* * *
Davina sat on the plank floor in the middle of the trunks. She had opened all of them, looking for that Bible. She had peered under the rough fabric guarding furniture and tried every drawer she could find. The Bible was not here.
She discovered other family items besides furnishings. Clothing, a doll, an old musket, even a brooch of some value. One trunk held some letters from over a hundred years before, their ink oxidized to a light brown but the parchment still supple. One of the barons wrote them to his son. They mostly contained instructions on behavior and comportment. In one, a scold had been given about a special friend, and a warning to avoid an entanglement. She suspected that friend had been an inappropriate woman.
She stood and looked around once more, hoping to spy one more place to search. She had enjoyed handling a few relics of her ancestors, but that was not her reason for being here. She could not ignore that there had been no remnants of the current owner’s life, nor of Brentworth’s past. Not one of those dukes had cared about this land or spent much time here. They had stewards and factors like Mr. Roberts manage the estate and send them their rents.
Giving up, she made her way down the stairs. Perhaps it had been left in the chapel that burned, as Brentworth had concluded. She preferred to believe a retainer had taken the Bible for safekeeping, much as her grandfather was sent away for that purpose. If so, she doubted she would ever find it again.
The day looked fair, as so few did now, what with winter on its way. She decided to take a turn on the lane and road and enjoy the sun. She stopped in her chamber to don a bonnet and choose a pelisse, then walked down to the reception hall.
As she always did when she passed this way, she glanced at the tall drape that hid the damaged part of the house. She noticed its edge had moved so a gap showed. Although as thick as a carpet, she doubted that drape completely kept out the cold in January. This hall would be unpleasant then, even with its huge fireplace. Today, that gap allowed in a noticeable draft.
She went over to fix the edge. Curious, she peered through the gap first. To her surprise, she saw Brentworth standing within the ruins. He did not move. He did not seem to be looking at anything at all. He just stood there, arms folded, his gaze on the rubble at his feet.
* * *
He did not want to name the distasteful emotion filling him. It was not a sentiment that men acknowledged, and he was no better than the rest. Yet it pressed on him and demanded recognition.
Shame. After all the nightmares, after years of regret and self-recrimination, that was not what he had expected to feel if he stepped inside these walls.
I was young and blind. It was not an excuse. He was the heir to one of the highest titles in England andshould nothave been blind. God knew he had been trained to use more astuteness than he had shown, and to never betray his duty the way he planned.
Mostly, however, he should have suspected that a mercurial temperament might thrive because of something darker. The excitement of freedom and passion had obscured his vision. He had lost control, losthimself,and reveled in doing so. He ignored any suspicions that inched into his mind and any warnings given by others. It had been enthralling. Heady. He’d behaved like a man let out of prison after twenty years.
Fire. Screams. He could smell it now, the stink while the flames consumed cloth, wood and eventually all within the stone walls. The scent still lingered on the remnants of the building. Even ten years of rain and snow, of nature reclaiming the floor tiles and fallen roof beams, could not clean the place of that odor. The bishops would like that. They would approve of the whole story. First sin, then punishment, but never total forgiveness.
Only he had not been the one to pay, had he?
The stones at his feet came into focus. He became aware of his surroundings again. He knew why. He was not alone anymore.
He did not look toward her presence, but he felt her there.Go away, woman.
“I told you not to come in here, that it was dangerous,” he said.
“You are in here. It can’t be too dangerous; there aren’t even many stones or beams left to fall.”
He sighed at her relentless rationality.
“What happened?” She asked as would a tourist wondering how Pompeii was buried.
“It burned.” He looked at her in time to see her narrowing her eyes. They had trod this path before. “I was here.”
She gazed up at the sky. “In this wing?”
“It was night and I was in my chamber. The family apartments were in this wing then.”
“It is a wonder you survived.”
I almost didn’t. “Roberts gets the credit for that. He was heroic that night. The fire spread so damned fast. Up to the servants’ quarters, down to the dining room. He roused me, and we did what we could, but we knew it was hopeless. Then it was just about getting people out.” He was lying to her in a way. Leaving out the hard parts. It would be like her to know there were omissions.
“Did you get them all out?”
Ah, she did not miss anything. “All except one. I blame myself.”
“You cannot be blamed. Fires happen. They are unpredictable and can level a city.”
“It started in my apartment, Davina.”
