Captain Durant's Countess

chapter 17


There would be no chance meeting with his countess in the garden tonight. Reyn finished his dinner, rang for the tray to be taken away, and actually picked up one of the books Maris had put in his room for his edification. It didn’t take long for his eyes to droop and his head to swim. But if he went to bed, he’d be wide awake in the middle of the night with nothing to take his mind off his restlessness.

Best to leave his suite, perhaps cadge another cigar, wander about, and have a word or two with some servants. Maybe even walk down to the village pub. One always picked up a good bit of gossip at a pub.

He put on the smudged spectacles, then removed them so he could clean them with a handkerchief. They were growing on him, not that they improved his vision at all. They gave him something to hide behind, though.

How often was one judged on one’s appearance? He thought of Maris, who’d come to him buttoned-up and spotless, obscuring her looks with an excess of respectability. He much preferred her rumpled and flushed from a good f*cking.

Enough of that. He was damned lucky to have bedded her twice today. Now that he was almost thirty—well, in another year anyhow—he’d have to anticipate that his capability would diminish, just like the poor old earl. Reyn hoped he still had some good decades left, but one never knew. He’d been lucky so far, despite the ball embedded in his shoulder and the saber scars. Tomorrow he could prick his thumb on a thorn in Maris’s garden and die from sepsis, or break his neck falling from Phantom, or be shot dead in a duel by David Kelby.

Hadn’t Maris said he was staying in the village? The cigar became even less of a possibility as Reyn clapped his hat on his head, hurried downstairs, and walked through the massive front door that a John held open for him.

He’d ridden through Kelby. It was not very big and not very far from the house, an easy jaunt for a man who’d marched through most of Europe and eastern Canada. A thousand stars lit the clear night sky as Reyn walked between the copper beeches, listening to the owls hoot and the bare branches rattle.

Reyn preferred the solitude of the night. He’d never had trouble staying awake on patrol. Every sense came alive and he could practically hear the universe thrumming all around him. In the dark, no one could read and other skills became much more useful.

He didn’t expect to encounter the enemy on the road, but once he got to the pub, he’d have to be careful. Reyn was anxious to hear what the local populace had to say about the Kelby family. And if he was lucky, he’d find the earl’s nephew over a pint with his informant.

A haze of wood smoke stung Reyn’s eyes as he approached the tiny village. Kelby was mostly dark, but the inn and its front-room pub were lit up like Christmas. He could smell roasting meat and years worth of sour ale that had spilled in the alley.

He pushed open the door and all conversation stopped. He should have expected that, and slouched, trying to look as much like a distracted antiquities expert as possible.

There was no sign of David Kelby. Reyn plunked himself in a corner and ordered ale from a very pretty barmaid. Talk resumed and he wondered which of the men would approach him first to ask for his curriculum vitae.

He didn’t have long to wait. Two fellows came over to him, both looking somewhat familiar.

“Sir, you’re the man the earl hired to go through his attics, ain’t you?”

“I am indeed. Do I know you?”

“I’m Bob Hastings. I took your horse when you came the other day. Fine animal. This here’s John.”

“Francis Smith,” the other man said with a black look to his friend.

“Good evening, gentlemen. Night off?”

“We do get them regular. The earl’s good that way.” Bob took a mouthful of the brew he’d brought with him.

“He seems a very nice old gentleman,” Reyn agreed.

“Not like his nephew.”

“Shut your gob, Bob!”

That had the effect of reducing Bob the groom to helpless laughter.

Reyn wondered how steadily he’d been drinking. Well, this is altogether too easy. He turned to Francis. “I met Mr. Kelby this afternoon. He seemed to think I’d make off with the Kelby fortune. I confess, I was a little insulted. In my line of work, reputation is everything.” Hoping he sounded appropriately sniffy, he pushed the glasses back up on the bridge of his nose.

“Counting his chickens before they’re hatched, he is,” Bob volunteered. “Always coming around the house spying. The earl don’t see him anymore. Bad blood there.”

“Bob!”

“I’m just stating the facts, Frank.”

“You’ll be working for David Kelby soon enough if he’ll keep a lounger like you on. If I was you, I’d stubble it.” Francis Smith went back to the crowded table in front of the fire.

Reyn saw a few other familiar faces, more Johns if he was right.

“Won’t you join me, Mr. Hastings?” Reyn waved to the barmaid and pointed to Bob’s tankard.

“All right. That’s kind of you, sir.”

“I’m not being kind. I’m curious. I’ll be at Kelby Hall at least a month and I find the atmosphere there somewhat daunting. I’m used to working at big houses, though,” Reyn added quickly, “going through, uh, family treasures. Usually to value items for sale.” He thought that anyone in “his line of work” might in truth do that. “But I understand everything has to remain in at Kelby Hall.”

“I don’t know nothing about the house. I’ve never stepped inside it ’cepting for the kitchen,” Bob said. “Worked there all my life. Since I was a boy.”

That wasn’t so very long ago. Bob’s usefulness to David Kelby was considerably less if the young man didn’t have free access to the house, though Reyn didn’t rule him out as the traitor just yet. “Do you like your job?”

“It’s all right. No one rides much anymore, but there are still a lot of horses to take care of. I’ve got a way with horses, I do.”

“So do I. I find them so much more congenial than many people I’ve met.”

It took Bob a few long seconds to get the joke, but then he laughed.

“The staff seems very competent.”

“Comp—?”

“Skilled. Good at what they do.”

“Oh, aye. The earl wouldn’t have it any other way, though really it’s the old cove Amesbury what does it all. The butler, you know. Runs a strict household. I’m glad he’s not my boss.”

Amesbury was probably more terrifying than the earl. If anyone had his finger to the pulse of the household, it would be Amesbury. But Reyn could not see the disdainful butler approving of David Kelby and assisting him in any way.

Reyn spent the next half hour talking horses instead of possible conspirators. Sleuthing business was tricky, especially when one didn’t want to tip one’s hand. The young groom was nearly poetic in his appreciation of the animals, and Reyn discovered he had more in common with the boy than he expected. The conversation gave him a flickering spark of an idea, which he quickly blew out. He didn’t have time to worry about his future away from Kelby Hall, just the next few weeks while he was romancing the countess.

No. Romancing was not accurate. Servicing was more like it. Reyn would have to keep his growing feelings in check, for what was the point of yearning for what he could never have?

He’d had too much to drink, but not so much as he could miss the invitation in the pretty barmaid’s eyes as he rose to leave. Before he’d come to Surrey, he would not have turned her down, but he was tired, and left the pub. He’d had enough birthday presents for one day.

The moon had risen over the treetops, bathing the road in silvery light. The stars had dimmed a bit by comparison, and the temperature had dropped enough for him to long for his army-issued greatcoat.

He stopped before a curve on the road, alert to a noise ahead. Footsteps, not horse hooves, yet he pressed himself to the hedgerow anyhow, debating the wisdom of calling out. In the end, he decided to whistle a drinking song off-key but stay in place. If his fellow nocturnal traveler had less than honorable intentions, he might underestimate Reyn’s ability to defend himself.

The crunch of boot steps stopped. “Who goes there?”

Reyn aborted a high note.

“Come out and show yourself!”

The man sounded imperious, yet Reyn heard the slightest quake in his voice. He decided to round the corner, pulling the knife from his boot first.

Would an antiquities expert carry a knife? Any sensible man would, Reyn decided, expecting to face something similar as he stepped past the hedges. “Good evening!” he said cheerily. “I’m just bound for Kelby Hall. The rest of the party are just behind me.” He hoped.

“You.”

“Yes, it is I,” Reyn agreed.

“Durant.”

Reyn knew who was before him. He slid the knife up his sleeve, walked forward, and resumed whistling.

David Kelby stood in the middle of the moon-drenched road. “Why, Mr. Kelby! I did not expect to see you again so soon. A lovely night, is it not?” Reyn deliberately slurred his words.

“You are drunk! I’m sure my uncle would not be best pleased.”

“Oh, don’t tell on me, I beg you. I’m afraid I have no head for spirits. But I was so b-bloody bored up at the big house. Can’t do a proper job when it’s dark and there isn’t a soul my equal to talk to me there.” That was certainly true.

It was preferable that Kelby think he was a pompous idiot rather than someone in thrall to the countess.

“What brings you out this evening?” Reyn asked.

“A walk,” Kelby said. “As you said, it’s a lovely night.”

Had he been meeting with his spy? Reyn was sorry he did not choose to wander about the garden. He might have bumped into them whispering and plotting, but knew he wouldn’t find out much by quizzing Kelby on the lane.

Squinting, Reyn noticed that Kelby’s cravat was askew, which made him think the spy they were looking for was not a John, but a Mary. Of course.

Kelby was a ladies’ man. If he’d managed to seduce sensible, virtuous Maris, he was likely to sweep some poor impressionable maid right off her feet.

Reyn tried to remember the girls that had brought him his meals and swept his hearth. They’d made no particular impression on him, but he’d open his eyes and work some of his own charm if he had any left to spare.





The next morning, Reyn was prepared to do his flirtatious best with a housemaid or two, but the breakfast tray did not come at the hour he’d arranged for it, nor was there a response when he tugged his bellpull after waiting rather patiently. Perhaps the bell system was broken, or they’d forgotten about the mad man in the attic.

He’d already washed and shaved with the tepid water on his dressing stand and was fully dressed. Would he be shot if he sought the breakfast room, breaking the earl’s fraternization rule?

Reyn decided he didn’t care. He needed food in his stomach after all the ale he’d consumed with Bob. It hadn’t been hard to play the drunk with Kelby. He didn’t have a head for spirits. He’d learned nothing of significance from his sacrifice, but at least he hadn’t been in his room mooning over Maris.

The house seemed unusually quiet. He noticed at once the absence of the human green wall. The footmen were not in place along the main floor corridor. He’d planned on asking for directions, but like a hound on the hunt, he thought his long nose would track the bacon and toasted bread.

He was wrong. Reyn stood in the cavernous entry hall, uncertain which way to turn.

He wished he’d pocketed that great houses of England guide. He thought there’d been a floor plan, not that he could read the cribbed print on the pages devoted to Kelby Hall. He only knew a few places in the Hall—the earl’s library, which he wouldn’t dare to enter, Maris’s sitting room, his own bedroom, and the attics.

It wasn’t the sort of day for walking outside. The bright blue sky of the past few days had faded to gray. A light rain spattered the sidelights surrounding the heavy oak front door. Strange that there wasn’t a footman on hand to open it even if he didn’t want to go out in the gloom. They were like jack-in-the-boxes, always popping up when you least expected them, only to perform a service you didn’t even know you needed.

Maybe they were all on a workers’ uprising, Reyn thought with a grin. Inspired by the French Revolution, rioting against injustice on Kelby’s sole street—although he hoped the earl and countess kept their heads.

Reyn felt the cold of the hall seep into his bones. It would be difficult to work upstairs. They’d have to light more candles, bring up more lamps, keep the fireplace tended. It would be cozy to lie with Maris on the chaise, listening to the rain on the roof. Perhaps they’d forgo the boxes altogether.

He decided to head left, poking his head into the open doors along the way. There was no sign of footmen or food. Wondering if he had an overlooked biscuit in his saddlebag, he was just about to go up one of the stairways when he met Amesbury coming down.

“Oh! I’ve just been up to your rooms,” the old butler said a bit breathlessly. “Lady Kelby was most particular in wishing to speak to you. Please follow me.”

“Is everything all right?”

“No, it is not, sir. The Earl of Kelby is dead.”