***
Orlando found it difficult to listen to Lady Lynden without being distracted by some feature of her face. Her mouth was so expressive, her lips full and luscious, and her eyes changed according to her mood. Sometimes light and clear, other times dark and tumultuous. To his surprise, when she returned from the house, they were bright blue and merry. Whatever her father had said to her, she now seemed to accept Orlando's presence.
Unless she had got her way and he was about to be dismissed.
"Mr. Holt," she said, striding up to where he stood in the center of the walled garden. "Present yourself to my maid in the kitchen at supper, and she'll direct you to your new room."
He nodded, feeling a little light-headed with relief. It would be easier to search the house if he was actually living in it. Thank you, Mr. Farley. You may have just saved your daughter. Or condemned her. Orlando would know soon enough if she indeed deserved the Assassins Guild’s justice. Someone—their client—obviously believed she did, but Orlando wanted no doubts before he'd act.
"Now, the rules," she began, and he groaned. "You don't like rules?"
"I love rules," he said. "My entire life has been governed by them." This at least was true. His father's strict rules when he'd been a child, his brother's equally strict rules after he inherited, and society's rules of what was acceptable for a man to do when he was frustrated with all the other rules imposed on him. Hughe's rules were lax by comparison, and they didn't come with a beating if he failed to follow them. Or guilt.
So much guilt.
"We have some time left before we should go in for supper," she said, pushing past him. Her hips swayed, and he couldn't stop staring at the way the muscles in her calves moved beneath her netherstocks. He'd seen women's calves before, but not a single one could compare to Lady Lynden's exquisitely curved ones.
"Mr. Holt," she snapped. "You'll be useless to me if you continue to stare like that."
He blushed like a bloody schoolboy. "What can I do first?" he asked.
"These trees need to be covered during the winter months. I have canvas in the barn and stakes to build a structure. Can you hammer straight?"
"Of course," he said, liking the way her eyes narrowed and her lips pursed. She was trying to categorize him, he guessed, to label him and put him in the appropriate box. She'd already called him arrogant and charming with so much disdain that he suspected his allotted box wasn't kept for her favorite people. He would have liked to prove her wrong, but what was the point? Most likely she'd be dead soon. If not, he'd be gone.
"Come with me," she said and led the way out of the walled garden and around the side of the manor house. At first glance it appeared to be a sturdy stone structure with much of the front wall covered in ivy, but when he looked closer, he noticed rotting window and doorframes. Long arms of ivy reached across some of the windows and one slender stem threatened to get a hold in a large crack in the stonework.
She led him to the barn near the stables. No sound came from the stables, no neighing or stomping or chatter of grooms. There were no horses at Stoneleigh it seemed. No horses, no children, no young men capable of helping in the garden. It was a tomb.
"You're employed for as long as you wish to be, Mr. Holt," she said as they entered the barn. She indicated the wooden stakes leaning against the far wall. "You'll be given food and board and can come and go as you please in the afternoons as long as I am happy with the amount of work you do in the mornings. If this arrangement is not acceptable, you can go to Sutton Hall and ask for work there since it seems they have plenty after all."
Orlando sent up a silent curse. He should have learned more about Sutton Hall and its master before he used it in his concocted story.
"I think I'll stay," he said, gathering up the stakes. They were taller than he by half a body length, but not heavy. He smiled at her because he wanted to smooth away the line that had settled between her brows. "I like Stoneleigh."
"Oh?"
"I want to learn about orange trees."
The line cleared and her eyes brightened. "Of course. They're a fascinating plant." She picked up a box, and he followed her out of the barn, back to the walled garden. "My mother planted them almost twenty years ago," she said, her voice wistful. "She'd always been a keen gardener and liked a challenge. When she heard that her mother's kinsman, Sir Francis Carew, had brought several plants over from the Continent, she asked for his supplier and bought some herself. She and Sir Francis exchanged letters on their techniques for growing the trees here in England. They are the first to attempt to do so, you know."
"Really?"
"It took some experimentation, and they both lost plants to frost but they learned. And now look at them!"
He did indeed look, but not at the trees, at her. It was as if a candle had been lit inside her. Her eyes shone and her cheeks flushed pink. Over a few trees! He didn't understand it.
Orlando dumped the stakes to one side of the furthermost tree and Susanna placed the box next to them. It was filled with hammer, nails, a pruning knife, and other tools.
"What does the fruit taste like?" he asked.
"The ones from these trees are quite sweet. The ones growing further down are the bitter Seville variety, which Mama planted earliest of all. The first crop will be ready in about two months. You'll be gone by then."
And so might she.
He crouched near the bundle of stakes, pretending to inspect them, but in truth his gut churned at the thought of ending the life of the extraordinarily beautiful and vibrant Lady Lynden. Surely she wasn't guilty. How could such a creature be vicious enough to end the lives of two husbands? She didn't fit the pattern of his previous targets. He'd felt no qualms ending the lives of those who committed the basest crimes and gotten away with it, but Lady Lynden was different. She couldn't possibly be guilty. Could she? And if she was, could he do what needed to be done?
He drove a stake into the soft earth, far enough that they wouldn't shift in anything less than a gale. After the first one, he turned suddenly to ask if it was to her liking, and caught her staring at him. Or at his arms, to be precise. He'd pushed his sleeves up to above his elbows and her gaze was fixed on his bare skin.
"Are you pleased, my lady?" he asked, his voice sounding thicker and more seductive than he intended. He didn't mean to flirt with her but he found he couldn't help himself.
She blushed fiercely and quickly looked away. "It will do, Mr. Holt."
He worked until all the stakes were firmly in place at regular intervals along the line of trees. There were twelve of them, all carrying green fruit the size of a child's fist. It wasn't until he parted the branches that he became aware of the number of fruit. The crop would be good if they didn't lose them to frost.
She explained all this to him as he worked. She told him the canvas would protect them from the English winter, so much colder than their native climate. She went on to tell him how Sir Francis Carew had built a wooden structure around his trees which could be removed when the weather warmed. The canvas was simply attached to the top and opened on sunny days, even in winter, and replaced at night. He'd found this the best method in England's cold winters.
"He wrote to me and said his trees like the extra protection, and there is not the hazard of the canvas sides being torn off in strong winds."
The trees liked it? She spoke of them as if they were people. "You could build something like that," he said.
"I could if I had six of you here on a permanent basis," she said wryly.
He picked up a mallet and hammered the last stake as far into the ground as it would go. He wished there were six of him too. Then he could continue his investigation without wasting time protecting bloody orange trees from freezing their delicate little twigs off. It was ludicrous. They weren't supposed to grow on English soil, and he was no gardener. He was the second son of a London merchant and a trained assassin, skilled at everything from surviving in the forest to dancing in foreign
courts. Hughe had better be bloody appreciating the thoroughness with which he undertook this assignment. If he didn't...
Orlando smiled ruefully to himself. If Hughe didn't appreciate it, there was nothing Orlando would do. He liked being part of the Assassins' Guild and he would never jeopardize his position. The satisfaction of getting justice for victims overrode any qualms he had about taking a life, but most of all, he liked the adventure working for the Guild offered. It kept him from being bored, and being bored was something Orlando needed to avoid at all costs.
He drove another stake into the ground with all his strength, but it didn't drive the sudden, hateful memories away, or the guilt. He'd always have those.
The shimmering golden sun was hovering on the horizon by the time they returned the gardening tools to the barn. The stakes were ready for the canvas to be attached to them, but first the trees needed fertilizing and light pruning.
"We'll start tomorrow," Susanna said, walking alongside him to the house.
They skirted the perimeter of the small kitchen garden and he breathed in the scents of sage and thyme. They were the same herbs growing at his London home, and he felt a little nostalgic for the days when he and his brother would play hide and seek among the rosemary.
"Thank you, Mr. Holt," Susanna said at the door. "You're a hard worker. I'm sorry we cannot pay you better for your efforts." She dipped her head, hiding those beautiful eyes. Was she ashamed of her family's lack of fortune? Or ashamed she'd misjudged him?
"You have saved me from starving to death on a freezing night. I should thank you."
"Freezing? It's autumn, Mr. Holt, not the depths of winter. And here I thought those muscles made you tougher." She swept past him into the kitchen, leaving him staring after her.
She was flirting with him. Wasn't she? It was difficult to tell. Most women softened their caustic remarks with a wink, and some even went so far as to lift their skirts when no one was looking. Lady Lynden left him feeling uncertain and on edge. It wasn't a feeling he was used to.
He removed his hat and went into the kitchen, but Susanna had already passed through. A generously sized woman stood at the central table pounding dough with her massive fists. She looked up, not breaking her rhythm.
"You the gardener, eh?" A tangle of thin red veins spread across her cheeks and nose, and her smile revealed a gap in her front teeth. "M'lady said there'd be an extra mouth to feed for a few days. She didn't say you had the face of an angel."
An angel? That was new. "Orlando Holt at your service." He bowed, eliciting a surprisingly girlish giggle from the cook.
"You can call me Cook," she said. "Everyone does. I've been called Cook for so many years now I can't even remember my own name no more." She giggled again, making her large bosom bounce beneath her apron. "Go and wash up outside." She jerked her head at the door he'd just come through. "When Bessie's finished with the mistress, she'll show you to your room. You're to have supper here with Bessie, Mr. Hendricks and me, and breakfast too. We dine with the mistress at midday every day in here."
"The servants dine with Lady Lynden in the kitchen?"
"That's the way we do things here at Stoneleigh. M'lady says it's too lonely now that Mr. Farley must stay abed so she likes to dine with us. She has her supper with her father in his room and breaks her fast in her own parlor, but for dinner we all come in here. She says she's too dirty after working all morning in the garden to sit in the dining room so the kitchen it is." She slammed her fist into the dough then picked it up and placed it on a cloth laid out on the table. "I know it's probably not how things are done where you come from." Her gaze was challenging, defiant, daring him to make fun of the arrangement or her mistress. He wondered what Cook would do if he did. Hammer him with one of those paws?
"I think it's a fine arrangement. I wouldn't want your mistress to be lonely." He ducked out through the door and found a pail of icy water and a scrubbing brush in the corner of the kitchen garden. He washed up and was about to return inside when he heard a man speaking.
"...just turned up, out of the blue," he said.
"Does he know the master can't pay him?" That was Cook.
"Aye. They offered him board and food but no money."
"And he still took the job? He must be desperate."
"That's the thing. I know there's work up at Sutton Hall, but this man Holt said he'd been round there and got turned away. There's probably work at Cowdrey too, but he says he's a gardener, not a farm laborer."
"Aye, there's a difference you know. The old mistress told me that once. She said gardeners got more knowledge so they're smarter."
"You think this Holt fellow has a brain?" The man snorted.
"He might have. Just because he's got a face like an angel and the seams of his jerkin are popping apart trying to cover those shoulders doesn't mean he's got wool between the ears."
"Humph."
"So you think he's lying about asking for work over at Sutton Hall?" Cook asked, her tone challenging.
"Could be."
"Hendricks!"
"Well, none of us know him. And he...never mind."
"He what?"
"He looks at Lady Lynden like..."
Orlando pressed himself against the wall and leaned closer to the open doorway.
"Like what?" Cook prompted. She sounded indignant, defensive. Orlando liked her even more.
"Like he wants to...you know..."
Cook clicked her tongue. "They all look at her like that. She's a beauty, and any man with eyes in his head goes a little foolish around her."
"Yes but he's...I don't know. There's something about him I don’t like."
"You haven't met him!"
"I've seen him through the window just now. He's got a swagger about him."
"Well, I never thought I'd hear you judge someone before meeting them, Mr. Hendricks." The sound of chopping filled the strained silence. Orlando thought the man called Hendricks may have left, but then Cook spoke again. "You can't protect her forever."
A deep sigh then, "I know. I know, Cook. But something tells me this man Holt is going to bring trouble to Stoneleigh."
"If he does..." Whack went the knife on the chopping board. "...I'll slice his balls off."
Orlando winced. "Slice whose balls off?" he asked as he entered the kitchen.
Cook looked up at him but continued to chop the turnip with a precision that would make Hughe pleased if she was one of his band. A thin man covered in so many wrinkles he looked like a crumpled piece of parchment sat on a stool near the hearth, stirring the contents of the cauldron hanging from a hook above the fire. The suspicious Hendricks.
Orlando nodded at him. "Well met, sir." He held out his hand. "Orlando Holt. Gardener."
"John Hendricks, manservant." He took Orlando's forearm with a grip so hard it left behind red marks on his skin when he let go. "I hear you're helping the mistress in the garden."
"Aye."
"For how long?"
Orlando shrugged. "Until it's time to move on. I'm just passing through."
"Weather'll get bitter soon," Hendricks said. "Don't leave your departure too late."
"I won't. I hope to arrive at my sister's place in Salisbury by Christmas." He peered into the cauldron and breathed deeply. "Ahhh, I haven't smelled a broth that good in an age."
"It's beef broth left over from dinner. There's bread and cheese to go with it." Cook waved her knife at the bench seat on the other side of the table. "Sit, Mr. Holt. Hendricks, fetch the marmalade."
"Why do I have to fetch the marmalade when he gets to sit?"
She thrust out one plump hip, making her skirts swish across the flagstones at her feet. "Because he doesn't know where the pantry is and you do." She pointed the knife at a door leading off the kitchen. "And when you get back you can take the dough to the bakehouse and put it in the bread oven. It should be ready by now."
Hendricks eyed her knife. "I'm supposed to be a gentleman's groom of the bedcha
mber," he mumbled but softened it with a smile that made his wrinkles bend.
"And I'm supposed to just cook and Bessie's supposed to just be lady's maid." She waved her knife at the door. "Now go fetch the marmalade before poor Mr. Holt starves to death."
Hendricks's smile was replaced by a scowl. "He doesn't look like he's going to starve anytime soon," he muttered as he stalked into the adjoining pantry. He came out holding an earthen jar as another woman entered the kitchen. "Bessie, meet our newest member of staff before he expires from lack of marmalade."
Despite himself, Orlando laughed, and if he wasn't mistaken, Hendricks almost cracked a smile but held it in check. The thin old man wasn't so bad after all. Orlando rose and bowed to Bessie. "We've already met," he said. "Bessie was kind enough to grant me an audience with Mr. Farley."
"I could hardly say no when you said you wanted to help my lady in the garden." He guessed her to be aged about fifty like the other two. She had a smooth, friendly face with golden flecks in her green eyes that made them merry and spirited. A caul covered all of her hair except for the front and she stooped a little, as if her back pained her.
"Ignore Hendricks," she said with a mischievous twinkle in her eyes. "None will expire from lack of marmalade at Stoneleigh. We have enough to feed the queen's army if they pass through."
"Heaven forbid," Cook wailed. "Don't talk about armies and wars coming to Stoneleigh."
"So where did such a handsome devil as yourself blow in from?" Bessie asked Orlando.
Cook's knife stilled and Hendricks paused at the doorway, the cloth-wrapped dough in his arms. The only sound was the crackle of the fire and Orlando's heartbeat. Every time he spoke a lie he wondered if he'd be caught out, if he'd gone too far and under-estimated his audience. This time was no exception. Country folk weren't always simple. Some traveled. Others might have family in other counties.
"I worked in the garden of Collier Dean in Sussex."
"Who's the master there?" asked Hendricks.
"A gentleman by the name of Tindale." The harder his heart beat, the smoother his lies became.
"And you were gardener?"
"Aye." The shorter his answers, the less likely he was to be caught out. Hughe had taught him that and a near-fatal experience had driven the point home.
"Is Tindale nobility?" Hendricks went on.
"No."
"Does he farm his land?"
"He has sheep."
"Did you—"
"Hendricks!" Cook and Bessie cried together.
"Leave him be," Bessie said.
"Off to the bakehouse with you," Cook scolded, shooing Hendricks out the door with a shake of her knife. "Don't mind him, lad," she said to Orlando. "He's just jealous a younger and more handsome man has come into his domain."
Bessie burst out laughing. "Aye," she said. "He's used to us fussing over him, but now you've come along with your dimples and long eyelashes and he thinks we'll stop."
Hendricks flirted with the other servants? Orlando liked the old boy more and more. "I'm sorry my presence upsets him."
Cook dismissed his concern with a wave of her hand and ladled broth from the cauldron into a bowl. Bessie disappeared into the pantry and returned a moment later with bread and a wedge of cheese which she set on the table. She handed a knife to Orlando and he sliced up the cheese.
"Ignore Hendricks," Cook said, placing a bowl of broth in front of Orlando. "He's just set in his ways."
A ribbon of steam drifted up from the bowl, and Orlando breathed in its spicy aroma. He was starving. "Has he worked here long?" he asked, sitting down.
"Going on thirty years," Bessie said, sliding into the seat beside him with her bowl. "Cook and I arrived about the same time as each other, a few years later."
"That's a long time. Have you always been the only servants at Stoneleigh?"
"Goodness no," Cook said. "There were more than a dozen of us once all crowded around this table. Stable boys and maidservants and two gardeners too."
"Really?"
"Oh yes," Bessie said as Cook pulled over a stool and sat at the table with them. "They did all the hard work the mistress couldn't do on her own. That's Mistress Farley, Lady Lynden's mother."
"When did she die?"
"Three years ago. Her orange trees almost died that winter too, but Lady Lynden rallied from her grief long enough to save most. She worked hard that year, with the gardeners' help. That was before she married Lord Lynden."
"The gardeners had to be let go after that," Cook said quietly. She stared at the steam rising from her bowl. "Master couldn't afford to keep them on. Nor most of the others." She glanced at Bessie. "We were the lucky ones. We got to stay."
"Aye," Bessie said sadly. "The master was kind and took pity on us. We three were too old to get work elsewhere you see. We knew no other way except how it was at Stoneleigh. He's the kindest master is Mr. Farley. The very best."
They both bowed their heads, their voices hushed. It was as if Farley were already dead. Perhaps the old man was more ill than he appeared.
"I have a question that's been nagging at me ever since I arrived at Stoneleigh," he said. "It's a little personal and if you think I'm prying..." He left the sentence hanging. In his experience, people liked to gossip about their betters. It made gathering information from servants his favorite method of investigation.
"Go on," said Cook. "We've nothing to hide." But she glanced at the back door leading to the kitchen garden and the outbuildings where Hendricks had gone.
"Lady Lynden is a widow and her husband was the brother to the current master of Sutton Hall?"
"Cousin," Bessie said. "It's coming up to twelve months since the previous Lord Lynden left us."
"How did he die?"
Cook shrugged. "Weak heart the coroner said."
"A coroner was called?" Usually a coroner was only sent for when a death was thought to be suspicious.
"Aye. Lord Lynden was young and his death sudden. A waste of time if you ask me. Course he died of natural causes. Anyone who saw the body would know that."
"Really? What did he look like?"
She looked at him like he was a simpleton. "Like he was dead."
"You saw him?"
"No, but I know others who did."
Orlando didn't ask the rest of his questions. He didn't want to raise her suspicions, and he suspected she wasn't the right person to ask anyway. He needed to find someone who'd seen the body. Preferably the coroner himself.
"Lady Lynden must have been heartbroken," he said instead.
The ensuing silence and furtive glances told him more than words ever could. Lady Lynden wasn't heartbroken in the least.
"He was her second husband, was he not?"
"Aye," Bessie said with another glance at Cook.
"How'd you know about that?" Cook asked, dropping her spoon with a clunk in the bowl.
"I asked at the village." Orlando held up his hands in surrender, spoon and all. "I confess I wanted to find out who would be in need of my services the most. The innkeeper at The Plough told me some of Lady Lynden's history."
"Bloody Milner," Cook mumbled. "Can't keep his mouth shut, that one."
"I'm sorry I pried," Orlando said. "But I admit, Lady Lynden intrigues me."
Bessie sighed. "She intrigues all the men," she said. "That's the problem."
"Problem?"
Cook pointed her spoon at him. She seemed to do a lot of implement pointing. "She's not for the likes of you, young man. She's a gentlewoman so keep your hands to yourself."
Hendricks re-entered the kitchen with a scowl that gouged deep grooves across his forehead. "And if you don't, you might find yourself carved up in the middle of the night."
Bessie and Cook stared at him, but Hendricks had his back to them, ladling broth into a bowl from the cauldron. They were still staring when he sat next to Cook.
"Just letting our young gardener know how things lie here at Stoneleigh," Hendricks said cheerfu
lly, scooping up a spoonful of broth.
"That's enough, Mr. Hendricks," Cook said. "He means no harm."
The air in the kitchen suddenly seemed as oppressive and charged as a summer thunderstorm. Orlando decided to leave his question about Lady Lynden's poverty and ask a more pressing, but no less provocative, one. "Indeed I don't," he said. "Poor Lady Lynden is only young and yet twice widowed. That happened to my sister by the time she was eight and twenty." He had a thousand questions for the people who'd known Susanna all her life, but there was one burning above all others to be asked. He had to approach it carefully, with stealth, so as not to fuel their suspicions. "In my sister's case, her husbands both died in the same manner too. It was very sad. People began to suspect her of doing something to bring about their deaths."
"What are you implying?" Cook blustered.
Orlando shrugged. "Only that my poor innocent sister had to suffer through suspicion from certain quarters for a time. It was unfortunate."
"It was," Bessie said, reaching for the bread and the marmalade jar.
"But that's all it is," Hendricks said. "Unfortunate. There's nothing more to the deaths. Understand?"
"Of course." He understood. He understood that it was quite a coincidence that both of Susanna's husbands died from the same cause, one that was difficult to diagnose.