Behind the Mask (House of Lords) (11 page)

Strathmore nodded thoughtfully.

“Will you return to India?” Colin asked.

“I don’t believe so,” Hollier said. “I have made my fortune, and I am satisfied. No, my hope now is to settle down.”

“And hopefully to give us those grandchildren we’ve been after him for,” the elder Mr. Hollier said, chuckling merrily, his jowls and paunch jiggling.

Young Hollier actually looked embarrassed, but Colin did not miss the quick glance he cast at the doors to the drawing room. Did he have some sort of arrangement with one of the Chesney daughters? Did he hope for one?

It was only when they went into the drawing room and Colin observed the strange tension between Hollier and Miss Chesney that he understood. When the man had gone to India, Miss Chesney would have been barely old enough to marry. The two of them had either had some sort of understanding and not been allowed to marry, or one of them had wanted the other and found their affections to be unrequited. From the look of sheer misery on Miss Chesney’s face Colin guessed it was the former. He also did not miss the way Lady Sidney and Mrs. Hollier looked expectantly at the two young people, as if young Hollier might at any moment go down on one knee right there in the drawing room.

It was of no import to him, Colin told himself. It would certainly be a reasonable alliance for Miss Chesney, especially if she hoped to stay near Sidney Park. There was no reason for him to feel as much consternation as he had at her misery. She was not his responsibility, nor were her feelings any of his concern. Let her brother deal with it when he arrived.

Still, by the next morning he still could not take his mind from her. He would go out and ride the perimeter, he decided. A chance to clear his head was all that he needed.

John Mowbray, the brawny head groom, was already out in the stableyard, and he smiled when he saw Colin. As he waited for his horse to be saddled, Colin chatted amiably with Mowbray, asking the sort of questions he planned to put to the rest of the staff later in the day. Mowbray, it turned out, had lived on the estate all his life. His father had been head groom before him, and
his
father before that. In his youth Mowbray had been a playmate of the future Viscount Sidney and Toby Hollier, as well as Miss Chesney.

“Something of a tomboy, then?” Colin asked.

“I suppose you could say that,” Mowbray laughed. “She certainly knew how to climb a tree, and she was a bolder rider than any of us. She never backed away from a dare. Being the littlest and a girl to boot probably had some influence, but I don’t think she’s changed much since then.” Suddenly, as if realizing only at that moment how his analysis of his mistress’s character would sound, he said, “Of course, it’s not my place to say such things about Miss Chesney. Forgive me, My Lord.”

“No indeed,” Colin said.

Mowbray’s brow wrinkled. “Then perhaps you will permit me a question, My Lord,” he said.

“Of course.”

“Are you pursuing Miss Chesney?”

“Pursuing her?” Colin asked, playing dumb.

“Do you mean to marry her?”

Colin thought he might actually be flushing. “No, no,” he said, holding up his hands. “I assure you, that is not my purpose in coming here.”

“And whyever not?” Mowbray demanded. “Is there something wrong with her?”

His tone was so serious that Colin stared at him for a moment before realizing he was joking. Then both men laughed, and the tense moment had passed. Colin mounted the chestnut he had been given yesterday and rode out of the stable yard. But he felt John Mowbray’s eyes on him all the way to the end of the yard.

In a way he was glad that the servants all seemed to think his purpose at Sidney Park was strictly social. It meant that Mr. Jameson was as circumspect as he appeared, and that Eleanor had managed to keep her mother and sisters from learning his true purpose. But it also made things far more difficult than they might have been had Lady Sidney known the true reason behind his visit. Yet
that
would also have caused difficulties, particularly when the princess arrived with her mother and her mother’s weasel of a comptroller.

Colin had met Sir John Conroy on two occasions, neither of which he would ever forget. The first time was right after Colin had entered the Foreign Service. He was still learning the ropes, working routine duties and trying to find his way in the maze of national security. Princess Victoria’s half sister Feodora was planning a marriage to Prince Ernst of Hohenloe-Langenburg. Among the retinue who had appeared in London for the wedding was a man called Franz Bernhard, a revolutionary and unstable young man, whom Colin had been sent to squire around the city in the days before the actual marriage celebration. Bernhard had proved to be a rather boring, idle sort of youth, and Colin, who had just turned twenty-three, had quickly begun to chafe at being his shadow. But he had relished the chance to observe Sir John up close, since the man had a reputation for being a ruthless, cunning viper. It was he who had devised the Kensington System, the rules under which the Princess Victoria was being raised. At the time the child had been only ten or eleven, and had been quite cowed by her mother and Sir John. Colin had seen her only once, and after the prince’s party had departed with his new bride, he had thought very little of the strange circumstances under which the princess lived. But then nearly two years later, just before Colin was to leave for the Continent, Sir John came to the Foreign Office at Whitehall to ask the new Foreign Secretary, Viscount Palmerston, to expel many of the agents of the princess’s Uncle Leopold from the country. Palmerston had, of course, denied the request, and Sir John had become so enraged that he picked up a letter opener and threw it through the window. The glass had scattered all over the carpet as Sir John turned smartly on his heel and marched out of the room.

Naturally, these experiences had not fostered a great deal of respect for the Duchess of Kent’s comptroller in Colin’s mind. But he had learned that if there was one thing Sir John respected, it was rank. He had not pursued the matter any further after that incident, and it was because Palmerston was the highest authority to which he could appeal. He had reached the top rung, and he would not have been satisfied if he hadn’t.

But understanding him didn’t mean Colin trusted the man. He would have to be watched carefully.

For now, however, Colin meant to clear his mind of his troubles. He rode across the bridge and through the trees towards the south hill. He had a pair of Steiner binoculars that had been a gift from Angeline in his pocket, and he thought he might be able to get a wide view of the flats from the top of the hill. But when at last he came out of the trees atop the shallow ridge, he saw that there was not much he would be able to survey. The flats were shrouded in fog.

"It will clear by midday," Miss Chesney's voice said. Colin turned to see her sitting atop her powerful bay, dressed just as she had been yesterday morning. He had thought she was not yet awake when he slipped out of the house, and it occurred to him that John Mowbray had not mentioned that she had gone out riding.

"Is it often foggy down on the flats?" he asked. It was a stupid question, but he did not know what else to say.

"In the mornings when the weather is warm, yes," she replied. "I was going to ride down to the waterfall. Would you like to see it? My mother will be quite disappointed if she discovers I have failed to show you one of the most splendid sights in the Park."

"Of course," he said, though he knew he really ought to be returning to the house to collect Strathmore and begin questioning servants.

She turned her horse and he followed her along the ridge. When the path widened she slowed so that he could come up alongside her. "Did Jameson give you what you needed?" she asked.

"He did, thank you. He seems to be a very capable steward."

"I believe my father found him invaluable," she said. "He is a trustworthy man, My Lord, and extremely patriotic. He will not steer you in the wrong direction if you seek his help."

Colin nodded. Grasping for some topic to steer the conversation away from his mission, he asked, "Have you known the Holliers long?"

She looked straight ahead as she said, "All my life, it seems. Toby and Leo and I played together as children."

He laughed. "John Mowbray told me you were the best tree climber among the lot of you."

She blushed, but at least she smiled. "I suppose that's true. I was quite the hoyden as a child. I suppose I still am," she said, looking down at her smart coat and breeches.

"No one who saw you in those breeches would think of you as anything but a woman," he said rather too quickly. But the words were out, and he could not take them back.

Fortunately, she met his eyes, her grin widening. "Thank you, I think," she said.

They turned down a narrow path. To one side the river burbled as it rushed down the slope. The trees began to thicken, and they crossed over another bridge. Then they came out into a little clearing. At its center was a small, shallow pool being fed by a waterfall that came from twenty feet up. Along the rocks ferns and flowers grew. The whole scene was one of abundant lushness, and Colin found himself marveling at it.

Miss Chesney dismounted and he followed her lead as she brought her horse to the edge of the pool. As the animals drank, she went over to sit on a low, flat rock. He joined her.

"I suppose you came here often as a girl," he said.

She nodded. "Leo taught me to swim here. My father was furious with him because Toby—" she stopped abruptly.

After a moment's silence he said, "There was something between the two of you, wasn't there? Forgive me, I know I have no right to ask."

"It's all right. It feels so long ago now. We were friends until he went away to school, and when he came back I was sixteen, and he was not yet twenty-one, and things...changed. We wanted to marry, but he had no fortune and no profession, and my mother refused him."

"But now he has made his fortune," Colin said. He looked over at her. Her eyes were fixed on the waterfall, but she seemed a thousand miles away.

"Yes," she said softly. "And he has come home."

"Do you...do you still love him?"

She turned to look at him, and in that moment he realized that he was in deep trouble. He wanted nothing more than to take her in his arms and comfort her, and it was an instinct he had never felt before. "I don't know," she said.

He kissed her. He wasn't quite sure how it happened, only that suddenly his lips were meeting hers and she was leaning into him.

Suddenly she pulled away, a hand to her lips, and the moment was gone. "I'm sorry," he said.

"Don't be." She smiled, suddenly her bright, cheerful self again. "Would you like to climb to the top?"

He agreed, desperate for any excuse to get off that rock. She led him along the edge of the pond. To one side of the waterfall the stones jutted out sharply, and it was possible to climb. She went first, taking the handholds and going confidently up. He followed, his boots slipping on the wet rocks, trying not to look up at the way her breeches molded to her body.

At last the scrambled over the edge and up onto the flat ground above. She had turned to look out over the landscape. He came up beside her and followed her gaze.

"You see?" she said. "The fog is beginning to clear already." She turned back towards the river and then she screamed.

Colin whirled. Miss Chesney was frozen, one hand to her mouth, her eyes fixed on the body that lay not twenty feet from them at the edge of the river. Instantly Colin threw his arms around her, cradling her head against his shoulder. "Don't look," he whispered. Her shoulders were shaking. "It's all right." But as he looked over her head at the body of John Yates, he knew that it was a lie.

Somehow Eleanor managed to climb back down the rocks to her horse. Lord Pierce rode with her back towards the great house. For a long time neither of them said anything, but as they crossed the bridge Eleanor managed to ask, "Are you a spy, Lord Pierce?"