“I think,” Sir Richard suggested judiciously, “that we’d better let them have turns, my dear. Shall we say ladies first, Mr. Blayne? Or Kate, shall we give him the courtesy as our guest?”
They faced one another, John Blayne and Kate, neither willing to yield, both knowing that yielding there must be.
“Come, come,” Sir Richard said gently.
John Blayne shrugged his shoulders. “I yield. Sir Richard—as an American, I’m trained to chivalry. Ladies first.”
Sir Richard laughed. He was enjoying the contest. “Very nicely put, I must say! Did you hear that, my dear? Trained to chivalry he says—very nice, for an American, eh?”
Lady Mary met smile with smile. “He’s much better than expected.”
“Thank you,” John Blayne said. “And now, if I may confess it, I’m delighted to accept your invitation to luncheon, Lady Mary.”
She inclined her head and nodded to Wells. “Lay another place, Wells, and use the silver soup tureen.” She glanced at the waiting men. “And in the small dining hall, just the three of us.”
“Very good, my lady.” Wells disappeared.
Through all this, Kate had waited in stiff patience. Lady Mary, it seemed, had forgotten the controversy and perhaps Sir Richard wanted it forgotten. Well, she insisted upon it. She turned to face them and spoke with firmness. “Mr. Blayne, pray proceed.”
He answered with a sort of desperate gaiety.
“You have the floor, I believe, Miss Wells. No? Very well, then. Sir Richard, she’s right—I’m planning a great piece of folly—quite terrible, in fact. I do plan to take it away.”
Kate ignored the gaiety. “Sir Richard, it’s the castle he’s taking away.”
Silence fell. Lady Mary broke it faintly, “Did you say away, Kate?”
“To America, my lady.”
“To America?” Lady Mary echoed in a whisper. Then the monstrous meaning crept into her understanding. “Richard—he’s taking the castle to America!”
Sir Richard went white, then the red came flashing up from his neck. He was suddenly half blind with pain stabbing at his temples. “Mr. Blayne, I don’t understand.”
“I can’t blame you, Sir Richard,” John Blayne said gently. “It’s my fault. We should have had our lawyers handle the transaction—I’m always too informal—too impetuous—but I thought my letter would explain everything—would be enough …”
He reached into his pocket for a piece of paper which he unfolded and laid on the table. “Here’s what I had in mind.” It was a sketch of the castle, not in English meadows but against wooded hills.
Lady Mary fumbled for her spectacles, put them on and stared at the few words in the lower left corner. “Conn-Conn-”
“Connecticut,” he said.
“What an odd name,” she observed. “Is it the name of the artist?”
Sir Richard looked at it with detached interest. Nothing could matter until this hammer in his head ceased to pound. He forced himself to speak.
“Rather a nice drawing, my dear. It looks like the castle right enough—though the east tower is too short. The two towers should be the same height, Mr. Blayne.”
Kate stepped forward, she put her hand on John Blayne’s arm and spoke softly. “They still don’t comprehend—they simply can’t. You must help them—indeed you must.”
He looked down at the small hand on his arm and then into her earnest eyes. He nodded, and she let her hand slip to her side.
“Sir Richard,” he said, “let me remind you.” He took a letter from his breast pocket and unfolded it. “I brought a copy of my letter to you, luckily. Perhaps you will recall—and Lady Mary, Connecticut is the name of a state, not of an artist. Let me read just this paragraph, Sir Richard. ‘I intend to use this castle as the most beautiful museum ever conceived in Connecticut. The cost will be immense, but I am prepared to spend any amount in order that my mother’s priceless collection of art can be properly housed for the public to enjoy.’ … Doesn’t this mean Connecticut, USA? I don’t know of any other.”
They were stricken, he could see that. Sir Richard sat down in a huge oak armchair. “I thought—conceived in Connecticut—I supposed it meant merely that you were speaking of the—the idea, you know.”
“It’s an invasion—that’s what it is,” Lady Mary cried, her soft voice suddenly shrill. “It’s the Spanish Armada all over again, Richard.”
Very straight and dignified, Sir Richard put up his hand for silence. He sat motionless, attentive only to the thunder in his skull. His gaze was fixed on some point in the distant end of the great hall and when at last he spoke it was as if he spoke to someone there, his voice low and unsteady. “I inherited Starborough Castle and the estate entire, including one thousand acres of forest and three thousand acres of farmlands, from my ancestors. It has belonged to my family for five hundred years. It was given to my ancestor, William Sedgeley, for extraordinary bravery in defending the King during a plot to assassinate. In each generation we have … done our best to care for castle and farm and forest. In my time, unfortunately, the world has changed so that a heritage such as mine has become an intolerable burden, far beyond the power of one man to bear. I am responsible for seventy families who live and work upon my land. … I … I … I …”
His voice failed. Kate ran to his side, Lady Mary sat down suddenly in a high-back chair. Her delicate face was white.
“Oh, my God,” she murmured.
John Blayne went to her side but she pushed his hand away.
“Please,” she murmured.
Kate looked earnestly at the American. “Mr. Blayne, I know what to do for them both, may I ask you to do something for me?”
“Yes indeed, Miss Wells, anything, anything at all. I had not intended to cause them such distress. I am sorry, believe me.”
“Then”—she managed to smile in spite of her own inner heaviness—“will you join your men at the inn and come back instead for dinner? It will give Sir Richard and Lady Mary a little time to accustom themselves to—to this strange situation.”
“Gladly, Miss Wells, but perhaps it would be better if I did not return until tomorrow?”
“Come back this evening,” Sir Richard said in an unexpectedly firm tone. “We have not done talking, nor shall we until we understand each other.”
Lady Mary lifted her head, proudly now, and as the lady of the castle she spoke. “And, of course, you will spend the night, Mr. Blayne.”
“You’re very kind, Lady Mary, but I don’t want to put you to all that trouble. I shall get a room at the inn,”
Wells, who had entered the room to announce luncheon, stood unobtrusively in the doorway. “Pardon me, my lady, but I understood that the gentleman from America was to stay in the castle. I have already removed his suitcase from his motorcar and unpacked it.”
“Thank you, Wells. What room have you put him in?”
“The Duke’s room, my lady.”
“Take him to King John’s room,” Sir Richard said sternly.
“Not King John’s room, Richard,” Lady Mary replied in a low voice, looking earnestly at her husband. “The damp, you know, and besides they’ve been very noisy in that room lately. Haven’t they, Kate?”
But Kate, engaged in another conversation, did not hear the question.
“I believe they’ve been taking heed of what’s been going on. They’re always ahead of us in these matters, you know.”
Sir Richard smiled indulgently at his wife and the strain that had come over them both was momentarily eased. He turned to Wells. “The Duke’s room it shall be, Wells.”
“Very good, my lord.”
While they were settling the matter of the room, Kate and John Blayne had been settling the matter of his return to the castle.
“…yes, dinner is at eight, here in the great hall, and, please, Mr. Blayne, black tie.”
“Oh, but of course!” He smiled his understanding of all she had been saying, nodded briskly to Sir Richard a
nd Lady Mary, then walked toward the door that led out to the garden. He would not let himself look back, even before he went out the door. He felt that he could not bear it if Kate had turned away.
Only after the door closed behind him did Kate direct herself to her two charges. “And now, my two dears,” she said with a lightness she had not thought she could muster, “won’t you go in to your luncheon?”
Promptly at eight o’clock they sat down to dinner—Lady Mary and Sir Richard at either end of the long narrow table, John Blayne between them and on Lady Mary’s right. Wells stood by the buffet, ready to serve. Kate, in black dress, small white apron and neat little cap perched on her brown curls, stood behind Lady Mary’s chair. To John Blayne she looked like an actress, oddly charming in the part she now had to play; to the master and mistress of the castle she was only doing what she had done since she had been old enough to take her place in service.
As if a truce had been called, the conversation at dinner ranged from art to politics, from medieval history to contemporary drama, from the status of farming on both sides of the Atlantic to the importance of blood lines in breeding stock. The small roast was delicious, the wine was vintage; the dessert fruit was damsons bottled the previous summer from an ancient tree in the kitchen garden. The cheese was Stilton.
Only over their coffee cups in the small sitting room off the great hall was mention made of the business at hand. Kate had brought in the coffee tray and set it on a low table before Lady Mary. The American noticed that there were four cups on the tray and that Kate had left cap and apron in the kitchen.
“Black or white, Mr. Blayne?” Lady Mary asked as she poured.
“Black, please, Lady Mary.”
The two men stood with their backs to the fire. Kate stood beside Lady Mary on a low couch.
“Tomorrow morning, Mr. Blayne,” Sir Richard said casually, “I have asked my solicitor, Philip Webster, to join us for our discussion of this matter of the castle.”
“I shall be happy to meet him.”
“It is possible,” Sir Richard hesitated, “that you might have liked to have your legal representative present, too. But I daresay you could not get him over from America in time for our meeting tomorrow.” Sir Richard chuckled slightly.
“My lawyer, David Holt, of the New York firm of Haynes, Holt, Bagley and Spence, accompanied me to England, Sir Richard. He has been staying in London, but I made a telephone call to him this afternoon. He was due to arrive at the inn in the village this evening.”
“Then we shall both have our advisers. Capital!” Sir Richard exclaimed. “Capital, indeed. Ten o’clock tomorrow morning in the great hall. Perhaps you would like to have a ride before breakfast? Wells could find you something to wear. My horse is spirited, but quite reliable. However, you might prefer her ladyship’s, an older mount but strong in wind and limb.”
“Thanks, Sir Richard, I should enjoy nothing more than an early-morning ride.” He turned to Kate. “Would you join me, Miss Wells, and show me something of the countryside?”
She smiled up at him like a radiantly happy child, then shook her head. “I have duties in the morning, Mr. Blayne.”
“I understand,” he said quietly, then he turned back to Sir Richard. “Perhaps it would be well for me to retire now, Sir Richard, with all that is before us tomorrow.”
“Quite so.” Sir Richard moved toward a bell pull on the wall and the sound of a distant ringing could be heard. When Wells appeared in the doorway, Sir Richard spoke. “Take Mr. Blayne to the Duke’s room, Wells.”
“Yes, my lord.”
“I’d better just go along with them and see that everything is right,” Kate said. She took the coffee tray and went toward the door.
“How kind you are,” John Blayne murmured.
He said good night and was halfway across the room when Lady Mary remarked, “Oh, I hope they won’t bother you tonight.”
“Careful, my dear. You must not mystify or frighten our guest out of his night’s sleep.”
“Don’t worry about me, Sir Richard, I’m a good sleeper. I assure you, Lady Mary, that I shall be quite all right. Until the morning, then!” He stood in the doorway and lifted his hand in a gesture of farewell.
Sir Richard and Lady Mary were sitting together now on the low couch. They looked regal, and yet tender at the same time, and thoroughly in command while the truce held. Swords would be drawn in earnest in the morning.
After the door had closed, Lady Mary sighed and laid her hand lightly on her husband’s. “He’s rather nice, Richard, don’t you think, in spite of his being an—”
“Very nice,” Sir Richard agreed, “surprising, as a matter of fact. One never knows Americans.”
Wells opened the door to the Duke’s room. “Here you are, sir. I hope you’ll find everything to your satisfaction.”
The bed had been turned down and John Blayne saw that his pajamas and robe had been laid on the faded coverlet; his slippers were neatly arranged on the floor. The light on the table by the bed gave a warmth which the room had lacked when he had gone to it before dinner to dress; a small fire in the grate had done its best to counteract the dampness.
“The candle, sir, is near the lamp, and there’s a box of matches.”
“Whatever do I need a candle for?”
“The electricity has a way of failing, sir, and some of the passages have no light in any case.”
“But, Wells, I really don’t expect to go wandering around the castle during the night.”
“Very good, sir, but then you never know. Best be prepared is what I always say. If that is all, sir, I’ll wish you a very good night.”
“Thank you, Wells.”
The old man turned and left. Kate busied herself about the room, testing the windowsills with her forefinger for dust, arranging the long satin curtains. It was an immense room, and the windows reached from floor to ceiling. The crimson satin curtains were shredding and she was trying to hide the rents. She caught his glance and dropped the curtain.
“You’ve a cut on your forehead,” she said sharply and came to him to inspect.
He put his hand to his head. “I gave myself a blow this morning on that low door when we were going into the great hall.”
“And you never said a word!” she cried.
“So much began to happen all at once.”
“I must wash it immediately.”
She went to a stand and poured water from a large porcelain pitcher into a basin and opened a drawer for a clean towel.
“It’s nothing,” he said.
“There’s blood dried on it, under your hair,” she retorted. “Stoop down, please—otherwise I’ll have to fetch a step ladder.”
He laughed and stooped down, and felt her light touch on his bead as she washed the slight cut. A faint clean fragrance came from her. Her skin was very blue, her eyes more blue than any he had ever seen, a deep violet blue—very rare! One saw it in the paintings of the early madonnas. Her dark eyelashes were set thickly together and curled upward softly.
“You don’t seem like an American,” she was saying, as she kept at her self-appointed task. “Does that hurt?”
“Not in the least.”
“Will you bend a little lower still, please? You’re really shockingly tall, aren’t you?”
“Depends on the girl I’m standing beside.”
For the first time he heard her laughter, a lovely sound, free and warm.
“The inside of your mouth is pretty, too,” he added.
She put her hand over her mouth. “I daresay you’re looking straight down my throat—I forgot I was so close.”
“I didn’t.”
She stepped back at that. “Now, really, Mr. Blayne—”
“Couldn’t you call me John, as long as I’m in the castle?”
“I only know King John,” she said, trying not to laugh.
“Ah, but he’s dead!”
“I’ve started the bleeding, I’m afraid!” She cam
e close again to wipe the blood away. “And King John isn’t dead—altogether. He still has his room here—the one we didn’t put you in. An old castle like this is always alive. At least it’s—inhabited.”
“Do you mean haunted?”
The lovely mouth was very near now, and he held himself taut. In the absorption in her task he saw her lips parted, the tip of her tongue between white teeth.
“No,” she said, “not haunted. How can you be haunted by people you love? They are people—in different forms and shapes, perhaps, but alive.”
She stepped back with a gesture encircling the room. “To this room, you may be waked in the morning by bells from the royal chapel below. It’s the ballroom now, but it was once the place where Queen Elizabeth knelt at dawn to pray. She prayed often—did you know that? People don’t think of it, but she was religious. I daresay she was lonely and couldn’t trust anyone—not even Essex whom she loved—perhaps especially Essex, because she’d told him she loved him, and so he had advantage.”
“How do you know she told him?”
“She couldn’t help it. Queen though she was, she fell in love like any woman. I daresay she fought her own heart, knowing she couldn’t—mustn’t—give herself into any man’s power. But her heart won. It makes me glad I’m nobody.”
“A beautiful little nobody!”
She laughed again. “I laid myself open, didn’t I—but you needn’t have taken notice!”
“I can’t help noticing.”
She pretended annoyance. “I shall have to stop talking altogether! There—it’s only a scratch, after all.” She walked away from him to the basin.
“No—no, please!” he said, following.
“If you keep teasing—” She was at the door now.
“Let’s get back to the subject of the castle,” he said. “Tell me more about it.”
She considered, lingering on the threshold. “The reason I went with you in the passages is because they’re quite dangerous, really—”
“Haunted, too?”
“No, but they lead to dungeons, I told you—and an underground river.”
“Oh, come now—that’s too perfect! It’s what castles dream of having—dungeons and underground rivers.”