Mortal Arts (A Lady Darby Mystery) (7 page)

“There aren’t any art supplies in his rooms, not that I saw,” Gage pointed out, and I realized that he had been to see Will.

For some reason that set me on edge. I didn’t want Gage visiting him without me being present.

“Where does he draw?” he persisted.

I felt indignant. As if Michael would lie.

Michael glanced from me to Gage to Philip. Then he sighed, as if he’d just made some kind of troubling decision, and pushed to his feet. “It might be easiest if I just show you.”

I blinked in surprise, rising to follow.

Gage’s eyes darted to me as he stood. “Is that really wise? After all, you just told us he’s been unwell this evening, that he had a relapse.”

“Yes, but when he’s like this he’s very docile.” He turned his face to the side, showing us his profile. “As long as you don’t try to stop him from doing what he wants to do.”

A quiver of alarm stirred in my gut, but I refused to heed it. Will had been my champion and confidant. He had believed in me when everyone around me was disparaging my talent. My mother dead, and all but forgotten by my sister and brother, who were off in London and Cambridge, I was left floundering after enduring months of belittlement at the hands of my drawing master, Signor Riotta. When he abruptly quit and Father complained about the time and expense it would take to lure another art instructor to the relative wilderness of Northumberland, I had almost told him not to bother. Then Will had taken me under his wing. He had taken one look at my sketchbook and cursed Signor Riotta roundly for a fool.

Without Will’s confidence and guidance I might never have found peace with my talent. I remembered well the turmoil of my early adolescence—the frustration and inadequacy, the raging emotions. Will had helped me to channel it into my artwork, to embrace my gifts instead of deny them. I owed him much.

And because of that, I couldn’t allow a little fear to persuade me to turn my back on him now. Not when the very least I could do was visit him in his chamber.

Unfortunately Gage seemed hell-bent on preventing it. “Then it’s not safe. What if we startle him? Who knows what the man is capable of when he’s out of his head?”

“He’s never truly harmed anyone,” Michael argued.

“That doesn’t mean he won’t.” The fact that Gage sounded genuinely distressed did nothing to cool my anger at his interference. “Cromarty, I have seen unwell men wring the life out of another human being while in the throes of a mania.”

Philip frowned, and I knew he was considering Gage’s words. There was enough truth to them to give anyone pause. But I could not let Gage keep me from Will, whatever his motivations were for doing so.

“Will would
never
hurt me,” I insisted, scowling at him.
“Never.”
I turned to Michael for his corroboration but his eyes said that he was not as certain of such a thing as I. A knot of fear lodged in my throat.

“He may not be able to comprehend who you are,” Gage answered, his gaze far too compassionate for my liking.

“Well, what is he at his worst?” I knew I surprised the men by asking, particularly Michael, whose face visibly paled. “Does he attack anyone when he’s lost in his head? Has he ever been in the grips of a . . . mania?” I had difficulty repeating the word. “Has he become violent?”

“Not in many months,” he admitted. “And even then, he would only fight you if he thought you were going to confine him or dose him with medicine he didn’t want, and then just until he made his escape. He’s far more likely to be so engrossed in his thoughts he won’t even know we’re there.”

“Then I don’t see what we have to fear,” I stated defiantly. And then, before Gage could voice the objection forming on his lips, I rushed on to say, “Besides, with the three of you gentlemen there with me, should something go wrong, I’m certain you could protect me.” It was a challenge, and perhaps one made in poor taste, but I was not about to let Gage’s fears, well-founded or not, stop me from seeing Will.

Gage’s eyes narrowed and, knowing he could no longer appeal to my good sense, he turned back to Philip. “Cromarty, this is a bad idea. There is far more at stake here than physical danger from a man in the grip of a mania.”

I glared at Philip while he thought over Gage’s words, daring him to deny me this. He seemed torn between Gage’s appeal for my safety and the emotions he must have sensed in me. I wanted to curse Gage, knowing that his display of protectiveness had probably brought back memories of my being shot and nearly drowned in the loch next to Gairloch Castle not so many months ago.

I didn’t understand Gage. Was his conscience troubling him that his stubborn refusal to listen to my doubts regarding the initial findings of our investigation had almost cost me my life, and he wasn’t about to see me in harm’s way again? Or was there something else, something specific about Will?

He was an enigma. One sent to torment me. For all that seemed to lie between us was unanswered questions, unspoken words. That silence was filled with so much noise it was deafening.

Philip leaned toward Michael. “You believe Kiera will be safe?”

“I would not have thought to take her to him had I not.”

Philip rubbed the stubble just beginning to show along his jaw and nodded.

I hurried to take Michael’s arm, lest Philip change his mind. As it was, I was worried Gage would make another protest, but he surprised me by remaining silent.

Michael led us into the entry hall and up the central staircase. At the top, he turned right, away from our assigned bedchambers. A door opened a few feet down the hall to reveal another set of stairs. Though less grand than the approach to the first floor, the flight to the second was still far from ordinary. Rich wooden panels covered the walls from ceiling to floor and the same red carpet as the central staircase ran up the middle of the stairs. A large window covered the wall on the landing, allowing plenty of moonlight to spill into the shadowed space. It looked out onto the front drive, providing a fine view of the trees straddling the lane that led away from the estate.

At the top, he guided us through a heavy door on the left, which he opened with an ornate key. “The nursery is back in the other direction. Facing the firth.”

I nodded but could not manage a reply. Tension had mounted tighter and tighter inside me with every step we took that brought us closer to Will. As we turned right down another passageway, I realized my fingers were gripping Michael’s arm like talons through his coat. This part of the manor house seemed deserted, but the walls and floor were well maintained.

Michael came to a halt outside a door near the end of the hall. He lifted his arm to knock, and then hesitated with his hand hovering there next to the wood. I could feel his doubt quivering inside his muscles, his uncertainty that bringing me here was the right thing to do.

I inhaled deeply to calm my racing heart and pressed my hand to his biceps, hoping he could sense my good intentions, my desire to help. The floorboard creaked as either Gage or Philip shifted behind us. I closed my eyes to pray they wouldn’t voice an objection now.

The sound of knuckles wrapping lightly on wood brought my eyes open with a snap. A few seconds later, the same stoop-shouldered man I had seen at the top of the stairs opened the door. Mac’s head was covered in grizzled gray hair and his face was lined with age, but he still appeared hale and hearty—more than capable of handling a man half his age. I knew that his slouch was more a matter of poor posture than a crooked spine.

He eyed each of us belligerently, studying me a moment longer than the others, before stepping back from the door to let us into what looked to be a parlor.

“They’re here to see William,” Michael told him while I took in the sturdy but elegant furnishings. “How is he?”

Mac grunted and lifted his hand toward a door on the far side of the room. “See for yoursel’.”

I followed Michael across the room. He rapped once on the gleaming wood and then turned the doorknob.

The room was dim, lit only by the fire crackling in the hearth. It cast flickering shadows over the walls and furnishings, revealing an unmade bed and a toppled chair. I swallowed the acrid taste of fear coating my mouth and stepped over the threshold. Beyond the signs of recent distress, I could tell the room was clean and well kept. No must or smoke fouled the air.

Inching forward, my toe brushed against something. I looked down to discover a simple sheet of paper, but as my eyes traveled along the gleaming wooden floor, I realized it was merely the first in a tangled trail of parchment and charcoal sticks littering the room. I bent closer to examine the foolscap and saw that it was covered in drawings.

Most were merely childish scribbles, as if the artist had been too overwhelmed to do anything more than thrust his elbow back and forth in the most elemental of movements. But others were inscribed with terrible images. Of pain and anguish. Of despair. Of men and women shuffling around a courtyard, some barely clothed, hopelessness dragging down their faces. On one page two men grappled while others cheered them on; in another a man scratched at the wall with his fingernails. And in still another a man huddled over his knees, surrounded by scribbles of darkness.

Blinking away the burning wetness from my eyes, I focused on the room before me, searching for the artist. And I found him, hunched in the far corner, scrabbling at the wall with his charcoal, as if, having run out of paper, he was forced to inscribe his memories onto the blank canvas of the wall. I sucked in a sharp breath at the sight of him. His hair standing on end, his shirt hanging open over one pale shoulder—the flesh covering it so thin that I could see clearly the sinew and bone.

Biting my lip to withhold a sob, I moved farther into the room, pulling Michael along with me. I heard the crinkle of paper as either Philip or Gage picked up some of the pages on the floor I had stepped over, but I had no concentration to spare for them. It was all focused on Will. He seemed not to notice our presence, so consumed was he by the task before him.

“Will.” Michael spoke so gently, as if a word too harsh would send his brother spiraling to his death. Or flying across the room in a wild rage. Either possibility tested my resolve to stand there and witness it, no matter the obligations I felt toward Will.

“Will,” he repeated. “We have guests. You remember Kiera St. Mawr, don’t you?” he said a little louder, giving him my maiden name. “She married Sir Anthony Darby. You . . . you remember, you told me you had met him once.”

Through this entire exchange, Will made no movement to show that he even heard the words, let alone that he understood them. His focus remained resolutely on the wall before him, scratching softly with his charcoal against its surface. He was lost. Lost in one of his memories.

“I’m sorry . . .” Michael began to say as I pulled my arm from his grasp and moved deeper into the room.

“Kiera,” Philip warned as I came to a stop to stare up at the wall Will was sketching on.

Mini murals in black and white covered its surface from the floorboards to as high above his head as he could reach. The flickering light of the fireplace seemed to hide and reveal them in haunting patterns, illuminating first the image of a woman chained to a bed, and then a man with rivulets of what appeared to be water running down his arms, though from the trails’ starting points at the undersides of the figure’s elbows, I realized, with a chill, that it also could have been blood. A third sketch depicted a man, his head drawn overlarge to show the dilated pupils of a person who stared at a ceiling where insects and other winged things seemed to hover. A fourth illustrated a man with his head being held underwater by two men standing over him.

My steps slid toward Will, trying to see what he was drawing now.

“Kiera,” Philip cautioned again, shuffling closer. I held up my hand to hold him off.

The sour stench of body odor assailed my nostrils and I wrinkled my nose. I feared it was coming from Will, but as I moved closer it dispersed, as if it had never been.

I leaned forward to see that this drawing was no different from the others—a frantic scrawling of lines depicting exaggerated proportions and faces—but the emotion was somehow altered. The others were frightening and definitely tormented in their portrayal. But this one was worse, even though the subject matter was by far the least disturbing.

Will had utilized the corner of the wall to draw himself trapped into it. The imagined room surrounding him was stark and bare like the others, and empty of all save his huddled and broken body quivering against the cold stone. His arms raised to cover his face, it was impossible to see his expression, but the posture, the abject misery and despair etched into each line, told everything.

Before I could change my mind, before I could doubt my actions, I stepped closer and rested a hand on Will’s shoulder. One of the men behind me sucked in a harsh, worried breath, but Will did not even flinch. He simply continued to sketch in the lines of his feet. I pressed into his thin flesh more deeply and then kneeled to pick up a discarded nub of charcoal, settling onto the floor beside him. Silently I reached up to continue shading the wall of his all-too-real prison.

Several moments passed when all that could be heard was the scratching of our charcoal across the plaster. No one else moved, or breathed, the chamber was so still.

And then Will’s movements began to slow and then falter. I could feel his awareness shifting, like a tangible presence. He blinked his eyes at the wall in front of him. Not wanting to alarm him, I lowered my hand and waited to see if he would acknowledge me. Slowly his head turned, and his stormy gray eyes, the pupils almost swallowing their depths, stared back at me.

I willed my breath to remain calm, my gaze unchallenging and unclouded by emotion. A minute ticked by, and then two, and then a glimmer of something sparked in his vacant eyes. His brow crinkled and his mouth worked. And on a sliver of sound, he spoke.

“Kiera?”

CHAPTER EIGHT

N
ever in my life had I felt so much sadness and so much joy in the same breath. The two opposing waves crashed inside me, enveloping me and threatening to pull me under. Emotion clogged my throat until I thought I might choke on it. Swallowing desperately to dislodge it, I nodded my head, worried I would lose him again if I did not answer. “Yes,” I murmured. “Yes, Will. It’s me.”

Will’s eyes traveled over my face, as if hungry for the sight of me, of anything outside the nightmarish memories in his mind. I forced a smile to my lips, even as I felt the first hot tear slip free from my eye and slide down my cheek. Will focused on it for a moment before returning his gaze to my eyes.

I reached out carefully to take his hand, removing the charcoal from between his fingertips. He stared down at it in confusion and then allowed his eyes to slide up the wall beside him at the drawing there as I held fast to his chilled fingers, grimy with charcoal residue. His gaze trailed over me to the men standing behind me. I did not turn to see their faces, absorbed as I was in watching the play of light and thought across Will’s. He seemed all too willing to accept the fact that so many virtual strangers had observed his odd behavior. I wondered if he was simply resigned to it or if embarrassment was now beyond his ability to feel.

“Will,” Michael said, his voice husky, “you didn’t eat your dinner. Shall I have Mac bring you another plate?”

Will’s shoulders suddenly seemed to slump under the pressure of holding his head up. He shook it listlessly. “No. Too tired.” The tone was gravelly and broken, either from fatigue or disuse.

I heard feet moving across the floor and then Michael stood over us, leaning down to help Will up. “You have to eat something, Will. Please.”

Will looked at his brother and then me. He nodded.

We guided him toward a wingback chair positioned near the hearth, and while Michael settled him comfortably, I turned to call out to Mac.

“He’s gone for his dinner,” Philip told me from the doorway. At some point, he and Gage had retreated to the parlor.

I nodded and turned back to help Michael. We righted the overturned chairs and began gathering up the papers scattered across the floor. And all the while, Will’s gaze seemed to float about the room as if unable to focus on anything. Suddenly feeling like an intruder, I touched Michael gently on the back and told him I would wait for him in the parlor.

Will’s head perked up at the sound of my voice and his gaze sought out mine. “You’ll return?”

Stunned by the request, I could only stare at Will’s earnest face flickering in and out of the amber light cast by the fire. His face was so gaunt, his eyes shadowed.

Michael paused in his tidying to stare first at his brother and then at me.

“Please,” Will added as the silence stretched.

“Of course,” I replied, feeling ashamed that my astonishment had forced him to utter such a word, so close to begging. “Yes. I’ll return. Soon,” I promised him, hoping he could sense my sincerity.

His gaze held mine another moment before sliding away. I took that as my cue to leave, exiting through the doorway just as the surly manservant returned with Will’s dinner. He glared at me as we passed, shutting the door to the bedchamber behind him.

I stared at the wooden barrier for a moment longer, unable yet to face Gage or Philip. My insides felt scoured and raw, and dark emotions bubbled too close to the surface.

“Do not take it personally,” Philip said to my back, forcing me to turn. He leaned awkwardly against the back of a Hepplewhite chair, his body still taut from the scene in the bedroom. “Ole Mac is always like that.”

I wondered if the man even remembered me. After all, if I hadn’t recognized him immediately, how much more must I have changed in the last ten years from age fifteen to twenty-five. “Is he really the best person to be looking after Will?” I questioned, unaccustomed to servants displaying such blatant aversion for those they served.

“Oh, aye. You won’t find a more loyal man to the Dalmays than Mac, particularly when it comes to William. He was his personal servant during the war,” Philip explained.

I knew that much, but loyalty wasn’t the only thing to be considered.

“And he’s not the only one Michael hired to assist his brother.” Gage’s voice was stiff, and I couldn’t tell whether it was because he was angry or merely uncomfortable with what we had just seen. “There’s another man, named Donovan. I met him the other day. He seems to have some kind of medical experience.”

I nodded. Perhaps a former surgeon’s assistant or an apothecary’s apprentice.

I worried my fingers and glanced back at the door to the bedchamber. I couldn’t help but wonder how many times similar events had played out in the last nine months since Will’s release. Michael had told us that he was improving, that these . . . lapses . . . were happening less and less often. But how many times had they occurred to begin with?

The memory of Will crouched in the corner scrabbling away at the wall with a stub of charcoal kept flashing before my eyes and made my chest ache. I wrapped my arms around myself against a sudden chill.

The bedchamber door opened and Michael reappeared. He was exhausted. Dark circles had formed under his eyes and his face was pale and drawn. How many nights had he lain awake, worrying about his brother? How many times had he been called from his bed to deal with a problem concerning Will?

He sighed and closed the door, but not before I saw Mac bending over Will, helping him manage the spoonful of soup he was ladling into his mouth. Will’s hand shook from the effort.

Michael crossed the room to lean over a sideboard that rested against the wall near the hall door. The emotional strain of the last few minutes seemed to tighten the muscles across his back, stretching the fine fabric of his evening coat. I tensed, uncertain if he was angry with me for approaching Will in the manner I had.

I knew he had every right to be upset with me. I had disregarded his warnings and walked straight into the lion’s den, so to speak. If Will had turned on me and harmed me, I knew neither Michael nor Will would have been able to forgive themselves. And it would have been my fault.

Michael inhaled deeply, pressing his hands into the smooth slab of oak so hard that it jostled the glasses and decanters lined up along its surface, making them tinkle and clatter. I braced for whatever reprimand was coming.

“I have
never
 . . . seen Will react that way.” His voice was soft with bafflement. He shook his head. “Not with anyone.” Pushing away from the sideboard, he turned to look at me. “How did you know he wouldn’t hurt you?”

“I . . . I didn’t,” I admitted. “But . . .” I swallowed around the dryness in my throat. “It seemed logical that as long as I didn’t alarm him or try to force him to stop drawing, he wouldn’t be upset. I’m much the same way, you see.” I offered him a weak smile. “When I’m immersed in a painting, I don’t note the servants coming or going with trays of food—left untouched because I don’t recognize my own hunger or thirst.” I laughed nervously. “Sometimes I don’t think I would notice if my studio caught fire. Only the passing of daylight captures my attention, because once it’s too dark to see I have to light lamps in order to continue.”

“Are all artists like that?”

“No,” I admitted, hating to squash his hopes. “I’m a bit . . . eccentric.” That was the word my grandmother had taught me to use many years ago.

“But is it possible . . .”

I shook my head, cutting him off. “Will was never like that before.”

He nodded and turned his face toward the wall.

“How does he usually come out of these trances?” Philip asked.

“Sometimes he just all of a sudden stops and blinks his eyes, like he’s waking up from a deep slumber. Other times he tires himself out and falls asleep. But he’s never come out of it with the help of someone else before.”

I looked up from my examination of the rug below my feet to find Michael studying me in silent contemplation. I didn’t have to glance at my brother-in-law or Gage to know they were scrutinizing me in much the same way.

“It’s not really so surprising,” I said defensively, wrapping my arms tighter around me. “He wasn’t likely to feel threatened by a female. And I didn’t demand anything of him.” I ran the toe of my slipper over a burr in the rug. “I was just letting him know I was there.”

“We know, Kiera.” Philip rested a hand on my shoulder in a gesture meant to reassure me. “Ye did well.”

But I could tell that something I had said had bothered Michael. Had I not been looking him in the eyes as I spoke I might have missed it, but I had seen the flicker of emotion, the flinch that had tightened his shoulders before being masked. His gaze had slid away from mine and fixed on the point where the rug met the floorboards. I frowned, confused by his reaction.

“It’s late,” Philip declared, seemingly unaware of the change in his friend’s demeanor. “If there’s nothin’ else pressing, perhaps we should continue this conversation in the morn.”

Michael cleared his throat. “Of course.”

Philip rubbed a hand over the stubble on his jaw wearily. “I’ll speak to my aunt and Caroline then, and we’ll try to sort everything out. But I canna promise ye anything. Ye did lie to them, Dalmay. And it might be best for all involved if there was some distance between ye for the time bein’. The engagement need not be so hastily broken, but a little space and reflection are not unwarranted.”

Michael nodded, having not raised his gaze through this entire speech. “I understand. My thanks, Cromarty.”

Philip joined me in my study of our friend’s down-turned head, but did not comment further. “Come along, Kiera.” He pressed a firm hand to the small of my back, guiding me toward the door.

I glanced over my shoulder at Michael, and then Gage, just before Philip steered me through the door and out of sight. The taut expression Gage aimed at my back did little to reassure me.

* * *

I
was surprised to find my lady’s maid waiting for me in my bedchamber. I eyed her suspiciously as she rose from her perch on the edge of the vanity seat, hands folded before her, wondering what had brought on this sudden change in routine. Normally I was forced to ring for the girl, sometimes several times, in order to get her to attend to me. Which suited me just fine. Nothing annoyed me more than to have someone flitting about me, forever fussing with my appearance.

But, then again, Lucy had been acting strangely ever since we’d left Gairloch Castle. I suspected she missed her rather large family and found the uncertainty of each new location more of a trial than she wished to admit. So I decided to overlook the oddity of her prompt presence and crossed the room to allow her to begin unfastening my dress.

However, after enduring several minutes of her sharp movements, jerking and jostling me as she unhooked my garments, it became apparent I was not going to be able to ignore her unusual behavior or the evidence from her overwrought sighs that she had something to say. “Out with it,” I ordered her, reaching out to steady myself on the bed pole. “What’s got you in such a dither?”

“I dinna like it here, m’lady.” Her thick brogue was heavy with condemnation. “Ye said we’d be stayin’ in Edinburgh t’night.”

“We were supposed to.” My voice wavered with each of Lucy’s tugs. “But unforeseen circumstances have impelled us to stop here, and we shall likely remain for a few more days.”

Lucy fell silent, but I could tell from the continued roughness of her movements that she was far from mollified. “Why don’t you like it here?” I persisted.

“It’s no’ for me to say,” she replied crisply.

I stifled a sigh. “I can’t do anything to make it better if you don’t tell me what the problem is,” I reminded her, feeling as if I were talking to my five-year-old niece.

“There’s naught ye can do, m’lady.” She pulled the dress up over my head without warning, smothering me in fabric.

I sputtered and turned to glare at her, but she had turned away to lay the costly gown over a chair. “Lucy, if you don’t tell me what has made you so determined to maim me . . .” I threatened.

She flushed and dropped her gaze to the floor. “Sorry, m’lady. It’s just . . .” She began to worry her hands, darting a look at me. “I ken I shouldn’ be listenin’ to the gossip. ’Tis likely just the maids flappin’ their tongues. But . . .” She glanced about her as if worried someone might be listening and then leaned toward me to murmur in an exaggerated whisper, “They say a
madman
lives here.” Her eyes were wide with fright. “And I dinna think my mum would like it if’n he murdered me in my sleep.”

I frowned. I shouldn’t have been surprised that Lucy had heard about Will from the Dalmay servants, but I was. Especially when he was spoken of in such terrifying terms. I wondered if Michael knew what rumors his staff were spreading. If he hoped to keep the truth about Will’s whereabouts during the last ten years a secret, he had best look to getting his servants in line first.

“There are no madmen living here,” I answered in a calm voice, unwilling to classify Will as such no matter what had been said. “And you are
not
going to be murdered in your sleep.” Of all the nonsense . . .