhaven Tavern.
“That place is a den of thieves and villains,” Major Doverton exclaimed. “It should be shut down, Winslow!”
“But then where would your men drink?” Mr. Winslow said mildly. “To say nothing of the wild young gentlemen slumming it for an evening. I think instead, a subtle visit might be in order.”
Major Doverton agreed reluctantly that this might be a more useful means of investigation. “I’d like to involve Colonel Fredericks, too,” he added.
“Colonel Fredericks has retired,” Serena objected, remembering the amiable old commander of the regiment whom she’d known for most of her life.
“Not entirely,” Mr. Winslow said. “He still handles some important aspects of security, under the direct authority of the government.”
“Really?” Serena was vastly intrigued, and eager to tell Tamar.
“Hmm,” Winslow said thoughtfully. “I’d like you and your sisters to move out of the castle until this is over. Perhaps you could come and stay with us.”
“Oh no, I thank you. We couldn’t impose. Besides, if it’s dangerous, doesn’t it make more sense to remove the gunpowder?”
“The gunpowder is perfectly safe,” Doverton said. “So long as you don’t set fire to it! I think Mr. Winslow means that we shall set a trap for whoever is involved, and we don’t want you here when they walk into it.”
“But I would love to be here when they walk into it,” Serena said, narrowing her eyes as she recalled the man who’d brandished the dagger at her and chased her through the woods. She pulled herself together. “I assure you we would not get in your way, and will stay inside the castle when you tell us. In fact, if we carry on as normal, surely it will be better for your plan? After all, we don’t want them to know they are suspected.”
Mr. Winslow tugged at his lower lip, clearly undecided.
“I would not take any chances with my sisters’ safety, sir,” she said quietly, and he looked from her to Alice and then to Doverton, who shrugged.
“Very well,” Mr. Winslow said reluctantly. “But I don’t want anybody outside after dark. If you go out for the evening, you must stay away until morning. My house is at your disposal, as I’m sure is the vicarage.”
Doverton, who seemed to be regarding Serena now with more admiration than anything else, coughed and said, “I’ll be sending men up here on watch, but they’ll remain out of sight until they can trap the villains.”
Serena nodded. “Will you follow them to see where they take the gunpowder?” she asked eagerly. “After all, they’ve already gone off with at least two barrels.”
Again Mr. Winslow and the major exchanged glances. “That is a sensible idea,” Doverton allowed. “If it can be done without putting your persons in danger.”
*
The girls were released from their lessons just as Serena was donning her hat and pelisse to go for a stroll in the orchard. On one level, she ill-naturedly wished her sisters to Jericho. On another, she recognized that having them with her would be best. Whatever strange magnetism drew her and Tamar together physically, was just a little frightening—particularly when he’d made it clear he had no intention of offering marriage.
Besides, she couldn’t send them away when they so clearly wanted to come.
“We could walk into Blackhaven,” Helen suggested hopefully.
“We wouldn’t be back before dark,” Serena pointed out, “not unless we ran there and back without stopping. Let’s just walk in the orchard.”
“What’s in the orchard?” Helen asked mutinously.
“Jem, apparently,” Serena said as they approached. “Listen, he’s arguing with someone.”
“Oh Serena,” Maria breathed. “Do you suppose it’s them?”
Serena’s heart lurched into her throat. “Surely not. It’s still light.” And Major Doverton’s men were unlikely to arrive before dark. “You have to run,” she said intensely, “as soon as I say so. Promise me.”
Helen’s hand slipped into hers. “As long as you come with us.”
“Of course, I will. Carefully, then…” She opened the orchard door, and at once saw Jem half way up the central path.
Perched on a ladder against the largest apple tree, he was arguing with someone out of sight, but he didn’t give the impression of fear or even true anger. Breathing more easily, she led the way in.
“Stay with me,” she warned as Helen and Alice began to run ahead. The fact that they obeyed said more about their fears than their words had ever admitted. Perhaps she should send the girls and Miss Grey to the Winslows…
Jem caught sight of their approach and waved, another comforting sign. In fact, considering whom she had half-arranged to meet here, she was fairly sure before they even rounded the bend that it was Lord Tamar they would discover.
It was. He stood behind his easel, wearing his usual old coat, busily painting, although he spared a quick smile in their direction. The girls ran to him with every appearance of delight.
“I see you’ve met Jem,” Serena said wryly.
“I’ve told him he’s trespassing,” Jem said at once. “But he says he has your permission to paint in the grounds. I thought he was lying.”
“Well, I suppose I never said he couldn’t,” Serena said. “And since he seems to know everyone in Blackhaven, I doubt his lordship would object either. This is Lord Tamar.”
“Are you sure?” Jem said dubiously. “He doesn’t look much like a lord to me.”
“He’s an artist.”
“So I see.”
“Look, he’s painted Jem!” Alice cried in delight. “With a cross face. Sir, will you paint us, too?”
“You can’t afford me,” Tamar said grandly.
Alice’s face fell.
“I might as a present though, for your birthday,” he added.
“Is Jem’s a present, too, or can he afford you?” Helen asked.
“Of course, he can. Jem is a working man.”
“I don’t want my picture painted!” Jem exclaimed. “I only want to finish pruning this da—wretched tree before dark.”
“Carry on, Jem,” Serena said hastily. “Though I’m glad you’re here because Lord Tamar is helping us with the barrel problem.”
“How fares the barrel problem?” Tamar inquired.
Serena quickly told him what had transpired with Mr. Winslow and Major Doverton. While she talked, the girls admired his painting and then ran off, playing tag among the trees. It was good to see Maria forgetting the adult dignity she had begun to assume and play like a child once more. Serena had given up childhood too easily.
After a few moments observing them, she moved to take their place beside Tamar, watching him work.
His brush flew over the page, painting in the background with sure, swift strokes. While real life Jem returned to his work, it was the Jem of the painting who kept drawing her gaze. Tamar had somehow caught both his irritation and his basic good nature. More than that, there was something noble in his poise, the way he was twisted round to look out of the picture, something idyllic about the whole scene.
“You’re very good, aren’t you?” she marveled. “Where did you study?”
He wrinkled his nose. “Tamar Abbey, largely. My father had left a huge collection of art materials there. I’ve no idea where they came from. I expect he won them from some poor devil in a card game. I just painted to amuse myself till a few people convinced me I was quite good. I got a few pointers from other artists who knew what they were doing, sold a couple of paintings to my neighbors and then had the idea of coming here to see if I could make any kind of living out of it.”
“Can you?”
He shrugged. “I can feed myself, send a little home, but it’s not enough to rebuild the estate, give my sister a dowry, or my brothers any kind of stable income.”
“What do they do?” she asked curiously. “Your brothers?”
“Get into trouble, largely.”
“Are you close?”
“God, no. We can’t stand each other.”
Serena blinked at this casual assertion. “And your sisters?”
“The twins aren’t so bad. Christianne is still sweet enough to have caught a husband with prospects who doesn’t give a fig for her poverty or her awful family. I like your family. Is your brother as good-natured?”
“Mostly.” She wrinkled her nose. “Though he can be quite unbending, which is how I come to be here in disgrace. I didn’t do the right thing.”
“Do you mean failing to marry the dull man who didn’t make you happy? Isn’t that the right thing?”
She blinked. “Put like that, I suppose it is. I wanted everyone to be proud of me, as they were of Frances. And Frances is happy. I assumed I would be, too. I didn’t think. I just obeyed, did what was expected. It didn’t seem much of a burden at first. And then—” She broke off to tell the girls not to crash into Jem’s ladder unless they wanted him to break a leg, and they ran further away from the apple tree.
“And then what?” Tamar prompted.
She sighed. “I suppose I’d grown discontented ever since Gillie married Wickenden. Gillie’s an old friend, the daughter of one of the officers stationed here. She was not a great match for him by the world’ standards. Conversely, he was considered a brilliant match for her. But none of that mattered to either of them, because they married for love. I saw it shining in her eyes and I knew beyond doubt that whatever duty, respect, or even liking I might feel for Sir Arthur, I would never have the kind of happiness Gillie had discovered.”
He glanced up at her. “Is that what you were looking for with Dax?”
She shook her head impatiently. “I wasn’t looking for anything with Dax. He just encouraged my natural liveliness, which had been so desperate to break out. I’m afraid I’ve always been too lively.”
“No, you’re not. It’s part of your charm. Don’t lose yourself to please anyone. It would be such a shame.”
She brought her gaze from the picture, which she’d been staring at rather blindly for several moments, to his face. “You don’t lose yourself, do you? You just do as you wish, whatever anyone’s expectations of a peer.”
“Well, to be fair, no one has any expectations of this peer, except that he will go to the devil faster than his father—having less money to prop him up.”
She frowned. “But you’re not going to the devil, are you? You’re earning, looking after your family—to say nothing of me and mine!—and keeping your head above water. If you don’t count the bailiff,” she acknowledged.
His gaze dropped from hers to the painting. “Never discount the bailiff.”
But she’d already glimpsed something in his face that caught at her breath, something that wasn’t quite sadness or desperation or secrecy and yet, was made up of all three. She moved to see him better.
“There’s something you’re not telling me,” she said.
“Many, many things. My life is not a book written for well-bred young ladies.”
“No, there’s more,” she said with certainty. “You give no details about your family, you turn the subject when I speak of them—”
“So would you if you had my family.” Selecting a different paint brush, he began to add detail to the fallen leaves in his picture.
“And the bailiff cannot touch you,” she blurted. “You’re a peer of the realm. Why do you keep up such a fiction?”
“To make myself seem interesting. Actually, I’m not really Tamar at all. I just pretend so I’ll be invited to parties.”
“Are you?”
“Sometimes. Blackhaven seems to like me.”
She scowled at him. “I meant, as you very well know, are you really the Marquis of Tamar?”
“If I wasn’t, I’d sweep you off your feet and marry you out of hand.” At last, his gaze came back to her, warm and deliberately distracting. She knew that, and yet it didn’t stop the butterflies soaring in her stomach or the memory of his passionate kisses.
“Why?” she managed. “Why is it worse to be a marquis? To be this marquis? What have you done?”
If there was any thought behind her questions, it was to taunt him, goad him into telling her the truth. She wasn’t prepared for the rush of emotion, of absolute fury and misery that spilled from his eyes, before his thick, black lashes swept down, hiding them.
He threw down his brush, began packing his palette and brushes and rags into his satchel. “The light is fading. Jem has finished his work, and you must take your sisters back to the house.”
“You’re dismissing me!” she said, in outraged frustration.
He laughed, swinging the satchel over his shoulder. “Oh, my dear, it’s the best I can possibly do for you.”
“Lord Tamar, play tag with us!” Helen panted, running up to them, Alice and Maria at her heels.
“Next time,” he said, covering the painting. “I have to go, and so do you.”
“But you will paint us?” Alice pursued.
“Of course, I will. One day.” Easel and picture under his arm, he cast them a comical bow. “Farewell, young ladies. Lady Serena, your servant.” At last, a quick, faint smile lit his eyes. “I am that, at least.” And then he was striding off toward the upper door, calling to Jem as he went.
Serena felt as if she’d been pushed over and trampled. Worse, she had the awful feeling that she’d driven him away, that she’d never see him again.