Silent in the Sanctuary (7 page)

“Is she? How lovely! She wrote the most delightful letters when I was abroad. I shall be exceedingly pleased to see her.”

Portia’s eyes narrowed. “You are a singular woman, Julia. I would have thought, given her notoriety, you might have found it a bit much that Father invited her.”

“It seems a curious sort of hypocrisy to object to Hortense on the grounds that she was once a courtesan. Aunt Hermia has been rescuing prostitutes for years and forcing them on us as maids. Consider Morag,” I reminded her. Morag had been one of Aunt Hermia’s most doubtful successes. She was skilled enough, but entirely incapable of keeping a position with anyone who expected a conventional maid.

“Yes, but Father. He seems quite smitten with her. What if he marries her?”

“Then I shall give them a nice present and ask if I may be a bridesmaid.”

“Ass. You are not taking this at all seriously.”

“Because it is ridiculous. Father is nearly seventy, Hortense will not see sixty again. And she is delightful besides. Who are we to thwart their happiness?”

Portia nodded slowly. “I suppose you are right. Still, I would have thought you would have minded about her. Because of Brisbane.”

She was watching me closely, and with some effort, I forced my voice to casualness. “The fact that she was Brisbane’s mistress twenty years ago is no concern of mine. Their liaison ended decades ago. Besides, his affairs are his own business. I told you that on the train.”

“I know what you said, Julia, but that is not necessarily what you believe. You are a faithful creature. I would be quite surprised if you were not still harbouring a tendresse for him.”

“I thought you were the one encouraging me to molest our young houseguest with unwelcome attentions.”

She snorted. “If you believe your attentions would be unwelcome, you are dafter than I thought. Do not think I failed to notice, dearest, you did not deny you still have feelings for Brisbane.”

“Then let me do so now. Nicholas Brisbane is a person I will always think of with affection, for more reasons than I can enumerate. But as for any sort of future with him—”

The dressing bell sounded before I could finish, for which I was rather grateful.

Morag appeared then, and Portia tarried a few moments longer, bullying Morag into piling my hair onto my head. I had cropped it some months before, but had let it grow during my travels, and with a bit of artful pinning it looked quite becoming. Portia left as Morag was buttoning me into a severe crimson satin gown. There was not a ruffle or furbelow to be found on it, not the merest scrap of lace or tiniest frill. The simplicity was startling. I powdered my nose lightly and daubed a bit of rouge onto my cheeks, touching my lips with a rosy salve I had purchased in Paris. Morag grumbled about whorishness—a bit of duplicity, I thought, given her own past—but I ignored her and motioned for her to fix my earrings to my lobes. They were delicate things of twisted wires set with tiny seed pearls and bits of garnet. They were not costly, but they were very pretty and whenever I moved my head they glittered in the candlelight. I rose and instructed Morag to keep the fire hot to make plenty of coals for the bedwarmers. She trudged out, grumbling again, and again I ignored her.

I started from the room, then as an afterthought, Portia’s words ringing in my ears, I hurried to my writing table instead. My morocco portfolio lay atop it, still clasped since I had last seen it in Italy. I snapped it open and scooped up the pendant Brisbane had given me. It took but a moment to secure it at the base of my throat. I paused to look at my reflection, surprised to see my colour was high. I must have over-rouged, I thought, wiping at my face with a handkerchief. I told myself I needed the pendant because the neckline of my gown was too revealing for a family dinner, but the truth was I had a dozen pendants more suitable, and scores of fichus and scarves that would have served just as well. If I had stopped to consider the matter, I might have realised I had put it on because now I was back in England what I longed for most was to see Brisbane again.

But I did not consider. I wore it as a curiosity instead, a piece of interest I might have bought in Italy. I could wear it among my family and no one save Portia would know it had been given to me by a man who had caused me more disappointment and more elation than any other I had ever known.

The dinner bell sounded as I left the room, and I hastened down the gallery. For all his eccentricities, Father disapproved of tardiness. I fairly flew down the staircase and along the corridor to the nave. From there it was some distance to the hall, but I could see the great wooden doors, fifteen feet high and propped open, light spilling over the great stones of the floor. Just outside the doors, in what had been one of the tiniest chapels, stood Maurice, the enormous stuffed bear one of our great-uncles had brought home as a trophy from a hunting expedition to Canada. He was a frightful old thing, with huge, sharp yellow teeth and claws that had terrified me as a child, and the bear bore him a striking resemblance. But now the bear was moth-eaten, and looked slightly embarrassed at the bald patches where we children had rubbed off his fur from too many games of sardines. I lurked behind him for a moment to catch my breath. The nave was deserted, the long shadows stretching empty up to the webbed hammerbeams of the ceiling. It appeared everyone else had already arrived. I took a slow, calming breath, then slipped through the doors.

As the Chapel of the Nine Altars, the hall had been built on mammoth proportions, and it had not been altered much over the years. A massive space, its walls were punctuated with nine curved bays that had once housed the altars of the most sacred place of the Abbey. The original stone had not been panelled, and the effect was impressively medieval. Tapestries warmed the stones instead—great, heavy things that told the story of a boar hunt in exquisite detail and rich colours that had grown gently muted over the centuries. Two of the bays had been converted to monolithic fireplaces, and in front of them wide Turkey carpets had been laid, although their silken pile did little to drive out the chill of the floors. Sofas and chairs were huddled near the hearths where fires blasted up the chimneys. In summer, lit with sunlight from the enormous tracery windows, the room was beautiful. On a cold winter’s night, it was just this side of miserable. The other guests had already assembled, gentlemen doubtless grateful for their elegant coats of superfine, while the ladies shivered with bare shoulders. They were gathered near the hearths like wintering animals, and I saw Alessandro in particular looking rather pinched about the face. I noticed that Aquinas was moving about, pouring hearty measures of whiskey to ward off the cold. Portia’s doing, no doubt.

She came toward me, her colour high and her eyes bright. “Dearest, where have you been? You’ve been an age. I was just about to go and look for you.”

“The bell just rang,” I began, but she was already towing me across the room to where Father stood in conversation with another gentleman whose back, in beautifully tailored black, was facing me.

“Julia!” my father boomed, in delight, I think. I kissed him, breathing him in as I did so. Father always smelled of books and sweet tobacco, a receipt for comfort.

“Good evening, Father. I was terribly slighted that you were not available to welcome me, you know,” I teased him, smoothing his wayward white hair. “I might think you had forgotten I am your favourite.” It was a joke of long-standing among us children to make him admit he loved one of us best. None of us had ever caught him out yet.

Father smiled, but I sensed somehow it was not at my little jest. There was something more there, some greater mischief, and I knew, even before the gentleman turned to face me, that I was the hare in the snare.

“Julia, my dear, I believe you already know Lord Wargrave.”

And there in front of me stood Nicholas Brisbane.

Mischief, thou art afoot,

Take thou what course thou wilt.

I stood motionless for a lifetime it seemed, although I know it cannot have been more than a few seconds. I summoned a deliberate smile and extended my hand, forcing my voice to lightness. Rather unexpectedly, both were steady.

“Brisbane, what a surprise to see you. Welcome to Bellmont Abbey.”

He shook my hand as briefly as courtesy would permit, bowing from the neck, his face coolly impassive as Plum’s beloved Carrara marble. He was exquisitely dressed in evening clothes even Ly would approve, all black-and-white elegance, down to the silken sling that held his left arm immobile just above his waist.

“My lady. Welcome home from your travels.”

My smile was polite, wintry, nothing more. Any observer might have thought us the most casual of acquaintances. But I was deeply conscious of Father and Portia watching us intently.

“Thank you. Did I understand Father correctly? Are congratulations in order?”

“The elevation is a very recent one. In fact the letters patent have not yet been read. His lordship is overhasty in his compliments,” he said mildly, but I knew him well enough to know this was no façade of modesty. Brisbane himself would not care about titles, and I could only imagine he would accept one because it ensured his entrée into the highest circles of society—a useful privilege for someone in his profession.

For my part, I was impressed in spite of myself. I was one of the few people who knew the truth of Brisbane’s parentage and upbringing. To rise from that to a viscountcy was little more than miraculous. It meant whilst I had been sunning myself in Italy, Brisbane had busied himself investigating something very delicate and probably very nasty for someone very highly placed.

“I did not realise you were staying at the Abbey, my lord. I confess I am surprised to see you here.”

Brisbane’s eyes flickered toward my father. “I might say the same of you, my lady. His lordship declined to mention you were expected to return home before next summer.”

Father’s eyes were open very wide, a sure sign he had been up to mischief. He was incapable of feigning innocence. I looked from him to Brisbane, fitting the pieces together swiftly. My appearance was as much of a surprise to Brisbane as his was to me. He was pale under the olive of his complexion, and I realised he was attempting to compose himself. Whatever he had expected of his visit to Bellmont Abbey, a reunion with me was no part of it.

I had just opened my mouth to tease him when he looked past me and beckoned sharply to a lady hesitating shyly on the edge of our circle. I had not noticed her before, but now I wondered how that was possible.

“My lady,” Brisbane said smoothly, “I should like to present to you my fiancée, Mrs. King. Charlotte, Lady Julia Grey.”

I know that I put out my hand, and that she took it, because I looked down to see my fingers grasped warmly in hers, but I felt nothing. I had gone quite numb as I took in the implication of what Brisbane had just said.

“Mrs. King,” I murmured. Recovering myself quickly, I fixed a smile on my lips and repeated the greeting I had given Brisbane. “Welcome to the Abbey.”

“And welcome back to England, my lady,” she said breathlessly.

She was a truly lovely creature, all chocolate-box sweetness with a round, dimpled face and luscious colouring. She had clouds of hair the same honeyed red-blond I had admired on a Titian Madonna. Her eyes were wide and almost indescribably blue. She had a plump, rosebud mouth and an adorably tiny nose unadorned by even a single freckle. Only the chin, small and pointed like a cat’s, belied the sweetness of her expression. There was firmness there, perhaps even stubbornness, although now she was smiling at me in mute invitation to befriend her. Unlike me, she wore widow’s weeds, although touches of purple indicated her loss was not a recent one. The black suited her though, highlighting a certain fragile delicacy of complexion no cosmetic could ever hope to simulate. She was a Fragonard milkmaid, a Botticelli nymph. I hated her instantly.

“I am so very pleased to make your acquaintance, my lady,” she was saying. “Lord Wargrave has told me simply everything about you. I know we are going to be very great friends.” She was earnest as a puppy, and I had little doubt most people found her charming.

“Has he indeed? How very kind you are,” I said, fingering the pendant at my throat. It had been an involuntary action, and I realised as soon as my fingers touched the cool silver it was a mistake. Mrs. King’s bright blue gaze fixed on the piece at once.

“What an unusual pendant. Did you acquire it on your travels?” she asked, peering closely at the coin.

“No. It was a gift,” I said, covering its face with a finger. I turned to Brisbane, who was watching our exchange closely. I nodded toward the sling. “I see you have managed to injure yourself, my lord. Nothing serious, I hope.”

He lifted a brow. “Not at all. A nasty spill from a horse a fortnight ago, nothing more. His lordship was kind enough to invite me to recuperate here away from the bustle of the city.”

“And you will be here for Christmas as well?” I asked, forcing my tone to brightness.

“As will my fiancée,” he replied coolly, locking those witch-black eyes onto mine.

I did not blink. “Excellent. I shall look forward to getting to know her intimately.” The words were blandly spoken, but Brisbane knew me well enough to hear the threat implicit within them.

His gaze wavered slightly, and I inclined my head. “I do hope you will excuse me. I must greet the other guests. Mrs. King, a pleasure,” I said, withdrawing from the group. Father caught my eye, his own eyes bright with mischief. I turned my head, not surprised to find Portia at my elbow.

“Well done, dearest,” she whispered.

“Whiskey,” I hissed. “Now.”

In another of the little altar alcoves a sideboard had been arranged with spirits of every variety. We made our way to the whiskey decanter and stood with our backs to the room. Portia poured out a generous measure for both of us and we each took a healthy, choking sip. I swallowed hard and fixed her with an Inquisitor’s stare.