The next morning, with Lady Vanessa pale and listless in her bed, refusing my offer to read to her or sing a soothing song, Maud Scruggs soon shooed me from the room. Feeling quite useless, I resumed my perched on the windowseat in my bedchamber and gazed out at the relentless sea, while an uncomfortable mix of odd thoughts swarmed through my head.
Nell Ridgeway. I fancied I could hear the tolling of the death knell in the distant pounding of the surf.
Vanessa. Whom I pitied with all my heart. Which was not why I was here. In order for her to improve, I must stand firm. Push her into a better future as competently as David pushed her chair. But how could I when she seemed as fragile in mind as in body?
David Tremaine. Very much his own man, though by now I was firmly convinced only a man lost in love would keep his thankless job in the face of Lady Vanessa’s rants. Yet he did not knuckle under to her every whim. Last night, in fact, it might have been better if he had been less intransigent. But I could not fault him for it. A life was as stake. Or so we thought, though the search efforts had come too late.
Exmere . . . Robert. A difficult man to ignore. And now the added complication of some mysterious doubt about his father. Did he truly believe the earl to be less than competent? And if so, why? The man I had seen so far might be a recluse, but I saw no sign of anything questionable. Though a trifle world-weary, the earl gave every appearance of a man in charge. It was his son and heir who was the fribble.
Huntley? A young man determined to shadow his brother in all things, including giving the appearance of a care-for-nobody. And yet he had joined the search for Nell with a boyish enthusiasm that could not be faulted. Likable, harmless, I decided. A young man whose depths were still unplumbed.
Kenrick? A languid town beau, his slicing tongue the only thing to penetrate his thick cloak of ennui. But he too had set off on the search for the missing girl without a murmur. A glimmer of the unusual to alleviate his boring day? And yet I had no reason to dislike him. To me he had been nothing but polite.
Norvelle? A guest with a weakness for the ladies, but he seemed harmless enough. Just another ton beau without a care in the world beyond the cut of his coat, the style of his cravat, gambling, drinking with his friends, and the inevitable cherchez la femme. But I had to grant that he had joined the search party with a ready will.
A soft rap on my door and one of the housemaids stepped inside. “Miss Ballantyne, the vicar has come to call—on his way home from the Ridgeways, don’t you know—and Lady Emmaline asks, would you please join her in the drawing room.” The maid gulped a breath, looking quite satisfied that she had managed this lengthy message without stumbling.
Genuinely surprised, for a moment I was speechless. I was being invited to help the lady of the house entertain the vicar? “Yes, of course,” I murmured, before taking a moment to check my face and hair in the pier glass. My day suddenly brighter, I followed the maid to the drawing room, where the opinionated, all-too-superior tone of a male voice caused me to pause in my tracks. It was not at all the hushed voice of comfort I expected to hear from a vicar on the day after a tragic death.
“Dear Lady Emmaline, you are far too kind-hearted, a Christian virtue to be treasured, no doubt, but in this case, quite wasted. Surely there can be no doubt about the nature of the crime committed here.”
At first, the gist of his words puzzled me, and then I put it all together. The vicar had just come from the Ridgeways, where, surely, he could not possibly have implied that Nell took her own life. No one could be so cruel. Or was he merely passing along his opinion in a house he knew to be estranged from the Ridgeways? In either case, not the actions of a proper man of the cloth. No wonder poor Lady Emmaline had sent for me. I had not yet met the vicar and already I despised him. I huffed a breath and marched into the drawing room.
The Reverend Cecil Aylworth was a gentleman of uncertain years, not much over fifty I guessed, but with a face marred by dissatisfaction. Rather than act as a succor to his congregation, I suspected he found fault with everything, from his own family to the multitude of sins committed by his parishioners. He greeted me with the patronizing air of a bishop to a petitioner for alms, even as my skin crawled when his gaze swept over me in an assessment worthy of a rake.
“Ah, Miss Ballantyne, perhaps you may convince Lady Emmaline she is not seeing this matter clearly. A young woman like yourself must well be cognizant of the erratic emotions engendered by affairs of the heart. How easily a young lady may become overwhelmed with life and wish to put an end to her pain.”
I felt a strong urge to step forward and slap his smarmy face. Instead, I clasped my hands tightly in front of me, took a steadying breath, and offered, “In the past two years I have lost mother and father, witnessed the deaths of thousands, and known hundreds of women who suffered as much and still survived. So, no, I cannot accept that women are feeble creatures who put an end to their existence over something so trifling as the loss of a lover’s interest. If, indeed, that is what you are implying.”
“My dear child, I grant you that some females are stronger than others, but Nell Ridgeway was not among them. And so I have told her parents—”
Lady Emmaline gasped. “You could not have been so un-Christian!”
Mr. Aylworth appeared to smell a foul odor. “The Church is quite clear on the subject of those who take their own lives.” The sanctimonious prig stared at me with avid eyes, as if challenging me to deny his salacious imaginings.
The old goat!
“Mr. Aylworth, I assure you, you are mistaken,” I said. “There can be no question of Miss Ridgeway taking her own life. These cliffs are frequently dense with fog, as I am certain you know. Undoubtedly Miss Ridgeway tired of walking on the moor and chose to walk along the cliffs instead. Quite possibly, her vision obscured by the mist, she stumbled into the fissure that nearly claimed me not long ago. A great tragedy, but not a sin.”
Lady Emmaline’s sob of relief penetrated the silence as Mr. Aylworth scowled, twice attempted a rebuttal, and finally said, “I believe the cliffs have been remarkably clear of fog for the past several days.”
“And I believe you are wrong,” I returned, putting all the steel I could manage into every syllable. “You are in the village, are you not, vicar? My bedchamber overlooks the cliffs where Miss Ridgeway was found. All in all, I believe I have quite the better view of the conditions at Moorhead Manor. And so I will say at any inquest that may be held.”
Due to my sailing into the room on a fit of temper, we had stood throughout this inimical exchange. The Reverend Aylworth now huffed a breath, and mumbling something unintelligible, bowed to Lady Emmaline before striding out without so much as a further acknowledgment of my existence.
The vicar was so sooner out of sight than Lady Emmaline heaved a great sigh. “That horrid man. He wished to refuse poor Nell burial in the church grounds. I cannot thank you enough, child. You vanquished him, as I knew you would. You have such strength of character, I can only envy you.”
I stared in astonishment, finally managing a “Thank you, my lady,” before offering a brief curtsy and dashing for the stairs. I needed to return to my room and mull over what had just happened—not only my standing up to the vicar but Lady Emmaline’s astonishing words. But fate intervened when I nearly crashed into Mr. Blythe on the landing. And naturally, with my spirits elevated by my close encounter with the vicar, the whole story poured out.
He laughed out loud, a hearty sound I would have considered too much effort for a London dandy. “My dear girl, you are priceless,” he said. “Cecil Aylworth is intolerable. If Hycliffe had not honored the promise made by his father to his wife’s sister, that miserable excuse for a man of the church would never have been offered the living. He’s the village’s cross to bear. I’ve always rather hoped they might rid themselves of him some dark night.”
“Mr. Blythe!”
“Call me Kenrick, dear girl. As I shall call you by your Christian name. Penelope, is it not? For we are family now.”
“Penny,” I said, returning his smile. “Penelope is a character from an ancient tale.”
“So be it. And I shall pass the word to Exmere and Huntley as well.”
I shook my head. “I’ll not be first-naming the viscount, sir. After all, you do not.”
“Oh yes, I do. He’s been Rob to me all my life. Though not in public, I admit,” he added with a hint of chagrin in his eye.
I’d had doubts about Kenrick Blythe’s character, but I was won over. At that point, I admit, anyone who spoke ill of the vicar was bound to be high in my esteem.
That night at dinner, Kenrick, with soft-spoken inserts from his mother, regaled the company with what he termed my “rout” of the Reverend Aylworth. “Good God!” Huntley exploded, “he cannot have been so cruel.”
“Evidently he was so low as to tell the Ridgeways he suspected suicide,” I offered.
“Marcus,” Lady Emmaline ventured, speaking to the earl who was scowling at his roast beef and vegetables as if they had suddenly been attacked by worms, “I think I must call on the Ridgeways, with Miss Ballantyne to lend me support. They must know that we will not allow the vicar to make such outrageous assumptions.”
Silently, I applauded her unexpected spirit, while we all waited to hear what Lord Hycliffe might say. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Exmere open his mouth then close it again, evidently thinking better of offering his opinion.
“Our young gentlemen have done their bit,” Lady Emmaline added, “by joining in the search for poor Nell. Now, I believe it is our duty to stand up for what is right, no matter what has transpired in the past.” With a small gasp at her unexpected temerity, Lady Emmaline covered her face with her napkin and hung her head.
For a few moments the earl stared sightlessly into the silver epergne in the center of the table, and then pronounced, “Helen was a sweet child and in no way involved in the animosity between our families, which is why I allowed her to sneak in and out of the house with impunity these past months. Nor can I imagine her taking her own life. But even if she did, I will not support that idiot’s contention that she should be buried in unhallowed ground. And so you may tell the Ridgeways,” he added on close to a growl as he gazed down the table toward Lady Emmaline’s quailing figure.
A general sigh of relief swept the table, even the cynical Mr. Blythe not immune to the earl’s magnanimous decision. “And by all means take Miss Ballantyne,” Hycliffe added. “She seems to have enough spine for us all.”
“I have suggested, my lord, that Penny has become a part of our family,” Kenrick offered, “and the use of Christian names would not be amiss.”
“I say, capital idea,” Huntley declared while the earl mulled this less inflammatory suggestion.
“Penny, is it?” he said, looking as solemn as a high judge. “That is your preference?”
“Yes, sir,” I whispered, feeling far from the strong, confidant female I allegedly was.
“A pity. I rather liked Penelope Ruth.” A sudden smile lit his face, wiping away the years and making him look remarkably like Exmere. “Welcome to the family, Penny. It was a fortunate day you came our way.”
I glowed the rest of the meal, the rest of the evening. I was still glowing the next afternoon when Lady Emmaline and I set out for our visit to the Ridgeways. After that, of course, the glow did not last.
I had seen maimed bodies, bodies blown into bloody pieces. I had seen frozen bodies and the bodies of those who had simply dropped to the side of the road under the relentless heat of a Spanish summer sun. But I had never before seen the pale and scarred body a girl of seventeen who had fallen onto rocks and been engulfed in pounding surf for as much as twenty-four hours.
I think I said all the right words. Certainly, the Ridgeways were infinitely grateful, if more than a little shocked, by the earl’s support against the narrowmindedness of the vicar. Of one thing there was no doubt. Nell Ridgeway should not have died. As her mother vowed over and over, even after she knew we supported her cause, Nell was beginning to turn the heads of young gentlemen in the neighborhood but had formed no attachments. There was simply no reason to suspect suicide from a broken heart. More than that, she had been looking forward with great eagerness to her London come-out in the spring.
Each word spoken by Mrs. Ridgeway was a stab to my heart. Something was horribly wrong, I knew it.
Lady Emmaline and I spoke not one word on the carriage ride home, but my thoughts were rampant. My insatiable curiosity demanded to know what happened the day—or was it the night?—that Nell went missing. Yet the tragedy threatened to split the cocoon I had made such an effort to build around myself. I could not go there. I had enough troubles with Lady Vanessa and my struggle to force all thoughts of Exmere from my mind. Any speculation about Nell Ridgeway’s death must be put aside.
But hadn’t another death been mentioned? Something about a girl found dead, possibly strangled, at the base of a tor?
Yes, less than a year ago, if I remembered correctly. I must try to recall who told me . . .
No! I was Penelope Ruth, faithful above all else. Which meant faithful to my employer, to his daughter, to the other residents of Moorhead Manor. That was enough of a challenge, sometimes more than I felt I could manage. All other shadows must be shunted aside.
The glimmer of a wistful thought flickered through the miasma of death and duty. Would the time ever come when I would address Lord Exmere as “Robert”?