I rode in through the gates I'd entered three days before, the weeds still in abundance. The house loomed out of the rain, imposing at a distance, even grand. As I drew closer, the ruin of the thing became more apparent.
I was surprised to see Grenville's landau stopped at the front door. The landau was empty, and Jackson was checking the harness. Grenville's groom came forward, unasked, and helped me dismount. I took my canvas-wrapped bundle from the pack, left the horses for the groom to look after, and went inside.
Denis's men were not there. They'd finished stripping my walls to bare stone, and a whiff of smoke from the garden told me they'd burned the rest of the debris.
Lucius Grenville stood on the stairs of the wide hall, with Lady Breckenridge a few steps above him. The two of them did not notice me come in, being too busy arguing.
"You are a pompous prig," Lady Breckenridge said clearly. "I tossed aside being obedient to a man the day after I took my wedding vows."
"It is not a question of obedience-" Grenville broke off his retort when he saw me standing below. "Lacey." He looked embarrassed. "I beg your pardon; we ought not to have barged in without your leave."
"It's raining," I said. I tucked my package more firmly under my arm. "I do not mind my friends running tame in my house, but I must wonder why you wish to."
Lady Breckenridge gripped the wrought-iron railing with a dove-gray leather glove. "I came to pry through your mother's sitting room for any clue to the gown and the takings from the church. Bartholomew told us that you'd been ordered to Denis's hunt and nothing else."
"And I came to encourage her to return to Oxfordshire as planned," Grenville said, his face still red. "Why, Lacey, did we take up with such blasted stubborn women?"
I looked at Lady Breckenridge as I answered. "Because they are more interesting than meek ones. Grenville is right. Please go to Oxfordshire and stay with your son."
"If you are concerned about threats from Mr. Denis, you know I am as safe from him here as I am there," Donata said.
"I know that, but I'd feel better if you were gone."
Something sparkled in her black-lashed eyes. "And the same day I decided to give up obedience, I vowed not to live to make others feel better."
She'd gazed at me as boldly the day I met her, when she'd handed me her cigarillo and then proceeded to trounce me thoroughly at billiards. She'd looked at me without shame then, and she did so now.
"For your own safety then," I said. "Please."
Her eyes were very dark blue in the dim light of the hall. She turned away, lifted her mauve and brown striped skirt, and walked on up the stairs. Neither of us went after her.
Grenville came down to meet me on the ground floor. "What are you doing back here, anyway, Lacey? We thought you'd be busy with Denis's search."
"Because this is the last place I saw Cooper. I wondered if I'd missed something." And, frankly, I was putting off reporting to Denis. "I assume the weather meant an end to Lady Southwick's shooting match?"
Grenville looked pained. "Not a bit of it. Lady Southwick was annoyed that she could not watch you pop at targets, but she made the rest of us capitulate. She regretted it soon, because Godwin almost winged her."
"Good Lord." I thought of Godwin and his bizarre, dandyish clothing. "What happened?"
"I am not certain, to be honest. Godwin lifted his pistol to shoot, we heard a bang, and Lady Southwick gave a yelp and fell. Godwin looked very confused. I could have sworn he fired down the range, but Lady Southwick had stepped off the terrace at just that moment, foolish woman. I thought she'd been hit, but the ball had missed her. Went right past the poor woman's nose. I found the bullet in an ornamental urn down the terrace. Lady Southwick decided we should find our own entertainment for the rest of the afternoon." Grenville dusted off his sleeves. "Lady Breckenridge insisted on coming here."
"There is a second reason I want her gone." I motioned for Grenville to follow me out of the house.
The wind nearly swept us from our feet as we walked onto the old terrace. Another storm was coming, and coming hard.
I pulled the canvas-wrapped bundle from under my arm. "This is thoroughly unpleasant."
Grenville looked curious. "What is it?"
"A man's hand. I do not have to show you."
"Good God." Grenville took a step back. "No, show me. Get it over with."
I gingerly unwrapped the canvas. The hand lay palm down, fingers blackened, fleshy part thoroughly pecked. It was a workingman's hand, blunt-fingered and callused.
Grenville tugged out a handkerchief and pressed it over his nose. "Highly unpleasant, I agree."
I wrapped the thing again and described how I'd found it.
Grenville dabbed his mouth and returned the handkerchief to his pocket. "I suppose, if the appendage belongs to Cooper, we can conclude that Cooper took the horse when you left it, rode out to the marsh, met an enemy, fought, and lost his hand in said fight. But where is the rest of him? Carted away? Or did he drag himself away?"
"If he'd gotten away from his enemy, he could not have gone far in such a state," I said. "Who knows what other injuries he sustained? Yet, no villager or farmer reports having a hurt man wander onto his fields or ask for help. And, if he did survive, why not return to Denis? Or make it to the nearest farm and send a message?"
"The enemy might have taken him away," Grenville said. "Killed him elsewhere. Not a good thought."
I looked across the open land to the copse and the gray curtain of rain coming toward us. "The trouble is, no one in these parts keeps things to themselves. Denis asked me not to let on that we were looking for Cooper, but everyone already knows it. If someone had seen Cooper being dragged or carted away-or even spied an unfamiliar face on the road-everyone for ten villages around would know. And someone would have told me."
"Unless Cooper's enemy was a local person," Grenville pointed out. "Someone so familiar he would not attract notice-if he were seen driving a cart down a road, this would not be unusual. The question is, why should a local man kill Cooper?"
"Many resent Denis taking over Easton's house and are not afraid to say so. I do not believe Denis understands how country people can close ranks. He is very much of the city. But why hurt Cooper and then keep it secret? If villagers wanted to drive Denis away, they would do so much more openly, I'd think."
"Possibly, unless it is a direct resentment neither of us can guess." Grenville looked up at the windows of my house, which were framed with heavy stone pediments. "I understand why you want Lady Breckenridge gone. A dangerous atmosphere. But you will have to persuade her. She will never listen to me."
"I believe you overestimate my influence," I said, smiling a little.
"Not at all. She respects you. She respects very few, not that I blame her. Treasure that."
I did. The fact that Donata Breckenridge was fond of me surprised me every day.
Behind us, Lady Breckenridge emerged from the house. "Are you finished with your secret discussion?" she asked. "I mentioned taking up the carpet in your mother's sitting room, if you remember. If you had done so, you'd have found this in a little niche under the floorboards."
She handed me a notebook. The curtain of rain I'd seen approaching took that moment to strike, and we hastened inside, my bundle again under my arm. Grenville propped the door closed against the wind, and I opened the notebook.
The light in the hall was too dim to show me much, but I saw enough. "This is my mother's," I said.
"I suspected so," Donata said. "I thought I should bring it to you before I pried into your family secrets."
Chapter Thirteen
That had been generous of her. Donata was quite interested in her fellow human beings. I'd caught her one evening in Grenville's private sitting room in his London house, uninvited, looking through his curios. She'd shown no mortification that I'd found her there.