Candice Hern (59 page)

"Why didn't she tell me, Mama?" he asked in a choked voice as he continued pacing the room. "Why didn't she tell me about her father? I knew about her elopement—she felt obligated to tell me that, I suppose. But not the rest." He stopped pacing for a moment as a thought struck him. "Come to think of it, there were some hints of her unhappy past, if I had but paid attention. From Bradleigh and Emily and Uncle Edward. But I... I disregarded them as meaningless, believing Mary so bright and high-spirited that nothing really bad could have ever happened to her. Oh, God!"

His mother rose from the chaise and came to his side, placing a hand on his arm. "She did not tell you, I think, because she was ashamed. It was difficult enough for her to tell me. She seemed to think it reflected badly on her that she did not fight back, that she allowed her father's abuse. To admit such a thing to a man she cared for... well, that would have been unthinkable."

"But it was not her fault."

"Of course it was not," his mother said. "But she would not see it that way. I suspect most children of abusive parents must believe it is somehow their own fault, that they are deserving of such treatment. Mary must surely have felt that way. Having been so isolated and alone, she would have had none but her father to influence her behavior."

"Oh, my poor Mary," Jack said, blinking furiously against the moisture welling up in his eyes. "My poor, sweet Mary. I must go after her."

His mother threw her head back with a loud sigh. "Jack, my dear boy, I have waited six weeks to hear those words."

Jack gave his mother a quick hug and a kiss on the cheek and then bounded out of the room toward his own suite. He had to find her. He had to find Mary. He had to make it up to her, somehow. He had to make her believe him. He wanted more than anything to convince her that he loved her—for herself, not for her money. He should have known his Mary was not like Suzanne or all the rest. Blast it all! He should have gone after her right away. If only he hadn't spent the last six weeks wallowing in dissipation, she might even now be safely in his arms. And so now he had to present himself to her with an even more tarnished life. He could only hope that she would forgive him.

If he could find her.

Jessop was dumbfounded to find that Jack was leaving before tomorrow's clandestine shipment was safely received and secreted in Pemworth's underground caverns.

"You stay and take care of it, Jessop. I have something much more important to do."

Jack had no idea where to begin his search. After six weeks she could be almost anywhere. He knew she had a home in Bath, so that was to be his first stop. But when he arrived at her Queen's Square house, he found the knocker off the door and no answer to his insistent pounding. He sought out Mary's man of business, but Mr. Fleming was either unable or unwilling to give out any information on his client.

Jack traveled from Bath to London, remembering her announcements in the London papers and thinking she might have been there all along. But the house she had let on Upper Brook Street was now occupied by a young baronet and his new family, and the lending agent had not heard from Mary since she had left for Pemworth.

Desperate, Jack dashed off notes to all those friends of Mary's he could recall, and called on those still in Town. He was received coolly in every case, which he supposed he deserved, but in the end no one knew where Mary was.

Jack kept thinking of the announcement in the newspaper. Perhaps she had not come to London, but had sent it from somewhere else. It was a long shot, but worth a try. He first visited the offices of the
Morning Post
. They were willing to admit that the announcement was legitimate and had been submitted by Lady Mary Haviland herself. Any further information was strictly confidential. However, after some judicious hints of potential lawsuits over misuse of fraudulent information, delivered in his best Superior Marquess manner, Jack was shown the original letter from Mary, still on file. It had been sent from Bath, on the same day they had discovered her missing from Pemworth.

So, she had been to Bath. Frantic and sick with worry over what might have become of her, he traveled once again to the famous spa. He would try to trace her trail from there. He returned to Mary's house on Queen's Square, where the knocker was still removed. He pounded on the front door, and this time it was opened by a housekeeper who eyed him warily. When he identified himself, her eyes widened and she stepped aside to let him in.

"Her ladyship is not here," the housekeeper said, "but perhaps you should speak to Mrs. Maitland, who is here just now. Wait here in the morning room, my lord, and I will send her to you."

Mrs. Maitland? Good lord, Olivia Bannister was here. Well, thank God for it, for perhaps she would know something of Mary's whereabouts. He paced impatiently as he awaited her arrival.

"Lord Pemerton!" The door swung open to admit a radiant and smiling Olivia. She offered her hand.

"Mrs. Bannister," Jack said, kissing the air above her fingers. "I beg your pardon. It is Mrs. Maitland now, is it not? Or perhaps I should simply call you Aunt Olivia?"

Olivia laughed. "Why not just call me Olivia?" She seated herself on a settee near the window overlooking the square. Jack followed suit and sat in an armchair across from her.

"I am sorry, Olivia, but I have not yet offered you my felicitations on your marriage. You are most welcome to the family."

"Thank you, my lord."

"I think you may be permitted to dispense with the 'my lords' and call your nephew Jack, my dear. Is Uncle Edward with you?"

"Yes, we are staying a few days at the White Hart," Olivia said. "I needed to return to Mary's house to pack those of my things that were still here."

"Olivia," Jack said in a quiet voice, "can you tell me where Mary is?"

She looked at him for a long moment, her head cocked to one side as if weighing what she should say. "I am afraid I do not know," she said at last.

Jack closed his eyes and breathed deeply. He had been so sure Olivia would know. "Are you certain?" he pressed. "She was here for a time, at least."

"Yes, I know," Olivia said. "She must have come here straight from Pemworth. She must have known I would return here eventually. She left a letter for me here, and .. . and a year's salary."

"She did not mention where she was going?"

"I am afraid not."

"What about the servants?" Jack asked in an almost frantic voice, his stomach in knots as he considered that he might never find her. "Might they not know where she has gone?"

"I have asked them myself," Olivia said in a patient tone, "and they have no more idea than you or I. She took her maid and coachman with her, but neither said anything belowstairs about where they were going. Perhaps they did not know. Anyway, they left after only one day and have been gone ever since."

Jack ran his fingers through his hair. He had never felt so helpless and frustrated in all his life. He was desperate to find Mary, but the only trail he had seemed to lead nowhere. Well, if Olivia could not help with Mary's whereabouts, perhaps she could at least shed some light on her departure.

"Olivia," he said, "you must have been the last person at Pemworth to see Mary. Can you tell me anything to help me understand why she ... why she left like that?"

Olivia's eyes narrowed as she studied Jack. "You are in love with her, aren't you?"

"Yes."

Olivia sighed. "Edward told me as much. I must apologize for misjudging you at first. I had thought you a heartless cad and a shameless flirt, but at Pemworth I had begun to change my mind. I could see in the way you looked at her that you cared very much for Mary."

"Yes, I do."

"If you don't mind my asking, why have you waited until now to go after her?"

Jack let out a breath through puffed cheeks and leaned his head against the back of the chair. "Because I'm an idiot. Because I was hurting. Because it took me this long to realize how much I want her."

"I hope you find her, then," Olivia said, her eyes softening, "for she deserves to be loved."

"Then help me decipher this mess. When did you last see her?"

"Let me think." Olivia's brow furrowed in thought. "It was late afternoon. She was heading down the corridor to her room and was very agitated. I asked if she was ill, and she said she was. I tried to help her, but she very curtly asked to be left alone and sent me away." She took a ragged breath. "I have not seen her since."

"Do you know where she had been when you saw her?" Jack asked.

"No," Olivia said, "but I suspect she had been outdoors for she was still wearing her bonnet. Although, because of her fair skin she usually carried a ... Wait a moment. She must have been walking near the gardens along the east wing, for I found her parasol there the next day. She must have dropped it."

"Her parasol?"

"Yes," Olivia said, frowning in recollection. "I thought it odd at the time, but then ... well, my thoughts were fairly well occupied with other things that afternoon. Anyway, I found her parasol in the bushes just outside the library doors."

"The library?" Suddenly, an image flashed through Jack's mind of the face of Max, the spaniel, in the lavender bushes. The dog, seldom one to prowl the estate alone, had looked lost and forlorn. There was something significant about all this, but it eluded him just now.

Think, Jack.

Mary must have been outside the library. He had been speaking with Sedgewick. They were interrupted. By the dog? No, by a noise. Jack had heard a noise, and it had alarmed him. But why? What had he and Sedgewick been saying?

A bit skittish, ain't you, Jack?

Oh, my God. It suddenly all came back to him. They had been speaking of his original mercenary purpose for offering for Mary, and he was worried for anyone to learn of his financial problems. He had been afraid someone would overhear them.

Apparently someone had.

Oh, Mary. My poor Mary.

Jack jumped to his feet. "I must find her."

"Have you thought of something? Did you remember—"

"I know now why she left," Jack said. "And now I must find her." He opened the morning room door and shouted for the housekeeper.

"Yes, my lord?" she asked breathlessly when she appeared at the door.

"I wish to speak to all the servants," Jack told her. "All of them, at least, who were here when Lady Mary returned."

With some reluctance the housekeeper did as he asked. Because Lady Mary had not been in residence since early spring, there had been only three staff on hand when she arrived so unexpectedly: the housekeeper, the butler, and a footman. The footman could tell Jack nothing except that he had posted the letters to London for her. The housekeeper knew little else, save that she had been given the packet for Olivia.

"Did she leave the house at all?" Jack asked.

"Aye," the housekeeper replied, "she did leave for a short time, but I can't say as I know where she went."

The footman also knew nothing of where she had gone. The butler might know something, but he had taken the afternoon off.

"When is he expected to return?" Jack asked with no little impatience.

"Oh, any time now," the housekeeper said. "We keep somewhat irregular hours when her ladyship is not in town."

"Hmph. I shall await his return, then," Jack said. "Send him to me at once."

And so Jack paced the morning room for the next two hours while he waited to speak with the butler. Olivia served him tea and told him of her wedding and the wedding trip to Datching, doing her best to keep him distracted. Jack wandered aimlessly about the room—so obviously Mary's room—picking up objects at random and putting them down again. He only half heard what Olivia said, immersed in his own thoughts. Thoughts of Mary and how she must have felt when she overheard that blasted conversation in the library. If only she had stayed long enough to hear him confess his love for her to Sedgewick.

He wondered if he would ever be allowed the opportunity to confess his love to her directly.

When the butler calmly entered the morning room at last, Jack practically pounced upon him. Yes, he remembered Lady Mary leaving the house for a short time. He had called a chair for her, for she was only going a short distance.

"Where did she go?" Jack asked.

"She asked to be carried to Laura Place, my lord."

"Do you know whom she was visiting at Laura Place?"

"I cannot say for sure, my lord," the butler replied, "but she often used to visit the dowager countess Bradleigh, who lives there."

Robert's grandmother?

Muttering words of farewell to Olivia, Jack dashed out the front door and headed for Laura Place.

Chapter 23

Mary trod carefully up the stone steps of the sole remaining tower of a castle ruin near Glennoch. One of many ruins in the area, its standing tower still had an intact and reasonably safe-looking stairway, and Mary had been unable to resist the climb. The small fortress had been built on the very edge of a rocky cliff that dropped off dramatically to a small cove below, and so when she reached the top and stood leaning out between the crumbled merlons, she felt as though she hovered above the sea like a gull.

She circled the tower, admiring the view from all sides: the sea ahead and the relatively high wooded hills behind. She saw the figure of a man walking on the path from Glennoch. She seldom saw any of the local people on her explorations of the area, so she wondered briefly at finding someone on that lonely path. She turned from him, though, more interested in the view of the cliffs and the sea. She no longer feared meeting other people and would gladly chat with him if he came near the castle.

She stood facing the sea, her hair blowing loose in the strong breeze. Her eyes closed as she listened to the crash of waves against the rocks below. The sea was fierce and rough today, and the force of it smashing against the cliffside was strong enough so that, even this high above, the dissipated mist of each wave dusted her cheeks with moisture.

She felt each wave as if she were the cliff itself, strong and unimpeachable, able to withstand the mightiest assault, still standing tall and proud, changing ever so slowly and inexorably with time.