Authors: Beth Trissel
Will nodded
, glancing back down at the tender scrawl
.
“
Thank you
for all your help, Charlotte.
You two
go
on home
.
I’ll l
ook in on Julia
.
”
She
laid
her hand on his arm.
“There’s something else
I noticed
.”
Will glanced
up
.
“Yes?”
“That coat of Cole’s
Julia found in the attic.
It’s slashed in two places, the sleeve and the chest.”
“I saw
,
briefly,” Will said.
“What of
it?”
Charlotte a
nswered as if deep in thought.
“Well, the first
cut
would have been the sleeve, likely his sw
ord arm.
It has a
dark greenish residue around
the tear
in addition to blood, like an herbal poultice of some sort
was applied
.”
“Why
put a poultice on
his arm
with him sti
ll wearing the coat?
He would
have removed it to treat his wound, a
nd if he’d been fatally stabbed, why bother?”
“Exactly,”
she
nodded.
“I think he must have
taken the coat off aft
er the first wound
,
and
then p
ut it back on for some reason.
That
was when he received the
second
stab to his chest
.”
Will wondered aloud,
asking,
“Why would he dress to go out after being slashed?”
“That’s the question,
”
Jon said.
“Answer that, and you’ll have your murderer.”
“D
on’t
you
think it was Cameron?”
Jon lifted both
hands, palms up, and shrugged.
“I’m not saying it was or it wasn
’t.
Only that Cole thought he’d
finished
fighting
and retired to bed
.
Lik
ely everyone else had
gone
too.
N
o one really saw what
happened to him
afterwards
.
”
“No. No one
,” Charlotte said with a peculiar in
flection to her hushed voice, “e
xcept the killer.
”
She spoke as if she’d been there
,
further intensif
ying Will’s heightened senses.
He
hardly
noticed the
kind couple as they
walked away and
descended the stairs.
Instead, he envisioned
Cole
lying
in bed, a poultice on his arm,
awaiting the
physician’s stitching in th
e morning.
Someone
had
roused him
unexpectedly
and he dressed
to meet
––
who?
Apparently, Cole
never left his room
alive
.
I
n the
final
throes
of death, he
’d
summoned
every last ounce
of strength to writ
e this missive to
the woman so infinitely dear to him
...
the woman he was bent on being reunited with
.
Will
thought how much he
and
Cole
had
in common.
He would
do whatever it took to win Julia.
One thing still didn’t make sense
to him
, though
.
If Cole had the pres
ence of mind to put on his coat
,
then that meant
he wasn’t kil
led in his sleep.
And i
f he were
awake, how did such an expert
swordsman fall so easily?
Even with his sword arm injured he could still fence with his o
ther.
It was a little known fact that both Cole and Will could use either hand.
There was still a vital piece of the story missing, and for some inexplicable reason, it mattered
to Will
.
It mattered a lot.
****
Practice was finally at an end and the players
were
leaving.
Will h
ad no desire to face anyone
with news of Julia, but
must as least
bid his grandmother goodnight.
He charged down the steps
,
ne
arly colliding with Lyle
on the landing
.
The Aussie eyed him questioningly
.
Will shook his head
in mute response
.
Tight-lipped, reproachful, as if he held Wil
l responsible for Julia’s
precarious
state, Lyle
strode away
.
His silent
accusation
was
both
annoying and
painful in its potential truth.
Paul
dodged
a fiery vol
ley from Lyle’s
slitted
stare.
He
escaped with Father Seth who’
d
promised to see the delinquent youth home and help keep an eye on him.
Thank God for the saintly priest.
Anticipating a tongue lashing
from his grandmother, Will
ap
proached her grudgingly
.
Millicent had helped
the regal dowager
to her feet
and she
leane
d on her cane
.
He met his elderly relation’s watchful
inquiry
in mutual scrutiny.
She spoke first.
“Well, sir
, I should
say we can lay that rumor of your preference for men to rest
now
.”
Will rubbe
d a hand over the slight stubbles on his
chin.
“If you’ve finished thrusting suitable young ladies at me.”
“You prefer unsuitable?”
“I expect
you’ve surmised whom I prefer.”
She weighed him
, and
a faint smile curved her
thin
lips.
“
We’ll see about that.
Miss Patt
erson is still in the running.
But
If Hamlet can
keep
the fair Ophelia afloat, I shall consider his request.
”
“Touché,” Will conceded at her play on words.
She preened a little,
and
then
grew serious.
“But m
ark my words
,
William,
that is
one strange girl.”
“This is one strange household
, Ma’am,
and cursed.
What sin did our forebears commit to be so condemned?
”
“
Likely
no more than you or I
.
You must b
reak the curse
,
sir,
”
she said, not debating its reality.
“Just like that?
You make it sound a trifling matter
.”
H
er
eyes
deepened
to a
somber
blue-gray
.
“I
t will
take some
doing,
no doubt,
but it seems the
task has fallen to you
and Miss Morrow
.”
She grew brisk again.
“S
ee that the girl is
at practice tomorrow.
The show must go on.”
“Come hell or high water,
”
he muttered.
She
angled her head at him.
“It’s important
, William
.
”
For some peculiar reason
he couldn’t define in
sensible terms, he sensed the truth of her assertion
.
“
I know
.”
She nodded
her approval
and then limped across
the hall on
the beleaguered
Millicent’s arm.
A pang touched him at the h
eaviness in her gait.
This play took
all
her strength
.
“Ma’am?” Will
called after her.
The erect figure
paused.
She
turned
stiffly.
“Yes?”
“Do you know how Julia Maury died?”
“Drowned
, it’s said
, s
oon after
returning
to England
.
”
Her
quiet
reply sank
in his gut
like lead
.
“She didn’t long outlive Cole.”
“No. Poor soul.
S
he
took to wandering along the river
bank
in her grief and lost her footing
, or so the story goes.
Her father blamed the Wentworth family
.”
Will could imagine all too well.
“Julia
was his
favorite daughter.”
“I never heard
that
.
”
Giving Will
a peculiar look,
she limped from the hall
.
He stared
after
his grandmother
.
It only stood to reason that Julia
had been a favorite
.
How could she not be?
T
he
departing
actors
left
the house
unnervingly
empty
, p
erhaps because, somehow,
it wasn’t altogether
vacant
.
No. Something or someone still lingered.
Will sensed
an almost palpable presence in the great hall
, as if h
e––somehow Will knew the spirit was masculine––
would show himself at any moment
.
A finger of dread
ran down his spine.
Cold
ness
en
circled him
like mist, the eerie sensation
almost more than flesh and blood could endure
.
H
e
wasn’t waiting beneath the por
traits of his ancestors for an
apparition to
appear with a request like Hamlet’s father.
Without a backward glance, h
e spe
d up the steps to Julia and
slipped into
his darkened room
.
Pale light from the hall illuminated her slende
r figure curled
beneath pink
satin
.
She appeared
to be
sound
ly
asleep
.
How beautiful she looked lying th
ere and infinitely vulnerable.
Had
Will even truly lived before she came
to Foxleigh
?