Page 6 of A Duchess of Mystery (The Mismatched Lovers #3)

Despite its name, it was not a true castle but rather an immense, square edifice with towers in all four corners and, at its center, a courtyard enclosed on all four sides by the house.

To one side, a lane led down through a double row of cottages and a few larger houses where the staff who didn’t live in and the estate workers lived, but these were invisible from where Richard was standing.

The moonlight illuminated the snaking, sandy-colored drive as it approached the sweeping front courtyard.

A place he’d been forbidden to play as a child, as he was considered nothing but a nuisance.

Now he could do whatever he wanted anywhere on the estate.

The impulse to do some of the many things he’d been banned from doing as a child rose. He chuckled.

Baxter snorted. “Glad you like it, sir, but to me it just looks like a blooming palace. A bit too big and grand for the likes of us, if you don’t mind me saying so.”

Richard patted his horse’s warm neck. “Just what I thought when I first came here as a child of six, after my parents died. You’ll get used to it, have no fear.

I did.” But was he telling the truth? Or was he desperate to convince himself he could fit in here as, of all things, a duke? Only time would tell.

For answer, Baxter gave another snort. “You might, but I don’t think I ever will.”

They set off again, only the crunch of the gravel under their feet intruding on the enveloping silence of the night, now they were away from the trees.

Far off, an owl called, but, apart from that, the world appeared abandoned by all living things.

This did nothing to improve the way Richard was feeling about the castle.

Who would be there to greet him at this time of night?

All the servants would be abed. If his cousin’s murderous wife were there, she would be asleep as well.

He’d have to waken someone to let him in.

The grooms had always slept in rooms above the stables, so they would be easiest to raise.

He’d head around the back to the stableyard and try knocking them up.

He was the new duke, after all, so they couldn’t complain.

But nevertheless, he didn’t feel that confident.

He couldn’t shake off the feeling of being the same six-year-old boy arriving there for the first time, after the death of his parents.

Duke. How silly that sounded when he said it to himself. No, he was plain Major Carstairs. He could never think of himself as a duke. Let Baxter still keep calling him major —that would suit him well.

The moon slipped behind a cloud, plunging the landscape into deeper shadow, as he neared the back of the house. All was silent. Not a light showed in any of the windows. The house was asleep.

The stable courtyard was built as a large square with wide gates at one side, under an arch with a clock tower he knew all too well on the top.

A clock tower he’d climbed to as a child in order to change the time it read, for a dare.

Luckily, the gates were unlocked, so he opened one side and led his horse through, Baxter following, muttering to himself under his breath.

The horses’ still-shod feet clattered on the cobbles, so different from the crunching gravel of the drive.

Baxter closed the gate again, and they emerged into the stableyard to the welcoming whinnies of more than a few horses in the long, enclosed stable blocks to either side.

The double doors of the block on the right stood open, so they led the horses across the yard and in through them.

Both blocks were of similar construction, with a wide corridor along the front and doors to outside at either end.

Inside, a row of large looseboxes housed the inhabitants.

Unfortunately, out of the moonlight it was impossible to tell which were occupied.

Help was at hand.

“Who goes there?” a gruff voice called from out in the yard. Did it sound familiar?

Leaving Baxter, Richard looped his horse’s reins through a tethering ring and stepped back out into the light. “Your master.” Where was the fellow?

For a moment, whoever had challenged him stayed silent, probably digesting this news. Then he found his voice again. “My master is dead.”

Richard peered into the shadows, trying to make out who was speaking. “Your old master might be dead, indeed, but I am your new master. Who are you? Show yourself.”

A man in a long nightgown that gave him an alarming spectral appearance emerged from a shadowy corner, a musket gripped in his hands. His bald head, fringed by a straggle of thin gray hair, shone in the moonlight. “Master Diccon?” His voice quavered as though he couldn’t quite believe his eyes.

“Amos?” Richard’s own voice also shook. “Amos Rowan? Is it you?”

The old man, heedless of his state of extreme undress, lowered the musket and hurried forward, his face wreathed in the widest smile Richard had seen in many a long year, if a bit lacking in teeth.

“It is indeed your old Amos,” he stammered, as though he couldn’t get the words out for grinning with delight.

“And it’s you, it is, my Master Diccon, come home to us at last.” Tears glistened in the old man’s rheumy eyes, catching the pale moonlight.

They might have been a returning duke and humble groom, but when Richard had been a friendless child and had resorted to the stableyard to escape Marcus’s unwanted and vicious attentions, Amos had taken him under his wing.

On an impulse, Richard enfolded the old man in his arms, disturbed by how thin and frail he felt.

In his memory, Amos had always been a giant of protective strength, yet now he seemed small and shrunken, and not just by age. The old man hugged him back.

“You’ve come back to us,” he managed, as soon as Richard released him. “I knew you would one day, even when His Grace said as you were probably already killed in battle and that we’d just not been notified. I knew you’d come back to us one day.”

“I am indeed back, and must apologize for disturbing you in the middle of the night,” Richard said.

Perhaps it would be best not to discuss the reason for his return.

Not yet, anyway. The middle of the night was not the time, and the stableyard was not the place.

And anyway, Amos would only know the gossip.

Richard wanted the facts before he heard the tittle-tattle of the servants’ hall.

“And I’ve brought my good soldier servant and a couple of horses we purchased for our journey.

It’s black as Satan’s pit in the stable block, and we can’t see what we’re doing. Could you help us, do you think?”

Amos nodded with enthusiasm. “I can that, Master—I mean, Your Grace. Just let me go and stow away my musket and find some breeches and boots. And you didn’t disturb me.

I don’t sleep so well no more on account of my old bones, and I hadn’t been abed long when I heared the sound of your horses on the cobbles.

Me and the grooms, we’ve not long dealt with Her Grace’s carriage. ”

So Marcus’s mysterious widow was in residence here at the moment and had been out in the carriage. Was that going to be a problem?

The old man nodded his head at the far range of stables. “I won’t be more than a minute, Your Grace. And I’ll tell Mrs. Rowan to go back to sleep because you’re not a horse thief come trying your hand at Sultan.”

“Sultan?”

“His Grace’s new horse. Your Grace. The one what he won for that wager he made.”

He must have seen the confusion on Richard’s face. “I’ve a lot to tell you if you’ll let me get me breeches.”

Three minutes later, longer than Amos had promised probably due to him being interrogated by his wife, he was back with a lantern, his nightshirt tucked lumpily into his breeches and a pair of stout work boots on his feet.

Together, he and Richard, after a suspicious Baxter had been introduced, found a couple of empty looseboxes for their tired horses, unsaddled them, and gave them both a good measure of corn and a wad of hay to eat.

Amos insisted on carrying Richard’s saddle and bridle along to the tackroom while Richard carried the lantern.

Baxter, with a definite bowing to his legs as though in pain, trailed behind.

From the number of occupied loose boxes, the rows of saddles and the pegs of harness, it seemed Marcus had kept a large stable.

Larger than his father ever had. Interesting.

Presumably the cattle were all now Richard’s to do with as he pleased.

Including the horse from the wager, whatever that had been for—Sultan.

Not that Richard had ever been particularly interested in horses, which had been one of the reasons he’d opted for an infantry regiment as a fifteen-year-old.

“Now,” Amos said. “What about you, Your Grace? The house is all locked up at this time o’ night, but I think I could rouse them for you.”

Richard shook his head. “I don’t want them disturbed.

In truth, I’m sorry I got you out of bed, old friend.

You must still have the ears of a hawk. Baxter and I could quite happily have settled down for the night in the hayloft or an empty stable.

We’re used to far worse beds than that on campaign.

” He smiled. “However, if you could provide real beds for the night, we’d be more than content, and I can make my official arrival in the morning.

I can tell you, both of us are so tired we could happily sleep on the bare floor. ”

“The bare floor? For our new duke?” Amos nearly choked. “I’ve a couple of spare beds my sons used to sleep in before they married and went off to find employment elsewhere. But they ain’t good enough for Your Grace, not now you’re a duke.”

“Your son Joseph, you mean?” They’d often played together as boys. “I’d love to see him again, and be honored to sleep in his bed for the night.”

Amos shook his head, clearly troubled by this turn up for the books.

“But you’re the duke now, Your Grace, so I don’t think as it’d be wise to be taking up some of your old friendships.

Not that my Joe wouldn’t be honored to shake your hand.

But things’ve changed now, and we’ll all have to remember it. ”

Richard gave a wry smile. Amos had missed the irony of his statement when given to the man he’d just invited to sleep in his spare bed, the spare bed of one of the stable staff.

Up until this moment, the full import of Marcus’s death and his own inheritance of the title and property had not quite sunk in.

He’d thought he’d be returning to the home of his childhood, but he wouldn’t be.

Not really. Because his childhood as the indigent orphaned relation had been spent running wild with the children of the servants and tenants.

And now he would be the man in charge. Things were not going to be easy to adjust to.