Dark Obsession (23 page)

‘‘It was well before the war, and they were elderly then.’’ Mrs. Dorn’s gaze burned with unmistakable fury. ‘‘They surely will have all passed away by now.’’

Nora sighed. ‘‘The chairs and everything else in the room belong to Jonny. I’m quite certain we haven’t ruined anything, but really, what is a chair compared to a young boy’s imagination?’’

The woman’s thin lips opened on an indignant breath and then clamped tight. She did an about-face and stalked out the door. ‘‘A young boy’s imagination— bah!’’

Despite her relief that the confrontation had ended, a notion sent Nora dashing after the housekeeper. ‘‘Mrs. Dorn, another moment, please.’’

The woman turned back into the room with a look of pained resignation. ‘‘Yes, madam?’’

Nora nodded to Jonny first. ‘‘Dearest, run along and wash up for tea, won’t you? Cook told me she baked a special treat just for you today.’’

With an eager look he trotted off, though whether his enthusiasm was for his special treat or to elude the fuming housekeeper, Nora couldn’t say.

She took a moment to gather her thoughts, until Mrs. Dorn cleared her throat. ‘‘You have a question, madam?’’

‘‘Yes, I do. It’s . . . well . . .’’ There was no delicate way to put it. ‘‘Can you tell me where Jonny was found the night his father . . . ah . . .’’

‘‘Died?’’

Nora clasped her hands together and nodded.

‘‘That is not a time I wish to recall, madam. It is better left in the past.’’

‘‘If indeed it were in the past. But these events are still very much with us in the form of a little boy who will not speak.’’
And in the form of his uncle, mad or guilty or both.

‘‘He’ll speak when he’s ready, madam.’’

‘‘You sound frightfully certain of that.’’ Nora studied the woman, well aware she was using her position as lady of the house to back the servant into a corner. ‘‘Is there something you know about this matter, Mrs. Dorn?’’

The look she met scorched with defiance. ‘‘No, madam.’’

‘‘No. That is your answer? Nothing to add?’’

‘‘No, madam.’’

‘‘Mrs. Dorn, if you cannot or will not answer my questions, I will be forced to interrogate the other staff. Or perhaps I’ll seek out the local magistrate. I believe these details are on record, are they not?’’

The housekeeper’s scowl admitted defeat. ‘‘Very well. Young Lord Clarington was found not far from the headland, just within the tree line.’’

‘‘Who found him?’’

Mrs. Dorn’s glare wilted away. She plucked at her apron and scurried to a nearby sideboard. Her back to Nora, she fussed with the lace runner, then repositioned a crystal vase and a Chinese porcelain bowl.

‘‘Was it my husband?’’ Nora followed her, too intent on having answers to let the woman slip away. ‘‘Please, Mrs. Dorn. I’d never use the information to harm Jonny in any way.’’

The woman swung around to face her. ‘‘The Earl of Wycliffe.’’

Nora jolted. ‘‘He was here then?’’

‘‘He had been here all that week.’’

‘‘Visiting Grayson,’’ Nora murmured.

‘‘Visiting both Master Grayson and his brother, madam. The two earls often went out riding together in the early mornings.’’ A faint trace of tears clouded Mrs. Dorn’s eyes, banished in an instant with a terse sniffle. ‘‘There is nothing more I can tell you, madam. I don’t care to think about it.’’

‘‘No, of course not,’’ Nora agreed, taken aback by the housekeeper’s brief show of emotion. ‘‘Thank you, Mrs. Dorn. And I apologize about the table and chair. We’ll be more careful in future.’’

‘‘The objects in this house are not all you need be careful with, madam.’’ With that, Mrs. Dorn strode from the room, the terse warning echoing in Nora’s startled ears.

Lungs burning, Grayson lengthened his strides along the trail leading to the headland. He’d left Constantine safe in his stall; Lord knew, he’d ridden the Thoroughbred hard enough yesterday, and had been lucky despite taking too many chances. He would not risk injuring the horse this morning. Not with what he had to do, what he had to face.

Beyond the murmur of the rain-encumbered breeze, the forest seemed unnaturally quiet, muted by low, rolling clouds that created a blanketing melancholy, as if everything here—trees and plants and even the birds—hung suspended in silent mourning.

On either side of him, towering maples and gray poplars bowed with the weight of the rain, the thrust of the wind. Sodden branches hung over the trail, swiping his face and showering drops across his shoulders. Further off the path, squat rowans afforded garish splashes of color to an otherwise somber palette, their scarlet berries glistening like splattered blood against the leaves.

Some two dozen yards in either direction, the forest dimmed to nothingness, only those murky, prowling shadows that sped Grayson’s pulse and hastened his steps. Every breath of wind seemed to carry a whisper; every squelch of his boots a strangled cry from the grave.

So he had been ordered last night. All right, then, yes, he’d go . . . go to the very edge of the headland and see what fate planned for him. Up ahead, a tangle of bramble choked the pathway. He fought through it, thorns snagging his coat sleeves. A tendril whipped up and caught him across the bridge of his nose; another snapped up to sting his brow. He scored his palm as he tore the vines aside and kicked his way past.

The headland spread before him.

Heather and gorse, foxglove and red campion, shivered on their stems across the exposed bluffs. Free of the forest, he slowed but kept walking, afraid that if he stopped even for a moment he’d lose his momentum, his courage. With eyes focused on the churning, wind-whipped horizon, he made his way to the cliff edge.

It was there, with the ocean billowing beneath him, that the familiar dread robbed his limbs of strength. Even with feet braced wide, he swayed with the swirling gusts, dizzied, almost wishing . . .

If he simply let himself fall, would he hit the ledge partway down, or would he freefall to the salt-blanched shingle where they’d found Thomas? Rain splattered his face as the memory of that day sent waves of nausea spinning through him. The skewed angles of the arms and legs, the hideous twist of the neck, the bloody river that emptied, as all rivers do, into the sea.

‘‘I’m here,’’ he shouted. He opened his arms to the clouds, heavy and rumbling, pressing down as if to sweep him over the edge. ‘‘What do you want of me? Do you wish me to jump? Is that it?’’

Would he? If Thomas appeared to him out of that roiling sky to point a condemning finger, would Grayson accept his sentence? Did he have that strength?

The word hurled his heart against his ribs. Even now she might be gone from Blackheath. He’d wanted her to go, had told her as much in writing. But when faced with the reality of it—the dismal reality—he knew he could not let her. Nor could he leave her. Especially not like this, as Tom had left him. Without a chance to mend what was broken. To ask forgiveness. To at least say farewell.

‘‘I won’t do it. You’ll have to push me over.’’

He stepped back from the cliff as a soft sound burst in his ear, a single, faint note.

Laughter?

He pivoted, glancing wildly about. ‘‘Who’s here?’’

‘‘Charlotte? It’s you, isn’t it?’’ He flung dripping hair from his eyes. Chills rippled between his shoulders. ‘‘It was you last night. Where’s Tom? I’ve seen him here and at the house. Why won’t he speak to me?’’

‘‘At least tell me what I’m supposed to do there.’’ This time his only reply was a howl of wind and the slap of rain in his face.

‘‘No answers for me, then? I’m to play your game and be good about it, am I?’’

Something flashed in the corner of his gaze, a scrap of blue like the flick of a coattail. He scrubbed the rain from his lashes and strained his eyes, thought he saw more of that dark blue take form farther along the headland. It hovered motionless, silhouetted against the stormy sky, then disappeared down the slope of the promontory toward the beach.

‘‘Tom? Tom, wait.’’

Feet squishing in his boots, he trudged along the cliff to the sloping trail he, Tom and Chad had secretly scraped out many years ago. Their parents would have throttled them had they known. But it had remained their secret, their private challenge.

Always that competition between them, the subtle strife fueled by their very different natures and very different stations in life. Tom, the eldest and the heir, should have been the leader. The instigator. The one with courage built upon a young aristocrat’s confidence. Yet it had always been Grayson doing the prompting, along with Chad, who had never hesitated to test his limits—who, indeed, had never believed he had any.

Tom, meanwhile, had always hung back, assessing and cautious, joining in at the last minute only because he’d lose face with the younger boys if he didn’t.

Grayson half stumbled, half slid his way down the channel of loose stones and oozing mud that plunged to the beach, setting off little landslides in his wake. At the bottom he pushed off onto the mucky sand.

‘‘Now what?’’ he said through chattering teeth. His clothes were soaked, his body chilled through.

A memory flashed as vivid as a painting held up before his eyes.

I’m Captain Morgan! Chad is my first mate and you, Tom, are the Spanish. We capture you in the name of King George.
Using driftwood weapons, a sword fight would ensue, with Chad and Grayson always triumphant.
Now, into our secret cave, you swine!

Their cave . . .

The cliffs along this beach were riddled with fissures once used by real pirates. They’d grown up on the stories, and at the ages of twelve, ten, and ten and a half respectively, Thomas, Grayson and Chad had discovered one of the legendary hideaways and made it their pirate lair. During the next few years they had stashed all manner of salvaged treasure: shells, fish bones, driftwood and odd articles of clothing and debris washed up from passing ships.

Is that where he was being sent? Could the cave somehow shed light on Tom’s death?

The encroaching tide would soon send the waves sweeping into the cavern’s mouth. He’d have to hurry.

Only a narrow crevice opened onto the beach, and Grayson stooped to enter it. Several yards in, the ceiling rose to accommodate his height. Despite the tide having been out all morning, the rocks glistened and the sound of dripping echoed like high notes on a pianoforte. As he’d discovered as a boy, extensive fissures penetrated the cliff face, letting water seep down on rainy days as well as providing enough light to see without a torch in the daytime.

He groped a hand along the wall beside him, the rough stone abrading his already lacerated palm. Within a dozen more paces, a smaller chamber would open off to his right. Inside, the floor sloped high enough to remain dry even at high tide. That was the grotto they’d claimed as boys.

He counted his steps, but where the dusky light should have yielded to the gaping blackness of an opening just large enough to admit a man, Grayson’s probing fingers encountered rock. Not solid rock, but stones piled to seal the entrance.

Why? And by whom?

He crouched, feeling around with both hands. He hadn’t been inside this cave for fifteen or more years, nor had he believed anyone else had. He certainly didn’t remember a barricade here. The old tales of pirates flashed in his mind, but he dismissed them. Those seafaring brigands had long since gone the way of knights and troubadours.

‘‘Think you can keep me out, do you?’’

His words hissed off the rocks. Easing to his feet, he felt his way to one of the smaller stones lodged near the top of the gap. Carefully he fit his fingers into its jagged outlines. A bit of wiggling had it falling into his palms within moments.

He dislodged another just as easily and concluded this barricade had been erected by someone who hadn’t particularly expected intruders to come poking around. Apparently, someone had simply wished to disguise the grotto entrance on the off chance some Sunday picnickers happened to stumble upon the main cave.

He shifted a few more stones until he opened a hole large enough to climb through. From outside came the steady crash of the sea, louder now, swallowing more beach as each moment passed.

He hesitated while debating the wisdom of returning later when the tide ran back out. Then he scrambled inside.

His foot came in contact with something hard, but with enough give to assure him it wasn’t another boulder. He bent at the waist, hands closing around wooden slats. When he straightened, the dim illumination from the outer cave revealed what he’d already deduced: he’d found a crate.

Curious.

He gave it a shake, feeling the heavy contents thud and then settle with a jolt. He set the container down and jiggled the lid.

Nailed shut.

His eyes, adjusting now to the deeper darkness of the inner chamber, began to make out countless more crates stacked along the walls. Feeling his way about, he came upon the polished contours of some ten or so barrel-shaped casks crowded into a corner. Stooping, he put his ear to one and rapped his knuckles on its wooden surface. From inside came a faint slosh of liquid.

Apprehension churned in his gut. He returned to the first crate and stood, considering it a moment. Then he lifted a foot and slammed it into the slats, once, twice, a third time, until the wood splintered beneath his heel.

The contents clunked in protest. He dropped to his knees, tore the broken planks aside and clawed tufts of straw packing out of the way, all the while ignoring the jabs to his fingers. Holding his breath, he swept aside the last wisps.