Murder at Keyhaven Castle Page 10

  “I’ve known you to go to great lengths to skip Mother’s social events,” Lyndy said, tucking a soaked strand of hair behind her ear. His fingers trembled, and she could feel the pulse of his racing heart against her. “But this? However did you arrange for a lightning strike?”

  Stella smiled at him, relishing this moment alone.

  “I noticed you willingly followed me, my lord,” she teased when he bent his head to kiss her. His lips were warm, and surprisingly dry. He slipped his hand into her hair as if hoping to pull her even closer. And then distant thunder crackled, and the horses whinnied again.

  “We need to go calm the horses,” she said against Lyndy’s lips.

  Lyndy blinked slowly and sighed. His cheeks were flush; he too was breathing hard. “That’s not all I need to calm.” He spoke so softly, Stella wasn’t sure he’d said it.

  He laced his fingers with hers once more, and they walked toward the stalls that housed the horses. They passed a window, and the fire outside cast a glow across Lyndy’s features. He’d never looked so handsome. Another horse whinnied.

  “They’re still afraid,” she added.

  And so was she. She knew so little about Pistol Prescott’s intentions. Had the threat of violence died with him? Or was Lyndy, or someone he loved, still in danger?

  Stella quickened her step, longing to comfort and be comforted by Tully, her beloved horse.

  CHAPTER 11

  “Gentlemen,” Baron Branson-Hill said when Lyndy and the men clustered together under umbrellas held up by the footmen. A little rain wasn’t going to stop this private showing.

  After returning from the stables, Mother, to both their surprise, excused Stella from attending dinner. Whether Mother worried about Stella’s health this close to the wedding, didn’t want to interrupt the flow of the evening by waiting for Stella to change, or was content enough in Mrs. Swenson’s company, Lyndy couldn’t say. But he was glad of it. Stella needed the evening to get warm; he needed the evening to cool down. In the stables, his desire almost got the best of him.

  Only three, no, two more days, Lyndy thought, when Finn, his valet, helped him into dry clothes. And then the baron had arrived, having laid up in Rosehurst during the worst of the storm—a welcome, well-timed distraction indeed.

  “May I present the winner of the 1905 St. Leger Stakes . . .” The baron, as thin as a hat stand but filling the space with his presence, paused for dramatic effect. “And my latest acquisition, Challacombe.”

  Challacombe sauntered down the ramp of his horse wagon, following Leonard, the head groom’s lead, as if expecting to be applauded. Considering the horse’s lustrous bay coat, exquisite muscle tone, and white star on its forehead, Lyndy nearly obliged. The animal was a stunner.

  “Well, I’ll be,” Jed Kendrick said. “That horse is a beauty.”

  “Here, here, Baron,” Owen said. “He’s lovely.”

  “Yes, absolutely magnificent,” Sir Alfred agreed.

  Challacombe, head held high despite the rain, swished his tail and basked in the attention. Lyndy whispered to Leonard, who slipped him the nub of a peppermint stick, a treat for the horses, thanks to Stella. All their horses loved it. Would this champion racehorse enjoy it too? Lyndy stepped out from under the umbrella and approached the horse. Challacombe eyed him cautiously, snorting a warning until Lyndy slipped his open palm under the horse’s giant, soft lips. After one sniff, the horse lapped up the peppermint and nudged Lyndy’s hand for more.

  “Yes, a fine specimen,” Theo Swenson said, stroking his beard. “I know now, Elijah, why you wanted me to see him. Now I am sorry to have missed the St. Leger Stakes.”

  Baron Branson-Hill beamed with pride at this barrage of compliments. “He is the highlight of my collection.”

  “I always thought you were a nincompoop,” Stella’s father said, wiping the proud look from the baron’s face.

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “I said, you are a nincompoop.”

  “I think the baron heard very well what you said, Mr. Kendrick,” Lyndy said.

  “Yes, indeed, milord, I did. But why, may I ask, Mr. Kendrick, do you insult me in this way?”

  “Because you don’t know a horse’s ass from its elbow.”

  “Kendrick!” Lyndy chided. “Take care, man.”

  “Is that kind of talk necessary, Elijah?” Theo Swenson said.

  “You’re right, Theo,” Mr. Kendrick conceded. “You’ve got yourself a fine Thoroughbred here, Branson-Hill.”

  The baron’s shoulders relaxed, and he combed his fingers through his thinning brown hair. “Well, I should say so. The stallion is a champion, after all. And I’ll admit I paid a tidy sum for him.”

  “That’s what I’m talking about,” Mr. Kendrick said. “You’ve been had, Baron. That horse is a ringer.”

  “What?” A chorus of protests mingled with the pattering of the rain under the hollow of the umbrellas.

  “Are you suggesting someone has switched this horse for Challacombe?” Lyndy asked. Much the same as what Jesse Prescott did in Kentucky? Could it be a coincidence?

  “I say!” The baron crossed his arms across his chest, his fists clenched. “How dare you say such a thing. I know of no man who would stoop to such ungentlemanly behavior.”

  “Good for you, Baron, that you keep such admirable company,” Mr. Kendrick said. “But whatever you say, I say you’ve been cheated.”

  “It takes one to know one,” Jed Kendrick muttered.

  “What’s that, Jed? Did you say something?” his brother said.

  “I said you should know. Since ya cheated me out my rightful inheritance.”

  “Not that again,” Mr. Kendrick sighed as if this were a long-standing feud.

  “What think you, Lord Lyndhurst?” Baron Branson-Hill asked.

  “I don’t know of such treachery occurring on this side of the pond,” Lyndy said. Should he mention the dead jockey? No, better not add to the baron’s humiliation.

  “Perhaps this sort of thing happens in America,” Owen said, throwing in his assurances, “but no Englishman would stoop so low.”

  “Absolutely not,” Sir Alfred said, agreeing.

  Mr. Kendrick shrugged. “Wouldn’t they? If they could get away with it? Don’t you think, Theo?”

  “I’m afraid it’s true,” Theo Swenson said. “But it’s not your fault, Baron, most people are fooled.”

  Lyndy inspected the horse more closely, running his hands down the animal’s legs, across his back and barrel. The horse’s coat was slick with rain. Lyndy had seen Challacombe race but had never gotten this close to the stallion. He couldn’t tell the difference.

  “But not you, Theo,” Mr. Kendrick said. “You saw it right away too, didn’t you? I mean, this horse could be that two-year-old you raced at Saratoga last year.”

  “You mean Charmer? By God, you’re right.” The two men shared a laugh.

  “I have to admit I saw another look-alike at Salisbury last year,” Owen said, reaching out to pat the stallion on its back. “Damn fine horse, just the same. Won its race, if I recall.” Owen was kindly trying to ease the baron’s embarrassment. It didn’t work.

  “With all due respect, Mr. Kendrick, Mr. Swenson, I don’t accept your conclusion.” The baron, a rail of a man, trembled. From the cold or his anger, Lyndy couldn’t guess which.

  Lyndy raised his hand but stopped short of patting the baron’s shoulder. Lyndy had never had cause to regret the dictate that kept people from wantonly touching each other in public. Until I met Stella, that is. The baron, his shoulders sagging, rain dripping from the end of his nose, looked pathetic. A reassuring touch on the arm would’ve gone a long way.

  “I reckon we should go back in,” Theo Swenson said. “The wind’s picked up, and I, for one, am not used to this chill.” To emphasize his point, he blew into his hands before rubbing them together.

  “This ringer sort of thing doesn’t happen in England. My horse is the real Challacombe.” Desp
ite the baron’s insistence, he waved at the groom to stable the horse, without a glance at his “champion,” and trudged back toward the house.

  “I’d say, ‘he got what he paid for’ ”—Mr. Kendrick chuckled when the rest of the men sought the warmth of the front hall—“but in this case, he didn’t, did he?” Had the baron heard the brute’s comment? Lyndy hoped not.

  “That’s right, Elijah,” Jed Kendrick said. “Ya know just what to say when a man’s down, don’t ya?”

  “Are you still here, Jed?” his brother asked, as he handed his rain-drenched coat to Fulton. “I thought leeches preferred being wet.”

  Jed snatched his brother’s coat back from the startled butler, flung open the door, and threw the coat out into the rain.

  “Jed, what were you thinking?” Theo Swenson, pointing at the black coat lying in the gravel, voiced Lyndy’s silent question. Jed Kendrick was, by all accounts, an amiable fellow. Unlike his brother.

  “You’ll need a conjurer, not a valet to clean that,” Owen quipped, as always trying to lighten the mood.

  “You . . . how dare you . . .” Mr. Kendrick stammered with rage, his pointed finger shaking violently toward his brother. “Your children will starve before I give you another penny. Do you hear me? They’ll starve in the poor house. And I want you gone from Pilley Manor before I get home!”

  Jed Kendrick grabbed his brother’s finger and shoved him backward. “Go to hell!”

  Off balance, the older, rotund brother stumbled against a side table, knocking the silver calling card tray clattering to the floor. Jed, a smug grin widening on his face, ducked back into the rain, stomping his muddy boots over his brother’s coat as he went.

  * * *

  Stella brushed a curl from the little girl’s forehead. Gertie looked too peaceful, curled up in the blankets, to carry her to the bedroom Ethel had prepared for the children. Stella slipped down to the carpet beside the little girl. She crossed her legs, hidden beneath the yards of billowy sea-green silk of her favorite tea gown, as she’d seen photographs of the native people of the Great Plains do. After shedding her soaked, clingy evening gown, Stella had put aside convention, and her corset, and donned the most comfortable dress she owned.

  As Stella settled in near the warmth of the crackling fire, Ethel scurried around the library, picking up the mess until her arms were full of the makeshift toys the lady’s maid had managed to scrounge up. According to Ethel, Pilley Manor had never housed small children before, being the dowager house. If a dowager countess wished to enjoy the company of her grandchildren, she would visit them at Morrington Hall. As Ethel explained, “no self-respecting dowager would be seen entertaining children” at Pilley Manor. So it was up to Stella and Ethel to find suitable “toys.” Instead of blocks, Ethel rounded up cookie tins and butter molds. With no spinning tops or cup and ball games on hand, Stella produced string to play cat’s cradle. And to replace toy soldiers or dolls, Ethel borrowed several porcelain figurines from the back of a curio cabinet. Gertie clutched her favorite as she slept, a shepherdess with an attached tiny lamb.

  “What are you reading, Sammy?”

  After a simple supper of cold pheasant pie, string-bean salad, pickles, bread, and butter with Aunt Rachel and the children, Stella and Ethel had played with the children in the library. Long before Gertie succumbed to exhaustion, Sammy abandoned the games and crammed himself into a corner of the sofa to read a book he’d pulled from the shelf.

  “Hmm?” Sammy’s head drooped, his hair flopping across one eye. The boy was exhausted.

  “What’s your book about?” Stella asked again.

  In response, Sammy lifted the book from his lap so Stella could read the title: Castles of England and Wales. He continued to study one of the black and white sketches of the castles. The clock on the mantel chimed the nine o’clock hour.

  “I believe it is bedtime, don’t you?” Stella said. “Time to put your book away?”

  Sammy ignored her.

  “You heard your cousin. It’s time for bed, Master Kendrick,” Ethel said, with authority. When he didn’t respond, she reached down and tugged the book from the boy’s grasp.

  “Hey, I was reading that.”

  “What will your daddy say if you are still awake when he gets home?” Stella added. How many times had nannies threatened her with such a statement? Would it motivate Sammy any more than it had her? Probably not but was worth a try.

  “I don’t want to go to bed. I’m scared.”

  Of Uncle Jed? Stella didn’t believe it. More likely an excuse to avoid a proper bedtime. “I know you’re not afraid of your daddy.”

  Sammy hugged his knees, resting his chin on the threadbare patch of his pants. Tomorrow Stella would send someone to get new clothes for both children.

  “Not my daddy. I’m scared of the cowboy. He said he was gonna kill someone.”

  Cowboy? What was he talking about? Could he have seen Pistol Prescott? Overheard his threats? It was possible. Sammy and his family had arrived on the same ship as the Swensons.

  “What man?” Ethel said. “No one’s going to kill anyone.”

  “Are you talking about a man on the wharf?” Stella asked, pushing up from the floor and perching on the edge of the sofa beside him. “Why do you call him a cowboy? What else did he say?”

  “Never mind.” Sammy tried to shrug off her questions.

  “Sammy, if you know something, you have to tell me.”

  The boy shook his head. Stella skimmed the room for something, anything to draw the boy back out. The book about castles lay on the oak side table. Stella snatched it up and flipped it open. She paged through it until she found the picture she needed.

  “Did you know there’s a castle less than eight miles from here?”

  “So?” Sammy grumbled.

  “It’s this one.” Stella tapped on a sketch. Beneath the pencil sketch of a sprawling stone fortress beside the sea were the words: Keyhaven Castle. “What if I took you there tomorrow?”

  The idea was inspired. Stella had hoped to comb the halls of the castle, built hundreds of years ago by King Henry the VIII; there was nothing remotely like it in the States. But with all the obligatory house calls, teas, balls, and dinner parties these last few months, she hadn’t found the chance to explore it yet. This way, she could invite Lyndy, and Aunt Ivy and Uncle Jed, if he wanted, to join her and the children, have Mrs. Downie pack them a picnic and make a day of it. Otherwise, Stella would be stuck helping Lady Atherly and Reverend Paine finalize the wedding plans.

  “You mean it?” Sammy said, sitting up, dropping his knees with a thud on the floor. Gertie shifted in her blankets but didn’t wake up.

  “I don’t know, miss,” Ethel said, catching on to what Stella was trying to do. “It’s old and abandoned and well known to be haunted.” Sammy fidgeted in his seat but kept his attention firmly on the picture. “You don’t want to go there, do you, Master Kendrick?”

  “Yes, Miss Ethel, I sure do.”

  “Are you brave enough that ghosts of prisoners and dead soldiers won’t keep you away?” Stella said.

  Sammy squared his shoulders and puffed out his chest. “Braver.”

  “Then tell me what about this cowboy frightens you so much.” Caught by the women’s trick, Sammy’s shoulders drooped, and he sank back into the sofa.

  “Do I have to?”

  “You do if you want to go to Keyhaven Castle tomorrow.”

  Sammy exaggerated a sigh in defeat. “It was on the pier, like you said, Cousin Stella. The man scared me, saying he had a score to settle with someone named Morrington. I never saw anyone so angry before, at least not until Uncle Elijah and Pa started fighting.”

  That brawl was ridiculous—two grown men. And in front of the children, no less. But it explained how angry Pistol Prescott must’ve sounded.

  “That’s when I started to worry,” Sammy added.

  “But why are you worried?” Ethel asked. “Your name is Kendrick, not Morring
ton.”

  “But don’t you see, Miss Ethel?” he said, sheepishly regarding Stella from the corner of his eye. “That angry man was talking about the fella Cousin Stella is gonna marry. He had me calling him Lyndy, but I know his surname because when we got to his mansion, they all said, ‘Welcome to Morrington’s Hall.’ ”

  Stella wanted to hug the boy, laugh about his mistake, tell him there was nothing to be afraid of, but she stopped short. Boys his age didn’t enjoy hugs, even from their mothers. Or being laughed at. He wouldn’t appreciate being lied to either; the danger to someone at Morrington Hall could be real.

  “I assume your father heard everything you did and told the police?” Ethel asked.

  Sammy shook his head. “Why would Pa do that? You can’t trust the police.”

  Stella, who never crossed paths with a policeman until the day she found the dead vicar a few months back, couldn’t fathom such an attitude. Why on earth would a boy of ten think that?

  “But your daddy would be helping the police with their investigation.”

  “He’d never do that. Pa doesn’t like the police.”

  “Even just to tell them something he overheard?” Ethel said, crossing her arms across her chest in disapproval.

  Sammy squinted and made a face at Ethel as if she was missing the point.

  “Pa and me weren’t eavesdropping, if that’s what you think,” the boy said, sounding offended. “That cowboy told these things to us.”

  “When was that?” Stella asked.

  “When Pa asked him for a light and directions to Morrington’s Hall.”

  Stella gaped at the boy, bowled over by his revelation. Uncle Jed had encountered the jockey before the accident. He’d spoken to him, even knew of his threats. So why hadn’t he told her? She’d asked her father about Pistol Prescott, had voiced her concerns over Prescott’s threatening remarks, but Uncle Jed hadn’t said a word.

  “All the more reason to tell the police,” Ethel admonished.