Princes Trilogy: The Leopard Prince Part 31

Harry took out his knife. Dragging a chair over beneath the corpse, he climbed up and cut the rope. Janie slumped, suddenly freed from her self-imposed punishment. He caught the body and gently lowered her to the ground. As he did so, he felt something small and hard fall out of Janie's pocket. He bent to look and saw one of his own carvings: a duck. Quickly, he palmed the little bird. Had Janie been placing his carvings at the poisonings all along? Why? Had she meant to set him against Granville? Perhaps she'd seen Harry as her instrument of revenge. Harry darted a glance at d.i.c.k, but the older man was simply staring into the face of his dead sister. It would only grieve d.i.c.k further to tell him Janie had meant for Harry to take the blame for her crimes. Harry pocketed the duck.

"Ta, Harry," d.i.c.k said. He took off his ap.r.o.n and covered his sister's distorted face.

"I'm sorry." Harry laid his hand on the other man's shoulder.

d.i.c.k nodded, grief overtaking him again.

Harry turned to join Bennet. The last sight he had of d.i.c.k Crumb was the big man bending, a mountain of sorrow, over the slight form of his sister's body.

Behind them, the water hemlocks danced gracefully.

"THERE CERTAINLY HAS BEEN a lot of traveling of late," Euphie murmured, smiling benignly around the carriage. "Back and forth between Yorks.h.i.+re and London. Why, it seems that everyone barely draws breath before they rush off again. I don't believe I remember so much coming and going since, well, since ever."

Violet sighed, shook her head slightly, and gazed out the window. Tiggle, sitting with Violet, looked puzzled. And George, scrunched next to Euphie on the same seat, closed her eyes and gripped the tin basin she'd brought along just in case. I will not cast up. I will not cast up. I will not cast up.The carriage lurched around the corner, jostling her against the rain-streaked window. She decided abruptly that her stomach was better with her eyes open.

"This is ridiculous," Violet huffed, and folded her arms. "If you're going to marry, anyway, I simply do not see what is wrong with Mr. Pye. He likes you, after all. I'm sure we can help him if he has trouble with his Hs."

His Hs? "You were the one who thought he was a sheep murderer." She was getting tired of the almost universal disapproval aimed at her head.

One would think Harry a veritable saint from the shocked reaction of her servants at her decampment. Even Greaves had stood on the Woldsly steps, the rain trickling off his long nose, staring mournfully at her as she climbed into the carriage.

"That was before," Violet said with unarguable logic. "I haven't thought him the poisoner for at least three weeks."

"Oh, Lord."

"My lady," Euphie exclaimed. "We should, as gentlewomen, never take the good Lord's name in vain. I am sure it was a mistake on your part."

Violet stared at Euphie in exaggerated astonishment while beside her Tiggle rolled her eyes. George sighed and rested her head on the cus.h.i.+ons.

"And besides, Mr. Pye is quite handsome." Violet wasn't going to let go of this argument. Ever. "For a land steward. You aren't likely to find a nicer one."

"Land steward or husband?" George asked nastily.

"Are you contemplating marriage, my lady?" Euphie inquired. Her eyes opened wide, like an interested pigeon.

"No!" George said.

Which was almost drowned out by Violet's "Yes!"

Euphie blinked rapidly. "Marriage is a hallowed state, becoming to even the most respectable of ladies. Of course, I myself have never experienced that heavenly communion with a gentleman, but that is not to say that I do not wholeheartedly endorse its rites."

"You're going to have to marry someone," Violet said. She gestured cra.s.sly toward George's abdomen. "Unless you intend to take a protracted tour of the continent."

"Broadening the mind by travel-" Euphie started.

"I have no intention of touring the continent." George cut Euphie off before she could gather wind and babble about traveling until they reached London. "Perhaps I could marry Cecil Barclay."

"Cecil!" Violet gaped at her sister as if she'd announced her intention of wedding a codfish. One would think Violet would be a little more sympathetic, considering her own near predicament. "Have you gone raving mad? You'll trample Cecil as if he were a fluffy bunny rabbit."

"What do you mean?" George swallowed and pressed her hand to her belly. "You make me sound like a harpy."

"Well, now that you mention it . . ."

George narrowed her eyes.

"Mr. Pye is quiet, but at least he never backed down from you." Violet's eyes widened. "Have you considered what he'll do when he finds out you've run away from him? It's the silent ones who have the worst tempers, you know."

"I don't know where you get these melodramatic ideas. And besides, I haven't run away." George ignored her sister, pointedly glancing around the carriage, which was presently b.u.mping out of Yorks.h.i.+re. "And I don't think he will do anything." Her stomach rolled at the thought of Harry finding her gone.

Violet looked doubtful. "Mr. Pye didn't strike me as the kind of man to just sit back and let his woman find another man to marry."

"I am not Mr. Pye's woman."

"I'm not sure what else you would call it-"

"Violet!" George clutched the tin basin under her chin. I will not cast up. I will not cast up. I will no- "Are you feeling quite the thing, my lady?" Euphie piped. "Why, you look almost green. Do you know, your mother bore that exact same face when she was"-the companion leaned forward and hissed as if a gentleman might somehow hear her inside the moving carriage-"increas-ing with Lady Violet." Euphie sat back and blushed a bright pink. "But of course that can't be your problem."

Violet stared at Euphie as if mesmerized.

Tiggle buried her face in her hands.

And George groaned. She was going to die before she made it to London.

"WHAT DO YOU MEAN SHE'S GONE?" Harry tried to keep his voice even. He stood in the front hall of Woldsly. He'd come here to see his lady, only to have the butler tell him that she'd left over an hour ago.

Greaves backed up a step. "Exactly that, Mr. Pye." The butler cleared his throat. "Lady Georgina accompanied by Lady Violet and Miss Hope left quite early this morning for London.""The h.e.l.l you say." Had she received urgent news about a relative, maybe one of her brothers?

"Mr. Pye." The butler drew himself up in offense.

"I've had a very hard night, Mr. Greaves." And a harder morning. Harry pa.s.sed a hand over his aching forehead. "Was a letter brought to my lady? Or a rider? Did a rider come bearing some kind of news?"

"No. Not that it is any concern of yours, Mr. Pye." Greaves stared down his thin nose. "Now, if I may show you the door?"

Harry took two quick steps and grabbed the butler by the s.h.i.+rtfront. One step more and he slammed the man against the wall, cracking the plaster. "As it happens, what my lady does is my concern." Harry leaned close enough to smell the powder on Greaves's wig. "She's carrying my child and will soon be my wife. Is that understood?"

The butler nodded, sending a fine dusting of powder onto his shoulders.

"Good." Harry released the other man.

What would make her leave so suddenly? Frowning, he took the curving main stairs two at a time and headed down the long hall to his lady's room. Had he missed something? Said the wrong thing? The problem with women was that it could be d.a.m.n near anything.

Harry threw open the bedroom door, scaring a maid cleaning out the hearth. He strode to Lady Georgina's vanity table. The top had been cleared. He opened drawers and flung them shut just as fast. They were empty save for a few hairpins and a forgotten handkerchief. The maid scurried from the room. Harry straightened from the vanity and surveyed the room. The wardrobe doors stood ajar and empty. A lone candlestick sat on the table by her bed. The bed itself had already been stripped. There wasn't anything to indicate where she'd gone.

He quit the room and ran back down the stairs, knowing the servants were aware of his movements. He knew he must seem a madman, racing about the manor and claiming the daughter of an earl as his bride. Well, d.a.m.n them all to h.e.l.l. He wasn't backing down. She was the one who had brought it this far. She'd laid down the gauntlet and then run for it. This time around he wasn't going to wait for her to come to her senses. Who knew how long it would take her to get over whatever snit she'd gotten herself into? He might be a commoner, he might be poor, but by G.o.d, he was going to be Lady Georgina's husband, and his wife needed to learn that she couldn't just light out every time she got a bee in her bonnet.

Harry mounted the poor mare, already half asleep, and turned her in the direction of his own little cottage. He'd pack the barest essentials. If he was fast, he might catch her before Lincoln.

Five minutes later, he opened the door to his cottage, thinking about what to bring, but all thought stopped when he saw the table. The leopard stood on it. Harry picked up the carved animal. It was exactly the same as the last time he'd seen it in her palm. Except that it was no longer in a cage.

She'd set the leopard free.

He stared at the wooden creature in his hands for a minute, rubbing his thumb over the smooth back he'd so carefully whittled. Then he looked at the table again. There was a note. He picked it up with a shaking hand.

My Dear Harry, I'm sorry. I never meant to cage you. I see now that it wouldn't be right for me to force myself on you. I'll take care of matters myself. Enclosed is something I had drawn up when last in London.

-Georgina The second paper was a legal doc.u.ment. Lady Georgina had given him the Woldsly estate.

No.

Harry reread the fine script. The doc.u.ment remained the same.

No. No. No. He crumpled the paper in his fist. Did she hate him that much? Hate him enough to give up part of her inheritance to get him out of her life? He sank into a chair and stared at the balled sc.r.a.p in his hand. Perhaps she'd finally come to her senses. Finally realized how very far beneath her he lay. If so, there would be no redemption for him. He laughed, but it came out more a sob, even to his own ears. He'd spent the last weeks pus.h.i.+ng Lady Georgina away, but even as he'd done so, he'd known.

She was the one.

The one and only lady for him in this lifetime. If she left him, there would be no other. And he'd thought that was fine. His life had been adequate up until now, hadn't it? He could continue without her. But somehow in the last weeks she had burrowed into his life. Into him. And the things she had offered him so casually, a wife and family, a home, those things had become like meat and wine put before a man who had eaten only bread and water his entire life.

Vital.

Harry looked down at the crushed piece of paper and realized that he was afraid. Afraid he couldn't make this right. Afraid he'd never be whole again.

Afraid he'd lost his lady and their child.

TWO HORSES.

Silas snorted and kicked a still-smoldering beam. Two horses out of a stable of nine and twenty. Even Thomas's last act had been a p.i.s.s-poor one; he'd managed to save only the pair of nags before succ.u.mbing to the flames. The air was thick with the stench of burned meat. Some of the men pulling out the carca.s.ses were gagging, despite the scarves they wore over their mouths. Like little girls they were, whining over the stink and filth.Silas looked at the remains of the great Granville stables. A heap of smoking debris now. All because of a deranged woman, so Bennet said. A pity she'd taken her own life. It would've set a nice example for the local peasants had she been fodder for the hangman. But in the end, perhaps he would've thanked the crazy wench. She'd murdered his elder son, which made Bennet his heir now. No more jaunting off to London for that young man. As the heir, he would have to stay at Granville House and learn how to run the estates. Silas curled his upper lip back in a grin. He had Bennet now. The boy might buck and paw, but he knew his duty. The heir to Granville must oversee the estates.

A rider clattered into the yard. Silas nearly choked when he saw who it was. "Get out! Get out, you young cur!" How dare Harry Pye just dance onto Granville land? Silas started for the horse and rider.

Pye dismounted his horse without even looking in his direction. "Out of my way, old man." He started for the house.

"You!" Fury clogged Silas's throat. He turned to the gawking workmen. "Seize him! Throw him off my land, d.a.m.n you!"

"Try it," Pye spoke softly behind him.

Several of the men backed up, the cowards. Silas turned and saw that Pye had a long, thin knife in his left hand.

The bounder pivoted in his direction. "How about acting for yourself, Granville?"

Silas stood still, clenching and unclenching his fists. Had he been twenty years younger, he wouldn't have hesitated. His chest burned.

"No?" Pye sneered. "Then you won't mind if I have a word with your son." He ran up the steps to Granville House and disappeared inside.

Filthy, common lout. Silas backhanded the servant nearest him. The man was caught off guard and went down. The other workmen stared at their fellow wallowing in the stable yard muck. One offered his hand to the man on the ground.

"You're all sacked after this day's work," Silas said, and didn't wait to hear the grumbling behind him.

He mounted his own stairs, rubbing at the fire in his chest. He'd throw the b.a.s.t.a.r.d out himself if it killed him. He didn't have far to go. Entering the great hall, he could hear men's voices coming from the front room where Thomas's body had been laid out.

Silas swung the door open, banging it against the wall.

Pye and Bennet looked up from where they stood near the table bearing Thomas's charred corpse. Bennet deliberately turned away from his father. "I can go with you, but I'll have to see Thomas properly buried first." His voice was a whispered rasp from the fire.

"Of course. My horse will need to rest after last night, anyway," Pye replied.

"Now wait just a minute," Silas interrupted the cozy pair. "You're not going anywhere, Bennet. Especially not with this b.a.s.t.a.r.d."

"I'll go where I want."

"No, you'll not," Silas said. The burning pain was spreading to his arm. "You're the heir to Granville now. You'll stay right here if you want a penny more from me."

Bennet finally looked up. Silas had never seen such hatred in another man's eyes. "I don't want a penny or anything else from you. I'm traveling to London as soon as Thomas has been decently buried."

"With him?" Silas jerked his head in Pye's direction, but he didn't wait for an answer. "So your baseborn blood has begun to tell, has it?"

Both men turned.

Silas grinned in satisfaction. "Your mother was a wh.o.r.e, you know that, don't you? I wasn't even the first she'd cuckolded John Pye with. That woman had an itch that just couldn't be scratched by one man. If she hadn't died so soon, she'd be spreading her legs in the gutter right now, just to feel a c.o.c.k."

"She may have been a faithless lying wh.o.r.e, but she was a saint compared to you," Pye said.

Silas laughed. He couldn't help it. What a joke! The boy must have no idea. He gasped for breath. "Can't you do sums, lad? Must not be something they teach in the poorhouse, eh?" Another chuckle shook him. "Well let me spell it out for you, nice and slow. Your mother came here before you were conceived. You're as likely my son as John Pye's. More like, the way she panted after me."

"No." Strangely, Pye showed no reaction. "You may well have planted the seed in my mother, but John Pye and only John Pye was my father."

"Father," Silas spat. "I doubt John Pye was even capable of getting a woman with child."

For a moment Silas thought Pye would go for his throat, and his heart leapt painfully. But the b.a.s.t.a.r.d turned aside and walked to the window, as if Silas were not worth the effort.

Silas scowled and gestured scornfully. "Do you see what I saved you from, Bennet?"

"Saved me?" His son opened his mouth as if laughing, but no sound came out. "Saved me how? By bringing me to this mausoleum? By putting me in the tender care of your b.i.t.c.h of a wife? A woman who must have felt the sting of her humiliation every single time she looked at me? By favoring me over Thomas so there was no way we would ever have a normal relations.h.i.+p?" Bennet was shouting hoa.r.s.ely now. "By banis.h.i.+ng Harry, my brother? G.o.d! Tell me, Father, how exactly have you saved me?"

"You walk out that door, boy, and I'll never welcome you back, heir or no." The pain in his chest was back again. Silas rubbed his breastbone. "You'll get no more money, no more help from me. You'll starve in a ditch."

"Fine." Bennet turned away. "Harry, Will is in the kitchen. I can have my bags packed in a half hour."

"Bennet!" The word felt as if it were ripped from Silas's lungs.

His son walked away from him.

"I've killed for you, boy." d.a.m.n it, he would not go groveling after his own son.

Bennet turned, a look of mingled horror and loathing on his face. "You what?"

"Murdered for you." Silas thought he bellowed, but the words weren't as loud as before.

"Jesus Christ. Did he say he murdered someone?" Bennet's voice seemed to float around him.