“We will not ride far,” he assured her. “And I will keep to the wide open places. You may rest assuredtoo that I will have a pistol with me, Mama.”
“And that is supposed to reassure me?” she said, looking at him in some horror.
And yet when he was outside with Dinah and walking toward the stables, it seemed foolish to think of danger. The sun was shining from a blue sky, acrosswhich fluffy white clouds were scudding. There was afresh breeze blowing off the sea. She looked quitecharming in her sage-green velvet riding habit, hethought, the brown feather of the jaunty hat curlingabout one ear and sometimes, in the stronger gusts ofwind, brushing across her mouth so that she had toblow it away.
She was a good horsewoman, as he had expected her to be. He had paid her the compliment of mounting her on a frisky, though not wild, mare. She had asure seat and an easy, upright posture, and her handswere sensitive on the reins. He rode beside her on Jet,his black stallion, enjoying the sight of her while atthe same time keeping a careful watch on their surroundings. But they had soon ridden beyond the limitsof the cultivated gardens onto the wilder and moreopen stretches of land above the cliffs, and he breathedmore easily.
“Oh,” she said when they had ridden as close to the edge of the cliff as he dared take her, “I think itmust be very wonderful to live close to the sea. Lookat the sun sparkling on it. And the lovely salty air.”She breathed it in deeply.
“There are paths down to the beach,” he said. “One very steep one here and one less steep off to our left.I’ll take you down one day—if you like the feel of sandin your shoes and clothes and sand in your mouth andhair, that is.” He smiled at her.
“I think the joy of it would compensate for the discomfort,” she said.
Perhaps after tonight, he thought, looking at her rosy cheeks and at the pleasing arch of her back as she sather horse, he would be able to permit himself somerelaxation at last. Perhaps he could allow himself toenjoy her visit more. Perhaps he could flirt with her alittle. Or even allow something rather more seriousthan flirtation to develop if she was willing and if hiscousins did not recover too quickly from their illness.
The thought surprised him. He had not given much consideration to beginning a serious relationship witha woman. Certainly he had never met the woman whowould provoke such an intention. Until now.
But such thoughts on this particular day were dangerous. He realized that when his wandering attention was caught by a glimpse of movement at the comer ofhis eye and he looked up sharply in time to see someone duck down out of sight at the head of the less steepof the two paths down to the beach. The local men orwomen would not have avoided being seen even thoughthey would, strictly speaking, have been on Malvernland. They would more probably have hailed him and waved.
“We had better return to the house,” he said to Dinah, turning his horse unhurriedly so as not to alarmher and moving between her and the prowler on thepath. He only hoped that the watchers were not permanently on duty—he had seen no sign of anyone lastnight, though he had looked carefully—and that hisown men would do a good job that day of carelesslymaking common knowledge the fact that everythingwas to happen in four nights’ time, as originally planned.
“We were to attend a masquerade ball tonight for All Hallows’ Eve,” Dinah said. “Sir Anthony and mymother and I, that is, in London. And doubtless therewould have been dimmed candles and ghost storiesand other foolishness to frighten everyone. I am notsorry to be missing it.”
“You do not frighten easily, Dinah, do you?” he said, half with admiration and half with regret.
“But people always seem to believe that ghosts are out to harm the living,” she said, “when usually theyare living still in their own time and quite unaware ofus and the nineteenth century.”
“A very sensible attitude to take,” he said, amused, and yet looking keenly ahead to the line of trees thatseparated the clifftop from the cultivated gardens. “Butwhen you live in a haunted house like Malvern, Dinah,you would need a strong constitution indeed to pokeyour nose beyond your bedsheets on this night of allnights. Sometimes the living can be snatched up quiteunwittingly into the land of the dead. If you got in thepath of the sword fight in the white tower, for example,you might find that though the fighters were spirits andunaware of your presence, the swords were very real.Or perhaps in following a ghost you would run into anobstacle that was not there in his time or fall down asteep staircase that has been built since he lived.”
She was looking back at him, intently, lips parted. “You do it very well,” she said. “There are handsabout to claw at my back.”
“Better that,” he said, “than sword points through your heart. Be thankful at least that we are more thantwo miles from the graveyard. The village children, Ihear, sleep three to four to a bed on this particularnight of the year.”
He was rather disappointed when she smiled. “I think,” she said, “that you will not be happy unlessI am blubbering with terror tonight. I think you arevery proud of your home and its history, Edgar, andlike to see your guests do it proper homage. I do,believe me. I have never been so fascinated in mylife.”
They were back in the stables and he slid thankfully from Jet’s back and lifted her to the cobbles of theyard. No, she was not easily scared. He grinned downat her. But it did not matter. He must not worry thatshe would leave her room that night as she had thenight before. The night before she had seen him andmisunderstood. But she had looked mortified when hehad first lashed out at her in his anger and then scoldedher. And he knew she had been embarrassed as heconducted her upstairs and back to her room in silence. She would not make the same mistake againtonight.
“You have discovered my secret,” he said. “And since you are my guest, Dinah, and a well-behavedyoung lady, you will at least flatter your host by pretending to cower beneath the blankets tonight and by appearing at breakfast tomorrow looking suitablypale.”
“Done,” she said, slipping her hand through his arm for the walk back to the house. “And I shall befearfully glad that October is safely past for anotheryear.”
“And so shall I,” he said fervently.
Dinah enjoyed the morning ride and had to admit afterward that for the hour of its duration all her attention, all her senses, were focused upon her ridingcompanion. It was not surprising, of course. He wasexceedingly handsome and he was amusing, especiallywhen he tried to frighten her with ghosts he clearlydid not believe in. But there was something more thana physical awareness and an emotional pleasure in hiscompany. There was . . . Oh, it was just that she wasin love with him, whatever that term meant. It was nota feeling that could be analyzed in words.
And it was not something one could be reasonable about, either. She might tell herself with the greatestgood sense that she had met him only two days beforeand had spent very little of the intervening time in hiscompany. She could tell herself that she really did notknow him well at all. But good sense did not haveanything to say to anything. She was in love with himand she was enjoying the feeling, since she would notallow herself to dwell upon the tragedy of the fact thatas soon as the children were well she would be leavinghim, perhaps never to see him again.
Her mind was focused upon him for that hour. But for the rest of the day she could not stop herself fromthinking of something else. Orsomeoneelse rather.The dark rider. The man who looked so much like Edgar that she had thought he was he the night before.Perhaps it was the likeness that made her think somuch of the rider. And she was quite convinced thatit was the dark rider who had beckoned to her the nightbefore—or rather to the sad lady who still lingered inher bedchamber. Even though Edgar had a black stallion quite as powerful and full of energy as the onethat had appeared last night, she was convinced thatshe had seen one of the Malvern ghosts.
Foolish, foolish ward of that former master of Malvern, she thought. If she herself had a chance to ride off into the happily-ever-after with such a very beautiful and romantic figure of a man, she would seize itin a moment.
Would he come again that night? she wondered as she sat in a salon during the afternoon listening to theconversation between Lady Asquith and the vicar’swife, who was paying a call. Or rather not listening.Her mind kept wandering and she kept having to recallit. The vicar’s wife would think her very ill-mannered.
Perhaps he would come. It was, after all, All Hallows’ Eve, the night of all nights when he might be expected to come. She knew she would stay up andwatch for him. Though, of course, she thought regretfully, she would be able only to witness unrequitedlonging. Tonight she would know that it was not Edgarbelow her window but the dark rider. There would beno point in going down to him. Not that she wouldhave the courage to do so again anyway. If Edgar hadbeen furious the night before to find her out-of-doors,there was no knowing what his mood would be if hewere to catch her at it again.
But she could scarcely wait for the night to come.There was a strange, inexplicable longing in her to see him again. Perhaps it was the fact that he had beenfaithful to his true love for almost two centuries, returning again and again to reach out his arms to herin a mute plea to her to join her life to his. How wonderful it would be to be the object of such intense andlasting love. And perhaps it was his uncanny resemblance to Edgar and the fact that he appeared to belooking up ather, to be reaching out his arms to her.
Ah, the romance of it, Dinah thought. Sometimes real life seemed very dull in contrast. Instead of yearning for her and reaching out arms for her, all Edgarcould do was tease her and try to terrify her. He obviously did not have a romantic bone in his body.
