Laurie Alice Eakes - [Daughters of Bainbridge House 02] Read online

  “Vitriol versus vinegar,” Cassandra murmured.

  Deciding the paper was too small for a good detailed design, she began to work on one of her formulas, a way to make the silk of a balloon more airtight. She knew many used a mixture of birdlime, turpentine, and linseed oil, but that could prove highly flammable and needed more than one coat on either side of the silk. Doing so would take days, and how would she manage to find a place where she could boil a pot of something so odorous, let alone dangerous? Not to mention stretch the silk for the balloon. Surely it would make the fabric too stiff to properly inflate and deflate as needed. Elastic gum, perhaps? No, heavier still than the birdlime. She would adjust the amounts of the birdlime concoction first, since it was so common. Perhaps no linseed oil? Birdlime was oily enough. Yes, that might work. She still encountered the difficulty of where to melt it . . .

  Her musings and calculations kept her awake through the night so that she slept in the coach, annoying Honore, who wanted to chatter about how much she would enjoy autumn in the country.

  “Lies,” Cassandra managed to mutter at one time. “You will despise it.”

  She would too, if she ended up confined to afternoon calls from dull neighbors or evening parties or, worse, that favorite country house party activity of acting out a play.

  “I will not hate it in the least. London over the summer was quite, quite dull.” Honore launched into a list of things Lady Whittaker had promised they would do.

  Cassandra went back to sleep, and Honore woke her when the Hall was but a mile or two off so she could tidy herself.

  “You have creases on your face,” Honore announced. “And your hair is a disaster.” She smoothed a hand through her own perfectly coiffed golden locks. Even her traveling gown seemed to have remained wrinkle-free.

  Cassandra’s looked like jacquard, so many lumps and ridges had it formed without her moving. And her hair was a disaster, slipping from its pins. Good. The worse she looked, the less likely her ladyship would be to want Cassandra for a daughter-in-law.

  “I am certain she’ll understand.” Honore set her beribboned straw hat at a jaunty angle. “Lady Whittaker, I mean, as to why you look so crumpled. You have been ill, after all. I’d say you are still very much an invalid.”

  Cassandra yawned. “Do, please, say so.”

  Except how could an invalid go for the long walks she would need in order to find a place for the balloon? And how would her aeronautic friends write to her without everyone knowing? So many details. She would rather be back in Devonshire or, better yet, at Lydia’s little cottage in Tavistock. Except Lydia had sold the cottage, saying it reminded her of painful times after her husband left for the war.

  The carriage slowed. For the first time since climbing into the vehicle, Cassandra glanced out of the window. On the other side of the outriders, a high wall ran along the road. Behind it, trees towered in autumnal profusion of heavy, dark green and touches of gold where the leaves began to turn. Iron gates stood open in welcome, and a drive stretched long and straight ahead in a dim tunnel between the oaks and pines. A rather smooth and well-maintained drive for a family allegedly pinched for funds. Beneath the trees, though, lay telltale signs of neglect—piles of last year’s moldering leaves and a tangle of brambles that would make walking through the parkland uncomfortable at best. The lawn, curving beyond the tree line, also demonstrated a lack of consistent care with irregular mowing and several bare patches.

  In contrast, the house gleamed in a blend of gray stone and red brick, mullioned windows, and shining squares of glass in creamy frames. Clean glass caught the sun like gemstones.

  “It looks old.” Honore spoke in a whisper as though the occupants could hear her. “I do hope it isn’t drafty.”

  “It’s bound to be.” Cassandra clutched her reticule containing new balloon plans, ones she had made while lying in bed for weeks.

  She stroked her reticule, this one blue velvet to match her pelisse and slippers. In the wee hours of the morning, she thought perhaps she had solved her coating problem. That left finding a place to purchase a quantity of birdlime and a cauldron and build a fire . . .

  One difficulty at a time. The current one lay before her in the form of a tall, middle-aged footman lowering the steps of the carriage and holding out his hand to her. Of course he reached out to her first. She was the elder. As far as most people knew, his future mistress of the manor. But if Honore went down first, she could distract everyone from Cassandra’s awkward descent.

  “Honore, you first,” Cassandra directed. “I do believe I’ve dropped my . . .”

  Because she could not think of anything she might have dropped, she simply bent forward as though searching. A lie. Shame on her. Lying to preserve her dignity, or what dignity remained to her.

  But not a lie. She had dropped a tear. Out of nowhere, her eyes burned and the droplet splashed onto her knee.

  “You are so slow,” Honore said brightly. Affectionately. Too brightly. Never too affectionately. For all her foolishness, she was the kindest of sisters.

  More burning, another tear.

  Cassandra dashed her sleeve across her eyes as the footman lent his support to Honore, who began to chatter as though he were a friend long missed instead of a servant. Cassandra swallowed, blinked, and picked up her cane. By the time the footman extricated himself from Honore, Cassandra was on the ground with three steps to climb up to the front door. Only three. She could manage three, especially if a groom or footman came to her aid.

  She started for the house in Honore’s wake. Her cane sank into the soft earth that formed the carriageway, and she teetered, her weight coming down on her worst leg. She gasped in pain.

  A hand slid beneath her elbow. “Miss Bainbridge, allow me.”

  She froze at the unfamiliar voice, so cool, so clipped, so obviously the product of a fine school upbringing. Eton or Harrow, perhaps. The hand was strong, holding her upright with a palm beneath her elbow. Slowly she glanced up to eyes the color of the English Channel after a storm—gray-green and cool. He wore no hat, and his hair gleamed honey-blond in the sunlight, a bit darker than Honore’s golden locks. And he was in uniform. The red coat did not suit him, draining his naturally pale complexion of color. But for that flaw, his fine bones made for an attractive countenance.

  “We have not been introduced.” A bit rude, perhaps, but he was being familiar for a stranger. “I beg your pardon, but you appeared in instant need.” He smiled.

  She forgave his uninvited contact.

  “Gabriel Crawford.” He removed his hand from her elbow so he could bow. “Major Gabriel Crawford at your service, Miss Bainbridge. And I suspect you need that service up these steps.”

  “For a few more weeks only, I am assured.”

  A nonsensical thing to respond, true though it was. But ahead of her, Honore had mounted the short flight with her long-legged grace. The doors opened to receive her like gleaming arms, and her laughter drifted back into the afternoon.

  Cassandra should have been the first one over that threshold—as a bride.

  Her throat closed up again. Honore had done her a favor in going first. Cassandra would not enter first like a new bride.

  Eyes fixed straight ahead, she dug her cane into the ground and started forward. Major Crawford’s hand remained beneath her elbow without invitation, without rejection, without providing her the jolt of longing that the most proper of touches from Whittaker never failed—

  She drew her thoughts up short and pulled herself up the first step, then the second, then the third. With her lips set, she managed not to gasp or even whimper in pain. Then she stood on solid flagstones worn smooth from hundreds of years and thousands of feet and crossed the threshold without Geoffrey Giles, Lord Whittaker, at her side. No line of servants greeted her. She wasn’t their master’s wife. They would serve her as a guest and nothing more. Instead, a lady in black gauze over a pale gray silk glided forward and reached out her hands, noticed that Cassan
dra’s held a cane and a reticule, and rested them on her shoulders instead. “Welcome to Whittaker Hall at last, Cassandra.”

  Lady Whittaker, the earl’s mother, kissed Cassandra’s cheek. Though touched with silver strands, her hair shone the same brown as her son’s—so dark it appeared black in most lights—and she had the same brown eyes. She smiled and a dimple appeared in one cheek.

  Cassandra bowed her head to hide more foolish tears. “Thank you for the invitation, my lady.”

  “Oh, please, you should call me—” Lady Whittaker broke off. “We’ll discuss that later. Major, will you be so kind as to see to the unloading of their luggage. I am taking this young lady to her room. She looks in need of refreshment and a rest.”

  “Of course.” The major bowed and turned toward the front door, adding, “Until later, Miss Bainbridge.”

  “Cassandra slept most of the way in the carriage.” Honore appeared from the shadows of the great hall with its suits of armor standing in two corners like headless warriors, niches set with some sort of statuary, and one area set up with a fire and chairs to make the cavernous space welcoming. “But I am certain she’ll do well to lie down flat.”

  Bless Honore. Indeed, the backs of Cassandra’s legs itched and burned. She needed soothing ginger lotion rubbed into them. She also needed a show of protest.

  “I am truly quite all right, my lady.”

  “Nonsense, you are too recently an invalid.” Lady Whittaker herself bustled toward one end of the hall, leading the way down a corridor off the main hall, past a grand staircase so old a somewhat rusty dog gate hovered over it like the blade of a guillotine, and around another bend. “Watch your step here—the floor changes, as this is the newer wing of the house.”

  The floor turned from stone to wood. The dull tap, tap of Cassandra’s cane turned into an echoing thud, thud. She winced with each contact. So loud. She would wake anyone nearby. Except no one would be nearby. All the rooms opening off the corridor appeared to be small, cozy parlors, a breakfast room that would receive the morning light, and—hurrah! She smelled it before she saw the long table, globe, and shelves through the half-closed door—the library.

  Without any books.

  She could not resist stopping to push the door wide and look inside. Though two of the walls bore row upon row of shelves, not a one held a book. The only book in the room was an enormous Bible open on the table. The rest of the shelves were either empty or laden with decades of periodicals. The Gentleman’s Magazine, La Belle Assemblée, The Ladies’ Monthly Museum.

  “But Whittaker reads.” The words burst unbidden from Cassandra’s lips. She clapped her hand to her mouth, smacking herself in the chin with her reticule.

  “But of course he does.” Lady Whittaker paused a yard away and turned back. “He has his own library in the master suite on the other side of the house.”

  And up a floor, no doubt.

  “This is the ladies’ library,” Lady Whittaker continued. “My husband, God rest his soul, gave me a few copies of The Gentleman’s Magazine when it held articles he thought I would find of interest and not objectionable to a lady’s sensibilities, and I have simply scores of sermon pamphlets I do intend to have bound soon.”

  “I am certain those will do us a great deal of good,” Cassandra managed past a strangled throat.

  The truth. They would be a tremendous help getting her to sleep should she have difficulty—if she did not fret about all Whittaker’s lovely books out of her reach unless she got herself well enough to climb steps.

  Realizing Lady Whittaker was smiling at her as though she had granted Cassandra a great gift, she smiled back. “It’s a lovely room.”

  Which was the truth.

  “Whittaker may have told you that I am interested in a bit of engineering, so that table will come in quite conveniently.”

  “It does.” The proud mama nodded and simply glowed. “He uses it himself for his drawings.”

  His drawings? What drawings? Surely she hadn’t been betrothed to the man for a year and more without knowing he drew . . . anything.

  “You will find all the paper and pens you need in there.”

  “And I can read to her while she calculates.” Honore winked at Cassandra behind Lady Whittaker’s back. “We may make her a fashion plate yet.”

  “She is very pretty as she is.” Nothing but sincerity shone in Lady Whittaker’s glance from Cassandra’s crooked hat to her crumpled hem. “Rich colors suit you better than pastels, do they not?”

  “So Honore tells me.” Cassandra looked down, too conscious that what lay beneath that hem was anything but pretty—as opposite as it could get.

  “But we are embarrassing you, are we not?” Lady Whittaker turned abruptly and bustled ahead.

  Cassandra hastened to follow, afraid in the dimly lit corridor that her ladyship would turn yet another corner and she would be too far behind to see her and perhaps fall down the steps as she had that one night in the theater.

  Whittaker hadn’t been offended by her looks in the spectacles that made her eyes appear like something from the ocean that fishermen would toss back for sheer ugliness. He’d kissed her in the library to prove it. And kissed her, and . . .

  A hand clamped on her arm. “Stop,” Honore hissed between her teeth.

  She stood on the near side of a doorway Cassandra had been about to pass. Now that she had stopped and light streamed through the open doorway, Cassandra noted a short flight of steps down to another door. The faint aroma of oranges and lemons wafted through the air.

  “Is that the orangery?” Honore asked a little too loudly, as though that were her intent in stopping Cassandra.

  “Yes.” Lady Whittaker came back to the doorway. “We have oranges and lemons in there, so it is kept quite warm, a pleasant place in the winter, rather hot in the summer.”

  And a convenient exit without traversing the entire house.

  “The gardens are beyond.” Lady Whittaker sighed. “Not what they once were, I am sure, but still lovely in the spring. Everything is dying now.” Her face grew wistful. “One day we’ll repair the other glass house and I’ll have strawberries all year round too. Now I settle for them in June and bottle as many as we can. But you can see all that tomorrow. We keep country hours here, so I am afraid you missed dinner, but I’ll send in some refreshment and you can rest until supper. Miss Honore, your room is right next door here. You see, it was no trouble to turn these into a lovely little suite of rooms, as we still prefer to use the old part of the house for entertaining. Larger rooms. My father-in-law built these for warmth, not large gatherings, so the family uses them in the winter, though they are a bit far from the kitchens and—”

  She broke off and laughed. “Now listen to my tongue running on wheels. I’ve been so looking forward to your visit, though the circumstances . . .” Again that melancholy droop to her lips, the lower one full yet firm like her son’s, though she had to be at least Mama’s age, as Whittaker’s brother had been several years his senior. “I’ll send in Betsy to serve you right away.” With a swish of her skirts, she spun on her heel and hastened down yet one more corridor.

  “I am going to get lost,” Cassandra said.

  “Just sniff for the oranges, though you might want to wear your spectacles.”

  “You may be right in that.” Cassandra entered her chamber. Soft carpet deadened her cane and footfalls. The scent of lavender hinted at sachets set around to keep the moths from velvet curtains and bed hangings. Everything was blue or green or a blend of both—Cassandra could not tell in the fading evening light. She would ask the maid for candles to be lit. No, she would simply lie down.

  “I am so weary.” She stumbled toward the bed.

  Honore sighed. “But then you will not sleep tonight. And a maid is bringing refreshment.”

  “I am not hungry.”

  “Cassandra, you know what the physician said. You must eat well and get plenty of exercise as much as you can . . .”
/>   Her sister’s lecture, sounding more like managing Lydia than frivolous Honore, faded to a buzzing in Cassandra’s ears, a higher-pitched echo of the blood suddenly roaring through her skull.

  She reached for the edge of the quilted counterpane to turn it back and felt something crackle beneath her fingers. Embroidered satin coverlets did not crackle. But paper did.

  Someone had left a letter inside Cassandra’s bedclothes.

  7

  Darkness crept across the room where the last rays of dusk grew too weak to penetrate the grimy windows and the proprietor proved too cautious to light candles. Nonetheless, Whittaker knew the faces of the men around the table sticky with spilled ale. As he knew they had with him, he had made certain to see them each in enough light to identify them later. Their likenesses, poor an artist as he was, lay in papers he had managed to sneak into his rooms at Whittaker Hall one night while the household slept.

  He had tried to sneak farther into the Hall but had failed to reach Cassandra’s rooms. Too many servants scurried about, even with Mama’s economies. But his rooms were sacrosanct, out of reach of the maids and safe for him to enter with no one the wiser, including his keeper, Major Gabriel Crawford.

  Whittaker’s fingers balled into fists on his thighs at the idea of that man staying in the home Whittaker had inherited. His rightful home, his inheritance, his legacy, the home in which his future wife resided. At least the lady he still intended to be his wife, God willing.

  Which He did not seem to be.

  His hands tightened until the muscles in his arms bulged against the coarse linen shirt he wore under a leather jerkin. Cassandra was the woman Whittaker had prayed for all his life. He knew it mere days after meeting her. So why, a week before their wedding, would God destroy that intended union?