Lady Farquhar's Butterfly (27 page)

Olivia
hesitated halfway along the path which led from the gravel drive
and cut across lawn to the family tomb. Where was the gardener who
tended the hedges once a week? Or the milkmaid who took the common
lane to the village?

Hidden from
all directions, even the carriage would not be seen from either The
Lodge or the dower house.

Wincing as
Nathaniel hurried back and dug his fingers into her arm to drag her
along, she stumbled to keep pace the last few yards.

On creaking
hinges the door ground open and Nathaniel pushed her ahead of him.
Turning, shivering, she saw his breath misting in fast, shallow
bursts.

‘Where is it?’
The urgency of Nathaniel’s demands cut into reflections of her
treachery. She was about to sacrifice Max’s fortune to a villain in
order to preserve her own dreams.

Her entire
life had centred around reclaiming Julian. When the unexpected love
she’d found with Max foundered, the gold was to have shored up the
intense, transient happiness that had gilded her life with
hope.

Dashing away a
tear she forced herself to attend to Nathaniel. She’d still have
Julian, wouldn’t she? Shouldn’t that be all that mattered?

‘You can see
the hiding place,’ she said, dully, her hands hanging limply at her
sides. She did not bother to point; just watched as his greedy eyes
darted around the gloomy cavern until they alighted upon the tiny
disturbed crypt, its heavy stone lid awry.

With another
burst of laughter Nathaniel ran towards it. ‘Dear Lord, I mustn’t
forget to thank Mr Atherton for this!’ he cried, thrusting his hand
inside to withdraw a fistful of coins, some of which scattered upon
the floor. The weak sunlight from the high window illuminated his
joy, a manic grin twisting his mouth. ‘You found it when you
interred that cur I kicked to death – though if it’s any
consolation I never meant to kill it.’

‘It’s no
consolation at all,’ Olivia murmured, shivering as the damp seeped
into her bones.

Nathaniel
forced the lid open a few more inches and burrowed into the
darkness. Transferring the entire cache of gold he filled the bag
he had brought for the purpose, straining under the weight as he
headed for the door.

‘How
fortuitous you considered the animal worthy of a Christian burial,
my love.’

‘Where are you
going?’ Her aversion to his touch was replaced by panic. Already he
was on the other side turning the key in the lock.

She ran after
him but the iron bars slammed against her face.

‘To fetch
blankets and sustenance for five days,’ he said, unclasping her
hands which she thrust through the bars. ‘Time enough for me to
make good my escape.’

‘Nathaniel,
don’t leave me here!’ she shrieked. No more than a square foot of
iron grating in the centre of the door admitted light.

‘You were
shivering, Olivia,’ she heard him call. ‘I will not have your death
on my conscience after all you’ve done for me. Have patience. I’ll
be back soon to load up the carriage.’

‘I don’t
believe you! You’ll let me die here, won’t you?’ she cried between
panicked sobs.

He brought his
face close to the bars, sliding his hands between them to cup her
face.

‘I’m too fond
of you to do that, Olivia’ he soothed, as if he meant it, ‘and I
owe you too much.’ Kissing the tears which spattered the backs of
his hands he said softly, ‘This is a bittersweet moment. It reminds
me of all those occasions you turned to me for comfort. Once, I had
hoped we might share this discovery. That our joy would be
mutual.’

‘Five days!
Nathaniel, I’ll never survive it! I need to be with Julian!’

‘Four days
should give me ample time to disappear,’ he conceded.

‘And have no
fears over Julian. I have given instructions for him and Charlotte
to be released once I have secured a passage across the
Channel.’

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

‘BEAUTIFUL
MORNING, SIR!’

Max groaned
and turned his head from the sight of sunlight bursting through
clear blue skies as Frensham drew the curtains. Anything remotely
cheerful was a reproach. Since the events of twenty four hours ago
he seemed to have existed in some dark eternity.

Olivia might
be safe, but he felt a villain, a cad, a traitor; his heavy-handed,
bullying tactics a barbarous manifestation of his own jealousy.

Wearily, Max
performed the necessary ablutions before presenting himself in the
breakfast room.

He was chewing
on a mouthful of haddock and thinking he needed to speak to Amelia
about the quality of the food which tasted like sawdust when
Jonathan burst into the room, waving the morning’s news sheet.

‘You haven’t
finished telling me, Jonathon!’ Amelia’s shrill voice punctuated
the quiet of the early morning household. To Max’s surprise she
burst into the room in her husband’s wake, her hair hanging
undressed down her back, clutching a shawl over her nightdress.

‘Lady Farquhar
has left the country!’ announced Jonathon, breathlessly, slapping
the paper upon the table beside Max’s plate and taking the seat
next to him. Stabbing his finger upon the revealing paragraph he
shook his head in astonishment. ‘Gone to the Continent to begin a
new life on account of her shame.’

Max’s mouth
went dry. He managed to swallow the remains of his mouthful without
choking.

Amelia sank
into the seat opposite and snatched the news sheet from her
brother’s grasp. ‘Lady Farquhar has finally abandoned you, Max! Now
you can ask Miss Hepworth for her hand!’

Max knew he
was staring like an idiot; that he sounded even more like one when
he repeated, stupidly, ‘She’s gone?’

Amelia’s
excitement grew. ‘I’ve never understood the hold that woman’s had
over you, but it doesn’t surprise me that some great shame has
finally forced her from the country. Max, Miss Hepworth would make
the perfect wife.’

He wouldn’t
argue that point, but the fact was he loved Olivia. He’d been on
his way to tell her. He’d never considered jealousy one of his
faults, but seeing her in the arms of another man had turned him
into an irrational monster.

He jerked his
head up at the sound of his sister’s gasp. Amelia’s eyes were wide
with shock.

‘What is it?’
He seized the news sheet she was devouring, fighting her for it as
she tried to take it back.

‘Read it!’
Conceding defeat, Amelia leaned across the table to point to the
revealing article. ‘It’s a confession … for the whole world to
see.’ She went towards the window, turning with a self-satisfied
look.

‘So Lady
Farquhar has admitted her adultery to the whole world. I shall
invite Miss Hepworth and her mother to our house party at the end
of the month. If the weather is fine there will be plenty of
entertainment to be had outdoors. Perhaps, Max, we should organize
a picnic.’

‘My
matrimonial affairs are
my
concern, Amelia.’ Max spoke
carefully. There was too much too absorb. Miss Hepworth was the
least of his worries, but Amelia had the capacity to cause a lot of
trouble.

He shook his
head, trying to make sense of it: Olivia’s motives, the
implications. Why had she confessed her adultery to the whole world
before she’d confessed privately, in full, to him?

Amelia swept
across the room and laid her hand upon his arm.

‘Amelia is
right,’ said Jonathon. His voice quavered with excitement.

‘You must
think of your matrimonial duties, Max.’

Tossing back
her hair, Amelia’s eyes shone as she squeezed Max’s arm. ‘The world
now knows Lady Farquhar for the adulteress she is and that I stand
beside the true Viscount Farquhar.’

He finished
his breakfast in silence while Amelia speculated upon the possible
candidates who had participated in Olivia’s misdemeanours, to
extirpate any vestige of feeling he might still harbour?

Oh, he
harboured plenty of feelings! He just wasn’t sure what they were.
Guilt. Desire. And fear for her safety.

‘She danced
upon her dinner table for the entertainment of her husband’s
guests!’ Amelia’s voice rang out with delighted horror before she
whispered with exaggerated outrage, ‘I’m told she has a birthmark
on a very private part of her person which the men used to line up
to kiss! Lady Farquhar’s Butterfly, they called it!’

Studiously Max
maintained his silence, even as his sister went on, taking no
account of his feelings – or perhaps
because
she knew it
would wound him. ‘Can you imagine, Jonathon, how many men have seen
it?’ Was it anger at hearing Olivia maligned, or simply that he
must be one of the few men who
hadn’t
sampled Lady
Farquhar’s Butterfly, Max wondered, as he fought the urge to hurl
his plate across the table like a moonstruck calf and stamp out of
the room.

‘Visitor
downstairs wishes to see Mr Atherton.’

The parlour
maid who put her head around the door bobbed a curtsy.

‘Who is it,
Ellen?’ Amelia asked.

‘The lady
wouldn’t give her name, ma’am.’

‘You didn’t
recognize her?’

‘She were
heavily veiled, ma’am.’

‘You can stay
here, Amelia,’ Max told his sister curtly when she rose to
accompany him.

Downstairs in
the drawing room a small figure dressed in black wearing stout
boots and an enormous bonnet festooned with black netting turned at
Max’s entrance before hurrying forward.

‘Miss
Dingley!’

‘I came as
soon as I read the lies, Mr Atherton!’ she cried. ‘Though Catherine
would have dressed like this to hide her
shame
I have done
so merely to conceal my identity.’ Her eyes, when she raised the
veil, were full of entreaty. ‘Please, Mr Atherton, find Olivia and
bring her back. She was forced to write this confession. That man
made her, though I’ve no idea how or why.’

Max was
reminded of the night Olivia’s aunt had begged him in the corridor
to champion Olivia. The night he’d seen Kirkman go into her
bedchamber.

The night his
faith in Olivia had been eroded. Yet he still loved her, Max
thought, wryly as he ushered Miss Dingley to a seat.

If Olivia had
only had the courage to confess her adultery to him, she and Max
might have been looking forward to wedding bells at this very
moment.

‘How will I
possibly find her if she wrote this yesterday and has probably
already left the country?’

‘I don’t
believe she has left the country, Mr Atherton. You were the last to
see her’ – she paused meaningfully – ‘before you delivered her to
the reverend.’

‘I delivered
her to the man she was to marry after I discovered her in a
compromising situation.’ Max began to pace. He knew he carried a
considerable burden of both shame and blame for his part in
Olivia’s disappearance, but it needn’t have been this way if Olivia
had confessed her sins directly to him.

‘I want to
help, Miss Dingley, believe me.’ He strove for patience. Olivia was
not the wife for him. He could not afford to be in thrall to a
siren who made him feel completely out of control most of the time
and whom he’d learned not to trust further than the next platitude
that tripped off her tongue. ‘However,
The Times
states she
has taken’ – it was hard to say Julian’s name without wincing –
‘the child with her to the Continent. No doubt you’ll be reassured
in good time as to her whereabouts and safety. I’m sorry, Miss
Dingley.’

Why did he
feel like a limb had been lopped off when his suspicions about the
boy’s parentage had been confirmed by Olivia in the most brazen
manner?

Taking a deep,
controlled breath he turned to the mantelpiece, his tone and manner
signifying that he considered he had nothing more to
contribute.

He heard the
rustle of skirts as she turned; her sigh of disappointment and her
hesitation before her voice, thin and hopeful, ‘This morning on her
dressing table I found this.’

Would she
never let up? Reluctantly he looked at what she proffered. Blinking
to clear his vision, he looked again.

‘Three gold
coins, Miss Dingley? Worth a sum, but what of it?’

‘Where did she
get them, Mr Atherton, when they would finance more than just a new
wardrobe? Olivia has lived in poverty since Lucien died. Recently
she discussed with us the idea of taking a job as a companion.’

This was a
shock. Max took the gold to study the coins better.

Miss Dingley’s
agitation grew. ‘Why would she leave them on her dressing table if
she were fleeing to the Continent and would be in need of immediate
funds?’

Turning them
over Max felt the flutter of excitement in his gut tempered by a
wisp of memory: her last words which she had flung at him before
he’d all but torn her from the carriage and thrust her at Reverend
Kirkman.

‘I’ve found
the gold!’

He did not
tell Miss Dingley this. Not when she would immediately have pounced
and formed conclusions that needed more thoughtful
deliberation.

Yet it was
true the gold coins hinted at something deeper. Dismay lodged like
a heavy stone in the pit of his stomach. Olivia had tried to make
him believe she had found his grandfather’s lost fortune, but he’d
dismissed her words as more desperate lies.

He handed back
the coins with a frown, but was saved from having to offer a
sensible course of action for the door was flung open and Miss
Catherine and a dirty, dishevelled young woman he did not
immediately recognize stumbled across the threshold.

‘Mr Atherton!
Charlotte and the boy have just arrived!’ Miss Catherine collapsed
on to the settee while she caught her breath. ‘I’ve brought them
directly from Laura Place.’

Julian’s
nursemaid? The girl’s hair was a tangled mess and her hands and
face were dirty and scratched, as if she had crawled through
blackberry bushes. She looked terrified.