“But not tonight. Wonicot has seen to that.”
He let her go. “I don’t care about your past,” he said quietly.
Again she tried to understand what he was really saying, but she was tired and fraught, and she just wanted him to leave her alone. She turned to stare out of the window, and a moment later her door closed and she heard his steps retreating.
This time when he appeared outside in the courtyard, he didn’t turn and wave at her. He walked away, into the woods, and Antoinette knew that the light she had seen that first night was his. He was living out there, somewhere.
If she could find his home she might well discover his identity, and then she could force him into forgetting the letter and leaving her alone. He would have to leave if he didn’t want to be arrested, and she would be safe.
Suddenly “safe” didn’t have the same comforting feel. In fact, Antoinette was beginning to wonder if being safe was really something to be desired. And whether she was the sort of person who preferred to be very unsafe indeed.
Chapter 13
“Gabriel.”
Sir James Trevalen’s smile was a shade anxious as he greeted his visitor. Perhaps, thought Gabriel, he was expecting some ravaged, desperate creature, unshaven and shabbily dressed, more used to hiding out in the woods than to polite company. If he was, then he was mistaken. Gabriel was shaven and clean and far from desperate.
“Sir James, I had your note. You wanted to see me?”
“Yes, Gabriel, I did.” He sat down, gesturing for Gabriel to return to his own seat by the fire. The day had turned chilly, and outside the wind tossed treetops and bowed the taller perennials in the garden border. “I thought I owed it to your father to speak with you and to see how you are managing in the current difficult circumstances.”
“I am managing,” Gabriel replied levelly.
“You know all your friends are doing what they can for you. There has been a gross miscarriage of justice, and we will not rest until it has been righted. Unfortunately, because your father signed over Wexmoor Manor to Appleby, supposedly willingly, there’s not much we can do. By the way, I have tried to discover from your father the truth of the matter, but he will not speak to me.”
Gabriel gave a harsh laugh. “I’m not surprised, Sir James! It is a matter of a lady’s honor, you see.”
“Ah.”
Gabriel preferred not to air the possibility of Appleby being his father, not even to an old family friend, and both men fell silent. After a moment Sir James rallied, changing the subject slightly.
“I had a visit from a Miss Dupre.”
“Miss Dupre, dear me, don’t believe everything that little bird says. She is Appleby’s mistress, sent down here so that his reputation with the royals won’t suffer. As soon as the Great Exhibition is over, you can be sure Miss Dupre will be heading back to London and her cozy life.”
Sir James studied Gabriel’s face. “You sound bitter. Do you dislike her so much? Or is it the man who keeps her you dislike?”
“Both,” he said uncompromisingly.
“I have to say she didn’t seem the type to put herself in Appleby’s power. In fact, if I had met her anywhere else, and known nothing of her life, I would have said she was a well-brought-up young lady. A little intense, perhaps, and too frank to be popular at afternoon tea parties, but a lady nonetheless.”
“Don’t be deceived. Miss Dupre is a clever minx who can make you believe whatever she wants.”
Sir James ti
lted back his head and folded his hands across his lean paunch. “You obviously don’t admire her then?”
“No! Yes…I don’t know.” Gabriel stood up and peered from the window as if the weather might help him make up his mind. “I find her interesting, that’s all. My life at the moment is difficult…uncertain. I find studying Miss Dupre takes my thoughts off my own misery.”
An image of her perched above him, her body clasping his, eyes wide with surprise and wonder, shot into his brain. He pushed it out again before it had the inevitable effect on his physiology.
“Your family has a weakness for fallen women. Or so your grandfather used to say,” he teased.
“You mean the story about the king’s mistress? Yes, my grandfather believed if it wasn’t for our ancestor’s weakness we’d be titled now. Dukes or some such.” Gabriel raised an eyebrow. “Are you worried I might form an attachment for Miss Dupre? You needn’t be.”
“You haven’t asked me why she came to see me, Gabriel. Perhaps you already know. The lady wished to report an outrage perpetrated on her during her journey to Wexmoor Manor. It seems that she had already told the Wonicots but they weren’t taking her seriously—a prank, they called it. She wanted me to discover the identity of the man who committed the outrage and arrest him. She seemed quite keen that I do so.”
Gabriel continued to stare out over the garden. “And what did you say?”