Only after the door closed behind him did Kate direct herself to her two charges. “And now, my two dears,” she said with a lightness she had not thought she could muster, “won’t you go in to your luncheon?”
Promptly at eight o’clock they sat down to dinner — Lady Mary and Sir Richard at either end of the long narrow table, John Blayne between them and on Lady Mary’s right. Wells stood by the buffet, ready to serve. Kate, in black dress, small white apron and neat little cap perched on her brown curls, stood behind Lady Mary’s chair. To John Blayne she looked like an actress, oddly charming in the part she now had to play; to the master and mistress of the castle she was only doing what she had done since she had been old enough to take her place in service.
As if a truce had been called, the conversation at dinner ranged from art to politics, from medieval history to contemporary drama, from the status of farming on both sides of the Atlantic to the importance of blood lines in breeding stock. The small roast was delicious, the wine was vintage; the dessert fruit was damsons bottled the previous summer from an ancient tree in the kitchen garden. The cheese was Stilton.
Only over their coffee cups in the small sitting room off the great hall was mention made of the business at hand. Kate had brought in the coffee tray and set it on a low table before Lady Mary. The American noticed that there were four cups on the tray and that Kate had left cap and apron in the kitchen.
“Black or white, Mr. Blayne?” Lady Mary asked as she poured.
“Black, please, Lady Mary.”
The two men stood with their backs to the fire. Kate stood beside Lady Mary on a low couch.
“Tomorrow morning, Mr. Blayne,” Sir Richard said casually, “I have asked my solicitor, Philip Webster, to join us for our discussion of this matter of the castle.”
“I shall be happy to meet him.”
“It is possible,” Sir Richard hesitated, “that you might have liked to have your legal representative present, too. But I daresay you could not get him over from America in time for our meeting tomorrow.” Sir Richard chuckled slightly.
“My lawyer, David Holt, of the New York firm of Haynes, Holt, Bagley and Spence, accompanied me to England, Sir Richard. He has been staying in London, but I made a telephone call to him this afternoon. He was due to arrive at the inn in the village this evening.”
“Then we shall both have our advisers. Capital!” Sir Richard exclaimed. “Capital, indeed. Ten o’clock tomorrow morning in the great hall. Perhaps you would like to have a ride before breakfast? Wells could find you something to wear. My horse is spirited, but quite reliable. However, you might prefer her ladyship’s, an older mount but strong in wind and limb.”
“Thanks, Sir Richard, I should enjoy nothing more than an early-morning ride.” He turned to Kate. “Would you join me, Miss Wells, and show me something of the countryside?”
She smiled up at him like a radiantly happy child, then shook her head. “I have duties in the morning, Mr. Blayne.”
“I understand,” he said quietly, then he turned back to Sir Richard. “Perhaps it would be well for me to retire now, Sir Richard, with all that is before us tomorrow.”
“Quite so.” Sir Richard moved toward a bell pull on the wall and the sound of a distant ringing could be heard. When Wells appeared in the doorway, Sir Richard spoke. “Take Mr. Blayne to the Duke’s room, Wells.”
“Yes, my lord.”
“I’d better just go along with them and see that everything is right,” Kate said. She took the coffee tray and went toward the door.
“How kind you are,” John Blayne murmured.
He said good night and was halfway across the room when Lady Mary remarked, “Oh, I hope they won’t bother you tonight.”
“Careful, my dear. You must not mystify or frighten our guest out of his night’s sleep.”
“Don’t worry about me, Sir Richard, I’m a good sleeper. I assure you, Lady Mary, that I shall be quite all right. Until the morning, then!” He stood in the doorway and lifted his hand in a gesture of farewell.
Sir Richard and Lady Mary were sitting together now on the low couch. They looked regal, and yet tender at the same time, and thoroughly in command while the truce held. Swords would be drawn in earnest in the morning.
After the door had closed, Lady Mary sighed and laid her hand lightly on her husband’s. “He’s rather nice, Richard, don’t you think, in spite of his being an—”
“Very nice,” Sir Richard agreed, “surprising, as a matter of fact. One never knows Americans.”
Wells opened the door to the Duke’s room. “Here you are, sir. I hope you’ll find everything to your satisfaction.”
The bed had been turned down and John Blayne saw that his pajamas and robe had been laid on the faded coverlet; his slippers were neatly arranged on the floor. The light on the table by the bed gave a warmth which the room had lacked when he had gone to it before dinner to dress; a small fire in the grate had done its best to counteract the dampness.
“The candle, sir, is near the lamp, and there’s a box of matches.”
“Whatever do I need a candle for?”
“The electricity has a way of failing, sir, and some of the passages have no light in any case.”
“But, Wells, I really don’t expect to go wandering around the castle during the night.”
“Very good, sir, but then you never know. Best be prepared is what I always say. If that is all, sir, I’ll wish you a very good night.”
“Thank you, Wells.”
The old man turned and left. Kate busied herself about the room, testing the windowsills with her forefinger for dust, arranging the long satin curtains. It was an immense room, and the windows reached from floor to ceiling. The crimson satin curtains were shredding and she was trying to hide the rents. She caught his glance and dropped the curtain.
“You’ve a cut on your forehead,” she said sharply and came to him to inspect.
He put his hand to his head. “I gave myself a blow this morning on that low door when we were going into the great hall.”
“And you never said a word!” she cried.
“So much began to happen all at once.”
“I must wash it immediately.”
She went to a stand and poured water from a large porcelain pitcher into a basin and opened a drawer for a clean towel.
“It’s nothing,” he said.
“There’s blood dried on it, under your hair,” she retorted. “Stoop down, please — otherwise I’ll have to fetch a step ladder.”
He laughed and stooped down, and felt her light touch on his bead as she washed the slight cut. A faint clean fragrance came from her. Her skin was very blue, her eyes more blue than any he had ever seen, a deep violet blue — very rare! One saw it in the paintings of the early madonnas. Her dark eyelashes were set thickly together and curled upward softly.
“You don’t seem like an American,” she was saying, as she kept at her self-appointed task. “Does that hurt?”
“Not in the least.”
“Will you bend a little lower still, please? You’re really shockingly tall, aren’t you?”
“Depends on the girl I’m standing beside.”
For the first time he heard her laughter, a lovely sound, free and warm.
“The inside of your mouth is pretty, too,” he added.
She put her hand over her mouth. “I daresay you’re looking straight down my throat — I forgot I was so close.”
“I didn’t.”
She stepped back at that. “Now, really, Mr. Blayne—”
“Couldn’t you call me John, as long as I’m in the castle?”