“Tell me more about your brother.”
“He was handsome. Like my sister, he took after our mother. It spoiled him, I think. He never had enough. There were arguments with my father about his debts. When he inherited, it got worse, as I told you.”
“Did he have friends near here?”
She realized the questions had a purpose. “Yes. In this county and the neighboring ones. Other young men from families like ours, and better, would come by at times. Mostly he met them elsewhere. He would dress and ride out on a horse he had spenttoo much to buy, looking very fine. I imagine they spent their time doing what men do when alone together.”
“Then he came home one night with a pistol ball in him, and he rode out no more. Were any of those friends loyal?”
She turned her memories back to the beginning of her brother’s infirmity. “A few at first. Later, no. But he had changed then. He hated how that wound affected him. The ball had torn things in him, and the surgeon tore more. He was bent after that, and could not walk right, and his strength leaked away like water into sand. Finally, he did not move at all. A fever took him. He had no strength left to fight it.”
She snuggled closer as she spoke. Thinking about her brother saddened her. There had been little love between them at the end. Their mutual resentments clashed silently in the icy atmosphere of his chamber.
She should have been kinder, and done better by him. She should have done better by Rebecca as well. Rebecca—
“What am I going to do, Gareth?”
“You are going to go to sleep, so you can think clearly tomorrow.” He stood and raised her up and led her to the stairs.
He brought her to his bedchamber.
“I thought you said not tonight.”
“I said no danger tonight. You will sleep better here than in a strange bed. I will not wake you when I come in.”
He gave her one sweet kiss before leaving.
***
Gareth poured himself more brandy. It went without saying that he would not sleep much tonight.
He read Rebecca’s letter again. No magistrates. That suited him fine. He did not want any magistrates getting in the way with their legal particulars when he found these men.
They were being bold. Rash. This treasure must have great value to them. Kidnapping was a hanging offense. The kidnapping of a gentry woman, an innocent—the entire country would want them drawn and quartered.
He had no plan, but he knew he would need help. He sat down and wrote Ives a letter, telling him about finding some of the pictures. He encouraged him to come north, for that and for another problem. He ended by saying Ives should leave his law books behind.
He threw himself on the divan, closed his eyes, and counted out the days. If this treasure or its location could not be found in three days, a crude and dangerous rescue would have to be mounted. Better to find it, in order to have some bait. Sly and calculated would far surpass violent and bloody, if there were a choice.
His mind drifted into a half sleep. Events and images from the last few days mixed and remixed at random. A line in Rebecca’s letter loomed large.I have explained that you are one woman alone in the world, and not given to bravery, and that you will do what you can, especially if you will get a share.Clever girl, to insinuate an alliance to put them off guard. She knew Eva was brave enough but would not be alone in facing this.
He pictured Rebecca talking philosophy and radical politics until those men paid Eva to take her away. He smiled at the thought, but of course it would not be that simple.
Sleep did come then, but later, abruptly, he woke with a start. He sat and wiped his eyes. Disparate ideas in his head emerged, lined up, and forced themselves on him until he could not deny them.
A young man resentful of diminished fortune. A pack of friends riding the countryside. A treasure worth risking death for. A pistol wound, from an aim designed to kill. A paintingwashed with turpentine, so the underlying brushstrokes showed. Walls torn out and floor pried up and steps removed—
He looked up at the ceiling.
And a hidden cache of treasured pictures, right down the road from that young man’s home.
***
The next night, Eva woke before dawn with the weight and warmth of Gareth behind her. His arm covered her in a sleeping embrace. He had never come the night before, so his presence surprised her.
She turned carefully, so as not to wake him. She moved until she faced him, with her nose at his chest and her body against him and his breath in her hair. She laid her palm on his hip.
The intimacy relaxed her. Sleep the last two nights had been fitful, but now it descended like a soft cloud. When she woke again, light showed through the drapes. She lay there, not wanting to disturb the peace. The longer she did, the more time before the day brought back the sickening worry.
