Miss Cruikston’s horrified expression pleased Leona like no mention of her brother’s name had ever done before or, to her mind, was ever likely to do. The heavy pall that had begun to hang over her lifted a little.
“What’s this?” asked Sir Nathan.
Miss Cruikston’s former warmth chilled. “It is a subject not discussed in polite circles,” she said repressively.
Leona smiled for the first time since she had arrived at Furleigh House. “So, we have dealt with and dismissed all my options for leaving Rose Cottage. My purpose today was merely to acquaint you with this latest bit of information, not to beg shelter. Leaving is not something I have ever contemplated. I thank you for your kind hospitality today.”
Sir Nathan rose to his feet to pace the room. “No, we have not dismissed all options. We have expanded them. It is for you, Miss Leonard, to choose. I will grant you that much.
“As I see it, you have three choices, and staying at Rose Cottage is not one of them. I cannot allow you to. As you spoke of your conscience bothering you if you stayed here, so would mine if you remained at Rose Cottage.” He stopped pacing in front of Leona and stared down at her. “So, you may go to Castle Marin, be our guest here, or go to stay with your sister and her husband.”
Miss Cruikston looked as if she would say something else, but her brother quelled her with a glance.
Leona looked from one to the other. Shewanted to scream. She was neatly cornered. None of the choices Sir Nathan offered her were acceptable. It was a matter of determining which was less unacceptable than the other two!
Staying with George and Rosalie Sharply was out of the question. Her dislike for George Sharply ran long and deep. She was sure the feeling was mutual. Staying at Furleigh House would be uncomfortable in the extreme. Regardless of whether Miss Cruikston continued her cold demeanor, there was still the matter of Sir Nathan’s attraction to her. Being under his roof would create too many problems.
That only left Castle Marin. In truth, her reluctance to go to Castle Marin was in good measure due to her reaction to Nigel Deveraux. That reaction was, however, a private affair, something to be kept hidden from everyone. He did not look on her with the eyes of a suitor, as Sir Nathan did. On the other hand, he didn’t look at her as a silly widgeon without a thought in her head. There was that in his favor. Nonetheless, he was a man used to people obeying him without question—something Leona strongly doubted herself capable of doing.
She shook her head and sighed, the beginnings of a headache throbbing in her temples. She looked at Maria. Maria’s mouth twisted wryly. Despite herself, Leona smiled at her wilycompanion. She’d wager this was just the turn-up Maria was expecting.
She turned back to Sir Nathan and shrugged. “I guess we’ll be going to Castle Marin.”
CHAPTER 5
It is an often observed fact of life that those people who are of a “managing” temperament seldom acquiesce gracefully to being managed in turn. Thus it was with Miss Leona Clymene Leonard that March of 1815, when, despite all manner of spirited argument to the contrary, she, at last, found herself traveling in the company of Maria Sprockett to Castle Marin. Their journey was made in the first style of elegance, a situation which instead of gratifying Miss Leonard served to inflame her. The elegance and comfort irked her because the carriage was the Earl of Nevin's property, placed at her disposal by the Honorable Nigel Deveraux.
Sir Nathan Cruikston, in the manner of an unusually efficient civil servant, wrote Deveraux the same day Leona came to call on him and apprised him of Miss Leonard’s receipt of the fateful button. Deveraux acted swiftly. He sent the carriage with postilions to Rose Cottage accompanied by a strongly-worded letter, lacking both sympathy and hesitation, in which he informed her the carriage would convey her the next morning to Castle Marin.
Though reluctantly agreeing to go to Castle Marin as the least of all evils proposed for her, Leona remained determined tofollow her own course, for she did not take kindly to the type of autocratic pronouncements Mr. Deveraux seemed in the habit of making. By inventing last-minute chores and obligations in the neighborhood, she managed to delay the departure one full day and part of the next. It was a small victory for her rebellion, but one that brought a satisfied smile to her lips.
She was drowsing against the plush squabs when one of the maroon-and-blue-liveried servants called out to her that Castle Marin was visible ahead. She opened her eyes and leaned toward the window to catch a glimpse of what she could only think of as her future prison. To her astonishment, it appeared they were indeed approaching an actual medieval castle rather than some large stone mansion with pretensions to greater grandeur, as had many homes dubbed “Castle.”
A silver-gray curtain wall, some two to three stories in height and studded with mural towers, dominated the landscape. It appeared to be encircling an old Norman motte, or hill, for beyond the wall, silhouetted against a gathering, tumbling mass of afternoon storm clouds, could be seen the crumbling darker gray stonework of an old keep. In front of the curtain wall, she thought she caught the silvery green glimmer of a substantial moat. She shook her head as awe and amusement battled each other.
“Maria, look!”
Maria Sprockett shifted in her seat to look over Leona’s shoulder. “Oh, my. Gracious, I do see why Mr. Deveraux was confident we should be safer here than at Rose Cottage,” she observed dryly.
Leona laughed. “It hardly looks real, does it?”
“Hmmm. It looks like something Lord Byron or Shelley might rhapsodize over in one of their long poems. I almost expect to see archers along those walls and in those mural towers.”
“Look! There is a gatehouse ahead guarding a bridge across the moat to the barbican.”
“Do you think it is a working drawbridge?” Maria mused.
“No, it appears to be made of stone.”
“Pity.”
Leona laughed. “Yes, but take heart. I do believe I see the iron bars of a portcullis in the gatehouse.”
The carriage turned right toward the gatehouse, and soon Leona and Maria heard the sound of the horses’ hooves rattling on stone as they passed under the great bars of the portcullis and over the bridge. The wind picked up as the clouds gathered above, whipping around the castle curtain walls. Wind shuddered against the carriage and set it swaying, threatening to toss it into the moat. Leona pulled the lap robe provided by Deveraux closer about her.
Maria glanced up at the darkening sky. “I hope the rain waits until we are safely in the castle. I fear it will be a deluge.”
The carriage turned right again to follow the inside curve of the castle wall. Leona and Maria slid to the other side of the carriage to look up at the old keep. It stood stark and alone against the gathering gloom. Closer, it was easy to tell it was no longer habitable, for one-third of its walls were tumbled ruins. It was, nonetheless, a compelling and arresting landmark for the property.
