Authors: Jean Rowden
Fed and watered, Beddowes looked at the walls of the pit which might well be his grave; with two sound arms it would have been easy enough to heave himself out, but crippled as he was, the process would be difficult, maybe impossible. The rain stopped, quite abruptly, which gave him heart for the task. As he attacked the wet mud with the heel of his one half-decent boot, a flash of memory came to him. He’d returned to England, he was sure of it, and he recalled exchanging his military uniform for another, that of an officer of the law. It was a heartening thought. But what then?
No matter how he racked his brain he had no recollection of the reason for this fall into destitution; all he achieved was an increasingly severe headache. At last he gave up and concentrated on digging his way to freedom.
After some time the sky above him turned to a deep summer blue. The sun crept along the top of the wall of the pit, coming gradually lower until he could feel it warming the top of his head as he worked. With three steps dug into the wall, and some hopes that he might be able to climb out, Beddowes turned to look at the dead man who lay at his feet, illuminated now by sunlight. The cut of his thin hair and the softness of his hands proclaimed the corpse to be that of a gentleman, as did the faint scent of some kind of pomade, now overlaid with a far more pungent and unpleasant odour. Since the man had no features, it was doubtful if anybody would be able to recognize him. He’d been of slender build, and perhaps a little over five and a half feet tall. There was no clue to suggest any link between them.
Since his memory had failed him, Beddowes turned to speculation. It seemed likely the two of them had been
attacked at the same time, and the other man robbed of his clothes because they were of some value, whereas even a scarecrow would have provided better garb for a thief than his own poor rags. Was it chance that obliterated the man’s features, or had it been a deliberate attempt to make him unrecognizable? His right hand had also suffered a severe blow, perhaps as he tried to protect himself; it was black with blood and grossly swollen.
Beddowes’ eye caught something that looked out of place among the dried gore, and he bent to take a closer look. There was a ring upon the man’s little finger, only the barest glint of silver giving away its presence; the thieves must have missed it. Beddowes looked about him but there was nothing sharp, not even a stone, which he could use to cut away the dead flesh that surrounded the tiny glimmer of metal. Despite his desperate poverty, he felt a surge of distaste at the thought of stealing from a corpse; if only he could remember something about this man. He might have been a friend, or a deadly enemy. The thought brought another, but common sense assured him that he hadn’t killed his silent companion. The absence of the man’s clothes, the similarity of the injuries they’d both suffered, not to mention being hidden together from prying eyes, all suggested otherwise.
The removal of the ring with no tools but one bare hand and his teeth was an unpleasant task, but Beddowes managed it eventually. Without stopping to examine his prize he wiped it clean and tied it up in his shirt tail. A few minutes later he climbed into the warming sunlight, aching in every part of his body but very much alive. He found himself in a bleak moorland landscape. A jagged ruin of stone, evidently the remains of a chimney, gave the world a two-fingered salute, only yards from the pit. He had no recollection of ever seeing such a place before.
He felt sure he was in England. A clear blue sky stretched above him. The plants at his feet suggested late summer, as did the height of the sun. He needed no other compass but the one in his head, although he had no idea which direction he should take. Some instinct, perhaps some shred of recall, turned him to the west. With his back to the fallen chimney, he chose a lone tree and began to struggle towards it through the wilderness of gorse and heather.
L
ucille tossed and turned in her bed. When Mortleigh returned from his mission of mercy, she’d been shocked by the strength of her feelings for him; she’d never known such a powerful longing, and during that first evening it had been difficult to keep up the pretence of a civil conversation with her husband while her lover sat at the table. Every time she met Mortleigh’s eyes she saw the naked hunger in them, and knew her own were answering with equal desperation. All her life she’d been independent, and emotionally cold. To care so much for anyone was deeply disturbing. She was enslaved, in thrall to a man; it dismayed her to acknowledge she was as helpless to escape as the foolish Jackman.
She reminded herself that she was Lady Pickhurst; thanks to her father’s careful handling of the marriage settlement she was one of the richest women in the country. It had been her choice to accept the empty attentions of a doting old man in return for a life of wealth and ease. It was too late now to wonder if she’d done the wrong thing.
When Lord Pickhurst came to her bed at the end of the evening, she welcomed him with warmth. While her thoughts were with her lover, she was able to close her eyes and her mind sufficiently to prevent recoiling at her husband’s touch. When he rolled away from her and began to snore, she was
free to think of the man who lay sleeping in the guest wing. She edged to the side of her bed, lying wakeful, aching with longing to be in Mortleigh’s arms. It was pointless trying to pretend; ever since that first encounter, her body burned for his touch. For a moment she even considered going to him, but she dared not.
Having slept badly, Lucille felt weary and distracted the next morning; Mortleigh knew how it was with her. It was obvious in his secret smile and the kiss he blew off the top of a finger when Lord Pickhurst’s back was turned. The day passed in long hours of torment; even to see her lover sent a rush of heat through her body, but it was impossible to avoid him. Now she lay in her bed again, listening to the familiar rhythmic snorts from the next room.
She would be free of her husband’s attentions for a few hours; he rarely had the energy to visit her two nights in a row. Tonight, once again, the men hadn’t stayed long at the table, but when her husband came upstairs he hadn’t come near her door. She heard him grunting peevishly at Parke as the valet helped him into bed.
Mortleigh had hardly spoken to her all day, but as he passed her in the hall before dinner he had whispered a few urgent words in her ear. He intended to give his lordship a sleeping draught; she would be free to come to his room once the household was safely in bed and asleep.
Despite the fever running through her veins Lucille tossed restlessly in her bed as the clock slowly ticked away the hours. Her thoughts were a torment. She’d always considered lust to be a sin which ensnared men, not women. If some particularly fiery sermon briefly pierced her armour of self-esteem, Lucille might acknowledge herself capable of greed, jealousy, even hatred, but to her, the physical cravings of the body had always seemed a particularly
masculine sin. Lying in bed for a second lonely night, she knew she was wrong.
She had no faith; the threat of burning in hell held no fears for her, and yet she delayed. Arrogant and worldly as Mortleigh was, she had no wish to add to his hateful self-assurance. She told herself he was no better than a thief and a rapist, stealing her virtue in the night, and yet she couldn’t deny him; she’d been his from the moment his hands first touched her flesh.
The clock on the mantel struck one. She shuddered, her whole body aflame with desire. The battle was lost.
Knytte lay silent, only the faint creak of old timbers accompanying her as she crept along the deserted passage. Mortleigh let her in at once when she scratched at the door, reaching to draw her into the room and into his arms, his mouth hungrily upon hers before she had a chance to utter a sound, his free hand groping for her buttocks and pulling her roughly against him, so she could feel his hardness. Something inside Lucille rejoiced in his impatience. His need matched hers.
Mortleigh pushed the robe off her shoulder, nuzzling down her neck. Suddenly Lucille drew back, pushing him away. ‘No,’ she said.
For a second he was stunned to immobility. A wicked smile curved his lips but didn’t light his dark eyes. He took her wrist in a vice-like grip. ‘Oh, are we to play games, my pretty little tease?’
‘No,’ she said more urgently. ‘There must be no more marks. It was hard enough to hide the souvenirs you left before; I scratched and scraped at the bite on my neck to disguise it, and made up a story about slipping in my bath. My husband is not a fool.’
‘You offer me milk and water when I’ve already tasted
strong wine,’ he grumbled, but he relinquished his hold, and his hands were gentle as he stripped the robe from her, smiling when he realized it was all she wore.
‘There are many different wines,’ she said, stretching her arms above her head and making a slow and sinuous pirouette, ‘and each of them has their place upon the table of a discerning man.’
He carried her to the bed, where the light from the lamp was stronger. For a long tense moment he stared down at her naked body. Lucille slowly put her hands to her breasts, cupping them invitingly, and moving a little to the yielding softness of the mattress. Still he only stood and looked. Driven by her mounting need for him, she caressed her own flesh, tracking the lines his fingers had followed upon her body on their previous encounter, as if his touch had left unseen traces.
Mortleigh delayed his response until she was almost ready to scream with frustration. ‘I shall do my best to suit my tastes to the occasion,’ he said at last, lowering himself on top of her.
Later, as the first light of dawn showed through the heavy hangings at the window, they lay wound together, sated by a night such as Lucille had never experienced. Despite her words of caution, there was a darkening bruise upon her thigh; in response her fingernails had gouged new scratches down his back.
‘What do you think of Knytte?’ Lucille asked, hoisting herself up so she could study his face, dark upon the pale linen.
‘I haven’t seen much of it,’ he replied, opening his eyes to look into hers. He spoke carelessly, but his expression matched hers; this was no idle talk. ‘It appears to be a very rich estate.’
‘Oh yes, very rich. And one day it will belong to me.’
Fully awake now, he stared at her, open greed upon the sallow features. ‘Surely it’s entailed. I heard Lord Pickhurst has an heir, his sister’s child. Didn’t I see him in the garden?’
‘If he lives, the boy gets the title,’ Lucille said carelessly, ‘and an old manor house across the moor, with a few hundred acres of land. It was the family seat, long ago.’ She curled herself against him, catlike, rubbing her face upon his cheek. ‘My father is not a man to make mistakes, his lawyer checked the exact wording of every document before the marriage was agreed,’ she said softly. ‘Women are entitled to own property now, and to keep it. When my husband dies, Knytte will be mine. Of course, his lordship hopes to produce a son, that’s why he chose to marry again so late in life.’ She laughed. ‘He buried two wives without producing so much as a sickly daughter, which suggests the task has always been beyond him.’
‘I hate to think of his hands on you,’ Mortleigh said, surprisingly vehement.
‘Oh, he has the use of a great deal more than his hands,’ she teased. ‘Considering his age he is reasonably proficient. You must share me for a little while. Nobody knows what the future holds.’ Lucille smiled at the shadows above his head. ‘Old men die.’
‘Yes,’ he mused, tracing a finger down her cheek, and not quite repeating her words. ‘All men die.’
‘You’re leaving so soon?’ Lucille hissed angrily, watching the door warily as she and Mortleigh stood confronting each other across the salon. It was dangerous to converse openly while her husband was in the house, but since Lord Pickhurst had spent the day at home there had been no opportunity to talk.
‘Laidlaw promised to write, as soon as he had seen his doctor,’ Mortleigh said. ‘It has been two days and I haven’t heard from him. There were letters from town this morning, but nothing from my friend. Naturally I’m concerned.’
Lucille pouted. ‘Why didn’t you instruct your man to stay with him, if you felt it was so important? Anyway, you don’t need to travel to London yourself. Send a message. My husband has an agent in Holborn, he could be instructed to call upon Mr Laidlaw on your behalf.’
‘But by that time two more days will have passed.’ Mortleigh was calm but implacable; as always when she argued with him, she was losing. ‘I must go to London, but I shall return. Don’t you know your own power? I can’t escape your bewitchment so easily.’ He drew closer; they were almost touching. ‘What is this hold you have over me? Do you slip some love potion into my wine at the table every night?’
‘Don’t be a fool,’ she snapped crossly, turning her back on him and storming across to the window. ‘It’s too late to catch a train tonight, it will soon be dark. You must stay until the morning at least.’ She dropped her voice to a seductive whisper. ‘My husband will be tired, after riding around the park with you for so long, I have no doubt he will sleep soundly. Must I wander the house like a ghost in my shift, looking for company and finding none?’
She watched his reflection in the glass while pretending to look out at the garden; a hint of a smile reached his cold eyes. ‘How could any man refuse you? Laidlaw can wait a few more hours, but I shall leave at first light and catch an early train. All being well, I shall return to Knytte on Tuesday.’
‘Tuesday?’ She rounded on him. ‘I thought you expected to find the wretched man better, yet you’re staying long enough to bury him.’
He chuckled. ‘You have such a charitable spirit, Lady
Pickhurst, I swear you are the most soft hearted woman I ever met. I doubt if Laidlaw will require more than an hour or two of my time, but I have other affairs which cannot be neglected.’ He strode across and took her hand. ‘I shall not sleep tonight until you come to me,’ he said softly, ‘no matter how late.’ He touched each of her fingers in turn with his lips. ‘The days will pass. Only the most spoilt child doesn’t learn that waiting for a treat makes it all the better when the desired day arrives. On Tuesday a poor weary traveller will present himself at your husband’s door yet again, and a few hours later I shall be with you, while he sleeps with the help of my little bottle.’
‘As always it’s a woman’s part to wait,’ Lucille said peevishly, ‘and to trust in a man. In case my company is not enough to make you honour your promise, there is something else you might keep in mind. I shouldn’t like you to be tempted into the bed of some other rich man’s wife.’ Lucille stood on tiptoe to whisper in his ear. She spoke only a few brief words, but Mortleigh turned away, his eyes deep unfathomable pools as he stared out on Knytte’s lush garden. After a long pause, he lifted her hand again, and bit down hard upon the cushion of flesh below her thumb.
‘You wish to tie me tight, your ladyship,’ he said lightly, ‘like a spider spinning her deadly web.’
‘Is my offer not sufficiently generous to tempt you, sir?’
‘I have never heard better,’ he replied, ‘but a man may take a little longer than a woman to agree to sell his soul.’
Beddowes had lost track of time since he climbed out of the pit that was intended to be his grave; it might have been two days ago, or three, he couldn’t tell. Spells of delirium overcame him and he wandered aimlessly across the moors, only to turn towards the west whenever his senses returned to
him. For a while he was convinced that his old sergeant major, a man who had fought at Balaklava, was marching at his side, barking commands in his ear, or leaning close to share some illogical advice. ‘Survival, lad, that’s the ticket. Keep your back straight and your rifle clean, and make your poor mother proud. One foot after the other, but make sure it’s left, right, not right, left, got that? Be a bloody officer, you will, long as you do what I tell you.’
During his more lucid moments Beddowes knew himself to be hopelessly lost, but since the alternative to struggling onwards was to lie down in the mud and die, he walked on. He’d done his best to tend his broken arm, sacrificing most of his ragged shirt to bind it tightly to a piece of rotting wood he dragged from a bog, and strapping it high across his chest. This at least had returned some feeling to his swollen fingers, and now and then they would strum a beat in time with the thunderous drumbeat that crashed through his aching head.
There was stained brown water to be had occasionally, so he was rarely thirsty, but he had eaten only grass stems, a handful of bilberries and a few clover flowers since he finished the lump of bread. As another day began, and he struggled to his feet yet again, Beddowes felt a weakness in his limbs that warned him he was nearly at the end of his strength. Setting his back to the sun, he started off, only to come to a halt almost at once. A bird was flying low towards him, with something in its claws. The instinct for survival hadn’t deserted him; he bent to pick up a stone, and flung it with careful desperation. His shot missed the bird, but sent the raptor spiralling higher in alarm. A small dead rabbit fell almost at Beddowes’s feet.
A soldier learns to eat what and when he can. It wasn’t the first time the sergeant had eaten raw meat; he tore at the warm carcass with his teeth, sucking every morsel of goodness
from the gift fate had sent him. He still had no idea where he was, or how he’d come to be trapped in this godforsaken moorland, but some scraps of memory had returned. Despite the evidence of his tattered clothes and the state of his hair and beard, he believed himself to be Sergeant Thomas Beddowes, a detective in London’s police force. That conviction was all he had, and all he needed, to keep him moving.
The old library had provided a great deal of material on Knytte’s history, and Phoebe had fetched books and maps for Lord Pickhurst’s heir to study. She had also brought up some books with coloured illustrations of flowers to occupy Eliza. Once the children were settled, she picked up the keys she had borrowed; the butler hadn’t been too happy at letting them out of his sight, and she must take them back.