Chapter 3

CHAPTER3

After I woke, I dressed myself in a gown of pale green lawn, a dress I’d always liked because it set off my pale olive skin and dark eyes. I was no beauty like Violet—yet properly attired, I was passable as a lady. My hair was thick and glossy, and my jaw and cheekbones were fine enough—although marred by my nose, which was slightly bumped in the middle, as my brother’s had been. But who was here at Markham Hall to be bothered by my nose? Or my too-wide mouth? The sheep? Mrs. Brightmore?

I went downstairs for a quiet breakfast—toast and eggs by myself in the dining room with the early light slanting in through the small window. Markham Hall was brighter during the day, but it would never be an airy place. Something of a medieval gloom clung to the corners and crannies, even in the face of oncoming sunshine.

I liked it quite a lot, actually.

“Mr. Markham left for business in Scarborough early this morning,” Mrs. Brightmore informed me as curtly as possible. “I have no idea when he’ll be back, so you’d best not plan on his company today.”

“I shall find myself more than capable of coping on my own.” Around her, politeness came only with a struggle.

Why did Thomas have to die?

I missed my brother. And I missed my old life.

After breakfast, I decided on a stroll around the grounds. Despite the melancholy air of the manor house itself, the grounds in full summertime were gorgeous, green and fresh and dappled with sunlight. I made my way past the small garden and stables and into the woods themselves, following a narrow path that eventually opened into a pasture.

The servant from last night knelt near the dry stone wall, several cracked stones around his feet. I’d planned on a quiet morning with only myself and the trees, but I wanted to know more about this place, and so far, he’d been the only kind face I’d seen. Mr. Markham had been fascinating—magnetic even—but kind?

No. Nothing about that stern face and leanly muscled frame spoke of kindness.

“Hello,” I said as I approached the servant.

He wiped his forehead. “Hello, miss.”

“I don’t think I caught your name last night. I’m Ivy Leavold, Mr. Markham’s cousin by marriage.”

“I’m Gareth,” he said with a smile. He had an open face, blue-eyed and friendly, and when he extended his hand, I shook it. “I’m Mr. Markham’s valet.”

“Are valets here normally in the habit of repairing walls?”

He laughed. “Well-spotted. I was hired on as a valet three years ago, but as Mr. Markham is rarely at home—and these days prefers to travel without a servant—I’ve been applied to other tasks. But I don’t mind. It is much better than working in a mill like my brothers.”

“Yes, I suppose it would be.” I sat on an intact portion of the wall, staring at the rustling forest around me. At home, on a day like this, I would have run barefoot across the field or sang until my voice grew hoarse. On a day like this, I wanted to feel the grass under my feet and the wind on my face and read in the sun with a bottle of Madeira nearby.

Like I would have at home.

Home is gone.

“ . . . careful,” Gareth was telling me.

I brought myself back to the present. “So sorry,” I apologized. “What were you saying?”

Gareth pulled some hearting stones out of a nearby pail. “I said the locals think Markham Hall is cursed. Or rather, that Mr. Markham himself is cursed. It was so awful what happened to Violet, killed only a month after they married.” He spoke her name with a softness that bordered on reverence. Her Christian name, I noticed.

“Yes,” I murmured, my mind drifting from this valet’s uncommon familiarity with my cousin to her death. “And she was such a talented horsewoman.”

“It was Mr. Markham’s horse,” he said, and there was real pain in his voice. “She wasn’t used to riding him.”

Even as a girl, Violet had loved riding, insisting on it every day, even in the rain. And most of all she’d loved the unpredictable horses—the stallions and the angry mares. Perhaps her death was not that shocking after all, if she still rode animals like that.

“What happened to Mr. Markham’s first wife?”

Gareth shrugged. “It was before I came here. Mr. Markham was a very young man when he first married, and I believe his bride was young too. She was taken with consumption, or so the stories go. Bedridden not long into their honeymoon and died before it ended. Her grave is next to the other Mrs. Markham’s, in the village churchyard.”

The turrets of the house’s tower cragged darkly over the trees. I tried to imagine the churchyard beyond the hall, no doubt as ancient and stately as the house itself. “Hard to believe such a beautiful place could see so much sadness.”

“It’s more beautiful on the outside than on the inside.” There was a bitterness to his voice, but when I glanced over at him, the source was unapparent. And I got the distinct feeling that I wouldn’t learn any more from Mr. Markham’s valet today.

I slid off the wall, brushing crumbled lichen off my dress. “Goodbye, Gareth.”

He touched his forehead and turned back to his work.

The path continued into the woods, trees swallowing up the pasture and the memory of Gareth as if they’d been nothing more than fairy dreams. The farther I ventured in, the more fluid time began to feel. I could have been in Sherwood Forest during the time of King Richard or about to stumble onto a Druid rite. Only the crenellated tower through the trees reminded me of where I was, of whom I was, of my circumstances and the strange man to whom I owed my new livelihood.

Mr. Markham. Last night had been so different from anything I’d ever experienced. He had none of the stiffness and decorum I’d experienced in wealthy gentlemen, but he was hardly friendly; there was something forbidding about him that held informality at bay. Even I, lacking social graces as I did, recognized that about him. His strength came not from his station in life or his wealth, but from something else. His physicality? His self-assurance?

Whatever it was, it was deeply alluring. Captivating. When he had held my wrist, when he had deftly unbuttoned my sleeve . . . I touched the smooth underside of my wrist, imagining the firelight on his face as he had talked of prisons and pleasure.

A stream bubbled nearby, purling and gurgling its way down the slope, and I stepped through a blanket of bluebells to get to the water. The water looked cool and inviting. I sat and unlaced my boots, pulled off my stockings, and then stood. Holding my skirts aloft, I stepped into the stream.

It was delicious.

I closed my eyes, letting the rushing water and playful breeze carry me away, far from missing Thomas, far from the dark tower of Markham Hall.

A stick snapped. My eyes flew open, and I saw Mr. Markham watching me from the bank of the stream. He said nothing, eyes flicking from my bare feet under the clear water to my face, his posture anything but casual or accessible.

Should I say something? Am I doing something wrong?

He stepped forward to the bank and murmured, “Are you a naiad?”

I could not tell if he was sarcastic or playful. I should tread carefully here, be wary of the conversational missteps that Thomas had complained I was prone to. But it was difficult to be wary in the perfection of the stream and the flapping greenery, with the bluebells swaying in the warm breeze. Instead of answering, I reached down and splashed him.

The water splattered the front of his waistcoat. He glanced down at the drops rolling off the silk of his vest, watching as they slid off and hit the ground. He looked back up, his expression inscrutable—though there was a tightening around his mouth and along his jaw—and then without another word, he turned and walked away.

I watched him leave, feeling regret nip at me. It was just that his face had been so serious, and I had wanted him to smile, I had wanted him to join me, and now I had driven him away.

Suddenly, the rushing water became unbearable. I went to the bank and shoved my wet feet back into my boots, my skirts dripping the whole way back to the tower.

* * *

When I came downstairsfor dinner, I once again found myself alone.

“Mr. Markham preferred to dine alone tonight,” Mrs. Brightmore told me with entirely too much pleasure. “He was in an ill humor when he returned from his business in town.”

Ill humor that was my fault.

I was served soup that was too cold and rolls that were too hard, and no beverage other than water was offered, and by the time the miserable and lonely repast had ended, even the bleakness of my room seemed like a welcome alternative. I decided to stop by the library on my way up, peruse the books for a selection or two to keep me company tonight. Surely, I would not be called on to spend the evening with Mr. Markham, and even more certainly, I wouldn’t feel welcome in any other part of the house if I was by myself.

This morning, I had felt the faintest glimmer of optimism. I’d felt it possible that I could belong here and call this somber place my home. But as the sun went down and the house became once again dim and quiet, all those feelings vanished. Instead, I found myself looking over my shoulder as I walked to the library, feeling as if someone were watching me, although every time I turned, I found nothing more than shadowed paintings and faded tapestries in my company.

I hadn’t thought to fetch my lamp from upstairs or ask for a candle, and so the murk of the library was pierced only by the last glancing rays of the setting sun as they spilled in through the windows. I ran my fingers along the cracked leather and cloth spines, only able to make out the ghosts of the letters in the gloom. I paused when I got to the end of the shelf. There in a small glass case was a miniature, cunningly done, of a young woman with bright yellow hair and blue eyes. At first glance, I thought it might be Violet, but then I saw the name at the bottom: Arabella Markham. The first wife, the one who had died so young.

Every room in this house seemed to remind the living of the dead. Portraits of dead wives and ancestors, tapestries of battles and assassinations.

I shivered and straightened, realizing that the chill night air had slowly overtaken the room. I selected a book at random and hurried to my room, where I stoked the fire that had been lit—perhaps thanks to my new friend Gareth—and changed into my nightclothes. I tucked myself in bed with a candle and wondered if this would be every night at Markham Hall. If I would never again drink port with my benefactor or feel his fingers on my skin. All because of one infelicity in the stream.

Several hours later, I woke with a start. There must have been a noise, yet when I strained my hearing, the house seemed altogether still and silent.

But not sleeping. Markham Hall didn’t seem the type of place that slept. There was something watchful and alert even in its stillness, as if the stones themselves were too charged with history and death to be at rest.

I struggled to light my lamp in the dark and then slid my feet into my slippers. I wasn’t sure if I was planning on investigating or simply escaping my room—something about the sliver of moon and the twinkling stars called to my soul, promising safety and relief as soon as the walls of the house were no longer around me.

I encountered nothing conscious or moving as I went to the door, nothing save for a cat that padded past me without any indication of interest in my person or my movements. I pushed open the heavy door as quietly as I could and stepped outside, into the chilly air. Almost at once, I felt like I could breathe again, think again. The forest creaked and swayed in the wind, but the noise did not frighten me. It was quite comforting after the hush of the house.

I walked the perimeter of the courtyard, again and again, until I felt the telltale pull of exhaustion within me, and then I went back inside the house, temporarily blinded by the contrast of my lamp in the pitch-black foyer.

I stumbled into someone; strong arms steadied me, hands encircling my upper arms.

“Miss Leavold,” a voice said. I knew without raising my lamp that it was Mr. Markham.

“I was walking outside,” I explained.

“I see that.”

Just then, my lamp guttered, the oil insufficient to sustain the flame. I felt the lamp taken from my hand and set on a nearby table. The expanded circumference of the failing light allowed flickering glimpses of Mr. Markham’s face, of the dark stubble and even darker eyelashes, of the square jaw and the somewhat wide mouth.

“Are you so wild that you cannot even sleep in a bed at night?” There was a lift to his lips as he said it.

“It depends on the bed,” I answered, meaning to jest, and too late realizing the implications my reply made.

His eyes glittered and then the lamp went out, plunging us into darkness. For a moment, there was only breathing and no movement, and then, ever so softly, I felt a thumb brush across my cheek. My breath caught and my stomach flipped, and nothing that I had ever felt before matched this terrified delight that I felt right now.

The thumb moved across my jaw and then finally to my lips, pressing against them, making urges and imaginings swirl through me. All I could think of was how Mr. Markham’s stubble would feel against my cheek or even against my bare stomach . . .

I shuddered and, without thinking, parted my lips and bit his thumb.

He may have flinched, but I could neither see nor feel it in the dark.

“Go to bed,” he said, his voice cold and hard. “Leave me now.”

I hurried up the stairs, quickly shutting myself in my room, my breath still coming in short, uneven jerks. But it wasn’t fear or regret that tugged at me.

It was the memory of Mr. Markham’s thumb on my lips, of his eyes glittering in the dark.