Chapter Three
The Crosskeys Inn bustled with activity when Victoria reached there some three days later.
It had been a humble sort of place back in the days when Martha Houghton’s father ran it, but Martha had worked hard to make it efficient and respectable.
Situated on the road to Leeds, it did a fair trade if not with the upper classes, then with ordinary travelers and traders.
A coach stood in the yard when Victoria arrived, ready for departure. Indeed, the travelers were in the act of boarding, and she hung back to let the rush clear.
Lord Beckenham, still feeling well disposed to her, had lent her a pony and trap, even though she’d lied to him by saying she wished to use her half day off to see her family. The vicarage lay in the same direction as the Crosskeys, and he suspected nothing.
Victoria hated lying, even though she’d done her share of it—more than her share—back when she’d been seeing Jamie.
Just as the newly loaded carriage pulled out, a wagon trundled in and a couple entered the inn. It was noontime, after all, and customers came and went.
She walked the pony up, the cart clattering behind.
A man hurried out from the stables and Victoria’s heart skipped a beat, her eyes doing a double take.
He was tall, with a lanky build, black hair beneath a flat cap and a narrow, clever face, and she thought…
No, not him. This man was older and a bit more heavily built, with silver in his beard.
Jamie’s older brother, surely. William.
He glanced at her without a hint of recognition as he led the wagon out of the way. Nay, staid and proper, she looked nothing like the girl who’d run wild with his brother and caused his ruin.
“Help ye, miss?” He wiped his hands on his leather jacket before giving her another, closer look. Doubt flooded his dark eyes.
“William? I do not suppose you remember me.”
“Aye. Aye, I do.” Anger entered his eyes as he set his jaw hard. “I’m surprised ye’d show yer face here.”
Victoria drew a breath. “I did not come to start trouble.”
“That’ll be a change.”
“I wanted a word with your mother.”
He stepped closer to her, so he stood on one side of Lord Beckenham’s pony and she the other. She could feel the animosity roll off him like heat from a sun.
“Ye’ll not be bothering my mother, mind. She’s busy. And by any road, she’s cried enough tears o’er the likes o’ ye.”
“I can imagine. And I’m sorry—”
“If that’s what ye came to say, I don’t want to hear it. We don’t want to hear it. Begone with ye.” He turned away.
“I only wished to ask whether—”
Swinging back, he said viciously, “Ye’ll not speak to my mother. Jamie—” For an instant he seemed apt to choke on the name. “Jamie was her favorite, aye? Loved the books the same way she does, and the poetry.”
Poetry. Forever, my love.
He gave a grim smile. “None o’ us minded it. He was our favorite too.”
“I’ll ask you, then.” Somehow, Victoria managed to lift her chin and meet his hard stare. “Is he back?”
“What?”
“Jamie. Has he come back?”
William’s dark eyes narrowed, and sheer disbelief twisted his features. “Why would ye ask me that, ye dozy mare? Ye know as well as I do that Jamie’s dead.”
*
Victoria’s hands shook so violently, she could barely control the reins. Fortunately, the pony knew the way home.
She strove, as they went, to marshal her thoughts and control her trembling. It had been a bad encounter. But it had told her one thing: William had not seen or heard from his brother.
His brother was dead.
Aye, and for more than seven years, Victoria had believed that.
Why did her heart refuse to believe it now?
Slowly, during that journey, she came to herself. Was able to feel the soft air against her cheek, for it was a bright, sunny autumn day. To smell the tang of woodsmoke on the breeze, the sharp scent of crumbled leaves.
She let her eyes range across the open moorland beyond the village, so different in the bright sunshine than it had been in moonlight.
The bracken had begun to die back from vibrant green to yellow.
The patches of heather had withered, and the bogland turned brown with peat.
She could see no movement save that of a few wandering sheep.
No wild rider—as if he would be out in daylight.
Just a highwayman, after all. She’d imagined any resemblance.
Since ye ask so politely—
Aye, she’d lived with hard—and lonely—memories for too many years. Now she imagined those memories had manifested in the form of a rogue bandit.
Madness.
At the manor, she handed the pony and cart over to Timothy, who gave her a close look.
“Are ye well, Miss Henshaw? Only ye look like ye’ve seen a ghost.”
“Naught but sheep, Timothy,” she assured him.
“I am that surprised the master let ye go visiting alone. I would have been happy to go with ye.”
“I appreciate that, Timothy, but ’tis not far to the vicarage, and surely a highwayman would not be out in broad daylight.”
He failed to look convinced, and before he could ask any questions, she hurried into the house.
Following their visit, Lord Beckenham had sent Pru home with a stout escort, so Victoria knew Missy would be at large and looking to be entertained. It mattered little to the girl that it was Victoria’s half day. She was used to making demands whenever she chose.
But when Victoria entered the hall, she could hear that Missy was having her music lesson, torturing the pianoforte under Master Belair’s tutelage. With a sigh of gratitude, she climbed the stairs to her room.
She had thinking to do. More to reason out, though reason did not suit her well.
William believed Jamie was dead. No lie there—she’d seen the earnest pain in his eyes. And no need to talk to Jamie’s mother, who likely wouldn’t agree to see her anyway. She blamed Victoria for what had happened.
The death of her son.
Indeed, Victoria had no one to blame save herself.
Though after it had happened, she’d blamed her father. Oh, aye, she had. She’d raged at him in livid pain, screamed at him, wailed and hollered till he’d been forced to shut her in her room. Deny her food.
She’d wanted to die then, follow her lover into the grave. But a woman of seventeen—or at least her body—needed what it needed. She’d grown hungry despite herself. Her heart had gone on beating, her lungs drawing breath.
With plenty of time to think, she’d figured out where the blame truly lay: squarely upon her own shoulders.
If she had refrained from falling in love with Jamie—
No, not that. Impossible. Her heart had been more than half lost to him when he’d looked up from that book, face full of light and eyes filled with far-off places. And later, when she’d learned his heart and come to know the mind with which it moved in tandem, she’d just fallen deeper and deeper.
But after that, when her father had ordered her to break off her friendship with him and never see him again—aye, if she’d been obedient and done just that, well, it would have hurt terribly.
But Jamie would be alive today. Married to someone else by now, no doubt.
With a string of children. Perhaps sharing duties at the inn, but alive.
His laughter still a bright music that floated on the wind.
Shedding her cloak, she crossed to her dresser, where lay a small wooden chest, the one decorative item in an otherwise barren room. A small cask it was, meant to hold jewelry. Father had given it to her when she’d turned fifteen.
She had no jewelry, and it contained only small treasures. A blue feather she’d found. A rosy-pink pebble. A sweet note from her sister, Patience, and the like.
She had no interest in such things now. The chest possessed a false bottom, which her fingers pulled up to reveal an item stored beneath. Her one true treasure.
A piece of parchment, much folded and refolded into a square small enough to fit in the tiny compartment.
She should not look at it. It could only cause more pain. But…
She carried the precious thing to the window and unfolded it with tender care. A single sheet, covered in black writing.
He had written her many words, had her gypsy lad with the poet’s heart. Promises made of love and devotion. This was no poem, but it was all of these in a declaration no actual poetry could match.
Her eyes traced the bold script even though she knew every word by heart.
To Torie,
The wind has asked me my wishes. Would I choose to fly away with him to visit far-off palaces, temples, and fortresses? I told him, nay.
The sea has asked me, would I not sail away with him to alabaster shores and untold wonders? I told him, nay.
Sweet music has tried to seduce me away from you, but I told her I had made a promise to rest forever in your heart. Where I am safe. Where I am welcomed.
Where always and always I will return.
Forever, my love.
Tears blurred Victoria’s sight impossibly before she finished, but nay, she did not need to read those words. As beautiful as the soul that had created them.
And they’d killed him. Out on the moor, one moonlit night.