“Oh, you sweet thing,” she said with a giggle, touching her nose to the lamb’s. The flock was not far away, grazing in a giant white mass behind the cottage. “Let’s return you to your mum, yes? You’ll both like that. I thought you might be gone for good; second wee one this week to wander away. If only we’d found the first.”
“I confess I know little of sheep,” I said, watching her carry the lamb away. “Can they really tell their own children from any other lamb?”
“They smell them, yes,” the old man said, turning his head toward Joanna as she left. “You can see them nose the young as soon as they’re born and long after. It’s like a man’s signature, you see, perfectly unique.”
A man’s signature. I smoothed my hands over my apron, feeling for the scrap of burnt paper in the pocket next to the spoon. The penmanship. I could take the little scrap and search through George Bremerton’s things. . . . Lee had only checked his bags, but if he kept a journal or any correspondence, I could at least make certain he hadn’t written the note in the fireplace. That would put me at greater ease, knowing that he had nothing to do with the death of Lee’s mother. And if he did . . .
Well, I knew Lee needed to be away from the house soon, but that would make his leaving even more dire.
“This kindness deserves a reward,” the old man was saying, turning back toward the house. “Why don’t you join us for a bit of brandy?”
Poppy sighed and tugged hard at my sleeve. “Louisa, no. No, no! We should be going. I need to get back to the house and poison that grumpy old man with the mustache,” she said in a whisper that was, quite frankly, too loud to qualify truly as such.
And I agreed we should leave, but not for her peculiar reasons.
“Actually, we’re both needed back at the house,” I said, giving a little bow that he would not see.
“Then you decided to stay at Coldthistle,” he mused, leaning on the door frame and wiping at the sweat under his cap. “Well, my thanks again for the lamb. You ladies have a fine afternoon. It’s good, strong weather we’re having today. Go and make the most of it.”
And make the most of it I would. I told Poppy I would race her and the hound back to the house, and she agreed. We were all three of us out of breath when we arrived. A bank of clouds had followed us over, darkening the formerly sunny skies over the mansion. Chijioke’s whistle wound out from the barn, and Mary was doing a bit of washing under the overhang outside the kitchens.
Gaining access to George Bremerton’s room would require a distraction. Lee, of course, was the natural person to ask. He might be willing to draw his uncle down to the Red Room or out to the gardens for a stroll. Or, I thought darkly, he might simply want to be left alone and not pulled into a scheme to tarnish the memory of yet another family member.
I slowed down as we reached the yard, but Poppy and Bartholomew flew by, running at full tilt toward Mary and her washbasin. Poppy stopped short, but the little brown hound took a flying leap, plopping into the sudsy water and soaking him and Mary both. He barked with delight, splashing around and flinging water in every direction.
“Bad!” Poppy shouted at him, but she was giggling as she did.
“Would you control this infernal menace!” Mary screeched.
Poppy leaned into the basin, trying to fish out the slippery pup, who wriggled and bucked until at last he was on the grass and shaking away the droplets on his coat.
“Look what you’ve done,” Mary scolded, standing up to reveal her soapy frock and apron. “Mrs. Haylam will be very cross when I tell her.”
I stood back and watched, amused, biding my time while I concocted a plan to get Bremerton out of his chambers. From behind, I heard the crunch of horse hooves on the drive. Mary and I both turned to look, finding an elderly man riding in with a heavy satchel hanging from his saddle.
“That will be the post,” Mary said, waving to the man. “Can you collect it, Louisa? I’m in no fit state to be seen.”
She began gathering her things and wringing out the wet clothes, hurrying back inside the kitchen door. Poppy and her hound were of no use, rolling around together in the grass until both of them were covered in green smudges and dirt.
“It’s up to me, then,” I muttered, trotting off toward the drive. The man was balding, the naked skin on his head red from sun exposure and covered in brown speckles like an egg. He swung down from the saddle nimbly enough for a man of his age and dug in the bag tethered to the saddle.
“You’re a new face, miss,” he said kindly, giving a little bow.
I returned the courtesy and waited while he retrieved the messages.
“Just a few today,” he added, handing across a collection of folded and sealed packets. “Please send along me apologies to the master, young miss; the rains this week kept me from my usual route. Down t’Malton there’s all but a lake now formed in the south road.”
“I will tell him,” I said, hugging the messages to my chest. He touched his thumb to his forehead and grasped the saddle, pulling himself back up. Something prickled in the back of my mind. Messages. Rains.
I hadn’t gone to the house earlier because my contacts in Derridon sent a note to me at Coldthistle. It was about your mother . . .
That lying bastard.
“One moment,” I said, putting out a hand to stall him. He twisted in the saddle, regarding me with bright blue eyes. “Do you carry the messages from Derridon, too?”
“That I do, young miss.”
“And are there other messengers that might have come through?” I asked, trying to keep my tone light and unsuspicious.
“I doubt that greatly,” he said with a chuckle. “I’m the one knows this route best. Takes me all along the Derwent. Not much need of other riders, Derridon being as small as it is. ’Sides, I know all the men and boys that be riding this road, and the rains kept ’em all holed up in Malton this ha’week.”
“Thank you,” I said with a cooling smile. “You’ve been most helpful.”
He touched his thumb to his forehead again and clucked his tongue, the horse hopping forward and carrying him off, a spray of dirt and pebbles flying up in his wake.
No riders. No messengers. I knew now what to ask Lee even if it would hurt him terribly.
Chapter Thirty-Four
Seeking the Black Elbion
Many smarter than I have wondered at the miracle of creation, at the possibility of something appearing from nothing. In a similar vein I have wondered at the origin of the Black Elbion, a book that predates all known manuscripts and scrolls, yet I myself have seen crude depictions of it in caves scattered across Europe and Africa. In Asia. In the Americas. Beings that have not yet discovered the true nature of writing record it on their walls—a square with an eye, and a crisscross through that eye. I have seen it in France, in Belgium, in Egypt, Florence, the Levant . . .
But the mysterious how of it remains. How can this single image, an image of a book, appear again and again? Naturally, historians shrug this off as a coincidence. The symbol could mean anything. Yet I know it to be the Black Elbion. I have seen the real book. I have felt its insidious power.
The book calls to men. Its inky tendrils of sin wrap around the heart and do not let go. It speaks of power but at great cost.
I saw it first in a desert. It was luck or fate that drew me there, for I was intending to track rumors of a djinn sighted outside of Baghdad city, a diabolically tedious and ultimately futile search. Instead, I met a traveler going west, a woman swathed all in black. She went on foot through the desert, though the heat and the winds bothered her not at all. At first I thought her blind or delirious, her veiled form passing by us and into the great sea of sand, but then she stopped and turned, saw our tents, and approached. She would only meet with me and waved my guides away. In her arms she carried an immense square object wrapped in fur.
When she had taken some water, she revealed the book to me in that tent. I remember the sounds of the winds screaming against the can
vas, a sudden sirocco surrounding the camp, as if the desert itself wished to shield the world from the book’s unveiling. Her eyes glowed gold as she took in my reaction.
“This was pulled from the bottom of the sea before Jesus walked with his apostles,” she told me. Her English was delicately accented and she must have hailed from the surrounding lands. “The Janissaries are in pursuit. I must get it to safety. Will you help, strange one?”
I looked into her eyes and then at the red crossed eye staring up at me from the book. Here it was. Its power was unmistakable and so was hers. I did not know if I would ever see the Elbion again if I took it and its carrier out of the desert, but of course I would have to try.
“Will you go west with us?” I asked her.
She nodded, grinned, and began covering the book again. The winds died down. “We will go west. The Black Elbion wills it.”
Rare Myths and Legends: The Collected Findings of H. I. Morningside, page 301
Mary stood at the deep white basin in the kitchen squeezing out her apron. She grumbled under her breath, cursing a little louder whenever Poppy’s shrieking laughs traveled into the room.
“Goodness, they’re a handful,” I said, standing in the doorway between the foyer and her. She nodded absently and pushed a strand of wet hair out of her face.
“Aye, and I’m late with Rawleigh Brimble’s luncheon. He’s to take all his meals in his rooms today and I still look half-drowned. There’s just so much to do. Mrs. Haylam needs me to see to at least four rooms for new guests arriving next week. Some of those floors and windows haven’t been washed in years.”
And thank God for that.
“Don’t trouble yourself, Mary, I can do it,” I offered, sweeping over to the table and hefting the tray. “It’s the least I can do after your heroics.”
She watched me over her shoulder, wringing out the clean white linen of her apron with a smirk. “Mm-hm. Are we sure this isn’t because you want to see the handsome young man and soothe his tender heart?”
“Mary, that’s outrageous.” But I was already out the door, and whatever she called after me was lost to the door swinging shut. Faintly, I heard Poppy giggling her way into the kitchen behind me and her hound barking excitedly.
It was no easy feat taking the heavy tray up three flights of steep stairs, but I managed. As I went, I was struck again by the silence of the house. It might have been any family home during a quiet period of the day, with ladies sewing in the parlor and the gentlemen reading or out riding. That peacefulness would soon be broken. I needed Lee to come out of his despair, just for a moment, and distract his uncle while I conducted my search. It would be a miracle if he listened to me after the way our meeting in the grotto ended.
My palms began to sweat as I neared their rooms. It was one thing to flout George Bremerton’s wishes and remain friends with Lee; it was quite another to conspire with his nephew to reveal his dark secrets. But it had to be done. If Bremerton was lying about the messenger, what else was he concealing? Nausea rose in my gut as I considered that he might be seriously involved in the death of Lee’s mother. What if he had orchestrated it? What if he had done it?
And selfishly, I wondered if solving the mystery for Lee would somehow raise me again in his esteem. Yes, you fool, he is bound to fall in love with you after you implicate his last family member in a despicable crime.
I balanced the huge tray on my wrist and gave a few short knocks. My queasiness sharpened when Bremerton opened the door. He glowered down at me, a vein pulsing hideously in his temple. A long pistol was tucked into his trousers, and he hastily reached for a coat on the back of the door to put on and cover up the weapon.
This would require more delicacy than I had anticipated.
“What do you want?”
“I beg your pardon; I’ve brought the afternoon meal as requested,” I said, averting my eyes politely.
“Well, aren’t you all meek and courteous. That’s a change. Where’s the other girl? I asked the housekeeper to only send her.” He moved closer, his chest bumping the tray threateningly.
“Mary is indisposed,” I murmured. “I’ll only be a moment.”
“Fine. Put it down and be quick about it, and then I’m going to have a word with your employer. You’re meddlesome and strange, and I don’t want you anywhere near us.” He gave me the smallest possible crevice to slide through with the tray. Doing so required me to brush physically against him. I felt ill, discovered, and worse, he would be watching me too closely for me to speak to Lee.
But I walked softly through Lee’s rooms. The outer chamber was a sitting room area with a writing desk and a table for two. Through a small door lay his bedroom, with an armoire, screen, and window looking north out into the gardens. Lee sat on the bed, disheveled as before, his cravat hanging loose and rumpled around his neck. He stared out at the grounds, still as a statue.
“There’s food here, sir,” I told him gently. There was nowhere appropriate to place the service, so I diverted to the round table next to the bed and set it there. It felt bizarre to call a boy of my own age “sir,” but George Bremerton was not a meter behind me, watching.
“Oh, Louisa,” Lee said, standing and smoothing down his waistcoat. “You’re a sight for sore eyes. It’s good to see you again. I feel like we didn’t quite get to finish our last conversation.”
“She’ll be going,” Bremerton cut in, his arms folded tight and fussy across his chest.
“Don’t speak to her that way, Uncle. You’re embarrassing me.”
Bremerton tossed up his hands and pushed by me, cornering Lee against the window. Sighing, he blew out a furious breath and jabbed a finger at his nephew’s chest. “I am trying to be sensitive to your grieving, Rawleigh, but there is a limit. I will not cast aside every rule of society—”
I stopped listening. Behind me, at the open door, I felt an icy presence hovering. While they argued, I subtly turned my head, finding one of the Residents darkening the doorway, long, spidery fingers curled around the edge. It tilted its head to the side as if in inquiry, but I knew not what to do. Poppy breezed behind it, carrying a much smaller, more manageable tray, and of course Bartholomew trotted along at her heels. She didn’t notice the giant black shadow creature there, and it did not acknowledge her, either. It might have been one of her cruel adoptive brothers watching me. I couldn’t imagine being comfortable with such information, but Poppy was a strange creature.
Was it looking at me or the men behind me? Was it worried about me or was I under its surveillance, too?
Then, gradually, its blurry form jittering like a shape seen through fog, it lifted one hand and tapped its vacant white eye with a fingertip.
I’m watching you.
I shivered and turned back around, sensing the instant it was gone. It was Lee’s turn to go on the offensive, all but screaming at his uncle, his face bright red, curls mussed and falling over his forehead.
“And you’ve done nothing to arrange a burial for her, have you? You sat here all day like a hen minding its chicks. I can’t even take a walk around the grounds without you having a fit. It’s . . . It’s stifling! Just leave me be!”
George Bremerton retreated with a snarl, but only to the writing desk. He sat down heavily in the chair and glared at nothing in particular. Only a small victory, but Lee crossed to the other side of the bed and reached for the tea, pouring himself a cup and drinking it, still defiant and angry, and heedless of the hot water. He hissed through his teeth and drank more, as if the scalding somehow emboldened him.
“Here,” I said, happy for any excuse to dodge out of Bremerton’s sight. “Let me set this out for you.”
I slid the lid off the plate with tiny sandwiches and an array of cheeses drizzled with honey. Lee didn’t take any interest in the food, still choking down his too-hot tea.
“I need you to occupy your uncle for a while,” I whispered as quietly as possible. Lee leaned in close, lifting a brow. “Take him to the spa or
to the gardens. Something is amiss and I need to make certain he wasn’t involved with the murder.”
“He . . . What?” Lee nearly dropped the teacup. Then he remembered himself and lowered his voice, moving so close his ear touched mine. “You have proof of this?”
“I will,” I assured him. We were going to run out of time any second. “I have some new information, but I can’t tell you everything right now. He’s been lying to you, Lee, I know it. I’ll have proof enough if you can just distract him for a while!”
“I’ll do whatever it takes to find the truth, then, for my mother.” Lee nodded and set his jaw, putting the teacup down on the tray with more force than was strictly necessary. “Uncle!” He gave me a confident nod and fussed with his cravat, tying it back into a presentable knot. “I think some fresh air would benefit me greatly, or we might have a dip in the waters. And we must discuss the plans for my mother’s burial. . . .”
I followed him out of the room and kept walking, not sparing a glance for George Bremerton as I passed. “Will you be taking your supper in your rooms, sir?”
“No, no.” Lee waved me off with admirable indifference. His uncle was rising out of his chair and buttoning his coat. “You can leave us now.”
It was perhaps too callous to be believable, but I obeyed, giving a curtsy at the door and pressing through the outer chamber before scurrying out the second door and into the hall, just in time to see Colonel Mayweather stumble out of his rooms, his face purple as a plum, his huge mustachio twitching in the exact moment before he vomited blood in a spectacular arc over the Turkish carpets.
Chapter Thirty-Five
“Help m-m-me . . .”
The Colonel fell face-first into his own sick, crawling across the floor toward me with one shaky arm extended. He flopped onto his back like a dying harbor seal, his arms twitching as he tried to form another word. His eyes were red, filling with blood that soon spilled over and ran like crimson tears down his cheeks.