She escaped. Slipping out of the drawing room, she went to Petti’s chamber and collected the pugs for their evening walk about the forecourt. After this, she sought shelter in the single place at Chevriot in which she felt at home.
In the aftermath of the afternoon entertainments, the animal denizens of the stables rested in gentle quiet. Freshly polished harnesses dangled and saddles gleamed in the light of the full moon that peeked through windows. Ravenna walked the length of the building and into the carriage house, her lamp flickering amber light across silvery moonbeams. She found only ancient Bishop Abraccia’s equally ancient groom tucked beneath his coat on the floor of a stall, sleeping.
Returning to the other end of the buildings, she drew open the door to the room where the pups and mother lived and stared at empty straw. Setting the lamp on the bench, she bent to press her nose to the straw. No scent of the dogs remained. Mother and litter had been removed, all evidence of them cleaned away, and fresh straw strewn. Civilization had returned even to this tiny corner of Chevriot.
“What can a gentle lady be about in a stable so late at night, I wonder?”
She whirled around.
Lord Case leaned against the doorpost, eyes hooded, his hands behind his back and chestnut hair gleaming in the moonlight. He carried no lamp.
“Waiting for someone, Miss Caulfield?”
“There was a litter of pups in this stall,” she said. “I came to see them and have discovered them gone. Home, I suspect, now that the castle gates are once again open and their master could retrieve them.” She spoke while her mind sped. The bishop’s groom was probably deaf and in any case too far away to hear if she called for help. Martin Anders had not committed the murder but that did not mean that Monsieur Sepic’s hurried investigation of his deputy had revealed the truth. Lord Case knew that she and his brother were pursuing their own investigation, and Lord Vitor did not entirely trust him. And someone at the castle, still unknown, had pushed her into the river.
“They were not hunting dogs or lapdogs,” she said, “so they did not belong here, I think.” Or Lord Case could have pursued her here for less malicious but nevertheless unwanted purposes. Or perhaps had he come to the stable to meet a lover? She could not imagine delicate Arielle Dijon rolling in the hay on a winter night—or any night. Iona’s impassioned plea to tell no one of her scandalous behavior rang in Ravenna’s ears. How her sister Arabella had lived in this world for so long, and so willingly, she had no idea.
“Ah,” Lord Case said. “I recall Vitor mentioning something about keeping a young dog at the house. Was that perhaps one of this litter that has now disappeared?”
“Yes. One of those.” Confronted by his keen stare it suddenly seemed outrageously presumptuous that she had forced the pup upon his brother.
“I see.” He moved into the room, producing from behind his back a bottle and two goblets. “I, however, have not come here looking for dogs.” He righted one goblet and deftly poured wine. In the moonlight, it shone deep golden. “Have you had opportunity during this tumultuous week to taste the vin jaune of the Jura, Miss Caulfield?” he said conversationally.
“I have never been fond of wine.” Her tongue had gone dry. He blocked the door, and again a man had trapped her in this room. But she did not believe Lord Case would let her go as easily as his brother finally had. Not until he got what he’d come for.
“This will alter your notions of wine, I think.” He held forth a goblet to her. “It is superb, dry and rich. Go ahead. I shan’t bite. Not at least if you try the wine.” He smiled, and there was something of his brother’s smile in the curve of his lips, but without the warmth and humor.
She wrapped her cloak more snugly about her. “I will return to the house now, if you will allow me to pass.”
“My dear Miss Caulfield, I haven’t any ill intentions toward you.” He spread his hands. “I merely wish to talk. Do sit”—he gestured to the bench—“and enjoy some wine, and we will become better acquainted.”
“I don’t wish to drink wine. Please allow me to pass.”
“Yes, Wesley.” Lord Vitor filled the doorway. “Allow the lady to pass.”
“Ah,” the earl said with a lift in his voice. “As always your timing is superb, Vitor. I have just now poured a libation for Miss Caulfield. The next was to be for you.” He set down the goblets and bottle on the bench and went to the door. “I wish you”—he looked over his shoulder—“and you, madam, a pleasant night.” His footsteps receded into the dark.
“Did he frighten you?” Lord Vitor’s voice sounded gravelly.
“Not a bit. The pitchfork is within reach, of course.”
He did not smile.
“Failing that,” she added, “either the goblets or that bottle would have served.”
He came forward and stood close. “Did he frighten you?” he repeated.
This frightened her—the singing of her nerves when he was near, the strange longing to be with him and the contrary urge to run.
“No.” She ducked around him and took up the goblet that Lord Case had filled. “But I should actually like to taste this wine. Iona was in alt about it the other day. Even Lady Penelope agreed, and not in the presence of the prince, so it might be considered truth of a sort from her.”
He looked at the floor. “The dogs have decamped, it seems.”
“I suspect she was not intended to drop her litter here.” She sat on the bench beside the bottle and empty glass. “If a bitch cannot find a safe place to deliver her pups close to home, she will look for shelter elsewhere. But the pups were old enough to be weaned. Perhaps their master has finally found her and collected them.” For an instant, oddly, she considered her mother, and that neither she nor her father had ever come to collect their three lost daughters.
“What sort of dog is it?” he asked.
“It?”
“Gon?alo and his ilk.”
She sipped the wine. The glass was cold and the wine indeed rich, just as Lord Case had said. “A shepherd, perhaps, or a very unusual hound. Perhaps an accidental mix of both. The French no doubt have working dogs that we do not. We might ask Lord Prunesly,” she said with a twisted grin.
“Give me a glass of that wine—or five—and I will go ask him myself.”
She laughed and poured the wine. He accepted the goblet from her, taking care, it seemed, not to touch her hand, and moved to the window and opened it. Brilliant moonlight cast him in silver.
He leaned back against the wall. “Will I be obliged to pay someone for the creature, then?”
“It’s unlikely. As the runt, he probably would have been discarded in the river.”
“Ah. But he became my prize instead,” he said wryly.
“Don’t blame me for it. I only gave him to you. You needn’t have kept him.”
“What of ‘It is too late—he is yours—he will always be yours now’?” He bent and sat down on the clean straw with movements so economical and fluid that she saw how this large, powerfully built man had trained his body to the sort of discipline required of a monk. “Has your philosophy altered since only this morning?” he said.
“Was that only this morning?” she said over the open mouth of the goblet, the golden honey aroma stirring in her nostrils. “What a peculiar day it has been.”