The Scoundrel's Secret Siren (2 page)

“Oh, long ago, Miss Lorelei. In my grandmother’
s mother’s day, or even earlier.”

“How diverting! There is certainly much to be said for a real ghost over a ghost in a novel.”

Nell left them to return to her duties and Constance tremulously picked up her tea. It had grown dark in the garden while they had been talking and she darted a nervous glance outside while a footman came in to draw the curtains and light the candles.

“What a heart-wrenching and ghastly tale
. That poor lady,” Constance said at last.

“
Oh, yes. I agree. It is a very horrid way for things to end – to die like that on a deserted road in the middle of the Surrey countryside.”

“Do you suppose there is really a ghost?”

“I wouldn’t know…” Lorelei trailed off thoughtfully. “What we need is a nice clear night with the moon out from behind those tiresome clouds – a perfect night for ghost sighting, if ever there was one! There really is only one way to find out for certain.”

Constance stared at her a moment, before paling further. “Oh, no, Lorelei! You don’t mean that you want to go out there, after dark
, and search for ghosts. It is very frightening out there. And what would Miss Fallon think?”

“But it is the only way
to find out for ourselves, dear. Oh! I won’t say a word and Miss Fallon will never be any the wiser. And I am not afraid,” brushing a blonde curl out of her eyes, Lorelei smiled at her sister. “Do take heart, Constance. I am not asking you to come with me. I will need you to keep watch.”

The following days were very dismal, however, with
no chance of a clear night. Constance found relief in the thought that by the time the rain had ceased the idea would have gone out of Lorelei’s head. Lorelei, however, spent her time laying plans for her upcoming adventure. She decided that she would wear her black riding habit and hat, and pin on a veil so that no one should recognise her. She was glad that Ronald, the head groom, was a heavy sleeper – a fact fortuitously overheard from one of his underlings, and was not likely to wake when she sneaked out her mare, Tulip.

It was four days later that Constance finally confronted h
er. The rain had abated and they were taking a quiet ride about the estate. Lorelei’s groom, Pierson, rode a way behind, allowing the sisters to speak without fear of being overheard. Lorelei would have preferred to take a nice, brisk, gallop, but Constance was not much of a horsewoman and did not enjoy going above a sedate walk.

“There’s
something on your mind, Lorelei. I can tell, you know – you get a faint frown when you are up to no good,” she observed. “I hope you are not still thinking of that ghost story or whatever madcap scheme you may have cooked up that night!”

Catching the anxious expression on her sister’s face,
Lorelei laughed. “Oh, don’t look like that, dearest. It is nothing bad!  Only consider, soon I will be presented and the Season will begin, and I will have no choice but to settle down into a respectable marriage to some dreadful bore of a gentleman – just like the ghost! And then it will be too late.
I
don’t have an officer to elope with, you know. I am not even certain how one would go about finding one. Though, otherwise, you could say that we are kindred spirits. But I have thought about it, and decided that an adventure will be just the thing. The Season will be upon us soon, and then it is only a matter of time before I must succumb to the inevitable and marry some rich dullard.”

Constance shook her head, bewildered
and alarmed. “But I thought you wished to go to town?”

“And so I do! But it has only recently occurred to me how brief and small an excitement that will be compared to the life I will spend ordering a manor and being a great lady. Unless
, of course, I end a spinster, which is just as likely, you know. I am no great beauty.”

“Oh, don’t say that! I am certain you will take very well, and you won’t think it so boring
then
to have a gentleman offer for you.”

“But I’m not
very certain I would mind being a spinster all that much! I have enough of a fortune from Mama to be comfortable. And I will have a lot more time for novels, and adventures, then.”

Con looked horrified.
“You’re teasing me. Adventures? I know you would not really wish a life of infamy. But what is it you have been plotting?”

“I
have decided on a dark gown and a veil to cover my face. For I mean to sneak out tonight, if all goes well and the weather stays clear, and see for myself this ghost of Paddlington Road.”

Constance turned to stare at her as if she had gone insane. “I beg your pardon? Lorelei, have you taken leave of your senses?
I thought,
I hoped,
you were quizzing me! To go riding alone, at night? Aside from the fact that you would be quite ruined and in disgrace if discovered, before you have even been presented, there are many other dangers to consider!” her voice hushed, the younger lady sounded scandalised by this latest trick of her sister’s.

“
I have told you, I will wear a veil and I will not be discovered! Don’t worry yourself so much, my dear. It is only one night, to do something I would never do otherwise. And there might not even be a passing carriage or anyone that might spot me at all. We are quite in the country, you know.”

“Your mare might take fright or throw you! You have never ridden in the dark. You might get lost!”

“Tulip is the gentlest horse on Earth, Con. You know she will obey me, and I am an excellent horsewoman. How could I get lost, when I will be following the road?” She gave her sister a pacifying smile.

“There might be bandits! What then?”

“Bandits? Here? I shouldn’t think there will be. But I will take father’s pistol, just in case, if it will be a comfort to you.”

“But you
don’t know how to use it!”

“I have seen father honing his aim!” Lorelei insisted defensively. “And these bandits of yours won’t know that I have never shot a pistol before.”

When Constance still looked unconvinced, Lorelei sighed. “Please, Con. This is my
only
chance to do anything interesting before I must succumb to matrimony and old age. I need your help.”

Con hesitated a moment, anxiously brushing a ringlet behind her ear.
“Oh, very well. But I am still certain that this is a very bad idea. And you must not be gone long.”

“
Thank you.” Lorelei said warmly, very happy that she had a sister to aid and abet her.

*

It was very dark outside when Lorelei led Tulip, saddled and eager to be free of her stall, past the verge at the back of the house, where the sound of their passing was unlikely to be heard by anyone. She was dressed in her black riding habit, hat and veil, with the silver of her mother’s moonstone pendant against the pale skin the only colour on her person.

“Oh, Lorelei, this is not right!” Constance whispered urgently, coming closer to her sister. She had come out to keep watch and her apprehension has been growing steadily since Lorelei h
ad put on her riding dress. “What if there really is a ghost? I think you ought not to go!”

Lorelei, patted her sister’s arm. “I am not afraid of the ghost. And I won’t give it up and go back inside either. Don’t fret, Con! I won’t be very long!” with those confident words, the young woman squeezed
at the sides of her horse and took off into the night.

*

Lorelei thought that the ladylike reaction would have been to become frightened by the silence and the gloom, and hurry back home. A lady would even have learned not to be quite so fast in the future. But she found that she did not mind the dark – it made ghost hunting more exciting. She carefully picked her path along the carriage track which led away from the estate until, at last, she stood on a stretch of road not far from where the carriage had apparently turned over all those decades ago, under a towering old oak. She was fully prepared to feel a chill or hear whispers or weeping. Lorelei waited in quiet anticipation. It was very quiet, but she did not see anything remotely ghostly, and felt rather disappointed. She was about to resignedly turn Tulip back in the direction of the manor. Suddenly, Lorelei heard voices.

“The devil confound
it!” a masculine voice swore. It was a low and cultured voice despite its obvious vexation.

“They said down in the village that this road is haunted, my lord,” a second masculine voice said,
with a curious mixture of politeness and amusement.

“And I suppose you’re warning me not to wake the spirits with my own wrath, Howe
.” The low velvet chuckle sent a shiver down Lorelei’s spine, but she ignored this strange reaction. Men! She realised there were men on the road – at least, they were certainly not ghosts. She really ought to turn her horse, she knew. But they did not sound like highwaymen.

Curiosity, magnified by
too many weeks cooped up with nothing but tales of adventure, proved impossible to overcome. She cautiously proceeded forward.

She saw them before they caught sight of her approach, so preoccupied were
they with the overturned curricle. From what she could see in the dark, it was a very sporting vehicle and she could not for the life of her understand why anyone would drive something so precarious along a country road at night.

“Well, I am certainly lost now, Howe.
Cressley is sure to be back at the club this very moment, enjoying his supper and victory. Most likely, thoroughly foxed.” Having uttered this perplexing sentence, the man looked up, straight at Lorelei, who had stopped on the road.

“What’s this!” He
straightened at the sight of her, and she could see that he was tall and broad of shoulder. The second man, obviously some sort of retainer, gave a momentary start. “It seems I have roused your ghost after all, Howe. Good night, Lady Ghost.” The cool amusement in his voice left no doubt that he did not for a moment believe her to be an apparition. She got the perplexing notion that his eyes were appreciatively taking in her appearance, but surely such a thing was impossible, not to mention improper!

Lorelei knew a moment of panic at the thought o
f recognition, before she remembered her veil and the fact that if she could not see the stranger’s features, he would not be able to see hers.

“Perhaps,” she ventured with sass she most definitely did not feel, “it is you, sir, who are the apparition, waiting to lure me to my grave.”
Daringly, she drew nearer, the hoof beats a slow and steady rhythm on the empty road.

Alastair Tilbury, the sixth
Earl of Winbourne, took in the shape of the woman on the horse. Her face was hidden and he could see little of her figure under the dark cloak she wore. Despite himself, Winbourne was intrigued.

“Ah, but I am not a mysterious apparition on a dark roa
d, merely a hapless traveller with a broken carriage.”

“Well, sir, if you were so foolish a
s to drive a curricle down a country road at night, I can only say that the fault is entirely yours.” Lorelei could not believe her own ears when she found that she was flirting with the man!

“It was for a wager, my l
ady Ghost, and it would have been unsporting to refuse it.”

“You are a Corinthian then.”

“Unashamedly, I am.”

The humour in his voice drew her in. “Well, you would be interested to know, perhaps, unless you
wish
to spend the night guarding your curricle, that there is a village not three miles down the road, and you might ask for horses at the inn, or perhaps lodging. I suppose I ought to offer to take you there on my horse.” It was, she knew, a very fast thing to do – to ride off alone into the night with a strange man, but she sensed no danger from him, despite his unfortunate habit of making foolish wagers. It would surely be worse to leave him.

He paused a moment, considering
, before nodding quickly. “It seems a very fine solution. Howe, stay here with the horses – I shall send a man from the village. And take care you don’t draw the attention of any other ghosts that might happen this way. They may not be so benevolent.”

The valet took this parting shot with his usual
good humour. “Take care, sir.”

Alastair wasted no time flinging himself on the horse behind her, and Lor
elei gave a startled gasp as a spicy scent that could only be his assailed her senses at the same time as a strong arm slid around her waist. It was an action that under any other circumstances, in her own identity as Miss Lorelei Lindon, ought to have caused outrage. A gentleman ought never to take such a liberty. But she was not Lorelei Lindon just then, and so she allowed herself to enjoy the unfamiliar sensation.

“Since I am convinced that you are in no way a ghost, my dear apparition, I wonder if you will tell me what you are really doing o
ut on the country road at night?”

“Perhaps you are mistaken to put your trust in me, and I
am
a ghost, luring you into a cold grave by the wayside?” She would never usually have dared speak thus to any gentleman.