Page 57 of Beneath the Devil’s Mask (The Hidden Hearts Collection #4)

Nineteen

Morning sunlight streamed through the windows of the marquis’s study, but the warmth did not touch Mandell where he sat slumped in the wing chair by the hearth, lost in troubled slumber.

He had known if he dared sleep, the dream would come, but he could no longer bring himself to care.

Since his parting with Anne, he had struggled with feelings of desolation, of utter hopelessness.

Sometime near dawn he had surrendered, falling into an exhausted sleep, eventually allowing the nightmare to claim him.

But it was different this time. Mandell frowned, sensing it even in the depth of his slumber.

He heard the knocking at the door, the thunder of the dream command.

Open! Open in the name of the tribunal! But this time it was not his mother’s soft hands seeking to thrust him into the closet, but bony fingers, gnarled with age.

A mocking voice cackled in his ear. Forget, boy. Forget everything except that you are the marquis of Mandell.

“No.” Mandell muttered, tossing his head against the chair’s hard cushion. He could not forget. “You don’t understand. Have to save her.”

Struggling to free himself from those clutching hands, he peered down the length of a mist-shrouded street.

He could see the distant forms of the mob, mad, howling like a blood-crazed beast with a hundred mouths.

And she was there, in their midst, being hauled away by a black-cloaked phantom in a plumed hat.

Anne! Anne!

The phantom glanced back when Mandell called.

He could sense the burning mockery of its gaze, but its features were obscured by a death white veil, clinging to its face like a gossamer layer of skin.

The phantom dragged Anne toward a towering scaffold and Mandell could see the guillotine, its sharp blade already rich with blood.

He had to get to Anne, had to tear away the veil that hid the phantom’s hideous features.

It was the only way to save her. Mandell fought against the restraining hands, but it was hopeless.

The aged fingers seemed only to grow stronger, entwining him like vines, pulling him back into the suffocating darkness of the closet.

When he was thrust inside, the door slammed closed. He could hear insane laughter and then the hammering. The door was being nailed shut so that he could never escape.

“No!”

Mandell’s head snapped forward. He wrenched awake with a start.

His breath coming quickly, his gaze roved round the study as he tried to recollect where he was and shake off the last vestiges of the dream.

It bewildered him because he was certain he was fully awake. And yet the hammering had not ceased.

He blinked and realized that someone was knocking insistently upon the study door. Before he could recover his wits enough to issue any command, the door inched open, Hastings thrust his head through the opening and inquired anxiously, “My lord?”

Mandell pressed his fingertips to his eyes and indicated with a curt gesture that the footman could enter. Hastings stepped inside.

“I am sorry, my lord. I did not mean to disturb you.”

”You didn’t. I had merely dozed off for a few minutes.”

Hastings frowned. `Did my lord sleep all night in that chair?”

“No.” Mandell ran a hand over his unshaven jaw.

“I came down to read just before daybreak.” He looked for the slender volume of Shakespearean sonnets and discovered it had tumbled to the floor.

Upon the small tripod table stood a pool of wax that had once been a candle. “What time is it?” he demanded.

“Near nine of the clock, my lord.”

Mandell frowned. Obviously, he had dozed off for more than just a few minutes. He noticed Hastings regarding him with a troubled expression and snapped, “Well, what is it, man? What did you want?”

“Begging your pardon, my lord, but there is a lady that insists upon seeing you.”

“A lady?” Mandell straightened, unable to help the eager note that came into his voice.

“It is not your lady, sir.”

“Oh.” Mandell sagged back in the chair and murmured. “I did not suppose that it would be. I no longer have a lady, Hastings.”

“I am very sorry to hear that, my lord.”

Mandell averted his gaze, discomfited by the level of sympathy and silent understanding he read in the younger man’s eyes. He asked with no real interest, “What wench is it that would plague me at such an ungodly hour?”

“It is me, Mandell,” a soft feminine voice spoke up.

Hastings had left the door open and Mandell glanced up to find Sara Palmer silhouetted on the threshold. She wore a pelisse of pink china crepe, complemented by a Caledonian cap of plush silk trimmed with rich bands and fox-tail feathers. Mandell remembered the hat well. He had paid for it.

His jaw tightened. He could hardly believe that Sara would possess the boldness to come here, but nothing about her should surprise him.

“May I come in?” she asked.

“You already appear to have done so.”

“I did not quite trust your footman to announce me properly.”

“You refused to give me your name, madam,” Hastings said.

“This is the Honorable Mrs. Nicholas Drummond, John,” Mandell sneered. “You may make her acquaintance as you escort her out again.”

Hastings looked startled by this order, yet more than ready to carry out the command. Every line of his stolid form radiated disapproval of Sara.

But Sara moved into the room, deposited her parasol upon Mandell’s desk and stripped off her gloves. “I only require a few minutes of your time, Mandell.”

“I thought you would be gone on your bride trip. Does your husband approve of his wife calling upon single gentlemen?”

“You and I are cousins now,” she reminded him. “Besides, Nick doesn’t know I am here.”

“Nick doesn’t know a good many things,”

At least she had the grace to color a little at that. Mandell was sore tempted to evict her from the house himself, but whatever her reason for coming, he sensed that Sara was determined to stay put until she had her say. Loath as he was to admit it, Mandell felt a stirring of curiosity.

After a reluctant pause, he dismissed Hastings.

The footman retired with a stiff bow. When the door closed behind him, Mandell rose to his feet, suddenly conscious of his disheveled appearance.

He was clad in nothing but his breeches and satin dressing robe.

Sweeping back the strands of hair from his eyes, he adjusted the folds of the robe, which gapped open about his bared chest, and he belted the sash more snugly about his waist.

Sara demurely turned her gaze away during the procedure. Her affected modesty only served to sharpen Mandell’s anger with her. He did not invite her to sit down, but she did so anyway. Perching upon the edge of his desk, she glanced about his dark-paneled study with bright curious eyes.

“This is the first time I have ever been privileged to enter your house,” she said. “It is exactly what I would have expected of you, elegant but cold. Very severe.”

“Is that why you came here? To discuss my decor?”

“No.” Some of her bravado slipped away, her features becoming more subdued. “You might be interested to know, Mandell, that we left the countess’s party not long after you did last night. Nick got noticeably quiet. He hardly spoke a word during the carriage ride back to our flat.”

“That would be a first for Drummond.”

“He was not at all himself. When we arrived home, he gave me a quick kiss goodnight. Then he went out alone and did not come back until well after midnight.”

“And the pair of you wed only two days? Can it be your charms are wearing thin so soon, my dear?”

Her cheeks flooded with color at his mocking tone.

“I believe Nick’s distracted state had more to do with you,” she accused.

“You told him something that upset him. Or at least I think you did. It is not always easy to tell with Nick. He seems such a straightforward sort of man, but I’ve come to realize he can be very good at dissembling. ”

“He doesn’t hold a candle to you, my dear,” Mandell said.

“Are you worried about what I might have said to him? Whether I asked if you still have that charming habit of dragging all the covers to your side of the bed? Whether I warned him not to waste too much money on stays and chemises because you don’t often wear them? ”

“Mandell, you didn’t!”

“No, I didn’t, curse you. As you well know I would not after the shock of hearing that you were already married, of seeing Nick trail after you like some lovesick calf.”

Sara gave a tiny sigh of relief. She eased off the desk and came to Mandell with contrition in her eyes or at least the appearance of it.

“I am sorry, Mandell. Truly I am. I wanted to tell you about Nick and me sooner, but everything happened so fast. And I know you would not be pleased, so I turned craven. I thought it would be better to wait.”

“Until you had him well and truly hooked?”

She tried to place her hand on his arm, but Mandell shook her off. He said bitterly, “Tell me just one thing, Sara. Out of all the trusting noble fools in London, how did you happen to settle upon Nick? Was it some sort of twisted vengeance against me because I would not gratify your ambitions?”

“No! It was nothing like that!”

“Then what was it? You could not have fancied Nick any great matrimonial prize! From a worldly point of view, you could not have done worse than Drummond. He is not a wealthy man.”

“I did not realize his grandfather would cut him off.”

Mandell gave a hard laugh. “There was not much for His Grace to cut.

Nick was never a favorite with the old man.

The most the duke ever offered Drummond was that wretched palace down by the river, a crumbling Tudor wreck.

He would never have allowed Drummond even that if he had realized that Nick meant to convert the place to a charity hospital someday.