“Well, Miss Williams,” the earl said, “we have been hearing some stories about you.”
She looked at him mutely. She found herself wondering how Marged would behave in such a situation. Marged was wonderfully courageous. Marged would not look away or tremble—or crack under pressure.
He strolled toward her across the room until he was no more than three feet in front of her. He stood very tall and straight. His hands were at his back. She had the sudden and terrifying impression that he held a whip in them.
“We have been told,” he said, glancing briefly to his left at the gatekeeper, “that you were at the scene of a gate breaking last night, Miss Williams. Is this true?”
She stared at him. Very deliberately in her mind she was reciting the Lord’s Prayer.
“Perhaps there was an explanation for your being there,” he said. “If so, you must say so and you will be allowed to return home. Why were you there?”
Give us this day our daily bread.
“You were taken up by one of the men known as Rebecca’s daughters,” he said. “Did you know him? Or did he merely kidnap you and set you down somewhere else?”
Aled. Oh, Aled, oh, Aled, oh, Aled. As we forgive those who trespass against us.
He asked her numerous questions. She lost count of the number of times she recited the same prayer. Stupidly, she could not remember any others to recite. And her mind was not lucid enough to pray spontaneously.
And then Sir Hector started on her. He was much louder, much angrier. He shouted at her until he lifted one hand and would have brought the back of it across her face if the earl had not grabbed him by the wrist.
“I don’t think violence is going to get anything out of her,” he said. “I will try other methods, Hector, but I would prefer to be alone when I try them, if you get my meaning. Leave her with me. She will not escape me and I will get the truth out of her, never fear.”
Sir Hector gave a short bark of laughter as Ceris’s blood froze. What did he mean? But there was no doubt in her mind what he meant. There was a half smile on his lips, an expression at horrible variance with his cold, cold eyes.
She was on the verge of breaking her silence and begging Sir Hector Webb not to leave her alone with the Earl of Wyvern. But a brisk knock on the door was preceded by its opening. It was behind Ceris. She did not turn her head to look.
“I beg your pardon, sir,” Matthew Harley said, his voice breathless. Ceris closed her eyes briefly. “I have just heard. Has she said anything?”
“I believe,” the Earl of Wyvern said coldly, “that the cat has got her tongue, Harley, or whatever it is that takes maidens’ tongues in Wales.”
Ceris heard Matthew exhale through his mouth. She stared woodenly downward at the floor.
“There has been a dreadful mistake,” Matthew said. “And I am not surprised she has said nothing. She belongs to the chapel here, you know, and it would be considered sin enough to have her expelled and driven up the mountain.”
He knows about Aled, Ceris thought desperately. She looked up fleetingly to see the earl raise haughty eyebrows.
“Ceris and I got engaged yesterday,” Matthew said. He sounded almost embarrassed. “We went walking last night. We went quite a distance across the hills. And then we got to kissing and then to other things and”—he laughed—“well, I suppose I tried to go too far and she took fright. She went running off, and before I could catch up to her to apologize, we got all caught up in whatever was going on down on the road. Suddenly there were black-faced men fleeing to all sides of me and Ceris was down on the road. And then a rider in dark women’s clothes snatched her up and made off with her. I have been worried silly. That was why I sent this gatekeeper over to you, Sir Hector, instead of dealing with the matter myself. I am sorry. I neglected my duty.”
“It is my duty to be up and dealing with such matters,” the earl said.
“Ceris?” Matthew came into her line of vision. “Are you all right? Oh, please let them untie her hands, sir. She has been an innocent victim. Did you recognize him, love? Or anyone else? And what did he do with you? If he—”
“I did not recognize him,” she said, looking down rather than into his eyes. She did not know quite what was going on. “He dropped me from the horse’s back when, I suppose, he thought he was safe from pursuit.”
“Thank God.” Matthew drew a ragged breath.
They believed him. She did not really listen to all that was said over the next few minutes, but they believed him. Her hands were released and were soon so painful with the pins and needles of returning circulation that she had something to concentrate on.
“I’ll take you home, Ceris,” Matthew said, setting an arm loosely about her shoulders. “If you can trust me after last night, that is.”
Never did words have more of a double meaning, Ceris thought.
Chapter 23
IDRIS had told her. He had come darting into the farmyard while she was there with his father, talking over with him what his duties were to be. Idris had told both of them.
“They have come for Miss Williams,” he had gasped out. “They have dragged her down to Tegfan with her hands tied behind her back.”
