The Wild Baron (Baron 1)

“At least,” Toby said, so white in the face Rohan thought he would be ill. “Make one of them a man. With a gun.”

By nine o’clock that evening the house had been thoroughly searched, all the doors and windows secured, and footmen set to patrol the house throughout the night.

The baron, Susannah, and Toby sat in the Mountvale drawing room, a lovely room that smelled of fine old silk, rich oak, and lemon wax.

Toby was saying, “You told me, sir, just to look in on Marianne before I went to bed. Well, I just walked in, sir, and there she was, sitting out there, singing and talking to herself until she saw me. Then she wanted me to come out and play with her. I told her no, told her to come in this minute, but she wouldn’t. I tried to get her in, but the little nit just scooted closer to the edge. It nearly flipped my heart over. I’m sorry, sir.”

“Don’t be silly, Toby. You did precisely the right thing. My own heart was in my throat when I saw her. You did well.”

“Do you have any other brothers, my lord, except Vicar Tibolt?” Susannah said. She was seated so quietly, her eyes never leaving Marianne, who was all tucked up on a settee in the shadows of the corner of the drawing room, the maid on one side of her and the footman on the other.

Rohan slowly nodded. “No, just Tibolt. But he wouldn’t harm any of God’s varmints, as he calls children. He’s got humor about him, although our parents never admitted to it, and he positively reeks of goodwill. No, Tibolt isn’t the man who opened that window and put the chair next to it for Marianne to climb out on the balcony.”

“Tibolt?”

“Yes, Toby. My father gave the naming of one boy to my mother and he named the other. My mother was the one who selected the name George. My father likes the unusual, the extraordinary even. I believe Tibolt was a bishop in ancient Constantinople. Perhaps George told you that our father was renowned for his, ah, benign wickedness. He thought it a great joke. Naturally, he wanted Tibolt to be just as wicked as he was. My father hoped the irony of it would amuse him until he stuck his spoon in the wall.”

“Goodness,” Toby said, “I’m glad Papa didn’t do anything like that to me.”

“It appears that there ended up being no irony at all,” Susannah said.

“Indeed.”

Toby gave a loud yawn.

“It’s time for you to go to bed, Toby,” Susannah said.

Toby stood up immediately, but he didn’t move. He looked down at his toes.

“What’s the matter, love?” Susannah asked.

Toby blurted out, “Could I sleep in your bedchamber, sir? It’s not that I’m scared, but, well—”

“I was going to suggest it, Toby. I think it might make me feel a good deal better if you were to sleep in my bedchamber,” Rohan said. He sighed. An eight-year-old boy sleeping in his chamber? Well, th

ey’d done it for the past three nights. The boy didn’t snore. If Rohan did, Toby hadn’t said anything. Rohan rose. “I’ll tell Fitz to fetch a bed to my room.”

“I don’t like what happened, sir.”

“Neither do I. On the morrow, I will see if I can’t figure out who visited Marianne. It certainly wasn’t my brother Tibolt.” It couldn’t have been Tibolt. Marianne was just a little girl. She was wrong about the man looking like him.

He looked over at Susannah as he spoke. Again, he saw the stab of panic in her eyes. And something else. Fear? What the hell was going on here? He didn’t say anything until Toby had left the room. “Now, perhaps you’d like to tell me what this man was looking for?”

His voice was soft and soothing, just the sort of voice to make one spill one’s deepest secrets without hesitation. She shook her head, shaking that damned voice away. She didn’t know what to do. She picked up the sleeping Marianne and settled her over her shoulder. Then she left the drawing room, Rohan behind her.

She said finally, her voice quiet so as not to disturb Marianne, “There is something, but I can’t believe it would have anything to do with this.”

“Will you allow me to be the judge of that?”

“I think I’m being silly.”

“Tell me.”

“You sound, my lord, like a judge, all stiff and mean,” she said as they walked side by side up the front staircase.

“My lord?” He cocked a thick brow at her. “Surely after watching you climb through a window and out onto a balcony—your ankles all bare, your stockings showing to your knees—shouldn’t you give it up and call me Rohan again?”

She wouldn’t look at him. They stopped at her bedchamber door. She laid Marianne down on her own bed, and the child began sucking on her fingers.