Elisabeth Fairchild (3 page)

Chapter Three

He fell through ice. Terror and gray water closed over his head, breath surprised
from him in a startled gush of bubbles. Above him the face of a woman wavered.

He blinked. Shook his head. No ice. No water. No fall. That was the past. Only the
woman was real. Now.

“You look pale,” she said.

Her complexion was paler than his, fair and silken and dusted with a scattering of
golden freckles, like specks of light trapped beneath her skin. He closed his eyes.
In Belinda Walcott’s cool grip he drew strength, dizziness fading.

Evergreens and peppermint. Christmas. She smelled of Christmas. His eyes closed involuntarily
as he gave her knuckles a courtly kissing, her fingers cold as marble, no gloves to
be seen. Such an omission stirred within him concern for her comfort, the reckless
desire to warm spinsterish flesh between his hands, as his uncle had, when he was
little, on the coldest of days.

The harsh sound of Gabriel’s excited breathing echoed in the stairwell, along with
the skitter and slide of doggie toenails on marble flooring, before a well-padded
dog’s body connected solidly with the backs of his legs.

The impact threw him against his guest. His chin met cheekbone, his chest the softness
of her breast. His arms instinctively encircled slender shoulders, bracing her, like
a bird from the wind, protecting her from further displays of exuberant enthusiasm
from a protective spaniel who believed it his responsibility to circle, and sniff,
and bark a challenge at anyone who invaded his master’s space.

Self-consciously, Copeland let go his hold on Miss Walcott and stepped back.

“Down!” he ordered.

But Gabriel had not jumped. In fact, he sat himself between Copeland’s shoes, pressed
to his shins, a solid doorstop of a dog looking up with a low grumble, hackles raised.

Belinda extended a hand that the dog might sniff. “Be not afraid,” she said gently.

Gabriel cowered, lip curled.

“Gabe!” Copeland snapped.

Trembling, hair on end, the dog sat statue still, ears flattened to his skull.

“Gabe.” Copeland knelt, surprised. “What’s amiss, lad?”

With a throaty little moan, the spaniel licked his chin, his cheek, with an urgency
of affection.

Copeland stroked the vibrating throat, confused by this unusual display. “You must
be cordial to our guest or you must take yourself outside.”

Gabe obeyed, tucking tail, throwing fretful glances over his shoulder.

Puzzled, Copeland watched him go. “I must apologize. Gabriel is generally the most
well-behaved of creatures.”

Miss Walcott wore an enigmatic smile. “Dogs care not for me, nor I for them.”

“Have you a cat?” Copeland asked.

“It would be imprudent given my current circumstances. You see, my landlord has a
dog.” Her mouth lost all its humor, her eyes possessed a faraway look. “And I’ve no
means to keep a cat.”

How dreadful, Copeland thought, to have a purse so limited.

“I do hope you and Gabe will get along before you leave. He is a most affectionate
creature. Follows me about like a shadow.”

“How wonderful to be so loved.” The joining of their gazes left him surprisingly breathless,
hungry for the love she spoke of, for all that death meant to deny him. His pulse
raced. His heart beat hard. He had never had such a reaction to anything he and Henrietta
spoke of. Reflexively his hand slid toward the inner pocket of his coat.

He forced himself to look away from the mystery of Miss Walcott’s gaze, the curve
of her lips, to the wooden leer of one of the green men who peopled the stairwell
banisters: a lifeless carving, emerging from a branch that would bear its unplucked
wooden apple forever.

No time for love. No right. With Henrietta, or the intriguing Miss Walcott.

Thoughts raced, needs unquenched by his decision not to marry. Copeland wanted, now
more than ever: the succor of a woman’s arms, the haven of a woman’s welcoming bed,
the bliss of the little death, the sweetest of life’s riches. Must he deny himself
all of this because the life left to him was of short duration?

While his mind went temporarily mad, his mouth spoke quite calmly of the mundane,
that she might not know how much her words affected him.

“I shall see to it that your trunk is carried up.” He yanked the bellpull, sounding
every inch the concerned host, the calm, controlled gentleman, his tone rooted in
years of tutored graciousness. When one stood heir to a family’s title and fortune,
generations of family pride rested upon one’s shoulders.

He tucked her hand in the crook of his arm. “I had planned that you should occupy
the green bedchamber, next to Maggie’s, but as Maggie is not coming, you may have
another if you like.”

Two footmen came running.

“Yes, my lord?”

“You will bring the chest?”

“Yes, my lord.” They grunted in lifting the weight of it—an unusual chest—painted,
and carved: oak leaves and prancing, bearded centaurs. It looked old, perhaps medieval.

Miss Walcott moved with fluid grace as the footmen led the way up, her arm on Copeland’s
as they began the climb. A light clasp, and yet it sank into the depths of him, flesh
to flesh, bone to bone.

“I am afraid I’ve bad news.” His job to tell her, to see her settled and made comfortable,
but all he could really think of was the weight of her fingers upon his sleeve.

Her free hand ran along the polished banister, fingertips trailing among carved apples
and walnuts, almost a caress. The wood sprites hiding in the leafy balustrade watched
his reaction. The whole house, at times, seemed to watch.

Above him, in the chiseled crownstone, griffins and gorgons leered. At the base of
the candelabra on the landing, lions scowled. Even the footmen seemed to watch him
more than was their habit.

He shook his head, shook away the feeling. He read too much in the smallest things
of late.

“Maggs is not coming,” he told her. “The boys are down with croup. I hope you are
not too disappointed.”

No reaction for a moment, then she shook her head and smiled again—tilting his sense
of equilibrium.

“See to it that all of the packages for my sister and her family are bundled up and
sent to Marlborough at once.” He spoke over his shoulder, the words directed to the
senior footman.

“Yes, my lord,” Browne said. “I regret to hear your family is so stricken.”

“You will not know the other guests, I fear, unless you have met my brother, Marcus,
and his wonderful wife, Kate.”

Belinda said nothing, just looked at him, head turned, gaze reserved.

“But of course I remember your brother and his wife, my lord,” Browne said. “A steadying
influence she seems to be.”

Steadying, indeed. Dear, wild Marcus had needed steadying, and financial assistance
to settle the debts incurred in his wilder days. Browne knew them all too well—had
been with them since they were boys.

They had passed him on the stairs that day, bundled against the cold, woolen scarves
and mittens making them clumsy, skates banging against their backs. Copeland could
hear the distant echo of excited voices. Browne, serious even then, had bade them,
“No running. Too dangerous with skate blades at your throats. You know your uncle
will be angry if you knick the woodwork.”

Not they, but Uncle Cope who had run—later that same day.

Copeland’s pulse raced. He did not want to remember, did not want to tear away the
scab of old wounds. He wanted to focus on the moment, on the unusual young woman who
stood interrupted in her climb, gray eyes fixed on him, a focused, intelligent, delving
gaze that gave him the impression she read his thoughts.

“Capital fellow, my brother Marcus,” he said. “As are my chums from London. Kind enough
to drive all this way.”

Miss Walcott provocatively arched one pale golden brow. “The snow—”

Browne interrupted, quite uncharacteristic of him. “Dreadful weather, my lord. Comes
down very thick.”

Copeland made the mistake of looking apologetically into Miss Walcott’s eyes. He thought
he heard something pop—had the dizzying sensation that the ground opened up beneath
him—of falling—feet gone numb.

Rather than trip up the risers, he halted abruptly. She stopped as well. Little choice
when their arms were linked. She braced his elbow, a firm grip.

His lungs dragged. His heartbeat loped. He let go the banister to seek the vial of
foxglove tonic in his inner coat pocket.

“Are you all right?” Three voices asked in unison as he took a drop beneath the tongue.

Was he? He pressed a finger to his pulse, ready—waiting—listened to the pounding in
his ears, looked into deeply concerned eyes—deep waters rushing over his head, a shock
of cold, the shock of falling. His breath caught, in a frightened little-boy hiccup.

His heart beat fast. Not the past. Not the past.
Please God, not that.
He pushed it away, filling his eyes with sight of her, and only her—this moment—her
eyes, as gray-blue as icy water. No, not so cold. She looked upon him with concern,
reaching out to him, making unexpected connection—he could not yet be certain what
kind.

A different drowning sensation washed over him. He forced himself to look away, thought
of Henrietta.

“I am fine.” He slid the vial back into its nest, focusing on the gleaming leather
of his boot against the Pompeian red carpet’s oak-leaf border. Pale satin peeked from
beneath swaying skirts.

However had she managed to keep satin slippers dry?

A ridiculously practical thought, anything to stop him from falling into the deep
waters of the past. He swayed, closed his eyes, counted heartbeats, took the next
step. “Come along.”

“Are you sure you are recovered?” Browne asked.

“Fine,” he insisted, to convince himself as much as the others.

Belinda Walcott moved in perfect tandem, as if they were joined at elbow and hip,
as if she did not walk so much as glide. “I am afraid you will think me most forward
in asking.”

That lifted his brows. “Oh?”

“Do you mind if I take the room at the end of the hallway?”

He almost tripped.
His
room lay at the end of the hallway. He imagined saying politely, “But of course,
please do. I’ve no objection to sharing.”

Crass. Juvenile, really. A dying man ought to view life with greater gravity, but
there still lurked within him the teasing adolescent who had first realized how charming
the differences between a man and a woman could be.

“The
Fleur-de-Lys
?” she clarified.

“Ah. The bride’s room.” At the
far
end of the hallway. Not his room. The room she requested was the coldest and least
inviting of the bedchambers. He did not care for the view, or its reputation.

They topped the stairs.

“The
Fleur-de-Lys
, my lord?” Browne asked.

Copeland nodded, Belinda’s hand still trapped in the crook of his elbow. He did not
wish to release her, to quit their conversation. His gaze fixed on gray-blue eyes
and pale gold lashes, an exquisite combination.

“You know Broomhill?”

She chuckled. “Everyone knows Broomhill.”

“And the resident ghosts? Have you ever had the pleasure of meeting the one who is
said to occupy the room you’ve requested?”

She laughed, the sound running like a teasing finger the length of his spine. “Ah,
but that is why I have come,” she said.

Chapter Four

Belinda watched her host from the frost-fingered, stained-glass windows of the
Fleur-de-Lys
Room. Her carved chest had been left at the foot of the bed, but she was in no hurry
to unpack. Time enough for that. For now, she was more interested in observing the
new owner of Broomhill from this, the room of her undoing.

An unmistakable figure in directing the servants who cut bunches of mistletoe from
the oaks along the drive, trim and commanding, the snowflake-laden wind flirted with
the ash-flecked darkness of his hair. She rued the near miss of their mistletoe kiss
in the stairwell, rued the interruption of the dog. She would do her best to avoid
the animal and hoped the dog might reciprocate, lest her plans be spoiled.

Behind her the door creaked open. With a rattle of a coal scuttle, a freckled, mobcapped
maid unobtrusively arranged the hearth, lit the tinder, and blew the coals to a healthy
glow.

She rose, dusting off her hands. “That’s better.”

“Thank you,” Belinda said.

The girl looked around with a shiver. “Coldest room in the house if you ask me,” she
said. “Could not pay me to sleep in it. Not for any amount of money.” The girl rubbed
her arms as she made her way out, empty scuttle rattling.

“Please, do not close the door,” Belinda called after her. The girl did not hear.
The door clicked shut.

However, no sooner had she gone than it creaked open again. A second maid, wearing
spectacles, bore in a steaming kettle in one hand, a wavering lamp in the other. Fresh
linen draped her arm.

Hot water. How lovely. Lord Copeland was thoughtful, his staff well trained.

The maid went about her business as quietly as the first. When she was done, she drew
from her apron pocket a ring of jingling keys and went to Belinda’s chest.

“Such a pretty thing.” Lamp held high, she leaned close to squint through oval lenses.
“All-over oak leaves and odd creatures.” She attempted without success to lift the
lid, muttering beneath her breath, “Locked are you? Well. We’ll just see about that.”
Kneeling, she rattled her keys hopefully.

Belinda held tongue, knowing the secret catch would confound the woman.

“No place to put a key,” the woman said to herself. “His lordship says I am to unpack.
But how to unlock a chest that will not take a key?”

Belinda stepped from behind the curtain and said mildly, “No need to unpack. I am
used to seeing to myself.”

The woman turned, started with a gasp, keys dropping with a ringing clatter. “Oh,
my!”

Belinda waved a dismissive hand. “I shall ring if I require assistance, and please,
leave the door open when you go.”

The woman made no argument, simply laughed and rubbed her glasses on her sleeve. Sliding
them back onto her nose, she left the room muttering, “Time for new spectacles, Maddie.”

Belinda returned her attention to the window, to her plan. She kept imagining Lord
Copeland’s smile, his easy way with strangers, his welcoming reception of a stranger.
She had not expected such a warm reception. It made her aim more difficult. Indeed,
she felt for the first time in a very long time the faintest twinge of guilt.

But no. She must remain stalwart. Resolute. A Copeland had changed her life. Because
of this gentleman’s kin, she had grown used to fading into the background of every
room she entered. Ignored. No longer worthy of notice. And when the rest of his guests
arrived, his brother, his friends, she might have to resign herself to fading into
the background again. For now, it was a rare pleasure to be offered her host’s attention.
She must—she would—take advantage.

Could she meet her goal before the others arrived? Scattered snowflakes drifted from
a clabbered sky. The roads to Broomhill suffered dreadfully in bad weather—always
had.

She went back to the window with a chill smile. Let it snow.

***

Copeland scanned the face of Broomhill as he returned to the hall, cheeks tingling
with the cold, the smell of holly keen. Sap stickied his fingers, smelling like Christmas,
smelling like Belinda Walcott.

So alive his senses—impending death’s gift to man—the opening of his eyes, his mind.
He had never truly recognized the world’s beauty until told he was not much longer
in it. All seemed precious, fragile, impermanent—like the snowflakes dotting his collar
and melting on his cheek—like the nose-biting smell of burning wood drifting from
five sets of smoking chimneys.

Broomhill was an architectural hodgepodge of eras slammed together side by side in
a rambling chimney-topped box, no great effort to match brick colors or style, but
he had been drawn to it even as a child, a gut feeling from the moment he saw it.
He had known it was meant to be his when he stepped through the door, with a sense
of what the French called
déjà vu
. He liked the odd façade, the figured parapet, the domed bow window over the main
archway flanked by columns and arched niches. Pale stone quoins stretched like uneven
teeth along the wings’ outer edges. Just as the spirits of past owners colored his
interest in the place, medallions of stained glass colored the eyes to the house’s
soul—windows of a time long past.

A light shone dimly through those marked with the
fleur-de-lys
, flower of the lily. His French tutor had taught him it was an emblem based on the
iris, but later, in researching family heraldry, he had found conflicting references.
One old text stated authoritatively that the
fleur-de-lys
was based on the body of the bee, wings furled.

The light moved—a shining will-o-the-wisp in the grand pile he began to think of as
his own, and yet it was not his, not really. He was temporary custodian. These bricks
and mortar would long outlive him, just as they had outlived his uncle before him.

Belinda Walcott stood looking out at him, her dress pale as the falling snow—like
the Lady in White reputed to haunt the room she had claimed.

He laughed, breath fogging the air, snowflakes cold against nose and tongue. He laughed
because the guest who bade him call her Bee, who smelled of evergreens, of Christmas,
had asked for precisely the right room, the one with windows marked with the bodies
of bees, wings furled.

Copeland entered the hall chuckling, nose tingling in sudden warmth, snowflakes melting
on his lapel, winter’s frosty breath disappearing as Bolton helped him from his coat.

“Tea is served, my lord, in the little drawing room. Maddie has just gone up with
hot water.”

“Thank you, Bolton.”

“Do you wish the musicians to play tonight, my lord?”

“Lovely idea. I think my guest would approve.”

“I know your brother would have.”

Which brother?
he almost blurted, so much had his thoughts strayed of late to James. Bolton meant
Marcus, of course. The staff made a point never to mention James.

Especially here.

The irony was, both brothers would have liked the music.

“Yes,” he said. “A pity they will not be here.”

No sooner had he spoken than a stifled shriek above them was followed by the unmistakable
sound of smashed crockery.

“Maddie,” Bolton said.

“More hot water required,” Copeland said calmly.

“Yes, my lord.”

Copeland mounted the stairs, prepared for a rattled Maddie standing in the midst of
broken crockery and spilled water, not ready for a wide-eyed Maddie crashing into
him as she raced downstairs. She burst into tears as he steadied her matronly shoulders,
on her face an expression he could not quite define.

“What’s amiss, Maddie? Surely a broken jug is not worth your tears.”

“Not the . . . I am sorry, milord. It was just—just . . . but you will not believe
me, milord. Indeed, I do not half believe it myself.” She wrung angular hands and
tugged at a mobcap gone askew, her chest rising and falling at such a galloping rate
it made his own heart beat faster.

“Seen one of our resident ghosts, Maddie?” He meant to calm her, to make her laugh.

“Seen?” She shook her head emphatically as she dried tear-streaked spectacles, and
clamped her lips together as though none could pry the truth from her. “No, milord.
It was . . .” she gave a sniff and forced a smile. “Nothing. Silly of me, really,
to make such a fuss.” The words were meant to convince herself as much as him. “There,”
she said. “All better. I shall just go and fetch a broom now, and clean up the mess
I have made.”

She set off down the stairs.

“Maddie?” he called after her.

She turned, her gaze straying uneasily to the top of the stairs. “Yes, milord?”

“Were you in our guest’s room just now?”

She shook her head. “Your chambers, milord, though I did light the fire in the
Fleur-de-Lys
a quarter of an hour ago, as requested.”

He let her go, drawn to the head of the stairs, ignoring the broken crockery lying
in a puddle in his room, turning instead, toward Miss Walcott’s bedchamber.

Had his guest been offended by Maddie’s yelp? The crashing noise? What had upset the
old woman? Rattled her so much she would not risk telling him tale of it?

He paused before scratching at the door, hand pressed to his chest, wondering how
many of the staff knew—wondering how much they kept from him. There were times when
he felt as if his heart were imprisoned behind the locked door of his body, that when
it beat erratically it did but cry for release, as any trapped creatures does. Times
like now, when he felt a sudden swell of agitated anticipation.

He looked forward to seeing his guest again, to hearing her voice, to watching her
lips, to discovering what mysteries hid in the guarded depths of her eyes. For a moment
he actually relished his quickened pulse, the thunder of his heartbeat.

He knocked again. The door swung open.

“Miss Walcott? Care to join me for tea?”

Silence met his inquiry, a hushed stillness, but for the faintest creak of well-oiled
hinge, and an intriguing tapping sound. Driven by curiosity, he stepped inside, feeling
like an intruder, continuing to call her name. A scent lingered on the air. He closed
his eyes and inhaled deeply. What was that smell? Like Christmas. Christmas evergreens.
Not pine. Not cedar. Something like. Something familiar. It made him think of chapel,
and angels on the ceiling.

No angels here.

A breathless quality hovered about the dark bedstead, trapped in its deep red bed
hangings, in the dark chest at its foot. The silence broke with the shift of the fire’s
coals, and the incessant, brittle tapping. He crossed to the window, the room’s only
illumination apart from the faint glow of the fire. He looked down on the drive, at
the spot where he had looked up.

The snow swirled thicker, as if Nature would take on bodily form. Ice pelted down
with an unending, graceful persistence, wind driven against this corner of the house,
winter’s fingernails tapping insistently at the glass. The chill darkness of the pond
below would, he thought, be frozen by morning.

So much for the best Christmas ever. His guests would undoubtedly be delayed.
Sadness touched him, and yet there was, too, a sense of inevitability to the weather,
as if it had been planned especially for him.

He always thought of the pond as frozen—even in summer—frozen in his mind—in time.
It had frozen his heart long ago.

***

Belinda’s host frowned as he entered the drawing room, his manner intent, contained,
as though he carried with him secrets—dark and oppressive. He started when Belinda
said brightly, “There you are. You will be hungry after your efforts.”

His lips parted, as if he would say something, and then he glanced distractedly at
the cozy-covered pot, the cake tray overflowing with what looked like salmon pâté
layered between buttered slices of bread, and with a sudden smile that broke across
his features like sunshine, said, “I hope I have not kept you waiting.”

Waiting,
she thought
, I have spent a lifetime waiting. How long has it been? An eyeblink? An eternity?

He crossed to one of three ice-flecked casement windows that looked out over the winter-touched
bowling green, colors fading as ice and snow blurred reality’s edges. She saw the
same view from a different window, everything gone soft, indistinct, a wind-driven
whiteness.
Ghostly
, she thought, with an inner smile.

“A beautiful and dreadful sight,” he said.

His breath steamed the window, temporarily melting ice.

She tipped her head. “The ordinary, become extraordinary. Not dreadful in the least.”

His gaze darkened. “I worry.”

“Ah!” Snow and ice blew at once both up and down, defying the laws of gravity, the
moment crystallized, Nature on display. “Your friends would not be so foolish as to
put themselves in danger.”

Snow flurries created a lively nimbus behind his dark head. Eyes deep wells of shadow,
of sorrow, his concern drifted like snow, catching on his mouth, building in his eyes,
deepening his voice. “I should not like any ill to befall them.”

Ill had befallen her. Those whom she had expected to care, had not. She felt a moment’s
pang: admiration and jealousy.

“You are comfortable in your haunted room?” His expression of concern was for her
now—an unexpected gift, balm to the torn edges of her soul.

“Right at home,” she said with a keen sense of irony.

“You must ring if you need anything.” His lips twitched. His dimples played. “Especially
if the Lady in White comes to call.”

The remark startled a harsh laugh from her. “Do you think it likely?”

“Anything’s possible.” He glanced toward the chandelier. “My maid . . .” He turned
his attention to the food, taking up a plate. “ . . . has just suffered a fright,
though she refuses to say what terror she confronted.”

He plucked up a pair of silver tongs, placed a plate before her. The planes of his
face, the depths of his eyes, displayed an attractive luster. She saw in him the boy—polite—well
schooled—playing host now—features rearranged, lips lifting. His smile never quite
dismissed the sadness in his eyes, when he believed himself unobserved. She must coax
him to trust her, as she had trusted—heart, mind, body, and soul.