The Mask Revealed (The Jacobite Chronicles Book 2) (7 page)

“What did you do to her?” Richard asked admiringly. His voice showed no concern for his sister. Clearly he was amazed that this dandy would have the courage to hit her back, although it seemed that was what he had done.

“I, sir!” Sir Anthony screeched indignantly, wincing as the pain knifed through his ruined nose. “I did nothing. She merely looked at the blood and fainted. I must confess, I feel a little faint myself.” Richard’s expression changed from admiration to contempt. It seemed that after all, this effeminate rag was still in danger of allowing Elizabeth to bully him into an early grave. It was pitiful. That it was unlikely his hoyden of a sister would faint at the sight of blood did not cross his mind.

“Maybe you should send for a doctor, Lord Edward,” suggested Lady Winter, looking up from her unsuccessful attempts to revive Beth. “I did warn her earlier against imbibing too much alcohol, afraid that she would become embarrassingly drunk.”

“No, no, I would not hear of it. I am so ashamed. We have quite ruined your evening, and all because of a careless gesture on my part. I am sure my wife will be mortified if she awakes to discover what a scene she has caused by her jealousy and intoxication. No, no, my carriage is ready. We must leave immediately.”

There were many cries of protest at this, but Sir Anthony was adamant. His wife would come to herself far better in a quiet environment, and would be more likely to accept his profound apologies for his thoughtless flirting if she were not reminded of her actions by being surrounded by well-meaning people who would only unintentionally add to her humiliation.

“If we leave now, I am sure I can persuade her that nobody noticed the scene she caused, and that we left quietly, with your permission of course, Lord Edward? That will ensure that she is not too embarrassed to enter into your company when we return from our sojourn overseas.”

Lord Edward couldn’t wait to get rid of the annoying couple. With a bit of luck their departure would signal the break-up of the party and he could head off to his club all the quicker. Even the ladies realised the wisdom of this suggestion, although they were a little concerned at Beth’s continued lifelessness.

Sir Anthony promised to send for a doctor the moment they reached his house, which was only a short distance away, and within moments the coach driver had scooped up the still senseless Lady Peters and spirited her away.

Lord Edward accompanied Sir Anthony to the door, offering him a new handkerchief to replace the blood-soaked one he now held. He could not resist offering a last piece of advice.

“This is what comes, sir, of marrying beneath yourself.” Sir Anthony looked up, and Lord Edward held up a hand.

“I do not mean you, sir. Elizabeth is after all, my cousin, and is well-born enough. But her father married beneath him, a
seamstress,
” this last word was delivered in scathing tones, “and a Scot, at that. You will have to be firm if you are to curb the bad blood she has inherited from her mother. I advise you of this as a friend. She must be chastised for her drunken behaviour this evening. What man does not eye a pretty wench, eh?” Lord Edward winked conspiratorially.

Sir Anthony eyed him with an expression of utter disgust, which Lord Edward would have recognised had not the former’s face been almost completely obscured by red-stained linen.

“I think I may own that I was also in the wrong to behave so inconsiderately so soon after my wedding. I will deal with my wife according to my fashion, my lord,” he replied curtly.

Lord Edward watched the carriage clatter out of the drive with satisfaction and scorn. It would be a long time before they were invited back into his house, whatever his sisters might say. His cousin would be an unbearable shrew and her husband a doormat within weeks. Not at all an example to show to the females of his household, who knew their place.

* * *

Beth recovered consciousness in the coach, roused by the bumping of the wheels along the uneven road. Her head ached terribly, and her mouth was dry. When she tried to moisten her lips with her tongue, a dart of pain shot through her jaw. She lay still for a while until she felt less disorientated, taking stock of the situation.

She was half lying on the bench seat, her head on her husband’s lap. His arm lay across her chest lightly, stopping her from moving too much as the carriage bounced its way along. She opened her eyes slightly and looked up at him. He was sitting upright by the window, a cloth still pressed to his nose. Even in the dim light of the coach’s lantern she could see the dark stain on the front of his yellow waistcoat, and remembered what she had done. Feeling a little better, she tried to sit up, but his arm tightened, holding her in place. He dipped his head to look down at her, and his eyes were dark slits in the pallor of his face. She opened her mouth, and he laid a finger warningly on her lips.

“Be quiet,” he said softly. “We will have plenty of time for explanations when we arrive home. I trust my people implicitly, but not the coachman.”

“But what..?” started Beth. The warning finger became a large hand, which covered her mouth, smothering whatever she’d been about to say and sending shards of pain from her bruised jaw shooting up the side of her face.

“If you insist on speaking,” he said, “then I will have to render you unconscious again. I don’t want to do that, but I will if necessary. Do you understand?” The voice was Sir Anthony’s, but the tone was not. It was hard and cold. She froze.

“I said, do you understand?” he repeated softly. She nodded slightly. “Good. And do you promise to remain silent until we reach our lodging? If you do, I in return will promise not to hurt you, and to answer all your questions once we arrive.”

She had no choice in the matter, and they both knew it. She nodded again, and the hand withdrew from her mouth. He lifted her gently into a sitting position, but did not relinquish his hold on her. She leaned back against his chest, having no alternative, and they travelled on in silence.

Was he after all the man who had threatened her in the derelict room, as she had thought at first sight of the scar? It wasn’t possible, surely? The scar was the same, exactly; she would never forget that, it was engraved on her mind as the only means she had of identifying him. She had thought from his careful concealment of his features that night that she must know him, but that this dandified, quintessential courtly Englishman could be the menacing, Gaelic-speaking Scot of the Manchester alleyways was incomprehensible.

Yet whoever the man who was now holding her might be, he was not any version of the Sir Anthony Peters she had seen before. His reaction to her blow and his behaviour now told her that. She shifted experimentally, hoping he would let her move away from him. She found the close contact with him disturbing; she didn’t know him at all, and wanted to put a distance between them so that she could marshal her thoughts in preparation for what looked like being a very unpleasant confrontation at his house. His arm tightened again warningly; presumably he thought she might try to leap from the carriage if he let her go. She stayed where she was, her head against his chest, listening to his heartbeat, strong and steady as they travelled through the night.

Unbelievably, she must have fallen asleep. She struggled back to wakefulness as the carriage stopped. The door opened and the coachman appeared to assist her out. For a moment she wondered whether she should declare that she was being kidnapped and throw herself on his mercy, but when she looked in his face she saw the closed, indifferent expression of the servant who will do what he is paid to do, no more and no less, and knew that the chances of him risking his job to aid what he probably thought was an hysterical female were virtually non-existent.

She looked at Sir Anthony, who had also stepped down from the carriage and now took her elbow in a firm grip.

“If you would be so kind as to bring in our luggage,” he said to the man, who turned immediately to do his bidding. Then her husband propelled her firmly away, up the steps of the house, whose door had been opened by a servant, across the hall and into a lamplit sitting room, where he assisted her into a seat and with a firm command to her to stay there, disappeared.

She sat for a moment where he had placed her, before realising with alarm that if he could trust his people, as he had said, she could expect no aid from them, and no one else would hear if she were to call out for help. She stood, suddenly panicked, and looked around frantically for a means of escape. She made a move toward the window, just as Sir Anthony re-entered the room, closing the door quietly behind him. He had a tray in his hands which he placed on the table.

“I thought you might like some refreshment. You did not eat much at dinner,” he said conversationally. “Or would you prefer to go straight to bed? To sleep, I mean,” he added. “I know you’re very tired.”

Beth was flabbergasted. He was talking to her as though they had just returned from a pleasant evening at the opera. The whole situation took on an unreal aspect, and she wondered vaguely if she would suddenly awaken in her own bed to find this whole day had been nothing more than a bad dream. She looked at the man she had thought of until now as Sir Anthony Peters. He had removed his wig, and she saw for the first time that his natural hair was long and dark. The lamplight picked out chestnut highlights in its thick glossy waves. His face was still white, but in places the tan of his natural skin was showing through and his nose was red and swollen at the bridge. It
was
broken, she thought with satisfaction. His star-shaped patch had disappeared, presumably washed away by the flow of gore, and his face was smeared, although his nose was no longer bleeding. His accent was still unmistakably English, and Beth was confused absolutely.

“Who are you?” she said.

He sighed, and sat down. He looked unutterably weary suddenly, and she was reminded of her own fatigue. Only the sense of the danger she was in was keeping her alert, but she could feel the tiredness creeping in at the edge of her consciousness, dulling her senses. She had had less than five hours sleep in three days, and he looked as though he had enjoyed about the same amount of rest.

“I thought you had guessed who I was,” he said. “Although how, I don’t know.”

“Your scar…” she said. Her eyes flickered towards his right hand automatically, and he looked down, seeing the ridged white line that marred the tanned flesh of his hand.

“Ah,” he breathed, as realisation dawned. He never thought of it, he’d had it for so long, since he was a youth. Clearly he was growing careless, he thought with alarm. Or complacent at his easy success so far. It was small lapses like that that could lead him and others to the gallows.

“You’re very observant,” he said wryly, relaxing into the chair and stretching his legs toward the fire. “And you have a good memory.”

“I find fear clarifies the memory like nothing else,” Beth said.

“And you were very afraid that night, I remember. I’m sorry for that, but I had no choice.” He spoke matter-of-factly. “I suppose you remember exactly what all the others look like too, down to the last eyelash.”

“I think I would recognise some of them again, yes,” Beth said, consciously speaking slowly to still the shake of her voice so that he would not be able to tell that she was afraid tonight, as well. “But you were different.”

“In what way?” He was interested. Small things could be important.

“You were obviously the leader. And from the great pains you took to hide your face, I thought that we may have met before, and that you were afraid I might recognise you. So I tried to memorise as much as I could about you, so that if I saw you again in another guise, I would know you.”

“And presumably denounce me to the authorities. Although you didn’t denounce the others, did you? You could have gained great favour from your brother if you’d delivered up a nest of Jacobite traitors to him, you know,” he said. He looked across at her, a foolish-looking flawed clown with his streaked make-up, the rouge still forming two perfect circles on his cheeks, and she wondered how he could look so ridiculous and yet be so intimidating. He was tired as well, she thought; maybe if she could keep him talking, she could edge past him to the door and make a run for it. It was worth a try. Was there anyone else in the house? Her mind raced. One servant had opened the door for them. Maybe that was it. It was late, the others would surely be in bed.

“I had no wish to gain the favour of my brother,” she replied with sincerity, “least of all by betraying a lot of men who….” She stopped, deciding against what she had been about to say. “I don’t know what I would have done,” she continued after a pause. “I just wanted to know who you were if I met you again. I hadn’t thought beyond that.”

His eyes were closing, the warmth of the fire lulling him, but he still caught her sudden movement as she took her opportunity and made to run for it. His hand shot out like lightning, grasping her wrist as she moved past and stopping her in her tracks.

“Don’t,” he said quietly, almost wearily. “Even if you were to escape me, which you won’t, you won’t be allowed to leave the house until I say so. I can’t let you go just yet, you surely understand that?” He held her gaze with his own. She expected a threatening glare, but his eyes held apology, a plea for understanding, although the grip on her wrist was relentless. She tugged experimentally, to no effect.

“You were lucky that night,” he continued. “If I’d known you understood Gaelic then, I could not have let you live, do you know that?”

She blanched. Was he trying to tell her that he was about to finish the job now? Was that why he’d married her, to give him an excuse to get her on her own so he could silence her? She pulled against his grip more frantically, trying to prise his fingers open with her free hand.

“I didn’t want to hurt you then, and I don’t now, although I will if you give me no alternative,” he said, leaning across to capture her other hand. “I didn’t intend for all this to happen.”

“How long were you going to keep pretending?” she cried. “Were you going to wait until I was asleep before you murdered me? Or were you going to do it in Italy or France, where no one knows us?”