Читать книгу Legacy of Secrets - Sara Mitchell - Страница 15

Isabella Chilton Academy

The cuckoo clock Mr. Chilton had bought her over forty years earlier on their wedding trip to Europe finished declaring the nine-o’clock hour. Isabella gratefully settled into the cushions of her favorite settee, and allowed a wisp of sweetly painful nostalgia to drift through her mind. Everett, that clock always did make you smile….

Unlike his previous visits, this evening Grayson ignored the clock’s charming antics of woodcutter and wife chopping while the cuckoo warbled. Instead, as restless as one of the school toms on the prowl, he wandered about her private parlor, his hands idly drifting over the collection of objects given to Isabella by her students. His expression remained aloof, almost grim. She waited without comment for him to speak, though as always the growing hardness that surrounded him like a suit of medieval armor saddened her.

He swiveled suddenly, dropping back onto the game board one of the chess pieces he’d been fiddling with. “Aunt Bella, I need to talk with you about—” A muscle twitched in his jaw; he lifted a hand to tug his earlobe, an endearing boyhood habit he’d never outgrown.

Calmly Isabella laid the piecework in her lap. “Talk to me about what? Perhaps your recent adventures over these past few months? Those, ah, shooting exhibitions? Don’t scowl, dear. You had to know your mother would write to me when she read about you in the weeklies. Your father was kind enough to include several of the articles, one with a rather…interesting…photograph of you.”

Grayson emitted an ungentlemanly snort. “Ah, yes. The photograph. The one where I was straddled with a foot on the back of two horses while I shot a bull’s-eye at the target? Caused the gents to swear and the ladies to swoon. Doubtless Mother’s was the only swoon not feigned.” His laugh was short and bitter. “When I stopped by home for an overdue visit my ‘reckless behavior that shamed the family name’ provided fodder for three evening meals.”

“I’m sorry your visit home was another difficult one.”

He merely shrugged again, and looked away. “Never mind. It’s not important.”

“Come along, now.” Isabella leaned forward. “Talk to me, my dear, about whatever you need to. But since it’s after nine, doubtless there’ll be a knock or two on the door soon.” She paused, then finished matter-of-factly. “Ofttimes in the evenings, after chores, a student comes to me with her burdens, needing to share, or just needing a chat.”

“There. That’s what I want to talk about with you, Aunt.” Her nephew casually scooped up the glass paperweight from the piecrust table and turned it round while he talked, his words increasing in volume along with velocity. “You run a school for orphaned women. But that doesn’t mean you’re their mother. No matter how many years they live here, they’re not family. In truth you know little about them. Yet you take on all the responsibility for their misfortunes, not to mention their futures—and your own.”

“My future, and that of my students, rests where it always has. In God’s hands.”

Isabella was not surprised when Grayson merely arched a brow, looking more cynical than ever. “The truth of what I’m saying doesn’t change, especially after today’s incident in the woods, with Miss Shaw.”

Ah. Here then was the real purpose for this circuitous conversation.

“Now, really, Grayson. Someone shot at her. I think her reaction proved to be remarkably levelheaded.”

“Ha! You wouldn’t say that if you’d been there.” He paused. “What do you really know about her background, Aunt Bella? I don’t think you have ever fully appreciated the risk, inviting strange young women without any family connections into your life. I know Uncle Everett’s family pretty much washed their hands of you after he died, and you turned Sumner into this school. But I don’t think Uncle Ev—”

“Without the Academy’s existence, I would have no home at all, Grayson. Not here, at any rate.” Not for the world would she admit that his words jabbed, deep inside. “Tell me, are you more concerned about the fact that Sumner is no longer the beautiful Chilton family estate, or are your objections primarily all the ‘strange young women,’ Neala Shaw in particular?”

“Aunt Bella…” A band of red spread across his deeply tanned cheeks, but his expression revealed little. Somewhere over the years the boy had learned to screen his feelings from even his favorite aunt. “I’m not quite that much of a heartless cad. I’m sorry for her orphaned status—I know life is difficult, especially for…for women like Miss Shaw—but my first concern is you. For your safety and well-being, especially when you insist on maintaining such a small household staff. What if I hadn’t been here this afternoon? Your gardener would have expired from the exertion had he been forced to traipse through the woods, after an irresponsible woman old enough to know better than get herself lost, then spin wild tales.”

“Neala is neither irresponsible nor given to melodrama. Really, Grayson. Last fall, for example, when she’d been here less than a month, she saved the stables from burning down. She almost died herself because she refused to run away. If you knew her—”

“The point is that you don’t really know her any better than I do. She could have set that fire herself, Aunt Bella.”

“Grayson! What a scandalous observation.”

Her nephew shrugged. “Just staying objective. You seem to think letters of introduction from solid citizens, detailed applications, and one personal interview are sufficient to protect you. But I’ve seen—”

“As they have been,” Isabella interrupted. She tapped her foot several times, then forced it to stillness. “I’ve been operating this school for almost twenty years, my boy. I can count on one hand the students who had to be dismissed for lack of good character.”

“All it takes is one,” Grayson muttered darkly. “Women have never been the ‘weaker’ of the species, regardless of how you view them.” For a nightmarish second an expression on his face turned him into someone Isabella didn’t know at all. “Contrary to your quaint notions about creating godly wives and ‘Able Stewards of Society’—isn’t that one of your slogans?—a lot of females these days prefer to dump their husbands completely, or marry a lonely old man in hopes he’ll die soon after the vows. They’d rather help rob a bank than work in one. Sweet young things with innocent-looking eyes can be ruthless, far more devious than most garden-variety male criminals. Women kill, Aunt Bella. And smile at you while they carry out the deed.”

Oh, my dear, my dear. He was still suffering, deeply. “You are referring to your friend’s tragic death last fall, I presume.”

Grayson had been in a very bad state, Isabella knew. He had written her a brief note explaining about the death of his childhood friend, asked if he could come for a visit—then spent the next months making a spectacle of himself with that dreadful pistol of his. Until the telegram two days earlier letting her know of his pending arrival, Isabella had not heard from him at all since the note.

“‘Tragic death.’” He slammed the paperweight down hard enough to scratch the table and send several other knickknacks skittering toward its scalloped edge. “What an insipid description of the deranged woman who plunged a butcher knife in the back of an unarmed man. The partner I was supposed to be protecting. The friend I’d known for most of my life.” His eyes glistened as he stared through Isabella, seeing frightful images she could scarcely imagine before he covered his face with his hand.

A knock sounded on the door. “Miss Isabella?” The door opened a fraction. “Can I talk with you for a little while? It’s about this afternoon—Oh!”

Neala Shaw froze in the portal, her eyes flooding with dismay, guilt—and a smattering of outrage. “Mr. Faulkner. I didn’t know you’d be in here.”

Though her aching knees protested, Isabella managed to rise without betraying the effort it required. “Do come in, my dear. As it happens, my nephew would like to talk about this afternoon, as well.”

“Yes. Do join us, Miss Shaw,” Grayson echoed so mockingly Isabella almost swatted his arm. The mask was firmly in place again, all emotion smothered beneath the cynicism.

Small wonder that Neala walked across the room with the aura of a condemned convict headed for the gallows. Isabella started to speak, then caught herself as she watched the pair of them size each other up as though they were the only two people in the room. Hmm. She silently thanked the Lord for His nudge, and waited for an appropriate moment to leave.

“Mr. Faulkner, since you’re here, I suppose I should apologize for hitting you with a stick.”

“Miss Shaw, no apology is needed, since in point of fact, you missed.”

“Yes, I did.” Two bright spots of color turned her pale complexion the color of broiled salmon. “But it wasn’t for lack of trying. Perhaps I should extend an apology anyway, since in God’s eyes the intent of the heart, as much as the action, determines one’s guilt.”

“Spare me your self-righteous homilies. I need them even less than your contrived excuses.” He stalked across to stand in front of her, hands fisted at his hips. “My aunt, and Mr. Pepperell—now, they’re the ones who deserve your apology. They’re the ones who would have worried themselves into early graves if I hadn’t been here.”

“Your aunt knows I would never—” Neala broke off, then whirled around to Isabella. “Miss Isabella…are you all right? I thought you looked…fatigued, at supper, but I thought it was from the trip to Berryville. I didn’t know, I mean I didn’t realize…and I haven’t seen Mr. Pepperell since lunch. Is he—is he—”

“Calm yourself, Neala.” Isabella slid Grayson a reproving stare as she laid a hand on the girl’s rigid shoulder. “Mr. Pepperell and I are both right as rain. You’ve done nothing wrong, and certainly nothing to cause me worry. Concern, perhaps, because you still tend to assume more responsibility than is appropriate. How fitting, isn’t it, that my nephew seems to share that very same trait?”

Grayson made a derisive sound, which Isabella ignored. Keeping her lips pressed together to keep a smile at bay, she squeezed Neala’s shoulder a final time, then started for the door. “I’m sure the two of you can talk about me much more freely in my absence, so I’ll go take care of a matter and return shortly.”

“Aunt Bella…”

“Miss Isabella…”

“I trust both of you to remember what they say about the spoken word? Once allowed to escape, it cannot be recalled.”

She closed the door behind her, and let out a soft chuckle. Well, Lord, You wanted me out of the room. I leave them in Your far more capable hands.

Gray stared at the closed door in consternation. His aunt had left him alone in the room with Neala Shaw. He didn’t know which would provide more relief: tossing the conniving little baggage out the window, or exiting that way himself.

Neala cleared her throat. “Obviously she expects us to come to some sort of accord.” Her fingers fluttered at her waist before she twined them together. “Mr. Faulkner, it would help tremendously if you believed me, about someone shooting at me, I mean.”

“Why should I, Miss Shaw?”

“Because I’m not a liar!”

“Well, now how would I be knowing that, me darlin’?” he retorted in a perfect mimicry of the Academy’s Irish stableman. Her obvious frustration pleased Gray more than was polite, but for some reason he couldn’t seem to quit needling her. He folded his arms, rocking a little on his feet while he watched a barrelful of expressions race across her face. “This is only the second time we’ve met, after all. Why, for all I know your hunter might be lying in wait in my bedroom.”

“Well, if he was, at least he’d be close enough to do the job! Oh!” The brown eyes rounded in dismay as her palm flew to belatedly cover her mouth. “I can’t believe I said that! I can’t believe…I don’t know what came over me. I don’t talk like that, I don’t even think like that.”

Abruptly she turned her back to him.

Deprived of the entertainment of watching her face, Gray’s attention zeroed in on a long strand of curling hair that had escaped the pins to dangle down the back of her neck. She’d managed to stuff the rest of the mass into a twist of some sort; he thought it made her look dowdy, incredibly old-fashioned. Yet his fingers itched to twine that strand around his hand. He wanted to know if her hair felt as soft as it looked, if the curls were as untamable as the fire sparking in her eyes a moment ago.

And he hated the longing almost as much as he hated himself.

“Apparently you’ve not heard about my reputation,” he observed coolly. “Even if you send a man with a gun after me, Miss Shaw, I’m not the one who’ll end up in a pine box.” When she turned back around, something in the dark brown eyes goaded him to add, “Well? Why don’t you go ahead and say what you’re thinking—that your headmistress’s nephew is a dangerous fellow, and today he tried to shoot you out in the woods?”

She blinked, and the expression disappeared. “Mr. Faulkner,” she began, then hesitated. Just as Gray opened his mouth to deliver another jab, she drew herself up and leveled a look upon him worthy of Aunt Bella. “Mr. Faulkner, do you enjoy intimidating people and insulting women innocent of any wrongdoing, or do you merely possess a misogynistic streak?”

“I only enjoy intimidating devious women,” he whipped back without missing a beat. “Insults I save for conniving liars. As for an innocent woman, I can’t remember the last time I encountered one, age notwithstanding. So you might say my…ah…misogynistic streak developed over years of exposure to various members of your misnamed ‘gentler’ sex.”

This time she stepped back as though he’d just sprayed her with venom, but at least she didn’t turn her back on him. “There’s no use trying to talk with you, is there?” she whispered, half to herself. “You’re just like Adrian…”

Adrian? “Who’s Adri—”

“Tell your aunt I wished her a good night,” Miss Shaw chirped in a voice women used with toddlers and small children. Without meeting his eyes she scuttled across the room to the door, where she delivered her parting shot. “I’d wish you the same, except I think you’ve forgotten how to have a good anything, which I find terribly sad.”

The door opened and closed with a firm click. Gray stood, her words ringing in his ears. The desolation he’d been fighting for months pressed back around him, squeezing all the air out of his lungs.

Neala Shaw…

He closed his eyes, half lifted his hand as though reaching out for that dangling strand of hair. Eventually, moving as if he were fighting his way through thorns, he returned to the fireplace and sat down in the chair where Aunt Bella had been sitting. The faint scent of his aunt’s toilet water wafted through his nostrils.

With a shuddering sigh Gray leaned his head back and tried not to think of anything at all.