The Gallant Guardian (28 page)

“I hope so, Felbridge, I hope so.” The marquess turned to the desk behind him, pulled out a blank sheet of crested stationery, and scrawled a few lines on the heavy cream paper. The conversation was at an end. Felbridge bowed and shut the door quietly behind him.

So his lordship was worried, was he. Good. That meant he might journey first to Harcourt to check up on things before returning to London. The marquess was an excellent manager of the estate and he invested a good deal of time and effort in it, but in the end, he always tired of country life and returned to the metropolis for amusement. However, the last few times they had been in London it had seemed to Felbridge, at least, that Lord Lydon had not been enjoying himself as much as he had been seeking distraction, making the rounds from the theater to the gaming room at Brooks’s to the boudoirs of enticing women in a frenetic attempt to capture the adventure and sense of purpose he had found so easily in India where every word and every decision was fraught with difficulty and challenge.

For his part, Felbridge almost hoped that Griggs would find something that required the marquess’s presence at Harcourt and would catapult him out of this uncharacteristically somber and reflective mood.

Max finished his letter, sealed it, and left it on the corner of his desk for Mr. Hickling to collect. That done, he surveyed his desk with a jaundiced eye. He really did not feel particularly like doing anything. The letter had merely been an excuse to get rid of Felbridge and his acute powers of observation. The man saw entirely too much and Max, who did not particularly wish to examine his own state of mind at the moment, certainly did not wish to have anyone, even his oldest friend, doing so for him.

He really ought to invite Tubby, Colly, and Jack back and pick up where they had left off when interrupted by Charlotte’s unannounced visit. But somehow the thought of obviously lascivious women and the hearty cheerfulness of his friends left him cold. Perhaps returning to London would be the thing. Certainly the divinely alluring Madame Dufour could be counted on to amuse him. That also seemed rather stale and bloodless. Max could picture it all now: the delighted surprise, the intimate dinner, the come-hither look in the dark eyes, the seductive way she would shrug her shoulders or gesture so as to make her revealing décolletage even more revealing.

Until now, Madame Dufour’s skilled dalliance had attracted him, but now it seemed so practiced, so artful that it lost all enticement for him. There was no challenge or charm in inspiring such feelings in someone who had indulged in them for years with scores of men. He wanted to bring the light of passion into the eyes of someone who had never experienced desire before, heightened pulses to someone who had never known what it was to want a man.

Max was for Madame Dufour what any attractive man would be for her; it was the game that meant something to her, not the person. For the first time he could ever remember, Max wanted to mean something to someone. He would not let himself think who or what that person would be, but he could not banish the vision of green eyes sparkling with grateful tears or a softly whispered
thank you.

Where were they now? Had they reached Crockham Hill or Edenbridge yet? Had he been mad to send them home to possible danger, or would he have been mad to let them stay when he was growing daily more attracted to the young woman he was supposed to be protecting, not entertaining tantalizing thoughts of her soaking wet in a thin muslin gown or swinging her bare feet in the water.

Max groaned and rose to his feet. It was time to go out riding, to engage himself in as much physical exercise as possible so he would be too exhausted to think or to speculate. At least he had sent Griggs along. But could he trust Griggs to be as quick to sense danger and to react as he would be? Should he have gone himself? Max paced the carpet in front of the fire. No, he told himself, it was better that he had not gone, for his presence would have warned anyone bent on wrongdoing that the Winterbournes’ guardian suspected something. It was better to lull the perpetrator of the accidents, if there was one, into a false sense of security so that they could catch him and put an end to it all.

Chapter Thirty

The marquess need not have worried; the Winterbournes could not have been in better hands than Griggs’s. The tiger’s sharp eyes missed nothing as they bowled along toward Harcourt. They were constantly scanning the countryside and the road ahead of them for danger of any kind, from any direction. Occasionally he would offer a comment such as
Drop yer hands, sir,
or
Give them their heads a bit…that’s it,
but he never seemed to take his eyes off the road or the fields on either side. Griggs had been duly impressed by the seriousness in his employer’s voice and the anxiety in his eyes when he had been given his instructions to keep an eye on the Winterbournes at all times. In all the marquess’s wild escapades, the curricle races, the sparring matches, even a duel, Griggs had never seen his lordship anything but laconically at his ease, his voice never rising above a bored drawl. This worried guardian, his face tense with concern, was a stranger and Griggs had promised with unusual solemnity not to let the young earl out of his sight during all his waking moments and to report immediately if he observed even the slightest thing out of the ordinary.

“Stay as long as you need to,” the marquess had instructed his tiger, “and let it be thought that you have come to Harcourt to continue with the lad’s driving lessons and consult with him about improving the stables. Say whatever you have to, but I want his sister to know that he is being looked after. He is everything to her and she has suffered enough as it is.”

“Yes, sir. Of course, sir,” Griggs had replied with awed seriousness, but behind the keen eyes and sharp, foxy features his mind was working busily. So that was the way the wind blew, was it? Concerned as Lord Lydon was for the safety of the boy, it was really her ladyship’s happiness that dominated the marquess’s thoughts. Any fool with eyes in his head could see that. Griggs had turned away to hide a sly smile. According to his guess they would
all be reunited fairly soon, because the Marquess of Lydon was a man of action and he would not be able to sit idly by and let others do his work for him, especially where someone as important to him as Lady Charlotte was concerned. He would soon become impatient at having to rely on secondhand reports and would journey down to Harcourt to satisfy himself that everything that could be done was being done. In the meantime, Griggs intended to do his best and keep a weather eye out for trouble.

Thus it was that several days later as he and William were entering the stables, Griggs, ever watchful, glanced up just in time to see two slates, jarred loose by William’s opening the door, slide from the roof toward the lad’s head. Without a second thought, the tiger, only a step behind William, hurled himself at the boy, pitching both of them onto the floor of the stable.

“What happened?” Round-eyed with astonishment at this strange behavior, William picked himself up off the floor.

“Begging your pardon, sir, but those two slates was heading right for your head; they would have given you a nasty crack if they had hit you.”

“Oh my.” Dazed by the sudden turn of events, William stood glued to the spot digesting this bit of information while Griggs crept silently back out the door and, hugging the building, peered around to the back. No one was in immediate sight, but he established that there was a window opening from the loft above through which someone could very easily have gained access to the roof.

He turned and made his way back stealthily into the stable and climbed the ladder to the loft, The hay on the floor made it difficult to tell whether or not anyone had been there recently, but it did appear that the hay on the floor in front of the window had been pushed off to either side and the wood on the sill was slightly scuffed as though someone had stood upon it to gain footing for the roof. He looked down and surveyed the stableyard, being careful to stand back far enough from the window so as not to be seen from below. He still saw no one, but there was a cart next to the wall behind the stables that offered easy access to the wall and there was a spinney on the other side in which a man could easily hide. It would have been useless to follow. Anyone who had climbed the wall would be long gone by now.

It must have been someone from Harcourt, Griggs reasoned, as he climbed back down the ladder; because only someone very familiar with the routine of the household would know that the stableyard was likely to be empty at this time of day while Jem and Tim were cleaning out the stalls, Speen was in the village with a wheel that needed a new rim, and the maids, who had been hanging out the laundry in the yard the day before, were busy with ironing.

“Are you all right, lad?” Griggs’s pointed features were made even sharper with concern; he was truly fond of William. To be sure, the lad was a trifle slow, but he was as gentle and kind a soul as one could hope to meet and his love of horses alone would have endeared him to the tiger even if he had been completely witless.

“Yes…” William was still stunned by the shock of it all. He looked up uneasily at the ceiling. “Do you think any more will fall? We must tell Charlotte. She will have it fixed.”

“That she will.” Griggs was torn. He wanted to stay and calm the boy, but at the same time he felt that something should be done immediately and he certainly did not want to leave the lad alone. “Let us go find Jem and Tim. They can help you harness the horses and I shall just go and have a word with someone about the roof.” William agreed and was left under the watchful care of the stable-boys while Griggs sought out Lady Charlotte.

He found her in the library, and the instant he appeared she knew something was amiss. Her face paper-white, she rose quickly from her desk, knocking off a pile of papers in her haste. “My brother?”

“Is perfectly fine, my lady,” he assured her hastily. “But it was rather a near thing.” Griggs hated to be the cause of such an anxious expression in those eyes. “I mean, it was just an accident—two slates from the roof that fell—but it should be fixed.”

“But
you
do not think it was an accident.” Though she was nearly dizzy with the relief that had followed the first cold shock of fear, Charlotte pulled herself quickly together to deal with the problem at hand.

“No, my lady.” The tiger could not help admiring the brave and efficient way she mastered her emotions and took control of the situation—a very special young woman was Lady Charlotte Winterbourne.

“Do you have any idea what caused it?” Charlotte could not bring herself to ask
who.

“I could not see anyone, my lady, though from talk I have heard around the stables, I have my suspicions.”

Charlotte nodded. They both had their suspicions.

“My master asked me to keep an eye out for anything unusual and I should return to Lydon Court at once. His lordship will want to deal with this himself immediately.”

“Ah.” Charlotte hesitated, hating to ask for the marquess’s help yet longing for the reassurance of his company.

Griggs was pleased to see her worried frown lighten at the mention of the marquess. “Then with your permission, I shall be on my way. I left Master William with Jem and Tim at the moment. Mr. Speen told me that they can be trusted.”

“Thank you. I shall keep him close to me or he will be with Speen until I hear from Lord Lydon. And Griggs…”

“Yes, my lady?” The tiger paused as he was about to shut the door behind him.

‘Thank
you.
My brother owes you his life, and I owe you an incalculable debt of gratitude.”

“I was just following orders, my lady,” he replied gruffly. “Besides, I am fond of his lordship; we all are.”

She smiled mistily at him. Griggs had no trouble seeing why his master was so concerned for her; she was a taking little thing, with worries too big even for a grown man, much less a young woman. And yet, with all that she had on her mind, she had taken the trouble to thank him for reacting as anyone might have done when things started hurtling off the roof at them.

Griggs would have preferred to have saddled up directly and headed off for Lydon Court, but a moment’s reflection made him change his mind. Whoever was behind this was far more likely to tip his hand if he thought his villainy was going undetected. A sudden departure immediately following such a near miss might reveal Griggs’s suspicions. Better to prepare the household by alluding publicly to his departure and leaving the following day as though it had always been agreed that he would return then to Lydon Court with the horses lent by the marquess for the curricle.

Whistling as he crossed the stableyard, Griggs exuded a blithe lack of concern as he went to retrieve William from Jem and Tim. It was a crying shame, it was, that someone wished to harm such a nice lad, open, honest, and appreciative of everyone—qualities that, to Griggs’s way of thinking, were in all too short supply in the world.

Though Griggs’s careful assumption of insouciance might have fooled anyone who happened to see him, its effect was lost on one
observer. Skulking in the shadows of the carriage house, Tom Piggott cursed his bad luck as he surveyed the shattered slates. Griggs’s suspicions, or lack thereof, had no effect on him as the panicked refrain
Whatever shall I do now? Whatever shall I do now?
played over and over in his mind. The time for circumspection was past. He was doomed. Either Sir Cecil would expose him and he would be transported, a fate as horrible as death to the timid Piggott, who had found life away from his own square mile of existence in Somerset trying enough, or he would be caught for trying to injure the young earl and an even worse fate would befall him. He had suffered such an agony of apprehension from the moment he had left Wadleigh Manor that at this point he did not much care what happened; he just longed for the suspense to be over.

First he had had to deal with that brute of a horse, then there had come residence in an unfamiliar household where he was distrusted by everyone, who could see in an instant that he had no more affinity for animals than a windmill. Jem and Tim, the two people with whom he had had the most contact at Harcourt, had made no secret of their scorn for him. All the others had followed suit and Tom Piggott had disliked them just as heartily in return.