Taking the paper with her, Frances left the ballroom and headed, uninvited, to the earl’s personal quarters.
When she tapped on the study door, the footman Isaiah answered. “I need to see the earl,” Frances told him.
“He’s not available at the moment.”
“It’s important. My sister is in trouble. Tell him.” She was shrieking, but she didn’t care.
The earl, Lord Crawford, and her father appeared behind Isaiah. “It’s all right,” the earl said. “Where’s your sister?”
“I don’t know. I found this in the ballroom where she was supposed to be decorating earlier.” She held out the note. “It’s from Sir Desmond.”
“It’s unsigned,” Lord Crawford pointed out.
“Sir Desmond has said this to me before. I—I refused to help him. I believe him to be the traitor. He told me Georgina would be ruined if I didn’t help him, but I didn’t believe him. What could he do in a houseful of people?”
“Georgina is missing. We found out shortly after the sheriff left. That’s why I’m here,” her father said quietly. “Do you have any idea where she might be?”
“Isaiah,” the earl said, “have the servants check all the outbuildings for Miss Georgina Smith-Pressley. Let the three of us begin with the attics and work our way down.”
“I’m coming, too.”
“Frances, go comfort your mother,” Sir Edmund said.
“You comfort her. I’m searching for my sister. This diabolical creature sent me the note.” Frances folded her arms over her chest and stared at her father.
“I’ll keep her safe, Sir Edmund,” John said. “Come along, Frances.” He held out his arm, thrilled when she placed her hand on his sleeve.
Grumbling, Sir Edmund followed the others up flight after flight of stairs to the attics. They went from one space to another without luck. As they started back down the stairs, Frances said, “Is anyone checking the castle ruins? Lord Wethers’s body was found there.”
“If Sir Desmond killed Wethers, it would make sense he’d use the same location again. Come on.” John hurried downstairs to the entrance to the castle, Frances scurrying behind him, trying to keep up.
When John reached the heavy door keeping out the cold, he stopped and held up his hand. “We need to be quiet from here. If Sir Desmond’s in there, we want to surprise him.”
Three heads bobbed agreement. The only one he paid attention to was Frances’s, and he gave her hand a squeeze with stiff fingers.
She smiled at him, and he opened the door and strode in. The absence of a roof and the churned-up snow on the stone floor gave enough reflected light that no candles were needed in this area during daylight. They spread out around the main level of the castle, checking behind broken walls and peering into the cellars where the floor had given way.
John saw the snow on the path ahead of him was undisturbed. He headed back the way he had come until he found Frances starting up a narrow stone stairwell.
“You can still see footprints on these stairs. They are too large to be Georgina’s,” she told him as she continued to climb.
“Come back down. It’s dangerous. Let me go up first,” he told her.
She ignored him as she continued her climb. “I’ll be—Georgina. I’ve found her. She’s bleeding.” He could hear Frances’s voice echo off the stones.
He hurried up after her. Behind him, he heard Crawford and Sir Edmund’s voices as they made their way to where he was.
When he reached the top, he saw Frances carefully step around the narrow ledge and then kneel on the ice next to her sister’s prone body. Between the sisters and him was a chasm going down past the main level into the snow-covered stone floor of the cellar. The ledge Frances was on was barely two feet wide in places where it stuck out from the ancient walls.
“Get ropes and some able-bodied young men,” John called to the two men behind him. “And if anyone sees Sir Desmond, they are to hold him until I have time to deal with him.”
“Yes, Wolfbrook,” Crawford shouted and hurried away.
“Frances, be careful.” Sir Edmund said from where he stood behind John. “If you slip, you and Georgina could both fall.”
“I am aware of that, Father.” Her voice showed her annoyance.
“How sturdy does the ledge feel?” John asked.
“The mortar between the stones crumbles every time I move. I don’t know if it will hold any more weight.” Her voice wobbled.
“Don’t be frightened, Frances. We’ll get you both out of there safely.” He tried to sound comforting. He was terrified he’d fail.
“I’m not frightened. I’m cold. My face and fingers are getting numb.” She looked down into the abyss and then across at him. “That’s quite a drop. Too bad there’s not more snow down there to break our fall.”
“It’s only Christmas Eve. We don’t get our deepest snows until March.” Christmas. Christmas. The plan formed in his mind. “Sir Edmund. Go into the house and tell my servants I need four thick fir trees, at least twenty feet tall, brought to the main level of the castle.”
“What?” The man gazed across at his daughters, obviously in shock.
“Four fir trees, twenty feet tall, brought here now.” He snapped out his words.
Sir Edmund went to do his bidding, John hoped. “Frances, can you hang on for a while? We’ll get you both to safety, but it will take time.”
She nodded her head. “I’m worried about Georgina. Her skin is cold and she’s not moving.”
“Is she breathing?”
“Yes.”
John slumped. That was good. Now to get them both safely into the house.
He heard Crawford come up the stairs. “Percy Jones is bringing some rope.”
John looked around Crawford to the wiry Jones. “Do you think you can take two ropes out to Frances? We’ll hold on to one end here.”
Jones nodded. “I can do it, but I only have enough rope for one here.”
John looked around, aware everyone was looking to him for answers. He was the earl. “Are there any of the strongest servants here?”
“They’ve gone out to bring back the twenty-foot evergreens.”
John glanced back and said, “Let’s tie one end of the rope to the top of the steps coming up here, and then a large noose to the other end.”
“A noose, my lord?” Jones looked puzzled.
“It’s a good strong loop. I want you to take it out to Frances, have her put it around her waist, and then both of you come back here. Are you willing to make the trip out there and back?”
Jones straightened his spine and nodded once. “Yes.”
“Good man.”
John found he trembled from the cold and fear as Jones made his way along the icy shelf. He gave Frances the noose end of the rope while a servant tied off the other end behind John and Crawford.
He saw Frances shake her head and then slip the rope around her sister. Brave, foolish Frances.
The movement must have awakened Georgina, because she stirred and nearly rolled off the ledge before Frances and Jones stopped her. All three slipped and stone dust rained down on the main level.
“The rope is secure, my lord.”
John nodded, unable to speak. His first idea might save Georgina, but it wouldn’t help Frances or Jones. He could see Frances speaking to Jones and her sister, but she kept her voice low so he couldn’t hear her. Jones nodded. What had he agreed to?
Then Jones returned along the ledge, picking his way carefully as more stone dust fell. When he made it to John he said, “The two Miss Smith-Pressleys are staying out there until the younger feels strong enough to walk back.”
“Idiot woman.”
“My lord?”
“Sorry, Jones, that wasn’t a criticism of your bravery. How is the ledge holding up?”
“Steady enough where the women are, but that section midway around feels like it will let go at any time.”
“Blast. Where are those trees?”
As if to answer his question, some of his servants came into the far side of the castle lugging a tall, thick evergreen tree.
“Bring the tree to the side of the tower on your level and lay it down. Then get on either end and pull it across the gap in the floor,” John directed.
When they finished, John could see his idea would protect the two women. If the other trees arrived in time.
“Good idea, John,” Frances called to him. “It should break our fall.”
“I don’t want to fall. I want out of this freezing, dirty castle now,” her sister complained.
“Wait until we get the other trees in place. How is that going?” John called to his servants.
“The second tree is almost here. Then we’ll have to go find the other two to chop them down.”
John looked at the two women. Both were pale and visibly shivering. It would soon be dark, and lighting both levels of the drafty ruins would be impossible. “Let’s get this second tree in place and then we’ll see. Put the base of the tree by the top of the first tree on the side of the hole where the two ladies are.”
While the other servants did as he commanded, John called Isaiah to him and gave him one more instruction.
When they were done, John wouldn’t have wanted to walk on the trees and trust them to carry him to safety, but it would keep the two women from falling straight down to the stone cellar floor. A fall that would surely kill them.
“All right, Frances. I want you and your sister to walk around the ledge to us.” He tried to make his voice calm and commanding. To his own ears, he sounded timid and weak.
“I’m going first. I’m cold and injured and I want to go inside and sit by a fire,” Georgina said, rising unsteadily.
“This isn’t how I planned to spend Christmas Eve, either.” Frances pressed back against the stones and helped her sister get in front of her. “Of course, I wasn’t foolish enough to listen to Sir Desmond.”
“Must you criticize everyone I talk to? Everything I do?”
“How did you end up on this ledge having to be rescued?” Frances sounded annoyed. With the steel in that tone, John decided he never wanted to get on her bad side.
“He said he found something miraculous to show me, but we’d have to climb out here. I don’t remember anything else.”
“How can you be so foolish?”
Georgina turned her back on her sister and hurried along the ledge until she hit a slippery spot. Then her feet started to go out from under her. She clung to a rock protruding from the ancient wall as her feet slid and shifted, trying not to fall off the narrow, icy stones.
John heard himself gasp as rock began to fall away from the perch where the two young ladies stood. Georgina screamed and grabbed the rope tied around her middle as well as the protruding stone. Frances’s face was bloodless as she pressed her body against the rough wall and hung on by her fingernails.