The Fifth Kiss (18 page)

The wait for the snow to cease falling seemed endless. All that day and during the interminable night that followed, Olivia seemed to hear her sister's voice asking her to watch over the children. Why, she asked herself repeatedly, had she let her pride—and Strickland's rudeness—drive her from their sides? She slept briefly and fitfully and seemed to hear Perry's weeping as a background to all her dreams.

To her relief, the morning dawned clear. Telling herself that the nightmarish feeling that had haunted her since the governess's arrival would soon be at an end, she hurried downstairs, sent for the coachman and succeeded in convincing him that the roads would be adequately clear by noon and that they could easily reach Langley by eight or nine that night. To her chagrin, however, Miss Elspeth appeared at the breakfast table looking heavy-lidded and ill, reluctantly admitting in response to Olivia's questioning that she had, indeed, caught a chill. “But I don't refine on it too much, Miss Olivia. I shan't permit a slight indisposition to deter me from the journey.”

“A
slight
indisposition?” Olivia asked suspiciously, putting a hand on the governess's forehead. “You are feverish, if I'm a judge.”

“It's only the slightest flush,” Miss Elspeth insisted, edging away from Olivia and throwing on her shawl, determined to prove that she was quite capable of proceeding with their plans. “Do you think we shall be able to depart shortly, or shall we have to wait until the afternoon when … er … the sun has had a chance to … er …?”

Olivia, guiltily aware of the young woman's watery eyes and flushed cheeks, nevertheless tried to ignore the problem. “We shall be on our way by noon,” she said firmly.

But Charles stepped in and put his foot down. “You'll not depart at noon, my girl,” he declared. “In fact, you'll not depart
at all
today. Miss Deering will return to bed until her fever has completely abated. To go outdoors in this cold while one is feverish would be disastrous.”

“Charles is quite right,” Olivia agreed reluctantly. “You must go back to bed. But Charles, why may I not leave anyway? Miss Elspeth can follow later, when she has quite recovered.”

“But … to travel all alone … is it quite the thing to …?” Miss Elspeth asked weakly.

“I've traveled alone any number of times,” Olivia declared. “I don't see why I can't do so now.”

To Olivia's intense relief, Charles made no objection, and the carriage was permitted to depart for Langley at the appointed hour. She sat back against the squabs, wrapped the lap robe about her legs and permitted herself to hope that the nightmare was at last drawing to an end. Because the first few hours of the trip were uneventful—the roads having been made passable by the warmth of the sun and the tracks of the numerous vehicles which had passed over them—she was soon lulled into complacency. She would shortly arrive at Langley Park, ready and able to take her poor nephew under her protective wing and do battle for him. But in the manner of most nightmares, just when one believes that all the fantastic obstacles that can possibly appear have already done so, another one rears up ahead.

As the carriage journeyed farther and farther from London, the traffic grew thinner and the roads more difficult to travel upon. The snow deepened as they moved westward, causing the horses to slow their pace. The trip, which normally would have taken no more than nine hours, now seemed endless. By the time dusk fell, Wollins, the coachman, began to realize that, since they were already several hours behind schedule, they were not likely to reach their destination that night. Fearful that the cold night air would turn the soft snow icy, he suggested to Olivia that they stop at an inn for the night.

Olivia objected stubbornly, for she was impatient to escape from what felt like a deepening mire of delay. But as the night darkened, the road grew slick, and she could feel the horses' hooves slipping against the ice. Reluctantly, she agreed to permit the coachman to pull into the nearst innyard.

The Hare and Horn was a coaching inn, a convenient stopping-place for the feeding of stagecoach passengers but not noted for the nicety of its overnight accommodations. The innkeeper eyed Olivia suspiciously and demanded his money in advance. It was only the appearance of Wollins at the door—for the coachman was an elderly retainer who, because of his dignified demeanor and well-cut livery, gave the innkeeper pause—that saved Olivia from greater disrespect. “Watch yer tongue when ye speak to my mistress,” the coachman told the innkeeper severely, “or ye'll deal wi' my fist on yer beak.”

“Well, 'ow wuz I t' know she's a lady?” the innkeeper asked in injured innocence. “Wut sort o' lady is it don't 'ave a maid with 'er?”

Olivia colored and ordered her dinner with cold aloofness. In truth, she had never wished for, and didn't employ, an abigail for her own service. She had always been too independent to wish for assistance in putting on her clothes or dressing her hair. But she couldn't blame the innkeeper for looking askance at a lady who was traveling unaccompanied. If she had anticipated spending the night at an inn, she would have brought one of the housemaids with her.

However, the admonished innkeeper immediately mended his ways and served her an enormous, if tasteless, dinner, hovering over her with deferential obsequiousness. He then led her to a bedroom which he claimed was the best in the house but which was small and dank-smelling, with a ceiling so slanted that one could not stand erect on the far side of the bed. She uttered no word of complaint, however, for her eye fell on a soft feather bed covered with a goose-down comforter which was so inviting that it made up for all the other deficiencies. She shut and locked the door and, weary to the bone, quickly stripped off her outer garments and slipped into bed. To her chagrin, she found the comforter smotheringly warm, yet if she attempted to throw it off, she was frozen by the cold air of the room. No amount of poking at the small fire was sufficient to warm the room in the slightest. Surrendering to the inevitable, she crept under the stifling quilt, gritted her teeth and prepared to endure a sleepless night.

Toward dawn, she fell into a heavy sleep, waking to find the sun already high. With a cry of annoyance, she jumped out of bed, banging her head solidly against the low ceiling. Dazed and smarting with pain, she nevertheless dressed hurriedly and ran downstairs to learn from the innkeeper that her coachman was walking the horses around the innyard to keep them warm—and had been doing so for more than an hour. Impatient to start out, she made for the door, but the innkeeper pointed out that he had set out a breakfast of steak-and-kidney pie, bacon, poached eggs, muffins and hot tea especially for her. With a sigh, she sent him out to inform the coachman that she would drink a cup of tea and be ready to leave in a moment. Hastily, without sitting down, she took a swallow of the steaming brew and scalded her tongue. When she at last climbed into the carriage, with a lump swelling on her head and her tongue burning painfully, she wondered irritably what next would befall her on this nightmarish journey.

But no other obstacles appeared until she walked into the hall of the manor house at Langley Park later that afternoon. “You may inform his lordship of my arrival, Fincher,” she said to the surprised but obviously pleased butler as she threw off her pelisse and tossed it to him, “but I'll pay my respects to him later. I want to see Perry at once.”

Pulling off her gloves, she ran across the huge hall toward the stairway. But as she might have guessed, the last and greatest obstacle appeared to bar her way. At that moment the library doors opened and Strickland himself emerged. “Well,
well
,” he said in his usual, sardonic style, “what have we
here
? Can it be Miss Olivia Matthews? This is quite like a scene from
The Prodigal's Return.
”

Olivia glowered at him in chagrin. He seemed to loom up before her—one more manifestation in the series of nightmarish impediments to obstruct her path to her nephew's side. He stood towering over her in his shirt sleeves, his neckcloth open, his face unshaven, his entire aspect dark and forbidding. She felt tortured, frightened, foolish and worried; she had a painful lump on her head and a scorched tongue; she was aching in body and spirit and in no mood for arguments. “I shall be available to converse with you later, my lord,” she said grimly, “but at the moment I wish you will stand aside. I want to see Perry, and I shall permit
no one
—not even
you
, my lord—to prevent me!”

Strickland blinked at her explosion of temper and stepped backward in surprise. “
Prevent
you, ma'am? Why should I want to do that? What
are
you talking about?”

“I am talking about you, sir. I refuse to listen to another of your speeches about my meddling and interfering. I have no patience for it now.”

“But I haven't said anything about—”

“No, not yet. But I'm certain you are forming a speech in your mind. If you are, I'd be greatly obliged if you'd keep it to yourself until later. In the meantime, I merely wish to point out that I have a perfect right to visit my sister's children, whatever you—”

“But I've never said you
haven't
,” the astounded Strickland said.

Olivia was taken aback. “You haven't?”

“Of course I haven't. Have you ever heard me say that you couldn't see the children?”

She stared up at him suspiciously. “Well, then … if you will let me pass—”

He stepped aside and bowed low, motioning toward the stairway in ironic mimicry of a footman. “Go right ahead, my dear. Make yourself quite at home. This is Freedom Hall to you, I assure you. Freedom Hall.”

She gave him one long glance of amazement and ran past him to the stairs. At the first landing, she glanced back. He was standing where she'd left him, looking after her with an expression of surprise still on his face. But when their eyes met, his look changed to one of mocking amusement. He made another bow, more satiric than the first. She put up her chin in annoyance and continued hastily up the stairs.

Neither of the children was in the schoolroom, but the sound of Mr. Clapham's voice brought Olivia to the doorway of Perry's bedroom. She paused on the threshold to watch them before she made her presence known. Amy was sitting at the window, holding a slate on her lap and concentrating on forming letters with such intensity that her tongue was sticking out of a corner of her mouth as if it were trying to aid her fingers. Mr. Clapham was seated at the side of the bed, reading aloud to a supine Perry from Goldsmith's
History of England
. Perry, however, staring up at the ceiling, was not really listening. His eyes seemed to be focused on something far away, and the droop of his mouth gave pathetic and mute evidence of his bewildered unhappiness. The governess had not exaggerated in her description of his precarious state of mind. Olivia was very glad she'd come.

“Gorgana, the enchantress, awaits you,” she announced with a mischievous laugh. “How can you remain cooped up here indoors when I've transformed the whole outdoors into a snow-covered fairyland just for you?”

“Aunt
Wivie
, Aunt
Wivie
!” Amy squealed in delight, dropping her chalk and hopping out of her chair. Perry's head turned, his mouth dropped open, and he stared at Olivia in disbelief, while the tutor, his eyes wide in adoring relief, got awkwardly to his feet. Amy flew across the room and was enveloped in a warm hug. Then Olivia went to the bed and sat down beside her nephew. The boy sat up, peered at her for a moment, and then fell against her with a desperate eagerness, hugging her tightly and burying his head in her shoulder. “I thought you … weren't coming,” he said, choked.

Over the boy's head, Olivia looked across at the tutor, her eyes questioning. He made a shrugging motion, as if to say, “I don't know
what's
wrong with him.”

She nodded and looked down at Perry. “Let me take a good look at you, Perry, love,” she said, determinedly cheerful. “Amy has grown so much in the short time I've been gone, I can scarcely credit it. What about you? I'll wager you've grown a whole inch.”

“You've been gone a
long
time,” he corrected, releasing her and looking at her reprovingly.

“Yes, you're right. It seems like an age, doesn't it? Are you sick, Perry? Is that why you're in bed?”

“I don't …” Perry began but finished with a small sigh.

“He hasn't felt well enough to get up these last two days,” the tutor explained, “but the doctor says he's quite well. Just a bit tired out.”

“Papa said I could stay in bed for today, but I must get up tomorrow,” Perry added wearily.

“Does something
hurt
you, Perry? Your head? Or your stomach?”

“Just something in here.” The boy put a hand on his chest. “It feels so heavy sometimes. Miss Elspeth said it's only the megrims, and I shouldn't mind it. She went to fetch you, you know, when Sir Budgidore fell ill.”

“Yes, she did. And here I am.”

His underlip began to tremble. “Sir Budgidore died, you know. You didn't come in time.”

Olivia pulled him into her arms and cradled his head on her shoulder. “I'm so sorry, love. We shall miss him at the Round Table. Perhaps, tonight, after supper, we can hold a dedication ceremony—dedicate one of the seats at the Round Table to be forever called the Budgidore Chair in his honor. Would you like that?”

Perry lifted his head and looked at her with brightening eyes. “Oh, yes, I
would
. Why can't we do it right now?”

Mr. Clapham cleared his throat. “Lord Strickland has ordered that we … er … refrain from playing the Round Table game, you know.”

“Oh, don't worry about that,” Olivia said with matter-of-fact cheerfulness, smiling reassuringly at her nephew. “Everything will be—”