The Nightingale Legacy (Legacy 2)

“Certainly, my lord,” Tregeagle said at his most stately. “I think I will make up the Autumn Chamber.”

“It’s too dark, too chilly,” said North, thankful he knew which bedchamber it was. “She would catch an inflammation of the lung were she to have to sleep in there. It also needs airing.”

The three men looked at each other. Coombe said slowly, “If she became ill, she could be here for a very long time.”

North nodded, saying, “Quite true. If you put her in a poorly aired bedchamber, one that’s damp to boot, she might very well become ill. Very ill. Then she would be here for a very long time, possibly a longer time than Coombe believes.”

“A pertinent observation, my lord,” Coombe said, cleared his throat, and added, “I think the Pink Oval Room would be best. She’s a female, after all, and everyone knows that pink goes well with the peculiar temperament of their sex.”

“That would be appropriate,” said Mr. Tregeagle after some deliberation. “The windo

ws were open all day yesterday since our new maid, Timmy, was cleaning in there—for practice, you understand, my lord—and it wasn’t raining. Yes, that will be fine, Coombe.”

North just shook his head at them. He was grateful actually that they’d welcomed him back, since Mount Hawke had basically been theirs since his father had died. He wondered if they would have kept the doors locked in his face had he been a female. It seemed a distinct possibility, given their behavior toward Miss Derwent-Jones. It was a good thing she was leaving in the morning, otherwise they might poison her.

He nodded, aware that Coombe and Tregeagle were both looking at him, supposedly for his approval, which seemed silly since they obviously did exactly what they liked, but he said, “The Pink Oval Room would be quite nice, or at least it had better be.”

She was sound asleep when he carried her upstairs to the lovely corner room that overlooked an apple orchard, planted more than fifty years before. His mouth watered at the thought of those fat apples, nearly ripe now, so many of them, enough for the villagers throughout the winter. The trees gracefully covered the sloping land that fell away from the castle nearly to the bottom, where the land flattened out and there was a narrow thread of a stream that wound about over three acres of Mount Hawke land.

The room had once belonged to a female, to which female, he had no idea. He didn’t know who had furnished it in the soft pink and cream colors. He supposed that women had lived here at least a few years at a time, since male heirs had continued to be born and inherit Mount Hawke. But he hadn’t lived here with his mother, only his father and his grandfather. Had his mother ever visited Mount Hawke? He shook his head, shoving the brief memory and the elusive pain it brought far back. No, there had been no woman living at Mount Hawke in this century.

The furnishings were frayed, for they were old, but all was clean and polished. Everything smelled like lemon and wax. Although he hated this stone mausoleum, he appreciated the care everyone had taken of it. Timmy, the new maid, had done quite an acceptable job. A household of men wasn’t at all a bad thing, that is, until they were called upon to exhibit good manners to a passing female.

He removed only her scuffed boots. There was a hole in her stocking on the outside of her left foot. The skin was reddened and chafed. He didn’t like the looks of it. He covered her and snuffed out the single candle.

Coombe was waiting outside the Pink Oval Room. “Is the young lady all right, my lord?”

“She’s asleep. We’ll see just how all right she is tomorrow.”

“The, er, chamber, my lord, it showed Mount Hawke to advantage?”

“Yes, the maid, Timmy, did a fine job. Oh yes, Coombe, you will ensure that the breakfast Polgrain serves tomorrow is magnificent. You will ensure that the dishes used don’t have a single crack and that they’re sparkling clean. There will be a spotless tablecloth on the table. There will be linen napkins. Do you quite understand me?”

“Aye, my lord. Of a certainty. We are not stupid. Since she is leaving immediately after breakfast, we have determined it our duty to see that her young lady’s stomach is well filled for her journey to where she belongs.”

And just where, North wondered, did she belong? He wondered when Mr. Roland Ffalkes would be arriving, for arrive he would, doubtless with poor Owen in tow. He supposed that since she was young and a female and didn’t know the way of things in this man’s world, it was up to him to see that she was protected from her erstwhile guardian. What it was he would do, he hadn’t the faintest idea.

He quietly closed the door. He was frowning. Coombe said, “You require my services, my lord?”

“Oh no. It’s just that she’s—no, it’s nothing of importance, really. Good night, Coombe.”

“Good night, my lord. We will survive this.”

“Survive what? The temporary visitation of one single female?”

“You forget that she was armed, my lord.”

“Go to bed, Coombe.”

“She looked vicious, my lord. She could have shot me.”

“You deserve to be shot. Go to bed.”

“Yes, my lord.”

When he awoke in the dark of the night to a terrified scream, he thought for an instant he was back at the battle of Toulouse, surrounded with cannon belching death at them, and French soldiers shooting madly, piercing flesh with the deadly bayonets, men who had nothing left to die for but glory—surely nonsense to want to die with your guts exploding out of you as you screamed away your life—and for Napoleon, a man who deserved to write himself into history, but without any more deaths for his doomed cause. He could still hear the French soldiers shouting, “La gloire! La gloire!” Even when their comrades dropped dead beside them or in front of them and they had to step over their bodies, they kept up their shouts, over and over again, “La gloire! La gloire!”

He sat bolt upright in his bed utterly disoriented. There was another scream, then another. It was a female scream, not a man’s scream, not a soldier’s scream. A woman? Here? At Mount Hawke? He got his wits in order as he shoveled his hands through his hair.