Sybill (37 page)

He frowned as he saw the unrelenting sternness on her face. “Then leave!” he shouted.

“Leave?” Sybill stared at him as if he was insane.

“This is my house!” he repeated as he had so many times. “I am Lord Foxbridge. I do not want you here.”

As she fought to control her anger, she said, “But I have no other place to live. This is my home, too.”

Taking her arm in his painful grip, he drew her toward a window. He pointed to the seaside gate. “There is where you can live, my lady. Beyond the gate is a cottage which will serve as your dowager house.”

“Christopher, this is insane!”

“Is it? Leave, my lady mother. When you tire of the cold wind howling through the walls and wish to be warm, come to the Cloister.” He caressed her shoulders. “Come to me, and I will take the ice from your bones in my bed.”

She spun and slapped his face. “Never, Lord Foxbridge!”

With a growl, he recaptured her and pressed her to him. “You will be very sorry you struck me, Sybill.”

“I am sorry to have anything to do with you!” she spat as she drew away. “I will leave in the morning. Even you must have the decency to allow me to pack. I will take only what is mine. My clothes and my maid.”

He smiled as he rubbed the reddened spot on his left cheek. “And that damnable cur of yours.”

“Of course. I would not leave Goldenrod here to your perverted ideas of fun. He might continue to show such good sense that the servants would have to restrain him to keep him from taking a bite out of you. Goldenrod and Clara Pekins will go with me.”

“Christmas is next week. By Twelfth Night, I am sure I will see you here dancing as my betrothed.”

“Don't wager your money on me again. I'm afraid you will only lose it again.”

His curses followed her along the hall. She would not come crawling back to him. Instead she would live in the small house until the will was read. Then she would find Trevor. Happiness could not be so distant in her future.

The cold, gray fingers of dawn caressed Sybill as the wagon stopped before the small cottage. Drawing her cape closer, she stared at the building. It was far different from any home she had known. The fancy London house and Foxbridge Cloister had not prepared her for this place, but she would survive.

When she was helped from the wagon seat by the driver, she thanked him absently. All her thoughts were on what she would find within these walls. She would have to live here until the will could be read. That would be at least two months. With the harsh winter weather clutching the countryside and the upcoming holidays, no one, especially a barrister accustomed to the comforts of his hearth, would be traveling to the Cloister.

Holding tighter to her bag, she knew she must not lose her salvation. During the night, while Christopher had celebrated his victory again, she had slunk into the master bedroom. In the desk where Owen refused to let her look, she had found enough gold pieces to buy food until summer. Theft did not bother her. She felt she was due something from the Wythes.

She had not planned to take time to review the papers in the drawer until she saw they concerned her and Trevor. When she read them in her room, she fed them to the leaping flames in the fireplace. Even now she shook as she thought of how easy it would have been for Christopher to discover those pages and learn the truth. She wondered if that had been Owen's intention. No, he had not wanted his son to know the truth. Otherwise he would not have had as strong a case to disown his son. It was unfortunate that Christopher would inherit all of this. Despite his plans, which had come close to destroying two lives and had taken a third, Owen had failed. Time had proven to be his deadliest enemy.

“My lady?”

Sybill smiled gratefully at the woman by her side. Clara had elected to go into banishment with her. Although she urged her to marry Mac instead, Clara was insistent. Several other servants had also approached her when they learned of her punishment, but she told them all she would have no room for a full staff. Their concern warmed her as she stood in the biting wind.

“Yes. Let's go inside. We have much work to do before we can rest.” She called to Goldenrod, who was enjoying the chance to explore the brown grass woven into its winter mat along the stone walls.

Clara's gasp of dismay as she entered the small house echoed the hopelessness in the pit of Sybill's stomach. Although larger than the Beckwith home, the cottage was a ruin. Clutter clung to its shadowed corners. The furniture was scattered and tipped over throughout the room, which was sprinkled with animal droppings. Cobwebs drooped with years of dust. As Sybill took a step toward the hearth, the dirt stirred up by the movement of her feet on a carpet of an indeterminable color caused her to sneeze.

“My lady, you must ask Lord Foxbridge to let you back into the Cloister. You can't live here.”

Taking her maid by the shoulders, she looked into the woman's startled eyes. Slowly, overly enunciating each word, she stated, “Clara, you must never suggest that again. I won't beg Lord Foxbridge for charity. Do you understand?”

“But, my lady, you—”

“Do you understand?” she repeated. “I can't live at the Cloister with that man.”

Comprehension flowed across the taller woman's face. Her dark brown eyes widened in shock. Without her lady saying more, she knew exactly the offer Lord Foxbridge had made to his stepmother. “I understand,” she said softly.

Sybill relented from her stern stance. “We have a lot of work to do. We'd best get started.”

If Clara was shocked that Lady Foxbridge could clean a room efficiently, she did not show it. Once a fire was started and the driver had left, after bringing in the few things they had brought with them, they heated water. Soon they were scrubbing the furniture, walls, and floors. Even in her fervor to make the place livable, Sybill was careful not to push herself too hard. She did not want to do anything stupid. By the time the last rays of the early-setting sun glimmered through the now-clean windows, the small cottage glowed with cleanliness.

She looked with satisfaction around her new home. It was not as fine as the Cloister, but there was a floor beneath their feet and, with the shutters closed, the wind could be kept out. Clara would sleep in the loft, and Sybill's bed was at one side of the main room. Goldenrod already had claimed a spot near the hearth. His ragged snores could be heard throughout the room as he dreamed of chasing rabbits in the marsh.

Opening the basket which had arrived while she was washing the window in the loft room, she was surprised to find a folded piece of paper on the top of Mrs. Dailey's fragrant bread and freshly churned butter. She tilted it so she could read it in the light from the hearth.

Lady Foxbridge,

You are not alone. If you need help, send Clara to the Cloister. We will help you either here or at the address of a friend in Liverpool.

Basil Marshall

She pressed the page to her chest as she fought tears. Although she should have known better, she had felt abandoned too often. Glancing again at the note, she saw Marshall knew how to contact Trevor. Perhaps she should simply forget everything about the Cloister and flee to Trevor in Liverpool. She shook her head in regret. She could not travel the winter roads with only Clara as a companion. She would not risk her child to escape Christopher's sadism.

“Come, my lady. Let us have something to eat.”

She nodded joyfully. “Yes, we should celebrate our new home. We must be happy it's so small. Only that way could we clean it in a single day.”

Clara urged her to sit in the room's only chair. She placed one of the bedpillows behind her lady's back and offered her a stool for her feet. Handing her a slab of the bread, she also poured her a tin cup of the cider.

“You are spoiling me, Clara,” she mumbled through her mouthful of supper.

“Not so. I just want you to rest. You know how important that is when you are with child.”

Sybill choked on the bread. With a large gulp of the cider, she managed to swallow it, although tears of pain splashed from her eyes. She looked up to see Clara watching her with concern. “How did you know? Did Kate tell you?”

She snorted in derision. “That one never said anything to me but ‘Do this' or ‘Do that.' I have been helping you dress since you arrived, Lady Foxbridge. The changes that come with pregnancy are highly visible to me when I try to close the hooks that did not strain in the past.”

“You never said anything before.”

“If you wanted to talk about your baby, then you would have told me. I couldn't help overhearing Lord Foxbridge, your husband, ordering you not to tell the present Lord Foxbridge. I knew there was a reason for silence.”

Sybill took her friend's hands in hers. “Thank you, Clara. It's my dream to leave. If Christopher learns of this baby, he will never let me go.”

“To Trevor?”

“You don't miss much, do you?” She smiled to soften the edge of her words. Choosing words that were not lies, but which would not reveal the truth, she added, “Shortly after I married Owen, I knew it was a mistake. I knew I loved Trevor. Now Owen is dead, and I hope to spend the rest of my life with the man I love.”

“But the child—What about the child?”

She shrugged. “That is the crux of the problem. I don't know what Christopher will do when he learns he is about to have a sibling. It all depends on how Owen's will is worded. If it says what I expect it will, the Cloister will be Christopher's. Then he won't care about his penniless sibling. Trevor and I can marry, and all will be as it should have been.”

“I hope so, my lady.”

Under Clara's warmly maternal care, Sybill finished her meal and readied herself for bed. As she nestled under the covers warmed by bricks heated on the hearth, she decided it would not be too horrible. She would not have to worry about Christopher or about being struck by her husband. If Trevor could be with her, it would be perfect. As she drifted to sleep, she was thinking of the note she would compose to him in the morning.

The days passed easily. Sybill never had a chance to be lonely. Mac called each evening to visit Clara, and often he brought his sister. While Sybill talked with the Beckwiths and Clara, she discovered a new family unlike any she had ever had. There was no pretense among them, and they laughed easily together. Only one topic was forbidden. No mention was made of the Cloister and its new lord.

Christmas came and went without much notice. She went to church with the Beckwiths. Instead of sitting in the pew reserved for the Wythes, she shared the one chosen by her friends. It did not surprise her that Christopher did not attend the service. Like an infected sore, the empty pew held everyone's attention as they tried to listen to Reverend Sears and not stare at Lady Foxbridge sitting primly among the no-account Beckwiths. Subtly the minister tried to ingratiate himself with her, but not too much. He was not sure what would be the final result of this disagreement within the Wythe family. As his living was controlled by the Cloister, he would court both factions.

Sybill arrived home to be greeted by an exuberant Goldenrod and a feast. In her absence, the table in the cottage had been filled to overflowing with succulently steaming roast meats, pies, and baskets of breads. Tears blurred the holiday scene. She invited the Beckwiths to share the largesse from her friends at the Cloister. How they had managed to smuggle all this out without Christopher's knowledge would make for an exciting tale.

As she presided over her holiday table, she tried to pretend everything was perfect. She wondered where Trevor was spending this day. Was he sitting with his family around a burdened table, eating a holiday feast and thinking of her?

Mac's jest brought her out of her sad thoughts and into the joy again. With an effort, she put her sorrow deep within her heart as she savored the warm comfort of being with people who loved her.

After Christmas, the weather became frigid. The wind blowing off the sea sought each chink in the cottage wall to worm its way in to freeze them. On the hearth, the fire danced to the vagaries of the moving air gusting about the room. Sybill spent much of her time huddled beneath a blanket. While she spoke with Clara, who was bundled up in the same manner, her fingers were busy sewing clothes for the child she yearned to feel moving within her. The task kept her busy and kept her fingers from growing stiff with chilblains.

As Twelfth Night approached, she knew a festival would be planned at the Cloister. The celebration on the eve of Epiphany always was her favorite holiday. Last year, she had celebrated joyously with her father and his houseful of guests. Laughing at the memories, teasing the ones chosen as the Lord of Misrule and his lady to rule over the proceedings, and sharing the wassail were memories of her father she could savor. She could not have envisioned then the turns her life would take.

Late in the afternoon of Twelfth Night, she urged Clara to go to the Beckwiths' for their party. She did not want her maid to miss the excitement. At first, Clara demurred, but finally Sybill convinced her. Assuring her that she would be safe in the cabin, she watched as Clara wrapped her shawl and a cloak she borrowed from Sybill around her shoulders.

“Be careful,” urged Sybill. “If it starts to snow again, it would be so easy to lose your way.”

“I don't think I could,” she answered gaily. “My heart would call out to Mac's, and that would lead me directly to him. Are you sure you will be all right?”

She smiled indulgently as she saw that Clara was torn between her two strongest loyalties. “Go! I have Goldenrod. He will let no one into the cottage who I don't want here.”

Clara nodded as she tied the ribbons beneath her chin. Her brightly shining brown eyes were the only part of her face visible as she waved. A blast of winter cold struck them, and the maid was sucked out into the frosty afternoon.