Barbara Metzger (23 page)

“Don’t be tiresome, dear boy, and I shan’t be either.” With that she floated up the stairs to plan her wardrobe for the coming days.

As one, Graydon and Daphne hurried to the small parlor. There was a neat inventory of missing items, with
Urn, alabaster, gift of Miss Daphne and Major Howell,
heading the list. Daphne sank onto a sofa and kicked her slippers off. “Uncle Albert is really gone again. Lud, how can we hold his funeral without him?”

Graydon poured them each a glass of wine from the solitary decanter remaining on the mantel. He handed one to Daphne and sat beside her. “A toast.”

“Not to Uncle Albert, I hope.”

“To the thieves. Can you imagine the poor cawkers’ surprise when they realize what they’ve got?”

Daphne pretended to read from the list: “Ten candlesticks, silver; two figurines, jade; one baron, incinerated. Oh dear.” She sipped at her wine, wondering why the man’s presence made her forget to panic at the hobble they were in now. Gray was sitting so relaxed, with his coat unbuttoned and his carefully arranged curls falling onto his forehead. He always could make her feel safe and secure. When they were children he used to tell her not to be afraid of the thunder and lightning, that he’d protect her. She used to believe him, too. Daphne sighed.

The major heard her and said, “Don’t worry, sweetheart, we’ll come about.”

There, he was doing it again, keeping the storm at bay.

Graydon reached into his pocket and pulled out a small box wrapped in tissue. He held it out to her. “Here, I’ve been wanting to give this to you for ages, but the time never seemed right. It’s to celebrate our parents’ wedding.”

She unwrapped the package to reveal a gold heart on a chain, similar to the one she used to have. She swallowed the lump in her throat. “It’s lovely, Gray. Thank you.”

“It’s just a token. I wish it could be fancier.”

“Like Lady Seline’s diamond necklace?”

“Brat,” he replied with affection. “If I got you diamonds, your name would be a byword in the neighborhood, and well you know it. You deserve something better than this, though, for being such a trooper about this whole coil, and making the wedding such a success.”

“No, the locket is perfect.” She started to open the sections.

“A portrait inside would have been too egotistical, even for me. What was in the other one, anyway?”

“A lock of your hair your mother once gave me.” Daphne fussed with the catch so he couldn’t see her face. When she finally got the locket open, a tiny scrap of folded paper fell out. “What…?” The message read:
She’s not my mistress.
“You gudgeon.”

“That not what I wanted to say, either, Daffy, but the time was always wrong.”

Daphne’s heart was hammering so loudly, she was surprised he didn’t hear it. “What did you want to say?”

“I—”

The time was still wrong. Ohlman cleared his throat from the doorway. Daphne tucked her toes under her skirts so the butler wouldn’t see she was barefoot.

“Pardon, Miss Daphne, but that Terwent person has returned. He insists on seeing you or Major Howell. I explained that you were resting after the wedding and all, but he is determined to wait on the doorstep until he sees you.”

Graydon sighed. “You may as well show him in, Ohlman. The deuced chap is as hard to dislodge as a tick.”

“And we don’t want him feeding the gossip mills in the village either,” Daphne agreed.

The valet hadn’t improved in the days he was gone. He was still pinch-faced and prune-lipped, long-nosed and livid that he was being done out of his rightful share of whatever villainy was going on.

He’d been to Bow Street, it seemed, and all the morgues. Everyone knew of Awful Albert Whilton, but no one knew where he was. In desperation, Terwent had called on the magistrate, who allowed as how some soldier had kindly brought the baron’s body to London some days back, with his identification on him. The family had been informed.

“Is it true?” Terwent demanded. “He was already cold when you sent me haring around town?”

The baron had been cold, all right, from the icehouse. Graydon reflected on the peripatetic barrel and truthfully admitted, “We were as confused as you about the whole matter. Of course, we weren’t surprised to learn of his death, considering the baron’s state when he left.”

“And we did notify his man of business, who must have missed you in London.” Daphne was careful not to say when they’d sent the letter. “So now we are merely awaiting the return of the ashes until we proceed.”

“Ashes? You’re not burying the bas—the baron?”

“No, the condition of the body, don’t you know, and the amount of time gone by.” Graydon studied his fingertips.

Terwent’s nose was twitching; he was smelling a rat. No body, no funeral. No funeral, no reading of the will. And no reading of the will meant no pension for Terwent. He wasn’t sure why these toffs were so determined to keep him from his due, but if they weren’t up to something crooked, his name wasn’t Sam Fink, which, in fact, it was. Close as inkle-weavers, these two, with her shoes under the sofa. They had more than their heads together, unless he missed his guess.

“Them ashes better be getting here in a hurry or I’ll be knowing the reason why. I’ll go straight to the magistrate, I will. And not that local bumbler who sits in your pocket”—with a glare toward Daphne—“but his nibs in London. He’ll get to the bottom of this; see if he don’t.”

Lord Rivington should be back in town from the wedding by then, but Graydon saw no reason to have this unpleasant little leech disturb his godfather’s rest. “The ashes will be here tomorrow, without fail.” He tossed the valet some coins. “Why don’t you put up at the Golden Crown again, and we’ll send for you as soon as we know more details.”

Daphne didn’t want this man snooping around the house any more than Graydon did. “We’d offer you a room, but the Manor is still at sixes and sevens, with the guests and their servants.”

Terwent left, still muttering about those ashes being there tomorrow or else. The moment the door was shut behind him, Daphne ran, without bothering to put on her shoes, over to the long table where the remaining gifts were displayed. She was studying the selection when Graydon reached over her shoulders and picked up a silver Russian samovar.

“This one, I think. It has a lid and handles.”

“But it’s got a spigot!”

“So the baron will think he’s in a taproom and feel right at home.”

The Wedgewood was too pretty, and the Ming too valuable. Daphne nodded and followed him to the fireplace, where they tried to fill the coffee urn with the ashes from the grate. Without a broom and dustpan, they had as much trouble as Sailor and Handy, at last resorting to tearing pages from the gift list book to serve as sweepers. Not enough volume, Graydon decided, and threw another log on the fire. Not enough weight, Daphne judged, and tossed her slippers into the flames. They were ruined anyway, and Uncle Albert had always been as tough as shoe leather.

By the time they were finished and the urn was back on the table, Graydon felt like a chimney sweep, but Daphne looked like Cinderella to him, all warm and rosy, with streaks of soot down her face, and dirty toes showing beneath her bedraggled skirts. Was there ever a prettier sight? He took out his handkerchief to wipe her flushed cheeks, stepping nearer to do a better job. And nearer, until there was hardly any space between them, and her cheeks were even pinker, and her blue, blue eyes were staring up at him.

“Ahem,” said Ohlman from the doorway.

Graydon stepped back. “No, I can’t find the speck in your eye, Daffy.’’

“Pardon, Miss Daphne, but Master Torrence is ailing. The nursemaid fears he had too much punch, but thought you should be called since the lad is feverish.”

Torrence wasn’t the only male with fevered brow, Ohlman reflected with satisfaction as Miss Daphne swept from the room with a hurried good night to the major. Her presence wasn’t required in the nursery whatsoever. The boy’s tutor was with him, and they’d already administered a sleeping draught, but Ohlman wasn’t going to fail in his duty again, not twice in one day. Bare feet indeed!

*

Except for Ohlman and Mrs. Binder, who were consoling each other with the private stock in the housekeeper’s apartment, the servants were all finished with their celebration and had gone to bed.

Tomorrow was the big cleaning day and they’d be up early, with headaches.

When the last candles were finally extinguished, Sailor and Handy crept out of the woods and slinked toward the house. They met Sal, who was patrolling the grounds for leftovers. She didn’t bark at them, naturally. They were old friends, and her mouth was full.

Slowly, silently, like shadows at Stonehenge, the two bandits made their way to the colonnaded porch of Woodhill Manor. They inched their way up the marble stairs, each holding one handle of the urn. Since Handy was so much smaller than Sailor, the urn bumped a few times, chipping the alabaster and making enough noise to waken the dead. Luckily Uncle Albert was a heavy sleeper.

At last they were at the massive front door. The boys lowered the urn to the ground, banged on the knocker, then ran as if all the hounds in hell were at their heels.

It was only Sal, with half a roast duck to share.

Chapter Twenty-Four

It is back.
Such was the message in Ohlman’s hand both Graydon and Daphne received with their morning hot water. They met at the top of the stairs and together hurried in search of the butler. He couldn’t explain, other than that the container had been left on their doorstep last night, like an infant at the church gates. Now it was locked in the butler’s pantry. Ohlman wasn’t taking any more chances. They all went to look.

The alabaster was chipped and the lid was unsealed and the contents rattled.

“What’s that noise? It never used to make noise.” Graydon tried to look inside, but the neck was too narrow.

“My word, I wonder what they did, the thieves who took it.”

“We’ll never know. Maybe it’s better that way. There are some peculiar people in the world.”

“But what if it’s not…?”

“For all we know, Mr. Biggs could have sent us
one of the missionaries who were his previous clients. Don’t think about it. Just be happy we have
someone
to show Terwent.”

Ohlman nodded, then added, “It also feels lighter than it did.” So they added some of the ashes from the samovar, shoe leather and all, and glued the lid on with sealing wax. They all watched as Ohlman locked the door behind them.

Then it was time to notify the vicar, tell the boys to put on their black armbands, and inform the rest of the household.

“Good.” Cousin Harriet wasn’t precisely grief-stricken. She refused to put on mourning for the dirty dish. “He wouldn’t for me.” Daphne couldn’t argue with that.

Lady Bowles, on the other hand, wore perpetual mourning, so she was prepared.

“We’ll understand if you choose to leave now,” Daphne hinted. “With a funeral and mourning, this won’t be a very lively house party, I’m afraid. We won’t be entertaining, of course.” She pointed to where the servants were draping hatchments over the doors and hanging crepe from the mirrors.

“Oh, but I couldn’t desert you now. Furthermore, Mr. Foggarty is planning a lovely dinner. It would be a shame if we all had to cancel. Why, he’d have no company whatsoever. But don’t worry, I’ll make your excuses.”

The few remaining guests hurried their departures when Daphne explained the situation. They didn’t want to add to her burden, they said. They didn’t want to perjure their souls by pretending to be sorry the old curmudgeon was dead, more like.

Daphne sent messengers round to all the houses in the neighborhood, the village, and the tenant farms. Not many chose to come to pay their respects to a man they didn’t. What, give up a day’s planting for that bastard what tried to raise the rent on them? Not likely.

So it was a small group that returned to the village chapel for the service. Miles may have come out of duty; Mr. Foggarty definitely came to see Seline, for Daphne could hear them chatting in the back row. A few locals did attend, mostly the grandmothers with nothing better to do. Two old men who remembered Uncle Albert as a nasty little boy came to gloat that they’d lived longer than the nasty piece of goods he’d turned out to be. Ohlman and Mrs. Binder were there representing the Woodhill staff. Terwent sat alone, weepers tied to his hat. And Mr. Rosten from the London solicitors’ firm took a seat as the vicar opened his prayer book.

Daphne tried to pay attention, seated as she was in the front pew, and to set an example for Dart and Torry next to her. Her mind kept wandering, though, from the vicar’s raspy voice to the man seated at the end of her pew, on Torry’s other side.

How good he was, she thought, and not of Uncle Albert, whose urn was on the new altar cloth. Graydon had carried it there himself, to guarantee its arrival. Not many other men would go to such efforts for a wretch who wasn’t even related, or work so hard to ease the boys’ apprehensions. He wasn’t wearing his uniform, but the midnight superfine stretched across his broad shoulders looked just as handsome. With the gleaming white stock and black brocaded waistcoat, he was a nonpareil, and Daphne felt even more blue-deviled at her own appearance.

She looked a frump. Her blacks were two years out of style, hot and heavy, and she looked ready for the coffin herself in the dreary ensemble, topped with an old black ruched bonnet of Mama’s that hid every curl of hair. One week, that’s all she’d give Uncle Albert of deep mourning. One week was seven days more than he deserved, and about how long it would take the village seamstress to stitch up some light muslins in gray or lavender. No, just lavender. Let the Moon Goddess keep her grays and silvers. Heaven forbid anyone think Daphne was trying to compete with the dashing widow.

Daphne’s attention was recalled to the service when the vicar cut short the eulogy because his voice was reduced to a croak—and because he was reduced to lies, trying to find something good to say about the baron.

Finally they all trooped out to the graveyard and the family crypt. The boys pointed out the grave of the highwayman along the way. The newly dug plot had a bouquet on it, which curiously resembled the arrangement of flowers Daphne had done for the wedding reception. She shrugged and watched as the urn was placed on a shelf in the Whilton mausoleum. The vicar said a few last words, his voice miraculously restored, and they all gave heartfelt amens.