Whispers at Midnight (37 page)

“Mr. Sullivan!” Emma exclaimed.

A wry grin appeared on Ryne’s face as he
made a half-bow from his chair.

“Forgive me, madam, Trudy. I have let my
manners lapse. Curse of the Wicklow blood, I suppose.” He laughed
loudly.

Gardner shook his head. “Perhaps we should
find another topic if this one is going to cause my brother to cut
a sorry figure in the presence of ladies.”

***

“Bloody hell, Ryne. Just what is it you are
after here?” Gardner growled. “Must you lust for the girl right
under Amanda’s nose? Even a blackguard like you ought to have more
feeling. After what you’ve done to Amanda . . .”

Emma had sent Trudy upstairs about an hour
after dinner and then had gone to Amanda’s room with a tray.
Gardner and Ryne found themselves alone together in the study.

“Just what have I done to Amanda?” Ryne
walked slowly to the table that held a tray of crystal decanters.
He poured a generous glass of brandy for himself.

Ryne contrasted his brother like darkness to
daylight, needing only a mask to make him appear a bandit in his
black waistcoat, shirt, and breeches.

Gardner scowled as he removed and tossed
aside a coat of pale blue velvet piped in gold braid. In his tan
breeches and cream brocade waistcoat he looked totally the
gentleman in company with an irascible highwayman. He shook. Ryne
was forever exasperating.

The night was quiet and still, almost
stifling outside, but the atmosphere in the library was as charged
as the air before a storm, so great was the hostility between the
brothers.

Gardner deliberately held his temper in
check until Ryne left the table to pace across the floor. A moment
later he went to the table and poured a snifter of brandy for
himself. He took a long swallow.

“Don’t play the simpleton with me, Ryne,” he
drawled. “I know you too well. You’ve seduced the girl.”

“The devil I have.” Ryne spun around. “Is
that what she told you?”

Gardner gave him a cold look. “She told me
it wasn’t your fault. But I know your game.”

Ryne’s temper eased. He took a slow sip of
brandy.

“She admitted having been bedded?”

“She did not deny it.”

“I suppose that knowledge ended your
interest in her.”

Gardner scoffed. “That knowledge prompted me
to ask for her hand in marriage.”

“How noble you are, brother.” Ryne shrugged
nonchalantly but his eyes had become hard and cold as glass.

“When is the wedding to be?” he asked,
turning his back to Gardner and gulping the remainder of his
brandy.

“She declined.”

“She did what!”

“She declined,” he repeated. “And it’s just
as well,” he mumbled under his breath.

“What’s that?” Ryne asked.

“Nothing.” Gardner scowled. “Nothing.” He
drained the last of his brandy from the glass and set it aside. It
would have been a dreadful mistake if he had married Amanda. At
least luck had been with him that she had not agreed to his hasty
offer.

“What does this mean?” Ryne asked. “If it’s
some trick between the two of you—”

“Damn you, Ryne!” Gardner slammed his glass
to the tabletop. “I don’t know why I bothered with you. What I do
know is that I’ve enjoyed about all your company that I can stand
in one night. I’ll leave you an open road to your midnight
rendezvous with Trudy.” He laughed. “And I hope that stern-faced
aunt of hers leads you to the altar by the nose.”

Ryne glared angrily at his brother, but
Gardner had already turned his back and was storming out of the
room. Ryne cursed and kicked a leather ottoman so hard it crashed
into a bookcase and knocked two volumes from the shelf. Damn
Gardner and that green-eyed vixen. They were going to ruin his
carefully laid plans. And neither of them knew just how dangerous
that could be.

Still cursing beneath his breath, Ryne
poured himself another few swallows of brandy and drank it down
slowly. He had to be careful. Any more and he would not be
clearheaded enough to do what must be done before morning.

***

The bedroom was her cocoon, so luxurious and
plush, its pink satin and roses soothing her and shielding her
against the dark secrets she could feel in every other room of
Wicklow. Emma sensed her mood when she brought the supper tray, and
tried to comfort Amanda.

“My dear, you have worn yourself out with
worry. Don’t deny it. Rest is what you need. You have not been calm
since the theft occurred.”

Amanda sat back against the pillows. “Oh,
Emma, I wish it were only the theft I am worried about.” She closed
her eyes momentarily. “I have begun to wonder if there is not
someone who wants me to leave Wicklow. Emma,” she said, sitting up
quickly, “do you ever hear strange sounds in the house, a voice at
night?”

“Only Ezra,” Emma replied. “That bird is
everywhere with his annoying chatter.” She patted Amanda’s hand.
“Now, you hush this talk. You’re only upsetting yourself more. I’m
going to sit right here until you eat every bite of food I’ve
brought.” Her voice was gentle but insistent. “And you’re not to
stir from this bed till morning. Lots of rest,” Emma chattered on.
“That’s what you need.”

Amanda ate. Emma would allow nothing else.
Half an hour later, when Emma took the tray away, Amanda, feeling
much better, settled down into the feather mattress. Tomorrow Cecil
Baldwin would come and she could tell him what she suspected. He
was the only person who could possibly help her.

Her mind ran through all that had happened,
trying to find the answers she desperately needed. At last she gave
up the quest and slept, but it was a restless sleep fraught with
the strange whispers and dreams she had come to dread. She dreamt
an intruder slipped into her room and rambled around searching
through her dresser and desk. It was such a realistic dream that
she could hear the clatter of bottles being knocked together and
the scrape of wood on wood as drawers were pulled slowly open.

She tossed upon her pillow and whimpered.
Another sound came, one that was at odds with the thumping and
bumping in her dream. It sounded like a moaning gush of wind
blowing through the door. She shivered and pulled the covers
tightly around her as the draft made an icy trail over her bed. The
room shook as if a whirlwind spun inside the darkness.

Amanda heard a muffled cry of fright, the
sound of hurried footsteps, and then, from another quarter, the
soft, whispered calling of her name.

She felt a touch on her brow, a hand as soft
and gentle as her mother’s had been. Once again there was the
whispered calling of her name and then a deep, peaceful slumber
that lasted until the sun teased her awake with thin, gay ribbons
of early-dawn light slipping through the windows.

Jasmine. She smelled jasmine scent so
strongly the room might have been doused with it. The smell was
overpowering. Amanda rubbed the sleep from her eyes and climbed out
of bed. She pulled on a wrapper and hurriedly lit a candle. The sun
had only just begun to paint bright bands of amber and orange in
the morning sky.

At first she noticed nothing unusual in the
room, but as her eyes went to the dressing table she saw that a box
of powder had been upset and the bottle of jasmine scent overturned
and spilled. She was pondering how the disturbance could have
happened, projecting herself back into that peculiar dream of last
night, when she noticed that the door to her bedroom was not
completely shut.

All her fears and uncertainties came
plummeting at her. Emma had shut the door. Amanda struggled to
think logically. Perhaps Emma had not fastened it securely and
during the night it had swung open of its own accord. Any other
night she would have made sure the key was turned in the lock. But
last night she had been so upset she had forgotten.

The only solution she was willing to accept
was that while the door was open Ezra had flown in and knocked over
the bottle. That would account for the sounds that had disturbed
her. She smiled faintly. At least this puzzle had a simple
solution.

Amanda started for the windows to open them
more. The room needed a good airing. But at once she stopped as if
frozen. She had an inclination to cry. It had not been Ezra in her
room, though she wished fervently that it had been so.

Ezra could not possibly have carried away
the old ship’s log that was missing from her desk.

Though it seemed an endless time, only a few
minutes had passed since she climbed out of bed. She hastened to
shut the door that still stood mockingly ajar. But as she stood
there so near the corridor, she could hear the sound of someone
moving around in the hall below. She was thinking of the intruder
and wondering if it might be that same person moving stealthily
through the house.

Without considering the consequences, she
found herself hurrying silently to the stairs. She tied the blue
silk wrapper tightly around her waist as she went. But when she
arrived at the landing that overlooked the wide entrance hall, she
saw no one.

“
Amandaa . . .”
It was the strange,
distant whisper she had heard in her dreams. The sound floated and
fell to silence in the circles of light that streamed in from the
three round windows above the door.

Awestruck, Amanda clutched the rail near the
spot where the Turkish King’s head rose. Her fear was gone but she
felt a peculiar sensation sweeping over her in its stead. The
prickling on the back of her neck was there as it had been when she
knelt at Jubal Wicklow’s grave. Below her on the dark slate floor,
three circles of light met and merged and sped as one to the base
of the Turkish King.

Amanda stood there a long while watching as
the sun rose higher in the sky and the circle of light traveled up
until the face of the king was bathed in the bright light of
morning. The glass eyes caught the beam and glowed like tiny suns
themselves. The spectacle lasted only a moment before the fall of
light changed and the hall once again looked totally ordinary.

She leaned over the rail, staring at the
fierce face of the Turkish King.

“Guardian,” she murmured. “Guardian of
what?”

She did not hear the light step behind her
and was not aware anyone had approached until she felt the slight
pressure of someone standing dreadfully close.

“It’s a long way down,” Ryne whispered in
her ear, his arms wrapping around her and his hands clamping over
hers on the rail. She felt the heat of him searing through the thin
silk wrapper as he lined his body against hers. A shudder of fear
ran through her.

Ryne laughed huskily as he felt the tremor
of her small frame against his thighs and chest.

He turned her in his arms so that she faced
him, but still she was pressed tightly against the banister.

“Let me go, Ryne.” She pushed ineffectually
at his chest.

“I want to talk,” he whispered, and pressed
his lips to her throat.

“There is nothing for us to say, Ryne,” she
murmured unsteadily as her hands gripped his shirt.

“Gardner—” he started, but was interrupted
by the loud sound of knocking from the front door.

Ryne released her and she hurried down the
stairs while he stood and watched from above.

“Who’s there?” she asked.

“Cecil Baldwin,” came the answer. “I am
sorry to have arrived so early, but—”

Amanda flung open the door. “Oh, Mr.
Baldwin, I am so very glad to see you. Do come in.” His kind face
was like a beacon and she quickly ushered him inside. “Will you
wait while I go up and change? There are things I must discuss with
you right away.”

They had almost reached the drawing room
door when Amanda stopped and cried out. There beside the base of
the Turkish King lay Ezra’s limp body. Amanda bent down and picked
it up. The curved beak was open slightly, the head hanging down
from a twisted neck.

He was dead.

“Bury the bird near Jubal Wicklow’s grave,”
Amanda instructed Groom. With a look of sadness the old man took
the creature from the house. He promised to construct a small box
in the barn and then comply with her wishes.

Gussie was distraught. It was she who had
cared for Ezra over the years and she was heartbroken that the bird
had met with a sad end.

“He was old,” Ryne insisted. “Probably died
there where he perched on the king’s shoulder and toppled off.”

“His neck was wrung,” Amanda said
flatly.

“Wrung,” echoed Trudy, whose face had gone
remarkably white. Trudy and Emma had come down shortly after Mr.
Baldwin arrived.

“Or simply broken from the long fall,” Ryne
suggested.

“It was wrung,” Amanda said bluntly. She
looked accusingly at Ryne, only to see that his dark eyes were
flashing a warning. “It’s a long way down,” he said only a few
minutes ago.

“Nonsense, my dear.” Emma placed an arm
comfortingly around Amanda’s shoulder. “You are overwrought. You
were too fond of the bird. Nobody would have hurt the poor
creature. Certainly no one here.”

Amanda was prevailed upon to go to her room
and dress. She ascended the stairs slowly. She could not escape
thinking how wrong Emma was. Someone had killed Ezra. But who would
kill a harmless bird who did nothing more alarming that flutter
overhead and mock the people he heard?

Or was that the cause of it? Had Ezra
imitated words that were meant to be secret? Had someone in the
house thought Ezra’s chatter so dangerous?

“Amanda,” Cecil Baldwin called to her as he
emerged from the drawing room, followed by Emma and Trudy. “You are
looking much better.”

Amanda was dressed in a sunny yellow gown of
chintz that had a bodice laced with pale green velvet ribbon. She
had brushed her hair until it shone and, with a matching ribbon,
tied it back in a cascade of curls. The dress had been chosen to
offset her mood. She did not want anyone to see how successful this
latest attempt to frighten her had been.