Chance the Winds of Fortune (49 page)

Sabrina smiled understandingly at her young brother; then, resting her cheek against the curve of his shoulder, she said, “'Tis only natural that you would grieve for something that you had never known, and by all rights should have. You were not crying for James Verrick, a man you never knew, but for some idealized man who could have been a father to you,” she tried to explain. Her voice had taken on the brittle quality it always did when she spoke of their late father.

“You did not cry nor grieve, did you, Rina?” Richard asked now, looking down at his sister's still beautiful face.

“No,” she answered shortly. “He had been dead to me for a long time. He abandoned us, Dickie, and from that day forward he ceased to exist for me, except as some despicable creature to be scorned.” The bitterness and hurt she had known all of those years was still vivid in her mind.

“Actually,” she added, bringing the conversation back to their immediate problem, “knowing Lucien as I do, I really suspect that he wants to make certain that nothing goes wrong where Kate is concerned. A mistake like that could cost you your life. And even though she is quite mad, the woman is still a cold-blooded murderess. I do not think she will be able to escape the gallows this time.” Then Sabrina glanced up and saw their usually decorous nanny reeling along the corridor like a drunken sailor.

Richard must have had similar thoughts as he stared in disbelief at the diminutive woman who, despite her tottering steps, was approaching quickly. With an uneasy laugh, he exclaimed, “Good Lord, she is certainly muddled. Well, you were warned, Rina, about taking on an Irishwoman as nanny,” Richard said with a wink. “I can remember Mason warning you against such a risky decision. He said, while begging your pardon at the same time—always proper Mason is—that you would rue the day you took her on.”

Sabrina snorted rudely. “That was almost twenty years ago, and besides, as you well know, Mason is prejudiced. 'Tis ancient history, but his fiancée ran off with an Irish footman when they were all in service somewhere else. O'Casey has always been above reproach, much to Mason's disappointment.” Sabrina always had staunchly supported her choice of a nanny, although now, as the woman fell to her knees before her, she was beginning to have her doubts, especially as she listened to her hysterical babbling.

“Oooh, Yer Grace! Yer Grace. Lord help us, 'tis demons, they are. And they be comin' fer me next! Oooh, may the saints be preservin' us!” she wailed, wringing her hands. “'Tis the devil himself, 'tis. Come fer us from the fiery gates of hell. Had his she-devil with him, he did, and never, God rest me soul, have I ever seen such a face. Like a fiend, 'twas,” she croaked, her ringers tightening around Sabrina's arm. “Came fer him, her did, and all aglow, her was! Then in a pouf of smoke, her was gone,” she sniffed, then began to cry convulsively.

“Lord help us is right,” Richard said, eyeing the old woman pityingly, for obviously she had become demented. “I am certainly thankful you insisted on looking in on the children, Rina. No telling what could have happened with O'Casey here talking about demons and—” Richard paused, becoming aware of his sister's unusual stillness. “I am sorry, Rina. I didn't mean to disturb you. I really did not mean that anything had happened to the twins,” he apologized, thinking his casually spoken words had upset her.

“Kate,” Sabrina said, a strange expression in her eyes as she stared up the corridor beyond the nanny.

“Kate?” Richard repeated. “But she's already left the house.”

“Has she?” Sabrina demanded doubtfully as she bent down and struggled to free her nightdress from O'Casey's death-like grip. “'Tis Kate she is babbling about, Richard. I know it is. Don't you understand? Kate was the she-devil who frightened O'Casey half out of her wits. If you had wakened to see Kate's scarred face staring down at you, you would be half mad too.”

“Here, let me help you,” Richard said, prying loose the whimpering nanny's grasp. “God, I wish Lucien were here, and not somewhere out on the grounds,” he said worriedly, the pathetic image of the elder Mr. Taber suddenly coming to his mind.

“I want you to find him, Richard. Please,” Sabrina begged when she saw him shake his head. “If Kate is indeed loose in the house, we will need all of the help we can find. You can run faster than I can, Richard. Now go! Please!”

Richard hesitated only an instant before he rushed off as bidden, retracing the steps they'd taken just moments before. Sabrina watched his figure disappear into the darkness shrouding the corridor.

“You wait here, O'Casey,” she told the cowering woman. “I will only be a few minutes. I am just going to tuck in the twins. Do you understand, O'Casey?” she said gently, picking up the branched candlestick that Richard had set on the floor before running for help.

“Oh, don't be leavin' me! Oh, please, Yer Grace, don't be a-goin'! Herself'll be comin' fer me. 'Tis the devil after me soul!” O'Casey cried, crouching against the wall and rocking back and forth.

“I must go, O'Casey,” Sabrina told her, her voice sharpening. It seemed to have a sobering effect on the nanny, for suddenly she came to her senses.

“B-but her took him, her did! Her stole young Lord Andrew! I saw it meself! Left a changeling in his bed, I'm sure. Oh, 'tis powerful evil, and now it has the sweet lad.”

In disbelieving horror, Sabrina stared down at the sobbing woman. She wondered if this were more gibberish, or indeed the truth. Without stopping to think about what she might come face-to-face with, Sabrina ran the rest of the way to the nursery. Once she was there, her steps faltered; one of the candles had been snuffed out, but there was still enough light to see the empty crib where her son had lain. She stood beside it and numbly stretched out her hand to feel the sticky drop of blood staining Andrew's pillow. He was gone! There was blood on his pillow—but whose?

On shaking legs, Sabrina hurried over to the adjacent crib, not knowing what to expect. She breathed a sigh of relief and feasted her eyes upon her peacefully sleeping daughter. Her slumber seemed undisturbed, but as Sabrina stared down at Arden's innocent face, a drop of melted wax spilled onto the bed, drawing her attention to another dark red stain.

More blood.

But it was not her daughter's, she thought thankfully as she gently examined the small, vulnerable head of blond curls. Arden mumbled something unintelligible in her sleep, then gave a contented sigh as she slipped deeper into her untroubled dreams. With clumsy fingers, Sabrina covered her daughter's small shoulders with the soft wool coverlet, but she couldn't help thinking that Kate had stood in this very spot only moments before. And yet her daughter had been left unharmed. But what of her son?

Sabrina spun around. Where had Kate gone? Why had she slowed herself down by kidnapping Andrew? Then her own question was answered as she imagined the maddened hatred in Kate's pale eyes. She easily could have been halfway across the valley by now; yet she had not run, had not chosen to leave Camareigh—at least not yet. She had come for Andrew first.

With a last reassuring glance at her daughter, Sabrina took her first steps toward what she hoped would be a final confrontation with Lucien's cousin Kate. And this time, when they met face-to-face, she would be less merciful with this madwoman who had stolen her son.

Hurrying from the room, Sabrina turned in the opposite direction from whence she had come, her swiftly moving feet carrying her deeper into the south wing, away from the troop of men who were regrouping in the hall to puzzle over the whereabouts of their elusive quarry.

Pausing indecisively at the intersection of two corridors, Sabrina noticed for the first time a trail of blood. How Kate had managed to get even this far, wounded as she was and carrying Andrew, Sabrina could only wonder about. As she took the darkened corridor to her right, a slow realization of her destination was growing within her, for her steps were carrying her to the seldom-used back stairs that opened into an inner courtyard. From there was access to one of the kitchen gardens, which had a gate opening into the grounds—the way to Kate's freedom.

The stairs once had been a little-known exit from Camareigh. The ancient wooden staircase was rickety, its steps half rotted away, and because of the danger it held for any unsuspecting person, Lucien had decreed them restricted. They had been boarded up for years now. And just last month it had finally been decided to have the decrepit stairs torn down and a safer staircase erected. But even the workmen had not been immune to accidents, and the chief carpenter had broken his leg as a result of his fall. They would resume working on the job at the end of the month, but until then, the old staircase still stood. And since the workers would be returning, and everyone at Camareigh knew of the danger of the south stairs, they had not bothered to board up the entrance again.

Only a stranger to Camareigh would be unaware of the dangerous condition of those stairs, and in the darkness, which would hide the workmen's scaffolding, that person would have no reason to hesitate—especially if she were in a desperate hurry.

Sabrina quickened her steps, a dreadful foreboding gathering at the back of her mind. The knuckles of her right hand gleamed white against the taut skin as she kept a tight grip on the heavy silver candelabrum, while protecting the vulnerable flame with her cupped left hand. The corridor was bitingly cold, and since this section of the wing was left unheated, the damp had penetrated deeply into it. Few people wandered this way, except for a maid armed with a feather duster, who cleared the passage of cobwebs once a fortnight.

Sabrina was halfway down the corridor toward the south stairs when she heard a terrified scream. She needed no soothsayer to tell her the portent of that haunting cry. For an instant later a low rumble vibrated through the hall, becoming a thundering roar and climaxing in a deafening crash. Her unfaltering steps carried her into the thick, choking dust that was settling over everything, like a dirty shroud.

There was only one thought in Sabrina's mind when Kate's horror-filled voice was abruptly silenced: fear for her son. In her mind's eye she saw the steep flight of steps leading to the flagstone floor of the courtyard. This image now made her sickeningly weak as she reached the opened door to the stairwell.

An icy draft of air hit her, extinguishing her light and leaving her poised on the edge of the gaping hole. Sabrina stood motionless in the somber silence, her eyes seeking blindly for something familiar to grasp.

She bit back a start of surprise when she touched the door and felt a splinter of wood dig deep into her palm. Supporting herself against the door, she carefully placed the useless candelabrum on the floor beside her feet, then leaned farther out into the blackness.

“Andrew? Andy, love? Where are you, Andy? Answer Mama, please, Andy,” she called softly, but the death-like silence only deepened.

“Andy!” she screamed, forgetful of her precarious balance in the doorway. “Oh, Andy, where are you?” she cried. But the ominous gloom seemed to mock her as it echoed back her words.

With a sigh, Sabrina surrendered to the despondency that had been shadowing her ever since Rhea had been kidnapped. The euphoria she had experienced upon learning that Kate had not murdered Rhea now vanished, plummeting her into a desolation of spirit. As she contemplated the certain death of her son, she now knew a depth of sorrow that filled her mind with a paralyzing black void.

Rough hands reached out and grabbed her as she began sinking weakly to her knees, too tired to fight any longer against her grief.

“Rina!” Lucien spoke harshly, because his relief was still overshadowed by the fear he had felt as he'd helplessly watched his wife slipping away from him, the gaping doorway looming perilously close to her swaying body.

As he had neared the south stairs, her white-clad figure had seemed appallingly ghostlike in the eerie glow of the torches being carried by the group of men following him. They had been climbing the Grand Staircase in search of Kate when Richard had met them with his alarming news; then, upon leaving the nursery, they too had followed the trail of blood into the south wing. It was only as they'd neared the corridor leading to the south stairs that he'd realized Kate's ultimate destination—for that was now her only hope of escape.

Butterick had turned back with a contingent of men and was circling the grounds in the hope of cutting Kate off, but now, as Lucien saw Sabrina's ravaged face, he realized that they had all been too late to stop Kate. Unlike Sabrina, he had forgotten the dangerous condition of the ancient staircase, but now, with a smoking torch illuminating the debris-filled stairwell, he remembered only too well.

“Andrew,” he whispered.

Richard leaned closer, holding his flickering torch lower as he strained to catch sight of any figure or movement below. But the shadows were too deep, and the area remained a silent well of death.

Lucien held Sabrina against him, keeping her face turned away from the destruction below, in which the body of their young son lay.

Richard continued to squat in the doorway, his nightshirt billowing around him. He refused to believe that this was the end, that his innocent little nephew was lying dead in that heap of rubbish. As he continued to stare unblinkingly, the light from the torches intensified, until the whole stairwell seemed alight with a thousand candles. “Lucien,” Richard said, glancing back at his brother-in-law. And this one grimly spoken word was enough to warn Lucien against what he was about to see. “It's Butterick. They're searching below.”

Lucien tried to prevent Sabrina from glancing down, but she moved too quickly. Richard's words had struck a note of response inside her, which cut through the blank numbness that had held her enthralled. Lucien could feel her trembling as they stared down at the nightmarish scene now revealed in the dancing torchlight. Kate was dead.