A Duel of Hearts E-Book

Barbara Cartland

• Herausgeber: Barbara Cartland Ebooks Ltd
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Serie: The Eternal Collection
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 544

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2012

Beschreibung

Miss Cartland's novels are always glamorous, but her thirty-ninth novel, A Duel of Hearts, set in the dashing, elegant period of George IV, has a breath-taking allure which exceeds anything. she has written before.

Leseprobe

A Duel of Hearts

Miss Cartland's novels are always glamorous, but her thirty-ninth novel, A Duel of Hearts, set in the dashing, elegant period of George IV, has a breath-taking allure which exceeds anything. she has written before.

1

“What is the hour?” Caroline asked, not taking her eyes from the road ahead of them.

Sir Montagu pulled his gold watch from his waistcoat pocket, but it was difficult for him to see the hands. They were moving fast and, although the moon was rising, trees cast dark shadows over the narrow roadway so that it was a few seconds before he was able to reply,

“It wants but three minutes to nine-thirty. We have done well!”

“I hope you are not over optimistic, sir,” Caroline answered, ‘for methinks this by-lane of yours, although unfrequented, has taken us longer than if we had kept to the highway.”

“I swear it is shorter,” Sir Montagu replied. “I have travelled it often enough and, I suspect Lady Rohan will be bemused at having the other road to herself.”

Caroline laughed.

“If we do reach your sister’s house before they arrive, I shall ache to see their faces when they perceive us a-waiting them. Do you really think, Sir Montagu, they are watching the road behind them and wondering why we are not in sight?”

“I imagine that is precisely what they are doing,” Sir Montagu smiled, “unless they think we are ahead of them.”

“Which - pray Heaven - we are!” Caroline cried fervently. “How much further have we to go?”

She whipped up the horses as she spoke and the light phaeton sprang forward at an even greater speed.

“Not more than four miles, I should think,” Sir Montagu replied, “We join the main, highway about a mile from here.”

“ ... In front of Lady Rohan’s greys,” Caroline added, her voice gay and excited.

She saw that they, were approaching a turn in the road and reined in the horses slightly. Although they had been going for over an hour and a half, the chestnuts were by no means tired and Caroline, with a little thrill of pleasure, realised that Sir Montagu had not boasted when he averred they were the finest bred pair of high-steppers in London.

The phaeton swung round the corner and the moonlight revealed two or three cottages clustered round a village green. Facing the stocks and duck-pond was a small gabled inn, its signpost swinging creakily in the wind, its windows bright with light. But Caroline noticed only that the road widened and was straight for the next quarter of a mile. She lifted her whip but as she did so the small groom at the back of the phaeton raised his voice.

“Cuse, m’lady, but I suspicions there’s something powerful wrong with th’ off wheel.”

“Something wrong?” Caroline asked in consternation. “I feel nothing.”

“Tis rattling like a bone-box, m’lady, and I reckons us ought to ’ave a look at ’un.”

“Lord! If it isn’t enough to try the patience of a saint,” Caroline exclaimed, reining in-the horses and pulling up opposite the small inn “Hurry, boy, hurry,” she added impatiently. “I swear you are but imagining disaster.”

The groom scrambled down. Sir Montagu, after leaning over the side, of the phaeton, also descended. He spoke to the groom in a low voice and they both peered at the wheel.

“Surely there is nothing amiss?” Caroline asked after a moment, her voice anxious.

“I am afraid the boy is right,” Sir Montagu replied. “There is a pestilential crack in the axle. I believe it would be definitely dangerous for us to continue.”

“This is beyond everything,” Caroline cried.

“Well, maybe it isn’t as bad as might be feared.” Sir Montagu said soothingly. “Suppose, Caroline, you wait in the inn while I enquire if there is anyone in the yard who can repair the axle.”

The groom ran to the horses’ heads while Caroline descended.

“Was there ever such ill-fortune?” she asked Sir Montagu angrily. “Here we are well up to time and only a few miles to go when this occurs.”

“Mayhap it will only take a few minutes,” he suggested consolingly. “Come inside, Caroline. It is not too ill a place. I have rested here before and a glass of wine will serve us well. My throat is dry with dust.”

“Very well, if it please you,” Caroline said. “But instruct them to attend to the wheel with all possible haste.”

Sir Montagu turned to the groom.

“Now hurry, lad, find the ostler and bring me tidings as to what can be done.”

“Aye, sir,” the boy replied, as Sir Montagu, sweeping off his hat with a gesture, opened the door of the inn to allow Caroline to enter.

It was a small place low-ceilinged and oak-beamed, with an atmosphere of cleanliness and cheer and the parlour had a log-fire burning brightly in the big fireplace. There was only one occupant sitting before it, his feet outstretched to the flames, a glass of wine at his elbow. He glanced up casually as the door opened. When he saw who stood in the doorway he sat up abruptly, his eyebrows raised in astonishment.

He was a young man, Caroline noted, dressed in the height of fashion, his well padded olive-green coat trimmed with sparkling buttons. His dark hair was arranged in the latest windswept style and he would have been good-looking save that his thick eyebrows nearly met across the bridge of his nose in what appeared to be a perpetual frown, and his full mouth turned down at the corners as, if he viewed life with a constant sneer.

“If you will seat yourself by the fire,” Sir Montagu was saying to Caroline as they entered the room, “I will order a bottle of wine” He raised his voice, “Hi, landlord.”

The young man in. the green coat sprang to his feet.

“Reversby!” he exclaimed “What are you doing here?”

It was obvious both by the tone of his voice and by the expression on his face that he was none too pleased to see Sir Montagu. The latter turned slowly and paused before he replied in his most suave tones,

“I collect no reason why I should answer that question? You have not bought the place have you?”

Caroline felt uncomfortable, for it was obvious that the two men had no liking for one another, then she suddenly remembered her own position and that she did not wish to be recognised. She turned her head away, hoping that the size of her fashionable bonnet would cast a shadow over her face and she was thankful to hear a woman’s voice ask,

“Would her ladyship like to step upstairs?”

“Indeed I would,” Caroline answered and she moved quickly from the parlour into the outer hall where a pleasant-faced, middle-aged woman curtsied to her and, lifting high the candle she held in her hand, led the way upstairs.

“This, way, your ladyship. Mind the top step if you please. Tis not the same height as the others and is often a trap for the unwary.”

They reached the landing in safety and the woman opened a door.

“I hope your ladyship will find this room comfortable. It is our best and seldom in use but when we received Sir Montagu’s message this morning, we set to and gave it a right good clean. The bed has been aired too, your ladyship, and hot bricks have been in it the whole day. You will find it comfortable enough, I swear to that for, only last Michaelmas I filled it afresh with the finest goose feathers.”

The landlady pulled back the covers ready to display to Caroline the comforts of the big feather bed which bulged high under the oak four-poster, but Caroline was standing very still, her eyes wide and dark

“Did I hear you say you had a message from Sir Montagu this morning?” she asked.

“Indeed I did, m’lady. A groom arrived just before noon. He told us that Sir Montagu would be staying the night here, and very honoured we were to hear of it for Sir Montagu is an old and valued customer, to be sure. And when the groom added that Sir Montagu would be accompanied by his lady, we were fair excited, for though Sir Montagu has been coming here at various times the past two years and more, 'twas the first we had heard that he was wed. Oh, he’s a fine gentleman, m’lady, and though maybe ‘tis a little late, may I offer your ladyship our most humble felicitations.”

“Thank you – thank you,” Caroline said slowly, and in such a strange tone that the landlady glanced at her sharply.

“But ‘tis tired you are, m’lady and here I am chattering away when I should be getting your supper ready. It’s hoping I am that it will gain your ladyship’s approval, though maybe ‘tis not so fine as what you are used to, but there, we can but do our best, and if your ladyship will ring when you’re ready, I will come back and, escort you downstairs.”

“Thank you,” Caroline said again.

The door shut behind the landlady and Caroline was alone. She stood very still for several seconds and then gave a sudden shiver before she raised both her hands to her cheeks.

Now she was in a mess, in a tangle such as she had never dreamed or imagined. As the full significance of the landlady’s words crept over her, she felt herself shiver again. So Sir Montagu had meant to stay here, had arranged it all, and the trouble over the wheel was but a bit of play-acting between him and his groom. Fool that she had been to be tricked so easily. And yet had she not been more of a fool to be inveigled in the first place into taking part in this wild race, if indeed it had been a race?

Bewildered and frightened Caroline began to think back over all that had happened in the past twenty-four hours and to blame not only Sir Montagu but herself too. Yes, she was at fault from the very beginning.

She had known Sir Montagu Reversby was an outsider. She had been warned about him often enough, and yet it was those very warnings which had obstinately made her accept his company. How crazy, she had been! How wilful, how perverse! And it had brought her to this.

The Countess of Bullingham, Caroline’s godmother, was presenting her this season because her mother was not well enough to leave the country and endure the exhausting formalities of launching a debutante. There was not, however, room in Lady Bullingham’s town residence for Caroline to stay with all her retinue of attendants so her father’s magnificent mansion, Vulcan House, in Grosvenor Square, had been opened, and Caroline resided there with a cousin, the Honourable Mrs Edgmont, as chaperon.

But this did not prevent Lady Bullingham from keeping a strict surveillance over her charge, and little escaped her ladyship’s eagle eye.

“I detest that man Reversby, Caroline,” she had said as they drove home from a ball at Devonshire House. “I should give him the cold shoulder if I were you.”

Caroline laughed.

“He is very persistent, Ma’am. He offered for me for the third time this evening.”

“Offered for you?” Lady Bullingham’s voice was shrill. “How dare he? What impertinence! As if you, the toast of the season and the greatest heiress of the year, would look at him.”

“His very impertinence amuses me,” Caroline answered. “He is not easily cast away.”

“He will never enter the portals of my house,” her ladyship replied. “Offered for you indeed! I cannot imagine what your father would say.”

Caroline laughed. She could well imagine the chilly indifference with which her father would sweep Sir Montagu from his path, but at the same time it was an undeniable fact that she met him everywhere. He seemed in some way or another to obtain the entree to most houses, and the way he asserted impertinently that he intended to marry her made her laugh even while she did not take him seriously.

She might have heeded her godmother’s warning more readily had not Lady Bullingham with a singular lack of tact incited Lord Glosford also to warn Caroline against Sir Montagu. Caroline considered the Earl of Glosford a bore. She was well aware that her godmother wished her to marry him for, as the future Duke of Melchester, he was a notable catch from the matrimonial point of view.

Caroline, however, cordially disliked Lord Glosford’s la-di-da and effeminate ways, and as she had no more intention of taking his offer seriously than she had Sir Montagu’s, it was irritating to be lectured by him.

“The fellow’s a trifle smoky, you know,” he said languidly, ‘in fact, he’s not up to scratch Caroline. I should give him the go-by.”

“Thank you, my lord,” Caroline remarked “but I consider myself a better judge of human nature than your lordship is of horseflesh.”

This was a palpable thrust because Society had been chuckling for weeks over the tale of how Lord Glosford had paid five hundred guineas for a horse which had been found after a few days to have been doped for the sale.

It was perhaps Lord Glosford’s ill-advised words and her godmother’s continual nagging which had made Caroline accept so readily Sir Montagu’s suggestion of a secret race. He had spoken about it to her at a ball and then made an assignation for them to meet the following day in the park.

Mrs. Edgmont could do nothing when, during a stroll in Rotten Row, Sir Montagu walked beside Caroline and spoke in such a low voice that she was unable to overhear the conversation.

“Rohan has vowed that his wife is the best whip in the country, and that he will match his greys against my chestnuts driven by any female I like to suggest,” Sir Montagu said. “The race is to my sister’s house near Sevenoaks, and the wager is one thousand guineas.”

“And you propose that I drive your chestnuts?” Caroline asked.

Her eyes were sparkling. She knew Sir Montagu’s chestnuts. They were incomparable, and it was difficult too, not to wish to beat Lady Rohan who was often insufferable when she boasted of her feats with the ribbons

“I know of no one else who could defeat her ladyship,” Sir Montagu said softly.

Caroline hesitated. She knew she ought to refuse, she knew that a race on which large sums were wagered was not the sort of sport in which any well-bred girl should indulge, let alone Lady Caroline Faye, only daughter of the Marquis and Marchioness of Vulcan ... and yet the temptation was so great.

“I suggest,” Sir Montagu went on in his soft silky voice, “that no one shall know whom I nominate as my whip until the race is run. One phaeton shall start of Hyde Park Corner and the other from Whites Club. There will be starters at both places and only when the race is won shall we reveal the identity of the winner.”

“But how shall we keep it a secret?” Caroline asked. ‘Mrs. Edgmont will question me if I wish to leave the house after we have dined.”

“You can leave a note saying that you have made arrangements to meet some friends and will be in the company of Lady Rohan. You will be home earlier than if you had been to a ball, and if your chaperon learns the truth she will be too proud of you to chatter overmuch.”

Mrs. Edgmont would be too horrified not to wish to keep it quiet, Caroline thought, but she felt the excitement was worth any, risk even her godmother’s anger. It would be a thrill such as she had never known before to race against the tried and famous Lady Rohan, who was spoken of always as a nonpareil with a whip.

There might be trouble later, but Caroline had never lacked courage. She raised her firm little chin.

“I will do it,” she told the gratified Sir Montagu, “but it must be a dead secret until the race is over.”

“I swear it,” he replied.

She could be sure now that he had kept his word. Of course there had been no race, no bet, no competing phaeton driven by Lady Rohan. It had just been a trick to get her into his power and for all she knew, he might not even have a sister living near Sevenoaks. All she could be certain of was that it seemed inevitable that she must stay here tonight as Sir Montagu’s wife, and the price of his silence would be the announcement of their engagement.

Caroline shivered again as she thought of it. There was something oily and unpleasant about Sir Montagu. She had always known him for a commoner, even though it had amused her to flaunt him in the face of her other admirers who were all much younger, and who often found it difficult to compete with his wit and insolent effrontery.

Caroline looked around the bedroom, at the big four-poster bed, at the fire burning in the small fireplace, at the vase of flowers standing on the dressing-table with its frilled muslin petticoat.

Sir Montagu had chosen a pretty setting for his treachery. The mere thought of his thick, smiling lips, his dark eyes and his rather large hands filled her with a terrified repulsion. She had got to escape, she had got to get away from here. But how? How?

If she made a scene, if she called for the landlady and insisted on being sent back to London in a post-chaise, it would still cause a scandal. Besides, there was always the chance that they would not heed her, they might even think that it was just the shyness and the fright of a bride. It would be easy for Sir Montagu to over-rule her protests, to constitute himself her jailer as well as the legal lord and master they believed him to be.

Caroline looked wildly round her once again and then she crossed to the window. She threw wide the diamond-paned casement. The moon was giving more light than when she had entered the inn. It flooded the small garden which lay behind the house and beyond it she saw the darkness of trees. A wood! Caroline stared towards it and then looked down. Below the window was a drop of perhaps five or six feet on to a flat piece of roof which might cover a small larder or scullery. At the side of this, dimly outlined in the shadows, Caroline could see a water butt.

She stood staring down at it and made up her mind. She crossed the bedroom to the door and bolted it then, hurrying to the casement, she- swung herself on to the window-sill. Her dress of French velvet, with its rucked hem and full sleeves gathered and slashed with satin, was somewhat difficult to manipulate, but Caroline was used to climbing.

Indeed this was by no means the first occasion on which she had climbed out of a bedroom window. Time and time again as a child she had been punished by her governesses and by her parents for climbing out of her bedroom at home, and playing truant in the park or going down to the beach when she should have been asleep

Very carefully Caroline lowered herself out of the window until there was only a drop of a foot or so, then she finally let go of the sill. She landed with a thump on the flat roof and held her breath for a moment afraid that someone below might have heard her. But nothing happened. Everything was quiet save for a very distant burr of voices and laughter which might be coming from the tap-room.

Caroline peered down. It still seemed a long way to the ground, but there was the water butt and she realised that she must set her foot on the edge of it, holding on to the wall meanwhile. The only real danger was that she might fall into the butt itself but Caroline was sure-footed besides being able to balance herself cleverly, and with the exception of a scratched finger, a large tear in her skirt where it caught on a nail, and a great deal of dust and dirt on her hands she reached the ground without mishap.

She paused for a moment, then peeped in at the window nearest to her. As she had guessed, the flat roof was over a scullery. It was in darkness, but the door was open and beyond it she could see the big kitchen of the inn. The landlady was bustling around and there were several other people there as well. There were two young women with round, red cheeks under their mop caps and a man, with a bald head and wearing an apron, who looked as if he might be a potman. They were laughing and talking together and even though the window was closed, there was a savoury odour of roast meat.

Caroline did not wait to see more. She picked up her skirts and ran swiftly across the garden into the darkness of the trees on the other side. The wood was, not thick and, as it was still early in the year, the undergrowth was not high. There was a small path running between the trees and Caroline followed this. She had no idea where it might lead her, but her one idea was to escape as far as possible from the inn. She hurried on, deciding as she went that the main road to Sevenoaks must lie in this direction and that, if she could reach it, she would doubtless find a coaching house where she might procure a post-chaise which would carry her back to London. Once or twice she stumbled over briars which lay across her path they caught, too, in her skirt and Caroline had several times to stop, and disentangle them from the velvet, which was not improved by this rough contact with nature.

She had walked for some minutes when she heard voices. She stopped quickly. ‘Were they already in pursuit of her,’ she wondered. She had imagined it would be some little time before they ascertained that she was not in her room and as the bolt that she had placed across the door was a heavy one, it would require quite considerable strength to break it down.

Then she realised that the voices she heard were ahead of her and not behind as might be expected if someone was coming from the direction of the inn. She listened. Suddenly a cry of pain, of horror or indeed of agony, rang through the wood. It was just one cry, and then there was silence.

Caroline’s heart seemed to stop for a full second, and then beat again so fiercely that it almost leapt from her body. She pressed herself close against a tree trunk, holding on to it tightly with both her hands. The cry seemed to echo in her ears, but it was not repeated, instead she heard the sound of someone crashing through the undergrowth, moving swiftly almost as if running.

For one terrified moment she thought the person was heading in her direction. She pressed herself even closer to the tree hoping wildly that she, would not be seen. But the footsteps turned before they reached her. She heard them passing, she even saw someone moving through the shadows. She believed it to be a man, but the moonlight was deceptive and she was too frightened really to be certain of anything save that the footsteps were receding further and further away.

She listened to them, hardly daring to breathe, until she could hear them no more, and then there was silence - that strange, pregnant silence which follows a sudden noise. The wood seemed unnaturally quiet. Before there had been rustlings, the movement of small animals in the undergrowth, the flutter of a disturbed bird, now there was only silence, a silence which in itself was a fiercesome thing.

At last Caroline drew a deep breath. She moved from against the tree, aware for the first time, how tightly she had clung to it. There were marks on her hands where she had pressed them against the bark. She brushed them against each other and brushed away some leaves and dust from the front of her dress. Then she went on.

The little path she had followed still wandered ahead of her and eventually came to a clearing. The moonlight was bright, the trees were cut back to form a circle and on the far side of it Caroline could see the wails of a cottage. Studying it carefully, she perceived that the cottage was nothing more than a shell. It’s thatched roof had fallen in, the doorway was dark and empty, and the bricks were crumbling away.

There was nothing to be frightened of, Caroline told herself severely, but she was well aware that her breath was coming quickly and that her heart had never ceased pounding against her breast since that strange cry had echoed through the wood. Going forward a few more paces she stopped, and an exclamation of horror burst from her parted lips. There on the ground in the centre of the clearing was the body of a man.

He was lying crumpled up on the ground, one leg pinned under him, his arms outstretched, his hands wide-open as if in utter defencelessness, and his head thrown back so that from where Caroline stood she could only see the sharp line of his jaw. Horror stricken she stood there, seeing as if in a nightmare the moonlight shining on the buckles of his shoes, on the buttons of his black coat, and on a burnished knife-hilt where it stood out from the front of his neck. Below it a dark stream stained the purity of his frilled shirt.

For a moment Caroline’s wits seemed to leave her, and she could only stand and stare, not asking herself whether she should go forward or go back, but paralysed with the horror of those white empty hands motionless on the rough grass. And then, as she looked and kept on looking, she heard someone coming.

The movement had come from the other side of the wood firmly, purposefully, someone was approaching. There was a crackling of dry-sticks, the rustle as if a man thrust his way impatiently through the branches of the trees.

At last, just as the footsteps seemed to reach the clearing itself, Caroline moved. She was for turning and running away, following the path down which she had come even though it led her back to the inn but her knees felt too weak to carry her, and a sudden overwhelming faintness made her go no further than the trunk of a great oak tree against which she leant.

‘I must get away,’ she told herself, and yet she could not move.

It was a frailty for which she despised herself but in all her sheltered life she had never seen a dead man before, and his death cry was still echoing in her ears.

She leant against the oak and saw a man step into the clearing. He was tall and wearing a high beaver hat, his blue coat and buckskin breeches were exquisitely cut, and even in that bemused moment Caroline guessed that he was a gentleman of importance by the way he held his head and the commanding way with which he pushed his way through the bushes and into the clearing.

He walked on and saw the man lying on the ground.

“By God! What is this?”

He spoke aloud and his voice seemed to echo sharply amongst the trees.

It was that sound, the sound of a human voice which made Caroline take hold of her failing consciousness.

“I must away,” she whispered through, dry lips, and turned once again towards the path down which she had come.

The gentleman in the clearing must have seen her movement, for even as she took two steps from the shelter of the oak he looked towards her, and whipped a pistol from his pocket.

“Stop!” he called. ‘Who are you? Come here this instant!”

Caroline stopped. There was something in the stranger’s voice which demanded obedience. Very slowly she came forward into the moonlight.

“A woman!” the gentleman exclaimed and put the pistol back in his pocket

He swept off his hat.

“Your pardon, Madam. I was not expecting to find a lady lurking here and in such circumstances.”

His voice was steady and quite unperturbed and Caroline found it stiffened her pride, so although she was still frightened and her hands were trembling, she was able to drop him a curtsey.

The moonlight was full on his face. She found herself looking at the most handsome man she had ever, seen in her life. The moonlight turned his hair to bronze, but his eyes, set wide apart beneath a broad forehead, were grey as steel and seemed strangely penetrating.

“Might I ask what you are doing here, Ma’am?” he enquired, as Caroline did not, speak, “and also if you have any knowledge of this?”

He indicated with his hat the body on the ground. His voice was quiet and yet so authoritative that Caroline felt compelled to offer him some explanation of her presence.

“I was – walking through the wood, sir, when I heard voices , – then suddenly there came a cry – a cry of terror or of pain – afterwards. I heard someone moving quickly in that direction.”

She made a little gesture with her hand, and was conscious as she did so of the dirt on it.

The gentleman replaced his hat on his head and kneeling down, felt for the fallen man’s heart.

“Is he – quite dead?” Caroline asked, and try as she would she could not prevent a tremble in her voice.

“Without any doubt, whoever struck the blow struck to kill.”

He got up and stood looking down at the man’s face. ‘Strange,” he said, as if speaking to himself. “Strange, very strange indeed, for I was to meet him here.”

“You know – the man, sir?”

“Yes, I know him. He is a lawyer called Isaac Rosenberg. A rascal it is true, but I would not have even rascals meet their death in such an unpleasant fashion.”

“And you came here to meet him, sir?” Caroline asked.

She did not know why she was so curious, but something made her want to know more about this stranger.

“Yes, at his invitation,” he said quietly, “and that reminds me...”

He looked down at the dead man, dropped once again, on one knee and put his hand into the lawyer’s pocket.

“Ah, they are here!” he exclaimed, and there was satisfaction in his tone.

He drew out a packet of letters. Caroline could see there were perhaps half a dozen of them tied together with tape and sealed with a red seal. The gentleman slipped them into his own pocket, then he hesitated a moment and murmured as if under his breath,

“I wonder if they are all here?”

He felt in the dead man’s other coat pocket which was empty, and then inserted his hand in. the inside breast pocket. There was something there - a sheet of writing paper. He glanced at it and. stood upright suddenly tense.

Caroline, looking up at him, thought once again that he was, without exception, the most handsome man she had ever seen in her life and yet there was something strange in his face. It was an expression she could not fathom for the moment and then, as she watched, he crumpled the piece of writing paper in his hand and threw back his head with a sudden sharp laugh which had no humour in it.

“The devil takes it, but someone has paid a wonderful attention to detail.”

“What is it sir?” Caroline asked

He looked at her as if he had almost forgotten her presence.

“It is a jest, Madam,” he replied, and his voice was sarcastic. “A monstrous jest, I grant you, but one which will doubtless give pleasure though not to me personally.”

“I do not understand,” Caroline said.

“Why should you?” he asked. “But I will explain. This poor rogue here has been murdered for the express purpose of putting a rope round my neck. He was invited here to meet me. I was lured to this very spot. Here he is dead at my feet, and here am I all ready for justice to overtake me?”

“But, sir,’ Caroline exclaimed. “You did not kill him, I can swear to that.”

“Why, so you can! That indeed makes the joke even more enjoyable. Who knows you are in these woods?”

“No one, sir! No one at all. I did not intend to be in them myself until but a short while back.”

The gentleman, threw back his head and laughed again.

“The jest grows vastly more amusing,” he said, “and what is more, the plot becomes further entangled. How angry the perpetrator of this elegant murder will be when he finds that you can swear to my innocence!”

“Oh, but, sir,’’ Caroline cried, suddenly alarmed, “I don’t wish to swear – I mean, if it is a question of saving you from the gallows, but – but, sir, t’was my intention that no one should know that I had been here – it will be terrible for me, I assure you, should it be revealed, especially in a Court of Justice, that I was here at this hour of night.”

The gentleman smiled,

“In which case, Madam, may I beg of you to disappear as quickly as possible for if I am not mistaken very shortly someone will come and discover the corpse and, if they are fortunate the murderer lurking by it. So run away, Madam, as fast as your little feet can carry you, otherwise you will be embroiled in this most unpleasant and very unsavoury crime.”

“But sir, I cannot do that,” Caroline exclaimed. “Of course I cannot leave you when I know you to be innocent, but - ”

“There is no but, Madam, you must go.”

“And you?”

“I shall await justice.”

“But why?” Caroline asked. “Why must you be so stupid? If you are not here, they cannot prove that you murdered the man. It has got to be proved, you know. ”

The gentleman shrugged his shoulders.

“I do not cling to life so earnestly as all that Madam in fact, to put it briefly, life is of no particular interest to me at the moment. I would as soon die this way as any other.”

“Then you are either demented or foxed,” Caroline cried angrily. “There are plenty of decent ways of dying, sir, but to die through treachery, to give in meekly to what you have declared yourself to be nothing but a plot must be surely the action of a coward or a craven. Come away, sir, while there is yet time, and if they have to find the murderer, let them hunt for him.”

Caroline spoke passionately. The man listened to her with a smile on his lips. Then he shrugged his broad shoulders.

“Madam, you have convinced me. I will do your bidding. May I at least escort you out of the wood, if it is your desire to leave it?”

He would have offered Caroline his arm, but at that moment she put up her hand warningly.

“Listen!”

They both stood very still. From the far side of the wood in the distance, in the direction in which Caroline had come, there were voices and the sound of people moving through the trees

Caroline gave a little gasp.

“Quickly,” she whispered. “They may be searching for you or -for me.”

The gentleman turned swiftly.

“This way then,” he said. “My horse is not far away”

He led the way across the clearing and entered the wood. Caroline followed him. It was not easy going, for the trees were thicker here and more than once the branches, swung back to smack her across the face, while her skirt and the laces at her neck got caught in the brambles, but impatiently she dragged herself free, following the stranger as he forged ahead of her, conscious all the time of the raised voices and noisy movements behind them.

At last, after what seemed to Caroline an eternity of discomfort, the trees cleared and she saw standing tethered to one of them a horse.

“Here we are,” the gentleman said. “Can you ride pillion?”

“Yes,” Caroline replied briefly.

He lifted her in his arms, swung her up on the horse’s back, and sprang into the saddle. She put her arms round his waist. There was a sudden babble of noise, the sound of voices raised high.

“Do you hear that? They have found the body,” the gentleman said. He spurred his horse, and they started off at a quick canter across the open field which lay beyond the wood.

2

They had travelled some distance and the wood was almost out of sight before Caroline breathless from the speed at which they were moving and the difficulty of keeping her balance, gasped out,

“Where are we going, sir?”

Her companion reined in his horse until it settled down to a walk and replied,

“I live near here at Brecon Castle, and, by the way, my name is Brecon.”

“I seem to have heard of the Castle,” Caroline said reflectively.

“Oh, I dare say you have. It is a curst beauty spot and the people came in crowds to gape at its Norman towers. Perhaps you have viewed it from the roadway.”

Caroline stiffened, and was just about to reply haughtily that she was not in the habit of viewing castles from the roadway or as one of a crowd when she remembered her torn dress and dirty hands and realised that the stranger had no idea of her station in life. With an effort she kept back the words which trembled on her lips and said meekly,

“‘I am sure I would recall your fine Castle, had I seen it. Am I to understand that you, Sir, are Lord Brecon?”

“You are,” was the answer. “And now I will give myself the pleasure of showing you my Castle.”

“You intend to ride back to your own home, my lord?” Caroline questioned.

“Yes! Why not?”

“But surely that would be a very unwise thing to do? You told me but a few minutes back that the poor man in the wood was murdered by someone who wished to fasten the crime on you. If they suspect you, will they not repair at once to Brecon Castle in search of your lordship and enquire where you have been this evening, especially during the hour in which the man received the blow which killed him?”

“By Jove!” Lord Brecon exclaimed, “you are either as quick as any lawyer, Madam, or else an ardent reader of novels from the Circulating Library.”

Caroline laughed. It was only too true that her parents had reproached her not once but a dozen times, because she enjoyed the more lurid type of romance.

“Nevertheless,” his lordship continued, “there is something in what you say. What, then, do you suggest that we do?”

“Have you no trusty friends?” Caroline asked. “I remember once that a farmer of good standing was brought for questioning to the magistrates because he was suspected of being involved with a smugglers’ gang. A great many people thought him guilty, but he had three friends who swore he had spent the night in question playing cards with them. My father said later, “It is difficult enough to detect one man in a lie, but four avowing the same falsehood would be too much even for a judge and jury”.’

“Your father spoke truly,” Lord Brecon said, and he turned the horse’s head in another direction. “I will be as wise as he and seek if not three loyal friends at least two.”

Again, Caroline realised that he had misunderstood her, and it was with difficulty that she prevented herself from saying that her father was on the Bench when the farmer was questioned and not in the dock.

But perhaps such misunderstanding was all for the best, she told herself for now that she knew the identity of Lord Brecon it was of the utmost importance that he should not know hers.

“I have remembered two friends who will be of service to me, but we have two miles to go in order to find them,” Lord Brecon said. “Can you bear to continue our journey as we are or is the discomfort too great?”

“I shall be all right, thank you, my lord,” Caroline answered.

“Zounds, but my manners are most remiss, Madam,” Lord Brecon ejaculated suddenly, “for I have not enquired as to your wishes. You must forgive me, but the events of the last half-hour have left me somewhat bemused.”

“I understand, my lord”

“We ride now towards Sevenoaks. Is that direction to your liking?”

“I am pleased to say that it will suit me well,” Caroline said with dignity, thinking that when she got to Sevenoaks she would hire a post-chaise to take her back to London.

“Would it be an indiscreet question,” Lord Brecon asked, “now that we are so well acquainted, to enquire your name?”

“Caroline – ” Caroline began, and then stopped quickly.

Her thoughts had been engaged with the idea of returning to London and absentmindedly she had almost answered his question truthfully.

“Yes,” he prompted.

“ – er – Fry,” Caroline finished, adding the first name which came to her mind.

“Your servant, Miss Fry, and now perhaps you will relieve my curiosity and tell me why you were walking through the woods at the very moment when Isaac Rosenberg was struck down by some treacherous hand.”

Caroline thought quickly. She had been concentrating so much on Lord Brecon’s troubles that she had not had time to prepare a story for herself, but luckily once more the novels from the Circulating Library stood her in good stead, and slowly she began to propound a story which she hoped sounded plausible.

“I have had the most dastardly ill luck, my lord. I have been acting as companion to a lady of quality. I have not been in her service long, in fact only a few weeks, but long enough to be horrified and even disgusted by the lady’s character and behaviour. She was extremely eccentric and much of this was due to her partiality for the brandy bottle. However this evening instead of her feeling sleepy, as so often happens after she had dined, she insisted that we take a drive. She thought the night air would clear her head, so her coach was fetched and we drove for some miles during which she spent the entire time berating me for faults I have never had and for mistakes I have never made.

“I was patient with her, for indeed it was my duty to be humble but after a time she grew bored even with the sound of her own voice, and asked me to pass her a hand-mirror, which I carried for her in my reticule. I passed it to her as she requested, but unfortunately the coach lurched just as the mirror was exchanged between us and maybe, too, her hand was unsteady, from the amount of brandy she had drunk anyway, the mirror fell to the ground and was smashed.

“In a fury of anger she accused me of bringing her bad luck and vowed that from that very moment she could not bear to look upon my face again. She called the coach to a halt and set me down on the road. I pleaded with her, asking that at least she should take me back to her house where I might collect my clothes and leave on the morrow but she would not listen. Flinging the wages she owed me in the dust at my feet, she commanded the coachman to drive on.”

“Monstrous!” Lord-Brecon exclaimed. “Entirely monstrous! Such women should not be allowed to exist.”

“I found myself on a narrow, unfrequented road,” Caroline went on, “but had the idea that, if I went through the wood and struck across the field, I should reach the main highway to Sevenoaks.”

“So you would,” Lord Brecon answered, “but it is a mile or so and you would have found it tiring walking.”

“And that, my lord, is how I came to be in the wood,” Caroline finished, delighted with her tale which she felt confident his lordship believed without question.

“So now, if I convey you, to Sevenoaks, you think you can find a post-chaise or a stage-coach to carry you back to London?” Lord Brecon asked.

“That was my idea,” Caroline replied.

“Your home then is in London?”

His words awakened a sudden nausea in Caroline for her home. In that moment she had an overwhelming desire to be at Mandrake, to see her father and mother, to know herself safe and secure and under their protection again.

She wondered what stories Sir Montagu might tell when he returned to town. She foresaw explanations and excuses which would have to be made both to her godmother and to her chaperon, Mrs. Edgmont. It was all rather frightening and swiftly Caroline, impetuous as ever, made up her mind. She would not go back to London, she would not risk encountering Sir Montagu, at least until she had had time to consider how to treat him. She would go to Mandrake and what was more, she would tell her mother the truth of what had happened and beg her forgiveness. It was typical of Caroline that, when she had done wrong, she invariably owned up and now it was with a deep, sigh of relief that she visualised the end of her journey and her mother’s unfailing understanding and sympathy.

“No, my lord,” she said aloud, “my home is near Dover and it is there I would fain go until I find another position.”

“Then we must contrive to get you to Dover,” Lord Brecon replied, “and it seems to me that the sooner, the better. Are you game to go a little-faster, for if we amble on at this rate, it will take us half the night to reach my friends?”

“Go as fast as you like, my lord,” Caroline said and tightened her hold around his waist.

Lord Brecon urged the horse into a gallop, after which Caroline had thoughts for nothing but keeping her seat and holding her head low to prevent her bonnet from blowing away. It seemed to her that they travelled for quite a long time before Lord Brecon reined in his horse and exclaimed in tones of considerable satisfaction,

“There! This is where I thought they would be!”

Caroline looked up and saw in the field ahead of them flickering lights and the outline of low, curved roofs and tiny, thin chimneys which she could not for the moment recollect as belonging to any type of house she had ever seen before. Then, as she stared, understanding came to her. The field was filled with round-topped caravans and set amongst them a number of large wagons.

“Gipsies !” she exclaimed in surprise.

“No, not gipsies,” Lord Brecon contradicted her “a menagerie, and the owner of it is the loyal friend you would have me seek.”

“A menagerie!” Caroline exclaimed. “How exciting! I have seen one at St. Bartholomew’s Fair.”

“And that is where I imagine Grimbaldi will eventually end his tour,” his lordship replied.

By this time they had reached a gate into the field but when they would have passed through it, a boy came out of the shadows and barred their way. Dark-skinned, with long lank hair hanging around his face he looked suspiciously like a gipsy, and behind him appeared a woman with an equally dark countenance who held one child in her arms and had another holding on to her skirts.

“Hi ye,” the boy shouted, ‘th’ show’s over for tonight. Ye can’t come in here at this hour.”

“Our business is with Mr. Grimbaldi, boy,” Lord Brecon answered. “Lead me to his caravan ”

“With the boss?” the boy questioned doubtfully, a trifle awed by the rider’s air of authority. “Ye are sure on it? He didn’t say he were expecting visitors.”

“These are th’ quality, son,” the woman said in a low voice, “do as the gentleman bids.”

Lord Brecon threw a silver piece in the air. The boy caught it deftly.

“This way, sir,” he said, with a change of tone, and ran in front of the horse until he came to a big caravan set a little apart from the others, and painted crimson with silver carvings.

There was light from the uncurtained windows and a light too, streaming from the open door above a flight of steps.

“Hi, boss,” the boy called. “Here’s a swell cove as says he ‘as business with ye.’

Caroline, looking over the field, saw that there were over a dozen lighted caravans, the large wagons she had perceived were arranged in a circle and in front of many of them candles still flickered gutteringly. Childishly she wished she could have seen the animals, but most of the wagons were by now closed or covered for the night and in the far corner of the field a fire had been lit round which there were grouped a number of people obviously the attendants or keepers.

As she stared around her, a man came out on to the top steps of the caravan. He was a big man with broad shoulders and great muscled arms bulging under his crimson coat, and so tall that he had to bow his head to pass through the low doorway. He straightened himself and saw Lord Brecon.

“My lord!” he cried. “This is indeed a welcome surprise.”

“May I come in, Adam?” Lord Brecon asked, dismounting and adding, “I have brought a friend with me.”

The boy ran to hold the horse Lord Brecon dismounted then held out his arms to Caroline. She bent forward, felt his hands grasp her waist, was conscious as he lifted her of his strength, the nearness of his face to hers, and that her heart quickened suddenly. Then her feet were on the ground and Lord Brecon slipped a hand under her elbow.

“Let me help you,” he said.

He guided her over the uneven ground to the steps of the caravan and she climbed them with the helping hand of the man at the top.

“May I bid you welcome, Madam, as a friend of his lordship’s?” the man said.

“Thank you,” Caroline smiled.

“This is my old friend Adam Grimbaldi, Miss Fry,” Lord Brecon said. “His name is foreign, but his blood is English.”

“That’s true enough, as your lordship knows, and my heart is English too. Oh, but ‘tis good to be back in one’s own country.’

“I thought you would think that despite the triumphs you enjoyed in France,” Lord. Brecon said.

“Won’t you be pleased to enter, Madam?” Mr. Grimbaldi said to Caroline, indicating the door into the caravan.

“Thank you,” Caroline said again, and bending her head so that the feathers on her bonnet should not be caught on the carved lintel, she moved inside.

When she raised her head again, she almost gasped with astonishment. There was a woman in the caravan, and a stranger person Caroline had never seen in the whole of her life. She had been reclining on a bunk at the far end, and now as Caroline entered she rose to her feet.

She was very small and attractive in a piquant, foreign, manner, and she had long hair dyed the colour of guinea gold which hung in a great cloud to well below her knees. She was dressed in Turkish trousers made of some thin, gauzy material, and the upper part of her, body was bare save for two large silver breast-plates set with precious stones. Caroline was so surprised at her appearance that for the moment she could only stare, forgetting her manners, until the woman said politely with a French accent,

“Bon soir, Madame. You, have come, alas, too late to see ze animals!”

“I was afraid so – ’ Caroline began, but the woman was not listening to her. She was turning eagerly with a smiling mouth and sparkling, eyes to welcome Lord Brecon who had just entered the caravan.

“M’lord,” she cried. ‘I am so very happy to see you. I thought you had forgotten Zara.”

She sped towards him as she spoke, both hands, outstretched, and when he would have taken them and raised them to his lips she raised her face instead, and he kissed her. Caroline’s astonished eyes were round.

“And how do you like England, Zara?” Lord Brecon asked. He was looking fondly at this strange woman, Caroline noticed, and one hand was still held in hers.

“Ugh, but I detest it. It is cold, and ze audiences are slow to applaud. They are not warm like the French or noisy like the Germans. They are silent, and who can know if they are pleased or – how you say? – disgusted?”

Grimbaldi laughed.

“I have told Zara we are an undemonstrative people,” he said. ‘She will get used to us in time.”

“And your tigers? What do they think of us?” Lord Brecon asked.

“They think like me,” Zara said proudly. “If there is not a great deal of – what you call – clapping they think they are not a success – they sulk, they are sad – and they are very difficult for me to handle.”

“Poor Zara!” Lord Brecon exclaimed, and then he looked towards Caroline.

“I must introduce you to Madame Zara, Miss Fry. She is the greatest and probably the only woman tamer of tigers in the world. She has had a phenomenal success on the Continent and now we are honoured to have her in England.”

“I hope I shall have the pleasure of seeing Madame Zara perform,” Caroline said politely.

“Won’t you sit down Miss Fry?” Mr. Grimbaldi asked, bringing her a chair.

“Thank you.”

“Caroline accepted the chair and as she sank into it realised how tired she was.

“Miss Fry and I have had a fatiguing ride,” Lord Brecon said. ‘Speaking for myself I am both hungry and thirsty. Can we avail ourselves of your hospitality Adam?”

“But of course,” Mr. Grimbaldi answered, “though I am afraid the fare is not that to which you are accustomed, my lord. Would eggs and bacon be too simple a dish?”

“I should welcome it,” Lord Brecon said. “What about you, Miss Fry?”

“I cannot imagine anything I would rather eat,” Caroline said with a smile, “for indeed, having dined at six o’clock I am exceeding hungry!”

Then eggs and bacon it shall be, Adam, and if you have it a bottle of wine ?”

“There I have something I am not ashamed to offer you, my lord,” Adam Grimbaldi answered. “Champagne which I have brought from France.”

As he spoke, he drew a bottle from a cupboard at the back of the caravan and set it on a small table

Caroline looked around her and was amazed to see how compactly everything fitted in. There were cupboards and shelves, pictures and ornaments. The bunk bed was piled high with cushions while the floor of the caravan was concealed by a fine Persian rug.

“How cosy this is!” she exclaimed.

“My caravan is not so big as this one, but ‘tis far, far prettier,” Zara answered. “But you are tired, Madame. Will you not take off your bonnet and make yourself comfortable?”

“Yes, I would like to do that,” Caroline said, and raising her arms, she undid the strings of her bonnet and drew it from her head.

It was big and rather cumbersome as was the fashion at the moment, and though she was aware that her hair must be untidy, she was too tired to worry about her appearance. It was only as she threw her bonnet down on the bunk and the light from the lantern which swung above their heads glittered a little in her eyes that she looked across the caravan to see the expression on Lord Brecon’s face and realised that he was seeing her face clearly for the first time.

There was a look of surprise as well as of admiration in his eyes, and after a second Caroline’s eyes dropped, conscious that she was blushing a little under his scrutiny. She had no idea how lovely she looked as she sat there with the light shining on the red-gold of the tiny curls which framed her white forehead.

Her face was a perfect oval, small and exquisitely set upon a long, white neck. Her nose was very short and straight and her mouth full and naturally red. There was something so exquisite in the drawing of her face and the grace of her body that, looking at Caroline for the first time, people invariably found it hard to believe that she was not just the illustration of some enchanting fairy-tale.

But her eyes were the loveliest thing about her. They were very large and vivid with life, laughter and mischief. Caroline’s beauty was not a set, statuesque type, but something so pulsatingly alive that no one could be with her for long without feeling both the tempo of their own mind and body respond to her natural gaiety and enthusiasm for living.

Tired as she now was, she could not hide the eagerness in her voice as she asked,

“Do tell me about your Menagerie. Have you many animals?”

“A fair number, Ma’am,” Adam Grimbaldi answered, “and I am especially proud of my lions. I have three and the eldest one, Caesar, is as tame as a lap dog. I brought him up from a cub and he will allow me to do anything with him.”

Mr. Grimbaldi was obviously intensely proud of his menagerie, and he would have talked of it for hours to Caroline had not he been interrupted by the boy with the dark hair bringing in the eggs and bacon so that he must cease talking of his work and see to the entertainment of his guests. When they had eaten, and drunk a glass of champagne, Lord Brecon said,

“Now, Adam, I want to tell you why I am here. You must be curious, although with the greatest forbearance you have not asked me any questions.”

“I knew you would speak in your own good time, my lord. You wish, I think, for me to be of service to you. You have but to command.”

“Do you mean that, Adam, even though it means unpleasantness with the magistrates?”

Mr.-Grimbaldi shrugged his shoulders.

“Magistrates are invariably unpleasant,” he said. “It is of little consequence.”

“In France we have a very rude word and a very rude name for them,” Zara said, “but I will not offend the ears of ze young lady by repeating it here.”

Lord Brecon laughed.

“All right, Zara, I know it.”

“Then you agree with me?” she asked.

“I agree with you,” he answered.

She smiled and then her expression changed.

“M’lord, you have not killed a man in a duel? You are not wishing to flee ze country?”

Lord Brecon shook his head.

“No, Zara, it is not as easy as that. Perhaps I had better explain from the beginning. You had best close the door, Adam.”

Mr. Grimbaldi rose and closed the door of the caravan. Lord Brecon finished his glass of champagne and said,