The Ghost and Jacob Moorhead (7 page)

That vowel. How was she to retrieve it?

And just how vicious would Lady Fisher–Stone be in setting the
ton
on its ears concerning their evening of pleasure. How much deeper would the hole grow, the one into which she’d stumbled when she’d been unable to control her hopes of wedding Jacob? Had allowed too many to guess those hopes?

Finally alone in the cab, Melissa relieved her feelings with a string of soft swearwords. She was still swearing when the jarvey pulled up at her front door and came down from his perch to open the door.

He stood there, firmly in her way, until he was paid.

* * * * *

Jacob nudged the linen cupboard door an inch farther open. He watched his Cousin Mary enter her sitting room—and heard her speak. “Rube? Aren’t you early?”

The man
, thought Jacob,
is already there
?

“A bit perhaps. I found a book in your father’s library that I find exquisitely amusing.”

“Book?”

Jacob assumed the silence meant she looked at the title—hoped that was all it was…

“A traveler’s tale? Why is that amusing?”

“He visited my part of the world and if he is as wrong about everything else he reports as he is about
my
people then it is a book of fiction and something one should find amusing, correct?”

Jacob heard Mary chuckle. “Did he spend much time with your people?”

“He claims to have been with us for a year or so, but that is unlikely for surely I would remember it or at least have heard tales of his visit. I will ask in my next letter home. Assuming it reaches my family then someone will remember, will respond and, assuming that letter reaches me, I will discover if the man is a liar or if he simply has no ability to actually understand another’s point of view.”

“Hm.” There was another, longer, silence. Then, hesitantly, Mary asked, “Rube, am
I
so lacking in understanding? Have I wasted my life traveling and…”

This time it was a low rumbling masculine laugh coming from behind the door. “You have more empathy in your little finger than most have in the whole of their bodies, Mary. You understand those you meet. When you don’t, you ask the right questions. And, still better, you ask them in such a way you do not set up anyone’s back.” He paused. “Do I have that right?” he asked a trifle diffidently.

“Set up their backs? Yes, of course you do. Except, perhaps that is the problem…”

After a long moment’s silence, Rube suggested, “You are thinking about your stay
there
.”

Jacob guessed Mary nodded.

“Try again, Mary. Take your time and think carefully. Repeat exactly what you did, what you said and perhaps we can put together something that will explain how the king came to conclude you murdered his son. Or—” He paused and his tone was slightly more caustic when he continued. “Perhaps you will now admit the man is mad.”

Mary ignored the last. “I’ll try.”

“But not tonight. You are yawning. Go to bed and I’ll see you aren’t disturbed.”

“Don’t stay up too late.”

“No. I’m near the end of this chapter and will put the book down when I finish it.”

Jacob waited and heard a door close—obviously the door to his cousin’s bedroom. He rose to his feet, stretched away the stiffness that had crept in while he awaited Rube’s arrival—except Rube had already been there. Jacob frowned. What had Mary implied when she referred to…the problem?

Problem? And murder? What had the foreign prince meant by murder?
Something else I must discover
, he thought as he opened the linen cupboard’s door, which squeaked. Almost instantly the door across the hall opened as well. Jacob stared into the steely look in Rube’s face, glanced at the knife the man held in his hand and then back at his face.

Rube relaxed somewhat. “Yes?”

“Come out,” said Jacob softly but with very nearly the same steel he’d seen on the other man’s visage. “I want to talk to you.”

Rube grimaced. “Because I am in Mary’s rooms?” He sighed. “We had hoped to keep from you that…”

“
That you are lovers
?” asked Jacob, his whole body stiff with outrage.

“Lovers?” Rube blinked. Then he laughed softly. “Oh no. That would never do. My father would fall into fits and my mother die of embarrassment if I were to take a lover from among your sort. I would not wish to do that to my family.”

Jacob recognized irony when he heard it. He sighed. “You suggest that your family would be as outraged as mine. Very well. Then, if you are not sharing her bed, what are you doing?”

“Guarding her,” said Rube.

Jacob glanced at the place where the knife had disappeared within the man’s robes. “She’s…in danger?”

“She managed to insult a man who cannot abide insult. At least he calls it insult and threatens revenge.” Rube frowned. “He has made no
overt
move against her for very nearly two years now but we know his minions keep watch. Perhaps we have thrown them off stride by coming here. We were very careful and, with luck, they’ll not find her. At least not for some time. But I will not relax my vigilance since we cannot
know
.”

“Insulted someone important? Some man overseas somewhere. I was listening, you know. I heard you mention murder? May I know the details?”

“Insult is perhaps not the correct word…my inadequate English…” mused Rube but then shook his head. “Since you know so much I’ll tell Mary she must discuss the situation with you. Perhaps you’ll decide you must find someone else to chaperon your cousin, that it is too dangerous for others living here for Mary to remain.” Rube shrugged. “The two of you will come to a decision one way or another. But not now.
Tomorrow
. It is far too late tonight and Mary is tired.”

Jacob wanted to argue but decided the man was right. “You have her safe?”

“Go see.” He gestured toward Lady Mary’s bedroom.

Jacob crossed the room and tapped on the door. There was no answer. Frightened by Rube’s story, he threw back the door and rushed into the bedroom—only to find it empty. He looked around. Spun around. Stared at the impassive Rube who stood cross-armed in the doorway. He relaxed. “Where is she?”

Rube nodded toward another door at the far side of the room.

“The dressing room?” Jacob crossed to it and knocked softly.

After a moment his sleepy-looking cousin opened the door. “Jacob?” she asked and, suddenly alert, glanced to where Rube stood.

Rube nodded. “He knows.”

She sighed. “All of it?”

“No. Only that you are in danger.”

She heaved a still deeper sigh. “Fiddle.”

Jacob laughed at her sour expression. “Tomorrow you will tell me the tale and we will decide what to do.”

She nodded, shut the door and, after a few more words with Rube, Jacob found a nearby flight of servants’ stairs and went down them to the first-floor hall and into his bedroom. Once there, he settled into the well-worn and very comfortable chair set before the fire. He turned up the lamp, picked up his book and laid it on his lap.

Then, ignoring it, he stared into the fire. “Danger.”

Danger
?

Jacob winced at the voice. “It appears Mary is in danger of her life. Thus the bodyguard.”

I don
’
t like it
.
My little Mary in danger
.

“I don’t particularly like it either. Especially since Mrs. Jennings and Miss Tomlinson are here as well.”
What the devil am I doing
,
having a conversation with an impossibility
? “And I haven’t even been drinking.”

Do something
. The impossible voice sounded stern.

“Once I know more, I will. Mary will explain all tomorrow.”

There was a gentle sigh. Jacob waited. When nothing more was forthcoming he sighed softly himself and relaxed a tension he’d not realized he was feeling. He touched the book in his lap and shook his head. Ten minutes later he was ready for bed, doused the lamp. He put himself to bed, glad his valet had turned down the covers so he need not fumble his way between the sheets.

* * * * *

Honey
?

“Mel, dear?”

There better not be another who can contact you from this side
!

Jenna chuckled. “I agree. It was hard enough to accept when it is only you.”

Ah
,
my love
.
I miss that
.

“What do you miss?”

Your gentle sense of humor
…
Other things as well
. A ghostly hand approached hers but not so near the cold hurt.
There is something you must know
, the voice said much more abruptly.

“Tell me.”

Mary is in danger
.
Tomorrow she will explain to Jacob
.
I think we should all hear the tale
.

“Danger… What? Why?”

I don
’
t know
,
do I
?

Jenna tipped her head, stared at the ghostly replica of the man she’d loved for so long. “Jacob will do something. I’m sure he will know exactly what to do.”

That foreign man who arrived with Mary
?
He
’
s her bodyguard
.

“So you do know something.”

Not enough
.

“Tomorrow.” Jenna yawned.

Oh
,
my love
.
You are tired and I keep you awake with my nonsense
.

“If Mary is in danger it is hardly nonsense.”

True
…
But sleep now
.
I will watch over you
.

“Nonsense. Go watch over Mary. Then if something happens you can warn Jacob.” She stared at him. “You can, can you not?”

He hears me
.
Even when he isn
’
t drunk nearly out of his mind
,
he hears me
.

Jenna smiled at the satisfaction she heard.

But you are correct
—
as you usually are
.
I will go watch over my daughter
. He floated up off the bed and toward the door just as if he had to move through space to reach Mary’s room. At the door he paused.
I love you
.
I wish you
’
d had the courage to marry me when we could have done the trick
.
Then I
’
d not worry so much about you now
.

Jenna’s smile faded and her lips compressed into a stubborn line.

Her lover’s ghost sighed…and disappeared.

Chapter Five

A poorly dressed man burst into the one room fit for human habitation in the abandoned house. “They’ve gone.”

“Lady Mary? Gone?” The second, a seedy-looking man, looked up from where he cast, one hand against the other, a pair of dice.

“You heard me,” said the first, a vicious note creeping into his voice. “Gone, and what do we do now?”

The dicer straightened, stared into the hard stare the other sent his way. “Gone…”

“The
foreigner
won’t be happy.”

“The
foreigner
will be livid.”

Eyes flickered, glanced to one side then back to meet again. “You go tell him,” they said simultaneously. Each shook his head. Quiet descended on the only room in the deserted farmhouse that still boasted four walls and a roof.

“What we gonna do, Alf?”

Alf heard fear in the younger man’s voice. He tossed the dice, caught them one-handed and closed his fist around them. “I don’t know about
you
, my boy, but
I
know a certain captain that works off the coast just east of Brighton. I think I’ll go see if he’s got room for a passenger on his next trip across the channel.”

“Think he’d have room for two?” asked the other after a moment.

“Think he might… But the foreigner has got to be told.”

“Write him a letter?” suggested the younger.

Alf looked startled. “You can write?”

Embarrassed, the other nodded. “Not very pretty but so you can read it.”

“So
some
can read it, maybe,” said Alf on a dry note. “Think the foreigner can read English?”

“His problem.” The younger man shrugged. “We’d ‘ave done our duty by informing him.”

Alf thought about that and nodded. “You go buy paper and whatever else you need while I pack. We can drop the letter in the mailbag at the posting inn in Richmond before heading south.”

* * * * *

Jacob looked around Jenna’s room and nodded. “We’re all here. Now, Cousin Mary, a round tale and don’t leave out any bits you think unsuitable for anyone’s ears.” He glanced toward Verity and away.

Verity scowled. “If you mean me then say so.”

“Very well. Anything unsuitable for Miss Tomlinson’s ears must still be voiced. She’ll just have to blush and we’ll politely ignore her crimson cheeks. Cousin?”

“Now why,” asked Mary, “do you think there will be anything in this tale an innocent shouldn’t hear?” Before Jacob could do more than open his mouth, she continued. “Actually, there may be.” Her mouth compressed into a hard line for a moment. “Rube will tell you
much
of it is, but he still thinks in terms of harems and women who must be kept away from any man not father or husband.” She grinned when Rube’s face twisted into a moue. “Yes, you do. You wouldn’t keep such a close watch on me if you did not.”

“I keep close watch, Lady Mary, because you are in danger of your life and only for that reason. I know better than most that you can deal with very nearly any situation a man might face.”

Mary blushed slightly. “That is a high compliment, Rube.”

“That,” he said, his voice dry as the deserts surrounding his home oasis, “would be an insult to a lady of my people. As you know.”

Mary laughed. “
I
’
ll
take it as a compliment. Now for my tale.” She settled more firmly into the armed chair Jacob had pulled into a position so she faced Jenna who sat against pillows in her bed. “I had stayed for—oh, nearly a year?—with Rube’s family.”

“Where she saved my mother’s life,” inserted Rube. “She’d not bother to tell you that, but it is important.”

“Where,” repeated Mary, “I happened to have enough medicines in my kit and, for once, the right medicines, so that I was able to add my bit to Rube’s family’s physician’s efforts. He is a good doctor, Rube, and I learned from him. Very likely he’d have saved your mother without my poor efforts.”

“You learn wherever you go. Now continue or we’ll be all day at it.” He crossed his arms and leaned against the wall.

Mary cast him a
look
, sighed and continued. “The tale that I was a doctor eventually reached the ears of the headman of a tribe some distance to the south. The man had a son who was dying. He sent for me.”

“And, against all advice, she insisted she must go.”

“Rube, who tells this tale? Me or you?”

Jacob, before the tall man could retort, said, “I think you each have much to tell. Just carry on, either of you, whenever the other forgets something.”

“Very well,” said Mary. “Rube’s father organized my journey—mounts, guards, food and water…and he sent Rube to keep me safe.”

“Your cousin, Mr. Moorhead, rushes into danger never thinking it might be there. The journey was one adventure after another before we reached the headman’s region. Finally. Frankly, I’d rather hoped we’d be too late and his son already dead. It would have solved a number of problems.”

“He was not dead. Nor was there anything I or anyone could do for him. He had a wasting disease, Jacob. Someday they may discover what causes such and a means of curing that sort of illness, but just now we can do nothing for it. And so I told his father. His father refused to believe me, insisted I was merely attempting to increase the offer of recompense he’d made me.”

Rube scowled. “Since we’d already sent him word that no recompense would be asked or be necessary or accepted if offered, that didn’t make a great deal of sense.”

“Rube, the man made little sense about anything except his love for his—”

“Love? Nonsense,” interrupted Rube. “Love had no part in it. He’d sired only the one son among a multitude of daughters and now the son was dying. He was losing his heir.”

Mary bit her lip. “Perhaps.”

“Mary.”

Mary smiled a weak smile. “I know, Rube. You would say I always look for the best in people. Well, I prefer that to looking for the worst! In any case, the young man died a few days after we arrived and I was accused of poisoning him.
Murdering
him.”

“You would have laughed to see the look on her face when that accusation was thrown at her head.”

“Rube…”

His voice softened. “I know. You thought, at first, it was merely the father’s grief.” The steely look returned to Rube’s features. “Mary, my father warned you the man was insane.”

Mary sighed. “I have met all sorts in my travels but never a madman who had the power of life and death over everyone in his realm. It was, I suppose, lucky that he wished to make a public example of me because that meant a spectacle of grand proportions must be organized.”

“Which gave
me
time to organize her rescue and our escape. Believe me, that wasn’t easy. Not when the man was…” He frowned. “Mary, what was that odd word you used? The one derived from the Greek?”

“Paranoia. He was afraid of everyone surrounding him and therefore set one against another in such a way he was surrounded by more guards guarding each other than any of them guarded him. You don’t want to know the details of how Rube got me away. And if you do, it’s too bad. I don’t want to remember them. We escaped…but it was almost immediately obvious the madman sent emissaries after me. They were ordered to bring me back for punishment.”

“There were a series of attempted kidnappings before we left for England. We managed to get aboard a ship without anyone knowing, so it was some time before one of his agents discovered our new destination. After another two attempts at kidnapping, the madman’s agent organized a form of torture that would drive anyone less sane than Lady Mary straight into chains in a bedlam. If we could only find the spider in the center of the web, we might end things, but, although we’ve caught two of his minions, we’ve never managed to get one bit of information leading beyond them.”

“We will
not
use torture, Rube,” said Mary.

“Quickest way to information, my lady.”

“Assuming you can believe what you are told.”

“We’ve ways.”

“Rube…”

His mouth pulled in and then he relaxed, grinned. “I know. When in Rome and all that…”

She smiled. “Remember it.”

“Yes. It is how you delve into cultures you visit and it is a good way if you are only interested in learning. But I am interested in protecting you, in making it possible for you to live a normal life—or perhaps I should say, to return to the life you love.”

Again those listening heard wry humor.

Mary looked sad for a moment, thinking of all the places to which she wished to travel but dared not go. Not while there was still a madman insisting she be caught and returned to what he insisted was justice. She drew in a deep breath and huffed it out. Then she looked around. “Well? Now you know. Should we go?”

“Go?” Jenna blinked. “Go where?”

“Jenna, you are not stupid. Coming here, I may have put
all of you
in danger as well as myself. I should never have given into the temptation but I thought perhaps we could escape and not be followed.”

“And I think we did,” said Rube quietly. “The thing is, no matter how careful we’ve been—in the past, you know—we are always traced. Very likely, because of me. I, hm, stand out among the rest of you here in Mary’s homeland.” He cast a wry look around the room.

Jacob chuckled. “We’ve men who have complexions as dark, Rube, or even darker. Men who have spent their lives in India, for instance, and not taken care to remain out of the sun. But no one I know has dark curly hair in addition to golden skin. It is possible you are correct and that you may be the means by which Mary is traced.” Jacob, tactfully, didn’t mention Rube’s way of dressing, which was not that of an Englishman.

Rube nodded. “On this journey I was very careful to remain out of sight. We traveled straight through with nothing more than changes of horses to slow us up.”

“That explains how you got here so quickly.” Jenna’s comment was ignored.

Rube frowned. “If our enemy is as intelligent as I think, he will check for someone traveling fast. Or perhaps he has other means of tracing us. Bribery perhaps? We cannot know, but you must believe that eventually he will find us and once again organize a web of watchers around us along with the occasional hint he hasn’t forgotten us.”

“Hint?”

“He leaves…messages.”

“Your grim tone suggests they are not neatly written notes handed in at the door.”

“They are not.” Rube stared at Jacob and Jacob stared back.

“I will,” said Jacob after a moment, “pass on the word that any such, um, message is to be reported directly to me.”

“Or me.”

“Or you,” agreed Jacob absently, his mind elsewhere. “Mary, I think you must stay here. Your danger has not resulted in danger to anyone else, has it?”

“No,” said Mary, but with a doubtful note.

“But you worry?”

“Yes. I have to believe the madman will lose patience.”

“It is a cat-and-mouse game,” said the bodyguard. “Then there is something that occurred to me not too long ago. It is possible our spider doesn’t wish to capture you but is waiting for his king to die, so that he may go home without you. Getting you out of the country, secretly, would not be easy and he must know it. But in the meantime he follows his king’s orders to the letter, if not with quite the spirit intended.”

Mary sighed again. “Jenna?”

“I agree with Jacob. You must stay.” Jenna had listened to urgings whispered in her ear, insistent promises to help watch over Mary and give warning if trouble arrived. “We can, I think, keep you safer here than anywhere else… But please don’t ask me why.”

“Why do you think that?”

“I said not to ask,” she growled but then relaxed. “But I do have very good reasons.” Jenna, blushing, looked down at her hands.

Jacob gave her a sharp look but glanced away almost immediately.
Surely not
, he thought.
Surely she doesn
’
t hear that voice as well
?
My granduncle
’
s voice
? Jacob shook his head ever-so slightly. No, of course not. It was only he who had lost his mind to the point he heard voices. Voices that could not exist…

* * * * *

Melissa yawned. “You again.”

Everston sneered. “You
have
been a naughty girl, have you not?” he asked.

“I haven’t a notion what you mean.” Melissa leaned forward on one elbow and chose another bonbon, hiding her expression by doing so.

“I think you do.”

“Lord Everston, if you’ve something to say then say it.” She continued to poke through the box, searching for—well,
pretending
to search for a certain flavor.

“But it is so much more fun to drag it out,” he complained in, for him, a whimsical tone.

“I assure you, I am not in the mood for games.”

“Ah. But you were the other evening, were you not?”

Melissa tensed.
So
.
As I guessed
.
Word has gotten around
.