Page 13 of The Elusive Earl (The Bad Heir Day Tales #3)

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

“You look like you were to the plaid born,” Morna said. “But what is a St. Didier doing in the MacKenzie tartan?”

“My grandmother was a MacKenzie,” St. Didier replied as the fiddles lilted along. “I saw this kit ready-made in Edinburgh, had the tailors do a few alterations, and here I am.”

“Here you are,” Morna said softly, “still keeping watch, though nothing happened while you were off on the laird’s business.” Nothing except some wild, tender lovemaking, some long nights of sleepy affection, some cautious discussions of the future. In the past fortnight, Morna had allowed herself every possible liberty with Graham, knowing full well they were both trying to make up for lost time.

Maybe in twenty years, their intimacy would be less limned with rejoicing and wonder, less motivated by what they’d nearly been denied—assuming fate granted them twenty years.

“While I was in Edinburgh, spring arrived.” St. Didier took a sip of punch that Uncle Brodie had not doctored—yet. Morna had assigned the first footman to monitor Uncle’s behavior. Brodie had circulated in polite society very little in recent years, and a formal ball would doubtless tempt him to mischief.

“Spring arrives every year,” Morna said, foot-tapping with each downbeat. “Good heavens. Vera Conroy’s dancing master has failed his office.”

Miss Conroy’s steps were correct, her sense of rhythm adequate to the challenge, but she was pressed against Peter like a stray bit of wool clung to a thorny blackberry cane.

“How fortunate that Miss Lanie can’t see the vicar’s daughter making a cake of herself. Peter is comporting himself like a gentleman, though. I don’t suppose you’d like to dance, Miss MacKenzie?”

The supper waltz was just beginning, and couples were still drifting onto the dance floor. Morna caught sight of Graham, Aunt Hibernia on his arm by the open veranda doors. He looked magnificent in full kilted regalia, Aunt Hibernia a mere sprite wrapped in a Royal Stewart shawl at his elbow.

Graham had been right to put himself on display like this. The neighbors were having a good gawk, and Morna was too.

“I’m sitting out for now,” she said. “Lanie cannot dance, Graham cannot waltz, so Peter has had to uphold the honor of the castle. I am about half a wee dram away from telling Uncle Brodie that Vera Conroy fancies him.”

“The poor young lady doesn’t deserve that. Somebody needs to take her shopping in Edinburgh.”

“She’s been, which is why she’s so consumed with jealousy toward Lanie. Lanie lives in a castle, Lanie has the latest fashions, Lanie’s settlements are quite generous. When Vera goes to Edinburgh, she goes as a vicar’s daughter, not as an earl’s cherished relation, however distant. What, by the way, were you doing in Edinburgh for better than a fortnight?” Morna asked because Graham had all but told her St. Didier had been dispatched to retrieve an engagement ring.

Morna had regarded engagement rings as an extravagant affectation, but now that she was engaged, or as good as, she found the gesture touching and generous. Still, it didn’t take two weeks to pick up a ring.

“I was sent to retrieve goods not suitable for entrusting to the mail,” St. Didier said. “I also tried to find the former cook, Mrs. Theobaldia Gibson. I was unsuccessful.”

The past, again. Always trying to intrude on present joys. “Graham set you at that task?”

“He did. Mrs. Gibson, who was quite mature at the time of the countess’s death, emigrated to Boston when she left the castle. I did find her sister, who claimed Theobaldia’s decision to leave Scotland was made abruptly, though Boston apparently agrees with her well enough. The sisters correspond, and Mrs. Gibson has never explained why she left a prestigious post here to skin rabbits in the wilds of Massachusetts.”

“Mrs. Gibson claimed old women weren’t safe in their beds at the castle.” Morna nodded to Aunt Maighread, who had engaged old John MacIver in earnest discussion by the door to the cardroom. “The post was prestigious when Mrs. Gibson took it, but scandalous when she left.”

“Scandalous by English standards, perhaps, but I gather local sentiment ran against the sheriff’s man and Dr. Ramsey, not against the MacNeils.”

He gathered correctly. “Graham came home referring to himself as a felon nonetheless. I hate that.”

St. Didier took a perhaps dilatory sip of his drink. “Because he’s innocent?”

As the waltz wound on, Morna considered her answer. “Because he’s more than innocent. He took punishment that either should never have been meted out, or should have been meted out for another.”

“Which theory do you favor?”

The question was serious. St. Didier sought her honest opinion. “Graham told you about the candles?”

“Somebody was in the sickroom between when Peter brought up the posset and the present earl came by to see to the countess’s medicinal tisane. Could it have been a maid or a footman?”

“Not likely. The family tended to her ladyship in the evening. We each had our little jobs, and putting the candles out would have been Graham’s responsibility if her ladyship was ready to sleep following her last dose of the day.”

“Then whoever blew out the candles wasn’t familiar with the sickroom routine, were they?”

In the whole castle, who would not have known the nightly ritual designed to give the countess enough company, enough nourishment, enough medicine, but not too much of any of the foregoing? The kitchen certainly knew the particulars, which ruled out Mrs. Gibson. The housekeeper, maids, and footman, most of the family…

“Frustrating,” Morna said, “to have no answers after all this time, and when we think we have an answer, we have more questions instead. Aunt Hibernia is quite bold.”

The old dear had just kissed Graham’s cheek.

“She is doubtless congratulating him in anticipation of his good fortune. Might I escort you to the buffet?”

The music slowed to the final reprise, the dancing couples eased apart, and Peter looked like a man who’d survived Waterloo. His smile was wooden, while Vera Conroy chattered brightly at his side. When he’d delivered his partner to the vicar’s wife, he decamped with observable dispatch.

Nevin Bodeen took Peter’s place in less than three seconds.

“Graham has insisted that he’ll see me to the buffet,” Morna said. “Besides, you owe the local belles a chance to interrogate you. Unlike Uncle Brodie, your recollections of fashionable London date from the present century.”

St. Didier smiled, and Morna realized with a sort of dismay that he could be attractive . Too serious, too observant and quiet, but when he allowed himself a glimmer of humanity, his looks took on an appeal that Morna would not have believed possible absent the evidence of her own eyes.

“Escort Aunt Hibernia,” Morna said as Peter made his way toward them through the throng. “She will have more intelligence to share with you than Wellington’s best spies ever gathered behind enemy lines.”

“I’ll do that. Peter, good evening. Your gentlemanly forbearance does you credit. In your situation, I might have been tempted to engage in a judicious bit of tripping on a lady’s hems.”

“I didn’t think to trip over her hems. Forewarned and all that, for next time. Morna, a question.”

“Of course.”

“Where’s Lanie? I searched before the supper waltz, which I wanted to sit out with her, but then Vera the Limpet got hold of me, and now I can’t find Lanie anywhere.”

“Shall I check the ladies’ retiring room?”

“She’ll go up to her apartment rather than brave that brood of vipers, but the footman at the landing said she hasn’t gone up.”

The footman was stationed on the landing to stop misguided guests from wandering into the family wing.

“Let’s have a word with Dunhaven, shall we?” St. Didier suggested. “He’s been by the veranda door for the past quarter hour. Perhaps he saw her slip out of the ballroom.”

Morna took a quick inventory of the guests not yet heading across the corridor to the buffet in the gallery. Vera Conroy was still in earnest discussion with Nevin Bodeen, and the lady looked entirely too smug for the occasion.

“Let’s have a word this instant,” Morna said. “Lanie would not have absented herself voluntarily right before supper without telling me.”

“Fetch John MacIver,” Graham said quietly, though the urge to bellow was nigh choking him. “Fetch him discreetly.”

“Lanie is missing,” Peter retorted. “Nowhere to be found, and you want to chat up the gamekeeper?”

Morna glowered at Peter and then slipped away in the direction of the corridor.

“Does MacIver have scent hounds?” St. Didier asked.

“He does, and they are well trained,” Graham said. “He’s also loyal.”

Peter looked from Graham to St. Didier. “Loyal to the MacNeils?”

“Loyal to me,” Graham said, “and the castle. We’ll need something that bears Lanie’s scent, preferably something she was wearing this evening. Peter, get you to her apartment and find us a shawl or dressing gown, even a pair of slippers or a shift, if she’s worn them recently. St. Didier, we’ll need warm cloaks. and you’ll want to change into boots. I’ll meet you at the back terrace door.”

The ballroom emptied while Graham stood near the grand staircase and pretended to admire the decorations. Antique chandeliers glowed with hundreds of eight-hour beeswax candles, pennants hung from the minstrels’ gallery, and pots of daffodils and ferns graced the ballroom’s perimeter. While the guests dined, the footmen would sweep up the original chalk pattern decorating the dance floor and apply new, and fresh ice sculptures would be brought up from the cellars for the punchbowls.

The stags had long since lost their antlers, and Graham would soon lose his mind. Two eternities later, Morna glided into the ballroom, the picture of serene good cheer, John MacIver at her side.

“Laird, good evening.” Craggy old MacIver in full Highland kit was an impressive sight. “A fine spread you’re puttin’ on.”

“We’ll see that you get a heaping plateful,” Graham replied, “as soon as we find Miss Lanie. She’s not in her room and not in the castle that we’ve been able to discern, though we’ll do a quick inspection upstairs in the next quarter hour. I’d thought to impose on your hound for assistance with the search.”

MacIver studied the fancy ghillie brogues laced about his feet. “Bit nippy to go for a stroll.”

“Nippy, dark, and dangerous for a blind woman. We fear she might not be out strolling voluntarily. We need your discretion as well as your best tracking dog.”

“Then I will need me boots, Laird, and something from Miss Lanie’s wardrobe that she’s worn recently.”

MacIver’s response eased the tiniest morsel of Graham’s worry. “I can send a groom to fetch the hound, and we’ll find you a pair of boots. You’d best eat now while you have the chance. This could be a long night.”

“Aye, and cold. We’ll find her, Laird. If she’s on the property, we’ll find her.”

MacIver strode off, a groom was dispatched with all possible speed, and Graham was left with Morna in the deserted ballroom.

“You take the family quarters,” Graham said. “I’ll do the guest wing. I’ll meet you back here.”

Twenty minutes later, Graham was out of breath and out of patience. “No Lanie,” he said when Morna joined him in the ballroom. “I’ve asked the aunties to make a discreet perusal of the music room, library, and so on. Peter is having a gander belowstairs.”

Lanie’s shawl lay over the newel post at the foot of the grand staircase—another carved stag.

Morna took up the shawl and sniffed it, then rolled it into a ball and waved it at Graham. “Don’t say it, Graham MacNeil. Do not say this is your fault. Lanie might well be napping in some alcove.”

“The whole castle is too noisy for somebody with her sensitive hearing to nap, and we’ve looked in the alcoves. Somebody has taken her.”

“She would set up a hue and cry if somebody tried to abduct her.” The confidence in Morna’s tone was belied by a glance toward the terrace doors, which still stood open.

“A hue and cry,” Graham replied, “that we wouldn’t hear while two hundred feet are stomping on a wooden floor and Perthshire’s best fiddles are trying to be heard above that racket. The staff is going full tilt in all directions, and Lanie would easily have been tricked into showing somebody a portrait in the library.”

From there, she could have been spirited out the French doors and into the night. The work of a moment.

“Then somebody is a kidnapper,” Morna reported, “and that is not your fault. We’ve had criminals in Scotland since before the Flood, I’ll have you know, and we had them even when you were off in Australia.”

How dear, stubborn, and wrong she was. “Morna, somebody is making a point: I can hide on the family estate all I please, but I and the people I love are not safe as long as I dwell here. Perhaps if I’d not asked so many questions about the past, Lanie might still be safe.”

“You don’t know that. God in heaven, Graham, Lanie might be having a good cry because she can’t waltz with Peter while Vera Conroy was trying to count his ribs with her own.”

That observation offered a glimmer of both hope and dread. “Miss Conroy was in earnest discussion with the Bodeen twit immediately after the waltz. Bodeen offered for Lanie, didn’t he?”

“And she turned him down flat, showing the good sense for which we all treasure her.”

A footman signaled Graham from the terrace doorway, and Graham nodded acknowledgment. “MacIver’s hound has arrived. Let’s find our gamekeeper and meet St. Didier by the terrace door.”

“I’ve already changed into boots.” Morna held up the hem of a lovely velvet ballgown to reveal the toes of a pair of very practical, substantial boots. “The latest in Scottish fashion, that’s me.”

Graham kissed her, for courage, and because, for his sake, she was trying to remain calm in the midst of disaster.

“No dancing slippers for me tonight,” Graham said, taking the shawl from her and leading the way to the corridor. “I’ve warned Peter we’ll be gathering by the terrace door. Drat and blast, it’s snowing.”

“The hound won’t care about a dusting of snow.” Morna swept past him, and they were soon at the door to the back terrace, where MacIver, St. Didier, Peter, and a panting canine met them.

“Lanie’s shawl,” Graham said, passing over the ball of wool. “She wore it earlier today. One of her favorites.” His voice shook as the thought assailed him that Lanie might never wear it again. “How the hell do we start, MacIver? We’ve thousands of acres, and now it’s damned snowing.”

“Barely,” St. Didier said, passing Morna her cloak. “A few stray flakes. I’d suggest a perimeter search first.”

Peter pulled on a three-caped greatcoat. “What does that mean?”

MacIver stroked a hand over the hound’s head. “Yon Englishman is thinking that if Miss Lanie was led away from the premises on foot, then we’ll pick up her trail by making a loose circle around the whole castle. We’ll come upon her line of scent, and we can follow where it leads.”

“No carriages have come or gone in the last hour,” St. Didier said. “I asked the groom who brought the hound. Unless somebody lifted Miss Lanie off her feet, threw her over his shoulder, and carried her away without provoking her to screaming, we stand a good chance of picking up her trail.”

Graham searched for his new cloak among the garments hanging from pegs along the dimly lit hallway, lost patience with the exercise, and grabbed the countess’s old cloak. Morna passed him a scarf and wrapped one about her own neck.

“Lanie might need a cloak,” Peter said, taking one off a peg. “And I might need to kill somebody.”

“We’ll find her,” Graham said with a calm and confidence he did not feel. “MacIver, you’re in charge.”

“Then you will all stay well behind me. Give the beast time and space to do his job. He’s the best in the shire, if not in all of Scotland. Come along, Hamlet. We’re off for a wee stroll.”

Hamlet, the doomed prince. Lovely.

Graham allowed everybody else to file out into the night behind MacIver before bringing up the rear and closing the door. The front of the house had been resplendently lit with torches, while the back was lit only by the rising moon. Flurries drifting down on a chill breeze shone like diamonds, probably the last of the season, and tonight of all nights.

As Graham tromped along behind the others, Morna dropped back and took his hand.

“We’ll find her, Graham. She wants to be found, she’s quite sensible, and we’re determined.”

All true, but little comfort, so Graham squeezed Morna’s fingers and kept silent. Twenty minutes later, nobody was saying much of anything when the hound stopped, sniffed more slowly, and looked up at MacIver.

The gamekeeper merely stood still while the dog resumed sniffing, then broke into a trot, nose down, and headed for the dark line of trees twenty yards ahead.

“The woods,” Peter muttered. “Lanie would never have gone for a walk in the woods at night by herself, much less by day. Somebody wants to die a slow and painful death.”

“The Leap is that direction,” Morna said. “Threaten violence later. Find my sister now.”

The hound let out a yodeling whuffle, and MacIver responded with a command in Gaelic.

Graham dropped Morna’s hand and broke into a run.

Morna caught up to Graham only when he’d stopped ten yards short of the precipice.

“Who’s there?” Lanie asked, two words laced with more anxiety than annoyance. She sat on the old bench, knees drawn up and skirts tucked over her feet, a small, dark shape in a large shadowy night.

“Lanie, it’s Morna. Graham is with me. Peter and St. Didier are coming right along, and MacIver and his hound are with us too.”

Lanie stood up, not six feet from the drop, and Morna nearly screamed.

Graham ambled toward the bench. “Stay right where you are, Lanie. You’re about two yards from the Leap, and we wouldn’t want you starting any new legends. I do believe that’s my cloak you’re wearing.”

“It’s too long on me.”

Graham reached her, enfolded her in a hug, and soon had a lachrymose female in his embrace. “You’re safe, Lanie. We’ll get you back to the castle, find you a toddy and a warm fire. You’re safe.”

“I want P-Peter.” A wail from the heart as Lanie slipped from Graham’s arms.

Morna wiped a tear on her sleeve and shoved Peter forward.

“I’m here, Lanie,” Peter said, sounding surprisingly calm and cheerful. “I’ve brought your old cloak.”

Lanie was shivering despite the warmth Graham’s cloak afforded. Peter wrapped the second cloak around her. “Let’s get you out of these woods.”

“I knew I was at the Leap because of the noise from the river and the knots in the bench, but the falls below made it hard to listen for the violins.”

“The violins are silent now,” Morna said. “The guests are enjoying the supper break.” Somebody had timed this kidnapping very carefully, somebody who knew of Lanie’s acute hearing. Graham’s thunderous scowl told Morna he’d reached the same conclusion.

“You can tell us how you came to be here when you’re warm,” Graham said. “Because everybody is focused on the buffet and the gossip, few will even have noticed that you were absent.”

“I am so cold,” Lanie said, leaning into Peter.

“Let’s get you home.” Peter wrapped an arm around her shoulders. “Follow the sound of MacIver’s panting hound, to whom I promise a diet of juicy steak for all the rest of his days.”

“He’d rather chew on your boots,” MacIver said, “but the steaks would suit me quite well.”

Morna wanted to hug the old man for providing a pragmatic touch of humor and hug the dog for preventing a tragedy.

“He told me to stay on the bench, and I’d be safe,” Lanie said. “People can freeze to death. I thought I felt some snowflakes on my cheeks.”

“You did,” Morna replied. “Did you recognize the voice, Lanie?”

The only sound for the next few moments was the dog snuffling along as he led the party in the direction of the castle.

“I did not. I assumed he was a man, but he whispered, and his accent was odd. English, but not from the Borders or Yorkshire. He smelled like Graham, and his hold on my arm was quite firm.”

Morna could feel Peter growling and hear Graham silently swearing vengeance, which wouldn’t yield them any answers.

“How did this person trick you into leaving the ball, Lanie?” Morna asked.

“He smelled like Graham. He was wearing Graham’s cloak. I realize that now. The new one, from Edinburgh. He whispered to me that if I’d come along, somebody had asked to meet me on the terrace. Then it was ‘just a bit farther’ until I began to struggle and demand to be returned to the castle. I realized Peter would never ask me to rely on a stranger out of doors in the dark, and my escort didn’t walk like Graham. Besides that, Graham would never give me cause to worry by playing blind man’s bluff games with me or whispering like some truant schoolboy.”

“Damned right I wouldn’t.”

The abductor knew which cloak was Graham’s, knew that Lanie identified people by scent, and further knew that the cloak would be redolent of Graham’s heathery fragrance.

“How did you find me?”

“Peter tried to locate you before the supper waltz,” Morna said. “He was waylaid by Vera Conroy, then he sounded the alarm at the first opportunity.” And that blasted waltz had gone on forever.

“Graham summoned MacIver,” Peter added, “and we had old Hamlet fetched, and here we are. I am personally ready for a go at the buffet.”

Was Peter trying to comfort Lanie by mentioning food? To calm himself? To pretend Lanie hadn’t been abducted from amid a crowd of neighbors in her very home?

“Some things had best be discussed now,” Morna said, “while Lanie’s recollections are fresh.”

“That’s up to Lanie.” Graham took Morna’s hand and gave it a squeeze. “She can decide if she’d rather eat, talk to us, do both, or rejoin the crowd in the ballroom and put off the rest until later.”

Morna wanted to argue, but Graham was right. Lanie’s needs came first.

They emerged from the woods, the back of the castle looming before them against the night sky.

“Not far to go now,” Peter said. “We’re out of the woods, Lanie.”

“I know. The smell is different, and we’re no longer walking on leaves and bracken. My feet are blocks of ice.”

Good God, she was wearing heeled slippers. Graham and Peter muttered curses.

“You are all too quiet,” Lanie said. “If you want to know my preferences, I’d like to return to the ball, enjoy supper with Peter just as we’d planned, and make sure Vera Conroy sees that I’m on hand and enjoying myself.”

Vera Conroy lacked the wits to orchestrate this crime. Nevin Bodeen was mean enough to consider this a prank, but he’d have needed an accomplice from within the castle.

“If nobody objects,” St. Didier said, “I’ll find a footman to take the hound back to his hearth.”

MacIver passed over the leash, and St. Didier headed across the garden toward the sunken steps that led to the pantries.

“St. Didier will feel responsible,” Lanie said. “He’s like that. He thinks he’s supposed to keep everybody safe all the time.”

Graham sighed. Peter was muttering again, this time in the Erse.

“We think,” Morna said, “that you deserve to be safe in your own home.”

“I’m all but blind,” Lanie retorted. “I will never be safe when the rest of the world is for people who can see well. I am hungry.”

Morna wished she could pry Lanie from beneath Peter’s arm and hug her and shake her and hug her. Lanie was trying to be brave—more brave than usual—and that she had been victimized yet again, not by a disease, but by a person acting willfully, was abominable.

“You’ll need dry shoes and stockings,” Morna said, rather than curse and rant and kick the potted tulips. “Let’s get you up to your apartment.”

“I want to take a tray in the study,” Lanie said. “The study will be warm, and I can eat in peace there with Peter. By the time the fiddles are tuning up again, I shall be smiling graciously where everybody can see me, and you lot can watch for who acts surprised.”

Graham and Peter exchanged a look, and then it was Peter’s turn to sigh.

“If that’s what you want, dearest Lanie,” he said, “that’s what will happen.”

With profuse thanks to MacIver, who looked to be standing at least three feet taller in his kilt and boots, the party broke up at the back terrace door. Morna went to fetch dry slippers and stockings, Graham took up impersonating a jovial host, and Peter escorted Lanie to the warmth and safety of the old earl’s study.

Only as Morna was sorting through wool stockings in Lanie’s dresser did she realize the full impact of the night’s mischief. Lanie was shaken—they were all shaken—and might well come down with a lung fever as a result of being kidnapped.

Peter was furious now, but likely also hoping to pass the whole matter off as a prank taken too far.

St. Didier was off to sort suspects and evidence belowstairs.

And Graham was, without doubt, planning to leave, to go far, far away for a very long time, once again taking the blame for a crime he did not commit.